Her mind drifted to the make-out session in the kitchen as she steamed and scraped. The rough texture of Mac's tongue, the way he tasted. And his scent. Good gravy, his scent. She sighed. She needed to set aside her inappropriate feelings for Mac. She should ignore the strange animal attraction that was out of proportion to the length of time they'd known each other. She didn't quite know how she would do this, because he seemed unwilling to accept his role as just her co-worker. Instead, he was the "co-worker" her sister had astutely air quoted, despite Diana's denials. Whenever Diana and Mac came together, their mouths and pelvises had a way of finding each other. This was a puzzle.
She steamed and scraped until she almost wore a hole in the wall when her Omni warbled with an incoming communication. She glanced at the display. Mac. Her stomach flipped, and she stifled a smile. Then her shoulders sagged as she chastised herself. Not thirty seconds earlier, she had decided to keep him at arm's length. Therefore, the appropriate response to his Omni call was irritation, not anticipation.
She answered the call in audio mode.
"Hey, what's up?" she said, keeping her voice light.
She engaged the video controls, and Mac's handsome face appeared. He wore plaid pajama pants and was shirtless. He was big and beefy, so strong, even though he was a little fluffy around the middle. He really was the perfect size for her. Oh Lord. The light caught his eyes at the right angle, and they flashed white like the inside of an oyster shell as he looked into the camera. City lights twinkled behind him.
"Hey, Ms. Independent," he said. Diana found herself smiling at the endearment. "Turn on your camera."
She paused in her scraping and frowned, looking down at her outfit. Ratty old cutoffs, a tank top with holes and paint splatters on it, no bra, and a yellow bandana covering the eight or ten random braids she slept in.
"Can't," she said. "I look a mess."
"I think we are beyond all that," he teased. Diana found herself tilting her head to one side as she pondered the accuracy of his statement.
"I don't think we are." On screen, his face registered wry disappointment, and he poked his bottom lip out in a pout.
"What are you doing?" he asked. Stretched out on his bed, leaning on one elbow, he raised an eyebrow at her. As he shifted in the bed, his shoulder muscles rippled, making his tattoo move. Her mind conjured the memory of tracing it with her fingertips.
"I'm working on my house. Stripping wallpaper in the guest bath."
"I've seen it," he said. "I'm stunned the little cowboys are not your style."
"Actually, I would keep them, except I think the previous owners had it installed during the last Clinton administration," she said. "They're kinda cute. But judging by what I can see of your place, maybe not your style?"
As if that mattered. Diana reminded herself she was keeping Mac at arm's length.
"I'm not sure I have a style," he said. "When I bought this place, I hired someone my real estate agent recommended to do the build-out. I live in a converted warehouse on Riverfront. I'm told they used to make sewing machines here. The office is downstairs, and I live upstairs. Not too far from you."
"Huh. It looks like you live in a high-rise."
"Oh that," he said, waving at the scene behind him. He gave a voice command, and the twinkling city lights disappeared. He gave another command and brought up security cameras set to various views around the building. "I thought you'd prefer to see me against a more attractive backdrop."
He was flirting.
She stood at the edge of a precipice. Should she flirt back? Flirting could be fun...flirting with Mac was fun. She found herself reconsidering the decision to put distance between them. Then she scolded herself for thinking about abandoning her principles.
"Ulysses MacKenzie Bodie, are you flirting with me?" she blurted, cringed and winced. Stupid, stupid.
He paused, pursing his lips and raising an eyebrow. "If I said yes, what would you do?"
"Remind you of what I said that morning when you left..."
"When you asked me to leave," he corrected smoothly.
"When I told you I'm not interested in more than one night," she said. She pressed the steamer to another section of wall and held it there for a few seconds, then moved in with her scraper. Good-bye, little cowpokes.
"Forgive me for being confused, but I think you are interested in more than one night."
She blushed from her neck to the tips of her ears. He totally had her number, but she couldn't acknowledge the truth in his statement. Nope. She watched his face on her holographic monitor. He waited for her reaction. Time to change the subject.
"So, have you found anything on Julie Wheeler?"
He rolled his eyes. "No," he said. "Bubba and I retraced her usual route home. Not a trace of her. Her Omni went radio silent the same night we think she disappeared. The daughter went to stay with her father, but he's a trucker--he's been out of town. She reported the disappearance to police, a couple of days after her mother went missing, then she disappeared, too."
Diana went still. "Is she okay?"
"We found the girl's Omni at her father's house. She had removed it and left it there, but there doesn't seem to have been an attack or anything like that. She just took it off."
Diana sighed in relief, and told herself if she ever had a teenager, she'd make them get an Omni implant, so they couldn't just "disappear."
"It would have been nice to at least talk to the girl," Mac continued. "If I had a teenage daughter, I'd make her get an Omni implant."
Diana stifled a bark of surprise. The man must be a mind reader.
"You okay?" His blue eyes registered concern from her screen.
She waved a hand dismissively, forgetting for a moment that he couldn't see her.
"Uh, nothing. Just clearing my throat. What happened to the police report?"
"The report was filed before we had the run-in with the changeling. Apparently, they didn't think much of an underage shifter girl's word. The intake officer said that if her mom still hadn't made it home in a few more days, she should try contacting protective services."
Diana closed her eyes in frustration. Despite all the resources expended on keeping sex workers safe, it all fell apart when one actually went missing, and the establishment police got involved. Or rather, didn't get involved.
"So, what do we do next?" Would they have to investigate her disappearance? Interview people who knew her? The thought of being close to this man again, alone in his truck, filled her with excitement and trepidation. She wanted him, but she didn't want to want him.
"We aren't doing anything next. Bubba does investigations, and I do security. He might want to interview you, but, but he already set out drones for a search grid. Of course, without an Omni signal...it's more complicated."
"The drones will only work if she happens to be outside when they go by," she finished for him.
She scraped the wall furiously, leaving gouges as her mind processed this. She wanted to help find Julie, but she wasn't in a position to do so. Which was just as well, since she needed to focus on her concubine assignment. Immersed in her thoughts, she didn't realize Mac was still talking until he raised his voice.
"Diana! Are you looking at me?"
Mac had done something to the display to distort his features. His mouth stretched horizontally, and his lips were twice as wide as his head. When he spoke, his distorted mouth resembled a duck's beak.
She couldn't help it. She let out a bark of unladylike laughter, snorting through her nose.
His face snapped back into place. He poked at the camera lens, and a distortion like a water drop breaking the surface of a puddle made his face ripple.
"Turn on your video, Diana."
"Nope!"
"I've already seen you naked!"
"Not gonna do it."
"I work in security. I could hack your camera. I know how to do it." Apparently, lots of people knew how to do it since her sister used hobby white magic to
do it. "You're acting as if you care what I think about your looks..."
He let his voice trail off. The implication hung there like a challenge.
"You're trying to manipulate me." She sounded prim and huffy, but she could barely contain her smile.
The tiny light of her camera blinked on. Her image appeared on the inset of her screen in the corner of the holographic display. She paused in her scraping and got a good look at herself. Tiny bits of wallpaper stuck to her cutoffs, tank top and skin. The tank top skimmed over, but didn't contain, her braless chest, and the fold of her side boob was obvious.
"Hey!" she said, throwing a blob of soggy wallpaper at the holographic screen.
"The screen is not solid. Throwing things at it will do you no good."
"Okay, haha Mr. Smartypants," she said in mock irritation. She raised an eyebrow at him. "You're so interested in my bathroom. Why don't you come over here and help me strip wallpaper?" she blurted. Her black eyes went wide at her slip. Did I just invite him over to my place? Yes, I did.
"For someone who says she doesn't like me, you have a peculiar way of showing it." He grinned. "I'll be there in ten minutes."
The screen dissolved into thin air.
Shit. Shit shit shit. Damn.
She blinked stupidly at the non-existent screen. She called back. He didn't pick up.
She dropped her wallpaper implements, ran for her bedroom, and quickly donned a bra and t-shirt. She brushed her teeth, freshened her breath with mouthwash, peered at herself in the mirror, and splashed cold water on her face. She debated changing into clean shorts when the doorbell rang.
Less than ten minutes, it can't be him!
She opened the door to Mac, tall, dark and broody, his broad shoulders filling her doorway. Her insides turned to fondue as she took in the faded t-shirt that stretched over his muscled chest and the basketball shorts that would afford her a nice view of his tight butt when he walked away. She had to admit, he really did look as if he might be there to help. She gave him a wry smile and waved him in.
Mac couldn't decide which version of Diana he found most attractive. All-Business Diana, in her cassock and leggings? Or the temptress in a blue dress at Jacob's party? Backyard Barbecue Diana or her even more laid-back version, Home Improvement Diana? He noted with disappointment that Home Improvement Diana had used the time it took for him to drive over to restrain her ample bosom and put on a more modest t-shirt. He strode past her, headed for the guest bath and poked his head in. He took in the peeling wallpaper and the dusty light fixtures. A small piece of pressed composite plywood in front of the vanity made him wonder what hole lurked beneath. The one redeeming feature, a claw foot tub, appeared heavy enough to make the floor beneath it sag visibly. He wondered how much of this work Ms. Independent insisted on doing herself.
"So, tell me how I can help," he said.
"Well...I'm stripping the wallpaper to start," she said. "The floor is wrecked down to the subfloor and probably the joists too, so tread lightly."
Mac's eyebrows went up in surprise. "You sound like you know what you're doing."
"My mom used to flip houses when I was a kid," she said. "She's been handy as long as I can remember. She had Vanessa and me helping her out after school and during the summers."
"I'm impressed," he said, eyes twinkling at her. He was close enough to see the tiny red-brown freckles dotting her nose and cheeks.
"Anyway, she made sure we both knew our way around a home improvement store," she said. "I don't like having others do the work I know I can do myself."
"Did your dad get involved in your projects?"
"Not really. Working vice is a pretty all-consuming job..." Her voice trailed off. She went quiet and looked away, a sad expression crossing her face. He thought about Diana's dedication to her clients and realized that while she got her work ethic from both her parents, her father must have inspired her choice of profession.
Mac smoothed over the awkward silence. "Is your sister this handy?"
"Yes, but she gets other people to make her home improvements," said Diana, smiling up at him. "She's quite the delegate."
He turned to look at her face to face. "So where do you want me?" This produced an attractive blush under her freckled cheeks.
"You really want to help?" she asked. "I thought you said that as a ruse to come over and try to have your way with me." The moment after she said this, she pressed her lips together hard and looked away. Bashful. Shy and cute.
"Of course," he said. He would let her figure out if he meant "Of course I want to have my way with you" or "Of course I came to help."
She had to look up at him, but their height difference was less than he was used to. There were so many things about her that were different and changed his perceptions about what he desired in a woman.
"Here," she said, placing a large damp sponge in one hand, and a scoring tool in the other. "You're taller than me. Why don't you start scoring and wetting other there by the window?” She indicated the window over the tub, which looked out into the side of her neighbor's house.
Mac's eyes narrowed on the tub, which appeared heavy enough to compromise the floor underneath. He placed one foot in the tub and gave it an experimental bounce. The floor held. All seemed well, so he stepped in with both feet and bounced a bit more. Diana gave him an encouraging smile. Mac smiled back and bounced a bit more, testing the stability of the floor. Then the left side of the tub sagged and fell into the floor with a sound somewhere between wood splintering and stepping on wet leaves. He slid sideways in the tub, braced himself against the back wall, and recovered with an unconvincing smile. He did not realize how much the tub was still sinking until Diana held her hands out to him and beckoned urgently, looking alarmed.
Mac paused to see if the tub would sink more. He was certain it would hold long enough for him to get out. He swung one leg out. The tub began to sink at a faster rate. He tried to balance himself, arms out as if he were surfing and fell out of the tub sideways, arms windmilling, the sponge and scoring tool flying. He realized too late under his hefty bulk, the tub would continue to sink, possibly down to the foundation.
Diana screamed, "Get out of the tub. Get out!" She backed away to give him room to scramble out. His knees hit the floor hard and radiated a numbing pain, which hurt like hell. The floor shuddered from the impact, and the wet splintering sound continued, and he tried to regain his footing. Diana stumbled and went down, her butt hitting the floor hard before she recovered and scooted backward away from him.
Diana's eyes went wide as she correctly judged that Mac needed to clear the bathroom altogether or risk the entire floor caving in. It would be unwise to stop his forward momentum at this point, a conclusion both Diana and Mac seemed to reach simultaneously and without discussion. She began a panicky scramble similar to a housecat's reaction upon being tossed in a tub of cold water. He crawled after her, his knees picking up splinters as he followed her retreat.
All movement ceased as they flattened themselves against the wall opposite the bathroom door. The tub's rim had come to rest flush with the floor. They looked at each other, startled, and she burst into laughter.
His pleasure at the sound eclipsed the humiliation of his ungainly retreat. Her smile made every splinter, every scrape, worth it. She covered her mouth to stifle another round of laughter. He smiled with her.
"Not very graceful, are you?" She eyed his knees and grimaced. "Want me to...put something on your knees? So you don't get infected?" She indicated the bloody mess of his knees. She stood up and reached out a hand to him.
They spent the next part of the evening with Mac sitting on Diana's living room couch while she knelt in front of him, picking splinters out of his knees with a pair of tweezers. Mac drank a Lone Star beer and watched her. She looked serious and concerned as she removed the splinters, and his mind flashed to his mother doing much the same thing when he was a child.
"I think you're warming up to me," he said, cock
ing his head to one side. She pursed her lips thoughtfully, keeping her eyes focused on her work.
"Maybe," she said. "Time will tell."
"What does that mean? You sound like a fortune cookie."
She grinned at him.
"Did you just cause my tub to fall through my floor? I think a little less criticism is in order."
"Valid point." He winced as she pulled out another splinter. "I'll call my contractor, by the way, to have a look at your floor. Unless you don't want the help."
"I guess I don't mind the help." She gave him a sideways smile. She was open to taking his help, which seemed like progress.
After a pause, she looked thoughtful, then said, "I'm surprised your knees are in such bad shape. I thought you guys were virtually indestructible."
"Let me set you straight. It's not 'you guys,'" he started. "It's 'y'all,' or if you mean more than one person, 'all y'all.' And while I do heal faster than the average person, I'm not indestructible." He poured on his Southern accent for maximum effect.
"I read up a bit on...guys like you," she said, her eyes on his knees. She seemed hesitant to continue. "Is Jacob your mentor?"
"Yes," he said. He said nothing else for a few moments. "I had a hard time around the time I hit age twelve. "My parents got a referral for a mentor. That's how I met Jacob."
"What does a mentor do?"
He paused. "Since Minotaurs don't usually grow up in shifter homes, things like shifting don't come easy. We have to be taught."
"What happens if you don't learn?" She was openly looking at his face, not his knees. Her expression was open and curious.
"Jacob always said that shifting is a big part of Minotaur identity. Not shifting leads to anti-social behavior and strung out emotions. There's a reason why Minotaurs have a reputation for violence."
Diana frowned. "I can't imagine going through life not being able to be yourself." Her dark eyes held notes of sadness.
The Minotaur's Kiss Page 10
