by Radclyffe
Carter knew she wasn’t going to be able to reason with Allen, because for whatever reason, Allen was fixated on Rica. Maybe she wanted Rica to be guilty. Maybe on some level she needed Rica to be guilty. Just because Allen was supposedly one of the good guys didn’t mean her motives were pure, or rational. Carter didn’t really care. All she cared about was getting Rica out of Allen’s line of fire. She wasn’t certain quite how she was going to do that, but she knew she had to. An arrest would ruin Rica’s life.
“If there’s something going on at the gallery in New York City, Rica is obviously not involved. She hasn’t been there for weeks.”
“She was there about a month ago.” Allen walked to the door, then paused as if in afterthought. “By the way. Unless you bring me something on Rica, you may find yourself on the bad end of an obstruction of justice charge.”
Carter watched the door swing closed behind Allen. She might have no official role in Rica’s life any longer, but nothing that had happened between the two of them had been about the case. Nothing that mattered. And now, Carter realized, keeping Rica from being destroyed because of her family ties was the only thing she cared about.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“So?” Kevin pounced the minute he saw Carter exit the station’s rear door to the parking lot. “What’s the word?”
“How’d you know I’d come out here?” Carter asked, stalling.
He snorted. “Come on, you and I have been ducking out on meetings this way for the last four years. What did she say? You were in there long enough.”
Carter squinted in the bright noon sun. Her head ached. Her heart ached. “Let’s go for a beer.”
Kevin stopped and stared, his big open face revealing surprise and concern. “Kinda early.”
“It’s either that or a pain pill,” Carter said as she wove her way through the departmental and private vehicles baking on the tarmac. “What would you choose?”
“Good point. The Shamrock?”
Carter nodded, thinking that the dark, dingy hole-in-the-wall bar suited her mood perfectly. Plus, it was a cop bar, but not the kind where whole squads got together to celebrate. It was a place for solitary drinking when the waste and insanity that was a cop’s daily fare got to be too much. No one would bother them, or even notice them. Cops went to the Shamrock to try to forget, not for company.
The couple of men who sat at the bar didn’t look up as they walked in. A woman, blond, thirty, looking as if she hadn’t slept in a week, was slumped over a glass she cradled in both hands in a booth against the wall. She glanced once in their direction and quickly looked away. She was still new enough to be embarrassed at not being able to handle another dead child, another senseless vehicular fatality, another rape. Carter tried to remember how old she’d been when she’d passed from caring to numbness. It’d been a while ago. Before this case. Long before Rica.
“Two beers,” Carter said to the bartender. She handed a longneck to Kevin, and they ambled into the darker recesses at the rear. She slid across the cracked red vinyl seat to the far corner of a booth, turned sideways to rest her sore back against the wall, and stretched her legs out into the aisle. Kevin pulled at his beer, sitting across from her and waiting.
“Allen wants to get a warrant on Rica for whatever’s going down at the gallery,” Carter said at last.
“Huh. I don’t think we’ve got enough hard evidence on that to go after anyone, not yet. I agree there’s something there—probably a little bit of cash cleaning. Small-time, though. I’m surprised Pareto would risk his daughter for something like that.”
Carter drained half the bottle in several deep swallows. “It’s not Pareto. It’s Brassi.”
“Yeah, that would make more sense—Brassi setting up a little sideline and using Rica as a front. You think she knows?”
Carter shook her head. “Pareto doesn’t give those orders himself. Brassi is his messenger, so Rica would think that anything Brassi told her to do was coming from her father.”
“Well, if Pareto doesn’t know about it, Brassi’s risking his neck. All the daughter has to do is tell Daddy that this guy is fooling around with her business, putting her at risk. Do you think Brassi’s really that crazy?”
“Oh yeah. He thinks he’s got Rica in his pocket because he’s important to her father. And some other reasons. It goes back a ways.”
“All this family shit makes me nuts,” Kevin muttered. “Loyalty only goes so far, you know?”
Carter regarded Kevin silently for a long moment. “You agree with me, then? That Rica’s not part of this?”
Kevin shrugged. “You’re good police. Good instincts. Even if you are thinking with your…whatever, right now.”
“My whatever,” Carter said, grinning sadly, “doesn’t come into this. Rica doesn’t want anything to do with me.”
“If your dick’s anything like my dick, that doesn’t matter.”
Kevin didn’t always wear his wedding ring when he was working undercover. None of the undercover detectives did. But Carter had never known him to fool around on his wife of a dozen years. They had three kids. She tried to imagine what it would be like to go home after a day or week or a month of being someone else, of living another life, and then putting all that aside for the semblance of normality. She’d never needed to. She didn’t have another life besides the one she assumed until the next assignment. “So you think Allen’s off base with this plan of hers?”
“Yeah, I do,” Kevin said slowly. “She’s jumping the gun—and might blow any chance of getting at Pareto by going for the small fish first. Even if she got something to stick on Brassi, he’d never turn. Just doesn’t make good tactical sense.”
“Yeah, I think Brassi’s a dead end as far as getting to Pareto. Glad you agree.”
Kevin frowned. “Why is it so important what I think?”
“Because you’re my partner and someone needs to keep an eye on Allen,” Carter said quietly. “And because I turned in my shield today.”
Kevin banged his beer bottle down with a thump. “Jesus Christ, Carter, what the fuck’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing.” She grinned just a little unsteadily. “Well, if you don’t count the bumps and bruises.”
“Don’t try to laugh this off. We’re talking about your goddamn career here.”
“No we’re not. We’re talking about Allen’s personal agenda and the fact that we both know it’s wrong.”
“Okay. Fine. We’ll go over her head. Together.” He started to slide out of the booth. “Come on. Right now.”
“If I could move fast enough I’d haul you back down, but I can’t. So just sit. Please.”
“Fuck,” he muttered, but he settled back into the seat.
“It’s more than Allen. It’s me, too, Kev. Things used to be really clear to me. Black and white. Right and wrong.” She drained her beer and set the bottle gently on the tabletop. “Now it’s not.”
“That’s because of Rica. You’re all twisted up about her, but it doesn’t make what her father does right.”
“No, it doesn’t. But it doesn’t make her wrong.”
Kevin rubbed his face furiously, then sighed loudly. “What are you going to do?”
“You don’t have to worry about it.”
“Like hell. I don’t want to end up coming after you one of these days.”
Carter smiled, and hoped this once, she was telling the truth. “I’ll make sure you never need to.”
*
Reese marveled, not for the first time, at how memory blunts the fine details of beauty. She knew every inch of Tory’s face as her own, but the images she’d replayed in her mind dozens of times while she’d been in Iraq were nowhere near as breathtaking as the reality. The midday sun slanted through the window and haloed Tory’s face as she slept. Her hair held a little more gray, her skin carried a few more lines around her eyes and mouth than when they’d first met, but she was only more lovely with the passage of time. Reese traced a f
ingertip along the edge of her jaw and smiled when Tory murmured with pleasure.
“You’re supposed to be sleeping,” Tory whispered, her eyes still closed.
“I was.”
Tory opened her eyes and regarded Reese with professional focus. “How do you feel?”
“Lazy.”
“Silly me,” Tory said, laughing softly. “Here I thought you’d be home for at least a couple of days before you started chafing about the inactivity.” She ran her fingers gently over Reese’s collarbone. “What about this?”
“If I lie on my left side like now, it doesn’t really hurt. I can even move my right arm pretty comfortably.”
“You’re still not going to be able to carry the baby for a while.” At Reese’s sound of protest, Tory hastened to add, “Back and forth to the crib like this morning is fine. But getting her in and out of her car seat is going to take two strong arms. Believe me, she’s still nonstop wiggle.”
Reese grinned. “I noticed.” She smoothed her hand over Tory’s bare shoulder and down her arm to clasp her fingers. “My unit was scheduled for recall to the States in a few weeks. Because of my injuries, I most likely won’t be going back.”
“Thank God.” Tory shuddered. “I didn’t even consider that might happen.”
“I wouldn’t be here at home recovering if my father hadn’t arranged it. I might even still be in Germany. But I can’t do much until my collarbone heals, anyhow.”
“I’m really grateful to him for getting you home, and for keeping the press away from us.”
“The military isn’t all that anxious to tell the public all the little details of what’s happening over there. They rescued us so fast, I’m not even sure the embedded reporters with our unit knew what was happening.”
“Still,” Tory brushed a kiss over Reese’s mouth, “I was very glad to have him for my father-in-law this past week.”
“I’m sorry it’s been so difficult. He can be—”
“No, I mean it. He was very helpful, and I’m sure it was hard for him.”
“It’s going to get harder,” Reese said quietly. “I plan to resign, and I’m going to ask him to move the paperwork through.”
Tory closed her eyes, took several long breaths, and then met Reese’s gaze. “Are you sure?”
Reese smiled. “I was thinking about it all the way back in the plane. I realized as I was coming home that I’ve been moving toward that decision for a long time. Even before I met you, leaving active service to come here was the first step in letting go of that part of my life.”
“Reggie and I will be very grateful if you do. It was so hard with you away.”
Reese stroked Tory’s chest and cupped her breast. Most of the fullness from pregnancy had subsided, and she caressed the warm, pliant flesh gently. Tory’s nipple tightened and Reese felt an answering tension in the pit of her stomach. “I know. For me too. A lot of the time I just felt…empty.”
“You’re home now. It will be all right.” Tory covered Reese’s hand with her own and pressed Reese’s fingers firmly into her flesh, stilling the gentle strokes. “I don’t think you want to do that. Not until you’re bet—”
“You don’t have any broken bones, do you?” Reese murmured, working her thumb across Tory’s nipple.
“No, but you do.”
“I’m not going to move much of anything.” Reese slid her hand from beneath Tory’s, clasped Tory’s neck, and drew her close. She kissed her, tasting her lips slowly while she traced the soft junctures with her tongue, replacing another memory with the wonder of the now. “And you don’t have to do anything either. I just want to touch you.”
“Oh God, yes,” Tory murmured. “Anywhere. Everywhere. Whatever you need.”
What Reese needed was to skim her fingers over Tory’s breasts and hips and thighs as she kissed her again. She drank her in, slowly savoring her as she continued her explorations. She watched Tory’s eyes as she caressed her, recognizing the instant when pleasure became need. She smiled.
“You’re so beautiful when you’re aroused.”
“I feel like part of me has been closed up in a dark room,” Tory said breathlessly, “and you just opened a door. The sunlight almost hurts my eyes, but it feels so good to be warm. God, don’t stop touching me.”
Reese nipped at Tory’s lower lip. “I never will.”
“Reese, darling, I need you so mu—oh!”
“It’s all right,” Reese soothed as she swept her fingers between Tory’s thighs. “Let me give you this.”
“I’m afraid I’ll forget and hurt you,” Tory said desperately. “Reese, I don’t know—”
“Shh.” Reese slowly stroked through the heat, massaging the places that made Tory tremble, easing inside, a little deeper with each stroke. “You feel so good. I need you.”
Tory tilted her hips and took Reese in completely, one exquisite millimeter at a time. “Oh that’s so good. Deep. I want you deep inside.”
When Reese was completely sheathed, she lay still, only her lips moving on Tory’s. As her tongue met Tory’s and they gently teased, she felt Tory tighten around her fingers. Still she did not move. As the contractions came faster, harder, she whispered, “I can feel you coming.”
“Yes,” Tory whimpered softly. “Coming. Just for you.”
“I love you.”
“Oh,” Tory cried softly as her orgasm washed over her. “I love you.”
*
Rica dropped the book she’d been pretending to read as she sat for hours on the sofa. She’d read and reread the same few pages over and over. She regarded the phone on the end table as if it were a loathsome creature rather than an inanimate object. It had rung only once in the last twenty-four hours, and she’d been reluctant to answer it, knowing it was likely to be a call about some problem at the gallery in New York. But then, what else would it be? Carter wouldn’t call. She had sent Carter away, and Carter would respect her wishes. Carter was the first person in her life who had ever really listened to what she had to say, and believed her.
She picked up the phone, finally admitting it was time to do what she’d been avoiding all day, and pressed the familiar numbers.
“Hello,” her father said.
“Papa? It’s me.”
“Hello, Rica. I was just about to call you.”
“I need to see you,” Rica said, feeling an unanticipated surge of relief at having said the words.
“Yes. I have some things to discuss with you, too. Let’s talk tonight.”
“Tonight?”
“Why wait. I’ll send a car.”
“But—”
“I’ll see you later, cara.”
Surprised by her father’s oddly abrupt tone, Rica wished that she could see Carter. Just being with Carter made her feel as if she had a real life of her own, one worlds apart from the one she’d been born into. But wishes, she had learned, were only painful indulgences, and she didn’t have time for that luxury at the moment. She needed to get ready for the most important meeting of her life.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
It was well after midnight when Rica arrived at her family home, but her father was waiting for her in his study, dressed in a suit as he always was and looking far fresher than she felt. He rose when she entered, came around his desk, and kissed her on the cheek.
“Let’s walk in the gardens, cara,” he said.
He wanted to talk outside, Rica realized, and immediately braced herself. Although the house was routinely swept for monitoring devices and the phone lines checked, she knew that her father never took chances when he discussed business. She took his arm and followed him out as if they were going to take a leisurely stroll. He didn’t seem the least bit tense, but she doubted that she had hidden her own anxiety very well from him. It felt as if someone were kneading her insides with an iron fist.
As soon as they were outside, Rica said, “There’s something I want to tell you, Papa.”
“Let’s sit.”
Her father led her along a subtly lighted flagstone path to a secluded seating area with a wooden glider suspended from two tall trees in its center. She had often spent hours during the summer curled up on that very glider, reading and dreaming. She sat next to her father, who extracted a cigar from his inside jacket pocket. She waited while he went through the ritual of clipping the end with a small cigar knife he carried—a gift from her stepmother—and firing it with a gold lighter. Her father smoked a custom blend of tobacco, and the smoke that drifted into the air was vaguely sweet.
“What is troubling you?” Alfonse asked.
“There are things we’ve never talked about that I need you to know,” Rica said. “Things about me.”
“If there is something that concerns you,” Alfonse said, “then I want to know.”
“I’ve never wanted to hurt you.”
“And you haven’t.”
“If I do, it’s only because I need you to know how I feel. Because I want you to understand.” Rica realized she’d forgotten the logical things she’d planned to say, and simply said what was in her heart. “I am never going to be any part of your business. I don’t want anything to do with it.”
“I understand that such matters do not interest you,” Alfonse said quietly. “But you are my daughter, and that is a powerful tie that will always be important. Your husband—”
“Papa, there isn’t going to be a husband. I am never going to marry a man. I’m a lesbian.”
Alfonse continued to smoke and slowly swung the garden swing with a foot against the flagstone. “We are all complicated people. Love—desire—it is never simple. There are many reasons to marry, and not all of them are about what we feel.”
“I’m not going to marry someone I don’t love, and I’m never going to love a man. Not like that.”
“What about children?”
“I don’t need a husband for that.”
Alfonse smiled faintly. “No, but it is easier. Would it be so difficult to take a husband who would want children as well, and have the other things you need with someone else?”