Key West

by Stella Cameron

  “I think that’s supposed to be a compliment.” A compliment she wasn’t sure she should enjoy.

  Chris put a foot on the side of the tub while he dried a leg. The man did have great legs. The hair all over his body was very dark. His buttocks flexed; a deep scar on one side also flexed.

  “What happened to you?” she asked. “What caused the wound?”

  He slapped a hand over the part in question. “That’s my war wound. Nothing really. We had a disagreement over the appropriate way for a man to get his point across to a woman, and guess what? He had a gun, and he had no sense of humor. That was a real nuisance to me for some time. It’s tough when you can’t sit down.

  “I was lucky, though. The guy had lousy aim. See?” Still presenting his back, he moved closer. “Feel how deep it is.” Holding her breath, Sοnnie passed her fingertips over his muscular flesh. “Very deep, but it doesn’t…You feel nice.”

  “Uh-huh. About the aim. Guess what he was aiming for?” Sοnnie stroked the cheek and the back of his thigh.

  “Can you guess what he was aiming for?” Chris asked again.

  Her fingers between his thighs brought them together like clamps that trapped her hand. Sonnie followed the line of his spine with her eyes. She concentrated on the question. “Oh, that’s sick. It’s awful. Why would he want to shoot you there?”

  “Because a bullet in the heart usually guarantees death.”

  Sonnie suffered another fierce flush, but she laughed with him, and she wasn’t quick enough to stop him from drawing her hand all the way through his legs and holding it over what made him feel so very masculine.

  This time the big reaction came from Chris. He made incoherent sounds and moved against her palm.

  Sonnie grew tight in places that felt good that way, and she kissed his scar with lips that lingered. “You’re a bad man, Chris Talon,” she said when she rested her cheek where her mouth had been. “You play with my mind—and my body.”

  “And you don’t like it?” He sounded as if he fought for every breath.

  “I shouldn’t. And we should be dealing with serious stuff.”

  “We already are,” he said. “What we’ve started together isn’t going away anytime soon. Thank God.”

  “You know what I mean.” She grew hotter and hotter.

  “We’re going to deal with that—soon.” He stopped moving, and straightened—but kept his hand over hers. He was so hard. “How are you doing, Sonnie?”

  She wasn’t going to play any more games. “Shocked, but okay.”

  “You’ve got guts.”

  The urge to make a crack about her sanity was difficult to swallow.

  He released her hand and faced her. “You and I are going to be joined at the hip from now on. Can you handle that idea?”

  Her eyes were at the level of his navel. His abdominal muscles were solid ridges. “If you think I have to stay close to you all the time, I’m going to trust your judgment.” Oh, what a penance.

  “You know I can see right through this, don’t you?” He gathered a handful of cotton on either side of her breasts and pulled it tight. “Funny. Such a prudish thing, yet so sexy. I’d like to eat it off you. Or maybe tear it off in bites, hmm?”

  She spread her hands on his abdomen and urged him closer. What she felt for him was overwhelming. Looking up into his tensed features, she was almost afraid of that intensity. “How did you find me on that beach, Chris?”

  “I drove this island from one side to the other, and from top to bottom. I did it over and over again. I was desperate by the time I just happened to notice Romano’s Jag by the side of the road.”

  She looked away.

  “You can’t hold anything back anymore,” he said. “I can feel the walls closing in on us. What happened to bring you to that point?”

  If she was supposed to think clearly, there had to be more distance between them. She got up and sidled past him. “He came to the Nail and said he needed to talk to me. He gave me Frank’s medallion and he cried. I felt sorry for him. Don‘t blame Roy. What was he supposed to say when my brother-in-law said he needed some of my time?”

  Chris took her place on the toilet set. He ran his fingers through his hair, sending drops of water onto his shoulders. “But what happened?”

  “He drove me all the way to Miami and he got madder and madder the farther he went. Sometimes he drove slowly; then he’d travel miles and miles at the kind of speed that made me expect to die at any moment.”

  “F—friggin’ bastard.”

  She started to lower herself to the side of the tub. Chris reached for her hand and pulled her to stand beside him. Then he tipped her to sit on his lap.

  “He said wild things. He told me he’s going to marry me now and I’m going to do whatever he tells me to do.” She didn’t want to talk about money angles, or about Billy and Frank’s supposed plot against her. “When I wouldn’t cooperate, he hit me. Then he started to hound me about the accident, about what I remember. He took me to that wall by the beach and parked. And he kept on hounding me.”

  Chris held her by the waist. What she felt beneath her bottom made it almost impossible to concentrate.

  “What I don’t get is why he attacked you. How could he expect to get anywhere with you if he got violent?”

  “Because Frank did it.” She squeezed her eyes shut and gritted her teeth. She had never before said that aloud.

  “I know,” Chris said, and he stroked her hair back so gently that his touch was a phantom. “I figured that out a long time ago.”

  She felt so ashamed. “Ι married too young, and I didn’t want to go to my family and admit I’d made a stupid mistake by going against their wishes.”

  “I know, I know.”

  “I think Romano and Billy want me in a sanitarium. And Romano wants to be my husband so he can control everything that’s mine.”

  “Don’t worry. They’ll never pull it off. Not as long as I’m still breathing.”

  “Please don’t even say that.” She wrapped her arms around his head and held his face to her breasts. “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I can’t even think about you getting hurt.”

  Chris lifted her and set her down astride his lap. The gown rode up her thighs and settled around her hips.

  “Chris,” she said, and rested her brow on his shoulder. “Is this really wrong?”

  “No,” he said simply. “It’s really right. I thought I’d closed this part of my life off. The part that needs to feel what I feel for you. My future was never supposed to include another woman I cared a damn about. Sonnie—oh, hell—what I feel for you is lethal, or it will be if we have to say good-bye.”

  Thinking only became more of a feat. The most intimate parts of their bodies pressed together. Sonnie was afraid to move even an inch.

  “I went to the hospital in Miami,” Chris said. “And I talked a records officer out of some information I think is going to underscore what we’re already thinking.”

  “That Romano and Billy have been trying to kill me ever since I had the accident?”

  His eyes half closed and she guessed he was having at least as much trouble concentrating as she was. “When you line everything up, it’s very incriminating. Sonnie—oh, lady, I think we’re going to have to postpone this discussion, at least for a while.”

  She crossed her arms and pulled the nightgown over her head.

  Chris’s lips parted. His chest expanded. Never taking his eyes from her face, he lifted her and brought her down on his erection. Their bodies joined as if they were halves of the same whole.

  He held her there, not moving, just breathing hard and watching her eyes. “Does this hurt your hip?” He smoothed the scars there. “Don’t lie; just fess up.”

  “It’s not hurting. Nothing’s hurting. I want to tell you something.”

  Restraint was costing him dearly. The distended veins at his temples said what he didn’t say. “Tell away.”

  “I remembe
red something about that night. I was angry. I’d found out how Frank took advantage of me because I was too dumb to know what he was up to. He arranged a new will for us. I won’t go into it now, but it meant I didn’t have anything that was mine anymore.

  “I went to the airport to tell him I’d taken care of that.” Chris shifted the tiniest bit and Sonnie squeezed herself tightly about him.

  “And I was going to tell him I wanted a divorce.”

  He was utterly still, utterly focused on her. “You’re sure?”

  “Yes. I always knew I was angry about something, but I wasn’t sure about all of it. Tonight I remembered.”

  His smile puzzled her. “What’s funny?” she asked.

  “Not a darned thing. I just happen to think those are the best words I ever heard. That you intended to divorce him.”

  “Chris, I don’t think Ι can stay like—”

  “Ι surely can’t.” And he gripped her hips again to shift her, to begin again what they’d known once before.

  Abruptly he stopped and reached between her legs. “I’m going too fast,” he said.

  She pulled his hand away. “No, sir, not too fast at all. This is what I want. Time for play later, maybe.”

  “I like the way you know your own mind.” He held her breasts, kissed each one, and managed to draw smothered gasps from her when he concentrated on her nipples. “Sensitive?” he said, his voice muffled.

  Sonnie worked to make him move with her.

  He moved.

  Burying his face in her neck, he used his strong buttock muscles to drive and retreat. Sonnie hovered on the edge, longing to go over, yet wishing she could hang on, feeling just this, for a very long time.

  Holding her bottom, Chris got up. He managed not to come out of her while he went to a wall and supported her there. She crossed her ankles behind his back and gave herself up to the beat inside her body, her breasts, deep in her womb. He kissed her again and again. They reached for each other, wound around each other, and gave and received of each other.

  And Chris pushed inside her again and again.

  He shuddered, and so did Sonnie. Their cries were muffled against shoulders that would bear teeth marks.

  Then there was a stillness that seethed, a silence that roared. And gradually heavy peace settled, and Sonnie slowly lowered her feet to the floor.

  She didn’t know how long they stood there, clinging.

  “Is there room for me in your bed?” Chris asked at last.

  Sonnie took him by the hand. He grabbed a handful of tousled clothing from the counter and let her lead him into her bedroom.

  Chris saw a bed with pale covers along one wall. Sonnie climbed in first. Chris followed, placing his bag and pants on the floor. He rolled toward her and found her facing him. In the darkness, her teeth showed white in a smile and her eyes glinted.

  As long as he was with her, he was convinced she would be safe. Romano would be running scared after their scuffle, but the man was a coward who picked on women, not the kind who would confront someone bigger and stronger.

  “What are you thinking?” Sonnie asked.

  “That at least for tonight I’d like to just be with you. Maybe I should be too disciplined to take any time off from what I’ve got to do, but I’m only a man in…Sonnie, I can’t promise a thing yet. I don’t know what’s ahead for me because I can’t see it clearly. But you’ve stopped being a woman I just feel protected toward.”

  He paused and Sonnie said, “I love you, Chris,” and didn’t care if she might be making a fool of herself.

  His hand, a hand strong enough to crush things that got in his way, curved over her shoulder with warm tenderness. “You don’t have to say a thing,” she told him. “I only wanted you to know.”

  “I’m not supposed to be afraid of things,” he said. “I’m surely not supposed to admit it if I am. But I love you, Sonnie, and that does scare me.”

  She wouldn’t ask him to explain why, but she would get as close to him as she could, and hug him as tightly as her arms would hug.

  The kind of excited hope she felt was new. He hugged her back and managed to touch her in a dozen little ways guaranteed to arouse her again.

  “What would Ena think if she knew we were in here together?” Sonnie said, giggling. “I don’t think she’d approve.”

  “She’s well-meaning,” Chris said, and his fingers found their way to the slick flesh between her legs. “But I agree with you; she probably wouldn’t approve.”

  He used his thumb, making small, unbearably wonderful circles while two fingers passed inside her.

  Sonnie held his penis, fluttered her fingertips over the end until he moaned.

  If she kept on touching him that way, Chris didn’t think he could even pretend to be happy with going slowly. He did love her. All his promises cut in stone, the ones that said “never,” had crumbled.

  Damn. She was flicking her tongue back and forth over one of his nipples. She might not be a woman of vast experience, but she certainly classified as a natural.

  He speeded his attention to her pleasure and she forgot teasing him. Instead she arched away from him and actually gripped his forearm, urged him on. He felt the ripple of her climax, and realized that, for the first time in his life, he’d found someone who matched him, fit with him, complemented him as if she had been designed for him—and as if he’d been designed for her.

  “Whatever happens,” he told her, “you and I are right for each other. I’m never going to forget that, and I want you to keep telling yourself it’s true.”

  Drawing short breaths, Sonnie kissed him. “I won’t have to try hard,” she said when she drew away. “Can we make love again, please?”

  He rubbed his nose against hers. “I’ll take it under consideration.”

  “Oh, thank you,” she said with laughter in her voice, and rose over him, pushing him to his back.

  Chris embraced her—and frowned. He placed a hand behind her neck, and clamped his other arm around her waist. “Keep still,” he whispered. “Let me listen.”

  She went rigid, but didn’t say anything.

  The room was warm, yet he felt cold. His spine grew tight. He’d feel better if his gun was in his hand and Sonnie wasn’t on top of him.

  They were being watched.

  Hair rose on the back of his neck. “It’s okay,” he said against her ear. “Just hang on and stay calm. Slide off me, sweetheart, but don’t make any sudden moves.”

  She did as he asked, settling stiffly at his side.

  Making as little rustle as possible, he made contact with the toiletry bag and eased out the Glock. This was the ultimate vulnerability, the ultimate bad scene. His gut, and his gut had rarely been wrong, told him they were seen by someone they couldn’t see, which meant he couldn’t know where an attack would come from.

  His eyes were well adjusted to the darkness. He swept as much of the room as he could without lifting his head.

  There.

  The next breath he took stayed right where it was.

  As swiftly as he dared, he swapped the gun for the flashlight. “I’m going to turn on a light,” he told Sonnie…“Just stay still.”

  Click. The noise the flashlight made had the impact of gunshot on his brain, but the beam instantly found what he’d seen.

  Directly above the bed, something alive gleamed. Then it was gone and Chris leaped from the bed to pull on his shorts. “Stay where you are,” he told Sonnie.

  “Forget it,” she told him, already on her way to the bathroom. She was back at his side in seconds and pulling her nightgown over her head. “What’s going on? Chris, what is it?”

  He switched off the flashlight. “If I put the lights on in here, we lose any advantage we might have, and it isn’t much as it is. You’ve got to stay here, Sonnie. You’ll handicap me if you don’t. And you’ll put yourself into more danger than you have to.”

  “I’m coming with you.” She’d scream if he didn’t give her a stra
ight answer. “Tell me what’s happening.”

  He held her by the upper arm and went toward the door. “There’s someone above this room. There’s a hole in the ceiling. I saw an eye watching us.”

  Twenty-nine

  Finding the way to the attic was easy. After all, he’d been there before. Dark stairs tucked into the opposite end of the upper hallway rose to a door, the door that had been Edward’s. No light showed around its ill-fitting edges.

  “Please stay here,” Chris told Sonnie. Only seconds went by before he heard her bare feet climbing behind him.

  At the top he threw open the door, then gritted his teeth at the noise it made when it hit an inside wall. Holding Sonnie behind him, he listened.

  “There’s no one there,” Sonnie said aloud, jolting him. “There isn’t. Do you smell something? Sweet? Sweet and perfumed. Where do I know that from?”

  Chris shook his head, and still he waited. The feeling of a malevolent presence had faded. He switched on his flashlight and swept the area. He hadn’t expected to see the room almost completely cleared of Edward’s possessions. A sagging couch flanked a table and a chair. On the other side of the table, a single bed—tidily made and covered with a faded patchwork quilt—extended from the wall. A portable vinyl wardrobe shared space with a chest of drawers, and several trunks lined the wall behind the door. The obscene posters had left fade marks.

  Chris turned on overhead lightbulbs that hung, unshaded, from wires. Crouched, weapon at the ready, he entered.

  “They’ve gone,” Sonnie said, walking in as if he weren’t still practicing caution. “But you’re right. We’d better not make much noise. Hey, look at this.”

  He couldn’t help smiling at her jaunty obliviousness. “Let’s keep it down, sweetheart.”

  She looked back at him, but pointed to the floor where a braided rug had been left turned back.

  “There may be no one around now,” he said, “but I’ll bet your boots someone just left in a hurry.” The dormer was open. Another trunk stood beneath it, and when Chris cautiously looked outside he saw a short flight of rough wooden steps leading down to a second-story balcony at the back of the house.