Man in Black

by Melissa Shirley

  His words set her heart fluttering. “Sad to say, pretty boy, but you aren’t getting steak and lobster in this town unless your momma’s chef makes it.”

  “I wouldn’t know what my momma’s chef makes. Besides, doesn’t it turn you on that you have a man hostage in your castle ready to bow to your every whim?”

  “It would be sexier if the man was naked.” She shrugged as he lifted the bottom of his shirt. “Oh, too little too late.”

  He lowered the hem. “This is nice,” he said softly. “I like the whole domestic thing.” As though he hadn’t meant to say it aloud, he moved on. “And who knew they sold toilet paper alongside fresh fruit and vegetables? And did you see the deals on tube socks? I didn’t even know they sold them in bulk.”

  “Yep. Walmart. Eighth world wonder.” His back muscles bunched and stretched with every move of his arm. “Jesse?”

  “Mmhmm.”

  “You don’t smile much. Why is that?”

  With the stealthy moves of a panther, he gave the stove knob a quick twist, set his spoon down, and turned. “You’re silly. I smile all the time. See?” He shot her a grin that should have had its own patent. Then he spooned noodles in an unnatural yellow sauce onto plates and carried them to the bed where she sat cross-legged on her comforter. He went back for the bottle of wine.

  “Yeah. I’ve seen the show-stopper. It’s nice, but it never quite reaches your eyes. I’m talking a smile that starts at your toes and works its way up. The ‘heart is full of happiness’ smile.”

  Setting her wine glass on the table in front of her, she stood, walked three steps before ending up in front of him. She reached around him and pulled two forks out of the dish drainer. She only owned the two, and they had no real home. She set them on the counter, and he cocked his head to one side as her hand crept around the back of his neck.

  The wine warmed every part of her body, lowered her resistance to the idea of giving into her lust.

  “I’m about to smile right now.”

  “I would love to see that.” She pressed in close, pinning him between her and the counter. “What can I do to help?”

  He clasped his fork-holding hands at the small of her back and pointed a gaze at her mouth. “This is a good start.”

  He lowered his head and glided his lips across hers. Her heart stopped then sped up. His fingers traced her spine and gripped the lower hem of her shirt in his fist as his lips continued their masterful work. Her nerve endings tingled, begging her to surrender her complete will to him, but she held on, pulled back, leaned her head against his chest, and breathed out a long, whooshing breath.

  With a gentle index finger, he tilted her chin up so that her eyes met his.

  “Is this your big seduction plan? Ply me with boxed meals and kiss me until I am too weak to resist?”

  He cupped her cheek. “Is it working?”

  “I’m not sure yet. I haven’t tasted dinner.”

  He pressed a kiss to the tip of her nose. “You make me smile.”

  In the harsh light of morning, Jesse found it easy to discount all the emotions he had no place for in his life.

  As he sipped coffee across the table from his mother, guilt didn’t matter. The woman who’d burrowed under his skin and rewarded him with pleasant dreams meant very little under the seven a.m. sunshine. A future for him in Rangers End didn’t exist. He’d never see these people once his father had a hold of Gilden’s land, but he was certainly enjoying Ryhan’s attempts to convince him to stay. Still, he was a far cry from declaring his undying love for her, from settling down anywhere. And certainly not here. No white picket fences. No requisite number of children. Just no. But as the thought came, pictures of that life, with her, flashed through his mind. For once, he didn’t shudder at the idea of binding his life to someone else’s. For once, the picture of the perfect family included him, and it didn’t make him want to go running for the nearest strip club to prove his bachelorhood.

  “You’re quiet this morning.” The observance came from over the rim of a chipped mug, rather than a piece of fine china.

  “Just waking up.”

  Coffee sloshed over the top of his mother’s cup as she set it down. She ignored the dribbling drops and covered Jesse’s hand with her own. “Darling, I want to speak with you about something private, and I know it’s probably none of my business, but I feel there are some things you should know.”

  He tilted his head and waited. Private? None of her business? That could be just about anything in his life.

  “You’ve been spending time with that Connor girl?” Her face soured as she spoke the name, and Jesse looked down at his plate, his blood starting a slow burn. This wasn’t going to be pretty if she kept going. And she did. “She has a reputation, Jesse. A bad one. Why, she’s making videos of herself in compromising positions and posting them on the internet.”

  He pushed the anger behind a wall of teenage defiance. “It’s cheaper than a dating service.”

  A loud, long sigh drifted from his mother’s lips. “Is that really the kind of woman you want to waste time on?” She folded her hands in front of her when Jesse yanked his back. “The planning commission has already decided to remove her from her position as soon as the auction is finished. She’s lost every job she has, and you can bet no one in this town is going to hire her. She might as well leave now and go somewhere else.”

  All the old resentments came bubbling back. He clenched and unclenched his fist on the table. “So, you’re going to run her out of town too? Let them make her believe she’s as worthless as you made me feel?”

  “Jess.” Her fingers trembled, her wedding ring clinking against the wood table.

  “Don’t do that. Don’t pretend we’re so close you get to have this conversation with me. You don’t.”

  Anger surged through his veins as he pushed the chair back and rose to his full height. Towering over his mother, he bent, one hand braced on the table in front of her, the other on the back of her seat. His face hovered inches from hers as his eyes flashed fire. “Maybe you should think about what the town would say if they knew your piece of shit son had to come keep your electricity turned on and your telephone connected, pay your gardener and your pool boy. What would the town say if they knew their mayor couldn’t manage the affairs in her own household?” Venom dripped from his tone. Ice hardened in his veins. He hadn’t wanted to do this with her—to throw out all her wrongs—but she’d forced the issue, turned on Ryhan the way she’d done to him.

  “That’s not fair, Jesse.” She sat back in her chair. “I told you about the investments. I’ve been alone, trying to manage without anyone. It’s not fair,” she whispered, as though repeating the words made them truer.

  He straightened and crossed his arms. “You want to talk about unfair? Unfair is judging someone before you know the whole story just because she isn’t part of the Richie Riches. It’s all okay if you live on the right side of town and keep your mistakes hidden behind your electric fences and your garden gates. Right, Mom?”

  “Jesse.” Her eyes clouded with tears. The pain echoing in her strained voice confirmed he’d hurt her.

  “I gotta go. I have shit to do.” He stomped out of the formal dining room, through the foyer and out the door, straight to his car.

  If he hadn’t already signed all the checks and had them mailed, his mother would have a very rude awakening. She would finally have to climb down from her pedestal and see how real people lived. He twisted the key and sped around the circle drive as though he could outrun the thoughts in his own head. No. He hit his palm against the steering wheel. Only his mother.

  He zoomed around the town square, flying over country roads he hadn’t driven since he’d first gotten his license. Nothing in Rangers End ever changed. He wanted to scoop Ryhan up and get her the hell out of there before these people had a chance to destroy all the goodness inside her. As if it hadn’t been years, he remembered the looks of disgust, the way he’d been ignored,
treated to the finest loathing money could breed.

  Whipping the car around, he cursed his own stupidity. He had bigger fish to fry, and to do it, he needed to get to the land office at the town hall.

  After a morning of digging through property records and plat maps, finding everything he needed to worm his way into the bidding war for the town square, he drove to Lucia Gilden’s house. He pasted on a bright smile, not the one that went to his eyes, and raised his hand to knock.

  “Why, Jesse Megalos. What a nice surprise.” For being so old, the woman moved with the agility of a gazelle. She slid a hand through his arm and maneuvered him into a sitting area in a part of the house he’d never seen. This monstrosity of a home could be measured in acreage rather than square footage, and the little devil in him shook hands with the businessman and began calculating property value.

  In the library, she marched him to a seating area to stand in front of a woman wearing a high-collared shirt with one of those lady medallions fastened at the throat and a long cross necklace resting against her chest. Her boring brown skirt covered every square inch of leg and ended in sensible shoes that would have made his mother proud. Her hands were sheathed in pristine white gloves. Her face, devoid of all makeup, her hair, pulled back into the tightest bun he’d ever seen, and the Bible clutched in her gloved hands, spoke volumes about the woman. When the hell had Rangers End gone Amish?

  “Alexandra, this is Jesse Megalos. Jesse, this is my granddaughter, Alexandra. She’s just come back to Rangers End today, and I thought you two would have so much in common.”

  A blind fool could see that Jesse had nothing in common with this woman, but he needed Lucia Gilden. And what better way to get to the woman than through her granddaughter?

  The granddaughter obviously didn’t agree. She stood and grimaced at his extended hand. She stuck her shaking fingers out, almost made contact, but then snapped her arm toward her chest. She fondled the giant pin on her throat as a shade of dark red blotched her neck then her cheeks.

  Mrs. Gilden nudged his arm. “She’s single and free this evening, and a much more suitable companion than that Ryhan Connor.” Her mouth twisted as if saying the name left a bitter taste inside. “Alex has a fine reputation.”

  He tilted his head. Just yesterday, the woman had been acting like she worked for Match.com, trying to set him up with Ryhan. That, he’d enjoyed. This crossed the border right into Weirdsville.

  He nodded, willing to keep up the ruse for the sake of business, but when this was all over and he’d reached his goal, he promised to do everything in his power to make sure these people never said another bad thing about Ryhan again.

  “Grandmother, I have church this evening.”

  Lucia turned to Jesse. “She has a special relationship with the Lord.”

  “And I will not jeopardize that relationship for a tawdry romance novel cover model.”

  He whipped his head around and a half-grin/half-smirk danced across his lips. He’d been called a lot of things, but a romance novel cover model? “Don’t they have long hair and ridiculous pants?”

  The younger Gilden woman shot daggers with her eyes. “Do not mock the Lord.”

  “I wasn’t.” He’d been mocking the models. At her pained glare, he held up both hands. “I apologize.” His little devil took control of Jesse’s feet, moving them forward until they were wedged between hers. He reached down, took the Bible and set it on the table. His hands clasped around hers, and he pulled her to her feet, standing close enough to make sure her body pressed into his. With a steadying arm at her back, he leaned so that his breath tickled a loose curl at her ear. “I would love to take you to dinner, maybe dancing.” Her heart thumped hard against his palm, and she dangled on the ledge of hyperventilation.

  “Di-du-dinner?” Her hands fluttered from her sides to his biceps, across his chest, to his back and then dropped to her sides. He slid his fingers down to her wrists and brought them to his neck.

  He winked and brushed back an imaginary hair from her forehead, before tracing a line along her jaw, across her shoulder then down her spine. “And dancing.”

  “D-d-dancing?”

  He lifted one of her hands and swayed his hips against hers. “Mmm. Dancing, slow, our bodies crushed together in the dark, hearts beating in perfect time to the music, hands caressing sweat-slicked skin.” His lips brushed her cheek. “All night long.” The problem with his statement involved a very different woman from the one he held in his arms. He pushed the thought away and refocused his attention on the matter at hand. “I’ll pick you up at seven?”

  “Okay,” she squeaked, and he turned to leave, pleased with the business transaction he’d just completed.

  10

  Ryhan’s legs ached. A blister on her heel confirmed that she’d gone the literal extra mile to find a job to save herself from eviction and homelessness. She had nothing to show for her day other than that blister and a line of perspiration rolling down her back. She pushed open the door to the Rusty Hinge Bar and Grill and plopped onto a stool. In this place, no one would stare or say rude things to her. She could order her drink in peace. These old timers and regulars didn’t care one whit about the internet or anything her damned fool ex might have uploaded to it. They cared about empty glasses and cold food.

  “Hey, Hank,” she said, adjusting her skirt and crossing her legs. “How’s it going?”

  Hank Steirs had been sixty years old for as long as she could remember. Never without his baseball cap or his smile, he’d been a constant in her life since she’d first arrived in Rangers End in the back of Lana’s station wagon. He’d been her tutor, her friend, the grandpa she’d never had. He taught her to play poker, to drink whiskey, and to know when to say when. Of course, not every lesson earned her a gold star.

  The sympathy in his eyes said his wife—the busybody goddess that all other gossiping hags aspired to be—had already filled him in. “How you doing, Ryhan?” Concern etched a few new lines into his forehead.

  “Oh, you know me. I’m. . .” Her thought ended with a bunch of words she couldn’t bear to speak.

  “In need of a nice tall Jack and coke?”

  “Make it a double?”

  “It’s on me.” He walked down the bar, picked up a glass, and began pouring. She spun her chair to take in the other patrons. Fred and John Shipley, twin brothers who’d married badly and divorced better; Janet Rigney who ordered the same drink every day since her husband had died but never brought the glass to her lips; Paul Higgins, whose sister owned the bar.

  “Quiet night, Hank?”

  “Yeah. Pool league was last night. That was a big brawl. You know those Finkle boys can’t stand to lose.” He told the story as she half listened and downed her drink in two easy swallows. “You need another?”

  “Yep. And keep them coming. It’s been a long week.”

  She chatted easily with Hank, learning all the gossip he’d heard or overheard from his wife. Ryhan had been a big topic, though he’d tried to downplay it. She consumed five drinks before Hank tried to sneak coffee past her. “Hey sweetheart, why don’t you slow down a little? Drink a cup of coffee. It’s fresh.”

  “Hank, I’m not driving. I have nothing to go home to and no reason not to sit here and drink my sorrows away, including the ten or so I didn’t know and you just enlightened me on. So, will you please use your fancy mixological skill to make me another? Please?” She finished with a bite to her words. As he nodded and walked away, regret slammed into her, and she dropped her chin to her chest.

  A hand braced the bar on each side of her as a head nuzzled hers. “Hey, pretty girl. What are you doing sitting here all alone?”

  Oh, that voice. Even almost complete in her numbness, a shiver skittered over her skin. “Drowning.” She leaned her back into his chest. “What are you doing here, Jesse?”

  “Wishing I was with you.” His whisper heated her, earlobe to toenail.

  She spun the chair as he straightened, a
nd she caught sight of a woman wide-eyed with shock standing next to him. Ryhan tried to make out where she’d seen the other woman before, but her alcohol fogged mind kept her shrouded in mystery.

  “Oh, you brought a date.” She reached behind her chair, picked up the drink Hank set on her coaster, and gulped it in a less than smooth sip. The glass cracked as she slammed it against the bar. She wiped her mouth then squinted and moved her head closer to the woman. Alexandra Gilden? No, it couldn’t be. “Weren’t you at a convent somewhere?” Ryhan pointed at Alexandra who stepped to slip a possessive arm through Jesse’s. Ryhan leaned too far forward to investigate the white-gloved hand cupping his elbow then teetered off the barstool, and gravity took over. Jesse scooped her up before she had a chance to take the full tumble.

  “Slut.” Ryhan didn’t miss Alexandra’s whisper.

  Instead of forcibly prying the other woman’s hands off him, Ryhan pointed a finger and shot Jesse a wink. “She who goes to church doesn’t remember Mary Magdalene?”

  “Mary Magdalene didn’t make movies. You need to go to confession,” Alexandra hissed.

  With the day Ryhan had had, Alexandra, a former friend, had just stepped on the wrong toe. “How many Hail Marys do you think a sex video will get me?” She slid off her barstool and snagged her fingers into Jesse’s shirt as she swayed. With her legs almost steady underneath her, she continued. “Or is my repentance coming through the fine people of this town who won’t look at me? Who won’t give me a job? Who actually turn away from me when I walk into their shiny little businesses begging for someone to hire me?” She stepped forward, and Jesse stopped any progress with a strong hand on her shoulder. “You tell me about confession again, and I’ll be adding another sin to my list.”

  He grabbed her around the waist and spun her away from his date. “Okay, you. Let’s get you home.”