Happy New Year--Baby!

by Marie Ferrarella

  “Sherwood’s pulling Dombrowski and me off the surveillance.” Winston paused. He looked at Dennis. “You, too.”

  That made no sense to him. “Why?”

  Winston put it as delicately as he could. “Well, he thinks this is a dead end. Standish or his henchmen haven’t been back.” He gestured toward the other apartment. “She doesn’t seem to know anything. What are we still doing here?”

  Dennis would have thought that was self-evident. “Protecting her.”

  “From what, the smog? No, I think this time, you’re not thinking with your head, Lincoln.” Winston sighed. “This time, you’re letting other parts of you make the decisions.”

  He saw the anger pass over Dennis’s face, knew it was settling into his bones. If he wanted to, Dennis could have lashed out at him. Winston was certainly no match for the man. Instead, he heard Dennis answer in a low, steely voice. “I still think we can find the disk.”

  Winston couldn’t refrain from saying what he believed. What Sherwood believed. They were just wasting their time and miles of videotape staying here.

  “Well you’re in the minority. Sherwood wants us to pursue another angle. He wanted me to tell you that you’ve got twenty-four hours to tie up any loose ends and then be out of the apartment.”

  Dennis slipped his hands into his front pockets. Silence prowled around the room with him as he moved. Finally, he turned and looked at his partner.

  “No.”

  “Dennis, Sherwood’s stretching it as it is because he likes you.”

  Dennis didn’t want favors from Sherwood. He wanted to catch the men who had torn apart Nicole’s apartment, the men who encouraged others to put everything on the turn of a card. And then gleefully collected the money when they lost.

  “No,” he repeated with finality. “I’m not leaving.” He did some quick calculations. “I’ve got some time coming, I’ll take it now.”

  “And when it’s up?”

  Dennis shrugged. “Maybe by then, I’ll find the disk.”

  “What if you don’t?”

  Dennis didn’t want to talk about it now. He hadn’t thought anything through yet. “Let me worry about that, okay?”

  “This is a mistake, Dennis.” The concern in Winston’s voice was clear.

  There Winston was wrong. So was Sherwood. “I don’t think so.” He touched his partner’s arm, asking for indulgence. And faith. “I told you, I’ve got a gut feeling about this.”

  The expression on Winston’s round face was skeptical. “Sure it’s your gut and not something else?” Dennis opened his mouth to contradict him, but for once, Winston was quicker. “Don’t forget, I’m the one who’s been sitting at those monitors, getting blisters on my cheeks watching you play Mister Perfect while you’re making saucer eyes at her.”

  The expression broke the tension, making Dennis laugh. “You’ve got a law degree from Stanford, Winston. Can’t you do any better than ‘saucer eyes?’”

  Winston waved a dismissive hand at the criticism. “I didn’t major in English. I majored in common sense, something you seem to have abandoned.” Winston paused. “What do you want me to tell Sherwood?”

  Dennis knew he was right about this, even if Winston had his doubts. “Just that something came up and I’m taking vacation time.”

  “Right. Vacation time. In the middle of an investigation. He’s really going to buy that.”

  Right now, what Sherwood thought didn’t matter to him. “I don’t care if he does or not,” Dennis said. “I’m doing what I think is right.” He couldn’t just walk away from her now. For more than one reason. “She’s vulnerable. The minute we all pull out, I know things’ll go down.”

  Winston shook his head. Dennis was asking for trouble. But they had been partners almost from the beginning of their careers. He owed Dennis in more ways than he could enumerate. “What do you want me to do?”

  Dennis nodded. When it came down to the wire, he knew he could always count on Winston. One arm around his shoulders, he ushered Winston toward the door. “Keep me informed if something else does come up.” Dennis turned the doorknob and looked at the man beside him. “And Winston?”

  “Yeah?

  “Thanks.”

  Winston shrugged without answering. What was between them went without saying.

  “Problem?” Nicole asked when Dennis let himself into her apartment.

  Her phraseology caught him off guard. He turned away from her as he closed the door. “With what?”

  She felt as if she’d hit a sour note. He hadn’t wanted to talk about his work the one time she’d asked him about it. He was always so open about everything else. Was there something wrong?

  “Your partner. Winston,” she elaborated when he didn’t say anything. “Is there a problem at work?” She thought of the worst case scenario, at least as far as she was concerned. “Are you going to have to go back right away?”

  Keep it simple and close to the truth, he reminded himself.

  “Not right away.” Suddenly, his throat felt really dry. He opened the refrigerator and took out a can of soda. “But soon.” When he popped the top, a slight spray covered the top of the can. He took a long sip. It didn’t help.

  Nicole nodded, then took the can from him, taking a sip herself. She’d just put the twins down and was looking forward to spending the next hour alone with Dennis. When Winston showed up, she was afraid that Dennis was going to have to leave with him.

  She handed the can back to him. Her hand brushed against his. “I’ll miss you.”

  It was as if she were giving voice to his thoughts. He looked at her in surprise. “What?”

  “When you go back to work,” she explained. “I’ll miss you.” Nicole began sorting the laundry out on the sofa. There were so many tiny things to fold. It amazed her that babies went through so many clothes each day. She smiled at him. “I guess I’ve gotten accustomed to having you around all the time.”

  He picked up a crib sheet and folded it in quarters. “You mean having me underfoot.”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t say that.”

  No, she hadn’t. And her eyes were saying a great many things to him now that they shouldn’t. “You would have when we first met,” he reminded her.

  That was true enough, but there was a reason for that. “When we first met, I thought you were like all the others. Crafty, deceitful—”

  And you were right.

  Dennis folded another crib sheet. “Because I wanted you to let the deliverymen in?”

  She laughed. That seemed so long ago now. “I thought it was a ploy.” She’d heard a lot better, and a lot worse. Nicole knew that she had put Dennis through a great deal when they had first met. And all he had wanted was her friendship.

  She placed her hand on his arm. “I’m sorry. It’s just after you’ve had your feelings used as a soccer ball so many times, you get a little wary.” She looked into his eyes. “But I know better now.”

  He sorted out the tiny shirts. Erika wore the yellow flowered ones, Ethan the blue ducks. He had been able to look into the eyes of a terrorist and lie without flinching, but he couldn’t look into her eyes. “Well, there’s something to be said for being on your guard.”

  There was that practical side of his. It was almost as if he was trying to warn her away from him. Not a chance. She took the shirts he was holding out of his hand and let them drop onto the pile on the sofa.

  “Yes, but not so much that it almost ruins something wonderful for you.”

  Her body was so close to his, he couldn’t think of anything else. “You’re making this very difficult to resist.”

  She raised her eyes to his. There was an unspoken invitation in them. “Then don’t.” Because he hesitated, she stood on her toes, her hands on his arms for balance, and kissed him.

  The kiss, softer than a summer breeze, went directly to his gut like a sucker punch. He took hold of her wrists. “Nicole, I’m only human.”

  Very deliberate
ly, she maneuvered out of his restraint. Twining her arms around his neck, she kissed him again, this time she lingered a tiny bit longer, heating his blood, heating hers. “I’m glad to hear that.”

  He wasn’t free to do what every inch of his body begged him to do. “You’ve just had twins.”

  “Human and observant.” Each word was punctuated with a kiss, feathered along his jawline. “What more can I ask for?”

  He framed her face with his hands. It seemed the only way to stop her. “You know what I mean. You can’t—”

  “Yes, I can.” He could feel the grin spreading from her lips to his hands. “Dr. Pollack said that she was amazed at how quickly and completely I bounced back, especially considering the way I went into labor.” Her body leaned seductively into his. “I asked her if it was all right to have relations.”

  The smile that rose to his lips seemed to have arrived there on its own. He felt it filtering through his entire body. “And why would you have done that?”

  Her eyes teased him as her hands rested on his chest. “Because I want to have them. Relations,” she breathed against his neck.

  He wondered if she could feel his heart beneath her hands, and if she realized that she owned it. “With anyone in particular?”

  The smile on her lips deepened until it was ingrained in every fiber of her being. “Yes, with someone very particular.”

  He covered her hands with his and then removed them from his chest. “Nicole, you might regret doing this.”

  It was as close as he could come to refusing her. Because he didn’t want to refuse her. More than anything in this world, he wanted her, wanted to make love with her until every inch of his body was exhausted beyond hope of ever recovering.

  One in a million, she thought. No other man would have tried to talk her out of it once she had come this far. Slowly, she moved her head from side to side, her eyes on his.

  “Uh-uh. There are a lot of things in my life that I regret, but this will never be one of them.”

  Lord, but he ached for her, ached to feel her body sliding along his, ached to just hold her in the wee hours of the morning and know that she was his. “You don’t know that.”

  “I know that,” she contradicted him. As she drew herself up again, her body whispered along his. Her mouth was inches away from his lips and her breath enticed him as she spoke. “I know that this was meant to happen. From the very first, this was meant to happen.” She looked into his eyes, searching for answers. “Now, are you going to make me humiliate myself by—”

  Dennis laid a finger to her lips. He didn’t want her to ask. At least he could spare her that. “Shh. Anyone ever tell you that you talk too much?”

  She lifted her chin proudly. “Not anyone who’s still breathing.”

  He grinned. “I didn’t think so.” He sampled her lips, lips that made him think of wine, delicately aged and incredibly sweet.

  Nicole surrendered to the feelings that were rushing through her. She fell headlong into the kiss she had initiated, letting it make her head swim.

  Dennis felt the moan vibrate along her throat as he pressed his lips to the long, slim column. He couldn’t believe the way that excited him. He filled his hands with her hair, feeling drunk just being with her. His very brain was scrambled.

  His heart was racing in his chest, in his ears, in every pulse point of his body. This was wrong, wrong to take her when she was being deceived, and yet, he couldn’t help himself, couldn’t stop himself. He would have never taken the first step, but she had, and she had taken him with her.

  He had no will of his own. That seemed to have disintegrated the moment her lips had touched his.

  Her fingertips feathered along his chest as she worked at opening the buttons on his shirt.

  “You know,” she told him, trying to maintain a straight face, “I’ve never had to throw myself at a man before. They were always there, ready to take me if I so much as nodded in their direction.” She had been very willing to party then, to place herself on display as she searched for love and acceptance. “This is a whole new experience for me.”

  The smile slid from her lips. She looked at him seriously. “I like it.” Her lips fluttered along his. “I really like it.”

  His palms itched. Dennis was eager to touch her, to familiarize himself with every inch of her. But he couldn’t take her here. What if Winston hadn’t turned off the camera? He couldn’t let her be captured on film this way.

  Nicole undid the last button and slowly slid her fingertips along his chest between the parted sides of his shirt. Dennis shrugged out of it.

  The next moment, he swept her into his arms and carried her toward her bedroom. There was no camera there.

  Her eyes widened in surprise, then filled with pleasure. “Ooh, I could really get to like this,” Nicole laughed. “We’re like Scarlett and Rhett.” The next moment, she reconsidered, her lower lip adorably pouty. “No, not like them.”

  He lightly flicked his tongue along her lip, making her shiver.

  “No staircase?” he guessed as he entered the room.

  Nicole shook her head. Her reason was far more basic than that. “They didn’t have a happy ending.” The feel of his chest against her cheek stirred her and made her feel safe at the same time. She couldn’t remember ever being this happy. “I like happy endings.”

  The muscles in his stomach tightened as her words danced along his chest.

  “So do I.”

  Dennis set her down. Now, he had to tell her now, away from the monitors. Now while his conscience goaded him on.

  The words felt like lead in his mouth. “Nicole, there’s something I have to tell you.”

  Something in his manner told her she didn’t want to hear. She shook her head. “No, there’s nothing you have to tell me. You just have to make love with me. Make love with me here and now, before I burn up and become a cinder.”

  Still there was doubt in his eyes. She had to make him understand.

  “No one’s ever looked at me the way you do. No one’s ever treated me the way you do.” She took his hand and laid it on her breast. “Can you feel that? That’s my heart, Dennis. You’ve brought it back from the dead. Legally, that makes it yours.”

  She didn’t know what she was saying. He couldn’t let her go on like this. “Nicole—”

  Her eyes implored him. “Don’t make me ask again.”

  A man could only be so strong. He couldn’t resist both her and himself. “I won’t.”

  His mouth covered hers. The needs buffering his body blocked out his guilt. Tomorrow, he’d deal with it all tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow things would come to light that he could work with. And then she would forgive him this lie. This huge lie that had allowed him to enter her life in the first place.

  He undressed her slowly, treating her like an unexpected gift he had received for Christmas. With his heart hammering in his ears, he watched her eyes for any sign that she wanted him to stop.

  But all he saw there was encouragement.

  He glided his palms along her body, glorying in the silky feel of her skin. It was like rich whipped cream, and he had a terrible yen for cream.

  Nicole felt her skin tingle as he removed her T-shirt, pulling it up over her head and tossing it aside. There was desire in his eyes when he looked at her. Tender desire.

  Had desire ever been tender? she wondered. It hadn’t been with Craig, or with anyone else. But it was tender now. Tender and worshipful.

  If someone had come and told her that she had died and gone to heaven, she would have believed it. Because nowhere on earth had she ever encountered anyone like Dennis.

  They undressed one another, garment for garment, their hands reverently exploring each other’s bodies. Each pass was sweet agony, stirring desires, creating more demands.

  He took a step back and looked at her. She was beautiful. The smile that crept to her lips was shy and full of pleasure. “What?” he coaxed.

  “When you look at me, I
don’t feel funny.”

  “That’s good,” he murmured against her temple, doing delicious things to her nervous system. “Because you don’t look funny.”

  Within moments, they were sealed in one another’s arms, sealed to one another’s bodies. Dennis clothed her in warm, openmouthed kisses that threatened to reduce her to the consistency of ice cream left out on the counter overnight.

  They tumbled onto the bed, lost in a world of their own creation. A world they were both eager to explore. They touched, tasted, ignited and gloried in the discoveries.

  Nicole wrapped herself around Dennis, wishing that time could stand still, that it could remain this way forever. There was an urgency drumming through her. She couldn’t shake the feeling that, somehow, she was on borrowed time. It went far beyond the fact that the twins would be waking soon, far beyond logic.

  She wanted forever, but she would settle for now. As long as now contained him.

  Her body called to his. He wasn’t going to be able to hold back much longer. Turning so that he was on top, he pushed the hair away from her face.

  “Hey, what’s your hurry?” He could feel his loins throbbing as she moved beneath him. “It’s better if you go slowly.”

  She felt as if she were going to explode soon if he didn’t take her. “Says who?

  “Damned if I know.” She sparked a fire in his body, in his very soul. Feeling her firm torso moving beneath his, it was almost more than he could manage to keep from taking her quickly.

  But he wanted her to remember this. When she looked back on this, he wanted her to remember this with love, not with anger or shame. He wanted her to know that he loved her.

  This was the only way he had to show her.

  “Wait.” Taking both her hands in his, Dennis held them above her head. Slowly, his body teased hers, preparing it for him.

  “For what?” she asked thickly.

  But he didn’t answer. Instead, he showed her. His lips moved along her face, along her throat, along the upper planes above her breasts, sealing each inch with a kiss that flowered into another, and another.

  Nicole twisted and turned, absorbing the sensation, trying to contain the anticipation that impatiently pounded all through her. Like her dream, she realized in a haze. Except this was better. Much better.