Dirty (28 page)

Hormones.
 
That had to be it.
 
Maybe I was a late bloomer...like Hank.

The taxi pulled into my driveway and I paid my fare, including a generous tip.

“Thanks, lady.”
 
The teasing sparkle in his eyes made me hesitate before getting out.
 
“You know,” he said, “that’s one helluva dress.”

And just like that every bit of last night’s as well as tonight’s tension drained away.
 
“Thanks.”
 
I emerged from the cab with a fresh outlook.

I did look damn good for a mature woman.
 
My life wasn’t over yet.
 
There was still hope I might find the right man for a second chance at a long-term relationship that would work.
 
I didn’t care about happy endings any more, those were for fairy tales.
 
All I wanted was a shot at a truly satisfying one.

With a genuine smile on my face and a lightness in my step, I went inside, undressed, poured myself a glass of JD.
 
Then I kicked back on the sofa to check the late news.
 
I hoped like hell HPD had made good on their promise and kept mine and Dawson’s name out of the headlines.

By the time the sports segment aired I felt reasonably confident Nance had stood by his word.

Just when I thought this night might turn out all right after all my doorbell broke into chimes.

I glanced at the clock.
 
After eleven.
 
Who the hell would be at my door at this time of night?

Like I had to ask.

I would wring Dawson’s neck if he was out there.
 
Considering the fact that I still didn’t know who’d taken a rock from my yard and used it to disfigure a murder victim or who had left a snake in my bed (I had since ordered the locks changed and a new password from my security service) I checked the peep hole before opening the door.

Hobbs.

A whole new set of worries morphed into frown lines on my face (that would likely become permanent wrinkles–hey, but that’s what Botox is for), I jerked the door open.
 
“This better be good.”

Hobbs looked me up and down then lifted a disapproving eyebrow at my tattered terry-cloth robe.
 
“Guess what you’re getting for Christmas?”

I hauled him through the door and closed it behind him.
 
“What do you want, Hobbs?
 
JD and I were just getting reacquainted.”
 
Another round and I might actually sleep soundly tonight, snake or no.

“Shouldn’t you be armed?
 
There does appear to be someone out to get you, Jackie.”

I pulled back one side of my robe and showed him the sweet little hootchie holster that kept my equally sweet little .32 nestled right against my lavender panties.
 
The .32 didn’t have a nickname.
 
Carrying the extra piece almost felt like cheating on Shorty, but a girl could never be too careful.
 
And why the hell was everybody suddenly worried about me?
 
I had been taking care of myself for years, I could do it now.

“How do you sleep like that?”

I blew out a puff of indignation and marched back over to the couch.
 
I didn’t bother explaining that when I went to bed the weapon went under my pillow.
 
“What do you want, Hobbs?”
 
I took a long swallow of JD.
 
When I looked up my assistant was suddenly standing over me, the fifth in hand, to refill my glass.
 
That bad, huh?
 
“Okay, what?” I demanded.

He moistened his lips and filled the glass before answering my question.

“Well.”
 
He set the bottle aside and seemed to have trouble deciding what to do with his hands after that.
 
“I made a new discovery about Rayburn this evening.”

Hobbs was right.
 
I needed another drink.
 
When the burn had subsided I said, “Spill it.”

He roamed the boundaries of the room a couple of times.
 
But that was Hobbs, he had to get to the point his own way and in his own time.
 
I held my tongue and let him do his thing.
 
Abruptly he stopped and announced, “Your long lost lover did have a family.”

I sat up a little straighter.
 
Jesus.
 
Anticipation gave way to uncertainty.
 
I didn’t want to learn I’d helped a married man commit adultery.
 
Wasn’t it enough that he had gone missing, was presumed dead?

Hobbs cleared his throat and went on.
 
“Rogue agent or not, prior to coming to Houston to work on the Disposable case, Mr. Rayburn was quite the celebrated hero.”

My attention shifted from my self-pity session to Hobbs as he continued.
 
“I found an article from an obscure New Jersey newspaper about Rayburn’s outstanding service.
 
He received some sort of commendation.”

I ordered my fingers to relax before I cracked the glass I held in a death grip.

He said the rest without pausing to catch his breath or giving me room to interrupt.
 
“The picture in the newspaper showed Warren Rayburn with his mother and stepfather, Laura Rayburn Dawson and Charles Dawson.
 
Also pictured was his one sibling, a younger brother named
Derrick Dawson
.”

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

I wore my ready-for-battle uniform today.
 
Black slacks, black, double breasted boxy jacket and my mandatory symbol of power, my Christian Louboutins.
 
The only true deviation from the rigid business armor was the sassy lavender and lace camisole beneath the unisex jacket.

I hadn’t allowed Hobbs to call Dawson at home last night.
 
Nor had I called him.
 
Nope.
 
He wouldn’t get a heads up.
 
Instead, I drank two pots of coffee to clear my head.
 
Waxed my legs and any other part of my body that needed errant hair removed.
 
Applied a heavy duty facial mask, a root touch-up, then painted my nails (toes included) bruiser purple for combat.

Instead of sleeping I spent the night looking for anything I could find on the Dawson family, which was only that the father had been some sort of war hero and senator who’d died one year before his eldest son, step-son actually, disappeared.
 
The mother had passed a few years later.

Dawson was basically an orphan.
 
No one I spoke to this morning at his old precinct would say diddly-squat but it was more what wasn’t said that mattered.
 
Hobbs had called his high school first thing only to learn that his senior year Dawson had been voted the student most likely to end up in jail.
 
He had, apparently, walked around with a huge chip on his broad shoulders and a penchant for finding trouble.

One would think that all of the above served as sufficient motivation for being royally pissed off since Dawson hadn’t mentioned any of it and...it was.
 
But the real kicker...the final straw that broke the camel’s back...was learning who his former fiancé had been.

Mercedes DeVille.
 
Only the hottest supermodel currently gracing the cover of every hip magazine. Six feet tall, probably weighed all of fifty pounds soaking wet.
 
Abso-fucking-lutely gorgeous.

The possibility that he’d considered me attractive in my naked state by any stretch of the imagination had evaporated beneath the harsh glare of reality’s runway lights.

Those commercials,
don’t hate me because I’m beautiful
, had immediately come to mind.
 
And being a real woman with real flaws, I did hate her.

Still, I felt reasonably confident that I looked pretty damned good this morning.
 
Any woman who had put herself through that much physical torture, especially the waxing, in the wee hours of the morning, and including sleep deprivation, would be dangerous in a room alone with a member of the male species.
 
Made perfect sense since it was ultimately men for whom we women went to such extremes and suffered such immense discomfort and doubt.

Lying bastards.

Fury brimmed all over again.

Don’t get me wrong.
 
I fully understood that Dawson had himself a whopper of a motivation for having lied to me about who he was.
 
But, dammit all to hell, I hated deception more than any other single thing in the whole freakin’ universe.

I pivoted and strode across my office, retracing the path I’d already made about fifty times.

“Hobbs said you wanted to see me.”

I halted dead in my tracks, felt my stomach take a dive south, and turned to face the man who’d spoken.
 
The one who’d kept me awake all night.
 
Who’d made me utterly miserable.

If I lived a thousand years I would never forget the way Dawson looked at that precise moment.
 
Maybe it was the personal knowledge I now possessed.
 
But somehow I saw through the tough guy persona and super sexy exterior.
 
Though it was difficult with him looking like he’d just rolled out of bed with his perpetually tousled hair, Yankees tee contouring to the interesting terrain of his chest beneath an open button-down shirt, and those wickedly worn out jeans gloving his lower half.

Those final moments before we both passed out in that coffin reeled through my head before I could stop it.
 
His ragged breath...his taunt body beneath me.

I pushed the images aside, wet my lips and said, “Close the door, Dawson.”
 
I folded my arms over my chest and decided it would be best if I remained standing.
 
I reminded myself that his last relationship had involved a supermodel and I got mad all over again—at me, for feeling inferior.

He shut the door, hesitated before turning around just long enough to plow the fingers of one hand through his hair.
 
My own fingers twitched to follow the trail his had taken before I curled them into my palms.
 
In the event that I had somehow failed to notice, my traitorous brain reminded me that the man had the best ass I’d ever laid eyes on.

It just wasn’t fair.
 
But then, life rarely was.

When he finally faced me he looked directly into my eyes with that same fierce determination he’d oozed the first time he swaggered into my office.
 
“Just so you know, that hasn’t happened to me since I was fourteen.
 
Some things just won’t be put off, not even for breathing.”

He thought I’d called him into my office to discuss the coffin incident.
 
I almost laughed, emphasis on the almost.
 
I’d bet a million bucks, if I had it, that his ex-fiance had made that happen a time or two just entering a room.

I cleared my throat and managed a firm yet neutral expression, despite the fury and jealousy eating away at my guts.
 
“This meeting isn’t about...that.”
 

Confusion muscled its way onto his face, elbowing out some of that cocky determination.
 
“I didn’t follow you last night,” he hastened to assure me.
 
“I haven’t since you said back off.”

I wasn’t quite sure I believed that but his whereabouts last night wasn’t what I had on my mind at the moment either.

“Why didn’t you tell me that Warren Rayburn was your half brother?”
 
Or that your ex was an alien being?
 
After all, most models sported numerous perfect qualities that never, ever happened in clusters as a matter of nature.
 
How much added synthetic material constituted an alternate life form?

I mentally screamed.
 
God, I hated jealousy, especially on my part, almost as much as I did deception.
 

Why hadn’t I seen this coming?
 
Not a single applicant had applied for the opening at my agency and out of nowhere an ex-cop waltzes in.
 
And this thing that had been brewing between us from day one...it had to have come from somewhere.
 
No matter that Rayburn’s dark alluring looks had been utterly opposite from Dawson’s blond haired blue eyed dazzle...there was something there...a familiarity that reached out to me and wouldn’t let go.
 
I should have picked up on that.

“Not my half brother,” he corrected.
 
“My
brother
.
 
We were just as close as if we’d had the same father.”
 
All emotion had vanished from his face.
 
I couldn’t have read him if I’d had a direct connection to the Psychic Network.

“I told you up front how I feel about deception,” I said, laying it out clearly and simply for him.
 
The fury that had charged me up for this confrontation was suddenly, glaringly absent, leaving me too vulnerable.
 
I hated that feeling.

He nodded.
 
“Does this mean I’m fired?”
 
The flash of hurt in those blue eyes did serious damage to the flimsy shield guarding my own feelings.
 
But with only one swoop of those long lashes his weakness was concealed as efficiently as his true identity had been from the beginning.

“Before we get to that,” I redirected, “I want to know why you came here and what really happened to...your brother.”
 
That Dawson considered the older man a full brother spoke volumes about their relationship.
 
That I wanted to torture information about the supermodel out of him spoke the same about me, only in a less complimentary manner.
 
I told myself that smart people never discussed politics, religion (in Texas that would be synonymous with sports) or previous bed partners.
 
I had to be smart...at least smarter than I’d been.