Kiss Them Goodbye

by Stella Cameron

  “Because you’re afraid I’d hurt you, or Wendy. It’s Wendy you worry about most and I like you for that. But are you really thinking about the whole picture, or just about sex?”

  His eyes never left her face and he didn’t flinch. “I need that, too. I want that, too. But I’d settle for kissing you—for now. Just to see how we like it. You probably wouldn’t want that when I have nothing else to offer you.”

  Vivian looked at their joined hands and inched them toward her. He stopped her, kissed her palm, pressed it against his neck and leaned slowly closer.

  She heard his breathing, focused on the distinct contours of his mouth. He stopped moving toward her and she almost panicked at the thought that he might not kiss her.

  His eyes closed. His lips found hers in a soft, careful kiss. She heard their mouths part, but almost at once he drew the tip of his tongue across her lips and nipped lightly. They shifted their faces, noses bumping gently. Vivian felt his features, the beard stubble, feathered her fingers over his brows, his closed eyes.

  Spike maneuvered her to face him, pulled her forward until her knees were between his thighs. He held her head and stroked the corners of her mouth. Vivian pressed her mouth into his, passed her tongue over the smooth insides while his thumbs at the corners of her lips, rubbing, aroused her.

  He heard her pant, felt her tongue meet his and shifted on the chair. The little white tank top had wriggled up and when he sought her waist he found a bared midriff. With each touch, she moaned, and he moaned with her. He found the indentation in her spine, between her hips, slid a hand beneath her jeans and held her smooth bottom, let his fingers graze the dip between the cheeks.

  And Vivian rubbed him, his neck and shoulders, his sides, across his chest. She pinched his flat nipples and he thought he’d lose the last vestige of his control. Abandoning his mouth for his chest, she trailed her tongue over his skin, gradually lowered her head and sucked a dozen places on his belly.

  Vivian didn’t want to think about anything but the way he felt, and the way she felt with him. His abdomen, tight and inflexible, tasted salty. The sensation that came when he slipped her tank top from one shoulder stopped her breath. He bent over and kissed her there. His hands passed from her ribs to the sides of her breasts. And she burned, her nipples, deep in her womb, between her legs where flesh turned hard and erogenous. It swelled, throbbed.

  In one swift motion, Spike pulled her from her chair and astride his thighs and, as she’d known must happen, he stopped kissing her. He held her in strong arms, such strong arms she couldn’t catch her breath.

  Beneath her, she felt his erection. He wanted her as much as she wanted him. He pushed the distended ridge behind his zipper against her center. “Spike?”

  “This is going to sound crazy,” he said against her face, rocking her, dipping his tongue rapidly into her mouth and, always, breathing like a suffocating man. “I want you so bad it hurts.”

  “I want you,” she told him. It was too late for pride.

  “Vivian, I don’t just want sex with you.” He gave a short laugh. “Not that I don’t need that enough to make me want to take you no matter what the cost might be. But if I can’t have all of you, all the time, I’m not going to do something that’ll mean you’ll walk the other way if you see me coming.”

  She pushed a hand between them and massaged the hard length of him.

  Spike captured her wrist. For moments he closed her hand even harder over him and let his head drop back.

  Just as quickly, he pulled her hand from him.

  “I’d never walk away from you,” she said, leaning on him, pressing her face into his shoulder. “Not unless you told me to.”

  They came together in a frenzied burst. He kissed her wildly and didn’t confine himself to her mouth. Rocking her on top of his distended penis, he pulled her top above her breasts, held his tongue between his teeth while he narrowed his eyes to look at her. Beads of sweat broke out on his brow and upper lip.

  Vivian couldn’t stand waiting. She thrust herself toward him and he buried his face between her breasts. His mouth, settling over a nipple, pulled a cry from her and she moved him to the other breast. She put her feet on the floor either side of him and stood, pushing his head back while she tried to get closer and closer.

  Spike unzipped her jeans and slid his fingers inside her panties. Her hips jerked against him. He’d just about lost it all. Even knowing he should stop, not because he didn’t want her but because common sense told him to, he still couldn’t bring himself to leave her on the brink.

  Seconds passed in silence while he licked her breasts, flicked the tip of his tongue over her nipples—and got serious about his finger action. He longed to kiss her down there and finish the job with his mouth. Even if he’d decided to go for it, Vivian let him know it was too late. She curved forward over him, wrapped her arms around his head and held him hard against her, and came in a burst of convulsive thrusts.

  Already she tore at his zipper. Why did this have to be a decision? he wondered. He needed her now. They needed each other. “Not now, cher,” he murmured, holding her hand away. He had to hold on, get through this. “Not here.”

  “I like it here.”

  So did he, as long as she was with him.

  “Spike, I’ll never, never turn away from you.”

  “I’d rather not have to remind you of that promise,” he said, and stood up, moving her to his side and zipping his pants. Blood pounded in his head, and elsewhere. He willed his drive for sex to calm down. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and we’ll become what? Appropriate? I’m following you home to make sure you get safely inside.”

  Chapter 9

  “The only identifiable prints on the phone are yours. And that jackass Devol’s, of course. But since I figure he’d have fixed the thing if he was worried about it, I’m reckonin’ he’s probably clean, him.”

  Vivian swallowed several times but her mouth remained dry. Detective Bonine had set himself up in Uncle Guy’s old office in the south wing, apparently oblivious to the dust that layered everything and swirled in a slice of sunlight through velvet-draped windows. He shifted papers on the rosewood desk, sending more murky clouds into the air, and didn’t even sneeze.

  Vivian sneezed.

  So did Gary Legrain, whose very tall body all but reclined in an orange velvet chair with skeins of bright beads knotted on each leg.

  She met his gray eyes but he showed no emotion. However, from the moment he’d arrived before nine that morning, she’d liked him and been grateful he was at Rosebank. He’d offered, without pressure, to act as Charlotte and Vivian’s attorney if they wanted him, at least until they decided what to do about permanent representation. They assured him they wanted and needed him.

  “Did you read my clients their rights last night?” Legrain asked in his rumbly voice.

  Bonine slammed a bronze pineapple paperweight on top of a file. “I’ve told them they aren’t suspects.”

  “That wasn’t my question.”

  “Well, you got the answer I decided to give you,” Bo-nine said. “You still aren’t a suspect, Ms. Patin, but I’d like to read you your rights just the same. Better for both of us.” He whipped out a card and recited the Miranda in a rapid mono-tone as if he saw nothing wrong with having taken advantage the previous evening.

  “You recordin’ this?” Legrain asked innocently, scanning jammed bookcases at the same time.

  Bonine’s face had turned its signature shade of puce. The shaft of sun lighted a muzzy reddish halo around his grizzled head and Vivian got a fleeting vision of horns on top. Last night and early this formerly wonderful morning had not left her in the mood for sleep. Now she was exhausted and the horned mirage of Bo-nine made her giggle before wisdom clicked on.

  “You’re bein’ warned, you,” Bonine said. “There’s nothin’ funny about the situation here, or your part in it, Ms. Patin. You may not find me, or what could happen to you so funny in a while.”

/>   “Intimidating witnesses—”

  “Shut your mouth, Legrain,” Bonine said and Vivian didn’t need someone else to warn her the man was melting down. “Much more out of you and I’ll have you removed.”

  “On what grounds?” Legrain asked in a reasonable voice which wasn’t likely to calm Bonine. “Where’s the recorder?”

  “On the grounds that you’re a pain in the ass.” Bonine got up and fussed around in boxes he’d had brought in until he produced the necessary recording equipment and switched it on. He gave his name, Vivian’s, and the time and date in bored tones then added Gary Legrain’s presence as an afterthought. “You gonna let me get on with my business now?” he asked.

  Legrain levered himself out of his chair and commenced to take long, slow strides around the room. He made the mistake of pulling one of the orange velvet drapes aside to get a better view of the courtyard and stables. Vivian lost count of the number of times he sneezed amid clouds of pungent dust.

  “Are you done interruptin’ this interrogation?” Bo-nine asked when the sneezing stopped. He went on without waiting for a reply, “Ms. Patin, isn’t it true that you and your mama got money troubles?”

  Vivian’s temper rose. She looked at her lawyer but he continued his round of the room and didn’t seem interested in the question. “We do,” she said. Honesty paid in the end—or mostly it did—even if she was caught off balance by the question.

  Gary Legrain stopped his pacing and sat on the corner of the desk—on the same side as Bonine. Vivian figured he had to be close to seven feet tall and he looked in good shape. He wore his dishwater-blond hair short and was more tanned than any other lawyer she remembered. He appeared to stare into the distance, much to the detective’s ire.

  “You comfy enough, Legrain?” Bonine asked. “You through sneezin’ and tryin’ to mess with my train of thought, you?”

  “You’ve got the floor,” Legrain said.

  “So here you are with this place. It needs to be condemned or repaired—”

  “It does not need to be condemned,” Vivian told him, even though she knew she was being baited.

  “As I was sayin’,” Bonine continued, “you got a notion to do this place up and run some sort of rooming house.”

  Either he was trying to make her angry or he was operating with minus gray cells. Neither possibility encouraged Vivian. She didn’t need a mean-spirited troublemaker or a mental midget with power.

  “A hotel,” she told him, turning up the corners of her mouth. “My parents were in the restaurant business and I’ve been in hotel management for—”

  “I didn’t ask for a life history,” Bonine said. “I know all that. You wanna open a hotel then.” A sneer didn’t improve the arrangement of his belligerent features.

  “We’ll start small,” she said, as if she hadn’t picked up on his attitude. “A few rooms and a restaurant.”

  Bonine pushed back in his chair and hauled his feet onto the desk. “This whole place needs work.”

  “Don’t I know it?” Vivian actually enjoyed hiding behind her innocent eyes.

  “You got the money?”

  Legrain said, “Where are you going with this?”

  “You’ll see, you,” the detective said. “You got the money, Ms. Patin?”

  She shook her head and managed to find bubbles of tears.

  “Yeah,” Bonine said with satisfaction. “I’d say you were in a big bind. How long have you known Devol?”

  “Are you going to make some connections anytime soon, Detective?” Legrain’s profile had turned hard. He narrowed his eyes.

  Bonine ignored him. “How long?”

  “We met a couple of years back, maybe longer,” Vivian said. “We used to talk whenever I was here visiting my uncle.” And this morning we did more than talk.

  “We’ll come back to that. You told me Louis Martin was bringin’ good news. You told me what he said, but I don’t necessarily read it the way you did. Maybe it was bad news. Perhaps there was something in the briefcase you didn’t want anyone to see—some question about the ownership of Rosebank, maybe. Did he threaten you, want money or something?”

  “The detective is way out of line,” Legrain said. He snapped out his words and stood up. “I suggest you back off and rethink how you want to pursue this, Bonine.”

  “Save it for the prosecutor, Legrain. You don’t get to make suggestions to me. Devol would do anything to get back at me for whatever he’s decided I’ve done to him. He’d be on the front line to help someone make a fool of me.” He creaked sideways in the chair to peer at the recorder. “Will you look at that? Damn cheap equipment quit.” One heavy finger plunked down on a button and Vivian realized he was turning it on, not off. When had it stopped recording?

  Confused, she lost her battle to keep on seeming unfazed. “Spike had nothing to do with any of this. He didn’t know you’d be the one to come.”

  “He knew,” Bonine declared.

  “Are you suggesting Devol’s an accessory?” Legrain asked. “If so, that’s a pretty flamboyant accusation.”

  Bonine gave a smile that flared his nostrils. “I’m not suggestin’ anythin’, me. Just doin’ my job.”

  “Apparently the priest saw—”

  “What he does or doesn’t say he saw is between him and me at this point. I’m an analytical man, me. Time of death doesn’t have to mean a thing in a case like this.”

  Tapping at the door startled Vivian. Legrain raised his eyebrows. Bonine’s frown wiped out his eyelids.

  Vivian said, “Come in.”

  Madge Pollard, Cyrus’s right hand, she who kept St. Cécil’s—and Cyrus—running, trotted into the room with four cups on a tray, and a guileless smile on her lips. “Break time,” she said, or just about sang. “From what Cyrus, and now Charlotte have told me, not one of you is taking care of yourself. How will you think your way through this tragedy if you don’t give your brains a good slap now and then.”

  Bonine was exercising male viewing rights. Madge’s cream shirt and tan pants were demure enough, but she had the kind of figure that would turn a Kevlar jumpsuit into sexy gear.

  “Put it there,” Bonine said, referring to the tray and pointing at the desk. He actually tilted his head to watch Madge do as he asked.

  “Cream and sugar?” Madge asked. “I’ll be mother.”

  Vivian clamped her lips together. Nothing Madge did would surprise her, but the ditzy brunette act could become a party piece.

  “Cream, no sugar, please,” Legrain said and his interested grin let Vivian know he hadn’t missed Madge’s charms, either.

  Black curly hair, chin length, bounced with each move of Madge’s head and the deep intelligence in her dark eyes made them even more appealing. Vivian didn’t think an interruption by Gil the gardener would have been as well received.

  Once the men held their coffee, Madge handed a cup to Vivian and picked up one for herself. “We’ve got tea.” She smiled all around. “Hot tea. Cools you down. Isn’t that what we say, Vivian? Stops you from feeling wiggly.” Another innocent grin. “I hate it when the heat makes you wiggly, don’t you?”

  Affirmative mumbles followed, and the clearing of throats, and a certain gleam in eyes that probably envisioned Madge feeling “wiggly.”

  Vivian stared at Madge in disbelief. Who would have expected someone else to spout Mama’s tea and body temperature wisdom?

  Madge had burst into the room to be a Good Samaritan and try to spring Vivian, but Madge was also having a great time with her act.

  “I heard that about hot tea,” Bonine said. He’d gotten up. “I need coffee for that brain slap you talked about. Very apt. But I’ll remember to try the tea later.”

  What was she, Vivian wondered, yesterday’s grits? Her own appeal had been remarked on more than a time or two, yet Bonine treated her like a cottonmouth. Spike, he was the reason. Bonine really hated him. She thought of the detective’s earlier insinuations and pressed a hand into her jumpy s
tomach. It would be better for Spike Devol if he kept his distance from her—not that she expected Bonine to give up the notion that his old enemy had masterminded a potential coup, or assisted the mastermind. Things like this didn’t happen to Vivian Patin.

  “I don’t think there’s a need to continue the discussion now, do you?” Gary Legrain said to Bonine, who blinked a few times and gave a sharp shake of his head.

  Slap it some more. Vivian had an irreverent vision of the detective’s brain ricocheting inside his skull.

  Madge inhaled sharply, audibly, and said, “Oh, ya, ya, I was so taken with the company I forgot to remind you of your appointment this afternoon, Vivian. Your mama asked me to.”

  Appointment? “Thank you.” Vivian felt herself turning red. She wasn’t a comfortable liar.

  “I told you to be available at all times,” Bonine said. “I told you that early this mornin’.”

  Madge put her arm beneath Vivian’s. “Some appointments can’t be ignored, can they?” She smiled encouragement.

  “What kind of appointment?” Bonine asked. “Who are you seeing—Devol?”

  “No,” Vivian said.

  Instead of concentrating on catching a killer, Bonine had turned Louis’s death into a reason for a vendetta. Gary Legrain’s pinched expression could mean he was thinking the same thing. Since he was taking Louis’s death hard, that wouldn’t be a pleasing idea.

  Madge hung on her arm. “Now, Detective, you know there are some things a girl can’t discuss around men.”

  Vivian wanted some of whatever Madge had swallowed before coming into the office.

  Legrain actually seemed a bit flustered but Bonine’s curiosity made his head jerk forward and his mustache twitch.

  He opened his mouth to speak but Madge cut him off. “Private things,” she said, her voice conspiratorial. “Do you know Reb Girard?”

  “The lady doc in Toussaint?”

  “Uh-huh. The very one. I understand she’s real helpful in delicate times. She’s guided a lot of women through similar situations. And, of course, she’s a wonderful doctor. I’ve always thought women doctors were better at some things. They have smaller hands.”