by Sheryl Lynn
The insurance policy, Easy suspected, was the key.
Two men walked into the office. Startled, Easy straightened from a file drawer and automatically reached for the loosened knot of his tie. On office days he wore button-down shirts and ties—his one concession to being a businessman.
Walk-ins were as rare as whooping cranes. His nerves prickled in alarm. “May I help you?” he asked.
The taller of the two men smiled. Easy didn’t like that smile, it held grim secrets. For that matter, he didn’t like the looks of either man. The tall man wore a suit with a pale blue shirt and a striped tie, but the jacket shoulders bunched at the seams and the sleeves were too short. The tie was clumsily knotted as if he’d never tied one before and had to take instructions from a book. Suede shoes spoiled the power-suit effect. The other man wore jeans and a pullover shirt. The jeans had greasy smudges on the thighs, like wipe marks. Massive arms and a neck so thick it appeared his head rested directly on his shoulders, coupled with a lumpish expression, said he probably spent far more time at the gym than inside bookstores.
The tall man stepped aside. No-neck moved in, effectively blocking the door. Easy’s back muscles tightened and twitched.
“You Earl Z. Martel, private investigator?”
Easy knew a few tricks, but in these close quarters, especially against that muscle-bound dirtbag, he doubted if tricks would do much good. He needed a bazooka. Determined to brazen it out, he extended a hand and moved away from the filing cabinet. “I’m Martel. What can I do for you gentlemen today?”
He didn’t see the punch. He didn’t realize he’d been hit until he was on the floor, stupidly looking up at the lazily circling ceiling tiles. Heat swallowed Easy’s face and his right eye clouded. He blinked and wished he hadn’t. White shards exploded in his head.
No-neck rubbed the knuckles of his right hand. Brassy metal gleamed on his finger.
“That’s a wake-up call, Martel,” the tall man said. “You won’t see the next one coming.”
“Didn’t see that one coming,” Easy muttered and gingerly touched his right eye. His fingers came away slickly red. A glance showed his shirt splattered with crimson flowers. He put a hand under himself to get up.
No-neck kicked him. The blow caught Easy squarely on the hip. His hand slipped on the flat carpet and he fell on his side, ending up clumsily twisted.
Years of football and years as a military cop had taught Easy that the first man to lose his temper, lost the game. He struggled against the hot rush of fury rising in his chest. No-neck stood too close. If Easy’s throbbing hip were any judge, he wore steel-toed boots.
“You stay away from Jeff Livman. Stay away from Catherine St. Clair, too. We’ll be watching you, Martel. You get anywhere close to our friends, and we’ll turn more than your face into hamburger.” The tall man turned to-ward the door.
No-neck waited until his companion walked out of the office before he followed. He closed the door behind him.
Hurting too much to curse, Easy labored to his feet He swayed unsteadily and ended up lurching against the desk. A bout of dizziness made him wobble; he held onto the desk for dear life. Fat drops of blood spattered silently on the desk. His lack of depth perception told him his right eye had swollen shut. He made his unsteady way to the bathroom.
He glared at his reflection in the mirror over the sink. No-neck had opened an inch-long gash above Easy’s eyebrow. Not to mention ruining his favorite tie. Blood had stopped pumping from the wound and now congealed in thick gobs in his eyebrow. His right eye looked as if he’d stuffed marbles under the lids.
He ran cold water in the sink and jerked paper towels from the holder. He needed stitches. The thought churned his already queasy gut. He hated needles.
The office door opened with a faint squeal of dry hinges. Easy jumped, his heart in his throat. He snatched up a small metal waste can. Used paper towels fell like clumps of snow. Brandishing the can, he charged out of the bathroom.
Catherine St. Clair gasped and clapped her hands over her mouth.
Easy skidded to a stop. He froze with the waste can clutched over his head, his feet widespread. “Oh, it’s you,” he said. “How’s it going?”
“Easy?”
He lowered the can and set it on the floor. He smiled weakly. “Sorry, I thought you were someone else.”
“Oh my God, what happened to you? You’re bleeding!”
“No kidding.” He dropped onto a chair and flinched at the pain in his hip. He could feel a bruise spreading across his pelvis.
Catherine flung her purse on the desk. She rushed into the bathroom where water continued to run in the sink. She emerged a few seconds later, trailing water drops on the carpet.
Easy peered up at her through his good eye. Even wide-eyed and pale-faced, she looked incredible. A light green knit shirt clung to her curvaceous figure, and her green-and-fawn striped skirt floated around her legs like a gauzy cloud. A nice sight for sore eyes.
She pressed a wad of wet towels to his bloody eye. “What happened?”
“I whistled at the wrong lady,” he said, deadpan. Her look of sheer horror made him regret his flippancy. “Some joker sucker punched me.”
“With what? A crowbar?”
“His fist. He was wearing a ring. How bad is it?”
“It’s terrible. I have to get you to a doctor. You’re covered in blood. Your poor eye! Where else are you hurt?” She raked her anxious gaze over him head to toe.
“He kicked me, but no big deal.” That revelation had a nice bonus effect. She held the compress on his eye with one hand while she ran her other hand gently, but firmly over his chest. He resisted the urge to tell her where he’d been kicked. When she began poking and prodding his thighs, he figured he’d had enough comforting. For now. He nudged her hand away. “I’ll live.”
“You don’t look good.” She returned to the bathroom for fresh towels.
Now that the pounding throb in his head had receded to a bearable ache, he grew curious about Catherine’s presence. When she returned, he asked, “What are you doing here?”
She replaced the bloodied towel with a fresh cold compress. The cold water felt good against the hot swelling. Her light vanilla perfume had even greater therapeutic results. Once upon a time, he’d told her his favorite scent in the whole world was vanilla. She’d begun wearing vanilla after that. That she still wore it did funny things to his insides. Having her so near almost made getting socked worthwhile.
She smoothed hair off his forehead. “I think you’re right about Jeffrey breaking into my house.”
Of course. Livman had seen the information—complete with reports typed on letterhead—Easy had given Catherine. “Is it the packet I gave you? Did Livman take it?”
Her wondering gaze seemed to ask, How did you know? “It’s gone. I looked for it this morning, but it’s missing. I didn’t realize it was gone until I looked for it. Jeffrey is the only person who could have any interest in those papers.”
Total lack of surprise fended off Easy’s dismay. His cover had been blown before, and he’d survived. He’d survive this, too. He cautiously touched a fingertip to his swollen eye. “Yep. He sent a couple friends over this morning to tell me to back off. He plays rough.”
She cocked her head first one way than the other. Her eyes flashed with blue fire. “Jeffrey hit you?”
“Not personally. The thugs he sent told me to stay away from Livman and from you. He knows I’m after him, Tink. The real question is, does he know whose side you’re on?”
“I CANNOT BELIEVE Jeffrey sent men to hurt you.” Catherine paused inside the door of Easy’s apartment. She clutched her purse to her chest. Her expression revealed nothing about her reaction to the small apartment filled with more computer equipment, paperwork, maps and books than with furniture.
Easy headed for the bedroom. Catherine’s comment annoyed him. Her actions of the past few hours had convinced him she knew Livman was a murderer. She’d driven
Easy to the emergency room, sat with him while he waited, and held his hand while the doctor put two stitches in his eyebrow. She hadn’t said much, but her concern for him had blared through loud and clear.
Now she couldn’t believe Livman hired thugs.
“Women,” he muttered. He worked off his tie and shirt. Rusty blotches marred the purple, gold and blue pattern on the silk tie. No-neck would pay for it somehow, that’s for certain. He carried the ruined tie and bloodstained shirt to the kitchen.
“Do you know how to get blood off silk?”
Catherine turned from the sink where she prepared an ice pack. She glanced at him, did a double take and stiffened. Hot spots flared on her cheeks. The blush spread until her entire face burned bright red. She abruptly turned back to the sink.
Easy glanced at his bare chest. She’d seen him naked before, so there was no big deal about him not wearing a shirt. Still, despite hitting the big three-oh, he stayed in pretty good shape. He guessed she thought he looked good, maybe too good. He slid in closer, his shoulder grazing hers.
“I don’t want to trash the tie. Know how to fix it?”
Pointedly not looking at him, she took the tie and shirt.
“Is something wrong?” he asked innocently.
She thrust at him a pack made from ice cubes in a plastic sandwich bag. “Put that on your eye. It looks awful.”
“Feels awful,” he said pitifully. He maneuvered until she had to look at his face. “Kiss it and make it feel better?”
She scrambled backward. “Go put a shirt on. And use the ice.”
He obediently pressed the ice pack to his eye gingerly, but remained where he was. She breathed hard, her bosom rising and falling in erratic hitches. The green knit shirt complemented her suntan and showed off her curves. He wondered when she’d turned into a fitness fanatic. Her throat worked in a convulsive swallow. She clutched his shirt and tie so tightly her knuckles turned white.
Contrition replaced his urge to torment her. “Thanks for taking me to the hospital.”
She lowered her gaze. “Somebody had to.”
“I’m glad it was you. I hate doctors.”
The corners of her mouth twitched. “You always were a big baby.” She pressed the tips of her fingers to her mouth. Her engagement ring sparkled. Traces of humor beginning to blossom withered away into a stricken expression that struck Easy straight in the gut. Her fear brought him no satisfaction at all.
“Jeffrey sent those men, didn’t he?”
“Yep.” He idly pressed his hip where the bruise from the kick darkened an area nearly eight inches in diameter. The doctor had claimed no permanent damage, but his hip ached all the way to the bone. The flesh covering the bruise felt tight enough to split like ripe fruit. “What did you say to him, Tink? What made him suspicious enough to snoop around your house?”
Shaking her head, she returned to the sink and began running cold water. She trailed her fingers under the stream. “I asked him if he’d been married before. He tried to pass it off, so I told him I could check public records. That made him furious. I calmed him down, and he told me about Roberta. Do you have any prewash?”
“What’s that?”
She shot him a look askance. “Never mind.” She plugged the sink and reached for the dishwashing detergent.
“What do you mean by furious?”
She chewed her lower lip a moment before answering. “He was angry, as if I had no right to know about his past. He was terribly unhappy about having to speak of Roberta. I thought he was going to cry. Uh, I think I teased him about his age, too. I tried to get him to admit he’s forty. He laughed it off.” She squirted detergent on the shirt. “Everything he said that night was a lie. Everything.”
“So you made some direct hits.”
She scrubbed hard at the blood stains on the shirt, working up copious pink-tinged lather. “It still doesn’t prove he’s a killer. He could be…jealous. Maybe he thinks you’re trying to break us up.”
“Did you tell him about us?”
A light shudder racked her body. “No.”
“So he had to see the papers to know about me. If I found out my fiancée hired a snoop to check me out, I’d talk to her.”
Her lips thinned into an unyielding line. She scrubbed harder at the shirt.
“It’s the big fad of the nineties to investigate the one you love. Every once in a while, a subject finds out about me, but he doesn’t come to me. I’m just a tool.”
She stilled with both hands in the water and her head hanging. “He’s angry. When I discovered the packet missing, I realized he’s angry and he’s punishing me.”
“Uh-uh. He’s worried,” Easy said. “Maybe he’s scared.”
“I’m the one who’s scared. He’s showing a cold—cruel!—side of himself I never expected. He won’t talk to me. He won’t return calls.”
“Sounds like he’s playing on your guilt. If he gets you worked up enough, you’ll forget the lies.”
She snorted in derision. “It won’t work. I can’t marry him anyway.”
The sheer joy leaping through his heart shamed him. Here she suffered a broken heart, and all he could think about was that now he had a chance with her. He forced a frown to keep from smiling. “I’m sorry. Not that you won’t marry him, but that you’re hurt. I don’t want you hurting.”
She swished the shirt in the water. The soapy water had turned pink. “I thought Jeffrey was the real thing. I thought he loved me. I thought he was honest! I’d have a family of my own and children. I don’t want to live alone all my life, drawing pictures for kids I don’t know.”
His shame deepened. “You’ve always got me.”
She slumped and closed her eyes. “Oh, please. Whatever we had once is long over. We’re not kids anymore. I don’t even know if I can be friends with you.”
“Yes, you can!” he exclaimed. “We were best friends once. We still care about each other.” He placed a hand on her shoulder.
She knocked his hand away. Water splashed his bare chest. “You ruined my life once. Now you’ve done it again. You still haven’t shown me one shred of proof Jeffrey ever hurt his wife. Not that it matters! He doesn’t trust me, I don’t trust him, and now we’ll never get married.”
Easy’s anger simmered near the surface, but her trembling lower lip and glazed eyes tamped that emotion. He steeled his jaw, prepared to take whatever abuse her wounded feelings deemed necessary.
“Then you have to go and get hurt! Look at you! Your eye could be permanently damaged. You could go blind because you can’t leave well enough alone!”
He lowered the ice pack. “Sounds like you care about me.”
With a frustrated groan squeezing through clenched teeth, she pushed his chest with both hands. He stumbled a step. “How can I possibly care about you? You’re thickheaded and stubborn and stupid and you don’t have an ounce of common sense. You come roaring into my life and wreck everything! And now you got beat up.”
“I’m not hurt that bad,” he said cautiously.
She slammed her small fist against his chest The blow shocked him. He dropped the ice pack and caught her wrists before she thought about aiming for his bad eye. She jerked up her head, and her furious expression crumpled.
Appalled at seeing her so close to tears, he pulled her hands against his chest. She sagged against him and he cradled her the way he’d hold a child. “I’m sorry.”
“I thought I could love Jeffrey. I really thought I could and then—then—then you show up. And I know I don’t love him and I probably won’t ever love anybody. Nobody will ever love me. I’ll end up alone and childless and living with—with—cats!”
Her icy, damp hands clutched at his upper arms. She sniffled.
He stroked her silky hair, wanting to soothe her but uncertain how. A million words clogged his throat, but all of them had to do with how much he loved her. He suspected in her state of mind, a declaration of love would earn him a matching black eye.
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br /> So he kissed her. Her lips were as soft as warm taffy. He told himself he merely wanted to make her feel better. She kissed him back and her fingers dug into his biceps. Her hands were cold, but her mouth was hot and eager, questing with sweet silky thrusts of her tongue. He kissed her deeply, wanting to drown within her, losing himself in the heated mindlessness of loving her.
She dragged her lips from his, so he kissed her cheeks and chin and she let her head fall back so he could kiss the tender line of her throat. She purred, a tiny, luxurious sound from deep inside her breast, and desire maddened him. Nothing else mattered except her. Her fingers worked convulsively against his back and she pressed her body against his.
She moaned and whispered what sounded very much like, “I hate you. Easy Martel,” then found his mouth for another kiss. He knew she didn’t hate him at all.
Chapter Eight
“Stop…please, stop,” Catherine whispered. This was wrong, all wrong. She shouldn’t be embracing Easy, touching him, kissing him. Wanting him. She weakly pushed against his arms until he lifted his head.
Desire marked his good eye, turning it as black as midnight, smoldering with sultry heat. All her resistance against other men, she now knew, had been a sham. She had always resisted sexual advances, not because of a moral high ground or depth of character or even from fear, but because she did not want those men. She had never desired any man except Easy Martel. Fluttering anxiety in her chest told her she never would.
“We’re good together, Tink.” He plunged his long fingers through her hair, deliciously pulling her scalp. “No one can ever make me feel the way you do. And you feel it, too. You know I’m right”
Her knees threatened to buckle. Using the countertop next to her side for balance, she backed unsteadily away from him. His fingers slid from beneath her hair and trailed tenderly across her cheeks. Her belly ached in repressed arousal. Her chest ached with the depth of her emotions. Her eyes and throat ached from holding back tears. Intuition nagged her soul, telling her only Easy held the power to soothe those aches.