Private Passions

by JoAnn Ross

  “I’d say that’s pretty obvious.”

  “Is it?” She considered that a moment. “You don’t really think it has something to do with my books?”

  “I know damn well it does,” he growled, frustration rearing its ugly head again. “Do you still have that .25 I gave you?”

  He’d given her the gun when she was being stalked. He’d also taken her to the police range and taught her how to shoot it. And although it had made her uneasy, she couldn’t deny that the blue-steel pistol had provided a certain sense of security.

  “It’s in the bottom drawer of my dresser, beneath some sweatshirts. I try not to think about it.”

  “You might want to move it to the top drawer.”

  “Surely you don’t believe—”

  “Dammit, Desiree, the guy uses the same ribbons you wrote into your book.”

  “I’m willing to concede that’s a remarkable coincidence. Not that he uses the ribbons, but that of all the reporters in town, he picked me to send the flowers to. But I still believe it’s only a lucky fluke on his part. He probably doesn’t even understand the significance of what he’s done.”

  “I wish to hell I could believe that.”

  “You could if you weren’t always looking at the dark side of life.”

  “It’s my job to look at the dark side,” he reminded her. “To go where the good people of New Orleans don’t want to go. And to deal with the kind of garbage taxpayers want carted away.”

  Like her stalker. Once again, Desiree had to concede that he had a point. And for not the first time, she wondered how he found the strength to remain in such a demanding, depressing job day after day.

  “The taxpayers definitely got their money’s worth when you joined the force, O’Malley.” Her hand was still nestled inside his large, strong one. She linked their fingers together and gave him a warm and genuine smile. “I told Karyn that you’re one of the good guys.”

  “You were talking about me? With Karyn?” For a man who’d faced down more than his share of armed perpetrators, the absolute terror in the detective’s voice was almost laughable.

  “Just girl talk, O’Malley.” She patted his cheek.

  “Girl talk.” He leaned his head back against a pillar and briefly closed his eyes. “I’m undoubtedly doomed.”

  “Not a chance. Unless every instinct I’ve got has gone on the blink, the lady’s as hooked on you as you are on her.”

  His eyes popped open and he gave her a glance that was more than a little self-conscious. “Do you think so?”

  “Absolutely.”

  He considered that for a long moment, then shrugged, as if putting the matter of his romantic life behind him for more important subjects.

  “So here’s the plan,” he said, his tone revealing that he’d fallen back into his cop mode. “You’re not going to have anything to do with this guy. I don’t care if he sends you enough flowers to build a freaking Rose Bowl float. I don’t care if he writes you letters every day, ties them with red satin ribbons and seals them with a kiss. You’re to pretend you’ve never heard of him.”

  “That’s ridiculous!”

  “What’s ridiculous is the idea of a reporter—a female reporter—getting chummy with some sicko who reads rape fantasies in novels, then gets off on reenacting them in real life.”

  “There was no real violence in any of my stories.” Desiree felt obliged to defend her work yet again. “In each case, the theme of the tale is the heroine getting a fantasy man to do what she wants, while outwardly seeming to be forced to do what he wants. Being at the mercy of a physical force so much stronger than the heroine herself allows her—and the reader—to remain blameless for her most secret, politically incorrect desires.”

  “Dammit, I’m not going to sit here and argue political correctness with you, Desiree!” he exploded. “I’m not going to argue about this point, period. Not while a serial rapist is running around loose. You’re not to have anything to do with the guy.”

  “Are you speaking as a friend or a cop?”

  “Both.” He spat out the single word from between clenched teeth. “As a friend—and a man who once loved you—I refuse to accept the idea of you being in danger.”

  “And as a cop?”

  “I won’t let you screw up my investigation.”

  “Ah.” She nodded. “Now we’re getting to the gist of the matter.”

  “Dammit, Desiree!”

  He jumped to his feet and glared down at her. In the past, whenever they got to this point, the arguments would escalate until one of them—or both—would lose control. Fury would usually be followed in quick succession by passion, which inevitably led to lovemaking that was every bit as stormy as their fights.

  There had been a time, not so long ago, when Desiree had believed that they might have made it, if they could have only stayed in bed twenty-four hours a day.

  O’Malley took hold of her shoulders, his long fingers digging into the flesh beneath her sweater. “This isn’t a fantasy. It isn’t make believe. This guy’s all too real. And he’s dangerous. I don’t want you getting involved.”

  “But I am involved. And if I ignore him, what’s to stop him from going out and getting rid of his anger by raping some other unsuspecting woman?” If that happened, Desiree knew she’d never be able to forgive herself.

  “He’s already raping unsuspecting women,” O’Malley reminded her succinctly. “He doesn’t seem to need any additional motivation.”

  “What if I agree to meet with him?” The thought had been growing in the back of her mind since she’d first read the note that had accompanied the roses.

  “Are you crazy?”

  “You could use me as bait.” She decided against mentioning that she’d seen just such a plot device lots of times in the movies.

  Desiree’s journalistic instincts were humming. Talk about a scoop! Nabbing the French Quarter rapist and saving the city’s Mardi Gras would not only make the mayor and city council very happy, it could well earn her a coveted spot at the network.

  “Like hell I will!” There was a wild flurry of wings as O’Malley’s explosive response caused the ducks gliding on the blue-green waters of Whooping Crane pond to take to the sky.

  The two of them stood there, him glaring down at her, her looking defiantly back at him, until finally O’Malley proved he could still surprise her.

  “You know,” he murmured, “as much as I hate to admit it, that’s not such a bad idea.”

  “Really?” The possibility of going undercover to catch a rapist had her feeling a lot like Wonder Woman.

  “Really.” He got that familiar, faraway look in his eyes that told Desiree he was working out a plan. “First, I want you to withhold the story. So he’ll think you’re ignoring him,” he added, when she opened her mouth to argue.

  “Oh. That’s a good idea. It should make him frustrated and angry enough to make a mistake.”

  “Let’s hope. We’ll tap your phone at home. And your extension at work. Then, when the creep contacts you again, try to set up a meeting.”

  “I’ll convince him to meet with me somehow.” Excitement pulsed through her veins.

  “You’re not meeting anyone.”

  “But—”

  “We’ll have an undercover policewoman impersonate you, then we’ll nab the sicko son-of-a-bitch.”

  So much for Wonder Woman. Knowing when she was outgunned, Desiree decided she should at least hold out for Lois Lane. “I don’t like sharing center stage, but I suppose I don’t have any choice.” She shrugged and reminded herself that she still knew more about this case than any other reporter in town. “I’ll make you a deal.”

  “You’re not in any position to negotiate,” he reminded her. “But I’m willing to listen.”

  “I’ll agree to keep the story off the air. For now. But I get an exclusive when the guy’s arrested.”

  He swore, but without heat. “Sold.”

  He tossed their empty cardb
oard coffee cups into a nearby trash can. As they walked back to the unmarked police car, Desiree was so caught up in the excitement of the moment that she failed to see the man, clad in black jeans and a black cashmere sweater, who was watching her intently from the shadows of an ancient oak tree.

  * * *

  ROMAN WAS SLOUCHED in a chair in the library of his allegedly haunted home, staring unseeingly out at the tangle that had once been a lovely Southern garden. Beside the French doors, Desiree’s book Private Passions lay on the faded oriental carpet where it had landed when he’d thrown it across the room. Ironically, it had landed open to the short story he’d read all night long. Over and over again. As he had for the past three days, ever since Desiree Dupree had first shown up at his door.

  Myriad erotic images from the book kept flashing in front of his mind’s eye, like the seemingly never-ending mirrors in a carnival fun house. Images of women tied with red satin ribbons. Images of Desiree Dupree dressed in lacy lingerie, in black leather, in a short-skirted, white-fur-trimmed Santa’s helper dress.

  None of these dark fantasies would have been all that disturbing were it not for one fatal image that kept popping up in those endless mirrors, like a devilish joker in Mephistopheles’s private deck of cards.

  A reflection of himself. Dressed all in black. With blood on his hands.

  Cursing, Roman dragged himself out of the chair and poured another glass of brandy from the new bottle he’d opened sometime during the long and sleepless night. Although it was not normal behavior for him to be drinking before noon, these were far from normal days.

  The phone rang. And rang. As it had been doing for days.

  Cradling the snifter in his hands, he listened as the answering machine picked up, expecting to hear his agent’s voice inquiring where the hell he was and why he wasn’t returning his calls. There was a movie deal on the table for Killing Her Softly. It was irresponsible, not to mention crazy, to turn incommunicado when so much money was at stake, the frustrated male voice had pointed out time and time again.

  Roman took a long swallow of the brandy, prepared to ignore the call as he had all the others. But then the voice that had been haunting both his waking and sleeping hours came over the answering machine.

  “Hello, Mr. Falconer?” Desiree’s polite tone was far from intimate. Nevertheless, it stirred him in ways he didn’t want to be stirred. “This is Desiree Dupree.” As if he wouldn’t recognize that throaty voice in the dark. Lord help him, especially in the dark.

  There was a slight pause, as if she sensed he was standing there listening, and she was waiting for him to pick up. Not on a bet, sweetheart.

  During these long, grueling, semidrunken hours of introspection, he’d decided that getting anywhere near the woman would be too damn dangerous.

  Dangerous for him.

  And more to the point, dangerous for her.

  His fingers tightened on the stem of the glass.

  “I was calling about that date you paid for. Since I’m not one to welsh on a deal, especially when it’s for a good cause, I thought perhaps, if you weren’t doing anything tonight...well, as it happens, I’m free.”

  She paused again. Utilizing every ounce of his willpower, Roman refrained from scooping up the receiver. “If you’d like, that is.”

  Another pause, a bit longer than the first. Roman pictured her combing her hand through her thick hair in frustration. And, he sensed, a bit of self-consciousness she was not accustomed to experiencing.

  “Of course, if you’d like to just call the entire thing off, that’s fine with me.”

  This time when she paused he caught the faint murmur of a curse so colorful it almost made him smile. Almost.

  “It’s just that you seemed so determined, I expected to hear from you. And when you didn’t call, I thought...”

  Another curse, a bit louder and even more pungent than the first. This time Roman felt his lips lift into a stiff half smile. Funny, after the other night he wouldn’t have thought he’d ever have anything to smile about again.

  Life, he decided was filled with surprises. Most of them these days were bad. As for Desiree, the jury was still out on her.

  “Oh, hell, Falconer. If you want to go out, give me a call. If not, that’s fine with me. I’m not going to sit around waiting by the phone like all your other women.”

  After she’d slammed the receiver down, he crossed the room to the machine, rewound the tape, then pressed play.

  As her inimitable voice curled around him once again, Roman sipped his brandy and reminded himself that any involvement would be a mistake.

  A mistake bound to prove as fatal as it was inevitable.

  He heard a crack. Glancing down, he realized that the stem of the snifter had snapped, spilling brandy over his hand and down the front of his black jeans. He’d never realized the stems were that fragile.

  As he watched the crimson blood begin to flow from the cut on his finger, Roman decided there must have been a flaw in the crystal.

  * * *

  DAMN THE MAN! Three days after her unsettling talk with O’Malley in Audubon Park, Desiree was tapping furiously away at her keyboard, turning her notes from an interview with a murderer on death row into a lead story. Although the station had several competent, well-paid writers on staff, she’d never wanted to be just another pretty face who stood in front of the camera like a well-dressed ventriloquist’s dummy and mouthed words someone else had written.

  “You’d better be careful,” Karyn said, pausing at her desk on the way to the editing room. “You pound on those poor keys any harder and you’re going to have to go on the air with a broken fingernail.”

  “And wouldn’t that be a tragedy,” Desiree muttered, not taking her eyes from the screen. “Probably cost us at least five points in the ratings.”

  “At least,” Karyn said good-naturedly. “Want to talk about it?”

  “There’s nothing to talk about.” She skimmed the story, satisfied that she’d caught the essence of the man in his final interview. The pictures Sugar had taken would supply the visual punch.

  “Whenever a woman says that she’s furious about nothing, it’s usually a man.” Karyn pushed aside a stack of memos and perched a hip on the corner of the desk. “Something going wrong with your love life?”

  “What love life?” Desiree muttered as she hit the Save key with unnecessary force.

  “Ah.” Karyn nodded. “I’m sorry.”

  “Oh, hell.” Fearing that Karyn was apologizing for having fallen in love with Michael, Desiree dragged her eyes from the screen and leaned back in her chair, willing her body and mind to relax.

  “I’m being a bitch. I know it. And believe me, I couldn’t be happier about you and O’Malley. Perhaps I am a little envious,” she admitted. “Of what the two of you have together. But it was never like that with Mike and me, Karyn. And it never would have been. We’re too different.”

  “Actually,” Karyn mused, “I think the problem might have been that you’re too much alike.”

  “How on earth did you come to that conclusion?”

  “You can’t deny that you both have an overwhelming need to be right. All of the time.”

  “So what’s wrong with being right?”

  She laughed. “Thanks for proving my point.” Her smile faded as she studied Desiree’s drawn face. “It’s the rapist, isn’t it?” she suggested.

  “Yes and no. I can’t figure out what he’s up to. Why would he send me flowers and write a note complaining about not getting any press, then, when I still don’t say a word about him on the air, not even bother to respond?”

  She glared over at the phone, which the police had tapped, willing it to ring. It wasn’t as if she really wanted to talk to the rapist, but the waiting was driving her crazy. And then there was the little matter of Roman Falconer....

  No! She was not going to think about the temperamental, enigmatic mystery writer.

  “Perhaps he got mad and left to
wn,” Karyn suggested, bringing her mind back to the other man who was never completely out of her thoughts these days. “Or maybe he’s dead.”

  “Dead? Why on earth would he be dead?”

  “Hey, even serial rapists must have heart attacks. Or get run over by a taxi, which in this town is more likely.”

  “One can only hope,” Desiree muttered. The headache she’d woken up with this morning was coming back. She reached into a drawer, poured two aspirins from a plastic bottle and swallowed them with a drink of cold coffee. “But I can’t quite shake the feeling that he’s still out there. Waiting.”

  “For what?”

  “That,” Desiree said, putting her cup down with a snap, “is the 64,000 question.”

  * * *

  THIS HAD TO STOP, dammit! Roman pointed the remote-control device at the television, darkening the screen. He needed Desiree Dupree in his life like he needed more of those damn nightmares that revealed more about the rapist’s crimes than he should know. But the ugly truth was he could not get her out of his mind.

  “If you’re not careful, pal,” he muttered, “you’re going to find yourself obsessed with the woman.”

  Which would, he reminded himself yet again, be a major mistake.

  He reached for the bottle of whiskey he’d switched back to after polishing off the brandy, then reminded himself of his resolution to cut down.

  Even as he vowed to refrain from watching any more newscasts, or even think of her, the doorbell rang, resounding through the house like a death knell.

  Roman felt a prickling sensation at the back of his neck. A second sense he’d always trusted kicked in, telling him that the object of all his consternation was standing on his front step.

  “Yet another well-intentioned resolution goes down the tubes,” he muttered. Surrendering to the inevitable, he went to answer the door.

  8

  THE ANGRY WORDS tumbling around in her mind were forgotten the moment the door swung open and Desiree found herself staring up into the most tortured, haggard face she’d ever seen.