Unlawful Contact (22 page)

“That’s what I’ve always assumed.”

She filled the tea kettle, put it on the stove, then turned to face him, leaning back against the counter, waiting for the water to boil. “Two kilos of coke is a
lot
of coke. That has to be worth—”

“About five hundred grand on the streets. The shit was uncut.”

“Wow! Geez!” She couldn’t even imagine that much cash. Okay, so maybe she could
imagine
it. “So someone stole it from the evidence room and planted it on you to make it seem you had a motive and a reason to premeditate murder.”

Hunt nodded. “Something like that.”

“That seems like a lot of work and a lot of risk. Why not just kill you?”

“That’s easy. Think about it. If I’m caught with drugs, Cross’s death makes sense. I shot him because he discovered I was crooked, and I go to prison. Crime solved. But if I’m found with a bullet in my head—”

She understood. “Then the cops have another crime to solve and lots of loose ends.”

He grinned. “Exactly. The cops start digging, asking questions about Cross, about me. They find Megan. The whole thing blows up in this guy’s face. By making sure I went down, this bastard covered his own ass. He made sure the buck stopped with me.”

“So the man we’re looking for had to have access to the evidence room. That means he had to be DEA or a police officer back then, right?”

He shook his head. “Not necessarily. The stuff they found on me was an exact chemical match for some shit Cross and I had brought in a couple of weeks prior to the shooting—eighteen bricks of uncut Colombian. That’s why it was so incriminating. I’m guessing Cross lifted some of it himself when he and I drove it to the incinerator.”

Sophie mulled over this information, got nowhere, moved on to something else. “Here’s something I don’t understand. Whoever planted the heroin on Megan had to have access to New Horizons. Would a guard from Denver County Jail be able to come and go from a halfway house at will?”

Hunt seemed to consider this. “Only if he were transporting someone that day. Otherwise, probably not.”

“Would New Horizons have video surveillance?”

“They might, though not in residents’ rooms. Still, we might be able to see who entered her room if they have cameras in the halls. If it happens to be a guard from Denver County, we’ll know we have him.”

“The place was swarming with cops that morning. There were five squad cars there.” Sophie remembered how stunned she’d been to realize the police were there because of Megan. “I’m sure lots of people entered her room.”

“You know, that’s the thing.” He leaned forward, rested his arms on his knees. “I’ve always figured Cross’s accomplice for a cop. Whoever he is, he was able to stash the drugs like a pro and arrange for a second search of my house.”

“Who’s to say he isn’t? Maybe the guard thing was totally random—” And then it hit her. “Or maybe Cross had more than one accomplice. You told me that Megan said ‘they’ would come after her, right? Maybe she wasn’t as drugged out as she seemed. Maybe she wasn’t referring to Cross. Maybe she really meant ‘they.’”

Hunt stared at her. Then he squeezed his eyes shut and buried his face in his hands, and she knew he was thinking of his sister. “God! Gang raped?
Gang raped
, Sophie?”

It was a horrifying, sickening thought.

Then he looked up at her, his gaze seeming to measure her. “You’d make a good agent.”

Behind her, the kettle whistled.

“Obviously not, or I wouldn’t have screwed up today at the drugstore.” Sophie turned back to the stove, filled her mug with steaming hot water, then set the kettle aside.

It all seemed so obvious in hindsight. Women who were hiding alone in hotels didn’t need pills or condoms, therefore she shouldn’t have been seen buying any. Why hadn’t she realized that herself?

“Hey, I told you—this is new for you.” He walked up behind her, slid one arm around her waist, nuzzled the side of her throat, planting little kisses that made her insides melt and her knees go wobbly. “Quit beating yourself up.”

“It’s not a small mistake, Hunt. I endangered both of us.” She took her tea, pushed past him, and walked back to the table. “So, is there anything that stands out for you?”

He opened the fridge, grabbed a Murphy’s, popped the top. “The smack I found in your apartment looked like it was laced with fentanyl.”

“So did the stuff they found in my rental car.”

“And wouldn’t you know it, the stuff they found in Megan’s room tested positive for fentanyl, too. I think you ought to ask the paper or your attorney to demand the lab results on all of it. If we can find out where it came from, we might be able to find our perp.”

“I guess fentanyl is the hot thing these days.” She took a sip of her tea. “There’ve been two overdoses in the past couple weeks—one involving a young prostitute and the other a female inmate at the Denver County…
Jail
.”

She heard her own words, looked up at Hunt, chills skittering down her spine.

He crossed the room until he stood over her, the look on his face dead serious. “
Two
ODs? Both young women and both involving fentanyl? That’s damned strange.”

“The one at Denver County was found dead in her cell, a ruptured balloon in her stomach. I covered it.” And she’d been so distracted by Hunt that she’d barely paid attention to the details of the article. She couldn’t even remember the victim’s name.

“Jesus!” He set his beer on the table. “I want to know everything there is to know about both victims.”

“Couldn’t it just be coincidence?”

“If drop dead were on the streets, there wouldn’t be
two
ODs. There would be fifty or a hundred. Injection drug users would be dropping like flies all over Denver, and the ERs would be packed with addicts on respirators.”

“So you’re saying the drug
isn’t
on the streets. How would they get it?”

“Maybe it
is
just coincidence, but we know that Cross and company brutalized other girls besides Megan.” Hunt sat down, met her gaze, his face hard. “What better way to get rid of someone you want to silence, particularly someone with a history of addiction, than to give her a deadly drug she can’t resist?”

S
OPHIE LOGGED OFF
the Internet, wishing there were more she could do tonight. She’d sent e-mails to her attorney and to Tom, asking for the information she needed and telling them as much as she safely could about her situation. She’d asked Hunt to read the e-mails before she sent them, just to make certain she didn’t inadvertently screw up again.

“I’m Marc Hunter, and I approved this message,” he’d joked, kissing her cheek.

Not surprisingly, Tom had written back almost immediately. The man lived at his desk and was never far from his e-mail. He’d told her he’d already planned to follow up with DOC on her open-records request on Monday morning and assured her the paper would not let it drop. He’d also promised to get a hold of the test results on all of the heroin and to order CBI background checks on both overdose victims. Then he’d warned her to keep her head down.

“Your desk is waiting for you,” he’d written.

Since when did an e-mail from Tom leave her feeling choked up?

Since your life went to hell, Alton.

Oh, yeah. Well, okay. As long as there was a reason.

John Kirschner had replied in short, staccato sentences, letting her know that he’d already filed a formal complaint with the jail and would be more than happy to subpoena New Horizons’s surveillance tapes—if any such tapes existed. Then he’d reminded her not to miss her arraignment on Thursday morning and asked her to schedule an appointment sometime in the next couple of weeks to go over her case in detail.

Sophie shut down Hunt’s laptop and walked out of the bedroom to the laundry room, where she retrieved her clothes from the dryer and changed into them. Then she followed her nose toward the incredible smells that seemed to be coming from the kitchen. Had Hunt made dinner? God, she hoped so, because she was suddenly starving. The last time she’d eaten a real meal had been lunch. And that had been yesterday.

She turned the corner but found the kitchen empty, pots on the stove and dishes piled in the sink. Then she heard the unmistakable
pop
of a champagne cork coming from the living room. She walked down the hallway, stepped through the doorway, and froze.

Two white candles sat in silver candleholders in the middle of a coffee table, their golden flames reflected in the dark, polished wood. The coffee table sat in the center of the room between two plush sofas and across from the fireplace, where a cozy fire crackled. Two places had been set with linen, silver, and crystal. Nearby on the floor sat a silver champagne chiller filled with crushed ice. The sultry sound of jazz drifted in the background.

Hunt poured out the champagne. “How’d it go?”

“Wow.”
For a moment, that’s all she could say.

“Are you hungry?” He bent down, stuck the bottle in the chiller, then stood and walked toward her. He was still wearing his jeans, but he’d put on a sleek black shirt and had rolled up the sleeves. He looked casual, sexy…delicious.

“This is amazing.”

When was the last time a man had done something romantic like this for her?

Never. That’s when.

“I hope you like salmon.” He slid his arm around her waist, ducked down, and brushed a kiss over her lips.

“I love salmon. What are we celebrating?”

He pressed his forehead to hers, looked straight into her eyes. “
Now
, Sophie—we are celebrating
now
.”

She felt her breath catch, something bittersweet rushing through her, part hope, part despair. And suddenly she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.

“Go make yourself comfortable.” He released her and strode down the hallway toward the kitchen.

She walked over to the coffee table, sat on the thickly carpeted floor, and stared into the fire, its warmth seeping into the cold places inside her.

There’s no “happily ever after” for us, sprite. There’s now. Only now.

Could it be that simple?

Could it be any more simple?

Neither of them had any idea what was going to happen tomorrow or even five minutes from now, but rather than worrying about it, Hunt was savoring every moment, trying to experience as many of the pleasures of life as he could before they were taken from him forever.

Tears pricked Sophie’s eyes, but she fought them back, determined not to spoil the mood Hunt had obviously worked so hard to create. She needed to put her fears aside and take hold of this little taste of heaven he was offering—if not for her own sake then most certainly for his. This was as close to a normal life as he was going to get.

There’s now. Only now.

Well, happy endings were overrated anyway.

Hunt walked back through the doorway and set two dinner plates on the coffee table. Sophie’s mouth watered. On each sat a grilled salmon filet covered with a relish of tomatoes and black olives next to buttery baby potatoes and steamed asparagus.

“I didn’t know you could cook.”

“I can’t—but I can read a recipe as well as the next guy.” He sat, a lopsided grin on his handsome face. Then he picked up his champagne glass and fixed her with his piercing gaze. “To now.”

She raised her glass, smiled. “To now.”

Champagne tickled its way down her throat straight into her empty stomach. She set her glass down and tucked her napkin in her lap.

He picked up his napkin. “So what did they say?”

It took her a moment to realize what he was asking. “Tom said he’ll follow up on the request for the report and do the background checks. My attorney said he’ll subpoena the halfway house’s surveillance records if they have any.”

“How long do you think it will take?”

“I can’t be sure, but I’m guessing we’ll have the information from the background checks by midday Monday. That usually takes only a couple of hours.”

“Perfect. That means we can spend the weekend searching this place for information about Megan’s life.” He picked up his fork. “Bon appétit.”

The food was delicious, the salmon soft and flaky, the relish adding tang and saltiness, the asparagus cooked to a perfect crispness. The champagne was cold and dry with a long mineral finish that went straight to Sophie’s head. The tension of the past week began to melt away, the shadows chased away by good food and drink, the warmth of the fire, and the heat of his gaze. She found herself telling him about her parents’ restaurant—how she’d all but grown up in the kitchen, being coddled, fed, and fussed over by a staff of finicky French chefs and a sommelier who took her wine education seriously, even when she was six.

“That sounds like a wonderful way to grow up.”

“I probably would have become the manager or maybe the wine buyer if…”

If her parents hadn’t been killed.

Marc saw the grief in Sophie’s eyes and knew where her thoughts had taken her.

She cleared her throat. “Sorry. I’m babbling.”

“No, you’re not.” He reached over, took her hand, gave it reassuring squeeze. “It must have been the most horrible thing in the world to lose your mom and dad.”

She nodded, took a deep breath—and then changed the subject. “So tell me about the army. Did you grow up wanting to be a soldier?”

He couldn’t help but laugh. “Hell, no! I grew up wanting my mother to stop drinking and using and start acting like other kids’ moms. I didn’t spend a single moment thinking about the future. By the time I was a senior, it was clear that the army was my only chance to avoid mowing lawns and changing oil for the rest of my life.”

As they finished the meal, he told her about boot camp and how the meanest master sergeant on the face of the earth—a bastard by the name of Stracher—had kicked his ass into gear. He told her how he’d discovered he had skill with target shooting. He told her how he’d been transferred into Special Forces after 9/11 and deployed to Afghanistan as a sniper, where he’d spent a winter high in the frigid mountains near Tora Bora.

“It must have been very hard.” Her cheeks were flushed, her body relaxed, her gaze focused on him, a dreamy look in her big blue eyes. She was obviously feeling the champagne. “I’m so glad you made it home in one piece.”

“You know what kept me warm at night?” He leaned in closer, brushed a strand of hair from the satin of her cheek. “I kept thinking about this beautiful girl from my hometown. I only spent one night with her—just one night—but it was the sweetest night of my life. She gave me her virginity and told me to shoot for the stars. I tried, Sophie. I tried to shoot for the stars.”

He must have been feeling the alcohol, too, or he never would have said anything like that. Or maybe it wasn’t the champagne. Maybe it was just being near her like this. He seemed to be running at the mouth a lot lately.

She turned her head, nuzzled her cheek against his palm, her skin unbelievably soft, her eyes drifting shut. “Did you really think of me these past six years?”

He ran the pad of his thumb over her lower lip. “Oh, yes. I thought about you. Dreamed about you. Fantasized—”

Her eyes flew open, her pupils wide and dark. “About me?”

“Yeah.”
Slow down, Hunter. Do you really think a woman wants to know that sort of thing?
“Does that bother you?”

She shook her head, the flush on her cheeks going deeper, her lips parting on a breathy whisper. “I was just thinking we could…you know…try out a few of those, um, fantasies. While we have the chance.”

And that
right there
blew away any fantasy.

He tried to say something, but all the blood in his body had rushed to his crotch.

“So, Marc Hunter, where do you want me?”

Geez-us!

Where did he want her? God, he wanted her everywhere. Against the wall. Spread-eagle on the bed. On her hands and knees. In the hot tub. On the dining room table. In the Jag. Hell,
on
the Jag.

But one fantasy stood out above the rest. “It’s not so much
where
I want you, Sophie, as it is
how
. Nothing tastes quite like a woman, and no woman tastes like you.”

She gave an almost inaudible gasp. “Then you want…”

“I want dessert.” He stood, reached for her, drew her onto the couch beneath him.

He kissed her out of her blouse, suckling her through her bra until she was whimpering and writhing, her nipples straining against the wet lace. Then he moved on to her pants, drawing the fabric down her long legs, tasting his way down her silky skin, over her sensitive calves to the tips of her little toes. But as scrumptious as her skin was, this wasn’t the taste he hungered for most.

He worked his way back up her legs, nudging her thighs apart with his hands, inhaling the wild, musky scent of her arousal, filling his lungs with her. Yes,
this
was it, the scent he’d wanted inside his head for so, so long. But now he wanted a taste.

He licked her inner thighs along the edge of her panties, heard her gasp, her fingers sliding into his hair, rough lace and soft skin both sweet against his tongue. Then he drew back and licked his way up the lace where it covered her cleft, the soft folds of her labia beneath. When his tongue felt the tiny bud of her clit, he held himself still, flicking it through the thin cloth, feeling it swell.

She whimpered, lifted her hips eagerly toward his mouth. “Please, Hunt!”

He chuckled. “Sorry, but this is my fantasy, and I’m going to take my sweet time.”

She gave a pained moan. “Is this your ‘torture Sophie’ fantasy?”

“No, it’s my ‘Sophie lets me do whatever I want to do’ fantasy. I’m going lick you everywhere, until your scent is imprinted on my brain, until I can taste you in my dreams, until you saturate my skin. So settle in because this is probably going to take awhile.”

He saw her belly contract, felt her shiver, and knew what he’d said excited her.

“But…what about you?”

“Sweetheart, this
is
for me.”

Sophie couldn’t believe what she was feeling, the arousal so fierce as Hunt tormented her with his lips and teeth and tongue, licking, nipping, and sucking her most tender places, bringing her to the edge again and again, only to trail scorching kisses across her belly or the inside of her knees or her throat, letting the inferno inside her cool before finding his way back to the place she burned hottest. And she
was
burning, her skin now so sensitive that no matter where he touched her, his mouth felt like fire, a river of hot cream flowing between her legs. Her senses were overloaded, her lungs straining for breath, her nails cutting into his shoulders, into the fabric of the sofa, into her own palms as she tried to hold on.

And he hadn’t even taken off her panties yet.

When he did, slipping his hands beneath her to pull the soaking cloth down her legs, the anticipation was almost more than she could take. She opened her eyes, felt her heart trip as he settled his head between her thighs and parted her gently with his fingers, his gaze fixed on the most private part of her, an expression of blatant male hunger on his face.

“Hunt, I—oh!”

He cut her off with one long swipe of his tongue, whatever she’d wanted to say lost in a rush of pleasure. “Give yourself to me, Sophie.”

And then Sophie was lost, his tongue stroking her, flicking her, thrusting deeply into her, his lips tugging on her aching clitoris, suckling her, drawing her into the heat of his mouth, one of his arms thrown across her hips to keep her from bucking. Again and again he drove her to the brink, only to back off and leave her hanging in midair, desperate, panting, begging him to fill the throbbing emptiness inside her and finish this.

Then at last he slid up the length of her body and kissed her long and hard on the mouth, his skin drenched with her own wild taste and scent. She reached for his zipper, frantic to free the bone-hard ridge of his cock and feel it inside her. But he caught her hands.