by Nora Roberts
“No.”
He couldn’t get enough of her. Each time he thought desperation would overpower him, he found something new to tantalize him. The subtle flare of her hips, the narrow dip of her waist. He wanted to feel the bite of her nails on him again, hear that choked cry of release when he dragged her over the next edge.
Her breath was sobbing, his own so clogged in his lungs he thought they would burst from it. He moved up her again while her hands raced over him and her body bucked.
He could see her eyes, and nothing else. Just the dark glint of them, watching him as he rose over her. He held back for one quivering instant, then plunged.
Here was everything. The thought stabbed through him, then shattered in his brain as she closed hot and tight around him.
She rose to him, fell with him, the slick slide of bodies mating. Sighed with him as pleasure shimmered. Her heart thundered against his, beat for beat. Their breath mixed, drawing him deeper so that his mouth was on hers, another link, as they moved together.
The tempo quickened so that the slide became a slap, and sighs broke into gasps and moans. Her hips pistoned as he pounded into her. As sensations staggered her, she raked her nails down his back, dug them into his hips. Urging him on even as she was swamped by the next crest.
He felt himself slip—a glorious feeling of surrender—and with his face buried in the tumbled mass of her hair, he fell.
* * *
It was over for him. He knew it the minute his system leveled and his mind began to work again. He’d never get over her. Never get past her. With one sweep, she’d destroyed a lifetime of careful avoidance.
Now he was stupidly, helplessly, irretrievably in love with her.
Nothing could be more impossible or more dangerous.
She could slice him to pieces. No one had ever been allowed to have that kind of control or power over him. He didn’t mean to let that change now.
He needed some sort of defense, and determined to start building it, he rolled away from her.
She simply rolled with him, stretched that long, limber body of hers over his and said, “Mmmmm.”
Another time he might have laughed, or at least felt that knee jerk of pure male satisfaction. Instead he felt a light trip of panic.
“Well, you got what you wanted, Fletcher.”
Instead of being insulted, which would have given him a little room to regroup, she just nuzzled his neck. “Damn right.”
To please herself she hooked a leg around him, then shifted to straddle him and slick back her hair. “I like your body, Blackhawk. All tough and rangy and taut.” She trailed a finger over his chest, admiring the contrast of her skin against his. “You’ve got some Native American blood, right?”
“Apache. Very diluted.”
“It looks good on you.”
He twirled a lock of her hair around his finger. “White bread,” he said dryly. “But it looks good on you.”
She leaned down until they were nose to nose. “Now that we’re all cozy and complimentary, how about doing me a favor?”
“And that would be?”
“Food. I’m starving.”
“Want a menu?”
“No. Umm.” She tilted her head, teased his mouth with hers. “Just something that’s on it. Maybe you could send down for something.” She trailed her lips down to his jaw, back up to his mouth. “And we could, you know, fuel up. Mind if I grab a shower?”
“No.” He rolled her onto her back. “But you’ll have to wait until I’m done with you.”
“Oh?” She smiled. “Well, a deal’s a deal.”
* * *
And when he was done with her, she staggered more than walked into the bathroom. She closed the door, leaned back against it and let out a long puff of breath.
She’d never had to work harder to maintain a careless, sophisticated image. Then again, she’d never had anyone turn her inside out and leave her jittering like a mass of jelly before.
Not that she was complaining, Ally told herself as she rubbed the heel of her hand over her heart. But her idea that sex was simply a pleasant occupation between two consenting adults who, hopefully, cared about each other had been forever shattered.
Pleasant didn’t begin to describe making love with Jonah Blackhawk.
Waiting for her system to level again, she scanned the bathroom. He’d indulged himself here, she noted, with the deep, why-don’t-you-join-me whirlpool tub in his customary jet-black. Though it looked tempting, she thought she’d settle for the separate shower enclosed by seeded glass.
The sink was a wide scoop in a jet-black counter. Nothing stood on it, no pieces of him left out for the casual eye to study. Just as there were no pieces, no odds and ends, memorabilia or personal photographs, in his office or bedroom.
She was tempted to poke in the cabinet, rifle through a couple of the drawers—what kind of shaving cream did he use? What brand of toothpaste?—but it seemed so pitifully obvious.
Instead she crossed the white tiles and studied her own face in the mirror. Her eyes were soft, her mouth still swollen from that wonderful assault of his. There were a number of faint bruises shadowing her skin.
All in all, she decided she looked just the way she felt. Like a woman happily used.
But what did he see when he looked at her? she wondered. When he looked at her in that cool, distant way? He wanted her, she could have no doubts about that. But did he feel nothing else?
Did he think she hadn’t noticed the way he’d drawn back from her both times, after passion had been spent? As if his need for … separation was as deep as his desire.
And why was she letting it hurt her? It was such a female reaction.
“Well, I am a female, damn it,” she muttered and turned to switch on the shower.
If he thought he was going to get away with nudging her back whenever he pleased, he was very much mistaken. The man was not going to rock her to her toes, then stroll away while she was still teetering.
She stuck her head under the spray, mumbling to herself.
She expected a lot more give-and-take in a relationship. And if he couldn’t trouble himself to give her a little affection along with the heat, well then he could …
She trailed off, winced.
She sounded like Dennis, she thought. Or at least close enough.
At least she could stop that before she dug herself a hole too deep to crawl out of.
The only relationship she had with Jonah was a physical one, and she herself had insisted on it. Both of them knew the ground rules and were smart enough not to need them spelled out.
If she needed to mix emotion in with desire, that was fine. That was okay. But it was also her problem.
Satisfied she’d solved the matter in her own mind, she turned off the taps, turned for a towel.
And let out one wild yelp when she saw Jonah holding one out for her.
“Most people sing in the shower,” he commented. “You’re the first I’ve come across who talks to herself in the shower.”
“I was not.” She snatched the towel.
“Okay, it was more unintelligible mumbling.”
“Fine. Most people knock before they come into an occupied bathroom.”
“I did, but you couldn’t hear me because you were talking to yourself. I thought you might want this.” He held up his other hand and the black silk robe that dangled from his fingers.
“Yeah. Thanks.” She wrapped the towel around herself, anchored it with a hand between her breasts.
“Dinner’ll be up in a minute.” Idly he skimmed a fingertip down her arm, sliding water over flesh.
“Good. I need to get my weapon off your desk.”
“I moved it.” Frowning now, he traced the curve of her shoulder. “I put it in the bedroom. The door’s closed. They’ll just leave the tray on my desk.”
“Works for me.” When she felt the brush of his finger over her collarbone, she released her hold on the towel, let it fall to he
r feet. “Is this what you’re looking for?”
“I shouldn’t want you again already.” Eyes on hers, he backed her against the wall. “I shouldn’t need you again.”
“Then walk away.” She tugged down the zipper on the trousers he’d pulled on. “Who’s stopping you?”
He closed a hand around her throat. Though the pulse under his fingers jumped, she merely lifted her chin and dared him.
“Tell me you want me,” he demanded. “Say my name, and that you want me.”
“Jonah.” She took the first step onto a bridge she knew could burn away under her feet. “I’ve never wanted anyone the way I want you.” Her breath hitched as she drew it in, but her eyes remained steady. “Give it back to me.”
“Allison.” He lowered his forehead to hers, in a gesture so weary and sweet she reached out to comfort him. “I can’t think for wanting you. Just you,” he murmured, then took her mouth, took her body. Desperately.
* * *
“I gotta say,” Ally commented as she ate like a starving wolf, “you’ve got a really good kitchen. A lot of clubs, the food’s mediocre at best. But yours, um …” She licked barbecue sauce from her thumb. “It’s first-class.”
She shook her head when he picked up the wine to top off her glass. “No, uh-uh. I’m driving.”
“Stay.” Another rule broken, he thought. He never asked a woman to stay.
“I would if I could.” Smiling she tugged on the lapel of the borrowed robe. “But I don’t have a change for tomorrow, and I’m back on eight-to-fours. As it is I’m going to have to borrow a shirt from you to get home. You did a number on mine.”
He did no more than pick up his own glass, but she felt him retreat. “Ask me to come back tomorrow and stay.”
He looked back at her. “Come back tomorrow and stay.”
“Okay. Look at that! Look at that! That runner was safe.”
“Out. By a half step,” Jonah corrected, amused that she’d nearly come off the sofa when the play on the wide screen caught her eye.
“Bull. You watch the instant replay. They hit the bag at the same time. Tie goes to the runner. See? Manager’s coming out. Give him hell. Anyway—”
Satisfied the requisite argument would proceed over a controversial call, she turned her attention back to Jonah. She smiled, rubbed her bare feet intimately against his hip. “Pretty good deal from my point of view. Good sex, good food and a ball game.”
“To some …” He reached down to trace a finger up her instep. “Paradise.”
“Since we’re in paradise, can I ask you something really important?”
“All right.”
“Are you going to eat all those fries?”
He grinned at her, shoved the plate in her direction, then leaned over to answer the phone. “Blackhawk. Yes.” He held out the portable receiver. “For you, Detective.”
“I left this number when I logged out,” she told him and took the phone. “Fletcher.” She straightened on the sofa, and her eyes went flat. “Where? I’m on my way.”
She was already on her feet when she tossed the receiver on the hook. “They found Jan.”
“Where is she?”
“On her way to the morgue. I have to go.”
“I’m going with you.”
“There’s no point in it.”
“She worked for me,” he said simply and walked into the bedroom.
* * *
Jonah had seen and done a great deal. In the first half of his life, he’d thought he’d seen and done everything. He’d seen death, but he’d never seen it stripped bare in cold, antiseptic surroundings.
He looked through the glass at the young woman and felt nothing but raw pity.
“I can verify ID,” Ally said beside him. “But it’s cleaner procedure if the visual comes from somebody else who knew her. Is that Janet Norton?”
“Yes.”
She nodded to the technician behind the glass, and he lowered the blinds. “I don’t know how long I’ll be.”
“I’ll wait.”
“There’s coffee, down this corridor and to the left. It’s crap, but it’s usually hot and strong.” She reached for the door, hesitated. “Listen, if you change your mind and want to go, just go.”
“I’ll wait,” he said again.
It didn’t take her long. When she came out, he was sitting in one of the molded plastic chairs at the end of the hallway. Her footsteps clicked on the linoleum, and the clicks echoed.
“Nothing much to do until the autopsy report’s in.”
“How did she die?” When Ally shook her head, he got to his feet. “How? It can’t be that big a dent in the rules to tell me.”
“She was stabbed. Multiple wounds, by what appears to be a long-bladed knife with a serrated edge. Her body was dumped on the side of the road off southbound 85, just a few miles outside of Denver. He threw her purse out with her. He wanted us to find her and ID her quickly.”
“And that’s it for you? Just identify her and put another piece in the puzzle?”
She didn’t snap back. She recognized the chill in his eyes as temper on a short leash, and her own was straining.
“Let’s get out of here.” Ally headed out. She wanted to fill her lungs with fresh air. “From the number of wounds, it appears she was killed with considerable rage.”
“Where’s yours?” He shoved the door open. “Or don’t you feel any?”
She strode out ahead of him. “Don’t snap at me.”
He grabbed her arm, whirled her around. She led with her fist and pulled it an inch from his jaw. “You want rage.” She shoved away from him. “I’ll give you some rage. From the looks of things, she was getting sliced to pieces while I was rolling around on the sheets with you. Now ask how I feel?”
He caught her before she got to the car and wrenched the door open. “I’m sorry.”
She tried to shrug him off, then push him away, but when she spun around snarling he just wrapped his arms around her.
“I’m sorry.” He said it quietly, pressing his lips to her hair. “I was out of line. We both know it wouldn’t have made any difference where we were or what we were doing. This would have happened.”
“No, it wouldn’t have made any difference. And still, two people are dead.” She drew away. “I can’t afford rage. Can you understand that?”
“Yes.” He took the clip out of her hair, rubbed the back of her neck. “I’d like to go home with you. I’d like to be with you tonight.”
“Good, because that’s what I’d like, too.”
She slid into the car, waiting for him to climb into the passenger seat. They both needed to set aside the rage, she knew, and the guilt. “I have to get up really early.”
He smiled at her. “I don’t.”
“Okay.” She pulled out of the lot. “That means you get to make up the bed and do the dishes. That’s the deal.”
“Does it also mean that you make the coffee?”
“It does.”
“I’ll take the deal.”
When she reached her building, she pulled into the underground garage. “Tomorrow might be a long one,” she told him. “Does it matter what time I get to your place?”
“No.” He got out of the car, came around to her side, then held out his hand for her keys.
“So what, did you take like a charm-school course or something?”
“Top of my class. I have a plaque.” He pressed the button for the elevator. “Now, some women are insecure and find the simple courtesy of a man opening doors for them or pulling out their chair, whatever, troubling. Naturally you’re secure enough in your own power and femininity not to be troubled.”
“Naturally,” she agreed and rolled her eyes as he gestured her into the elevator. Then he took her hand and made her smile.
“I like your style, Blackhawk. I haven’t been able to pin it down, not exactly, but I like it.” She angled her head to study him. “You used to play baseball, right?”
&nb
sp; “That and your father kept me in high school.”
“Basketball was my game. You ever shoot hoops?”
“Now and then.”
“Want to shoot some with me, on Sunday?”
“I might.” He walked out of the elevator with her. “What time?”
“Oh, let’s say two. I’ll pick you up. We can go—” She broke off, shifting in front of him fast and pulling her weapon. “Keep back. Don’t touch anything.”
He saw it now. The fresh scrape and pry marks on the door. She used two fingers on the knob, turned it, then booted the door open with her foot. She went in low, slapping the lights on, starting her sweep even as Jonah stepped in front of her.
“Get back. What are you, crazy?”
“One of the things I learned in charm school was not to use a woman as a shield.”
“This woman happens to be the one with the badge, and the gun.”
“I noticed. Besides.” He’d already scanned the debris of the room. “He’s long gone.”
She knew it, felt it, but there were rules and procedure. “Well, pardon the hell out of me while I play cop and make sure. Don’t touch anything,” she said again and, stepping over a broken lamp, checked the rest of the apartment.
She was swearing in a low, steady voice as she headed for the phone.
“Your old friend Dennis?” Jonah asked.
“Maybe, but I don’t think so. Lyle was heading south out of Denver.” She jabbed her fingers into the keypad on the phone. “I think I just found out what he was doing here. This is Detective Fletcher. I’ve had a break-in.”
Even before the crime scene unit arrived, Ally snapped on protective gloves and began to do inventory. Her stereo components, good ones, hadn’t been stolen. But they had been smashed. Her laptop computer and the small TV that stood above the stereo had received the same treatment.
Every table lamp in the place—including the antique bookkeeper’s light she’d bought for her desk—was broken. Her sofa had a long gash from end to end, and the guts of it spilled out in nasty puffs.
He’d poured the half gallon of paint she’d bought then had never gotten around to using, in the middle of her bed.
Over the bed, he’d slopped a message in the same paint.
Try To Sleep At Night
“He blames me for his sister’s death. He knows I was the one. How does he know?”
“Jan,” Jonah said from behind her. “She has to be the one who warned them something was wrong that night,” he continued when Ally turned. “You got the Barneses back to their table, but they were still both gone for an unusual amount
