by Jeanne Rose
And his intense expression . . . the blatant need she recognized . . . knowing that need was for her . . . took her very breath away.
She leaned into him, rested her head against his shoulder as they strolled down Broadway. Suddenly the street seemed less forbidding. More intriguing. She relaxed and trusted that he would keep her safe.
Every so often they would stop and he would snap a few more photos of the denizens of the night.
Whether or not he did, she noticed the day people out of their element, too. An exhausted-looking woman in a professional dress carrying bags of groceries. A couple of teenagers in school uniforms playing tag on the street and laughing as if they didn’t have a care in the world. A businessman coming from the elevated carrying a briefcase in one hand, a bunch of flowers in the other.
Adriana remembered all the renovated buildings she’d spotted on her way to Val’s the day before. While it had its drawbacks, the neighborhood obviously wasn’t as dangerous as she’d come to believe.
Lulled into a sense of security, Adriana was shaken when, less than a quarter of a block before them, a man charged out of an alley near the long-deserted Uptown Theater. He was hauling a young blonde in a spangled jacket, short-shorts and high heels behind him. She was digging those heels into the pavement, resisting for all she was worth.
Homely face a mask of fury, the man stopped, turned and yelled, “When are you gonna learn you gotta pay for your keep, you little bitch?”
“Not tonight, please, Jack,” she begged, tears streaming down her painted face. “I don’t feel so good. Can’t I skip even one night?”
“Don’t give me no grief, Lilly!”
Adriana was appalled. The man was obviously a pimp, the girl his prostitute. And she was just a girl. Beneath the layers of make-up and masses of gelled blond hair, her face revealed her true youth.
Adriana grabbed onto Val’s arm. “She can’t be more than fifteen or sixteen. What in the world is she doing on the street?”
“Surviving.”
“But that’s awful.”
She realized Val was too busy lining up shots of the tableau to be properly outraged. Lilly was struggling, trying to free herself from Jack. The pimp raised his arm and backhanded her hard across the face. Her head snapped back and she muffled a scream.
Drawing closer fast, Adriana yelled, “Hey! Stop that.”
Jack turned a mean frown on her. “Mind your own business, lady, unless you want some of the same.” He flexed his narrow shoulders under what looked like a lime-green jacket beneath the streetlights.
“I’m okay, really,” the girl squeaked, wiping at her tears with the back of a shaky hand.
Up close, she looked even younger, and Adriana wasn’t about to walk away from the situation. Heart pounding, she raised her chin and gave the pimp her blackest stare.
Adriana warned him, “If you don’t let go of he–r”
”You’ll what?”
“Call the police, for one.”
Laughing, the pimp let go of the girl, who was now sobbing openly. “That better, lady?” He advanced on Adriana, fist raised.
His mistake.
Before he could carry out his physical threat, Val stepped between them. With a deep-throated roar, he picked the pimp up by his scrawny neck, shook him like a rag doll, and threw him into the alley so hard the man went flying back into a dumpster that was overflowing with garbage. His head snapped into the metal edge. He slid down to the filthy pavement, body lolling to one side, obviously unconscious.
“You shouldn’t’a done that!” Lilly wailed. “Now I’ll get the blame, and I don’t want to be nowhere near Jack when he’s really uptight!”
Lilly appeared so terrified that Adriana forgot to be afraid herself even though Val had shown his capacity for violence twice in as many days. Besides, having decked the pimp, Val had returned to his normal well-contained self. He wasn’t even breathing hard. She wrapped her arms around the girl’s thin body.
“Let’s get out of here.” She gave Val a beseeching look. “Maybe we could go somewhere nearby to calm her down? A coffee shop?”
He nodded. “On the next block.”
Even as Adriana led the shaking girl away, she glanced back at the nasty Jack, who was still out for the count.
“Oh, God, what am I gonna do now?” Lilly moaned.
A few minutes later, they entered a greasy spoon that was empty but for a man sitting at the counter and muttering to himself over a bowl of soup. Once ensconced in a back table, they quickly gave the waitress their orders, Adriana insisting the girl eat despite her protests. Only then did she follow up on the girl’s complaint.
“What do you want to do, Lilly,” she probed, “now that Jack will be angry with you?”
The blonde fingered the distinctive gold cross she wore on a chain – a dove was etched at the junctures of the two stems. “I don’t know what to do.”
“You want to keep working for Jack?”
“No. I hate it.” Tears pooled in her great blue eyes and fear pulled at her delicate features. “But I got nowhere else to go . . . and he’s not all bad, anyhow. Found me at the bus station, gave me a place to stay.”
“Bus station?” Val echoed, his gaze centered on the cross she still toyed with. “You are from another city?”
“A small town not too far from Kenosha. Um, that’s Wisconsin.” Lilly stared at the sunglasses he’d slipped on.
“You ran away from your parents?”
“I was having some trouble at home.” She gulped. “Now I wish I’d never left.”
“Then maybe you should go back,” Adriana suggested.
“Can’t. Besides, my mom will be really mad at me.”
“Are you sure she’s not worrying about you?”
“Maybe. Yeah, I guess.”
“How old are you?” Val asked.
Lilly hesitated. “Jack told me to say eighteen.” She chewed at her lower lip. “I guess it won’t hurt nothing – I’ll be fifteen next month.”
Adriana swallowed hard. She couldn’t imagine herself on her own at that age. Surely Lilly didn’t have to be, either. “Don’t you think your mom would like you to come home?”
Lilly shrugged and her full lower lip trembled. “Don’t matter what I think. I don’t have no money, anyhow. Jack keeps it for me. Says that way it’s safe, only he tells me how to spend it. He wouldn’t like me going home. And my mom sure don’t have nothing. My dad spends every extra penny on booze.”
Undoubtedly the reason the girl ran away in the first place. Adriana took a deep breath. Sending her home didn’t sound like the perfect solution to her problems . . . but it sure sounded a lot better than her walking the streets and letting a sleaze like Jack control her. At least she’d have a chance.
Val seemed to think so, as well, for he produced his wallet and pulled out another hundred dollar bill. “Will this be enough to buy your fare to Kenosha?”
A hopeful glimmer in her eyes, Lilly looked from Val to Adriana. “Sure. That’s plenty for a ticket. Too late to leave tonight, but first bus out is five in the morning.” She sounded as if she’d memorized the schedule, as if she’d been thinking about going home for a while. “So that’s enough time for both of you, right? Just, please, don’t make me do nothing really gross.”
“Make you . . .” Adriana started as she comprehended the girl’s meaning.
“We don’t expect anything of you,” Val assured her. “Consider this a gift from someone older and wiser.”
“You’re kidding, right?”
“I do not kid.”
But he certainly dazzled. Again, he was helping out someone he didn’t even know. Adriana couldn’t stop staring at him. Val turned to face her, and for a moment, they were alone, someplace where no one could bring her down.
Then the waitress came with their food and brought her straight back to reality.
Once again, Val pulled out the small pouch and laced his extra-rare steak with herbs. Lilly seemed
curious, but she was too busy stuffing her mouth with food to comment. Wondering if that damned pimp starved the poor kid when she was making his living for him, Adriana found she was hungry, as well.
A half hour passed before they left the greasy spoon. Once on the street, Val searched the area with his intense gaze as if he had special antennae.
“The scum is gone,” he stated, obviously meaning Jack.
“Good!” Lilly said, sounding relieved. She fingered her cross and stared down at her toes. “Um, I don’t know how to thank you.”
“You will thank me by going straight downtown to the bus station and waiting there until the Kenosha bus leaves in the morning,” Val said seriously. “No more making friends with strangers.”
“But you’re a stranger. Both of you.” Shyly, Lilly hugged Adriana, then tried to do the same to Val.
He jumped back as if burned. “A handshake will suffice,” he said stiffly.
A bit downcast at the rejection, Lilly nevertheless complied. But when Val offered to flag down a taxi for her, she laughed and told him she was more comfortable on public transportation. They waited with her until the next bus arrived and watched her safely alight. She paid the driver, then rushed to the nearest window, where she pressed her nose against the glass and waved at them.
Lilly really was just a kid.
And Adriana glowed with happiness that Val had gotten her off the streets. So, when he asked, “Where to?” she quickly answered, “Your place.” Caution shadowed his features, and Adriana thought he was about to refuse. She moved closer and purred, “Please?”
“I should take you home.”
Her pulse rushed through her at his very closeness. “But you won’t if I ask you not to.”
“No.”
“I don’t want to be alone.” She slipped off his sunglasses and slipped them into his breast pocket. Stared longingly into his shadowed golden eyes. “I want to be with you.” Adriana was surprised that she meant that in every sense of the word.
“I only hope you do not regret that wish.”
Despite the doubts she’d had about Val, her instincts told her he was a man who would never hurt her . . . a man she could trust with her life.
MIKLOS RAKOSI WAITED in the shadows of the doorway as Kadar and his new woman strolled past him, so intent on each other that they saw nothing else.
Rakosi had returned to the Gold Coast neighborhood where he’d first seen them together, had asked around and found out where Adriana Thorn worked. She was a deejay at After Dark. She’d also been a friend of the victim. He’d followed Kadar at a distance since the moment he’d left the house and had seen her at the cemetery.
He’d been shadowing them since, had seen the altercation with the little whore, had heard their conversation as they said their goodbyes.
What a waste.
Rakosi chuckled and left the doorway. Kadar and the Thorn woman were crossing the street. His nemesis would be livid if he knew his enemy had been so very, very close . . .
And Kadar would have sensed his presence had he not been wearing the medallion. He fingered the token that gave him some of the power Kadar himself enjoyed. Rakosi had always been resentful that he had not been able to employ those powers on his own. Damn his father for taking up with such a weak-spirited woman.
The woman – he intended to get to her. But first, he had other fish to fry. With a grin, Rakosi took off in the opposite direction.
Kadar couldn’t win. In the end, he would be finished by his own disease.
CHAPTER SEVEN
VAL KNEW ADRIANA desired him every bit as much as he desired her. Her request to be taken to his home had surprised him, however, and he had agreed before he’d thought the thing through. He knew she hadn’t longed to come here just to talk . . . and anything else would be dangerous for both of them.
So what in the world was he doing?
Telling himself he was a fool, he held open the front door to the unlit cavern that was his home for a time. “Step inside, but be careful until I provide us with some light.”
“It’s so dark in here,” Adriana murmured, sliding by him too closely for his own comfort. “Doesn’t your chandelier work?”
“I have not felt the need to try it.”
Val closed the door, cutting off the streetlight but for the glow through the unboarded front windows. Darkness surrounded them where they stood. Darkness in which he could lose himself with her. She shifted, stirring the air, teasing him with the scent of her essence and a subtle perfume that hinted of lilacs in bloom. Her breath quickened slightly and he knew she felt the instant attraction of their closeness.
“Candles suit me. Wait here a moment.”
His night vision was far better than hers. While he walked straight to the fireplace without mishap, she would probably stumble over something.
He picked up the matches from the mantle and lit the candles, first there, then around the rest of the room. Meanwhile, she wandered inside, dreamily unbuttoning and removing her outer garment, casting it onto the sofa.
Her white dress glowed against the shadows of the room and enticingly swirled around her slim body. The material was fine, translucent. The bodice was cut deep and wide, showing off her creamy shoulders, the slight swell of her breasts and the length of her graceful neck to advantage. The mere thought of tasting that expanse of skin set him afire inside.
But if he thought Adriana would throw herself into his arms and beg him to make love to her the moment they had some privacy, he was mistaken. She stayed a distance away, her body language and facial expressions showing her inner turmoil, that she both wanted and was a bit afraid of him.
As well she should be.
Hoping to relax her, he turned on the radio to a classical station and asked, “Would you like some wine?”
“Sounds wonderful.”
Adriana seemed relieved, as if he’d given her a reprieve. Perhaps she would change her mind about what she wanted of him, after all.
He would try not to be too disappointed.
From a cabinet with leaded glass doors built into a wall, he removed two crystal goblets and a decanter of his favorite Merlot. “I hope you like red?”
“Very much.”
He set the glasses on the end table, and turning on the lamp, decanted the wine, fascinated as always by the deep red rivulet that pooled at the bottom of the crystal. Then he held out a glass, catching a glimpse of her exotic loveliness through the crystal goblet. The wine sloshed a bit as she took it, making it appear as if she were enveloped in blood.
Heart pounding, breath sharp, he ripped his gaze away and controlled his imagination. “A toast?”
“To the beginning of a very unusual, very intense relationship,” she said.
Adriana had no idea of how right she was. Val clinked his crystal to hers and savored a sip of the Merlot at the same time she did. Even so, he was intrigued watching the muscles of her throat delicately work as she swallowed. Her responding smile dazzled him, and he gazed hungrily at her full mouth, wanting to sip the wine from her lips.
“This is a strange place for you to be living,” she said, startling him into a change of thought.
“Strange?” he echoed.
“It’s so old and needs so much work.”
She was staring at the intricately carved wood of the mantelpiece. To make it shine once again, multiple layers of dirt and varnish and stain would have to be removed. No easy task, he was certain.
He swirled the liquid in his glass, warming it between his hands. “My family’s estate in Hungary is much, much older, and repairs far greater than those required here are a constant headache, so I feel very much at home.”
“Then you’re going to work on this place? I mean, you own it, right?”
“Of course.” A landlord could walk in unannounced and surprise him. He couldn’t have that. To please her, he said, “I have had thoughts about how I might renovate.”
“It does have great potential,” sh
e admitted. “How did you find this particular house, anyway?”
Thinking that she must be using her questions as a delaying tactic, he played along with her. “I had my agent contact a local realtor. The house was mine before I ever arrived in Chicago.”
“Then you mean to stay?”
Her voice quivered slightly, as if she were afraid he might deny it. He only wished he could tell her what she wanted to hear.
“For a while, until my work here is done,” he said.
She frowned at that. “Your photography?”
“And other interests.”
“Oh, yes, some business with a relative, wasn’t it?”
“Exactly.”
“What kind of business? If you don’t mind my asking.”
It wouldn’t hurt to tell her, “I am to retrieve a family heirloom.”
“That’s it?” She definitely sounded disappointed. “And then you’ll be leaving?”
“Perhaps. If I have no other reason to stay.”
Adriana could convince him to stay, Val thought . . . at least for a while. Though his family was in Hungary, he had no companion who awaited him. No soul-mate. He’d never found one. And not for the lack of trying.
“So, when you do leave,” Adriana was saying, “what will you do with the house?”
“I haven’t thought that far ahead.”
“Oh.”
Her inquisitiveness winding down, Adriana seemed a bit melancholy. She sipped at her wine again, and this time a drop splashed on her breast, the ruby red glaring against the stark white material of her dress. He grew taut with his desire to explore that territory, to taste the wine from something other than his glass.
To make love to her, no matter the consequences.
She claimed to have chosen to wear white as an alternative color of mourning. And as a reflection of her faith in an afterworld. He only wished he could stop thinking of her as a very lovely sacrificial victim . . .
Val continued staring at the wine staining her bodice. He was mesmerized by it. Mesmerized by her. It had been so long since he’d taken a woman . . . and he wasn’t certain that he’d ever been as taken himself as he was by Adriana Thorn. He wouldn’t be able to resist seizing what he was certain she was subtly offering. But he had to be careful that he didn’t let things go too far, let her know who he really was.