Your Bed or Mine? (30 page)

But he used the tip of the blade to toy with her.

Lightly.

Seductively.

Purposely.

He ran the tip of the cold steel across her bare foot.

Zada shivered.

The sensation, incredible.

The danger, more of a turn-on than she ever imagined.

Upward the blade moved.

Threatening.

Tantalizing.

Taunting her tender flesh.

Upward.

Along the inside of her right thigh.

Zada moaned.

Across her abdomen.

Zada moaned louder.

Right up to the valley between her breasts.

“Take the top off,” he ordered. “Slowly. There’s no need to hurry. I hope we have the rest of our lives.”

Tears filled Zada’s eyes.

Her fingers fumbled with the buttons of her silky top.

They couldn’t work fast enough to suit her.

Zada ripped the top off and threw it aside.

His gaze traveled downward to her lacy thong.

He ran the tip of the sword lightly across the fabric.

The sensation took her breath away.

“Off,” he commanded.

“And if I don’t take it off?” Zada asked.

“I’ll take it off for you,” he answered.

Slowly, she removed the thong.

She was exposed now.

Completely.

In more ways than one.

Her heart, full of an undying love for him.

Her body, naked and waiting for anything he wanted.

He lowered the sword, and placed it on the bed.

Those dark blue eyes, still holding her captive.

Zada smiled.

Seductively.

Rick wasn’t prepared when Zada slipped off the bed. She picked up the sword before he could stop her. Rick laughed when she
pointed it at him—nervous-like.

“This wasn’t part of your fantasy,” Rick reminded her.

“My fantasy,” Zada said. “My prerogative to change it until it suits me.”

Rick didn’t like the tone in her voice or the gleam in her eye. He walked over and turned on the bedside light. When he turned
back around, Zada placed the tip of the sword lightly against the waistband of his pants.

“Be careful with that thing now, Zada,” Rick told her, and he meant it. “It isn’t a toy.”

“Have you talked to anyone?”

What?

Rick said what he was thinking. “What did you say?”

“Have you talked to anyone?”

“No,” Rick said. “Why?”

“No one?”

“No,” Rick said. “The last person I’ve talked to is you.”

She moved the blade up the front of his shirt.

Rick gulped.

The blade moved up to his neck.

Rick was afraid to gulp.

Lightly.

Slowly.

Thankfully, the blade moved up to his chin.

Rick held his breath.

The blade moved lightly across his lips.

Up to his nose.

Their eyes met.

Zada smiled.

And knocked the hat right off his head.

“Jesus, Zada!”

Rick frowned at her.

“Take the cape off,” she ordered.

“Put. The. Sword. Down,” Rick pleaded.

“Do you want me to take it off for you?” she asked.

“Okay, okay!” Rick said and frowned at her again. “Cape coming off here, master. Cape coming off.”

He jerked the cape off and threw it on the floor.

“Now, the shirt.”

Rick pulled the hem of his black Zorro shirt out of the waistband of his black tight-fitting Zorro costume pants, pulled it
over his head, and threw it across the room.

“And
this,
” Rick said, hands at his waist now, “is exactly why no self-respecting man should ever dress up in a flipping Zorro costume
trying to fulfill his wife’s fantasy.”

“No talking,” she ordered.

She pointed at his pants with the tip of the sword.

“Now, the pants.”

Rick laughed nervously. “No way,” he said, shaking his head. “Not until you put down that sword.”

“Shall I slice them off for you?”

Rick jumped back when Zada made the sign of Zorro—zip, zip, zip—through the air.

“Okay, Zada, I get the picture,” Rick said, his fingers fumbling with the buttons on the pants as fast as possible. “I know
this is payback for me being such an ass. And if it makes you feel any better, I know I deserve it.”

“
Keep
talking,” Zada said this time.

Rick slipped off his loafers. He pulled the pants down, and stepped out of them. After he stood up, he kicked the pants aside.

He reached up to take off the mask.

“Leave the mask on,” she ordered.

Rick dropped his hands and wisely covered his privates.

“I said keep talking,” she said. “Go back to that ‘I know I deserve it’ part.”

It was all Zada could do to keep a straight face.

Too bad she was holding a sword, instead of a camera.

Rick? Wearing nothing but a black mask? His hands over his privates?

A Kodak moment if I’ve ever seen one!

“Well?” Zada said, practicing the Zorro sign again.

Zip. Zip. Zip.

Dark blue eyes peered out at her through the mask.

But the look in his eyes left no doubt he was sincere.

“I still haven’t figured everything out, Zada,” Rick said. “You have to admit yourself, from my point of view, none of it
makes any sense. But I know just as well as I know that I’m standing here right now, buck naked and with a sharp sword pointed
at my privates, that you’re telling me the truth. As crazy as it all sounds, I trust you. And I know you wouldn’t cheat on
me.”

“Where were you last night?” Zada demanded.

“I stayed in a motel,” Rick said. “Why?”

“And you’re sure no one told you that Alicia’s brother was responsible for the phone calls and the photograph?”

“Alicia’s brother?” Rick look surprised. “I didn’t even know Alicia had a brother.”

“Right answer,” Zada told him.

She walked over to the armoire on the other side of their bedroom, opened the door, and placed the sword safely inside the
cabinet. When she turned back around, Zada smiled.

“Turn the light off,” she told Rick.

Rick reached over and switched off the light.

She walked up and pushed him backward onto the bed.

Rick grabbed her hand and pulled her on top of him.

“I really do like the mask,” Zada whispered.

“Want me to leave it on?” Rick whispered back.

Zada’s answer was a long, delicious I’ll-love-you-forever kiss.

Six months later.

Zada’s soy coffee flavor on Monday morning—exactly two weeks before Christmas—was Sugar & Spice and Everything Nice. She’d
chosen that particular flavor for a special reason: that’s what little girls are made of.

Besides, Zada doubted any coffee company—soy or not—would name a flavor Nails & Snails and Puppy Dog Tails.

But boy or girl, it didn’t matter to Zada.

She knew it didn’t matter to Rick, either.

She smiled, running her hand over her flat stomach, and wondering what it was going to feel like in a few more months when
she started showing.

She smiled again, thinking how nervous Rick had been the night before—pacing back and forth in the den—both of them waiting
the torturous time it took for a plus or a minus to appear in the test circle.

They’d both been so excited, they’d jumped around the den screaming like children themselves, poor Simon barking his disapproval
at their rowdiness. Another smile crossed her lips, thinking about Rick’s last words when he’d left for the center only a
few hours earlier.

He’d said with a proud grin, “Go ahead and tell the girls the good news, Mommy. You tell each other everything else. No reason
to keep something this important from them.”

She’d hugged him.

And kissed him.

And thanked Rick for understanding.

They’d called their families as soon as they found out. His parents, both ecstatic over a first grandchild. Her mother, already
praying for a granddaughter. Sally, promising to go through her baby clothes.

When she thought about it, getting pregnant really couldn’t have come at a better time. Her book
Quack, Quack, Recycle That!
was finished. Her editor loved it. Her publicist was even working on a guest appearance for her and Simon on the Animal Planet
network, during the week after Christmas when they would begin their tour of children’s hospitals.

By the time it was close to the baby arriving, all of her commitments would be completed. Then she would do what a mother
was supposed to do—focus on nothing but her newborn baby.

Baby.

Jen, Tish, and Alicia were going to freak!

Zada walked to the laundry room, and pulled on her jacket. She stepped into her snow boots, and went back to the kitchen for
her cup of Sugar & Spice and Everything Nice.

It had snowed over the weekend. And with the weather they’d been having so far this winter, it looked as if a white Christmas
would be a good possibility.

Zada smiled at that thought, too.

She headed out her front door, and started across the street. But she stopped midway, surprised to see the large moving van
sitting in the middle of street, two doors down.

Alicia had sold the house a few weeks back, but all of the details had been handled by an attorney, not the buyers themselves.
Alicia had been a little worried because everything had been completely hush-hush throughout the entire sale.

Not knowing who their new neighbors were going to be had driven Tish crazy. She’d come up with every scenario possible from
victims in a witness protection program to a Chicago mobster hoping to hide his family out in the ’burbs. She and Jen would
never admit it to Tish, but the fact that everything had been kept under wraps had worried them, too.

Zada glanced at the moving van again.

Mobster or whoever, what person in their right mind would move this close to Christmas? Especially if they had kids?

Kids.

Zada smiled and hurried on across the street.

She walked up Tish’s porch and stomped the snow off her boots. Once she stepped inside, she left her wet boots by the front
door, and padded down the hallway in her stocking feet.

“Hey, have you guys seen the moving van? I guess our mystery neighbors have finally arrived.” Zada said this as she walked
into Tish’s kitchen. She was talking to an empty room.

“We’re in here,” Tish yelled out.

Zada walked into Tish’s dining room.

Tish, Jen, and Alicia were all standing at Tish’s dining room window, sipping from their coffee cups, staring out the window.
Zada didn’t have to ask what had drawn them to the window.

Zada walked up behind them. Everyone shifted over to make room. They all stood at the window, sipping coffee, staring.

“Who in their right mind would move two weeks before Christmas?” Zada asked, saying exactly what she’d been thinking as she
walked across the street.

Alicia said, “I’m sure Jake Sims is asking himself that same question right now.”

Zada’s mouth fell open. “Get out!” she said. “You mean as in retired Chicago Cubs first baseman, Jake Sims?”

Tish said, “I prefer to think of him as he who looks damn good in those underwear commercials, Jake Sims.”

“You would,” Jen snorted. “How about always making the headlines for his wild parties, Jake Sims? Or, dated every bimbo starlet
from coast-to-coast, Jake Sims? And especially not exactly the kind of neighbor we need in Woodberry Park, Jake Sims?”

Alicia said, “Who, as of six weeks ago, became a single dad with custody of his twelve-year-old daughter who hasn’t lived
with him since she was an infant, Jake Sims.”

Tish said, “I don’t care what Jake Sims you want to call him, the twins are going to pee themselves when I tell them a famous
Chicago Cubs baseball player is moving right across the street.”

“The twins are going to pee themselves?” Zada laughed. “Try Joe, Charlie, and Rick are going to pee themselves.”

Zada looked back at Alicia. “Are you sure about this, Alicia?”

Always quick to answer Tish said, “Alicia finally got the scoop last night. Jake’s attorney handled the sale so the past owners
wouldn’t jack up the price because Jake was the buyer. He called Alicia since she was both the Realtor and Jake’s new neighbor,
and asked Alicia if she would let the movers in this morning.”

“It’s a sad story, actually,” Alicia said. “You may have heard it on the news when Jake’s ex-wife was killed in a car accident
out in LA. That’s where she and the daughter were living. His ex-wife was only thirty-eight years old. Tragic, for her and
the daughter.”

Daughter.

Zada absently ran her hand over her stomach.

Tish said, “Jake’s taking the daughter on a Disney cruise over the holidays. He obviously realizes how hard this first Christmas
is going to be for his daughter without her mother. They won’t officially move in until after the New Year.”

Tish paused, then looked over at Jen. “Tell me, Jen,” Tish said. “Does that sound to you like someone we don’t want for a
neighbor?”

Jen rolled her eyes.

Zada was still thinking about the car accident. The poor daughter, losing her mother so young.

Mother.

I’m going to be someone’s mother!

Without warning, Zada burst into tears.

Tish handed Zada a tissue.

Zada blew her nose.

Alicia handed Zada a glass of water.

Zada took a drink.

But when Jen put a hand on her forehead to check her temperature, Zada had had enough.

“Would the three of you stop it, already?”

Jen looked at Tish.

Tish looked at Alicia.

Alicia looked back at Zada.

“Sorry, Zada,” Alicia said, “but you scared us half to death. One minute we were standing there talking. The next minute you
were sobbing your heart out.”

“I’m sorry I scared you,” Zada said. She reached for her coffee cup and held it up. “I think my bursting into tears has something
to do with the flavor of coffee I’m drinking this morning.”

Alicia looked at Tish.