by Jacobs, Ann
“Oh.” All she could see now was the lightning bolts, crackling in the distance, and rain coming down by the bucketful. Feeling very small, she took a seat at one end of the sectional and tried to tell herself she was safe in here, protected from the raging storm.
She noticed her briefcase on the floor beside a glass-topped end table. A state-of-the-art laptop sat on the table—Gray’s, she assumed since it bore little resemblance to the one inside her briefcase that held the file she needed to prepare for Monday’s trial. When she glanced at the screen, she noticed the screen was open to LexisNexis, the premier information system used by major law firms and law schools—a roomful of law journals and case law that she had access to only in the state attorney’s offices at the courthouse.
“I thought we might need to look up something, so I booted up LexisNexis.” He must have noticed the shock on Andi’s face at the sight of the toy she’d never be able to afford for her personal computer. “Don’t look so surprised. The DEA provides subscriptions to its operatives, at least the ones who may someday end up testifying in Federal court. If they didn’t, I could get access through Winston-Roe. My uncle still holds out hope that someday I’ll give in and start writing wills for little old ladies the way my dad did.
“Would you like a drink before we get down to work? I’ve got beer and the makings for daiquiris and margaritas if you don’t mind premixed. I’m afraid the liquor stock is down at the moment, since I threw a bachelor party for a buddy last month.”
“I’ll take a beer if it’s no trouble.”
Apparently it wasn’t, because Gray opened the refrigerator built in to the wall behind the bar and pulled out two bottles of Michelob Light that he set down next to the laptop. “What kind of case is it that you’re trying?”
“Trafficking in cocaine. Four defendants.” Andi pulled out the file. “The case resulted from a police sting set up to get a wholesaler and a street dealer. Two college kids who were customers of the street dealer got caught up in the arrest, one because he rode along with the dealer to buy a couple of grams, the other who had let the dealer use his cell phone to arrange the deal.”
Gray pulled up the Florida statute on drug trafficking, scanned it quickly, and shook his head. “Seems unfair that the law holds them all to be equally guilty, but that’s how I read it.”
“Yeah. My job’s to enforce that law, though. Sometimes I don’t enjoy what I have to do.” Andi pulled out her laptop, booted it up, and set it on the table in front of Gray. While he read the charges, she took a sip of her beer.
“I’m surprised the attorneys for the kids didn’t move to separate the case, since the degrees of culpability are so clearly defined,” Gray commented. “Oh wait. I see that they did, but the judge denied the motions.”
“Judge Smith is known around the courthouse as the hanging judge. He won’t give an inch to any defendant accused of dealing drugs—of any kind, even marijuana. It was these guys’ bad fortune to draw him. The wholesaler has the best representation. He’ll need it, because he’s undocumented, and a conviction will get him deported as fast as the judge can manage.
“The two kids’ parents retained private counsel, but the guy they hired has very little trial experience with criminal cases. The dealer, who’s likely going to have his charges reduced because he’s working with the police to trap other wholesalers, is using a public defender.”
“In those kids’ situations, I’d have gone for Tom Ellis—or a partner in one of the other big firms that has a criminal division with a record of getting the majority of its clients acquitted.” Gray set the file down and glanced out the window, sliding close to Andi and putting an arm around her .
Andi had been trying hard not to look out at that panorama of nature’s fury, but she gathered her courage and checked out what Gray had described. When she did, she saw lightning strike a palm tree near the raging surf, sending flames skyward until they fell, creating smoke that rose from the white foam on the ground. She gasped, then closed her eyes and buried her face against the soft fabric of Gray’s T-shirt.
He drew her closer and tunneled his fingers through her hair. “This isn’t just an ordinary late spring thunderstorm, honey. The wind’s ripping off palm fronds and strewing them all over the beach. Go ahead, scream if you want to. Or come up here on my lap. Trust me, this building has lasted through more than one category three hurricane. It’s not going anywhere. We can talk more about the case later, after the storm passes.”
“My God, Gray. I’m so scared.” Giving in to her fear, Andi let him lift her onto his lap and hold her as though she were a frightened child. Come to think of it, she was—a twenty-seven year old kid no less terrified of storms than she’d been ever since she was eight years old.
She tried to concentrate not on the sounds of the storm but on his slow, steady beat of Gray’s heart, the reassuring sound of his breathing. As he held her, murmuring comforting words as he ran his hands along her spine, the fury of the storm let go of her mind, leaving only the two of them . . . and a growing need that wouldn’t be denied.
Chapter Six
Gray had seen people who’d been afraid with far better reason, but he’d never before felt so protective, so determined to take care of another human and chase her demons away. He cradled Andi against his body, using his hands to move up and down her back because the motion seemed to calm her. “It will be all right, I promise.”
She burrowed her face against his shoulder when another roll of thunder rattled the windows and set her to shivering yet again. “Would it help if I drew the drapes?” he asked.
“N-no. Don’t leave me, please. I’m sorry to be such a coward. I know, in my head, that we’re safe—it’s my mind playing tricks on me, taking me back . . .”
When she raised her head and met his gaze, he couldn’t resist lowering his lips to hers, intending the contact to be only a gentle, reassuring kiss. She was having none of that, though. She wound her arms around his neck, holding him captive, opening her lips to him. When he tried to keep his original goal in mind, she looked up at him, tears glistening in her eyes.
“Please, Gray. Make love with me. I don’t want to think. Not about the storm or the trial or anything else. I just want to feel. To find out if the we’re really as good together as I’ve been imagining ever since I first saw you from across that room.”
How could he say no? How could he be sensible when every cell in his body told him to do as she asked, devour the woman he was beginning to think meant far more to him than a weekend hookup? He couldn’t, not with her looking at him as though he’d hung the moon, practically begging him to drive away the demons that the storm outside had brought to life.
When she burrowed her hands under his T-shirt and found bare skin underneath, he let her go long enough to peel the offending material over his head and toss it away. His breath caught in his throat when he got rid of her top and found creamy, delightful skin—no bra, not even a inconsequential scrap of see-through lace to impede his view of her small, firm breasts.
“God but you’re beautiful.” Lowering his head, he took a taut, pink nipple between his teeth and worried it with his tongue, loving the way her heartbeat slowed at first, then accelerated as passion began to replace her fear. She gave as good as she got, skimming her soft, seeking hands down his arms, along the back of his neck and lower, until he felt her fingers slip tentatively under the elastic waistband of his pajama bottoms.
There was no false shyness about her, no pretension of innocence that so many women affected. Andi knew what she wanted. He liked that. He liked it, too, that when it came to sex, she let him take the lead—something he was certain would never happen if he should someday face her in a courtroom.
As he caressed her and enjoyed her tentative exploration of his lower back, he imagined her submitting . . . handing over control of her mind and heart to him. Not just her dy.
Just as he recognized a streak of sexual dominance in himself, he imagined a n
eed in Andi to relinquish control, to find the greatest pleasure in a lover who would command her pleasure. He wanted to be that lover who broke through her reserve and made her soar under his command.
He stood. Taking the two condoms he’d put into his pocket and tossing them on the table, he shoved his pants down, never taking his gaze off her arresting features. “Stand up for me. I want to see you naked.” The idea of lying with her, skin to skin, had him so damn hard that it hurt to move when he took her hands and brought her up on her feet, beside him.
She unzipped her shorts and let them glide over her satiny flesh, her gaze on his until the material rested at her feet. Her eyelids shuttered and she lowered her gaze, a subtle sign of submission that he liked.
He saw no hesitation—just the slightest bit of nervousness in the way her hands shook as she moved to get rid of the scrap of see-though pink silk that did little to hide the proof that she was a natural redhead but worked wonders at firing his already raging libido.
“Let me.” With deliberately slow motion, he dragged his hands along her sides, taking the last of her protection with him when he pushed the bikini undies over her hipbones. “You don’t need to hide anything from me, Andi. I’ll take care of you.”
“I know you will.” She said that so softly he had to strain to understand.
“I was trying to be a gentleman, but I can’t resist taking what I’ve wanted from the moment I laid eyes on you at Bennie’s.” He took her lips again, tracing them with his tongue before accepting her invitation and claiming her mouth. No longer banked, his hunger now grew unrestrained, his body reacting predictably when she moved closer, her flat, soft belly cushioning his erection.
He cupped her chin, deepened the kiss. Her skin felt as soft as a baby’s, smooth as satin against his fingertips. Her pulse raced, and that made his own breath come harder, rougher as her desire fed his. Breaking that connection, he moved his lips along the path his hand had taken, moving past the column of her throat to cup her breast.
“Oh, yes, don’t stop,” she murmured, her wet breath tickling his cheek. When the thunder rolled again, he felt her shiver, but just for a moment because he found a taut nipple and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger.
“It’s all right, I promise. Concentrate on us. Forget about the storm.” While Gray couldn’t care less about the storm raging outside, he had to fight to control the one inside his body. That one was setting him on fire. “Concentrate on what’s going on between us.”
She let out a little squeal when he increased the pressure, tugging on her nipple while he shifted so his erection settled between her thighs. When she looked up at him and whispered, “I need you inside me,” it was all he could do to resist until he could grab a condom, rip the package open, and sheath himself.
“Lie down for me.”
No hesitation. She lay back against the cool leather, her eyes half closed, her expression dreamy. Gray had a feeling that Andi was the angel he’d fantasized about but never consciously sought out even as his friends were settling down around him. His need visceral, he came down atop her and nudged her legs apart so he could kneel between them.
● ● ●
Andi welcomed his weight atop her as he joined their bodies, chasing away the last of her terror as a storm greater than the one outside built inside her. This felt right . . . The wetness, the heat. The delicious stretching of her sheath around his rigid sex. The security of having his big body over hers, shielding her from Nature’s onslaught.
“Oh Gray.” Her inner muscles contracted around his heat and hardness.
He moaned. “You feel so damn good. Oh yeah. Squeeze me again. Like that.”
When he moved inside her, it felt right. Forceful yet tender, he went deeper with each stroke. God but this felt incredible—better than anything she remembered from a few past encounters, as though they’d been destined to be together.
This didn’t seem like a weekend hookup, but much more. His substantial weight grounded her, gave her a sense of security that banished the storm from her mind, leaving her feeling only him and the supple leather of the sofa cushions beneath them.
Slow motion, like a gentle sea, emotion flowed between them, even as the storm raged outside. The pure physicality of him clutching her hips while he moved in her, ever stronger and faster, of her digging her fingers into the taut muscles of his back and shoulders, merged into a climax beyond anything she’d experienced before.
Later, after he’d picked her up and taken her to his bed, they lay together in the dark, oblivious to everything except the slow, steady beat of his heart against her ear . . . the mingled sounds of their breathing as the storm slowed to a gentle rain against shuttered windows.
Andi had never felt so peaceful . . . so fulfilled. It was incredible, she thought as her eyes drifted closed, to feel this way with Gray, when she’d known him less than twenty-four hours.
Chapter Seven
When Gray woke at the sight of sunlight streaming through the windows of his room, he was momentarily surprised. An early riser, he was used to seeing the sky still dark—or at least that hazy, blue-and-pink glow of sunrise. But he felt good. Fantastic, in fact, as he stretched out in bed, inexplicably pleased to discover he wasn’t alone.
Andi. She slept much like she made love, with wild abandon, on her side with one arm draped over his belly, both legs tangled in the covers, her auburn hair draped over his arm. Her breathing was slow, steady, her mouth slightly open. He couldn’t help grinning because it looked as though she felt perfectly natural lying here with him.
The woman didn’t show the slightest bit of pretense. He liked that. A lot. With Andi, what he saw was exactly what he got.
Normally Gray didn’t sleep with his lovers. Doing so felt too personal, too confining, or at least it had in the past. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d brought a woman home, period, much less spent the entire night with her on his turf. Now that he thought of it, he realized that he generally took women to their homes, had sex with them, and left—sated and without any need to give them any more than the requisite “Thanks and I’ll call you” speech.
Waking next to Andi felt right though. As if she belonged here with him, for more than the mind-blowing lovemaking that still lay gently in his mind. Leaving her to the sleep he figured she needed after last night’s storms, the one outside as well as the one they generated in each other, he rose quietly and padded to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee.
Before the storm, she’d seemed eager to look for shells, and they should be plentiful enough this morning, following last night’s blow. Turning on the TV, he checked the times for low tides, when shell hunting would be at its best. Eleven o’clock. They’d have plenty of time to get down to the beach that was practically deserted when he looked out and saw the aftermath of the storm—upended lifeguard stands, remains of broken chairs and chaise lounges, even a trio of to beach umbrellas floating some fifty feet offshore in the foaming surf.
No, it wasn’t a day for swimming in the Gulf, even if he’d been inclined. They should find plenty of shells, though, even though the Pinellas County beaches weren’t prime hunting grounds for unusual specimens. Sand dollars should be a dime a dozen, along with the tiny, colorful coquinas that some natives liked to make into soup. With luck, they might come across a battered conch shell churned up from the sea bottom by the storm and brought ashore on the incoming tide.
Taking his coffee and checking to find Andi still fast asleep, Gray moved to the sofa where they’d laid out her case file and made notes of possible cases she might want to use in her opening and closing statements. As he had back in law school, he felt a strong pull toward criminal defense . . . advocating for defendants wrongly accused, or who’d been caught up peripherally in a serious crime that could conceivably ruin their lives forever, as was the case with two of Andi’s defendants.
When he got back from this upcoming assignment he wished now that he’d never volunteered for, Gray
fully intended to resign from the DEA and persuade his uncle that he wanted to join Winston-Roe—in the criminal defense division, not estates and trusts or corporate law, which still held no appeal.
Andi Young had a lot to do with his potential ninety degree about-face in career plans, which shocked the hell out of Gray because no other woman had even tempted him, after years’ acquaintance, let alone in less than twenty-four hours. There was something about her . . .
But first things first. He re-read the police report and depositions, this time from the perspective of a defense attorney—what he fully intended to become despite his uncle’s feeling that criminal defense was the redheaded stepchild of the firm.
The primary defendant, a Venezuelan national who spoke no English and was in the United States illegally, reminded Gray of several acquaintances he’d cultivated during undercover assignments with the DEA. He had no sympathy for the man but wasn’t the least bit surprised that he’d managed to retain a defense lawyer—a Latino solo practitioner reputed to have Mafia ties. The man’s extensive practice included clients similar to the present defendant. These scumbags provided smaller dealers with their merchandise and took the fall for the big drug lords, who paid their legal fees in return for keeping their own names clean. Gray had more experience dealing with these guys than he’d ever dreamed of before joining the DEA.
The dealer who’d bought into the sting was small potatoes, a user with a long rap sheet who’d done three terms in Florida prisons. Crack cocaine was his poison of choice, although he allegedly dealt whatever poisons he could find that his customers—mainly university students—wanted. Gray had no sympathy for this guy who apparently smoked up his ill-gotten gains since he’d pled poverty and had a public defender trying to get him a light sentence by having him render “substantial assistance” to the undercover narcotics cops.