by Desiree Holt
“Just giving you some information to pass along.”
He watched Tony head for the door with his usual arrogant walk. The kid was getting an over-inflated idea of himself. Someone needed to take a chip or two out of him. Later.
First, his plan. He needed to put it into action soon. To take Carrie/Dana out of the picture before she began digging around any more. Her reputation was that of a bulldog. She’d be all over the past like green on grass unless he got rid of her. But he had to do it right. One single death would be suspicious. A string of them would have the county on edge, especially because it would be such an anomaly. He’d do what he had to.
At the same time, he’d be giving folks a new bone to chew on. Something to take the focus away from those old cases. The sheriff would be too busy to help Dana and the newspapers would have something new to feed on. Something that would provide misdirection.
He hadn’t been caught before and he wouldn’t be now. He was damned good at that—not getting caught. And he already had his first victim chosen. But he’d better get moving before things fell apart right before his eyes.
Today. He’d start today. He could feel the sexual excitement the violence stimulated coursing through his body. Throwing some bills on the table, he settled his Stetson on his head, smiled at everyone, and walked slowly out of the diner.
****
He watched Leanne Pritchard stop at her truck, both hands filled with plastic sacks of soda, and stare at the flat tire. Even at this distance, he could see the frown on her face. She looked around, as if seeking someone to help her, but the parking lot was fairly empty of people. Besides, she’d parked way down at the end of a row, on the side, where hardly anyone ever went. He’d never let his own kids park so far away. But she was driving her daddy’s truck and probably worried about scratching it.
She set her sacks down and patted her pockets, obviously looking for her cell phone. Kids never went anywhere without them these days. She finally pulled it out and stared at it. This was the chance he’d taken, that she’d be able to call for help. But it was a risk he was willing to take. He could just help her with her tire and be on his way. Wait for a more appropriate time.
But like so many kids these days—and adults—she’d apparently forgotten to recharge it. She jabbed it back into her pocket in disgust.
Okay. Good.
She started back toward the store, but he only let her get a few steps before calling her name. “Looks like you got a little problem, Leanne.”
She looked up and recognized him at once. Of course. He was a friend of her father’s. Tucking strands of her long, blonde hair behind her ears, she flashed a smile.
“Yeah. My tire’s flat. Lordy, but Daddy’s going to kill me.”
“Over a flat tire? Oh, honey, I don’t think so. Where were you headed?”
“Back to…my friends. I made a soda run.”
“They’re waiting at the park?” he asked, chuckling as she gasped in surprise. “Oh, honey, some things aren’t too secret after all. Kids have been sneaking into the park as long as I can remember.”
She dropped her eyes and nodded. “I-I was going to call one of my friends to come and get me, but my cell died. I guess I forgot to charge it.” She perked up a little. “Do you have one? Maybe I could use yours.”
He held out his hands, palms up. “Left it at home, dang it. Charging on the counter. Need to get myself one of those car chargers, I guess.”
“Oh.” Her smiled disappeared as she frowned.
He reached down and picked up her bags. “Why don’t we do this? I’ll give you a ride back to the park. Then you can get a couple of those strong young stallions to come back here and change your tire.”
She sighed with relief. “Oh, would you? That was my plan, anyway.”
“Sure. Come on. Just hop into my truck and I’ll have you there in no time. Lock up your vehicle.”
But they hadn’t driven for five minutes before she turned to him, puzzled. “Wait. We should be heading out toward the interstate.”
“I know a short cut. Just relax, honey. I’ll have you there before you know it.”
Leanne nibbled her lower lip, obviously uneasy. “Listen, maybe you could just drop me off someplace where there’s a phone.”
“Now, now, Leanne. I’ll have you there in short order. Just relax, honey. How about I put in a CD. Music makes everyone feel better.” He lifted the lid on the center console, fumbling inside.
She slid as close to the door as she could get, and he sensed the tension in her body. Okay, he couldn’t wait any longer. Flipping up the console cover with his right hand, he pulled out the saturated cloth he’d stashed there, reached over, and clamped it over her face.
Panicked, she grabbed his wrist with both hands and tried to pull it away, but even one-handed he was stronger than she was. She wriggled frantically, trying to pull her head back, but his hand stayed clamped against her face until finally her hands fell away.
He smiled to himself as he thought of the excitement ahead. His cock hardened and his blood pulsed. Oh, yes. He was looking forward to this. The killing would just be a bonus.
Chapter Eight
The shower helped ease the tension of the day. The tea and brandy did even more. Pulling on shorts and an old Tampa Bay Buccaneers T-shirt, Dana settled herself at the dining room table with a sandwich, a drink, and her briefcase. Her laptop sat open in front of her, ready for input.
She tried to clear her mind of everything except the project at hand, but Cole Landry’s ruggedly severe face kept flashing across her internal television screen. Thoughts that she’d never had—never wanted to have—about any other man kept poking at her.
What would it be like to have a man’s hands on her that she desired and didn’t fear? Holding her breasts. Chafing her nipples. Taking those nipples into the wet heat of his mouth. Laving them with his tongue.
Dana shivered. It wasn’t that she didn’t know how things were done. God knows enough men had tried to coax her into it, had tried their best, like Grant, to make it work. But none of them had ever reached the icy core of her, frozen away all these years.
Until Cole Landry.
What would she do if she found herself alone with him and the unfamiliar sensations buzzed up through her? How would she react? She was at once apprehensive and wanting.
And stupid.
She crossed her forearms on the table and rested her head on them. Maybe if she closed her eyes for just a minute, she could gather her scattered thoughts.
****
She knelt on her bed, unselfconsciously naked, and held out her arms to him. He’d just kicked off his worn Western boots and stripped off his clothes—jeans and a chambray shirt. He smelled of man and hay and horseflesh, a scent guaranteed to charge her pheromones. Her eyes feasted on his incredible body. Solid. Muscular. Broad shoulders tapering to a narrow waist and lean hips. Muscles carefully sculpted beneath the taut skin. Dark curls scattered over the hard wall of his chest, arrowing down to the thick nest at his groin.
And jutting directly at her, a magnificent cock, the head dark and swollen.
“You in a hurry, darlin’?” His sexy grin was positively lethal.
“Only to get you over here.”
He bore her down to the mattress under his weight, her breasts pressing against his chest, the matte of hair tickling and abrading her nipples. Every nerve under the surface of her skin vibrated with anticipation and the walls of her pussy fluttered waiting for his cock.
“Miss me?” he asked in his low drawl.
“Always. You work too many hours.”
“Well, tonight you’re gonna relax me.”
His tongue outlined her mouth before brushing across her lips and gliding inside. Every place it touched, heat burst forth and scorched its way through her body.
His mouth was everywhere, brushing against her cheeks, the line of her jaw, her neck. Sucking that very tender spot behind her ear. Biting it gently. Then the
hollow of her throat where her pulse beat like the wings of a trapped bird.
His head dipped and he captured one nipple with his lips, pulling and nibbling at it until it stiffened and peaked. Then the other one. His hand rhythmically squeezed her breast. Electricity sparked through her, straight to her center where she pulsed with unremitting need.
Her hands smoothed over the taut flesh of his back, feeling the powerful play of muscles beneath. The hot length of his cock against her thigh. The sensuous strength of his body between her thighs.
His mouth worked its way down her body to her navel, stopping to probe the furled flesh with the tip of his tongue. Then a hot, wet line to the curls covering her mound. And then…Oh, God! His fingers opening her, and his tongue doing a wicked dance on her clit. Her hips jerked, and her fingers clutched the thick pelt of his hair as sizzling sensations rocketed through her.
“Delicious,” he murmured against the slickness of her labia. “I’ll never get enough of your taste.”
“I want to taste you, too,” she gasped.
“Later.” He looked up, her cream glistening on his mouth. “When I come this time, I want to be inside you.”
His tongue continued to stroke her clit, two long, lean fingers sliding into her wet, hungry pussy, stroking her sweet spot until she was nearly mad with desire.
“Please,” she begged.
“Please what?” he teased.
“Please…fuck me.”
She couldn’t keep her body still, thrusting her hips at him, moaning, crying out.
“All right, then, darlin’. Get ready.”
The crinkle of foil. The snap of latex. The press of the head of his penis against the opening of her vagina.
He shifted on the bed, slid his hands beneath her ass to lift her to him and drove home with one fierce roll of his hips. There! Oh, God, she felt so full, the long, thick length of him stretching her.
She lifted to meet him and the rhythm began. In and out. Thrust and retreat. Slow, hot, his cock dragging over every nerve ending in the walls of her pussy. Each time a little harder, deeper than the time before. He bent over her so he could lick her nipples, and shards of lightning shot straight to her center, gripping and clutching at his rigid length.
In and out, in and out.
She wrapped her legs around him, locking their bodies together and rocking her hips. As if that was a signal, he rammed into her harder, his balls slapping against her as he pummeled her faster and faster.
The coil of lust wound tightly inside her unwound and reached into every part of her as her climax built and built. As if sensing her thoughts, he drove into her harder one last time, tumbling them both into a black velvet space filled with fireworks.
She was mindless, shuddering with the force of the spasms rocking her, the beat of her heart so fierce she was sure it would burst from her chest. His cock pulsed inside her as he shattered with the force of his release, shouting her name.
Dana unwound her arms from his neck and—
Ouch!
Her arms fell away, bouncing her head against the hard wood of the table. Dana sat up, rubbing her forehead, and realized she was panting and covered with sweat. And the dream smacked her brain.
Cole Landry. Sex. Damn, damn, damn.
Now it came back to her in every vivid detail, awareness still thundering through her body. For her entire adult life, she’d tried her best to achieve sexual satisfaction. In any form. Anything that would melt the terrible wall of ice she’d been trapped behind all these years. She’d read everything from how-to manuals to erotic romances. Talked to more therapists than most people ever knew. But all to no avail. The wall remained immutable. So why now? And why with Cole Landry? She hardly knew him, for god’s sake, and she was having erotic dreams about him?
That’s what you get for daydreaming. He’s beyond your reach, and even if he wasn’t, he wouldn’t waste his time with someone with so many sexual hang-ups. He probably just has to crook his finger and women fall into his bed.
Enough!
She hurried on unsteady legs to the kitchen for a glass of water, drank it standing at the sink, refilled the glass and stumbled back into the dining room on legs still unsteady. Opening her briefcase, she pulled out her research material—copies from the newspaper records, the note pad she’d used at the sheriff’s office, the…Wait! Where was her Blackberry? Although she took copious notes by hand, she always entered key facts on it. This afternoon those included a list of things to follow up on—names, phone numbers, and addresses of people who might be able to provide her with some insight.
Her BlackBerry was her Holy Grail. Sometimes she felt as if they had an umbilical cord relationship. It kept her organized and connected to her stray thoughts, her impressions, and everything that might otherwise seem trivial. Not to mention that it also contained every important number and name in her small but exclusive inner circle. She was never, ever without it.
Feeling the edges of panic creeping in, she searched again through her briefcase, her purse, her coat pocket and again came up empty. Frustrated, she dumped everything out of her briefcase and purse, scattering the contents on the table and shoving objects this way and that.
She bit her lip in frustration, hard, as she dug through the mound of papers and junk. Still nothing. Again she checked the pockets of the slacks she’d been wearing. Nothing. Forcing herself to be calm, she went through every room in the house, trying to think where she might have put it down, a tiny thread of alarm skittering through her.
Thirty minutes later, she was still empty-handed and fighting another full-blown panic attack. What the hell had she done with it?
When was the last time she’d seen it. The table in the sheriff’s department popped across her mental television screen. The small digital device lying on the table, peeking out from beneath the folders. She was always so meticulous about things like this, aware of the nature of the info it contained.
But today she’d been too anxious to escape the good sheriff. That was pretty damn stupid. She’d let Cole Landry throw her off balance, and it had screwed her up. She rubbed her forehead, the headache nudging its way back to the forefront again.
All right. So she’d have to give in and admit that it was at the sheriff’s office. Had he looked through it? Pried through her personal information? Although it required a password, she knew police departments had electronic wizards who could bypass such things.
And what the hell did she do now? Wait until tomorrow? Go back there tonight and do battle with some night dispatcher who might not even know what she was talking about?
Well, damn it all anyway.
The jangling sound of the doorbell startled her. Dana frowned. She didn’t think the few people she made contact with since arriving in High Ridge would be coming around to pay her a social visit. Grant had once urged her to get a gun, telling her anyone who traveled alone to the weird places she ventured ought to have some protection. Now she wished she’d taken his advice.
The bell rang again. This time the sound was a little longer, as if someone was holding a thumb down on the button.
She looked through the peephole in the door and nearly passed out. Cole Landry, macho sheriff, all around pain in the ass and the object of her unexpected erotic daydream stood on her doorstep. Wiping her suddenly damp palms on her shorts, she undid both locks and cracked the door open.
Chapter Nine
He looked at his handiwork, pleased with himself. Leanne was spread-eagled on the back seat of the truck, restrained, eyes wide with fear.
“What are you doing?” The words came out as a whimper. “Let go of me! Get off! Get off of me right now!”
He laughed, enjoying himself. This was the beginning of the good part. “No one can hear you, little girl. Go ahead. Scream your lungs out. Still,” he cautioned, “can’t take any chances.”
He slapped a piece of duct tape across her lips. Moving closer, he sang as he shoved her thighs even further apart, stretc
hing her to an impossible angle, filling her with pain.
“There was a little girl, who had a little curl, right in the middle of her forehead. Now, little girl. Let’s see how nice you play.”
Chapter Ten
Cole Landry’s huge presence filled Dana’s tiny porch and crowded her doorway. His Stetson was still perched on his head, but apparently he’d taken time to ditch the uniform. His feet were shod in worn Western boots, so similar to those in her dream, she wondered if he’d somehow been in her mind. A black T-shirt clung like a glove to his broad shoulders and narrow waist, and well-worn jeans did little to conceal his long legs and muscular thighs.
Or the erection that was visibly pressing against his fly. What was that all about?
She didn’t know what terrified her more—his presence, his arousal, or her reaction to both. Heat grabbed her like a fist, and every bit of saliva in her mouth dried up. She had to swallow twice before she could make a sound.
“Uh…hi.” Well, it wasn’t poetry, but at least she got the words out. “What can I do for you?”
His eyes burned into hers like smoldering coals. “I have something of yours and figured you might want it. Is it all right if I come in?” One corner of his mouth turned up in a semi-grin. “I promise not to attack you. I am the sheriff, remember?”
Dana felt the heat of embarrassment flush her body. She backed up and swung the door wide, and Cole removed his hat and stepped into the house. As he brushed past her, she caught his scent again, the same blend of male and horses from her dream, and again she shivered. She’d never reacted to a man this way, not even those she’d forced herself to go to bed with. Cole Landry should have danger painted on his forehead, in flashing red letters.
Digging for a calm she didn’t feel, she waved him into the tiny living room, closed the door and stood as far away from him as the limited space allowed. Being this close to a man she’d just imagined having sex with totally unnerved her.
She watched his gaze roam lazily around her space, and she sensed his brain registering every detail. Not that there was much to see in the small cottage. A living room and dining area with a view into a small but well-equipped kitchen. A narrow hall that led to the two bedrooms and bathrooms.
