One Taste

by Cari Quinn

“I wondered….”

  She wet her dust-dry lips. Enough of the wondering already.

  “You’re pretty.” Against her neck, his voice sounded seductively slurred, as if he’d just crawled out of bed. “And smart. Too smart for this.”

  Kiki stiffened, her body reacting as swiftly as if he’d branded her with a flaming torch. The man was delirious. He was—

  “Wondered why you…stayed.”

  “S-stayed?” she asked, realizing that of the two of them, she was the one who sounded as if she’d lost a few platelets.

  “At the Quikky.” Vincent turned his face into her hair. “Ringing up chili dogs. And….”

  His nose tickled her neck and she barely suppressed a shiver. “Condoms,” she finished with a small smile.

  “Yeah.” He gathered a fistful of her uniform pants in his fingers. “Some toy gun.”

  She flinched, her hand halfway to his hair again. She should’ve known better than to touch him even once. “I’m sorry. I thought—”

  “Don’t. Think.” His breath fluttered over her skin. “This can’t be heaven. Because if it is, it’s shitty. No offense.”

  “None taken.” Hysterical laughter rang up in her throat. “I’d be disappointed, too. No. We’re alive. You’re alive.”

  A cop car and an ambulance swung up outside the Quikky Snak, red and blue strobe lights flashing. Thank God.

  “Are you okay?” He opened his eyes. “He didn’t hit you, too?”

  That he could think of her well-being now twisted her belly into knots. “I’m fine.” She cupped his cheek, meeting his hazy, near-black eyes. For that one instant, everything rioting inside her smoothed out, silk over satin. “My hero,” she said, her voice hoarse.

  She glanced up as two uniformed cops, one male, one female, approached the store, guns drawn. She shuddered. Not more guns.

  “Kiki?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Will you—”

  The cops shouted out a warning that they were coming in, but she didn’t respond. As much as she wanted to yell that the gunman was gone, she didn’t. Vincent didn’t need another jolt. They’d be found soon enough.

  Vincent shut his eyes. “Stay with me?”

  She nodded fiercely, tightening her hold on him. When his lips parted on another low groan, her heart stumbled.

  Oh, God, please let him be okay. I’ll let him lie on top of me forever if you’ll just let him be okay.

  Really, weren’t there worse things than a shattered pelvis? She didn’t need a functioning reproductive system, anyway. Besides, her girl parts hadn’t seen this much pressure for a while, and—

  And now even her thoughts were babbling.

  The cops entered, shouting commands at each other.

  “Over here,” Kiki called, grinding her teeth as the first notes of “Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer” jingled through the speakers. If there had ever been a time she’d less felt like ho-ho-ho-ing, she couldn’t remember it.

  The female cop turned her head, eyes narrowing. “Everyone okay?” she asked, picking her way toward them through the minefield of magazines and puddles of soda.

  “No.” Kiki glanced at Vincent’s rapidly paling cheeks. “He’s been shot.”

  The male cop knelt at her side. “And you, miss?”

  “I wasn’t injured. He protected me.”

  Kiki answered their questions mechanically, her mind centered on the still man in her arms. But when the EMTs eased Vincent away, her fog lifted. “I have to stay with him. I promised.”

  “He’ll be okay. Let us take care of him, and you can meet us at the hospital.” The female cop tried to soothe her.

  Kiki felt the loss of Vincent’s warmth acutely, even as her crushed legs trembled with relief. “No. Understand me?” She shoved the cop’s patting hands away and struggled to her feet. Her body throbbed, and her shaky legs wobbled. But she didn’t care. “I’m coming with him.”

  “Only family is allowed to ride in the ambulance.”

  “Do you see his family here?” She fisted her hands on her hips, tucking her thumbs underneath her fingers so they didn’t shake like the rest of her. “Dammit, I’m coming.”

  Five minutes later, the ambulance doors shut behind them. Kiki took Vincent’s cool hand in hers. Through the narrow pane of glass in the doors, the Quikky Snak blurred as they whizzed away from the curb, sirens blazing.

  She would make this up to him. One way or another.

  They were arguing. He didn’t recognize the voices at first, but the clipped notes of one and the low tones of the other stabbed ice picks of pain into his brain.

  Go away. Now.

  Antiseptic scented the air, and the beep-beep-hiss coming from his right clued him in that he wasn’t home in his black silk-sheeted bed. Clearly, any women ministering to him here would wield needles, not sex toys. And the swish of paper over his thighs proved he wore more clothing than he usually did when he was in bed at home, too.

  Normally, he didn’t don paper dresses. At least not for female company.

  “…he needs rest. You’ll be an unpleasant reminder….”

  “He asked me to stay. He can tell me to leave himself.”

  “Here’s an idea.” Vincent moistened his parched lips, wondering if that was really his voice. Surely he didn’t sound so feeble. He cocked open one eye and peered into the harsh light, then abruptly closed it. Hurt too much. “Both leave.”

  The chatter stopped. Then the cooing began.

  “Vincent, my dear boy, can you hear me?”

  “Are you in pain?”

  What kind of idiotic question was that? The details were sketchy at the moment, but if memory served, he’d been plugged by a.22 caliber bullet. It had felt quite real at the time.

  Thank you very much, Kiki.

  Not that he wanted to speak to anyone in his current condition, but he wouldn’t throw his grandmother out. Yet. The other one, however…the one who’d turned him down flat for sex before she’d gotten him shot? She could leave.

  “Gran,” he said, addressing the first voice. “I don’t want visitors.”

  “You heard him, Miss Wyatt.”

  He expected Kiki to debate the point. In his limited experience with her, she rarely backed down without a fight. Instead, silence descended, and a moment later, the door opened and shut.

  She hadn’t argued. She’d just…gone.

  But it didn’t make him happy. Thanks to the hellfire scorching his left shoulder and the weighty blanket of fatigue smothering him, he doubted anything could.

  His grandmother’s heels clicked on the floor as she approached. “Vincent, honey,” she murmured, kissing his cheek. “You had me so frightened.”

  Her heavy perfume clouded around his head, setting off a painful pounding behind his right eye. Since when did his gran wear any scent but vanilla lotion and flour?

  “How are you feeling, sweetheart?”

  “Amazing, considering I’m—” He started coughing, thereby ending his rant before it had even started.

  A plastic cup bumped his mouth. “Open up.”

  He complied. The cool liquid trickling over his dry lips gave him a fleeting pleasure, and after a few halting sips, the tickle in his throat subsided.

  Warily, he opened his eyes again. Without his glasses, the view was fuzzy around the edges, but he could see his grandmother hovering at his side, stroking his leg. Being her generally warm, wonderful grandmotherly self.

  Too bad he wasn’t in the mood for hovering and stroking.

  “I got shot.” He craned his neck to look at the damage. “In my left shoulder. Right?”

  “A little below the shoulder, actually. It wasn’t too deep. You were very lucky.”

  Lucky. Right. That’s exactly what I am.

  “Don’t worry, darling.”

  “Don’t worry? I have a deadli…job,” he amended as her patting ceased.

  “I know where you work, dear. You’ve worked there for six years now.” She spoke
slowly, giving him plenty of time to process her words. Did she think he’d had a head injury to go with his bullet wound?

  At the moment he couldn’t argue. His mind didn’t seem fully functional. Much like his achy body.

  “Right. At Comtek.” He let out a breath. “Where else?”

  Where else, indeed.

  Visions of aggrieved phone calls from his agent danced in Vincent’s head like sugar plum fairies on speed. Jerry hadn’t wanted him to push so hard to get into Scarlet’s release schedule for next Christmas, but Vincent had been sure he would be able to pump out a holiday romp in record time. His publisher’s schedule meant his deadline would be pretty tight, though that hadn’t fazed him. Why worry? He hadn’t foreseen any problems, so he’d quickly agreed.

  That, of course, had been before his recent sexless spate had dovetailed with his lack of writing inspiration. Two extensions later, he had no wiggle room left.

  And he’d just bought a new Jeep.

  And a new income property.

  And his grandmother an insanely expensive faux fur coat for Christmas, the holiday he hated and she adored.

  God. He was so screwed. A small smile creased his lips at the irony. Hadn’t that been his plan for the evening? He’d gotten screwed, all right, just not in the way he’d intended.

  He’d just wanted a little physical release. Instead, he’d earned himself a bum shoulder and a deadline he didn’t have a chance in two hells to meet. All because Kiki Wyatt didn’t consider him a suitable candidate for sex and couldn’t differentiate between a real and a fake gun.

  Vincent pressed a hand to his head. Now the fairies were trying to Riverdance their way out of his skull. “What am I going to do?”

  “Sweetie, you’re barely out of surgery. You should be thanking your lucky stars the bullet grazed you.”

  “Grazed me?” He ground his teeth together. “Then why does it hurt so damn much?”

  When his grandmother perched on a stool beside his bed, light ricocheted off her left hand. “Just take it easy.”

  He squinted, trying to make out the source of the glitter. His grandmother liked jewelry like most women, but that beam of light had nearly blinded him. “Where are my glasses? And what’s on your hand?”

  “They’re being repaired. I’ll be able to pick them up for you tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  “Yes, tomorrow. Tonight, you’ll be resting.”

  Fat chance on that one. “And your hand?”

  “We’ll talk later.” He smelled his grandmother’s evasion even more strongly than her wafting perfume. “I want you to tell me what happened tonight.” She leaned closer. “Are you having relations with that girl?”

  “Kiki? No way.” He yanked at his sheets as he relived Kiki’s swift dismissal. “She’s a gas station attendant.”

  When barbed tentacles of heat hurtled up his left arm, he winced. Probably served him right for taking potshots at Kiki’s profession. And if he thought that, either he was developing a conscience or they had him on some really good drugs.

  “I hardly know her,” he added.

  “So why is she so devoted to you?”

  He nearly choked on the water he’d started to drink. “You’re mistaken, Gran. Forget devoted. Kiki’s not even that fond of me.”

  Nor did she bother tempering her rejections with tact, which he actually didn’t mind. Back when he’d dealt with female rejection on a daily basis, they’d usually just made up some lame excuse. Direct worked. Not as well as a purred, “Yes, I’m dying to have sex with you,” but all in all, he could deal.

  If it weren’t for the damned bullet.

  “She fretted all night, waiting for you to get out of surgery. She’s still wearing your blood.”

  It all rushed back, how he’d tumbled on top of Kiki as his world went black. She was such a tiny little thing.

  He’d probably hurt her. Forget probably.

  But she hadn’t complained. She’d cradled him against her, offering comfort. Offering her warmth, when he’d felt so cold. And the one time he’d managed to look at her, her normally cool gray eyes had shone with tears.

  Something wrenched inside him, and for once, it wasn’t pain. But it bothered him a heck of a lot more.

  “Who did this?” he asked in a low voice. “Who held us up?”

  “He got away.” His grandmother clasped his hand, linking their fingers. Her touch steadied him, as it had since he was a little boy. “They’ll find him. I promise.”

  He peered at his arm again, or tried to. But between his general got-crushed-by-a-semi malaise and the thick bandages wrapped around his shoulder, not to mention his blurred vision, there wasn’t much point. “How much blood did I lose?”

  “Too much.” She pressed a kiss to his forehead and got to her feet. “Baby, you look peaked. Get some rest.”

  “But—”

  “No buts. Sleep. I’ll be back later.” She kissed him again and left him alone with the beeping machines and his thoughts.

  He shifted on the unforgiving mattress. What time was it? At least it was still dark out. This time of year, that wasn’t saying much.

  Vincent squinted at the clock. He was due at Comtek at seven. His position as a network engineer didn’t allow him much downtime, and today was no exception. They were implementing a new security design for a prestigious new client, and other than Lynsay, no one on his team was capable of spearheading the project. He’d done a lot of the legwork in securing this client. He deserved to see it through.

  But God, he was tired. No wonder, he’d been through surgery. How bad was his wound? Was his grandmother sugarcoating things? Where the hell was his doctor? He had to get to work. And write his book.

  Deadlines were his lifeblood. The nastier the better. He thrived on stress and had always procrastinated right up to the crisis point without any ill effects. But this time, waiting to start his book until less than six weeks before it was due had put the first nail in his metaphorical coffin.

  His editor probably wouldn’t object to a deadline extension, especially in this circumstance. But his romance writing career had stalled some time ago, and he’d be damned if that stall turned into a permanent end.

  At this point, getting his book—his blisteringly hot book—finished on time even took precedence over heading up the Stavros project at Comtek. Which really burned his ass.

  If someone had told him even five years ago he would be this fired-up to write romances, he would’ve busted a gut laughing. He wasn’t exactly Mr. Sensitivity. But that had been before his grandfather died. After that, his grandmother’s life had changed, and so had his.

  Lucille had always read romances, but during her husband’s illness, they became a lifeline. One night, Vincent had found himself reading the tattered book in his grandmother’s purse while she stood vigil at her husband’s bedside. He’d been surprisingly intrigued. None of his expectations had been close to the truth.

  It wasn’t just women’s porn. The story was about two people falling in love, and yeah, they had sex. So what? Even a guy who’d never experienced falling in love himself could theorize what it must be like. Maybe he didn’t envision curling up with those sorts of novels all the time, but his grandmother’s book had given him a respite from his grief.

  Even after his grandfather died, he’d occasionally thumbed through Lucille’s book stash. And when her favorite author died unexpectedly—the one whose story he’d borrowed from her purse—something clicked in Vincent’s mind. He could write romances, too. In some miniscule way, he could begin to replace all his grandmother had lost.

  It had taken time for him to learn how to write a decent story. His natural way of phrasing things didn’t necessarily jibe with the feminine sensibilities of most of his readership, but that didn’t mean he didn’t enjoy writing. He did. When he finally started selling books, he definitely enjoyed the additional income stream.

  Not only that, but apparently his masculine point of view ca
me in handy. How many fan letters had he received that mentioned his “uncanny” ability to write dominant men with surprisingly real emotions? And women who always knew just what to say to inflame their men to the point of implosion? It was as if he had an inside track to the male mind.

  Or something.

  Even his grandmother had eventually become a big fan of Vicenza Bishop. She had no clue her grandson and Vicenza were one in the same, and he planned on keeping it that way. It was bad enough that she read his sex scenes. Neither of them needed the joy of her actually knowing they were his.

  Making her happy had always been his grandfather’s first priority, and now it was Vincent’s. So he’d write his damn book, collect his damn advance, and pay his frigging bills.

  Everyone would live happily ever after.

  Now he just had to figure out how to make it happen.

  Chapter Three

  Kiki coasted into her driveway just after sunrise the next morning, too tired to do more than tap the brake pedal.

  What a horrible night. The worst of her life, hands down. Well, barring the night she’d bolted out of Hendrix Chapel minus her groom. That one tended to win most suck contests. But the previous night had taken some prizes, too. Her eyes burned and her stomach ached from a cross of guilt and nerves. She was also ravenously hungry, though she doubted she could keep anything down.

  She turned off the ignition and pressed the side of her face against her window. The frosty glass distracted her, but not enough to blur the image of Vincent lying bleeding in her arms.

  It wasn’t just that he’d gotten shot, although that was more than bad enough. It was that she had all these unresolved feelings for him, the kind that tended to coagulate and boil over at the worst possible moment.

  Like right now.

  Would she ever forget feeling the bullet enter Vincent’s body? When it had struck him, her own limbs had spasmed so hard she’d nearly fallen. Hell, with the angle of their bodies, it was a miracle the bullet hadn’t just kept going.

  What woman didn’t fantasize about the intimacy of sharing a bullet with her dream man?

  Okay, that was an exaggeration. Even she wouldn’t have called Vincent her dream man. But she’d definitely imagined how that rangy body would feel wedged against hers. And in her imagination, he hadn’t been bleeding all over her putrid green work uniform.