The Science of Loving (44 page)

When I finally relented, and eased my fingers out, she shivered. Feeling devilish, I caught her eye. “That’s one.” The look on her face was priceless. I let her scramble away, giving her a head start before I lunged after her, turning her laughter into breathy squeals when I caught her.

“Yeah?” I growled, giving her a look that said she was lucky the phone interrupted our wrestling.

“Hello, this is Detective Ledesma with the SDPD. I’m trying to reach Dr. Angelina Martin.”

“Yeah, she’s right here. Hold on, I’ll put you on speaker.”

“Dr. Martin?”

“Yes, I’m here.”

“Are you okay talking with…”

“Mathew James? Yes it’s fine.” She smirked. “He’s my bodyguard.”

“And boyfriend.” I added, pulling her close.

“And my boyfriend.” She agreed, batting my hands away from her tits. I didn’t know how she expected me to keep my hands off her when she was in her birthday suit. It was my favorite outfit.

The detective cleared his throat and continued. “Well, we’ve had a surprise development in your case—a good development. Weird, but good—we have your attacker in custody. He was arrested last night in an unrelated assault. When we ran his prints, they matched the ones left on your car as well as ones from a cold vehicular homicide case.”

“That’s great—not the homicide—I mean catching the bad guy.” She clapped a hand over her mouth then mumbled red faced. “You know what I mean.” She was adorable when she rambled.

“Yes Dr. Martin, I do.” The detective’s grin came over the phone clearly before he turned serious. “Can either of you tell me anything about Avery Johnson?”
Motherfucker.

“He’s an ex-employee of mine. We’re in the process of filing a complaint against him for unauthorized use of a company credit card.”

“Could Mr.Johnson’s attack on Dr. Martin be out of revenge?”

“That’s possible. You also might want to check his connection to Angie’s mother. The two of them ambushed her at a coffee shop. Her folks are in the middle of a divorce. There’s a lot of money involved, and it’s getting nasty.”

“No, that doesn’t make sense; Mom would lose even more if I died. Without an heir the trust goes to the National Science Foundation.”

“Maybe he wasn’t trying to kill you. What if your dad’s mishap wasn’t really a mishap? When it didn’t end the way they’d planned, they decided to grab you. How much would your dad pay to get you back? Or me and my family? We’d liquidate everything to see you safe.”

“What happened to your father?” the detective asked after a brief pause. He was probably taking notes.

“He had a hit and run with a bicyclist that almost knocked him into traffic.”

“Yeah, and if anything happens to him, Angie becomes trustee to the family fortune. After your mom’s earlier freak-out, I wouldn’t put anything past either one of them. We know Avery’s not above extortion. He blackmailed Max.”

“Blackmailed?” The detective sighed heavily.

“Maximilian Karlson. Yeah, we have all the ingredients for our own soap opera: a sex scandal, big money, divorce, intrigue, blackmail.”

“You wouldn’t happen to know the nature of the blackmail?”

“Only second hand, Max recently confessed to my other partner, Tom Reid, so you’ll want to ask him. The three of us met in college, and after we graduated, we started an architecture firm, James, Karlson and Reid Enterprises. Avery was the catalyst for our split. So who did the douchebag assault?”

“A stripper. He allegedly smacked her when she refused to give him a lap dance. Big mistake. Her boyfriend’s an MMA trainer.”

“Un-fucking-believable.”

“When the police showed up, she was kicking his ass in the parking lot.” Damn, that was twice in one week a girl had gotten the better of him. Gotta love serendipity.

Angie was shivering by the time we said our good byes. “You don’t really believe Mom would purposely harm me, do you?”

I did, but I knew that wasn’t what she needed to hear. “Sweetie, all she’d have to do is mention the trust. It wouldn’t matter if she did it on purpose, it’s a twofer… Avery could get revenge
and
money.” Needing to lighten the mood, I swatted her butt. “Now get into the kitchen woman, and make me a sandwich. You think I can live on pie alone? I’m going to call the folks.”

The call was short but informative. When Mom started cursing in Spanish, I knew Stephanie was about to learn Angie wasn’t alone anymore. It was dangerous messing with someone my mom claimed, and she’d claimed Angie right there in that Walmart parking lot. Through their work over the years, my parents had made friends with everyone from the low riding, ‘We’re not a gang, we’re a car club,
esé
.’
to bankers and politicians, and they were owed plenty of favors. Stephanie couldn't imagine the shit storm that was about to rain down on her.

The police still had my car, so Mat dropped me off for my Sunday caffeinating. I could barely hide my smile as he fled after Danny asked him if he wanted to hear about her latest yeast infection.

“That was just mean,” I told her as she snickered. She had way too much fun messing with him. Maybe being an only child wasn't so bad after all.

“Well, how are we supposed to talk, when all the good stuff is on his stupid list?”

“What list?” Les asked.

“He has a list of topics he considers unseemly.”

“There’s just some things he’s not comfortable discussing with his mother and baby sister.” I said, feeling the need to defend him. Lord knows I wouldn’t want to hear intimate details about my dad. Just thinking about it weirded me out.

“Yeah, whatever.”

“Hey guys, sorry I’m late.” Carla slid in next to Danny. “What happened to your face?”

“Long story.”

“So give me the Reader’s Digest version.”

“Flat tire on Wednesday, asshole jumped me, met my tire iron. Asshole assaulted a stripper on Friday, got his ass kicked again, got arrested.”

“Wait, what stripper?” Les demanded. “You never said anything about a stripper. As your favorite minion, I have the right to know these things, so I can be the one to break it on the grapevine.”

“Oh, it gets better.” Danny gloated. “Carla, guess who the asshole is?”

“It’s somebody we know?”

“Avery the douche.”

Carla held a hand to her mouth catching the coffee she was choking on. “Shit, well timed boss. He got his ass handed to him by a stripper? That’s fucking priceless.”

“Haven’t you guys ever seen a stripper work a pole? They’re freaking strong.” Les looked around the table. “YouTube people, duh.”

“Yeah, well this pole dancing stripper’s also into MMA.” Danny grinned.

“Hey, maybe she’d like to go out for coffee sometime.” Les shrugged. “What? She sounds interesting.”

“So did Avery go after Angie to get back at Mat?” Carla asked.

“Probably.”

“That and Angie’s loaded. Well, she’ll be loaded when her dad kicks the bucket,” Les piped in. “Again with the looks? Hey, I’m just saying what everybody’s thinking.”

See no filter. You always knew where you stood with her. That was why I threw her a bone. “You were right about Mom. She came by our place and had it out with us. God, it was ugly.”

“Shit, what’d Mat do?”

“Offered to throw her out, but let me handle it in the end.”

“And…”

“I threatened her with the police if she didn’t leave. I never want to see again.

“Hallelujah. It’s about damn time.”

“Yeah, well my ‘come to Jesus’ moment feels like crap.” I was tired of all the attention, so I turned the spotlight on Les. “So has Bob asked you out yet?”

“You better believe it.” Les fanned herself. “Who knew under that stiff exterior, beats the lonely heart of a freak?”

“Yeah, you have to watch out for those stiff ones.” Danny snickered then made me blush by winking at me.

I spent the rest of the morning learning more about my boss’s love life than I was entirely comfortable with, and being alternately appalled and intrigued as Les and Carla enter into a lively, and educational discourse on erotic body piercing. I liked having girlfriends. Even Carla was okay once you got past all the metal. By the time I texted Mat, my debauched goddess was humming on a caffeine high and my sides ached from laughing.

“Is it safe?”

“For you, but I don’t know about Bob.”

“????”

“Les met Carla.”

“Sh!t.”

It was too nice a day to spend indoors, so after picking me up, we spent the day strolling through Balboa Park, watching street performers and eating snacks at the International Houses. We ended up cuddling in the botanical gardens surrounded by the rich smell of plants and loam. I snuggled closer, and an elderly woman smiled when Mat kissed my hair as she passed by. I was content. A huge weight lifted from my shoulders as I finally realized, not just in my head, but in my heart, that he genuinely wanted me, that I was enough.

“Hey Jack, what’s up?”

“I had the strangest conversation with Stephanie. She’s suddenly ready to sign the divorce settlement, saying something about returning to the east coast.”

“Really.”

“Yep, you wouldn’t know anything about that would you?”

“Me? No.”

“Uh huh. Talk to your folks lately.”

“As a matter of fact, I talked them last night.” Hurricane Carmen didn’t waste any time. “You heard they arrested Angie’s attacker?”

“Yes, a detective called.”

“Maybe he called Stephanie too.”

“Maybe.” Jack sounded unconvinced, but let it drop. “How’s my baby.”

“More beautiful than ever.”

I smiled seeing her walk in sporting another pair of my boxers and one of my old tee shirts with ‘Erecting Monuments’ written across her chest
—I wonder if she realizes ‘Monumental Erections’ is written across the back
—it was a souvenir from an ‘Over-The-Line’ tournament. For the last sixty years, OMBAC, Old Mission Bay Athletic Club, a.k.a. Old Men Behaving As Children, has hosted the drunken tournament, raising money for a slew of charities. Part of the fun was getting the most juvenile and hopefully vulgar team name you could think of announced over the P.A. Ours was one of the tamer ones actually; Tom could be so touchy.

“Who was that?” I'd never seen her so relaxed, so open. Yesterday, she might’ve spent a better part of the afternoon blushing as we enjoyed the park, but not once did she hide.

“Just someone I’m working with on a side project.” Not a lie. “Drawers full of sexy lingerie and you put on my old rags?”

“Mmmmm, they’re comfy, sexy isn’t. Besides, you steal my sexy when I wear it. What’re you doing with them, hanging them on a secret serial killer alter?”

“Naw, it’s more like a shrine.” I tugged her down on my lap and she started giggling, “What?”

“I thought you might be a serial killer the first time I saw you. I even wondered if you’d squeeze me to death or just fuck the life right out of me.”

“The mouth on you girl, I’m shocked…”

She blushed. “You’re a vitiating influence.”
Vitiating huh, gonna have to look that one up.

“So, you’ve been obsessing on my dick all this time?”

“No…”

“How about now?”

“No…” I rubbed my hard-on against her ass. “Maybe…”

I flipped her on her back, pinning her. “Let’s see if I can change that to absolutely.”

Epilog