Lethal Seduction (11 page)

Chas remembered his first look at her. He'd walked into the club, and there she was—working those giant titties like a mechanic operating the Big Dipper. That was some good memory.

“We've got to go now,” Rosarita said, when dinner finally came to an end.

“Do we have to?” Martha pleaded. “I'm so enjoying myself.”

“Yes, we have to,” Rosarita said through clenched teeth. “Tomorrow is Dex's only day off. He likes to sleep in.”

“If he's planning to sleep late, why do you have to leave early?” Venice said innocently.

Rosarita wanted to bitch slap her. “Don't you get it?” she said nastily. “He has to get twelve hours of sleep. So, if we go now, he gets it. But if we leave later, he'll only get eight.”

Dexter looked at her as if she was totally crazy—which, of course, he was beginning to realize, she was. “How about another fifteen minutes?” he suggested.

How about sticking it up your ass?
“Fine,” she muttered, her mouth tightening.
I really want to sit here with my prissy sister, your stupid parents and Daddy's tramp-of-the-week girlfriend.

Chas, who was busy keeping a watchful eye on his two daughters, realized once again how different they were. Why couldn't Rosarita be more like Venice? He'd already decided
that, although he loved them both equally, he'd leave the bulk of his money to Venice and her kids because she was the responsible one. If he left it to Rosarita, she'd probably pick up some fortune hunter who'd spend it instantly. Venice would make sure it wasn't squandered away, besides, she'd always take care of Rosarita—in fact, he'd make sure that provision was put in his will. The best thing about his plan was that he wouldn't be around to listen to Rosarita's screaming.

“What are you smiling at, Daddy?” Rosarita said, suddenly reverting to her sweet side—which she could put on at will.

“Just thinkin' 'bout a thing or two,” he said.

Varoomba grabbed his hand. “Your daddy has such a cute smile!” she exclaimed. “I love it when he laughs, he's so adorable!”

Rosarita wanted to throw up. This one was a big-titted, squeaky-voiced nightmare. And stupid with it.

“Don't go callin' me no names in front of my girls,” Chas hissed, highly embarrassed.

“Sorry, honeybunch,” Varoomba cooed.

So the evening wound to its natural conclusion, and Rosarita and her group went home at the same time as Venice and Eddie.

As soon as they were gone, Varoomba shook out her mass of red hair, allowing it to fall around her face. Then she unzipped her orange dress, standing before Chas in a red-white-and-blue thong and nippleless bra. “How'd I do, babykins?” she crooned. “Was I the hit of the party?”

“C'mere,” he said, reaching out to tweak her enormous erect nipples. “C'mere, an' put those big bazookas all over me.”

So she did.

•

Meanwhile, across town, Joel Blaine was in the Boom Boom Club, complaining to the manager, “Where's the broad with the big knockers? How come she's not here on a Saturday night?”

“She called in sick,” said the manager, a grim-faced man with patent-leather hair and a permanent scowl.

“Sick my ass,” Joel said. “I want my money back.”

“I got a nice little Puerto Rican number blew in yesterday.”

“I don't do foreign.”

“How about Texas born and bred? That appeal to you?”

“Big tits?”

“Small, but nice.”

“Forget about it,” Joel said. “I'll come back next week, and Miss Big Rack better be here.”

If he wanted small tits he could get them anywhere. Rosarita wasn't exactly stacked, she'd informed him they were her own, but he knew they weren't the real thing, he'd noticed the scars hidden underneath.

Honey,
he'd wanted to say to her.
If you had 'em done, why couldn't you have had 'em done bigger?

Instinctively he knew Rosarita was not the type who took well to criticism. But maybe he'd see how far she'd go for him. “Sugar, you got the greatest boobs in the world,” he'd tell her, “but
I
like 'em bigger. Here's twenty thou—go get 'em done again.”

Was she worth twenty thousand bucks? No fucking way!

The only woman worth twenty thousand bucks in his mind was Madison Castelli. Now there was a
real
woman. It didn't matter that she wasn't stacked like some freako stripper, she had what it took in the brains department, and
that's
what Joel was looking for. A touch of class.

Maybe he should do something about her. Turn on the charm. Launch into pursuit mode. At least call her.

Maybe he would.

Eventually.

•

“Thanks,” Dexter said.

“For what?” Rosarita said warily.

“For being nice to my parents. Ever since we had that talk you've been pretty damn good.”

“You think so?”

“Yes, I do.” He was lying on the bed with his hands behind his head, watching her undress. She was down to black panties and a lacy bra. “Come lie beside me and we'll talk,” he suggested.

Hmm
 . . . Rosarita thought, ever since she'd mentioned to him that they never had sex it had certainly made a difference. Yesterday he'd been quite enthusiastic. Now, tonight, she could see he was once again in the mood.

She bounced onto the bed beside him. “You want I should blow you?” she said, tantalizing him with her tongue, sticking it out and wagging it at him.

He hated her vulgarity. “Can't we just lie here so I can hold you in my arms?” he said, ever the romantic.

“If you're sure that's all you want,” she said, immediately beginning to caress his half-erect dick.

Within seconds he was fully aroused, which didn't surprise her. “I'll only be a sec,” she said, jumping off the bed and vanishing into the bathroom.

He counted to twenty, and she was back.

Once more with feeling,
he thought.

He had a hunch that tonight was the night he was going to get her pregnant.

S
LAMMER WAS LIMPING
and panting and drooling. In fact, he was doing everything possible to attract Madison's attention. His mistress had been tramping across Central Park for two hours now, and he'd had enough. As a pampered New York City apartment dog, he was anxious to go home. It was hot, and he could do with a drink of water and a lie down. Pulling back on his leash, he looked up at Madison appealingly with his big brown eyes and gave a little whimper.

It was as if they communicated without words. “Okay, okay,” she said with a sigh. “I'm taking you home.”

Had she walked off enough frustration and fury? Had she gotten rid of the demons that were starting to plague her?

I'm twenty-nine years old,
she thought.
I have no man to go home to. I have a father who's lied to me all my life. And I don't have a mother. No, that's wrong. The fact is, I have a dead mother that I never even knew.

She had to talk to somebody, get it out of her system before she went crazy. Michael was not the right person. All she had for him were questions, and he'd better damn well answer them, because she wasn't taking any more of his evasive shit.

She thought about dropping by Jamie's, but since it was
Saturday, Peter would be around, and that wouldn't do at all. Her other best friend, Natalie, was in Los Angeles. That would be a mammoth two-hour phone conversation, but surely it was worth it, wasn't it?

Back at her apartment, she saw that the light on her answering machine was blinking. Three calls. The first one was from Michael. “We've got to talk,” he said, sounding tense and not at all like himself. “I've checked into the Plaza. Won't go back to Connecticut until I've seen you. Call me.”

The second was from Victor. “Got several ideas for your next victim,” he boomed. “Most of which you'll probably hate. Drop by the office Monday and we'll discuss it. If you're very good I'll buy you lunch.”

And the third message was a voice from her past. Jake Sica, a guy she'd met in L.A. when she was there on assignment at the beginning of the year. He was the brother of Natalie's ex-co-anchor, Jimmy Sica.

“Hi,” he said. “This is Jake—I'll be in New York for a few days next week, and I'd like it a lot if we could get together. Y'know, Madison, I think we—” The machine cut off.

“Damn!” she said, thinking about Jake for a moment, which was a welcome diversion from all the other crap she had churning around in her head. He was an award-winning photographer with a casual attitude. As far as she could recall he had longish brown hair and laughing brown eyes. He favored old leather jackets and denim shirts, and he had an easygoing, laid-back attitude.

She'd liked him a lot. But at the time they'd met she'd been caught up in a murder case in L.A. and he'd been involved with a call girl. Quite a convoluted situation. However, she'd gotten Victor to use his photos in the magazine, and they'd stayed in touch sporadically until he'd moved back to Arizona several months ago and they'd lost contact. Now he was on his way to New York next week.

Hmmm . . .
she thought. Jake might be the perfect person to talk to. Someone she hardly knew—somebody she could pour her heart out to. And he'd listen, because he was smart and intelligent and, most of all, he was nice.

But how was she supposed to contact him with no phone number?

Oh well . . . that's the way things were going lately. She wasn't surprised.

She picked up the phone and called Natalie in L.A.

Natalie's brother, Cole, answered. “Guess who?” she said.

“Don't have to,” Cole said. “I'd know that sexy voice anywhere.”

“How're you doing?”

“Great.”

“Natalie tells me you're living with Mr. Mogul, so how come you're there?”

“I drop by occasionally. Big sis is barely talkin' to me though—still pissed 'cause of me and Mr. M. Keeps on waitin' for him to dump me so she can say I told you so!”

Natalie did not approve of his current boyfriend—a much older megabusinessman whom she had unofficially christened Mr. Mogul.

“Your relationship with this guy has lasted quite some time, hasn't it?”

“I get why she's worried,” Cole said. “He's big time, an' what do I do? Stretch people's muscles for a living. But hey—we're havin' fun. How're you?”

“Getting by.”

“Comin' to L.A. anytime soon?”

“That depends on Victor. If he sends me out on an assignment, I'll be there.”

“What happened to the movie deal on your piece about call girls?”

“Two drafts later the studio passed. That's Hollywood, I guess. Anyway, I made a lot of money and met the great Alex Woods. Now
there's
a character.”

“You gotta come out here again, we'll do the jogging thing—I know how you get off on physical activity.”

“Is that a dig?”

“You got it!”

They both laughed. Madison was extremely fond of
Natalie's little brother. Not so little, actually. He was a good-looking twenty-three-year-old with abs of steel and a great smile. Cole made his living working out the bodies of the rich and famous. He was one of the most in demand fitness trainers in L.A.

Madison remembered how shocked she'd been when she'd reencountered him earlier in the year in Los Angeles. Instead of the little brother she remembered—the horny teenager who was into rap, gangs and getting high—Mr. Focused had emerged. Cole was gay, handsome and, as Natalie would say, had his shit together.

“Where
is
Natalie?” Madison asked.

“Probably at the studio,” Cole said. “That girl is workin' hard, she's real into her new job.”

“I thought she was fed up with covering showbiz news?”

“That was before she got to anchor her own show.”

“Wasn't she anchoring the news with Jimmy Sica?”

“This is a much bigger baby.”

“Ask her to call me.”

“Will do.”

At least hearing from Jake Sica had taken her mind off Michael and his shattering revelations. She contemplated calling her father back, then decided to hell with him, she didn't feel like it. Instead she went into her bedroom, unplugged the phone, popped a sleeping pill from a bottle of Halcion David had left behind and crawled under the covers with her clothes on.

Soon she fell into a deep sleep.

•

She was awakened the next morning by a hammering on her front door. It took a while for her to open her eyes. She wasn't used to taking any kind of pill, and the Halcion had knocked her out—which she supposed was the whole point.

Slammer crouched beside the bed, barking and gazing up at her with his deep, soulful eyes as much as to say, “How long do you expect me to hold it in?”

She reached for the clock, noting it was past ten. Damn! She'd passed out big time.

She lurched out of bed, becoming aware that she'd slept in her clothes. The pounding on her door wasn't about to stop. There was also a pounding in her head to match, but that was probably the effect of the sleeping pill.

Christ! Who
was
it? And why didn't they go away?

She went to the front door. “Yes?” she said, sounding as unfriendly as possible.

“It's me,” Michael said. “Let me in for crissakes, I've been standing out here for ten minutes.”

What did
he
want? To tell her more stuff? Drive her even crazier?

She opened the door and he burst past her into the apartment. “What the hell's wrong with you?” he said angrily. “I called six times last night and three times this morning. Where were you?”