He wasn’t dumb, she’d told him, but for an instant, he felt it. His muscles were taut, his synapses firing constantly, and his brain was so overwhelmed, its orders were muddled. Hold her? Touch her? Kiss her? Tear her clothes off? Carry her off into the bedroom or just trade places with her on the couch?
Or relax and enjoy?
Oh, yeah, that sounded good. Relax as much as he could with a raging hard-on and enjoy it even when the pleasure left him broken into a whole lot of pieces of happy nothingness.
His hands shifted to rest on her spine, one at the base of her neck, the other low on her back. Even through her clothing, the contact felt unreasonably intimate. When they got undressed, when he could touch her bare skin, nothing between them anymore, no anger, no smugness, no misunderstandings...
Finally she made the last small move he’d been waiting for, sinking down, taking her weight from her knees, her body stretching the length of his, her hips cradling his erection, her breasts pressed against his chest, the pleasure of her desire crashing hard against the pain of his.
Sliding his hands upward, he skimmed them beneath her shirt, over the soft skin of her back, higher to the barrier of her bra, then back down again. They resumed their upward movement on the outside of her shirt, not stopping until he’d reached her ponytail. Even with his eyes closed, he didn’t fumble over the clasp that held it, tossing it aside and letting her hair fall, long and silken over his hands. He stroked it, caressed it, then laid his palms flat against her head, held her still and took control of the kiss, plunging in his tongue to fill her mouth.
She whimpered softly, not in complaint or protest, and when she glided her hands along his body to his groin, he groaned far less softly.
Wriggling together, they were working their way into a prone position on the sofa when his cell phone rang. Martine’s breath caught—hard to miss when his tongue was in her mouth—and her body, for an instant, was as rigid as his own before she pushed herself up onto her arms. The intrusion, both of the phone and the unwelcome memories it brought, washed over him like an ice bath, stopping his heart midbeat, making his hands shake. No, damn it, not this time... He’d waited so long...
The phone rang again, and suddenly her body went all soft again, pressing against him in the most sensitive places. A smile that was part frustration and part sly touched her lips before she pressed a chaste kiss to his mouth, then pushed herself off the couch. “See if you need to answer that,” she said, raising her hands to the buttons of her black shirt. She undid one, then two, then three, head ducked, hair falling across her face, before catching his stunned gaze and smiling. “I’ll wait for you in the bedroom.”
Skimming through the rest of the buttons, she slid the shirt off her arms, let it fall to the floor and walked—sauntered—sashayed—away before he had a chance to notice much more than the bright orange of her bra and the smooth brown of all that skin.
He had to roll onto his side to work his cell from his pocket and to grind out a nongreeting. “This better be important.”
“Some information came in on your missing heart case.” It was Steve Lawson, one of the detectives on shift.
Jimmy rubbed the back of his neck, his frustration subsiding. Nothing else was, thankfully. “Text it or email it to me, will you? Just don’t call me the rest of the night.”
“Aw, DiBiase’s committing assault with a friendly weapon,” Lawson said in an aside, and in the background a couple of people snickered.
“You guys ever gonna grow up?”
“That’s rich, coming from Detective Peter Pan. Check your email when you’re done. What’ll that be? Five minutes?”
“Screw you, Lawson.” He hung up before any of the guys could respond and left the phone on the kitchen counter on his way to the bedroom.
The only light in the room came through the windows, dampened by the screen that kept peepers from seeing in while still allowing a view out, and it all seemed to gather on Martine, standing beside the bed.
All those years ago, she’d been sort of a challenge: something he’d wanted and expected to get. Like he’d told her, everything had come easily...until her. His untrustworthiness had turned her into an opportunity missed, one that he’d regretted ever since. But here she was. With him. Wearing jeans and socks and frilly bits of silly orange lace that would soon be gone.
Here she was, giving him another chance, not just for great sex but everything he’d wanted...and some things he hadn’t even known he wanted.
God help him, he wouldn’t screw it up this time.
* * *
Warm air drifted over Martine’s bare skin—so much of it—as the central heat kicked on, chasing away the goose bumps on her arms but doing nothing to settle the butterflies in her stomach. She wasn’t new to standing naked, or partly so, in front of a man—her sex life was a healthy one—but something about this felt new.
It wasn’t the gorgeous apartment. She’d dated men with money before. It wasn’t the fact that her body wasn’t quite as toned and firm now as it had been ten or even five years ago. She was growing older as graciously as she could. It wasn’t even all those years of hostility and yearning and anger she’d harbored for Jimmy.
It was this moment. The yearning now. The need. The intensity. The seriousness of it. The not-just-sex-ness of it. The he-was-getting-too-important-ness of it. It was wanting to please him and wanting to please herself and being oh, so grateful that doing one would naturally accomplish the other.
She let her gaze slide over him: his dark hair still mussed from running his hand through it; the familiar devilish and sly and boyish and charming gleam in his eyes; the stubble on his jaw that indicated a long day; the navy T-shirt, bearing a large gold star and crescent of the New Orleans Police Department’s badge, that stretched broad across his chest but clung to his flat stomach; the faded jeans that clung everywhere, and quite impressively. “No phone?”
He shook his head. “I left it out there. I told them if they called back, I’d shoot ’em.” As he spoke, he lifted his shirt on the right side and removed his pistol from the holster, skirting around her to lay it on the night table next to a Taser and a canister of pepper spray.
She reined in her smile but couldn’t help the easy, light tone to her voice. “Is that it on the weapons?”
“Depends on your definition of ‘weapon.’”
“You are ready for everything,” she teased. “You happen to have any condoms?”
“Somewhere.”
“Don’t bother looking.” She took off her own Taser and pepper spray, added them to his, then reached into her hip pocket to remove a sleeve of condoms. “I come prepared, too.”
Finally he moved toward her, and all the warmth she’d felt a few moments ago disappeared, chased away by the shivers racing through her. These were good shivers, though, the kind that promised delight and satisfaction, the kind she would never grow tired of.
He reached her with four steps, but instead of pulling her close for a hard kiss, as she expected, he stood a bit away, raised his hand and touched her cheek with a gentleness that humbled her. “You’re an amazing woman, Tine.”
She forced back the lump rising in her throat, blinked back sudden moisture in her eyes and, when his fingertips skimmed close to her mouth, she caught his hand, guided it to her mouth and pressed a long, slow damp kiss to his palm.
His free hand cradled her nape and pulled her against him, while his right hand reached lower on her spine, to the thin closure of her bra. With her hips pressed to his, his arousal seemed even more impressive, and she couldn’t deny that the silly woman who still peeked out from her brain from time to time was amused by his one-handed dexterity with bra closures. A moment of subtle movements, and the garment fluttered, shifted downward until the straps caught on her shoulders.
“Oh, you’re good at that,�
� she murmured before he took her mouth. She slid the straps off and let it fall, nibbled at his tongue, then began exploring his still fully clothed body. The shirt was soft, like an old favorite, but not as soft as the skin it covered. Living art, an expansive canvas that invited her to touch rigid muscles, sensitive nerves, the network of bone that drew her hands downward. The collarbone connected to the rib bone, the rib bone connected to the hip bone, the hip bone connected to the pelvic bone and... Hallelujah. She was a happy girl.
Groaning, he shifted his hips out of her reach, so she grabbed handfuls of his shirt and began peeling it upward, forcing them both to break the kiss or be strangled in the process. She stared at him, her thoughts too chaotic with emotion, at the small knot of scars on his right shoulder, at another scar that ran across his biceps, at the gorgeous even tint of his skin and the way it stretched across his rib cage and dipped low over his abs.
“You forgot to say that you’re handsome as sin,” she murmured, her hands touching here, gliding there, savoring over there. “That’s the biggest reason women were so easy. The money helped, the football and the badge, too, but being so damn gorgeous with that naughty-boy grin was the icing on the cake.”
He rested his forehead against hers, his gaze heavy and all-seeing at such proximity. “It truly surprised me to find out that not all women—namely you—found my naughty-boy grin charming.”
“At this moment...” Her voice was fading as drawing air into her constricted lungs became harder. “...I’m sure I would find everything about you totally charming if we could just get out of these clothes.”
It was if she’d unknowingly discovered the magic words to send him from languidly touching and kissing and looking to stripping off his own clothes with breathtaking speed. He took a moment longer with hers, undoing the button and the zipper on her jeans, pulling the flaps of denim away from her body to glimpse inside, then yanking everything off as efficiently as he’d done with his own.
“I’ve never been with a woman wearing orange panties,” he said with a broad grin as said panties sailed across the room inside her jeans. “Come Mardi Gras, we’ll have a private party—you in those panties and bra and me in nothing. I’ll even give you beads if you show me your breasts.”
Mardi Gras. That was the end of February, not even two months away. Would they be together then?
Not the time to think about it, her rational mind decided. Damn sure not the time to wonder if she would even be alive then. This was now, and she was going to make the absolute best of it.
Without a frame, the bed sat lower to the floor, and when Jimmy took hold of her shoulders to lower her back, her breath caught at the falling sensation. A foot above the mattress, he let go and let her fall, and she bounced on the shades-of-blue quilt with a laugh. The mattress bounced again as he joined her, but his mouth on hers stopped her laughter, and his body over hers sent shivers and need rushing through her. In bed, there was always time for play, but right now, with fire dancing in her stomach, with hunger long too unsatisfied burning through her and his dark eyes stark with that nothing-matters-but-you look, playtime was over.
When he knelt between her knees, plastic crinkled beneath her hip. She groped blindly for the string of condoms, tore off one packet before throwing the others aside, then smiled her sweetest, most innocent smile. She pushed up, and he obligingly rolled until he was on his back and she was kneeling just a few inches below where she needed to be. “Let me put this where it goes—” she drew her fingers over the length of his erection “—and then I’ve got a promise to keep.”
She was going to ruin him for other women.
And herself for other men.
For the rest of their lives.
* * *
Nothing could wear a man out like a long week at work, days spent mostly with Martine and nights spent mostly worrying, thinking, wanting her, besides a couple of hours of impressively good sex. Jimmy lay on his stomach, the pillow he hugged underneath his head nothing compared with the silky skin he’d been touching and tasting and just looking his fill of. He was pretty sure, if he had a bit of artistic talent, he could draw a perfect replica of her perfect body, with every bump, birthmark and pore exactly in place. That was how intently he’d studied her.
She lay on her back, her hair spread over the other pillow, her cheeks flushed, her smile radiant. Sex was a great pastime—no one would ever get an argument on that from him—but sex with someone special was...well, special.
So much for Martine thinking he was smarter than he let on. Blame it on his oxygen-and blood-deprived brain. That part of him was still processing the fact that Martine had actually had sex with him, that she’d given him a second chance, that she was looking at him as if third and fourth and endless chances might be forthcoming.
Don’t get too ambitious, buddy. You might act like a kid, but you’re still forty. Those all-night workouts are a thing of the past. Though if anyone could bring them back into the present, it would be Martine.
She turned onto her side, bunching the pillow under her head, and gazed at him. “If I’d known you had a thing for orange lingerie, I would have worn it sooner.”
“If I’d known I had a thing for it. For what it’s worth, pink works, too. Red. Yellow. Green. Purple. Brown. Black. White. Beige.”
“So, basically, every color known to man.”
He wrapped a tendril of her hair around his finger, taking care to not pull. “Every color known to this man. And all the millions I have no clue about.”
“So...was it worth the wait?”
Letting her hair uncurl, he moved his hand to her stomach, caressing with just the tips of his fingers across her concave belly, up to her breasts with their sensitive nipples, over her hip bones and lightly, just barely, between her legs. “Haven’t I stroked your...ego enough tonight?”
With the pause, he penetrated the damp curls and made her breath catch, sending hundreds of little quivers along her nerves. She caught his hand, lifted it away and pressed a kiss to his wrist. “That wasn’t the reward I had in mind.”
“Reward?” He grinned. “I like rewards.”
“Was it worth a piece of warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream in bed?”
His grin gave way to laughter. Martine had a weakness for apple pie. That was going to make life easy when he needed a quick apology, a little persuasion or just a little treat to give. A man could find good apple pie anywhere.
“It deserves the whole damn pie. Stay here, and I’ll get it.” He kissed her and swung his feet over the side of the bed just as his cell phone rang. He sighed.
“At least their timing is better.” Martine slid up to lean against the headboard, the sheet tucked under her arms. She was the prettiest sight he’d ever seen.
He tugged on his boxers, then headed down the hall, snatching up the phone as the next ring started. “Didn’t I say don’t call me again tonight?”
Lawson responded, “Hey, we gave you a couple hours. Even you can get laid in that amount of time. Besides, we’re working. Why shouldn’t you?”
He glanced down the hall, where he’d pulled the bedroom door until it was almost closed. The sound of water came faintly from behind it. Martine was in the master bath. He turned on the speaker, set the phone on the counter next to the stove and got the ice cream from the freezer. “Oh, I don’t know. Because I put in all my hours for the week and already made a good start on next week’s hours?” After peeling off the plastic lid from the pie, he plated two large pieces and popped them into the microwave. “What’s up?”
“We got something new on your lonely heart case.”
“Don’t call it that.”
“That NCIS agent—”
“The cute one,” another voice chimed in. Detective Petitjohn.
“The cute one that you didn’t used to be married to,” Lawson cl
arified. “She called it the lonely heart case, and you know it fits. Poor heart out there, wondering where the hell its body got off to. Besides, all good serial killers need a name of some sort.”
The microwave dinged, and Jimmy removed the hot bowls and started spooning up ice cream. “Forget the name. What about the case?”
“A woman took her dog out for a walk a little bit ago. He ran off into the woods and came back chewing on something.”
Petitjohn took over. Jimmy had never met a detective, himself included, who didn’t like having his say in a conversation. “This woman’s a surgical nurse, and she recognized it right away as a human heart. Your victim’s, we assume. We got no shortage of heartless killers around here, but yours is the only heartless victim at the moment.”
A soft rustle came from behind him, a sound Jimmy couldn’t identify. He spun around and saw Martine, wearing the white button-down shirt he’d tossed on the bathroom counter after work and leaning heavily against the doorjamb where her legs had apparently given way. Grief and revulsion etched deep lines into her face, and the blood that had drained left her so pale, he thought she might faint.
Damn it. Dropping the spoon, he took a step toward her, but she backed away.
“They cut out her heart? Her heart?” Horror echoed through the words and showed on her face and in the crumpling lines of her body. She sagged, and he lunged for her, catching her on the way to the floor, sinking with her the last few inches.
As he lifted her into his lap and wrapped his arms around her, Lawson’s voice came distantly. “Uh, look, sounds like you have your hands full. We just, uh, thought you’d want to know. Later, man.”
He assumed the phone went silent, but he couldn’t tell because Martine’s panicked attempts to draw a full breath were too painful to separate out any other sounds. He held her snugly and stroked her tousled hair back from her face. “Breathe, darlin’. Just focus on that, one slow breath... That’s good, Tine, now take one more... Breathe a little deeper this time... That’s it, sweetheart.”
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