Her eyes closed and then opened as if signaling to him that she was ready. His lips curled into a slight smile, and as if never a man rushed, he slowly began to move inside her. Each stroke felt so sweet, so loving, so complete that she wondered if it were always like this. She wondered if a man could truly love a body as slowly, as perfectly, as he was loving hers. But then she knew the answer to that was no. No man could ever love a body, especially not her body, as wonderfully perfect as he was loving hers.
She felt the pressure of need increasing within her. Her breath seized her lungs and she reached back to the headboard rails and held on as he moved in and out of her. Each motion pushing her closer to heaven until she came on a stifled yell of pleasure. His release came swiftly. She felt the warmth of him spewing into her and she cried. This, this moment, this touch, this love, was everything she wanted, everything she needed.
He kissed the tears away from her cheek. “Did I hurt you?”
“No. You are so wonderful, Takahiro. You just…you feel like you were always meant to be in my life. Like there was this space waiting for you. And now that you’re here I don’t want to ever have to let you go.”
He smiled down at her. “Good to know, because I don’t want to let you go either. In case you hadn’t noticed I’ve been trying to keep you here.” He chuckled and she laughed a little herself. “And I’m not just keeping you here because of what happened to you. You could have asked to go home and a cop up in Scottsdale would have been assigned to protect you, but I was hoping I could do enough to make you want to stay here.”
She smiled up at him. “I’m here. Very comfortably so I might add,” she reached her arms up and wrapped them around his shoulders.
“If I put all my weight on you it will be too much, Sheila. Trust me on that.”
“Hmm,” she pouted a little because she wanted his body completely connected to hers. “Then maybe we should reverse our positions so I can sleep on you tonight.”
“Babe, if you stay on top of me after what we just did believe me when I say that sleeping is not exactly what we’ll be doing.”
Despite his words he reversed their position with ease and she rested on top of him in a near sphinx position as she looked down into his eyes. “I liked it a lot when you were inside of me though,” she shrugged. “But this is good too. Oh, I um…I’m not on the pill. I’m not ovulating and I’m almost sure of that, but I’m not on the pill either.”
“And we didn’t use anything.” Those words rolled off his tongue as if he didn’t care about their lack of protection. “I’m clean. Recently tested due to work, so I know I’m clean. You’re a virgin,” he looked down at the bed and she saw the tinge of red. She gasped “So I know you’re clean too.”
“I’m so sorry about your sheets. We should clean that.”
“You should stay on top of me for a couple minutes. I’ll draw you a bath to ease the muscles that will ache after what we’ve just done—love making. Don’t mistake it for anything else. I could take you down to the courthouse and marry you right now.”
She laughed because she knew he could. Pinal County was much like Vegas in that marriage license and wedding could happen swiftly if people wanted it to.
“Now see I’m going to have to hold you to that.”
“Hold me to it, babe. And while you’re at it, keep holding me to you.”
She snuggled on top of him getting lost in the scent of man and spice connected to her. This man was her perfect match, and there was no other place she wanted to call home than right here with him. Whenever he formed the words to ask for her hand in marriage she was going to say yes and she knew that without doubt.
“Two weeks and counting,” Sheila looked in her rearview mirror as she drove toward the High Noon café. When Eddie and Justin said they wanted her to do more than just the layout she had no idea they wanted her to start scouting out places they planned to feature and shoot in too. She should have known there was a shoe waiting to drop.
Now here she was heading out to High Noon on a day when they were closed just so she could see if it would be a good place to do the shooting for their December winter solstice issue. Thankfully, she wouldn’t have to be there too long. The owner had told her a small crew would be in to get everything prepped for the evening meat delivery but she could still tour the areas including the kitchen. They were actually really nice, but why wouldn’t they be? If Eddie liked what he saw and heard then High Noon was about to get a boat load of free publicity in a major upscale, highly circulated magazine. There was absolutely no way this wouldn’t be good for them.
She felt less safe without her personal security guard, but he didn’t have a choice in not staying with her. He didn’t look comfortable with it, and she knew Takahiro wasn’t happy about the lack of security detail, but they both seemed to know it was coming. If she really thought about it then she knew it too. The media attention had died down. There was something else dominating the headlines, something that took the spotlight off the politicians who wanted to use her attack to further their ambitious careers. She wasn’t oblivious to what they were doing, but despite their motives she appreciated their requests because it helped with her safe recovery.
Now she was on her own, other than still occupying space in Takahiro’s house. He didn’t seem to be pushing her out the door and she wasn’t running for it. He had gone back to her place with her so she could check on the house and pick up a few more things to take back to his place, but other than that her home wasn’t the house with her name on the note; her home seemed to be with him instead.
It had been two weeks now and she was trying to get comfortable with going it alone to work. But this was the first outside of work activity she had to go to on her own since her guard had been taken away from her. She was nervous to say the least, but it had to be done. She could not continue to live her life in fear of the unknown.
She pulled into a spot in the front of the café. Paul Tisdale, the owner she had spoken with on the phone, greeted her at the door. The older man looked like a very distinguished and slightly skinnier version of Sean Connery.
“I can’t tell you how excited we are about this possibility,” he said as he walked her into the dining area.
“I’m glad you all agreed to showing me around, and to letting us do the shoot and expo on this place for our winter magazine. I really think, from the little I have seen now, and the research I have already done, that this could be a good upscale meets economical dating spot. And as always, fashionable and chic is a criteria for us.” She looked at the slate colored stone on the floors, the mahogany square tables with the matching chairs. Those chairs had a gorgeous ivory cushion to them that looked plush and clean. She had to say that they took a chance on the light color with food because a drop of any sauce could be difficult to clean. But from what she could see from the stone floors to the crystal chandeliers hanging overhead, this place would be great for both a fashion shoot and a review on the style of the place. The food, well, that would take some investigation, but fortunately they weren’t asking her to do food tasting. They were hiring a woman who could do that if they wanted to do a separate article in the spring magazine they could use her.
She would admit the magazine was growing in a positive way. She was proud of the progress and glad to be in on it, but she was also a woman of comfort. Once she found a spot she was good at with work she wasn’t the person trying to climb the invisible ladder. She was content where she was and branching out of that was upsetting her zone, but she could get comfortable with this too she guessed.
“With the work you put into this place I’m surprised the food doesn’t cost twice as much.” It’s not that the food was cheap because it wasn’t. If a person were barely living paycheck to paycheck this wasn’t the place for them, but it was still comfortable in the price range that a night out for a special night could be doable if they saved for it, and those living more comfortably could come once or twice a month without brea
king their bank.
“I wanted classy, affordable, but still I wanted to have a certain clientele. I hope that doesn’t make me sound uppity, but I really wanted good people in here. Clean, considerate, good tippers for the staff.”
She laughed. Yeah, because no matter how great the place looked she was sure they weren’t exactly paying more than the usual waitressing hourly rate to their staff.
“Tips are important,” she nodded.
“Very. I worked through college being a waiter so I know how hard it is. But I also understand being an owner of a restaurant now, how hard it is to pay everybody what they think they deserve.”
She nodded. She had read up on him and knew he had worked for one of the Tempe seafood restaurants years ago.
“Here is the ladies’ room.” He smiled as he opened the door and switched on the lights. “I don’t come in here when there are ladies in here,” he joked. She didn’t find it funny but she smiled anyway. Maybe she smiled more so because he looked uncomfortable being in there.
She walked down and took a look at each of the stalls. Black toilets, which she loved, contrasted with the same slate stone that was in the main hall and dining area. “A bidet,” she lifted her eyebrows.
“Nothing but the best,” he nodded.
She couldn’t believe he had one in every stall. This man had spared no expense at all. The countertops were marble, the sinks a very beautiful black, the mirror beyond clean. She loved keeping her house clean but she wasn’t sure she had ever kept the bathroom mirror that spotless. The lighting was softly beautiful yet bright enough to be safe. Perhaps what she loved most is that it wasn’t that annoying florescent lighting. Yes, she could see a lot of pictures being shot here too.
“The men’s bathroom,” she said as she walked toward him. She had to see everything. He seemed happily eager to show her everything too. Every section had been pristinely clean and beautiful. Of course she knew they had cleaned it with extra care since they were having a visitor, but the high quality of the place told her they kept it cleaned like this often. She hadn’t missed the two chairs in both bathrooms where the attendant would sit. She knew what it was, but he had explained anyway. There was always an attendant sitting there. In the women’s bathroom it was a woman and in the men’s bathroom it was a man. She hadn’t pictured it any other way, but she didn’t mind listening to Paul as he raved about his place. If it were hers she would rave about it too.
The kitchen had her giddy because it was more magnificent than she could have imagined. It looked like it should be on its own celebrity style cooking show. She hadn’t walked into the freezer area because that was not something she needed up close and personal with, but she did look in from the outside since the door was ajar. Apparently they were taking some things out and somebody had missed closing it. They got a gentle tongue lashing when they came back too.
“And this is only a small part of my staff. We have Chef Gloria Rider. She studied in Paris, but has traveled the world. We were lucky to get her.”
Gloria smiled innocently as she pushed her brown with caramel blond highlights back from her face. “And she’s beautiful too, so she would look great in the pictures.”
Both women laughed. She, herself, already knew they were going to have models in the pictures because it was about fashion and style along with eating here, but she could imagine if they wanted to do more with the article they could give a picture of the owner, the chef and the staff. She wasn’t sure on that so she wouldn’t say so here and now. The woman was beautiful though. She was at least five nine, beautiful soft brown skin with cat eyes, a shade of hazel that just looked perfect on her. Yeah, if Justin or Eddie saw her they would probably want to put her in a designer gown and add her to the photos. She was model perfect in so many ways.
“That there is Hank. He does the heavy lifting when needed. And of course you can’t miss Tony there who really handles our freezer and the refrigerator sections. He’s the guy who knows produce like he invented it.” He laughed. “But Jessie, now she’s our meat girl. She would have been here, but she had to go to the hospital with her father. He’s having his colonoscopy today.”
She nodded. “Family is more important,” she affirmed. “Besides, this really was just getting to know the place and from what I see I definitely think this would be the perfect spot. From the photos I’ve taken I’ll show them to the bosses and the final decision is theirs to make, but I like it.”
“Wonderful,” he said. “Now you have to stay for lunch.”
“Oh, no. I don’t want to put you all out.”
“No, no. I had Gloria come in just to cook for us. I insist,” he chuckled.
“So do I,” the dark voice came at them so fast it cut off all the laughter when they saw the gun in the man’s hand. “Now, why don’t you lovely people go take a break in the freezer,” he stated, not asked as he pointed the gun at them. They started to file in and she was behind Paul getting ready to go in too.
“Not you,” he said to her as he motioned for her to step back.
“Yeah, you’re ours.”
She didn’t need to look to know that voice. It was Ike, and she knew that, but her head still snapped to his direction to see the gun he held in his hand too.
She watched as the other guy closed the freezer door. She saw the worry on their faces and heard the latch close over the door. They wouldn’t be able to get out. There wasn’t a stitch of glass in the pane so they couldn’t see out and she couldn’t see in. What she could see was the guy lowering the temperature gauge. He was going to freeze them to death. She didn’t need to question that. They had seen his face at least so they would be able to testify against him.
Ike laughed. “Second time’s the charm.”
“You,” she took a step away from him trying to find her escape route. She just had to get out and get to the road where she…what, got lucky if a car drove by so she could get help? No, this road wasn’t busy during the day, and probably not all that busy at night either, which is why this cozy elegant restaurant fit perfectly there.
She watched them both place their guns to the side, one on the counter behind him and the other on the ledge with the decorative flower jars. They weren’t going to shoot her. They both obviously thought the two of them could beat her to death or something, and she was certainly sure the skinny guy was better at fighting—or at least good enough to inflict damage. He had hit her over the head from behind so maybe he wasn’t as good as she thought. But they wouldn’t be one on one. She didn’t know him, but she knew Ike. She knew he had been in the Army which meant he had been Army trained and that meant he knew how to fight in ways she didn’t. But thank God he wasn’t a Marine. She had heard they knew over a hundred ways to kill with their bare hands. She hadn’t heard that about Army men so maybe she could get an upper hand.
Ike was the first to come at her, pushing her back so hard she hit the back of her shoulder on the edge of the wood cabinet. It hurt, but she didn’t have time to think about that before he pushed her into the counter and started taking off his belt. “I heard you got messed up with a belt the last time. Gotta love the Internet. You can find anything there.”
He was so busy gloating that he hadn’t noticed, and the other guy obviously hadn’t either since he was watching Ike like he was his lover in action, that she had grabbed a butcher knife out of the knife block. When Ike came at her she didn’t think, she didn’t hesitate, she just jabbed it into his stomach, ripped it out and sliced his brachial since his arm was in the best spot for that.
Of course while she was taking care of one the other guy got her from behind and threw her across the counter. He kicked her in the stomach as she tried to get off the floor and then he sunk his hand into her hair and yanked her up, ripping out some strands of hair with the force of his actions.
“You will die for that!” He twisted her around by her hair and punched her in her stomach and then in her face. Then he grabbed her and threw her across anoth
er counter.
She saw the silver without knowing what it was she picked it up so when he came back and grabbed her she was armed, even though she didn’t know with what. She jabbed it into his stomach and ripped it out then went for his chest. He pushed her back but she couldn’t be stopped. She kicked him in his knee cap and then she jabbed the meat timer into him again, and again. She just kept stabbing him in the chest and right into his heart on the last jab. She wasn’t sure how many times she stabbed the man because she just functioned like a wild animal afraid for survival and willing to do anything to make sure survival was a definite.
When she calmed, when she finally looked at the body on the floor she realized he wasn’t breathing and with the amount of blood coming out of him she would say he was dead. The other guy, Ike the devil in Scottsdale, was definitely dead.
Instead of focusing on the dead bodies in front of her she ran to the freezer and pushed the heavy latch up and opened the door. They ran out, shivering, shaking, teeth chattering. She hadn’t called the police, not because she hadn’t thought of it, but because her phone and other belongings went flying with the first line of attack.
“Phone,’ Paul’s teeth were still chattering as his shaking finger pointed at the wall. She ran to the phone and called 9-1-1. She felt the tears in her own voice trembling, but they hadn’t come to her eyes. It was like she was relieved that it was over. The guy who took her the first time, and the guy she didn’t know was involved but he was, were now both dead. They couldn’t stalk her, hunt her like a dear, and hurt her anymore.
Cops were in and out, the media had apparently started gathering outside, and her bosses were just getting through the line of yellow tape, but not the second line bordering the kitchen. They had to shout their comforting words to her. They apologized for something they didn’t do, but she guessed with it being Ike, their employee that they vetted before hiring, she could understand how they felt as if they dropped the ball somewhere. They hadn’t and while she wasn’t permitted to go to them she did give them a nod of acceptance, a way of trying to tell them this was not their fault.
Red Noon Page 11
