by Dawn Brown
She felt like a woman now, though. A slight smile pulled at her lips. Her skin still tingled with memory of Des’s thorough touch, the wet exploration of his mouth. Good Lord, she couldn’t remember the last time sex had been this good, or feeling so quietly content afterward.
Des’s heartbeat slowed beneath her ear. Maybe he’d fallen asleep. She shifted on the bed to get a better look at his face.
“No,” he groaned, “I’m sorry. I can’t possibly go again.”
Exhausted and well sated, she merely giggled. “Where’s the prowess I thought I’d get with a younger man?”
“Four times is plenty of prowess. A personal record, actually.”
“Oh, don’t sound so wounded. If we went again, I doubt I’d be able to walk tomorrow.”
Des chuckled and pulled her against him. His lips brushed the top of her head. Something pulled tightly in her chest at the tenderness of his kiss, filling her with all kinds of unwelcome flutters.
Good sex and love were not the same thing. Bad enough she’d broken her own rule about getting involved with a source, the last thing she needed to do was confuse lust with actual emotion.
“Do you have brothers or sisters?” he asked suddenly.
She blinked at the sudden shift in conversation. “Two sisters.”
“What are they like?”
She tilted her face to look up at him, but his expression was inscrutable. “Where are you going with this?”
“Nowhere…I’m curious about you…is that bad?” His fingers fiddled absently with the ends of her hair.
“No, it’s not bad.” Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling there was something more than idle curiosity driving his questions. “I have two sisters. One older and one younger. Maura is the oldest, and she’s nauseatingly perfect. She’s a stay-at-home mom who makes Martha Stewart look like a slacker. She and her perfect investment banker husband have two perfect children, a boy and a girl. The only time they are less than perfect is when they spend the day with Auntie Shayne and she fills their little bellies with candy and junk food.”
“You’re pure evil.”
She grinned. “It’s true, I am.”
“What about your other sister?”
“Aiden’s perfect too, but not in the sterile way Maura is. She works for a magazine, in the art department. She’s engaged to her college boyfriend, who worships the ground she walks on. The whole thing is sickeningly sweet.”
“That leaves you.”
“Well, I’d say you know me rather intimately, wouldn’t you?”
“You have two perfect sisters, how are you perfect?”
“Um, I think we can safely say I’m about as far from perfect as one can get.”
“I don’t know about that.” His hand drifted down and cupped her breast. Her nipple tightened immediately. “You seem perfect to me.”
“Please, no cheese after great sex.” He chuckled, the sound bringing a smile to her lips. “And I wasn’t fishing for compliments, by the way. I meant in my parents’ eyes, my sisters have it together, while I…don’t.”
“How are you less than perfect?”
“Well, not being able to bear children, followed by my divorce, didn’t help to convince my parents I had my life together. But their real issue is my work. My father thinks I’m an unnatural woman—his words—because of my preoccupation with death, and, well, my mother doesn’t acknowledge what I do. She tells people I’m unemployed. One of her friends keeps emailing me job postings.”
Des laughed aloud this time. “Your parents are cracked.” He rolled her beneath him, positioning himself between her legs and caging her head between his arms. “There is nothing unnatural about you.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “And you’re an excellent writer.”
“Yeah? How would you know?”
“I read one of your books.”
Sure you did. “Which one?”
“The one about the guy who murdered his friend’s wife, then eventually went after his friend’s daughter, killed her and didn’t get caught until years later.”
An odd swelling filled her chest. She reached out and stroked his cheek. “You did read it. When?”
“Shortly after I threatened to sue you. I’d heard you were planning to speak to some people in town. I knew you’d be going ahead with your book with or without my family’s cooperation. I figured I better see what kind of writer you were.”
She tensed, uncomfortable with the turn the conversation had taken. “And?”
“I liked that you concentrated on the investigation rather than the gore. You’re a good writer. I just didn’t want you writing about my family.”
Doubt unfurled low in her belly. In the dark bedroom, she couldn’t read his expression. Did he feel guilty for sleeping with her? Like he was betraying Julia, his mother and brother? Shayne didn’t want to be anyone’s regret, but especially not his.
“Are you sorry?” she blurted out.
“What?”
Insecurity swirled inside her. She wasn’t sure she wanted to hear his answer, but after a seven-year marriage to a man who cast her aside like a broken toy, she wouldn’t let herself shy away from difficult questions again. “Are you sorry we had sex?”
“My God, no,” he said, incredulous. “Why would you think that?”
“I wondered if by being with me you felt like you were betraying your family.”
“Don’t ever think that,” Des said, cupping her face with both hands. His mouth found hers and he kissed her, hard and fierce.
Still, doubt nagged at her. “I would never use what’s going on between us for my book. Do you trust me?”
“More than anyone I’ve ever known.” He kissed her again. This time with a tenderness that stole her breath. “Do you have regrets?”
“No,” she told him truthfully. Despite the many reasons why getting involved with him was a bad idea, she liked him, more than she should, given that whatever was happening between them had nowhere to go once she left Dark Water. Still, she had enough to deal with. She’d cross that bridge when she had to. “I want to be careful not to blur the lines between you and me and my work.”
A wry smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “You’re not going to like what I’m about to tell you.”
Suspicion coiled tightly in her stomach. “Well, don’t keep me in suspense.”
“I’ve decided to help you with the book.”
Had she heard him right? “My book? How exactly would you do that?”
“I’ll answer your questions. I know who you should speak to in my family, and I’ll convince them to talk. My only stipulation is you stay away from Julia.”
She sat up, gathering the sheet in a ball against her chest to hide her nudity.
“You know,” he said, gently tugging at the blankets, “I’ve seen everything up close and personal. You don’t need to cover up.”
“I do, actually. This is serious. I don’t understand why you would go against your family to help me.”
He sighed and sat up too, not bothering to make any attempt to cover himself. She forced her gaze to remain on his face, refusing to let her attention wander down his hard-sculpted body.
“I’m not loyal to anyone in my family—except maybe Ian.” He shrugged. “The truth is, if it were up to me, I’d have nothing to do with any of them.”
“Why are you living here, working for the family business?”
“Julia embezzled from one of Heddi’s companies. I convinced Heddi not to press charges by agreeing to pay the money back. Since the prospect of having the money returned combined with the opportunity to make my life hell was far more appealing than sending Julia to jail, she agreed.”
There really wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do to protect his sister. Yet, where was Julia when he needed her? He’d given up everything to help her, and she didn’t seem to have any problem leaving him here holding the bag. That kind of loyalty was impressive, but it could be dangerous too.
“Are you h
elping me to spite your grandmother?” She didn’t like the sound of that.
He leaned closer to her. “I don’t want anything bad to happen to you. I can help you get the answers you need faster and get you out of Dark Water before anything else happens. As much as I would hate to see you go, Heddi’s dangerous.”
Warmth rolled through her, easing the icy knots in her stomach. “You’re very sweet, but I can take care of myself.”
“I know you can, but I’m still going to help. And I want to go with you tomorrow.”
Oh no, he couldn’t do that. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Until, you’re done with your book, I’m going to stick close. You shouldn’t be on your own.”
“You don’t have to worry. I won’t even be in Dark Water tomorrow. I’ll be in the city.”
“I don’t want you to be by yourself in case Heddi has someone following you.”
“I plan to do more than sign paperwork tomorrow. I’m going to try to see your father while I’m there.”
Des paled, and he hesitated before speaking, as if carefully choosing his words. “I don’t even know what he looks like. I could pass him on the street and not even know who he is.”
“If you’re considering meeting the man, you need to think about what that means. I don’t want you to do anything rash, anything you’re not ready for,” she told him, the memory of his reaction to his father’s voice still clear in her mind.
“I don’t know what I’ll do about him. I might wait in the car.” His mouth lifted in a smug grin. “But one thing I do know, there’s no way I’m letting you out of my sight.”
Chapter Thirteen
“In cases of familicide, often the presence of stepchildren increases the risk of violence.”
—excerpt from Blood and Bone by Shayne Reynolds
“How in the hell did you ever end up married to that guy?” Des asked, slamming the car door behind him.
Heat crept into Shayne’s cheeks as she slid the key into the ignition. “It’s a long, involved story that doesn’t put me in the best light.”
The truth was, while she’d been sitting across from her ex for the past thirty minutes, she’d been asking herself the same question. God, had he always been that obnoxious, or had today been special? Maybe she shouldn’t have brought Des with her. Not that she hadn’t tried talking him out of coming, for all the good it had done.
She looked up as Travis strode purposefully in front of her car toward his silver SUV, Sandy at his side. The seven years they’d been married seemed distant, like a dream, or a movie she’d watched ages ago. He looked the same as he always had—gray suit over his football-player build, short blond hair—and yet like a complete stranger.
She glanced at Des next to her. The two men couldn’t be more dissimilar. Des, like the anti-Travis, leaned casually against the passenger seat, body lean, wearing faded jeans and another ugly shirt—this one black with a big, orange buddha on the front. His hair touched his collar, long compared to Travis’s near crew cut.
She shifted her gaze to Sandy, the woman fair and petite, a slight stretch in her sundress over her small baby bump, the only hint she was pregnant.
Perhaps Shayne wasn’t the only one looking for the complete opposite of what she’d had in their marriage.
She gripped the gearshift, and glanced behind her, but Des covered her hand with his. She turned and met his gaze.
“She’s pregnant,” he said.
Her cheeks heated, though she had no idea why his observation embarrassed her. “I told you he’d moved on to try for that family.”
“You did, I just didn’t realize you meant he’d actually succeeded.”
Please don’t ask me if I’m okay.
Instead, he squeezed her hand gently, his eyes dark with concern. “Like I said, he’s an asshole.”
Despite his words, the quiet compassion in his tone and expression caught her off guard. A lump thickened in her throat, and she nodded, unable to speak until she coughed lightly.
“I’m fine,” she told him, even though he hadn’t asked. She wished her voice didn’t rasp. “I knew about the baby. I’m okay with it.”
And that was true. So why the sudden surge of emotion? But she knew why, even if she didn’t want to acknowledge the answer. Des’s concern for her feelings touched her more than she cared to admit.
She dropped her gaze to their joined hands, but Des slipped his fingers beneath her chin and tilted her head up. His thumb traced a slight arch back and forth beneath her lower lip. Her heart stilled, and a warm shiver raced through her. He took her mouth with his, in a soft, almost-chaste kiss. The tenderness squeezed her heart.
Oh no, she couldn’t feel things like this for him. Whatever was between her and Des had no potential for growth, nowhere to go.
She pulled back. “We should go.”
He frowned, but nodded. “Okay.”
She slid her hand from his grip, backed out of the parking space, then steered from the lot onto the busy street. They drove for a while in silence, neither of them willing to bring up their next destination. Not surprising really. During the two-hour drive from Dark Water, Robert Anderson’s name was never mentioned once. And while Des had appeared nonchalant and upbeat most of the time, more than once Shayne had caught him, staring pensively out the window, as he was now, a vertical line creasing the flesh between his brows.
“We need to talk about your father,” she said, carefully.
“Anderson,” he corrected, without looking away from the rapidly passing office buildings and factories alongside the highway.
“Your decision to meet him is entirely up to you, but I need you to understand I’m following up on details for my book.”
He turned and looked at her, brows drawn tightly, eyes narrowed. “Like what?”
“I have a few questions about some information he gave me.” She hoped Anderson didn’t start with his innocence claims. They’d infuriate Des. “I also want to ask him some questions about your mother’s activities before the murders. Her first husband implied she was involved with someone else right before her death. I’m hoping I can verify if Anderson also believed she was having an affair.”
God help Shayne if Heddi discovered the angle she was following, Des thought. Heddi would have Tic on her so fast Shayne’s head would spin. And nothing he said or did would stop the woman.
All his life, Heddi had held his mother before him like paragon, a virtual saint whose life he’d ended with his mere conception. Maybe she wasn’t perfect after all. An odd weight lifted from his chest, only to slam back down as Shayne exited the highway, turning onto a narrow city street clogged with traffic.
Almost there.
Des’s stomach churned. Did he really want to go through with this? Meet the man he couldn’t even refer to as his father? He had to. There was no way in hell he was letting Shayne face Anderson alone.
She drove to a small complex of run-down garden apartments, pulled into the nearest visitor’s parking and shut down the engine. The wind whistled through unseen cracks around the windows. Outside, fat cumulus clouds swept across the sky, rapidly blotting out the blue.
Shayne turned to him. “You don’t have to come if you’re not ready for this.”
He wasn’t ready, not by a long shot. He would have been perfectly happy to go through the rest of his life never knowing the man. But he wasn’t about to wait in the car while Shayne chatted up a two-time killer. “I’m going.”
Together, they got out of the car and crossed the parking lot to a chipped concrete path that led to the front door. The chilly wind whipped around them. A reminder summer was almost over, fall on its way.
With his pulse pounding in his ears, Des pulled open the heavy steel-and-security-glass door, moving aside to let Shayne pass. They stepped into a small lobby that served the four apartments in the block—two up and two down. A mix of cooked foods mingled with the pungent stink of cat urine. Des held his breath as Sh
ayne pressed the buzzer for Anderson’s place.
This was it. No turning back.
He looked to the security door dividing the lobby from the ground floor apartments, and wiped his damp palms on his jeans. No one came.
She hit the buzzer again.
Still no answer.
Relief slid over him, draining away the tension in his muscles. Thank God, he wasn’t home.
“Son of a bitch,” Shayne muttered. “Why would he make a point of giving me so many ways to contact him if he was going to avoid me?”
Shayne sounded distracted, like she was thinking out loud rather than asking his opinion, so Des didn’t bother replying. She moved to the security door and peered through the reinforced glass.
“That’s his apartment there, on the left,” she said.
“So? He’s not home.”
“Maybe. I have an idea.”
He didn’t like the sound of that. He followed her outside, but instead of heading to the car, she started around the side of the building.
“Where are you going?” he asked, falling into step beside her.
“I’m going around back to peek inside through his window to see if he’s there or not.”
She couldn’t be serious, but she was. They walked past a patio with rusted bicycles shoved between a brick wall and yellowed, plastic lawn furniture. “What if he is there?”
“At least I’ll know if he’s out, or trying to avoid me.”
The next patio didn’t have anything atop the uneven stones. The balcony for the apartment above created an overhang, helping protect against the wind, as Shayne made her way to the sliding-glass doors. Heavy drapes had been drawn across the window inside, leaving only a narrow gap to see through. She cupped her hands around her eyes to block out her reflection while she peered in.