by Bonnie Dee
“How did he use you, Camilla?”
“Those men he works with brought me from Guatemala, smuggling heroin. Inside.” The pistol was slack in her hand, but still jammed into Jordan’s side.
Lauren moved a step closer. “They used you as a mule.”
“Si. Then I met Robbie. He was so good to me, gave me a job in his home and everything. I was only seventeen. I loved him, but he never really loved me. He never…” Tears streamed down her cheeks and she sucked in a wet, rattling breath.
Lauren took another small step forward, aiming her gun toward the floor, but ready to bring it up in a second. “What did you have to do for him, Camilla?”
“They needed a translator. I got more money than I’d ever imagined for recruiting other mules and explaining what to do. I was as bad as those men. Que puta!” she sobbed.
Camilla was losing her focus on her hostages as she told her story. The moment was so close Lauren could feel it. A quick kick to her gun hand and one clean shot were all Lauren needed.
“What happened to make you shoot Robert that night?”
“I finally had enough to send for my two younger sisters. I paid for everything, their papers and their plane tickets. But those bastards told the girls they had to carry drugs to earn their way. They were packed with 200 grams each. They made it through customs, but Bethania’s burst inside her.”
Lauren nodded. Heroine-filled condoms swallowed and later passed by the mule occasionally leaked or broke causing illness or death. She could imagine Camilla turning on McKenzie, the confrontation, the escalating argument, her realization she’d only been a pawn to him and then the shooting.
“I never meant to kill him. I was so angry. He said he was sorry about Bethania, but he wasn’t, not really. He was as evil as those men were, and he never really loved me.”
Lauren gazed right into the other woman’s eyes, letting her see her sympathy. “I get how it happened. But you don’t want to hurt Mike. Don’t make him another victim.”
“I never wanted to hurt Mikey. After I found out he might have seen me, I didn’t know if he’d tell, but leaving town would look suspicious, so I tried to act normal and wait to see what would happen.”
“Did you drive past Danny Stipe’s house the other day looking for Mike?”
“I wouldn’t have hurt him, I swear. But if he happened to be out in the yard… You see, I thought I could just talk to him, find out what he might have seen, maybe convince him to keep quiet or explain what had happened so he could understand.” Her explanation became more confused as she went on. “And today…I didn’t expect the boy to be here. He doesn’t like crowds and Celia never takes him places like this. I thought he’d be with a sitter, and I could see Robert one last time. I had to come, don’t you see, to beg his forgiveness for what I did?”
“But you came armed with a weapon,” Lauren pointed out. “Camilla you’re bringing more trouble on yourself with every move you make. If you give me the gun now, I can fix this. Please, before someone gets hurt.”
Lauren slowly reached out her hand.
With a sob, Camilla dropped her gun to her side. Lauren stepped forward and took the pistol from her limp hand.
Covering her face with her hands, Camilla wept, loud wails that shook her body.
As Lauren quietly told the woman her rights, she glanced at Jordan, still standing with Mike’s arms locked around his neck, face buried against his shoulder.
“Are you both all right?” she asked when she was finished with Camilla.
Jordan nodded. His eyes expressed more sorrow than one person should have to bear. Lauren wanted to alleviate any of that sadness she could, but for the moment all she could do was offer a smile.
Her adrenaline rush carried her through the next half hour. First she transferred Camilla into Officer Grady’s care, swearing to the cop he’d hear more from her later about his lax security which had nearly cost lives. When he’d left with the prisoner, Lauren faced the daunting task of telling Celia McKenzie the news.
She had no idea what the protocol was in such a bizarre situation. She debated waiting until after the viewing was over to destroy the rest of Celia’s illusions about her husband. But too many people had come into the foyer and witnessed Camilla being taken away. Gossip was starting to circulate.
Lauren entered the chapel but before she even reached Celia, the woman walked toward her, a frown furrowing her forehead. “What’s happened? Where’s Mike?”
“It’s all right. He’s with Mr. Langley in another room. But there’s been a new development in the case. Perhaps the funeral director should make an announcement and end the viewing so I can explain everything to you privately.”
For the first time, Lauren appreciated Danny Stipe, who didn’t ask questions, but implemented her plan, quickly dismissing the guests and getting them moving out of the room. Meanwhile, Lauren ushered Celia and the rest of the family into the side chamber where Jordan and Mike waited.
Jordan sat on a chair with Mike still wrapped around him like a little monkey. The boy disentangled his arms and legs and climbed down from the man’s lap to run to his mother.
She knelt and gathered him into her arms, still frowning at Lauren over the top of his head. “Tell me what happened.”
Lauren was used to difficult conversations. It was often her duty to tell people their loved ones had died or even been murdered. Facing the family’s grief and their anger with composure and compassion was probably the most difficult part of her job. It never got any easier.
By the time she’d finished explaining everything to Celia and listened to her weeping, the adrenaline had slowly receded from Lauren’s system. Her body was shaky and exhausted, but she couldn’t relax yet. She needed to go to the station and formally interrogate Camilla.
Jordan had withdrawn from the room after Lauren began talking to the McKenzies and Stipes. Before she left the building, Lauren went to find him to make sure that he was all right.
He was alone in another antechamber off the visitation room. He sat on the floor with his forearms resting on his drawn-up knees and his head hanging down. Every line of his body signaled exhaustion.
Lauren crouched beside him. “Are you okay?”
He lifted his face. His thick bangs fell across his eyes and he pushed them back so they stood up in crazy cowlicks. His skin was corpse pale with dark smudges beneath his eyes, but he gave her a wan smile. “Never better.”
“Liar.” She returned the smile. “You look like shit.” Like I feel.
“Thanks. You look gorgeous. How do you manage to go through an ordeal like that and still look beautiful?”
“Practice,” she quipped. “But seriously, are you going to be all right?”
“In a while. I just have to shake it off. Hey, you were amazing in there, talking her down.”
“But you were the one who was calming her. I swear I could see you sucking up her pain like some giant vacuum.”
“Vacuum?” He raised an eyebrow. “I’ve been called a lot of things, but—”
Lauren cut him off, leaning in to cup a hand around the back of his neck and press her mouth to his. She moved her lips in soft, nibbling kisses, teasing him to response. His mouth relaxed, growing soft and pliant beneath her lightly stroking tongue.
As the heat and intensity of the kisses grew, Lauren opened herself to him. She reached out with her mind and senses and heart, inviting him inside her. Clamping down on her own busy interior life, she tried to become an empty vessel for his emotions to pour into. She pulled him into her arms, offering the comfort of her body and the strength of her support, willing him to release the collective misery that wasn’t even his own.
And slowly tendrils of sorrow like vapors of fog seeped into her consciousness. Her heart ached and her body physically hurt from the tastes of acrimony and anger, guilt and gloom that permeated her.
“Oh God!” she murmured against his mouth, suppressing a whimper.
Abruptly Jo
rdan drew away and he let go of her. His eyes opened and he shook his head. “You don’t want this. Believe me.”
“No. I do. I want to help you if I can—even a little.” She grabbed his hands, entwining their fingers. “You bear everyone else’s burdens. Now it’s your turn to share your pain with someone. Let it go, Jordan. Give it to me.”
She squeezed his hands tight and closed her eyes, and a renewed wave of emotions swept through her. It was like being in a crowded room at a party with the music too loud and people shouting over it. The din of feelings was deafening and overwhelming, but Lauren held firm, absorbing fragments of mostly negative emotions, but some positive ones too. Her head began to ache and her natural instinct was to release the cause of pain, Jordan’s hands.
Instead, she sent back feelings of her own, strength and caring to replace what bled out of him. She imagined herself as a sort of intravenous replacement fluid and smiled at the concept, “the IV bag o’ love”. And she took that humor, the relief, joy and pleasure she felt at simply touching Jordan, and shared it all with him.
The exchange of feeling was like refracted light trapped in a crystal; it careened back and forth between them. When she finally opened her eyes and returned to herself, Lauren didn’t know if minutes or hours had passed. She was emotionally drained yet uplifted. Joyful and bittersweet, her perspective had shifted and she felt like a different person, but that wasn’t a bad thing. She was ready to change, ready to open herself to the possibility of love and ready to trust her own instincts once more.
Sitting back on her heels, she finally let go of Jordan’s hands, but remained gazing into his eyes for a little while longer before she finally spoke.
“I have to leave now to take care of business, but…would you be interested in going on a date some time? No guns or criminals, I promise, just dinner and a movie.”
Jordan smiled slowly, a lazy curve of his lips that made her want to kiss him again. “I’d like that.”
Chapter Nine
“Hey, baby.” Lauren’s husky murmur raised gooseflesh on his skin and brought his cock to attention.
“Hi. Hard day?” He grabbed her hand, pulling her through the front door and into his arms. She snuggled up tight against his body, her curves fitting his angles like the pair of them was made to mesh together.
“They all are. Too long and too damn busy.” She smiled. “But a lot better when I know I’m going to see you at the end of the day.”
“Did you have to go to court?”
She was just the right height for his chin to rest on top of her head, and her nod bumped his chin. “Yeah. Camilla was on the stand. They’ve been keeping her hidden, and when it’s over, if her plea bargain goes well, she’ll be in Witness Protection instead of prison.”
“It’s all pretty fucked up, isn’t it?” He nuzzled and kissed her hair. “She did murder the guy, after all.”
“That’s the system. FBI is much more interested in taking down a syndicate than in a simple murder.”
“Are they even going to try to get testimony from Mike?”
“Probably a taped interview. The kid can’t go on the stand.”
“Poor little guy. He’s doing better these days, but he’s still messed up. It’ll be a relief for the family when the whole ordeal is over and they can get on with their lives.”
“Mm.” The sound vibrated against the hollow of his throat and her mouth pressed against him there, kissing and licking. “Guess what? I don’t want to talk about anything connected with my work tonight. Why don’t you tell me about your day instead?”
“Worked on a design in the morning, stopped at the center this afternoon and spent time with the kids, then came home and caught up on some paperwork.” He paused. “And I stopped to look at puppies again. You sure you don’t want to get one?”
She pulled away and looked up at him. “It’s your place. If you want one, you should get one.”
He growled his annoyance at her continued resistance to the idea, but understood it. A mutual pet meant commitment and even after three months together Lauren was gun shy. “It wouldn’t be my dog. It would be ours. We both live here now.”
A small smile played at the corners of her mouth. “I like dogs,” she admitted.
Jordan cupped the side of her face and leaned to kiss her soft lips lightly. “Then tomorrow we’ll go look at the litter together.”
A hot mixture of desire, pleasure, contentment and happiness surged from her, lapping over him like a tropical surf. She clung to his shoulders and kissed him hard.
“I love you,” she mumbled, so low he wasn’t sure he’d heard right. But the pure, blazing light that arched between them let him know he hadn’t imagined the words.
And she’d said them first—an abrupt, giant stride forward for Lauren.
He smiled down at her and offered them back. “Love you, too.”
Her cheeks colored as she shrugged off her jacket and dropped it beside her purse in the foyer. Grabbing his hand, she pulled him with her toward the bedroom. “Less talk. More action.”
Obeying her command, Jordan swept her off her feet and carried her the last few yards to lay her on the bed. He stripped in record time then helped her with removing her clothes, pulling her silky red panties down her smooth legs. Every time he saw her naked body, it was a revelation, as if he wasn’t intimately familiar with it by now.
Her skin was porcelain fine, unblemished and luminous, especially displayed against the navy blue sheets. He sat on the bed beside her and stroked his hands up and down her body, enjoying the soft, firm texture of her skin, the heat that radiated into his palms and the delicious mixture of emotions that filled him. She was dark and light, sadness and joy, vulnerable self-doubt and incredible strength, and he appreciated every aspect because the sum total was an amazing woman.
Her nipples thrust up so invitingly, he had to bend down and take one in his mouth while tugging and rolling the other between his finger and thumb. His tongue rolled over the hard nub, teasing it, before he sucked it deeply into his mouth.
Lauren’s soft whimper whipped his arousal to a greater height, the quiet, needy sound burning straight through him. Her pleasure filled him, igniting his own.
She reached for his cock, her hand wrapping around his girth and simply holding him. Her thumb rubbed it idly while she lifted her breasts toward his suckling mouth.
Jordan took her tit between his teeth, knowing how his sharp nips affected her. Lauren loved a little rough treatment of her breasts, a hard squeeze of the round fullness or a punishing pinch of her nipples. She gasped and moaned as he alternated between gentle fondling and harsh twists.
His cock ached with her mounting desire which suffused his being. His need and hers bled together until the two of them were one throbbing, lust-drenched being.
When they reached this state, which was usually almost immediately during lovemaking, it would be all too easy for Jordan to jump on her and pound her into the mattress. It took considerable willpower to make sex last when escalating, mutual hunger kicked in.
He released her tit from his mouth and sucked in a breath before lavishing the other with the same loving, punishing treatment. He put up a mental block, shutting out some of the incoming sensations and reining in his own libido, while he left her chest and kissed his way down Lauren’s stomach.
She wiggled beneath his tickling mouth, and her skin tightened and twitched when he dipped his tongue in her navel. He licked a snail trail down her belly to the little landing strip of hair that marked her pussy, then paused to breathe in her aroma, musky and feminine. His mouth salivated for a taste of her, but he decided to play a little first. Small, puckers of his lips against her inner thighs and all around her crotch were all he’d give her as she whined and arched her hips, begging for more.
He slipped his finger along her seam, teasing between the soft folds to find her wet opening. He traced around it, delicately, carefully, causing her infinite frustration and yearning. M
ore. More. The pleading for a firmer touch flooded him and he gave into the pressure, probing one finger, two, then three inside her. Her muscles clenched around them, drawing them deeper. And, as he thrust them in and out, he finally bent to flick his tongue over her erect clit.
Lauren’s sigh of relief was audible both to his ears and inside his head. He licked the bud with steady strokes that brought her closer and closer to the edge of orgasm. Random flashes of pleasure gathered and grew stronger, combining like single threads into a strong rope that tugged on a place deep inside her. He could draw her climax out of her. A few more thrusts of his fingers and laps of his tongue would bring her to it. She was thrusting against him, moaning and lifting her hips.
Jordan loved this moment when his lover trembled on the verge and he had the power to give her bliss. It was a simple act yet deeply moving. Breathing her in, he paused a moment just to hear her whimper of disappointment, to feel her hands clutching at his head, urging him onward. Then he withdrew his fingers from inside her, splayed both hands over her hips and held her while his tongue lapped feverishly over her clit.
She arched up and wailed as the tension burst and a flood of ecstasy overtook her…and him. His cock was like steel, aching with the need to come. He thrust into the bedding, rubbing, desperate for relief while Lauren’s juices burst across his tongue. He lapped inside her, feasting on her flavor, then returned to her clit to give it a last soft lick.
Twisting away, she clamped her legs together. Her nerve endings were so sensitized, the mere touch hurt. And he could feel that, too. He couldn’t wait, not a second longer. He had to be inside her now.
Jordan moved up beside her and guided his cock to her. She was open, wet and ready for him, sliding onto his shaft in an easy glide, taking him in all the way to the hilt. After giving her a quick kiss, he pulled back so he could see her face. He liked making love like this, on their sides, as if they were having a silent conversation between their bodies. The position didn’t allow for much movement, no frantic thrusting. It was a leisurely coupling, intimate and personal.
