L
eaning back on the headrest, Abby sighed. “I can’t believe I ate three chili dogs! I just know I am going to regret it later. You should have stopped me after the second one.”
Chris reached across the seat and tugged Abby’s hair the way he always did. “I couldn’t stop you if I wanted to. Damn, I missed those hot dogs. It’s been years since I’ve had one.” Chris thought it had been years since he’d enjoyed himself so much, but then he remembered dinner at the Polo Lounge, and that was almost as good. Almost, but not quite, because he had Abby all to himself now.
“Hang out with me, and I’ll show you what fine dining is all about.” Chris laughed. “Do you ever have popcorn for dinner? You don’t look to me like you have any kind of weight problem.” Jesus, did he just say that? In the world of women, all men knew not to mention age or weight.
Do you ever have popcorn for dinner?
Shit, talk about shooting yourself in the foot.
“All the time,” Abby quipped. “Hey, do you want to know something?”
“From you, everything,” Chris said, his tone serious, no longer light and teasing.
He felt Abby staring at him but couldn’t take his eyes off the road since the traffic was backing up outside the Buzz Club.
“I was going to say…I was…I like you…that’s all,” Abby said lamely as she stared out the passenger-side window at the groups clustered outside the bar.
He reached across the console and took her hand in his. “I like you, too, Abby. More than you know.”
There, he’d said it. He waited for her to punch him, yank his hair, anything, but she simply remained in her seat, quietly staring out the window. Maybe he
shouldn’t
have said that, hell he shouldn’t have said anything. He’d probably just ruined a lifelong friendship.
“I do, too,” she said so softly he wasn’t sure she had spoken at all.
Chris managed to steer the Toyota Camry into the parking lot without banging into another vehicle. He suddenly had that kid-at-Christmas feeling all over again. Squeezing her hand, he found a parking spot next to her MINI Cooper. He shut off the engine, then turned toward her.
Oh, be still my heart.
“Did you just say what I think you said, and if so, does this mean you’ll have dinner with me sometime? Like maybe tomorrow?” One of LA’s top ten, and he couldn’t come up with something more original. But it is what it is, and he was being real, very real. More real than he’d been in all his thirty-three years.
Abby turned to him, an impish twinkle in her eyes. “Depends.”
When he saw she was teasing, Chris played along, just like he always had in the past, only this time it was different. Special. Hell, it was downright intoxicating. “On what?”
“Lots of things. First, of course, is where you’ll be taking me. I don’t want to eat caviar and drink thousand-dollar-bottles of champagne that tastes like old socks. Personally, I like a steak. Rare. Baked potato, loaded. I don’t do salads much, but I do like vegetables. They have to be cooked a certain way, not too soft, but crisp, you know, where you can almost hear them snap as you bite into them?”
Chris stared at Abby, unsure if she was serious or if this was just Abby being Abby. That was exactly the way he liked his vegetables, and he liked his meat rare and his potato loaded. Well, damn.
Taking a deep cleansing breath, he brought her hand to his lips. He kissed the tips of her fingers. One at a time. Softly, slowly, knowingly, as though he’d done it before. This was better than his fantasy, better than anything he could’ve strummed up in his wildest dreams. He took her other hand and repeated the process, slowly, lovingly, one finger at a time. When he heard her gasp, it was almost his undoing.
“Anyplace you want to go, we’ll go,” he promised, continuing to dot light kisses along her wrist.
Abby pulled her hand away, touching the delicate area on the inside of her wrist where his lips had been. Surreal was what it was. How had an invitation to have a hot dog turned into something so sensual, so intoxicating? With Chris? Not just Chris, but the man of her dreams.
“I’ve imagined this moment since the first time I saw you. It seems like light-years ago,” Abby said lightly. Uncertain if he’d heard her, she cleared her throat, deciding if one of them didn’t halt this slow, sensual seduction, she wouldn’t be responsible for what happened next.
Hating to do it, but knowing she had to, Abby removed her seat belt and reached for her purse on the floorboard. She turned to Chris. “I have to go. Chester…I have to take him out. So, I guess I’ll…”
“Yeah, yeah. I’ll call you first thing in the morning. I promise. It’s okay to call you early, right? You know, like in a few hours from now. I probably won’t sleep, so I’ll be up early. I know you get up early, but that means different things to different people. Yeah, yeah, I’ll call you. Do you want me to follow you home?”
Jesus Christ, I sound like a fourteen-year-old in heat.
Yes, she wanted him to follow her home, come inside her house, and do things to her she’d only dreamed of, but she couldn’t say that. Yet. Instead she said, “Thanks, but I’m fine. I do this all the time, remember? Be sure you call me. Early. You’re right, I sleep like you do. Early is good. I’ll…well, I’ll be up, so it’s okay to call early. You know, really early.”
I have to get out of here right now.
“You really have to go?”
“Oh, stop it! You know what I’m talking about. Seriously, I have to go.”
“Okay, Abby. Tomorrow we’ll talk. Early. Real early.”
Abby nodded and walked over to her car as she watched Chris watch her. She gave a slight wave before removing her keys from her pocket. She hit the
UNLOCK
on the remote pad. In a daze, she dropped onto the seat, tossing her purse on the passenger seat. Never, ever in a zillion years had she envisioned this. What had she missed all the years? Chris had never come on to her, never really flirted with her. He’d always been a good friend who teased her, called her Shorty, and…and he’d kissed her fingers. Each and every one of them. She wondered if she’d ever be able to wash her hands again. Maybe she could protect her hands the way Ida did and wear latex gloves.
Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, she inserted the key in the ignition, started the MINI Cooper’s engine, then shifted into reverse. She was so intent on what she was doing, she just missed the Corvette that swerved into the parking spot next to her, barely missing the back of her bumper.
What a jerk,
she thought as she backed out of her parking space. Abby thought it almost looked like the guy was trying to deliberately hit her! Someone who probably had too much to drink and shouldn’t be on the road to begin with. She watched the shiny blue vehicle for another second or two, waiting to see if the driver got out, maybe to apologize? When she saw that wasn’t going to happen, she yanked the gearshift to
DRIVE
and forgot about the Corvette. She should’ve flipped him off. For sure, her mother or Sophie would have. No, Sophie would’ve gotten out of her car, kicked his shiny Corvette, then kicked him in the balls, after which she’d flip him the bird while her mother cheered her on. Or it would be vice versa, with Typhoon Toots doing the kicking and Sophie cheering her on.
Refusing to allow the moron in the Corvette to spoil what she thought of as a perfect evening, Abby pulled onto the main road and glanced in her rearview mirror, looking for Chris’s Toyota. When she didn’t see him, she felt a tinge of disappointment. Had she really wanted him to follow her all the way to Brentwood even though she’d told him it wasn’t necessary? She had to admit that a part of her had. Abby hadn’t experienced genuine love and concern from either of her two short-lived relationships. Did she want that from Chris now? Again, she admitted it wouldn’t hurt her feelings, but it was too soon, too new to start what-iffing everything Chris said or didn’t say.
Chris had been her friend forever. Seeing him as anything more than that would take some getting used to. Smiling, Abby knew she could and would get used to the idea.
Twenty minutes later, she zipped her MINI Cooper into its spot under the carport. Glancing at the digital clock on the dash, she saw it was only a little after one. Plenty of time to do what she needed to do. Slipping her heels off before getting out of the car in order to avoid another tripping accident, she hooked the leather straps around her index finger, then reached for her purse. She could hear Chester panting on the other side of the door as she inserted her key in the lock. “I’m coming, boy.”
Opening the door, she bent over to receive several affectionate wet kisses from Chester before he sprinted out the door into the front yard. Abby waited inside the doorway for him to christen each and every bush before calling him inside.
After she changed into her Wonder Woman nightshirt, she carried her laptop to her bedroom, where she set it down on top of the comforter, propped a couple of pillows behind her head, and went to work. Chester jumped on the foot of the bed, where his blanket and pillow lay on top of the comforter, just waiting for him. “You’ve got it made, Chester, but you know that, right?” Abby said.
“Woof, woof!”
Abby laughed and returned to her work. Lingering thoughts of Rag and his mysterious disappearance had plagued her all day. She checked her e-mail to see if she’d received a reply from the e-mail she’d sent him that morning. Nothing.
Remembering the desk chair that was out of place in Rag’s office, she wondered if it was one of his gambling buddies searching for him. But why skip in and out unnoticed? Why not ask around the office, see if any of his employees knew of his whereabouts? None of it made sense. If the paper hadn’t recently been sold, Abby doubted she’d give another thought to Rag’s disappearing act. Wouldn’t he want to be around to gloat or remind the staff that the new bosses would bring in their own staff? Of course he would. She recalled his words quite clearly. She was positive. One didn’t misunderstand when one’s job was about to be taken away. Abby had even called her mother to cry on her shoulder. Two and two definitely weren’t adding up to four.
Abby actually considered calling a few of Rag’s known Vegas hangouts, see if anyone there had seen or heard from him, but immediately dropped the idea. He’d serve her ass up on a platter in tiny slices if she was to do that and he found out about it. Too risky, for the moment. Maybe there was a woman, a girlfriend? She tried to recall any mention of his latest squeeze, but there were too many to narrow them down to a few. He rarely mentioned a name anyway. If he did, it was usually “babe, “doll,” “broad,” or some other chauvinistic reference to women.
Maybe she should ask Chris to look into Rag’s disappearance. He was an attorney. Surely he had or knew an investigator who could check into Rag’s affairs without its becoming public. Yes, Chris would know what to do. She considered the late hour, but he had said he wasn’t going to go to sleep and would be calling early. She felt hot all over as she thought about their conversation. What would he think if she called him instead of waiting for him to call her? It’s Chris, she told herself. He wouldn’t care what time she called. She raced to the kitchen, where she’d left her cell phone in its charger. She punched in his number as she returned to the bedroom.
“Chris Clay.”
Abby smiled. “Remember, you’re supposed to say hello?”
She heard what sounded like rustling covers, then the click of a lamp switch.
“I should have known it was you. What? You couldn’t wait for me to call you? No one else calls me this late except your mother. I always say that, don’t I?” He was acting like he was fourteen again. Fourteen must have been a good year in his life.
“Were you in bed?” Abby visualized his broad shoulders splayed across the bed, his classically handsome features, jet-black hair mussed from her fingers raking through it. And then she visualized herself nestled next to him.
“Yes, but I wasn’t sleeping. I might never sleep again. I was just waiting for…you know, early, to call you. Abby?” Fourteen and one month.
“Oh, sorry. What?”
“You asked if I was in bed, and I told you I was,” Chris repeated.
“You want me to call back tomorrow?” she asked, then remembered it
was
tomorrow.
“No, I’m awake. Actually, I was just thinking about you. So what gives?”
“You’ll think I’m crazy, but I’m certain you already do.” Abby took a deep breath, releasing it. “I’m sure you heard Mom and me discussing
The Informer
at dinner last night.” She paused, allowing him a second to follow her. When he didn’t reply, she continued. “Rag, my boss, didn’t show up for work today—yesterday, that is. That in itself isn’t unusual. He’s known to spend his weekends gambling and drinking in Vegas. He rarely shows up on a Monday, but he’ll call with some half-baked excuse. It usually takes him a day to ride out his hangover. Here it is the middle of the week, the paper has been sold, and he’s nowhere to be found. I thought about calling the casinos where he hangs out, but he’ll kill me if he finds out, which leads to my reason for calling. I figured as an attorney you might have an investigator or know of one that I could hire to find Rag. I know what you’re going to say, but before you say it, don’t waste your breath. Of course I’m a reporter with contacts. I’m simply hesitant to use them. When Rag decides to grace us with his presence, as I said, he’ll have my ass for checking up on him. So do you think this is something you can help me with? We can still do that early call. This call is just…a ball.”
Oh, God, how lame was that?
Several seconds passed before Chris spoke, and when he did, his words were a complete shock.
“I’m afraid I can’t, Abby.”
“Can’t or won’t?” she replied, more than a little miffed at his response.
“Neither. It’s simply a conflict of interest. Your mom asked me to do a bit of work for her. I’m sorry. That’s all I can tell you.”
And here she’d thought after the fingertip kissing, Chris would be putty in her hands. Wrong. That had to mean their entire evening was a conflict of interest. She needed to say something. “I see. Then I guess I won’t bother you anymore. Good night.” Abby snapped her cell phone shut. She made a mental promise to herself to never ask Christopher Clay for another favor as long as she lived.