“Not knowing anything. Um, magnesia.”
Spence parked the truck beside the horse barn. His gaze automatically scanned the area, looking for something—anything—out of order. Funny, the way his old Special Forces training kicked in after all these years. “Amnesia? It’s kind of hard to explain. How about if you went upstairs and opened your bedroom door but didn’t turn on the light. You’d know everything was still there, even if you couldn’t see it. No,” he said after a slight pause. “Bad analogy.”
“What a ’nalogy?”
They sat there in the truck, bone-tired, but basking in the satisfaction of having accomplished more than either of them had expected. Spence tried to explain. The boy was like a sponge. An intelligent sponge, but by the time they climbed down to go inside for supper, he wasn’t sure which was more exhausted—his brain or his shoulders.
After supper he fixed the leaky kitchen faucet. No big deal, even though he’d never done it before. With all the odd jobs he’d held as a youth—licit and illicit—plumbing was one he’d missed. Ellen handed him the tools and supplies, and logic did the rest. Next, the horses were brought in for the night, rubbed down and fed. Spence helped. He’d worked with horses before, but it had been a while. Over the past couple of years he’d probably managed to spend a total of one week at his own ranch. Thank God for his manager, who treated both stock and property as his own.
“At the rate you’re learning, even if you never regained your memory, you could probably get a job as a ranch hand.”
“I’ll keep it in mind.” As long as it was her ranch, he added silently. And as long as she worked beside him, humming under her breath and smelling of hay and baby powder. He glanced over at Pete who was doing his best to lure one of the half-wild barn cats into accepting a handful of dried corn.
“I know I should get him a dog,” she murmured. They stood side by side and waited for the boy to come down from the loft, where the bushy-tailed gray cat had hidden. Shadows lurked in the corners of the barn where the outside security light couldn’t reach. Ellen sighed heavily, and without thinking, Spence draped a companionable arm across her shoulders.
Companionable? Yeah, right.
“They sort of go together. Boys and dogs.” In this particular case he sided with Pete.
“He cried for days after Bowser died, but come to think about it, he didn’t start asking for another dog until fairly recently.”
“That probably means he’s healing. Wounds don’t last forever, Ellen. That doesn’t mean there aren’t scars, but after a while even a scar becomes a natural part of—” He shrugged. “You know what I mean.”
Did she? Did he? Was he talking about the pain a boy feels when he loses a father or a beloved pet, or the bone-deep grief of a woman who loses a beloved husband?
Something told him he’d better back off. He had enough to handle without diving into those particular waters.
Back in the house, Ellen went through the checklist. “Homework finished?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Clean clothes laid out for the morning?”
“My green shirt’s getting too little, Mom. I’m really growing pretty big, aren’t I?”
Spence looked him over with mock severity. “You’re going to have to un-grow until your mom can get you some new clothes. Looks to me like those pants are shrinking, too.”
From the width of his grin, you’d think the boy had been paid the greatest compliment. Shaking his head, Spence crossed the room and switched off the outside security lights. Given the option, he’d have left them all on—porch lights and barn lights—but Ellen was the one who paid the power bills.
The rest of the nightly ritual involved chocolate milk and cookies. “Can I have seven, Mom? They’re real little.”
“Three.”
“’Kay. Thanks. While I watch TV?”
“Just until the first commercial break.”
Tonight’s treat was a wildlife special on snakes. Pete, seated cross-legged on the floor, was awed by the anacondas. Spence, seated beside Ellen on the faded slip-covered sofa, murmured that she might want to think about getting him a mutt before he adopted a pet from the wild.
“Go ahead, gang up on me, why don’t you?” she teased, and Pete looked around, his avid gaze going from one to the other. The boy was no fool.
After Pete went upstairs, Ellen picked up a book and Spence switched to an all-news channel, eager for any shred of information he could glean that would arm him for the coming confrontation. What he needed was an advance scout to bring him up to speed on what was going on behind the scenes. Reporters had their sources, but not all sources were reliable. And all, unfortunately, were subject to bias, deliberate or otherwise.
He could always simply walk into the courtroom unannounced and let the chips fly. If he had only himself to consider, he might choose to do it that way, but there were others involved through no fault of their own. Before he exposed himself, he had to know Ellen and Pete were safe. If Del Brio knew where he’d been staying these past two weeks, he might put two and two together and come up with something that made Spence break out in a cold sweat, just thinking about it.
A few miles away a hushed meeting was taking place. Two men stood on a country road. Two cars, one heavily detailed with a flame motif, were pulled up under the shelter of a stand of young pine trees.
“Sonofabitch, man, that’s no answer! I need answers! I gotta know, damn it! I told Frankie we knew for sure, that’s why he went ahead and got that Joe Ed Malone guy appointed.”
The smaller man hunched his bony shoulders and looked away. “Shouldn’a told him nothin’.”
“It’s been two frigging weeks, man! I had to tell him something. Listen, Sal, the guy’s got to be dead. We checked every place he coulda been holed up and didn’t come up with nothing. You saw that car—nobody could’ve lived through that. What I want to know is where the hell’s his body?”
“Coulda been sucked out—the door was tore off. Dogs coulda worked him over, buzzards maybe.”
“Then how come his coat didn’t get sucked out with him?”
The smaller man shrugged. “Beats me. I’m not the one that give the boss the all clear.”
“Hellfire, man, once the cops found his car with all his stuff inside, Frankie was ready to move in. He had Joe Ed Malone all set to take over the minute Harrison was out of the picture.”
“Yeah, but we still don’t know for sure if he’s dead or not. Me, I think he’s shacked up wi’ that widder woman,” Sal said, his voice more of a whine. “These two guys I met in a bar said—”
“I know what they said! You tol’ me a hunnert times! You wanna be the one to tell Frankie we was wrong? We don’t even know for sure it’s the same guy, and I’m tellin’ you this, I ain’t wearin’ no cement boots fer nobody!”
There was more swearing, more frustrated grumbling, then Silent Sal finished using up his month’s allotment of words. “Check out the widder’s place again, but I ain’t doin’ him if you find him. Doing a D.A., you’re talking big time lethal injection.”
“Yeah, well, lemme tell you something, good buddy. If there’s a chance this guy Harrison’s still alive, one of us better find him fast. If he turns up alive after we told Frankie he was dead, we’re gator bait.”
The man known as Silent Sal, who wasn’t always silent, nodded. Peaches absently scratched his newest tattoo, which showed signs of becoming infected. He knew what he had to do. He’d been doing it ever since he’d knocked over his first convenience store when he was eleven years old, down near the border. He’d shot his first man at the tender age of thirteen, but this was the big league. Screwing up when you were dealing with a man as powerful as Frank Del Brio could give you a bad case of the deads.
Sal stalked off, muttering something under his breath about heading south. Reaching his own nondescript sedan, he turned and pointed at Peaches’s pride and joy. “Why’n hell don’t you get yourself a car that don’t stand out lik
e a dog in a cathouse?”
“Hey, I like art. You got a problem with that?” Peaches slammed the door and started the engine, racing it a couple of times before he backed out. Sal was a pissant. Let him head south. Who needed him? Peaches had a lead through some schoolkid—work ’em right and kids leaked like a gutted muffler. If it checked out and he could produce a dead body—didn’t matter how long it’d been dead—old Frankie boy would be choppin’ in tall cotton from now on. And the man who’d made it happen would be set for life.
And it wouldn’t be Sal.
“Oh, yea-a-ah,” the tattooed man crooned softly.
“I warned you about overdoing it,” Ellen grumbled. “But no, you had to go and prove something when you’re barely off crutches. Here, hold still.” Ellen poured a palmful of the smelly liniment and slapped it between his shoulder blades.
“One crutch, not crutches. And it was only for a couple of days to keep you from jawboning me to death.” He’d given himself away when it had taken three tries to lever himself up out of the chair.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. And who had a turnip-size knot on his head?”
“Cantaloupe. It’s gone now— Ouch! Don’t dig in so hard!”
She pinched him, but they were both grinning. Having her hands on him under any circumstances was good. Incredibly good.
Dangerously good, Spence reminded himself. He forced himself to keep at the front of his mind his dual priorities: bringing down Del Brio’s regime and keeping Ellen and Pete safe.
Shifting slightly, he tried to find a comfortable position, but there was none to be found lying facedown on his hard mattress. What he needed was something softer—something that would accommodate the changes that were rapidly taking place in his groin area.
“Thought any more about getting Pete a dog?” He tossed the topic into the ring, desperate for a distraction. Ellen’s hands had slowed until the massage was becoming a lot more than just a remedy for sore muscles.
“He won’t let me forget. I thought about getting him one for Christmas, but he really needs a new bike. Maybe I can get him a reconditioned bike and a dog from the pound.”
Warm, firm palms slid down his spine, then spread out over his hips, where he wasn’t sore at all.
“Is that peppermint I smell?” Spence sucked in air through clenched jaws.
“Menthol.”
“Yeah. Ah-hh…don’t stop. Look, why don’t I get him a dog and you can get him the bike?” His voice sounded as if it had been wrung out and hung up to dry.
“You might not be here Christmas,” she reminded him, her hands working their way up toward his shoulders, thumbs biting into his flesh.
Spence took one deep breath, then rolled over to stare up at her. She snatched back her hands as if they’d been guilty of some terrible transgression, her attention seemingly focused on the pottery base of the small bedside lamp.
“Ellen, look at me.”
“I don’t think so,” she whispered.
“Damn it, look at me!” When she did, he almost wished he could snatch back the demand. Was that truly sadness he saw in those clear green eyes? For him? That didn’t make sense—not that anything had made much sense once he’d gone through lost-and-found and come out on the other side.
But nothing that he knew of involving her had changed in the past few hours. Sitting up, he caught her by the shoulders, shaking her gently. “Ellen, look at me. Hear what I’m telling you. I can stay or I can leave if my being here creates a problem. It’s your call. But I want you to know that wherever I am, whatever I’m doing, I will be back. That’s a promise.”
It was a promise he had no right to make—he didn’t even know if she wanted to hear it—but it was a promise he fully intended to keep. For Pete, if that was the way she wanted it, and for himself.
She sighed and offered him a wobbly little smile, but said nothing.
He waited, hardly knowing what it was he was waiting for, hoping for.
Oh, yeah, he knew, all right. Of all the lousy timing.
“Will you?” she whispered.
“You don’t believe me?” This was going to be tricky. It could be dangerous for all three of them if he surfaced before he had things set up and someone made the connection between them.
“Storm, it’s not that I don’t believe you. It’s just that—”
It’s Spence, damn it—not Storm! But he couldn’t tell her that without confessing the whole thing, and right now, the less she knew, the better. She’d denied his presence once. He didn’t want her to have to do it again, because this time she might not be able to pull it off. There was a basic honesty about Ellen Wagner that was one of the things he lo—liked so much about her. Del Brio’s trained gorillas might not have known she was lying that first night—she hadn’t had time to get used to Spence’s being here. Next time, if Del Brio sent anyone with an I.Q. larger than his collar size, she’d be a sitting duck.
It was partly frustration, partly spontaneous combustion that made him kiss her. But it was sheer sexual desire that shoved him over the edge, beyond the reach of common sense. He knew—they’d both known right from the first—that no matter how attracted they might be, any deepening of the relationship was asking for trouble.
Well, to hell with playing it safe!
Ten
The pressure had been building for too long. One touch and the kiss caught fire. Groaning against her mouth, he pulled her down on top of him. Awkward at first, she twisted until she was lying half across his body, one of her legs entangled with one of his. The scent of liniment, shampoo and baby power seeped into his senses as her hands moved hungrily over his chest.
He could tell she was as eager as he was. The knowledge added fuel to an already combustible situation. Jake’s bed—Jake’s jeans—Jake’s wife.
But my woman.
She tasted of apples gone winey. If this was all there was, all there could ever be—
He broke off the thought as the taste of her mouth, the feel of her soft warmth drove the last shred of reason from his mind. Somehow, without losing contact with her mouth, he managed to unbutton her shirt. Two fingers found their way inside her bra.
It wasn’t enough. He wanted her naked beside him, underneath him, on top of him. Wanted full possession in all the ways a man could possess a woman. “Ellen,” he whispered harshly, dragging his mouth from hers. “You know what’s happening, don’t you?”
Breathing heavily, she nodded.
“If you want to raise an objection, you’d better do it now.”
She shook her head, her face still hidden in his throat. “We barely know each other. Only two weeks ago you were a…a stranger,” she whispered against the pulse pounding there.
“Oh. Right.” Easing a hand down between them, he touched her in a way that made her whimper. “Guess we’d better wait a few more minutes, then.”
She stroked his nipples with her menthol-scented fingertips. “I guess we’d better,” she mused, though he couldn’t tell if she was laughing or panting. They were both breathing audibly.
“I certainly wouldn’t want you to think I was rushing you.” Where’s your common sense, man? You don’t need this kind of trouble!
It was when her fingers left his nipples and began trailing down his chest, his stomach, to his flat, hard abdomen that he knew there’d be no turning back. The time for reason was past. He could no more deny himself—deny either of them—this moment than the shore could deny the incoming tide.
Desperately, knowing that it would end all too quickly, he tried to store up fragments of time in his mind—fragments involving the sense of taste, of touch and scent. Things were moving too fast. He thought he heard her whisper something like, “Time’s up,” but his heart was pounding so heavily he couldn’t be sure.
Her fingers moved south again. At the first tentative touch, he nearly lost it. Knowing that if she touched him again it would be over before it even began, he snatched her hand up to his mouth and nibbled her fingers,
torn between the urge to race toward the finish line and the almost equally powerful need to savor each step along the way.
This was more than foreplay—this touching, tasting exploration—the rocking, grinding of pelvis against pelvis in sweet anticipation. Playing for time, he whispered, “Peppermint,” as his tongue traced the lines across her palm.
“Menthol. It’s supposed to relax the muscles.”
“Guess again,” he whispered, soft laughter erupting that in no way broke the tension. Teasing had never been a part of his sexual repertoire. He’d never particularly missed it, never even thought about it. But then, he’d never before known a woman like Ellen.
“Storm?” she whispered. “We could find out, unless you’re afraid.”
“Oh, lady, do I look like the kind of man who backs down from a challenge?”
Eyes dancing, she moved her body sinuously against his. He gave up any hope of prolonging the inevitable. With much twisting and squirming, they struggled to shed the rest of their clothes. He had trouble with the gripper at her waist. “Haven’t you ever heard of elastic?” he muttered.
“Haven’t you ever heard of patience?” she retorted sweetly.
“Patience and short fuses don’t go together.” Truer words, he told himself, shuddering, had never been spoken. He brought her hands to his lips again and kissed each finger, then placed them on his body, giving her silent permission to resume explorations.
And resume, she did. “You’re so hard…everywhere,” she marveled. Talking was something else that had never played much part in his sex life. “Like one of those TV advertisements for exercise equipment.”
As if she knew how it affected him—Judas priest, she had to know! It wasn’t something a man could hide—she took great joy in slowly dragging her hands down his torso, across his abdomen, circling his navel. Reaching his groin, she traced the crease of his thighs, her fingertips brushing against the thicket of dark hair.
He groaned. “You’re killing me by degrees.”
“I was trying to go slow, in case the liniment burns,” she murmured as her hands closed around his rigid shaft.
The Quiet Seduction Page 13
