Free His Partner's Wife by Janice Kay Johnson Page B

my
bedroom or bathroom. Nobody laid a hand on the remote control or the toaster.
You're done with the main part of the house."
    Geoff had opened his mouth.
    She swept on. "You've told me what not to do. Ask my
fifth-grade teacher. I've always been obedient."
    John had looked as if he was trying not to smile.
    "So don't fuss!" she said now.
    "Fuss!" Sweat beaded Geoff Baxter's receding
forehead. "We're friends! Aren't friends supposed to worry?"
    John laid an arm across his partner's shoulder and firmly
turned him toward the street.
    He gave Natalie one last, rivetingly intense look.
"Call if you need me," he said, and steered his cursing partner from
the porch and across the lawn—which really needed mowing now—to their dark blue
sedan at the curb.
    Natalie took a deep breath, closed the door and locked it.
Alone at last.
    "Thank goodness," she said aloud, but without
quite the fervency she'd tried to tell herself she felt. Hastily she raised her
voice again. "Sasha! Kitty, kitty. Those noisy men are gone. Come here,
kitty, kitty. I'll open you a nice can of Fancy Feast."
    No sign of the cat until Natalie reached the kitchen, when
Sasha materialized by her food bowl.
    "Oh, sweetie." Natalie plopped onto the kitchen
floor and gathered the long-haired black cat into her arms. Sasha wasn't a
particularly cuddly cat, preferring to choose her own time and place, but this
time she submitted with good grace, even purring in her quiet, restrained way.
    "You missed me," Natalie mumbled, gaining a
mouthful of hair. Absurdly, tears pricked at her eyes and she gave the cat a
squeeze.
    Sasha looked up, round eyes molten copper, and abruptly butted
her nose against Natalie's.
    "You did!" She gave a sniff. "I'm so sorry I
haven't been here, sweetie. It must have been scary."
    Her half-Persian refugee from the animal shelter agreed in
her tiny chirp that yes, she was scared of all those big, bad men. Leaping from
Natalie's lap, she indicated that a particularly tasty treat would make her
feel ever so much better.
    Natalie laughed and blinked away the dampness. Ridiculous to
cry just because she was glad to be home and glad she'd been missed. As she opened
the can and served trout to the cat, she almost wished she hadn't paid for a
housecleaning service to take care of the fingerprint powder and the dirty
footprints on the carpet. It might have been good for her mental health to have
something vigorous to do.
    She'd make dinner, she decided on an upsurge of energy. Not
the scrambled eggs and toast she'd planned, but a real, honest-to-goodness
meal, the kind that usually seemed like too much trouble. Hungarian goulash.
    A chuck steak she'd put in the fridge would work, and she
unearthed the other ingredients. While the meat browned, she diced green pepper
and onion and took spices from the cupboard.
    Once the goulash was simmering, Natalie turned on the
television news. Her murder—not a good way to put it, she thought queasily—had
been covered by the Seattle stations on the local news, even though Seattle
should have had enough murders of its own to keep journalists busy. But, just
her luck, this one had seemed to appeal to them. A woman who worked for a newspaper—never
mind that she sold ads instead of writing hard-hitting features—had come home
after work to find a dead body in her house.
    "Although the police deny they've reached conclusions,
we're told that there is no sign that murderer or victim were attempting
burglary," they had avidly reported. "How and why did a stranger end
up dead on the upstairs floor of this newspaperwoman's home?"
    After half an hour, she could relax. None of the networks
had anything new to work with. Local news was followed by national, focused on
an earthquake in China, Mid-East peace talks, which never seemed to bring
peace, and the president's veto of controversial gun-control legislation. Maybe
feeling so cynical was a sign of impending middle age, Natalie feared, sighing
as she turned off the