Deadly Gamble (19 page)

Russell crossed the room, sniffed at Nick's pant leg and wagged his tail.

“He can see you,”
I mouthed.

“I'd better go,” Sheila finished, and I realized she'd been talking right along. “I want to sit with Bert, be there when he wakes up. Thank you so much, Mojo. I don't know how I will ever repay you.”

“Thank you so much, Mojo,” Nick repeated. “I don't know how I will ever repay you.”

I made a face at him, said goodbye to Sheila and hung up.

By then, he'd wandered over to the table, with no interference from Russell. Greer's check lay faceup, and Nick whistled when he read the figure.

“You probably saved Bert's life,” I said. “So I forgive you for every lousy thing you've ever done to me.” I smiled and spread my hands. “Now, you can leave.”

Nick eyed me skeptically. Shook his head.

I sighed. “Listen. I am really tired and I want to go to bed, and I don't need a ghost watching me sleep. So if you wouldn't mind—”

“I
do
mind. I heard what that cop told you. You shouldn't be alone tonight. So Chester and I are going to burn a little extra ectoplasm and stick around till morning.”

“You're a ghost. What could you do if somebody broke in?”

“You'd be surprised,” Nick said.

I narrowed my eyes.

“Mojo, go crash before you collapse.”

“You've got to promise—swear—that you won't climb into bed with me again. That
really
freaked me out.”

“I promise,” he said, raising one hand and setting the other on an imaginary Bible.

“Like your word means anything,” I challenged. But I
was
tired.

Nick rolled his eyes. “You said it yourself—I saved your friend's life. Now, you're practically calling me a rapist.”

“I did
not
call you a rapist.”

“That's about the only thing you haven't called me.”

“Go away.
I forgive you
. Now, zip on back to the train station and get your ticket punched.”

“Not,” he said.

I looked down at Russell. “If this man so much as moves toward my bedroom door, bite him.”

Russell whimpered.

“Well, then, at least bark!”

Chester took another friendly swat at Russell's nose.

Russell walked over to Nick and licked his left shoe.

So much for canine loyalty.

“
Good night,
Mojo,” Nick said. He leaned to pat Russell on the head, then dropped into my chair at the computer. Tapped a few keys.

I was intrigued—since when did ghosts use computers?—but too tired to investigate. I retreated as far as the bathroom, washed my face and brushed my teeth.

A few minutes later, I tumbled into bed.

I'd closed the door and considered putting a chair under the knob, since it didn't lock, but I knew that wouldn't stop Nick if he wanted to get in. As if to prove the point, Chester sprang through the wood and hopped onto the mattress to join me.

A thump sounded from the other side, along with a dog whine.

Poor Russell. He'd tried to follow Chester's lead, with the inevitable result.

I sighed, got out of bed and went to let Russell in. He made several pathetic attempts to jump onto the mattress, but his legs were too short.

I gave him a hoist.

“Too many frankfurters, buddy,” I told him, huffing a little from the exertion. “And there will be absolutely
no
farting.”

Russell curled up on the pillow opposite mine, sighed as eloquently as I had and closed his eyes.

I crawled back into bed. Turned onto my stomach.

Chester planted himself in the middle of my back.

I smiled. He weighed a ton, but it felt good, just knowing he was there.

I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again, it was morning.

I smelled coffee brewing.

Russell was snoring on the pillow, and Chester was gone.

I used the bathroom, washed up, pulled on sweat pants and a tank top and headed for the kitchen.

“Nick?” I called. I was about to thank him for making coffee and not jumping my bones during the night when my breath caught in my throat.

Tucker turned from the counter, where he was opening a bakery box.

There were deep shadows under his eyes. He hadn't shaved, his clothes were rumpled and he needed a shower.

I would have been glad to give him one personally.

“Who the hell is Nick?” he demanded.

W
ho was Nick? How was I supposed to explain that, to a cop, no less, without ending up under psychiatric evaluation?

Before I could think of an answer, a horrible thought streaked through my sleep-befuddled mind like a comet trailing fire.

“You're not dead or anything, are you?”

Tucker stared at me. “What kind of question is that? Do I
look
dead to you?”

“If you are, just tell me, okay? Don't beat around the bush, because my nerves can't take it.”

He laid both hands on my shoulders and pressed me into a chair. Leaned down to search my eyes. “Mojo, are you on something?”

My heart beat a little faster. His fingers felt warm, even through the fabric of my bathrobe. His breath tingled against my lips. I reached up, laid my palm on his chest.

A heartbeat.

“You're alive!”

He reached back, awkwardly, groping for a chair. Dragged it close and sat down hard. “Moje,” he said, “I
told
you not to believe the news—”

I planted a smacking kiss in the center of his forehead. Slipped my arms around his neck.

He removed them. “Who's Nick?”

I bit my lip. My eyes burned. “You're not going to believe a word I say.”

“Try me,” he said.

Might as well just spit it out, so he could have me committed and be done with it. “Nick's my dead ex-husband.”

“Do you want me to levitate something?” Nick asked, from just behind my right shoulder. “It might convince him.”

I didn't look back or answer. Nick could read my thoughts. All right, then, I'd give him the full benefit of my Anglo-Saxon vocabulary.

Tucker plunged his fingers into my hair, dragged the sides of his thumbs lightly over my cheekbones. “Moje, what's going on here?”

I wished Nick would get out. Maybe Tucker and I could share a shower before he called for the wagon and had me hauled away.

“My ex,” I repeated lamely. “He's been haunting me.”

Everything in Tucker's face went absolutely still. “You were talking to a dead guy?”

I nodded, patently miserable and wildly happy, at the same time, because Tucker hadn't blown up in his car. He wasn't on leave from the train station.

“I told you, you wouldn't believe it.”

“He believes you,” Nick supplied helpfully. Now, he was standing directly behind Tucker. “But he's a logical kind of fella. Ask him about his cousin Jessica. She was hit by a car when she was four and he was seven, and he saw her every night for six months after it happened.”

“
Will
you not help?”

Tucker cupped my chin, turned my head so we were eye to eye again. From his perspective, I'd been talking to empty space, and I expected some comment on that. “When I was seven,” he said instead, “a bunch of us were playing baseball in a park. My cousin—” He stopped, and his jaw worked.

I was too shaken to speak.

“Her name was Jessica, and she was a tomboy. She wanted to get into the game, but she was only four and she wasn't supposed to leave our grandparents' yard. She ran into the street—”

I closed my eyes, made myself open them again. Swallowed hard.

“She called my name,” Tucker went on. “I turned around, and I was about to yell at her to go home. Instead, I was just in time to see an old pickup come around the corner on two wheels and—”

I touched his hair.

“Practically every night for the next six months, I woke up and found her standing at the foot of my bed.”

“See?” Nick said. “What did I tell you?”

Get out,
I told him mentally, without looking away from Tucker's face,
or I'll never forgive you. Not ever.

“I thought I was dreaming,” Tucker finished hoarsely. “But I've always wondered, because she looked so real. I used to get up, turn on the light, go downstairs for a drink of water—whatever I could think of, and when I got back, she'd still be there.”

“Did she ever speak to you?”

Tucker shook his head. “She'd just watch me. After five minutes or so, she'd vanish. Then we moved—my dad got a job in Flagstaff—and I never saw her again.”

“Know what?” I asked gently.

“What?”

“I believe you, Tucker.”

“‘I believe you, Tucker,'” Nick mimicked.

WILL you get out?

“Thanks,” Tucker said gruffly, and rested his forehead against mine.

“You just want to get him naked,” Nick accused.

You're damn right I do,
I answered.
Thanks for sticking around all night, and goodbye.

Nick sighed. I felt him leave.

“What you need,” I purred to Tucker, “is somebody to wash your back.”

Tucker kissed the tip of my nose. Then he kissed my mouth.

His tongue tasted of mint mouthwash.

One thing about Tucker. Even when he was working undercover, he practiced good oral hygiene.

The harsh buzzing of my ancient doorbell interrupted, chewing its way between us, pushing us apart.

“You'd better get that,” Tucker said, sounding a little breathless. His lips were almost touching mine; I felt a subtle vibration coming from them.

“If we ignore them,” I reasoned, “they'll go away.”

“Not if it's the cops,” Tucker said.

I sighed. Mental note: I am a person of interest in a felony assault.

I hate it when that happens.

The bell rasped through the air again, more insistent this time.

Tucker grinned. “I'll grab a shower. You deal with whoever's out there.” He kissed me again, just before shoving off his chair and rising to his feet. He waggled his eyebrows at me. “Get rid of them.”

I waited until he was behind the bathroom door before I answered the bell. I kept the chain on and peered around it.

An acne victim of indeterminate gender stood on the landing, holding a striped box in both hands and looking irritated.

“I didn't order anything,” I said, none too patiently.

“It's your free Chinese dinner,” the delivery person insisted, sounding testy, and probably male. “We called and left a voice mail. You won it.”

“I don't want—”

“It's free,” he said.

“Oh, for Pete's sake,” I replied, “just leave it on the mat.”

“People are starving in Africa, you know.”

Ah, a philosopher. I have never understood that line of reasoning. How would my eating something help the hungry in other lands?

“If you're angling for a tip, you're wasting your time,” I said. I have a rule. I don't tip rude people, especially when they interfere with my love life.

“Look, lady, it's my job to deliver this chow mein or whatever it is. A quarter from you is not going to change my life. Just take the freakin' box, will you?”

I made up my mind to call the food-delivery service, at some point in the near future, and complain about their personnel. So what if the food was free? I hadn't ordered it, or the attitude.

I took the chain off and grabbed the stupid box.

By now, Tucker was in the shower, naked and lathered and sleek.

“Thanks for nothing,” I told the kid, “and tell your boss to take me off the phone list.”

“Whatever,” the kid snapped.

I slammed the door.

I didn't bother to carry the free chow mein as far as the kitchen. I set the box on the coffee table with a thump and headed for the bathroom.

I'd promised myself I wouldn't succumb to Tucker's charms, and there were all kinds of reasons to support that decision—his ex-wife, his crazy job, my own history of poor taste in men—but this was elemental. Until I'd walked into the kitchen that morning and found him standing there with a box of doughnuts, and even for a few minutes after that, I'd half believed he was dead.

Bert had nearly died the night before, and life seemed terribly tenuous.

I needed to celebrate, even though I knew I would probably regret the decision later.

When I burst through the bathroom door Tucker was out of the shower, clean and gloriously male. He gave me a devilish grin and held out his arms.

“Wait,” I said.

He cocked an eyebrow. “What?”

“I have to brush my teeth.”

Tucker stood close behind me while I dabbed paste onto the old bristles, scrubbed and foamed. He lifted my T-shirt, laid his hands on either side of my waist, and slid them down into my sweatpants, over my hipbones.

I nearly choked on my toothpaste.

I bent to spit and rinse, and when I did, I came into direct contact with Tucker's erection. I straightened again, with a gasp.

He chuckled and eased me back against him. At the same time, he slipped a finger into the moist curls between my legs and teased me until I groaned, my head resting against his shoulder.

“We—shouldn't—do—this,” I said, knowing all the while that we would.

Tucker nibbled at my earlobe. “Umm-hmmm,” he agreed.

I turned to face him, wrapped my arms around his neck, looked up into his eyes. “I thought you were dead,” I told him. His hands were up under my T-shirt now; his thumbs grazed my bare nipples.

“So you said,” he murmured, and nibbled at my mouth.

“No, I mean
really
dead—”

Tucker hoisted me off my feet, and if I'd been the kind of woman who worries about such things, I might have been embarrassed at the way I automatically wrapped both legs around his hips.

“You're about to find out how really
not dead
I am,” he said.

Fortunately, the bed wasn't far away; Tucker made the trek with me entwined around him, and we fell to the mattress together. The bedsprings creaked so loudly that I was glad Bad-Ass Bert's was closed until further notice; I wasn't tracking at the moment, or I would have been ashamed of such a thought, given what had happened.

Tucker was lying on top of me, and this was one of those times where there wasn't going to be any foreplay. He felt so good, everywhere we were touching, and the way he kept kissing me almost brought on the big O well before the fact.

He sampled my breasts, simultaneously tugging down my sweatpants, and I was beyond ready for him when he suddenly lifted his head and looked into my eyes. “I didn't bring—”

“I don't care,” I said.

Tucker came into me with a long, hard thrust of his hips.

My eyes rolled back; damn it, I was coming. Already. My entire body seized around him, buckling with a release so sudden and so ferocious that I couldn't even cry out. I was too busy falling apart.

Forget the long, slow build—I'd been working on that ever since the
last
time we'd made love, more than three weeks before.

Tucker was a man focused on the job at hand; his body moved rhythmically on and within mine. I was already starting another climb, and when I could focus again, I noticed the half smile quirking his mouth. He was taking his time, shifting his hips slightly, from side to side.

The friction was delicious.

I clawed at his back. “Oh, damn, Tuck—”

“Slow and easy, babe,” he rasped.

I exploded again three seconds later, and when I came out of the daze, breathless and slick with perspiration, he was still setting his own pace.

We climaxed together the next time, and it was so intense, so powerful, that I yelled. Tucker went deep, and closed his eyes, and I saw the muscles tighten in his face.

I don't know how long we lay there, when it was over, cross-wise on the bed, our arms and legs entangled, our bodies still joined. Presently, Tucker rolled to one side and fell asleep. I forgave him, since he'd been working undercover for days and he'd just given me the ride of my life.

I kissed him on the forehead, covered him by doubling the bedspread back, and got up. I didn't sleep after sex; it always energized me.

I took a quick shower, put on jeans and a tank top and started for my computer, intending do a little Googling on the list of names Greer had given me the night before.

The first thing I saw was the chow mein box, lying open on the floor. Before I could get mad about the mess, I spotted Russell. He was full out on his right side, and he was way too still.

Alarm—the instinctive kind—clenched at my insides like a fist made of cold steel, and for a second or so, I couldn't move at all. “Russell?” I whispered, and that broke my inertia; I dropped to my knees beside him, much the way I'd done with his master the night before, under the pool table. “Russell!”