Flynn let her look her fill before reaching for her and unhooking the towel. The material pooled on the floor and Dana stepped over it, moving between Flynn’s spread knees, circling her arms around the PI’s neck. Flynn’s eyes went to the wound above her left breast and Dana saw the PI swallow. Flynn’s fingertips moved toward the wound, hovered over it. “This is my fault,” she said hoarsely. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry that I ever talked to Ariel about you—”
“Stop.” Dana pressed a hand to one side of Flynn’s face. The skin felt taut and cool, a nerve jumping in the side of the lean jaw. “Look at me, Willie Rae.”
Flynn lifted her eyes to meet Dana’s. “It isn’t your fault. You couldn’t have known what Ariel and Jean-Marie were planning.”
“I should’ve been more careful,” Flynn argued. “I’ve spent my life being careful and the one time I’m not…this is what happens.”
“Don’t do that.” Dana allowed just the slightest edge of annoyance to enter her tone. She saw Flynn’s eyes flare in surprise and smiled grimly. “You Don’t get to be a martyr about this, Willie Rae. I won’t let you be. Now, can we please get back to where we were?”
Flynn slowly raised an eyebrow, then she nodded. She lifted Dana up easily into her lap, and Dana wrapped her legs around the PI’s back, pressing close, feeling Flynn’s hard, slightly roughened nipples brush against the undersides of her own breasts. She kissed Flynn again, rather more thoroughly this time, starting with her mouth, and moving along her firm jaw line, then down to her throat where Dana felt the muscles bunch and a pulse beat fast just beneath the skin. Her hands moved lightly up and down Flynn’s back. After five years of waiting, Dana wanted to melt right into this woman.
She sucked in a shuddery breath as Flynn‘s fingers found her, the muscles in her abdomen and thighs contracting with the heady rush of desire.
“My God, you’re so wet,” Flynn murmured.
Dana nodded, her heart racing. “That’s what five years of keeping a woman waiting will do.”
Flynn’s thumb brushed over her engorged, sensitized clitoris, making her gasp and grab at the PI’s shoulders, digging her nails in there. Turning her thumb in a slow circle over the twitching clitoris, Flynn slid one finger inside of Dana, seeking that area specially roughened for pleasure, caressing it, stroking it, and as Dana’s muscles contracted and gripped, she pushed a second finger inside. Five years of imagining this moment came to a head in a heated rush after just a few seconds. Flynn gently withdrew her fingers and stood up, lifting Dana with her as she turned around to lay her down on her back on the bed.
Flynn straddled her on all fours, ducking her head to kiss her first on the neck, and then on the shoulder, gently biting her there, before moving to her full breasts. Dana reveled in the cool burn of Flynn’s tongue on her skin as the PI worked her way down, moving steadily southward, but at a sweetly agonizing slow pace. When at last she felt Flynn’s lips drift between her legs, and the tip of a tongue flick across her swollen sex, a need of the most intense kind she’d ever experienced sent a jolt from her feet to the top of her head. Heat flushed her thighs. She grabbed a fistful of the sheet beneath her in one hand and Flynn’s short hair in the other, pushing the PI’s head down to where she needed it to be.
Flynn pressed a series of soft, teasing kisses against Dana’s swollen, throbbing clitoris, arousing her to an unbearable level, making her shudder against the bed. “Ah Jesus, Flynn,” she gasped. “Just fuck me, please!”
In response to Dana’s plea, Flynn pushed her tongue flat against Dana’s twitching clitoris, and then curled the tip up, licked her from bottom to tip, then back again. Dana felt hot stickiness leak onto her own thighs, and she groaned with the effort of trying not to come instantly. Then Flynn slid both hands under her butt, lifting her up from the bed and running the tip of her tongue briefly back and forth the sensitive outer lips of Dana’s sex, before circling it in a small, tight orbit around her clitoris in a way that set the tiny nerve ends there all quivering at once. Dana hooked her legs around Flynn’s neck, pressing herself hard against the PI’s mouth as the orgasm roared up on her. She had to bite her lip to prevent herself from screaming aloud as Flynn thrust a deft tongue deep inside of her and brought her to a wildly bucking, head-spinning climax. Last thing they needed was to bring Chan, or Dr Leon, running into the room—how embarrassing would that be?
Still shaking, breathing in short gasps, Dana lay back in the PI’s muscular arms, sighing with pleasure as Flynn’s thumb traced the outline of her nipples. She let an exploratory hand move between their closely entwined bodies, seeking the wetness and warmth between Flynn’s thighs.
Flynn’s breathing hitched. “So much for the submissive part then,” she muttered.
Dana sucked one of the bud-like nipples into her mouth, and gently ran the edges of her teeth back and forth across it until Flynn moaned. Her thighs clamped around Dana’s hand and she pressed herself into the fingers that probed her swollen sex. She rocked against Dana’s hand, quickly finding a rhythm to match. “Careful, or you’re gonna make me come right away,” she groaned, voice husky and low.
Dana raised her head from the nipple just long enough to give Flynn a smirk and a quick kiss. “That’s okay. I don’t intend to do this just once, anyway. Five goddamned years, we have a lot of lost time to make up for.” She guided the Flynn’s hand between her own legs again, to let her feel just how ready she was to prove her intent to do this more than one time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
“If you feel up to it, I can take you home?”
Dana frowned through a pleasant post-coital haze. “Didn’t you say Dr Leon wanted to see me again?” she murmured.
“Then he can do a house call. I’m sure he won’t mind.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed he’s very obliging when it comes to you, Flynn. I don’t suppose your funny little doctor friend would have some clothes in my size?”
Flynn quirked an eyebrow. “Really? And I was kind of getting used to y’all being naked.” As Dana poked her hard in the ribs, she snorted a laugh and squirmed away from further assault. “Okay, okay. I’ll go see if I can scare up some clothes for you, woman.”
Leon wasn’t home. Chan explained that Dr Leon had been called to attend a client someplace, and did not expect to return until mid-evening. He had instructed Chan to tell Flynn that he would call round to her friend’s home at a convenient time to check upon her. He fetched a mismatching bundle of clothing roughly in Dana’s size, apologizing for the footwear—a pair of souvenir Mardi Gras flip-flops. Flynn snickered when she saw Dana frown at those.
“Imagine if I got a picture of this,” she said, toying with her phone camera. “The blackmail potential would be immense.”
“Don’t even think about it,” Dana threatened. She threw back the covers and swung her legs over the bed, completely unabashed in her nakedness, and Flynn turned away to hide the flush of desire.
Wandering to the window, she lit a cigarette and smoked it whilst gazing down at the rain-drenched street and trying to make some sense out of her own feelings. She heard Dana say “About us…our situation—” and desire soured into dread. But the reporter said, “I meant it—about not losing you now that I have you. If I were being honest, I’d say that I’ve been in love with you since we met that night during Katrina.”
It took Flynn’s brain a moment to catch up to what her ears were hearing. She turned to see Dana giving her a frank stare. “I don’t expect you to say that you love me, too, Flynn. I have an idea that might be expecting a hell of a lot just yet. But let’s get one thing cleared up—when we made love, your past and anything you’d done during it, none of that even occurred to me. Not once. Ariel Rousseau was wrong about that. And I’m fully aware that you slept with her—you already should have a idea that I’m over that?”
Flynn blinked. Then she strode to the bed, took Dana’s face between her hands, and gave her a deep, slow kiss. “I do love you,” she murmured, “and
I’m not afraid to say it.”
Dana smiled up at her. “Okay then,” she said. She arched an eyebrow. “But you have to tell Pierce about us—” she shook her head at Flynn’s baffled frown. “Oh come on, don’t tell me that you don’t know how she feels about you? You have a—certain effect on women, Flynn.”
“Not all of them,” Flynn said, embarrassed, thinking about how Erin Krueger had once turned her down. But Dana didn’t know about that and she gave Flynn a skeptical face now. “Besides,” Flynn added with a shrug, “Pierce already has a partner. She knows we’re just a—casual thing.”
“Hmm. Well, you make sure that you tell her anyway, Willie Rae. Because I don’t like to share my toys,” Dana stated.
Dana’s apartment in the Warehouse District was neat and clean, appointed in a simple, modern style—altogether just what Flynn would have expected of her. Whilst Dana changed out of her borrowed clothing into something more her as she put it, Flynn navigated the unfamiliar kitchen to make eggs and coffee.
Boudreau called whilst she was whisking eggs in a bowl. “How’s your patient?” she inquired dryly.
“Recovering nicely, thank you,” Flynn told her.
“Uh huh. Fire Department have been going over the Dufresne property. Place had been converted into some kind of Voodoo temple, by the looks of it. They think the fire started when some of those stinky-ass oils the Voodooists are so fond of got spilled and caught alight.”
Flynn poured eggs into a sizzling pan of butter. “Accident then?”
“Looks like it. But Antoine Camber and Helen Dufresne both were shot before the fire started, so that was no accident. Looks like Ariel shot ‘em, too. They found her with a half-melted Beretta beside her. She shot her cohorts, then stabbed herself to death. Can’t fucking imagine why she’d do that…” Boudreau’s voice trailed into troubled silence.
“Guilt? Or maybe a power struggle that got out of hand?” Flynn suggested. She was deceiving her friend, and whilst that didn’t necessarily make her feel good, she also knew that sometimes what was right, and what was necessary, were not to be found even in the same vicinity of one another.
Boudreau took the bait. “Anything is fucking possible right now. And honestly? I don’t know if I care. These people were doubtlessly responsible for killing two innocent women. Maybe the fact they all turned on each other and wound up dead is better than all three pleading out at trial. Jesus Christ, Flynn, is that you cooking that I hear? I thought y’all didn’t cook?”
“I’ve been learning some new skills of late,” Flynn said with a smile.
Dana reappeared in the kitchen then, having changed from the borrowed attire into dark slacks with a gold-buckled belt, and a plain white man’s shirt with epaulettes at the shoulders, the neck opened to reveal an appreciable amount of cleavage. A tiny four-leaf clover on a delicate gold filigree chain hung just below the hollow of her throat. Flynn paused with the spatula in her hand hovering above the egg pan, and just stared at the reporter as the now familiar warm sensation of desire tickled at her.
“You should put your eyeballs back, you might be needing them later,” Dana advised her in an arch whisper. She sat down at the table which Flynn had already set with cutlery.
Flynn cupped her palm over the phone. “If that’s the last thing I see all day, I’d be extremely happy.” Dana gave her a smile that was like the sweetest arrow to Flynn’s heart. Other parts of her anatomy, too. She held the phone between her neck and shoulder to flip the eggs, then put the spatula down to pour coffee for Dana. She carried that to the table. “So what happens now?” she asked into the phone.
Boudreau sighed. “I daresay the DA’s Office will rule it murder-suicide and that’ll be the case closed. Waylon got into Ariel’s store—he found a journal there. Some pages were missing—” suspicion entered Boudreau’s tone. “I don’t suppose you know anything about how those pages might’ve gotten torn out?”
“Nope.”
“I thought not. Anyway, there’s enough in the journal as it stands to strongly suggest Antoine, and Ariel, both acting on Helen Dufresne’s orders, killed the Larue women. Say, Flynn, do you think there are more of them?”
Flynn had turned back to the stove to finish cooking the eggs, and now she scooped those onto two plates along with buttered toast. Five minutes with Dana Jordan, and already she was making breakfast. It was more than she’d done for any woman in years, including Boudreau. “More of whom?” she asked, confused by the detective’s sudden switch in conversational tack.
“Jean-Marie’s bat-shit crazy acolytes. Y’all think there might be more?”
Flynn wedged the phone into her shoulder again to carry the plates to the table. She sat down, reached for the hot sauce, and shook some onto her eggs. She saw Dana frown, her lip curl in distaste, and shrugged at the reporter. Apparently they were never going to agree on eggs and hot sauce. Thinking about Boudreau’s question, Flynn wondered how many people in New Orleans were Voodoo believers? Thousands, she guessed. And how many of those believed in the variety of Voodoo that Jean-Marie had peddled? “I don’t know, Pierce,” she replied honestly. “Sure, it’s possible there are others. But I suspect when word gets out that the head has been cut off this Hydra, the body will simply wither and die.”
“You know, that was damn near poetic, Flynn,” Boudreau said with wry admiration. “They found vehicles belonging to Jean-Marie and Ariel parked close by the temple. Hopefully there will be DNA to tie them to the Larue women. The fire ruined any chance of getting forensic from the temple.”
There might be DNA from Dana in at least one of those vehicles, Flynn realized, but there was little she could do about that. Dana’s DNA would not show up in the system, and without a sample for comparison the NOPD would never likely be able to connect her with any forensic evidence.
“So, tell me—” Boudreau added, “what’s really going on with you and the reporter?”
Flynn paused forking eggs into her mouth. Her eye caught Dana’s, and her heart fluttered as the reporter winked at her. She looked down at her plate, smiled. “Don’t know if I care to answer that right now, Pierce.”
The detective gave a low whistle. “Oh man, Flynn, you and Dana Jordan? So y’all finally got it together. What, you bonded over a migraine?”
“Something like that.”
“Well, shit,” Boudreau huffed. “Good luck with that, I guess. Listen, I don’t understand everything has happened over the past twenty-four hours, Flynn, and I suspect I never will. But just tell me this—it won’t come back to bite any of us in the ass, right?”
“Doubtful,” Flynn assured her.
“Fine. I can live with it then. Take care of yourself, and your reporter, Flynn. I’ll talk to you later.”
Flynn closed the phone and switched it off, not wanting to talk to anyone else right now.
“That was Detective Boudreau, I take it?” As Dana tilted a questioning eyebrow at her, Flynn nodded. “She doesn’t know about any of what happened?”
Flynn shook her head as she cut up a piece of toast and smeared some eggs onto it with a dollop of the hot sauce. “It’s better she doesn’t know. This way Boudreau has official deniability.”
Dana then reminded Flynn of her promise to reveal why she was willing to trust Agent Krueger. “You said that you both aren’t so unalike. So what did you mean by that?”
“Erin was CIA…but you figured that, right?” Dana nodded. “Well, I was trained by the CIA, too.”
Dana stared. “You’re kidding?”
“No.” Flynn shook her head. “After I left New Orleans, I knocked around various places, doing whatever work I could find. I was always a tough kid, and a pretty resourceful one, too. I studied at night school, and eventually I was able to go to college. Criminology and law enforcement studies.“She smiled at Dana’s surprised expression. “I know, right? Anyway, the Agency recruited me from out of college.”
Dana’s surprised expression morphed into one of disquiet. “The
CIA actually recruits from our colleges then?”
With a wry smile, Flynn nodded. “Y’all would be shocked at some of the shit our government gets up to. Especially in the name of homeland defense.”
“I can imagine—unfortunately. So they recruited you, and what? You became an assassin for our government? I thought the CIA only worked overseas? Why didn’t you tell me this before rather than let me believe you were a hired killer by choice?”
Flynn held up a palm. “Whoa. Let me explain. I was a freelancer. The CIA trained me, and technically, I was at their beck and call, but I was never officially employed by any agency of the US government. The CIA employ such freelancers when they need complete deniability of their actions.”
“Actions on US soil?” Dana guessed. Flynn nodded confirmation.
“I took contracts on an independent basis, too. That’s the thing—it wasn’t as though I were coerced by the Agency. In fact, I often enjoyed the work.” Flynn grimaced at the need she suddenly felt to confess this. She wished she could’ve just kept it a secret, but she sensed that would’ve been a bad way to start off this relationship. “For a while I enjoyed it, anyway. Then—I don’t know—I guess I just stopped wanting to be that person. So I told my Agency handlers that I wanted out.”
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