“Do not lose them,” Des hissed into his cell. “Whatever you do.”
“No way.” Wanatabe’s breezy tone pissed Des off. “We’ve got him cold, heading over the Fremont Bridge. Would be easier if I didn’t have to hold your hand while concentrating on doing my job, though.”
Des clicked to break the connection. “Fuck you, too,” he muttered, striding down the hospital corridor.
He was glad for the back-up, and Tom’s men were admirably flex about changing plans in midstream after he found out about Larsen, but he’d forgotten what a pain in the ass collaboration could be. He and Ava were a seasoned team, but Tom’s minions and their pumped up egos were going to be a challenge. It would have been less nerve-wracking to plant a GPS device on Larsen’s car than to actually tail him, but they couldn’t identify the vehicle until he took off in it.
Des was startled by how violently Larsen had pissed him off. He considered himself a very cool customer. A necessary character trait for a man who played such high-stakes games. Emotions resulted in mistakes. Mistakes were unacceptable. Dr. O had drilled that into them.
But that arrogant fucker Kev Larson was going to pay for talking to him like that. Correction: Kev McCloud. He was certain of it. He could feel that fact, humming in the air. He could smell it. That acrid, burning stink of destiny.
An Internet search to check out the face of the guy’s identical twin, the one who’d slit Dr. O’s throat, would confirm it. There had to be some resemblance, even with those godawful scars.
But he scarcely needed a confirmation. How Edie could fuck a man so hideously defaced was beyond him. The idea made him want to vomit. It he were Edie, he’d be flinching in horror whenever his eyes landed on the guy. Maybe she fucked with her eyes closed, or dog style.
He caught sight of himself in a window. Took a moment to check out his own impeccable, chiseled good looks. Smiled widely at himself, sucked on a tooth. Yes. Charming, dapper. Perfect.
Dickhead. Playing alpha dog with him. Pissing to mark his territory right there in a hospital corridor. Publically humiliating him. This brain damaged, fucked up, ugly, pathetic amnesiac asshole thought he could win a pissing contest with Desmond Marr, VP of Helix International, son of Raymond Marr, one of the richest men in America?
Wrong. Larsen was going to be humbled, and Des was going to enjoy the process, very much. So he felt territorial about Edie? Des would hit him where he lived. His mouth watered as he imagined going at that lithe body, pounding like an earth drill. Or having those plump, rosy lips wrapped around the base of his dick, anxiously sucking.
While Larsen watched, straining and grunting at the gag.
Yes. That would go a long way toward compensating Des for the discomfort of the preceding five minutes. And it didn’t have to stop there. Ava had said that McCloud was the prototypical X-Cog subject. Tough enough to crown and fuck around with for a while. Des could probably crown the guy himself without burning him. He wasn’t half bad at X-Cog crowning, no matter how Ava carped and carried on, with her insanely high standards about vestigial muscles and speech control and reverse sensory info, blah blah fucking blah. Spare him. It wasn’t like he had to make the guy do cross-stitch.
Des would crown that arrogant prick. Make him grovel and crawl. He’d roll over, eat from the floor, bark like a dog, lick Des’s shoes.
Yes, that would be Larsen’s life. What little was left of it. Until he started bleeding out his orifices, and they sent him to the boneyard.
The phone buzzed in his hand, interrupting his fantasy. The display told him it was Ava. Her tenth unanswered call since he’d left the hotel. Controlling bitch couldn’t just let him do his job. He muted the phone, stuck it back in his pocket unanswered. Av could wait.
He turned the corner to the ICU. There was Parrish’s family. The stringy plucked chicken of a sister. Charles’s sharp, masculine good looks did not translate well onto her face, sadly. Her daughter, Charles’s thick-bodied, dull-eyed niece, Tanya. The sweet little sister, Veronica, crying in a chair, looking luminous and vulnerable. Big limpid eyes, just like Edie’s. He ran his eyes down over her figure, in the modest lavender satin. Budding. Coming along nicely. He liked them super fresh from time to time. A taste he’d picked up from Tom, in their college days.
The shriveled bitch in the beaded black chiffon came hustling over. “Des! Thank goodness. Did you see her? Did you see that…that horrible person with her? Do you see what I mean about him?”
Des nodded, giving the woman a hug, careful not to inhale the powdery stink of her perfume. “I did, Mrs. Morris,” he said. “Knowing he was one of Osterman’s victims, and how he attacked Charles eighteen years ago, he’s certainly both brain damaged and mentally ill. Deadly dangerous, and to Edie most of all. She’s completely under his spell.”
The aunt flinched, theatrically. “We know.”
“I thought he seemed nice,” Veronica muttered, rebellious.
“Don’t talk about things you don’t understand,” the aunt scolded.
The phone buzzed again. Des pulled it out, expecting to see Ava again on the display, but it was Wanatabe. He hit the decode function, and smiled his apology to the ladies. “Yes?”
“We lost them,” Wanatabe announced.
Des was speechless for a moment. “What?” he spat out.
“He’s gone.” Wanatabe sounded defensive. “I have no idea how he made us, but he—”
“Not interested.” Des hung up, gave the ladies a reassuring grin. The rest of him wanted to howl like a hungry dog.
“I don’t know what to think of this wild story of Edie’s, about Uncle Charles being poisoned,” Tanya said. “I mean, the only person we can think of who would have a motive is that man. And the person with the best access was Edie. Like, do the math. It’s obvious.”
Des stared at her, acting astonished at the woman’s incredibly intelligent insight. “My God, Tanya! You’re so right! I can’t believe that didn’t occur to me. You must be unusually perceptive.”
Tanya simpered. “Women’s intuition, I guess.”
“When the lab has the results, they’ll probably assign a police officer to the case,” he said. “We have to make sure to explain this whole complicated situation right away. Make sure to stay available.”
“Anything for Uncle Charles,” Tanya said piously.
“I hate it that he’s out there with Edie,” Des fretted. “I’d like to question that son of a bitch myself.”
The pig faced security guy started digging in his pocket. “I have his business card,” he said.
Des stared. “You have what?”
“He gave it to Max Collier this afternoon.” The idiot stared at the thing, brow knitted. “Kev Larsen, Lost Boys Toys and Flywear.”
Des snatched it out of his hands. No home address, but he could pass what was there on to Tom, who could pry the necessary info out of the databases floating in cyberspace.
Then, the time consuming process of kissing, hugging, petting and reassuring the old biddy and her brain-dead spawn. He texted the data to Tom while loping to the parking garage. Ava could do the search, but she was probably in the middle of a screaming meltdown. Ava had to be kept busy. Her restless, unstable brain needed a constant source of data to crunch, the way a huge, slavering predatory animal in a cage needed constant chunks of bloody meat.
The phone buzzed again. Ava. He braced himself. No reason to put this off any longer. He decoded, hit talk. “Yes?”
“Where the fuck are you?” she screeched. “Why have you stopped answering your phone? Is this a time for adolescent power games?”
“Av, calm down—”
“Did they get her? Is she in the bag? Tell me she is.”
“No. Ava, I—”
“What do you mean, no? We clearly instructed those meatheads to nab the mealymouthed bitch while Parrish was having his fit! We’ve already planted the vials of Tamlix-12 at Edie’s apartment! And they wasted it? We stuck our asses miles out into the air for nothing?”
“Shut up, Av! They choked because I told them to choke!”
“Why? Goddamnit, Des!” Her voice was so shrill, he winced, and held the phone away from his ear.
“McCloud,” he said, letting the word punch through the momentum of her tirade like a bullet.
She went abruptly silent. Ah, the satisfaction. Those fleeting moments of Ava rendered speechless. It almost never happened.
“What?” she whispered.
“You heard me.”
“You mean, he’s alive? You know where he is?”
“I know better than that. He’s alive, and he’s a fucking amnesiac. No clue what happened to him. Can you believe it?”
“Oh. Oh, my God.” Her voice trembled with excitement. “Where?”
“Edie Parrish is fucking him. Tonight she asked if I could put her in touch with someone who could look through Dr. O’s archives. To find this guy’s family, his past. Isn’t that sweet, Av? You can imagine who came to mind. Don’t you feel the urge to help the poor fucker?”
“God, yes,” she moaned. “I’ll help him like he’s never been helped before.”
“So, you see? I had to leave her on the loose until we got a line on him. Now we bag them both. She left the banquet with him, and went to the hospital to check on her dad. I met them a few minutes ago—”
“Met them? You mean, you’ve met him? What’s he like?”
“Ugly,” Des said harshly. “He’s an arrogant, ugly prick, and he needs to be taken down.”
“That can be arranged, darling.” Ava was happy again, excitement bubbling in her smoky, seductive voice. “So what’s the plan?”
“Wanatabe was following them, but he lost them—”
“They can’t even tail a goddamn car?” she exploded.
“But I am retrieving his home address as we speak,” Des soothed. “We’ll get them. Soon. We just have to figure out how to play this. The cards have changed, babe. It’s better, now.”
“What do you mean? What’s to play? We take him. He’s ours. End of story.”
“No, Av,” he said patiently. “McCloud has a grudge against Parrish for letting Osterman dick his brain around. Now he’s fucking Parrish’s daughter. If we want to mess with the Parrishes, he’s our man. Suspect number one. It’s beautiful. An opportunity we cannot pass up.”
“You’re complicating things,” Ava scolded. “I need him as a reasearch subject, not a fall guy! He does me no good in jail!”
“Not jail,” Des wheedled. “Give me credit. He does dreadful deeds, then he disappears forever. The case stays open. The evil scientist, the obscene mind control experiments, the murdered billionaire who financed it all. The kidnapped heiress, his innocent daughter, raped and brainwashed, carried away to an awful fate, her body never found. Juicy, sexy stuff. They’ll write bestselling true crime novels about it.”
“I still think it’s too risky. Not when I need to—”
“Later, Av.” He broke the connection, slid into his Jag, and was about to dial Tom to see if he’d found an address. The phone buzzed.
Av, again. He gritted his teeth, decoded it. “What?” he snarled.
“Edie,” Ava whispered. “Did she look pretty tonight? Does fucking McCloud give her a nice rosy glow? Could you smell if she was wet for him? Tell me, Dessie. Did you like her?”
He cleared his throat, lust pumping through him, hot and immediate as he saw it happening. Edie, naked but for a crown in the lab beneath the bright, cruel white lights, eagerly servicing him. Ava watching, with her master crown, her dark eyes behind the goggles lit with unholy excitement. And McCloud, grunting and straining across the room while he waited his turn for the slave crown.
“I liked her fine,” he said thickly. “She’ll do.”
“I think this is going to be a lot of fun, Dessie. Don’t you?”
“Oh, yeah.” He gripped his crotch, massaged it. “Lots of fun.”
The drive through the city didn’t cool Edie’s buzz of arousal one bit, but her brain churned stubbornly along, independent of the buzz. It sounded so luxurious, to go to Kev’s lair and play sportive erotic games in his big bed. Feeding each other ice cream. Fooling around, giggling, teasing. Having fun. What an alien concept.
But fun was not in the cards for her right now. She was the one with the controlling family breathing down her neck, and she had to protect Kev. Of course, the best way to do that was to stay away from him, but she couldn’t ask that of herself. For God’s sake, she’d just discovered him. It was too damn cruel.
The next best thing was just to try to keep them both as far out of sight and out of range as possible. It was only a temporary solution, but there she was. All out of bright ideas.
When he pulled up next to a big warehouse, she looked at him. “We can’t stay here tonight,” she said.
“I was thinking the same thing,” he replied. “They’ll find my address. It’s not hard, even for a nonprofessional, and I assume your father has a private investigator on the payroll. Could your people come up with a piece of paper tonight authorizing them to drag you away?”
She considered it. “I’m not sure, not without my father signing it. But they could get the police to issue a warrant for your arrest. On what grounds, I don’t know, but they’d think of something.” She heaved a sigh. “I was looking forward to that brainwashing session.”
“It’s highly effective in a hotel room, too,” he assured her. “We’ll get good results, I promise. Your brain will be squeaky clean.”
She snorted with giggles. “Then why are we here at all?”
“I need some stuff from my arsenal,” he said. “Couple of back-up guns, some knives, some cash. Odds and ends.”
She gaped. “Backup…you mean, you’re armed? Now? With a…a gun?” Her voice squeaked on the word.
“Of course. I’m always armed. Take another look at my face, Edie. Can you blame me?”
Um. He had a point, but his matter-of-fact tone made her feel panicked. “Oh, God, Kev. That’ll make things worse. They could use that against you, make you look dangerous and crazy—”
“I never said I would use them. I certainly won’t display them. But I’m always armed. Lack of vigilance will get you killed.”
She forced herself to accept this brutally cold assessment of reality into her mind, and not be scared shitless of it. “I’ll need to stop at my place, too,” she said. “I need clothes, underwear. I can hardly wander around tomorrow bare-assed in the Slut Dress of Shame.”
He plucked at the wrinked flounces of pleated chiffon. “I love this dress,” he said. “We keep this dress. It makes my palms sweat. I can hardly breathe when I look at you in that thing.”
The air ignited. Edie had to consciously relax so she could pull air into her lungs to speak. “We’d better, um, try to focus,” she whispered.
“Focus.” His voice was velvet soft. “Right.”
He was around the car and helping her out before she even managed to find the latching mechanism. Gallant gentleman. Ooh.
His building was a square brick block, no frills. The huge stairwell was likewise plain, with its wide, steel and poured concrete stairs and the massive steel mesh freight elevator.
“I’d rather take the stairs,” he said. “I’m too spooked right now to walk into a cage. Makes me claustrophobic.”
“That’s OK,” she assured him. In fact, the stairs with his arm around her was no effort. She just floated up. After all the stress and emotional violence of the evening, she was still giddy. Wafting.
He had an impressive number of scary looking locks, and he squinted at them all carefully before pushing the door open. He stepped in, still holding her outside in the dark entryway. Then he pulled her in and shut the door. “I don’t want to turn on the lights,” he said.
“That’s OK. I can see it all right,” she murmured, impressed.
Even with no lamps lit, the apartment was full of ambient light. It was enormous, the ceilings unimaginably high. It was simple, nearly empty. Walls of raw, exposed red brick. Huge, arched windows twice the height of a tall man marched along the far wall, letting in light that gleamed against the wood-paneled floor. Windows designed to maximize light for the sweatshop garment workers of a century ago, she imagined, but the effect was stunning. A huge kitchen was in the corner nearest the door, a center island with stovetop, range, sink. There was an office workspace. There were skylights, lit by the dull orange of streetlights reflecting off the clouds. She drifted out into the middle of the space. The far end had a grouping of couches, a TV. Then a loft, a wrought iron spiral staircase, presumably leading to a bedroom and bathroom.
“This is my place.” He sounded oddly unsure of himself.
It was so perfectly Kev. Lavish, over-the-top luxury, coupled with Spartan austerity. She spun around to take it in, and a flicker caught her eye. Kev whipped his head around at the startled sound she made.
But it wasn’t a fire. Candles. They stared at the table in the corner. Candles flickered, lighting up platters of roasted meats, grilled vegetables, cheeses. Rolls and baguette, stuffed mushrooms, roasted artichokes, a plate of peeled shrimp, smoked salmon, cracked crab. Heaps of gleaming fruit. A fluffy looking, goopy, creamy dessert, like tiramisu. A sweating champagne bottle perched in a silver ice bucket.
“Oh, my God, Kev,” she whispered. “Did you…?”
“No,” he said. “I wish I could take credit for that, but it wasn’t me. It must have been Bruno. This is his style.”
“Your brother catered a surprise meal for us?”
He shrugged. “He desperately wants to get me laid. He thinks that getting laid is the solution to any man’s problems. Common cold? Get laid. Ingrown hairs? Get laid. Pursued by an angry billionaire? Get laid.”
She thought about it for a moment. “Works for me,” she said. “Now that I’ve met you I can see his point.”
“I never did manage to pound the concept of personal space into that kid,” Kev grumbled. “He figures if he can pick the lock, he’s invited.” He wandered over to the table, gazed at the food. “I’m hungry.”
“Do we have time to—”
“No.” He grabbed a chunk of crab meat and dropped it into his mouth. “Absolutely not. Excuse me for a moment. I’ll be right out.”
She stared at the food as he disappeared into a room in the back, and went back to the kitchen to see what Bruno had done with the takeout containers. If he was like any normal guy…yes. Bruno was evidently a perfectly normal guy. The takeout containers were still there, littering the kitchen counter in a big, drippy, oily, garlicky mess. So was the heavy paper bag that the feast had come in. Perfect. Good to go.
She gathered up containers. She was hungry, and they weren’t going to find anything this appetizing in an all-night Denny’s. She forked food into containers, snapped lids and stowed them in the bag. She was boxing up the tiramisu when Kev came out. “Huh?”
“We’re taking this with us,” she informed him. “The tiramisu will do as well as ice cream. You know, for the brainwashing. The dessert element is essential. Otherwise the mental programming won’t take.”
“Ah…yeah,” he said, bemused. “Whatever. I just have to run to the safe in the bedroom and grab some cash, and we can go.”
She dropped the tiramisu into the top of the bag, and called after his retreating back. “You promised to show me your big bed.”
He looked back. “Don’t distract me. I’m about to snap as it is.”
She laid the bag on the floor, and swept her hair sensuously to one side, twisting it into a thick, fuzzy coil over her shoulder. “Snap, then,” she said softly. “That’s something I’d love to see.”
He blew out a careful breath. “Oh, man. You are dangerous.”
“Am I?” She drifted over in front of him. “Feels good to be dangerous. I think I like it.”
“Uh…” His eyes narrowed, unsure of what to do.
Seconds ticked on, and she lost patience. “Show me your bedroom,” she demanded. “Right now.”
He blew out a sharp breath, and turned, throwing up his hands in surrender. She followed him up the swirling helix of the staircase.
The bedroom in the loft seemed as if it should be small in comparison, but it was a huge room in its own right, with yet another vast window on one side, though it had a huge black-out shade pulled down. More normal rectangular windows faced out the alley.
It was flickering with dozens of candles, too. On the dresser, on the shelves, on the bedstands. Another bucket of champagne sat there.
“Amazing that he didn’t burn the place down.” Kev opened the closet, reached inside, began manipulating something in there.
“It’s beautiful,” Edie murmured. And then she saw the bed.
It was as enormous as Kev had promised. He must have the sheets custom made. The snowy linens were turned precisely down, the textured bronze duvet cover strewn with a mass of crimson rose petals.
“Kev!” she exclaimed. “Did you see the petals?”
His head jerked around and he stared at the bed, and rolled his eyes. “Oh, for the love of Christ. I’m changing the locks. Again.”
“No. It’s wonderful. I’m charmed. It works.”
He shot her a speculative look. “Works? How do you mean?”
“How do you think?” She scooped up a handful, buried her face in them. “I know we need to run. I understand completely. But candles, rose petals…it seems a terrible waste, doesn’t it?”
She fell backward onto the bed, letting the petals bounce and flutter around her, settling around her shoulders, against her face.
When she opened her eyes, she stopped breathing, shocked.
The ceiling was covered with a painting of hypnotic beauty. A sensuous mandalic design, made of deep, earthy colors. Cobalt blues, rust reds, sunset oranges. “Kev!” She jerked up onto her elbows, flinging her head back to study it, conscious of the artful effect that position had on her bosom. “Did you paint that?”
“Yes.”
She stared at it, marveling. She would have to get used to this. He was not a one-trick pony, like she was. All she knew how to do was draw, and have the occasional bizarre psychic episode. He had endless tricks in his bag. He would never stop surprising her. “It’s amazing.”
“It’s one of my first stunt kite designs,” he said. “Get up. We take care of business first. Then we play.”
She got up onto her knees and hiked up her skirts, tossing them up over his bed so that the pleated frills frothed over his coverlet. She scooped up big handfuls of rose petals, letting them fall over her face, her head, her throat, her shoulders. Fragrant and soft. A fantasy.
He was almost in the bag, but she needed one last push to tip it, call it a victory. She saw herself reflected in the mirror over his dresser. She seemed to float on a cloud on the petal strewn bed, her hair a wild mass of tangles. She reached down, to the vee shaped base of the corset bodice, and tugged until her nipples popped over the top. That ought to get him. Worked before. He went gooey when she flaunted her boobs.
She adjusted herself, propping herself up for maximum special effect, and peeked up to check the results of her efforts.
His face was a mask of self-control, but his eyes blazed. The heat so intense, it felt almost like anger. But not quite. Oh, no. Not quite.
The velvety electric pressure of his desire against her was so palpable, she could reach out in the air and stroke the texture of it.
“You just love to push me, don’t you?” he said.
“You’ve noticed?” She made her voice light. “If you’re worried about the time crunch, keep in mind, I never did bother to put my panties back on. And I’m, ah, super ready. No need for elaborate foreplay. No need for a smooth lead-in. You could just, ah, go for it.”
He jerked a drawer open, pulled out foil packets. Excitement thundered through her nerves, like a roar of applause in a stadium. She’d gotten him. It felt so good to tease him, to lure him. She barely recognized herself. So sure of herself. So sure of him. So free.
He stood behind her, gazing at their reflection in the mirror across the room. His body so tall and elegant. Her face seemed so pale in the flickering candlelight. Bright spots of red on her cheekbones, her eyes shadowy smudges, her boobs spilling over the bodice. A scene from a seventeenth-century bordello. The seductive courtesan, rouged nipples spilling out. She’d never cast herself in the role of sexpot courtesan before. Not clumsy, shy, inhibited Edie. He’d unleashed something inside her she’d never known was there. And she loved it.
Kev reached around to cup her breasts, rolling her nipples between his fingers. Sweet sensations rushed through her, making her shudder and arch against his caress, whimpering. His heat surrounded her. He slid his hands beneath her skirts, stroking his big hands up over her thighs, her bottom. Trailing his finger down the sensitive cleft until his finger stroked, and then slowly penetrated her hot, slick core.
She squeezed around him with a low cry, and her thighs unlocked, let his hand delve deeper, parting her, petting with a skill that unhinged her joints. Making sure she was ready. He didn’t trust her judgment. So what. He knew just how much to touch, how hard, how deep, how fast. He was so tuned in to her.
He wrenched open his belt. She watched in the mirror as he rolled the condom over himself. Every tiny sound was amplified in her head, every tiny detail, intensely eroticized. She wanted to burn it all irrevocably into her mind. She wanted to hang on to this forever.
He shoved her forward, and she caught herself on her hands against the piled up drifts of silky crimson petals, as he tossed layer after layer of crinkling chiffon up over her back. Shifting her, spreading her into position. She arched her back, throat clutching with anticipation.
His big hands clamped over her hips, fingers digging in. “I’m taking you at your word,” he said.
She met his eyes in the mirror, and gave him a smile she’d never seen on her own face. “You do that.”
He did. He was gentle when he penetrated her, and each careful shove made her clutch around him. But once he was wedged in deep, he let go, let her feel his power. Every thrust jolted fresh excitement through her body. Each perfect, swiveling stroke pressed against new glowing sweet spots, blooming into existence out of nowhere.
The heavy thudding of his flesh pounding hers made her sob, her heart twisting and swelling into something vast. Her throat was so hot. She was wailing, yelling, she had no idea what, jerking back to meet him, but he kept her trembling and whimpering on the edge.
They soared over that edge together, and the mutual explosion rocked them, blasting them through inner space. And sweet oblivion.
They might have lain there, collasped and joined like spoons for hours for all she knew. It was earthly perfection. She could have lain there forever, just feeling close. So real. And so whole.
Kev lifted his head. “Oh, fuck,” he whispered. “They’re here.”
“Who?” Edie jerked her head around. “Where?”
“Outside. Shhh, don’t speak out loud. Maybe your dad’s guys, maybe the cops, maybe the guys in the white coats, who the fuck knows. But there’s no reason for a car to park in the alley under this window at this hour.” He pulled himself out of her body and slipped off the condom as he circled the room, blowing out candles. “Get dressed,” he said. “Quick. Goddamnit. What an asshole. Getting us boxed in.”
Fortunately for her, all that getting dressed entailed was tucking her boobs back into the strapless bra and the bustier, and letting the filmy skirt fall down over her bonelessly soft nether parts.
Kev slid a large, scary looking gun into a shoulder holster, checked a second gun that was strapped to his ankle, and tucked a third, a big square looking thing, into the back of the pants he’d pulled on. He wore dull green cargo pants now, covered with handy pockets, not the dress pants he’d worn before.
She gestured at the gun tucked into the small of his back. “Aren’t you afraid that gun will, um…go off?” she asked.
His flashing grin came and went. “No,” he said.
No time for feeling silly. He flung his coat over her shoulders. “Wait here. I’m going to get my bag downstairs.”
“Wait here?” She looked around, confused. “How’s that?”
“We’re going out the back way.” He gestured at the side windows.
Her belly clenched. Heights were not her thing. “You think they won’t notice a girl in a puffy pink gown playing Spiderman?”
“They’re renovating the building next to mine. Gentrification has come to my neighborhood. It’s covered with scaffolding, practically touches my fire escape. Makes my building a big security risk, but it’s handy for a quick getaway. We’ll go out that building.”
“But…but you’re parked right next to the—”
“We’ll take a different car.”
Of course. He had another car. But she dove after him as he headed out the bedroom door. “I’m coming out, too. For the food.”
He whirled around so fast, she ran right into him. “What?”
“I’m hungry, and it’s the middle of the night, and all I’ve got are animal crackers in my own cupboards,” she whispered fiercely. “I’ve already packed it all up, for God’s sake! All I have to do is grab the bag!”
He grumbled all the way down the stairs. She grabbed the big sack of food, tried to hang onto it when he grabbed her arm and swept her along, but he jerked it out of her hand and led her back upstairs.
He pulled the window open and helped her onto the fire escape, where she concentrated very hard on not looking down. Kev stepped with appalling calm over the three-foot gap over the four-story drop to the dark alley below, dangling his duffle and the food bag with a casual air that she found very irritating.
He leaned out from his perch on the scaffolding and held out his hand. She clenched her jaw. Goddamnit, she was a dangerous, feral, sexy wild thing now. Crawling around on scaffolding four stories up in the air was nothing to a wildcat like her. Even in Jimmy Choo peep-toes.
Kev pulled her to himself, right into his arms, but she didn’t have a moment to congratulate herself for living through it before he was dragging her through the pitch-black. She followed him, since he seemed to know exactly what he was doing, but could anyone always know exactly what he was doing? They were going to break their limbs. Fall into a hole. Brain themselves on a beam. Get eaten by rats.
They didn’t. He pulled a little flashlight out of one of his many pockets, and shone it in front of himself, leading her down dusty concrete stairs. When they got to the ground floor, he slung the duffel over his shoulder, passed her the food bag and swept her into his arms.
She squeaked in alarm. “What the hell? Kev?”
“No floor down here,” he said. “It’s all chunks of brick and broken pavement. You’d hurt your little naked painted toes. Can’t have that.”
He held her when they got to the door, and peered out of the building. Three dark figures stood at his front door. One of them took out a pick gun, and inserted it into the lock. A loud thudding sound echoed in the deserted street.
“They’re going right on in,” Kev whispered. “That’s weird. What the fuck is this all about? Who are those guys?”
The door opened. Two of the men went in. “I don’t want to find out tonight,” she said. “Please, let’s just go.”
“Shh. This guy’s looking our way. When he turns, we go, and run around the corner. Fast. Get ready.” His voice barely caressed her ear. He ventured another peek, and wrenched on her arm. “Now.”
They took the corner and ran down the block, to where a silver Volvo was parked, and leaped in. Kev drove slowly at first, barely rolling, without turning on the lights for a couple of blocks.
When he picked up speed, she started breathing again. “Wow. Breaking and entering. I had no idea Dad’s guys would go so far.”
“Live and learn. Would have been a lot better if you’d listened to me. We’d have been gone a half hour ago. Don’t think I like dragging you over four-story drops and into an unlit construction site for fun.”
She shot him an outraged glance. “Excuse me? You appeared to be enjoying yourself on our little detour.”
His eyes gleamed. “I never said it wasn’t good,” he said. “Just that it wasn’t smart. But it’s a mistake I won’t make again.”
“Mistake? You call sex with me a mistake? You graceless clod.”
His grin flashed in the dark. “Tell you what, Edie. You win this argument. You fucked my judgement. You won, I lost. And I learned a valuable lesson. You won’t win again.”
“Oh, no?” She made her voice very sweet. “Is that a challenge?”
“If you want to take it as one,” he said. “But we don’t have sex unless we are locked inside an environment that I have judged to be one hundred percent safe. Get your head around it.”
“Ah.” She chewed on that. “A secure sex zone.”
His grin flashed. “Exactly.”
“Get ready for sexual torment,” she told him cheerfully.
“Whatever. Just keep in mind. Every second of sexual torment, you pay for ten times over. I will have no mercy. None.”
His voice sent a thrill through her. He didn’t let her glimpse his hidden intensity very often, his iron control was so complete.
But when she caught a flash of it; his depths, the power that the severe conditions of his life had forged in him, it stole her breath.
It would have been terrifying, if she hadn’t been crazily head over ass in love with him. She felt like one of those girls on the covers of the fantasy comic books and novels she’d read as a teenager, on her knees, clutching his muscular leg. Checking out his furry loincloth at lovingly close range. Helpless love slave. Mmm. Sign her up for sexual torment.
She pressed her thighs tight around the flush of excitement.
But her pride stirred, too. He could radiate all the sexy macho charisma he wanted. She would radiate right back. Ka-pow.
“Threaten all you like, you big brute.” She made her voice light. “We’ll see who’s begging on his knees in the end.”
He laughed, delighted, and jerked to a stop at the curb. She was startled that they’d already arrived.
He got out first, surveying the street for a long moment before he let her door open. “This has to be quick,” he said. “This will be their next stop, too. Three minutes. Preferably less.”
She scooted and scurried to keep up with his long strides. He made impatient noises while she rummaged in the silly little clutch bag for her keys. The keys dropped, with a rattling clink. He shoved her aside, picked them up and opened the door. “No lights,” he growled.
Great. Packing in the dark, with trembling hands, and a huge, impatient man breathing down her neck. She rushed around, grabbing things off her drawing table by feel, shoving them into her sketch bag.
“Hey. Didn’t we come for clothes?”
“I need my sketchbooks!” she shot back. “I need pencils and pens and charcoal, and my pencil knife, and—”
“Just get them,” he said, resigned. “Don’t waste time explaining.”
She tossed the art bag at his feet and dove into the closet, hissing unladylike expletives until she found the suitcase. Then she blundered into her bedroom, bumping her shins hard enough to make her gasp.
“Two minutes over,” he said.
“I’m going as fast as I can in the dark!” She wrenched open drawers, grabbed stuff at random. Underwear, T-shirts, something that she hoped was a sweater. Next drawer, jeans. She kicked the ridiculous shoes off her abused feet, and pulled on her red high-tops, with a sigh of relief. Though they would look very special, with the dress.
“Grab a coat, and let’s go,” Kev rapped out. “Now.”
“But my toiletries, and my—”
“We’ll buy some.” He grabbed the suitcase.
Edie scuffed her feet on the ground and caught the door jamb, blocking him. “Kev, I need to leave a note for Jamal!”
He froze, dismayed. “You can’t turn on a light.”
“But I can’t just disappear on him,” she pleaded. “Please. Kev. He’s only eight. He depends on me. He’s my friend.”
Kev was silent. “Edie, I’m sorry,” he said gently. “But I have a bad feeling. Other people will read any note you leave for him. I don’t think you should draw attention to Jamal. He has enough problems.”
He’d hit on the one argument that could scare her into sheeplike compliance, and she still fought it. “But…but—”
“You’ll have to make it up to him later.” He slung the book bag over her shoulder, grabbed her suitcase. Shut her door, locked it.
Kev went ahead, making no sound, even on wooden boards that always groaned. He pulled her out onto the rickety landing of the staircase that zigzagged down the side of the building.
Black figures fell silently from above, a heavy rain of death.
Thud, thud…thud. One landed on top of her, crushing her to the stairs. Knocking out her wind before she had a chance to scream.