"I used to help my mother with dinner sometimes. I never actually cooked a meal, but I peeled potatoes and cut up chicken and made salads. Aunt Marie had a housekeeper who didn't much care for sharing her kitchen. Except for getting snacks, it was mostly off limits to Remy and me." Breaking off, she sighed, then took a deep, fortifying breath. "Michael—"
At last he looked at her. His expression was so hard, so unforgiving, that she wished he hadn't. "Go read the newspaper. Watch TV. Finish that book you started. Just get out of my kitchen and leave me alone."
Although his words—and, worse, his look—left her feeling raw, she withdrew with all the grace and dignity she could muster, withdrew all the way to the bedroom. There she hung up her dress, picked up their remaining clothing and straightened the bed. Then, after turning out the lamp, she went to the window, opened the drapes and the sheers behind them, and stood there, leaning one shoulder against the jamb.
She had come here—to this apartment, to Michael—needing time, and, she decided, she'd been given enough. Tomorrow, when she wasn't feeling quite so blue, she would tell him everything—what the two men had said after they'd killed Nate Simmons. Why she had fled the police station. Why she had refused to go to Remy for help. She would tell Michael, would place her life completely in his hands, and he would decide what to do.
She wondered what that would be. Would he go to his boss or whomever the appropriate people in the police department might be and tell them that an FBI agent might have been responsible for Simmons's murder? Would he arrange for the police department, rather than the FBI, to provide security for her?
Or would he call his friend Smith? As an assistant U.S. Attorney, Kendricks must have some pull within the local FBI office. Would he take over?
But what if Michael didn't believe her? What if he found the possibility that a federal agent would have someone murdered too absurd to accept? What if he insisted on turning her over to them anyway?
That wasn't likely, she comforted herself. No matter how angry he got, no matter how hurt he was, he wouldn't endanger her life. As long as there was the slightest, the most remote, chance in hell that Remy was guilty, Michael would protect her.
He had to.
If not for her sake, then for his own.
* * *
Michael stirred the roux in the efficient way Aunt Sirena had taught him, careful to avoid splashes, and watched it darken, but his mind wasn't on the job. He was thinking about Valery and how the best day in recent memory had turned so sour.
He had pushed her. Just so he wouldn't have to talk about Evan, just so he could avoid yet another conversation on how he should forgive himself and put the past behind him. He should have simply stated that he didn't want to discuss it. He should have distracted her with a kiss. He should have made love to her again.
He shouldn't have asked for some sort of declaration from her. He shouldn't have pushed for recognition that what they had shared was special. He shouldn't have brought her fears, her past, her other lovers, into the bed with them.
Those promises she had rattled off before they made love—I won't make any demands of you. I won't think this means something. I won't expect more than you intend to give… Maybe he had misunderstood them. Maybe she hadn't thought that was what he wanted to hear. Maybe it had been her way of telling him that that was what she wanted.
But he couldn't offer such promises.
He just couldn't.
Small, dark flecks in the pan in front of him caught his attention, and he muttered a curse. He had forgotten Aunt Sirena's first rule of roux making: pay attention. The high temperatures made burning roux an easy thing, and he'd just done it.
He moved the pan off the stove, pulled out another cast-iron skillet and measured oil into it. While it was heating, he went as far as the bedroom door. "Valery?"
She was standing in the dark, staring out the window.
"I just burned the roux. Want to make another one for me?"
Her voice seemed small and insubstantial. "I don't know how."
"I'll show you."
She hesitated so long that he thought she was going to refuse; then, slowly she turned away from the window. "I'll probably burn it, too."
"All it takes is oil and flour, and I have plenty. We'll keep trying until we get it right."
"What if it's never right?"
"Then we'll enjoy what we have."
She stopped in front of him, close enough now that the light from outside the room touched her face. She looked sad. Regretful. Wistful. Beautiful. "I'm sorry, Michael."
"No regrets, remember?" He brushed his palm across her hair, then pressed a kiss to her lips. "Come on. We missed lunch. Let's see about dinner."
He had never shared his kitchen with anyone—his cooking lessons with Aunt Sirena had taken place in her kitchen over in Slidell—but it was easy enough to get accustomed to. It would be easy, he acknowledged, to become accustomed to sharing a great many places in his life with Valery.
But maybe not on a permanent basis.
Maybe not until she someday realized that time had passed—weeks, months, years—and he was still around.
As soon as dinner—steaming gumbo ladled over hot rice—was ready, they ate, settling on the sofa with their bowls, napkins and drinks. Leaving their dishes for later, they made love there, too, as easily, as comfortably, as if they'd been together for years.
Made love, Michael thought with a scowl as he held her afterward. Someday she would acknowledge that. She would admit that it was more than just good sex. She would see that this wasn't an affair but a relationship. A commitment. It might not last forever—few things ever did—but if it didn't, it wouldn't be for lack of trying on his part.
Someday she would understand all that.
And when she did, he would be waiting.
* * *
They shared his bed that night. That was another pleasure Michael had forgotten—a warm woman close enough to touch at any time. It was another intimacy that Valery couldn't turn away from.
He slept soundly for seven or eight hours, rather than his usual three or four, or five if he was lucky. That was a pleasure he'd forgotten, too. Amazing, he thought with a grin, what the release of tension could do for a body.
Now he was watching Valery, asleep on her stomach, her face buried in her pillow. The case was white, old-fashioned, no doubt another find from her shop. His grandmother had pillowcases like that—linen or cotton, scalloped edges with lace or crocheted borders, and embroidered with flowers, different for each month of the year. He remembered dog-woods for April, mums in November and poinsettias for December. Valery's had violets in a dozen shades of lavender and blue.
His grandmother would like Valery. So would his parents. When this was over, maybe he could take her to the farm for a visit.
When this was over.
If she was still in his life.
If she didn't get scared and run.
But even if she did, he was a damned good cop. He figured he could find her. She might have a lot to fear … but he had a lot to lose.
Leaving the bed for a moment, he turned the heat on to warm the apartment. When he returned, she moved, murmured, shifted a bit closer, but continued to sleep. Slowly, as the room temperature rose, he edged the covers down, revealing the smooth, pale skin of her back. There was a symmetry to her body that appealed to him artistically, a sense of balance. Her back was long, her waist small, curving in nicely. Her hips flared out generously, a word that he used only in the most flattering way even though he knew she would hate it, and her legs… Her legs went on forever.
Symmetry. Balance. Everything needed it. In his work, good investigative skills were balanced by gut instincts; there was a time to be tough and a time to go easy, a time to negotiate and a time to act. Cooking required a similar balance of flavors, of textures, of proportions. Symmetry and balance were especially important in painting—lighter hues against darker, intensity against subtlety, shadows
against light.
And in their lives. Stress demanded relaxation. To fully appreciate joy required an understanding of sorrow. Solitude led to a need for companionship. Distance from the people around you needed to be off set by closeness to the people who mattered.
Celibacy, he thought with a self-deprecating grin, led to a hellacious need for making love, as evidenced by his own arousal after doing no more than looking, admiring.
At last he let himself touch her, trailing his fingers down her spine, spanning her waist, stroking across her bottom. The changes in her body came gradually, so gradually that it took a while to realize that she was awake. The sleepy, relaxed air around her gave way to tension. Now, everywhere his fingers touched, chill bumps appeared. Her breathing had become shallower, more tautly controlled. The overall softness was gone, replaced by a tightening of muscles, a drawing up of nerves.
He leaned over her, nuzzling her hair back, seeking her ear. "I know you're awake, sweetheart," he murmured before kissing her there.
A soft sigh vibrating through her, she stretched sinuously, sensuously, then turned onto her side to face him. "Good morning." She sounded drowsy, hazy, as if the greeting required all her energy. Her eyes were still closed, her hair standing on end in places, mashed flat in others, and her face was soft, lazy, sleepy.
"Did you sleep well?"
"Hmm."
"Want to sleep some more?"
"Hmm."
"All right. Just a morning kiss, then I'll let you sleep." But it wasn't her lips he kissed. Bending lower, he cupped her breast in his palm and closed his mouth around her nipple. It hardened quickly, growing between his teeth, responding to his gentle bite and strong sucking kiss. She reacted quickly, too, catching her breath in a gasp, trying to speak his name but losing the second syllable in a deep, hungry groan.
Valery forced her eyes open, not an easy task when her body wanted nothing more than to lie back and let Michael have his way with her. The first thing she saw was his head bent over her breast. It was a lovely picture … a lovely sensation … a perfectly lovely way to start a day.
Then, before the thought was even completed, he ended the kiss and looked up at her. He looked well rested, she thought, smugly satisfied that she had played some small role in the accomplishment. His eyes were clear, his expression endearing—and his chin, where it rested against her breast, was bristly with a day's growth of beard.
"Good morning," she repeated, lifting one hand to stroke through his hair.
"You don't look so sleepy anymore."
"I don't know. It might take a few more kisses like that to get me fully awake."
"I have something better than kisses."
"I know. I feel it." She smiled appreciatively. His arousal was pressing against her thigh, hard and so hot. The heat generated between them was intense. She felt it everywhere he touched her, felt the ache for it everywhere he wasn't touching. She felt it deep inside, where she was hot, damp, empty, throbbing for his attention.
The look he gave her was serious and chastening. "I was referring to coffee."
With an uninhibited laugh, she wrapped her arms around his neck and wriggled a little closer. "Sure, you were. And this—" She rubbed against him, pressing indecently close, making him catch his own breath. "Am I supposed to ignore this?"
"Could you?"
"It's an awful lot to ignore."
"If you tried really hard…"
"It'd be easier to make it go away—and a lot more fun, too." Pulling him closer, she kissed his throat, his jaw, his chin, slowly working her way to his mouth. By the time she reached it, he was ready. He kissed her hard, filling her mouth with his tongue, taking, demanding, feeding. His passion was reserved for her, he'd said, and yesterday he'd proven it. He was showing her again this morning, stirring her own passion, making her hotter, needier, than she'd ever been.
She wanted him then, right then, wanted him inside her, wanted him to fill her hard and fast, then to do it again slow and easy. She wanted him deep, rough, tender.
But he had other desires, other plans. He intended to seduce her even though she'd been ready, achy and hot since that first kiss. He suckled her breasts, making her nipples hard and sore, making her muscles strain, making her groan with helpless pleasure and mindless need. He left hot, wet kisses along her stomach, her hip and between her thighs, such sweet kisses that she nearly cried, creating such sweet torment that she nearly died. She begged him to stop, begged him never to stop. In the end, she simply begged.
"Please, Michael … please…"
He joined with her then, lifting her hips, seeking his place and filling her with one long, smooth thrust, pushing hard and deep until her body gloved him. Her senses feverishly heightened, she felt him—felt every inch, so intimately connected, so hard, so hot that it was a wonder, she thought dazedly, that they didn't steam. He took her hard, the way she wanted, and tender, the way she needed, demanding her passion—her body, her soul—and giving his own in return, and when she reached the edge, when the need for him shattered, when release washed over her with a hoarse cry and a relentless shudder, he filled her, hot and liquid, equally relentless, equally shattered.
For a long, ragged time they lay entangled—her body still sheltering him, his body pressing hers breathlessly down, their legs entwined. Finally he lifted his head from the pillow beside hers, gave her mouth a sweetly passionless kiss, then offered her a drained smile and a greeting.
"Good morning."
* * *
It was a few hours later before Valery got her morning bath and a few hours after that, over bowls of leftover gumbo, before she could keep the promise she'd made to herself the night before. They were sitting at the table, sharing the last soft drink in the house, when she finally spoke. "I need your help, Michael."
He studied her for a long time before mildly asking, "What kind of help?"
"Police help."
After another long silence, he shrugged. "To protect and to serve—that's my job. So far I've done the protecting. What about the serving?"
She took a deep breath and found that it didn't help. "You asked before why I was afraid to let the police turn me over to the FBI after—after I saw that man die. If my reason was personal."
"And it was. Remy."
"Yes." Betraying her cousin was harder than she'd expected, but she pushed on. She owed it to Michael—owed him the loyalty. The gratitude. The trust. "After I told you about growing up with him, you still wondered why I didn't go to him."
"I still don't understand that. In spite of all that's happened, he's still family, Valery. He's still your cousin—maybe not a great one, but…" He shrugged.
"Yes," she agreed again. "He is still family. His parents are really the only family I have left—by love, at least, if not by blood. That's why… That's why I didn't tell you everything. That's why I haven't told anyone everything."
Considering that, he left the table, taking their dishes into the kitchen. When he returned, he sat down not to her right, where he had been, but in the chair across from her, and he had that hard-edged look in his eyes. She was no longer talking to the man she'd made love with most of the morning, but to the cop who wore a badge and carried a gun.
"You have information about Simmons's murder that you haven't told anyone—not even the detectives who originally interviewed you?"
She nodded.
"What sort of information?"
She let her eyes drift shut, let the scene from that sunny Monday afternoon fill her mind. The misfortune of literally running into Nate Simmons. The pleasant half block's walk alongside him. The arrival of the two men. The guns, Nate's surprise, the shooting, her shock. And the words those two men had spoken as their friend lay dying. Oh, yes, their words.
"After the men shot Simmons, I told you they were in no hurry to get away. They were so calm, so deliberate about everything."
"They weren't interested in you. They didn't care that you'd seen them, that you could i
dentify them."
"Sort of," she hedged. This was where she'd started lying, by omission if not with her actual words. "When they shot him, I was standing only a few feet away. I had his blood on my clothes. My first thought was to run, but there was a stoop behind me and a brick wall beside me. There was no place to go, no place to hide. I was terrified that they were going to kill me, too, because I could identify them. One of them pointed his gun at me and asked, 'What about her?' The other one—Vince—looked right at me, and he said, 'Forget her. Our deal—'"
She broke off and reached for the Coke, but found her hands were unsteady. Locking them together, she pressed them between her knees and continued. "He said, 'Our deal with Sinclair was only for him. Let's get out of here and let him know that the job's done.' And the other guy, the littler guy, just sort of laughed, and he said, 'Hell, Sinclair's a fed. He'll find out that Nate's out of the way soon enough.'"
He sat silent for so long that she began to worry, began to wonder if confiding in him had been the right thing to do. But finally he spoke. "Those were their words? You're not paraphrasing what they said? You remember their exact words?"
"Those were their words. It's not the sort of thing I'd be likely to forget."
"And you assumed they were referring to Remy."
"How many other federal agents named Sinclair are there in New Orleans?"
"I don't know of any," he admitted. After another of his thoughtful silences, he asked, "You believed them, didn't you? Remy's your cousin, Val, he's family. And you believed that he hired those two men to murder Simmons."
"I don't know. I don't know him anymore, Michael. I don't know if he could have someone killed." She felt disloyal for continuing. "I don't know if he could kill me."
The idea that Remy could hurt her was so ludicrous to Michael that his first impulse was to laugh, but he controlled it. After all, she had a valid point. She didn't know Remy. But he did, and he didn't believe any of this. In all his years with the FBI, the greatest harm Remy had brought on anyone was to send them to prison, and that was a result of their own criminal activities, not any malice on his part. If there was no other choice, if push came to shove, he knew Remy was capable of killing a suspect, but only if there was no other choice, only if it was kill or be killed.
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