Fatal Affair: 1 (Courthouse Connections) (13 page)

While those juicy details would undoubtedly
send the tabloid rag guys into a frenzy, spreading embellished versions of the
salacious stories with unrestrained glee, JD couldn’t help worrying about how
Lanie could cope with the inevitable conjecture about how she had fitted into
the dead man’s sex life. Frankly he was a little concerned about that himself.

He approved of Tony’s plan for him and Lanie
to give a private interview to a reasonably cooperative reporter, admit their
affair and reveal the open marriage arrangement she’d had with her late
husband. Lanie would move in with JD at his condo on Tampa Bay, where they
could limit media access to her. JD had agreed to his part in the plan once
Tony had convinced him that it could work.

“I can’t ask JD to do this—drag his good
name through the mud with mine.” Lanie’s voice was small, barely audible. “No.”

JD reached over and tilted her head so she
had to look at him. “You don’t have to ask me, I’ve already volunteered. By
presenting ourselves as a loving couple rather than two people who got caught
having a casual affair, I believe we can sway public opinion in our favor.
Besides, I want to do it. I’ve wanted us to be together 24/7 ever since we got
to know each other down in Key West.”

I want to see you through this so we can
have a future together.
Though JD had always valued
his privacy, it would mean nothing to him if he lost Lanie. He took her hand
and squeezed it. “It will be okay, I promise. This will work. Meanwhile, Rocky
and his team of investigators will keep on looking for other evidence to prove
your innocence.”

“What if—”

Tony held up a hand as if to stop Lanie
from asking the questions JD had been fighting in his head all day long. “I
don’t want to hear any what ifs. Don’t doubt that working together we’ll get a
not guilty verdict. Remember I’m the best there is at what I do—and that’s
defending cases successfully even when they seem indefensible, which your case
is not. Now give me a real smile and get ready to go face the media out there.”

“Shouldn’t we rehearse what we’re going to
say?” This was new territory for JD, being in a situation where one misspoken
word could get the woman he loved put in prison for killing the blowhard
senator who had used her for so long.

Lanie squeezed JD’s hand, her expression
strained but not as much as it had been when Zach had escorted her into the
conference room a few minutes earlier. JD reminded himself that she
occasionally practiced criminal defense too, although she didn’t have Tony’s
impressive track record. “I imagine it will be more effective if we don’t sound
as though we’re reading from a script,” she suggested.

“Exactly.” Tony paused then spoke quietly
to Lanie, as though trying to calm her fears. “I want you to go out there and
tell the reporters that you and JD are together, that you’re in love and that
neither you nor he had anything to do with the senator’s death. I suggest you
say that you and Winstead had agreed to divorce quietly because of the
campaign, and that you had agreed to cool your relationship with JD until the
divorce could be finalized.”

JD pulled Lanie off to the side, spoke so
only she could hear. “I do love you sweetheart. Are you with us on this?”

She reached up and laid her fingers on his
cheek. “I love you too. I think I’ve loved you since that first night. I just
wish to God I could keep your name out of this, but part of me is glad we won’t
have to hide our feelings anymore. Let’s go talk to that reporter.”

This is the first time I’ve ever ridden
in his car,
Lanie thought as she settled in the
passenger seat of JD’s quietly luxurious Jaguar sedan and tried to decompress
from the hour-long interview they’d just endured with the evening anchor from
one of the local TV channels. Thank God it had been only one reporter, not the
two dozen or more of them who had stared at them while they’d delivered the
written statements that Tony’s team had prepared.

JD had looked as stressed as she’d felt,
fielding questions about their relationship and where they each had been night
before last, during the time when Wayne had been killed. Lanie wished there had
been a way JD could have avoided the media circus, but she was ever so grateful
that he’d been there at her side, lending her the substantial strength that had
attracted her to him in the first place.

“I’m so damn sorry you had to go through
all that because of me.” Fighting tears, she placed a hand on his forearm as he
drove out of the parking garage and turned south toward Bayshore Boulevard. “So
sorry.”

He caught her hand and brought it to his
lips. “I told you, sweetheart, we’re in this together. All the way. Please quit
worrying about me. As I told that TV anchor a few minutes ago, I’m sorry the
senator is dead. No one has even suggested that I had anything to do with
killing him. No matter how it happened, I’m thrilled that we no longer have to
sneak around to be together.”

So much had happened in so little time.
Lanie’s head swam just trying to process it all. She felt JD’s warm breath on
her knuckles, tried to concentrate on the pattern made by silvery moonlight
shimmering on the quiet waves of the bay as she tried to calm her frazzled
nerves.

It didn’t work. “Purrz will get hungry if
somebody doesn’t go out to the house and feed him. And I don’t have anything to
wear except the clothes on my back.” She glanced down at the rumpled business
suit she’d been wearing when the detectives had confronted her. “This certainly
isn’t in any shape to wear to the office, let alone to court. I’m supposed to
be at an arraignment for a DUI client tomorrow afternoon.”

Lanie stifled a self-deprecating sigh.
Strange that among all her other problems she should be stressing over the most
mundane and easily solved ones. She decided that the more pressing issues were
too much for her to tackle just yet. “Tony said that he’s arranged for one of
my office mates to take over the few cases I have pending, but I need to go
over the particulars with him so he’ll know what’s been going on.”

After JD negotiated a long, narrow driveway
and pulled the car into a covered garage, he cut the engine and reached out to
stroke her tear-stained cheek. “Rocky will be going out to your house in the
morning to look around a little bit more. I’ll text him to grab your cat and
some of your clothes and bring them to you here.”

She remembered that JD had mentioned he had
a cat too. “Do you think our two cats will get along?” Holding JD’s hand and
trying not to feel too out of place there, where he’d lived with his wife
before her death, Lanie walked beside him to a white high-rise building that
faced the bay.

“I’ve never seen the security quite as
visible as it is tonight,” he commented, chuckling. She felt some of her
tension start to ease when he so easily joked about the situation she’d placed
them in. “As for the cats, I imagine they’ll get along just fine. Scat’s a
pretty laid-back guy as long as he’s getting his food and a reasonable amount
of attention. Welcome home.”

When they got off the elevator on the tenth
floor, he unlocked the door and stepped back for Lanie to go inside.

A regal looking lilac-point Siamese
observed them from his perch atop an antique mahogany table with intricately
carved legs. Posed next to a crystal vase full of artfully arranged silk
flowers, the cat reminded Lanie of a porcelain statue. He wore a disdainful
look on his aristocratic face—that is until he spied JD and made a graceful
leap to the floor to circle their ankles and rub up against their calves.

JD bent and scooped up the cat. “Lanie,
meet Scat. Go ahead, pet him. He likes attention, especially from pretty
ladies.”

When Lanie tickled him under his chin, Scat
rewarded her with a playful butt of his soft, sleek head against her hand.
“Hello Scat. You’re a handsome boy.” JD set him on the floor and he headed down
the hallway, turning his head to look at them as though he wanted them to
follow.

“He’s trying to tell me he’s ready for his
dinner. I’m sure we could both use something too.” Taking her hand, JD led her
through the condo to a gleaming, well-equipped kitchen with windows that
overlooked the bay. He filled Scat’s bowl with dry food and poured fresh water
into a water dispenser before peering inside the oversize stainless steel
refrigerator. “Is beef stew okay? My housekeeper always makes something for me
while she’s here cleaning and today’s stew day. It won’t take more than a
couple of minutes to warm some up in the microwave.”

“That sounds wonderful.” Whether it had
been her nerves or the disgusting jail fare they’d given her for lunch, Lanie
hadn’t been able to eat a bite for fear of throwing up. Now, though, her
stomach was growling.

“Is there somewhere I can clean up?” No
amount of hunger could entice her into eating without washing off the worst of
the grime she was sure had rubbed off on her during the miserable hours she’d
spent in that cell.

“Go back down the hall. The powder room is
behind the second door on the right. Make it quick for now, though. We’ll
shower before bed.” He must have realized she needed not only some warm water
and soap but also some semblance of normalcy.

By the time she got back to the kitchen, JD
had set out plates and silverware on a round oak pedestal table in front of a
bay window. The stew smelled wonderful, its aroma wafting through the room in a
trail of steam that led her to a brightly striped casserole dish filled to the
brim with chunks of beef, potatoes, pearl onions and carrots in a savory-looking
gravy.

She breathed in the heavenly aroma,
welcomed the feeling of normalcy that seeped into her body as she watched JD
ladle stew into two bowls he’d placed on the table. He smiled at her before
turning back to the counter, as though he found nothing disturbing about having
her here in his home. As if he weren’t harboring an accused murderer he’d just
bailed out of jail.

JD finished slicing some crusty bread and
put it in a basket. Lanie watched him bring it and a bowl of salad to the
table. “Come on, sit and eat while everything’s fresh,” he told her as he held
out a chair and waited until she took a seat before joining her and settling
down to eat.

Simple but tasty, the food filled her belly
but not nearly as much as JD’s company consumed her heart. Just being with him
again made her happy. If only their reunion had come about because of anything
except Wayne’s grisly murder and her subsequent arrest.

She couldn’t have everything, though. Not
now—maybe not ever. She counseled herself not to agonize about the future she
might not have but to focus on the here and now.

When she looked over at JD she saw he was
watching her, seemingly calm and happy to be with her no matter how horrible
the circumstances that had brought them together tonight. For a long time they
sat and ate, quiet except for occasional comments about inconsequential things.

Scat had stretched out between them on the
hardwood floor, a picture of feline contentment. He projected an aristocratic
aura, as though he knew his worth and was certain of his place in JD’s elegant
condo.

When she tried to imagine Purrz here, it
struck her how out of place the scruffy yellow alley cat would look next to
JD’s sleek Siamese. She was deathly afraid that she herself was similarly out
of synch with JD’s elegant surroundings.

You’re out of your league here, just
like your cat with his questionable pedigree.

Up until now she’d never felt out of place
with JD, but then she had thought of him as just a successful lawyer, a partner
in one of the most prestigious firms in Tampa. She’d had no idea, until Zach
had explained during the ride to Winston-Roe’s office that JD had put up her
million-dollar bond in cash, that he was rich—so rich that he could put his
hands on that obscene amount of money in just a matter of hours.

Lani looked around at what she imagined
must be a priceless collection of antique crystal behind the glass doors of the
custom-made oak kitchen cabinetry. Were the pricey-looking sets of stemware his
or had they belonged to his late wife? Lanie remembered JD saying he still
lived in the same condo he’d bought when Miriam had become too sick to get
around safely in the waterfront home they’d shared.

A shudder coursed through Lanie when she
imagined this place being full of ghosts who were very much alive in JD’s memory.
She wondered if he’d want to sleep with her here or if Miriam’s spirit would
come between them if they shared his bed.

Lanie desperately needed to feel his arms
around her, to hear the reassuring sound of his breathing. She longed for him
to chase away the horrors she’d experienced these last twenty-eight hours,
exorcise the vivid image of Wayne’s mutilated body and the accusing eyes of the
detectives who blamed her for his murder.

But she only wanted to accept JD’s comfort
if he needed her as much as she needed him, wanted her for herself, not a
stand-in for the ghost of his dead wife.

JD hated the way Lanie hesitated when he
suggested that they shower and turn in for the night, but he’d hesitated—maybe
for a bit too long—before implying that they’d go on here the way they’d done
on weekends that now seemed long in the past. He was still mulling over the
question of whether he should show her to the guest suite that hadn’t been used
since Miriam’s last days or take her to his room, his bed, the way he’d done at
his place on Cedar Key.

Would that seem too crass, considering
that someone killed her husband only two days ago?

Fuck. They’d just told the gossipmongers of
the press straight-out that they were lovers. Lanie hadn’t hesitated for a
second about telling the reporters that she and Winstead had agreed to divorce
and go their separate ways before she and JD had begun their affair.

She’d looked pale and scared but she’d met
JD’s gaze and assured the TV anchor who’d interviewed them that she’d fallen in
love with him and asked for the divorce because her marriage had been one of
convenience that had become one of inconvenience, not only to her but to the
senator.

So why were they hesitating to reach out
and take what they both wanted?

JD couldn’t come up with a valid reason why
they should let the circumstances prevent them from taking comfort in each
other now that they were alone. They had no need to feel awkward together.

He’d felt a bit of discomfort at first,
bringing Lanie here to the place where he’d lost Miriam and fought for so long
to accept the reality that she was gone. He’d never brought another woman here
before tonight. This had been his solitary place of mourning, his lonely den to
consider later, after he’d fallen in love again, the disturbing fact that he
might never be able to declare his feelings for Lanie.

As daunting as the circumstances were that
had brought her here, Lanie lent her special brand of warmth to this sterile
condo—a warmth that he’d found missing since months before Miriam’s death.
“Come on, sweetheart. We’ve got a shower and a nice big bed waiting for us.
It’s been a long, hard day for you. For me too, because I wasn’t able to do
more to protect you.”

* * * * *

Pulsating needles of hot water washed away
the pervasive feel of the jail from Lanie’s skin as JD ran his soapy hands over
her body. She wanted to do the same for him but something stopped her.

Was her conscience telling her she had no
right to feel pleasure while Wayne lay dead, not even buried yet? Or was it
more that fear over her coming ordeal had taken over her mind and buried all
her tender feelings deep in her subconscious, along with her libido?

Lanie stood quietly, not saying or doing
anything, just thinking. And loving the growing sense of safety that bubbled up
inside her, a feeling that nothing really bad could happen to her as long as JD
was taking care of her.

I won’t think about anything else, not
now. Not the past or the future. Only the here and now. And JD. He seems to
know that I need him to lead and make me follow. He must sense that I don’t
have the strength now to take the initiative.

“Tell me what you want,” she murmured
against the calloused hand that cupped her chin and drew her face up to meet
his soft, accepting gaze.

“You know I love you. There, I’ve finally
said the words I’ve been holding back for too damn long. I always want to show
you just how much. I can’t be around you and not get hard, but I want you to
know that sex can wait.

“Tonight I’ll be satisfied just to hold you
and thank somebody up there for bringing you back to me. I want to banish the
pain I see in your eyes and reassure you that everything will work out for
you—for us.” He lowered his head and ravished her mouth, as though staking a
claim. “You’re mine now. Trust me to take care of you.”

“I do.” She knew he’d taken on a big job,
and she realized that neither he nor Tony and his team could guarantee that
she’d be exonerated. Still, she felt as though JD had lifted a heavy load off
her shoulders with his unwavering support. “I’m so sorry to have dragged you
into this mess, but I thank you for being here for me. I know I wouldn’t be
able to get through it alone.”

That was the truth. If not for the sweet
hours she’d stolen with JD she’d have crumbled weeks ago, ever since Bert had
practically ordered her and Wayne to continue the charade of a happy
marriage—at least until the upcoming election. The pretending was over now,
though she’d rather have had it end peaceably with her and Wayne just going
their separate ways. She’d never wanted to reveal her husband’s secret life,
never wanted to threaten Bert with reporting Wayne for racketeering—and she’d
certainly never, ever wished for Wayne to die.