“The cops are on the way, and Darice has been notified. She’s—what’s that?”
Chloe held the envelope out to her along with the note as anger clawed at her. She’d trusted Selena, and she’d betrayed her for a few hundred dollars.
Chapter Sixteen
Darice finished up a session and assured the client the photos would be ready within three days and headed back to her office.
“Boss,” Angeline called from the corridor behind her
She turned. “What is it?”
“Marie’s been calling every two minutes since your session started. She’s on line two now. Shall I put her off?”
“No. I’m leaving early since I don’t have any more clients to see.”
“Okay,” Angeline said with an approving smile.
Darice stepped into her office a moment later to a flashing light on her phone. She took her time being seated and then reached for the phone. “McMasters,” she answered coolly.
“You bitch! Who else have you sent this file too?”
“You’ll see,” Darice said icily. “Now, back the fuck off my woman.”
A dark growl came over the line. “Darice you have no idea who you’re messing with.”
“Neither do you, Marie,” she said icily. “Your little stunts will land your accomplices in jail, and I bet once they realize you have no intentions of bothering with them they’ll start talking, especially the guy from the flower shop. I bet he left his paw prints all over that candy box.” She wanted to beat his ass to death for scaring Chloe, but she’d let the police handle it. As Zyra said, there was no need for her to go after anyone personally—yet.
She sighed bored. “They’ll never talk but I’ll rip her to shreds and your career along with it. How is business?”
“Back off, or this is going to turn into a nasty goddamned game of attrition for us both.” She couldn’t devote everything she had to a war with Marie, so she had already taken care of the most crucial points to hit. There was no reason to waste time on minor scrimmages when you could just go for a crippling blow.
“We’ll see,” Marie said and the whine of a disconnected phone filled her ear.
“Damn her,” Darice said slamming down the phone.
****
Chloe waited through the police’s brief interrogation and watched as the items were bagged for forensics. She hoped there was something there that would expose at least one of the assholes involved in this nasty little game.
“As I said last night,” the male officer said after speaking with a crime scene tech. “We can’t make any promises.”
“I understand,” Chloe said quietly.
“You want to take a few days off or something,” he said. “This will probably all go away faster if you’re out of sight.”
“Out of sight?” she asked anger making her voice hard. “I was attacked by a stranger who said he was going to gang rape me next time. Does that sound like this will all go away after a few days?”
“This person is probably just some uh—you know. He’s probably anti-lesbian.” The officer gave her a small smirk. “He probably thinks if you had a man in your life—”
“Obviously you agree,” she snapped. “What do I have to do? Get freaking raped and beaten for you to see how serious this is?” She smashed a hand on Selena’s desk.
“Miss—” His partner started.
“Sex with men isn’t all it’s cracked up to be!” she screamed at him and glared at his partner.
“That’s enough,” the first cop said grimly. “We’re just trying to help you.”
“No, you’re not. I’m sure you—”
“Stop it, Chloe,” Ace said quietly. “Screaming at them won’t help anything.”
Chloe glared at her and blew out a harsh breath and got to her feet and stalked across the room to look out the window trembling with rage. She knew Ace was right, but the prejudice was like a hand around her throat. Their treatment of her was like having that man threaten her all over again.
Feeling helpless, she blinked back tears clearing her vision. There was a man looking up at her. He waved, and she stepped back going cold all over.
Darice had backed into this, but it wasn’t her fault. Chloe didn’t blame her for another woman’s refusal to take no for an answer, but this just might drive them apart if she did get gang raped.
Chloe wrapped her arms around herself as she listened to the voices of the cops as they finished up.
A chill came over her and she wished Darice was here to hold her.
****
Darice listened to the silence as they headed to Zyra and Simone’s that afternoon. Neither one of them was in the mood for lunch, so they’d skipped it. She pulled into the driveway and cut the engine and just sat there for a minute and then climbed out. Chloe followed suit and Darice walked around to her side of the car.
The air was a little cool this afternoon and there was a slight breeze blowing the leaves around.
“Chloe, I’ll understand if this is too much for you and you want to stop seeing me until I get things handled with Marie.” Darice leaned toward Chloe putting one hand on the roof of the car.
Chloe looked at her. She loved how Darice read her like a book sometimes. “I thought about it, but this isn’t your fault, Dari,” she murmured. “And I don’t think walking away from you will fix a thing. In fact, all it will do is damage our relationship. I mean walking away says I don’t trust or believe you.”
“I wouldn’t think you were weak,” Darice said softly. “Things are a little dangerous.” She stepped closer to Chloe and Chloe looped her arm around Darice’s waist. Darcie caressed her cheek. “Do you believe me?”
Chloe nodded. “Darice, I’m in love with you, and I don’t want to lose you,” Chloe murmured. She did believe Darice. She admitted she’d needed that proof of finding that note at Selena’s desk but that was understandable. She’d been hurt badly before. “Yes. I believe you.”
Darice sighed. “I’m in love with you too, Coe.” She kissed the tip of her nose.
“What did Ace tell you before we left?” Chloe asked as she snuggled closer against her and not just because of the chill.
She loved the clean smell of her soap and the hint of cherry blossom in her moisturizer. Every time she thought of the scent it reminded her of home and every dream she’d ever had of falling in love. Both things had become synonymous with Darice.
“She said they found cameras in our apartment, and she’s going to talk to a friend in the police department about the prints. She managed to lift some from our apartment. One set of them belongs to a PI and the other two sets they’re still trying to match.”
“Cameras?” she demanded panic tightening her chest. “Darice?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Darice said soothingly. “We’re not moving back in there. The home inspection should come through tomorrow and if all is well, I should close on the house within the next few weeks.”
“I can’t believe someone’s been watching us,” Chloe said helplessly. “Is she going to tell the police what she knows about the prints and cameras?”
“It’s being handled.” Darice said and kissed the top of her head. “Let’s go inside.”
“What kind of PI does something like this? Breaks into someone’s home and shoots video of two people having sex in someone else’s bed?”
“Someone who’ll do anything for money,” Darice said and led Chloe inside.
Chapter Seventeen
“How’d you like the house?” Simone asked that evening as she and Chloe made dinner.
Chloe smiled. “Everything I want,” she answered. “Darice said I could do anything I wanted to it.”
Simone threw her a grin. “I’m not surprised. “She wants you to be happy, to make the home yours.”
“I know.” Chloe finished up the salad and turned her attention to the dressing while Simone finished grilling the steak. “This whole thing’s made me realize I need to spend as muc
h time on my relationship as I spend on my work. You know. The whole misunderstanding and breakup was as much my fault as Darice’s.”
“Yeah, well, we all have to learn how to navigate the waters of love,” Simone murmured. “Relationships are like plants, ever growing, ever changing.”
She leaned against the counter. “You’re right. Oh, how did things go at the sperm bank?”
“We’ve found a donor. I’m going to go in for the insemination in a week.” She beamed.
“That’s so great. I can’t wait to be a godmother and spoil the baby rotten,” Chloe said and gave her friend a mischievous grin.
“Keep your fingers crossed. It might not take the first time.”
“It’s going to don’t worry.” She wanted children too, and knew she’d be the one to carry them. She wanted the entire experience of motherhood.
Simone’s excitement about her insemination carried over to dinner conversation. Chloe made comments here and there, but her mind was preoccupied with what Darice might be up to.
And who was Ace? Who did she really work for? She didn’t seem like a normal security-for-hire person. Not that she had experience with them.
Darice’s cell phone rang as they finished dinner and Darice pulled it from her pocket and glanced at the display. She hit a button and looked at something and a smile flirted with her full lips.
“What is it?” Chloe asked.
“Nothing, baby,” she said and immediately put her phone away but it rang a moment later. She glanced at the display again. She chuckled but didn’t answer it.
“What’s funny?” Zyra asked curiously.
Darice grinned. “Nothing much.”
Chloe glared at her but didn’t say anything. Trust, she told herself as her nails dug into her palms. And patience.
“We’re going out for dessert, you guys want to come?” Zyra asked after they’d finished the dishes.
Chloe looked to Darice and shook her head. “No.”
“You guys go ahead,” Darice said as she moved to Chloe’s side and pulled her against her in the brightly lit kitchen.
“See you guys later then,” Simone said and gave them a wicked smile. “Don’t do anything we wouldn’t.”
Zyra chuckled. “Honey, I don’t think there’s anything they could do that we haven’t.”
“Zy,” Simone slapped her shoulder lightly and then led the way from the kitchen.
Chloe looked up at Darice. “Darice what are you hiding from me?”
“Nothing, sweetie,” she said and then frowned. “I want to show you something.” She pulled her phone from her pocket. “Marie came to me that night and this is partially what it looked like. I sent this video to a few people that Marie caused to sever professional ties with me. She told them I’d come onto her.”
Chloe groaned not wanting to see the video, but she watched it with gritted teeth. “You choked her.”
“It was just enough to heighten her pleasure and nothing more.”
“You liked it,” Chloe accused softly. “I can tell.”
“Yeah, but you’ve made it clear you didn’t want any part of erotic asphyxiation,” Darice said. “But I wanted to kill her not get her off.”
Chloe set the phone down on the counter keeping her eyes on it. Darice had liked choking the woman. She’d wanted to kill her. Maybe that darkness in Darice was what had scared her about that one sexual act she would say no to with Darice.
Chloe looked up into her lover’s eyes. “You really are dangerous aren’t you?” she asked quietly. Darice wasn’t a killer, she told herself. Those two men she’d killed had deserved it.
Darice shrugged. “I would never hurt you, and as you can very well see I didn’t hurt her either.”
“I’m going to trust you when you say nothing happened and this was just dummied up to get back at her.”
Darice stroked her face. “I didn’t fuck her, baby, and I never wanted to.” She kissed Chloe. “You are the only woman that turns me on.”
“You’re turned on from watching that,” Chloe said recognizing the danger in Darice’s nature. It was clearer now than it had been before, and Ace must be someone similar to Darice. There was an air of menace about her that Darice carried as well, but she wasn’t afraid.
She liked the idea that Darice would do anything to protect her, but she didn’t want her lover to break the law.
“I’m turned on thinking of what I want to do to you,” Darice murmured, low.
She caressed Darice’s hips and glided her hands up to her sides. Chloe stroked the curves of Darice’s breasts before brushing the nipples with her thumbs. “Don’t break the law because of me.”
Darice nipped Chloe’s lip. “Don’t worry about that now. I do want you,” she whispered and kissed her hard. Her tongue stroked Chloe’s, swept over the roof of her mouth, and dueled with Chloe’s.
Chloe reached up to stroke Darice’s jaw, and cup the back of her head as heat invaded her, infused her blood.
Darice’s knee slid between Chloe’s thighs and pressed against her clit while one of Darice’s hands cupped Chloe’s ass and urged her to move on her. Darice broke the kiss, her lips warm and firm against Chloe’s neck as her tongue made small circles on her skin before sharp teeth bit lightly.
Chloe moaned harshly. Her clit was swollen, her womb clenched and her juices ran hot to dampen her panties. “Dari.” She strained closer and Darice’s fingers sank into Chloe’s hair and pulled tight causing her scalp to prickle.
That bite of pain made her wetter and her breathing harsher.
“I want you right now.” Darice drew back and turned Chloe to face the counter. She glided her hands down the front of the yoga pants Chloe wore. Darice’s fingers played over Chloe’s mound.
Chloe panted. “Darice,” she pleaded roughly and rubbed against her hand as she reached back to curl a hand around Darice’s head. “I need you inside me.”
Darice pushed her hand down past the waistband of Chloe’s pants into her panties. A finger circled her clit and Chloe gasped as pleasure radiated through her. She traced the entrance of her bald pussy with a single finger. Chloe’s juices eased from her, dampening it. “Are you hot for me, Coe?”
“Dari,” she breathed raggedly. “I’m burning out of control for you.” She ground her ass against Darice’s engorged clit and Darice pushed two fingers into her heated cunt as she kissed the side of Chloe’s neck.
Darice’s other hand came up to pluck at one of Chloe’s nipples and Darice ground against Chloe’s ass sending another ripple of pleasure through her.
Chloe hissed. “Fuck me, harder. I need you.”
Darice thrust her fingers deeper into Chloe’s pussy and her hand flattened so the heel was pressed tightly against Chloe’s clit. “Your pussy’s so tight around my fingers it’s insane.” Darice’s voice was rough at her ear.
“Oh, Darice!” Chloe groaned hard and her hand went to rest on Darice’s. Her nails scraped the soft skin as Chloe ground against the fingers shuttling inside her.
Darice ground harder against Chloe’s firm ass, and her fingers fucked faster into Chloe’s tight body. Then, she pulled them free, Chloe groaned in protest and Darice delivered a stinging slap to Chloe’s clit that tore a screaming orgasm from her.
One more grind against her, and Darice was coming too, with hard cries of release.
“Damn, Chloe, you own me,” Darice said so softly that Chloe barely heard her.
“You wreck me too.”
****
The next morning, Chloe woke to a cold bed and silence. There was no coffee brewing and the shades were pulled closed against what looked like grayness. She sighed and glanced at the digital clock on the bedside table. She didn’t have to be at work for another hour.
Chloe pushed back the covers and climbed out of bed, glad there was an en suite. She padded toward the closed door.
“No, Marie.” Darice’s voice was hard. “We both know what I found is true. Not only that, your fingerpr
ints were found in my apartment, and I never invited you there.”
Chloe strained to hear more and leaned toward the door.
“You broke and entered, you made porn on the bed where my woman sleeps and you expect me to dance to your tune. Nuh-uh, girlfriend. Bail your ass out of jail when they pick you up, and they will be picking you up. We will file charges and if you hold up your end, no charges will be filed…Are you listening, babe? I don’t give a shit who you have to stab in the back. The guy that had his hands on Chloe better emerge soon… Make it worth his fucking while to take the charge of assault then. If you don’t, your company is going down hard.”
Warmth spread through Chloe as she listened to the one-sided conversation. Darice was willing to commit professional suicide for her. She knew that if Marie had enough money to start this war, she could still cost Darice some clients.
“No. I’m not giving you the rest of the intel I have. I’ll send you a sneak peek, and I will be keeping an eye on you. My sources inside your business will be keeping me up to date with the most detailed info…You’re damn right. I love Chloe. She’s worth any backhanded shit you’re going to do to me. Now are you going to hold up your end of the bargain? Fantastic. You better get to work then.”
Chapter Eighteen
Chloe released a breath she hadn’t been aware of holding and jumped when the bathroom door opened. She stared at Darice who gave her a curious look.
“Morning, Chloe,” Darice said. “You want to go out for breakfast?”
“Uh—no.” Darice was dressed in gray slacks and a green blouse left open at the throat. She looked so damned gorgeous and every bit the fierce negotiator she’d just sounded. She just wondered what and how Darice had gotten enough on Marie to make the other woman back off.
“Okay,” she said as she walked toward her. Darice stroked Chloe’s cheek and let her gaze slither down Chloe’s body to the pink slip she used as a nightgown with its spaghetti straps. “If all goes well, we’ll be in our own home soon.”
Mad About Her Page 8