Bad to the Bone

by Debra Dixon

  “I’ll take her down,” Jessica volunteered. There was certainly nothing to keep her in the office now that the agents had come and gone. All she could do was hope.

  Even so, she didn’t move, waiting for Sully’s agreement rather than walking out. It cost her nothing to pretend Sully was in control. And as long as he believed he was, he’d keep his suspicions to himself instead of sharing them with the Houston police. One smart man was quite enough to deal with. She didn’t want to have to juggle an entire department.

  “All right,” he finally agreed. “But wait in the lobby. We’ll caravan. I want to make sure you get back to Jericho.”

  “Make sure we get back?” Jessica echoed, unable to keep the trace of sarcasm out of her voice. “Where else would we go?”

  “Twenty-two Knoll Road, Utopia, Texas, for starters.”

  Her hands stilled in the act of reaching for Iris’s shoulders as she passed. He already knew where she lived? A half beat later she dropped her hands, sending Iris out the door to talk to Carol and wait by the elevator.

  When they were alone, she said, “I thought you said you were off Phil’s case.”

  “Yeah. But I’m not off yours.” It was both a warning and a promise. The warning scared the hell out of her, and the promise took her breath away with the possibilities.

  “How do you know my address? I never told you. You weren’t there for my statement.”

  “Didn’t need to be. I checked out the rental car this morning. Sloppy of you to leave the identifying paperwork on the dash last night. Anyone with a badge can get a copy of your driver’s license information from the rental agency.”

  “Gee, Sully, looks like you went to a lot of trouble to find out where I live. Why didn’t you just search my purse or ask me for my phone number?”

  “That wouldn’t be nearly as much fun, would it?”

  “I don’t know. Searching for the gun certainly seemed to amuse you. I’m surprised you didn’t check my panties for my birth certificate while you were at it. But then, you weren’t thinking very clearly at the time.”

  It was the wrong thing to say, and she knew it as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Taunting Sully was tantamount to prodding a sleeping lion. Her heart thudded sickeningly. She reminded herself that the door was still open. Nothing could happen. Nothing.

  So why did it feel as if something was happening? Why was she hoping something would happen? His eyes burned into hers, relentless and angry.

  Sully gritted his teeth as she flung that little barb at him. Ooh, the lady was good, reminding him that his self-control had gone right out the window this morning. She knew how to push buttons, but she was sadly mistaken if she thought all he could do was unfasten them. He could push ’em too.

  “Don’t you worry.” Sully let his gaze travel downward until it rested where the juncture of her thighs was hidden beneath her skirt. “I’ve been givin’ your panties a lot of thought.”

  As he intended, his plain talk shut her up. Her eyes flared with a mixture of what he thought was panic, anger, and maybe the tiniest twinge of arousal.

  “Tread carefully, Jessie. The only reason I haven’t turned you and that peashooter over to Houston PD is that girl trusts you and needs you right now. So I’m content to watch your little drama play out. But if you piss me off, I can change my mind in a New York instant.”

  “What?” she mocked, anger gaining the upper hand in her expression and voice. “And give up the only chance you have to stay on this case? Peddle that line of bull to someone who’s going to buy it. I saw your expression when you walked out of the captain’s office. He took you off the case. Face it, Sully, you’re not givin’ me up to them because I’m your ticket back into the game.”

  “You’d do well to remember that I’m the one who can punch your ticket.”

  “How can I forget with you glaring at me like that all the time? Why the hell are you so angry at me, Sully? What’d I do to you?”

  “Besides the lying? The gun? The secrecy?”

  “Yeah.” She laughed. “Besides that. It’s not enough. Not for this.”

  They hadn’t raised their voices, but they were so close now, he could lean down and kiss her if he wanted. And he wanted to. He wanted to do more than kiss her. None of it was romantic or elegant or gentle. No hearts and flowers. Just sweat and satisfaction. All of it was erotic and gritty and rough.

  “Why are you so angry?” she whispered, reminding him that she was waiting.

  “You don’t get it, do you?” Sully flicked his gaze at her mouth, exercising every ounce of control he had not to take it with his. Slowly he placed his fingers along the edge of her collarbone and used his thumb to stroke the hollow at the base of her throat. Her pulse jumped beneath his touch.

  “Jessie, if I stop being angry, we’re going to end up in bed. Or up against a wall. Leave my anger alone or there’ll be hell to pay.”

  “Then I’m safe. I’ve already paid hell.” If she hadn’t been running—escaping—when she said it, Sully would have admired her comeback.

  “Not like this,” Sully said softly.

  The phone call only took a few minutes. When he was done, he stopped by the secretary’s desk and gave her his card. “Keep this just in case, Carol.”

  “Okay. And would you tell Miss Daniels I’m sorry I didn’t speak to her? I feel awful for not recognizing her, but I was so agitated over those men and what they did to the office.”

  “That’s right. I forgot. Miss Daniels is a former employee. How long has it been since she worked here?”

  Startled, Carol said, “She never worked here. And I would know. I address all the Christmas cards every year. Mr. Munro has this thing about a personal holiday greeting for every employee. Her name’s never been on the list.”

  “Then how do you know her?”

  “She’s an associate of Mr. Munro’s. She’s in the business or something. She used to come in a couple of times a year.”

  “Are you sure?” Sully’s mind was already heaping the latest lie to the pile accumulating at Jessica’s feet.

  “That white streak in her hair is a little hard to forget.” Carol sounded rock-solid on that point.

  Sully asked to make another phone call. This one took a little longer because he had to dial information for the number, but he finally reached the Utopia police and identified himself.

  SEVEN

  As soon as Jessica pressed the code, the beach house gate drifted open on silent gears. She took her foot off the brake and pushed the accelerator. Neither the stop-and-start motion of the car or her second call to Iris produced more than a muffled grunt from the sleeping girl

  Jessica frowned, knowing that falling asleep had been more than Iris’s way of dealing with the sun, which had hovered on their horizon most of the way back to Jericho. Iris had closed her eyes, not to shut out the piercing light coming through the window, but to shut out reality. It was an old trick, and not very effective. At least not for more than a few hours at a time.

  Unfortunately everyone had to learn that for themselves. Iris would soon enough, and Jessica wondered why fate always felt the need to teach that particular lesson at such an early age. She also wondered why waxing philosophical gave her headaches.

  Jessica rubbed her temple and drove to the front of the house, Sully right on her tail—as he had been the entire trip. She swore under her breath, tired of being chased and just plain tired. They hadn’t left Houston until almost five o’clock. Between the long drive and stopping to get Iris some dinner, it was after seven.

  And still plenty of day left, Jessica thought irritably.

  In the odd way of daylight saving time and summer, twilight had abandoned the early evening, delaying the night. Ordinarily she worshiped the light and dreaded the dark. Night was a time for facing the past, a time for the nightmares.

  Funny how perspectives changed so easily. After a day in Sully’s company, she craved a little darkness in which to hide. Since the aft
ernoon visit to Munro Security, Sully had grown icy, as if holding himself in check, but the anger was still there, smoldering, waiting to flame. With Iris between them, dinner had been neither the time nor the place to continue their last discussion. So they had maintained an uneasy truce, responding to innocuous questions with vague answers.

  Dreading the next confrontation, Jessica climbed out of her car. There would be one. Of that she was sure. Although he hadn’t grilled her yet, Sully wouldn’t have forgotten the sober suits with boxes. Cops never forgot, and they never forgave. Especially not stubborn cops like Sully, ones who got the job done without excuses.

  He was already out of his car, eating up the ground between them with long purposeful strides. Sully looked like a man with a few things on his mind and the newly found time to say them. As much to escape him as to wake Iris, Jessica started to lean back into the car. Sully stopped her, his voice reproachful.

  “Let her sleep. The kid’s wiped out.” He shrugged. “I’ve seen it before. It’s the emotion. It’ll be better if I carry her inside.”

  “She’s too …” Before she could voice the objection, he was around the car and easing the door open. “… big,” she finished lamely.

  With one hand Sully kept Iris from tumbling out while he slid the other beneath her knees. In a smooth, quick movement, as easily as if she weighed no more than air, he had her out of the car and against his chest. Jessica realized the girl wasn’t that big at all. Now that her eyes were closed and the perceptive watchfulness was hidden, she looked younger than twelve. She seemed fragile and innocent.

  An unfamiliar and unfocused anger stabbed Jessica as she realized that Iris had spent her life relying on the kindness of strangers. An entourage of bodyguards, maids, and hit women didn’t count for real companionship and guidance. What kind of family was that for a kid? None at all. Unfortunately that’s all Iris had. And hope.

  The kid wanted so badly for her father to be alive. Iris loved him, worshiped him. Jessica wasn’t at all certain an absentee father like Phil Munro deserved her love. Money didn’t matter to a kid like Iris. Neither did the houses, the cars, and the private schools.

  None of it had ever mattered to Jessica. None of it could replace the gaping hole ripped out of her heart when she realized her own father had cared more about money than getting his daughters back alive. Whenever someone asked her what a life was worth, she could tell them to the penny. A quarter of a million dollars.

  She’d pay ten times that much if it would bring Jenny back. But it wouldn’t. Nothing could bring Jenny back. There was no way she could ever make it right.

  Jessica dragged her mind to the present as Sully turned to bump the door shut with his hip. She saw Iris’s eyes fight against the drowsiness weighing them down. They fluttered open long enough to register Sully’s face. At least that’s what Jessica thought, but the stare was slightly off—more like over his shoulder than on his face.

  “Good,” Iris mumbled as her lids fell, and smiled at Sully. Her chin dipped toward her chest. “She stopped … crying.”

  Puzzled, Jessica wondered if she’d heard Iris correctly. Then she watched Sully’s knees buckle—just for an instant. That was only an illusion of course. The man’s knees wouldn’t dare betray him. Nevertheless he appeared ill at ease, frozen in his tracks, frowning warily at the top of a head full of blond curls. As if he was afraid Iris might say something else. Something worse.

  Jessica raised an eyebrow and shut the car door.

  What do you know that I should know, Iris? Sound asleep and without even trying the girl had managed to shake Sully right down to his cowboy boots. Jessica found herself smiling. The man was human after all.

  Before she could ask about the cryptic mumbling, Lincoln stepped outside. He looked every inch the bodyguard today. His impeccably starched shirt and saw grass-colored trousers were sharp enough to have been featured in GQ magazine, but the shoulder holster and 9mm Beretta were straight out of Mercenary Monthly.

  Lincoln held the door for Sully, checking Iris carefully as she was carried by. “I was beginning to worry.”

  Trailing in Sully’s wake, Jessica told him, “Don’t stop now, Linc. It looks like we may have plenty to worry about.” Although she didn’t have much hope, she asked, “Has Phil called?”

  “No. No one has.” That was a subtle reprimand. The next statement was a subtle request for information. “The police weren’t with you when you left.”

  “Give us a minute, okay?” she asked, and tucked her hair behind her ears. “Iris doesn’t need to hear this again.”

  Sully waited silently for her at the foot of the stairs. She brushed past and led him to Iris’s room without a single hesitation. Making a mental blueprint of her surroundings was another old habit that had snapped into action last night. Iris had given her the nickel tour before they’d settled in for that long talk.

  The room was cool and semidark. A welcome relief after the day’s heat. Above twin beds were posters of unicorns and a road sign that said “Angel crossing.” Jessica smiled, remembering her own preteen fascination with unicorns, and moved to one of the beds. She subdued the family of trolls inhabiting it—they looked more manageable than the explosion of clothes on the other bed. Then she shoved back the purple spread and stepped out of the way. For all Sully’s rough handling of women, he was apparently also capable of gentleness. That was obvious as he put Iris down on the mattress. She landed so softly that she simply snuggled into the pillow and didn’t move again. Not even when a lock of hair slipped down across her cheek to tease her nose.

  Sully reached out to brush the hair away, his big hand making the girl’s cheek look delicate by comparison. Abruptly, as if embarrassed to have been caught in a random act of kindness, he pulled his hand back and walked out of the room.

  “Don’t worry, Sully,” she whispered as she followed him into the hallway, “I won’t tell anybody you can actually be decent when you try.”

  “I don’t imagine there are many people who’d believe you.”

  Bristling, Jessica said, “If that cutting little statement was supposed to be another insult—”

  “No, Jessie.” He laughed bitterly, shaking his head. “This time I was taking the knife to myself. ‘Decent’ isn’t what most people expect out of Sullivan Kincaid.”

  “Then what do they expect?”

  He turned and blocked her path down the stairs. “I wouldn’t know. I don’t ask them.”

  The grim set of his jaw convinced her he did know exactly what people expected. His colleague in Houston had called him the devil and, if Sully’s not-so-tongue-in-cheek response was to be believed, so had his father. Jessica sensed the darkness in Sully’s soul, but she couldn’t bring herself to accept that Sully embraced it. There was too much anger in him for there to be much peace. He fought the darkness every step of the way.

  She’d seen him pull himself back from the edge. The darkness didn’t own him because he used it. His anger was like a shield, something he could focus outward. Jessica envied him that ability. Her anger was always bottled up, a physical thing pressing against her ribs.

  “Do you care what people expect?” she asked finally.

  When he didn’t answer, the silence wove a spell of intimacy around them. The world suddenly narrowed to the two of them, and she didn’t like it. Didn’t like the way he made every second seem a victory. He was waiting for her to do something stupid—like give in to the impulse inside her that urged her to take one tiny step closer.

  A second before she gave in, Jessica broke the spell. “What was Iris talking about, Sully? Who cries for you?”

  A slow, sinful smile crossed his face, as if he’d been anticipating the question or her retreat. When he spoke, his tone was patronizing. “Jessie, Jessie, you didn’t buy into that sleep-talk, did you? Iris is an adorable flake. Who knows what she was dreaming about at the time.”

  “Yeah, I bought it,” Jessica confessed and pushed past him. “I bought it beca
use you looked like you’d seen a ghost.”

  Sully hauled her around, keeping her from descending the stairs. “Not a ghost, darlin’. An angel.”

  Her expression must have been incredulous. His grin got bigger, but his eyes were deadly serious.

  “Shocking, isn’t it? To find out that even Sullivan Kincaid rates an angel. Yessiree, buddy, Sullivan Kincaid, the devil himself, has his own personal angel. That’s what they tell me anyway.”

  “Angel? I don’t understand.”

  “I spent yesterday trying to track down our illusive Madame Evangeline, remember? Which means I spent the day with an assortment of psychics. Most of them see auras and feel vibrations and read those cards. But one of them claims to see angels.”

  “Lucky for you.”

  “Yeah. Lucky me. She told me mine was weeping.” Good. She stopped crying.

  A chill slithered through Jessica as she remembered that when Iris said those words, she had been looking beyond Sully—over his shoulder. Involuntarily Jessica glanced back toward Iris’s room.

  “Gives you pause, doesn’t it?” asked Sully softly. “Shook me up for a second or two. Maybe you should ask her about your angel.”

  “I don’t have one.” Her answer was sure and quick.

  “Why? Did yours get tired of crying and fly off to find someone who was worth redeeming?”

  If Sully’s intent had been to wound, he did a fine job. Because he was right. She wasn’t worth redeeming; she’d known that for a long time. Jessica covered the pain of the truth with a joke and started down the stairs. “Silly me. When St. Peter was handing out angels, I thought he said, ‘bangles.’ I had plenty of bracelets, so I very politely said, ‘No thank you, sir.’ ”

  “What a shame,” Sully commiserated, but he didn’t sound sympathetic. “I have a feeling you could use an angel right about now.”

  “Now is way too late. I could have used one sixteen years ago.” Jessica recognized her mistake before Sully even asked the question.