by Celia Roman
If a little thrill of heat flickered to life in my nethers, it was easy to ignore. I was bone weary, the throb in my noggin was growing by leaps and bounds, and worry over Fame gnawed away at whatever of me was left over. Weren’t no room for the physical in amongst that lot.
I slipped into the bathroom and took care of the necessities, and when I walked back out, Riley was sitting on the end of my bed unlacing his boots. Dark shadows marred his sun kissed face and wrinkles bracketed his mouth what shouldn’ta been there. He glanced up and them hazel eyes of his was hard and flat, like the thin line of his mouth.
“Your turn,” I said, and put my back to him.
Let him find his own way about.
His boots thudded onto the floor, then his swishing footsteps passed me by. The bathroom door shut behind him, and I scrubbed my hands over my face. Lordy, it was gonna be a long night.
I was tucked snug as a bug in a rug into bed by the time Riley finished in the bathroom. My eyes was squeezed shut, but that didn’t stop me none from knowing when he flicked off the overhead light, nor when he padded across the bedroom and slipped under the covers, let alone when he curled his big oak of a body around me and kissed the side of my throat like we done this ever night.
Sure, we’d slept together a time or two, but it’d only ever been sleep, and usually, them nights me or him one was sick or otherwise too tired to tango.
And we was heading right quick toward the time when the horizontal tango was more’n a slim possibility.
His sigh feathered over my nape through my stick straight hair and he relaxed beside me. “Night, baby.”
“Goodnight,” I said.
Heat seeped into me, shared from his skin to mine, and gradually, his breathing eased into sleep. I lay stiff as a board under the heavy hand draped over my hip, scarce drawing air into my lungs. Thoughts whirred in my head, like an offbeat engine skipping outta time. Death, imprisonment, family, sex, ‘round and ‘round the images went, spinning into a confused hurricane of fear and dread.
It was too much for one woman to hold. My mind rebelled and clicked off, and I followed Riley into Morpheus’s uneasy grip.
Chapter Four
A warm, calloused palm slid across my thigh and hard hips pressed into my bottom.
“Sunny,” Riley said, his voice sleep-rough and sexy as sin. “God, baby. You feel so good.”
I snuggled into him, too groggy to resist. Didn’t want to nohow. Hadn’t ever wanted to, but he was a Treadwell and I was a Carson—
My eyes popped open and I went stiff as a board as reason popped into my daft noggin.
“What’re you doing?” I asked.
He laughed, low and husky, and his hand slipped into the willing place between my thighs. “What does it feel like I’m doing?”
“About to draw back a nub,” I retorted.
I blinked gritty eyes against the thin dawn streaming into the room through gaps in the curtains and did my best to ignore the sensual heat stirring under the skilled caress of his fingers. My heart skipped a beat, then hit double time, and I bit my tongue against a curse. Dang his sorry hide, and dang mine, too. I been too long without, and unless he cheated on me these past few months, so had he.
He shifted in the bed behind me, rubbing his erection along my bottom through my panties, and his hand eased under my shirt onto my bare stomach. “C’mon, Sunny. Don’t say no. I need you.”
My traitorous body relaxed against him and my eyes slid shut. “I ain’t ready.”
He laughed again, a short huff of breath against my nape. “You feel ready. You feel so good.”
His fingertips brushed higher, trailing heat upward, and his palm cupped my teeniny breast, right over the marks Teus put there after I killed his pet monster. Riley’s arm tightened around me, drawing me into his chest, so close his heartbeat echoed into mine. “You feel so fucking good, baby.”
The words was low and hoarse, and held a lifetime of brutal need, a need so familiar, it was part and parcel of who I was.
“Riley,” I breathed, and melted into him. What would it hurt to have him, just this once? To love him the way I wanted to since I learnt what men and women could do together, when they was both a-willing?
A loud knock on the front door interrupted the sensual haze. Riley swore under his breath and rolled away from me. “Don’t move an inch, Sunshine, not a single goddamn inch.”
I propped up on an elbow and watched while he stuffed bare feet into last night’s jeans. “Where you going?”
“To get rid of whoever is at the fucking door.” He yanked his pants up over a naked bottom and buttoned the fly, then crawled across the bed and collapsed on top of me. “Stay hot for me, baby.”
He smacked a rough kiss to the side of my throat and was gone before I could hardly catch my breath. A slow smile tickled my mouth as I snuggled back under the covers, eyes closed. Riley’s nude image lingered in the very front of my mind. Long, muscled limbs, tousled auburn hair, and a sleepy promise in them hazel eyes of his. Fire flickered through me, licking my skin, and I curled tight around it, holding in the heat he give so freely.
Lordy, I had it bad.
The front door swung open and male voices spoke, too low for me to hear. A minute later, the door swung shut, and a minute after that, Riley padded back into my bedroom, scowling like somebody nabbed his favorite toy. He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder toward the living room. “Your grandfather Walkingstick is here.”
I bit my tongue against the curses popping into my mouth. Johnny Walkingstick. ‘Course, it was. Anybody else woulda knowed Riley was here and come back later, but not my grampa. He had his own schedule. Weren’t nobody else privy to it and he let not a dadgum thing stand in the way of his fulfilling it.
It weren’t the only thing I learnt about my daddy’s daddy, but it was about the top trait. That, and once he was somewhere, he weren’t going nowhere ‘til he said his piece.
I threw the covers off my legs and slid outta bed. “Sorry, Riley.”
“Not nearly as sorry as I am,” he muttered. “I’ll keep him company while you hop in the shower.”
“Thanks.” I sighed and stretched, and grinned when Riley’s gaze grew heated. “Put on the coffee, wouldja?”
“Yeah, sure,” he said, and shook his head. “The things I do for you.”
“Keep right on a-doing ‘em,” I retorted, kindly tart.
He laughed and shook his head again, and walked back into the living room. Meanwhile, I gathered clean clothes and what defenses I’d need to face Johnny Walkingstick and whatever he come all the way from Snowbird to tell me.
I hopped into the shower and scrubbed down lightning quick, then pulled on clothes and marched into my living room. Riley and Johnny was sitting at my kitchen table sipping steaming cups of hot coffee. The aroma of fresh ground coffee tickled my nose and lit a hunger a mile deep in my belly.
The men was quiet. They faced each other with the critter Aunt Sadie found a while back sitting on the table betwixt ‘em. Johnny was dressed in his usual attire, a plaid flannel shirt and jeans. Bless him, but Riley was barefoot and shirtless. His fiery hair was tousled and for all the world he looked like he just rolled outta my bed.
Which was exactly what he done.
I refused to apologize for having a man I cared for get caught in my house early in the morn. If my grandpa didn’t approve, next time he could call before he showed up.
I poured myself a cup of coffee and plopped into a seat between ‘em. “Who let the critter outta the cage?”
Johnny’s stoic features were broken by the slight twitch of his lips. “Why you got him in a cage?”
“Don’t know what it is.”
“Then you need to work on your detective skills.” A sigh heaved outta Johnny, silent for all the force behind it. “Libby rounded up a Wampus Cat and took care of the Ew’ah.”
It took me a minute to shift gears, and not solely ‘cause I hadn’t got enough sleep. I talked to cousin Li
bby about that Wampus Cat when I was still in the hospital some three weeks back. It was the only thing I knowed what could scare off the demon haunting my boy’s almost first grade teacher, her what’d called me when the Ew’ah showed up outside her house in the middle of the night. I’d foisted Miss Jenny off on Teus, a minor Greek deity what’d been bugging me to be his companion. In return for introducing her to him, he removed two of the marks of service inflicted ‘cause I killed his pet catfish some time back.
‘Course, he’d also redecorated my trailer in ocean colors for helping track down the folks what’d dumped toxic industrial waste into the local waters. Small favors, you ask me, but I’d take what I could get, ‘specially since I had bigger fish to fry in the here and now.
I hid my momentary lapse behind a sip of coffee. “I’ll let Miss Jenny know it’s safe to go home now. Give Libby my thanks.”
“Give them to her yourself. She’s throwing a surprise birthday party for me.”
An odd lump clogged my throat. I glanced down at the coffee cup in my hands. Steam rose outta its black depths and wavered in the air above it. The things I didn’t know about my daddy’s family was legion. Here time was sneaking up on the birthday of the only grandpa I ever met, and I hadn’t even knowed the date.
Riley saved my bacon with a statement cloaked in neutral respect. “It’s not much of a surprise if you know about it.”
A rare smile cracked Johnny’s weathered features. “She doesn’t know I know.”
I’d bet my last dollar she did and just didn’t want to spoil his fun at having one over on her. Libby Squirrel was a sharp’un, she was. Not much got by her.
“Why you telling me?” I asked.
“You’ll come.” Johnny held a hand out to the critter and waited patiently ‘til it crawled onto his palm and squatted there like a pup begging attention. “You notice anything unusual happening around here?”
I sputtered out a laugh. “Unusual is an ever day event.”
“Ain’t that the truth,” Riley muttered.
I cut a side-eyed glance at him. He been back in my life long enough to witness unusual firsthand a time or two, and get caught in its snare to boot. Bless him, but Riley hadn’t knowed what he was getting into when he swaggered into the trailer and tried to charm me into helping his ex-girlfriend solve her monster problem.
I shifted my gaze back to my grandpa and eyed the smile playing around his normally stoic expression. “Why you ask?”
“The one and the other have something in common.” Johnny waggled a gnarled finger at the critter. “Behave, now. No mischief or you’ll answer to me.”
It blinked its huge eyes up at him and, unless I was sore mistaken, wilted a mite.
Riley sat straight up in his chair. “Wait. You can communicate with it?”
Johnny’s bushy gray eyebrows quirked upward. “You can’t?”
“It won’t talk to us.”
“Maybe you ain’t saying the right thing.” Johnny tapped a finger against the critter’s midsection. “Go on. You know what to do.”
It scrambled off him faster’n I ever seen it move and tucked itself back into the cage like that was exactly where it belonged.
I eyed my grandpa steady like. “You know what that thing is?”
“Some things you need to figure out on your own.”
“And some things I need some help with.”
His chocolate eyes fixed on me, staring into and beyond me, seemed like. “Me and Libby are gonna help you with that. You come ‘round, meet your family. Reignite the part of you your grandma was so scared of.”
“I ain’t two natured,” I said. “That’s why she hated me so.”
“She hated you because she was afraid of you. She was afraid you had too much of your mama in you and not enough of your daddy, and she was afraid you’d be her equal.”
All of them fears had come true. I was a stone cold killer like my mama. It’d pushed out the good my daddy’s blood shoulda carried.
And I killed my grandma, though I weren’t certain that made me nowhere near her equal, considering it was more luck and determination what’d kept me going when she had her claws in me that night.
As if remembering the pain, ever scar she inflicted flared to life, ripping hot agony through skin and muscle. I set the coffee cup down and knuckled my eyes ‘til it passed.
“You should’ve stopped her a long time ago,” Riley said
“Had to bide my time, didn’t I? Same as her.” Johnny splayed his palms flat against the table, then pushed himself outta his chair. “Party’s coming on quick. You’ll both be there. Fame and his family, too.”
My eyes popped open under my fingers. “His ex-wife and brother was found dead last night.”
“I heard. Don’t worry. It’ll work itself out. You may want to have a gander in the deep wood again.”
I shook my head. Last time I went into the deep wood, I about didn’t make it out alive. I weren’t real anxious to go looking for trouble again, leastwise not ‘til I healed up some.
Johnny shuffled to me, dropped a kiss to my forehead. “Libby’s expecting you to say no when she tells you about the party. Disappoint her.”
A short laugh huffed outta me. “Go on with you, Johnny. And you be careful driving back home.”
“Walked,” he said, and away he went to the door.
“I’ll see him out,” Riley said to me.
“Put on a coat.”
Riley grinned and winked, and the two of ‘em disappeared out my front door into the cold December air, one wearing nothing but street clothes, t’other not even that.
Chapter Five
My phone rung right about the time Riley stepped into the shower, leaving me to rustle up the morning meal. I prodded sizzling bacon with a fork held in one hand and with t’other, fished my cellphone outta the back pocket of my jeans and checked the caller’s ID.
Tom Arrowood. Thank the good Lord above.
I thumbed into the call. “Hey, Tom. What news?”
“Nothing good, I’m afraid.” He coughed a soft, rasping bark, then cleared his throat. Paper swished against paper in the background. “The District Attorney hasn’t arrested Fame yet, but he has seventy-two hours from when they take him in for questioning to do so.”
I stifled the nasty words what popped into my mouth. No more quarters for the cussing jar today. “They gonna take their time, ain’t they?”
“As much time as they can. Maybe if Fame weren’t known for his, uh, extralegal activities, it would be different.”
“He ain’t a violent person,” I said, flat as a fresh-planed board. “He ain’t never done nobody no harm.”
Something squeaked on the other end of the line. “Everybody knows Fame caught Lily and Ferd in flagrante.”
“Don’t mean he murdered ‘em.”
“No, it doesn’t. Rest easy, Sunshine. I’m going to do everything I can to help him.”
I scooped bacon outta the pan onto a paper towel lined plate, then scooted the pan off the eye and cut it off. “I know you will.”
“Good. Now, a couple of days after Fame is charged, there’ll be a bond hearing. The DA’s going to ask for a small fortune, or no bond at all. He’ll have Sheriff Treadwell there backing him up regardless.”
That’d be the same Sheriff Treadwell what was feuding with my uncle. Chances was good he’d throw his weight around and push for the bond to be as high as was humanly possible. I leaned a hip against the counter and glanced up at the ceiling, the very same one what’d gone from water stained to sparkling white one tile at a time over the past few weeks. Starting, say, right about the time that critter come to live with me.
Well, dadgum. How’d I missed that connection?
I shook the thought away and asked, “How much?”
“Well, he’s probably going to be charged with both murders and a handful of lesser crimes, so at least a million.”
I whispered a hoarse, “Dollars?”
“Don’
t worry, honey. I’ll talk it down to a reasonable amount.”
“What’s reasonable?”
“Somewhere between a quarter and half a million.”
My knees give out. I slid down the cabinets and thumped butt-first onto the linoleum floor. A quarter million dollars? He might as well’ve asked me to hand him the dadgum moon.
“We ain’t got that kinda money, Tom.”
‘Specially after we paid him for services rendered. I been around long enough to know that crime sure did pay lawyers a heckuva a lot more’n it did criminals.
“Don’t worry,” he repeated. “Fame will figure something out, I’m sure. In the meantime, you may want to find the deed to his property.”
That I could do, and I’d throw my deed in with it, if I had to. I was nigh on certain I would. Fame’s property was huge, but it weren’t worth no quarter million dollars. Leastwise, I didn’t think it was.
“Is there anything else you need?”
Tom’s voice drawed me back to the present. I knuckled my forehead over the sharp ache growing there. “We’re ok. Thanks for asking.”
“It’s the least I can do, Sunshine. Your family’s been good to me over the years.”
I snorted out a laugh. Yeah, if you wanted to call handing him business ever time Trey or Gentry got caught on the wrong side of the law, I guess we done right well by ol’ Tom.
Speaking of. Tom weren’t exactly on the straight and narrow. He took to drink when times got tough, and times was pretty dang tough right now, considering his wife was facing some serious charges thanks to yours truly.
“How’re you doing?” I asked.
“Good, all things considered.”
The words held a touch of humor I never woulda expected outta him. “You ain’t still mad about me helping Belinda get caught, are you?”