desire for Bliss: a novel of Sex, Mystery and Romance (RiverHart Book 2)

by Adira August

  "We got two victims, here, Dane. Two. And Hart's got something serious going with that reporter. If Metzger, or whatever her real name was, threatened Rivers, you think in all Hart's security people, the billionaire can't get one to take her out and grab all her surveillance records?"

  "I do," Dane agreed. "I'm on it."

  Upham deflated. "What do you mean? How?"

  Dane gestured for Upham to follow him over to the large windows overlooking the Mint, away from the other detectives and the interview rooms with their electronic surveillance equipment.

  "I had to make an end run around the D.O.D." He said. "Nobody's saying anything because even the fact of his having military contracts would be classified. He also has some serious political connections."

  "How serious," Upham asked.

  "Senator Golriche."

  "Head of the Armed Services Committee? So, you're saying we can't touch him?" Upham asked.

  "No, I'm saying I had to look into him on the quiet. Through other channels, let's say," Dane told him. "So let's just get this Mackin case cleared and we can concentrate on Hart. By then, I might know something."

  Upham nodded. "Okay, but we have to keep it really quiet. If he's got connections like that, they'll shut us down."

  "Yeah," Dane agreed. "Until we can make a case. See, Hart's name is at the top, but I hear it's the brother who has all the smarts. Long as he's available to the military, well, they might leave Hart's dick hanging in the wind. Hart just gets in their way."

  Dane walked Upham back to the desks. "You wait for the A.D.A to approve the warrant and get it to a judge. Maybe we can wrap this one up, tonight."

  Hunter Dane went through the heavy metal door into the anteroom of the Denver City Morgue. He signed in and found the pathologist on duty, Heather Zee, working on Agatha Metzger, whom she still knew as "Jane Doe."

  Dr. Zee was nowhere near as cute as a girl named "Heather" should be. She was a gray-streaked faded blond in her mid-forties, tall and and bony. Her "patients" had more cheerful dispositions.

  Sergeant Dane parked himself at the foot of the autopsy table and waited to be recognized. He knew the drill. She cranked open a chest spreader and then favored him with a sour look.

  "If you're looking for cause of death, somebody shot her in the head."

  "I guessed," he said. "We've identified her."

  She lifted the heart from the body and set it on a scale. "Leave it in the case file." She inclined her head toward a rolling steel table near her that held the file and any samples or evidence she collected from the body.

  Dane didn't move. After Zee dictated the data on the heart, she plopped it into a large stainless steel bowl.

  "And?" She asked him turning her attention back to the gaping cavity in the body.

  "I need to see Irene Mackin," he told her.

  "Be another hour before I get her in here."

  "I need to see her before you wash her. I have some comparison restraints coming. I need to see if she could have been wearing them," he said.

  She lifted out a lung. "I'll call you."

  "Doctor Zee?" Came over the intercom.

  "Yeah, Billy."

  "I got a package here for Dane. Guy wants him to sign."

  "He'll be right out," she said. Then, to Dane, "Go. Come back later."

  "I got a search warrant coming. I need to know now, so I can recognize the right thing. We have to execute the warrant before he burns everything or his trash gets picked up. I can arrest this asshole on the basis of the restraints alone. And they'll convict him. Her blood'll be on them. C'mon, Zee, ten minutes. You were at the scene, you know what he did to her."

  "Being manipulated is one of my favorite things," she muttered while she examined the other lung.

  "The suspect's a lawyer. A rich one."

  "Then any discrepancies in the autopsy, like pushing the time up to be consistent with your warrant, will be discovered, lose this case, and get us both fired," she said, neatly severing the second lung from the body.

  "Go get them," she told him.

  Dane ran out. By the time he got back, Zee was dumping the lungs into the big bowl. "Show me," she said.

  He opened the three packages and laid the restraints out on the steel counter. She stepped over, still gloved. "It's the set in the middle," she said. "You come back after you serve the warrant for the comparison. I won't wash the body until you get here. Use enlargements of the photographs and my expert opinion, if you find them. There's no question, the ones in the middle. The only ones that extend up over the back of the hand, that could make that void."

  Dane marked the three sets and filled out three evidence envelopes.

  Zee opened the stomach. "If it's a help to the family, if you see them, he severed her spinal cord about the sixth blow. I'll have to cut down to be sure, but it looked like T-11. She didn't feel a thing after that. Or move her lower body."

  "But she was conscious?" He asked.

  "Maybe." She used scissors to cut something in the peritoneal cavity.

  "But if she could have been conscious, what killed her? There wasn't enough blood for her to bleed to death."

  "Sergeant, you ever consider the possibility of waiting for the preliminary report?"

  He shrugged. "Speculate, I won't hold you to it."

  She suctioned out the stomach contents. "Most blunt trauma deaths come from internal bleeding, not external. I suspect I'll find a ruptured kidney, probably renal artery damage." She shrugged. "Although there might be suffocation, involved."

  Dane frowned, "You found evidence of strangulation?"

  "He gagged her."

  "We didn't find a gag," he said.

  "You were talking to your crime lab people." She lifted out the stomach. "It was shoved most of the way down her throat," she said.

  "What was it?"

  Zee dictated her stomach notes. Dane's text alert sounded.

  "I gotta go. What was shoved down her throat?"

  "Won't be positive until I post her and remove it, but it looked like a large, bright blue dildo. With sparkles."

  Dane straightened the envelopes on the counter, lining up the edges. Then picked them up and jammed them into his coat pocket.

  "I fucking hate people," he said, and left.

  "I get that," Zee said to Agatha, who did not disagree.

  LOVE

  Prelude

  The elevator door closed behind Eustace and Talia.

  Finally, Ben and Avia were alone. Finally, she could take care of him. She had seen the haunted look in his eyes when he wasn't engaged with someone, and the new lines etched around his sculpted mouth.

  As soon as the elevator doors closed, she wrapped her arms around his waist and looked up into his tired face.

  "You didn't abort a deal worth millions to fly back here because of me. You had to already be in the air when all this went down. You don't have to tell me about your business, Ben, but, are you okay? What can I do?"

  She was shocked at his sudden change in demeanor, he seemed to sag in her arms. An infinite sadness crept over his features. She held him tighter.

  "I want to lie in bed with you and not think of anything else," he said. "But first, I want to be clean."

  They walked hand-in-hand to his bedroom, and undressed each other. He was wearing the key to her collar on a long platinum chain. It stirred something inside her, actually seeing it there. He seemed equally moved, stopping to look her over, nude but for her collar. Impulsively, she leaned over and kissed the key lying over his heart. He pressed her head against his chest for a few seconds.

  Inside his palatial bathroom and they walked into the shower and stood together in the warm, healing sprays. They shampooed and soaped each other, and ran their hands over slippery skin and through wet, clean hair.

  Ben kept them under the flowing streams of water for a long time, his hands not able to get enough of running over her body, but he didn't get an erection. She read his strange mood and didn't try
to entice him, though she wanted him inside her so very much.

  Finally, he wrapped them both in warm, white bath sheets. They dried each other and he smoothed a fragrant oil on her arms and legs, back and bottom. He kissed her where he had spanked her a few days before.

  In his bedroom, he opened a drawer in his tallboy and pulled out a pair of gray flannel pajama bottoms. She selected one of his white t-shirts and slipped it on while he tied the cord to the pajama pants that hung low on his hips.

  "I spent a lot of money and silk and satin for you to wear to bed, you know," he told her. He turned down the bedclothes. Picking her up in his arms, he kissed her tenderly and laid her on one side of the big bed.

  "I want comfort clothes, tonight," she told him. "Besides, I think I gave most of those to Talli."

  "I saw," he smiled, getting in beside her.

  He pulled up the down comforter, and rolled her away from him, until she was half on her side, half on her stomach. He pushed one leg up, and fit himself against her. His arm circled her waist, one hand cupping her breast. His leg went between hers. She couldn't tell where his front left off and her back began.

  He let go of her for a second while he reached back and turned off his phone. He found the remote on the bedside table and plunged the room into blackness. The heavy curtains kept any light from outside from creeping in.

  Then his arm was back around her, his hand on her breast, her hand clasped around his. They both wriggled a little, fitting even more closely. He kissed her hair and shoulder and she felt his cock thicken and waken, but only nudge her bottom in a sleepy way and then retreat.

  She had few coherent thoughts. She was so safe and warm in his arms that she thought if there was heaven, it must be to feel like this forever. She felt him relax, and they drifted into a deep sleep.

  Sometime during the night, he rolled away from her and she could feel him trembling … she turned over, pressed herself against his back, her arm slid around his waist. She kissed his shoulder. He quieted, and she sank back into the sweet oblivion.

  WEDNESDAY

  Morning

  Ben opened his eyes to blackness, Avia's soft bottom pressed against his own. His felt around - his phone read 5:17am.

  Stumbling to the bathroom, he felt slightly hungover, even though he'd drunk nothing the day before.

  He took a piss leaning heavily on the wall. He should wake up. He should turn his phone back on. He couldn't recall ever having turned his phone off, before.

  As he washed his hands in the sink, he thought of his Avienne, curled up in the bed, warm and soft. Waiting for him. He drank cool water from his cupped hands and dried them with a warm hand towel. It seemed to him his hands were always cold in North Dakota from mid-September until mid-May. The best thing about being rich, to him, was the luxury of heated towels.

  He crawled back into bed, and wrapped himself around her again. He pulled her whole body against himself with both arms. Even asleep, she snuggled back into him. Welcoming him. Instantly, he was asleep.

  Avia awoke on her side. Ben's upper arm under her neck, her head and his on the same pillow. His arm was bent, his forearm a guardrail across her chest, his hand curled around her upper arm.

  It was still very dark in the room, but she could hear traffic outside. Rush hour? So it was daylight.

  His other arm lay over her waist, his hand again cupped her breast. She realized she was aroused. She also realized with a smile that Ben had morning wood. Or in Ben's case, morning oak tree.

  His erection was snugged between the tops of her buttocks and pressed into her sacrum up to the small of her back. He was very hot and very hard and he felt very, very good.

  She let herself fantasize about wriggling him into wakefulness. About him slipping into her, lazily, half-awake, filling her. Her hips flexed a little as her clit woke up looking for pressure. She imagined him slowly fucking her, his hand leaving her breast for her pussy to bring her to orgasm.

  In her mind, neither of them said a word, and he came with his mouth against her shoulder, gasping her name.

  And then it occurred to her, in her present reality, she might pee all over him and she stifled a giggle. Besides, he had been in such a strange mood last night. And didn't she wake up and he was ... Ben was crying? She must have dreamed that.

  His erection subsided, his hand on her breast relaxed and his breathing deepened. She slipped away from him carefully, pushing a pillow against him to clutch. He did and rolled onto it, holding it tightly to him.

  Avia padded into her own bedroom and used her bathroom. She washed her hands and saw her hair. Oh for crap's sake! She'd gone to bed with her hair wet and now it was squashed in on both sides with a messy Mohawk above. A comb would not fix that.

  She stuck her head under a stream of warm water in the sink, toweled it a bit and used a brush to smooth it back.

  She stared at the brush for a moment. It was blue plastic with a flat back crossed by several narrow slits. It had a longer handle than most, which is one reason she liked it. And now she was wondering what kind of spanking implement it would be. She smacked it sharply against her thigh. It was light, but had a nice sting. She wondered if she could just leave it around for Ben to find …

  You are getting to be so weird.

  She put the brush down and used her fingers to loosen her damp waves and arrange them around her face. Her flushed face.

  "You're allowed to want what you want, Avia. To like what you like. I want you to think about it, fantasize about it. You please me so much when you ask for it, talk about it."

  How many times had he asked, demanded, insisted, forced her to tell him what she wanted? She pulled off his t-shirt. Isn't that what he wanted?

  Bunching up the t-shirt, Avia buried her nose in it, inhaling deeply. The scent was not hers alone, but his mingled with hers. He'd held her close all night. They made the scent together.

  She caught site of the RiverHart choker in the mirror, all she now wore. If it's what he wants, I have no choice, she thought, and it made her feel ... relaxed, she decided was the word. Any hesitation she had about telling him her fantasy fled.

  But not right now. Now, I have to be there for him, because something is troubling this man I care for so much.

  She went into her bedroom to find her robe and stopped at the terrace doors, moving the curtain aside just a little. Hard morning light poured through the opening. She stepped back, leaving the narrow space, that sliver managing to light the room dimly, enough to make out her robe thrown across the foot of her bed.

  She took a step toward it.

  "Don't," came his deep, husky voice from the darkness of her doorway.

  She stopped, her nude body backlit by the bright morning light. His eyes adjusted to the dimness and he took two steps toward her. Beautiful. Long and lean. All legs and her full, heart-shaped ass, good, wide hips that sloped suddenly in, to her slender waist. Her breasts, high and full -

  "Your nipples are hard," he said.

  "You were touching me in your sleep. You had a lovely erection. I woke up this way," she said softly.

  "But your hair is wet. You've been up for a while, now."

  He moved to the edge of the drape and opened it wider. The room brightened. He circled her. She stayed still. He couldn't take his eyes from her, from her lovely shoulders, the delicate lines of her clavicle, her graceful neck. The collar. All she wore was his collar.

  He stopped in front of her. "You're still aroused. Your skin is flushed."

  "Yes," she said. "I was thinking about you. In bed, I was thinking about your erection inside me. It was a nice thought."

  "You didn't wake me," he said, his middle finger lightly brushing her pubic hair. "You're wet."

  "I - I was still thinking. And now you're here. So, yeah, I am."

  He slipped the middle finger he'd used to touch her under her collar and gently pulled until she stepped toward him, almost touching. He could feel the heat from her body.

&nbs
p; "Still thinking. About me inside you?"

  She flushed red, her nipples tightened further. "No," she whispered, licking her lips. "I, um, I had my hairbrush and I wondered if it would, well, how it would feel if you used it."

  "If I used it?"

  She shifted on her feet. "On my bottom." He waited. Her thighs clenched. "To spank me," her voice was hoarse and a dark flush ran up her neck and over her cheeks. But she held his gaze.

  "Good girl," he said and drew her to him, kissing her hair. He felt her arms circle his waist. He knew it was humiliating for her, but she'd told him. He hadn't had to threaten or force. She'd submitted to him. Perfectly.

  And your dick should be so hard a sandblaster couldn't etch it. You should be rewarding her. Telling her to fetch the brush. Pinking up her gorgeous ass a little. Making her explain more about the fantasy where you fucked her when she woke up. Giving her orgasms. Taking care of her. You should be having fun, morning sex. She wants it. She wants it, now.

  But his dick lay inert against his thigh. He didn't want to examine why too closely. Or at all.

  She lifted her head to look at him. He forced himself to look back, to face her disappointment.

  But her look was loving. She smiled up at him. Her fingers traced his eyebrows and cheekbones, and the shape of his mouth.

  "You are the most beautiful man," she said. "Can I tell you what I want? I mean - besides breakfast?"

  "Always," he said, fearing her expectations for him to perform, now, to be the Dom he promised her he would be. But he also wanted to encourage and respect how hard she was trying.

  Her fingers trailed along his jaw and down the side of his neck. "I know I'm not very sophisticated about … things sexual. But maybe that's a good thing?"

  He clasped his fingers at the small of her back. "Tell me," he said.

  "I want to find all kinds of things that just live in the world and see if they might be fun to play with. For us," she answered. "I want to keep them in a special box or something and you can go in there sometimes and try some out. I know, you have all these sophisticated devices you invented. But, I mean, what can you do with like, a shaving brush?"