by Emma Rose
“You still don’t have my permission to go,” Eddie called, taking his place behind the desk.
“Tyler could be looking for me right now,” she cautioned.
“He can wait a moment,” Eddie advised. “I’ve got something you need to hear. It’s a gift, in a way, but you might not like it.”
Cami sat down in front of him, curious as to what gift could come out of a manila folder in his briefcase. The tone in his voice gave her double cause for concern. It was the same tone Tyler used when he was discussing the wine tonight. The tone that says, “I’m going to win.”
“Before investing in this place I did a lot of research. Not just into Steve, but into Grafton, its businesses and the people likely to become customers. One of the businesses I looked into was Lightfeathers, and of course one of the people was your dear friend, Maralee Snow.”
“Leave her out of this,” Cami blurted reflexively. She wasn’t sure what game they were playing with each other, but she didn’t want Maralee to experience any of the splashback.
“But she’s already involved and one of the most interesting people at that. I was surprised to discover how much Lightfeathers actually brings in a month. She’s doing quite well, you know.”
“She worked her ass off to get that business going. Of all people, I thought you would appreciate a self-made success.”
“I do.” Eddie nodded. “But she didn’t do it by herself. She took a hefty venture capital loan which she pays off regularly. The director of her investment company is a golf buddy of mine. He could be persuaded to require a balloon payment. So she’s a little more vulnerable than she should be.”
“Why would you do that? What would hurting Maralee get you?” Cami’s heart pounded for the second time tonight, and this time it would not end in her pleasure.
“There’s more. Turns out your friend’s personal life is as unstable as her professional life. Two sisters dead before their time, a mother in the loony bin and a father murdered in the woods with a hunting arrow, that’s a family tree that could use a good pruning. Of course, it sounds like her old man could use a good killin’.”
“Shut up about this,” Cami hissed, leaning forward in her chair as if she meant to strike like a snake. Eddie’s slow, southern speech just kept bobbing along.
“Of course, a woman who killed her own dad may not be in the best shape to run a pivotal business.”
“Maralee Snow did NOT kill her father. I don’t know who did and I don’t care. I’m just glad that asshole is dead. But it didn’t have anything to do with her and the police cleared her. All you’re doing is swirling up old memories. I don’t want to live in the past. I live in the present where no one cares how Mr. Snow bought the farm he so richly deserved.”
“Oh, they might care when they see this,” Eddie drawled, slowing placing in front of Cami picture after picture. The house, the diary, the arrowhead, a close up of the blood encrusted tip of the arrowhead all came into view.”
Cami’s head became swimmy. All these years, all this time, she would have never believed Maralee capable of murder. The sweet girl who talked to squirrels and claimed to see fairies in the forest could no more jab an arrow into a human than she could walk through walls. But there it was—the arrowhead the police, boy scouts, and volunteers all searched the woods for and couldn’t find. In a box. In her closet.
“You were in her house the other day,” Cami seethed.
“Not me, an…um…associate may have stopped by. Now, I want you to listen carefully because here is the tricky part.”
“Why would I listen to anything you said? You violated the privacy of my best friend and are getting ready to blackmail me with her sorrow. There’s not even a word for how low this is.”
“Look,” Eddie held up his hands, trying to get Cami to stop talking long enough to hear him out. “I don’t want to turn these in. Heck, if I could I’d give your murdering priestess a medal. But, here’s the thing. There’s something much more important to me than Maralee Snow, and that’s being with you. That’s what I mean when I say this is a gift.”
“What? You’re going to give me your evidence in exchange for my hand in marriage? How corrupt and disgusting is that?”
“I don’t want your hand in marriage, at least not quite yet and certainly not as a price for these pictures! What I am trying to say is that we both know we have something undeniable between us. Leather and lace; strength and submission. But, I can’t get you to investigate it because you’ve fallen hard for the white picket fence your step daddy was never able to buy you as a girl.”
“Johnny Rhodes wasn’t my step daddy.”
“Whatever. Anyway, you won’t let yourself just enjoy the ride and give me a chance, and as long as he’s your boss you won’t leave Tyler either. So now you have an excuse because doing what’s natural with me won’t be sinful, it will be noble. Because you’re doing it to save your friend.”
“You want me to have an affair with you in exchange for your discretion about Maralee’s past?”
“Not an affair. An…um…experiment. I won’t say a word to Ty Ty and you won’t either. You will submit to me sexually and experience everything you know you crave for a period of six months. At the end of the time, if you still want to be Tyler’s woman, I’ll give you this folder and we will part as friends, even-steven. And if you realize you were made to be with me, then I will give you this folder and we will burn it together in the bonfire of our lust.”
“And if I decide not to take your offer?”
“It’s not much of a threat. I’ll turn this folder over to the cops. They buried this murder once before, who’s to say they won’t bury it again? I doubt your friend will lose anything but a few nights’ sleep. So you see it isn’t really blackmail. It’s an incentive. A way for you to save face and reach for what you know you need. Remember, I didn’t drag you down here or tie you to that wall. You came down here. You opened up. You wanted me.”
The blood pounding in her ears made it very hard for Cami to hear anything of consequence. She couldn’t believe Maralee murdered her father, and she didn’t think anyone else would buy it either. But, it did give her a chance to be with both men and have the perfect reason for doing so, and it did give her a hope of saving her best friend a lot more grief.
“I accept your offer with two conditions,” she said clearly. “First: any sex we have is clearly ‘off the books’—no one knows and nothing interrupts my work.”
“Done,” Eddie nodded. “That suits my purposes fine. I’ve got to work with Tyler to get that conference here and I don’t need this in the way.”
“Second: Maralee is never to find out about this folder. As far as she is concerned the past is buried in Mill Valley Cemetery, never to be seen again.”
“Also done,” Eddie conceded. “Truth is, I like Miss Snow and I’ll be happy to keep her little secret.”
Cami stood without saying goodbye and walked to the office door hoping she could make it up the stairs without falling on her quivering legs.
“So, we have a deal, Camellia?” Eddie called.
“Deal,” Cami agreed and went upstairs where there was light, hope, and good in the world. Maralee grabbed her arm the minute she came through the closed door and appeared on the patio edge.
“Tyler’s in the main bar and Howard said to keep an eye out for you.”
“Harold, dear. His name is Harold,” Cami said, her voice thin with exhaustion. “I think Tyler and I are going to call it a night.”
“Oh my goddess, you smell like sex!” Maralee whispered as she leaned close to Cami. “Quick come stand by the fire pit and pretend to be cold. Get as close to it as you can!”
“Then I’ll smell like an old hickory stick,” Cami protested as her friend pulled her along.
“That’s better than Eddie’s used blow-up doll,” Maralee snapped back. Cami stood and felt the fire warming her. She marveled at her friend. Could she have killed her own father? Could she have hidd
en that from Cami all these years?
Steve called for everyone to come back into the bar. Cami sidled up next to Tyler who gave her a huge hug then wrinkled his nose.
“Ew, smokey,” he said, kissing her anyway.
“Too close to the pit,” Cami explained, thanking God for her small friend—murderess or not.
Eddie appeared out of nowhere, and stood near the bar smiling at Cami and nodding toward Maralee. Steve and Harold stood side by side. Harold took an open bottle of champagne and poured himself and Steve a glass. Steve asked him to give the official first toast signifying the end of the evening, and the opening of the bar.
Standing beside his partner, Harold raised his glass. He knew this bar was going to make the difference in their lives they had always dreamed would happen. He looked at Tyler and Cami, seemingly at home at the beginning of a new love, he looked at Eddie and Cami who would be beginning something else, and he looked at Eddie and Maralee, one of whom would definitely be party to an end.
“A new friend taught me recently that you can’t put new wine into old wineskins.” Harold began, nodding to Maralee. “You must put the future into something new and that is able to grow with it. The past may be kept in old bottles, but the present must be allowed to breath. And so, I hereby open The Wine Loft for the present and the future to thrive. To new wineskins!”
All gathered raised their glasses, offering a wish, a hope, a prayer, and a destiny.
“To new wineskins!”
Chapter Five
“Dammit. I forget to tell one person he is uninvited to the moon greeting and now he is asking to bring a guest. So I have two hearts to break,” Maralee grumbled as she flipped through the response cards on her desk while looking for her keys. Cami had long resigned herself to the fact their weekly Thursday night dinner would begin at Maralee’s house with a thirty-minute key search. “I have to find my squeaker and we can go.”
“Ever since you bought this new alarm system we’ve had this same discussion. Why don’t you put the squeaker on the same ring with the rest of your keys?”
“If someone got the keys to my office they could also get in my house. The squeaker is supposed to protect my space. It can’t do that if it’s lying around my office available for any client to pick it up,” Maralee argued.
“I don’t think the person who was in your house lifted your keys from Lightfeathers and then mysteriously replaced them that afternoon.” Cami tried to lighten up the point. She knew darn well who had been in Maralee’s sanctuary/home—it was Eddie Dunning, or one of his lackeys—looking for evidence. She hadn’t told Mare anything about the photos Eddie showed her or the deal she made to protect her friend (and get her thrills).
“Well, at least you’re admitting someone was in my house,” Maralee sniffed, pulled her alarm remote out from under a pile of bills, and waved it in the air. “Found it! How’s Plaza Casita Mi Casa? I’m in the mood for Mexican.”
“That’s not Mexican. It’s a bunch of hamburger and tomato paste with cheese on a fried tortilla.”
“First you’re a myth dunker, and now you’re a Mexican food purist? You’ve been very negative lately.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Mar! In English the name is “place of my little house my house.” They just strung a bunch of Spanish words together. It’s owned by George and Sylvia Harrison who live on Fernhouse Drive. It’s not Mexican!”
“Who cares? I’m in the mood for their Chimichangaranga.
“Is that even a thing?”
“Margaritas…” Maralee sang temptingly.
“Let’s go.”
Later, dipping their Tostitos into the homemade salsa that Cami correctly guessed was nothing but tomato sauce, canned chili, and Old El Paso taco sauce thrown in a blender, Maralee renewed her earlier question.
“So, how do you suggest I tell Eddie and his guest they are no longer invited to the moon gathering?”
“Why are they getting the boot?”
“Because of what he did to you, stupid, added to the fact you’ve renewed your love life with Tyler and don’t need to have Eddie pawing all over you at a time when we are celebrating Diana’s goodness and love.”
“Is that the only reason?”
“Isn’t that enough?” Maralee was still furious at the way Eddie stranded Cami and then used her at the wine opening.
“Um…well…if that is the only reason, then you shouldn’t uninvite him. I want him there.”
“You want him there?”
“Okay, okay, okay. I’m going to tell you something and I don’t want you to say anything for at least three minutes. You are going to eat your chamanranga-chiminy-cho-roo or whatever the hell that is and just listen.” Cami took a big swig from her margarita. “I’m still seeing Eddie Dunning.”
Maralee’s mouth dropped open and chip fell out on the table.
“Classy,” Cami said, frowning. Maralee forcibly clamped her jaw shut and looked at her watch while she picked at her food, waiting for her chance to explode. But, as the clock ticked on, Maralee decided to offer this whole situation up to her goddess and simply support her friend.
“Well, Cam. I can’t decide if you’re just a sex fiend or a glutton for punishment, but I’m not going to judge. If you want him there, I’ll let him and his friend come.”
“I don’t know which I am either, and maybe I’m both,” Cami confessed. She swore to herself she’d never tell Maralee about Eddie’s threat to turn Maralee in for the murder of her father, but she also knew she had to talk to someone about her feelings. “Tyler makes me feel good, but Eddie makes me feel alive, in a different kind of way. He’s into things Tyler would never dream of trying and I like them.”
“Things like what, abandonment and misogyny?”
“You’re doing a swell job with the not judging, by the way.”
“I meant I wasn’t going to judge you, not him,” Maralee defended. “But, I’m sorry. You were saying…”
“Eddie’s on the edge. Tyler likes sensual things and thinks sex is ‘nice,’ which it is, but Eddie has this whole philosophy and meaning within his love-making. It’s rough, and built on the power of giving myself to him fully, an amazing exchange of dominance and submission that gives me such a rush. I think it might be addictive.”
“Not you too!” Maralee threw her hands in the air. “Geez, ever since that fetish bar opened up everyone in Upper Grafton has gone all whips, chains, and marmalade.”
“Well,” Cami laughed, “I don’t know about marmalade, but the whip and chain part has been enchanting. Seriously, though, it’s not about the leather. There’s a—”
“I know, there’s a “deeper component between lovers who exchange power, blah, blah, blah,” Maralee droned. All anyone in her shop had been talking about lately were their experiences going to The Spreader Bar and what an interesting, sexy idea it was. For the druidic priestess, sex was about being naked and honest, and she saw being leathered and latexed as hiding the true passion. But, it was the new fad so she pretended to go along with it.
“Who’s Eddie’s guest?” Cami asked, concerned she might be released from her submission before she got to explore more of the territory.
“He didn’t say. The note just says he has a friend from out of town that he would like to bring to the gathering.”
Cami dipped her chip in the weak salsa and took another big gulp of margarita. She never knew what Eddie had up his sleeve, but it was usually as exciting as it was terrifying.
***
The date for the moon gathering was circled, as usual, on Cami’s calendar and she checked it again while she planned Tyler’s meetings for the month, noting with some relief that his meeting with Eddie Dunning wouldn’t be until two weeks after the gathering, so she had time to collect herself before being in the same room with the two men who were sharing her body and affections.
She absent mindedly scrawled TGIF on her memo pad when the room suddenly seemed to grow brighter and the air around her bristl
ed with electricity. She looked out her office door to make sure Eddie hadn’t walked in, because lately every touch made her feel that way. It wasn’t her lover. It was the angel of St. Petersburg, Dr. Andrew Sovich.
He left the lab so infrequently most of Dyes Industries administrative staff had never seen him so the towering blond and built man garnered a lot of attention. Cami dropped her pen and rushed to greet him in Tyler’s outer office.
“Dr. Sovich, I’m glad to see you again.” She reached out to take his hand, but he did not offer it and looked rather confused or possibly even offended by her address. “We…um…met in the park some time ago. I’m Camellia Hill.”
“I know who you are, Miss Hill,” Sovich said in a stilting deep voice, his Slavic accent stressing her name as if it were a clinical diagnosis. “I have seen you.”
“Let me tell Mr. Bach you are here. I don’t see you on the schedule for today.” She flipped through her computer screens looking at all of Tyler’s plans. Had he not uploaded his phone into the system again? “Did you think you had an appointment today?”
“Da.” The doctor said with characteristic efficiency, then added what she thought might be a touch of humor. “I thought I had it when he called the lab half hour ago and said, ‘come now.’”
Cami chuckled quietly, feeling more awkward by the moment. She went to ring Tyler when his office door suddenly flew open.
“Andrew! Dear Andrew!” Tyler bellowed as he wrapped his arms around the huge Russian and pretended to kiss him. Cami stood behind her desk immobile with the shock of the strange scene. He kept his arm around the doctor and led him into the office, closing the door behind him. The last thing Cami heard was Dr. Sovich’s bemused reply.
“It is too early for you to be drinking, yes?”
The doctor took his seat in one of the large chairs opposite Tyler’s desk as the executive turned on a white noise machine he had installed in his office for just such occasions. Cami didn’t bother trying to listen through the door or wall, because once that machine was on all you could hear were deep rumblings of voices being covered by the sound of fake waves and seagulls. Tyler sat behind his desk and placed the contents of a newly opened envelope in front of Dr. Sovich. He sat there grinning like a school boy as the stern man looked at each document for a small forever, seeming to absorb every word.