Quintic (16 page)

She let her
lips
trail on his skin, feeling his
heartbeat, slow and regular as always, but faster than when he
slept. She smiled and sighed. He let go.

“
How about
dinner tonight, Princess? I have meetings most of the afternoon so
better if I pick you up at the hotel. Around seven?”

That sounded
good. And if she was lucky, they might not go out at all. She
smiled, “Seven’s good. You pick the place. See you
then.”

No talk. No
fight. She left before he
could change
his mind.

Had Patricia
known what was on Christopher’s mind, she might not have smiled. He
watched her go back to her desk and sit, shoulders straight, his
mood much improved. She had smelled wonderful, had felt so fucking
warm in his arms. Holding her gave him a boner. Hell, touching, or
merely
watching
her made his hard. The damn woman had felt it
too.

Later, just
the two of them, he hoped she would be more receptive, but for now,
he had bought a few hours of peace. Time to check some of the
places she had mentioned in her report.

Patricia
left the office at five and walked back to her hotel. With the wind
picking up and rain on the way, the weather was somewhat chilly but
walking soothed her and helped clear her head. Christopher was into
jogging; she wasn’t. He could run for an hour straight; she
couldn’t, but she could walk for hours. She smiled.

If
she
managed to get him near enough to her
bed or any exposed part of her, she might skip the report talk
tonight. She didn’t expect a two-week delay like for the motel talk
(and since that had turned into a full-team meeting, a long
postponement was
not
a good thing), but a day or two she could easily
endure. Maybe if she removed herself to the Yoga place for a while?
Hum. Considering Christopher was now in charge of the case, and how
seriously he took the responsibilities of his position, perhaps too
seriously when she was concerned, probably even the Yoga place
wasn’t safe from him.
Need a
reminder of the ‘don’t get personally involved in a case’ rule, Big
guy?
Unfortunately, that she was not the
only one struggling with that edict didn’t make the damn thing any
easier.

She
was at the hotel at a quarter to six. She
chatted with Carl on her way inside and stopped by the front desk
to pick up her mail. Juliet was on duty, so they gossiped about
Juliet’s new romance, her flavour of the month as Patricia called
the men the woman dated. Juliet was the worst when it came to
choosing boyfriends, even worse than Patricia was, which said a
lot. She passed the bar, waved at Luis but didn’t slow
down.

She forwent
the stairs for the elevator; her walk in the brisk air had tired
her a little. Midway she had belatedly remembered she wasn’t quite
over her previous night’s lack of sleep. She was a big sleeper;
Christopher always made fun of her for sleeping so much. She needed
eight hours a night at least; he could do with fewer than five
easily. Since meeting him, she was constantly sleep-deprived, and
her three-hour morning nap had not been recuperation enough. Or
maybe she was still slightly hangover.

She stayed
under in the shower for twenty minutes (the joy of living in a
hotel, she never ran out of hot water) before fussing over her
outfit. What to wear? Sexy or cute? If she aimed to render
Christopher defenceless, she had to predict his mood
right.

She
opted for seductively charming with a black
dress, always a winner. The black high heels were risqué; the jean
jacket provided the perky factor. Some black eyeliner and coats of
mascara turned her wide eyes sultry eyes. She painted her lips red
lipstick to better mark him, and let her wavy hair loose and
abondant. Silver loop earrings peeking through the wavesand added a
touch of teasing. Silver bracelets tinkled when she moved her
hands, and she intended to move her hands tonight. Up and down.
Perfume, rich yet subtle. The dress had an open collar like a man’s
shirt but without buttons. She wore matching a bra and thong in a
rich fuchsia colour under it. Souvenirs of the beach. The dress’s
deep décolletage and the bra’s push-up power advertised her
provocative intention. All she had to do now was to make the Big
guy take notice.

His Cooking
Time

E
xcept Chris didn’t come up. He
asked Carl to call her instead.

“
Hello,
Miss Patricia? Carl from downstairs. Mister MacLaren has
arrived. He wanted me to inform you he will be waiting in his car
in front of the hotel. He said to take your time.”

S
he took Chris’s breath away when
he caught sight of her stepping out of the hotel. Carl seemed to
agree. Damn that woman was sexy. And cute. He had been right not to
go up to her suite; they wouldn’t have made it out. They wouldn’t
have reached the bed for that matter, not by a long shot. Perhaps
the couch? She had that narrow table right beside her front door
that was about the right height.

He got out
to open her door and
stared at endless
legs, unveiled by the little black dress hiking up her thighs as
she sat. And peeking down as he closed the car door, his eyes
glazed over the spectacular view of her lace-clad breasts. The
crushed-raspberry colour racy thing she had bought during their
vacation, see-through if he remembered the beach correctly. And he
did. He sighed. They wouldn’t even have made it to the couch, not
even close.

He
had
wasted his afternoon checking out
addresses with Ham and Charles. A fucking recognisance tour to
decide what to investigate first. They even drove by the club. Not
a classy joint. Lemieux’s Italian place seemed as good a starting
point as any.

As
agreed,
he had made a reservation for
their dinner. She was going to be furious; she turned talkative
when angry. Hence, he was counting on her
I-dare-you
reaction tonight.
He wanted her mad enough to slip but not so much she would decline
to sleep in his arms.

He
drove quietly; she didn’t speak either. Her cent
slowly perfumed the car. Sweet and musky tonight, the contradiction
of her. Her narrow entrance table would have been fucking
perfect.

With the
traffic, the drive took over forty minutes. They crossed the
downtown area from the north-east to the south-west before reaching
the Irish Borough. He felt her tense as she realised he wasn’t
taking her to any of their usual places. She tugged on her dress in
a vain attempt to cover more of her legs. The hem turned into a
barometer of her anger; the more she pulled, the angrier she was
getting. Luckily for him, she could only stretch the fabric so far;
each time she yanked the skirt half, the top dipped lower. Glimpses
of the fuchsia thing, the skin underneath, long smooth legs, he
still had a magnificent view. Fuchsia. Legs. Fuchsia.
Legs.

The closer
they got, the stiffer she got. Furious didn’t come close to
describing her mood when they reached the restaurant. They had not
exchanged a single word in the car. He found a parking spot two
doors down the place. She jumped out before he had time to round
the car and open her door.

She
stomped to the restaurant, him right by her
side, his hand on her lower back. The hostess sat them in a corner
at the back as he had requested. He wanted to eye the place on a
busy night. And he wanted a quiet corner if they were to
argue.

She barely
waited to be seated to engage. “I don’t know why we had to come all
the way across town to this place. If you wanted more information
about the food, all you had to do was ask. The food was good,
classic Italian, a little above average. Service was barely
average. Sex after was good too. Classic and above average. And the
rest is none of your damn business.” She mouthed it all in a
measured tone, but he knew better.

She was on
the offensive and
about to clamp up. He
should have tried to pacify her, but he was getting angry in turn.
Wasn’t going to let her even think of running or hiding. She had
led him around and kept information from him. Joshua had shown up
again through Lemieux, and no way in hell was Chris going to let
the motherfucker get between them. He didn’t give a damn shit about
her past with the Lemieux guy, but, dead or not, he was going to
make sure the guy had not done anything to her.

Are You Having Fun Yet,
MacLaren?

T
he waiter came over to hand them
menus and explain the night’s specials. The damn woman asked
questions about the night’s special, the wine list, the dessert.
Hit and stall, stall and hit, her unique fighting styles; she
excelled at both.

“
I’ll have
the house lasagna. The chef didn’t change his recipe, did he? I’ve
had it before,
when I came
with another man
, and it was
simply
delicious
.”

Cute, Pussycat, but you’re going to have to try
harder
. “I’ll have the same. And a bottle
of red wine. The private-import Montepulciano Brunello you have on
the card.”

He
waited
as the waiter came back with the
wine. She liked it; she hummed around her first sip. Good. Ready
for the next round then. His turn.

“
I don’t
care what you did or did not do with the guy. We
started investigating out the addresses. That’s what we do,
remember? But we can’t get an angle if we can’t figure out the guy.
And right now, I don’t have a clue. Please explain it to me.” Aim
and fire. He had no doubt she could handle it; she could deal with
verbal sparring when she was in a full-on fighting mode. “How did
your sex-crazed ex-boyfriend ended up dead in a cheap motel’s
backyard, a cock ring on his prick?”

She didn’t
answer. Furious
was she? He knew calling
Lemieux her ex-boyfriend wasn’t accurate. The guy had been
short-term, the one before Joshua, but it didn’t necessarily mean
she had not liked him romantically. Patricia’s heart and soul were
too close to her skin for her just to have fucked the
guy.

Chris was
convinced s
he had liked Lemieux; he just
didn’t know how much. Yet, how much could she have loved the jerk
if she had dated Joshua right after? The damn woman had peculiar
rules about whom she dated and whom she didn’t. Because of her
fucking never-date-a-friend-of-a-friend decree, she shouldn’t have
dated Joshua. Chris fucking wished she hadn’t.

The
sex-crazed remark sh
e probably liked even
less. Her left-hand fingers were white as she held the foot of her
wine glass. Before provoking her, he had made sure she wasn’t
holding the glass with her right hand (live and learn, she had
thrown a drink in his face once).

“
How am I
supposed to know why he was killed? I had no contact with them in
the last two years. Would we be here if he hadn’t been one of
Joshua’s guys?” Of course not.

She was
lying, though. She had repeatedly contacted Mario. And she knew he
knew. She was usually better at lying than that. He frowned.
“Mario−”

“
Mario
doesn’t count. Leave him out of this.” Easy for her to say. “And
Rick wasn’t my boyfriend. Shall I put it in terms you understand?
Lemieux was just a fuck. As for his sexual habits, not that it’s
any of your damn business, I wasn’t with him long enough to
know.”

Dancing in the
Past

S
he was nervous yet
excited. The man had offered to take her somewhere different. Her,
a city girl who had seen it all already, she was blasé. Many men
had courted her; she was tired of men. Too many of the wrong type
of men had courted her, and she had decided none would
again.

These days, she concentrated on her
career. Climbing the corporate ladder one might have said, had
there been such a ladder in her world. Climbing the corporate
ladder for no other purposes than the climb itself.

“
What happens when you reach the
top?” A colleague had enquired.

“
The top? I will always find a
higher place to climb to.”

“
No, you won’t,” the colleague had
disagreed.

“
Yes, I will.” She did not
understand why she couldn’t. She reached a step higher, then
another. And aimed for yet another rung. The money was not
important. She did not seek fame, hated it in truth; notoriety was
completely irrelevant to her journey. She did because she must. Men
did not understand.

She had met the handyman at her
workplace. From the start, the man intrigued her. She had donned
her work uniform; he should not have approached her. The uniform’s
sole purpose was to deflect intimate contact, especially from
men.

Lemieux, her new handyman of a man,
persevered. Once. Twice. Three times a lady. She understood that
song now but made him wait nonetheless. He was a most beautiful
male specimen, masculine without being overpowering. He liked to
play. A man-child in a grown-up body, and quite grown-up at that. A
man-child in a manly body with an old man’s soul. Intriguing.

They made love; urgently she felt,
albeit he was careful and so attentive it disconcerted her. Lemieux
gave more than he took, holding back yet demanding.