by Gina Wilkins
“Come on, eat a little somethin’,” Polly urged, motioning toward the fast-food feast she’d brought with her to Dallas’s apartment a few minutes earlier. “You need to keep up your health.”
Even had it not been for the role she was playing, Dallas wouldn’t have had the heart to point out that the selection Polly had provided was not exactly healthy for a supposedly pregnant woman. Basically, the menu consisted of deep-fried fats and cholesterol, with a side order of empty calories. But the concern in Polly’s dark eyes was genuine, and the gesture had been well-intentioned. Dallas made an effort to eat a few bites, silently grateful that she didn’t really have a delicate stomach to contend with.
“That’s better,” Polly said, watching Dallas swallow a soggy french fry. “You’re eating for two, you know.”
And consuming enough fat for six, Dallas thought, but managed a weak smile. “This is really good, Polly, but I’m just not very hungry. It was so sweet of you to think of me.”
Polly flushed faintly beneath the layer of paint she habitually wore. “Hey, don’t start getting all mushy about it,” she bluffed, reaching for her own half-eaten double bacon cheeseburger. “I was hungry and I wasn’t in the mood to eat alone tonight. Thought you might want to join me.”
“Whatever the reason, it was still nice of you,” Dallas replied, sincerely this time. “But I won’t embarrass you.”
Polly shrugged and took an enormous bite of her burger. Her mouth still full, she asked, “You hear from Sam?”
Dallas allowed her lower lip to tremble. Just a little. “No,” she murmured, and sighed. “Not a word.”
And she hadn’t, either. Not that she’d expected to, of course.
She wondered if he missed her. She wondered if he was having trouble sleeping alone. But most of all, she wondered if he was sleeping alone.
“Yo, Dallas.”
Dallas blinked and looked across the table, finding Polly looking at her strangely. “Yes?”
“Where you been, girl? I’ve said your name three times.”
Dallas blushed. “Sorry. I was, uh, thinking.”
“About him, right?”
She could answer with complete honesty. “Yes. About Sam.”
Polly made a sound of disgust and shook her head. “Man, you really got it bad. Way he treated you, you’d think you’d be glad to get rid of him.”
Trembling lower lip again. A heavy sweep of eyelashes as accompaniment this time. “No,” Dallas said on a long, miserable exhale. “I miss him, Polly. I want him back.” Damn it.
“Even if it means giving up your kid?” Polly asked bluntly.
Dallas rested a hand on the harness and her breath caught in what might have been a sob. “I think so,” she whispered. “I can’t raise it alone. And I don’t want to try without Sam.”
“You could give it up for adoption,” Polly suggested, avoiding Dallas’s gaze as she seemed to concentrate on scooping up a tablespoon of catsup with half a limp fry.
“I know. I wish I thought that would help.”
“It would get the kid out of your way.”
“But it wouldn’t help us financially. That’s what Sam’s so upset about. He doesn’t like to be broke. He’s real proud when it comes to money. But I was sick a lot at first and the doctor bills just cleaned us out. Giving the baby up for adoption would mean that I wouldn’t have to pay hospital or delivery fees, but it wouldn’t replace everything I’ve already cost poor Sam.”
“‘Poor Sam,’” Polly repeated, her voice all but dripping with scorn. “Sometimes you just make me sick.”
“I’m sorry,” Dallas murmured and huddled into herself, looking utterly miserable.
“Oh, hell, now you’re doing it with me!”
“Doing what?”
“Letting me treat you like a victim. You ain’t no doormat, Dallas. Get up off the floor and quit inviting folks to wipe their feet on you.”
Dallas lifted her chin, carefully hiding her amusement at Polly’s sharp advice. “Well, what should I do?” she asked, allowing herself to show some asperity. “You seem to have all the answers—how are you going to support your baby all alone? You don’t even have a job.”
Polly nodded, seemingly more comfortable with Dallas’s aggression than her former meekness. “I got plans,” she said simply.
“What plans?”
Polly shrugged. “That’s my business.”
Patience, Sanders. “Great,” she muttered. “You sit there telling me everything I shouldn’t do, but you won’t give me any advice about what I should do. You won’t even tell me what you’re going to do.”
Polly looked torn for a moment. And then she set the last of her sandwich on the paper plate in front of her and leaned forward, as though concerned that someone else might hear them. “I’m not raising this kid,” she admitted. “I’m giving it up.”
“Adoption?” Dallas asked, trying to look sad. “Are you sure you want to do that?”
“Look, you’re right about one thing. It’s damned hard to raise a kid alone, and I want this one to have a better life than I could give it by myself. But I’m not going to end up broke and alone after I have it, like you’ll be if you ain’t careful.”
“Well,” Dallas dared, “you won’t have a lot of medical bills, probably, but you’ll still be broke. You still won’t have a job.”
“I can get a job anytime I want,” Polly returned sharply. “As a matter of fact, I had a high-paying career before I got in this shape, thanks to the latex industry’s shoddy workmanship. I could go back to it any time I wanted. But it ain’t going to be necessary. I’m getting paid for this kid. Well paid. And I’m taking that money and starting over somewhere nice. Somewhere cool,” she added, plucking discontentedly at her sticky maternity T-shirt. “Michigan, maybe. I had an aunt who lived in Michigan. She said it was real pretty there.”
“It’s real cold there,” Dallas said. “Snow up to your chin in the wintertime.”
“Beats the hell out of frying eggs on your chin down here in the summertime,” Polly retorted with a grin.
Dallas picked at her food, making a small mountain of mangled fries. “So, uh...what’s this about you getting paid for the kid? You make it sound like you’re—well, you know. Selling it or something.”
Polly shrugged. “Or something.”
Dallas widened her eyes. “You can do that? Legally?”
“Hell, no, it ain’t legal,” Polly muttered with a scowl and another quick look around them. “Not exactly. But a girl’s gotta look out for herself. Nobody else gives a rat’s ass, I’ll tell you that for sure.”
“But what about the baby? What will happen to it?”
Polly glanced down at her stomach, then quickly away. “It’ll go to a good home,” she said quietly. “They promised me that. Wealthy people, who don’t want to waste time with all those stupid bureaucratic rules lawyers make up so they can get rich handling private adoptions. There’s a waiting list a decade long for available white babies, and there’s plenty of people with enough money and enough determination to get around that list. The kid will get a good home. So why shouldn’t I get something out of it, too? I’m doing someone a service. I’m the one who’s had to carry the kid all this time. I’m the one who’s all swollen and aching and bloated. It ain’t fair that I have to suffer and some shark lawyer makes the dough, is it?”
“I hadn’t really thought of it that way,” Dallas said uncertainly.
“Well, think about it. You go back to your Sam with no baby and a fistful of money and you could probably get him back in a snap—though God only knows why you’d want the creep. As for me, I’m taking care of myself. Just like always.”
Dallas put her other hand on the harness, as though she were holding her baby protectively. “I don’t know if I could do something like that.”
Polly shrugged. “Ain’t no one making you. It’s just a suggestion.”
“I really think you should give this some more thought, Poll
y. It sounds awfully risky to me. What if you get caught? You could go to jail.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Polly grumbled, then sighed. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m no murderer or anything.”
“I never thought you were,” Dallas assured her loyally.
“Man, it’s a wonder you’ve survived as long as you have. You’re about as street-smart as a kitten.”
Dallas lifted her chin again, letting it thrust out proudly. “I can take care of myself.”
“Yeah. Right.”
“I can,” she insisted.
“Like you’ve been taking care of yourself the past week?” Polly asked sharply. “Going without food? Moping around over Sam the creep? Bawling your eyes out?”
Dallas lowered her chin. “I’ll get him back,” she muttered.
“Mmm. Well, if you want to know any more about what I said, you just let me know. But don’t you go talking to anyone else about it, you hear? If I find out you’ve been running your mouth about my business, you’re going to be in a truckload of trouble, you got that?”
Dallas cowered. “You wouldn’t turn your big friends on me, would you?”
“I just might,” Polly countered, searching Dallas’s face as though testing her sincerity. Apparently deciding that Dallas was no more than she seemed, she relaxed. “But I like you, kid, or I wouldn’t have said nothing. You won’t talk to anybody, will you?”
“Who would I tell?” Dallas asked with a weary smile.
Polly seemed to accept that. “Just don’t tell no one.”
Dallas ate another lard-dripping fry to avoid answering.
* * *
DALLAS COULDN’T BELIEVE her hand was shaking when she raised it to knock on the door in front of her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this nervous. She wiped her palm on one leg of her polyester slacks and lifted the hand again. This time she made herself tap firmly on the wooden door.
During the minute or so that followed, she wondered just how Sam would greet her. Professionally—partner to partner? This was, after all, a scheduled working visit. Would he kiss her? Or would he go back to the same brusque, strictly-business manner they’d used before this assignment had begun? Was their affair over, as far as Sam was concerned? Or had he even considered the possibility that it could last for a while? Maybe a long while, if they worked hard enough at it. Dallas was willing; she just wished she knew how Sam felt about it.
He opened the door, and his shuttered expression didn’t give her a clue how he felt about seeing her after almost a week. He stepped back to allow her to enter. “Hi. Come on in.”
“Thanks.” She moved past him, trying not to waddle—which wasn’t easy, since she was wearing the harness. She looked curiously around the living room of Sam’s apartment, which she’d never visited before. It was nice. Neat, clean, decorated in comfortably overstuffed furnishings in burgundy and green. It wouldn’t have been featured in any decorating magazine, but Dallas imagined it was a pleasant place to come home to after a hard day’s work.
Sam closed the door and turned to face her. He seemed to grope for something to say, and then he glanced down at her middle and apparently decided to keep it light. “How’s Bob?”
She managed a smile. “We’re getting by.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.” She wiped her palms down her pant legs again. “Uh, how have you been?”
He shrugged. “Okay. Been tying up the paperwork on the Perkins case. You know how I hate paperwork.”
“Don’t we all.” This was ridiculous. She felt as though she were on a blind date—and it wasn’t going very well. She cleared her throat. “I have a lot to tell you. Polly and I have been talking, and—”
He forestalled her by raising a hand. “Hold on a minute.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “What?”
“You want a soda or something? We could at least sit down before you start giving your report.”
She twisted her fingers beneath the bulk of the harness. She didn’t really want anything, but maybe it would help them relax if they sat down over cool drinks. “Yeah, a soda sounds good. Thanks.”
Sam nodded and took a couple of steps toward a doorway she assumed led to the kitchen. And then he stopped, and turned back to face her. “Dallas?”
She swallowed. “Yes?”
“I’ve missed you.”
Her knees weakened. “I’ve missed you, too,” she whispered, wishing she could read that stern face of his.
“I’ve missed you a lot,” he said, his frown deepening.
Thoroughly confused, Dallas began to smile, anyway. “I’ve missed you, too. A lot,” she added, taking a step toward him.
He didn’t give her a chance to meet him halfway. He was already there, his arms around her, his mouth moving wildly against hers. The harness was a solid intrusion between them, but Sam ignored it. His hands swept her back, settled on her hips and held her as closely as possible under the circumstances. Her mouth opening eagerly beneath his, Dallas strained to get closer.
Sam reached beneath the hem of her blouse and fumbled with the straps of the harness. A moment later, he tossed the bulky appliance out of the way and pulled Dallas firmly against him. Her now slender body settled snugly, intimately, between his thighs. He was already aroused, she noticed dreamily.
So was she.
She needed to touch him. It had been so long....
His face was hard and warm beneath her palms, his jaw firm, and his cheeks lean, both faintly stubbled. His thick, sandy hair was long enough to completely hide her fingers when she buried them in its depths. It hadn’t been trimmed since she’d last seen him.
Beneath his white knit shirt, his broad chest expanded against her with his ragged breathing. She could almost feel his heart racing against hers. His solid thighs cradled her between them, locked her against the erection that strained his jeans, emphasized his need for her. His arms were tight around her; strong, hungry.
He felt as utterly perfect as she had remembered.
“I want... I need...” His voice was hoarse, his words awkward with his impatience. He was already groping for the hem of her blouse.
Dallas murmured soothingly against his mouth. “I know what you want. I need it, too,” she whispered, lifting her arms to help him rid her of the blouse. And then she tugged at his shirt.
They caught their breaths simultaneously when her uncovered breasts brushed his bare chest. Murmuring his pleasure, Sam cupped her breasts in his hands and lowered his head to kiss the soft upper curves. And then her hardened nipples. She arched backward to give him better access.
She didn’t actually remember lowering herself to the floor—or being lowered. One moment she was on her feet in Sam’s arms, the next she was lying beneath him, the remainder of her clothing tangled on the floor around them.
Her short fingernails dug into his shoulders as he moved over her, kissing, stroking, nipping, rapidly bringing her to a point of mindless need. She shoved at his jeans, but waited only until he’d opened them and pushed them out of the way before arching demandingly upward. Sam groaned, and buried himself deeply inside her.
* * *
SAM’S FACE WAS HIDDEN against her throat, his lips moving very close to her ear. “Dallas?”
She snuggled closer, one hand slowly drifting over his warm, bare back. “Mmm?”
He kissed her earlobe. “How do you like my apartment?”
She giggled. “I like the living room. The carpet is especially nice. Soft, comfortable.”
He moved his head to kiss a smile against her slightly tender lips. “If you think the carpet is comfortable, you should try my bed.”
“I’ll have to do that sometime.”
“Yeah. Soon.” He kissed her again.
“Very soon,” Dallas whispered, her hand sliding to the back of his neck, as she raised her lips to his again.
He groaned and lifted his head. “You have to get back to the apartment soon. An
d you haven’t even told me what you’ve learned this week.”
Dallas lifted an eyebrow and glanced downward. She was completely nude, and tangled intimately with Sam, who had finally kicked off his jeans so that he, too, was unselfconsciously naked. “You haven’t exactly given me a chance to report,” she told him.
He grinned. “No. I suppose I haven’t. Any complaints?”
“Not a one,” she assured him.
“Good.” He kissed her one more time, then reluctantly drew away. “The bathroom’s through that door, if you’d like to, um, freshen up.”
She smiled. “Thanks. I believe I will.”
“Want me to pour you that soda now? Make some coffee, maybe?”
“Soda’s fine. I’ll be right back.”
The bathroom was done in the same greens and burgundy as the living room. Idly studying the tasteful Paisley wallpaper, Dallas wondered if Sam had decorated it himself. She opened a drawer in search of a comb and swallowed hard when she discovered a tube of lipstick, a pink plastic disposable razor, and a half-empty tube of jasmine-scented bath gel. Paula, she thought, quickly closing the drawer.
Had Sam made love to her on that soft living-room carpet?
Dallas scowled into the mirror and combed her hair with her fingers.
Wearing only his jeans, Sam was in the kitchen pouring soda over ice when she rejoined him. A plate of cookies lay nearby—bakery cookies, she noted, wondering if he’d bought them with her visit in mind.
He looked up with a smile. “I thought you might like a snack.”
“You know I always like a snack—especially when it’s cookies,” she replied, reaching for one.
“Yes, I remembered.” Leaving the sodas on the table, he walked up behind her and circled her waist with his arms. The maternity top was baggy around her without the harness to fill it in. Sam didn’t seem to notice as he held her close and pressed a kiss on the back of her ear. “As cute as you look wearing Bob, it’s much easier to hold you this way,” he murmured.
“Don’t call me cute, Perry,” she retorted, finding reassurance in the teasing. “And we are not naming the kid Bob. Got that?”