Poisoned Prose (A Books by the Bay Mystery)

whispered glumly, as if he knew what Olivia had been thinking.
    Olivia had to agree. “You took a bullet for her. She’d be despised by everyone if she left you.”
    “That’s why I’m going to take this job in Texas. She needs me gone. So I’ll go because that’s how much I love her.” Harris’s voice was hoarse and world-weary. “Being with her was worth this agony. Every second she was near me I felt completely alive. She was like a drug. Maybe after six months in my self-imposed Texas rehab, I can come back and be the cool ex-boyfriend.”
    “Or the one who got away,” Olivia said.
    Harris gave a rueful snort. “That’s the master plan. But don’t tell anyone. I’d rather not look like a total jackass if it doesn’t play out.”
    After promising to keep his confidence, Olivia hung up. When she returned to the living room, it was empty. Rawlings and Haviland had gone to bed. Olivia turned the lights off and climbed the stairs to the master bedroom. Rawlings was already stretched out with a pillow tucked under one arm, and Haviland had his head in his paws on the floor by her side of the bed.
    Olivia got under the covers and moved closer to Rawlings. He slid both hands under her nightgown, his palms sliding up her thighs, over the hill of her backside, and he traced the slope of her spine. His lips brushed against her neck and then searched for her mouth. She met his kiss hungrily. Her conversation with Harris had created a need in her—a need to feel that what she had with Rawlings was safe. She plunged her fingers into his hair, demanding that his kiss be deeper, that his body respond to her desire faster.
    They made love feverishly and then lay back breathing hard. Haviland had relocated to the closet and only reemerged after Olivia and Rawlings began to whisper about the case.
    When they were too tired to speak rationally, Rawlings said, “It may not seem like it right now, but it helps me to talk things over with you. You and I are good together in so many ways, Olivia. We should do something about that.”
    Olivia felt a stirring of alarm. “What do you mean?”
    Rawlings sat up on one elbow and looked down at her. His face was in shadow, but every contour and line was familiar to her. She could feel him frown as he searched for the right words. “This business of me keeping a change of clothes and toothbrush here. It’s not enough. I want more than a drawer.”
    Relieved, Olivia smiled. “You can have the whole dresser. I’ll empty it tomorrow.”
    “I’m not talking about a piece of furniture. I’m talking about us merging our lives.”
    “What, like living together?” Olivia asked.
    “For starters,” Rawlings said.
    Despite the fact that she was too exhausted to consider such a major decision, Olivia envisioned the chief’s poetry books on her nightstand, his shampoo in the shower, his family photos on the bureau. Instinctively, she drew away from him. “Why can’t we just stay as we are? We’re happy.”
    Rawlings flopped onto his back again. “We are. But I want to take the next step. I want to come home at the end of the day and see you. Or be waiting for you when you’re done at the restaurant. I don’t want us to have to plan to get together. I want us to just be together. Permanently.”
    Turning her face toward the window, Olivia stared at the pale moon. “Let’s talk about this another time. I’m so tired that my head feels foggy.”
    Rawlings put a hand on her shoulder and traced small circles on her skin. “Just think about it, okay?”
    She didn’t answer, and within a few minutes, his breathing slowed and his shoulders rose and fell in a steady rhythm. Olivia was too unsettled to follow suit, and after tossing and turning for almost an hour, she went downstairs and reclined on the sofa. Haviland followed her, looking confused, but after she stroked his head, he stretched out on the rug and closed his eyes.
    Olivia’s gaze drifted over her tidy bookshelves, taking in Egyptian sculptures, miniature paintings from Russia, Greek amphorae, carved jade from China, Lalique crystal, and other souvenirs from her extensive travels. She’d never shared her space with another human being, and though she loved Rawlings, she didn’t know if she wanted his things in her house. She didn’t know if she wanted him here all the time either.
    I’m too used to being alone
, she thought as the French carriage clock on the mantel chimed out the hour. Olivia listened to