Strangers with Benefits (Siren Publishing Classic) Read online

  The officer grabbed one of the bags from her and another from her trunk.

  “Lock it.” He chuckled and Sidonie couldn’t help herself from laughing about it, either.

  She did and they dropped the bags on the floor in front of a huge washer. He had her unlock the car and grabbed the last three by himself. The only thing she was left to carry was the little embroidered bucket with her supplies.

  God, that was sexy.

  Get yourself together, girl.

  Sidonie shook her head and opened the front door for him to walk in with the last of her bags.

  When they stopped inside, he dropped the bags and pulled a folded twenty dollar bill from his front breast pocket. As he extended it to her, Sidonie shook her head.

  “I’m okay.” No way would she take his money.

  “No, you’re not. Wash your clothes and get something to eat.” He smiled. “Just give me a few to fill this out, okay?”

  “All right.” Sidonie smiled and made change for the twenty in the machine.

  As she tumbled the change into the washer, she looked outside and the officer was gone. She wondered where he went. Maybe there was a real emergency somewhere and he had to go and help.

  But it was no matter, she had gone through too much today to not finish up these clothes.

  The ironic part was that she could have replaced quite a few pairs of stolen underwear with her hundred dollars if she had of just called Slick Rick.

  By the time she got the clothes out of the washer and loaded them into the dryer, she walked back to her car and sat down, in the hopes of relaxing for a minute.

  That minute was far from relaxing as she realized that she would have to listen to the radio. Sidonie didn’t listen to the car radio. In fact, she didn’t even know what the radio stations were here. She always connected her phone to the car and played music from her internet radio stations or her downloaded stuff.

  Before she had the chance to irritate herself scrolling through the FM stations, she saw the glint of headlights in her rearview mirror.

  She sighed and shut the car off, but before she could step out, there was a knock on the window.

  “Hi. Mrs. Clark?”

  “Hi.” It was the eye candy officer.

  “Sorry about that, but the website showed movement, so I went to the grocery store, but they already left. I just wanted to give you your ID back before I go check one other place.”

  “Okay. Thank you.” The sentiment was heartfelt. She never imagined she would meet a cop and that he would be so nice.

  Sidonie stepped out of the SUV and slid her ID back into her wallet.

  “No problem. If I find anything, I’ll let you know shortly, okay?” He smiled again and Sidonie nodded back.

  Officer Handsome pulled away for the second time, only this time Sidonie watched him go.

  As she waited in a small, uncomfortable plastic seat for the clothes to finish drying, Sidonie tapped her toes. She hadn’t realized how important her phone was until she didn’t have it. Shoot, she couldn’t even think of a way to amuse herself that didn’t include the damn thing.

  She absently counted the water stains on the ceiling and listened to the rhythmic hiss of metal buttons slide against the belly of the dryer, over and over again monotonously.

  The whole of it was truly boring and she felt as if she watched a pot of water in the hopes it would begin boiling. She heard the hiss of a dryer slowing down, and then the beep as it stopped. At least now she had something she could do with her hands.

  As she folded the clothes, she sorted them into three piles: Katie’s, Mark’s, and hers.

  The underwear and socks were tossed into catchall bag for her to deal with at home as they didn’t require ironing if left to their own devices.

  Just before she lugged the last bag to her trunk, she saw the headlights of the now familiar police cruiser pull up beside her vehicle.

  Officer Gorgeous stepped out. “Hey. I tried to catch them but they must have turned the phone off. The pings stopped and the witness at the last address said someone was parked beside her house for a while then drove off. But I did do a wipe on the website for you, so at least they won’t have access to your personal data.”

  “You know what? It’s okay. But I really appreciate all that you did for me. I never imagined meeting an officer that would be so helpful.” The man flushed slightly and Sidonie was embarrassed.

  She was a plumb idiot and her statement owned up to as much. She shouldn’t have made it seem like all police officers were cut from the same cloth as the poor examples she had seen before. Especially since this one, in particular, seemed so helpful.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “No worries, Mrs. Clark. I get it. I really do.”

  He handed her a card with terribly executed block script on the back with a case number. The handwriting matched him, oddly enough, despite the script being as ugly as he was attractive. The style was rough and masculine, but not overly large, as if his ego was proportionate to his status in the world and he accepted it.

  “I just wanted to let you know how much I appreciated you. You made a really bad experience a positive one and you are wonderful at your job.”

  If her prior statement made him flush, now his ears were redder than a hot poker fresh from the fire.

  She leaned over and asked the dumbest question yet. “Can I give you a hug?”

  He complied, and she gave him a small, stingy hug because the last thing she needed to do was sexually harass the man when he was doing his best to be kind to her.

  “Have a wonderful night, sir,” she said when he released her. “And be safe.”

  “I will do my best.” He tipped his head and drove away, leaving her with her thoughts and little else.

  When she drove home and hoisted her stuff into her apartment, Sidonie sighed and left the bags right in the floor. She would deal with them tomorrow. It took two hours to log into everything she used on the phone to change passwords and monitor her account activity, in case they had gotten to any of her information.

  Her mail account came with a wipe feature that she used as a backup in case the one the officer did wasn’t enough.

  But when the next morning came, Sidonie thought about the kind public servant and she wondered if he was in need of the money he had given her. He might not have been able to have lunch because he gave it to her. She knew cops weren’t paid that much, like teachers, but more day to day danger involved.

  It wasn’t as if she was hurting for it.

  She called the renters insurance first, and the cell phone provider to make sure her service was suspended. The phone insurance plan representative offered to either send her a phone by courier to arrive on Monday, or she could go into her local store and pickup another after she paid the hefty hundred and seventy-five dollar deductible with an agent.

  She decided to go into the store as she would want the kids to be able to call her if she wasn’t at home.

  She stepped over the bags she left at the door and went on a quick excursion. She stopped at a drug store and bought a funny thank you card that wasn’t extremely emotional or sappy, just good for a chuckle or two.

  The card was much easier than the choice on how to give him his money back. She didn’t feel comfortable mailing actual money, so she bought a prepaid gift card worth twenty dollars and since that didn’t seem like enough, she got a gift card worth ten for a popular fast food place she saw lots of officers at when she passed by.

  She wrote a confused note on the flap that she didn’t recall the gist of and sealed the envelope, but the darn thing almost refused to close. Sidonie pulled the card with his information out and looked at it so she could address it correctly.

  Dennis McTavish was Officer Gorgeous’s name and the card gave a general number to what she assumed to be his precinct along with the address.

  When she went to the store, she wanted the same one she used to have, but her carrier
no longer offered that model and she deliberated over her choices until she finally settled on a device that she might be able to live with for the next two years.

  After her phone turned on for the first time, she felt a weight she didn’t even know was there lift from her shoulders and she spent an irritating hour setting up her e-mail account and the numerous apps she used.

  She would have to wait until she went to work on Monday to set up her office server e-mails and systems, but at least she wasn’t incommunicado.

  The first message she sent was to her best friend, Mimi.

  The phone rang with a generic jingle she immediately hated, and she made a mental note to change it as soon as possible.

  She swiped to answer. “Hello?”

  “Hey, girl! What happened to you?” Mimi asked in flurry of words that barely made sense.

  “Girl, lemme tell you! I got robbed last night!”

  “What!” Mimi screamed. “Oh my god, are you okay?”

  Sidonie huffed. “Yeah. Lemme tell you all about it. Uggh! I’m so disgusted.”

  “You know what? Let’s do this over drinks and wings. My treat.”

  “Okay. Can I get a couple of hours? I just picked up the phone, I need to drop this card off in the mail, and not to mention… I look like crap.”

  Mimi laughed and Sidonie rolled her eyes, despite her best friend not being able to see the dramatic gesture.

  “You want me to pick you up?”

  “Sure, why not.”

  “All right, see you at six?”

  “That works for me.”

  Sidonie used the two hours to put away the clothes she had allowed to linger on the floor overnight. The kids bags were tucked away into the drawers and closets, and her clothes were put away in her walk-in.

  Then she made herself up for a girl’s night out. A simple beaded tank top and pink jeans were paired with a set of strappy flats. Since she would likely cancel her hair appointment, she was stuck rocking a bun.

  By the time six came, she popped down to the entrance and watched her best buddy pull into a visitor’s space.

  Sidonie looked in her purse for a tube of lip balm and smoothed it on as Mimi drove them to parts unknown in the search for a perfect hot wing and an even better beer on tap.

  They were headed downtown when she looked back in her purse and realized she hadn’t put the card in the mail.

  “Hey, can we drop this off first?” Sidonie held the card up for her friend and Mimi shrugged.

  “Sure. Where are we headed?”

  “A mail box, I guess?”

  Mimi chuckled. “Girl, you don’t even have any stamps on it.”

  Sidonie flipped the card over and tsked when she realized she had nary a stamp on the front. “Dang, I sure don’t.”

  “Where is it going?”

  Sidonie rattled the address off.

  “Actually, that’s the big one, not too far from where we’re headed.”

  “Okay, then carry on.”

  Mimi drove to McRae Street and turned as they looked for the entrance. When they found a small service road off to the left, they pulled in and Sidonie noticed the lack of police cars. Most of the officers must have been out already, but she should be able to give the card to someone inside.

  When she walked up the ridiculous number of stairs to open the door, she saw three uniformed officers, two older females and one young male, sitting behind a huge bulletproof glass across a huge expanse.

  The group almost felt like a tribunal judges.

  “Hi, I just wanted to drop this card off for an officer that helped me yesterday,” she said to all three as she had no idea which one could help her.

  The youngest of the officers smiled. “Do you know his name?”

  Sidonie flipped the card over. “It’s Dennis McTavish. His name is already on the back.”

  “Okay, slip it under here.” He pointed to the small metal slot at the lower half of the glass and she dropped it in.

  “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. I’ll put it in his mail box.”

  When she walked back out, she wondered if Officer McTavish would like the card.

  But she would never have the chance to find out.

  Fifteen minutes later, Mimi and Sidonie sat at the bar of a popular spot downtown called the Copper Penny. It was a small place that served the best cheese steaks in town and the blue cheese dressing was to die for.

  As they each nursed a beer, Mimi with her preferred Corona, and Sidonie with her sixty minute IPA, Sidonie told her friend about what happened to her the night before.

  “You should have called me!”

  “For what, honey? If Officer McTavish couldn’t do it, then I doubt you could, Inspector Gadget.”

  Mimi’s nose wrinkled and pushed her slim frames. “Yeah, whatever.” Mimi rolled her eyes and sipped the brew with apparent greed. “So are you going to try and contact him again?”

  “For what?” Sidonie laughed.

  “Well, it seems like he may like you.”

  “No way, Jose.” Sidonie rolled her eyes and took as big a bite as she could manage of her cheese steak. “He was just a really nice person and he wanted to help me. I don’t think he was looking for anything when he did it.”

  Mimi lifted an eyebrow skeptically at Sidonie’s statement. “So you’re telling me this cop waded into a ditch, carried your laundry inside, gave you twenty bucks, chased the phone GPS, came back to the laundromat three times, and wiped your device from the app on his computer without you asking, and he doesn’t like you? I’ve never met a cop that helpful before.”

  “Yeah, well there are some people who choose the right career for themselves, dontcha know? He just seemed like the type that wanted to help people and that’s why he chose the job he does. And he is perfect for it, too.”

  “You didn’t get a picture of the guy?”

  “No phone, remember?”

  “Gah! He probably has a Facebook page. What’s his name?”

  “Uh, Dennis McTavish.”

  Mimi dug out her phone, the exact same model as Sidonie had chosen earlier that day.

  “I’m going to see if I can find him, hold on a sec.”

  After a few minutes, Mimi said, “Ooh, is this him? God knows, he’s sexy.”

  Sidonie looked at the device and nodded. “Yeah, that was Officer Gorgeous.” She had to tear her eyes away from the phone before she drooled on it.

  They laughed and ate and drank until Sidonie couldn’t hold another beer to save her life. When all was said and done, they piled back into Mimi’s car.

  That night Sidonie fell asleep as usual.

  But the last thoughts before she nodded off that normally crossed her mind were absent.

  In their place was Officer McTavish.

  Monday morning, she called the twins to see how they fared with their father. Seeing as the man spoiled them to no end, both were excessively pleased with their break thus far. She didn’t mention what happened to her, there was no reason to scare them as she was okay and nothing really bad happened to her, even if the theft really hurt.

  Sidonie would never steal from anyone. She had worked too hard in life so that she didn’t have to take from others.

  Monday, she went to work as usual. She told her supervisor about her stolen phone, so they would know to watch for any potential breeches in case the guy that took her things was a tech guru of some sort.

  The last thing she needed was to have the company firewalls breeched because she lacked common sense and put her job in danger.

  Sidonie loved her job. She was good at what she did, even if she didn’t save lives on a daily basis. She worked for a technology firm that specialized in accessibility software for the disabled. The software her company made was for advanced tech, like smartphones, tablets, and computers.

  The company also tinkered with hardware, but everything was in development, so none of the projects she worked on were currently available to the public
, though some of her hardware was in the testing phases.

  There was a joy to be found in the idea that one day the tech she developed now would be in the hands of a deaf or blind person and could take the place of an assistant or service animal.

  Her current baby was a device that would work as a smartphone, but created for the blind. There would be no display as most tech users were used to it, instead, there was a bracelet that the user wore on one wrist.

  The bracelet would use GPS to allow the user to navigate the world with simple directional feedback that used vibration to tell them where safe walking was available. It would decipher sidewalks, and give an audible chime when the desired location was close.

  The bracelet would also use Braille to give information, the same way a smart phone user would read blogs and newspapers with visible words.

  The tech was in its infancy stages, but a few years from now, she could potentially create something that would improve the quality of life for those without use of their sight. It would hopefully allow them freedom to go and come without worry.

  Today, she was working on a safety alert that would allow the user to request help with a simple command.

  There was an issue somewhere though, as the call only was successful half of the time. The other half, it called numbers close to the one she programmed in and she ended up speaking to half of the company in succession.

  Why did she decide to take on this project to begin with?

  Chapter Two:

  Dangerously Attracted

  Officer Den McTavish knew he was going to have a long day on patrol Saturday when he stood up for roll call.

  The afternoon started out fairly normally. He made sure his shoes and brass, the covers on his gun belt and shirt pins, gleamed with a hand polished shine. Since he preferred to be casually dressed on his own time, Den used the locker room to get ready per his usual habits.

  The briefing was the standard. He was given his beat, the patrol area he was supposed to work within. Tonight, he was working a spread-out district that would just skirt downtown’s drunk wagon and end in Midtown, near the airport.