“You already came,” he taunted into her ear. “Three times. No more for you until I say.”
Julie choked on her sob. “What? Mason, no ... please!”
It didn’t matter, because in that moment, there was a thud from upstairs, followed by a door opening. Yet, while Julie stiffened. Mason continued pinching her nipples and rolling her clit under his thumb.
“Mason...”
“I know,” he said calmly. “But we’re going to finish this tonight, understand?” He didn’t wait for her to nod. “And you are not going to touch her, do you hear me? She’s mine.”
He let her go to stand on her own two feet a full second before Luis strolled into the kitchen.
He grinned at them lopsidedly. “Hey!”
“Hey,” Mason replied, moving away from Julie to circle around the island. “You’re up early.”
Luis shrugged as he made his way to the coffee pot, giving Julie no choice but to use her useless legs to shift aside.
“I’m having trouble sleeping.” He said, taking up the mug Julie had left behind. “Is this yours?”
Julie managed to rock her head mutely.
Luis turned back to the machine. “I mean, I sleep,” he went on, pouring himself a cup. “But I wake up exhausted.”
Behind him, Mason met Julie’s eye and held it as he raised the hand that had moments ago been buried knuckle deep inside her and brought the two middle fingers to his mouth. The pit of her stomach dissolved in a hot rush of liquid as he sucked each one slowly, cleaning them of her essence.
“I think maybe it’s just everything that’s happened,” Luis continued on as he turned just as Mason lowered his hand. “Are you guys leaving, or...?”
Mason shook his head. “No, we were just about to sit, actually.”
“Oh, great!” Luis moved to the table and took the head. He sat.
Moving to the left, Mason rested a hand on the back of a chair, gave it a little pat and shot Julie a wicked grin.
“Have a seat, sexy.”
Flushing at the raised eyebrow Luis aimed at them, Julie shot Mason a glower, which he ignored.
“So do you guys always get up this early?”
Sidestepping around Mason, who marched past her towards the machine, Julie took the seat.
“I usually get up early for classes,” she answered. “But I’ve always been an early riser. It drove my parents nuts.” She chuckled. “My Mom’s a self-pronounced debutante who stays up most nights rubbing shoulders with the crème dela crème of high society fashion. My dad’s a pilot so he’s gone for days at a time and when he gets back, he’s fighting jet leg and exhaustion. Then there is me, waking up at the crack of dawn.”
“But you were a really good kid, so...” Luis mused.
Julie snorted. “Why would you think that?”
Luis’s gaze darted sheepishly towards Mason before flicking back to her. “A hunch?”
“Uh huh...” She twisted around in her seat and looked to where Mason was pouring the last of the coffee into a mug. She briefly wondered why when his mug was still on the table, steaming. “Are you telling people I was a good kid?”
Scooping three teaspoons of sugar into the cup and stirring it, Mason smirked. “I said no such thing. I may have, however,” mug in hand, he returned to the table, “mentioned something about you being incredibly punctual.”
“Punctual?” Julie mimicked dryly.
He set the mug down in front of her and reached for his, pulling it over to the chair next to hers. “You were always on time. I remember that about you. I could tell exactly what time it was, just by seeing what she was doing,” he told the last part to Luis.
She watched as he folded his frame into the seat.
“Is this for me?”
He glanced from her to the cup he had set before her. “Well, I haven’t yet mastered the ability to drink two cups at once, so I guess, for now, I have no choice but to share.”
Endeared by his thoughtfulness, Julie wrapped her fingers around the scalding hot ceramic and dragged it closer.
“Thank you.”
She took a tentative sip as he inclined his head. Her eyebrows rose up in surprise at how perfect it was, right down to the amount of sugar and creamer. It was as though he had made her coffee every morning their entire lives.
“This is amazing,” she said, looking up at him. “How did you know how I liked it?”
The gleam in his eyes could only be construed as mischievous as he brought his own cup to his grinning lips. “I’m a really fast learner.”
As innocent as the response was, Julie felt a wave of heat roll up her neck to flood her face at the wicked implication behind the comment.
“So, this is nice,” Luis observed. “You two getting along.”
Mason sat back with a deep exhale. “Yeah, she practically begged me to forgive her.”
Julie almost spewed the mouthful she’d taken of her coffee. “You forgave me?”
He reached over and tapped her lightly under the chin. “It’s all right, love. It’s all in the past.”
She swatted at him.
Luis chuckled. “So do you guys have anything planned for the rest of the day?”
Mason let out another breath, interlocked his fingers behind his head and leaned his chair back on its hind legs. “I was thinking we could go to the beach, maybe drive around ... oh wait...”
The smile melted off Luis’s face and he turned his attention to the dark brew held tightly between his pale hands. Julie felt her gaze shift to the wall of glass ten feet ahead of her against her will and a chill spiked down her spine.
It hadn’t gotten any easier since the discovery of the body hanging from the basketball hoop. Julie couldn’t even bring herself to look out a window, never mind opening the front door to get the newspaper. Without their cars, they were sitting ducks, waiting for the next shoe to fall, and she hated it. Hated feeling so helpless.
“Have you heard from your uncle?” Julie asked Mason, which was really pointless, because the one time Dean Vance had called to let them absolutely nothing, he’d called the house phone. Since then, it hadn’t rung at all.
“Nothing,” he mumbled.
Julie pulled in a breath and shoved to her feet. “I’m going to call the sheriff,” she decided. “It’s been three days. I need my car back.”
No one stopped her when she marched to the phone and snatched it up. There was silence as she dialed and waited for someone to pick up on the other end.
The cranky dispatcher told her Sheriff Reynolds was in a meeting and would call her back when he had a minute. It irked Julie that the woman hadn’t been pissy until Julie had given her name and reason for calling. What pissed her off even more was the fact that she had a feeling Sheriff Reynolds wasn’t going to call her back.
For a moment, while she stared at the phone in her hand, she contemplated calling a cab. She could go home, visit her parents, and let her dad make her a plate of her mother’s famous cookies and cuddle the horrors away. But not even her mother’s award winning cookies had the ability to save Julie from being thrown in jail.
Defeated, she set the receiver down and returned to the table. She took up her mug, but didn’t drink.
“He’ll call me back,” she grumbled.
“It’s going to be okay,” Luis said evenly. “They’re going to catch the person responsible. I know it.”
“How?” Julie wondered.
Luis jerked a thumb over his shoulder to the wall behind him. “The handprint. They had to have gotten a match off of that by now.”
“Not necessarily,” Julie muttered. “The print was already faded by the time they got around to coming by. Granted, they could possibly get a partial, but if this is the person’s first offense, odds are, they won’t be in the system. Not until they catch the guy and run his prints.”
Luis chuckled nervously. “You sure know a lot about this stuff.”
“I’m training to be a forensic—”
> Shaun walked in then, which surprised all of them.
“Is there a fire?” Mason mused. “Did you try to cook again?”
Shaun flipped him the middle finger mutely as he shuffled to the coffee machine. Julie gulped down a mouthful of hers with a sly sort of amusement when he found the machine empty.
“Why did no one leave me coffee?” Shaun grumbled in a hoarse, sleepy voice.
He shoved the empty pot back into the machine and staggered over to the table. He reminded Julie of a cranky five year old.
When he yanked out a chair across from Julie, Luis darted to his feet, looking like someone just took a dump in his drink.
“I need to finish...” The rest was a series of mumbles that got lost the further away he hurried from the table.
Mason met Julie’s eyes and shrugged. “Apparently my friends have been huffing glue this morning.”
“We could be screwing hookers and you wouldn’t notice.”
Mason’s good humor vanished. He threw up his hands and dropped back in his chair. “Not this again, Shaun. Seriously. Stop.”
“You’re the one picking some ho before your bros.”
Julie’s fingers tightened around her mug. “I have a hot cup of coffee and perfect aim. Call me a ho again,” she challenged.
Mason put his hand up before Shaun could open his mouth and fire back, or before Julie could give in to temptation and douse the asshole just on principle.
“I told you to knock that off,” he said to his friend. “We’re too old for this shit, Shaun!”
Shaun had the decency to avert his gaze. He stretched his long arm and snatched up Luis’s forgotten mug. He dragged it to him and drank a mouthful before making a face.
“Ugh!” Yet he drank again. Apparently it didn’t matter to him how disgusting it was, he really needed his caffeine.
“I’m going to get dressed,” Julie muttered, pushing out of her chair.
She started turning her back, but stopped at the last second, faced the table, snatched up her coffee in case it too was taken, and shot Shaun a glare before turning on her heels and leaving.
In her room, she set the mug down on the nightstand and threw herself down on the bed to stare blankly at the ceiling. So this was what being in prison felt like, she mused to herself. But at least prisoners had yard time. Julie couldn’t even bring herself to open a window in fear of what may crawl in, or what she might see outside. There could be a whole field of bodies out there and she was blissfully ignorant of it.
Sitting up, she reached for her cellphone off the nightstand and phoned Maureen. The voicemail picked up after the third ring.
Julie hung up and phoned Dean. He picked up on the second ring, sounding breathless and very loud. Something roared in the background. Kids squealed. There was laughter and the hiss of wind blowing into the receiver. Julie snatched the phone away from her ear.
“Hello?” she heard Dean yell on the other end.
“Hi!” she shouted back. “It’s me, Julie.”
There was a pause, more shrieking from the kids. “Hi Julie! Is everything all right?”
She wet her lips. “I was just wondering if you’d heard anything—”
“What?” Dean called back almost instantly.
Julie took a deep breath. “Have you heard from the sheriff’s office?”
“No! I haven’t,” he yelled. “I’ll call them again when I get home. Listen, Julie, I’m taking the kids...” The wind hissed. “So I’ll...” More wind. “Don’t...”
“Mr. Vance?”
“Yeah, I’m here!” he assured her. “Don’t worry! I’ll handle it.”
Julie hung up without saying goodbye and pitched the phone to the other side of the bed. Dean’s assurance had in no way assured her at all. She felt as lost and hopeless as ever.
Sucking in a calming breath, Julie rose, and as she’d done every day since all of this began, she paced. Her fingers worried the pendent at her throat, sliding it restlessly back and forth on its chain. She considered praying, but, at this point, she was sure she was just spamming God’s inbox.
A knock interrupted her stressing. She hurried over and opened the door expecting Mason, but found Luis.
“Hey!” she said in surprise.
Luis didn’t smile back. He fidgeted nervously and surveyed her with the look of a burglar hiding from the cops.
“I heard you come up. Can ... can we talk?”
Bemused, Julie nodded and stepped aside to let him in. She shut the door behind him. “Are you okay?”
Luis hesitated to survey her room, taking in the white walls and rumpled bed. She felt her face warm at the memory of the previous night, of having Mason see her, curled up and naked on that very bed. Then she remembered Luis had no knowledge of that. Even then, she couldn’t help wishing she had straightened it before letting anyone into her room. It seemed unreasonably personal.
“Luis?”
Moving around him, she hurried to the bed and began drawing the covers into place.
Luis dropped his gaze to his feet, his cheeks pink. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” She tucked the last corner in and turned to him. “What’s up?”
He continued to study his sneakers for a long moment, a look of guilt and frustration twisting his features. “I wanted to ask ... have you ... you know...”
Julie put her hands up to slow his rambling. “Okay, start that over again.”
Luis’s chest rose as he inhaled deeply. “Sorry.” He squished a knuckle into the corner of one eye. “I was just thinking ... you know Mason and Shaun better than I do. I mean, you grew up with them, right?”
Julie frowned and shrugged. “I guess, but not really. They were both three years ahead of me in school and the only time I really came into contact with them was at Maureen’s house.”
“But you know them, right?” Luis urged.
She shrugged again. “I guess. Why...?”
Her question only seemed to agitate him further. His mouth formed a thin, white line. He began to pace, never quite meeting her eye in passing.
“Luis!” she snapped, her own tension blossoming anew.
He stopped and pivoted on his heels to face her. “Something...” He broke off. Tried again. “Something isn’t right.”
Julie’s frown deepened until her face began to hurt. “What?”
He leaned towards her, dropping his voice. “Something’s wrong with Shaun.”
Her heart dropped. “What?”
Luis’ face convulsed with a mixture of aggravation and pain. “Please don’t tell them I said anything.”
“Them?”
If possible, the muscles tightened even further on Luis’s features. “Mason and Shaun.” He took a step towards her. “They have both been so good to me and I...” He broke off and turned away, throwing his arms out wide in frustration. “I’m Judas.”
Julie blinked in surprise at the unexpected volley of thoughts. “Judas?”
He confronted her once more, looking appalled with himself. “I am betraying my friends all because I’m freaking out.” He shoved all ten fingers back through his hair. “I’m a bad person.”
Julie went to him. “You’re not a bad person. It’s been really hard for all of us.”
Luis nodded slowly. “I haven’t been sleeping,” he confessed. “I mean, I do ... I think, but when I wake up, I’m exhausted. I jump at every little noise and ... I can’t even look outside.” He exhaled, a sound between a sob and a laugh. “You must think I’m pathetic.”
Julie shook her head, her heart going out to him. “I don’t. I feel the same.”
He dragged his slouched body to the chair by the door and dropped into it. He planted his elbows on his knees and stuffed his face into his hands.
“You know, I’ve never had friends like Shaun and Mason. I mean,” he raised his head and looked at her. “Shaun’s a bit hard to digest sometimes. He’s mean and sarcastic and a pain in the ass...”
Julie chuckl
ed.
Luis smiled weakly. “But he’s a good guy once you get to know him. He will always have your back in a fight.”
Julie raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t peg you as a fighter, Luis.”
He snorted and dropped his gaze. “I’m not, but that doesn’t stop others from trying to turn me into one.” His expression was solemn now. “Shaun was always there, always standing up for me, and here I am thinking the worst.” He shook his head in disgust. “I just need more sleep I think, or less coffee.”
Julie went to him, rested a comforting hand on his shoulder. “Don’t beat yourself up, okay? It’s actually normal. We’re all under a great deal of stress being locked up here without any answers. It’s going to be okay.”
He raised his head and peered up into her face. “So you don’t think I’m crazy?”
She shook her head. “Not even a little.”
Relief dropped his shoulders and lifted some of the darkness from his eyes. He got to his feet, towering over her as he reached out and pulled her into his arms. Taken by surprise, Julie stood stiff for a second. Slowly, she raised her arms and patted him lightly on the back.
When he drew back, Julie let her arms drop, expecting him to step away, only he didn’t. He moved closer. Then his mouth was on hers.
Shocked, Julie froze. She stared wide-eyed at the back of Luis’s eyelids as he mashed his mouth over hers, a little wet and a whole lot sloppy. When his hands flattened against her back, pressing her closer, Julie broke free, gasping and shoving him back.
“I’m sorry!” Luis looked horrified at his own actions. “I am so sorry. That wasn’t ... I wasn’t ... shit!”
Raising a trembling hand, Julie wiped him off her mouth. It wasn’t to hurt him, but his heat felt wrong against her skin.
“Julie, I...” He started reaching for her and she jerked back. He dropped his hand. “I’m so sorry.”
Before she could respond, he had turned and bolted through the door, narrowly bowling Mason over.
“Whoa!” Mason jumped back just in time. The hand he’d raised to knock dropped to his side. “Where’s the fire?”
Luis didn’t stop. He shoved his way through. A moment later, Julie heard his door slam shut.
Kissing Trouble Page 22
