She let out a giggle. ‘Maybe I should get some of that.’
‘Sorry.’ Billy placed an arm around me. ‘It’s a limited edition. Only enough for one gal.’
‘Well,’ Tammy’s eyes swept up and down his body, ‘if you decide to try a new gal, let me know.’ She looked at me and pulled a face. ‘No offence Chanel, but a girl’s got to let people know she’s willing to interview for a new job, if you know what I mean.’
Oh, I knew what she meant, all right. Girls had been trying to let Billy know all night they were willing to be ‘interviewed’. He, bless his pink, frilly apron, seemed oblivious to it all. I was beginning to relax when I was in public with him. I guess a lifetime of being admired made you oblivious to it all.
This time though, he was particularly oblivious. His gaze fixed on a group of men loitering near the toilets. Three of them. Varied heights. Spanish, maybe Italian. Black leather jackets. Predators.
One held a beer. The others, glasses of red wine. But they didn’t appear to be drinking them. More as if the drinks were props in a stage show.
One of them, the shorter, stockier one, leaned towards the tallest and said something. Beanpole tilted his head to the side and then nodded slowly. He took a sip of his wine, put the almost-full glass on the nearest bar table then jerked his head towards the exit. The other two deposited their drinks, falling into step as they followed him to the stairs and up into the cold night.
Tammy was still chatting, oblivious to the sharks that had just swum away. I pasted a smile on my face to hide the unease I felt.
Billy’s arm relaxed on my shoulders and he pulled me in even closer. ‘You ready to go?’ he murmured in my ear.
A tingle ran down my spine. ‘Absolutely.’ I turned towards him, running my palms down his chest till they rested on his ab muscles.
I could feel them tensing under my touch as he sucked in a breath of air. ‘Come on.’ He grasped my elbow. ‘Let’s go.’
I made the walk home in my sky-high heels in record-breaking time. ‘What are you doing,’ I squealed as Billy picked me up and threw me over a shoulder.
‘It will take you forever to climb the stairs in those shoes.’ He wasn’t even puffing as he ran up the steps. ‘See,’ he deposited me in front of the door to our apartment. ‘Much faster.’
‘Hmmmmm.’ I shimmied my skirt back down my legs and then started the hunt for my keys.
Billy’s hands smoothed over my skirt, circling round to the front to pull me back against him.
‘Not helping,’ I muttered, staring into the depths of my bag. It tinkled when I shook it so I knew they were in there somewhere. I gave up trying to see them and went for the grope method at about the same time that Billy did. But he wasn’t groping the contents of my bag, cataloguing and discarding everything that didn’t feel like keys. No. His hands were dancing over the curves of my body, leaving tingles in their wake.
‘Got them.’ I pulled the reticent keys from my bag, holding them up triumphantly.
‘Excellent work, Smith,’ he mumbled. His teeth grazed the skin of my neck and I dropped the keys.
‘Damn.’ I bent over and Billy’s hands immediately turned their attention to the curves of my buttocks.
‘Babe. Are you trying to test my self-control?’ he asked. ‘Cause I got to tell you, it’s close to breaking.’
‘Nearly there.’ I grabbed the keys, fumbling with them as Billy’s lips found the nape of my neck.
He turned me around, pushed me back against the door and, as I surrendered myself to his kiss, plucked the keys from my hand.
I heard the sound of them being inserted into the door and then he pulled his lips from mine and pushed the door open.
‘Show off.’ I turned and scooped Cocoa up, kissing him on the head.
‘I’ll take him,’ Billy said. ‘You get those clothes off, and don’t even think about falling asleep before I get back.’
‘Who could sleep?’ I said, reaching down to pull off a shoe. I was so turned on it felt like I would never need sleep again.
As soon as I lost the other shoe I raced into the bathroom and jumped into the shower. Thirty seconds later I was back out, towelling myself dry. Then I raced up the stairs, digging around in the bottom corner of my wardrobe where I had shoved the plastic bag containing the lingerie I’d bought the week before.
I pulled out the black, gauzy, lace thong and push-up bra the woman had assured me would drive Billy wild.
It only took ten minutes, but it felt like forever, before he and Cocoa were back from Cocoa’s night-time pit stop.
Cocoa reached me first, jumping up on the bed to give me a snuffly dog kiss. I scratched him as he groomed my neck, a somewhat painful experience. When he had decided I was flea free, he jumped down and into his own bed, twirling around a couple of times before settling into a ball of black fur.
I tensed as I heard Billy’s footsteps on the stairs. I felt ridiculous lying on the bed in the lingerie. The alcohol in my blood had given me the confidence to put it on, but now I was questioning my decision.
What if he didn’t like it? What if he laughed?
I rolled onto my side and raised myself up onto an elbow as his head drew level with the bedroom. No time to back out now.
‘He insisted on peeing on every single tree.’ He reached the top of the stairs and turned to face me. ‘And then he….’
He froze, his jaw hanging open as he stared at me. Or rather, at my lingerie. ‘What is that,’ he breathed, stepping closer to the bed.
‘A bra, and some panties,’ I said.
I saw his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed. ‘You know when you say the word panties, and you look the way you do.’ He stopped and closed his eyes.
‘What’s wrong?’ I sat up on the bed. ‘Don’t you like them? I can take them off.’ Maybe the lady in the shop didn’t know what she was talking about.
His eyes flew back open. ‘Oh, they’ll be coming off all right,’ he growled. ‘But I will be the one doing the removing.’ He pulled his shirt up over his head and tossed it onto the floor behind him.
It was my turn to stare as he undid his zip and slid the jeans to the floor. I didn’t know if I was ever going to get used to how perfect he was.
‘Now,’ he said, climbing onto the bed till he was kneeling over me. ‘I don’t know if we can call this a bra.’ His fingertips slid over the soft material. ‘I mean bras are meant to hold your breasts in, aren’t they?’
‘Yes.’ I arched my back to give his hands better access but they slid teasingly away from where I wanted them to be.
‘And these…panties.’ The words came out as a hiss. ‘Did you know that they are see-through?’
‘That was kind of the idea.’
He grasped my hips and rolled me sideways sucking in a breath at what he saw. ‘There doesn’t appear to be much material in them.’
‘No,’ I whispered as his hands trailed over my buttocks. ‘Do you want me to take them off?’
‘Not yet,’ his words were a murmur against my skin as he trailed kisses over a hip bone. ‘I think first that you need to be punished.’
‘What for?’ I craned my head up and peered down at him.
‘An outfit like this could give a man a heart attack. Next time you need to warn me.’
‘So…how exactly were you planning on punishing me?’
‘Well,’ his fingers danced over my stomach, ‘from what I’ve heard, people being punished often scream. So my plan, Miss Smith, is to not stop till you have screamed yourself raw.’
‘Promise?’ I could feel a satisfied smile curling my lips. Turned out the woman did know what she was talking about after all.
‘Oh, I promise all right.’ His answer was a throaty growl.
2
Drag Mum
‘Where is it?’ I tapped my fingernails on Mark’s desk.
‘Where’s what?’ He looked up from the report he was pretending to work on. He’d been staring at the same page si
nce I’d walked in the door so I knew his mind was somewhere else. Probably thinking about Cindy, the woman he’d been dating for the past few months. From what I could tell they had a fairly tempestuous relationship. More off than on most weeks.
‘The graph?’
‘The…oh, right. What do you want that for?’ He glanced guiltily towards the door.
‘Don‘t worry, Billy isn’t here.’
‘You didn’t tell him?’
‘Of course I told him.’ I smiled brightly and held out my hands.
He pulled open the bottom drawer of his desk and reached under a couple of packets of Pringles to pull out the piece of paper. ‘You going to destroy it?’
‘Why would I do that?’ I opened it up, picked up a pen and put a Y in the latest box with the number 10 next to it.
‘What’s the ten for?’ he asked.
I raised an eyebrow at him and smiled.
‘Ten. Since Friday?’
‘It was two whole days.’ I shrugged, put the pen back on the desk and sauntered into the kitchenette to boil the jug.
‘Chanel!’
I jerked away from my fantasy of Billy and some lingerie I was planning on buying that afternoon, and spun towards Trent.
He had his head poked around the door and, when I met his gaze, he jerked his head and said, ‘My office.’
I toyed with the idea of making a cup of tea first but gave it up as a bad idea. I suspected he wouldn’t appreciate being kept waiting any more than Ramy did. The main difference was while I jumped when Ramy told me to, it was because I didn’t want to be punished, where with Trent it was because I respected him.
I followed him back down the corridor and into his office. He gestured to the seat opposite his desk, which I took to be a positive sign. I pulled it out and perched on the edge.
‘What’s Billy up to these days?’
I blew out a puff of air. ‘He’s very happy. Not going to get bored and we are going great thanks.’
He stared at me for a second, a perplexed look on his face, then he cleared his throat. ‘Well, that’s great.’ He nodded his head. ‘The Superintendent asked me to find out?’
‘Oh, right.’ I could feel a blush wash over my cheeks. ‘His work visa came through last week. Bruce is hiring him as Head of Security.’ The Superintendent?
‘Will you ask him to call this number?’ He pushed a piece of paper with a mobile number written on it, across the desk to me.
‘Sure.’ I put a finger on the paper and slid it back and forth while I stared at it. ‘Any idea what this is about?’
When he didn’t answer I looked up at him. He grimaced and shrugged.
‘Need to know basis?’
He nodded, and I felt a little sad. Did he have anybody he could confide in?
The promotion, no matter how temporary it might be, had put a divide between him and the rest of us. There were things he couldn’t tell us, and things we wouldn’t tell him.
He was no longer ‘one of us’ and I found myself wondering if that stung? First, he had lost Tess to Harry, and now this. Divided from his work mates by a promotion.
I shook myself. It wasn’t like he had really been one of us. He’d been a detective, so there had always been secrets, things he couldn’t tell.
‘Chanel?’ The questioning tone in his voice made me realise I was staring at his face without seeing him.
‘How are you?’ I asked.
‘I’m good.’ He rolled his pen with one finger. ‘Getting there. Got a date tomorrow night.’ He flashed me a grin.
‘Really.’ I sat even further forwards on my seat and rested my elbows on the desk. ‘Anyone I know?’
‘Gloria. One of the detectives from The City Station.’
‘Gloria.’ I worked my way through the few members of that station that I had met. ‘Dark hair, a bit taller than me, looks like a runner?’
‘That’s her.’ He leaned back in his chair. ‘I thought it might be too soon but….’ He shrugged again.
‘Time to get back in the saddle.’
‘Yeah. That’s what I decided. So when she asked me.’
‘She asked you?’
He ran a hand through his hair. ‘Yeah. Ran into her at the train station the other night.’
‘Is that a bar?’
He let out a laugh. ‘No. I’ve been catching the train to work. Much easier than trying to park around here.’
I nodded. Parking was a nightmare unless you managed to have an apartment with a car spot like I did. Parking at the station was reserved for the three patrol cars and patrons.
‘So…,’ Trent looked sideways at me, ‘how’s Tess?’
‘She’s great, Trent.’ There was no use pulling any punches on this one. Especially not when it looked like he was about to get back out there. ‘Harry just bought her a huge diamond ring, and they’re talking about going to Spain.’
He sighed and rolled the pen a bit faster.
‘Look, the chances of this Gloria being the right one are slim,’ I said. ‘But even that is a much higher chance than you have of ending up with Mum.’
‘So you’re saying there’s a chance.’ He let out a laugh at the look on my face and held his hands in the air. ‘Kidding,’ he said, ‘just kidding. I’m not quite that hopeless. Not like Daniel.’
‘What about Daniel?’
‘Huh?’ He looked at his watch. ‘Bob will be waiting for you. You’d better go.’
‘I know.’ I pushed up out of my seat. ‘Places to go, bad people to catch.’
‘Don’t forget the number.’
‘Sure.’ I plucked the piece of paper off the desk and pushed it into one of the zip-up pockets on my vest. Wouldn’t do to lose the Superintendent’s number. ‘Have a good day.’
‘Yeah, you too.’ But his attention was already gone, taken, instead, by the huge mound of paperwork that dominated his table.
I watched him for a second, feeling sad that, apart from work, he wasn’t in my life anymore. But I knew if I had to choose, no matter how sad it made me, I would choose Harry. I was just glad it wasn’t me who had had to make that choice.
***
‘The Superintendent asked me to call him?’ Billy nudged the piece of paper with one finger before turning his attention back to the stove.
‘Totally weird, right?’
‘Totally. I forgot to ask you, does Bruce have any special dietary requirements?’
I grabbed the waist tie on the frilly, pink apron, pulling him towards me as I let out a growl. ‘You know when you talk like that,’ I snapped my teeth together a couple of times, ‘it just makes me so hot.’
He laughed and batted my hands away from his waist with the wooden spoon. ‘Stop it. I’ll burn the chicken.’
‘See, there you go again.’ I wrapped my arms around him and rested my head on his back. ‘Thank goodness you’re starting work tomorrow as a boring security guard. All this cleaning and cooking talk is making me sexually exhausted.’
‘Really?’ He put down the spoon and turned towards me. ‘Cause that’s not how it seemed last night. Perhaps I should go easy with you.’
Cocoa let out a high-pitched bark and launched himself off the couch. He pressed his nose against the door a second before the knock sounded. His bottom wiggled with the speed of his tail.
‘Oh, goody,’ I said. ‘He brought Lancelot.’
I released my grip on Billy and danced over to the door, yanking it open before Bruce could knock again.
A black ball of fluff exploded into the apartment and Cocoa took off after his best friend. I put my hands over my ears to block out the hysterical barking as the two of them raced up the stairs to the bedroom.
‘Hello,’ I yelled, letting go of my ears to pull Bruce into the apartment.
Bruce held out a bottle of sparkling wine and a bunch of flowers. ‘The wine is for you,’ he said. ‘The flowers are for the chef.’ He winked at Billy.
‘It’s a good thing he’s starting work for you
tomorrow,’ I stage whispered as I took them from him. ‘Cause the way he is right now he would be totally into these flowers.’
Bruce let out a gasp and trotted over to Billy. ‘What has she done to you?’ He batted at the apron with his hands. ‘She’s domesticated you. No, no, no, this will never do. A thousand gay men would cry themselves to sleep if they knew you were wearing this. We need you to be our big, tough, Billy so that we can revere and adore you from afar.’
I popped the cork out of the bottle and muttered, ‘As long as it’s from afar.’
‘Here.’ Bruce scampered over to his bag which he’d dropped next to mine by the front door. ‘I got you your uniform.’
He dragged a black t-shirt from it and shook it out before holding it up so we could see. Head of Security was printed in bold white letters across the back. ‘Try it on.’
‘Give me one second.’ We watched while Billy moved the chicken to a casserole dish and poured a sauce over it. He pulled open the oven door and deposited it inside. ‘Thanks.’
Bruce handed him the shirt and Billy jogged up the stairs to the bedroom, two at a time.
‘Do you know what Cocoa and Lancelot are doing?’ he yelled down over the balustrading.
‘Are they chewing on the cushions?’ I placed the champagne flute I was filling on the kitchen bench and turned towards his voice.
‘No.’
‘Are they burrowing under the covers?’
‘I wouldn’t call it that.’
‘Oh. Well, that only leaves humping each other.’
‘Do they do this often?’
‘It’s their favourite pastime.’
Bruce had positioned himself into the far corner of the small kitchen and had his head craned back while he stared up at the bedroom.
‘Stop perving.’ I punched him lightly on the shoulder.
‘Just trying to see if it fits.’
‘Oh, pulleeeease.’ I handed him a glass. ‘You’ve got that look on your face. You know, the one you get just before the drool comes out of the corner of your mouth.’
Billy Page 3