Because You Love Me ; Journey to My Heart

by Terra Little

  “You know I am,” Cooper said, swiveling around in his chair and reaching for his suit jacket. He tucked his cell between his head and shoulder, and shrugged into it as he got to his feet. “What time?”

  “Four o’clock, over at the lockup, so haul ass. Sixth floor. Let’s go get some beer and wings afterward.”

  “Hooters,” they both said at the same time.

  “You bet. See you in a few,” Cooper agreed.

  “Cool, but listen, I can’t stay out too late. You know how Cheryl—”

  Cooper hung up.

  The federal lockup was a thirty-minute drive away. Cooper had driven his Porsche to work today, so he made it in twenty. He parked in the employee lot and entered the facility through the employee entrance, flashing his badge at the entry checkpoint and then signing the departmental visitor’s log before being buzzed through a series of steel doors that led to an interior corridor. There he took the elevator up to the sixth floor and made his way to the guard station. Rhinehart and one of his associates, along with the suspect’s public defender, were already standing there when he walked up. After greetings were exchanged, the group was led to the interview room that Malcolm Johnson had been placed in for the meeting.

  Cooper hung back for most of it. His agents were responsible for taking Johnson into custody, so he was already familiar with Johnson’s charges, which included multiple counts of human trafficking, child endangerment and kidnapping, among other things. He didn’t need a recount of the circumstances leading up to them, especially since, as it stood, they had enough evidence of Johnson’s guilt to put the man behind bars for the rest of his natural life. Their case was pretty much airtight, and now that he’d been indicted and was fully aware of the predicament that he was in, Johnson was ready to make a deal in exchange for singing like a bird.

  If Cooper had his way, the man would be singing from behind bars for many years to come, deal or no deal. But first things first.

  Straightening from the corner that he’d been leaning in with his arms crossed, he rounded the table and set a digital recorder down on the tabletop, in front of Johnson. Now that Rhinehart was done wheeling and dealing, Cooper was ready to get down to business. “What is your relationship with Shannon Bridgeway?”

  “I know her from back in the day,” Johnson said, and Cooper noticed that, with the promise of a deal on the table and with life in prison officially off the table, the man’s demeanor was much less confrontational. “You want me to tell you all about her?”

  Cooper pulled a chair away from the table and sat down. “You understand that this interview is being recorded?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve been read your rights, which you also understand?” Johnson nodded. “I need you to speak clearly for the camera,” Cooper instructed, pointing to the video camera that was set up on a tripod in a corner of the room. “Yes or no?”

  “Yes.”

  “You should also understand that, in the event that any charges—criminal or otherwise—arise as a result of this interview, you will be expected to cooperate with prosecution efforts, up to and including testifying on behalf of the prosecution. If at any time you change your testimony or decide not to cooperate, any deals that you have been or will be offered become null and void.”

  “Man, I get all that,” Johnson sniped, trying to wave one of his shackled hands dismissively. Cooper cocked an amused brow at the attempt. “You want to know about Shannon or whatever she’s calling herself these days, or not?”

  “Yes, I do.” He opened the file folder that he’d brought with him and took out Shannon Bridgeway’s mug shot, sliding it across the table toward Johnson. “For the record, Mr. Johnson, is this the woman you’re referring to as Shannon Bridgeway?”

  Johnson studied the photo. “Yeah, that’s her. I’ve been knowing her since we were kids in the group home together.” He slid the mug shot back across the table, toward Cooper. “Where should I begin?”

  “Let the record show that the defendant, Malcolm Johnson, has positively identified Karen Lewis, also known as Shannon Bridgeway, via her most recent mug shot, which will be cataloged as evidence,” Cooper said, facing the camera. To Johnson, he said, “Why don’t you start at the beginning?”

  Two hours later Rhinehart caught up with Cooper as he was leaving the building. “Coop, wait up.”

  “Seems like you should have enough to at least bring formal charges,” Cooper speculated as they fell in step together, pushed through the exit doors and walked out into the employee parking lot. The change in temperature, from cool to hot and humid, was both immediate and extreme. Cooper reached up and loosened his tie to accommodate his suddenly dry throat. “She needs to be picked up before she absconds.”

  “Already on it,” Rhinehart said. “I sent my associate back to the office to make contact with the Missouri field office and get the ball rolling. Johnson’s cooperation with their case will help him on ours, but not very much, because if he’s convicted, this’ll be his third strike. And as such, I plan on throwing the book at him. Subtly of course,” he added, seeming to realize that he’d spoken that last part aloud. “After all, I did promise the man a deal and I do intend to offer him one, but I never promised him that the deal would be especially generous. And speaking of generous, Missouri’s prosecuting attorney has a reputation for not only having a prick, but also for being one. He’s old-school, so be prepared for him to drag Johnson all the way to Missouri for an in-person deposition, when a video conference would work just as well. Your team has more rookie agents right now than most. Who have you got that’s seasoned enough to escort him?”

  “I’m not sure yet. Maybe I’ll send Bearden and Bidwell again. They seem to work well together,” Cooper said, thinking, Who else? He’d always avoided being a third wheel but this was one instance when he would happily make an exception.

  “That’s because they’re screwing.”

  Cooper’s eyes popped. “What?”

  “You didn’t know?” Rhinehart queried, chuckling at Cooper’s cluelessness. “Man, what rock have you been hiding under?”

  “The question is, how do you know?”

  “I’m an assistant district attorney, man. It’s my job to know things like this. Plus me and Bearden use the same barber.”

  “Wait a minute, you and I use the same barber, so why haven’t I heard about this before now?”

  Rhinehart looked at him like he was crazy. “Because you’re the boss. Put yourself in Bearden’s place. Would you tell you something like that? Now,” he said, before Cooper could offer a response. “In light of the fact that this next case will ultimately be another notch on my impressive professional belt, I think a beer-and-hot-wings celebration is in order. What do you think?”

  “I think I’m going to have to have a talk with Bearden and Bidwell.”

  “Uh-huh. Remember that the next time you start wondering why no one ever tells you anything. And I meant about the beer and wings, Coop.” They looked at each other.

  “Hooters,” they said at the same time and made a beeline for Cooper’s Porsche.

  Chapter 13

  Cooper texted Olivia as soon as his plane landed in Missouri.

  Just got here. Pick me up at my hotel?

  He had advised her of his pending arrival as soon as Amelia had finalized his travel itinerary a week ago, telling her only that he was tagging along with some other agents on an escort trip for an unrelated case when she’d questioned his reason for returning to Missouri so soon after his last visit, and then breathing a sigh of guilty relief when she accepted his explanation without pressing for more information. “That, and I’d like to see you again,” he had admitted, too, because at least that was the truth.

  She texted back a minute later.

  Sure. Where are you staying?

  They hadn’t yet discussed that part of his plans
but he did have some thoughts on the subject. With you?

  She swung through the hotel lobby doors a half hour later, looking like a million sun-kissed bucks in a sleeveless red sundress that stopped just above her knees and matching stiletto sandals. A colorful woven clutch purse was tucked underneath one of her toned arms, and her signature Chanel sunglasses were dangling from the neckline of her dress by one temple. She saw him and stopped short, smiling from ear to ear. He came away from the wall near the elevators, where he’d been leaning, and closed the distance between them with long strides.

  “Hi, beautiful,” he murmured as he walked up to her.

  She blushed and half of the blood in his body flooded his cock. “Hi.”

  When he was close enough to reach out and snatch her up in a two-handed grip, that’s precisely what he did, cuffing her around the waist and hauling her up against him so quickly that she gasped both in surprise and just in time to make room for his tongue in her mouth. Her arms immediately wound around his neck and he groaned in gratitude, loving the feel of her soft breasts pressed against his chest and the scent of her skin in his nostrils, as her tongue lapped against his greedily. She caught his tongue and moaned as she sucked on it within the cave that their fused mouths created and he shuddered, withdrawing reluctantly as soon as she was gracious enough to relax her erotic suction.

  “Mmm,” she purred against his lips. “You must’ve missed me.”

  The tip of his tongue shot out and licked her luscious bottom lip. “I must have. Take me somewhere private so I can show you how much.”

  They only made it as far as the hotel’s parking garage before Cooper had a bright idea that Olivia was completely down with. They tossed his suitcase in the trunk of her Cadillac and quickly hopped into the back seat together.

  As soon as the doors were closed and they were hidden behind tinted windows, Cooper unfastened his pants and pushed them down around his ankles. He slipped his wallet out of his back pocket, found the condom tucked there and ripped the foil packet open with his teeth. After quickly sheathing himself, he reached for Olivia. “Oooh...you’re so wet,” he whispered as his fingers slipped into the silky folds between her thighs and began playing. Gasping, she settled on his lap, straddling him with her dress gathered around her waist and her bright red thong shifted to one side, revealing the plump lips of her glistening sex to his greedy eyes. He spied the tip of her engorged clitoris peeking out from between them and swore under his breath. Taking his rigid cock in hand, he spanked it once, twice, three times, to her audible delight, and then positioned himself at the entrance to her sex and slowly lowered her down onto his shaft.

  They cried out simultaneously as his glans penetrated her slick, pulsing warmth for the first time, and then they both seemed to dissolve into a state of catatonic bliss as Olivia sank down fully onto his length with one deep thrust. Cooper felt himself stretching her tight walls wide, felt her walls contracting around him like a honey-drenched velvet fist, and went limp with pleasure.

  Her eyes drifted closed as she planted her feet onto the seat at either side of his hips, braced her hands on his shoulders and began bouncing up and down on him. A second later, her head lolled to one side like she was high on a drug that took her straight to the moon, and her mouth dropped open. Even as his own face tensed and relaxed erratically, and his own breath lit the air like gunshots, Cooper watched the dramatic play of emotions as they crossed her face and listened keenly to the symphony of high notes curling out of her drooping mouth. His hands rode her jiggling butt cheeks lightly, possessively, allowing her full control over her ride and him just enough traction to pace his upward strokes.

  He reached up and cupped Olivia’s face, bringing her open mouth down to his and sinking his tongue deep and wide. Moaned out a song of worship the entire time that his tongue tangled with hers and his hands cupped her breasts through the material of her dress. She had the sweetest mouth that he’d ever tasted, the softest skin he’d ever had the pleasure of licking, the best sex he’d ever experienced. He couldn’t seem to get enough of her.

  He could feel her walls caressing every swollen vein in his cock as he slid in and out of her heat, could see the evidence of her pleasure coating his shaft as she bounced. “Awww...you feel so damn good,” he panted just as a sharp zing of pleasure thumped at the base of his spine, seizing every muscle in his legs and hollowing out his abdomen. “Oooh... I’m coming, Liv. I’m coming! Ah!” he shouted as his hips shot up off the seat and surged upward. His eyes rolled back in his head and his head lolled as, deep inside of her, he came violently.

  In the middle of an orgasm herself, she continued to bounce up and down on him, torturing him and stroking him into a state of ecstatic frenzy at the same time. When he couldn’t take any more, he lifted her off him and pressed his damp forehead into the valley between her breasts to catch his racing breath.

  And to mentally kick himself.

  Dammit, Talbot. You weren’t supposed to fall for the woman. Two ships passing in the night, remember?

  * * *

  Four agents had escorted Malcolm Johnson from Knoxville to Missouri, but after his grand-jury testimony the next afternoon, only three agents went back with him. Cooper stayed behind in Missouri for the next three days and two nights.

  The evening before he was scheduled to leave, Olivia took him to the historic Laclede’s Landing District on the St. Louis riverfront, where there was a lively and eclectic strip of after-dark entertainment venues and access to a walking trail along the river’s edge. They had before-dinner drinks in a dimly lit blues bar and then wandered into a karaoke bar for a dose of comedic hilarity before stumbling upon a tiny New Orleans–style supper club that was famous for its authentic Cajun cuisine, for a late dinner. Afterward they strolled along the lighted river walk companionably, watching the dark, murky water rush back and forth in comfortable silence until it was almost one o’clock in the morning and they were both stifling yawns.

  “I’ve kept you out too late,” Olivia said, giggling at his unsuccessful attempt to stifle yet another open-mouthed, audible yawn. “You have an early flight in the morning, which means you should be in bed right now.” She moved closer to him and threaded her fingers through his. “Let’s turn back.”

  “Soon,” Cooper promised, using the leverage that their joined hands gave him to tug her along with him as he continued down the concrete path. She leaned into him as they walked and, after a few seconds, rested the side of her face against his arm companionably. His thumb stroked hers gently. “I’m scheduled to teach a profiling class at a legal conference later next month, in Indiana,” he remarked casually. “I’ll be there for five days. If I send you a plane ticket, will you meet me there?”

  Speechless, Olivia thought about it for several long seconds, while her head secretly wrestled with her heart. Unless she was mistaken, and she really didn’t think that she was, neither of them was interested in anything more than what they currently had. This fling that she was caught up in with Cooper was just that—a fling. They enjoyed each other’s company, and God knew the sex was great, but at any given moment he was hundreds of miles away in Tennessee, where everything important in his life was. Meanwhile her life was here in Missouri. Add that to the fact that they couldn’t be more opposite if they tried, and a relationship between them, especially a long-distance one, would never work. Still, his offer was very tempting.

  “We could rent a car,” Cooper murmured into the blaring silence between them. “Maybe get lost sightseeing. Make love all night and sleep in in the mornings.” He brought their joined hands to his mouth and kissed the back of hers softly. “Catch a show or two and check out some of the local cuisine. What do you think?”

  “I think that, if I keep seeing you, I’m going to gain a hundred pounds.”

  “Would that be such a bad thing?” he wondered. “If we kept seeing each other, I mean.”

  S
he couldn’t look at him, couldn’t hold his piercing gaze for longer than a few seconds at a time because it made her pulse quicken and her blood heat with awareness. She looked out at the water instead. “What happened to the two ships passing in the night theory?”

  “Hmm...” Cooper breathed expansively. “I think it was shot to hell the moment that we stopped having just a fling and started doing something else.” He stopped walking and waited for her eyes to meet his. When they finally flickered up, he searched them for several seconds and then asked, “Or is it just me?”

  “No, it’s not just you, but—”

  “Is there someone else?”

  “No, there isn’t, but—”

  “No buts,” he cut in, squeezing her hand gently. “And there’s also no pressure, Liv. Just something to think about, okay?”

  A short time later, as if to ensure that she did just that, his lovemaking was intense and deliberate. Spread out on the mattress before him like a sumptuous meal, Olivia could do little to defend herself against his dizzying ministrations except lie there, quivering with pleasure, while he took his time feasting on her flesh as if she were both his first and his last meal.

  Again and again his lips, teeth and tongue brought her to the brink of orgasm, only to retreat at the last crucial second, leaving her teary-eyed with longing and whimpering pitifully. Grasping desperately at his hips every time he shifted and the tip of his heavy, bobbing shaft glanced across the opening to her pulsing walls and then flitted away, every time he sucked one of her nipples deep inside of his mouth and lapped at it decadently. Every time he sucked at her engorged clitoris and then let it slip out of his mouth noisily, or bit into the flesh on her neck and shoulders or tickled her curled toes with the tip of his flickering tongue.

  She was a sweaty, volcanic mess when her clitoris slipped out of his mouth one last time and he rose over her and braced himself on his palms on the mattress. Frantic for release, her legs were already bowed, her knees already practically meeting her ears when he loomed over her and offered her his still flickering tongue. She took it, sucking on it wildly, delighting in the taste of herself on his lips as she reached down between her thighs and soothed her jittery clitoris with a series of love taps.