Shaken: An Interracial Second Chance Romance (L.A. Nights Book 3)

by Sylvie Fox

  “I’m sorry,” Cam said.

  Jessie continued as if she hadn’t heard him. She spoke like she was in a dream, watching it, not reliving it. “I thought he’d fallen asleep. Until I didn’t hear any breath any more. I was seven, but I wasn’t stupid. In my heart, I knew.”

  “How’d you get out?” Cameron asked.

  “Mi tío. He was the one that found me. Took me to Mama.” Jessie’s voice went flat. “I had to be the one to tell her Papa was dead.”

  Before he thought better of it, Cameron pulled her into his arms. They weren’t man and wife in the way they used to be, but he wanted to give her comfort. Ease her suffering. Jessie shook like a ficus leaf in the Santa Ana winds. His shoulder grew wet with tears.

  “Shh. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.” He’d always thought it was something like that. But her family almost never talked about the Mexico quake. Even on Día de los Muertos, when they honored her father’s death, they only talked about his life. The only good thing to come of the quake is that it had been the catalyst that had brought the family to the United States. Bringing Jessie to Los Angeles and him.

  Pulling her tighter against him, he let her cry for the little girl who had lost her daddy. Where he’d harbored only a hard nugget of anger of his father’s accident at Strohmeyer’s, Jessie had kept in sadness.

  He added not talking to his wife, really talking to her, to his long list of life regrets. He’d mistaken sex for intimacy. If he’d known she’d witnessed death firsthand…he’d have…. Cam didn’t know what he’d have done different. Probably a whole lot of things.

  The lights flickered on, holding steady this time. Jessie jumped away from him like he harbored a communicative disease.

  A disembodied voice filled the cabin. “We’re taking the car to the lobby.”

  That was their only warning. His wife stood, grabbed the brass rail. She held on like it was a death-defying rollercoaster ride while they descended the ten floors to the bottom. He was as useless to her as a sixth finger. The minute the doors eased apart, he reached for her, but grasped nothing but air.

  Paramedics and a camera crew swarmed the elevator. He watched his wife’s profile transform from scared to self-assured with a single swallow. Jessie turned on the charm when the microphone neared her face.

  He swatted away an EMT like a fly. Slowly, he folded the blanket, putting it and the empty water bottles into his duffle. No one approached him as he walked from the elevator to the corner of the lobby.

  Jessie did a dramatic rendition of her entrapment in Spanish, then English. It would play on all the local news stations, he was sure. Angelenos were glued to their televisions when it came to three things: car chases, weather, and earthquakes.

  He stood at a distance, watching it all play out. The look he gave the reporters who dared turn his way stopped them in their tracks. He’d watched his career advancement stall out over being the subject of a news story. That was never going to happen again.

  When the hot, white camera lights switched off, the paramedics made one last attempt to help his wife.

  “I’m fine, really,” Jessie assured them. Soon everyone was gone, the news crew out the front door, and the techs down to the electrical panels that were the elevator’s brain. It was dawn. Only the two of them remained.

  She must have hidden them for the cameras, but suddenly fine tremors radiated through her body. He could see Jessie working to keep it all together.

  “I’ll take you home,” he said, his tone brooking no argument. She followed him to his car. He pulled the police placard from under the windshield wiper and drove her home.

  Gripping the door handle like a vice was the only way Jessie could think of to control the emotions swirling inside. Fear, relief, regret, and love pulled her heart in four different directions.

  It took a few blocks for her to get out of her own head and realize Cameron hadn’t asked for directions. “Don’t you need the address?” she asked as he pointed his car unerringly toward her house.

  “No,” was his swift reply. She couldn’t decide whether to be angry or grateful. She should have known he’d have her address. Jessie wouldn’t have been at all surprised to learn that he had a squad car swing by her house every now and then.

  “Once mine, always mine,” he’d said on their wedding day. She’d chalked it up to macho crap back then. But now that he’d come to her rescue without hesitation or bitterness, she was sure he’d meant it.

  At her building on Ogden, he pulled open the passenger door and took her bag.

  Despite her damsel in distress routine from a few hours ago, she still had some pride. “You don’t need to—”

  “Yes I do,” Cam said in the voice he probably used to cow criminals. Waiting a moment for her go first, he walked her to the door. How he found the keys so swiftly in the jumble of her bag, she didn’t have a clue. But he pushed open the door to the ground floor apartment entrance and escorted Yesenia in.

  What did a person owe to her ex-husband who’d saved her from being trapped in an elevator during the biggest quake Los Angeles had seen in a decade? She’d spent much of her childhood mimicking the manners of successful Americans, but there was no model for this. “You want some coffee?” she threw out. He ignored her, instead taking the stairs two at a time.

  A minute later he called down the stairs, “Jessie, you need to see this.” She tried not to bristle. He was the only person she’d allowed to use her gringa nickname after high school had ended and Mexican pride had kicked back in.

  Taking a deep breath, she made her way up the steps, gripping the iron railing tight. She didn’t want to fall if there was an aftershock. Testing the bolts with a little shake, the metal held firm.

  When she found him, he was prowling around the second story of her townhouse apartment.

  “See this crack,” he said, pointing to a new diagonal line in the plaster of the guest bedroom. “Have your landlord check on this.”

  Her eyes followed the hairline crack. If all went according to plan, she’d be her own landlord soon and this kind of thing would be her problem. Maybe she could make that coffee and invite Cam to sit at the table. She could ask him to sign the papers. Fingers crossed, in a few weeks she’d be the owner of this place, cracks and all.

  He was in the guest bedroom when she looked around, ready to execute her plan. “Someone sleeping here?” He pointed to the mussed bed. “Your sister back?”

  “Mí hermana,” Yesenia started. Then stopped. She wasn’t going to defend her family or her actions. And she wasn’t going to give him the papers now. Maybe later, when he called to check up on her. Because of course he would call. They hadn’t broken up because he didn’t care for her. “I think you should go,” she said, trying to sound firmer than the jelly jiggling inside where her resolve should have been.

  “Not done up here.” He strode to her bedroom. She followed in his wake.

  “Cam, is this really necessary?” she asked. Adrenaline that had propelled Yesenia for so many hours had worn off the minute she’d stepped into her own home. She was all done pretending she was okay. To turn off her phone, and curl up in bed for a day or two or ten was all she wanted. She needed time to pull her thoughts together. Maybe get an emergency appointment with her old therapist.

  As if reading her thoughts, Cam pulled down the bedroom window shades. He slipped the heavy curtains across their rods. “You should sleep.”

  Her arms crossed in front, ready to pull Cam’s shirt over her head. But she hesitated. She hadn’t undressed in front of him in years. Except for a few hours ago, she remembered. She hadn’t been embarrassed when she thought she was going to die. Suddenly she was as nervous as that third or fourth date when Cam had taken her back to his apartment.

  If eyes were windows to the soul, she needed to close hers fast. As if she didn’t give a damn about her husband in the room, she pulled off his shirt and wiggled out of his shorts. She extended her hand to return the borrowed clothes.
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br />   Cam came closer. It was like the elevator all over again. Suddenly she couldn’t pull enough oxygen into her lungs. But it wasn’t panic causing shortness of breath this time. It was another thing entirely.

  Dolores had always asked what she saw in this shorn stocky white guy with Law and Order as his middle names. Not the law. Definitely not the order. Not the hair or his wordlessness.

  It was this.

  He looked at her like no other man had. Cameron saw her. Not an undocumented immigrant. Not someone’s potential housekeeper or nanny. Not some nameless, faceless Mexican woman in Los Angeles, but her. It was something not a single other man had ever tried or accomplished.

  He took the clothes and tossed them toward the closet. He came even closer. Yesenia hadn’t been married to him for all these years without learning a thing or two about Cameron Becker. What she knew now without a shadow of a doubt is that he wanted her in this bed. That he wanted to make her his like he’d done so many times before. His eyes held hers with single-minded determination. He was going to kiss her.

  His big fingers pushed through the hair at her nape and held her jaw steady. She pulled in breath, gathering the strength to flee, to protest—to say yes. But nothing came from her mouth except breath. In an instant, his lips were on hers, making short work of any resistance Yesenia could have mustered. She cursed God above when his tongue met hers. This man wasn’t going anywhere for a while.

  The kiss turned from soothing to soulful in a heartbeat. Yesenia’s hands went around his waist, pulling him closer. Regret over their time apart shook her to the core. All her indignation, anger, and strongly held beliefs didn’t grip her as tightly as Cam.

  The soft material of his shirt slid upward in her grasp, exposing the toned muscles of his abdomen. He still worked out. The familiar arrow of blond tickled her palm as she followed it up to where the patch of hair fanned out on his chest. Locating his small nipple, she zeroed in with her thumb.

  His swift intake of breath unfused their mouths. “Jessie, fuck,” he groaned.

  “Yo sé,” she said, pulling the dark blue cotton over his head. He didn’t pretend to misunderstand. In the morning light, escaping from the space between the curtains, he was even larger than she remembered. His arms were all muscle, as big and thick as the branches on the decades-old ficus outside her bedroom window.

  Big hands. Yesenia had always loved Cam’s. Blunt-tipped fingers whispering against her skin, and flat palms skimming her sides had always made her feel small and delicate, though she was anything but. Those hands she’d missed shoved up her camisole and bra.

  The cool air on her exposed breasts was immediately replaced by Cam’s heat. First from his chest as he moved inexorably closer and kissed her again. Then from the hands he snaked up her ribcage. Each measured the weight of her breasts, as if merging reality with memory.

  “Por favor, tócame.” Please, touch me.

  Like Astaire and Rogers reunited, the old mating dance steps came right back. Cam marched her to the queen-sized bed she’d bought on an indulgent whim. He sat and pulled her with him until they were lying facing each other. Like a starving man, he devoured her mouth. Each thumb fondled a nipple to hardness. She nearly came from that simple touch alone. It had been so damned long.

  For long minutes he rubbed her nipples, dipping down to first kiss, then suck. He didn’t make an attempt to finish disrobing her. He left her camisole where it rested across her breasts. Her underwear remained firmly in place. Full nudity would have been too much for both of them.

  It had always been like this between them. This explosion, like two atoms colliding. When she’d been angry or he’d been silent, the desire between them had never waned. Before she’d finally gotten the courage to walk out, she’d had to cut him off like a dieter giving up sweets. One day at a time she’d weaned herself enough until leaving hadn’t stopped her breath.

  Yesenia pushed a hand against his chest. He didn’t move. But he stopped touching her for a moment. Long enough to gather what wits she hadn’t dropped on the floor the moment he’d stepped into her bedroom.

  He looked at her long and hard. Eyes the color of the ocean, and nearly as turbulent as the Pacific, met hers. Hair she’d never seen longer than the inch it was now, stood on end. Cam must have racked his hand through it a thousand times over the last six or seven hours.

  “Cameron. I don’t know,” she whispered in his ear, making one last fight to save her hard won independence. But in that single moment of hesitation, the tremors returned. She shook harder than the ground had a few hours earlier when the peril had been real.

  “Say yes to this, Jessie.”

  She closed her eyes for a long moment. His breath fluttered her lashes. Opening them again, she nodded. Decision made, desire replaced fear.

  His eyes didn’t leave hers. He reached down and pulled the thong between her legs aside. Finally releasing her from his gaze, he broke eye contact to concentrate on what he was doing. Yesenia couldn’t look. Looking would be admitting what was happening. What she’d promised herself would never happen again.

  ¡Dios mío! Yesenia didn’t need to see. She swallowed her gasp of pleasure. In and out went his finger. His gaze found hers again. But his stare was so intense, she had to close her eyes. Turned out that wasn’t any better. With one sense eliminated, all the rest went on overload. Cam’s thumb joined his other finger, this time on her clit. Yesenia gave herself over to the inevitability of the mounting pleasure and release.

  “Turn over,” he said. Following orders, she turned laying on her other side, her back to his front. Fabric against fabric was the sound of him shucking his pants, and whatever else he had on. Back and forth, he rubbed his erection against her.

  Fingers pressed into her thigh. “Let me…”

  Following his lead, she lifted her leg. The grip on her thigh tightened. Then Cameron was there thrusting inside her. Doubly shocked, she lost her breath. They’d never done it in any position other than missionary. During all those years, she’d worn her inhibitions like a cloak in bed. But this laid her desires bare before him. Yesenia squeezed her eyes shut. It was so good. She’d never been so filled.

  First slowly, then faster and harder, he moved in and out with delicious friction until she heard him shout as if his orgasm had been wrenched from his closed fist. He’d never come without a fight. Always a fight between the tightly wound man and his baser instincts.

  What she’d shut out from her mind, her body hadn’t forgotten. With the help of his deft fingers, she hit a second crest.

  “Why did we get separated?” Cam whispered in her ear right before she fell into the welcome oblivion of sleep. She only answered in her head. Because their sex life had never been the problem. Everything else had.

  Chapter Three

  Yesenia knew an opportunity when she saw one. It’s one of the things that made her a good investigative journalist. Leaving Cameron dead to the world, she finally finished the coffee she’d offered hours ago. She was well into the second cup, when Cam shuffled into the kitchen.

  At least he’d put on his briefs. He used to walk around their house as naked as the day he was born. Memories of their past tangled with what had happened a few hours earlier. She turned from him, opened the tap and ran her wrists under the cool water. When she’d gotten herself under control she faced him again.

  “Coffee?” he asked, gesturing toward the chrome pot on the counter. In the morning he’d always served himself. Then she remembered. Of course, he’d never been here before. She pulled a mug from the cabinet with a handle big enough to accommodate his hands.

  “Sit,” she said, directing him to a seat at the kitchen table. He pulled the chair out, but not before picking up the pile of papers on the table as if to set them aside. “Don’t move those. I need you to sign something.”

  If he hadn’t been so tired, his face, grooved with sleeplessness and worry, would have worn a perplexed look. She turned and made him coffee exactly how h
e’d always liked it. White, no sugar. She placed it on the table in front of him. He took a cautious sip.

  “It’s not poisoned.”

  The joke fell flat. She pulled some so-called breakfast cookies from a top cabinet. He used to love the lemon vanilla treats. Out of habit, she still bought them. She put two on a plate and slid it next to his mug.

  “What is this?” he asked, gesturing to the papers she’d lifted from her bag a little earlier. Putting them out on the table had been like lifting a yoke of responsibility from her shoulders. She didn’t need to carry the mantle of the Catholic Church any longer. Other Catholics got divorced. The Vatican had weddings of people who co-habitated before marriage and even had kids out of wedlock. Her divorce would be a small sin in comparison.

  “The owner of this building wants to sell,” she started, easing into the bigger issues.

  “Okay.”

  “He’s converting to condos.” She paused for a long moment, trying to read him. He sipped, but wasn’t giving anything away. “Rather than pay the relocation fee, he’s offered to sell me the unit below market.”

  “What’s the catch?”

  “For me, none. I would finally get to own something of my own.”

  “What about the house on Alsace? You remember the one we bought for your family instead of buying one for ourselves.” There was no sarcasm in his tone, but it was a blow to the solar plexus nonetheless. The cold tile of the counter dug into her back as she leaned heavily. Could they not do this without an argument? Without him digging up the past.

  Yesenia moved away from the counter and sat across from him. In only a few words, he’d pricked her enthusiasm like a balloon. She wouldn’t argue. There would be no yelling. She took one deep breath. Two. It wasn’t enough. She took one more. Then went for the same tone she’d use to throw it to the traffic reporter.