by Kit Frazier
My breath caught when his hand slipped beneath my shirt. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anybody the way I wanted him at that moment.
Thunder rattled the front window. The lights dimmed then brightened. John pulled back.
“Cauley,” he said, looking down at me with those incredible green eyes. “I have to tell you something.”
Now? Right this minute?
I pulled away, thinking of the blond gymnast with John’s car keys. “You’re gay.”
He chuckled, running his fingers lightly over my cheek. “No, Cauley. I am not gay.”
My whole body heated, but I waited. Nothing short of him telling me he was a fascist or a convicted felon was going to make me change my mind. And I might’ve made an exception for the felon-thing.
“I am leaving tonight. I will be back, but I have some things I need to take care of in Washington.”
Our gazes locked, then he trailed warm kisses down my neck. I could feel his fingers, warm and strong, skimming beneath my shirt, just below my bra. He leaned me back and all I wanted was to tell him not to stop. I squeezed my eyes shut.
“John,” I said, and sat up.
He blew out a long breath and sat up, too.
I shook my head. “I want to make love to you, but ‘
Leaning back against the sofa, he ran a hand through his dark hair. “I know you do.”
From anyone else that would have been arrogant. But the truth was I wanted him and we both knew it.
“Cauley,” he said, looking into my eyes. “What am I going to do with you?”
I wanted to say, “Stay with me,” but somehow, found the good grace not to say it out loud.
In the silence, John got to his feet. He held out his hand and helped me up.
I wanted to say something, ask him not to leave, tell him I thought I might be falling in love with him, but the words didn’t come. It was too soon, and truth be told, I wasn’t sure I knew what real love was.
I stood, watching as he packed up his computer and tucked his big gun back into his waistband. He turned to me and held out his hand, and I walked him to the door.
Outside, the night was dark, the air thick with the threat of rain, and his strong fingers wrapped around mine like a promise.
“I’ll be back,” he said, and he leaned in and pressed a kiss to my forehead.
Then he stepped out of the door. Lightning flashed green on the horizon, and he was gone.
Inside, the lamplight was dim and I felt cold. Would it really have been so wrong to just rip his clothes off, right there on the living room floor?
He’d said he had to tell me something, and I was pretty sure that telling me he was leaving was only part of it.
Absently, I wandered through the empty house, wondering what I might be doing if John had stayed. Probably having the best orgasm of my short, deprived life.
So why did he tell me he was leaving?
Muse sat, perched on the desk next to the Magic Eight Ball, and I reached down to scratch her behind the ear.
“The thing is,” I said to the cat. “I know he likes me. And there are Customs opportunities all over Texas. It wouldn’t be so hard to work out.”
Muse twitched her whiskers, her gold eyes glaring skeptically. I scowled back.
“Oh, what do you know,” I told the cat.
“What do you think, Eight Ball?” I said, picking it up and turning it over in my palms. “Will this whatever-it-is between me and John work out the way I want it to?”
Lightning crashed outside the library window and thunder shook the whole house.
Inside the Eight Ball, the little triangle tumbled in the blue liquid.
DON’T COUNT ON IT.
I looked at Muse. “Electromagnetic interference,” I said. “And besides. DON’T COUNT ON IT is not a definitive answer.”
Closing my eyes, I shook the ball again.
The triangle flipped and the answer appeared.
MY REPLY IS NO.
I stood, staring down at the Eight Ball.
“It’s broken!” I yelled, and threw it at the bookcase.
Muse narrowed her eyes and hopped down from the desk. She gave me a withering look of pity, then padded down the hall to join Marlowe on the bed.
Alone again, I flipped on the DVD player. The television screen flickered to life. There was only one cure for this kind of malaise chocolate and Casablanca. I fished a rock-hard, frozen Godiva bar from the freezer and the DVD spun and before long, Bogart was driving blissfully through Paris in springtime, teasing Ingrid Bergman about who she was and what she’d done before, completely unaware that both of their hearts were about to be broken into tiny little pieces because a bunch of Nazis didn’t respect geographic boundaries.
Sighing, I scooped up the bits of research John and I’d been working on. I stood, gnawing a corner of the frozen chocolate and staring at the article with the picture of Selena and her mom at the grand reopening of the Blue Parrot. The cutline read “Selenas Go Wild Over Exotic Animals.”
“Something about Selena…” I said aloud.
Lightning crashed so close to the house that the thunder was almost instantaneous. The lights dimmed as the thunder shook the house from foundation to rafters.
A chill skittered up my spine. As if I’d called him, Marlowe appeared in the hallway, fur bristling along his backbone.
“There is something about Selena,” I said to the dog, and nearly screamed when a knock sounded at my door.
“Who is it?” I said, frantically searching for my phone.
“Cauley, it’s me.”
I swung open the door.
John Fiennes stood in the darkness, the storm lifting his dark hair. Lightning crashed behind him and he seemed very handsome and dark in the night.
I swallowed hard.
“I’m here until Sunday,” he said.
Screw the stupid Eight Ball.
I opened the door and let him in.
Chapter Twenty-two
The television cast a noir glow over the sharp planes of John’s face.
“Casablanca,” he said and smiled, catching the onscreen conversation. He took the remote from me, flicked off the television, and as his body closed in on mine, he said, “I was wondering…”
I would have smiled at his truly bad Bogart impression, but I could feel his gaze as though he’d touched me.
I backed up a little as he advanced, and he said, “Why I’m so lucky? Why I should find you waiting for me to come along?”
“Oh,” I said, and before I could say anything else, his lips were on mine, hard and hot as he backed me into my living room, kicking the door shut behind him.
“Wait,” I said against his mouth. “I don’t have condoms.”
“I brought my own.”
“Of course you did.”
“Besides,” he said. “I’m a government agent. My physicals come with papers. Want to see?”
Did I.
He kissed me again, backing me all the way down the hall, into my bedroom, never breaking the kiss. I tore at his clothes as he worked on mine, and when I felt the edge of my bed at the back of my knees, a wave of apprehension washed over me. Could I really do this?
John broke the kiss, his hand hot against my bare breast.
“I want you,” he said. “I want to take you in my mouth, kiss every inch of your body and when I am finished I will do it again.”
Well. When he put it that way.
We were on the bed then, a tangle of arms and legs, John’s lips skimming from my mouth to my neck and down.
His hands were amazing, and he sent me over the edge almost immediately, and to my horror, I felt tears, hot on my cheeks as everything crashed in on me at once.
“Hey,” he said. “What is all this?”
I blew out a long, steadying breath. “It’s just…everything.”
This was going too fast and I knew it but my eyes drifted shut as he leaned down and kissed my tears. I gasped when he plunged inside me. In that
moment, I forgot everything. He moved against me as though some unseen force pressed him on and I moved with him, driving again and again until both our bodies shuddered. On a breath, we fell silent.
Nearly asleep, he wrapped both arms around me in a hold that was both comforting and possessive, and for that moment, I felt as though nothing and no one could ever hurt me again. I closed my eyes, wanting to remember the way he felt inside me, the way he’d shuddered against me, and the way he held me, pushing back the very bad feeling that someday, time and distance would make me forget.
We spent the next two days in bed, only getting up to eat and bathe, both of which we did together. I took the phone off the hook. Anybody who really needed to get a hold of me had my cell phone number. Nothing else mattered.
Throughout the weekend, we didn’t sleep, spending each moment as though it were our last, learning each other’s bodies. Sunday came too fast.
Late that last morning, John drew a bath. I poured wine into two glasses and stepped over the wide, tile edge into the bathtub. The water rose as I settled in front of him, his strong arms and legs wrapped around me.
I wished we could stay like that forever and I made the mistake of saying so.
Behind me, John was silent, and I could feel his bare, slick body slide beneath me, but instead of making love again, he took my hand in his.
“I would like that, Cauley,” he said quietly, his breath warm and sweet with wine. He examined my hand in his, folding his fingers around mine. “You are clever and beautiful and we would make handsome children.”
Children? I swallowed hard.
“But my life is very complicated.”
I swallowed. “I know.”
He let go of my hand, reached for the shampoo and gently worked a palm-full into my hair. I sighed. He had great hands. My body melted as he massaged my scalp, and any doubts I had ebbed into a lingering sadness.
“Lean back,” he said, and he poured warm water from the bath pitcher over my tilted head. “I’m coming back, you know.”
I didn’t say anything.
Stupid Eight Ball.
He set the pitcher down and reached around me, palming my breasts in his soap-slicked hands.
“And in the mean time, I’m going to make sure that you don’t forget me.” He nipped the damp flesh below my ear. Despite the warm water, I shivered.
He moved my wet hair and bit the back of my neck. His sharp teeth scraped my shoulder and his erection pressed hard beneath me.
“Cauley,” he said. His warm, wet hands slid from my breasts down to my hips and he thrust, sliding hot and hard inside me.
I gasped. John was leaving. He said he’d be back, but he was leaving. “I can’t,” I said, but my voice sounded small.
“No?” he said, holding me tighter, rocking against me. Water splashed over the edge of the bathtub, onto the tile, and my whole body shook.
“I just…”
“Tell me no,” he whispered.
The breath caught in my throat and I whispered, “Yes.”
“We’ve got an hour to get to the airport,” I said, stuffing his shirts into his bag. “And the drive takes at least that long.”
We rushed to gather his clothes and I was glad, because the rush meant we didn’t have to talk about the weekend, or his leaving, or the rest of our lives…
“I’ll drive,” I said. “I know the back-way. And I’ll check your BMW back into the rental company for you and have someone pick up me up.”
“No, I can ” but he stopped and turned to look at me and nodded. I could tell there was more to say. I figured he wasn’t sure how to say it.
I tripped over Muse, who yowled, frankly, more loudly than necessary. “Sorry, cat,” I said. “Shoot. I’m not even dressed yet.”
A bubble of hysteria rose in my throat as the clock ticked, and I yanked clothes out of my drawer, throwing shirts and shorts onto the floor.
I wanted to wear something stunning. I wanted to be stunning. Something he would remember. Maybe come back for.
“Cauley,” he said, and reached out and took my hand. I stopped throwing clothes and turned to look at him. He stared down at me and his eyes were so green they took my breath away.
Without a word, he slipped his dark Polo shirt over his head and skimmed it over mine. It was still warm from his body, and the scent of him lingered in the soft fabric.
“Too much trouble to get a new shirt?” he said, and reached around me onto the dresser and tossed my old football jersey onto the rumpled bed.
“So maybe I should get a new boyfriend.”
“Over my dead body,” he said, and he leaned down, his lips warm on mine, and kissed me until I couldn’t think straight.
We were running late. Despite feeling weak-kneed from lack of sleep and abundance of some truly mind-blowing sex, I hit Ranch Road 2222 and floored the little black BMW down the thousand-foot drop of Tumbleweed Hill. I felt the pressure of the decline in my ears. I felt the pressure of John’s silence in my stomach.
Forty-five minutes later, we parked and hustled into the airport, where we stood in the luggage check line.
“Do you have all your things?” I said, not knowing what else to say. My throat was tight, and I was having a hard time making the words come out.
“Give me your hand,” he said, and with my hand in his, he squeezed hard. We didn’t say anything else.
After his bag was checked, we moved toward the waiting area near the security checkpoint.
“I have to go,” he said, and I nodded.
He leaned down and kissed me, long and warm and hard. Pulling back, he looked down at me intently, then stepped away.
Turning toward the bank of security monitors, he showed the guard his ID, went through the metal detector and turned to look at me as a kaleidoscopic crowd of travelers coursed around him. Did they any of them feel as awful as I did?
From behind the gate John looked at me, his eyes shining as though his throat was tight, too.
He touched his hand to his heart, to his lips, then toward me and mouthed, “I’ll be back.”
I swallowed hard.
“No,” I whispered, as he turned and disappeared into the crowd. “You won’t.”
And I felt my heart begin to break.
I checked John’s black BMW back into the rental company and Mia picked me up in her Beetle, and for once, didn’t ply me with questions. She chattered about Roger and their upcoming plans for a trip to Aruba before dropping me at my doorstep.
“You okay?” she said. I tried to smile, but it came off pretty weak.
Mia nodded, watching me carefully. “Call me tomorrow?”
I stumbled through the living room without turning on the lights. I crawled into bed, Muse and Marlowe snuggling in, happy to get back to their usual routine.
But I wasn’t sure I’d ever be usual again. I lay there, listening to my body and thinking about my life.
I lived in a house that wasn’t mine, with a dog and a cat that didn’t belong to me. I may have been responsible for my friend’s suicide, although I didn’t think so. And his parents wanted me to prove it.
I turned, wrapping myself in the sheets and pulled the pillow close, breathing deeply of John’s scent, which lingered on the linen.
I wondered if he really would come back. Even if I never saw him again, I couldn’t make myself sorry for the weekend.
I sighed aloud and then fell asleep, listening to the rhythm of my body, the soft purr of the cat, and the gentle breathing of the dog.
Chapter Twenty-three
“The bastard stole my research!”
I’d woken up late, made a big pitcher of tea and was ready to get back down to business when I discovered I had nothing to get down to business with. Outside, the sky was gun-metal gray and clouds banked on the horizon, perfectly matching my pissy mood.
I’d called Mia and Brynn who’d broken land speed records to get to my house. They were standing in my home office, watching as I tore
the place apart, looking for the research I knew I wouldn’t find.
“A Customs Agent stole your research?” Mia said.
“It would appear so,” I said.
I felt like my heart had been backed over by a certain little black BMW.
My house was a wreck and my life was an even bigger wreck. And John was gone.
In addition to my life crashing into a million tiny pieces, my job was bumping the guardrail of the career track. I was on administrative leave for another two days.
I felt like screaming, so I did. “We broke into a crime scene, stole evidence, he screwed my brains out and the son-ov-a-bitch stole my goddamn research!”
“But the sex was good?” Brynn said.
“This isn’t about sex,” I said.
“I think it is,” Brynn said. “You haven’t even had time to enjoy your post-coital languor.”
Mia scowled at Brynn and turned to me. “Cara,” she said, taking my hand.
“Oh, stop it,” Brynn said. “This puts your lifetime sexual achievements to what, a whopping three?”
“Three and a half,” Mia said. “Todd Bryant. Prom night, senior year.”
“Wow,” Brynn said. “Soon you’ll be organizing their names on index cards and cross referencing them to keep track.”
“It’s just, out of the hundred things I could imagine coming from this, stealing my research would have been like, I don’t know, number nine hundred thousand.” I blew out a breath. “Am I really that bad at judging character?”
Mia and Brynn looked at each other, then Brynn said, “Want a list of all your bad characters?”
I sighed. “I guess I feel used. And a little…slutty. He as much as told me he was a dangerous guy.”
“Oh, for fucks sake. Why do you feel bad? Because you had marathon sex, or because you think he’s not coming back?” Brynn said.
“He’s not coming back,” I said miserably. “I was just a three-night fling and a pile of stolen research to him.”
“Well, according to your horoscope, you won’t be alone for long,” Mia said.
“Not being alone doesn’t mean I’ll be with John,” I said.
“Hm,” Mia said. “True. The stars get fuzzy on the details. Have you seen Mark lately?”
Brynn snorted. “Mark is like an old flannel shirt. You keep it in the bottom drawer in case you need something comfortable.”