“Here it is,” he said with a sinful smile. “And it’s all for you.”
Grabbing my wrists and pinning them against the seat, he climaxed with a grimace of raw male pleasure. His eyes were narrow and dark, their expression animalistic. He drove into me, filling me with his hot seed and spinning me into a world where only he existed. Muscles distended, chest gleaming, he shot every ounce of himself into me, his gaze like a lance on my face.
At that moment, he was everything. He’d given me his come, a place in his bed, and my name. I couldn’t imagine the last twenty-four hours of life without him.
“Now do you see how beautiful you are?” he asked, lowering his slick body on top of mine.
“I don’t know,” I said, so breathless I could hardly speak. “You might have to show me again later.”
He covered my shoulder in kisses. “I can show you again in ten minutes. Maybe five.”
I smiled. “Showoff.”
“Is it showing off if it’s natural ability?”
“Hm,” I said. “I’ll have to get back to you on that.”
He raised his head and grinned. “Make sure you do.”
Driving back to the house with my heart still racing, I could hardly keep from staring at him. He was amazing, passionate, intense – everything I wanted in a man. I knew I shouldn’t be this happy, but I couldn’t help it.
After what I’d seen in the mirror this morning, I had my suspicions and I wouldn’t forget them. But I couldn’t be sure of anything in my life, now or in the past.
Maybe ignorance really was bliss, after all. If only I could learn to keep my curiosity in check and my mouth firmly shut, two things I seemed to have a lot of trouble with.
“Your detective friend – did he mention anything else?” As soon as I said the words, I wished I could take them back. Talk about a leading question.
Drex parked and turned off the truck. “Like what?”
“I don’t know,” I said, shrugging. “Just wondering what he said, that’s all.” Suddenly my mouth was very dry, and it wasn’t just the heat.
“Somebody saw you walking down the street in town and called it in, but that’s it. You’re lucky. If things had gone a different way…I don’t like to think about it.” He opened his door but didn’t get out. I could feel his eyes burning the side of my face. “Is there something you want to tell me?”
“Um…” There were so many things I wanted to confess. So many things that would drive him away. Where would I start? Did he really want to know what I’d done, and who I might be?
It didn’t matter. I couldn’t risk losing the one person who was on my side.
“No,” I said. “Nothing I can think of.”
But as we walked into the house with Diesel trotting ahead of us, the trucker’s face was all I could see. His small, angry, frightened eyes, his useless attempts to yell around the gag. Stomach twisting with guilt, I pushed the images from my mind. I wouldn’t think about it. I couldn’t undo it, but I could pretend it had never happened. Not that pretending would really make it go away.
First I’d been desperate to remember. Today, I was desperate to forget.
CHAPTER TEN
I could get used to this.
Jane and I were in Chimayo’s best clothing store, which wasn’t saying much. But sitting outside of a dressing room watching Jane’s sexy bare feet under a curtain as she stepped in and out of skirts, shorts, and jeans – that was saying a whole lot.
The store specialized in cowboy boots, denim, and cheap flowered dresses that grabbed Jane’s curves and didn’t let go. Who needed high fashion when you had hips like that? When you had breasts that had never needed a bra and probably never would?
Shopping was definitely not my thing, especially for myself. But I sat outside her dressing room for an hour like it was five minutes. Jane in nothing, Jane in everything, Jane in cowboy boots and short skirts – it didn’t matter. She looked heart-shattering in all of it.
If only I understood her hold over me. Maybe it was how she had to live for the moment. Or the erection-inducing combination of vulnerability and nerve that made me want to strip her naked and hear her beg for another earth-splitting orgasm.
Her face lit up every time she pulled back the curtain and waited for my reaction. “What do you think?” she asked, emerging in a fringed skirt and denim shirt with mother-of-pearl snaps for buttons. “Too Annie Oakley?”
Too sexy was more like it, along with too pretty and too unfair. “Just add a pistol and you’re good to go,” I said.
“Don’t tempt me,” she said, squinting her eyes. “I might use it.”
“Then prepare to be disarmed.”
“I’d like to see you try,” she said with a defiantly sexy grin, and let the curtain drop.
I sat back with an absurdly contented sigh. It wasn’t like I’d never bought clothes for a beautiful woman before, so why did this feel different? I’d sat outside many a dressing room in Houston and Manhattan and L.A., playing sugar daddy to a hundred attractive girls whose faces blended together in a fog of red lipstick and whitened teeth.
Was it Amber I’d bought the Prada dress for, or was that Jessica? Had I stuck around long enough to see her wear it?
Brooke had a closet filled with gifts from me, and that told her everything she needed to know. I’d cared once, and that meant she could make me care again. All she had to do was keep trying and eventually she’d break me down.
But she wouldn’t. I’d made that clear a thousand times, but Brooke wasn’t used to being denied. She’d always gotten what she wanted, until it came to me.
I was the one person who wouldn’t give in to her. I’d given her a job, but she wanted a hell of a lot more. She wanted to be my wife.
Too bad the word wife wasn’t in my vocabulary.
One thing I could say about Brooke – she couldn’t hide anything from me. She wasn’t complicated or, frankly, smart enough to have secrets. Jane was a different story.
She was full of secrets, that much I could tell. She seemed to know it, too. I couldn’t help but wonder if we’d ever find out what her story was, and why she was here.
We. Be careful, Drex. It was easy to fall in lust with a woman with no past and no future, but easy never lasted very long. If anybody knew that, it was me.
Sitting in the truck across from Jane, combing the parched outskirts of Chimayo for my father, it was hard to remember why I had to be so careful. She was too beautiful and too bright, qualities that blinded me to her flaws. Did she have any flaws that weren’t charming and sweet?
Well, maybe her temper, except that just made me want to fuck her ferociously in about twenty different positions until she begged for mercy.
“We’re looking for a white Camry with Arizona plates?” she asked, peering out her window.
She was wearing a new sleeveless dress made of a slinky cotton that fell to her shapely calves and grabbed every curve along the way. She clutched the white cell phone I’d bought her like a three year-old holding a favorite toy. If I didn’t stop staring at her I was going to rear-end somebody.
“It won’t be easy to find,” I said. “But I have to try. Thanks for your help.”
“Thank me when I see the car,” she said. She propped a slim, tanned bare foot on the dash and took a swig from a water bottle. “How did your father end up in so much trouble, anyway? You still haven’t told me.”
And if I had my way, I never would. I didn’t like discussing the background I’d barely escaped, but she was out here looking for Elijah right along with me. She deserved the truth.
“He’s dabbled in just about every crime there is, but he specializes in the stuff nobody wants to think about.” I kept my voice even and cool, but inside I was erupting with anger. A man only got one father, and mine was a criminal bastard. “He used to drive truckloads of undocumenteds across the border from Mexico,” I told her. “He did it for years, starting when I was about twelve.”
Her eyes wer
e wide. It was probably the first time she’d ever hung out with the son of a human trafficker. “Then he was caught?”
Caught. As if a little thing like maximum security could stop Elijah. “Yeah, but he made even more contacts in prison. As soon as he got out he was back at it. I talked to him about it once. He said he was providing services people needed, and not everybody had to agree with how he made his living.”
“That’s one way of looking at it,” she said.
“Yeah,” I said. “The wrong way.”
I turned into the parking lot of a body shop where one of Elijah’s buddies used to work. The place was locked up tight, door padlocked, windows blacked out.
“He’s always been drawn to excitement, especially if it’s illegal,” I said. “His whole life has been one long, white-knuckle ride. Tax fraud, theft, embezzlement, you name it.”
Embarrassed as I was to admit the truth, Jane took it in stride. “Was he the same way when you were growing up?”
“Yeah, though we didn’t see him much. He’d make an appearance when he needed to hide out or catch up on sleep. My mother knew he’d never change, but she loved him anyway. For her, it was better to have some of him than nothing at all.”
“Do you have siblings?”
Christ, how I wished I could say no. “Two brothers – one younger, one half-brother. The half-brother doesn’t know about us. He was adopted by another family. He lives in Europe.”
Just saying those words – lives in Europe – made my gut twist with envy. Yup, Marc was exactly the kind of educated, worldly guy that Brooke and her father would fall all over. Elijah certainly had, and he’d never even called him or sent him an email.
It was fucking ridiculous to be jealous, but I was.
It irked me the way Elijah tracked the brilliant career of his bastard son, the result of a two-week affair in London when he was still a player who could charm the skirt off any woman he met. By the time he found out the girl was pregnant, he was back in the States and on to his next shady venture. He’d heard she was dead from an acquaintance who had no clue Elijah was the father of the baby.
But Elijah knew, all right. The girl had sent him pictures and begged him to be part of her son’s life. And when she’d died and the baby went to her brother, Elijah had been off the hook. He’d only started giving a shit when the kid went to Stanford and made a fortune before he was twenty-two.
I’d have been happy if Elijah had shown up for the occasional birthday, or my high school graduation. He kept a scrapbook of articles about Marc, snippets from business journals and paparazzi photos from high-dollar restaurants with his new girlfriend, a strikingly pretty American with short hair.
They didn’t even know Elijah existed. They were living the good life on the other side of the planet, while I was searching for the father who only gave me the time of day when he needed bail money or a place to crash.
“Your dad must be very proud of you,” Jane said.
I felt the old, familiar burning in my chest. She couldn’t know how wrong she was. “He’s proud of my brother, the European one.”
“I thought you said they’ve never met.”
“They haven’t. That doesn’t stop my father from thinking that one of his sons did everything right, while the others were screw-ups from birth.”
I could feel her eyes on me. “That’s got to hurt,” she said.
“Not any more,” I lied. “I stopped caring a long time ago.”
Perceptive as she was, I expected her to push harder. But she did me the huge favor of accepting what I said and leaving it at that. I considered walking around the body shop to see if there was any sign of life, but I knew what I’d find.
Nothing but another dead end. Elijah’s trail gone stone cold.
“I shouldn’t have let you come with me,” I said, turning back onto Main Street. “If I see my father or somebody he knows, this could get complicated in a hurry.”
“I insisted, if you’ll remember.”
“I remember, and I appreciate it.”
She turned her head to look at a parked car. Wrong make, Texas plates. “Why do you need to find him?” she asked. “Is he really your responsibility?”
It was a question I’d asked myself a hundred times. “Well, technically, whatever laws he breaks or money he steals is on him. But he’s a public relations nightmare for me. If I don’t know what he’s doing, I have to worry he’ll show up on the local news. Used to be only the police cared what he did. Now reporters do because I’m his son, and I have a high profile in Houston.”
I pulled into a trailer park, a sprawling dustbowl of a place filled with weather-beaten trailers and grizzled old trees. “You think your father could be here?” Jane asked.
“I doubt it. But there’s somebody who might know where he is.”
I’d been here before, almost two years ago to the day. I’d found my father in the last trailer on the cul de sac, sitting defiantly in front of a blaring television. There’d been a small duffel bag filled with cash at his feet, and he looked like he’d been awake for three days.
He’d sworn he hadn’t made any trips across the border, but he couldn’t explain the cash. Or wouldn’t. Only after I’d threatened to call his parole officer had he gotten in my truck and come home.
After I’d given the cash to a homeless shelter, my father hadn’t talked to me for four months.
I parked in front of the same trailer, told Jane to stay in the truck, and went to the door. Three knocks later, Maggie answered. She was the closest thing to a girlfriend Elijah had had in a long time. She visited him in Houston whenever she had a little extra money, which wasn’t often. Maybe three times a year.
She was raven-haired, late fifties, still pretty though she chain-smoked and had gone through four husbands.
“How you doing, Maggie?”
“Not too bad,” she said. She wore tight, dark jeans and a long t-shirt with the word Princess emblazoned on the front in gold letters.
“Have you seen Elijah?”
“He ain’t here,” she said, sounding apologetic. “Want to come in anyway?”
“Just for a minute. I’ve got somebody in the truck.”
Maggie bustled around the sparsely-furnished trailer, straightening pillows and sliding open short curtains. “Want some coffee?”
“No, thanks.” I sat on the edge of a flowered couch. It sank under my weight. “Listen, Maggie…”
She stood in the tiny kitchen and faced me. “I saw him a week ago, okay?” she blurted out. “One night and he was gone.”
“Did he say why he was here or where he was going?”
“We don’t talk about business stuff. You know he brought a dozen red roses this time? I pressed one in my Bible.”
“That’s nice,” I said, trying not to let my impatience show. “So, you don’t know what he’s doing? No idea at all?”
She crossed her arms. “I can tell you what he’s not doing. Something criminal. He’s changed, Drex. He really has.”
“If you don’t talk about that stuff, how do you know?”
“Because he said so. He said he’s got a lot to make up for.”
Nice of him to figure that out at this late date. “And how does he plan to do that?”
She lifted her thin, narrow shoulders. “Like I said…”
“You don’t talk about that stuff,” I said, forcing myself to smile.
“Right.” She sighed and stared directly into my eyes. “Let him be, please? He’s got no parole officer watching him for the first time he can remember. He’s just an old man who wants to feel the wind in his hair.”
And lots of cash in his pocket, I thought, but I didn’t say it out loud.
I was heading down her rickety front steps when she reached out and touched my arm. “One thing I’ll say, your dad’s not in Chimayo anymore. He’s long gone. I’d be seeing him otherwise. We’re close, you know.”
“Thanks, Maggie. I appreciate anything you can tell me
.”
“Good, because it’s the God’s honest truth,” she said.
I stepped onto the patch of sparse crabgrass she called a front yard. “I don’t suppose you’d call me if you hear from him?”
I saw regret in her face, along with grim determination. “Sorry, Hon,” she said. “Not on your life.”
By the time we got back to the house, Drex had decided.
He was done here. Done looking for his father, done leaving his company in the hands of employees, done trying to find out more about me.
On the drive back he made a final call to his detective friend, who had no new information about Elijah or me. I was still a nobody without a missing persons report.
As soon as Drex hung up, I felt a deep pit of loneliness in my stomach. How could I have gone to sleep in my old life and awakened in this one? How had no one seen anything?
We walked into the house in silence. I’d had two blissful days with Drex, but now it was back to harsh reality. Again, I was on my own. No home, no money, no idea of what to do next.
Drex took Diesel out for a long walk. It was early evening and a cool breeze gusted in from the terrace. It had gone from summer back to spring in an hour. Which meant cold nights. Unpredictable weather. Rain. I’d have to find a job and a place to stay, easier said than done with no name, no identification, and no history.
I had three bags of new clothes, but I couldn’t take them with me. I’d have to choose a few practical things. I knew I should get ready to leave, but I couldn’t bring myself to move off the sofa. As soon as I did, I’d be that much closer to the hostile, frightening world Drex had rescued me from.
But I wouldn’t complain. There was no way in hell I’d let him see how scared I was. He’d done a lot for me. I wouldn’t even think about asking for more.
Just after dark, Drex and Diesel came back. He unclipped her leash. She sat at his feet, looking up at him with nervous, expectant eyes.
“She saw a coyote,” he said. “I assume that’s why she snapped at my hand. This is what I signed up for, though. She’ll work with a pro when I get home and that will help. How much remains to be seen.”
Descended (The Red Blindfold Book 3) Page 9
