Cadence cuddled against him with a sigh, and he kissed the top of her head, her temples, her eyelids. She clenched her buttocks, taking stock of her condition. She luxuriated in the burn, the throbbing, relaxed into it, but could not imagine sitting on a stakeout anytime soon. He’d been hard on her, but she relished every moment, wouldn’t change a thing.
Except for simmering guilt and resentment. Cadence rued that she’d had to disobey, but when he’d put his foot down, he’d left her no choice. Why did Rahm have to be so hardheaded? He’d torpedoed her PI career. She knew he was trying to protect her, but she didn’t need that much protection. Still, he would be hurt and angry if he ever found out what she was doing. If not for Diane, she would never have gone rogue, never defied Rahm in that way. But how else could she have handled it?
A friend-in-need or a husband’s wishes? What kind of choice was that? A sucky one. A true dilemma.
He settled on the sofa, holding her tight. He toyed with her nipple. Like a good little soldier, it responded to his touch, stood at attention. “How do you feel about what happened?” he asked.
“What? The spanking or the anal?” They hadn’t done anything they hadn’t done before…yet a qualitative difference imbued the experience with strangeness. New meaning.
“All of it.”
She squirmed. “Fine, I guess.”
“Don’t give me that. ‘Fine, I guess’ is what you say when someone asks if chicken is okay for dinner.”
“What do you want me to say? It was different. And I’m not sure how or why.”
“How did it make you feel?”
Hot all over, but shivery. Powerless, yet powerful. Nervous, but calm. “Like I belong to you. How did you feel?”
Heat flared in his eyes. He cupped her neck and stroked the pulse point with his thumb. It leaped under his touch. “Like I belong to you,” Rahm said. “It makes me feel complete when we’re like this.”
He shifted her so that she straddled him. He flicked his tongue over her nipple, then sucked it into his mouth. Her response to him was immediate. Heat spiraled. Rahm alternated between breasts, between hard and soft sucking. Both drove her wild. Cadence was mass of aching need, when he released her.
“I will always discuss matters with you, seek your input then make a decision and explain my reasoning,” he said.
“That’s the way it’s been,” she agreed.
“I will continue with that, but I aspire to have more of what we had today. I want more than a sullen obedience to my rules: I would like your trust. Can you give me that?”
Guilt skittered through her. Cadence took a breath and nodded. “Yes.”
Chapter Five
“Everything okay at home?” Aaron’s voice broke through Rahm’s reverie, and he looked up to see his brother leaning against the jamb.
“Fine. Why do you ask?”
“You were staring into space. It’s not the first time I’ve seen you like that.” Aaron didn’t wait for an invite, but plopped himself into the guest chair.
“It’s like my marriage has entered a second honeymoon.” So what was the problem? Strategy served as the basis of his decisions as a military commander, but he could not discount gut instinct. What was his gut trying to tell him?
“Fucking like bunnies, huh?”
Rahm glared at him. “That’s your sister-in-law you’re talking about.”
“You brought it up.”
“We’re closer than ever.” They were fucking like bunnies. Sex—and the things he had done or planned to—never strayed far from his consciousness. But the renaissance of their marriage extended beyond the sexual. They’d become even more respectful, more courteous and thoughtful, doing little things to please the other. At the end of the day, he couldn’t wait to get home to her, hated to leave her in the morning.
Rahm sighed. “I’m second-guessing my decision.”
“And which decision are we talking about?”
“Cadence—working here.”
Aaron shook his head. “She was a good detective. And she loved doing it. Even loved the stuff most people hate.”
“You’re not making it easier.”
“Just stating fact.”
“I want her to be happy,” Rahm said. “Maybe I was unfair. She misses the job.”
“So let her come back.”
“I can’t. I still think it’s dangerous, and even if I could get past that, she sneaked behind my back. I can’t sanction disobedience by rewarding it.”
“If she had come to you and told you she wanted to work as a PI, what would you have said?”
“I would have said no.”
Aaron spread his hands. “Well? So what choice did you leave her?”
But there were rules. Agreements. Like the men and women under his command, she had agreed to follow his direction. He didn’t set rules arbitrarily. He tried to keep her safe and happy. “If you’d come home and found your wife had disobeyed your wishes, what would you have done?”
“I’d spank her ass so she couldn’t sit for a week,” Aaron admitted with a twist of his mouth.
“Would you have let her return to work?”
“I don’t know. But I wish I had that problem.”
“I’m sorry about Margo,” Rahm said. During his deployment his brother had met a woman, married and then separated.
Pain flashed in his brother’s eyes. “I am, too. I thought she was on board with domestic discipline. But…” he shrugged. “I hoped she’d give it more time.”
“When will the divorce be final?”
“Another couple of months.”
“Tough.”
“Yeah.”
His brother’s loss made him appreciate the bond he shared with Cadence. The fun. The laughter. The spanking. He’d pretty much kept her in pink. He loved her pout when she complained of her butt being sore.
Rahm was head-over-heels ecstatic with everything.
Almost.
One small thing niggled at him, a tiny, infinitesimal suspicion. He glanced at Aaron. Mention it or not? Fuck. Balls to wall, man. “Cadence is hiding something.”
Aaron jerked his head back, but Rahm didn’t know who was more shocked, his brother or him. He’d stated his concern as an emphatic statement, did not hedge in the least. Hearing his own words hit him hard with an unavoidable truth. Now he knew what his gut had been trying to tell him. He sighed.
“Hiding what? How?”
“That’s the part I don’t know.”
“What makes you think that?”
Because they had gotten so close, Rahm could read her like a book, but he rifled through his feelings for something concrete. “She’s rushing around a lot for a person without a job. She’s late getting home a lot.”
“Where does she say she’s been?”
“Shopping.”
“What does she buy?”
He shrugged. “Milk. Bread.”
Aaron arched his eyebrows. “I see your point. A housewife who buys milk and bread… she must have a plot underfoot.”
“You’re an asshole. And she’s not a housewife.”
“What is she?”
“She’s a—” Housewife. “She’s looking for another job.” Or was she?
“So she’s buying milk and bread. What else is she doing?”
“She’s buying it when we don’t need it.” That formed the crux of his suspicions. “We’ll already have a gallon of milk in the fridge or three quarters of a loaf of bread and she’ll come home with more. It’s like she dashed into the store and grabbed the first thing that came to mind.” Building an alibi. What was she doing with the rest of her day?
“What else?” Aaron asked.
“She gets phone calls and takes them out of the room.”
“Do you know who she’s talking to?”
“Her friend Diane mostly.” He’d checked her call logs. He’d felt guilty, but relieved, when he’d discovered her calls were to and from her best friend.
“We
ll, there you go. They’re probably talking about some embarrassing female thing you don’t want to hear about anyway.”
That’s what he’d assumed at first. But her behavior still seemed… sneaky. A wild hair of a thought struck him. “She’s not still working cases here, is she?” He frowned at Aaron.
His brother shook his head. “No. They’ve all been reassigned to other detectives.”
Rahm realized he was talking to the wrong person. He should broach his concerns with Cadence. Deal with them head-on. He grabbed his phone and tapped over to the calendar. He had an hour and half of unscheduled time. “You can take care of business for an hour or so, can’t you?”
“You’re going to talk to her?”
“Yep.” Rahm grabbed his jacket and headed out the door.
****
Cadence slouched in the driver’s seat and waited for Diane’s husband. Her friend was at work. Her physician husband should have been, except twice a week he came home for a nooner. With his nurse. How cliché.
She held her digital camera on her lap. “Come on asshole. Give me one more good shot.” She’d gathered enough evidence to give Diane what she needed to break the pre-nup: photos of Stephen and the nurse kissing outside a restaurant, going into a motel, him groping her as they entered the house. One of nursey poo removing her blouse before the doctor shut the blinds. The best ones she’d taken early in her investigations. Lately they’d become more circumspect, and she’d hadn’t gotten any good photos. But she had secured phone records of his many calls to his girlfriend and back copies of his credit card bills. Statements from hotel employees during one of his ‘medical conventions’.
Unfortunately, the most damning photos were the grainiest or slightly out of focus, and perfectionism insisted she try for some better shots. One last time.
Guilt about lying to Rahm mounted. Belatedly she wished she’d referred Diane to another detective at Simmons Investigations, but she hadn’t thought of it at the time.
Cadence drummed her fingers on the window jamb, then glanced at her wristwatch. Ten minutes late. How typical for a doctor. At twenty minutes past due, she was considering abandoning the stakeout when his Mercedes came wheeling down the street. Lady love sat next to him. The garage door went up. He pulled inside. The door came down.
Unfortunately, the blinds were drawn so the likelihood of capturing an incriminating shot plunged. Cadence sighed. Just in case, she’d sit this one out a tad longer. She reached for her bottle of water and brushed her arm across her breasts. “Ow.” Gingerly she touched her nipples through her blouse and lacy bra. They were tender from Rahm’s passionate kisses.
The pleasurable soreness extended to her well-fucked pussy, her almost as well-fucked ass, her jaw, and her rosy buttocks. Since the first disciplinary spanking more than a month ago, she hadn’t been punished since—although she’d been spanked plenty. She always looked like she’d applied rouge to her rear. Insatiable in his desires, Rahm challenged her, pushed her to her limits. She desired to please him, to see his gaze radiate with loving lust for her. In serving him, she discovered a fulfillment that surpassed anything she’d ever experienced.
This, she glanced around the car interior, would not please him. She set the water in the holder without drinking. She’d learned through experience that excessive fluid intake and stakeouts did not mix.
My last stakeout. Giving it up saddened her, but she would follow Rahm’s wishes. She might not always agree with his opinion, but she trusted him.
He’d always been a thoughtful, caring husband, but since his return, he’d become almost doting, doing small favors, helping around the house without being asked, massaging her feet as they watched TV.
Even their son had noticed. “You two are gross,” Jax had said one night at dinner, when Rahm cornered her in the kitchen, overcame her mock protests, and kissed her senseless. “Can’t you at least try to act like parents?”
“Son, if you’re half as lucky as I am, you’ll be twice as fortunate as any man deserves to be,” Rahm had said.
Cadence smiled. Rahm was so solicitous. However, she was duplicitous, disingenuous. Her smile drooped. Enough was enough. She grabbed the bottle, tipped her head back and drank—then spewed water everywhere when the car door was yanked open.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
Chapter Six
Cadence stared into the florid face and furious eyes of Dr. Stephen Jessup.
He latched onto her arm and hauled her out of the vehicle sending her camera crashing onto the asphalt. Everything Diane had told her about his temper roared to the forefront of her mind. Rahm had feared something like this would happen, and her pepper spray was buried in a zippered compartment of her purse.
Using one of her self-defense techniques, she broke his hold and wrenched out of his grasp. She backed away, putting half a car length between them. Fit and trim, she could outrun him if she had to. If only her knees would stop knocking. She hoped he couldn’t tell how scared she was.
“You’ve been following me for weeks, why?”
“I haven’t been following you,” Cadence lied, hoping the quaver she heard was only in her head.
“It’s a coincidence you show up at my office, restaurants where I’m having dinner, and my house?”
Fuck. She wasn’t as good a PI as she’d thought. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. Diane is meeting me here,” she bluffed.
“So If I call her, she’ll confirm your story?”
She gulped. Would Diane catch on? Why hadn’t they worked out a signal?
Cadence feigned disinterested innocence with a shrug. “Call her. You’ll see.”
“You two have been friends for a long time. She’d lie for you.” He bent and picked up her camera.
“Hey, that’s mine.” Cadence grabbed for it, but he shoved her away. She hit the car fender.
“Let’s look at what you have in here.” Jessup powered it up and pressed the review button. His lips tightened as he scrolled through the images. Then he shut off the camera, popped the side panel, yanked out the little disk, and dropped it into his pocket.
He tossed the camera into the car. She heard it clunk on floor. He leaned so close she could smell the mint on his breath. “Don’t let me catch you around here again.” He pivoted and strode to his house.
Cadence flung herself into her vehicle. The keys rattled as she started the ignition. She peeled away in a blaze of burning rubber. She drove five blocks before she pulled into a strip mall and parked. Adrenaline had her pulse racing, her hands shaking as she called Diane.
“Hi Cadence! How is it going?” Diane asked.
“Not good. Stephen caught me, Di. Outside your house.”
“Are you okay? What did he do?”
“I’m fine. A little shaken up.” She still trembled. “He took the disk out of my camera.”
“Oh no! He has the photos?”
“It’s not as bad as it sounds. I uploaded the first ones onto my computer last week, so all he has are some of the more circumstantial ones.” She paused. “But I don’t think you should go home tonight.”
“I won’t. I’ll go to my sister’s. First, I’ll call my attorney.”
“Okay. I’ll prepare an official report along with the photos and the other documents.” Cadence took a deep breath. Her heart still pounded.
“I can’t thank you enough, Cadence. I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”
“I wanted to help. But I think I’m done with the PI business.”
****
Guilty as hell, Rahm thought as he watched his silent wife avoid eye contract and push her food around her plate. He would wait until they finished eating before they had it out.
“Dinner was excellent. Thank you,” he said afterwards as they tidied the kitchen. She’d cooked a Chinese chicken dish with snow peas, fresh ginger, and brown rice.
She paused in wiping the kitchen counter. “You’re welcome. I took a Chinese cooking c
lass while you were gone.” Cadence picked up the ginger root, half a finger sliced off, and stowed it in the refrigerator. Then leaned against it.
“We need to talk—” Both of them spoke at once.
Rahm gestured. “You first.”
Cadence bowed her head, took a breath then raised her chin and stared into his eyes. “I’ve been lying to you.”
Rahm blinked. He’d expected prevarication, not a bold admission.
“About what?” he asked quietly, but held up his hands before she could speak. “Let’s go to my office. This could take a while.”
Cadence nodded. She held her head high as she sashayed down the hall. Despite her confession, his displeasure at the moment, he admired the sway of her hips, the roundness of her ass, which he was pretty sure was going to be beet red before the evening’s end. Rahm had another disciplinary surprise planned for her too. But he’d come back for that.
In his den, he gestured for her to take a seat on the sofa. “Now, tell me,” he said, and sat at the other end with a cushion between them.
She twisted her hands in her lap. “You’re not going to like it.”
Rahm almost laughed. “I’m certain of that.”
“I’ve, uh, been working a case.”
Sonofabitch! The thought had crossed his mind, but to hear her say it packed a punch. “For what agency?”
“No agency.” She shook her head. “On my own.”
Fuck. That was worse.
“Diane is divorcing Stephen and needed my help. He’s been violent and unfaithful, and she wanted to break her pre-nup.”
“Violent?” Rahm’s ears burned with fury at his wife’s foolishness, her lack of concern for safety.
“She’s my friend. I had to help her.”
“Yes, she needed assistance. But you should have referred her to our agency.”
“I know that now.”
Rahm crossed his arms to keep from hauling her over his lap and spanking right now. He needed to cool down first. “Why are you telling me now?”
“Because I didn’t like lying to you. Because I shouldn’t have taken the job. Because I’m not going to do anything like that again.” She rubbed her hands on her slacks. “Because I know I deserve to be spanked.”
Milestones Page 4