Sex, Lies, And Online Dating

by Rachel Gibson

“I hate blind dates.”

  He hung the towel over the weight bar. “She wasn’t bad. We just didn’t hit it off.” He unhooked the iPod and moved to the desk filled with his laptop and open files.

  “I hate getting all dressed up and going on dates and all you get out of it is a waste of time.”

  He set down the iPod and picked up a coffee mug. “Her cat was even more annoying than yours.”

  Lucy opened her mouth to defend Mr. Snookums, then closed it. “How long were you in her house?”

  He raised the mug to his lips. “A while.”

  “I thought you didn’t hit it off.”

  He took a long drink, then said, “We didn’t. When I dropped her off, she invited me in for coffee and I went in.”

  Lucy stood. “When I invited you into my house for coffee, you turned me down.”

  “That’s because I wanted to do you in every documented position and a few I’d made up.” He set down the mug and moved toward her. “But I was wired for sound and couldn’t even let you touch me.”

  “What?” Lucy held out her hand like a traffic cop. “You wore a wire? When?”

  “When we were together.”

  “Every time?” She dropped her hand to one hip.

  He stopped a few feet in front of her. “Yeah. You didn’t make any embarrassing confessions if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  Her mind moved from date to date and landed on that night in the hall. Her hands had been all over him. “Where was the wire the night I was supposed to kill you?”

  He folded his arms across his bare chest, and his face set in that expression she’d come to recognize. The one that told her he didn’t want to answer her. She folded her arms and waited him out. Finally he said, “I wasn’t wearing one that night.”

  “Where was it?” Lucy asked, although she had a fairly good guess. She didn’t believe for a second that the police had gone to the trouble of setting her up but hadn’t wired the house for sound. She didn’t know why she hadn’t thought about it before-it was so obvious. Maybe because she’d had other things on her mind.

  “There were digital recorders hidden in the kitchen, living room, and my bedroom.”

  She tried to remember what she’d said that night and couldn’t. She turned away and placed a hand to her forehead. Her heart sped up and her face got hot. What had the police heard? “My God, that night…when my shirt was off and your hand…what were we saying…what-”

  “No one could hear anything.” Quinn grabbed her arm and turned her around to face him. “That’s why I carried you into the hall. I didn’t want anyone to hear us. I wanted you all to myself without anyone watching.”

  Lucy felt her speeding heart stop. “Watching?”

  He leaned his head back and covered his face with his hands. “Shit.”

  “There were video cameras?”

  “Yeah.” He dropped his hands to his sides.

  “Oh my God!” She pulled the lapels of the robe close around her throat and tightened the belt. “Where were the cameras?”

  “The audio and video surveillance were in the air purifier in the kitchen, in a fake clock on the mantel in the living room, and in a clock radio beside my bed.”

  She thought back on that night. They’d never made it to his bedroom. They’d eaten dinner in the kitchen, and in the living room they’d kissed and he’d taken off her sweater. She gasped and shoved at his bare chest. “How could you do that to me?”

  “Lucy.” He grasped the tops of her arms. “I’m sorry. We thought…I thought you were Breathless. We thought that if you-”

  “How many people were watching?”

  “Two. Kurt and Anita were in a van outside.”

  Lucy thought back and could recall seeing a van parked on the opposite side of the street. Two people had been in that van watching him undress her and touch her breasts. She was horrified. “Oh God. Oh God, and there’s a tape?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where?”

  “Evidence room, I would imagine.”

  “How many people have seen it?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know.” She tried to pull away, but his grasp tightened. “It isn’t that bad.”

  “Have you seen it?”

  “No, but the cameras couldn’t see down the hall.”

  This time when she pulled away, he let her go. Lucy looked into his handsome face and felt the backs of her eyes sting. She refused to cry. Inside her, anger and humiliation gave way to a deeper feeling of utter betrayal. It didn’t matter that Quinn hadn’t had a choice. He’d set her up, and now there was a videotape of him taking off her sweater and touching her breasts. It was out there. Somewhere. For strange men to see. “I have to get out of here,” she said and walked around him. Even in her misery, she wasn’t going to act recklessly. “I’ll take you up on that offer to move cops into my house.” In a daze, she left the room. Maybe she could get the tapes somehow. Maybe if she called a lawyer, she could make the police give them to her.

  She walked into the spare bedroom and tossed her empty suitcase on the bed. She’d call first thing tomorrow morning.

  “Lucy.”

  She turned and looked at him standing in the doorway. A dark lock of hair fell over his forehead as his dark gaze stared into her. After everything, there was a part of her that wanted to throw herself against his bare chest and forget what he’d done. He could make her forget about everything for the few moments he held her. She loved him, and she wished she’d never met him.

  “Promise me you won’t leave until after I get back.”

  Once again she felt humiliated and heartbroken and all because she’d made the mistake of loving Quinn.

  “Promise me,” he repeated.

  She supposed he needed to get the security in place at her house before she returned there. “Fine.”

  “Promise,” he insisted.

  “Cross my heart.” Once again she’d been a fool where he was concerned.

  Lucy turned her back on him and unzipped the suitcase she’d unpacked the night before. She heard him move down the hall, and a few moments later, the water to the shower turned on. She shut the door and sat on the bed. Her vison blurred, and she wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her robe. She did not want to cry. She would not let Quinn see her cry.

  She thought about the night before and the way he’d touched her. She thought about the way he’d made her feel, and the way she felt right now. In her mind, she could not resolve the two feelings. They didn’t fit. The pleasure and pain of loving Quinn, being thrown from one extreme to the other, was too much.

  She listened for the water, and after it shut off, she moved across the room to the small dresser. She opened the top drawer and discovered the missing white blouse and pink panties she’d lost the night before. They’d been washed and folded and placed neatly in the drawer. She picked up the blouse and held it to her nose. It smelled like Quinn’s shirts. Again her vision blurred, and she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Even with everything else going on in her life, Quinn and her broken heart took front and center. It was crazy, but there was no denying it.

  She heard Quinn’s footsteps on the other side of the closed door. They paused for several heartbeats before continuing down the hall. Afew moments later, she heard the garage door open and his Jeep pull away. When he returned, she would be ready to go.

  Lucy set her black bra and underwear, a khaki skirt, and a black T-shirt on top of the dresser, then dumped the rest of her clothes back into her suitcase. She opened the door, and Millie followed her into the bathroom.

  “Out,” she commanded. Millie lay down and looked up at Lucy through sad eyes. “Fine,” Lucy muttered. She jumped into the shower and washed her hair and body. When she was through, she stepped over Millie and brushed her teeth and dried her hair. She pulled her hair into a ponytail, and by the time Quinn returned, she was sitting on his leather couch, dressed and waiting for him.

  His face was set in hard li
nes, and his jaw looked brittle enough to break. He wore jeans and a white Guinness T-shirt. She stood, expecting him to give her the details of the new security arrangement. Instead he took her hand and placed two small cassettes in her palm. “What’s this?”

  “The videotapes taken the night the house was wired.”

  She looked up. He had his cop face on, the blank, expressionless set to his features that made him look hard. Except for his dark eyes. He couldn’t wipe the emotion from his eyes. It flickered just beneath the surface, hot and alive and something he couldn’t control the way he could control the rigid set of his jaw. “How did you get these?”

  “Don’t ask.” He dropped his hand.

  “Did you check them out or something?”

  He looked at her for an eternity before he said, “No.”

  “Quinn?” He simply stared at her, and this time she knew that he wasn’t going to answer. She couldn’t outwait him for an answer, but she didn’t need to. His silence spoke for him. He’d stolen them out of the evidence room. For her. “But what if they’re missed? Won’t you get in some kind of trouble? Fired even?”

  He just continued to stare at her.

  “Won’t someone know they’re missing?”

  “Probably. The less you know about it, the better.”

  “What am I supposed to do with these?”

  “Whatever you want. But I would recommend that you destroy them and forget that you ever saw them.”

  “Isn’t that destroying evidence?”

  He shrugged one shoulder. “Technically, yes.”

  She looked down at the cassettes. “Are you certain these are the right tapes?”

  “They were labeled, so I’m pretty sure.”

  “But you’re not certain.”

  “You want to see them?”

  Not really, but she wanted to make sure she had the right tapes in her possession. She handed them back. “Yes.”

  He pointed to the couch. “Sit tight.” He walked out of the room, and when he returned, he had a video camera. He hooked it up to the television and popped one of the cassettes inside.

  She wanted to know if he’d get fired. The answer was, Hell yes. If caught, he’d be charged with petty theft, but since the tapes were useless to the Breathless investigation, the criminal charges would probably be set aside with the agreement that he not contest his termination.

  Quinn started the tape, then he moved across the room and sat on the couch next to Lucy. On the screen, their black-and-white images appeared, and Lucy leaned forward to watch as the two of them made dinner and talked about everything from the weather to local politics.

  In the past, he’d bent and stretched the rules, but he’d never completely broken them. He loved his job, and if anyone had ever told him that he’d steal evidence, he would have told them they were nuts. If they’d told him he’d steal it for a woman, he would have told them they were fucking nuts. But then he’d messed up and told Lucy about the tapes, and she’d looked at him as if he’d just killed her cat. One minute she’d been looking at him as if she’d wanted to jump on him and continue his workout, and the next, like he’d stabbed her in the heart. He would have done anything to have her look at him as she had the minute before.

  When he’d left, he’d taken the latest Breathless letter with him and dropped it off in the crime lab for the technicians to look over in the morning. He’d planned to take it in that day anyway. What he hadn’t planned until he’d looked in her eyes filling up with tears was a little petty theft, but by the time he’d walked out his front door, he’d known what he would do.

  He was a dumb ass. He’d put his job on the line for a woman who would never forget that he’d undressed her in front of a hidden camera. He’d risked getting terminated for a woman who sat next to him as stiff as a poker. A woman who’d made him want something he’d given up on. Something he’d convinced himself he was better off not having in his life.

  Quinn watched their images on the television screen as they ate dinner together, talking as if they were just two people getting to know each other. He didn’t recall the meal so much as he did her sweater and leather skirt. Then she brought out the chocolate cake, and he recalled how he’d felt watching her put the fork into her mouth.

  “Sometimes, chocolate is better than sex,” she spoke from the television.

  “Honey, nothing is better than sex,” he’d said.

  She set the fork on her plate and pushed it aside. “I guess that would depend on your basis of comparison.”

  He rose and said in a voice so sexually charged that he hardly recognized it, “Come here.” From across the room, Quinn watched the screen, where he wrapped his arms around Lucy. “Let’s give you something good to compare.” Then he kissed her and it was as hot as he remembered. Sexual energy rolled in waves from the television screen, scorching a path across the living room, and Quinn got a little hot watching it. He slid his gaze to Lucy to see if she felt it too. Her brows were lowered, and she appeared more pissed off than excited.

  “I need to use your restroom,” she said from the tape, and Quinn returned his attention to the screen. She moved out of frame and Quinn followed. The motion-sensitive tape shut off, and Quinn rose from the couch to place the second cassette into the video camera. He pushed Play and returned to his seat.

  The film started to roll with him walking into the living room, reaching for her purse, and dumping the contents on the couch.

  “You went through my purse?”

  He slid his gaze to hers. “Yeah, and you carry a lot of crap around with you.”

  She folded her arms beneath her breasts. “That’s how you knew about my pepper spray.”

  On the screen, Quinn shoved everything back into the purse, then moved to stand in the middle of the living room. He looked up when she entered the room, his dark gaze following her. Even on the black-and-white film, he could see the desire in his eyes. He’d thought she was a killer, and he’d wanted her anyway.

  On the film, she looked into the camera and told him she didn’t think they should have sex. From behind her, his gaze was directed at the camera too, although he knew they’d been looking into the mirror above the fireplace.

  He watched his hands move down her arms and come to rest on her waist. “You tell me when to stop,” he said and pulled her back against his chest. “Are you uncomfortable when I kiss you here?” He kissed the side of her throat and she shook her head.

  “That’s good. I like kissing you right here. Where your skin’s soft and your hair smells like flowers and looks like sunshine.” He shoved his fingers inside the waistband of her skirt and slid them to her sides. She tilted her head to the right, and he sucked the side of her neck. He slid his fingers up beneath the edge of her sweater to her breasts. His eyelids were heavy, and there was no mistaking the need reflected on tape.

  At the moment, Quinn didn’t know what he felt most, embarrassed or turned on. He was embarrassed by the things he was saying, but at the same time, watching his hands move upward and his thumbs brush her hard nipples was the most erotic thing he’d ever done. A hundred times more erotic than watching a porno flick. On the screen, her breath caught and her lids drifted shut as his hands cupped her breasts.

  “Your nipples are hard,” he whispered into the side of her throat. “Like a woman who wants to make love.”

  She turned and wrapped her arms around his neck. As they kissed, he slid the fingers of one hand beneath the waistband of her skirt and pressed his palm into her back. His other hand moved up her spine, then he gathered her sweater in his hands and pulled it over her head.

  “I love a woman in lace,” he whispered and lifted a hand to touch the lace edge of her bra with the tips of his fingers. “You’re so beautiful, you make me forget.”

  “Forget what?”

  “That I should take it slow. That I don’t want to blow it by rushing things,” he answered and pressed his palms into her breasts. “But it’s been so long.” He p
ushed her breasts together as he bent forward and kissed her deep cleavage. “Why did you have to look like this? This would be easier if you weren’t so beautiful. If I didn’t want you so much that I can’t think of anything but getting you naked.”

  He kissed her and ran his hands down her bottom to the backs of her thighs. Then he lifted her and wrapped her legs around his waist. He walked with her from the frame, and the tape kept rolling, fixed on the empty room. The sound portion continued, filling the room with the sounds of soft moans, and Quinn was stunned by the clarity. “Damn. I didn’t think the audio could pick up what was going on in the hall,” he said.

  Lucy didn’t comment. Her hands fell to her lap as they listened to Quinn’s voice fill the tape. “Nothing here but Lucy,” he heard himself say. “You want me, and I want to fuck you until you can’t walk for a week. Until you can’t move. Can’t think. Can’t do anything but moan. Do you want that, Lucy?”

  Okay, that was a little embarrassing. On the tape came a breathy, “Yes.”

  More silence, and then his groaned, “I’ll help you, Lucy.” What she said was unintelligible, and then it was Quinn again. “Yes, touch me there, just like that. You won’t be alone. Oh, God that feels good. I’ll get you help. I’ll get you all the help you need.”

  Jesus H., that was more than a little embarrassing, and he could feel his neck start to burn. He didn’t remember saying he’d get her help. He’d been so into her, so wrapped up in the moment, that he’d thought he could fix her. As if overcoming murderous impulses were curable.

  On the tape, the ringing of the telephone mixed with the telling sounds coming from the hall-his deep groan and the breathy moan she made deep in her throat.

  Sitting there listening, Quinn got so hard that he almost came too. He turned his head to look at Lucy, but her gaze was directed at the televison.

  “I’m sorry,” she said on the tape. “I didn’t mean to do that yet.”

  “You’ll make up for it.” The telephone stopped, only to start ringing again. “Shit! I’ll be right back.” Quinn’s image moved into the living room. He picked up the cordless phone next to the couch and cradled it between his shoulder and the side of his face. “Yeah?”