Quintic

by V. P. Trick

Even knowing Christopher would figure it out, she had voluntarily left out details in the damn statement, intimate details of her encounters with Lemieux and details that could lead to Joshua. It was time to man up to her omissions.

  He opened the door for her and locked it back softly behind her before retreating behind his desk. He had a distinctly ready-to-fight stance, so no way was she going to sit. He looked at her, visibly expecting her to talk. She didn’t. Set for a fight but not quite ready to engage the hostility yet.

  They glared at each other for a beat before he surprised her by rounding his desk to circle her waist and gather her into his arms in one swift movement. They never embraced or touched at the office, but none of the team was in at the moment (except for Bridget but the woman already thought they had had a fight). She relaxed, melting into his body’s warmth and strength and plastered her mouth against his neck. The vein pulsing under his skin throbbed under her lips.

  After a while, as he was holding her so she couldn’t move yet alone storm out, she expected him to start interrogating her; she never could lie to him when his body was this close. But he just held her. She felt safe in his arms; she had missed him last night and this morning.

  She let her lips trail on his skin, feeling his heartbeat, slow and regular as always, but faster than when he slept. She smiled and sighed. He let go.

  “How about dinner tonight, Princess? I have meetings most of the afternoon so better if I pick you up at the hotel. Around seven?”

  That sounded good. And if she was lucky, they might not go out at all. She smiled, “Seven’s good. You pick the place. See you then.”

  No talk. No fight. She left before he could change his mind.

  Had Patricia known what was on Christopher’s mind, she might not have smiled. He watched her go back to her desk and sit, shoulders straight, his mood much improved. She had smelled wonderful, had felt so fucking warm in his arms. Holding her gave him a boner. Hell, touching, or merely watching her made his hard. The damn woman had felt it too.

  Later, just the two of them, he hoped she would be more receptive, but for now, he had bought a few hours of peace. Time to check some of the places she had mentioned in her report.

  Patricia left the office at five and walked back to her hotel. With the wind picking up and rain on the way, the weather was somewhat chilly but walking soothed her and helped clear her head. Christopher was into jogging; she wasn’t. He could run for an hour straight; she couldn’t, but she could walk for hours. She smiled.

  If she managed to get him near enough to her bed or any exposed part of her, she might skip the report talk tonight. She didn’t expect a two-week delay like for the motel talk (and since that had turned into a full-team meeting, a long postponement was not a good thing), but a day or two she could easily endure. Maybe if she removed herself to the Yoga place for a while? Hum. Considering Christopher was now in charge of the case, and how seriously he took the responsibilities of his position, perhaps too seriously when she was concerned, probably even the Yoga place wasn’t safe from him. Need a reminder of the ‘don’t get personally involved in a case’ rule, Big guy? Unfortunately, that she was not the only one struggling with that edict didn’t make the damn thing any easier.

  She was at the hotel at a quarter to six. She chatted with Carl on her way inside and stopped by the front desk to pick up her mail. Juliet was on duty, so they gossiped about Juliet’s new romance, her flavour of the month as Patricia called the men the woman dated. Juliet was the worst when it came to choosing boyfriends, even worse than Patricia was, which said a lot. She passed the bar, waved at Luis but didn’t slow down.

  She forwent the stairs for the elevator; her walk in the brisk air had tired her a little. Midway she had belatedly remembered she wasn’t quite over her previous night’s lack of sleep. She was a big sleeper; Christopher always made fun of her for sleeping so much. She needed eight hours a night at least; he could do with fewer than five easily. Since meeting him, she was constantly sleep-deprived, and her three-hour morning nap had not been recuperation enough. Or maybe she was still slightly hangover.

  She stayed under in the shower for twenty minutes (the joy of living in a hotel, she never ran out of hot water) before fussing over her outfit. What to wear? Sexy or cute? If she aimed to render Christopher defenceless, she had to predict his mood right.

  She opted for seductively charming with a black dress, always a winner. The black high heels were risqué; the jean jacket provided the perky factor. Some black eyeliner and coats of mascara turned her wide eyes sultry eyes. She painted her lips red lipstick to better mark him, and let her wavy hair loose and abondant. Silver loop earrings peeking through the wavesand added a touch of teasing. Silver bracelets tinkled when she moved her hands, and she intended to move her hands tonight. Up and down. Perfume, rich yet subtle. The dress had an open collar like a man’s shirt but without buttons. She wore matching a bra and thong in a rich fuchsia colour under it. Souvenirs of the beach. The dress’s deep décolletage and the bra’s push-up power advertised her provocative intention. All she had to do now was to make the Big guy take notice.

  His Cooking Time

  Except Chris didn’t come up. He asked Carl to call her instead.

  “Hello, Miss Patricia? Carl from downstairs. Mister MacLaren has arrived. He wanted me to inform you he will be waiting in his car in front of the hotel. He said to take your time.”

  She took Chris’s breath away when he caught sight of her stepping out of the hotel. Carl seemed to agree. Damn that woman was sexy. And cute. He had been right not to go up to her suite; they wouldn’t have made it out. They wouldn’t have reached the bed for that matter, not by a long shot. Perhaps the couch? She had that narrow table right beside her front door that was about the right height.

  He got out to open her door and stared at endless legs, unveiled by the little black dress hiking up her thighs as she sat. And peeking down as he closed the car door, his eyes glazed over the spectacular view of her lace-clad breasts. The crushed-raspberry colour racy thing she had bought during their vacation, see-through if he remembered the beach correctly. And he did. He sighed. They wouldn’t even have made it to the couch, not even close.

  He had wasted his afternoon checking out addresses with Ham and Charles. A fucking recognisance tour to decide what to investigate first. They even drove by the club. Not a classy joint. Lemieux’s Italian place seemed as good a starting point as any.

  As agreed, he had made a reservation for their dinner. She was going to be furious; she turned talkative when angry. Hence, he was counting on her I-dare-you reaction tonight. He wanted her mad enough to slip but not so much she would decline to sleep in his arms.

  He drove quietly; she didn’t speak either. Her cent slowly perfumed the car. Sweet and musky tonight, the contradiction of her. Her narrow entrance table would have been fucking perfect.

  With the traffic, the drive took over forty minutes. They crossed the downtown area from the north-east to the south-west before reaching the Irish Borough. He felt her tense as she realised he wasn’t taking her to any of their usual places. She tugged on her dress in a vain attempt to cover more of her legs. The hem turned into a barometer of her anger; the more she pulled, the angrier she was getting. Luckily for him, she could only stretch the fabric so far; each time she yanked the skirt half, the top dipped lower. Glimpses of the fuchsia thing, the skin underneath, long smooth legs, he still had a magnificent view. Fuchsia. Legs. Fuchsia. Legs.

  The closer they got, the stiffer she got. Furious didn’t come close to describing her mood when they reached the restaurant. They had not exchanged a single word in the car. He found a parking spot two doors down the place. She jumped out before he had time to round the car and open her door.

  She stomped to the restaurant, him right by her side, his hand on her lower back. The hostess sat them in a corner at the back as he had requested. He wanted to eye the place on a busy night. And he wanted a quiet corner if they wer
e to argue.

  She barely waited to be seated to engage. “I don’t know why we had to come all the way across town to this place. If you wanted more information about the food, all you had to do was ask. The food was good, classic Italian, a little above average. Service was barely average. Sex after was good too. Classic and above average. And the rest is none of your damn business.” She mouthed it all in a measured tone, but he knew better.

  She was on the offensive and about to clamp up. He should have tried to pacify her, but he was getting angry in turn. Wasn’t going to let her even think of running or hiding. She had led him around and kept information from him. Joshua had shown up again through Lemieux, and no way in hell was Chris going to let the motherfucker get between them. He didn’t give a damn shit about her past with the Lemieux guy, but, dead or not, he was going to make sure the guy had not done anything to her.

  Are You Having Fun Yet, MacLaren?

  The waiter came over to hand them menus and explain the night’s specials. The damn woman asked questions about the night’s special, the wine list, the dessert. Hit and stall, stall and hit, her unique fighting styles; she excelled at both.

  “I’ll have the house lasagna. The chef didn’t change his recipe, did he? I’ve had it before, when I came with another man, and it was simply delicious.”

  Cute, Pussycat, but you’re going to have to try harder. “I’ll have the same. And a bottle of red wine. The private-import Montepulciano Brunello you have on the card.”

  He waited as the waiter came back with the wine. She liked it; she hummed around her first sip. Good. Ready for the next round then. His turn.

  “I don’t care what you did or did not do with the guy. We started investigating out the addresses. That’s what we do, remember? But we can’t get an angle if we can’t figure out the guy. And right now, I don’t have a clue. Please explain it to me.” Aim and fire. He had no doubt she could handle it; she could deal with verbal sparring when she was in a full-on fighting mode. “How did your sex-crazed ex-boyfriend ended up dead in a cheap motel’s backyard, a cock ring on his prick?”

  She didn’t answer. Furious was she? He knew calling Lemieux her ex-boyfriend wasn’t accurate. The guy had been short-term, the one before Joshua, but it didn’t necessarily mean she had not liked him romantically. Patricia’s heart and soul were too close to her skin for her just to have fucked the guy.

  Chris was convinced she had liked Lemieux; he just didn’t know how much. Yet, how much could she have loved the jerk if she had dated Joshua right after? The damn woman had peculiar rules about whom she dated and whom she didn’t. Because of her fucking never-date-a-friend-of-a-friend decree, she shouldn’t have dated Joshua. Chris fucking wished she hadn’t.

  The sex-crazed remark she probably liked even less. Her left-hand fingers were white as she held the foot of her wine glass. Before provoking her, he had made sure she wasn’t holding the glass with her right hand (live and learn, she had thrown a drink in his face once).

  “How am I supposed to know why he was killed? I had no contact with them in the last two years. Would we be here if he hadn’t been one of Joshua’s guys?” Of course not.

  She was lying, though. She had repeatedly contacted Mario. And she knew he knew. She was usually better at lying than that. He frowned. “Mario−”

  “Mario doesn’t count. Leave him out of this.” Easy for her to say. “And Rick wasn’t my boyfriend. Shall I put it in terms you understand? Lemieux was just a fuck. As for his sexual habits, not that it’s any of your damn business, I wasn’t with him long enough to know.”

  Dancing in the Past

  She was nervous yet excited. The man had offered to take her somewhere different. Her, a city girl who had seen it all already, she was blasé. Many men had courted her; she was tired of men. Too many of the wrong type of men had courted her, and she had decided none would again.

  These days, she concentrated on her career. Climbing the corporate ladder one might have said, had there been such a ladder in her world. Climbing the corporate ladder for no other purposes than the climb itself.

  “What happens when you reach the top?” A colleague had enquired.

  “The top? I will always find a higher place to climb to.”

  “No, you won’t,” the colleague had disagreed.

  “Yes, I will.” She did not understand why she couldn’t. She reached a step higher, then another. And aimed for yet another rung. The money was not important. She did not seek fame, hated it in truth; notoriety was completely irrelevant to her journey. She did because she must. Men did not understand.

  She had met the handyman at her workplace. From the start, the man intrigued her. She had donned her work uniform; he should not have approached her. The uniform’s sole purpose was to deflect intimate contact, especially from men.

  Lemieux, her new handyman of a man, persevered. Once. Twice. Three times a lady. She understood that song now but made him wait nonetheless. He was a most beautiful male specimen, masculine without being overpowering. He liked to play. A man-child in a grown-up body, and quite grown-up at that. A man-child in a manly body with an old man’s soul. Intriguing.

  They made love; urgently she felt, albeit he was careful and so attentive it disconcerted her. Lemieux gave more than he took, holding back yet demanding.

  Something special the place was. It told about him, not in intricate details but vivid glimpses of who he was. Of what he wanted. Did he like the women here? At first, she did not understand how he could. Yes, she’ll admit some of the showgirls were gorgeous, but she preferred the men.

  He bought her a drink. They sat next to one another, not touching, only his knee brushed against hers once in a while. She made as if the bar was like any other ordinary bar.

  Lemieux kept observing her, a smile playing on his lips. “You are now into my world,” he said.

  She was fascinated. Not excited per se, not sexually, not at first. But all that nakedness did somehow, eventually, arouse her.

  They drank; she became quite drunk. He bought her a dance, choosing a guy that resembled him. Tall. Lanky. Well-defined muscles. The male stripper was young enough to have flawless skin on his body but old enough for expression lines to mark his face and give it character. Old enough to know it took more to arouse a woman than just rocking one’s pelvis. The man danced with his body; he danced with his eyes, lasciviously looking her over. Her shoulder. Her breasts. Her belly. Her thighs. Caressing her yet never once touching her.

  Hand to his crotch, Lemieux watched her admire the showman. His hand did not caress nor grope but merely covered. She observed the show and her friend; neither man touched her. The naked man left. Her breathing slowed. Her lips hurt; her teeth had cut into the skin by the end of the dance.

  Lemieux bought a dance for himself, choosing the girl that was the most similar to her for the dancer had long, dark-brown hair, and a tallish, slender body. But the woman did not have her blue eyes, nor the dark-blue locks in her hair as a memento of an Italian sea. And the stripper’s breasts were too big for even a tall man to cup in his hands.

  Her man watched them both. The one prancing in front of him he gave a casual glance, curious at the most. Was he seeing the dancer at all? His heady gaze returned to her, sitting next to him, again and again. She felt the caress of his eyes. The hunger. No restraint muddied them now. His hand, immobile, still blanketed his groin.

  They left after the show and took a taxi to his place. She had not known until they were naked, in his room, that she would not have sex with him; she could not. Not because she would not know if he was with her or with the dancer. She knew. The dancer was a faire-valoir, a foil; both dancers had been for her. She finally understood his restraint on their previous nights.

  He wanted her all. Once he had it, he would not stop; he would show any limits. She was not angry at him. He did not push her. He understood he was asking too much.

  “I’m happy, Pattycake. I’m thankful for that one dance
. Us together watching each other watching the dancers, that’s to be our dance.”

  It could have been their chant du cygne, their swan song, but it wasn’t. She did not run from him. He had expected a dark part of her that night, and, in a way, she had given it to him. He handed it back, for her to do what she wanted with it. With him. They became friends.

  At first, they did not talk about their history together. They met amongst others. Laughed. Touched. Barely. She never told anyone. She certainly did not tell the man that came after, that man that would become her before.

  Later, the handyman did ask again. Requested to have her back again, but only if she wanted. “I’ll take you elsewhere, something special, something different,” he offered once again.

  And he did. In his own way, he freed her. She wished she could have returned the favour.

  Excerpt from The J-man, by Trica C. Line

  MacLaren Back to the Fun Part

  The waiter brought the food over. They ate in silence. Chris could see she was thoughtful, perhaps debating how much more she should tell him about Lemieux? Fat chance. He briefly considered getting her drunk enough to talk. His second option was more in the line of kissing and pleasuring her until she decided to speak. Unless he yelled loud enough to knock some sense into her. All of the above. Neither of them finished their plates.

  The waiter came back to offer coffee.

  “I’ll have a decaf latte,” she ordered. “And he’s going to take a double espresso. Make it tight. Thank you.”

  Chris took it as a sign the coffee was good here. Or was it more a signal that their chat was not over yet? Or both?

  By now, she was ever so slightly pianoting on the table, a telltale he had learned to pay attention to; something was coming. She was silently arguing with herself while frowning at him. She looked furious. Damn sexy. Tired. Sad. The sadness he did not like.