A Heart Decision

by Laurie Kellogg

  Sabrina’s sudsy hands slid up and down her glistening body in time to the beat as she dipped into a deep knee bend and gyrated her way back up, singing, “Tonight’s the niiiight....” Shimmy, shimmy—bump—grind.

  He shifted his hips and groaned. Sabrina’s slinky figure wiggled more seductively than any silicon-boobed stripper he’d ever seen dance. And in his line of work, he’d seen plenty. She might not have the overly voluptuous body of an exotic dancer, but she certainly had the moves down pat.

  Maybe he’d fallen back to sleep and actually was dreaming.

  Evidently, his father’s beating hadn’t been enough of a lesson on what it meant to be a gentleman. Otherwise, he would tell Sabrina about the front row seat he had for her sexy shower dance.

  Then again, with the way she’d been coming on to him, she’d probably turn up the heat on her performance.

  Of course, he could simply not watch.

  Right. He snorted. That was like telling himself not to look down at the pavement while talking a jumper off a ledge.

  No matter how hard he tried to drag his gaze away from the mirror, it insisted on darting right back to it. Even Dusty chewing on the corner of the sheet wasn’t enough to distract him for more than a second.

  Maybe he should’ve let Sabrina talk him into buying a shower stall with frosted glass, after all. At least it would’ve distorted some of the details.

  Once she finished shampooing her hair, she spun the faucet to off and stepped out of the shower, revealing the tan lines framing her golden curls and alabaster breasts. As she arched her back to towel her hair dry, her nipples stood erect, making his mouth water.

  The puppy tugged on the sheet, dragging it over Luke’s erection, cranking up the intensity of his arousal. “Dusty, no!”

  Sabrina’s gaze snapped to the open door and locked with Luke’s in the mirror. They stared at each other’s reflection for several pounding heartbeats while she wound the towel around herself and secured it.

  “Please tell me you’ve acquired psychokinetic powers, and you haven’t been hopping around the bedroom.”

  “The dog pushed the door open,” Luke rasped in a thick whisper.

  She strode to the bed and leaned in front of him to check the mirror from his perspective. Straightening, she locked her gaze on the steep peak in the scrap of sheet still draped over his hips. “How long has the door been—”

  “A long time.” The pressure in his groin and the weight of the fabric made him feel as if he’d swelled to tent pole proportions and could support the big top at the circus.

  “So then you saw—”

  “Do you want me to tell you I didn’t notice? Or do you want to hear how luscious you looked covered in bubbles?”

  “I want you to tell me the truth.”

  “The truth, huh? You mean you want to hear that I like watching you dance around naked? And that watching you lather yourself gave me a woody like—” He gasped as the puppy yanked the sheet again, this time pulling it completely off his aroused body, leaving him stark naked except for his cast and Ace bandage.

  Now he knew why dogs were a delicacy in some cultures.

  She gaped at Luke’s erection as if he were a sideshow freak—and licked her lips. The sight of her pink tongue made him groan. His already rigid flesh swelled another millimeter and petrified.

  “I-uhhh....” He cleared his throat. “I guess this makes us even, huh?”

  “No way. Even would be if you danced around the room and wiggled your tushy for me.”

  “See?” He grinned. “I knew there was a good reason I broke my ankle.”

  She continued to gawk at his lower half. “I guess that whole big feet thing is true.”

  “No.” He laughed. “There are lots of guys with huge feet and a puny Johnson.” He was hung a little better than the average fellow, but no one would ever mistake him for a porn star. “And just for the record, I’m not that well-endowed, Sabrina.”

  She swallowed with an audible gulp. “Compared to the guys I’ve seen, you are.”

  So he hadn’t been wrong when he’d surmised from her and Ben’s teasing at the party that they hadn’t been intimate. “Then it’s clear you’ve never seen your fiancé naked.”

  “No. We’re waiting until Ben’s sure he won’t have to compete with you for the rest of his life.”

  His penis twitched from the hungry look on her face. “So, uh, how many buck-naked men have you seen?” he smirked. “Not counting the shriveled up old men.”

  Her face flushed to a rosy hue as she tightened the fluffy terrycloth around her. “Uhhh—three?”

  Three? “I assume they were all lovers.”

  “One was a forty-year-old patient while I was in nursing school.” She looked down at her bare feet. “I guess you might call the other two lovers. I only slept with each of them once.”

  Jeez, she was practically a damn virgin. If she hadn’t gone back for seconds, both experiences must have been less than satisfactory. That revelation simply increased the throbbing in his groin.

  “They weren’t one-night stands if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  “No.” He smiled. “I know you better than that. Adam Chase was one of them, right?”

  She nodded.

  He’d figured as much from the regret on the oncologist’s face whenever he looked at her.

  “Adam realized it would never work out between us.”

  “So? Are you gonna wrestle that sheet back from Dusty for me, or are you planning to leave me lying here in my birthday suit all day? Heat spread throughout his body as her gaze swept him from the top of his head to the toes sticking out of his cast.

  “I don’t know.” Cocking her head, she chewed her lip as she scrutinized his anatomy. “I think I’ll keep you like this for a little while. I’ve never had the chance to really study such a magnificent specimen of masculine pulchritude.”

  His mouth turned desert dry as she sank onto the edge of the bed and slid her palm over his chest. He closed his eyes and surrendered to the pleasure of her caress. As her hand drifted south, he forced the word, “No,” past his lips.

  “Yes.”

  His breath caught in his chest when her fingers reached the thick thatch below his navel. “I’ll arrest you for sexual assault.”

  She chuckled. “Right. Do you really think any jury will convict me after hearing you’re a peeping Tom?”

  “You’d be perjuring yourself if you gave that testimony. I didn’t deliberately—”

  “I know. You already told me about your sneaky canine accomplice.” She waved toward Dusty, now tangled in the sheet. “You still watched.”

  He stared into her glittering eyes, which had turned the dark green of a champagne bottle. “In my place, no red-blooded guy could’ve looked away. After one glance at you, even fully clothed, I’d have every man on the jury on my side. I’m only human, Brina.”

  “So am I. No woman could resist the chance to touch a man who’s so obviously excited by her. But just to be fair, I’ll even things up a bit.”

  As she released the twist in her towel and let it fall away, his erection twitched. He’d never wanted to kiss or touch a woman so much in his life. Her high, firm breasts were made to fit a man’s hand, and far sexier than those on the more well-endowed women he’d dated.

  How the hell had he been stupid enough to swear he wouldn’t instigate an affair between them? He’d never felt more vulnerable—physically or emotionally—than he did right now, stark naked completely at her mercy. At what point could he rationalize that she’d made the first move?

  “You know what I’d like to do right now?” She smiled and traced a circle around the tip of his erection with the pad of her index finger.

  “What?” he muttered past his gritted teeth.

  “I’d like to straddle Mr. Happy and slide right down on him.”

  Ohhh, yeah. Her riding him could definitely be classified as a first strike. Sabrina’s verbal foreplay excited him n
early as much as the sight of her swollen pink nipples and her soft fingers caressing him. No woman had ever turned him on like this before.

  His heart thumped so hard it felt like it might seize. What the hell. If he went into cardiac arrest, she knew CPR. And he couldn’t think of a better way to die.

  ~*~

  Luke stared into her eyes, his gaze pleading with her. Whether to stop teasing him or to carry out her fantasy, Sabrina wasn’t sure. The only thing she was absolutely certain of was he wanted her. She’d never felt so powerful in her life. Making Luke ache for her aroused her more than any of her dreams. Every muscle in his beautiful body flexed and strained, deepening the delineation between them.

  Maybe if she made this exciting enough, he’d become as addicted to her as the junkies he busted were to the drug of their choice. If he needed her so badly he hurt without her, perhaps he’d consider a future with her.

  “First,” she whispered, “I think I’d like to see Mr. Happy beg a little.”

  As she wrapped her palm around Luke’s hot shaft, desire flared in his gaze. “Uhhh....I think that’s what he’s been doing.”

  “Then I’d like to hear his owner beg, too.”

  The tension in his hard body said it wouldn’t take much. She dipped her head and licked the drop of dew beaded on the tip of him.

  “Brina....” He panted. “Please, don’t do this.”

  “Wrong sort of begging. You’re supposed to moan, ‘Please saddle up,’ or ‘Tally ho,’ or some other equestrian cliché. If you say don’t again, I’ll have to stop because I don’t believe in a double standard.”

  “Princess, please.”

  “Please what?” Sabrina flinched as the phone in her purse played the song Ben had chosen to signal a call from him. With how understanding he was being, she couldn’t just let it ring. “I’m sorry, Luke. I have to answer it. It’s Ben.”

  A mixture of relief and regret flickered in his gaze.

  She retrieved her purse from the chair in the corner and dug out her phone. “Good morning.”

  “Hi, sweetheart. I know you’re usually awake by eight, but I wasn’t sure you would be today.”

  “I’ve already showered.”

  “Good. I wanted to find out how the patient’s doing before I head down to the office. Is he up?”

  She glanced over at Luke stretched out naked on the bed, his erection standing at full attention. “Oh, yeah.” She smiled at him. “He’s been up for quite some time now.”

  “I’m surprised. He called me in the middle of the night. We had a heart-to-heart.”

  “Really?” She glanced back at Luke and frowned. That could explain the sudden shift in his attitude when she’d returned with their supper. She spun her naked fanny to the bed. “Tell me all about it.”

  “He admitted he’s been crazy about you his whole life,” Ben said. “There’s something deeper going on with him than he’s letting on. He won’t talk about it.”

  She’d gotten that sense, too.

  “Don’t let him shut you out, Sabrina.”

  “I won’t.”

  “Who knows,”—Ben’s cynical chuckle rumbled in her ear—“maybe, if you’re lucky, he’ll get you pregnant.”

  “I couldn’t do that. I don’t want him that way.”

  “Why not?” He snorted. “No one’s ever had a problem using that tactic to try to get me down the aisle.”

  Two scheming bitches had already claimed Ben had impregnated them. Only his demand for paternity tests had saved him from their blackmail attempts. “That’s because you have a lot of what women want, Ben.”

  “And so does Luke.”

  “Yes.” She smirked and looked back at his rigid shaft. “So I noticed.”

  “I was talking about money. Since Luke graduated from the police academy, he’s worked every hour of overtime he’s been offered and given me about a quarter of everything he makes to invest for him. He’s amassed quite a nice sum over the last decade.”

  No one would ever guess it from Luke’s lifestyle.

  “You wouldn’t by any chance be padding that, would you?” she murmured.

  “Absolutely not. Of course, I won’t deny his money always seems to end up in my highest yielding ventures. And naturally, I haven’t invested any of it in the few that haven’t paid off.”

  And knowing Ben, when the market had taken a nosedive at the end of ’08, all of Luke’s money had miraculously been moved to secure funds only days before.

  “And you wonder why he feels the way he does about you?” she whispered into the receiver.

  Ben promptly changed the subject. “Thomas will be there by eleven to drive you to your apartment in the limo.”

  “Ben, he doesn’t have to—”

  “No arguments. You’ll need help with Luke’s wheelchair. And this way you can bring your car back with you. I’ll call you tonight. I love you.”

  “Me, too.” She disconnected the call and turned to find Luke struggling to pull up his boxer briefs.

  “I wasn’t finished with you, Detective Marino.”

  “Yes, you were. If you care enough for Ben to answer his call in the middle of seduce—”

  “I would’ve answered it if it was my brother or Annie, too.” She snatched the towel off the bed and wrapped it around herself again.

  “Are you gonna take me to the bathroom, or should I hop in there on my own?”

  She shoved the wheelchair over to Luke and held it still while he flopped into it.

  Talk about taking two steps forward and one step back. At least his wounded ego proved what Ben had just told her. Luke felt a lot more than just lust for her. “Well, well, well, it seems the detached cop isn’t so indifferent after all. Admit it. You’re jealous.”

  ~*~

  After listening to Sabrina laugh with Ben, envy chewed at Luke’s gut while Thomas chauffeured them, across the Delaware River to Sabrina’s garden apartment in Ewing, New Jersey.

  He hadn’t realized just how long it had been since he’d visited her home until Thomas pulled Luke’s wheelchair up the two steps and in through her front door.

  When he’d helped Tyler move her furniture into the three-room flat a few years ago, it’d been drab and unwelcoming. Since then, she’d personalized it with curtains and lots of pictures, turning it into a cozy home. It had a warm atmosphere that even his big old house lacked.

  She tossed him the television’s remote and raised the footrest on his wheelchair before Thomas insisted on following her into the bedroom to help her pack. Luke channel surfed between the talk shows and prime-time reruns for several minutes before he finally heaved a disgusted sigh and turned off the TV.

  A second later, the shrill sound of the doorbell pealed through the apartment. It took a few tries, but he eventually managed to maneuver the wheelchair over to the door and opened it.

  A woman who reminded him of Betty White smiled at him, holding a balding man’s hand like she would a young child’s. “Oh, excuse me. I was looking for—”

  Sabrina poked her head into the living room. “Harriet, how are you?”

  “Oh, Sabrina, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you had company.”

  “I don’t really.” She introduced Luke to Mr. and Mrs. Klausen and explained her plans to stay with him while he recuperated. “Would Richard like to visit with us for a while before we leave?”

  The vacant expression in the man’s eyes said his mind was already visiting another place far, far away.

  “If it’s not too much trouble, it would be such a big help.” Harriet squeezed her hand. “I’m almost out of disposable briefs for Richard, and I need to pick up a few groceries. I’ll be as quick as a bunny.”

  “Take your time.” Sabrina turned to Thomas standing in the doorway to her bedroom. “We’re in no hurry, are we?”

  “Not at all. Can I help by driving Mrs. Klausen to the store?”

  “That’s a wonderful idea.” Sabrina led Richard to the sofa and smiled at Luke. “You do
n’t mind Mr. Klausen keeping you company while I finish packing do you, Luke?”

  What was he supposed to say? That the old guy freaked him out? “N-no. That’s fine.”

  Once Thomas escorted Mrs. Klausen to the limo, Sabrina wandered into the kitchen and returned a few moments later carrying two glasses of ginger ale and a bag of Oreos.

  “Where’s Harry?” Richard asked.

  “She ran to the store. She’ll be back soon. How about a cold drink?” Sabrina handed one glass to Luke and held the other to the old man’s lips, wiping the dribbles from his chin.

  “You’re a good girl, Janice. I love you.”

  “I know. I love you, too.” Sabrina patted his shoulder and whispered to Luke, “Half the time, he thinks I’m his daughter. She died three years ago.”

  Richard’s vacant eyes drifted closed and a second later he began snoring softly.

  “Since he’s asleep, you can keep me company instead.” She pushed Luke’s wheel chair down the hall and into her bedroom.

  “Why the hell isn’t he living in a nursing home?” Luke whispered as he dug three of the cookies out of the bag in his lap. “Mrs. Klausen can’t be much past her early sixties. She should be traveling and enjoying her golden years.”

  “She wants to take care of her husband herself,” Sabrina said as she opened her bureau drawer and transferred a stack of underwear to the open suitcase on the bed.

  “More like she feels obligated,” Luke muttered past the cream-filled cookie.

  The thought of Sabrina being tied to him like that, sacrificing her happiness and freedom put a knot in his stomach.

  “No, she really doesn’t.” She spoke of the couple with a tenderness that made the cookie stick in Luke’s throat. “I won’t say Harriet doesn’t have days when she feels like quitting or that Richard’s Alzheimer’s isn’t terribly hard for her, but most of the time she puts her whole heart into caring for her husband.”

  “Why, for crying out loud? The man she married isn’t even there anymore.”

  “Yes, he is. Maybe not in mind or spirit, but the body of the man she’s loved for forty years is very much there, needing to be fed and washed and protected from wandering into the street.” Tears welled in Sabrina’s eyes. “How could Harriet let some stranger do that for him? Especially knowing, at some point during the day, he could have a lucid spell. She wants to be there for those few precious moments.”