Desert Heat
Page 28
“Nothing, if you like getting your toes painted. I don’t. Yet . . .” He looked down and wiggled his multicolored painted toes.
They all laughed. “They’re pretty, Uncle Mitri.”
“Yeah, having pretty toes is not what I’m going for, baby girl.” He picked her up and kissed her on the nose.
“Congrats,” Fina said, hugging Bethany, then Damian as they reached her at the front entrance. “And yay for more girls in the family! There’ve been too many stinky boys for too long.”
They made their way into the house. “Okay, Carey,” Fina said, grabbing her purse. “Now you know. You heard it firsthand. Can we go now? I gotta lot of things to do.”
Bethany smiled at Carey. Fina had told her that morning how Carey just had to be there when they got home to hear the news. A text or a phone call wouldn’t do. She was dying to know if her cousin was going to be a girl or a boy, and of course she was keeping all her fingers, toes, and eyes crossed that it was a girl.
“But I didn’t get to see the pictures yet,” Carey reminded her mom.
“That’s right,” Bethany said, pulling the sonogram photos out of her purse and handing one to Carey and another to Fina.
“Wow,” Dimitri said, squatting to look over Carey’s shoulder as she stared at the sonogram. “That’s crazy how you can see the face so clearly.”
“She looks like me,” Carey said with a big smile. “What are you gonna name her?”
Bethany turned back to Damian. They’d discussed a few names in the car but were far from decided. Though with all the D names, Bethany’s mind kept going back to what Trinity had referred to Damian as once—a daisy. She’d let it simmer for a while.
“We’re not sure yet,” Damian said, leaning against the back of the sofa and pulling Bethany into his arms.
Making herself comfortable between his legs, she placed her hands over his on her belly as they all discussed baby girl names for a few minutes, until Fina said they really had to go. Not long after she and Carey had gone, Dimitri began to make his exit, but not before mentioning whom he was giving a ride to—Ashlynn.
They were now in the kitchen, and Bethany glanced at Damian’s already frowning face. “Why are you giving her a ride?”
“Because she posted on her Facebook page that she and her friend were hitching a ride to the Suns game today. I commented back, thinking she was joking, but she was serious. So since I was gonna be over here today, I offered to drop her off on my way home.”
“She was hitching a ride?” Damian asked, looking as disgusted as he always seemed whenever Dimitri spoke of Ashlynn.
Bethany tiptoed out of the kitchen to the living room, but both men followed.
“Yeah, she said she does it all the time.” Dimitri reached for his baseball cap on the sofa’s middle sectional just as Bethany plopped down on the sofa and lifted her feet onto it.
“Does her dad know about this?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t ask me not to say anything, and it’s right there on Facebook,” Dimitri said, slipping his baseball cap on. “So if you’re gonna rat her out, tell Jerry to just say he saw it on her Facebook page. Don’t go throwing me under the bus.”
Dimitri kissed Bethany on the forehead and said good-bye to them both before walking out.
Over the past few months Bethany had come to the conclusion that Dimitri enjoyed riling Damian about any time he spent with Ashlynn. It’s why he always made comments like today’s. He could’ve walked out without mentioning it, but he had.
Glancing at her still-frowning husband, she smiled, opening her arms. “C’mere, my grumpy bear.” One glance at her, and his expression softened. “Why do you let it get to you?”
“Because,” he said, lying down next to her with his head on her lap, “he’s young and dumb and a girl like her’ll eat him up and spit him out. Even as young as she is, if he spends too much time around her it’s just a matter of time before that happens. Not that that’d be such a bad thing. The way he blows through girls, a bruised ego is just what he may need to get him to feel what I’m sure a few of those many girls he’s discarded must’ve felt. I still think she’s trouble, and I don’t want her dragging him down with her. Did I tell you she got a tattoo?”
She ran her fingers through his hair, looking down at him with a smile. “Yes, you did, baby. It says Loca, and I told you it’s different from the three dots that stand for Mi vida loca. Doesn’t mean she’s in a gang. It’s just a word.”
He frowned. “It’s still a reflection of what she’s very proud of. That’s she’s a crazy girl who’s hitching rides from strangers.” He turned his head and kissed her belly. “If Jerry weren’t on his honeymoon, I’d call him right now to tell him.”
“I’m sure you would.” She laughed, leaning over and kissing him.
She wouldn’t remind him again that she’d gotten a chance to get to know Ashlynn a little better in the past few months when they’d been over at Jerry’s a few times, and the girl wasn’t as bad as they both initially thought she was. Bethany actually felt for her. She’d detected a sort of sadness about her, and it tugged at her heart. From what Damian had told her about Ashlynn’s mom, and the fact that Ashlynn had chosen to leave her mom to live with a father she hardly knew, Bethany was certain the girl was carrying some heavy baggage. But she wouldn’t go there again. The last time she’d brought it up, Damian had dismissed it, saying that after years of being in the force he knew Ashlynn’s kind and Bethany’s sweet heart was just too untainted to see it.
Instead she went back to thoughts of Damian’s best friend. After only a few months of dating, Jerry and Janis had gotten hitched. Damian said he couldn’t believe Jerry had called it. He’d told her about the day he went to take Bethany her hair clip, how Jerry had mentioned the speed date had possibly landed the two of them future wife prospects, and Damian had thought him crazy. Now here they both were married less than a year later. Damian even had a child on the way.
Damian pulled her down and kissed her again. As usual the kiss turned into more. “Speaking of honeymoons, Mrs. Santiago,” Damian said, sitting up suddenly. “We really should get to bed early.” He stood up and held out his hand. “We have a long day tomorrow.”
Bethany took his hand, smiling excitedly. Because she was too far along to really travel anywhere comfortably, and now that they knew what they were having, she had asked Damian if they could spend what they would’ve on a trip shopping for the nursery. Of course he had agreed, and starting tomorrow they’d go on their honeymoon shopping spree.
But Damian assured her this was just the beginning of their honeymoon. He hadn’t quit the force, but he had taken an extended leave, and urged her to do the same. With her inflated belly, she really couldn’t argue about it. Zumba and her sexy one-woman act would have to wait until long after the baby was born. Even then the temptation to take a few years off and raise her baby as Damian had suggested was growing with every precious kick she felt.
Her new husband was very generous. As soon as Bethany told him she’d prefer to move back to Vegas with him and be near his family, because she already knew her family was more than willing to move here, he had a plan. Within weeks they’d situated her aunt and siblings in one of Damian’s townhomes, for which he was refusing to take any rent from them. If that wasn’t bad enough, he was also paying all the utilities, and someone had anonymously paid off what her aunt owed on her California house. Since the rent in the Los Angeles area was astronomical, they’d rent it, and her aunt and siblings would now be living off the rent from that house. Not that Damian wasn’t still insisting on paying any other expenses they had.
Once up, Bethany peered at Damian. “But it’s not even seven, we don’t need to go to sleep this early.”
“Who said anything about sleeping?” Those sexy bedroom eyes burned through her, igniting her insides instantly, because she knew that look—knew exactly what he had in mind.
Glancing down at his bulging crotch, she sti
fled a giggle. Her being pregnant hadn’t in any way impeded his insatiable hunger for her. If anything it heightened it. “Aren’t you even gonna try and adjust that? Have you no shame anymore?”
Pulling her to him abruptly, he smirked sinfully. “Absolutely none.” He licked her bottom lip. “Besides, with the visual I have going of your beautiful thighs over my shoulders, no amount of adjusting is gonna help me now.”
Moaning shamelessly at the very thought, she kissed him back feverishly. “Just don’t make me beg, Damian.”
“Are you kidding me?” He lifted her, cradling her in his arms. “That’s the best part. And this is technically just the beginning of our honeymoon.” He grinned scandalously. “So start begging.”
Bethany laughed. “Baby, please make love to me until I’m screaming your name,” she murmured, then laughed out loud, holding on for dear life when Damian broke into a sprint.
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Copyright © 2014 by Elizabeth Reyes
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Reyes, Elizabeth.
Desert heat : a novel / Elizabeth Reyes.
pages cm
Summary: “Between running from her past, working three jobs, and worrying about her family, the only thing that could further complicate singer Bethany Amaya’s life is falling in love. But after serendipitously attending a speed dating event and meeting the intense and sexy detective Damian Santiago, that’s exactly what happens. In the blink of an eye, Bethany is caught up in a passionate affair with the most irresistible man she’s ever met. As their romance heats up, Damian’s skills of detecting and reading body language begin to raise his suspicions. Bethany is keeping something from him. But Bethany refuses to get Damian caught up in her troubles. She feels that some things are better left unsaid. With everything suddenly working against her, the race is on to fix her life before the truth is revealed and Damian finds out it’s even worse than he imagines. Steamy and addictive, Desert Heat is the story of a fiery whirlwind romance threatened at every turn by a dark secret.”— Provided by publisher.
1. Love stories. I. Title.
PS3618.E9383D47 2014
813'.6—dc23
2014008278
[insert ISBN]