by J. A. Coffey
They shook hands, and Tim said, "Anna traded me in for a bigger badge."
Darius laughed and replied, "Never believe a woman when she says size doesn't matter."
Jess' mouth opened in shock, and she felt her face flame so hotly she had to move away. "Really, gentlemen, I expected so much more from you."
"See?" Darius hooked an unrepentant thumb at her. "The defense rests."
The men laughed when Jess spun away from them, but Darius grabbed her by her hips and tugged her back to his side. "Sorry, babe. Couldn't resist."
Tim eyed him and seemed thoughtful, and Jess liked that he didn't jump to conclusions about people. "You really disarmed three assailants by yourself?"
Darius stood tall, hands clasped behind his back, feet spread, and Jess realized he addressed Tim the way he probably did his Sensei. "I disarmed the three, knocked down the fourth, and the fifth ran off."
With a sneer, William said, "You let one get away?"
Oh, she could tell Darius thought little of him when he only acknowledged him with a raised brow. "I guess the Chihuahua didn't want to take on the big, bad wolf."
Tim nodded, his gaze steady and assessing. "Mind if I ask how you did this?"
A nod, and Darius stood even straighter. "I compete professionally in Aikido. It's my livelihood, although I admit I resorted to karate on them."
And Jess could tell by Tim's expression he knew Darius had let those boys off easy.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Confusion and anguish as she had never known battled within Jess, each one rearing up its mighty head to roar in frustration prior to delving back into the fray. She lay there on her back in the wan morning light, staring at the murky ceiling while she stroked the black cat who had taken up residence on her chest. Hot tears slipped from her eyes and nestled into the hair at her temples before soaking into the pillow beyond. Her throat swelled so large she feared she would not be able to swallow.
He hadn't touched her in three days.
A subdued sob racked her chest, and Queenie made a soft noise before stretching out her nose to touch Jess on the chin. Dovey chirped and crawled out from under the bed to nestle on her hip, and Victoria abandoned her comfy chair to cuddle up by Jess' face.
Towie whimpered and stood with forepaws on the bed, then leapt up to flop beside her calf.
Their furry sympathies for her plight only made Jess cry more.
Nine-thirty came and went before Jess roused herself, not wanting to keep her dog crossing his legs any longer than necessary. She cracked open the door and slipped down the long hallway, moving as quietly as possible by Darius' room. She dashed to the back door and let Towie out, then went back upstairs to shower.
His door was still closed, but she slowed her pace to mask any sounds of her passing. Once inside her room, she rummaged through her scant wardrobe for something to wear, then went into her private bathroom.
Her bath probably rivaled some of the nicer hotel rooms, with a cream marble-topped teak double vanity topped with frameless mirrors, an all-glass standing shower with Japanese teakwood floor slats to dry off, the slipper-back claw foot tub where Darius had first seen her naked, and Carerra marble floors under everything.
She noticed her feet were warm on the tiles and decided the floor must have radiant heat as well.
She truly vacillated between the tub and shower, wanting to scrub and run but thinking a hot soak might better soothe her wounded pride.
She found bubble bath and filled the tub, delighting when she remembered it was also a Jacuzzi. A tiny capful of bubbles yielded a mountain of foam, and she knew then the heat would strip away many of her anxieties.
She darted back to her room and grabbed her cell phone, and when she returned and eased into the hot water, she called Jeremy.
"How's my Pussycat?" he asked by way of answering.
She closed her eyes and slipped down to her shoulders. "What's on the agenda for today?"
"Nothing, Cupcake. Seems like everyone wants to live today."
Only Jeremy would find that a bad thing. She cracked a grin. "Can you play hookie?"
"Absolutely. Dad knows what you're going through. Whatever you need, Jess, I'm your go-to gal."
"Mm. So glad to hear that. Can you pick me up?"
"Sure. When?"
Jess had to open her eyes to read the clock. "I'm soaking away my problems right now. How about forty-five minutes?"
"Sure. See you then. Tootles." And he hung up.
Jess set down her phone and tipped back her head to wet her hair. She had never had to tell a boyfriend that she wanted to go out without him, and she had a suspicion Darius might not want her going off by herself right now, at least, not while there were attempts on their lives. But right now, she needed a friend, needed some time away from the man who made her quiver with need and then rail with dejection. She needed some distance and some friend perspective about the enigma that was Darius.
She stood up. There simply were not enough bubbles in the world to undo this particular angst.
Once dried and dressed, Jessalyn eased out of her bathroom and slipped back down the hallway. She went downstairs and let Towie back inside, waking him from his siesta on the stoop.
She decided Darius was still sleeping or gone, for the house remained eerily quiet. She opened up the kitchen and saw him look up from his paper.
He grinned and greeted her with, "Good morning, Sunshine. You look lovely."
The soft gaze in his eyes made her innards do a little flip-flop. It was so hard to understand the man! He made her feel sexy and desirable and then refused to touch her. "Thank you."
Those keen eyes bored into hers, reading her in a way that no one ever had. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing. I'm-" She looked at him, not wanting to hurt his feelings but not willing to lie about her plans. "I'm going out. I just need some friend time."
Darius just studied her, neither angry nor judgmental. "Is this X-chromosome friend time, or Y-chromosome friend time?"
She'd never thought of it that way before, and grinning, replied, "What if he's kind of both?"
He paused for a beat, his eyes boring into hers with that way he had that made her tingle. "Is everything all right?"
Not really, no. "Fine. I just," she smiled, "need some girl time."
Darius pushed out the chair across from him with his foot and motioned for her to sit.
A curl of dread filled her stomach. He was going to tell her to stay here, that it was dangerous, that she needed to protect herself, that Jeremy was no good for her. She pulled the chair out and sat down.
"Want some coffee?"
That surprised her. "Um. No, thank you."
Sincerity filled his eyes, displaying no animosity or subterfuge to her plans. "Toast? Eggs? When will he be here?"
She glanced at her new watch and tried not to let him know his easy manner and lack of confrontation startled her. "In a few. I'll just grab something at the local bakery if I get hungry."
Again he studied her. "Are you sure you're okay, Jess? You've been through a lot. Is there anything I can help you with?"
Her throat tightened for the second time this morning. "Not unless you can reverse time." She rolled and unrolled the hem of her shirt to avoid meeting his gaze.
In a graceful motion, Darius got up and circled the table, saying, "I can't let you go, Jess."
She opened up her mouth to protest, but he grinned a cocky little smile and added, "Without a hug."
He stood before her, arms spread, waiting for her to step into his embrace.
She moved faster than she planned, and the blasted tears squeezed out as she gripped his shirt into her fists.
His hands eased over her back, soothing her anxiety until she felt the ebb of her tears, which she had to admit took a few minutes. She loved being in his arms, being touched by him, and the absence of that these last three days had been nothing short of torture. His touch calmed her and paradoxically aroused her wit
h little more than a change in tempo or pressure. She wished she could come out and ask him why he avoided her, why she felt like he shunned her yet craved her, and how he could go from affectionate to aloof and back again with no rhyme or reason.
As if to prove her point, Darius stroked up along her ribs to gently cup her breasts before sliding back down and around to grab her backside and pull her up along his erection.
His head lowered to hers, and his tongue dipped into her mouth. She could tell the moment he tasted her tears, for his hands wiped along her cheeks and then buried into her hair.
She felt him melt with her tears, felt his own sorrow for her like a palpable thing. "Oh, Jess, sweetie, I'm so sorry. It will be okay, I swear. Please, don't cry, hon."
The Westminster chimes rang out, announcing to anyone inside that a car waited at the front gate. Without looking at him, Jess squeezed his hand, grabbed her purse, and ran outside.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Although it broke his heart- again- to watch her cry, Darius was glad for the opportunity this presented. He had plans- big plans- and he needed a chance to accomplish them without Jess nearby.
He opened the front door and from the stoop watched her leap into Jeremy's car and drive off, then he locked the door and went to the garage.
He decided the Tahoe would be his best choice for today, although truly it was not his favorite car. However, it had the largest inside capacity and therefore would do. He loaded it up with a box of giant yard bags, leather gloves, and some heavy planks before getting in and driving off to Jess' house.
Smoke still drifted up from random heat pockets. He carefully eased under the yellow police-line tape and began picking through her things. He remembered her dresser falling into the dining room so he went there first. Most of her clothes therein were undamaged, so he grabbed them and stuffed them into the giant plastic bags. He opened drawers and cupboards and checked shelves and gathered as many personal belongings as he felt he could salvage.
He loaded those bags into the SUV and unpacked the planks, hoping they would cover the open spots in the damaged hallway upstairs. Making a last-minute decision, he grabbed his cell phone and looked up Jeremy's home number, then called and left him a message: "Don't tell Jess, but if I don't come home tonight, look for my body at her old house." At least someone should know where to find him if this failed.
He lowered the planks over the walkway and managed to ease through the hallway to her room.
A gaping hole in the floor greeted him, and her furniture seemed to be destroyed, but he rummaged through the drawers nonetheless. Everything smelled, but he thought the right cleaning service might be able to help, so he unrolled another bag from the box and stuffed it full again, electing to drop it through the hole into the living room.
The closet yielded some photo albums and shoes along with her clothes, and he felt his breath catch when his fingers brushed against satin.
An emerald green gown.
The emerald green gown.
With a reverence he did not know he had, Darius slipped it from the hanger and held it at arm's length, imagining the lanky bespectacled girl who once wore it.
He folded it carefully, rolled it into a ball, and set it in the bag.
A pile now awaited him in the living room, and Darius felt his work here was done. He managed to slip back down the hallway, collect his planks, and return to the main floor in one piece.
He loaded the car, knowing he would not be returning.
The drycleaner in town thought she might be able to get the burn smell out, and Darius paid the premium and a hefty tip to have the items washed and dried and delivered by tomorrow.
Feeling an enormous sense of accomplishment, Darius found himself grinning as he vacillated his next stop.
Jewelry.
His GPS pointed out a few, but one was near Jess' store, so he thought he would shoot there first. She hadn't seen his Tahoe before, so hopefully she would not recognize him driving by. He slowed as he neared Phoenix Antiques and looked down the alleyway, grinning that no hoodlums hovered there and glad he was able to eradicate the problem with no one being injured.
Another two blocks brought him to a vacant lot, and something compelled him to pull in. An intact parking lot, devoid of rampant greenery, filled the front and spilled around to encircle the building, ending at a lush green field with a few scattered maple trees.
The front windows reminded him of a ba gua mirror, with all three windows being equal in size and looking like exactly half of a hexagon. He got out and poked around, looked into the windows to the fully-carpeted interior.
He frowned, not knowing why he stopped, sensing he needed to pay attention, and was still frowning when he got back into the car and continued on.
The biggest jewelry store in town boasted they carried engagement rings in every size, shape, color, and style imaginable. As Darius walked up to the clerk and inspected the rings in the showcase, he asked her, "What do you know about the vacant building a few blocks down? The one with the large glass windows up front?"
"Oh, the car dealership?"
He thought back to it. "Yes, it probably was. Do you know what happened to it?"
She nodded and pulled out a tray of rings for him to look at. "Yeah, it was Greene's Greeners. He sold only hybrid and electric cars. He got so busy he had to move the dealership closer to Boston. This place just couldn't keep up with demand."
A positive move. Being immersed in Asian culture as long as he had made one pay attention to the energy they called chi, or qi, that surrounded places or people. A company that moved because they outgrew their location had a lot of positive chi; a company that went under- not so much.
"Were you looking for a hybrid car?"
"No, no." He looked up at her. "I don't know what made me ask about the building. Maybe just the tiniest hint of an idea, so small I can't even make myself voice it." He grinned, then pulled a solitaire ring from the foam tray to inspect it.
The more he looked at the assortment of rings before him, the less he could see Jess wearing any of these. Inspiration struck and he asked, "Do you have any antique settings?"
"We do," the clerk said, and moved him to a display case further in back.
There Darius had tray after tray of rings presented to him, but he discarded them all as too small. "Anything bigger?"
"Actually," the girl ducked down and rummaged under the unit, "we have some pink ones here."
Pink. He looked at the tray and found a beautiful pink one, about two carats, on a gold setting.
"This is a radiant cut one point nine carat pink diamond on an eighteen carat rose gold setting, which is also known as yellow gold. All of these rings came from an estate sale in Georgia about ten years ago. It is estimated to be from pre-Depression era, possibly as old as 1890."
It was the prettiest thing he had ever seen, he thought, watching how the light twinkled and danced as he turned it to and fro. "The only thing that could possibly improve this ring will be the woman wearing it." At the girl's soft smile, Darius said, "I'll take it."
A few more stops, and Darius felt he would be ready to go back home. He swung by the hospital and asked to have the staples removed from his head. After an interminable wait of twenty minutes, a young nurse with coppery hair came up and led him to a nook. He sat in the chair she indicated as she reviewed his chart.
"These have been in for eight days?"
Voice low, Darius said, "Feels more like thirty."
"Yes," she said, "I'm sure it does." She poked around his scalp, asking, "Does this hurt?"
"Nope."
She moved her fingers and probed elsewhere. "This?"
"Nope."
"Good." She turned away and opened a drawer, pulling out a strange pair of scissors. "I'm just going to pop these out, and then you can wash your hair."
"Thank God."
He felt the pressure of the pliers as she twisted out the metal arms, and the nurse plucked at some of
the scabs to check for healing. "Here," she pressed a bandage to his head. "Hold this in place for a few minutes. Everything looks like it healed nicely. Have you been taking the antibiotics?"
"Actually, yes, I have." He met her eyes.
"And," she reviewed his chart. "The acetaminophen?"
"Actually, no." He crooked a grin.
"Any headaches, dizziness, nausea, vomiting, vertigo?"
He usually elected truth over anything else. "Just one dizzy spell, when my blood pressure, I think, got a little high. I was breaking up a schoolyard-type fight."
A bland expression held his. "Did you get hit on the head?"
"No. Not at all."
"How long did the spell last?" Her pen wavered over the paper, ready to document.
He thought back. "I don't know, maybe five minutes? I took some water and my Tylenol and meditated. It went right away."
There was something about admitting to people that he meditated that just seemed to give them pause. It had been an integral part of his life for the past ten years, though, and he couldn't see himself stopping a practice that so thoroughly helped him on a daily basis.
Her coppery eyes scanned him, then the chart. "That's good. Try to keep your blood pressure low, no running, exercising, doing anything strenuous, at least for another six weeks." She scrutinized him, and he liked the color of her eyes. "You look like you work out a lot. Do you think you can discipline yourself to wait six weeks?"
"Training? Yes, I can." He leaned back, feeling the hard lump of the jewelry box in his front pocket. Marriage to Jessalyn, though, would not.
A haircut was next on his to-do list, if only to have his scalp washed. And washed. And washed. The walk-in shop had a girl layered in tattoos and black-and-white striped hair who told him clipping a guy with a fresh scar was the coolest thing ever. She carefully massaged his head, mindful to not dislodge the scabs. She indulged him with a second wash when he told her he had been obligated to skip shampooing for the last week.