The Red Shoe Chronicles : A Fantasy Romance Anthology

by N. R. Larry

  Corvin shook his head. “I’ve got a few things to tend to first. I’ll drop by later to see how you’re getting settled in, though.”

  The thought of a stranger stopping by to see how she was settling into his place would have horrified Jenna just a few hours earlier. Now, though? Imagining him walking into any room with her in it made her skin tingle.

  She was liking being Angelina—at least for the moment.

  Corvin’s decision not to meet her at his place immediately had the added benefit of allowing her to blunder around New Orleans’s confusing streets without giving away her unfamiliarity with the city to him.

  Her eyes grew wide as he stepped up close to her, so close that her breasts almost brushed against his chest, and her nipples hardened at the thought. Then he reached one arm out past her and his scent enveloped her, hot and masculine, somehow both enticing and dangerous. It was all she could do not to close the space between them, drag his mouth down to hers, just to see if he tasted as good as he smelled.

  When the car door behind her clicked, she realized he had only been reaching around her to open the door for her.

  A hot blush crawled up her neck and onto her cheeks, and she spun around to toss her overnight bag into the passenger seat.

  I’m such an idiot.

  At least the heat of the car’s interior might account for the redness of her cheeks.

  “Okay,” she said. “I’ll see you there later. Thanks again.”

  “Sure.” Corvin’s voice rumbled in his chest with something that she hoped wasn’t laughter. A glance at his face suggested that whatever he was feeling, it wasn’t amusement. “See you later, Angelina.”

  Her sister’s name jerked Jenna out of her contemplation of the devastating effect Corvin had on her.

  It doesn’t matter how much I want him. Anything that happened would only be temporary. He thinks I’m someone I’m not.

  Better to focus on something more important, anyway.

  Like what kind of trouble Angelina had gotten herself into this time.

  Corvin watched Angelina drive away, then headed to the motorcycle he had parked in between two spots in the small lot.

  His claim that he had something else to tend to hadn’t exactly been a lie, but given the state of Angelina’s apartment, he wanted to make sure no one was following her—and to do that, he needed to make it appear as if she were traveling alone.

  Strapping on his helmet and kick-starting the bike gave her enough lead time, he decided. He fell in far enough behind her to keep up, if only barely.

  Her route was erratic, at best. She made wrong turns and doubled back on herself, twisting around through New Orleans’s already convoluted streets and making it difficult to follow her without being seen.

  She is definitely trying to shake any tails.

  Hell, she almost lost him a few times—and probably would have, if he hadn’t already known where she was headed.

  She’s good.

  He had to wonder what else she might be good at. There had been a moment back there at her car where he had been certain she was going to kiss him. Then she had blushed a bright red and all but leapt into car.

  That blush had made him want to wrap her in his arms around her and pull her up against him. Suddenly, everything about Angelina Riggs made him want to take her into his arms and ravish her—at the most inopportune times.

  For that matter, there was no good time right now. He was in the middle of an undercover operation.

  It didn’t seem to matter whether or not now was a good time, though. She was headed to his home—no matter how indirect her route might be—and he had offered to check in on her.

  So it looked like he had added yet another item to his growing “To Do” list.

  And number one on the list? Find out what kind of trouble Angelina Riggs had gotten herself into.

  Chapter 5

  Jenna found herself stepping into Corvin La-Stunning’s home carefully, as if she expected someone else to be there, like maybe a girlfriend, or a wife. Or even a roommate. But from the way he had talked, she assumed he lived alone, and she was glad to discover the place was, in fact, empty.

  It was also nicer than she had expected. Something about him had led her to expect a much humbler home. She would have been glad to learn that it wasn’t in the worst part of town. To walk into what appeared to be an exceptionally nice apartment in one of the better parts of the city was a pleasant surprise.

  Jenna dropped both suitcases—her small one and Angelina’s overnight bag—on the floor by the front door and wandered from room to room, examining the space. Like her sister’s apartment, this had clearly been sectioned off from what had once been a much larger house. Yet unlike Angelina’s place, this apartment was spotless. The dark wood floors and white walls offered a cool refuge from the heat outside, and that sense of refuge was heightened by the décor.

  The furniture itself was all in neutral shades—brown leather sofas, off-white bed-coverings, brown wood chairs. The decorations, however, were pure New Orleans. Art on the walls depicted various street scenes, apparently by local artists—including one odd little blue dog in a tiny, original painting. Art Deco style lamps, maybe actual antiques, drew on the city’s history, as did a number of framed tarot cards on the bookshelves.

  Who is this guy?

  Clearly not just the rough-hewn biker she first met in a bar.

  But just as obviously, he also wasn’t merely the kind of man who collected art pieces with an eye toward creating a space that worked, despite the varying styles it brought together.

  No. He was more complicated than either of those personas suggested.

  Corvin La-Complex.

  She shook her head.

  Don’t be ridiculous, Jenna. Everyone is complex.

  But not everyone drew her to them the way Corvin did.

  And she didn’t even know his last name.

  Then again, who needed last names, really? After all, he didn’t even know her first name. Not really.

  The thought made her cackle out loud.

  I think maybe I’m losing my mind.

  Having examined the whole apartment, she was fairly certain she knew which was the guest bedroom—and since Corvin had watched her pack only the one bag, she needed to stow the other suitcase under the guest bed.

  She only hoped she had guessed correctly.

  Then again, she wouldn’t mind ending up in La-Yummy’s bed.

  As long as he was there, too.

  Corvin tapped his blunt fingertips against the steering wheel as he stared at his apartment, watching for Angelina’s shadow behind the curtains and shades as she moved from room to room.

  Something about that woman wasn’t right.

  For one thing, when she unloaded her rental car to go inside, she had taken in an additional suitcase, though she had packed only one small bag at her apartment.

  What kind of person kept a go-bag in the car?

  Probably a troublemaking reporter. He wasn’t surprised to find that she had been in this position before.

  I wish I knew what other positions she’s been in.

  He shook off the thought.

  As a reporter, she had plenty of chances to piss people off—even more chances to glean information about the wrong people. Knowing too much in New Orleans was dangerous. It was a good way to find oneself fed piece by piece to the gators out in the Atchafalaya Basin swamps.

  Hell, he was pretty sure Salas’s people had done just that—and not too long ago. If Angelina was sniffing around Corvin, it might mean she had stumbled onto something about his investigation.

  If that were the case, she could get them both killed.

  Especially if she kept digging for more information.

  The more he thought about it, though, the less that scenario jibed with what he had seen today. Whatever she had discovered, Corvin didn’t think she was going to continue investigating. Somehow, Angelina had gone from hard-nosed reporter to terr
ified bystander in the course of less than forty-eight hours.

  When he found her in her apartment, she had been genuinely frightened.

  Whatever was going on with her made her vulnerable in a way that he normally didn’t find attractive. He liked his women to be strong and tough, able to take care of themselves with or without him.

  Angelina without her usual armor was the most desirable woman he had ever seen. Everything about her made him want to wrap her in a protective embrace.

  And maybe use my city-issued piece to shoot any motherfucker trying to hurt her.

  He shook his head to dispel the distinctly unprofessional thought.

  No. Angelina Riggs wasn’t a reporter on the trail of a story. She was a woman who was running from whatever she had found—and one who had run straight to him.

  Corvin felt oddly pleased by that idea, even as he acknowledged the fact that she hadn’t really run to him at all; he had followed her to her apartment. Still, she had had agreed to stay at his place for a while.

  By all rights, the knowledge that she was moving unchaperoned around his home, his refuge, should have bothered him. He couldn’t think of much that he valued more than his privacy. When he’d been a beat cop, he hadn’t even invited his partner into his apartment. It was the one place the filth he encountered in his job never followed him.

  The idea that Angelina might be dragging something horrible behind her should have been enough reason to keep her far away from his home.

  It wasn’t.

  In fact, the thought of her walking through his otherwise empty home, perhaps trailing her fingers across the tops of tables, seemed almost unbearably erotic. He could imagine her stopping to pick up one of his grandmother’s tarot cards—the ones he had framed on his shelves—then, maybe, moving into his bedroom and sitting on his bed, stretching her arms over her head…

  Damn.

  That irrepressible erection had returned.

  He had to get her in his bed for real. With him.

  Assuming this wasn’t all an act to try to get information out of him for a story.

  After all, his assumption that she was as vulnerable as she appeared was ultimately a guess.

  He only hoped he was guessing correctly.

  Having unpacked some of her own items into the weekender bag and stowed her suitcase under the guest bed, Jenna tried Angelina’s number for the third time in the last hour.

  This time, though, her sister answered. Jenna collapsed on the bed in relief, draping one arm over her eyes.

  “Hey.” Angelina’s voice was a harsh whisper.

  “Where are you?” Jenna demanded. “You owe me an explanation.”

  Not to mention a wild week in New Orleans.

  “Did you get checked into a hotel?” Angelina asked.

  “Of course not. It’s Mardi Gras. There aren’t any hotel rooms to be had.”

  Not that I actually looked.

  Better not tell her sister that part. Jenna might lose the moral high ground if she did.

  “You’re not in my apartment, are you?” Now Angelina’s voice echoed in a way that suggested she was holding her hand over the microphone to hiss into it.

  “Hell, no. Your apartment was trashed. Like someone-searching-for-something trashed—not your usual I-can’t-run-a-damned-vacuum-cleaner trashed. What’s going on, Ange? I’m worried about you.”

  “Oh. It’s nothing, really.” Jenna could imagine her sister’s unconcerned shrug, an attempt to make everything seem okay when it wasn’t.

  “I don’t believe you. You’re in trouble. Who broke into your apartment?”

  “Where are you staying, then?” Yep. Deflection. That was Angelina’s standard move. The worse things got, the more she tried to deflect attention away from whatever was really going on. It probably served her well as a reporter trying to get people to open up—if an interviewee didn’t like the direction the questions were headed, Angelina could change the topic and circle back around to it later. It was a conversational style she had been practicing all her life.

  This time, Jenna wasn’t falling for it. “What do you know about who broke into your apartment? I’m going to call the police to report it.”

  “No. Don’t do that.” Suddenly, Angelina’s voice was much louder and clearer. “I’ll tell you, I promise. After it’s all done.” She dropped back into a whisper. “This could make my career. Please, Jenna.”

  A story? She dumped me for a story?

  “Fine,” Jenna said shortly.

  “It won’t take long. I promise. Just … if you run into anyone who knows me, don’t let them know who you are, okay?”

  Jenna hated that wheedling tone. It never meant anything good for her. It never had.

  Then again, pretending to be Angelina had gotten her invited into Corvin La-Ohmigod’s apartment.

  She hoped her sister’s guess was right: that he was really a PI, and not a bad guy.

  She was counting on it, really.

  And that whatever trouble Angelina had found herself in wasn’t actually dangerous.

  Blowing out a breath, she closed her eyes and said a little prayer before answering. “Okay. But only if you check in every single day. Twice a day. No, every eight hours. If you miss even one check-in, I’m going to the cops and telling them … I don’t know. That you’ve been kidnapped or something.”

  “You won’t lie to the police.”

  Hoping her frown came through the phone, Jenna did her best to sound tough. “Don’t count on it.”

  “Okay, okay. I agree. Twice a day, though. Before noon and before midnight. Good enough?”

  The sound of the front door opening catapulted Jenna to her feet. Putting her hand over the phone, she dropped her own voice to a whisper. “I’ll hold you to it. Starting now. Call me again before midnight. I’ve got to go.”

  “Wait. What’s going on there? Where are you?” Angelina was still talking when Jenna disconnected.

  Serves her right.

  As she headed toward the person in the living room, Jenna found herself alternating between smoothing down her hair and clothes in case it was Corvin, and peering around corners fearfully, as if whoever had wrecked her sister’s apartment might have tracked her here.

  When she peeked into the living room, though, she found Corvin standing in front of the leather sofa, flipping through mail and frowning.

  For a moment, she was certain that sheer sexual heat roiled off of him—but then she realized that he had brought the high temperature of the outside in with him.

  At least, that’s what she told herself.

  She didn’t react to it like it was the warmth of a spring day.

  She reacted to it like it was a heat composed of pure pheromones. The scent of him, hot and male, went straight to the core of her, and she nearly closed her eyes as she breathed in more deeply. Her nipples tightened and it was all she could do to keep from whimpering.

  As he finished sorting his mail, he glanced up, catching sight of her gripping the doorframe and swaying slightly.

  His eyes darkened from emerald to an almost forest green, echoing the intensity of her response.

  Dropping the envelopes in his hand onto the nearest end table, he stalked toward Jenna, his muscled thighs perfectly outlined by his blue jeans. As he moved toward her, he stripped off his leather motorcycle jacket, leaving only the white t-shirt he wore beneath. He tossed the jacket onto the back of the nearest couch and came to a halt in front of her, standing so close that her erect nipples almost brushed against him. She had to tilt her head back to meet his gaze, and the heated expression in his eyes made her breath catch in her chest.

  Earlier, she had been worried about whatever trouble Angelina had gotten into.

  Oh, hell no. I am clearly in so much more trouble.

  Chapter 6

  When Corvin dropped his mail on the end-table, Angelina glanced at the pile of envelopes. With a sudden spike of adrenaline, Corvin realized that everything delivered to this
address had his actual last name on it.

  As did tons of other things in his apartment, probably.

  This really had been a terrible idea.

  I’m going to have to get her out of here and stash her somewhere else.

  By all rights, he should be out making more contacts on behalf of—or even better, within—the Salas crime organization.

  But one good thing about being undercover was that he didn’t often have to account for his time. He would make up something to cover his absence if anyone noticed.

  In the meantime, he needed to distract Angelina from examining his apartment too closely.

  He knew exactly how he most wanted to do that distracting, too. Ever since he saw her in Pirates Cove earlier in the day, all he had wanted to do was pull her up against him, cup that sweet, soft ass in his hands, and bury himself in her.

  A voice in the back of his head murmured that this was also a terrible plan.

  Probably his good sense talking to him.

  Too bad, because he wasn’t listening. Standing just inside the hall leading back to the bedrooms, Angelina held all of his attention. Her blue eyes widened as he moved toward her, coming to a stop a half-step too close for mere casual acquaintances. Close enough that he could reach out and take her in his arms.

  She froze, staring at him with wide, unblinking eyes.

  That raging erection was back.

  Wonder if she packed her bag of sex toys?

  An image of her naked, eyes closed, writhing as she touched herself, flickered through his mind, shooting straight to his cock like an arrow of pure desire.

  She won’t need any of them, if I have my way. I’ll make sure all she needs is me.

  His gaze heated at the thought, and she blinked rapidly, breaking eye contact.

  Down, boy.

  She was still the same reporter who had all but threatened to expose him only—yesterday? Had it really been that recently?

  Anyway, as hot as she had suddenly become—and as much as Corvin wanted to pick her up and carry her straight to his bedroom—he needed to be careful. Whatever game she was playing, it was clearly working on him.