Gingerbread Man (27 page)

***

IT WASN'T THE same in the house with her
mother away. Holly phoned the hospital again when she and Vince
arrived at the house. She couldn't talk to her, though. Jim Mallory
came on the line instead, saying not to worry. Her mom was sleeping
soundly and he wasn't planning to leave her anytime soon.

It was only slightly reassuring. She hung up
the phone, and felt her shoulders slump a little as she sighed.
"Anything wrong, Holly? Your mother?"

"She's fine. Sleeping. But it ought to be me
there by her bedside."

"Oh, I don't know. I kind of think she'd
like the idea of Jim hanging so close by."

"I'm her daughter. It's my place."

"Maybe Jim would like it to be his place,
too."

Holly tensed. "You think they're that
serious?"

"You didn't see Jim's face when you and I
told your mother Welles wasn't the real killer. You were totally
focused on Doris. I'll tell you, Mallory looked sick with worry and
fighting mad at the thought of her having to go through it all over
again." Vince shook his head. "A man doesn't look like that if he
doesn't care. He was all pale, kind of pinched around the eyes, and
his jaw was clenched so tight I thought it would break. He cares.
More than cares. You know?"

"You think he's in love with her?"

Vince nodded.

"Is it hard for you to say that, Vince? That
he loves her?"

"No harder than anything else. Why?"

She shrugged. "You kind of danced around the
words there."

"Did I?" He wasn't looking her in the eye
now.

Sighing, Holly changed the subject. "Think
we're safe here tonight?"

"I'm here. I'm armed. We're as safe as we can
reasonably be."

"You're supposed to say we're perfectly safe.
Tell me nothing's going to happen. What kind of hero are you,
anyway?"

"No kind at all."

She rubbed her arms, glanced toward the door,
the windows, beyond which she only saw black.

"Go to bed, Holly. Trust me, I'll be here and
you'll be safe. I promise. Okay?"

Sending him a shaky excuse for a smile, she
said, "That's better." And turning, she went to her room. She
didn't stay though. She hit the closet for extra blankets, took a
pillow off her own bed, and carried them into the living room for
him. He'd already started a pot of coffee brewing, and was standing
between the sofa and the television, thumbing the remote, flipping
through channels.

She dropped the pile of soft fluff onto the
sofa. "So you're planning to stay up all night?"

"At least."

"You don't have to do that, Vince."

He tossed the remote onto the coffee table
and turned to face her. "No?"

She shook her head.

"So, suppose I fall asleep out here? What's
to stop someone from sneaking past me?"

She swallowed the words that tried to leap
out, then said them anyway. "Come to bed with me."

He felt as if she had zapped him with a stun
gun. His face flushed, and a muscle twitched beside his mouth. His
gaze slid lower over her face, her body. He licked his lips.
"That's not gonna happen."

"You don't look like you mean that."

"Don't I?"

"No." She moved closer to him, and
hesitantly, slipped her arms around his waist, pressed herself to
him, and tipped her head back so she could see his eyes. "And I
really hope you don't, because I need you tonight."

He parted his lips to speak. She hushed him
with a forefinger.

"I know. You don't want me to need you. You
can't be my hero or my savior and you can't be the love of my life.
But I don't need those things tonight, Vince."

His eyes were dark as she lowered her finger
from his lips. "Then what
do
you need?" he asked, and his
voice was coarse.

"I need your arms tight around me," she said,
and she closed her hands on his forearms, and lifted them, settling
them around her waist He tightened them there. "I need your hands
touching me. I need your mouth ..."

He didn't let her finish. He covered her
mouth with his, before she could finish. One of his hands, big and
callused, cupped the back of her head, holding her steady while he
tasted her mouth with his tongue. His other hand curled over her
buttocks, and pulled her tight to his groin.

He was hard, pressing into her, and she knew
that this time, he wouldn't stop.

When his mouth slid from hers, to her jaw, to
her neck, she tipped her head back. When his hand squeezed her ass,
she arched into him, rubbing herself against the hard bulge behind
his jeans. He swore under his breath, grabbed her shoulders, pushed
her back, and held her away from him. His eyes were hungry when
they probed hers. "I've told you I don't have anything to give,
Red. This is here and now. That's all."

"I'm not asking for anything else." She
reached for the bottom of his T-shirt, and lifted it, slid her
hands over his belly and up to his chest, and dragged her nails
over his nipples.

He closed his eyes, gritted his teeth. When
they opened again, his eyes blazed. He grabbed her shirt with both
hands, pulled it off over her head, and threw it on the floor. He
didn't even pause before unhooking the bra, and throwing it to the
side as well. His eyes raked her breasts. Then his hands covered
them, and he squeezed. She shivered when his fingers drew together
on her nipples, and she opened her mouth to gasp when he pinched
them. He moved her backward until her legs hit the couch, then gave
a push so she was sitting down. Peeling off his shirt, he dropped
it, and knelt, and his hands went around her, palms flat to her
back, arching her toward him so he could bend and suck her breasts.
He sucked them hard, bit down with his teeth until sweet pain
jolted through her, then licked the sting away with his tongue, and
did it all over again. Each time he bit a little harder, and each
time she liked it a little better.

His hands slid around to her jeans, undid
them, and he jammed one hand down the front of them and inside her
panties. He didn't take his time. Didn't ease her into this, just
spread her folds and touched her. Rubbed her. Fingers pushed up
inside her without waiting for an invitation. He lifted her a
little, his fingers still in her, and held her around the waist
with a free hand, and she stood there, barely balanced with her
legs wide and her knees bent. "Shove the jeans off," he rasped.

She did, and he held her up until she managed
to shuck free of them, panties and all, then he let her fall to the
sofa again. He drew his fingers out of her and pushed her legs
wider, one up on the sofa, the other stretched out to the floor,
and he knelt low, and bent and pushed his face between her legs. He
licked deep, and her body shivered with rapture. When she started
to melt into his mouth, he drew his head away, and she almost
cried. But then he was on her again, his cock was pressing into
her, stretching her wider, pushing inexorably deeper until she
didn't think she could take any more, and then still more. She
pulled her hips back. His hands closed on the cheeks of her ass,
and he held her to him and pushed himself into her. Then he stayed
there, waiting. He bent his head and tormented her breasts, and
when his tongue and teeth did their work, she began to move.
Slowly, she slid her wet body up and down the length of him. Her
hands hooked under his arms, nails digging into his back, and she
moved faster, harder. And then she was linking her legs around him,
pulling him even deeper as her hips rocked.

She saw his face, watched the waves of
pleasure wash over him as he began moving, too, thrusting in hard,
fast, deeper, until he pushed her to the edge. She came, and she
heard herself scream his name as she did. And then he drove into
her once more, and went stiff as he held her and poured himself
into her.

Slowly, her warm muscles uncoiled, then
relaxed, then seemed to purr in her body. Vince lifted himself off
her, kissed her mouth, and gathered her gently into his arms.

"Where are we going?" she asked as he got to
his feet.

“To bed," he told her. "How do you feel?"

She opened sleepy eyes and smiled up at him.
"Mmm."

He looked at her, his eyes softer than she'd
ever seen them as he lowered her onto her own bed, and reached for
the covers.

She reached out and grabbed him, tugged him
in with her. "Don't go. Stay here. All night, right here."

"I'll sleep if I stay in here," he said, his
tone tender.

She pushed him onto his back, slid her body
on top of his, and kissed his neck. "Not for a while, you
won't."

***

HE SANK INTO a slumber as contented as that
of a well-fed baby when he'd finally managed to satisfy the
redhead's appetite hours later. He hadn't intended to. Hadn't
expected himself to be able to sleep even if he'd wanted to, given
that he'd just experienced the most incredible night of sex he'd
ever had, with a woman he'd been determined not to get involved
with.

He'd expected to lie awake contemplating that
for a while.

But he slept. And he didn't stir until the
insistent pounding on the front door woke him up. Sunlight tried to
perform laser surgery on his eyes when he opened them, so he
slammed them closed again. Damn.

"Someone's here," Holly muttered, lifting her
head the smallest bit from his chest in order to say so.

"I hear him."

Her head came up higher, eyes just a little
wider. "You think it's bad guys?"

"Bad guys don't knock."

She smiled, and dropped her head to his chest
again. It was a dopey, crooked, half-asleep smile. The kind a woman
who'd just had incredible sex would smile in the morning.

He managed to get up onto one elbow, and she
rolled onto her back and squinted up at him. Her hair was sticking
up all over, and her eyes were scrunched into tiny slits. "Good
morning," she said.

"Morning, Red." Against his better judgment,
he kissed her. That easy, that automatic.

When he drew back she said, "I even like your
morning breath."

He rolled his eyes, wrapped himself in a
blanket, then ran into the living room, picking up clothes as he
went. He brought them all back into the bedroom again to put them
on.

Holly was pulling on a knee-length plaid
flannel nightshirt, and jamming her feet into well-worn
slippers.

"It's probably Jerry," he said. "I emailed
him before we left the cabin that we'd be here."

"Mmm-hmm," she replied.

Vince tucked his shirt in and headed back to
the living room. Jerry stood on the other side of Holly's front
door. He was cupping a hand beside his face, leaning forward,
trying to peer through the glass between the tiny slit in the
curtains. When he saw Vince, he smiled. Vince yanked the door open.
"Do you have any idea what time it is?"

Jerry glanced at his watch. "Seven
thirty-five. Why? You have a date?"

As he said it, an odd sound, half yawn, half
something else announced Holly's emergence from the bedroom.
Looking past Vince, Jerry said, "Or maybe you already had one."

"Watch it, partner."

"So, who's the girl with the feather duster
on her head?" Jerry asked. But he sent Holly a warm smile as he
said it. "My guess would be, oh, lemme think... Holly?"

"Come on, get your ass in here." Vince swung
the door shut, and led Jerry toward the kitchen, which was the
direction in which Holly was shuffling. "Holly Newman, Jerry, my
partner."

Holly nodded to Jerry and zombie-walked the
rest of the way into the kitchen. "Coffee," she moaned.

Jerry frowned at Vince. "Is she asking if we
want some, or summoning it to appear?"

"A little of both, I imagine. Just tell her
yes, you'll have some."

"Yes," Jerry said. "I'll have some."

Her reply was a grunt, but she grunted while
running water into the carafe, so that was probably a good sign.
Vince pulled out a chair at the table. Jerry sat down, setting a
huge box of doughnuts in the center, opening the lid. From across
the room, Holly lifted her head and turned slowly like a wolf
catching a scent of blood. Her gaze fell on the doughnuts. One
eyebrow rose. Vince felt something warm and liquid in his belly,
and told himself it was just because he could smell that coffee
brewing. A trigger response.

Right. He was usually a much better liar.

"So, is the chief ready to fire my ass yet?"
Vince asked, helping himself to a doughnut.

"He was pissed at first. Then I told him what
you said on the phone, about the break-in and the boating accident.
I think he gets it. Oh, he's still griping, but I really think he
gets it."

"It would be nice if someone did. The Feds
sure as hell don't."

“They will, when we dig up something more
solid, and then they'll be eating crow. Besides, the two of us are
more cop than any twenty Feds."

"Three of us," Holly corrected. She sat down
at the table, hitting the chair heavily, and she plunked her empty
mug down in front of her. Then she turned the doughnut box toward
her and began perusing its contents, taking her time. "I'm working
on this case, too," she finished.

Jerry tilted his head. "So, are you Cagney or
Lacy?"

She hauled a doughnut out of the box. She'd
managed to locate the only one with both frosting and filling. "I
haven't decided."

Jerry studied her. "Look more like one of
Charlie's Angels, to me."

She lifted her eyes to meet his, and her lips
curled just a little at the corners. "Thank you," she said around a
mouthful of doughnut.

“It's just a guess," he said. "Hard to tell
for sure at the moment, but I figure you probably clean up
nice."

She shrugged.

"Nice enough to knock your socks off,
partner," Vince muttered. Then he damn near kicked himself for
saying what he was thinking aloud. What the hell was wrong with
him?