“I don’t want or need to speak about that ever again either. If she were with Eduardo on Wednesday night, it means that he didn’t personally come in that house to take out Kevin, but someone on your parents’ staff is on his payroll,” she told her husband.
Saxton nodded. “I did pull Dwight’s bank accounts. He was on someone’s payroll as well, just like she said.”
“Hubby, I want a normal life for our son… our children,” she told him.
“There is no such thing as normal. In either of my worlds. In the spy world, people want to kill me. In the Blakemore world, people kiss my ass because of my name. I hate them both, but at least when I take over the ranch, it can be as normal as we make it,” he told her.
“You seem excited about taking it over. Moving our import company won’t be too hard,” she told him.
He was grinning at her lasciviously. “Hmmm… Odessa…”
Odessa put her finger over his lips. “Say goodnight, Mr. Blakemore.”
“Goodnight,” he said.
Friday night, Dallas, TX
Ryanne stepped from the bath holding the oversized towel around her body. The steam from the shower had fogged up the mirror and she could barely see her reflection. She used an end of the towel to wipe away some of the condensation as she stared at the image of herself that gazed back at the new woman she had morphed into. As she regarded herself in the mirror, she noticed the teeth marks on her collarbone. He sank those fangs into my skin.
Using her finger, she traced over the indentations of Eddie’s teeth in her flesh. Her hand moved down to the brown skin which covered her breast. The perfect shape of that man’s mouth left marks upon her skin where he had pressed his lips together while he sucked at her flesh, creating small hematomas. They were also on the insides of her thighs, and one on her right butt cheek.
“I am 34 years old and covered in hickeys,” she said to herself. She turned in the mirror to check her back. It was covered in scratches that looked like claw marks. So much of her life had been spent in a classroom, educating herself via books. In one night, Eddie, Eduardo, or whatever his name was, had schooled her in the ways of love. He was only the third man she had ever been intimate with and if she had her way, he would easily be her last.
The pleasure he brought to her body as she surrender herself to their passion was earth shattering. The mere thought of his mouth on her breast, rushed blood to the capillaries drawing the skin around the buds tight.
“Damn it Eddie!” She said as she heard her phone chime in the other room. She moved to the dresser to see his face on the screen. Her initial response was to run her fingers across the image of his lips before swiping the screen to answer the call.
“Hello,” she said.
She heard his voice catch as he exhaled in relief. Eduardo spoke in the phone in a breathy voice, “I know you are thinking about me because I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“This is not a good idea,” she told him.
“I don’t care. I want…no I need to see you again,” he said.
“That is a worse idea,” she told him.
The line was quiet as the lover’s waited for the other to state the next words. Ryanne was saying nothing, but Eduardo had a lot to say.
“Ryanne, if you felt nothing from the night we shared, I will hang up and say no more,” Eduardo told her.
She hated herself for wanting him, but she did. She spoke the words she knew he wanted to hear, “Even if it is just for a night... this is about you, about us….”
Eduardo’s smile was almost audible through the phone, “I will come to you when it is safe.”
And he hung up.
Ryanne knew he was dangerous. Dangerous in the worst kind of way, but the way he made love to her, she didn’t care. Even if it was just once more…she was going to go for it.
I deserve some happiness too.
Chapter 23. And how did we get here …
Sunday Morning, Dallas, TX
Ryanne stood at the kitchen sink in her parent’s home. Technically, it was her home, too, or at least it would be until she could figure out what to do next with her life. The meeting with Dwight’s parents yesterday was not as stressful as she had imagined. When she met his parents at the bank, there was close to two million dollars in his account, something which shocked the Dobbins. Ryanne signed it over to them, along with the house, his vehicle, and any assets he owned. Always a bit of a minimalist, she had not collected a vast amount of anything, including clothes, shoes, or handbags. What she owned in that house equaled four boxes that shipped home via UPS.
His mother was in tears. His father didn’t seem too surprised by anything that had transpired, or if he did, he said very little. “I’m sorry for the loss of your son.” That was all she had to give them. The past three months, she had given Dwight even less. It had been almost that long since they’d slept together, and most of her time was spent at work. A job that she truly had grown to despise. She sent her official resignation via email with a newspaper clipping of her husband’s death. That was all she had to give to them as well.
The ice tea glass she had in her hands held a smudge of her mother’s greasy lipstick that didn’t seem to want to come off, no matter how much she scrubbed. Ryanne looked up and out the window to see Eduardo standing in the back yard looking back at her. The glass crumpled in her hand, cutting the flesh, leaving little shards of glass imbedded in the skin.
“Shit! Shit! Shit!” she exclaimed as she tried to rinse away some of the blood. She looked out the window again and he was not there. The back door knob turned and he let himself inside of the house.
His concern was for her hand as he immediately rushed to her side to care for her injury. Ryanne was jolted by how easily he had gotten into the house.
“You do know that if my daddy catches you here, he will shoot you?” she told him.
In a heavy South American accent, he responded, “I am more concerned about you shooting me.”
“Where did that accent come from? When you spoke to me before there was no accent …” she cried.
“I don’t have an accent. Everyone in my country sounds like this,” he told her, his index finger running across her skin, checking for remaining shards. He looked into her eyes as he switched back to his perfect Texas accent. “Does this help? I mean to sound more North American?”
She shook her head. “That whole Colombian accent thing is working for you. I would stick with that one.”
Eduardo cleaned the cut and blotted at the skin with a paper towel. “You should add some ointment to it, so that it does not get infected.” He bandaged her hand with extra napkins and sat down at the kitchen table. He sat there as boldly as if he had been invited in for coffee.
Since she had just brewed a pot, she poured him a cup, as well as one for herself, and took a seat at the table next to him. This is too frickin’ weird. “Did you come to have sex with me before killing me and leaving the country?” I said it. It’s out.
The look on his face registered genuine shock. “I am not some psycho! Why would I kill you?”
“Well, you did kill Saxton’s horse,” she told him. “And that Mateo guy … you put his head in a box….”
Eduardo sighed deeply. “Good God, Carina! Your sister killed my brother. I killed a damned horse. I mean, if this were to actually be even, I can still kill your brother!”
She held up her hands defensively. “No, not necessary,” she told him. “Carina?” She asked sheepishly.
“Uhmm, loosely translated, it means sweetheart,” he said as he noticed her hand. The right one had started to bleed again. “Let me see that,” he told her. Eduardo unwrapped the paper towels to check the cuts again. As if he lived in the house, he went to the fridge, located a stick of butter, cut off a pat and rubbed it across the cuts. The butter picked up a few extra shards that he had missed. He rewrapped her hand and placed a small kiss in the palm. “Now … it is all better.”
“Than
ks,” she said. It confused the hell out of her how he managed to know the perfect time to show up. He was sitting in the kitchen as if it were a normal day in their lives.
“Eduardo …” she started.
“No … for you … you call me Eddie,” he said. His dark eyes were looking for something in her face. Ryanne was uncertain of what he sought, so she asked.
“Eddie, honestly why are you here?”
“You know, I am asking myself the same damned thing. I should have went with my first option, and this uncomfortable space between us would be no more,” he said with an eerie calmness.
“What was your first option, if I may ask?” she truly wanted to know.
His eyebrows were up in a mock surprise. “I was going to drug you, throw you over my shoulder and take you back to my country … but I didn’t think you would appreciate that choice.”
Ryanne did not move. Neither did her face. “Your option sounds a great deal like kidnapping!”
Eduardo grinned as he gnawed on his bottom lip, “You North Americans and all of your techie terms. I am just saying I was considering it as a viable option…”
Her expression had not changed, “And how and why was that an option to anyone but you?”
He shrugged. “It sure as hell beats having this conversation.”
Her eyes finally managed to blink. “What conversation?” She needed a new approach. Evidently so did he, as he sipped at the coffee. He spat it out.
“What is this swill that I am drinking?” he asked.
Ryanne got up to pull the coffee canister from the cabinet. “It says it is a Colombian roast.”
“That is not Colombian coffee. You come to my country, I make you a great cup of coffee that you will write home and tell your parents about…it is so good.”
The silence between them was thick. She needed to know the truth. “Eddie, did you kill my husband to get to me?”
Eduardo understood the question; he simply didn’t know how to answer it. Or at least the answer he had would not be the right one, so he tried to play it off. “I don’t understand this question you ask of me.”
“Oh, now you want to have a language barrier?”
“Again, you North Americans and your sayings. It is so confusing at times. I’m sorry, I do not understand.” He was smiling when he said it. He also made the Colombian accent thicker on purpose.
“Fine. Did you kill my husband so you could have me?” she asked flatly.
The smile left his face. Eduardo leaned forward and rubbed his index finger across the fine hairs on her arm. “From the moment I laid eyes on you in that store, buying those ridiculous packages of white cotton undies, I knew I would have you.”
It was so raw, so passionate, and so intense, that Ryanne had to cross her legs. She uncrossed them at his next words. “Your husband, I killed because he was a lying, manipulative asshole. His instructions were to get you the job, date you, and keep an eye on the family. He married you and took out a large insurance policy... He was going to kill you and cash in…I did not sanction that…nor his actions. He also put his hands on you and bruised this beautiful face.”
Ryanne’s eyes closed as she gave in to his seductive touch. “I feel what you feel, and appreciate the chances you are taking coming here, Eddie. I just don’t know if I can go through with this…it is too damned weird and wrong.”
His words were soft as he caressed her cheek. “I could not leave without holding you one more time. I need to feel your lips upon mine before you exhale your breath in my ear when I connect our bodies. I want to move in the intimate dance of love with you, feeling the sweetness of you wrapped around me, pulling me in, telling me that in the end, what matters is us…Ryanne, what happened between us was real … I couldn’t leave without asking you to …”
“Asking me to what?”
His next words stole her breath. “I am asking you to... hell, I don’t know what I am asking anymore, but I was hoping that you could see the man…and maybe visualize yourself loving him.”
She was genuinely surprised. “And how did we get here?”
“We got here by me letting down my guard for a night and allowing you into my inner sanctum. You slipped in and I can’t get you out of my thoughts, my head, my heart…. I haven’t felt this way in a very long time about anyone … or anything, Ryanne. I feel so much when I am with you. Come home with me. Let me show you my country … my world…”
She was shaking her head. “But you are the leader of a Colombian drug cartel.”
“No, I am a farmer,” he told her.
Her lips were tight. “And what do you grow on this farm?”
Eduardo shrugged his shoulders. “Coca and coffee.”
“Coca, as in the plant from which cocaine is extracted?”
He smiled at her. “Yes. It is how I make my living. Not everyone has a choice in professions, Ryanne. Inside of this body, I am just a man with a job. Each night I go to bed alone. It is a lonely life. I am asking for you to spend some time with me … let me take you on a date…maybe sail around Cape Horn…”
She said nothing.
He threw up his hands and stood. “See! This is why I was truly considering option 1,” he told her.
“I understand what you are asking, Eddie, and I see you,” she said. “I have a lot of loose ends to tie up here. Maybe … I don’t know...in a month or so I could possibly come for a week.”
“I hope I did not disappoint you as a lover,” he asked with a face full of concern.
“Oh, no. You were … um … exceptional, I was very happy. Several times. That … oh crap,” she said giving in to the heat of him standing so close to her. “Honestly, Eddie, after that performance, I didn’t see how you had the energy to kill a horse, shoot a man, and scatter the livestock….”
He rubbed his chest massaging the spot where Longshot had kicked him. “I was tired as hell, I tell you that....”
Eduardo shuddered as he paused while a thought struck him, “And why does your brother sleep naked in November? He should understand that if a fire were to break out he would have to leave the house without wearing any clothing!”
She could not help it. She started to giggle. The whole conversation was so over the top ridiculous that she had to laugh at it all.
Eduardo checked his watch. “We are almost out of time. Your parents will be home in a half hour.”
“How do you know that?”
‘’Really, Ryanne?” His eyebrows were up again. “I have an idea on how I would like to spend our last moments before I leave your country … just a few minutes that are about us.”
Why the hell not? I deserve some happiness, too. Even if it is only for a half hour. “A half hour …”
“I can make a lot happen in ten minutes. If you are nice, I can take you there twice in twenty,” he grinned.
She held up her good hand. “I will be as sweet as sugar in the cane,” she said as he pulled her up from the chair, threw her over his shoulder, and headed down the hallway. Ryanne was giggling like a school girl.
One last time with him…with my Eddie.
It may not have been an ideal match or a perfect ending, but Eduardo did not think his trip to North America was in vain. There would be others he had to answer to for not killing the Blakemores, but he would deal with that when the time came. In his mind, he had accomplished what he set out to do, and in the middle of all the chaos, he found a woman who spoke to his heart.
That, he was certain, was not by a random chance.
-Fin –
About the Author
Olivia Gaines is the author of numerous bestselling novellas and books, including Two Nights in Vegas, A Few More Nights, and has had several number one best sellers with The Blakemore Files including Being Mrs. Blakemore and Shopping with Mrs. Blakemore.
She lives in Augusta, GA, with her husband, son and snotty cat, Katness Evermean.
Connect with Olivia on her Facebook page at http://on.fb.me/1eorEAr or her we
bsite at http://oliviagaines.com.
Coming Soon
A big box bookstore was coming to the sleepy college town of Venture, Georgia. In order for their stores to survive, Ethan and Janie will have to merge her comic book store with his traditional bookstore. The laughs are plenty as this unlikely pair find a way to get past their differences to turn the page creating a new chapter in both their lives.
Available Summer 2015
Dinner With the Blakemores (The Blakemore Files Book 5) Page 10
