Twenty Times Tempted: A Sexy Contemporary Romance Collection

by Petrova, Em

  There was also the ugly specter of I’m still married sitting out there, but I was working on that angle.

  The down side to us fucking all night like bunnies was that we hadn’t talked, not about the story, about us, who we were, what we wanted out of life. For that we needed time the universe wasn’t prepared to offer up in any great quantity.

  With the clock ticking, I had to move things along. Jackson was a martinet about tardiness and I had to get my head back in the game because the dangly bits weren’t co-operating with that plan. I made a mental note to stop at the Gap and pick up a couple pair of looser cut jeans because the brush burns from being squeezed like sausage into a too tight casing was growing old, fast.

  I said as much and made her laugh, easing the tension.

  I asked, “What’s your schedule today?” and pulled out the smart phone to make notes.

  “I have classes starting at ten, then meetings with profs, a makeup session tonight for my finance class.”

  “Give me a window to meet for dinner.”

  “Six, six-thirty?”

  It was going to be tight but if I was lucky I could manage it, so I suggested, “Let’s meet at O’Toole’s, alright? If I’m late, order me a Guinness and pastrami on rye.”

  “With dill pickles?”

  “Make it a double order. And I want to watch you suck them dry while I think dirty thoughts.”

  She laughed. “Okay, it’s a deal.”

  “I’ll call you if something comes up.” And then we grabbed our gear and power walked to the subway hand-in-hand.

  ***

  Jackson sat at the head of the conference table, the rest of us sprawled around the oval, shuffling papers, tapping onto netbook screens and flicking the plate of stale pastries back and forth.

  “Parv, you want to start?”

  My cohort in the investigation wiped his lips with the last napkin, the one we’d all been sharing through cream cheese and flakey bits of dried out dough.

  “Okay, here’s the deal. I hired the Thomas group to nose around and find out who was in town and who was still down in Miami making nice with the Haitians.” He slid copies of photographs around the table, some with palm trees and suspicious blood spatters, but most in and around Spanish Harlem and over by Central Park.

  Mac grunted and pointed to some faces I didn’t know while the contingent from downstairs hauled chairs into the packed room and apologized for being late.

  Jackson nodded to each in turn and indicated for Parvi to continue.

  “There’s no way in hell we go full frontal on these badasses. They’d come after our families first, then everyone else we ever knew from grade school on up.”

  Grant from downstairs grinned at Mac’s growl of “Fuck” and said, “That’s why we go in sideways. We keep the Feds mostly in the loop in case shit goes south.”

  I piped up, “Basically we only need to finger one man,” and I waggled for the one photo I’d yet to see, the one of Michael O’Brien, aka Malone. Parvi flipped it over for me to stare with that bowel-emptying feeling of dread at the picture of the man who’d hurt Taylor.

  Sweat beaded on my forehead and I clenched the edges of the eight-by-ten glossy, teeth clenched.

  “Rob? You know him?”

  “Rob.”

  “Uh, no. Not exactly.” Not in a way the men at the table would understand.

  I knew him more intimately than they could ever comprehend, having breathed in the essence of this asshole through the stench of fear and helpless anger coming off Taylor in waves. He’d hurt my lady—a push or shove, nothing really bad according to her—and I didn’t believe that for a minute.

  “Then tell us what you do know, son.” Jackson sometimes called me ‘son’ when I was poised to go off the deep end. Like now.

  I explained about Taylor and what he’d done to her, fucking her over for a percentage of her income, then helping himself to the entire pot when he had the legal means to do so, blowing through the money and abandoning her, broke, homeless, without a job.

  Jackson explained, “Ms. Richardson has come forward to offer us information on what transpired in Europe. She’ll provide dates, times, venues for when he pulled the cons, including whatever she gathered on his illegal gambling activities. She’s amassed a fairly impressive paper trail, including newspaper articles from Italian sources we wouldn’t normally have access to, let alone know about.”

  Parvi said, “And they aren’t nearly as plugged in as we are, so Google is not our friend in this case.”

  I added, “Part of the problem is that a lot of it is gossip, but you know the saying … where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

  Tony from downstairs asked, “Why hasn’t she taken this to the Italian authorities?”

  “That’s a good question, but the answer’s not so clear cut.” I explained the convoluted divorce laws as best I could. “He contested and she tried to offer as testimony his double-dipping from the two leagues, neither of which had much interest in being tagged in court.”

  Parvi picked up the story. “Basketball’s big business and insanely popular over there, including, hell … maybe especially the women’s leagues. The fans might love a juicy scandal under normal circumstances, but they wouldn’t take kindly to allegations of wrong-doing to interrupt their championship finals.”

  “So she picked the wrong time and place?”

  Parvi and I nodded together.

  Tony continued to pry, looking me over a little too critically for comfort. “You seem to know a lot about this woman.” I really didn’t like the way he said ‘this woman’ and braced for what was coming. “Sounds to me like maybe you have a more,” and he crooked his forefingers almost under my nose, “…personal interest?”

  “Van Horn.” Jackson’s voice carried a warning tone I seldom heard, whether directed to me or Tony I couldn’t be sure. “Sit. Down.”

  I didn’t remember standing up but my chair was cocked against the wall. I remembered even less gripping Tony’s forefingers in a bone-crunching grip and bending them back. To his credit he only grimaced and didn’t push back. If he had … well, we were thirty floors up and I had no trouble with throwing a man twenty pounds heavier than me through the plate glass window.

  “You got anything you want to tell us, Rob?” Jackson’s usually gruff voice had gone too soft, too menacing to ignore the implications. He wanted full disclosure about our relationship. If I spilled the beans, I’d be sidelined so fast my head would spin. My boss could even suspend or fire me. Not so much for my own good, but to make sure the bloody bottom line wasn’t cheated out of the story of the year.

  I couldn’t risk being shelved like that. When it hit the fan, I had no doubt O’Brien would come after Taylor and I needed to run that interference.

  Gritting my teeth, I spat out, “She’s my source and I fucking will protect my source.” I looked around the room, daring them to say different. You could cut the tension in that room with a knife but I wasn’t exposing our relationship until I could guarantee her safety. Even if that meant tying her to my bed until this mess was over with.

  Tony swallowed whatever snarky thing he wanted to say and instead asked, “So, do we know where this dude is?”

  Parvi smiled, revealing starkly white teeth against his dark olive complexion. “Our man’s right here, hanging with his boys and living large on the upper west side.”

  “Do we have an address?”

  “Oh yeah. And as we speak our Peg’s crawling up his financial ass. She’ll yodel as soon as she has a solid.”

  Jackson assigned each of us a task, everyone excepting me, and dismissed the crew into the din of the newsroom.

  “Walk with me, van Horn.”

  I followed him into his office and shut the door, then turned to find him pouring whiskey into two tumblers. He handed me one and asked, “Exactly how deep are you in, boy?”

  “All the way, Dave.”

  “Jesus, Rob, couldn’t you keep it in your
pants until this is over?”

  “No, sir, I couldn’t.”

  “Please don’t tell me it’s love.” When I didn’t answer, he sighed and chugged the caramel colored liquor. “The next thing you’ll tell me is you’re shopping for rings.” He looked me in the eye and muttered, “Don’t answer that.”

  “Sir, please don’t cut me out of this. It’s my story, I was the one who tracked all the coincidences. I don’t have enough to tie it into a pretty bow right now, but I’m damn close.”

  “What happens if you can’t close the noose over O’Brien?”

  “I go back to my original story. It’s still good and ought to make the front page.” Setting the tumbler on the desk, I leaned over it, my knuckles pressed into the scarred wood. “I want this, Dave, however I can get it.”

  “She’s trouble, van Horn.”

  “Yes, sir, that she is.”

  “I get you wanting to protect her, but if you get in O’Brien’s way I can’t stop him. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  I did, but that wasn’t going to stop me. If Taylor’s asshole husband wanted to come after her, he was going to have to go through me.

  “That man has friends, van Horn, friends you don’t want to get on your bad side.”

  “I don’t have a bad side, boss.”

  “Don’t get cocky, boy.” He pointed to the door, woodshed time over. “Go on, get out and do something useful.”

  “Sir.”

  “And, van Horn? Get me a goddamn Pulitzer.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Tay

  Cordie fidgeted, twirling the Styrofoam cup between her palms as if warming her hands, but I knew better. She had something on her mind, and in a rare fit of restraint, she was having second thoughts about voicing her opinion.

  That was worrisome on so many levels, I couldn’t begin to fathom what kind of lecture awaited. And unlike her normal brash approach, when she finally broached the topic, she came at it obliquely.

  “You could come and stay with us, dearest. You have finals, when?”

  “Next week. Monday.”

  Monday morning and evening to be exact, then grading. I’d already turned in my own work early. That’s what came of having time on your hands when the lord of the manor was off tilting at windmills.

  “Well, then. David has a friend who will be driving to Chicago for the break. Hmm, leaving Wednesday I do believe. I’m sure he’ll be happy to give you a lift.” She looked smug, far too smug for this to be a spur of the moment offer. “It’s on his way, after all.”

  I’m sure it was.

  “Did Rob put you up to this?”

  “Rob?”

  I stared, hard. She blinked.

  Gotcha.

  Taking a sip to put off the inevitable, she finally sighed and allowed that, “He only wants to see to your safety, Tay.”

  “What he wants is me out of the city, trussed in bubble wrap while he and his merry men circle the wagons.” That mixed a few metaphors and violated historical accuracy but there was no getting around the fact that whatever pile of shit Rob and his team had dug up, it was steaming hot and hitting the fan.

  It had also pulled him out of town, over his very loud objections, but he’d gone because he was the one who had found the original source material and whoever was offering up first person anecdotes on wrongdoing required one-on-one with Robert van Horn.

  Cordie continued, “Well, he has a point. If you think you’re being followed, then maybe it’s time to clear out and let the paper and the authorities deal with this in their own way.”

  “He doesn’t know, Cord, and don’t you dare tell him.”

  I’d let that one slip during our coffee break, and it was clear I’d live to regret my loose lips. I didn’t know for sure about ‘the tail’ and the longer I went without Rob to ground me, paranoia took over and created boogiemen wherever I looked. That was above and beyond the junkies and pimps and petty thieves who made my neighborhood the colorful cesspool of diversity that it was.

  Another reason not to add to his burdens was that Rob was strung so tight he chewed antacids like gummy bears and ran on a fuse so volatile I was short a couple of cheap ceramic place settings. What with the shouting and round missiles hitting the wall, my roaches might never recover. But the makeup sex had been, well…

  Both of us had walked funny for a couple of days afterwards.

  I took my best friend’s hand and said, “I appreciate the offer but I’m not imposing on David’s friend and the last thing you need is another house guest to babysit.”

  She objected, “You can’t stay alone, not now. Robbie said…” but bit off the rest, probably afraid I’d go ballistic and break it off with her little brother, knowing how I felt about overbearing, domineering asshole significant others.

  Oops, dial it down, girl. He’s not Michael O’Brien and never will be.

  Giving her my best squinty-eyed glare, I demanded, “What did Rob say?”

  “Actually, it’s what he didn’t say, if you know what I mean.”

  No, no I didn’t. But I could guess.

  “Sam told him I moved back to my place, didn’t he?” Her guilty look told me I was right. Damn my interfering cousin. He’d morphed from holding a virtual gun to my lover’s head to being his biggest supporter.

  Men. Doggone their guard dog hides.

  “Look, hon, I understand you don’t want to cause trouble or be an imposition but this isn’t ordinary times for anybody. You need to exercise common sense. Keep yourself safe so when the time comes and that asshole husband of yours gets what’s coming to him, then you can move forward with your life.”

  Ah, there was the lecture … and the reason for the surprise visit to the Big Apple. Cordie had a Nieman Marcus just down the road from her house. She did not need to drive more than seven hours, fight the traffic in the tunnel and blow megabucks to park her Lexus, all to share a latte with me on the corner of meddle and advice.

  The Fink most likely did have a good friend who was heading to Chicago, with the odds against me riding shotgun too high to calculate, so Cordie made the ultimate sacrifice, doing a road trip, driving solo, all to rescue a friend.

  The thought of all that goodwill and concern pouring in my direction had me in a purple rage of how dare they and who do they think I am, a little girl without the sense that God gave geese … geese again, I needed other waterfowl. The geese were getting old.

  There was one in particular that I planned to cook until he…

  Codie squeezed my hand and quietly interrupted my internal diatribe. “He didn’t ask me, Taylor. He didn’t have to. I volunteered because I trust my brother. If he’s worried about you, then so am I. And that goes for David and Sam and Marie.”

  All that worrying was why I was seeing shadows and men without faces around every corner, including drive-bys on a street that saw little traffic and strangers stuck out like undercover narcs.

  She asked, “When is Robbie due back?”

  “I’m not sure.” The fact was, I didn’t know where he’d gone. He’d warned me off using my cell phone so we emailed but it was catch-as-catch-can. I’d even gone so far as to use an internet café to maintain anonymity, doing my bit for the war effort.

  The situation seemed to be turning more cloak and dagger by the day and it made me wonder exactly what can of worms I’d opened by handing over my files to the paper. Speaking of which … I had a meeting with the editor and one of his assistants in an hour. I reminded Cordie of my obligations and got her to agree to give me a few hours to think over her generous offer.

  Mentally I was giving myself the pep talk: listen to reason, they are only thinking of your welfare, what would it hurt to visit with an old friend for a few days…

  “Let me call you, okay? I’ll decide after I hear what Rob’s boss has to say.” Cordie wasn’t thrilled but I hadn’t put my foot down, leaving the option open. I asked, “Do you have something to do while I…” waving my hand in the di
rection of the Post building.

  Cordie laughed and said, “This is Fifth Avenue, right? I think I can entertain myself for a few hours.”

  Standing up, I swept the small table clean and deposited our cups and napkins in the trash bin. We walked arm-in-arm, sidestepping the tourists, then split on the corner of Forty-eighth while Cordie continued on her way toward Saks.

  I had a feeling that whatever my answer was, Cordie was here for the duration, or at least until Wednesday. For some reason that day was ground zero, but for what I wasn’t sure. Rob had tasked his sister with being the cavalry. When it came to family and friends, Cordie took her obligations very seriously indeed.

  Despite my paranoia, it was fairly easy to convince myself that there was no real danger, that Rob had only recommended that step as a … what? Prophylactic? Was that the right term? Shaking my head, I pressed through the mob exiting the building and took the elevator to the thirtieth floor and my appointment with Jackson.

  ***

  “Please have a seat, Miss.” Parvi was always the gentleman, unlike his boss who’d throw out ‘park it’ or just point to a chair.

  Jackson had a snappish air about him, that kind of razor sharp edge that mimicked what I’d seen when Rob had a story in his teeth, worrying it to death.

  The editor started out with a question, “Are you aware of the term ‘spousal testimonial privilege’?”

  Short answer, sort of. “Um, is that where a wife can’t testify against her husband?” Uh-oh, I did not like where this was headed.

  Parvi clarified that it was known as spousal immunity. “It prevents a spouse from being called to testify against a defendant in a criminal case.”

  I sort of knew that, but hadn’t bothered to think further than helping these men point the finger of malfeasance at my ex-husband-to-be. Certainly not to the point where the courts got involved. I’d been thinking only of getting enough ammunition to take to the Italian courts so that the divorce would be finalized without me expending another two years in an agony of stasis.