Dangerous to Touch (17 page)

S
idney awoke before the alarm was set to go off, as usual, and she knew Marc was with her before she opened her eyes.

When she turned to look at him, all of the anger and confusion and disappointment she’d felt with him last night got mixed up in a rush of love so intense tears flooded her eyes.

He was lying on his back, his forearm draped across his lap, one knee bent, touching hers. Sometime during the night, he’d pushed the sheet down past his waist, revealing his naked upper body. His exceedingly masculine presence seemed to take up an inordinate amount of space.

She’d need to get a larger bed.

His face was troubled, even in sleep. There were faint circles beneath his eyes and a worried crease between his brows.

Her need to ease him was overwhelming.

Pressing her lips to the tips of her fingers, she touched the stubble shadowing his jaw, traced the hard line of his mouth. Trailing her fingertips over the long, brown column of his throat, she skimmed the sexy ridge of his Adam’s apple. As she moved her hand down farther, exploring hard pectoral muscles and warm skin, he shifted, causing the sheet to inch farther off his hips, exposing a dark line of silky pubic hair.

Apparently his lower body was naked, too.

Heart thumping with excitement, she sat up and drew her T-shirt over her head, wanting to feel his bare skin against hers. She brushed her fingertips over her jutting nipples, stifling a moan. Feeling a dull ache throb between her legs, she rubbed herself there, too, watching his penis thicken and elongate under the thin sheet.

Her eyes flew up to his face.

“Take off your panties,” he said in a rough voice, his heavy-lidded gaze fixed on the apex of her thighs.

She should have been embarrassed to be caught touching herself while she stared at him, but she was too enthralled by his arousal to be ashamed of her own. She also knew if she took off her panties, he’d bury his head between her legs and pleasure her with his mouth until she couldn’t remember her name.

Which was all very nice, since he seemed to enjoy it as much as she did, except that making her lose her mind was his subtle, insidious way of maintaining control.

This time, she wanted him to forget
his
name.

Instead of removing her panties, she slipped her hand inside them and began to caress herself lightly, studying his face. He couldn’t see what she was doing, but he didn’t have to.

“Don’t tease me.”

“Tease you? Never,” she promised, then bent her head to his lap and proceeded to do just that. Pulling down the sheet, she placed her open mouth on the inside of his thigh. His penis jerked, stiff and upright, saluting her efforts like a proper soldier.

“Sidney,” he protested, his voice husky.

“Mmm,” she replied, rubbing her cheek across his engorged flesh with a slight smile, basking in the glory of her feminine power.

He watched while she circled her fingers around his thick shaft and stroked him up and down. When a pearly bead appeared at the tip, she moistened her lips with it then licked his taste off them with delicate slowness.

Groaning, he let his head drop back against the pillow, surrendering to her ministrations. Instead of taking the blunt head of his erection into her mouth, as he clearly expected, she touched her tongue to the heavy sac below.

He shuddered. “Jesus, Sidney-”

“Don’t you like it?”

He didn’t say no, so she did it again, lapping at him like a kitten until he moaned, thrusting his fingers into her hair and bringing her head up. With his other hand, he gripped the base of his shaft and brushed the swollen tip across her parted lips.

Indulging him, she opened her mouth and took him deep.

“Oh God,” he gasped, his hand following the motions of her head as she moved up and down. She knew he was surprised by her shamelessness, but she couldn’t resist pleasuring him, and herself, in the most explicit of ways. “Sidney, please, stop before I-”

His stomach muscles clenched and he grabbed fistfuls of the sheet at his sides, but the valiant effort was all for naught. The sound of his harsh cry filled her ears as the salty taste of him flooded her mouth. Tears sprang into her eyes once again, her love for him threatening to burst from her chest.

After a moment, she stretched out on top of him, laying her head over his thundering heart, feeling it beat against her cheek as he threaded his fingers through her hair.

“I love you,” she whispered.

Beneath hers, his body tensed.

A jumble of images flashed through her mind, attacking her senses. He was thinking about another woman. A woman who had serviced him the same way. A woman he’d loved. A woman who had put her head against his chest just like this, just last night.

Crystal Dunn.

“You son a bitch,” she yelled, jumping to her feet.

His eyes flicked over her, but he said nothing.

“You said you were working!”

He rubbed a hand over his tired, handsome face. “I was.”

“With your ex-girlfriend?”

“I saw her,” he admitted, rising from the bed. Unfazed by his nudity, he strode out of the room, as if the discussion were over.

Trembling with hostility, she followed him down the stairs and into the hallway, where he began to calmly transfer clothing from the washer to the dryer. Only the hard set of his jaw betrayed his anger.

“Don’t you have anything to explain to me?” she asked, hands planted firmly on her hips.

His gaze rose from her bare breasts, which were quivering with indignation. “You expect me to answer to you because you said you loved me? Or is that what the porn-star quality blow job was for?”

Her hand itched to slap his arrogant face. “Get out,” she said.

“Not until my clothes dry.”

Realizing he’d be gone already if that wasn’t the case, tears blurred her vision. “Fine,” she said, heading toward the door. “I’ll leave.” Never mind that she was wearing only a very brief pair of panties.

She was almost outside by the time he caught up with her. Grabbing her around the waist, he yanked her back against him and held her there while she struggled. “I love you, too,” he said in her ear. “But if you think I’ll stay because of it, you’re wrong.”

“I never asked you to stay,” she said, trying to break free from his grasp. “You’re incapable of constancy.”

That made him mad, she could tell. It also made him hard. She stopped wiggling abruptly, aware she was grinding her scantily clad bottom against his naked groin.

“I went to Crystal’s last night,” he began, “because someone left photos of us taped to my garage door. I assumed it was her. It wasn’t.”

“Photos of us doing what?”

“Having sex. In your truck.”

She held herself very still.

“I wasn’t thinking about her because I prefer her to you. Far from it. I was thinking about her because she’s the last woman who told me she loved me, and I…didn’t handle it very well.” As her chest rose and fell with pent-up emotion, the undersides of her breasts rested heavily against his forearm. Despite the tension of the situation, or perhaps because of it, she felt herself responding to the way his body fit against hers. Her nipples peaked in arousal and a renewed heat pulsed between her thighs.

“I’m committing professional suicide by being here with you, Sidney,” he continued hoarsely, “but I can’t stay away. Every time I look at you, I want you. Even when I close my eyes, I see you. I smell you.” His breath was warm on her nape, his erection hot against her bottom. “I taste you,” he said, pushing her onto the couch in front of him.

He stripped her panties down her hips and she gasped, bracing herself to be taken from behind. Instead of the heavy thrust of his penis, she felt his hands caressing her thighs, squeezing her buttocks. Panting with excitement, she looked over her shoulder, covering her breasts with her fingertips.

Making a strangled, urgent sound, he moved his hot, open mouth from the base of her spine to the back of her neck. Biting her there tenderly, he slid the length of his shaft back and forth along the moist lips of her sex until they were both slippery with desire.

“Please,” she panted, gripping the back of the couch.

With a low, possessive growl, he filled her, driving all the way to the hilt in one smooth thrust. Almost sobbing aloud at the sheer pleasure of it, she began to rock against him, working herself forward and back.

“Sidney,” he protested, tightening his hands on her hips to slow her.

“No,” she said breathlessly. “Do it hard.”

Groaning, he jerked her bottom against his lap, giving her what she wanted, hard and fast and deep, over and over again until she thought she might explode with ecstasy. He was huge and hot inside her, the slick friction so good it was almost unbearable.

He reached underneath her to cup her swaying breasts. “I don’t know where I want to suck on you more,” he rasped, pinching her stiff nipples gently. “Here-” he moved one hand down between her legs, delving into damp curls “-or here.”

The mere suggestion of his mouth on her clitoris was enough to bring her to orgasm. Even before he touched her, she began to shudder and moan. As his fingers stroked the wet, throbbing flesh at the crest of her sex, she flew apart.

Burying himself deep inside her, he found his own release.

They stayed that way for a while, still connected, breathing heavily, hearts pounding. Finally he withdrew, tugging her panties back into place and drawing her into his lap. “I’m going to get you pregnant if I keep doing that,” he murmured, his lips on her temple.

“I hope you do,” she replied, lifting her mouth to his. He kissed her with passion, twining his tongue with hers, making her heart swell with hope.

“Why?” he asked when he raised his head.

Sidney grappled for an explanation. As far back as she could remember, she’d been alone, isolated by her strangeness, stranded by circumstance, emotionally abandoned by those who should have cared the most. Even her own mother couldn’t come to terms with Sidney’s affliction. So many times, she’d cried herself to sleep, aching to give her love to someone who would accept her for who she was.

How she longed to stroke a baby’s cheek! To touch unselfconsciously, to love unconditionally.

“I adore my nieces, but Samantha doesn’t bring them to visit often,” she began, afraid to reveal the depth of her need. “My parents and I don’t get along. If I had a baby of my own, I would cherish it.”

He didn’t ask where he fit into this rosy little picture, although his expression clearly stated that this was another one of her naïve fancies.

“I wouldn’t expect anything from you,” she clarified.

“Of course not,” he muttered, pushing her off his lap. “I’m ‘incapable of constancy.’”

She stared at him for a moment, a puzzle piece of his psyche clicking into place. He would feel obligated to marry her if she got pregnant. Maybe it was old-fashioned, in this day and age, but he wouldn’t let his child be a bastard. Like he was.

“Oh,” she said, her stomach sinking.

He jerked his head toward her. “You know, I really hate it when you do that. Instead of raping my brain, you could just ask me what I’m thinking.”

“Right. You’re such a great communicator.”

“I’ve known you for a week,” he defended, “and we’re already talking about love and babies. This is not in my comfort zone, okay?”

“Then use a condom from now on, and we won’t have to talk about it.”

His dark gaze traveled over her breasts, still flushed from her orgasm, down to the V of her thighs. “Fine,” he said, his face showing both anger and bewilderment, as if he couldn’t fathom why he’d failed to use protection again. Then the dryer fell silent, signaling the end of the cycle, and he went into the hallway to get his clothes.

Sidney pulled on a robe and wandered into the kitchen to make breakfast, feeling shell-shocked. He’d said he loved her. That he wanted her.

And yet, the only promise he’d made was that he wouldn’t stay.

Thanks to a Special Report by Crystal Dunn that aired over the weekend, women all over the city had been calling the homicide division to report uncommon canine behavior. After Detective Lacy narrowed the list down to single blondes with large breeds, she still had a dozen interviews to complete, and she couldn’t do them by herself.

Although Chief Stokes had partnered Lacy with another officer, a rookie from beat, she’d asked Marc to help out on the grunt work for the case.

He wouldn’t be able to stay at the kennel with Sidney.

A uniformed officer was posted on the street in front of Pacific Pet Hotel, but Marc was still reluctant to leave. “Do you have anything you use to control rowdy dogs?” he asked. “A stun gun or something?”

She looked at him like he was crazy.

“Pepper spray?”

Frowning, she rummaged through a drawer in her office and came up with a small yellow spray stick.

“Wear it on you. Clipped to your pants.” She complied in dutiful silence. “I’ll try to get back before closing,” he murmured, taking her into his arms.

She accepted his embrace stiffly, and it occurred to him that not only was he jinxing himself by saying goodbye, but he was doing it in the mushiest, most sentimental way possible, as if he was afraid he’d never see her again. He let her go long before he was ready to, disturbed by the cold wash of fear that struck him at the thought of losing her.

The uneasy feeling nagged him the rest of the day.

By late afternoon, they’d completed all but the last interview. Annemarie Wilsey was a kindergarten teacher who frequently walked her dog, Greta, along an undeveloped section of land bordering Camp Pendleton. Like Candace Hegel, she lived alone in a neighborhood of tile-roofed tract homes with large bedrooms and small backyards.

“Greta was acting strange, you say?” Lacy prompted.

Annemarie gave a nervous smile, patting the Rottweiler mix on the top the head. “Yes. We’d just left the house, and she wasn’t herself. She loves to go for walks, but that morning she was sluggish. Less than a block away, she just…collapsed.”

“Did she have convulsions? Seizures?”