Passion, Betrayal and Killer Highlights (32 page)

“Fine.” He picked me up and threw me onto his bed, then quickly fell on top of me and pinned my arms down against the mattress. “Was that better?”

I smiled. “Actually it was rather fun. Kind of like a roller-coaster ride.”

“How appropriate.” He kissed me again and I wiggled my arms free so that I could pull him against me in earnest. Anatoly moved off me long enough to remove his own jeans, and then reached for the bedside table.

“You don’t keep them in the bathroom?”

“My feeling is that the best place to store condoms is by a bed.”

“But then it looks like you were expecting to get lucky…. oh!” I sat up with a bolt. “You weren’t planning on bringing Porsha back here, were you?”

Anatoly shot me a withering look. “I hadn’t expected to bring anyone back here today—” He tore a condom free from the others in the pack and pushed me down on the bed again “—but I’m damn glad that I did.”

I felt a jolt of electricity shoot through me as he slid his hand inside my bra and fondled my nipple. “Yeah, this afternoon is definitely looking up.”

He unhooked my bra and then lowered his mouth to my left breast, his right hand lifting me so that I was arching toward him. I moaned as the last of my undergarments were removed. He caressed me slowly and methodically until it was all I could do to breathe.

Finally, he sat up and removed his own briefs. My eyes widened in disbelief. “Oh my God, you’re not circumcised!”

Anatoly looked down at his erection. “Nice of you to notice.”

“I’ve never seen an uncircumcised penis before.”

“Well, you’re welcome to become more acquainted with mine.”

I reached out my hand and stroked him slowly. Anatoly’s breath quickened. I glanced up at him. “It looks different.”

“Sophie, when men say they want women to talk during sex, this is
not
the kind of conversation they’re thinking of.”

“It’s like it has a little hat.”

Anatoly muttered a Russian curse and gently removed my hand. “You’re lucky you’re so damn sexy, you know that?” He hid the object of my fascination beneath a layer of latex.

“Hey, if you don’t like what I have to say, then give me something else to talk about.”

“Happily.” He pulled me up so that we were both sitting on the bed, my legs wrapped around him once more. He parted my lips with his tongue. I felt him pressing against my inner thigh, and then with a slow, deliberate movement he entered me and I forgot about Mr. Happy’s little hat. At first our movements were slow and sensual, but they quickly picked up speed. We fell back on the bed and I clenched the sheets in my fists as a wave of heat and pleasure spread from my groin to every other inch of my body. I breathed in, and the smell of our sweat mingled with his cologne filled my nostrils. With each thrust he seemed to fill me more completely, and finally I couldn’t hold out anymore. My body convulsed and my moans were lost in our kiss. Less than a minute later I felt him shudder, then I felt the full weight of his body on top of mine.

“That was incredible,” he whispered.

“Yes, it was.”

We lay there for a few minutes savoring the moment, but eventually I knew that I was going to have to break the silence. There were things that needed to be attended to—things that couldn’t be taken care of in the bedroom. I ran my fingers through his hair.

“Anatoly, I don’t want to ruin the mood, but do you think you could make me that espresso now?”

Less than a half hour later Anatoly and I were dressed and in his living room sipping a latte that rivaled any of the ones I had ever ordered at Starbucks. I thought about asking if he had whipped cream, but the inevitable innuendos that remark would elicit made me hold my tongue.

“So, by the look of your kitchen I would say that you know how to make a lot more than espresso,” I remarked.

Anatoly lifted an eyebrow. “I thought I just demonstrated that point in the bedroom.”

“Let me rephrase that,” I said quickly. “What dishes do you like to cook?”

“I can cook almost anything.” Anatoly put his cup down on a coffee table that was ugly enough to win him a reality show makeover. He smiled at me and sat down on the equally hideous sofa. “Italian, French, Mediterranean, even Japanese—you name the culture and I can probably cook you the corresponding cuisine. I enjoy being a bachelor and I enjoy good food, so learning to cook was the only logical choice.”

I love him.
“So why is a nice Jewish boy like yourself lugging around a foreskin?”

“In a country where extreme anti-Semitism is the rule rather than the exception, it is unwise to do something to your child that would make it easy for people to identify him as Jewish.”

“So what are you saying? That people in Russia hang out in public restrooms checking to see whose penis qualifies them for harassment?”

Anatoly looked at me and something in his eyes sent a chill up my spine.

“Trust me when I tell you that Jews born in the States don’t know how lucky they are.”

I swallowed hard. Anatoly had always come across as strong and in control, but at that moment I realized that his bravado might be something he had cultivated for the sake of survival. I reached my hand out and let my fingers brush against the stubble that had begun to form on his cheek. There was so much I didn’t know about this man.

My cell rang and I jumped up, spilling half my drink on Anatoly’s already stained carpet. I flashed him an apologetic smile before retrieving the phone from my purse. “Leah?”

“Sophie, you’re never going to believe this. Jerome just called me. One of his sources told him that the police did find a hair at Erika’s place.”

I squeezed my eyes shut and crossed my fingers. “The DNA didn’t match up, did it?”

“No, the hair they found wasn’t mine.”

“Yay! Oh, Leah, that’s spectacular!” I turned around and gave Anatoly a thumbs-up.

“It gets better.”

“How can it get better than that?”

“The hair was blond.”

“Bianca?” I wrinkled my nose. “But this isn’t making sense. If the hair was blond they should have known right away that it wasn’t yours.”

“It was dyed blond.”

I felt my heart flutter. “Dyed?”

“Mmm-hmm, and based on the lab results they know that whoever it belongs to was closely related to Bob.”

My mouth dropped open. There was a God and he was magnificently vengeful. “That little bitch,” I said joyfully.

“Come home. We need to break open the champagne.”

We entered my apartment to find Leah putting several champagne flutes on my dining table. She looked up at Anatoly and me and flashed us a huge grin.

I scanned the apartment and noted that while Mr. Katz was sitting on the couch in plain view, there was no child harassing him. “Where’s Jack?”

“He was tired, so I put him down for a nap. He didn’t sleep well last night.”

“Yeah, I know. He was very vocal about his insomnia.”

“A little early for that, isn’t it?” Anatoly nodded at the glasses. “All we know is that Cheryl
might
have been in Erika’s house. That doesn’t change a lot.”

“It gives me hope,” Leah said quietly, “and that changes everything.” She looked at Anatoly and her eyes narrowed. “You know, I think it would be appropriate for you to refund my sister’s money. She’s the one who figured out who killed my husband. She knew it was Cheryl right from the beginning.”

“I suspected,” I said. “I didn’t know anything.”

“We
still
don’t know anything,” Anatoly pointed out again. “Even if Cheryl is implicated in Erika’s alleged murder, that still doesn’t mean that she’ll be charged with killing Bob.”

“Now you’re just being a pessimist.” Leah dropped down into a chair by the table and causally crossed her legs. “Seriously, what are the odds that someone who wasn’t involved in Bob’s murder would up and kill his secretary days after his death?”

“About the same as the odds that someone would kill my brother-in-law weeks after someone else tried to kill me. And yet, here we are.” I took my place next to my cat and was starting to scratch him behind the ears when a horrible thought came to me. “Leah, you didn’t tell Jerome that we were the ones to find Erika, did you?”

Anatoly’s shoulders became more rigid and he stared at Leah, no doubt praying for the same answer I was.

“Of course I didn’t,” Leah said. “But I don’t think he would tell anyone if he knew.”

“But he doesn’t know,” Anatoly said again for confirmation.

“No, no. He had heard about Erika’s death earlier and he knew the police thought it might be connected to Bob’s murder, so he’s asked his sources to keep him updated on any new developments. I certainly didn’t volunteer anything about what I knew, and Jerome didn’t ask me to. In fact, during the interview almost all his questions were about Bob and our marriage. Although he did seem interested in what kind of things I liked to do in my spare time and my views on parenting and private schools.” Her voice trailed off and she smiled. “He’s a fascinating man.”

“How would you know?” Anatoly asked as he sat down next to me. “You just said that all the two of you talked about was you.”

I giggled. “Why do you think she found him so fascinating?”

“Very funny,” Leah said, but she didn’t look offended. “We talked a little about him, too. He’s different than any of my other male friends, or Bob’s friends for that matter.”

I blinked in surprise. “Bob had friends?”

“Okay—business associates. Anyway, Jerome is more…urban. When I first met with him today he was very professional, but as we spent time together he became more comfortable and he started using a lot of slang.” She looked off into the distance as if trying to recall something. “Is that kind of talk still called ‘jive’?”

“I think the popular term now is ‘talking black,’” I said.

“Right, right, I think he told me that.” She ran her fingers through her hair. “I showed him a few home movies I had made of Jack. He said he was ‘a city of a child.’ I’m not sure I know what that means but I kind of like it.”

For some reason the image of a Godzilla-sized Jack frightening a whole bunch of Japanese people popped into my mind.

“He should be here any minute. I called and invited him over since he was the bearer of the good news,” Leah continued. “This way I’ll have the opportunity to kiss the messenger.”

“What did you just say?” I scooted forward on the couch.

“Kiss the messenger? Really, Sophie, it’s just an expression.”

“Kill,” I corrected. “You’re supposed to
kill
the messenger, not
kiss
him.”

“Really?” Leah cocked her head to the side. “That does sound right. Well, I’m certainly not going to kill him after he told me that Cheryl’s one step closer to wearing an orange jumpsuit.” She laughed. “Cheryl hates orange. It makes her look like a demented jack-o’-lantern.”

“Here’s an expression for you,” Anatoly offered. “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched.”

Leah made a face. “And people call
me
a killjoy.” The buzzer went off and she got up to press the intercom. “Jerome?”

“Hey, girl.”

Leah smiled and buzzed him in. She waited impatiently for him to climb the stairs and then waved him into the apartment. “I’m so glad you could come.”

She gave him a kiss on the cheek, which, to my eye, he received with a little too much enthusiasm. Then he exchanged greetings with Anatoly and me and quickly turned his eyes back to Leah.

“Now that we’re all here, I’ll get the champagne.” She helped him remove his coat before retrieving a bottle of Cristal from the kitchen.

“What exactly did your source at the police station say?” Anatoly asked as Leah popped the cork and started pouring our drinks.

“Just that the police found a hair somewhere around Erika’s body that wasn’t hers,” Leah said, and handed Anatoly a glass. “For some reason they compared it to Bob’s DNA. Didn’t match but it was damn close. My man says that it definitely belongs to someone related to him.”

“Well, well, that
is
incriminating.” I shifted slightly in my seat. “It was nice of you to call Leah and tell her, Jerome.”

He nodded. “Leah and I are cool. I know she isn’t guilty of any of this shit.”

Jerome leaned against the wall, and I was struck again by his impeccable physique. Under normal circumstances I would have advised Leah to go for him in a big way, but until she was completely cleared of all charges, I was determined to keep her chaste and mournful. I cleared my throat.

“So now that you have all the information you need for your article, I guess we won’t be seeing you for a while.”

“My article isn’t due for another week and I’ll need to come back to check my facts. If you’re worried that I’m going to be dogging Leah in print, you can relax,” he said, completely misreading my concern. “I wouldn’t do that, and even if I wanted to,
Flavah
wouldn’t publish it.”

“Why not?” Anatoly asked as he draped his arm over the back of the couch.

I wasn’t sure if he was trying to get closer to me, but I inched toward the crook of his arm just in case.

“
Flavah
’s a black magazine,” Jerome explained. “And when this Cheryl chick started talking smack, a lot of the sistahs and brothas sat up and took notice.
Flavah
wants to make sure the people see this for what it is—just another battle in the war the police have waged against us.”

“Enough politics.” Leah lifted her glass. “We have things to celebrate. Let’s toast to Cheryl. May she rot in jail for the rest of her miserable life.”

“Works for me.” I stood and lifted my glass.

The buzzer rang again, and I looked at Leah questioningly. “Did you invite anyone else over?”

“No, but it’s not exactly unlike your friends to drop by unannounced. Honestly, Sophie, I don’t know how you put up with it.”

I was tempted to point out that it was a lot easier to put up with surprise visits from friends than the extended stay of family members, but I bit my tongue and waited while Leah inquired over the intercom who was there.

“Detective Lorenzo.”