CAPTURING CLEO

by Linda Winstead Jones

  “When this is over,” he said softly, “I might take a vacation.”

  Cleo looked up at him, her eyes wide and golden and tempting.

  “Florida,” he said. “Two weeks on the beach, doing nothing but sleeping and eating shrimp and... Maybe if I go, you’d like to go with me.”

  She smiled, but there was no humor in the twist of her lips. “Need female company for that last, unmentioned activity you plan to execute on the beach?”

  “No,” he said quickly. “Well, yes, but that didn’t come out quite right.”

  Some of the light in her eyes dimmed, making her look calculating. Uncertain. “When this is over, Malone, you’ll find some other woman in distress to take care of. That’s what you do, right?”

  “Not usually.”

  Cleo could very easily cut him down with a biting comment or a laughing refusal, but she didn’t. She continued to stroke Rambo’s fur while she stared up at him, her heart in her eyes.

  “I like you,” she said.

  “I like you, too.”

  “Last night we almost...”

  “Yes, we almost.”

  She shook her head gently. “I don’t want to be a notch in anyone’s belt, Malone. I don’t sleep around, I don’t get this confused about the way I feel. I certainly don’t go to Florida with men I’ve known less than a week.”

  “By the time this is over, you will have known me at least two weeks.”

  “Don’t make light of this,” she said sternly. “I don’t want to be… convenient.”

  “I want you,” he said. “There’s nothing casual or convenient about it, you’re not a damn notch in anyone’s belt, and if you think you’re confused you should take a trip through my head. Sleeping with you could cost me my badge.”

  “I don’t want that,” she said quickly.

  “Neither do I, but right now it seems like an acceptable risk.”

  “It’s not.” Cleo jumped to her feet, turned her back on him and headed for the bedroom. “I would never do that to you. I’m going to bed.”

  Luther left the couch and followed her. “We’re not finished.”

  “Yes, we are.”

  He thought about grabbing her before she reached the bedroom door, but he didn’t. She had every right to walk away, if that’s what she wanted. He just didn’t believe that ending this here and now was what Cleo wanted or needed.

  She turned before she reached the bedroom door, looked up at him with wide, amber eyes. “Believe it or not, I don’t take risks. Not for myself, and certainly not where your career is concerned.”

  “Neither do I. Which is why tomorrow morning I’m taking myself off your case.”

  She went pale.

  “I’m not leaving, Cleo,” he assured her. “I just won’t be on the case in an official capacity.” He reached out and stroked her pale cheek. She was so soft and warm, so giving beneath his rough fingers. “I’ve already gotten too close.”

  She nodded. “I know what you mean.”

  He lowered his head and kissed her. The way they came together, so easy and right and natural, had scared him at first. But this wasn’t something to be afraid of. Cleo kissed with everything she had, and he lost himself in her. Her lips parted, and he tasted her with the tip of his tongue. She held her breath, canted toward him, and rested her hand at his waist.

  Once he touched her there was nothing in the world but his need for her and her unrestrained response. The need to feel her beneath and around him was overwhelming, undeniable. His body ached, his heart clenched. Something he’d never experienced before, a certainty that this was right and real, consumed him as his desire for Cleo consumed him.

  He wasn’t a man easily consumed, but he surrendered easily. Gratefully.

  The SWAT team couldn’t drag them apart, not now. He was flying toward the inevitable, that joining of bodies that had been teasing and taunting him from the beginning. Had he known on some primal level, when he watched her walk away from her club that first night, that they would end up here? Maybe.

  He cupped her breast, warm and full, and brushed his thumb over a nipple that peaked in response. A half moan, caught low in her throat, almost sent him over the edge. Cleo wanted him. She was flying, too. Never taking his mouth from hers, he took a single step toward the bedroom, guiding her gently.

  “Luther,” she whispered, barely raising her mouth from his to speak. “Do you have a...?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  She sighed in relief and grabbed onto his belt buckle. “Good.”

  Chapter Nine

  Rambo wasn’t happy to be on the other side of the door Luther kicked shut, but she didn’t make much of a fuss. She barked once, then lumbered off to the kitchen and her food bowl.

  Kissing and touching, Luther and Cleo danced across the rose-colored carpet to the edge of her bed. If she thought too much about what she was doing she’d call an end to this, so she didn’t allow herself to think. She felt. She reached out and touched. She got lost in physical sensation in a way she never had before.

  Without taking his eyes from her, Luther removed his revolver and placed it on the bedside table.

  He slipped both hands beneath her T-shirt and dragged his hands slowly upward, bringing the shirt with him. Cool air touched her skin.

  “Let me turn off the light,” she said, reaching for the low-watt bedside lamp that cast a soft light through the bedroom.

  “No,” he whispered, gently grabbing her wrist to still her. “I want to see you.”

  Cleo swallowed hard. She wasn’t model thin, she wasn’t even what one might call slender. She didn’t need a lifetime of motherly admonitions to know that. Her body had fleshy curves. With the right clothes, she could make the look work for her. But completely bare?

  “What if you don’t like what you see?”

  “That’s not even a possibility,” he said, continuing to drag the shirt up, then pulling it over her head. The cool night air caressed her skin; Luther smiled as he reached out to touch her bare breasts. “You’re beautiful,” he whispered. “The most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.”

  She was afraid to believe he might be telling the truth. “Malone, you are so full of—”

  He kissed her to shut her up; she didn’t mind. He kissed so well, so thoroughly. While he moved his hungry mouth over hers, he reached up and blindly removed the scrunchy from her hair. The curls came tumbling down.

  “Remember when I said you couldn’t kiss?” she muttered against his mouth.

  He hummed an affirmative answer.

  “I was lying.”

  “I know.” He threaded his fingers through her hair, kissed her deep, and pulled her close. When he let his hands go slack, his palms skimmed slowly down her back and his fingers slipped beneath the elastic waistband of her flannel pants.

  Cleo shuddered, deeply and completely. From the top of her head to her toes, she quivered.

  Luther’s fingers pressed against her backside, as they kissed. Moving gradually, he slid the flannel pants over her hips and down, his hands skimming her flesh as he completed the chore.

  “Absolutely, positively, the most beautiful woman I have ever seen,” he muttered.

  He laid her on the bed, moving slowly, cradling her in his arms as he positioned her on the center of the soft mattress. She lay there, completely bare and as vulnerable as a woman could possibly be, while he sucked gently against her neck, her shoulder, and finally took a nipple into his mouth and drew it deep.

  Shivers of sheer delight winked through her body, a promise of what was to come, a hint of the pleasure they would share. Her body throbbed.

  “You are going to take your clothes off, aren’t you?” she said, pulling on his black T-shirt as he took his mouth from her breast. She worked the soft cotton up, while Luther nibbled at her throat and threaded his fingers through her hair.

  She’d always suspected he’d be magnificent beneath his starched shirts and conservative suits, and the sight of his ches
t as she tossed the T-shirt to the floor confirmed those suspicions. Muscled and trim, strong and dusted with dark hair, he had a perfect male body.

  “Beautiful yourself,” she whispered.

  He smiled briefly before covering her mouth with his once again. It was a possessive, demanding kiss. It was not the kiss of a friend, or of someone who might find her convenient. Her heart and soul were in that kiss, and so were his.

  She reached for his belt buckle and began to work it blindly, and still he kissed her. The buckle came undone, and he slipped his tongue into her mouth. She lowered the zipper and laid her palm over the hard length beneath his briefs, and he moaned into her mouth.

  She took her time, easing his jeans and briefs down, touching as she pleased, losing herself in the heat and desire they generated. Luther reached behind his back once, quickly, and snagged a single condom from his back pocket, catching it between his fingers and slipping it beneath her pillow.

  “You didn’t have that last night,” she whispered.

  “I grabbed it, and a few others, while we were at my apartment this morning.”

  “A few?”

  “Enough, I think,” he said as he lowered his mouth to her breasts again.

  She continued to work at his jeans until he was as bare as she, and they lay entwined in the middle of her big bed. They didn’t rush toward the joining they both wanted, but took their time touching, tracing curves and tasting, learning one another’s most sensitive places.

  Cleo held her breath as Luther grasped her hips in both hands and sucked on her neck. Her body throbbed, she wanted him inside her so badly. As the sensations grabbed her and started to spin out of control, she was tempted to tell him that she hadn’t been with a man in years, not since Jack. She wanted to tell him that she hadn’t chosen him lightly, that she’d never thought to feel this way again.

  But she remained silent, reaching down to touch him intimately and forgetting everything when he placed his hand on her in the same way.

  Finally, he retrieved the condom he’d stashed beneath the pillow. He opened the foil package quickly covered himself, and spread her thighs with gentle fingers. He hovered above her, all man, passion and wonderful heat, as he put his mouth over hers and guided himself to her.

  He entered her slowly, and her body gradually opened to take him inside. She wrapped her legs around Luther, snaked her arms around his neck and rocked against him. He satisfied one hunger with his long, slow plunge, and aroused another, a hunger for the thrill of completion, for a pleasure so intense and perfect it would change their world.

  He stroked her slowly, deeply, and the new pleasure began to grow. She sparked inside. She forgot everything and listened only to the demands of her body and her heart.

  She threw her head back, and Luther pressed his mouth against her bared neck. And still he stroked, slow and steady, deep and complete. She held his head in her hands, cradling him against her, rocking her hips in time to his. The light of the bedside lamp he’d insisted on leaving on cast a soft glow across their joined bodies. Hers soft and yielding, his hard and powerful. Cleo was glad he’d left the light on. The sight moved her, filled her with wonder.

  When Luther began to move faster, he lifted his head and looked down at her, his eyes so deep and dark they pierced her. She rested her palms against his arms, skimmed them up to grasp his shoulders, and closed her eyes as completion hit her with a force so powerful she couldn’t breathe, couldn’t scream. She felt Luther come with her, his body shuddering, his invasion deep.

  When she could breathe again, she opened her eyes and saw Luther staring down at her. Still, again. She reached up and threaded her fingers through his dark hair, guided him down so that his head rested on her shoulder.

  What could she say? It seemed that she should say something. Thank you. He wouldn’t understand. I love you. Even if that were true, and she wasn’t sure that what she felt was love, she wasn’t looking to scare him off. Not just yet.

  “Can’t dance, can’t kiss… I’m happy to know you’re good at something,” she said in a lightly teasing voice.

  Luther lifted his head and glared down at her. Even in the soft light, he looked unrelentingly hard. It was the harsh lines of his face, she reasoned, the glint in his dark eyes.

  “Don’t make light of this,” he whispered hoarsely.

  “I’m not.” She reached up to trace his jaw with her fingers. It was a fine jaw, she mused.

  “We should’ve waited until I officially took myself off this case, but… dammit, Cleo.” He sounded more than a little confused. “I’ve never lost control before.”

  “Never?”

  “Never.”

  She draped her arms around his neck. “Then, I guess it’s about time.”

  He didn’t sleep with women, not literally. He never spent the night, he didn’t stick around for breakfast. But it was going on four in the morning, and he woke in Cleo’s bed, her warm, naked body curled against his.

  Luther told himself that since he’d planned to spend the night on her couch again, anyway, it just made sense to sleep in a soft bed that was wider, softer, and made for sleeping.

  But it wasn’t the bed that kept him here, it was her. He didn’t want to let her go, he didn’t want to move a foot away from her, not if he could help it.

  The room was dark, the only light coming through the window—soft moonlight—and from the faint glow of the bedside clock. It was just enough to allow him to see her outline, to see the mass of dark curls spread across a white pillow.

  His fingers itched to touch her, but he didn’t. She slept soundly, in spite of everything that had happened this week. Rambo slept just as soundly on her bed in the corner of the room.

  Luther couldn’t sleep. What if she was right and the white roses were a subtle threat? No one else saw it that way. One detective had even suggested that because Valentine’s Day was coming up, the price of red roses had gone out of sight. The moron suspected they had a cost-conscious secret admirer on their hands.

  The roses hadn’t come from the usual florist. Luther had checked on that first thing. The week before Valentine’s Day, every discount store, grocery store and florist shop was lousy with roses. They’d probably never track down that particular purchase.

  Cleo had looked at those flowers and thought of death. Was the man who’d sent her white roses someone close enough to her to know how she’d react? Was her admirer the man who’d killed Jack? He still couldn’t be sure.

  In a few hours it would be someone else’s problem. He couldn’t be involved with Cleo and remain on the case. And he couldn’t not be involved with Cleo.

  “You should be sleeping,” she whispered, moving slightly against him. Her skin brushing against his, so soft and warm, aroused him all over again.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “You didn’t.” She sighed and draped her arm around his waist.

  “You should go back to sleep.” He put his arm around her and she curled up against him, closer than before. He liked it. He liked it too much.

  “Maybe,” she murmured. “I was thinking,” she added. “I think you should say yes.”

  “Yes to what?”

  “To being godfather to Ray and Grace’s baby.”

  Oh no, not that. One more decision he wasn’t ready to face. “I don’t know. It’s a huge responsibility.”

  “They love you, and I think it would be a great weight off their minds if you agreed to raise their child, if anything ever happened to them. Odds are, nothing will ever happen…”

  “You don’t know the Madigans,” he muttered. “Anything is possible.”

  Cleo raised herself slowly and placed a hand on his face. She was a shadow surrounded by black curls, a soft glimmer of pale skin in the night. “What are you afraid of?”

  She didn’t miss much, did she? “What I see every day makes a man wary of taking on anything as important as a child. There are so many disasters, there’s so much sorrow. H
ave you ever seen a mother bury her own child? Or a father watch as his son goes to prison for the rest of his life? I didn’t know that kind of pain existed. I’m just not anxious to put myself in a position where—”

  “Malone,” she said sweetly, laying her head on his chest. “That is so much crap.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I know you see the worst of people, the saddest moments in some people’s lives, but I also know that you’re smart enough to realize that what you see in your job is a small slice of life.” Her fingers absently caressed his side. “There’s a flip side,” she said. “Watching a child learn to walk and talk, birthday parties and graduations, soccer games and going to the circus.”

  “Yeah, but...”

  “What are you really afraid of?”

  He turned Cleo onto her back and held himself above her. In the dim light, he saw her gentle smile. “I’m afraid of nosy, bossy, mean women.”

  “Mean?” Her hand skimmed down his side.

  “A gorgeous, mean woman can drive a man crazy, you know.”

  “Gorgeous, mean, nosy and bossy. Sounds like a handful.”

  “You better believe it.” He kissed the side of her neck and tasted, flicking his tongue over her warm flesh.

  “I never thought of myself as mean,” she murmured. She touched him and found him ready. Her fingers lingered. “But I can be bossy.”

  “Do tell,” he muttered as he lifted his head to brush his lips over hers.

  “Make love to me,” she said.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  An insistent pounding on the front door woke him and Cleo. She sat up with a start, brought the comforter to her chest and jerked her head around to look at the clock. It wasn’t even six-thirty yet.

  “Something must be wrong,” she said, jumping from the bed and grabbing her clothes from the floor. She threw on the flannel pants and T-shirt as she made her way out of the bedroom.

  “I’ll answer the door,” Luther said, trying to dress as he followed her. He didn’t like what that pounding implied any more than Cleo did.