Flirting in Traffic

by BETH KERY

  “I’m probably stupid for telling you this but…what the hell.”

  “What are you talking about?” Finn asked.

  Mary Kate shook her head after studying him for a few seconds, a disappointed expression on her pretty face. “Remember earlier this week, how you asked me to keep an eye open for a red Ferrari passing in evening traffic?”

  “Yeah,” Finn said as he rose from his chair.

  “Well, I just saw one about a mile back as I drove to the trailer. It was snagged in that crap out there,” she said, nodding her head in the direction of the inevitable Friday evening traffic jam.

  “Did you see the license plates?” Finn asked as he came around the desk.

  “Yeah. You must be hanging around Jess too much. Since when did you go for the type of woman who would put SXKITN69 on her license plates?” Mary Kate wondered, clearly disgusted by what she perceived to be her big brother’s unusual display of male idiocy.

  “Hell if I know,” Finn admitted as he moved hastily past Mary Kate toward the door.

  Christ, his sister had a right to scold him, Finn thought grimly as he leapt over the concrete barrier a few seconds later. He was acting no better than a beast…a bull charging with single-minded intent at a red-haired woman in a red car.

  Amazing what lust could do to a guy.

  He glanced briefly at the man driving the dark blue pickup in the first lane, ensuring himself the dude didn’t decide he suddenly needed to close the one-foot distance between his truck and the car in front of him until Finn passed. He tapped on the hood of the next car, garnering the attention of a blonde young woman chatting almost nonstop on a cell phone before he passed in front of her. She stopped talking and gaped at him as he walked past.

  He didn’t know exactly what to expect from Esa at that moment, but he was strangely gratified by the fury that flared in her beautiful eyes as she rolled down her window.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing walking into the middle of an interstate? You could have just killed yourself!”

  His eyes flickered over to Carla, who watched him with avid fascination. He frowned. She suddenly smirked. He looked back at Esa.

  “Hello to you too. Traffic is at a standstill. Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?”

  “Hello?” she raged. “You expect me to exchange pleasantries with you standing in the middle of traffic? Maybe we should talk about the weather while a semi runs over your ass!”

  “Esa’s always been a worrier,” Carla explained pleasantly as she leaned forward. “Did Jess tell you that I was coming to your Grandma’s party tonight?”

  Finn’s eyes flew to Esa’s face at the mention of Grandma Glory’s party. Had her cheeks just turned pink in embarrassment or had they been that way before?

  “I haven’t had a chance to talk to him about it. We’ve been crazy busy at work,” Finn said impatiently. “Why haven’t you returned my calls?”

  He took in her amazed expression. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “It’s a simple enough question. Couldn’t you have at least done me the courtesy of returning my calls? I wanted to explain…about Julia.”

  Carla gasped. “Yeah, Esa, couldn’t you at least have done that?”

  “I-I never heard a word from you! And it’s none of your business one way or another,” she informed Carla sourly.

  Finn took one look at Esa’s furious, confused expression and knew she was telling the truth. She may not always be honest with her mouth but her face and eyes didn’t seem capable of telling a lie.

  “I’ve called you several times this week.”

  “You may have been calling somebody but it wasn’t me,” Esa replied defiantly.

  Finn considered the terse message on the voicemail that he’d been calling and silently acknowledged that Caleb had possibly gotten the phone numbers incorrect—although it certainly had sounded like Esa’s voice. Still, the message had never said an actual name.

  He didn’t have time to belabor the point when the guy in the car behind Esa started honking his horn repeatedly. Finn shot him an irritated, disbelieving look when he noticed the space that had opened up in front of Esa’s car, which measured all of ten feet.

  “I suppose I could have gotten the wrong number from Caleb.”

  “Who’s Caleb?” Esa asked.

  “He’s my cousin—a state police officer. It doesn’t matter who he is.” He leaned down and spoke softly near her ear. “The point is that I asked you to come to my grandmother’s Halloween party tonight in Bridgeport.”

  Her eyes got bigger behind her glasses. “Oh. I see.”

  “Not that I’m forgiving you for taking off like that all of a sudden again. Still, I can see how it must have been a little…disconcerting for you.”

  She snorted at what she must have considered to be a bald understatement.

  “Will you come?” he asked, hoping like hell that was excitement making her pulse leap at her throat and not anxiety about being accosted by a madman in the middle of traffic.

  The horn behind them blared loudly.

  “O-okay,” she said unevenly.

  He grinned. Even the jerk blasting his horn behind him didn’t seem half so annoying. “I’ll pick you up then. At eight?” he asked as he stood.

  “I-I, uh…I think it’d be best if I met you there.”

  “I’ll come with her,” Carla piped up. She leaned over the console to look up at him. “Jess invited me to the party but he said he needed to help your mom and grandma out. I said I’d get there on my own. He gave me the address.”

  Finn frowned as he transferred his gaze to Esa. She stared up at him, her full, pink lips parted, a bewildered expression on her pretty face. She looked so soft at that moment…so vulnerable.

  He resisted an urge to lean down and give her a long, thorough kiss through the car window.

  He’d prefer to pick her up himself so that she didn’t have such an easy manner of escaping him yet again. But he’d take her any way he could get her.

  For the moment, anyway.

  “I left you the address on your cell phone, but seeing as how it wasn’t the right number… You’re sure you have the address?” he asked Carla. She nodded eagerly.

  “I’ll see you at eight then.” He gave Esa a hard look, daring her to call him a liar, before he made the return trip walking through Dan Ryan traffic.

  Chapter Twelve

  Esa was so nervous by the time she parked the car at 7:58 that evening that she felt like a sixteen-year-old on the night of her junior prom.

  “Jeez, Jess wasn’t kidding when he said that the party would be packed, was he?” Carla said as they got out of the car and followed a football player and a mummy down the street. Sounds of rock music and children shouting with glee filtered through the pitch-black night. Esa had had to park three blocks away, the streets surrounding Finn’s mother’s house were so packed with partygoers’ cars.

  “Finn implied he was related to half of Bridgeport by blood or marriage,” Esa recalled.

  “Maybe I should have worn a costume,” Carla mused, her eyes on the bright white bandages of the mummy walking in front of them. “Something sexy…a French maid’s outfit or something.”

  “That’d have made stellar first impression on Jess’ mom.”

  Carla snorted. “As if it matters what kind of an impression I make on her.”

  Esa was too distracted to respond. Ever since she’d learned from Finn that he’d tried to call her this week she hadn’t been able to think about anything properly. She glanced down at her body in the darkness, assuring herself that she hadn’t put on her clothes inside out. She recalled Carla’s uncustomary warm praise about her hair and outfit earlier when Esa had picked her up, so she supposed she hadn’t been so out of it that she’d applied two different colors of eye shadow on each lid or something.

  Somewhere in all that mental stewing she’d decided that she’d tell Finn the truth about her. Toni
ght.

  She was sick of lying to him. She hadn’t engaged in such a bald-faced lie since her undergraduate days. Even back then her mother had suspected the truth about her moving into her smarmy boyfriend Jarvis’ tiny, disgustingly dirty studio.

  This was different, of course. Finn wasn’t her mother. So what if he no longer wanted to hook up with her—reprehensible phrase—once he understood she didn’t regularly engage in casual sex flings and work as the publisher of a racy singles’ magazine? Why would she want to be around him if that were the case, anyway?

  So that you can get in a few more rounds of what was most likely the best sex you’ll ever have in your life? a sly voice in her head answered.

  Well…there was that. She wouldn’t be a terrible person for wanting good sex. She certainly wouldn’t be any more single-minded than Finn himself.

  But something strange had occurred when she’d seen Finn walking toward her in traffic with that determined expression on his handsome face. Something that made the blood run so fast in her veins that she’d felt lightheaded. A heretofore unknown feeling had overcome her at the sight of him stalking through those cars like a tawny lion on the hunt. The sensation amplified until she was rendered nearly speechless by the time he’d leaned down and she’d caught his scent.

  How was it possible that a man could have such a profound effect on her body? Esa wondered as she and Carla followed the football player and the mummy up the stairs to the crowded front porch. Lit jack-o-lanterns of various sizes with facial expressions that ranged from the eerie to the comical glowed festively along the porch parapet. The rowdy notes of Ballroom Blitz sounded through the opened front door.

  “Hi Chase…that’s not Marisa under all those bandages, is it?” an attractive woman in her fifties with stylishly cut short blonde hair teased.

  “Nah, she’s coming with her sister Angie in a bit,” Chase said as he took off his helmet and gave the woman a hug. “You know Seamus Hatfield right, Mrs. M.?”

  The woman’s eyes narrowed as she studied Seamus the Mummy. “Used to play football with Finn in high school? Running back, if I recall correctly.”

  “You’ve got a good memory, Mrs. Madigan.”

  She laughed. “You’re right. A good memory is a necessity of life with all these kids, grandkids and cousins. Go on out to the deck, you two. The kegs are out there and Danny’s got burgers and brats on the grill. There’s more food than you’ll know what to do with in the kitchen.”

  “And what about the…” Chase asked as he mimed dealing cards. “I’m planning to win back some of the money that your two oldest sons took from me a couple weeks ago.”

  “They’re playing cards in the family room, not that I’m condoning gambling, mind you.”

  Chase moved forward and Finn’s mother caught sight of Carla and Esa.

  “Oh, hello! I’m sorry, I didn’t see you behind these two big guys. I’m Molly Madigan.”

  Chase and Seamus turned to examine them as Esa and Carla introduced themselves and shook hands with Molly.

  “Two women that look like them? They gotta be Finn’s, Jess’, Caleb’s…or maybe even Danny’s dates. Danny’s getting up there…starting to play with the big boys,” Chase speculated.

  He laughed when Esa glanced at him in surprise, giving away the near accuracy of his guess. He leaned forward and spoke close to Molly Madigan’s ear but loud enough for Esa and Carla to hear. “What kind of boys did you raise, Mrs. M., that they don’t even go and pick up their dates?”

  “Finn offered,” Esa said quickly, more to Molly than Chase. She’d already learned from Finn that the neat, attractive woman who stood in front of her wouldn’t take kindly to the idea of one of her sons behaving rudely. “I just wanted to drive.”

  “Oh, so you are Finn’s friend? He told me to look out for you. And as for Jess, he’s been busy helping Glory and me set up for the party,” Molly assured Carla, as though she were worried she might have been offended by Chase’s teasing. She took Esa by the arm. “Now, come on, you two, and we’ll look for them. I hope they’re not at cards already…or playing Wolf Man, now that it’s dark…”

  Carla shot Esa a dubious glance of amusement behind Molly’s back but there wasn’t much of a chance to either tell their kind hostess that she needn’t worry about attending to them personally or ask her what she meant by “playing Wolf Man”. The foyer and homey living room that they walked into was so loud with boisterous conversations and rambunctious music that all Esa could do was concentrate on following Molly through the crowd.

  “Oh, there’s Jess. Jess!” Molly called out.

  Esa spotted Jess out on the back terrace, leaning back on the railing with a beer bottle in his hand and chatting with another tall young man with sun-burnished light brown hair holding a spatula and dressed like a seventies rock star. Given his obvious chef status, Esa guessed he was Finn’s younger brother Danny. He smiled at something Jess said, the quick flash of brilliance reminding her poignantly of Finn.

  Molly Madigan had certainly given birth to some awesome-looking males, Esa had to admit.

  Jess glanced through the opened patio doors and waved happily when he saw Carla. Esa studied his handsome face as Carla went to join him. She was at least partially mollified that he seemed to be genuinely glad to see her good friend. Carla may pretend like Jess Madigan hadn’t gotten beneath her skin but Esa saw the familiar signs that indicated otherwise.

  Carla had gone through several bad breakups in the last five years. The scars that she’d received from those love-affairs-gone-awry were part of the reason that she’d acquired this new, callous, single-minded attitude regarding men and sex. But Esa could sense Carla’s bravado wearing thin when it came to Jess.

  And it worried her.

  “One down and one to go,” Molly shouted over the notes of Thriller. “Maybe Finn is in the kitchen getting something to eat.”

  Esa just nodded and followed her hostess into a crowded kitchen. The music was muffled somewhat when the heavy oak door swung shut. Almost every occupant of the room was a woman. Molly introduced her to so many people that Esa’s head spun, but she took extra interest when she was introduced to “Finn’s cousin Dina”.

  There was nothing suspicious about Finn’s teacher in the arts of kissing—in addition to God knew what other erotic activities. The attractive brunette who looked about five years older than Esa was as friendly as everyone else Molly introduced her to, so Esa supposed she could only be thankful to Dina for being such an amazing instructor.

  Although she hazarded a guess that Finn possessed an innate talent when it came to the kissing department.

  She also took extra interest in meeting Finn’s three sisters. Anna Jean and Ellen were the youngest—Esa guessed their ages to be around sixteen or seventeen. The purity of Anna Jean’s youthful features made her a perfect Joan of Arc while Ellen’s pert pug nose and saucy grin made her ideally suited for her surfer girl costume. The oldest of the three, Mary Kate, a pretty woman with a gorgeous mane of blonde hair, studied Esa with frank interest when Molly introduced them.

  “Finn was here just a minute ago. Not sure where he went off to,” Mary Kate offered politely.

  Esa started in alarm when several ear-piercing shrieks of terror penetrated the kitchen windows. She relaxed a little when the combined screams were followed by children’s hysterical laughter. Mary Kate and Molly exchanged a knowing glance.

  “Cory and Alex must have talked Finn into playing Wolf Man,” Mary Kate said.

  “Finn is playing Wolf Man? Let’s go!” Ellen told Anna Jean before both girls rushed out of the kitchen.

  When Mary Kate saw Esa’s confused expression she explained, “You’ll think we’re barbarians no doubt—my husband did the first time he attended one of Glory’s Halloween parties—but the Madigans have a tradition whereby we—”

  “Scare our children half to death,” a voice behind Esa said.

  She spun around to face a tall, incredibly striking w
oman dressed as Cleopatra. Cleopatra herself would have killed to look as gorgeous as this woman did when she was in her seventies.

  “Glory Madigan,” the woman said with a smile as she held out her bejeweled hand.

  “Esa Ormond,” Esa replied as she shook Glory’s hand and studied her with open fascination. “That costume is amazing. And you look fantastic in it.”

  “Thanks,” Glory said with a cheeky grin. She batted her false eyelashes flirtatiously. “I’ve been working out regularly at the senior center for the past three months. I’ve lost twelve pounds, but mostly just turned all the fat to muscle,” Glory added as an intimate aside to Esa.

  “Low-impact aerobics?” Esa asked.

  “In addition to water aerobics on Sundays and meditation on Tuesdays.”

  “I don’t suppose your referring to the new senior center on 95th and Ashland?”

  Glory looked surprised. “Yes, the facility is wonderful. I’m surprised you know about it. Do you live in the area?”

  “No, I just heard about it through the grapevine,” Esa responded in a vague fashion.

  “Mom’s been bound and determined to get into shape in order to wear that costume,” Molly explained with a grin.

  “Mom and Grandma Glory made it,” Mary Kate added.

  “Another Madigan tradition,” Molly said with a laugh. “We make Glory a different costume every year.”

  “I’m going to get you into one next year, Molly,” Glory said with a determined frown.

  From the doubtful expression on Molly’s face, Esa guessed that Molly was nowhere near as fond of dressing up as her mother-in-law was.

  “Oh…but we never finished telling Esa about the Wolf Man tradition,” Molly said.

  “It all started with my husband Sean and his six brothers,” Glory began. “I had five children and there were hoards of Madigan cousins. One Halloween Sean bought a Wolf Man mask and whipped the kids into a frenzy by hiding in the backyard and making growling noises—”

  “I was one of the kids,” Molly piped up. “I was in the seventh grade and invited to the party by my best friend Mary Madigan. When we heard those noises in that pitch-black backyard we were scared, I can tell you. But when Dad Madigan came bursting out of the bushes wearing that Wolf Man mask we were petrified. I’ve never screamed so hard in my life.”