By the time Armani arrived, the few gawkers—no big drama like spurting blood or writhing in pain to hold them—had melted away, including my rescuer, who I realized to my shame I hadn’t even thanked. I was almost looking forward to whatever riot act Armani was sure to read me if only because he wouldn’t expect an answer—at least, not until he wound down. Dashing my hopes, he drifted in silent as the grave to loom over the shoulder of my inquisitor after talking to the other EMT. His lips were tightly compressed, though, and I could tell this was just the calm before the storm.
When the questioning finally died off, Armani reached down to help me up and through sheer force of will I managed to get my muscles working so that I wasn’t completely dead weight. The romantic image of being clasped to Armani’s chest while he heroically bore me off into the sunset fell apart completely with the reality that the scene would more likely involve staggering and cursing under his breath. Not to mention the whole damsel-in-distress thing had never worked for me anyway.
Girl power and all that aside, though, there was something about Armani clutching me tight, his strong arm heating my gooseflesh that was maybe just a little gratifying. Add to that the fact that he wasn’t even complaining that I was getting him completely soaked in the process and I was about ready to take him home to mother, but that seemed a piss-poor way to repay him.
As soon as Armani had me settled into the car with the heat cranked to full, he turned my way and I thought here it comes.
“Christian Scientology?” he asked, a glint in his eye.
My shrug was barely detectable. “No insurance,” I rasped back. “Had to say something.”
He looked like he was struggling not to smile. “I think they call themselves Christian Scientists.”
“I’ll—” I winced as the pain temporarily overwhelmed me, “—remember that.”
Armani studied me for a few beats before reaching for his seat belt, adjusting my mirrors and generally doing the guy pre-flight check.
“Sounds like you’re in a lot of pain right now, so I’m not going to ask, but as soon as you get some aspirin and dry clothes, I want the full story, even if you have to sign it to me.”
I nodded meekly, made mellow by the warmth. My eyes shut of their own volition and the next thing I knew, Armani and I were parked out front of my apartment building and he was trying to wake me by chafing my hands. His face was less than a breath away from mine until he noticed that my eyes had opened.
Once inside, I felt like an invalid as I sat at what would have been my kitchen table had I had such a room and directed Armani toward pain meds and glasses via hand gestures. I tried not to notice that my studio apartment was not exactly in company condition—the pull-out sofa I slept on was still in disheveled bed mode, my jammie T-shirt slung over the side, dishes I’d been hoping elves would clean piled in the sink. But it seemed that Armani was the most concerned with the fact that I was about to exceed the doctor-recommended dose of the generic painkiller he brought me.
“Reformed Christian Scientist,” I said, hoping to bring back the smile I’d seen earlier.
“Uh huh,” he responded.
“Um,” yikes—okay, no unnecessary thinking noises. I mimed my way to the pad and paper beside my telephone.
I really appreciate you picking me up, I scribbled. Really. But—
“But what?” Armani asked, his voice gone cold. Apparently, his cop skills extended to reading upside-down chicken scratch.
Frustrated, I put down the pen. Writing was going to be too damned slow.
“I need a bath,” I croaked, hand to my throat as if it would make any difference. “Right now I feel like I’d pass out bending over to start the water. I’d never have called you to begin with if—” my voice gave out, which was probably a good thing, given that what had been coming out sounded all wrong in my head. I swallowed and tried again, softer. “Not that you were my last choice. Just—I need a girlfriend.”
Armani looked at me like a suspect he intended to crack, as if every word spoken had some other meaning. Finally, he swiped a hand hard over his face.
“Look, you witnessed a murder, came face-to-face with the killer. We probably should have set some sort of watch on you right from the first. My fault. But—dammit, by the time you’re through flirting and baiting, it’s a wonder I remember my own damned name,” he growled.
I was flummoxed. “So I do get to you.”
He practically glared. “Yeah, like that’s a freakin’ newsflash. Why else do you do it?”
“Because I can’t help myself,” I answered.
Damn and double damn. I should have stuck with the pen.
My admission didn’t seem to make him any happier. “Look, you’re a witness in an ongoing investigation.”
“Yeah.”
“And a pain in my ass.”
I was tired, I was soaked to the bone, but as much as I wanted that bath and my bed…
“So?” I challenged.
“So, we can’t do this.”
“Do what?” I asked, exasperated. “We’re not doing anything—”
In the blink of an eye, Armani had risen from his chair, taken my face in his hands and shut me the hell up with a kiss. And not just any tentative little first kiss—a breath-stealing, heart-pounding, fade-to-black kind of showstopper. I found I wasn’t nearly as exhausted as I’d thought. With minds of their own, my fingers buried themselves in his hair, reveling in the feel of the thick strands, kneading his scalp. My thoughts scattered as his tongue thrust inside my mouth and I gasped in reaction.
His hands slid from my face, down over my wet camisole, just brushing my breasts before settling on my hips. I was no longer cold—superheated was more like it—but wet was another matter.
Armani pushed himself away. Without looking at me, he muttered, “I’ll start the water running and wait just outside the door so I can hear you if you fall.” And he escaped into the only other room in my apartment, the bathroom.
My head fell to the table in frustration and sudden weakness. In the time it took him to get things ready, a series of unworthy thoughts flitted through my mind—pulling him in with me, faking a fall, flat-out asking him to wash my back. But I wasn’t going to trick Armani into anything. He either wanted me or he didn’t.
Still, I couldn’t help a bit of teasing, allowing a breast to brush his arm as he escorted me to the bath.
“I may need help with these wet clothes,” I said, damaged throat making it come out all husky.
He shot me a sidelong look. “At this point, I don’t think the bath would do those clothes any harm.”
“Such a gentleman,” I answered with a roll of my eyes.
“I am a gentleman. That’s why you’re on your own with those clothes.” Then he decided to turn my teasing back on me. “Besides, if I were to take them off, I’d need to taste you right—” the hand not supporting me rose to ever-so-gently slide over my throat until his thumb caressed the hollow, “—here.”
My nipples practically stood at attention, pushing noticeably against my camisole. The look he gave me was hot enough to scorch and smug besides.
I had no comeback.
“Speechless? Hmm, I’ll have to remember that.”
Which sounded promising, like maybe he’d do it again sometime, regardless of his “me heap big by-the-book cop” speech of earlier.
I wanted to give him something to remember all right, but with my legs wiggling like limp spaghetti, now didn’t seem the time. We made it into the bathroom without incident—or rather I did. The room was barely big enough for me by my lonesome. Even toweling off presented challenges. Once I was through the door, Armani closed it behind me, leaving a gap too thin even for a peep show.
As soon as he heard me settle into the water, the grilling began, evaporating my pleasant erotic buzz. Why had I been on the beach? Was I investigating a lead I’d failed to share with the police? What the hell had I been doing in that water? What in the blue blazes had ha
ppened out there? Okay, he really didn’t talk like that, but the effect was the same. I told him everything, quietly, painfully, including that I’d planned to go from the beach right to the station to talk about a possible link to Sierra Talbot’s death, but when it came to what had happened, I pleaded for a break.
My throat felt like someone had attacked it with sandpaper and ammonia, but more than that I needed to think. If I told him I’d been fighting with the killer, he’d demand to know why I hadn’t told him sooner. He might even insist on some kind of protective custody. If I didn’t fess up, I’d have to invent a plausible explanation for my condition and my brain didn’t seem to have thawed out just yet.
Generally, I’d found the truth, or a good portion thereof, would garner a lot less trouble than fabrication in the long run. In this case, though, with the truth so much stranger than fiction…
Getting out of the tub was like a really bad sitcom sketch—in a late-night slot due to the nudity and language. I got myself nearly upright before the strength in my legs gave up the ghost and they went straight out from under me. I bit down on a yelp to keep Armani from running to my rescue and grabbed frantically for the towel bar, which held for like a microsecond before coming half out of the wall and almost taking me down with it. I brought one knee up to catch my weight on the edge of the tub, but I was clumsy. Kneecap impacted with porcelain and exploded in pain.
Armani burst through the door at the commotion and grabbed me before the other half of the towel rack could give way. I clutched at him gratefully, as humiliating as it was, because the alternative was to go down in a soggy naked heap.
“You okay?” he asked, looking into my eyes and nowhere else.
My face had to match my burgundy towels, now spilling onto the floor, trailing in the puddle I’d created. “Sorry, I just, kinda, lost it for a second there.”
“No problem. Want me to carry you?”
I think I made a sound something like urk. “No, but if you could get me—” my hand went involuntarily to my throat as it flared in pain, “—a robe.”
I waved vaguely toward the peg at the back of the door. Armani eased me down onto the edge of the tub before slowly releasing me, watching all the while to be sure I wouldn’t topple over in his absence.
As soon as he tossed the robe to me, I slid it carefully on, relieved to have even that much covering. The red silk wrap with black Chinese dragons climbing either side only came to mid-thigh, but it was enough. Unfortunately, I couldn’t seem to make my shaking hands work enough to cinch it.
“Why don’t I help you with that?”
Eyes averted to a cartoonish degree, Armani grabbed both ends of the belt and tied it into a hasty knot. Apparently, the sight of my naked body was just too horrible to face. Or he’s being a gentleman just like he said earlier, my inner Pollyanna piped up. Yeah, my inner cynic retorted, like any man with a pulse would willingly pass up a view of a woman in the buff. It shouldn’t have hurt so much. I was used to rejection, albeit a little farther down the road.
Okay, so my inner cynic had rebooted. Time to see if I could get my inner wench back online.
“I know how much that performance must have impressed you,” I breathed, “but you think you can help me to my bed without losing all control?”
“I’ll try to contain myself,” he answered wryly.
He draped one of my arms around his shoulder and helped me creak to my feet and hobble to the edge of my bed.
“Turn around,” I ordered.
Armani rolled his eyes. “It’s not like I’m going to attack you or anything,” he said, turning his back.
“Yeah, I got that loud and clear,” I snapped. Great, a multiple personality free-for-all going on in my head and my inner censor was a no-show.
Unable to face Armani, I reached into the bedside table and snapped out a pair of panties to go under the oversized T-shirt I slept in.
He whirled me around by the shoulder, stunning the bejeebers out of me. “Dammit, what is your problem? Do you want me to attack you?”
I sneered at him, the best defense being a good offense. “Heavens no. Wouldn’t want you to do anything distasteful.”
“Freakin’ women and their damn push-me-pull-you routine—”
“First of all,” I barked, warming to the fight, “I don’t see any other women here, so if you’re going to insult me, at least treat me as an individual. Second, you’re the one with the whole catch me, kiss me, grill me, ignore me shtick.”
Armani’s face was red verging on purple. “So your defense is that we’re both screwed up.”
“I didn’t realize I needed a defense, Detective.”
He threw his hands up in the air. “Fine. This was a lousy idea anyway.”
“So you’ve said. Well, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”
Armani stomped off, steam practically streaming out of his ears.
My throat ached. My heart—no, my pride—stung. You’d have thought that would be enough to keep me awake. You’d be wrong.
I went facedown on the mattress, exhaustion having its wicked way with me, and stayed that way. Before unconsciousness rose up to meet me, it flitted through my head that the argument had successfully quashed any further questioning about the events of the day.
Chapter Nine
“Freakin’ gods, think they own everything.”
—Uncle Niko, just before getting fried in a freak electrical storm
A blast of music shocked me awake hours later, kicking my heart straight into high gear. George Thorogood and the Delaware Destroyers had possessed my laptop.
Not that I realized that’s what it was at first. Oh, no, not the way today was going. No, first I had to destroy my clock radio, thinking it was my freakin’ alarm. It wasn’t until that failed to stop the window-rattling rendition of “Who Do You Love?” that I blearily looked around for the source and discovered a shimmering image whirling ever larger on the black screen of my laptop, which should have been both closed and off.
Great, I thought, none too clearly, now I’ve got a computer virus on top of the rest of today’s weirdness. I stumbled out of bed and over to my desk, hoping somehow to nip this new problem in the bud and discovered two things: the actual words being sung were “Who Do You Trust?” and it was a helluva good Thorogood impression. When the image finally stopped spinning and my stomach stopped trying to rebel, it looked like some kind of animal icon lip-synching to the words—a sort of svelte wolf playing air guitar.
“Coyote?” I ventured, speaking the thought as it occurred.
The figure and sound both halted abruptly. Then the icon seemed to take stock of itself.
“Right,” it said, still in Thorogood’s voice. “Hold on, let me slip into something more comfortable.”
The coyote blinked and, as if changing channels, was suddenly a raven, another blink and then a rabbit, a fox, a man with too many legs, a scrawny old gent and, finally, a youth in a toga and winged sandals hovering mid-screen.
“Ah, that’s better,” he sighed, now sounding more like Zorba the Greek.
“Great, do you do parties?” I asked wryly.
He waggled his brows at me. “Actually, yes, but I prefer the adult kind.”
I groaned, really, really not in the mood. “Great, I witness one little murder and I get an immortal infestation. Look, you may not be able to tell, but I’m in serious need of my beauty sleep, so if you don’t mind—”
“Hey, hey, hey, far as I can tell, aside from the bed wrinkles—” he waved an airy hand at my chest/neck area, “—sleep’s been good to you. Besides, I’m a busy man. Messages to carry, mischief to make. It takes effort to make an entrance. Least you can do is show some appreciation.”
I sighed. If Coyote, or Hermes as he appeared now, was determined to play his little tricks on me, there wasn’t a damn thing I could do about it, far as I could tell. Maybe if I just heard him out I could keep things short and sweet.
“Okay, so you hav
e a message for me?” I asked.
“Of sorts,” he answered, now studying his cuticles in a pouting sort of way.
“Who do you trust?” I prompted.
He played with a nail that obviously hadn’t met his approval.
“Uh huh,” he answered vaguely, as if his full attention were elsewhere.
“Great. Do you think you could be any less helpful?”
He glanced up at me reproachfully. “Do you even have to ask?”
“Okay, well, this has been enlightening. Thanks so much for taking time out of your busy schedule—”
I turned back toward my nice warm bed, way too tired for twenty questions.
“Let me ask you something,” he demanded casually from the screen behind me. “Do you really think the water divinities give a damn about what goes on in Holly-weird?”
My brain must still have been foggy from sleep. The question didn’t track.
“What?” I asked, turning back reluctantly, only to find his eyes riveted on the spot where my jammie shirt cut off mid-thigh. I defiantly refused to dive modestly for the covers. Sadly, I didn’t think Hermes minded the lack of reaction.
“Hello, they’re called legs. Not like you’ve never seen them before. You were saying,” I prodded.
“Hmm, yes,” he continued, completely unfazed, “I just have to wonder whether they were truly in town to catch the show, you know.”
“Is there a message in here somewhere?” I asked, losing patience.
“Somewhere,” he agreed. “At least now you know the questions.”
Hermes smacked his lips and finally drew his eyes upward to meet mine. “Well, it’s been, as you say, enlightening, but—” he smoothed down his toga, which, oh looky there, didn’t fit as well as it had previously, “—I must away.”
And with the snap of a finger he was whirling around again, shrinking all the while with Def Leppard’s “Pour Some Sugar on Me” as his exit music.
Bad Blood: Latter-Day Olympians Page 7