by Vella Day
He removed a condom from his wallet. “Do you want to put it on me?” he asked.
She nodded. He stepped back and toed off his boots. He then stepped out of his pants and boxers. With one quick movement, he tore off her panties. “You don’t know how much I’ve wanted to do this.”
She slid he condom on his huge throbbing member. The second it was on, he lifted her off the ground. “Wrap your legs around me.”
Never had she engaged in anything so wanton. Holding onto his shoulders, she wound her legs around him, his hard shaft pressing against her opening. He used the wall to support her as he slipped his index finger between her folds and found her throbbing clit. Her breath caught in her throat at the first surge of lust.
She tilted her head back to invite him to take what he wanted. Trevor slid his hot lips down her throat, teasing the sensitive hollow of her neck. Stars lined the back of her lids. Oh, God. Oh, God. Every nerve ending ignited.
One hand cupped her breast as his other hand supported her butt. She couldn’t help but push her chest upward, wanting more, needing more. Using both hands, he grabbed her waist, lifted her up, and guided his shaft into her.
Her breath caught. “It’s big.”
“Lara.”
She clenched his shoulders, blocked out every thought, and pumped up and down with her legs. Blood thrummed in her ears as she rose higher and higher to a place she’d never been. Trevor backed away from the wall, wrapped his arms tight around her and kissed her with such passion, her heart nearly burst. His mouth opened as he pumped his liquid into her. She let loose her last ounce of control and climaxed with him. Heart thudding against her chest, her breaths rapid, she lowered her legs to the cold wood floor.
His smile came out lopsided. “Wow.”
“Yes, wow.”
“Let’s go.”
She was in no shape to move, nor did she want to. “Where?”
“Didn’t you say you wanted to take a shower?”
Years ago. “Yes.”
Trevor shoved his mug under the precinct’s coffee spout and inhaled the pungent bean aroma, ignoring the shouts from some criminal in the outer room. Last night’s adventure with Lara hadn’t ended in the shower. Not even close. They’d made love on the kitchen counter, in the living room while they watched some chick flick, Ever After, and again in Lara’s bed.
He’d called Dennis and told him the two of them would be staying at a hotel starting tonight. Lara had insisted she pay Dennis for the rest of the week since she basically had abandoned his family, convinced they had counted on the income.
His head still swam as he remembered the feel of her delicious body and how her tender caresses made him want to make love to her again when she awoke.
Once the coffee machine spit and jerked out the rest of the brew, he clicked off the lever and withdrew the cup. He shook his head in disbelief at the amazing woman. Her strength, her resilience, and her energy caused a huge endorphin rush. He wanted more. Too bad they both had jobs and a killer to keep at bay, or he’d be trying to convince her to skip work today.
Trevor yawned again and sipped the intensely hot coffee, nearly burning his tongue. He’d risen every hour during the night to double check if the newly installed alarm system was working properly. He couldn’t chance a power surge disengaged the alarm.
Tomorrow, he’d find the time to move them from her house to a hotel for the added security. Obviously, Dennis couldn’t keep her under control. Trevor would have to stay by her side from now on.
Somehow he’d let her convince him that if she ate lunch at the lab and checked in with Phil every hour, she’d be safe. If he didn’t have so much work to do at the department, he might have argued, but her sexy brown eyes had melted his resolve to keep her close. When she ran her hands down his chest and around his waist, no mortal man could have said no to her request.
The true convincer had been Phil. He’d called earlier to say Bernie, the lab tech, had taken his scheduled week vacation, and his departure couldn’t have come at a better time.
“Hey, Kinsey, you goin’ to stand there all day getting coffee?”
Trevor grunted some response, not even taking the time to see who wanted to use the machine.
With mug in hand, he strode toward his space, the ringing phone coming from his desk.
“Answer it, Kinsey. It’s been ringing for the last hour.” Caleb Crumpton rubbed his Buddha belly and belched.
“Nice. You could’ve picked it up.” The guy sat all of four feet from him. Trevor took a slug of the hot brew and smiled. Nothing was going to ruin this day.
Crumpton growled and turned back to his work.
Trevor slipped into his chair as he picked up. “Kinsey.”
“You the cop in charge of Missing Persons?” The voice was slightly accented and gruff.
“Sure am.” Trevor shot a glance at his brother’s empty desk.
“I overheard a friend of mine say he’d witnessed a murder in Tampa a few months back.”
Trevor straightened. “That so?” He pulled a yellow pad from his drawer. He wasn’t sure why the caller was asking for the person in charge of Missing Persons instead of Homicide, but he’d take the information and pass it along. “Did he call the police when it happened?”
“No.”
Trevor ground his teeth. “Why not?”
“Scared, I guess. He didn’t want the guy who offed his friend to come after him too.”
The man had Trevor’s full attention. “Is this witness in hiding or missing?”
“I’m getting to that.”
From the irritated tone, Trevor didn’t need to be pressing the guy too hard. “Go on.” He scratched the pen on the corner to make sure the ink worked. The line came out thin, but readable.
“He moved up north, but yesterday his neighbor called me saying they thought this missing guy—the witness—might be dead. I used to be his neighbor in Tampa. I knew better, but I wasn’t about to tell her that.”
“What did you tell this neighbor?” Trevor took a sip of his coffee. Christ, the brew tasted like boiled dirt. Maybe he should have brought a cup from home. Oh, yeah, he hadn’t spent the night at his place last night. He smiled at the image of being with Lara.
“I didn’t say nothing other than I was sorry and thanked her for letting me know. But then I got to thinking how my family would feel if I skipped town. My mom would have been real upset if I’d disappeared without letting her know.”
“You’re right.” Trevor didn’t know if the guy was shoveling a line of crap, but he wasn’t about to hang up on him. “Does you friend have a name?”
“Randall Johnson.”
Adrenaline spiked his pulse. Randall Johnson was one of his missing Seminoles. “Where is your friend right now?” He worked hard to stay cool, not wanting this guy to stop the flow of information.
“Close to Lake City.”
That was about one hundred seventy miles north of here. Crumpton cleared his throat and Trevor looked up. His neighbor mouthed something Trevor couldn’t understand. Couldn’t the guy see he was on the phone?
“Do you think your friend would speak with me?” Not only would he be able to cross his name off from those missing, Randall might hold the key to the location of the other men.
“Hell no. He knows he done wrong by not reportin’ the murder right away. If his name got out, the killer might come after him.”
Trevor’s pen decided now would be a good time to run out of ink. He scratched for a second before tossing the offender into the trash. He scooted back, pulled open his drawer, and grabbed a reliable mechanical pencil. “Why didn’t he call in a tip about the murder?” He could guess the reason, but he wanted the caller to confirm his suspicions.
“You dumb or something? He didn’t want no jail time. Police can trace calls, you know.”
No shit. The question knocking around his skull was whether Randall was involved in the killing. Trevor had this man’s photo. All he needed was co
nfirmation Randall was alive. He would turn that information to Homicide to check his connection to the killing. “Who was murdered?”
“Joe Merrick.”
Shit. He was another one of his missing men. Trevor squeezed the phone. “Can you give me an address where I can talk to Randall? I just need to be sure he’s the one who was reported missing. I won’t question him if you think he’d bolt.”
The silence lasted a couple of seconds. “He’s the right one, all right.”
Address. He needed the damned address. Trevor recognized the evasion. “Why call the police now?” Trevor twirled the pencil over his knuckles, attempting the same motion Ethan had perfected. The pencil clanged onto the table.
“I think it’s wrong to make his family worry. I had to call. You understand?”
Family? The records showed he had no family. “Absolutely. You’re a good friend. You wanted to do right by him.”
“Yes, sir, I did.”
Trevor didn’t sense this was some ploy to lure him somewhere. “How can I get a hold of Randall?” Trevor stilled. The guy wouldn’t have called if he didn’t want to help his friend.
“I invited him and a couple of friends over to my place tonight to shoot the breeze and shit.”
Think fast. “Mind if I drop by? You can introduce me as some long lost cousin, or an old friend. I won’t play cop, and I won’t arrest him.”
“It’s a long way to see if I’m telling the truth.”
Trevor drew a picture of a feather on his yellow pad. “I won’t tell Randall you contacted me. It’ll be our little secret.”
“Okay,” the man shouted, as a plane engine roared in the background.
Once the man gave in, Trevor took down Robby Nesman’s name and directions to his place in Lake City.
After Trevor disconnected, he looked over at the desk next to him to see what Crumpton had wanted, but the guy was gone. His loss.
He located Randall Johnson’s photo, the one he’d forgotten to give Lara yesterday, and headed to HOPEFAL. He and Lara were going on a road trip.
When he arrived at her lab, she was hunched over her computer. “Lara?”
She waved a hand without turning around. He waited. When she kept working, he strode over to her station. She looked up and when she smiled, his mood lightened.
“Guess what?” she said, with more excitement than he’d ever heard in her voice.
“What?”
“I found the identity of my John Doe #1.” She ran a hand along the top of the computer acting as if the machine had figured out the man’s ID.
He couldn’t be happier for her. “Who was it?”
“It’s one of your men.”
Excitement rushed through his veins. “Which one?”
“Randall Johnson.”
He immediately sobered and pulled up the neighboring chair. “That can’t be.”
“Why? I matched the dental X-rays Carla located for me to his skull.”
He hadn’t found squat on the man. Phil bragged that Carla was good, but she’d obviously located the wrong set.
Lara swiped a lock of hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear. He refused to address what that little gesture did to him. “I just received a call about Randall. That’s why I’m here.”
“What did they say?”
“That he was alive and well somewhere near Lake City, Florida.”
“I’d stake my reputation that the man in the coffin is him.” She leaned forward, her hands on her knees. “Why would you believe some random phone caller over hard science?”
“I agree it could be a setup, but what if it isn’t?”
“It’s possible I’m wrong, but I don’t think so. Do you think you can get a DNA sample from his family to be sure?” Her eyes shone.
“I hate to be the one to spoil your happiness, but Randall Johnson supposedly has no family left.”
“Damn.” Her mouth gapped open and she pushed back in her wheely chair. “Then I want to see this man in person.”
Trevor stood. “Exactly why I stopped by.”
18
Trevor pulled into the hotel parking lot right off I-75. The first eight motels Lara had called had been booked—something about a big convention in Gainesville and a festival in town. Great. The hotel they booked had mold plastered on the north side of the building, but she figured it was better than sleeping in the car. Turning back wasn’t an option. Nothing was going to stop her from meeting the man who claimed to be her dead John Doe.
Once they stepped inside the motel lobby, things went downhill. Not only did the place need a good cleaning, they were given the last room. Make that one room, with one bed. Yes, they’d had mind numbing sex, many times, in fact, if she counted what they did in the shower, but she believed his relief at finding her safe had precipitated their intense interlude, as pleasurable as it was.
“Lara? Your suitcase?”
She’d crossed the lobby toward the stairs without picking up her case. “What was I thinking?”
“I’ll get it. Are you okay?”
“Yes.”
Not really. She’d been in a daze for most of the ride between Tampa and Lake City, in part because she was trying to figure out how she’d messed up her identification, all the while fighting her growing attraction to Trevor. Okay, it was more than just a high school crush. The problem was that the Trevor Kinsey’s of the world never ended up with someone like her.
She pushed aside the sad reality and went over the facts of her case again. The dental arches of her skeleton matched the X-ray and the teeth lined up, more or less. To be fair, the man’s X-ray was a good fifteen years old. Teeth did shift, decay and fall out, but to be that wrong? Impossible.
Trevor took the entry card from her hand and slipped the end into the reader to open the door. Spacing out was not good. Inside, he placed her suitcase on the side of the bed closest to the bathroom.
She unzipped her bag. “You’re sure Randall, my dead guy, is going to be there?”
“He isn’t dead. Life doesn’t come with a guarantee, but Robby seems to think the guy will show up tonight.”
“I hope so.” Or not.
She hadn’t packed much as they’d only be staying the night. She tossed her nightgown on the bed and stashed her makeup bag in the bathroom. Back in the moldy smelling bedroom, she pulled the 8x10 photo from her backpack and studied his features one more time. She’d practically memorized the shape of his jaw and the slant of his forehead, but she wanted to be sure she hadn’t missed some small detail.
Trevor placed a hand on her shoulder. “Tell you what. I’ll give Robby a call to see if the guest of honor has shown up. The party should be in full swing by now and we can head on over.”
“Perfect.” She didn’t want to sit on a bed and wait.
This time when he made the call, he faced her, and she could figure out most of the one-sided conversation. Apparently Randall was at Robby Nesman’s house.
“Time to see who’s right,” he said, though there was no sparkle in his eyes.
She prayed someone had made a mistake. Her ego couldn’t take the blow nor could her job security take the mistake.
Trevor stuffed his cell in his shirt pocket and stood at the edge of the bed looking down at her. “Are you having regrets over what we did last night? You haven’t mentioned our love-making once.”
His comment came out of nowhere. He’d said nothing either. “No regrets. It was amazing.” When his eyes sparkled, she was tempted to have a repeat performance right there, but if she missed Randall, she’d never forgive herself. And the more time she spent in Trevor’s company, the more she liked him. Or did she love him? When his job ended, the separation would hurt even worse.
Trevor pulled her up to a stand, and then ran his hands over her arms. “You look pale. Are you sure nothing else is bothering you?”
Besides having a stalker after her and finding out she was adopted? “I can’t believe Randall Johnson is alive. I was so sur
e.”
“People make mistakes, Lara.”
“I’m not allowed to. I’ve worked hard my whole life to be the best. Now, I’ve just proven to myself and to everyone else, I’m not.” She refused to let the tear drop from her lash.
Without a word, he folded her in his arms and kissed the top of her head. That one gesture eased the ache of messing up.
She leaned back and looked up at him. “We need to go.”
The ride down Baya Avenue landed them by Alligator Lake. Under the full moon, the place looked rather swampy but pretty in a rustic sort of way. Robby lived in a double wide. The white picket fence was a nice touch, but her upset stomach prevented her from appreciating the beauty of the large Live Oaks that dotted the property.
A handwritten sign on the front door read, “Just come in.”
Trevor squared his shoulders. “Remember, I’m Robby’s cousin from Orlando. We’re a happily married couple. A safe married couple. I’m not a cop and you don’t work in a forensic lab. We’re not here to arrest Randall, just find out a little about him. Can you do that?”
Tension zigzagged across his face. “The moment I see him, I’ll know if he’s lying about his identity.”
“Good.”
Trevor knocked and entered. A mixture of beer and smoke assaulted her as a short man called out.
“Trevor!”
That had to be Robby. The man’s arms and upper chest were covered in tattoos, and his pulled back hair that formed a ponytail accentuated his thinning hair on top.
Trevor shook the man’s hand. “Robby. Good to see you again, man. I don’t think you’ve met my wife, Lara.”
The word wife had a nice ring to it. Though their marriage was a ploy to shield the real reason for the visit, her pulse skipped a beat. Before she could think about her reaction, the cousin hugged her and kissed her on the cheek. His hair reeked of cigarettes.
“Nice to finally meetcha.” He turned to Trevor. “It’s been what? Three, four years?”
“About that.”
Robby faced the two men and three women who filled all but one sofa. “This here is my cousin, Trevor Kinsey, and his little wife, Lara. They’re from Orlando.”