“There’s always an and,” she stated. It wasn’t exactly as if she could take her bike seeing as though her bike was still in her garage.
“And,” he stipulated; “You keep that smile I’ve been seeing the past few days on your face.”
She would try. She didn’t exactly feel much like smiling, but somehow being with Greg seemed to ease some of the tension flowing through her. “How about if I promise to try to keep the smile on my face?”
“I’ll take it.”
Now she still had one problem, or maybe several, but right now the problem on her mind was that she didn’t have any clothes except the ones she was presently wearing. “We have to go shopping tomorrow too. I’ll need clothes.” Clothes hadn’t exactly been in her budget for the next few months. She had plenty of clothes for all occasions, but now she had none and now she was going to have to stretch the budget so she could get some. She wasn’t exactly broke, but she wasn’t rich either and she didn’t like spending money as if it were as plentiful as the water in the ocean.
“You don’t have to get dressed on my account.”
She shook her head. “I don’t remember you ever having such a one track mind.”
He laughed, not just one of those chuckles he was so famous for, but a real hearty laugh, the kind that came from the belly. “What can I say; you have that effect on me.”
“Oh, just me, huh?”
“Just you.” He used the back of his finger to brush a chunk of her hair back from her face. “Clair, do you—”
She placed a finger over his lips to silence him. She didn’t want to know the rest of his question. The way he looked at her, the soft tenderness in his eyes, told her he was going to bring up the topic of love; or something connected to it. She didn’t want to have this conversation tonight, not when she was so all over the board emotionally. She traced her finger over his lips. “Can we just sleep for what’s left of the night?” She could tell he wanted to talk, but she just didn’t have the emotional strength for the conversation he wanted to have. It wasn’t that she didn’t love him, because she did. She was starting to remember those feelings of love more and more everyday, but she couldn’t say it yet, not tonight, not at this moment.
“All right, Clair. Sleep it is.” He scooped her up into his arms and stood effortlessly with her in them.
“I can walk.” Despite her verbal protest she found herself wrapping her arms around his neck.
“I just want to carry you,” and he did just that.
She borrowed one of his shirts to sleep in, but her mind was too busy thinking about all the things she needed to do tomorrow and she wasn’t able to just drift off into slumber land. Greg had fallen asleep easily. She tried not to move around in the bed. She didn’t want to wake him up. She stayed as still as she could, thinking about her to-do list.
She was going to have to buy a pair of workout clothes from the gym’s store. Now that would be near highway robbery. While she would get an employee discount the clothes were still astronomically expensive. She didn’t understand how the store stayed in business with the prices they charged. One pair of pants and a sports bra would be all she would get from them because outside of that, they were just too expensive. She could get quality clothes elsewhere for less money. She could sort everything out come morning, and she would sort everything out, but for right now she just wanted to sleep.
She wasn’t just over thinking what she needed to replace. She was thinking about Levins. He had found her, and while she knew it was a possibility that he would, her mind had somehow convinced her that he wouldn’t. Or maybe she just wanted to believe that he wouldn’t so much that she ignored the reality right in front of her. She wanted to believe Greg was just being over cautious—if there were ever such a thing—and that Levins wouldn’t find her. She wanted to believe that Levins had been smart and left town. That’s what people did when they broke out of prison—left town. They didn’t wait around in the same state just waiting to be caught, or at least she hadn’t thought they did. However she was also aware that some people broke out of prison and tried to finish unfinished business before vanishing into their new life. Unfortunately for her, Levins wasn’t one of the former type of people.
Levins pulled into a park at the second roadside motel he’d slept at in three days. He couldn’t stay in one place too long or he would end up risking getting caught. He looked a little different with red hair, enough that he managed to check into the motels without notice, but he wouldn’t risk one of the clerks seeing his face sprawled across the local papers, putting the proverbial two and two together and calling the cops.
He hated motels. He had always had a nice home to go home to. Since his conviction he’d lost everything. Somehow the loss of his home and substantial bank account didn’t matter as much as the loss of his chocolate éclair. He still had money stashed away in places he could easily get to, it wasn’t a lot of money, but it was enough to buy him a new identity, a new home and, if he decided on doing it, a new face. He figured he probably would get the face changed, but not before he finished his business in Colorado. He wanted Clair to remember him the way he took her.
Thinking of Clair made his mind drift back to when he’d had her. He had been her first, and he should have been her only, but he’d seen the way she looked at that man when she came out of the gym. He had seen that guy before, everyday at his trial and then again at his appeal hearing.
He hadn’t suspected back then, maybe because they weren’t an item then, but now that man had looked at Clair the way a man who’d had carnal knowledge of a woman looked at what he perceived to be his woman. And she, she looked at him as if she wanted him, maybe even loved him.
“We can’t have that sweet Clair.” He looked down at the early morning news paper, his picture front and center. The title was a blanket accusation that he was stalking Clair McPhee. Well, maybe he was. He knew her every move, knew her schedule, when she would be home, when she would be at work, everything. The mess at her home now was going to throw that off because she was no longer staying at home, and the guy he’d seen her with, well right there in the paper it credited her protection to one Special Agent Harland and his partner Agent Duvall. So the guy with Clair had been a fed. Well, that complicated things a little. She had round the clock protection from a man who was dead set on protecting his woman and had the legal permission to shoot to kill. He would have to modify his plan a little. He was going to have his Clair one last time before he killed her, but he would have to be smarter about how he got her. Grabbing her when she left work, or when she tried to get into her house just wasn’t going to happen with the fed on the case.
Lucky for him the other one wasn’t at this new location. It was just the fed and his Clair. Something about that made him angry. Maybe he was angry because he knew what a man and woman alone could do for each other. He liked it better when the bitch was on protection duty with him. Yeah, he knew she was a bitch and he planned to deal with her in another way, but for right now he needed to get his Clair back. “Ten year’s a long time, Clair,” he moaned as he started to satisfy his own arousal. “Soon you’ll do it for me,” he looked at the picture of Clair in the corner of the article. They should have used her picture as the lead for the story. Clair looked so sweet, so innocent; a picture of her front in center would have been better than the tiny side picture of her tucked away in the corner of the article. At least the picture had been in color. It didn’t look very recent. They had probably dug back through the archives for a photo. It looked as if it had been taken around the same time as the one in that fitness article she had been featured in years ago.
He knew about the article because one of his new friends doing time for rape had his sweet cheeks sending him clippings of the paper. Levins had saved his ass a couple times and he owed him. He gave him the clip without strings attached and promised to send him any new information he could find on Clair. That’s how he knew where to find her when he got out of prison.
The article had mentioned she was in Colorado still, and given her work location at the time he knew she had to be close to Colorado Springs, maybe still in Denver. His friend had asked a favor of his buddies on the outside and then he had it, Manitou Springs was where his Clair was living now.
He didn’t have an exact address when he broke out. He hadn’t wanted to wait for information. He had an approximate location and that would get him started. It wasn’t as if Manitou was so large he couldn’t figure it out. He started with the local fitness centers, not going inside, just watching the comings and goings for a day or two. He got lucky with his first one. The first day he didn’t see her. He thought he’d seen all the people entering, but he didn’t see Clair. He almost gave up and moved on, but something wouldn’t let him. He went back there, as if knowing she had to be there. It was as if he felt some connection, some bond that told him this is the place. And he had been right. She was there. He saw her when she came out that afternoon. He had waited from eight that morning until three that afternoon, before he saw her coming out of the gym. She hadn’t come out alone though and that set his blood to boiling point. He was going to have to teach Clair a thing or two about being faithful to him. “Just because a man’s gone away for a while doesn’t mean his woman gets to play hostess to another man,” he snapped.
Part of him wanted to take out the fed too. He was sure the man had seduced his Clair. She wouldn’t have gone to him any other way, not after what they’d shared. Hell, maybe he’d have some fun and get rid of all three of them; two feds and his chocolate éclair. He could even make the fed watch what he planned to do to Clair. He liked having an audience. He had never had one before he took Amy and Clair together. He didn’t realize how fun it could be to torture while being watched. He liked the idea; he’d have to remember to use it when he settled into his new home. He wouldn’t start right away. That would be too obvious. He’d have to wait at least a year. A year seemed like a long time, but he had waited more than ten years, surely he could wait one more. He would just have to make his reunion with Clair good enough to hold him for the year and then, then he would pick his next victim.
Chapter Ten
Damn her, and damn him. Just when she thought she had a chance at getting back with Greg, Levins had to go and escape. Janet knew it had been a good while since they’d had a romantic relationship, but she was sure he still loved her. She knew he loved her even if he had never said it. She knew because she had felt it in the way he made love to her. She was sure the day he asked her to move in with him, well no, he hadn’t asked, but she had convinced him to offer. All it took was setting her place on fire.
She hadn’t burned the condo unit down; she’d just made it uninhabitable for a few months. During that time she had convinced Greg to let her stay with him and then she just…well, she never left. They were comfortable making love every night…well, almost every night. There were times when he’d come home from work too tired, those nights she’d just let him hold her. Setting her place on fire, ruining her clothes and personal items was worth it because she had Greg. So what if she had to replace her entire wardrobe. Oh, she didn’t have anything near as expensive as Clair’s wardrobe, but what she wore he liked.
She liked when he liked her. She liked when he touched her. She had managed to be partnered with him, and God, she knew then what she wanted. Department rules be damned because she was going to get what she wanted, and she did. He’d slide so deep inside her that she had that eye crossing moment of sexual bliss. He had come too; even though he’d always worn a condom she was sure after they were married they’d have babies together. She wanted his baby.
But then, after she’d convinced him to give that slut bitch some space he changed. Making love wasn’t as often. He was pulling away from her and she needed to fix that. She put pinholes in his stash of condoms, hoping one of his swimmers would get through, fertilize her egg and they’d make a baby together. He would marry her for sure then. Then they would have been a family. She would have even left the bureau for him. She wouldn’t have needed to stay on there if she had Greg and the baby. But she hadn’t gotten pregnant, and then eventually he stopped touching her, stopped making love to her. He was always too tired.
She had realized she needed a new plan, something she could do to make him want her again. Maybe she could put bigger holes in the condom, ensure that one would break so she’d at least have a pregnancy scare, but before she could institute her plan he dropped her. “It’s time you leave,” he had said. “Things aren’t working between us, and I don’t want to do this anymore.”
How could he say that to her? She loved him and he loved her, and you didn’t just give up because things were rough. They would have been all right without Clair; she knew that. That little slut had hung on to him so long and so hard that she had poisoned his mind to other healthy relationships. He felt guilty for leaving her and the more she tried to appease his guilt the more he pushed her away. She didn’t blame Greg. He was a good man. It was all Clair’s fault.
But, then, like magic, recently Greg had been laughing with her again. Oh, it wasn’t everyday, but the occasional sorted joke would slip from his tongue and they’d laugh together. He wouldn’t have let out the remark if he weren’t still in love with her. She knew the remarks weren’t about her precisely, but the way he said things, it was like a secret code between them. He was telling her he wanted her.
Then that damn Levins escaped and Greg had gone off half cocked to the boss telling him—not asking—but telling him he was taking some personal leave to protect Clair. Clair—it was always Clair mucking things up for them. The bitch just couldn’t let go. She had her claws in Greg and she wouldn’t let go.
Janet couldn’t let him go to Clair alone so she asked for some time to assist him. He would need backup, she had assured the boss and the boss had fortunately agreed. She couldn’t imagine what it would have been like to have to try to keep her eyes on them from across the street. She would have found a way, but it would have been difficult because Greg was usually good at spotting a watcher.
When they showed up on the slut’s porch she saw the way Greg looked at her. His initial response might have been to bark about her weight, but his eyes had taken in too much of her body for too long and that proved the attraction.
She felt it then, that sickening feeling that she was going to lose him and she wouldn’t let that happen. She wanted to catch Levins as quickly as possible so they could get out of that house and get back to what they were restarting between them.
She saw the way Clair batted her eyes, swiveled her hips, and danced sexy for him. She hated it. She was so busy watching the seduction that little whore was dancing for him that she couldn’t keep her feet straight. God, she wanted to rip out her throat right then and there. But Greg, he had taken his eyes off Clair and started watching her. She knew he liked what he saw because of the curve to his lips, so she tried to dance sexier for him…but then she fell on her ass and the bitch up front regained his attention. She hadn’t missed the bulge in his pants and while she hoped it was because of her, she had a feeling he was getting off on the whore’s seduction.
Still, she was on solid ground because she and Greg had history. They were going to get back together until Clair told him about the phone calls. “Bitch,” she hissed. She knew from the way Greg looked at her that he wouldn’t forgive her for what she’d done. He saw it as betrayal when she was just trying to help him. She would bet anything Clair was the first one to say it was betrayal or deceit. He wouldn’t have thought that about her on his own.
Then, she had planned to go to him. She could do a lot in a twin bed with a man; that was no difficulty for her. She had snuck into his room, but he wasn’t in there. There was no doubt in her mind where he was, but when she snuck through the bathroom and peeped through the crack in the connecting door she would have never expected to find him ass naked with his dick buried in that whore. God she hated her. She had obviously seduced
him into her bed.
She stood there, watching them. Greg was thrusting in hard, uncontrolled and Clair was lapping it up like a dog, moaning and panting and quietly calling his name. She was edging him on, and he…he was just a man and it had been a long time. He hadn’t been with anybody in a long time, she was sure of that. She had seen him date once or twice, but never had she seen him bring anybody home. She had watched his house and he always came home by midnight, and he never had a woman with him. He was still in love with her, and he was waiting for her.
He was waiting for her until Clair got her hooks in him even deeper than she had them in there before. He hadn’t just fucked her once; he’d done it a few times—three that night to be exact. And he’d told her he loved her. How the hell could he say that to Clair when he’d never once in his life uttered those words to her? And then he fell asleep with her. She couldn’t believe he slept there. She had time to get back downstairs and think about what they’d done to her. She would forgive him because he was weak, but she couldn’t forgive her. Clair had tried to mess things up for them ten years ago and she was doing it again now.
She thought it would be just one night, but then he’d gone to her again. She hoped the sex was good for the whore because she’d taken something she loved away from her and she planned to destroy everything she could of hers.
When they went to the movies she faked needing to go to the office, but she didn’t go. She went back to the house, back to that bedroom. She was so angry. That bed had been where Greg had taken another woman and she hated it. In a rage she went back downstairs, grabbed the big chopping knife from the kitchen, went back up and slashed up the bed. The comforter still had the stain from where he’d fucked her before they left for the movies. She cut, and slashed, and ripped what she could. It wasn’t enough. She turned her attention to the other items in the room—the television, the pictures on the wall, everything. Still she felt the rage burning within her like a national park fire and she took to the closet. Oh that was fun, sweet revenge. She cut up everything she could. Every piece of clothing, every shoe that she could actually get the knife to cut through. Those black leather boots went too. She had been so fucking happy at the destruction that she hadn’t noticed she cut her hand. She noticed that when she went back downstairs.
Dangerous Obsessions Page 12
