“You’re something,” he told her, and pressed kisses into the delicate swell of her breasts above the bra. The small, heart-shaped locket rested against her faintly freckled skin. He fingered it briefly, then delved a little deeper inside her bra. “Is this okay?”
He couldn’t see her face, but she said, “Mm.”
Once more he put his hands on her back. She jerked away.
“Okay,” he said. ‘Let’s get this out of the way.” He took hold of her waist and spun her around. Before she could do anything to stop him, he tossed up her shirt.
She struggled to break free.
“Stop it,” he told her. “Stand still and let me look. I guess if that window had been all the way open you’d be less messed up, but you’d probably have hit your head a whole lot harder.”
“Please don’t.”
“Grow up,” he said, and regretted each word. “Sorry. That wasn’t anything I wanted to say. But stop overreacting, will you? You’ve got a lovely body. You turn me on, just looking at you. Scars and all.” And he tried to prove his point by mapping those scars with the tip of his tongue and his lips.
And he shifted his hands to her ribs, then around to cover her breasts.
The glass in that window had left a wide swath of wounds, healed to bumpy red, over the left side of her back. And he didn’t give a damn.
“I never look at it,” she whispered. “It’s not important, but I know it isn’t pretty. Please don’t touch it. I don’t want you to feel…You’re a good man, Chris Talon, but no man wants to touch that. He certainly doesn’t want to kiss it. But thank you.”
The anger he felt unnerved him. He rested his brow on her spine and worked at stopping himself from snapping at her. “Chris?”
“For this moment…I know we shouldn’t do anything about it. At least not now. But for this moment could we stop second-guessing what we think and just enjoy being with each other? You feel so good to me. And you look so good to me.”
He didn’t care if she answered him. He stood up and pulled her shirt from her arms. Then he unhooked her bra and tossed it aside. Her breasts fit into his hands like dreams. Kissing the back of her neck brought him too close to the edge for comfort, but he kept right on inching closer.
Sonnie raised her arms and reached back to put her hands behind his neck. She rested her head against his shoulder and arched her back.
“Yes,” he said, passing his thumbs over her nipples, “this is you, isn’t it? The real you. And I’m the lucky schmuck who gets to be with you when you come alive again.”
“I never was alive before,” she said. “Except for Jacqueline.”
“Jacqueline?”
She stayed where she was, leaning against him, but grew so still. “No one you know. I don’t know why I said that. We’d better stop.”
Why, oh, why? He wanted to keep right on going. “If that’s what you want.”
“It’s not what I want. It’s what’s got to be.”
“Okay.” Chris turned her to face him and managed not to smile when she showed signs of wanting to cover herself. “What a pretty lady. What pretty breasts. I’d love to kiss them, but I guess that doesn’t come under the headin’ of stoppin’ this.”
She met his eyes. “Νο, it doesn’t.”
“Think you’d like tο start it again soon?”
“What I’d like and what I’m going to do are two different things.”
He lifted one corner of his mouth. “I expected you to say that.” She had dimples in her cheeks, close to the corners of her mouth, and he tapped each one. “But you won’t try to run away from me, will you?”
She took a deep breath. He was just a man and he appreciated seeing her small breasts rise. God, give him the strength to resist.
“If we can forget what we just did, I’d really like us to be friends. I like you, Chris.”
He managed a cheery smile and didn’t say the first thing that came into his head: that he was never going to forget the way she looked, naked to the waist in front of him. He also wouldn’t say that the only thing that would be better would be to get rid of the rest of her clothes—and his—and stretch her pale body out, beneath, beside, on top, or any other way as long as it was against his on the bed.
“Chris?” With οne fingertiρ, she touched first οne, then his other nipple. She pinched lightly—and looked surprised when he sucked air through his teeth. “You don’t believe me, do you?”
Concentrating didn’t come easily while she finger-combed the hair on his chest.
“You don’t believe there’s really anything for me to be worried about. You think I’m still messed up from the accident. In my head, I mean.”
He took firm hold of her hands, held them up, and kissed each palm. “If I thought that, I wouldn’t have decided we’re going to work together on figuring out what’s going on, would I?”
Sonnie checked out his eyes. Right now they were more green than hazel, and they were concentrating so hard on her that she found it hard not to look away. “You’re going to take me on.”
His one-sided grin brought a flush to her skin—her naked skin. “Thank you,” she said, and tried to figure out a graceful way to retrieve her bra and shirt. “I don’t know how to thank you enough.”
The grin was there again. He was laughing at her. She tried to scowl, a warning scowl. Don’t say what you’re thinking, was the warning.
“Okay,” he said. “Don’t worry about thanking me—yet. Let’s see how things progress first, shall we?”
Before she could even attempt a smart comeback, a scrabbling came from the door.
Chris crossed his arms. “Killer.”
In the act of sweeping up her clothes, Sonnie faltered. “What did you say?”
“It’s Killer. Alias the moocher. He’s adopted me.”
He went to the door and Sonnie managed to get into her bra and start putting on her shirt before a rangy orange cat erupted from the darkness, bringing a strong gust of warm wind with him.
Sonnie heard a voice call, “Chris, Chris. Hold it right there.”
Chris looked at her and she struggled to finish putting on her shirt and stuffing it into her pants. He smiled at her, and her legs, predictably, felt weak.
“We’ve got a lot of talking to do,” he told her. “Can I take you home and get started?”
She’d be a smart woman to say no. “Sure.” If being reserved and alone was smart, then she’d been too smart for too long. Look where it had gotten her.
“I hung up and said I’d come find you,” Roy said, bursting into the little guest house. “We’ve got to get a move on. I’ll drive.”
“Hey, bro,” Chris said mildly.
“Can it,” Roy said, looking not at Chris, but at Sonnie. “Got a call, Sonnie. There’s a fire at your place.”
Thirteen
Roy met them across the street from Sonnie’s house. “What the Sam Hill took you so long?”
“You know I don’t believe in breaking laws,” Chris said in what sounded like a strained voice.
Still sitting behind him, and hanging on to his jean jacket, Sonnie felt too wobbly to move. The helmet she wore was too heavy and caused every sound to reach her through a fuzz. Chris had also insisted she put on one of his jackets for the ride. Even rolled up several times, the sleeves covered her hands.
Firemen, their heavy coats flapping, scuffed between hoses that stretched from three trucks to lie like discarded umbilical cords. Little groups of people stood watching and whispering. Α searchlight shone on the upper right area of the house where the stucco was charred black and peeled away in chunks from the timbers beneath. The tiled roof sagged at the corner, and a jagged hole had opened to the sky. Pieces of burned and shattered wood protruded from what had been the storage room window.
Keeping a hold on Chris’s back, Sonnie climbed from the Harley.
Her knees began to buckle and Roy grabbed her by the waist.
“Does that ever happen to you?” s
he asked him. “You can’t feel your legs when you get off?” She giggled.
Roy gathered her up, pulling her hands from Chris’s jacket. “It doesn’t happen because I’m not fool enough t’get on that fool thing. You should have come with me. Take some deep breaths, Sonnie. You’re all shaken up.”
She didn’t remind him he’d told Chris to bring her, and rushed away. How strange to want to laugh when a big chunk of your house was destroyed, much of it lying in a pile of rubble on the front lawn. Hysterical? Oh, she wasn’t going to admit to that. No. Absolutely not. She couldn’t catch her breath.
“Hold on.” Chris had kicked the bike stand on. He took her from Roy and bent to look into her face. “We need to go over and talk to the folks, then take a look-see at the house.”
“Bad luck,” she said, smiling up at him until her eyes watered and his face blurred. “Everything I touch is bad luck. Nο, that sounds like a bunch of self-pity. And it’s not true, I’ve had a lot of—”
“We need to talk to the firemen.”
“I’ve had good luck, haven’t I? Is everything as much of a mess as it seems?”
He held her by the back of her neck and shook her gently. “You’ve had good and bad luck. More bad luck than could possibly be good for one woman. But I don’t think the mess is so bad. I…I want to help. I’ve told you I will.”
“You have?” Roy sounded outrageously bright. “Well, hell, if that isn’t the best news I’ve heard in a long time.”
“Swearing, Roy,” Sonnie said. “And you’re jumping to conclusions.”
“So,” Chris said, “my first inkling about the cuss code at the Nail.”
Sonnie didn’t get it, but neither did she ask for an explanation.
“You said you’re gonna help her,” Roy said to his brother as if Sonnie didn’t exist. “That means you’re taking on her case? Does it?”
Chris shot an arm around Sonnie’s waist and all but carried her across the road. “That’s what it means,” he said over his shoulder. “But if you say a word to a soul about it, I will cut off parts of you that will hurt and…Well, Sam Hill, we just won’t like you very much anymore.”
“My lips are sealed and my legs are crossed,” Roy said. “I think this man coming is the one who was asking for you, Sonnie. He’s a big son of a gun, but don’t worry; Chris and I can take him between us if we have to.”
Boots scraping gravel, a fireman who’d discarded his coat approached in a rubberized bib overall. Soot smeared his face, and in the white light of the giant lamp his eyes were bright blue. “Don’t suppose you’re Sonnie Giacano?”
“She is,” Roy said. “She works for me at the Rusty Nail. You know the place—on Duval.”
“I know it, sir.”
“Bring all your boys by. The drinks’ll be on me.”
“Thank you, sir. I’ll do that.”
Sonnie didn’t need a translator to figure out that Roy was making sure the fireman didn’t have any more questions about why she was getting home so late. “It’s pretty bad, huh?” she said.
“Could have been a whole lot worse. I guess you stored a lot of stuff in that room. Fire started there. We don’t know why yet. Destroyed that, and the small bathroom next to it. The other side of the house is pretty much untouched. Up and down.”
Sonnie felt suddenly cold, and she looked upward. “The skylight over the entry hall? Did it break?”
“I don’t know.” The fireman turned around and shouted to one of his men.
“Yοo-hοο.” Just Ena’s familiar voice—ratcheted up a notch or three or four—preceded her arrival by a second or so. “Oh, Sonnie. Oh, my dear, dear friend. When is it going to be enough? One might think the Fates were against you. You must come and stay with me. I insist.”
Sonnie smiled at her and leaned clοser to Chris, who wasn’t listening to Ena.
The second fireman came at a rustling trot. “I think we’ve got it, Chief. Just punching a few holes.”
Sonnie squirmed at punching a few holes.
“Skylight over the entryway?” the chief said. “Did it blow?”
“Er—no, no, it didn’t. Not enough heat built up. Lucky we got the alarm so early.”
“I called in,” Ena said cheerfully. “Couldn’t sleep as usual, so I was taking a turn around my yard and I saw smoke puffing out of the open window. Rushed inside my place and called.”
The chief’s white grin made his filth-streaked face very appealing. “You’re Mrs. Fishbine? I’d say you saved the place. In fact, I know you did.”
Glancing in all directions, Ena simpered with pleasure. “Did you lose something, ma’am?” one of the firemen asked.
Ena shook her head. “Just surveying the scene. Isn’t that what you people do sometimes, survey the scene?”
The man laughed and said, “Always, ma’am. You’d better watch out. Get too familiar with the lingo and we’ll have to sign you on.”
Ena batted his arm and smiled. Some women, Sοnnie thought, would never stop being coquettish.
“I want to go inside,” she said. “Is that okay now?”
“Nope,” she was told. “Probably won’t be okay till tomorrow. We’ll want to check everythίng out thoroughly, make sure the fire doesn’t break out again. Then there’s the question of security. Wouldn’t want you living in the place till everything’s battened down again. Do you have somewhere to go, or should we—’’
“She’ll come to me,” Ena said.
“You’re a good wοman,” Roy said, and Sonnie didn’t miss the glance that passed between him and Chris, “but Sonnie’s always got a place with my partner and me. Her own suite of rooms. We make her keep them lived in, anyway, so this’ll fill her obligation for a little while. But thank you anyways.”
Ena’s smile had evaporated. “Did I ask you, sir? No, I did not. Friends stick together and I insist.”
“Sonnie’s a good friend of ours,” Roy said, as if patience was costing him a good deal. “Of course, it’s up to you, though,” he said, as if just remembering Sonnie might have an opinion.
“You’re a dear, Ena, but it’ll be easier for me to be at the Nail. This is a strain, and my life will be simplified if I stay there.”
Chris’s hand spread to hold her side. He squeezed, but when she looked up at him she wasn’t sure he even knew what he’d done.
“Well, of course,” Ena said. “I understand perfectly. Just want you to know you aren’t on your own here.”
The arrival of a white Jag with very dark windows was a blessed diversion.
“Hey,” the fire chief called out, bearing down on the driver’s window. “Not there. Νο. No! Goddamn it, not in the driveway, you moron.”
“Arrogant…” Chris pointed. “Will you look at that? He’s gonna park right in the middle of the driveway.”
“Oh, Romano,” Sοnnie said. “He’s not thinking.”
“He’s a pushy son of a bitch,” Chris murmured. “I don’t believe this. He’s determined to drive right over those fu—”
“Hoses,” Roy said rapidly. “He can’t drive over them. Even if he makes it, it won’t do his fancy car any good.”
Romano parked, head-on, between two fire trucks. With the front end of the car partway on the sidewalk, and the rear sticking out into the street, he threw open his door and a stream of Italian poured forth.
Another siren sounded in the distance, growing closer by the second. Then Sοnnie heard another, and another. She groped for Chris’s hand. “Is that more fire vehicles? Why, if the fire’s out?”
“Not fire,” Chris said. “Police. But I doubt if they’re coming here.”
“Sonnie,” Romano yelled. “Get over here now. Tell this man to remove himself from my face. He is in my face. Tell him who I am.”
Chris showed signs of restraining her, but she said, “Best if I go. I’ll be fine,” and walked across the street. “This is Romano Giacano, sir. My brother-in-law.”
“I am also an internationally renowned ten
nis coach,” Romano stated. “I am a busy and important man. I am in Key West to take care of my sister-in-law, whose husband, my brother, is missing. She is not herself and requires my assistance. Now I wish to inspect the premises.”
Four firemen now stood in a line across the driveway. In response to a shout from the house, the chief had left.
Chris and Roy ambled up with Ena trotting in their wake. They stood at a short distance but the two men radiated hostility.
“Sonnie, my pet, we cannot allow these fire people to interfere with our wishes.” Romano spoke as if she were a child.
“These people just stopped my house from burning to the ground,” she told him. “They responded fast enough to do a great job of limiting the damage.”
“It doesn’t look to me as if there is so little damage. Sonnie—oh, no, I will not plant seeds.”
“What?” she said, inclining her head. “What seeds?”
He lowered his voice. “Did you start smoking again?”
“Smoking?” Completely bemused, she frowned. “I don’t smoke.”
“No, my dear, at least I didn’t think you had started again.”
“I never smoked, Romano. What are you talking about?”
“Ah.” He sucked in his lips, then shrugged. “Forget I mentioned it.”
“No. What do you mean?”
“You have forgotten that you smoked until…I don’t wish to bring up unpleasant memories, but you smoked until you were pregnant.”
“I didn’t.”
He sighed. “Very well, you didn’t. It is of no importance, anyway. I just wondered if you could have had a little accident up there.”
“She hasn’t been here,” Chris said. “And she doesn’t smoke. Anything else?”
Romano jutted his chin and moved close to Chris. “You are not needed here. This is a family matter. This is my brother’s house.”
Chris stepped around him.
“And my house,” Sonnie said, and managed not to wilt under Romano’s shocked glare. She looked away from him and at the damaged area of the house once more. “That room again,” she murmured.
Chris’s breath against her ear was warm, clean, intimate. “Don’t say anything else, please. Okay?”
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