Breaking the Bad Boy (24 page)

She kissed him on his forehead and she picked up the keycard and the gun, this time checking the clip, and walked out the door.

Joss had never felt so conspicuous before. But her long bare legs and her blonde hair were attention getters. She slouched a little and tried to keep her hips from swinging with short steps. Maybe she could find a hat to hide her hair.

Pay phones were in short supply these days when everyone had a phone in their pocket, but there was one near the road and she dropped her quarter in and made the call. Someone picked up on the other end but hesitated.

“Hello?” Joss said.

“Hello.” A deep male voice answered.

“May I speak with James Fields, please?” Joss asked in her most businesslike manner.

“This is he,” the deep male voice replied, equally businesslike. How did she know it was really him?

“I don’t know how you intend to prove it, but I need you to, nonetheless, Mr. Fields.”

“I cannot prove it since I doubt we’ve met. Are you calling about your husband?” Joss gasped. Buck was being serious.

“Yes,” she said suddenly forgetting what the hell she was supposed to say.

“How is he?” Fields asked.

“He,” she took a deep breath. “He had his appendix out, on Sunday night or Monday, and he’s going to need money for the surgery.” She got it, she thought.

“Who is this? Is Buck okay?”

“He’s been shot, and the wound is through and through, but the damn man never said anything and it’s infected and we’re on the run from bad guys and some very angry Navajos,” she said in a single breath.

“Where are you?” He asked and she hesitated, but then answered.

“Super Eight motel in Lewistown room 59,” she said.

“I can be there in an hour, maybe an hour twenty.”

“Bring antibiotics or I’ll make your life a living hell.” He laughed.

“What’s your name?”

“You should probably already know that, Mr. Fields,” she said.

“Yes, Miss Erickson, I do,” he said.

“Don’t fail me, Mr. Fields,” she said and hung up. She thought briefly of calling Brent, but decided against it at the last minute, something wasn’t sitting well. Looking around she left the phone booth and made a circuitous route back to the room. She saw no one and she slipped in, she hoped, undetected.

She went quietly to the bed and looked at Buck’s face. He was unnaturally white under the fading bruises, she could tell, even in this poor light, but he was so handsome, and he was sleeping peacefully. His mouth twitched and he smiled. Or not sleeping at all.

“What did he say?”

“He’ll be here in an hour,” she said.

“Get naked.”

“Are you sure?” She felt his head again, it felt a little better, she thought.

“Positive, Duchess, I love you best when you’re naked,” he said. “When they get here they’re going to take you away from me. I can’t bear it. Get naked for me one last time, my Duchess.” He closed his eyes.

“Are you at least going to watch?” He opened his eyes and smiled.

“Yes,” he didn’t sound like himself. “Look in the panniers for some condoms, let’s see how many we can use before they get here. But get naked first.” She smiled, and started unbuttoning her shirt, or rather his shirt. She turned and looked over her shoulder at him and pulled it right, then left and zigzagged down her back and finally off. Her legs wide she bent over and untied her Keds sneakers and stood up again to kick them off. Turning around to face him she undid the buttons of her Daisy Dukes while rotating her hips provocatively and let them slide down her long legs.

That was when she began at the zipper of her bustier. She unzipped halfway and the front pulled open from the weight of her breasts and she came to the bed in a thong and a gaping bustier. Her skin was pink from the sun, and she was smiling the smile he loved. He reached for her and she moved just out of his reach and pulled back the sheet.

He reached for her again and she went to him. He finished unzipping her and pulled the bustier away from her and touched her reverently.

“You are the most desirable woman I have ever known,” he said and pulled her breasts to his mouth and kissed them both. “Get the condoms, Joss; that was a hell of thing for you to do to an injured man.”

She laughed as she hopped off the bed and grabbed the box and rolled one over him, and shimmied out of her thong. He put an arm out beckoning her to him and she went happily straddling him and riding him until they were unable to have human thought, and wave after wave of orgasm hit her over and over and she stifled a scream and he groaned and she collapsed on top of him still joined and sweating and happy.

“Let me see your wound,” she said after they held each other for a while and she realized he was no longer hot to the touch.

“It’s funny, it doesn’t hurt at all when I’m inside you,” he licked her shoulder. She tasted of sunshine and salt, and Joss. He closed his eyes. Leaving was going to be very painful.

“Nothing hurts when you’re inside me, we’re on a different plane, I think,” she said. Looking at the wound she squinted and then turned the light on. “The infection is nearly gone.” She said with surprise and delight in her voice. “Look, it’s almost completely gone.”

He looked and smiled. “Let me see your back,” he said and she turned. “Wow, the CDC could learn a little from the Navajo. This looks better than it has in, well, ever.” He turned out the harsh light and pulled her into his arms. They held each other for a while, each of them aware that it was almost over, Fields was going to show up with the cavalry very soon.

“How much time do we have left? Because I wouldn’t mind a little more of you riding me like a wild thing. I definitely have strength for that.” She lifted her wrist to her face and tried to see the watch but it was too dark.

“I don’t know,” she said dreamily but the last word was drowned out by a tremendous crash in the room next door. Joss inhaled to shriek, but Buck put his hand to her mouth, held her to him and rolled over to the far side of the bed and right off it to the floor on the other side. They landed hard, his body on top, protecting hers and he took his hand away from her mouth. He started to get up off her and she pulled him back, shaking her head. “I gave him the wrong room number just in case,” she said very quietly.

“You’re a fucking genius,” he said equally quiet. They waited, listening silently in the dark.

“They’re gone, she made you,
Bolton
. Cassidy said she had some kind of freakishly high IQ.” They heard the men speaking outside their open window.

“She didn’t get it from Cassidy,” the one called
Bolton
said and they laughed. “Let’s try the hospital.” Joss and Buck listened as the men opened and closed car doors and drove away.

“That must mean Fields is dead,” she whispered. He nodded. “I’m so sorry,” she had begun to tremble, this was the final close call, she had had enough, she was ready to break down now.

He kissed her and she clutched at him, and they joined with a fierce and forceful union that was somehow essential. Joss, too afraid to make a sound whimpered when she came, and since her body had done all it could that day she slept even before Buck had started breathing normally. They were completely entangled in the sheets, but Buck somehow extracted himself and lifted her to the bed and held her, spooning, through the long night.

Drifting in and out of sleep, he wondered how much more she’d have to put up with, and whether or not he’d be able to leave her when the time came. She had become something necessary to him on a deep level and he was slightly uncomfortable about that.

“He called you Buck,” she said and he jerked in surprise. He was thinking about what he was going to do now, and how he could do it and keep his Duchess safe. He had been completely attuned to her breathing and body, and yet she slipped past his guard, in more ways than one.

“Who did?” He brought his hand to her bare arm and ran the back of it down its smooth length. He propped himself up on his elbow to look at her face in the dim light. She turned slightly toward him.

“The man pretending to be Fields called you Buck. You said your friends called you Duke. You said Fields was your friend, so he should have called you Duke. Something felt wrong when I spoke with him, and so I gave him the wrong room number. I just didn’t know what it was until now.”

“Do you want to join the FBI with that brain?” He asked and she started trembling again.

“No,” she whispered and he pulled her close.

“Can you sleep?” He cupped her breast and ran his thumb lazily across its nipple.

“Yes, if you tell me that it’s all going to be all right.”

“It’s all going to be all right, my beautiful Duchess, trust me, I’m a trained professional,” he said. She needed to stop focusing on the crazy bad guys, and get some sleep, he thought. “Tell me why you have an Albrecht Durer owl on your delectable ass.”

“Tell me how you knew it was Durer,” she said.

“You’re not going to like it,” he said breathing deeply, preparing for her wrath.

“Try me,” she said wanting to turn to him, but he held her tightly.

“I pulled all your information and studied it before I even went to
Jackson
, where I first encountered Cassidy. I didn’t know what to expect, and I didn’t know how involved anyone in your family was. I learned he was your favorite artist, you did your thesis on him, and the current exhibit in
Denver
of his work is all down to you. I know what grades you got in high school, the courses you took in college and your GPA, the year abroad in Nuremburg, and your friends there, your Facebook status, your health club membership expiration, your salary, your social security number…”

“Okay, it’s okay, it’s your job; you have to be safe.”

No, Duchess, I’m a stalker. I didn’t go that in depth with anybody else, just you,
he thought.

“Under ‘identifying marks’ there was no mention of the tattoos; did you get them in
Germany
?”

“The Durer, yes. I dated an artist, he did it for me.”

“Gunter Hauer,” he said absently and she stiffened briefly in his arms but soon relaxed and he wondered if he was an idiot or if she just broke his guard down.

“That freaks me out a little, I’ve never mentioned him to anyone; I haven’t even said his name out loud since, well, since we broke up, and you know all about him.”

“I may have looked at your information a little more closely than the others, but I had no idea how dangerous you really were,” he said and she laughed quietly.

“Regardless of my known associations with an international art thief?”

“He spoke very highly of you. You wouldn’t have the job you have now if you weren’t completely cleared of any hint of wrong doing.” He said seriously.

“He broke up with me the day before he left for
Berlin
, and I was so mad I left for
Paris
on a train where I sat next to an official in the Surete. We were discussing food for two hours while the heist was going down in
Berlin
. He had been pretty tired of the German food and was waxing on and on about what his wife would have prepared for him when he got home. When he saw my picture come through Interpol he recognized me and cleared me immediately.

“You can choose to believe this or not, but you are the first person to have seen the owl after Gunter did it, despite my dubious reputation.” She said the word dubious with evident distaste and he kissed the back of her head.