Secrets in the Stone (6 page)

“There’s a staircase at the end of the hall on the second floor,” Adrian said. “I’ll take you up.”

“I’ll find it.”

“I’m not going to let you go wandering around up there by yourself.” As much as she wanted to stay downstairs in the brightly lit, warm kitchen rather than climb around in the frigid, dark, cobweb-ridden attic, Adrian couldn’t just let someone else take care of her problems.

“What? You think I’m going to steal the silver?” Rooke cursed herself for momentarily forgetting the sharp divide between the extremely wealthy members of the community, many of whom only summered in Ford’s Crossing, and the locals like her grandfather and her, who lived in the village year-round. Many of the year-rounders worked as domestic or grounds staff for the rich New York City families, and the villagers were grateful for the work. But the social classes did not mingle, as Adrian had just reminded her. How she could have forgotten, considering her family history, was just another sign of how off balance she really was. Ever since she’d first heard the message from Adrian Oakes, she’d been acting and thinking completely unlike herself.

“Right,” Adrian scoffed, certain Rooke was joking. “My grandmother never throws anything away. The attic is crammed with God knows what. I don’t want you tripping and breaking your neck up there.”

Rooke wasn’t certain what bothered her most—that Adrian didn’t trust her or that she didn’t think she was competent. Either one was an affront to everything she prided herself on. Stung, she shot back, “You might think it’s a national tragedy if you break a nail, but a few bumps and bruises won’t even register for me.”

“Break a nail?” Adrian exclaimed. “Why you arrogant, condescending…” She poked a finger at Rooke. “Let me tell you something, Ms. Macho Stonemason. I just spent two months dodging IEDs and suicide bombers in the middle of a…” Adrian clamped down on her anger. She couldn’t believe she’d let Rooke get under her skin so much that she lost her temper. She never lost her temper. Not since she’d discovered that the way to win an argument—to win anything—was with cold, hard logic and absolute control. She never let anyone know that they’d hurt or angered her. Why a total stranger could make her forget that was a mystery she was too tired to solve. Embarrassed by her loss of control, she said, “I apologize for my bad manners.”

“Why don’t you just take me up,” Rooke said, mentally adding
arrogant
and
condescending
to Adrian’s list of her bad qualities. “The sooner I get up there, the sooner I’ll be out of here.”

“This way.” Adrian pointed to the narrow hallway that ran from the corner of the kitchen into the adjoining wing. “There’s a back staircase.”

Of course there was, Rooke thought. Every house that had once had servants had a staircase into the kitchen for the help to come and go without disturbing the family in the formal parts of the house. Adrian had already grabbed one flashlight and started down the hall, so Rooke scooped up another and followed.

A blast of cold air struck them at the top of the stairs, and Adrian rubbed her arms. “God, I never remember this house being so drafty.”

“You’re shivering. Don’t you have a sweatshirt or something you can put on?”

“You’re in a T-shirt.”

Rooke shrugged. She was so used to working in a lather of sweat no matter the time of year, she barely registered the surrounding temperature. “The cold doesn’t really bother me all that much.”

“Of course it doesn’t.” Adrian resisted the urge to roll her eyes. Rooke Tyler reminded her of the soldiers she’d spent time with on her last assignment with her filmmaker friend Jude. Male or female, it didn’t matter—none of them would ever admit to any kind of weakness. Not fear, not pain, not even the heartache of losing a friend. They also tended to be overly protective and domineering. She admired them and was frustrated by them in equal measure.

Rooke slowed by the open door to the only room that was showing any light. Adrian’s bedroom. “Go ahead,” she said, turning her head away. It felt too personal to see where Adrian slept. “Get something warm to put on if you insist on being up here. Once we open the attic, it’s going to get a lot colder.”

“Are you sure you don’t want something? I’ve got extras.”

“No thanks.” Rooke hesitated. “I guess I can’t talk you into waiting down here, huh?”

“I don’t guess you can,” Adrian said lightly.

“You’re the boss,” Rooke muttered.

“I need to know what’s going on.” Adrian knew she probably seemed unreasonably obstinate to Rooke. Her independent streak and stubborn self-sufficiency often put a barrier between her and others, but if that was the price she had to pay to escape the narrow, soul-suffocating life that had been designed for her, the cost was well worth it. She’d rather be alone on her own terms than a player in someone else’s grand design.

*

“Oh God.” Becky clutched Melinda’s shoulders, her eyes wide and wild. “Oh God. I’ve never come like this.” Braced on the edge of the desk, she stared down between them, her legs spread wide on either side of Melinda’s hips. Melinda’s fingers played between her legs, sliding inside her and then up and over her clitoris. “Oh God. Please, please don’t stop.”

Melinda groaned, covering Becky’s mouth with hers, drinking her cries, swallowing her passion. The eternally hungry recesses of her soul filled as Becky burst into orgasm, Becky’s release searing her with the force of a lightning strike. Exultant, Melinda threw back her head with a shout of triumph, climaxing as she absorbed the rush of power.

“Yes,” she cried, tangling her fingers in Becky’s hair and pulling her head back to take her mouth again. “More.”

Becky whimpered, sagging in Melinda’s grip. Her lids were heavy, her eyes unfocused. Her hands trailed limply down Melinda’s arms. “I can’t. I came so hard already.”

“Yes, you can,” Melinda murmured, slowly stroking her, unerringly finding the places that made her breath catch and her pulse pound in her throat. “Let me show you pleasure like you’ve never dreamed.” She kissed along the edge of Becky’s jaw, then grazed her teeth over the soft skin beneath her ear. “Becky. Becky.”

“Yes.” Becky’s body opened, taking Melinda deeper. Her eyes fluttered closed and her breath shuddered out. “Yes. Yes.”

Permission given, Melinda thrust harder, filling Becky even as Becky’s passion filled her. Taking all that she had been given. Victorious.

“How does it look?” Adrian resisted the urge to reach up and steady Rooke’s hips as Rooke stood on one of her grandmother’s old walnut dressers and pulled insulation away from the underside of the roof. She didn’t touch her because Rooke clearly didn’t want her assistance, and she didn’t need any more sensory stimulation from anyone for a while. Her nerves jangled with constant bursts of energy that made her skin tingle and every part of her throb. She felt like a Roman candle with a very short, very hot fuse.

“It’s tough to see all the way to the outer angle of the roof, but there’s water back there,” Rooke reported, peeling back another few inches of the thick pink padding. The only light, other than from their flashlights, came from a single bare bulb at the top of the staircase at the other end of the attic, so she was working pretty much blind. “Yep. Got a hole next to where the chimney joins. Ah hell, my flashlight’s dying. Batteries were probably old.”

“Here, take mine,” Adrian said.

Rooke turned on the narrow width of the dresser, keeping her shoulders bent so she didn’t whack her head on the rafters, and took the flashlight from Adrian. “Thanks.”

“Can you do anything from in here to plug the hole?”

“Nope.” Rooke panned the light from one end of the attic to the other, marking her position so she could find the damaged section from outside. “I’ll have to get up on the roof and nail a tarp down over the whole area. Otherwise, you’ll have water in the walls before long.”

“You can’t get up on the roof in this storm.”

“As soon as it’s daylight, I shouldn’t have a problem.” Rooke ignored Adrian’s look of protest and returned to assessing the damage. She propped her flashlight on a horizontal beam, illuminating the section she’d exposed under the insulation, and pulled her pocketknife from her jeans. She used the blade to pry up a section of plywood. Pulling the edge down with her left hand, she cautiously worked her right over the surface of the plywood. “Damp, but not soaked. You probably haven’t lost a lot of shingles outsi—” She sucked in a breath as pain cut across the top of her hand. Fighting the instinct to yank her hand free, knowing she’d likely cause more damage, she held her arm still. “Could you pass me the light?”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just need to get a better look in here and I can’t reach the flashlight.”

“I’ll have to climb up there to get it.”

“Never mi—” Rooke braced her legs as the dresser shuddered beneath her. When an arm came around her waist, the muscles in her abdomen contracted sharply and she gasped.

“Sorry,” Adrian muttered. “Not much room up here.” She leaned a little closer and reached over Rooke’s shoulder for the flashlight. As she stretched for it, her breasts pressed into Rooke’s back and her pelvis snugged against Rooke’s ass. She couldn’t have blocked out the feel of those hard muscles even if she’d wanted to, and at least part of her didn’t. The low-level current in her body instantly kicked up a notch, and all her sexual alarms started blaring. She feared she might be vibrating and Rooke would know why. Embarrassed, she clutched the flashlight with a sigh of relief and delivered it into Rooke’s free hand. Then she eased away as much as she could, even though she still needed to hold on to Rooke for balance on the narrow surface. “Here you go.”

“Thanks.” Rooke shined the light into the tight space between the undersurface of the eaves and the sheet of plywood, trying to ignore the unfamiliar ache where Adrian’s palm pressed low on her belly. The throbbing in her stomach totally eclipsed the pain in her hand. “Can you reach the free lip of this plywood?”

“I think so. I’ll have to edge around you a little bit more. What’s wrong?”

“I just need you to make some room so I can slide my hand out,” Rooke said. A jagged edge of bent flashing canted inward, trapping her hand between the metal and the wood. Blood pooled on the wood under her palm.

Rooke sounded completely calm, but Adrian feared she was in trouble. She fought down a surge of anxiety and inched her way around until her legs straddled Rooke’s hip. Gripping the back of Rooke’s jeans with one hand, she hooked her fingers over the rim of the plywood. “Okay. What next?”

“When I say, pull down slowly until I tell you to stop.”

“All right.” Adrian bit her lip to keep from urging Rooke to hurry.

“Go.” Rooke kept the beam of light on the spot where the metal dug into her hand. Blood now covered her wrist and trickled along her forearm. Ignoring the burning in her hand, she focused on the unexpected comfort of Adrian pressed against her. The pressure forcing Rooke’s hand into the sharp metal edge abruptly eased. “Can you hold it right there?”

“I won’t let go, Rooke,” Adrian replied.

Slowly, Rooke drew her arm out. “Thanks.”

“Put the light on your arm,” Adrian said. “Let me see it.”

“It’s okay. I think we’re done up—”

“Rooke. Let me see your arm.”

“Climb down first before we both fall off of here.”

Reluctantly, Adrian eased to a sitting position and jumped down from the dresser. Then she turned and held out her hand. “Give me the flashlight.”

Rooke didn’t have a choice because she needed to brace her good hand on top of the dresser to get down. The instant she relinquished the light, Adrian shined it on her injured hand.

“Okay,” Adrian said briskly, squelching her initial panic upon seeing the amount of blood running down Rooke’s arm and dripping from her fingers. “That’s going to need some attention.”

“I just need to wash it up.”

“It needs a thorough cleansing, and then we’ll decide what else.” Adrian swept her flashlight toward the stairs. “Come on. You’re dripping on the floor.”

“Sorry,” Rooke muttered. She tugged her T-shirt from her pants and wrapped the bottom edge around her injured hand, hoping to catch most of the blood.

“I was kidding,” Adrian said softly, wondering if Rooke really thought she was that uncaring. She led the way, navigating through the haphazard piles of boxes, furniture, and racks of clothes as quickly as she could. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really.”

“Are you just being tough?”

“Not really.” Rooke stopped at the top of the stairs. “I’ll wait here until you bring a towel. I don’t want to get blood on your grandmother’s carpet.”

“You’re not serious, are you?” Adrian lifted the light enough to illuminate Rooke’s face. She looked paler than usual, but otherwise her expression was unreadable. If she hurt, she didn’t show it. Adrian gripped Rooke’s free hand. “Be careful on the stairs.”

Rooke tried to concentrate on maneuvering down the narrow stairs, but most of her attention was fixed on Adrian’s hand clasping hers. Adrian’s skin was very soft even though her grip was strong. She wondered how her callused, rough hands felt to Adrian, and she wished she had something finer to offer her.

“Here,” Adrian said, drawing Rooke into the hall bathroom. “Hold your hand over the sink, but let me run the water for a few minutes before you get it wet. I’m afraid the water has been standing in the pipes and I don’t want any rust to get into that laceration.”