by Caryn Carter
"And if I was...?"
"I'd say hold them for the future." He rubbed his thumb along the edge of hers. "The very near future."
Her breath stilled. Heat spiraled through her body. God, if he made her this hot with just words and a finger gliding over hers, what would he do to her when she really was naked and wild with desire in his arms?
The waitress arrived with the pitcher of beer and it couldn't have come at a more opportune time.
Bella grabbed the frosty mug as soon as the waitress filled it and took a long draught, bypassing the foamy cap and going for the icy cold liquid beneath, hoping to get away from the touchy subject and cool her heated insides at the same time.
"I can hardly wait to have sex with you, Bella," Nick said in an up-front, no-nonsense manner. "But I'm not going to until I know you're ready." He turned her hand over and dragged his thumb lightly down the center of her palm. "I think we'll both know when the time is really right." He looked up, his dark eyes openly desiring her.
Would she know? She thought she had known last night, but again he had proven he knew her better than she knew herself. At least where sex was concerned.
Franny was mistaken about Nick. He wasn't manipulating her for sex. He was sincerely worried that she'd regret it if they rushed sleeping together before she was ready. If he were out for his own personal gain, he wouldn't be at all concerned about her.
She relaxed a little more, secure in the belief that when sex with Nick did happen, it would be everything she had imagined.
* * * *
Nick carried both the overnighter and the garment bag as he and Bella headed to the Cindy Marie. He'd decided on the drive out to the Harbor that keeping both hands occupied was his best approach. How he would handle being inside the boat with only a few feet separating them at all times was something he'd soon find out. He knew what he had to do, but doing it without crushing Bella's ego should she come on to him again had him more than a little on edge.
"I'm only going to stay long enough for you to feel comfortable with your quarters before I leave." If he prepared her for his quick departure now, it might be easier to follow through on it later.
She didn't answer, just followed him without question, which only made him feel worse. He felt like he was leading a lamb to slaughter, and for one crazy moment he wanted to stop, tell her this was no good, that his intentions were anything but honorable and that he was setting her up for a big fall.
Instead, they kept walking, and at the end of the pier he helped her onto the deck. He opened the door to the main saloon and led her down the companionway to the master stateroom. He set her luggage on the floor, hung her garment bag in the locker, and swung open the door to the adjoining head.
"Everything functions pretty much the same here as it does on land," he said, sounding a lot like the owner had when he'd pitched the sale to Nick. He switched on the overhead light, gave both basin faucets a quick turn on and off and flushed the commode to prove his point. He opened the small cabinet over the basin. "You can store your personal items in here."
Okay, that didn't take long--ten seconds, maybe. Now what? Did he have her test the bed, wait for her to get all comfy in her pjs and tuck her in before he left? Yeah, sure.
"My cell phone will work from here, won't it?" She had made herself at home on the edge of the bed. Shit. Here he was making a big deal about her safety and comfort and he'd forgotten the most important thing of all. Communication.
With three long strides, he crossed the room and released the latch on a small door built into the bulkhead above the bed. He lifted out a telephone receiver and handed it to her. "Your phone will work, but there's really no need to use it. I have dockside service that works just like a land line." She gave the phone a cursory inspection and passed it back to him. He put it back inside the bulkhead cabinet.
"The stateroom door locks securely from the inside", he said, moving to the door. After he closed it, he went through the routine of latching both locks, then repeated the process a second time.
"I'm not going to embarrass you again tonight, Nick," Bella said in a low, level voice.
He spun around. "What?"
"I said you needn't be afraid that I'm going to try and attack you before you leave. You can relax."
"I don't know what you're talking about." He didn't sound convincing even to himself.
Bella jumped up off the bed, took a step forward, then stopped. "I'll be fine, Nick. Go on home and stop worrying about me."
This was not supposed to be the way it went. He was the one who was supposed to be assuring her that everything was all right. He'd better take control before she began to wonder if she had made a mistake trusting him.
"I just want to be sure you're comfortable before I leave, that's all. You have both my phone numbers with you?"
"Of course." She came right up to him, put her hands on his chest and gave him a push toward the door. "Now get out of here before I change my mind and throw myself at you again."
Was she mocking him? Or was she giving him fair warning that her control was slipping?
Before he had time to reason it out, his arms were already around her. She looked up at him. He read surprise on her face, but a hint of pleasure had worked its way in, too. He wanted to please her more, to please them both more, so he brought his mouth down to hers, his hunger for her wiping out his fear of her response.
She responded to him as easily and completely as she had on the other occasions when they had reached this level of intimacy and she opened her mouth to him as fully as he knew she would open her body to him when the time was right. And Lord, how he wanted that time to be now.
He took first one kiss, then another longer one, then still another that threatened to draw his very soul into hers. He was hard, and pressing against her wasn't enough. Not nearly enough. His resolve was slipping away as fast as the promises he'd made to her.
It stunned him when she broke away. "You're right," she whispered, her voice husky, her lips bright red from their zealous encounter with his. "You'd better hurry. I don't want you to regret not acting like a gentleman."
He couldn't tell whether she was mocking him again or being humorous to cover her disappointment with herself. She walked to the door, but stood far enough away from it that their bodies wouldn't touch when he walked by.
"I'll call you first thing in the morning," he said.
She nodded.
"You'll call me immediately if you feel the least bit uncomfortable, or if you need to ask me something?"
She nodded again.
Christ. He'd almost forgotten. "Call my cell phone. I usually turn the home phone off when I go to bed. I hate the sound of the damn thing if it wakes me." Thank God he had the presence of mind to pull this one out of the fire before it was too late.
All he needed was to have her call his home and him not answer. Not that he thought she'd make the connection as to where he was, but he didn't want to raise any unnecessary questions.
He made a quick exit and waited outside the stateroom door while she locked herself in. Then he hurried to his car, his mood nothing like he had imagined it would be when he'd first concocted this bizarre plan.
Behind the wheel of his car, he started the engine, let it idle while he tried to rid himself of Bella, so torn up inside he had to put a fist to his chest to press away the pain. He hated what he was about to do more than he had hated doing anything in his entire life. Maybe he should call it off, rethink the whole thing over again.
Then he remembered what Kevin Pitre had done. What Bella had helped him, albeit in a roundabout way, to do.
He twisted the key in the ignition, revved the engine and barreled away from the Harbor.
He had to get started. Searching Bella's house would probably take all night.
Unless she'd been smart and bought a small fire-proof safe. Then he'd have to take an entirely different approach.
Chapter Nine
Nick almost turne
d around and headed back to the Cindy Marie half a dozen times before he finally found himself standing on Bella's front porch, the key to her house in his hand.
He looked over his shoulder like a thief in the night. Like the thief he was. He was stealing Bella's trust in him as surely as she had stolen much of the anger and vengeance he held in his heart when he'd first met her.
The street looked pretty much as it had the night before when he'd brought her home. Low lights in the houses, drapes drawn, driveways stereotypically announcing the two-car suburban family. And like the night before, he saw no strange car or any other sign of someone staking out Bella's house.
It made him feel better to believe she'd lied to him. It made what he was about to do less distasteful. Now he could get to work with a sense of purpose and self-righteousness. To his way of thinking, he was on an assignment every bit as legitimate as any he'd worked on in the Department.
He turned the key in the lock, flipped on his flashlight and slipped inside. He was immediately enveloped by Bella's scent, an essence so strong it made him dizzy. Her familiar fragrance clung to him as he passed from the living room into the hall, nearly stole his breath when he entered her bedroom. He stopped, waited for his senses to clear, his breathing to even out before he arced the beam of light around the room. His pulse quickened. Bella's watch was on the table next to the bed. She'd forgotten it.
Nick walked over to the table, picked up the thin gold band. Fear gripped him. In the morning, when she discovered she'd left it behind would she make a trip to get it on her way to the office? He definitely didn't want that to happen.
Then he remembered she'd checked her watch at the restaurant when it seemed their order was overdue. He heaved a sigh of relief. She had another watch. He put the watch back on the table and did a one-hundred-eighty degree turn.
He would start with the closet. It was the usual hiding place for things not meant to be seen by visitors. He switched off the flashlight and turned on the overhead light in the roomy walk-in closet.
The first thing he did was search for a safe, since a closet was the most common hiding place in the home. When he didn't find one, he reached for one of the shoe boxes. There were two shelves of them. He decided Bella owned more shoes than the average shoe department. He'd be lucky to finish the closet tonight, much less have time to start on the rest of the house.
Methodically he went through the dozens of boxes, lifting out each shoe, checking the inside with his fingers, turning them over for signs of a false bottom where she may have hidden a safe-deposit key.
With a jolt, he realized he was losing himself in a sensual fantasy. He could almost feel Bella's skin against his fingers, her scent swirling around him so strong he almost panicked remembering his reaction of the day before.
He rose, shook his head to clear it, and began searching the closet shelves, the heaviness in his groin a painful reminder the night was going to be a long one. As he went through Bella's personal belongings, her particular scent of roses and lilacs brought her so close he felt he could reach out and touch her. He knew the scent of those delicate flowers would always bring her close even when she was locked away where he'd never see her again.
Frustrated, he slumped against the wall of the closet, envying the clothes that had caressed Bella's skin, the cotton and silk that knew her body better than he did. The intensity of his need for her overwhelmed him.
Beads of perspiration broke out on his upper lip, along his brow, dampened the collar of his shirt. He was so hot for her, his face stung. The closet grew stuffy. His head spun. The need to be near her, to smell her, taste her, dammit, to slip his fingers inside her, was all-consuming. He thought of nothing but seeing her again.
He forced himself to continue working. Hours passed. When he finished with the closet, his emotions were mixed, his belief in her guilt wavering. His years of experience in vice had led him instinctively to the places the guilty might hide evidence of their crime. Even the tiniest bit of evidence he would recognize. A piece of paper with some numbers scribbled on it in code, a key in the midst of a dozen others, a map that would give away nothing to the amateur. But he had found nothing. Not one shred of evidence, not one clue.
Bella's bathroom was next. Bottles of creams, lotions, containers of special soaps, bags of cotton balls, hair curlers. Condoms. The blood roared in his ears. He opened the box, trying to convince himself it would be the perfect hiding place and emptied the contents into his palm. Eight foil packets, all perfectly intact. Four gone. Four of them had been rolled on some guy's dick and then slipped into her. Only the discipline learned years ago, and which had not yet deserted him, made it possible to refill the box and put it back where he'd found it.
His discovery should have wiped out his desire for her, but it didn't. He still wanted her. Still couldn't wait to have her. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe she was telling the truth when she said she never wanted anything more to do with Kevin. Forcing himself to concentrate, despite the myriad of doubts that plagued him, he made sure everything he'd touched was back in it's proper place before he left to search the room next on his list.
In the kitchen, he switched on the light over the stove. This would be the most difficult room to search. There were dozens of bowls and boxes, containers that could well have been here for years. He mapped out a methodical search, plunged ahead and worked until his neck started to burn and his back ached.
When he finally glanced up at the kitchen clock, it was nearing four. He had to get a few hours of shut-eye if he intended to resume his search again that night. He switched off the light, looked around to be sure he'd left nothing out of place, and headed for the front of the house.
When he stepped into the hall, he switched on the flashlight. As he neared the front door, the beam of light landed on a stack of mail on a table against the wall. Out of curiosity he walked toward the table to get a closer look.
His heart tripped when he saw the return address of one of the more popular cruise lines. The envelope had already been opened. He picked it up and carefully slipped the contents out. His heart slammed hard against his chest. His breath stopped. Two tickets for a cruise. He checked the date. The ship was set to sail just about the time Kevin was due to be released.
Blood roared in his ears. It all made sense now. Bella had been stringing him along all the time. She had no goddamn need for a security system because there never was anyone lurking outside her house. Neither did she intend to be here for very long. She was leaving the country--and Kevin was leaving soon after to meet her.
Anger, hot as lava, roiled in his chest and rose to his throat threatening to choke him. He wanted to smash everything in the house, destroy everything that belonged to Bella, everything that proved there really was a redheaded, violet-eyed wisp of a woman that had thrown a net around him and snared him so completely.
Because he knew now that she had become more than a target for his sense of justice. She had become an obsession with him, and in spite of finding out who she was and what she was really like, he wanted her more than ever.
* * * *
Bella awakened Wednesday morning fully expecting to find Nick curled up beside her, their bodies as inseparable as water.
Her mood spiraled downward as her brain slowly separated fact from fantasy and she grudgingly accepted that her dreams had been just that and nothing more, that Nick hadn't been with her all night, that they hadn't made love until the sun came up.
The fact that it was already seven o'clock in the morning and she hadn't yet heard from Nick dragged her spirits down even more. In a dreary mood, she went into the galley, found the coffee where Nick had shown her it was stored the night before, and set a small pot on to brew while she showered.
Like the galley and the sleeping quarters, the bathroom, though tiny by comparison to hers, proved to be every bit as adequate as the one in her own home. Except that instead of her own salon shampoo and conditioner and her bar of creamy white body soap, she was
greeted by Nick's bar of green anti-perspirant soap and a bottle of store brand shampoo.
On a whim, she set the personal products she'd brought with her from home on the built-in shelf of the shower stall and reached for the bar of Nick's soap, brought it to her nose and drew in his familiar piney scent.
The sensuousness of the situation flooded over her like the water from the pulsing showerhead and as she slowly lathered her body, her erotic dreams of the night before effortlessly slid into an equally erotic sexual fantasy with Nick as the star.
Willing her hands to mimic his, she passed them over her breasts, squeezing gently until she felt her nipples harden and tingle. She closed her eyes, Nick's face as real as if he were standing in front of her. Her breathing accelerated. She parted her lips, the spray from the shower magically transformed into the liquid heat of Nick's kiss.
Sliding down her soap-slicked belly, her fingers found the center of the hot need drumming deep within her and began a rhythm she imagined Nick would have strummed had it been his fingers moving inside her. She gave in to the erotic pleasure she was creating, softly moaning as the pressure inside her built and the rhythm of her fingers increased, propelling her closer and closer to the threshold.
She caught her lip between her teeth, fighting to hold back the flood of need that was almost too much to bear. She imagined Nick inside her, pleasuring her, turning up her heat, letting it wash over him, urging her to come with him, to enjoy the fruits of their lovemaking together. With a low moan, she broke the connection between her mind and her body and slapped her palms against the tiled shower wall.
No. She wouldn't do it. This pleasure was meant to be experienced with Nick. She needed to let the pressure build, keep her need for him at a pinnacle. As difficult as it was, she willed her breathing to slow and the heat inside her to cool while she continued with her shower.
Later, while she dressed and treated herself to two cups of the most delicious coffee she had ever tasted, she thought of ways to convince Nick they should wait no longer to explore the many sexual pleasures they could bring to one another.