“Do you know a man named Freddy Bascomb?” Jamie asked.
Shandi dropped a butter knife. “Sorry,” she muttered.
“Well?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“As sure as I can be.” Shandi left the table, reappearing a minute later with her bags and makeup case. A battered Prada backpack hung off one arm. “Hey, you guys, this is really interesting and all that, but I’ve got to go.”
“Why so fast?” Jamie said, Mr. Sarcastic.
“Let her leave.” Marissa went to the door with Shandi. “You know you could tell me if you’re mixed up in a bad situation, right?”
Shandi looked away for a moment, then reverted to her usual self as she showily crossed her chest and raised her hand. “I swear I didn’t have anything to do with the break-in.”
Marissa gave her a quick hug. “I believe you.” But there was a remaining doubt.
Shandi clutched briefly, then pulled away. “It’s good to see you and Jamie together. Stick with him. He’s lots better for you than…the other guys.”
“Do you mean Paul?”
“Maybe.” Shandi’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “I’m sorry I’m such a lousy friend.” She dropped Marissa’s old key into her hand, no longer bothering with the fake smile. “Watch your back.”
“What does that mean?” Marissa’s scalp prickled. “Wait. Do you have an address? A number?”
“If you want me, call my cell.” Shandi waved as she disappeared down the stairs.
Marissa shut the door. Jamie stood nearby, watching. “You were rude,” she said. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen you be rude before.”
“She caught me by surprise. I didn’t mean to chase her out. I had more questions to ask her.”
“Don’t take this ‘being my protector’ thing too far, okay? I can deal with some machismo—God knows I’m used to it with my dad and brothers—but there’s a limit.”
Jamie fisted his hands; the sinew and muscle in his arms flexed and tightened. Suddenly she was taken with what a nice physique he’d developed. She knew, of course she knew, but now that they were lovers she was free to really revel in the attraction. She’d been suppressing a lot of sexual hunger.
“Sorry,” he said, “but I’m not stepping back. As long as you’re in danger, your business is my business.”
What she got was another of the distracting thrills. Not very liberated of her, especially when she usually found male bossiness very grating. She couldn’t even get prickly about taking care of herself. There was something deeply comforting about having a strong man in her corner, protecting her and encouraging her. “I’ve been perfectly safe for the past several days.”
“Because you’ve been at my place.”
She thought it was best to change the subject. “Did you hear what Shandi said about being a bad friend? And watching my back?”
Jamie nodded, suddenly wary.
“Does that make any kind of sense to you?” Marissa tensed. “I’m guessing it does.” She walked toward him, staring hard into his eyes so he wouldn’t look away. She poked a finger into his chest. “I want you to tell me without pulling any punches.”
“I don’t want to be the one—”
“Tell me.”
He blew out a breath. “All right. A couple of months ago, not long after you’d started dating Paul, I saw him in a bar on Prince Street. You know it. Macintosh’s. My kind of place, not his. It was midnight and I was there because—well, whatever. But it was late.”
“Why were you there? Were you drunk?”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Tell me. I want the whole story.”
Jamie turned away, his head hunched between his shoulders. “You were going out with Paul that night, and you’d told me you two were getting serious. I thought it might be the night. You know what I mean.” He checked her reaction. “I didn’t feel like sitting at home, thinking about what you were doing with Paul, so I went to Mac’s to drown my sorrows. Okay?”
Regret welled up inside her. “I didn’t know you were feeling that way. I am so sorry.”
“Yeah.” He tilted his head back, his Adam’s apple moving in his throat. “Anyway, I guess it wasn’t the night after all, because suddenly there was Paul, stopping by for a drink after your date.”
“He didn’t see you?”
“I made sure of that. I wasn’t in the mood.”
“So what happened?”
“Shandi came in.”
“Oh. I see.”
“After a while, they, uh…”
She knew he was trying to spare her feelings by not describing the events, but she could guess what he’d left out. Shandi was a flirt. Paul was a ladies’ man. One plus one equals two rotten louses.
Jamie’s brows knitted. He had to force his voice out. “They left together.”
“You’re sure it was—?” She saw the look on his face and suddenly found herself laughing and shaking her head and gulping at air. “Of course it was. Of course.”
Reckless energy boiled up in her. She didn’t blame Jamie, not a bit. But she needed a release. When he made a motion toward her, she shoved him away. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“How could I?”
Constricted by the walls around her, she walked in an agitated little circle, waving her arms. “How could you not? I would have never continued seeing Paul.”
“Are you sure of that?” Jamie asked quietly. Always the calm center of her tornado. “Or would you have decided that I was interfering because I was jealous over you?”
“I’ve always trusted you.”
“Yes, but you know how it goes. Kill the messenger. Our friendship might have been ruined. As much as I hated it, I had to let you find out for yourself.”
“You let me get burned.”
His face was harsh with the consequences of that decision. “I tried to warn you. I even tried to get Shandi to confess, but she claimed I’d gotten it wrong. She’d turned Paul down.”
“Could that be true?”
“You decide.”
Drained, Marissa went to sit on the couch. Jamie hovered nearby. She gestured at him. “Go home. I need to be alone now so I can get my head straight.” She was a smart woman. Why had she willfully disregarded the signs that Paul wasn’t worthy of her? Simply to make it easier to get out of the relationship?
Jamie plopped himself opposite her. “I’m not leaving.”
She glared.
He settled deeper. “You’re stuck with me, through thick and thin.”
There’d be no budging him. She was miffed, yes, but also grateful somewhere beneath the hurt and confusion. She thought of her parents, who fought and loved with equal passion.
Funny how for years she’d believed that she wanted to stay far away from their sort of marriage. And now, with Jamie, she was beginning to understand what true love meant.
Sticking with each other, through thick and thin. Good and bad. Love and lies.
10
“COME SNUGGLE with me, babe.”
Marissa waited a beat. “You talkin’ to me or the dog?”
Jamie patted the bed. “Who do you think?”
“The dog,” she said when Sally rose from her scroungy cushion in the corner of the pocket-size kitchen and padded across the room to lay her head near Jamie’s hand.
He looked at Marissa over the top of his wire-framed reading glasses. “Jealous?”
“As if. Blondes do not have more fun.” She tapped a folded-over page of the Village Observer with an ink pen. She was in a tank top and a pair of his pajama bottoms, curled up in his reading chair with the crossword. “Besides, I have Harry. If he’d just come down from the bookshelf.”
They were holed up in Jamie’s small apartment again. Despite the new locks and bars, he could see that Marissa still wasn’t comfortable at her own place. She wouldn’t admit it, so he’d claimed that Sally couldn’t sleep in a strange place and he didn’t want
to leave her alone.
Neither of them had suggested that they might sleep apart, even though there’d been several awkward moments when one or the other had started to comment on their change in situation, only to back off when the magnitude became apparent. He spent his time trying not to think that Marissa had turned to him only in a time of need and that before long she would be back up on her high heels, mowing down the opposition with a wink and a toss of her ponytail.
He had no idea what she thought. She wasn’t talking, except for muffled telephone conversations with Cass that turned to fake blather about sample sales when he walked into the room.
If not for that worry, plus the break-in, the body in the morgue, the Paul and Shandi problems, and the fact that Marissa hadn’t uttered a word of promising affection, Jamie would have believed he was living a dream. He was finally with her. That should have been enough.
“C’mere,” he crooned, scratching Sally’s muzzle.
“I’m finishing the crossword.”
He propped his open book on his chest. “Let me help.” The faster she was done, the sooner he’d have her in bed beside him.
She gave him a look before perusing the empty squares. “Replica. Six spaces. Last letter Y.”
“Easy. Effigy.”
“Not bad.” Her eyes narrowed and he knew she was searching for a stumper. “Portent. Six spaces.”
“No letters?”
“Nope.” Her pen tapped impatiently.
“Oh, the pressure.” He folded his arms behind his head. Sally looked at him with disappointed eyebrows, then retreated to her dog bed. “How about augury?”
A short pause while Marissa examined the squares. “That works.”
“Are you done yet?”
“Why so impatient?”
He took his book, stuck a marker where he’d left off, and laid it on the end table with his glasses and his alarm clock and the box of condoms that would soon need replacing. Hot damn.
“We’re still in the honeymoon period,” he said, flipping back the blanket. Honeymooners without a future. “Let’s enjoy it.”
Marissa chewed on the end of her pen, contemplating him with mischief dancing in her eyes. “Four-word phrase. Eleven letters.”
He counted on his fingers. “How about—no, that’s three words.”
“First letter S,” she said. “Last letter E.”
There were too many possibilities. “Suck my—”
“No profanity allowed!” She was laughing.
So was he, relieved that they still had a semblance of their previous rapport. “You have to give me a clue.”
“What you should have said instead of ‘Come snuggle with me.’”
Knowing Marissa, she’d be blunt. “Stick it to me,” he guessed.
“That’s terrible.” She put her feet down and tossed the paper on the coffee table he’d shoved out of the way to make room for the open sofa bed. “But you’re heading in the right direction.” She stood and stretched. Her breasts lifted beneath the skimpy top, pert nipples making pinpoints for his gaze. “C’mon, Mr. Puzzle Man.”
“Seduce me…” He was at a loss.
“Did I stump you?”
“Uh.” He’d erected a pup tent in his boxer shorts.
She saw. “So stump is the wrong word.”
“Thanks for the compliment.”
Her hands were on her hips, the pajama bottoms riding low. Her hip bones were prominent and her belly was flat, the color of heavy cream, accented by the glint of gold at her pierced navel. He scooted higher on the bed, his hard-on burgeoning. She didn’t have to act sexy. Simply her presence was enough to turn him on, even when there was no promise of more than physical gratification.
“‘Save me, Jamie,’” he guessed.
“That doesn’t fit the clue, and it’s only three words.” She rolled her eyes. “Not very empowering, either.”
“Then you can save me.”
“You got it.” She pounced onto the bed, crawling over him on her hands and knees. Her mouth dipped to kiss and nibble across his face. “Sex me up, babe,” she whispered, breathing hotly in his ear.
He put his hands on her luscious ass. “Is that it? The magic words?”
“Not romantic enough for you?”
Her hair was long and loose, falling in his face. Freshly scented with the strawberry shampoo she’d brought up from her place. He brushed his fingers through it, cradling her face. “Not romantic enough for you.”
“I don’t need—” She stopped, closed her eyes. He knew what she’d intended to say. “Maybe I do.”
His hopes leaped. “Four words,” he said, kissing her softly, quickly. “Starts with I. Ends with Marissa.”
She bumped him with her forehead. Pressed her fingers over his mouth. “Shh.”
“I can’t,” he said. Stupid, stupid. He’d been trying to play this out, stay cool, keep his heart off his sleeve, but it was no use. He had to be himself, not the men that she’d dated—and dumped. “I love you, Marissa.”
She rolled off him. Her face dropped into the pillow. “You had to go and say it.”
His expectations plummeted. “You had to already know how I felt.”
“Yeah, but saying it out loud is different.” She made a muffled screeching sound that quit abruptly, as if she’d bit a chunk out of the pillow.
When she looked up, her face was pink, her eyes pulled into narrow slits. “You know I love you, too.”
“But not in the same way.”
“I love you as a friend, and I love—”
“This,” he said, flipping over and pressing himself against her prone body. His erection hadn’t wilted. In fact, he felt even more aroused, swollen with hot, angry pride, as if his cock could make her love him if he was hard enough and good enough. If he could make her come until she was swimming in the proof that her feelings were stronger than she’d admit.
“Aggh.” She squirmed beneath him as he pushed the pajama bottoms down, baring her ass. “Slow down.”
“I don’t think so.” Reaching beneath her, he found the tight bead of one nipple and tugged on it. “You can tell me to stop, and I will. But you won’t do that. You want this too much.”
She panted. “Yeah? You think?”
“I know.” His knee parted her thighs. Her heat was apparent even before his hand slipped along the enticing curve of her bottom to the slickened folds that gave way to the press of his fingers. He wiggled them inside her and she clenched down, shuddering around the invasion.
“See?” he said, waving his fingers, showing her the shiny wetness. She moved her face away and he kissed and bit at her nape until finally she turned her head, watching him with one wild white-rimmed eye.
He put his fingers in his mouth and sucked, savoring the taste of her like a lollipop before slowly pulling them out from between his puckered lips. His nostrils flared. Her fragrance should be bottled as an aphrodisiac and sold in secret back alleys in exotic foreign countries.
Marissa was stunned. “Dammit, Jamie. What’s gotten into you?”
She should be asking what had got out. Having her evade his declaration had freed his inner brute. “Like it?” he growled, squeezing the firm flesh of her butt as he ground against her. A raging lust boiled his bloodstream, swelling and stiffening him until he felt as if he could punch through a bulkhead metal door with his erection.
“Yes!” She bucked beneath him. “I like it.”
“Get me a rubber.”
Blindly, she slapped her hand on the box, spilling condoms as she dragged it across the bed. One rip and she’d torn open a packet and was flinging the rolled latex disk over her shoulder. “Here.”
He lifted his hips to apply the protection.
Seeing his distraction, she tried to crawl out from beneath him. He gripped her between his thighs, every muscle he’d developed from biking and Frisbee flexing in concentrated effort.
Her hands spread, seeking leverage, but she flopped like a fish on th
e beach. “Let me go.”
“No.” He finished and pressed his full weight down on her. “You’ll like this, I promise.”
“The pets,” she said, grasping at straws.
They were sleeping. “That excuse only works once.”
“You’re being mean.”
“And nasty.” He stroked both hands along her back, tracing the narrowing of her waist, the flare of her hips. He reached around. She gasped and lifted her butt higher off the bed. Tempting him, the minx.
He humped against her. A pleased murmur slipped past her lips before she buried her face in the pillow crumpled between her elbows. She laced her fingers at the back of her neck, bracing herself as he entered her.
He grunted. “Ah-hh.”
She bit down on a moan. “You say the nicest things.”
“I tried, but you don’t need romance, right?”
“I said ‘maybe.’”
“When you decide, let me know, but for now—I—uh—” The impossibly tight clasp of her wet flesh was shorting out his brain. He plowed deeper, until his balls were bumping up against her. A small whimper broke free of the pillow, and then the tension in her shoulders let go and she became supple and bendy like a willow branch, swaying with the currents that coursed between them.
He used his hips. The slippery friction was maddeningly good. Eventually she flattened out and he lifted her up until she was able to get her legs beneath her. He rose to his knees, spreading his fingers across her slim, bowed back as she arched and twisted and gripped him in a velvet vise. How beautiful she was, how untamable.
She rocked backward to meet his next thrust and then they were off on a wild galloping ride, pounding toward climax. He closed his eyes, concentrating on the rhythm and the drive, his racing heart.
Marissa’s body had tightened again, squeezing spasmodically. She was up on her hands and knees, flinging her head, gnashing her teeth. Her black hair churned. He reached for the tangled tresses, pressing his lips to her spine and feeling for her trembling shoulders as he jammed his cock deep within her. A powerful orgasm ripped through him in pulse after pulse.
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