The manager said, “When you’re finished here, Mr. Kristiansen, just ring the front desk.” He put his business card down on the coffee table, on a rare non-bloody spot. “I’ve set aside another room for the ladies, when they’re ready. As soon as you call, we’ll send a bellman to help with the bags.” He set a paper bag on the coffee table next. It was a very glossy paper bag. It was a wine-sized paper bag. “To help make up for the trouble. Anything else you need, please just ask.”
“Appreciate that,” Harlan said, as if this were normal. “You know what? I only got a bite of my dinner before all the bloodletting happened. It’s cold now, and Jennifer didn’t get anything at all. Want some enchiladas?” he asked Jennifer. “They’re chicken. The bite I had was pretty good.”
“Or you could have what I had,” Dyma said.
Jennifer squinted at her. “Is it vegetables?”
The doctor said, “Little prick here,” Jennifer said, “Oh, surely not. So disappointing,” and this time, both Harlan and Owen grinned.
Dyma said, as the needle went in and Jennifer didn’t even care, “Are you even my mother? And yes, it’s vegetables. Of course it’s vegetables. I told you, I’m doing this.”
“Enchiladas, then, please,” Jennifer said. “I’ve bled way too much to eat vegetables.”
“Two of those,” Harlan said. “And I’m sure whatever’s in this bag is real good, but if you’d have them send up a beer along with that food, that’d be even better. When I get this much blood on me, I tend to want a beer. Of course, it’s usually my blood, but still. Whatever’s local and cold will work for me. Send all that to my room, please.”
“Of course,” the manager said, and melted away.
“Wow,” Jennifer said. “I mean, it’s not like I didn’t know rich people get treated better, but I didn’t think you could bleed all over somebody’s best suite and have them apologize to you. And give you wine. Does this happen to you all the time?”
“Nope,” Harlan said. “But only because I’m better behaved than you.” And this time, she laughed.
The doctor said, “I’m giving you an antibiotic shot as well, just in case.”
“Why not?” Jennifer said. “He’s paying. Notice how I’ve given up caring about that,” she told Harlan. “I have surrendered to my fate.”
The doctor smiled, then said, “I can get some crutches sent around first thing in the morning. It could be tricky to hobble on this thing for the next day or so.”
Harlan said, “Nope. I’ve got this.”
Jennifer said, “How, exactly, this time? I can’t wait to hear this one.”
“I’m carrying you,” he said. “Of course I am. What, you’re using crutches in the snow? No.”
“I’m heavy,” she said.
“Maybe,” he said, “but I’m strong.”
Dyma said, “Oh, man. You’re not supposed to agree with her! What are you, clueless? She’s sensitive about her weight.”
Harlan, though, was laughing. “Nah. Excuse to grope.”
“I need the crutches,” Jennifer told the doctor. “For after I go home.”
Harlan didn’t object to that, because how could he? “Bill through the hotel?” he asked the doctor instead.
“That’s how it works,” the doctor said, and started packing up. “Take care of yourself, young lady, and stay off that foot as much as you can. The internal stitches will dissolve on their own, and the outer layers are glued, but if you have any problems after you get home, be sure to give your own doctor a call.” After that, he stripped off his gloves and melted away only slightly less discreetly than the manager.
Which left Dyma and Owen, piles of towels nobody was going to want to use ever again, and a whole, whole lot of blood. Footprint-sized patches between the couch and the door, not to mention between the couch and the bathroom. And then there was the bathroom, which looked like a crime scene. And Harlan, who looked like he’d lost a fight, and was sitting down on the arm of the couch and asking, “Is this day over yet?” Then taking her hand, leaning down, kissing her forehead, and saying, “You did good. That was nasty. All right?”
“No,” Dyma said. “Not all right. Tell me. I go for a swim and dinner, assuming that my loving mother, who has trouble staying in this decade—in this millennium—will be sitting in here worrying about my safety like she always does, and instead, you’ve got the cops here. And a doctor. And blood. I thought I was being modern talking about my blood. This is serious blood.”
Harlan said, “Don’t go in your mom’s bathroom, then.”
“Exactly why?” Dyma asked. “And explain the cops.”
Jennifer said, “Maybe you’re not the only one with an exciting life.”
“Mom,” Dyma said. “I am so the only one with an exciting life.”
“I’m trying to think up a good story,” Jennifer said, “but the truth is, I broke my wine glass in the bathroom and stepped on the broken glass. That’s the whole story. The cops came because …” She waved a hand, then asked Harlan, “Are there any more wine glasses? Because there’s still that first bottle left, plus whatever’s in the bag.”
He eyed her and said, “How about a glass of water? At least until you get some food?”
“You’re no fun,” she said. “Anyway, the cops came because of the blood. They interrogated Harlan in your bedroom, I’m guessing, Dyma. As the suspect in my assault. To be fair, he is covered in blood. I thought they were going to take him down right at the door. One of them had his hand on his gun.”
“You’re kidding,” Dyma said. “Because you cut your foot?”
Harlan came back with her glass of water, and she struggled up to sit, attempted without much success to keep her robe closed around her, contemplated how many men she’d flashed tonight after a lifetime of flashing exactly none, and said, “So. If we’re having a party … does anybody else want wine?”
26
New Rules
Jennifer wasn’t on the couch anymore. She was on his bed.
Dyma had packed the two of them up, after the front-desk clerk had apologized over the phone that, “We only had one open room, but it has two beds. I hope that’s acceptable.”
Harlan said, “Yeah, that’s fine,” then hung up, explained, and said, “Owen, if you can handle the move, I’ll take Jennifer to my room to eat. It’s after nine-thirty, and I made her drop her bratwurst.”
“I think I can handle the move,” Owen said. “If you spell it out real slow.”
“Excuse me?” Dyma said, because of course she did. “I think I can just about follow a hotel employee to another room without getting lost. I can probably even figure out how to turn on the sink and flush the toilet all by myself.”
Owen grinned. “Yep,” he told Harlan. “I think we’ve got it.”
Jennifer didn’t say the thing again about Dyma’s curfew or wherever it was. Whether she trusted Owen by now or was just too tired, he didn’t know. Or, rather, he thought he did. He suspected that looking out for Dyma would be the thing that faded last in her, the way they said the voices of your loved ones were the last thing that remained, after all your other senses had gone dark. Which meant that she was finally relaxing about Dyma with Owen. And there were only so many things a person could worry about, multitasker or not. Especially, he hoped, when she was being carried down the hallway, her arm around his neck and her warm breath on his cheek, feeling warm and curvy and relaxed in his arms.
Now, she was sitting beside him on his bed, her injured foot on a pillow, wearing another hotel bathrobe. His, which he’d gone to get for her to change into before he’d brought her here. “Because,” he’d told her, “you deserve to be clean.” While he’d been gone, she’d managed to get the blood off her arms and legs, hopefully with Dyma’s help. He’d used his last ten minutes before the food had arrived to take his own shower and wash off the considerable accumulation of blood—no wonder, he’d thought as he’d watched the water in the drain go from red to pink, that the cops ha
d been so alarmed—and then change into his last clean clothes, which happened to be a pair of black sleep shorts and a faded Devils T-shirt. Now, he and Jennifer each had a tray in their lap, he had a bottle of beer on his, and she was sipping another glass of wine.
He said, “Is this the longest day of our lives, or what?”
She smiled. It was slow. It was impossible to look away from, too. Pale skin and freckles and a curvy little body in a too-big bathrobe that he wanted to take off. The gas fireplace on the opposite wall was sending out warmth, but it couldn’t possibly compare with Jennifer on your bed.
“It’s been long,” she said. “It’s been nuts. Yellowstone to North Dakota to here. A private jet. Your speech. All that bratwurst. All that cold. The police.”
“Hearing about your past,” he said.
“Hearing about yours.” Still a little tease in those eyes, but compassion, too. “I think we shared.”
“I think you’re right.” She was making only languid progress on her enchiladas, and now, she set her fork down, turned that sweet body toward him, and said, “Thanks for helping to keep me covered tonight, when my robe kept slipping. I saw what you did. You were … pretty special. All day.” She heaved in a breath. “And I’m thinking I was crazy to back out.”
He tried to think of what to say, and couldn’t. He knew what he wanted to say. He finally said, “Could be the drugs talking. Could be the wine.”
She said, “Could you take this tray away? And then, since you’re so good at taking care of people … could you come take care of me?”
That was his pulse rate taking a jump. He said, “You sure?” He took her tray away, though. He left her wine. Sometimes, you needed to live dangerously. Sometimes, you needed to be bad.
He was more than ready for that. Was she?
“I think the drugs are just letting me say what I want to say,” she said, “and it’s this. I’ve been careful all my life. Ever since I was fifteen. I’m tired of being careful. I want to take a chance. I want to find out what I’ve been missing. I want to fly.”
She thought he wasn’t going to do it. He was just sitting there, looking strong and beautiful and … she couldn’t tell what. Excited? Worried? Both? She was about to say something, although she couldn’t think what, or how to backtrack this time, when he put a hand on her cheek, stroked his thumb down her face, leaned in, and brushed his lips over hers.
Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was the painkiller. Or maybe it was Harlan, because that kiss, that gentle contact, sent tingles through her lips and sparks all the way down her body.
He didn’t smell like cedar and sage anymore. He smelled like himself. Like clean cotton, and something earthier, deeper under that.
He smelled like power.
His mouth tasted like dark caramel, which was the beer, she thought confusedly, and his hand was still on her face. Still gentle. Still strong.
He pulled back a little, rested his forehead against hers, smiled slowly, and said, “Hey.”
“Hey,” she said back.
“If we’re going to do this,” he said, “we’re going to do it differently.”
“Uh … we are?” She wanted his mouth back.
“Yeah.” He reached over and turned off the light on his side of the bed, so only the tiny spot over her side lit them. That, and the flickering orange and blue of the fire, casting shadows in the dark.
She tried to swallow. Now that she was doing this, or rather, now that she’d decided to do it, and couldn’t tell herself she’d been carried away in the moment, she was nervous. The muscles of his arms were so defined, it was like he’d been fashioned by a diamond cutter, and his chest was impossibly broad under the faded T-shirt. His beauty was a dark thing now, all angles and shade.
He said, “I get to look at you exactly as much as I want to. That’s my first rule. And, Jennifer—I am going to look.”
“Oh … kay.” She was having some trouble breathing.
“Second rule is …” He leaned down and kissed her again, nothing but gently, then trailed a string of kisses, light as a whisper, over to her ear, and told her, his voice a murmur, “You don’t get to try to please me.”
“Wh-what?” His lips were moving down now, below her ear. His mouth was on her neck, there where she was most sensitive, as if he’d been drawn to the spot. His hand was in her hair, holding her head, and it was getting a little hard to concentrate. “Harlan …”
“Also …” he said, between kisses at her neck. He was using his teeth the tiniest bit, and the liquid was flooding her veins. Those silver streaks again, going straight to the spot. “I love hearing you call me by my name. I think I’m going to have to insist on that, too.”
“Go back to the … second thing,” she said. “About me.”
He moved to her mouth again, and this time, he kissed her deeper. Kissed her harder, his fingers twining through her hair, tugging at it. So she’d know he was there, she thought, and that was exciting her more. “That’s my birthday present,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about pleasing me, because I’m going to be pleasing myself. You’re going to let me do whatever I want. And you’re going to do whatever I say.”
That was another jolt. A harder one. Alarm. Desire. She tried to say something. It came out as more of a gasp.
He was pulling the tie of her robe now, almost in slow motion, and then he was pulling the two sides apart, spreading them wide with so much deliberation. He looked her over for a long, long moment and didn’t touch her at all, but she could feel the excitement ratcheting up in him like she was in his body. He said, “You’re injured, and it’s going to be too easy for you to forget that once this starts. So if you’re moving tonight, it’s because I’m moving you. Safely. Are we all clear on that?”
She looked up into his face. Stern and strong, the laughter gone, all the surface charm stripped away. Like she was seeing the real man. A man who was way too much for her.
Too bad that too much was exactly what she wanted.
“Yes,” she said, and swallowed. “We’re … clear.”
His hand brushed over her. Her cheek. Her neck. Her shoulder. Her breast. Light as down, and still, she stiffened like she’d been shocked. He smiled and kept it going. Her belly. Her thigh. He stopped there, wrapped his hand around her inner thigh, and said, “Last rule. If you don’t want something, say so. If your foot hurts, if anything hurts, if it doesn’t feel good—tell me. Otherwise?” He wasn’t smiling now, and it wasn’t nice. Her heart was beating like she was in danger. Like she needed to run. He said, “Understand this, because I’m only going to tell you once. Tonight isn’t about you doing what you want, so get that through your head right now. Tonight, it’s all about me.”
27
Following the Rules
Oh, yeah. He’d been right. That was working.
For her, that is. Because you bet it was working for him. Her eyes were amber in the low light, her full lips a little parted, and he’d swear she was panting already just from that. Just from him spreading that robe open, looking her over, and saying a few things.
She was good at fantasy, she’d told him. But making those fantasies come true? That was what he was good at.
It was going to be any trouble at all to get inspired. Her skin gleamed white, except for the flush that was spreading from her chest to her cheeks under his gaze, her breasts were round and full and gorgeously pink-tipped, her waist was the kind of deep indentation that had surely been fashioned for a man’s hands, her hips were more than generous, and those were sure as hell some juicy thighs. White. Rounded. Perfect. He said, “You’re what Dyma said. Like something from another century. And I want my hands all over you. But first …” He got his clothes off in one big hurry, rolled over her, planted his hands on either side of her head, held himself rigid over her, watched those golden eyes widen, and enjoyed the hell out of it. He said, “Spread your legs a little, baby. I don’t want to hurt that foot.” A slow smile, the kind that would
let her know what he was thinking. “And I want to look.”
She took a breath, and then she did it, which meant he was, yes, between her legs. Which was a pretty damn good start. He said, “Now slide your arms out of that robe.”
She said, “You can’t … hold yourself up like that, though.”
He lowered himself slowly, until he was a bare couple inches from her face, until his chest was brushing the tips of her breasts, and said, “Remind me. What were your rules for tonight?”
That flush on her cheeks was deeper now, and he spared a moment to think about redheads, and how they couldn’t hide a thing. He wanted to see more of that. He wanted to see her face twist with the force of her orgasm, to see her eyes open wide with surprise and wonder and shock. He wanted everything. For now, though, he’d settle for this.
She said, “That I should …” Another breath in. “Do what you say.”
He lowered himself farther, just enough to kiss her mouth, to feel it opening under his like she couldn’t help it. He deepened the kiss, sent his tongue on a slow, sweet exploration, felt the way she took him in, the way her hands were clutching his shoulders, thought about that other sexual skill of hers, then pressed himself up again and said, “That’s right. You’re doing what I say. So if you want more of that? Take your arms out of there.”
She did. First one arm, then the other, and, yeah, that was what she looked like all the way naked. And waiting. Trembling a little with excitement, too. He let himself stay there and savor that moment. He let her wait a little longer, too. Then he said, “I’m going to kiss you some more. I’m going to touch you. I’m going to explore every single inch of you. Your only job is to lie back and enjoy it. We clear?”
“But you won’t …” She was gasping some now. Nothing but a kiss and a little dirty talk, and he already had her halfway there. “Get enough out of it. I should … I can … If you come up here, I can use my … mouth.”
Shame the Devil (Portland Devils Book 3) Page 21
