Body Movers (35 page)

beautiful even than I remember—I just…lose my mind.”

She knew the feeling. When she looked at Peter, her brain

emptied of common sense in order to process the torrent

of sensations pummeling her body.

“Like right now,” he said, sounding desperate. He dipped

his head slowly to her mouth, giving her plenty of time to

retreat.

But she didn’t. After years of hoping that he would

magically appear and save her, he had. She lifted her

mouth to meet his and melted into his arms for the most

intense, powerful kiss of her life. He tasted sweet, yet his

lips were firm and demanding. Their young kisses had

been born of first love, lust and discovery, but this kiss was

born of adult hunger, denial and deprivation.

He slanted his mouth over hers and speared his tongue

inside, flicking the tip against her teeth, bringing back in a

flood of sensory signals the memory of other delights they

had shared. Her body had a long memory, coming alive

under the slide of his hands down her back and over her

hips, pul ing her against his hardness.

At the intimate contact, her breasts grew heavy and

molten need swel ed in her stomach. She moaned into his

mouth, overcome with the desire to relive the earth-

shattering lovemaking they had always shared. Peter

broke their heated kiss long enough to pick her up and lay

her on the couch. Then he covered her body with his, his

eyes hooded with banked desire. He kissed her neck,

blazing a trail to her col arbone, then slid his hands

beneath her shirt to cup her breasts. Her nipples budded

under the sensitive strokes of his fingers and she felt his

erection surge against her thigh.

“I want to be inside you,” he whispered, tonguing her ear.

She sighed, rocking her hips against his, gratified at his

groaning response. She tugged his shirt from the

waistband of his pants, massaging the warm, smooth skin

of his back. “I want that, too.”

Suddenly, he stiffened, and she realized the phone was

ringing, pealing through the empty house.

“Leave it,” she whispered, reveling in the indention of his

spine. But a few seconds later, she realized that something

had changed, that Peter was pul ing away from her, his

expression dark and unreadable.

“I can’t do this.”

“Yes, you can,” she urged, pul ing on his arm. “I want you

to.” The phone continued to ring.

“No,” he said, standing and shaking his head. “It’s not

right. I’m only thinking of myself. That detective was

right—I’m not considering how this affects you, and I

should.”

She sat up, feeling as if she’d been unplugged from an

electrical socket.

He looked at her, his gaze deep and passionate. “I love

you, Carly, and I want to be back in your life, but not until

this mess is over. I have to make everything right.”

His words reminded her of where she’d spent most of her

evening. She stood and straightened her clothes, her body

stil humming from his touch. With the phone ringing in

the background, she said, “Peter, I went with Wesley on a

call earlier this evening…in your neighborhood.”

He frowned. “My neighborhood?”

“A woman was strangled in her home. Lisa Bolton.”

He froze, his expression anguished. “No…no. Oh, God, this

changes everything,” he said as if he were talking to

himself.

She had expected a reaction, but his detached distress

alarmed her. The clanging phone in the background strung

her nerves tighter. “Did you know the Bolton woman?”

He blinked and stared at her. “I should go. The police are

probably looking for me.”

The back of her neck tingled. “Why would you say that,

Peter?”

“They think I kil ed Angela. They’re probably going to want

to question me about this, too.”

He seemed inordinately calm for someone who’d just

learned he might be a suspect in a second murder. Deadly

calm. Stil ignoring the phone, she fol owed him to the

door, drawing hope from the fact that he’d seemed

genuinely shocked when he’d heard of the Bolton

woman’s death. He couldn’t be involved…could he?

“Lock this door behind me,” he directed. “If that guy

comes back, call the police, understand?”

She nodded, wishing things were simpler, but knowing

that things were likely never to be simple again. Life had

been lived…things were complicated, and seemed to grow

more so every day. “Thank you again, Peter, for…being

here.”

He reached up and caressed her cheek. “You’re welcome.

Carly, if things go bad, just remember that I love you and

that I tried to do the right thing. But I’m begging you,

please stop asking questions.”

Truly alarmed now, she asked, “Why? What do you

mean?”

But he simply opened the door and walked out,

disappearing into the night.

After she closed the door, she realized the phone had

stopped ringing. No sooner had the thought left her mind

than it began to ring again. With a sigh, Carlotta walked

over and picked up the receiver, sure it was a bil col ector

because her and Wesley’s personal calls always came

through their cel phones. “Hel o?”

“Ms. Wren, this is Detective Terry.”

Just the man’s voice triggered an instant headache. “What

now, Detective?”

“I called to make sure you’d made it home safely, that’s

al .”

She blinked. “Oh.” The memory of being overpowered by

The Carver’s thug rushed back to her, but there seemed to

be no point in mentioning the encounter, not when she’d

have to admit that Peter had emerged from the shadows

to save her. “I’m fine, Detective. Thank you,” she added as

an afterthought.

“No need to thank me, just doing my job. If we have a

kil er on the loose, who knows who his next victim might

be.”

Something in his voice told her that he had a suspicion

who the kil er might be…and was warning her to be

careful. The palm reader’s cautionary remarks came back

to her: You are facing danger. And then the woman’s

advice that she needed someone big and strong to protect

her.

Yet Peter was the one who might have saved her life

tonight, or at least her honor.

“Okay, then,” he said in her silence. “Good night.”

“Good night, Detective,” she murmured, and slowly hung

up the phone. She put both hands to her head and

groaned, thinking of how her life had spun out of control

since being reunited with Peter.

And then a fleeting memory snagged on something in her

brain and held. Lisa Bolton’s face had seemed vaguely

familiar, and now Carlotta knew why.

She had seen the woman at the party she had crashed, the

one where she had run into Peter.

28

After a restless night, Carlotta woke feeling groggy and

miserable. Peter’s touch haunted her, and his words

tormented her. He was so close, yet at the same time, out

of reach. The push and pul of emotions was wreaking

havoc with her judgment. And in the back of her mind, she

agonized over the possibility that he might have done

something awful that would forever keep them apart. How

could she both long for a man and fear that he was

capable of murder?

She threw back the covers and swung her legs over the

side of the bed.

And if she didn’t have enough of her own problems, she

expected that Tick character to ring the doorbel any

minute, demanding cash. Wesley had promised he would

“handle” it, but since he’d admitted to gambling away his

check, she had no idea where he’d get the money.

Unless he had more hidden stashes.

She showered and dressed quickly, dreading the

consultation appointment at the clinic where Angela had

been Botoxed, but looking forward to having lunch with

Hannah afterward. When she emerged from her room, she

found a note from Wesley on top of a covered plate of

French toast.

Sorry about last night. Made my payment this morning.

Lamb chops for dinner.

Carlotta shook her head. Wesley obviously thought he

could soften her up with food.

She dragged her finger through the powdered sugar and

syrup, then licked it off. He was right, the little turd.

As she left for the appointment, she scooped the

newspaper from the stoop and dropped it into her bag. On

the drive, she resisted the urge to smoke a cigarette, but

stopped to get an expensive nonfat latte. American vices,

she decided, were driving the economy.

Case in point: Buckhead Expressions was a five-story

building with a luxurious lobby studded with gorgeous

coeds dressed in pale blue lab coats sitting behind a black

counter and wearing phone headsets. After she’d forked

over the requisite three hundred bucks and was settled in

the waiting room, she noticed the headline on the

newspaper a person sitting across from her was reading.

BUCKHEAD SERIAL KILLER?

She nearly choked on her coffee, then yanked the paper

from her bag and scanned the lead story.

The police were investigating two murders that had

occurred in the same upscale neighborhood in the space

of ten days. The first murder, previously thought an

accidental drowning, had been reclassified after questions

surrounding the victim’s death had triggered an autopsy.

Carlotta bit down on the inside of her cheek—at least she

hadn’t been named.

The second murder was more brazen, with the woman

being attacked inside her home, in her bedroom, in broad

daylight.

The implication was clear—a kil er was on the loose

targeting beautiful, rich women, and his violence seemed

to be escalating.

Her heart thumped wildly and she wondered for the

umpteenth time if she should call Detective Terry and tel

him what she’d remembered about seeing the Bolton

woman at the same party as Peter. And for the umpteenth

time, she talked herself out of it. Chances were that half

the people at those events were from the same

neighborhood, country club, church, et cetera. The

wealthy moved in herds—eating together, socializing

together, and if rumors were to be believed, sleeping

together. The wealthy formed close-knit, inbred groups

and they protected their own, as evidenced in the

newspaper article by the comments of neighbors:

“We live in a gated subdivision with security systems, and

stil these people find a way to invade our neighborhood.”

“You have to be careful who you hire these days. I do

background checks and encourage my neighbors to do the

same.”

The locals, it seemed, were convinced the perp was an

outsider, perhaps a gardener or a pool-maintenance

worker. She doubted if any of them had considered the

possibility that the murderer could be living among them,

playing doubles at the club, raising money for his church,

dropping his kids off at private school.

“Carlotta?”

She folded the paper with a crunch and looked up at a

young woman carrying a clipboard. “Yes?”

“We’re ready for you.”

Carlotta rose, then made a rueful noise as she pointed to

the paper. “Did you hear about the two women who were

murdered?”

The young girl nodded, then leaned in to whisper, “I knew

one of them.”

Carlotta feigned shock and awe. “Really?”

“Yeah. Angela Ashford was a patient here.”

“Did she by chance see the doctor I’m going to see?”

“Yeah,” the aide said out of the side of her mouth.

“Otherwise, you’d never have gotten in so quickly.

Tuesday morning was her standing appointment.”

Carlotta didn’t have to feign surprise this time. A shudder

threatened to overtake her at the realization that Angela

should be there instead of her. Her conscience pinged with

the eerie sensation that she was stepping into parts of

Angela’s life.

She walked into the tiny exam room, a little overwhelmed

by all the mirrors and the oversize ads for prescription

cleansers, oral medications, topicals and the countless

before-and-after photos of cosmetic surgery procedures.

In the corner sat a computer screen where the pathetic

“before” pictures and miraculous “after” images merged

to make it appear as if the transformation occurred within

seconds, skipping over the surgery itself and the weeks or

months of recovery.

Carlotta puffed out her cheeks in an exhale. If a woman

had any confidence in her looks when she walked in, it was

likely to be dashed within a very short period of time. She

sat down and as the minutes clicked by, found herself

staring into the magnification mirror sitting on the table.

She scrutinized her pores, trying to remember how long it

had been since her last facial. Then she was distracted by

the fine lines around her eyes and mouth, conceding that

some of the lines could no longer be defined as “fine.” And

the recent sleepless nights were taking their tol —soon the

bags under her eyes were going to need luggage tags.