Illicit (6 page)

He settled into the leather seat and didn’t feel the cold. He didn’t feel anything besides a blind rage. Jaw tight, eyes on the door of his hotel room, and hands clenched on the steering wheel, he waited. Until he could find the threat and eliminate it, his little angel would go nowhere without him as her shadow.

Eva was his. For the first time in a long time, he and the leopard agreed on something.

Who knew Eva would feel so horrible after a night of amazing, mind-numbing sex. Had she mentioned amazing? She groaned into her pillow and wished for the darkness to steal her away. Her head throbbed. Her skin felt tight. Muscles she hadn’t known existed screamed.

Dizzy and disoriented, she struggled to untangle herself from the sheets woven through her legs. Every shift rubbed her thighs together. Stabs of pleasure moved through the center of her body, delicious and arousing, if not a little tender. She was swollen, and surprisingly eager for more.

She should have known her sexy stranger would be addicting. Rolling onto her back, she pressed a hand to the center of her aching forehead. Was there such a thing as a sex hangover? If so, would chasing the hair of the dog, or whatever they called it, ease her symptoms?

A grin surfaced. She smoothed her hand across cold sheets and found nothing but empty bed and a folded piece of paper. Her smile fell flat. Dread cinched her stomach into a knot. How could a white slip of paper freeze her blood and simultaneously make her sweat? Oh, she knew. The freak who’d killed Greg had left her a present. A vindictive love note. On a simple white slip of folded paper, the culprit wrote,

The kitty said meow, right before I blew a hole through his head. I’m coming for you next, Angel. You’re mine.

Greg was dead because of her. The heartache hit hard.
Behind closed lids, tears stung her eyes and she fought to push the memories away. This wasn’t the time or the place. Sitting up, she wrapped her arms around the knees she brought to her chest. She looked around the small, unfamiliar cabin she’d spent the night in. What in the hell was she doing here anyway? She pushed aside the doubt. She’d made her bed and gotten exactly what she’d needed. Yet now, more than ever, she felt raw to the bone and naked because of it.

She was alone. So damned alone.

Grief swelled inside her gut and, for a moment, she couldn’t breathe. She pressed a hand to her stomach and sucked in a gulp of air. A sob fought its way through her stubborn determination not to cry. For the rest of her life she was going to be alone. Greg was gone and he wasn’t coming back. There would be no more late-night talks in his study, no more watching him roll his whiskey back and forth. No more shared dinners on the couch. No more hope.

For a few precious hours, she’d managed to forget she was alone. She’d managed to shove aside the reality that the only man she’d ever loved was dead. Somehow, the brief reprieve made the loss stronger, almost unbearable. Over the last week, never-ending misery had numbed her. Thanks to Peter, the fire in her belly burned hot, made her remember the life taken, snuffed out, with the pull of a trigger. Images from the previous night fought with the gruesome pictures of Greg’s death, his bluish skin and glazed eyes staring sightlessly at her.

Death won.

Her hands curled into fists and the paper she clutched crumpled. Sniffling back the tears and the memories, she unfolded the note. Eva hoped she wasn’t making a mistake reading it. In the split second it took for her eyes to adjust in the darkness, doubt wormed inside. Had her instincts been wrong about Peter? Could he have killed…

No.

The sprawling chicken scratch was thankfully unfamiliar. She read the words aloud, “You’re a helluva fuck. See ya around – P.M.”

She let out the breath she’d been holding and closed her eyes. Helluva fuck. What an asshole, even if what he’d written was true.

Balling up the paper, she threw it across the room and missed the trashcan by a mile. Her gaze fell on the wrinkled tie in the middle of the floor, the silk binding that had left her completely in Peter’s hands. She tried to conjure the appropriate guilt for having had sex with a total stranger, for enjoying his rough touch and letting him thoroughly defile her. She found only a craving for more. Did that make her sick? Probably.

Eva forced herself out of bed and into her day-old clothes. She wanted away from the mattress that smelled of sex and man. She wanted even farther away from the bathroom where things had spiraled out of control. His hot, whispered “Please” against her neck was bound to haunt her for the rest of her life.

The sweet scent of perfume and death lingered on the dress she zipped up. The smell brought to mind the stricken faces of the Pard. In a few hours, she would have to face them and fulfill Greg’s last wishes. He had wanted her to read his will in front of the people he’d spent his entire life protecting and caring for.

Fighting a new bout of tears, she stepped into her black, fur-lined leather boots and pulled on her coat. Eyes straight ahead, she refused to glance back to the floor where her ruined panties and bra lay. Every time she moved, her tender nipples rubbed against the dress and hardened. They craved another, rougher touch.

No way.

She’d had enough sex in the last fourteen hours to last her a decade. The walk of shame was cold and dark. In the church’s empty parking lot she unlocked Greg’s black 4x4 truck and had a moment of panic when she reached for the door. Would another body roll out at her feet?

The wind howled around her, sending soft flakes of snow swirling in front of her face. The temperature dipped, reminded her that she wasn’t wearing any underwear. A gust blew up her skirt, contrasted with the memory of Peter blowing hot air across her clit. Damn. Where was his hot breath when she needed it? She’d get frostbite if she stood outside much longer.

Closing her eyes, her numbed and burning fingers pulled on the handle. The only thing that greeted her was the rich, familiar scent of Greg lingering on upholstery. She’d grieve again the first day his cherished scent no longer welcomed her. Her one second of comfort shattered the moment she sat down. Sitting down hurt her ass in a pleasurable-painful kind of way. Damn Peter No Last Name for making sure she would remember his claiming.

Wresting the keys into the ignition with frozen fingers, it took her two attempts to start the truck. The engine roared to life, streams of icy air pouring from the vents. She shivered, pressing her forehead against the steering wheel to wait out the cold.

Mistake. The throb in her head turned into a full-blown headache. An unwanted image of Peter flashed into her mind and she tried to shove the picture away. She was too raw from Greg’s death, too confused by the intimacy she and Peter had shared during their shower.

“I need you.”

She shook her head, found it impossible to dislodge her stranger. Jesus, even from a distance his arrogance prevailed. All over again she felt his hot, wet mouth. The stroke of his tongue. At the memory, a shiver ran down her spine. Her sex clenched in needy anticipation. God, the way he’d kissed her had been like a man starving. Desperate. Like a man allowed to glimpse salvation for the briefest of moments.

His husky, sex-drugged voice stole through her head once more: “
Please
.”

Without meaning to, her hand rose to her kiss-swollen lips. Slowly, softly, she drew her finger back and forth.

A pounding, three-beat knock rapped against her side window. Her fantasy crashed. Burned. Eva’s scream was loud and long. She barely heard the piercing wail over her thunderous heart. The knock came again, more urgently this time, and she forced her breathing to even. Who else was out in this weather?

Using the sleeve of her coat, she cleared the fogged window and peered out. Her relief at seeing the familiar face was palpable. And short-lived. She’d have welcomed anyone except Detective Grady Keller, the one man who’d know on sight she’d been fucked every way possible. The man who thought taking her virginity gave him permanent rights to her body.

Swallowing, she beat back the encroaching guilt. Would Grady know how many times? How many different ways? Would he know she’d allowed Peter to fuck her without a condom? He stood outside her door, his every exhale sending visible puffs of air from his mouth and red-tipped nose. Concern deepened the handsome angles of his face. A scraggy beard, the same dark brown shade as his eyes, protected his cheeks and chin from the frost. The coarse stubble invited a woman’s hand to run through it.

Dang. He sure hadn’t had that much facial hair when they’d dated in high school. The heavy, fur-lined jacket he wore made his shoulders wider and his chest thicker than she knew them to be. She pressed the button on the control panel, counted the seconds while the window whirred down. Any warmth the truck had managed to gain disappeared.

“Detective, what can I do for you?” Her voice was husky and raw from screaming. That was a lie. The rasp was from having Peter’s cock shoved so far down her throat.

Grady knew. Recognized the unmistakable aftermath of the kind of oral sex she liked to give. His left eye twitched. He stepped close. The squeak of boots on snow raised the hair on her arms. One gloved hand and then the other gripped the window frame, pulled him inside the truck. The bulk of his massive six-foot-four frame blocked her closest exit.

He scanned the inside of her vehicle before turning his hot gaze on her. “Eva.”

Her cheeks flushed. She fought the impulse to press her fingers against her swollen lips. Oh, she knew without looking that she had a freshly fucked and sated appearance about her. Grady would know. He’d seen that look on her himself too many times to count.

“What do you want?” She forced the words between chattering teeth.

His gaze moved over her lips, down the line of her throat to where, no doubt, she had a couple of love bites. Self-consciously she shifted and her coat gapped open, revealing the day-old dress beneath it. Well, hell. Even though a beard covered his face, she didn’t miss the tightening of his jaw or the thinning of his lips.

He stepped back, crossed his arms over his chest. “Ms. Marx, I’m going to have to ask you to step out of the vehicle.”

So, it was Ms. Marx now. “Come on, Grady, you can’t be serious. It’s cold out there. Why don’t you get in?”

“Out of the truck, Eva.”

“Why?” There wasn’t a single reasonable explanation she could think of.

“Because I’m an officer of the law and I’m telling you to step out of the truck.”

They stared at each other for a full minute before she caved. “Fine,” she snapped.

Glaring, she threw open the door. If the swinging metal hit him in the balls, well, that was his problem for standing too close. She stepped into the cold and, mirroring his position, crossed her arms over her chest. Around them, snow fell silently.

“You’ve been drinking,” he stated.

She knew what his tone meant. They’d dated on and off for the last dozen years. He’d taken her virginity. He’d asked her to marry him. Six times.

Her jaw tensed. “Yes. Last night after the funeral, I had a couple of drinks. Is that a crime? No. It isn’t. I’m getting back in the truck.”

“I heard you’ve got a new boyfriend. Where’s the asshole now?”

She cringed. Peter was probably half way back to Montana, not that she was going to tell him that. She lifted her chin. “I’m not his keeper.”

“Just his fuck buddy? Must be a real gentleman to let you walk alone, in the dark, with a murderer on the loose.” His words held an edge of accusation. It was the way his eyes darkened and then narrowed. His full, once very kissable lips pinched into an invisible line.

She’d never seen him like this before. He never lost his cool or his temper. Even sex between them had been sweet and tender. Grady was a consummate lover, slow and thorough. He’d handled her like glass, surely terrified of bringing her home with bruises. No one risked the wrath of Gregory Marx, not even the Sheriff’s son.

Peter’s hard pounding from the night before stormed through her mind, obliterating Grady from her memory as if he’d never been there. Peter was right, she’d had no idea just how much she’d come to hate him in the morning.

The simmering anger boiled over. She lashed out. “I suppose it’s too much to ask for some privacy, too much to ask that what I do isn’t topic for town gossip.”

“You mean
who
you do?” he shot back. “When the town sweetheart leaves the bar with an outsider, it’s news. Do you have any idea what they’re saying about you? God damn it, Eva, I can’t believe you let him fuck you. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Her eyes widened and her mouth dropped open before snapping shut. “What’s wrong with
me
?” She closed the distance between them and shoved her finger against the muscular wall of his chest. “You are way out of line,
Trooper
. I don’t have to stand here and listen to this.”

He caught her wrist before she could poke him again. Grady pulled her close, his insistence chilling her more than the bitter wind swirling around her bare legs. She pulled back, meant to dig her heels into the snow, but her boots found ice, slick and unpredictable. Down. She was going down.

Her arms flailed, reaching for something, anything to keep her head from bashing the frozen ground. His fist shot out, smashed against her cheek. The resounding crack split the air and shattered her confidence that she knew him at all. Reeling back, she clutched the throbbing flesh already swollen beneath her cold hand. Through the instant tears, she stared at him.

Had he hit her on purpose? Surely not. Grady had never been violent, never lifted a hand to her. He’d been her only true friend outside of Greg. Hell, he’d never even raised his voice. Until now. He’d hit her with a fist. Not an open hand. You didn’t use a fist to help someone. He was already jealous of Peter. Had he been angry she’d pulled away?