Designed for Murder (Killer Style) (7 page)

She wrapped around him tight as a glove and rocked against him.

“That’s right, fuck me,
mi cielo
, show me how deep you can take that dick.” He bottomed out, nearly losing it when she took him so deep that her ass brushed his balls with every downward thrust. That wouldn’t do. He wanted to feel her pussy clamp around him and squeeze every drop from his cock.

He dragged his thumb across her bottom lip before pushing it inside her mouth. “That’s it, get it nice and wet.”

Her eyes were hazy with lust, and she did exactly as told. Watching her lick and suck on his thumb made his balls tighten. “Lean back,
mi cielo
, I want to watch you take my dick into that juicy pussy of yours.”

She did, bending backward and bracing her hands on his thighs above his knees as she continued riding him hard and fast and sending them both hurtling toward the edge. Unsure how much longer he could take it, he withdrew his thumb and lowered it to where their bodies joined, stroking her clit and pressing against the side of the nub each time she pushed downward and engulfed his cock.

Blood pounded against his ears as he fought off the climax building in the base of his spine. A sheen of sweat covered her body, making her glisten in the moonlight as she rocked and swirled around his dick.

The sound of their panting filled the air around them. He was too close to form words and push her higher. Instead, he alternated the soft and hard pressure of his thumb on her clit as he circled around it. She moaned, tightening around him as her fingernails dug into his thighs.

“Fuck,” she cried as she undulated in a wave motion, massaging his dick as she slammed down on him. “Carlos. Hard. Now.”

Her words severed the tentative hold he had on his self-control. “Whatever you want,
mi cielo.
”

He pressed hard against her clit and thrust upward. Once. Twice. On the third time she snapped forward out of her backward arch, and her entire body tensed into one straight line as she clenched around him.

Using both hands, he clamped down on her hips, forcing his way into her tightness in one final balls-deep thrust, and his orgasm exploded, taking away the entire world except for Mika as the last ripples of her climax shook her.

She collapsed on top of him, every soft curve fitting against him. “
Mi cielo.
What does it mean?” she whispered against his skin.

“Heaven.” High on post-orgasmic euphoria, he couldn’t keep his eyes open, let alone spar with Mika or his own good sense. Tomorrow would be soon enough for that. “It means my heaven.”

Chapter Seven

“It’s not money that makes you well dressed, it’s understanding.”

—Christian Dior

C
arlos woke up in a tangle of soft blanket and Mika’s smooth legs, both of which were wrap
ped tightly around him. The sun was peeking around the skyscrapers, sending in rays of light through the studio’s large windows and hitting him right in the eyes. He shifted and Mika mumbled her sleepy protest. He unwound himself from her legs and the temptation of an early morning replay of the night before and slipped from beneath the blanket. After pulling on his jeans, he padded across the cool floor to the computer.

The lab results had to be logged into the police system by now. The sooner he found out what was so damn special about the material, the sooner he could figure out how to keep Mika safe from whomever was after her. Breaking into the Harbor City Police Department’s system had become second nature, allowing him to execute the keystrokes as he watched Mika burrow deeper under the blanket until only the long strands of her silky hair could be seen. Even that little bit was enough to grab his dick’s attention and send his thoughts skittering off to fantasies of wrapping her hair around the base of his cock as she lapped at the tip with her pink tongue.

The computer binged, announcing his successful breach of the police department’s system and yanking his dirty mind back before his big head followed the little one right back to the couch and the warm woman snuggled under the blanket.

Come on, man, pull it together.

He couldn’t let his dick overshadow his mission. Not again.

His fingers flew over the keys, banging down on them until he found where the crime lab’s preliminary report was logged…or more correctly, where it should have been. Instead, there was a note.

PAPER RESULTS DELIVERED TO DET. REGGIE WATTS, WHO REQUESTED THEY BE FILED BUT NOT ENTERED INTO THE COMPUTER SYSTEM UNTIL FINAL RESULTS WERE IN.

“Well played, Detective,” Carlos muttered.

Final results. That could be weeks.

Carlos turned the note’s meaning over in his head. Whatever the preliminary test results were, Reggie didn’t want him to see them. The detective was extended Maltese Security family, but he was a cop first—one who didn’t feel like sharing.

Stymied by an old-school move, Carlos stared at the computer screen. If he couldn’t access one avenue, maybe it was time to go down another virtual path. He exited out of the police system and accessed the district attorney’s records. He entered Mika’s name and
witness
into the closed case file search engine. Thirty seconds later he had access to everything pertaining to her sister’s murder trial—and there was a lot.

He skimmed the reports, searching for information about the perp’s parents. Like Mika had said, they were in Switzerland and hadn’t come back for any of the post-trial hearings. Of course, out of the country didn’t mean they couldn’t hire someone. It was a hypothesis, and a pretty damn shaky one considering that Mika wasn’t the only one targeted. Hell, she hadn’t even been at the front of the line…unless the parents were using the attacks on the other LARP members as a way to cover up their purpose.

Next up in the file were the crime scene photos. They were horror-movie bloody.

“What in the hell are you doing?”

He jerked his head up. Mika was sitting up, the blanket wrapped around her, and the color had drained from her face. She stared at a spot just over his left shoulder.

The mirror. Fuck.

“Why are you looking at those?” A brittle hardness turned her voice cold, and she gathered the blanket tighter around her bare shoulders.

The horrified look on her face ripped a hole in him. He exited out of the DA’s system as fast as possible. “Research. We haven’t ruled out Keenan’s parents.”

“And you thought you’d get more information about them by looking at…those?”

“I had to know the facts.” That’s what had gotten him in trouble with Ivy. Going with his gut instead of digging deeper.

“The facts?” Mika laughed, if you could call the strangled sound a laugh. “You really want to know what happened?”

He nodded, his empty stomach turning in on itself.

“Hana and I were both at the University of Harbor City. She was a sophomore. I was a senior. I introduced her to Keenan. He was a friend of a friend, a lacrosse player, a nice guy from a good family. At least that’s what I thought.” She paused, turning her face away from him. Her jaw hardened, and she wiped the back of her hand across one cheek and turned back toward him. “I was wrong. I was so wrapped up in my own little world that I didn’t even realize he had managed to isolate Hana until they’d already been going out for six months. That’s the first time I saw one of the bruises. I wish I could say it was the last, but…she always had an explanation, and I was too involved in my own stuff to see through the lies.”

Her chin trembled. She squeezed her eyes shut and seemed to shrink inside the blanket.

Regret ate the edges of his stomach. He’d done this to her. Brought all of the memories back. His chair screeched when he pushed it back and went to her. Her eyes snapped open, and she held up her hand, holding him back without touching him.

“When she supposedly fell down the stairs and broke her wrist, that’s when everything clicked into place. I confronted her about it. I told her to break up with him. I told her I was going to go to the cops or kill him with my bare hands. She begged me not to. She said it wasn’t what it looked like. She promised everything was fine. I didn’t believe her, but I didn’t know what else to do. So I did nothing.” Her voice broke and tears flowed down her cheeks.

Seeing her break down was like being pummeled by an invisible giant. He felt the blows, but there was nothing for him to strike out at. He was as helpless as he’d been in the last moments before he’d passed out from the poison Ivy had given him.

“But Hana did something.” Mika took in a shaky breath. “She found a counselor on campus and…well…she tried to leave Keenan. When she didn’t call home for our mom’s birthday, I went to her dorm room. Her roommates hadn’t seen her. I went to Keenan’s apartment. He wasn’t home, but the door was unlocked. I went in. That’s when I found her.”

She shivered under the blanket, and he couldn’t stand back any longer. He sat down, wrapped his arms around her, and tugged her close. It was the only thing he could do, and it wasn’t enough.

“It took the cops a week to track him down,” she said. “If I’d never introduced them, if I’d told someone, if I’d killed him with my bare hands, if I’d done something—anything—she’d still be alive. The fact is that any man who’d kill the woman he professed to love is a monster, and I introduced that monster to my sister.”

Carlos’s blood turned to ice.
A monster.
Was he a monster? The circumstances couldn’t be more different, but Mika wouldn’t see it that way. The wound was too fresh, her pain too close to the surface. He’d loved Ivy and he’d killed her. If…when…Mika found out, she’d put him in the same category as an abuser like Keenan. He swallowed back bile.

Not that it mattered what she thought of him. After this case was over, it was doubtful their paths would ever cross again, and that was for the best. No matter the connection between them, he was the last guy she needed in her life.

He kissed the top of her head. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.” She inhaled a sniffly breath and straightened her shoulders. “You didn’t kill her.”

“Mika, you don’t have to pretend—”

“The only place I pretend is when I’m dressed up as the Silver Queen.” She pushed out of his embrace and let the blanket fall as she stood up. “I hate lies and fake fronts and people who pretend to be what they aren’t. And yet here I am lying to the people closest to me about you.”

He couldn’t afford to get attached. How she felt shouldn’t matter to him. This was about the case. That’s what they
both
needed to remember. “You’re doing it for the right reasons.”

She grabbed her clothes off the floor. “But that doesn’t make it any less wrong.” She sighed and pulled the oversize T-shirt over her head, then reached for her jeans. “Come on, we need to go get something to eat and figure out how to catch this asshole before he pulls his next move and hurts someone else.”

T
ourists and Harbor City locals crowded Pippy’s Pancakes looking for a cheap, carb-heavy meal. Chatter filled the restaurant along with the smell of maple syrup and fresh coffee. The service was fast, and they expected you to inhale your food and get out the door to free up the table for the next person in line. The waitresses were crabby, there were timers on the table to motivate people to keep it moving, and the food was divine. It was Mika’s favorite place to eat.

There wouldn’t be any lingering over coffee or deep chats at Pippy’s. Not that she thought Carlos was that guy, but after everything she’d just told him about Hana, she needed a breather from her own emotions.

The waitress hustled over as soon as they sat down, order pad at the ready.

A quick glance at the menu and Mika knew. “I’ll go with the blueberry pancakes, eggs over easy, and a hot chocolate.”

Carlos sat across from her, the six-page menu with its description of more than four hundred kinds of pancakes in hand and a blank look on his face. She’d seen it before. The menu was all kinds of crazy with everything from Hawaiian pancakes to plain pancakes to Sarachi pancakes dusted with cayenne pepper.

“How about you?” the waitress asked, annoyance bleeding through her question.

“I’m gonna need a minute,” he said.

Mika sat up. That was the kiss of death at Pippy’s. You couldn’t mess with the flow. They’d probably spit in their syrup now. “Everything’s good; which one calls out to you?”

“There are a billion choices,” he mumbled.

“Four hundred and eighty-two, and not a stack of plain pancakes anywhere to be found,” the waitress said before popping her gum. “So what’ll it be?”

Carlos flipped the menu pages, eyeballing it like he could memorize it, analyze it, and then determine the best course of action.

“It’s just breakfast.” Mika giggled. “Go with your gut.”

He shot her a teasing glare. “Squealing pig bacon pancakes with scrambled eggs and orange juice.” He slapped the menu shut and held it out to the waitress, who took it and hustled off to the kitchen. “If those suck I’m going to blame you.”

“Nothing sucks here. It’s Pippy’s Pancakes.”

He looked around at the packed restaurant. “It’s a tourist trap.”

“Exactly, the people-watching is amazing.” Of course, the only person she was watching was him.

His brown hair had gotten away from him this morning, and waves curled around the top of his ears, giving him a messy, just-got-out-of-bed-after-being-fucked-well hotness that couldn’t be manufactured. Damn, the man was panty melting. She slipped off a shoe and slid her foot up the inside of his muscular thigh.

“The waitresses are rude.” He captured her foot with his hand before she could hit her target. But instead of pushing her away, he rubbed his thumb into her arch, stroking and caressing in a way that made it hard not to moan out loud.

“It’s part of Pippy’s charm.”

If covert, under-the-table foot rubs was how Mr. By the Book did breakfast, she was going to have to talk him into making this a regular thing after they’d wrapped up the case.

His talented fingers moved to the ball of her foot, rubbing in circular motions. “Who needs five hundred pancake choices?”

“I do.” She sighed. She couldn’t help herself. He really was good with his hands.

“Why?” He released her foot and laid it against his thigh.

“Because it’s fun.” She extended her leg until her toes moved up to brush against his dick, which twitched under her touch. “I like to come in here and play pancake roulette. Sometimes I love it, sometimes I don’t, but I always try something new.”

He spread his legs, giving her better access. Oh yes, he might be all rules and regulations, but he still liked to break them every once in a while. “How do you pick?”

“Whatever catches my eye in the moment.” She rubbed her foot across the now semi-hard bulge in his jeans, loving the way his breath caught as his gaze darkened with desire. “Welcome to the wild side of impulsive food choices. Next thing you know, you’ll be getting grapefruit juice instead of orange. It’ll be anarchy.”

His hand clamped down on her foot, holding it tight against his cock before he pushed it away and closed his legs as best he could in his condition. “Are you busting my chops?”

“I am.” Mika slid her foot back into her shoe while trying to ignore the dampness in her panties.

Carlos’s hungry gaze dropped to her mouth. “I’ll make you pay for that later.”

She shivered in the best way and pressed her thighs together. “Promise?”