The Damsel in This Dress (17 page)

“My nightgown.”

“Is it one of those flimsy lacy things?”

Oh God.
“Yes.”

“Mm. Good,” he murmured. He covered her mouth with his own and kissed her deeply. She made a soft, high-pitched little sound, and Soldier groaned and kissed her more thoroughly. Shoving her covers out of the way, he slipped the straps of her negligee down, exposing her breasts to the cool night air, and his hot mouth. Placing tiny kisses across her collarbone, he moved down, slowly, letting his tongue slide along her flesh until she wanted to scream with pleasure.

He hovered over one taut nipple, tracing circles around it with his tongue. She arched her back, trying to move so he would catch it in his mouth, but he shifted, refusing it, teasing her, making her crazy with desire.

Between her legs, she felt tense and urgent, and knew that if he stroked her there, it would feel so very, very good. Her insides went all tingly and achy and she could think of nothing but Soldier’s hard body and how it would feel if she let him make love to her.

Just as she’d decided it would probably be best to push him away, his tongue flicked across her nipple and her breath caught. He suckled, first one, then the other, as she squirmed in his embrace.

He slid his hand down her stomach and found that place between her legs capable of driving her over the edge. She was so close to climaxing, she wanted to weep. She moved against his thick finger, increasing her pleasure. With his tongue teasing her nipple and his hand working its silken magic between her parted thighs, she felt as though she were ready to fly to heaven.

But it was not to be.

An irritating noise began to emanate from his room. His cell phone. His
cell phone
was bleeping!

Abruptly, he pulled his hand away, and his mouth.

“God damned son of a bitch,” he bit out, each word a sentence of its own. “I have to take that, Betsy. Stay right where you are. Don’t . . . move.”

As if.
She was paralyzed with pleasure. She could barely take a deep breath, let alone move.

Through the open doors between them, she heard him answer, grind out a reply, then snap the phone closed. A moment later he appeared in the bathroom doorway.

“I have to go,” he said rapidly. “Can I take your car?”

“ ’Kay,” she squeaked, wound too tightly to utter a complete word.

He began backing away. “I’m sorry. I’m really, really sorry. I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”

“ ’Kay.”

“Where are your keys?”

“ ’Kay.”

“Where?”

“Um, purse . . . table . . . kitchen.” It was the best she could do under the circumstances.

Was it her imagination, or had he also been having trouble speaking? He closed the bathroom door behind him, leaving her totally hot and thoroughly bothered.

Betsy lay on her bed, naked from the waist up, the hem of her nightgown hiked up to her hips. Her mouth was wet from his kisses and her nipples ached. She was still swollen where he’d grazed her with his fingers.

Oh, man. How in the world was she ever going to get to sleep now? Damn him for leaving her in this condition!

Well, she mused as she envisioned Soldier’s handsome face inches above her own. She could always take matters into her own hands. . . .

Across the breakfast table, Loretta Tremaine grinned at Soldier. If he didn’t know better, he’d swear she was flirting with him. Nah. Betsy’s
mother
? Flirting? With
him
?

Her bright red hair had been teased and sprayed into a sort of flaming match concoction, and she’d sprinkled glitter on it. With every movement, her hair flashed and winked at him.

She wore a tasteful emerald green ensemble, but again, the bodice was cut way too low for his comfort.

He’d been surprised to see Loretta at Betsy’s house so early on a Sunday morning. He would have pegged her for a late riser, but she’d surprised him with coffee as soon as he’d sat down at the large oak table.

Piddle lay curled up under a chair, deep in slumber, as usual.

After taking a few sips of coffee, Soldier rose from the table and began rummaging around, looking for something to eat.

“I see her cupboards are practically bare,” Loretta remarked as she sipped at her own coffee. “Elizabeth needs to go shopping. Oh, that girl. You’ll just have to make do with odds and ends, I suppose.”

“No problem,” Soldier said. “When Taylor wakes up, we can go to the store.”

He poured himself a hearty bowl of Fruit Loops and added evaporated milk and brown sugar, sliced off a large hunk of Velveeta, poured a glass of pulpy grapefruit juice, and grabbed a handful of chocolate chip cookies. “Just like home,” he said.

Loretta winced as he tore into the eclectic assortment before him, but she said nothing about it. “How long are you planning on staying?” she asked. “That is to say, how long will Elizabeth need protection?”

Did the woman have something in her eye, or was she batting her lashes at him? Dear God, with a mother like Loretta, no wonder Betsy was among the walking wounded.

Soldier gulped down the grapefruit juice, then wiped his mouth on a cloth napkin that had tiny roosters printed on it.

“Well,” he said, “I don’t know. Hopefully, we can catch this guy soon and have done with it. Crime doesn’t hold to any timetable, unfortunately.”

Reaching for the carafe on the table, Soldier poured himself more coffee, then lifted his brows in inquiry as he tilted the container toward Loretta.

“No more for me,” she said as she pushed her cup away.

Soldier leaned forward and looked Loretta in the eye. “I spoke to Betsy about the possibility that her father is behind this. She doesn’t think so. You were married to the man. What do you think?”

The elegant line of the woman’s body shifted and tensed. She pursed her lips. Taking a deep breath, she let it trickle out slowly while she seemed to consider her words.

“I haven’t seen Douglas for years. He was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic after he’d sustained a head injury in a disgusting brawl.”

“As opposed to a classy brawl?”

She ignored his obvious sarcasm.

“Did he ever indicate to you that he might be angry with Betsy? That he felt she may have betrayed him in some way?”

Loretta rose from the table and took her cup to the sink, where she proceeded to wash it, dry it, and put it away in the cupboard. All with an air of nobility that would have put the Royal Family to shame. “Yes. Elizabeth was just eighteen when I called a halt to that travesty of a marriage. Douglas asked her to come live with him, but she refused.”

“Why?”

“You’ll have to ask her. I only know that it hurt him very much.”

“Was she afraid of him?”

The woman looked honestly taken aback. “Oh, no. Heavens no. She had nothing to fear from her father. He treated her like a princess.”

“So her refusal to live with him might have hurt him deeply. Hurt him enough to make him want to hurt her back?”

“You assume too much, Detective. Douglas has been in the hospital for the last nine years.”

She gathered her purse and her dog and walked to the door. “Douglas was a research scientist. He was very focused on his work, but he was ever the gentle man. And he adored Betsy. They were very close. Before his injuries, I would have said no, that he was not capable of hurting anybody. After he was afflicted, well, I can’t speak to that.”

“So you’re saying that after his injuries, he might have developed a capacity for violence?”

“As I said, it’s all rather moot, since he’s still in the hospital.”

“Are you certain? When was the last time you checked on him?”

Loretta sighed as though he’d been brow-beating her for hours and she had finally decided to yield. “All right,” she snapped. “It’s been six years since I’ve seen him. So I’m a shade self-involved. That’s not a crime. Douglas and I were divorced. He wasn’t my problem anymore. Lots of people get divorced. What happened to him that night was his own fault and none of my doing. I have nothing to feel guilty over. Nothing! He’s his brother’s responsibility now, not mine.”

Soldier watched Loretta stalk out the door. The more he saw of the mother, the more he understood the daughter. How in the hell had Betsy turned out so sweet and giving with a mother like that?

He didn’t want to hurt Betsy any more than necessary, but the fact of the matter was, Douglas Tremaine was most definitely a suspect.

As a result of one of his phone calls last night, he’d discovered something that Betsy and her mother were apparently unaware of, something that could mean nothing, or everything.

Three months ago, Douglas Tremaine had been declared well enough to be released from the hospital into his brother’s care. According to Betsy’s uncle Terry, her father was on his way to Port Henry, determined to see his daughter.

R
insing out his coffee mug, Soldier looked out the kitchen window in time to see his brother finish up an early morning run through the town. Ever since the divorce, Taylor seemed bent on burning off his anger—not to mention a storehouse of pent-up sexual frustration—with arduous physical workouts. As a result, his body was in top shape while his love life was stuck facedown on the bunny slopes.

Bursting through the back door in sweatpants and a damp white T-shirt, Taylor greeted him. “Hey, Jackson. Port Henry’s a nifty little place.”

“I know. I took a run before you got up,” Soldier replied.

Wiping his face on a towel he’d left by the back door, Taylor said, “Where’d you go last night?”

He dried the coffee mug and replaced it on the shelf. “I got a call around midnight from Officer Winslow at the PHPD. There was a B and E at a dry cleaner’s downtown and he wanted me to come and check it out.”

Taylor leaned against the back door. “Why you?”

“He knew I was in the area, and they’re short-staffed right now. It was an odd kind of break-in and he just wanted another pair of eyes.”

“Much money taken?”

Soldier shook his head. “I don’t think they were after money. The place was a total wreck, the interior vandalized, clothing cut to pieces and some even burned. Really weird. Until people come in to pick up their stuff, the owner’s not sure he’ll know what’s missing. Anyway,” he said, blowing out a tired sigh, “I’ve been up most of the night.”

“Yeah, I thought you looked a little beat,” Taylor said. “Sorry, Jackson. I’ll get showered, then we can go over my reports.”

“Show me yours and I’ll show you mine.” Soldier grinned.

His brother barked out a laugh. “Not much to see these days. You know how things tend to atrophy from lack of use.”

“Quit complaining,” Soldier chided. “Sounds like you just need to get a grip.”

“Yuk-yuk. You’re so funny, I forgot to laugh.”

Taylor laughed anyway and left the kitchen through one door as Betsy entered through the other.

She looked beautiful, all soft and feminine. Her hair was still damp from her morning shower and she was dressed casually in a rose-colored sweater and faded jeans. On her feet, she wore pink socks with little white hearts on them.

She busied herself with coffee, getting a bowl of cereal, pouring some juice. All in all, she spent a good ten minutes trying to avoid him, and confronting what had nearly happened between them last night.

When Betsy finally caved in and glanced in his direction, her cheeks flushed. She turned away and opened a cupboard, reaching for the sugar. As she did, he came up behind her. Slipping his hands around her rib cage, he pulled her against him.

Before he could apologize for leaving her in the lurch last night, she lowered her head and snarled, “Let me put this in terms you can understand, Detective.”

“Uh-oh.”

“See Betsy?” she said lightly, with a dash of menace. “Betsy is angry. Betsy is angry at the Detective. ‘Keep your hands to yourself,’ snaps Betsy.”

Soldier bent his head and placed a warm kiss at the nape of her neck. “The Detective is very sorry about last night. Detectives work strange hours sometimes. See the Detective lust after Betsy. He will make it up to Betsy, given half a chance.”

She squirmed. “Look, look, look. Look at Betsy, embarrassed and humiliated. See Betsy knee the Detective in his groin.”

“ ‘Oh, no!’ groans the Detective. The Detective likes his groin just the way it is.”

“See Betsy ignore the stupid Detective?”

“The Detective senses Betsy has a cold and unforgiving heart.” He slid his hands up to cup her breasts. Her spine stiffened, but she didn’t shove him away.

“Stop that,” she protested, trying to wiggle out of his embrace. “You’re a jerk. A big fat jerk. Besides, someone could walk in—”

“Taylor’s in the shower. Your mother was here, but she went home.” He rubbed his thumbs across her nipples. She gasped and lay her head back against his shoulder.

“Men live to do this,” he whispered almost inaudibly against the side of her neck. “There’s nothing sexier than coming up behind a woman and settling her butt into your crotch while you fondle her breasts. Mmm. Doggie Heaven.”

“Soldier—”

“Uh, woof.” The deep baritone came from somewhere behind them.

Both Soldier and Betsy jumped nearly a foot, two kids caught with their fingers in the cookie jar. Betsy’s trembling hands flew to cover her burning cheeks.

Without turning around, Soldier ground out, “Taylor, you are such a
dickhead.
”

He glanced over his shoulder to see his freshly showered brother clad in only jeans, his soggy towel tossed over one shoulder.

He grinned. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to interrupt.”

As the door to Taylor’s room closed, Soldier said, “I’m sorry, Betsy. I had no idea—”

“Mpf cnn nvrr fcc hm ngn.”

“What was that? What did you say? Take your hands away from your face, Betsy.”

She did. “I said, I can never face him again!” Her whole body shook, and when Soldier turned her around, he realized she was laughing so hard, she could barely contain herself.

“You’re not . . . mad?” He viewed her with skepticism.

“Mad? Mad? Gosh, why would I be mad! I’m laughing, Detective Doggie-man,” she gasped, “because I don’t know what else to do! You rejected me when I got loaded and tried, clumsily no doubt, to seduce you.
That
was just great. Then, you humiliated me last night, leaving me just when— Oh, forget it. But this morning, you grab me in front of your brother! Some lunatic is stalking me and that same lunatic probably murdered a woman. And to top it all off, my charming mother and her
Dick
show up unexpectedly from Paris, and, and, and . . . well, if I don’t laugh, I’ll probably go friggin’ nuts!”

She wiped the tears from her eyes. “Do you realize that ever since I met you I’ve done nothing but cry?”

“I often have that effect on women.”

“Very funny,” she snapped. “I’ve never been a crier. Sad movies, hurt animals, stuff like that make me cry. But for some reason, I just can’t seem to get control of my emotions! I hate this! I want to tear this town apart. Go from door to door and say, ‘Oh, hello. Are you the one stalking me? Yeah? Well cut it out, and by the way, you’re under arrest!’ ”

“Hey, that’s my line.”

“Tough! Vengeance is mine, sayeth the stalked!”

“Betsy,” he said, hiding a grin, “you’re under a lot of stress—”

“Oh! You think? Is that how you got to be a detective? From brilliant deductions like that?”

“It’s a gift.”

“Can’t you two keep your hands off each other for five minutes?” It was Taylor, emerging from his bedroom, fully dressed in jeans and a sweater, briefcase in hand.

Soldier looked into Betsy’s red-rimmed eyes. “Better now? Shall we get to work?”

She shrugged, then nodded. “Sorry I was sarcastic a minute ago. I know you’re a good detective.”

He smiled down at her and guided her toward the kitchen table where Taylor had tossed several manila file folders.

“Okay, I ran all the names you gave me,” Taylor began, opening the first file. “Nothing out of the ordinary on Ryan Finlay, your boss,” he said to Betsy. She seemed to sigh with relief. “I couldn’t get much on Carla Denato, except that she moved to Port Henry about a year ago from the Midwest. Nothing popped since her arrival, but I’m still doing some checking.

“As far as Linda Mattson, the woman who got married and moved to, where’d you say, Minnesota?” Betsy nodded. “Couldn’t get a line on her at all. She might be in Minnesota, but she might not. I’m still checking on that, too.”

Soldier flipped through the pages of the file nearest him. “I sent you some more names. People Betsy works with. Anything on those?”

Taylor pulled another folder from his briefcase. “Yeah, but not much. Upstanding citizens for the most part. Pretty boring. Chet Grover, one of the guys in the print shop, has been in and out of rehab. Drinking mostly, some drugs a while back. Nothing recent.”

“I don’t know Chet very well, but he seems like a really nice guy,” Betsy interjected. “I can’t see him doing anything like this.”

Soldier and Taylor both gave Betsy a nod but said nothing. As the brothers knew, looks could be deceiving.

“Betsy,” Soldier ventured, “we’re just checking possibilities, that’s all. We’re not accusing anybody.”

“Well, you hadn’t better be,” she admonished. “I know all these people. None of them are stalkers and none of them are capable of murder, and I’m sure of it.” She paused and softened her tone. “I’m almost certainly positively sure of it. What else have you got?”

Taylor leaned back in his chair. “Holly Miller, Rita Barton, and the rest of the staff—Morgan, Neal, and Martin—are all longtime residents of Port Henry. I’m still checking, but other than one messy divorce, one speeding ticket, and a couple of parking violations, these people all seem to be clean. But who knows? If I keep digging, something may pop yet.”

Soldier turned to Betsy. “We still haven’t talked about neighbors, professional acquaintances, service people such as hair dressers, the mailman, grocery store clerks. The list is virtually endless.”

“It just can’t be one of them. They’re all normal-looking, normal-behaving people who—”

“Betsy,” Soldier interrupted, running his fingers through his hair in frustration at her refusal to accept the truth. “I’m sure the guy who’s doing this is a seven-foot-tall, one-eyed drooling hunchback with a limp, with a tangle of greasy white hair, who holds a bloody butcher knife in one fist while the knuckles of his other hand drag along the ground.”

Taylor looked up. “You didn’t tell me we were looking for my ex-wife’s boyfriend.”

“But,” Soldier continued, ignoring his brother’s acerbic wit, “until there’s a full moon and he emerges from his bone-strewn Dumpster to drag his decaying carcass up the street to accost you again, we’ve got to go with other possibilities.”

Betsy sat back in her chair and crossed her arms under her breasts. “Well, you don’t have to get all sarcastic about it.” She shrugged and tilted her head. “It really could be anybody. I know that. I’ve known that all along. I just didn’t want to believe it.”

“I know,” Soldier said softly.

Taylor left the table to pour a cup of coffee. When he’d settled himself again, he said, “Okay, the note on the dog’s collar was a blank. No prints except for Betsy’s.” He took a sip from his mug. “Something did come up on someone else, though. It could be important, or it could be nothing.”

Both Soldier and Betsy turned their attention to Taylor. His eyes scanned the sheet he held in front of him. Handing the paper to Soldier, he waited while his brother read it.

When Soldier had finished, the brothers exchanged glances. “Yeah,” Soldier said. “I know. I talked to them late last night.”

“Hey, cut it out,” Betsy groused. “Enough with the meaningful looks. What’s going on?”

Soldier slid the paper toward Betsy. With shaking hands, she lifted the report and read it. When she finished, she slid it back toward Soldier, then sat staring at the tips of her fingers.

“So, he’s out. Daddy.”

Soldier nodded.

“And they don’t know where he is except he’d said he wanted to see me.”

Soldier nodded again.

Betsy’s eyes clouded with worry, bringing out Soldier’s every protective instinct. She was a mass of nerves, and this new development had just made things worse. Pushing herself away from the table, she said, “He wouldn’t hurt me. He would never
hurt
me!”

The back door swung open then, and Loretta walked in, Piddle under one arm, a bag of groceries under the other.

Soldier rose from his chair and took the groceries from her.

“Oh, you’re all up. How cozy,” Loretta observed. “Darling, I thought you’d need some necessities, what with guests and all. Champagne, very dry; caviar, very expensive.” She pushed a lock of flaming hair away from her forehead. At last looking directly at her daughter, she said, “Who wouldn’t hurt you, Elizabeth?”

Betsy blew out a breath, obviously unsure of what her mother’s reaction to the news would be.

“Prepare yourself, Loretta. It’s Daddy. He’s out. The hospital released him three months ago, and Uncle Terry has no idea where he is.”

An hour had passed since Loretta heard the news, flung herself into a fit of hysterics, clutched that mongrel to her bosom and fled out the back door. Taylor had decided to walk the seven blocks over to a farmer’s market and pick up some real groceries, leaving him to watch Betsy as she paced her living room. Her usually gentle eyes were filled with resolve.

“I refuse to be a prisoner in my own house,” she said evenly. Her eyes sparkled with determination, but her body language spoke of her fears: arms crossed, head down, mouth tight. “I refuse to believe my father has had anything to do with any of this. I refuse to listen to one more word about your so-called suspicions.”