“Actually, I think I’m here to photograph your main room.” She held up her digital camera. “My fiancé—” wouldn’t Eric the commitment-phobe just cringe if he heard that “—owns a bar and will be supplying the tables and linens for your New Year’s Eve showing. I want to give him a visual of the layout.”
This time Devon gave a slight bow. “Then I owe him, and you, my thanks.”
Chloe took a minute to study Poe’s brother, willing her pulse to calm. There was no reason his simple expression of gratitude should cause such a frisson of awareness to tickle her skin.
But it did.
“Just don’t fool yourself into thinking this is about the goodness of my heart or anything.” What it was about was not having to spend New Year’s Eve at Haydon’s Half-Time while Eric played hotshot host to the sports groupies who couldn’t get enough of ESPN. Or of him.
Devon laughed at that, the sound deep and almost musical. “Of course not. It’s simply you helping Annabel and my reaping the benefits, for which I am eternally grateful.”
Chloe nodded, still feeling Devon’s laugh where she hadn’t felt anything now in weeks. “Just so we’re clear.”
He gestured for her to precede him down the hallway toward the main room. She did, listening to his quiet steps behind her. Observing, indeed. This was stalking, plain and simple. No other explanation existed for the tremor traveling the length of her spine.
But there was, her former bad girl self insisted. A very logical, very obvious and very sexual reason. Being emotionally committed to Eric did not mean the death of her body.
When she turned the fourth corner in the gallery’s maze of hallways, she found herself facing an alcove where a woman of Middle Eastern descent sat flipping through what appeared to be a binder of tattoo designs.
Curiosity had Chloe hesitating just long enough for Devon to take the cue. “Mina Sayid? Chloe Zuniga.”
Mina glanced up, then stood and smiled, meeting
Chloe halfway as she entered the alcove. “Welcome to my tiny corner of Devon’s world.”
Chloe returned the other woman’s handshake and smile, taking in Mina’s Birkenstocks, jeans and long-sleeved slate-blue thermal top. The outfit seemed incongruous with the ruby embedded between her arched brows, black as her waist-length hair, yet somehow worked.
And then Chloe saw the artist’s henna-stained palms, taking one hand in her own and studying the intricate design. “One of my co-workers wears Mehndi art like this. It’s absolutely gorgeous.”
“Mina is one of the city’s best,” Devon said, moving to stand at Chloe’s shoulder. “She has quite the clientele for both her henna art and her tattoo designs.”
Chloe met the other woman’s soft gaze and smiled. “Pencil me into your appointment book. I’ve been lusting for weeks over the work Macy had done.”
“I can pencil you in right now if you’d like.” Mina swept her arm toward her empty studio. “I had an unexpected cancellation, and the rest of my afternoon is free.”
Chloe quickly considered what remained on her own calendar for the day. Oh, right. Nothing. Eric was hosting a Houston Texans night at the bar and had been quite clear that it would be the wee hours before he made it home.
She didn’t mind that so much as she minded that he hadn’t asked her to come with him. In the past, he’d always had.
She wondered if Devon would be spending the rest of the afternoon at the gallery. She wondered why she even cared, just knew that she did. Decision made, Chloe nod
ded at Mina. “Let me do what I need to do here with Devon, then we’ll talk.”
Devon crossed his arms and leaned back against the alcove’s wall. “Her work doesn’t come cheap.”
“Devon!” Mina cried.
Chloe glanced from Devon to Mina and back, more certain than ever of her choice. “Believe me, sugar. I’m worth it.”
And after a long hot moment, Devon replied, “So we shall see.”
O
N
M
ONDAY AT NOON
,
Annabel walked out of the Joseph A. Jachimczyk Forensic Center into the bright December sunlight, wishing more than anything for a hot shower and copious suds.
The tour, both fascinating and informative, left behind a definite ick factor along with a sense of exhilaration. Even now, reaching into her bag for her sunglasses, she knew that her heart had never beat with this sort of excitement in response to her work at gIRL-gEAR.
Listening to the coroner and forensic sculptor discuss reconstructing and identifying recently discovered skeletal remains was akin to coming home. A strange thought, since neither Annabel nor her brother had ever experienced the true meaning of the term.
Most of their childhood had been spent living with their maternal grandmother in her Tacoma, Washington, duplex until she’d finally moved them to Houston. She was the caretaker of choice when their mother went running after whichever man had most recently walked out, certain she knew what had gone wrong and how to win this one back.
Annabel had figured out by the time she was ten years old that her mother would always return alone. Whether or not she would return at all had become a running bet between Annabel and Devon by the time they reached their teens.
Neither had any idea if they’d ever met their father, though doubted they shared their paternity. Devon had an easygoing nature in contrast to Annabel’s prickly personality. Since they had grown up in the same environment, he teasingly attributed their differences to the quality of the donated sperm.
After losing count of the number of men who had come into their lives and stayed through Easter or Thanksgiving, but never both, Annabel had very dramatically decided not to risk making their mother’s bad relationship choices. On her twenty-first birthday, she’d quit dating.
Instead, she began taking lovers who would please her physically, but not require that she involve her emotions. Emotions meant putting her heart on the line, to be swept away and then summarily squashed when she burned the toast, or was late to pick up the dry cleaning, or gained too many pounds.
She was much too smart for that.
On her thirtieth birthday, alone with Jose Cuervo and chocolate chip cookies, she’d had an enlightening epiphany before nausea struck. All those years during which she’d thought sophisticated wisdom had kept her detached and uninvolved, she’d simply been incapable of falling in love.
She could lust her brains out with the best of ’em, but losing her heart was not—and never would be—an issue. She was immune. Superior, yet somehow…deficient.
Or so she’d thought until the night Patrick Coffey dragged her out of Paddington’s Ford and branded her with the heat of his body and the fire of his mouth. She’d responded instantly, shockingly, every cell, nerve and emotion fully engaged.
Crossing the parking lot now, she settled her sun
glasses in place and fished her keys from her bag. She hated these juvenile emotions. Expectations were a ridiculous drain; one was better off managing independently rather than looking to another for fulfillment.
Jerry Maguire had it all wrong. No one person could complete another.
She didn’t buy for a minute the happily-ever-after of her six gIRL-gEAR partners. Chloe made for a perfect example. Their wake-up calls would come soon enough, a call she would never have reason to anticipate as long as she stopped flirting with an attachment sure to cause her immeasurable grief. And doing so with a man who defined instability.
Though, even as she made the accusation, she doubted the accuracy. There were moments when she saw Patrick with the clarity of a diamond. Unfortunately, she mused wryly, most of the time she saw a thug.
Squealing tires brought her head up in time to see, hear and feel a souped-up muscle car roar into the parking lot. She frowned as the classic El Camino pulled in next to her Jaguar, with none other than the thug himself behind the wheel. She stood with her keys in her hand and remained unsmiling—not an easy task when Patrick looked like hell on wheels and she knew him so very intimately.
Her stomach fluttered as if defying her efforts at staying unattached, uninvolved. Even her hands trembled, holding her keys as she was, and she clenched her fists tighter. It was her knees, however, that gave her the most trouble. She took a step in reverse, backing smoothly into her car door, telling herself she was simply moving out of harm’s way.
Patrick cut the engine, turned to her and grinned the biggest, baddest grin she’d ever seen spread over his face. The silver hoop in his ear twinkled, as did his eyes
when he pulled his sunglasses from his gorgeous face. But it was his expression of boyish delight that was her undoing. This was what he’d looked like before something—or someone—had robbed him of his innocence, Annabel thought dazedly.
She drew in a breath that took far too much effort, and gestured toward his vehicle. “What is this?”
“My car.” He climbed out and slammed the heavy door against the equally heavy frame. “Don’t make ’em like this anymore.”
“Thank God for that,” she said, recognizing, as she did, that no other car would fit him. They shared a definite
bring-it-on
attitude. “You’ve had this in storage all this time?”
He shook his head, ran his palm lovingly across the bright red roof. “Bought it this morning. Got tired of hitching in your cat there.”
She ground her teeth until her molars ached. “You just went out on the spur of the moment and bought a classic El Camino.”
“Totally restored. A beaut, isn’t she?”
A smile pulled at her pursed lips. “And I’m sure you’ve given
her
a name?”
That devil’s grin again. “I was thinking of calling her Annie. She’s sleek, sexy—” he waggled his brows “—and hot under the hood.”
Oh, but he was cute. She folded her arms and strove to look stern. “Where did you get the money?”
“Same place I got the money to buy you, sister.”
Hel-lo.
“I would like to know.” Patrick made no effort at finding work, yet never lacked for obscene amounts of cash.
His grin vanished, replaced by a slow-growing wariness. “Why?”
“Fine.” She turned back to the task of unlocking her car door. His suspicion shouldn’t have hurt. She hated that it did. “Don’t answer me. God forbid I know anything personal about the man who’s sleeping with me.”
Two more weeks—no, less than that. Ten more days and he would be out of her life. She could easily replace him in her bed; she needed him for nothing.
Nothing,
she insisted, infuriated at the sudden sting of tears.
“I’m sorry, Annabel.” His fingers kneaded her neck, rattling her further when she needed to remain cool and detached. When she didn’t answer, he lifted his hand. “Every penny I have is on the up and up. Trust me.”
Her chest constricted. She whipped her gaze to his. “How can I possibly trust you, Patrick, when you still don’t trust me?”
He remained unmoving, unsmiling, poised as if on a precipice between saving himself and sharing what might be enough for her to take him down. When he glanced away, over and beyond the roof of her car, she knew he’d made his decision. Still, his expression remained grim.
“The money is mine, free and clear. There was a bounty on Russell Dega’s band of pirates.” Patrick narrowed his mouth, looked toward her, then away. “I would’ve split it with the gang’s informant. But she didn’t make it out alive.”
Oh God.
God.
Intuition told Annabel this was the reason for his lost innocence, the crux of his anger and pent-up pain. He was hurt, dammit, but she did not know how to offer comfort. Sex wouldn’t repair any of Patrick’s damage. Or any of her own.
Her heart began to race; her breathing quickened. Her world turned upside down with the force of what she felt. And so she did the only thing that seemed right. She
turned to him and slipped her arms around his rib cage, pressing her palms to the center of his back between his T-shirt and jacket. Her cheek she pressed over his heart, which lurched and began to beat as rapidly as hers.
She heard a strangled noise echo in his throat as his arms went around her. They stood like that for two minutes at least, unmoving, focused and close. She was aware of him in ways she’d never before taken time to examine, ways that were physical yet went beyond.
Today she wore flats. Patrick, as always, wore biker boots, putting the top of her head just under his chin. He rested there, so that she felt the grinding force of his jaw. She felt, as well, the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed the rest of the sound she was sure she hadn’t been meant to hear.
A part of her wanted to ask what had happened, who had been the informant and how she had died. But a less munificent part didn’t want to know anything about any other woman who’d shared his affections. Annabel knew this one had in extraordinary circumstances, and her own jealous thoughts made her feel very small.
She tightened her hold, nearly able to number Patrick’s ribs. He was that lean, that spare and hungry, given to no excesses other than the occasional drink and his performance in bed. She knew with clear certainty that he hadn’t been this way…before. That he’d been a party boy, rowdy and as benign then as he was dangerous now.
And so, as clear as she’d just been with herself about not prying, she went ahead and did. “Tell me about her.”
A laugh that was sarcastic rather than joyous rumbled in his chest. “Seven weeks and you’re finally asking for details.”
She’d always been curious; she knew no one who wasn’t. But until now, until this moment, she hadn’t been
sure she wanted the responsibility of safekeeping his secrets or sharing his pain. Now she had no choice.
Rejecting his tentative trust would kill the last trace of the boy inside him, and that she couldn’t do.
She breathed deeply, drawing in his warmth and the heady scent of wildness he exuded. “Tell me about her,” she said with more conviction. “I want to know everything.”
T
HEY ENDED UP SITTING
across from one another at Mission Burrito on Alabama, sharing a black-bean-and-chicken burrito dripping with salsa.
Talking softly over a front porch corner table made more sense than having this conversation in the middle of a busy medical center parking lot, even though Patrick could’ve stood with Annabel tucked close to his body the rest of the day.
Thing was, he hadn’t wanted to risk giving anyone watching the bright idea of getting to him through someone he held close. And he couldn’t imagine feeling closer to anyone than he had to Annabel then, holding her in his arms and hearing her ask him about Soledad.
He’d been home eighteen months, and Annabel was the first person bold enough or brave enough to want the specifics of his captivity. Ray had insisted Patrick take his time, talk when he was ready. Sydney had followed Ray’s lead, though hadn’t quite managed to hide her expressions of curiosity or pity.
The pity was what drove Patrick crazy, inciting the temper he’d spent three years in the islands controlling by walking away. His obvious hostility, even in absentia, completed the huge cause-and-effect circle that kept everyone at a big fat arm’s length.
And now Annabel wanted to know about Soledad.
Annabel, being Annabel, had opened her half of the burrito and was eating the chicken, rice, beans and vegetables with fork and spoon. His longneck dangling from his fingers, Patrick sat and watched her dainty destruction of her food in the basket. She looked up and caught him staring with what felt like a ridiculously goofy grin on his face.
“You find me amusing?”
“Not so much amusing as a contradiction. You eat with much more gusto in private.”
“In private you’ve usually worn me out and left me starving.”
“Good to know you enjoy my work.”
She balanced her fork on the edge of the burrito basket and blotted her mouth with a napkin before she answered. “I know this is going to come as a shock, but I enjoy
you,
Patrick. Your work, as you put it, is simply a part of who you are.”
He brought his bottle to his mouth because he wasn’t sure he could say anything, what with the way his throat felt so tight. Getting down the beer he’d just swallowed was going to be hard enough.
He was glad when he saw Annabel prepare to go on without waiting for him to reply. Even if he’d been able to speak, he’d yet to come up with anything to say. She enjoyed him, and that was more than anyone had offered in the way of accepting him for who he was now—not for who he’d once been.
“That said,” she began, all uppity and prim, “we’re at different places in our lives. Or maybe we’re even at cross-purposes. I’m not sure. All I know is that I’ve reached the point where I have to move forward to get what I want, and that means leaving the past behind.”
“gIRL-gEAR?”
“If necessary.”
“Me?”
“Ditto.”
He swirled the liquid remaining in the dark amber bottle. “And your closets? Are you cleaning out the skeletons?”
“I don’t have skeletons.” She threaded her fingers through the handle of the frosted mug holding her frozen margarita.
“We all have skeletons, Annabel.” He narrowed his gaze and focused, determined to see every nuance of her expression as he told her his truth. “Mine died because I wasn’t fast enough on my feet to save her. Her name was Soledad. She’d once been Russell Dega’s mistress. And the night before she lost her life she told me that she loved me.”
Annabel swallowed hard; he watched her work the knot from her throat, watched her pulse beat there in the hollow. “The informant?”
He nodded.
“What happened?”
He shook his head. “Tit for tat, sweetheart. Skeleton for skeleton.”
She reached for her fork and went back to picking through her rice and beans. After several seconds of doing nothing but moving food left to right, she calmly replaced her fork on the basket’s edge. “My mother.”
Now, this was interesting. “A living skeleton?”
“I don’t know. Neither Devon nor I have heard from her in years.” Annabel brought her straw to her mouth and sipped, then grimaced. “God, this is vile.”