Free 5 Big Bunny Bump Off by Kathi Daley Page A

said to Zak after only the two of us remained. We were sitting in the hot tub, sharing a bottle of champagne.
    “H mm,” Zak agreed as he seared a trail of kisses across my neck.
    “Do you want kids?”
    Zak stopped kissing me and sat up straight. He looked me in the eye. “Kids?”
    “Not now, ” I clarified.
    Zak let out the breath he’d been holding.
    “There was just a lot of baby talk tonight , and it hit me that a couple should be on the same page about something as important as kids. I almost feel like if the individuals who make up a couple aren’t on the same page, they might be better off not pursuing the relationship in the first place.”
    “I see.” Zak ran a finger across my cheek. “Yes, I’d like to have kids. Someday. How about you?”
    I maneuvered myself so that I sat on Zak’s lap facing him. I put my arms around his neck and looked him in the eye. “I think I might like to have your kids. Someday.”
    “So we’re on the same page?”
    “We are.”
    “Thank God.” Zak locked his lips with mine and tightened his arms around me as we slid down into the bubbling water.

Chapter 6
Sunday, April 13
    “Wake up, sleepyhead.” Zak kissed me awake.
    “What time is it?” I groaned.
    “Almost noon.”
    I opened one eye and then closed it against the lightness of the room. “It’s so bright.”
    “It’s the middle of the day,” Zak teased.
    “Just another hour,” I begged.
    “I have breakfast,” Zak bribed. “Hot coffee,” he waved it under my nose, “strawberry crepes just the way you like them , with sour cream.”
    I leaned onto my elbows. “You made crepes?”
    “I did.”
    Zak handed me the coffee and I took a sip. Talk about heaven.
    “Put some clothes on and we’ll eat on the deck. It’s a beautiful day.”
    “Or we could eat in bed,” I suggested seductively.
    “We could.” Zak kissed the tip of my nose. “But we have a lead and we need to be in town in just over an hour.”
    “ A lead?”
    “The case you bribed me into working on sometime after the chat about babies but before the second bottle of champagne.”
    “You have a lead? Already?”
    “I’ve been up for hours. Now get dressed before your breakfast gets cold.”
    I quickly put on shorts, a tank top, and a sweatshirt. Then I pulled my long, curly hair into a ponytail and hurried downstairs, where Zak had crepes, sausages, coffee, and orange juice arranged nicely on the outdoor patio set. It really was a beautiful day. Charlie and Lambda were napping on the natural stone patio as the glassy lake just beyond the white-sand beach reflected the warm sun. I slipped off my sweatshirt as I sat down at the table. The sun on my shoulders felt like heaven after the long, long winter.
    I shoveled the first of the four crepes Zak had made for me into my mouth before I paused for air. “These are so good. Tell me again why I don’t let you make me breakfast every day.”
    “Fear of commitment and a desire to maintain your autonomy and take things slowly,” Zak reminded me.
    “Oh, yeah. So about this lead . . .”
    “After I got back from my jog this morning , I looked into the lawsuit Spike mentioned. It seems that Blakely’s neighbor, Truman Washington, was being sued by Blakely for an issue concerning the property line. It sounded like things had gotten ugly, so I did a little investigation while you were sleeping. Apparently, the person who built Washington’s million-dollar house made an error when he calculated the exact borders of the property. Blakely didn’t realize the mistake either, until he applied for a permit to build a pool house last summer and had the land surveyed. When the surveyor’s report disclosed that the neighbor’s house had been built four feet over the property line, Blakely demanded that the part of the structure on his property be demolished. It seems Washington offered to buy the sliver of land from Blakely, but he refused and instead took Washington to court, not only