by Debra Webb
MacBride dropped the item into his jacket pocket. “I’ll just take it in for analysis.”
If he questioned Brian...
MacBride’s slow, deliberate approach abruptly derailed that worrisome thought. She tried not to look at him, but she simply couldn’t help herself. The way he moved, fluid, predatory. The fit of that expensive suit, even with his collar unbuttoned and his tie jerked loose, lent a dangerous element. There he was all polished and smart-looking on the outside, but something deeply primal simmered just beneath those outer trappings. She could see it in those blue eyes. She could feel it vibrating all around him like a force field. That short, silky hair looked as if he’d just raked his fingers through it, and his jaw sported a five o’clock shadow.
Everything about him screamed sex, blatantly challenged any female within sight to come have a taste.
He stopped no more than two feet away, his long-fingered hands propped firmly on his hips, the lapels of his jacket pushed aside. She told herself not to look into those eyes, not to let him draw her in more deeply.
But then he spoke and any hope of denying the urge was lost. “This was not a smart move, Elizabeth,” he said quietly, his voice soft and deadly serious. “Coming here makes you look even guiltier than you already do. Didn’t you stop to consider that access to this office was too easy? I’ve had someone watching twenty-four/seven for just this moment. You’d better start talking and this time I want the truth.”
She blinked once, twice, her mind frantically attempting to focus on his words while the part of her that made her female zeroed in on all that marked him male. Her very skin felt electric, ready to combust “I told you I—”
“I know what you told me, but it was a lie. Just like the other lies you’ve told me. I’m giving you another chance here. Tell me what you know, and this will be a lot easier on the both of us.”
Summoning her scattered resolve, she looked him square in the eye and said the only thing she could. “I don’t know what you want from me, Agent MacBride. I’ve told you everything I know.”
“Did you have sex with Harrison the night he was murdered?” he asked casually, unhurriedly. But he gave himself away when he shifted his gaze from hers, a visible concession to the tension mounting between them.
“No,” she said adamantly.
“Then you won’t mind submitting a sample for DNA comparison to the intimate body hair discovered at the scene.”
Mac knew he’d gotten her attention then. He heard the harsh intake of breath, saw the widening of her eyes.
“My attorney—”
“Your attorney can’t make this go away, Elizabeth,” he cut in smoothly. “Only I can. But to do that I need to be able to eliminate the possibility that you were in Harrison’s bed that night.”
For an instant she wavered, uncertain. He didn’t want that moment of increased vulnerability to pass. “Making that elimination would be a major step in the right direction.”
“I guess it couldn’t hurt,” she said stiffly.
He watched her lips as she spoke, knowing it was a mistake but unable to help himself. There was just something about her mouth, something that drew him, made him want to taste her. Made him want those lips on his body... ravishing him the way she had Harrison in that damned video he couldn’t get out of his head.
Before he could thwart the impulse, he’d moved closer, his thigh brushing hers as he stood closer than was safe. The resulting charge of the slight contact went straight to his sex, hardened him instantly.
“See how easy that was?” he offered roughly, fighting to stay on track.
She watched his lips now, her own slightly parted. Was she attracted to him, as well, or was this just one of her maneuvers to distract him?
Her tongue darted out to moisten her lips. Control slipped another notch and he was pretty sure that getting any harder would be impossible. But he had her right where he wanted her. He couldn’t let the moment go—just yet.
“Tell me why you really came here tonight,” he urged, his voice as soft as it was insistent. “Was it Novak’s idea or yours?”
Her gaze collided with his. “I’m no fool, Elizabeth. The clip has his initials on it. And I told you I had someone watching.” His eyes on the place had somehow missed anyone except Elizabeth. But his instincts told him Novak had been here. Mac trusted his instincts above all else.
“It’s...” She shook her head. “It’s not what you think.”
“How do you know what I think?”
She lifted one shoulder, confusion and uncertainty haunting her eyes. “You think I killed Ned.”
For the first time since he’d met Elizabeth Young, he allowed himself to look at her—the woman, not the suspect. The tomboyish sprinkle of freckles across the bridge of her nose. The way her glasses always needed pushing up or setting straight. The rich amber color of her eyes. His fingers itched to tangle in the thick mass of dark hair she always kept pulled back in a braid or ponytail. Long strands had slipped loose now. They clung to her face, appearing even darker against the creaminess of her skin. But it was her mouth that tormented him more than anything else. Wide, full, the bottom lip noticeably heavier than the top.
“You wanted to kill him,” he said without thinking.
She chewed that tempting lower lip for a second. “But I didn’t.”
“Was Novak in on it? Did the two of you plan this together?”
That sent her rushing for cover, but he blocked her path. “He was, wasn’t he?”
“I don’t know!” She tried to push away the arm that held her back, but only succeeded in shoving him a little further over the edge with her touch.
“Is he involved with the Gentlemen’s Association, too?”
Her head came up. She opened her mouth to refute his suggestion, but her face gave her away before she could tell him yet another lie.
“Don’t waste your breath, Elizabeth. Your eyes already provided the answer I suspected.” He choked out a laugh. “Do you have any idea how much danger you’re in right now?”
The fear and uncertainty vanished with one blink of her long-lashed lids. “From who? Them or you? You keep pushing me and pushing me like you really believe I’m guilty, but I see the way you look at me. I’m not blind, MacBride.”
And that easily he was lost. He took her face in his hands. As his mouth swooped down to claim hers, he felt the little hitch in her breathing. She tensed but didn’t draw away. He took that as permission to plunder the luscious mouth that had been driving him insane for days.
That was the final rational thought Mac managed. She tasted like chocolate and coffee. And she was hot, so damned hot.
He gently lifted her glasses up and off, leaving them on the table so that he could get back to touching her with both hands. His fingers delved into the thick softness of her hair, and he groaned with satisfaction. He’d wanted to touch her like this from the moment he first laid eyes on her. Or maybe before… from when he’d watched that video over and over. He took the kiss deeper, thrusting his tongue inside her, wanting, needing more than he dared take.
She held back, refused to surrender to the kiss. He was kissing her. She allowed it but didn’t respond.
Images of the innately sexual creature on the video flooded his head, and a jolt of jealousy went through him. He wanted her like that, wanted her responding to his touch, to his kiss.
He kissed her harder, demanding a reaction.
And that made him just like them.
He tore his mouth from hers, but couldn’t draw away completely at first. Had to hover there. Close enough to feel her pull. He licked his lips, tasting her, feeling her quick little puffs of warm breath on his damp skin. The way she smelled, like a rose beneath the warm sun, made him want to pull her to him again.
But he didn’t.
He stepped back, at a loss for words. She refused to look at him, kept her gaze somewhere in the vicinity of the fourth button of his shirt. Right about the same location wher
e the knife had entered Harrison’s chest. Another dose of reality slammed into him.
“I’ll take you home.”
At some point he would need to acknowledge having overstepped his bounds. But not right now.
Right now walking away pretty much took all the strength he possessed.
Chapter Nine
Elizabeth lay in the predawn darkness and mulled over the previous night. A part of her had wanted to go to Gloria’s place and demand answers. But how could she do that? It would be an outright admission that she didn’t trust her friend. A slap in the face. She just couldn’t do that. Gloria was the one person she had been able to trust. Brian had to be lying. There was no other explanation. Ned had almost ruined hers and Gloria’s friendship. It would be just like Brian to try and finish it off.
He was jealous that way. A selfish son of a bitch who cared only for himself.
She closed her eyes and exhaled a heavy breath. She’d been so blind. The whole idea of moving to the big city, of working with the masters at a design firm like Design Horizons. It had been her dream since she was twelve, when she realized what one could do with a mere gallon of paint and a yard of fabric. Her father’s work as a handyman had ingrained in her a love of houses. Big, small, old or new. She loved bringing them to life with color. As she’d grown older she realized there was a whole world of possibilities out there beyond her little hometown. And she was good at designing and decorating interiors. Really good, though she’d had no formal training or education in the field. Her skill came naturally, like breathing. She looked at a room and saw a blank canvas.
But the break with Brian had ended all that. She had no reputation, no contacts of her own, so she’d had to fall back on the sort of work she could do without any of those things—good, honest hard work. Interior painting could be backbreaking. You had to be good, as well as fast, to earn a living wage with little more than a brush and a roller. She was both, but she was a woman, which was an automatic strike against her. She’d had to work cheaply at first, and being choosy about her work location hadn’t been an option. Finding Boomer had proved a lucky break. He wasn’t afraid of anything, including hard work.
Now her work was pretty steady. The locations were a great deal better and she’d earned the beginnings of an excellent reputation. She could make it.
Just when things had been looking up financially, if not personally, Ned had entered the picture. Sure, she’d seen him around. The kind of parties Brian attended or hosted catered to the rich and socially privileged. Seeing Ned on a professional level had felt right at first. He’d seemed kind. She’d needed that. All her life everyone she’d depended on or needed had deserted her, one way or another. Her mother had walked out on them when Elizabeth was in kindergarten, her father had died last year, and then Brian had dumped her. According to Ned, the panic attacks were caused by years of uncertainty and stress. His counseling had helped.
The affair had been an accident—at least she’d thought so at the time. Brian’s caustic words reverberated in her head. It was hard to believe that Ned would have set out to reel her in like that when he could have had any woman he wanted. The memory of the video slammed into her thoughts like an out-of-control dump truck on a downhill stretch. Oh, yeah, she shouldn’t be shocked at anything she discovered about him. Worse, she kept referring to the video in the singular sense when the truth was she had no idea how many Ned had made or if Brian had done the same.
Bastards.
She flopped over onto her side. But the part about Gloria, she simply refused to believe. Elizabeth had every intention of chalking that one up to Brian’s cruel selfishness. He’d lost his friend and he wanted Elizabeth to lose hers. The first time she’d gotten accolades from a pleased design client, Brian had found a way to ruin it. Despite all the nasty little things he’d done, she hadn’t realized until the very end just how selfish he was. Or maybe she hadn’t wanted to see the truth.
But that was over now and she was left wondering if Brian was involved in Ned’s murder. Had it been his intent to set Elizabeth up? The fact that whoever had killed Ned had used the dagger she’d given him seemed to support that theory. Had Ned bragged to Brian about her gift? She considered MacBride’s suggestion that she submit to DNA testing. The implication made her curl into the fetal position. She didn’t kill Ned, so she wasn’t really worried on that score. But what if whoever had attempted to set her up had planted the evidence the police had discovered?
A harsh laugh burst from her. Okay, Elizabeth, exactly how would someone have gotten any of your pubic hair without your knowledge?
It wasn’t such an outlandish idea. Hair came off in the tub and on the bathroom floor when she used a brush or dried herself after a shower.
Sometimes there were loose hairs scattered about when she got around to housework and laundry. Someone could have come into her place while she was at work and Mrs. Polk was off playing bridge or visiting her old lady friends. It wasn’t outside the realm of possibility. Nor was the possibility that Brian had saved a couple of her hairs from their time as a couple. They’d lived together for several months.
But all that was just too surreal. That kind of thing only happened in movies.
This wasn’t a movie. This was real. Elizabeth hugged her knees more tightly to her chest. MacBride was certain she was involved or knew something important. He knew she was not telling him everything. He read her so well. And he kissed her like no one had ever kissed her before.
Her skin heated from the inside out. She’d tried so hard to block the memory, but it just wouldn’t go away. All night she’d awakened every couple of hours, and her first thought each time was of his kiss, his touch. He’d startled her with the move, although some part of her had known it was coming, and she’d frozen, unable to respond on even the most basic level.
Who was she kidding? She always froze—at first. It took a great deal of trust just to dive in, and she simply didn’t trust any man that much. She’d trusted her father, but he was gone now, then she’d put her faith in Brian, and look where that had gotten her. Her sister had trusted her husband and she’d paid dearly for it. So had Elizabeth. She’d almost gone to prison after taking that knife to her brother-in-law to stop the son of a bitch. Hadn’t it been another man who’d taken their mother away from them? She’d fallen so desperately for the guy she’d deserted her husband and two small children, never to be heard from again.
According to Ned, it was that abandonment that had set the stage for Elizabeth’s current phobia. She wasn’t entirely sure that was true, since she’d long ago blocked all thought of her mother. But maybe it was true.
One thing was certain, she couldn’t trust MacBride. He was an FBI agent who considered her a suspect in his current murder investigation. Even if she could muster up the courage to trust him, he would use that trust to prove her guilty.
No matter how attracted she was to him—and she was definitely attracted—she couldn’t let down her guard. Ned had offered some fancy name for her little trust issue, but she didn’t necessarily agree with his conclusion. Sure, with a guy she was attracted to she could work up enthusiasm for sex eventually—eventually being the key word. She closed her eyes and pressed her forehead to her knees. Brian had called her frigid. They’d fought so many times over her lack of sexual ambition that eventually she’d learned to submit to his needs a little more quickly, but only with conscious effort. Ned had known all the right words to coax her into cooperation. But no one, absolutely no one, had ever made her want to jump in with both feet.
Except MacBride.
Oh, she’d gone through the usual routine of freezing up at his first touch. But in mere seconds she’d wanted to throw her arms around him and climb his hard male body. The only thing that had stopped her had been that damned lack of trust. Yet for the first time in her life, she was certain she could have dived straight in, ignoring the whole trust issue. Just her luck to find the one man who set her on fire with barely a touch
and he wanted to charge her with murder.
She uncurled and rolled onto her back to stare at the ceiling, noting the cracks in the old plaster and the fact that the ceiling, as well as the rest of her apartment, needed a fresh coat of paint. She harrumphed. Painters were like hairdressers. They always needed a makeover but were too busy taking care of everybody else to find time to do their own. That was the story of her life. Always wishing for what she couldn’t have.
Her cell rang, cutting short the self-pity session.
Her heart took a breath stealing dip. It was scarcely daylight. Who would call her at this hour? Her sister? Something could have happened to one of the kids. She snatched the phone from the bedside table. Didn’t recognize the number. “Hello.”
“Elizabeth?”
Not immediately able to identify the woman’s voice, Elizabeth frowned. Something like a moan and then a grating attempt at clearing a throat echoed across the line. “Yes,” Elizabeth ventured.
“Elizabeth, it’s Annabelle.”
The ache of hopelessness in the woman’s voice propelled Elizabeth into a sitting position. Fear ripped through her at her first thought—Gloria. “What’s wrong?”
“There’s been another murder.”
Elizabeth went numb.
“I heard the call go out on the police scanner,” Annabelle explained solemnly. “I checked the address they called out against Ned’s patient log.”
A tense beat of silence sent Elizabeth’s heart into warp speed.
“It’s Marissa Landon, it has to be.” Another of those moan-like sounds. “Is this ever going to stop? Why can’t the police do something?”
“I’ll call Gloria.” Elizabeth scarcely recognized the stone-cold voice as her own. Thank God it wasn’t Gloria. But still, another woman was dead... murdered.
“We have to talk,” Annabelle urged. “I think there’s a new pattern developing here. Did you get to Ned’s office yet?”