Dark Lava: Lei Crime Book 7 (Lei Crime Series) Read Free Page A

person. In friendship, Anchara.
    She always ended her e-mails that way —“in friendship.” Anchara had always been unknowable to him, walled off, even when he’d tried his best to break down her emotional and physical barriers. When they’d started out, he’d been determined to really make it work, determined to get over Lei once and for all, and they’d been attracted to each other. In bed she had a feral quality, wide brown eyes opaque, her body flexible and tireless. Still, no matter what he tried, his best efforts failed to bring her satisfaction.
    Not that she ’d ever let on. Still, he knew, and it ate at him. He’d felt the weight of his mistake in marrying her like an anvil on his chest every time they had sex. They’d talked about it once, afterward.
    “ Why can’t you come?” he’d finally asked, playing with one of the black satin ribbons of her hair, the sweat of their effort drying in the light Maui breeze.
    “ I did.” She widened those huge eyes, batted them at him. “I’m sure the neighbors agree.”
    “ You pretended to.”
    That shadow that wa s always there, separating them, appeared again. It contained both her past as a sex slave on a cruise ship and Lei, who’d always hold his heart.
    “ I want to,” she whispered. “But I don’t know if I can. With anyone.”
    Stevens had been trying hard to keep his mind off Lei and give the marriage a real shot, but Anchara had moved ahead with the divorce without his knowledge the minute her green card for United States residency was imminent.
    Stevens decided not to respond to her e-mail today. Whatever it was cou ld wait. He had no great eagerness to see her again—Lei was the woman he missed.
    He phoned Lei even as he twirled the dial on the evidence locker in the corner of his office.
    “Hey.” Her slightly husky voice conjured her instantly before him—tilted brown eyes sleepy, curls disordered, that slender body he was always hungry for, warm in their bed. “You woke me up—I just got home and we were up most of the night.”
    “ Wish I was there waking you up some other way.” He stacked the bag with the beer can and the labeled plastic boxes holding the gel tape on the shelf and picked up the clipboard dangling from a string to log in the items.
    “ Me too.” He heard Lei yawn, pictured her olive-skinned, toned arms stretching, her small round breasts distending the thin sleep tee as her body arched. He felt himself respond to the rustle of her tiny movements in a way that wasn’t appropriate for work, and he gritted his teeth. “So when are you going to be home?” she asked.
    “ Usual time. Got called out early—a heiau desecration.” He sketched a few details—as a fellow officer, she often helped with his cases, and he hers.
    “ That sucks so bad.” Lei yawned again. “I’m too fuzzy to make sense. I’m going to turn the phone off and try to get some sleep.”
    “ I’ll see you later. I love you,” he said. He’d said it to her every day since their wedding a month ago.
    “ I love you, too. Come home soon. I’ll keep the bed warm.” She clicked off.
    Lei Texeira. Smart, intuitive, neurotic as hell. Scary brave —and as necessary to him as breathing.
    Stevens set the phone down, trying not to think of her under the silky sheets in that skimpy tank top, or that he was doing his best to get her pregnant. Trying not to think about the spooky threat that had come against them on their honeymoon, always somewhere on his mind. Well, she’d have the alarm on, and their Rottweiler, Keiki, on the bed with her…
    A knock at the doorjamb. He looked up, irritated. “ Yes?”
    Mahoe came in and shut the door. “ I gotta tell you something, sir.”

Chapter 2
     
    Lei turned the phone off and set it on the bedside table. Keiki, monitoring the whole exchange, set her big square head back on her paws, brown eyes on her mistress.
    “ It’s okay, girl.” Lei patted the bed beside her. “I know you don’t like it