Valentine's Day Is Killing Me (14 page)

A cell phone. He groaned at the find. True, it was just what he and his partner needed, but not as much as he needed Jocelyn at the moment. His hip was vibrating and he glanced down at the incoming call.

“Yeah, Raul. What’s up, man?”

“The four old dolls checked out. They weren’t in it. Just came over to do a pamper party, like they’d said. So, we know a friend of a friend that these ladies didn’t know must have invited Phat and Smooth to the mêlée. Maybe one of their girlfriends came by, just wanted a ride to wherever, and they musta fell by to pick up their women only because it was Valentine’s Day—but I don’t think there’s a connection.”

Ray stood and looked down at the telephone. Valentine’s Day was killing him. While that was great news,
the timing sucked
. “Cool,” he said flatly.

“You don’t sound excited, Holmes,” Raul said, laughing. “I catch you at a bad time?”

“Yeah. Real bad time.”

“Thought you didn’t do the whole Valentine’s Day thing.”

“It’s the day after, man, listen…I’m kinda in a hurry, but I found a cell phone dropped behind a Dumpster.” Raymond glanced up at the trajectory, trying to wrest back his detective logic. “Seems like in the flight from our boys in uniform at the front door, somebody lost or tossed a phone and kept moving. But the fact that it keeps ringing leads me to believe that they lost it, and they aren’t sure where it is. If it was an intentional ditch, they’d have a new one by now, would have told their inside contacts not to call it, and the phone would be dead metal, feel me?”

“You need to bring that piece of gold in pronto, man. We can get our boys in Forensics to dust it, break down the code, and pull everything off it—calls, speed-dial numbers, and—”

“I know, I know,” Ray muttered, looking up at Jocelyn’s window, ready to bay at it.

“Where’d you find it?”

Ray closed his eyes. “Off the fire escape behind Jocelyn Jefferson’s building.”

“Then definitely bring that home to Poppa, man. Hopefully it’ll help clear those ladies and lead us to anybody who’s been in regular contact with our boyz.”

“I’m on my way,” Raymond said in a weary tone. “I just have to make a call first.”

Jocelyn stood with the door open and her jaw slack. It took a moment for her mind to sync up with the image standing before her. Wrong man, right attitude. Oh, no!

“Professor Bryant?”

“Jocelyn, I thought about what you said, and just…I just…” He handed her a bunch of wildflowers that had been held so tightly, the stems were crushed and sweaty.

Her doorbell sounded and she absently depressed the buzzer to let Ray in. A second set of footfalls made her and Ben Bryant both turn around. She blinked twice and opened her mouth. An attorney was standing in her doorway with a bottle of champagne in his grip.

“I’m sorry. I tried to call first,” Marcus said, scowling at Benjamin Bryant. “I didn’t realize you had company, or that your father had stopped by.” He extended his hand toward the professor. “Marcus Dorchester, sir. Attorney at law.”

The professor looked down at the extended hand but didn’t shake it. “I’m not her father, Mr. Dorchester. And you definitely should have called first.”

She watched in utter horror as the two men bristled, instantly understood but misunderstood, and stepped back from each other like gunfighters.

“Oh,” Marcus said curtly, and then thrust the bottle toward Jocelyn. “I see. Next time I will definitely be sure to call, make voice contact, and arrange for
an appointment
. Have a good night.” He turned on his heels before she could say a word, and was gone.

Professor Bryant looked her up and down with a glare. “All you had to do was be honest with me, Jocelyn. I thought we both shared enough respect for each other not to play games. If you had some young suitor and preferred a purely carnal liaison, that’s all you had to say.” With that, he thrust the flowers at her, waiting until she accepted them, and turned on his heels and left, slamming the door.

Her phone was ringing off the hook, but she couldn’t move. She glanced at her watch. Raymond should have been back by now—7-Eleven was a five-minute spin around the corner, and at this time of night, traffic was nonexistent. Twenty minutes had elapsed since he’d left on a mission. She closed her eyes and dropped the flowers on the coffee table and set the bottle of bubbly down very slowly. He saw them, had to, but didn’t understand, and all she had was his work number—and he was definitely not there.

Jocelyn flopped down on the sofa and grabbed the phone. Just as she suspected, her girlfriends’ voice mail messages prattled on. Apology after apology filled her ear, but she wasn’t listening. Jacqui was having a postdate pity party—things didn’t go well when the guy didn’t call the next morning. Jocelyn skipped to the next message. Freddie was having an emotional meltdown because—the guy didn’t call the next day. Jocelyn sighed and fast-forwarded. Tina hadn’t called, which meant maybe one of her girls had gotten lucky. Her mother’s voice felt like fingernails down a blackboard, but for some unknown reason, she felt like calling her mother back.

She stopped the message retrieval, knowing that she’d only hear the professor’s forlorn voice, maybe a panting attorney, and her last girlfriend, who was still out in the wind. As she dialed her mother’s number, it annoyed her no end that not one of her friends had heard her very real SOS, acknowledged her pamper-party blues—except to say that, in hindsight, they should have come there, given the circumstances of their dates. That wasn’t the point! They should have honored the friendship, and come regardless.

The only quirky silver lining to the whole cloudy fiasco had been meeting Raymond Mayfield. But now even he was history. The rest of the messages could wait till morning, or maybe even until she came home from work. They’d made
her
wait, so now
they
could wait. By the time she connected with her mother’s voice, Jocelyn was grinding her teeth.

“The flowers were beautiful, honey,” her mother cooed. “You always remember.”

“I love you, Mom,” she said, staring out the window, waiting for the familiar turn of conversation.

“When I didn’t hear from you last night, I got hopeful,” her mother said, singsonging the word
hopeful.

“It was a wild night, Ma. What can I tell you?”

There was a pause. Jocelyn sighed. She hadn’t meant her tone to sound so acidic, but her mind and body were still trying to process significant disappointment, and her mom was getting on her last nerve.

“Oh, well, that’s a very different story than you normally tell me,” her mother said, her voice containing a mixture of curiosity and admonishment. “I hope he treats you nice and with respect, and showed you—”

“Here’s the details,” Jocelyn said, cutting her mother off as she stood and walked with the telephone. “I met him at a Valentine’s Day party, but have known him a long time—almost three years. Last night I got a mink coat, the next day a dozen roses, was taken to lunch at an expensive restaurant, and then to dinner tonight. He came back here for coffee, but left like a gentleman.”

“What!” her mother shrieked excitedly. “What does he do for a living?”

“He’s a professor, and a man with a law degree, and works downtown as a detective hunting drug dealers. He’s tall, dark, and very, very handsome. He has a baritone voice that runs all through me. But I haven’t been to bed with him. He’s kind, considerate, and respectful, and wears a gun to his job. Can you deal with that, Mom?”

“Oh dear Lord, child! Marry that man!”

Jocelyn chuckled and shook her head. The blend of three staved off her mother’s probing Inquisition. “He just left—I have to go lie down before I fall down. My virtue is intact, but my mind is blown, okay? I just wanted to call to say I love you, and so you wouldn’t worry. But I really can’t talk about this anymore right now, all right?”

“Oh, baby, I understand,” her mother cooed. “You just go on and lie down and rest your mind and your nerves. Make some tea and keep your resolve, and he’ll be back time and again, and will marry you—I promise. That’s just how it happened for me and your father.”

Jocelyn just looked at the telephone.

Jocelyn walked into the job so mean and so irritable that she barely even muttered
good morning
to Gail. She hadn’t slept a wink, had tossed and turned all night over a man who was definitely gone for good. Stupid! The only thing that made up for it was a devilish thing she couldn’t resist doing. It was a childish prank, bad form, but they all got on her nerves.

So God would just have to forgive her for e-mailing Professor Bryant a nice picture of Jacqui. And Jacqui would just have to forgive her for sending a 2
A
.
M
. message with a handsome professor’s pic from a campus event along with some sage insight into the man’s character…just like Freddie would have to just give her a friendship pass on the insanity that had attacked her brain when she sent a photo of a fine attorney off his Web site to her. Sending Freddie’s pic to him seemed like a good thing to do at the time, too. But now that it was morning, it was ridiculous. All she knew was, she wanted all these drama kings and queens off her phone, out of her hair, and to back off. Even her mom…especially her mom.

“Whooo-weee!” Gail whispered and gave Jocelyn the eye as she passed her desk. “Look what the cat dragged in. Gurl, you look fried.”

“I’m beat. Don’t start.”

“He rocked your world good again, didn’t he?”

Jocelyn let her breath out hard and began walking.

“Don’t you want your flowers, though?”

“No,” Jocelyn said, glancing at the huge spray of orchids, irises, and exotic ferns.

Gail was on her feet. “Chile, are you nuts? Read this card!”

Jocelyn had to laugh, even through her evilness. There was something about Gail that just radiated mischievous sunshine. “Tell me what’s in my card that you’ve already opened, then.”

“Listen,” Gail said in a conspiratorial tone. “This one’s got it bad. It says, ‘Dear Jocelyn, Thank you for the best time I’ve had in years. I’m sorry about what happened. Tried to call, but understand why you might not want to talk. I couldn’t help it. I had to leave after things came up so fast and messed up our flow. I’ll make it up to you tonight, if you’ll let me. We’ll start over and take it slow. I’ll bring coffee for the morning, if you still want me to.’”

Jocelyn stood very, very still.

“Gurl,” Gail said, coming in close and squeezing her arm and talking under her breath a mile a minute. “You cannot blame the man for getting overly passionate and having a premature ejaculation after you whipped the wild thing down on him and blew his mind! Take it as a compliment, especially when he sends flowers the next day to apologize!” She looked over her shoulder as though a SWAT team was about to barge into their conversation. “Call the man and be nice!”

Jocelyn’s hand covered her mouth. She nodded without explaining the confusion to Gail and raced for her desk. Her headset was on before her boss got to her desk. She nodded at Margaret and prayed she’d simply pass by. The other ladies were giving her thumbs-up from behind gray, padded panels. Her fingers were speed-dialing without the aid of technology. She listened intently to the messages on her home phone and closed her eyes. He’d called!

Raymond paced behind his desk like a caged tiger. He had to get out from this processing bull and go down to Seventeenth and Market, or lose his mind. She hadn’t called. Hadn’t acknowledged the flowers. Criminals were in lockup, but he was the one who felt caged.

“You all right, man?” Raul asked, holding two cups of coffee. “Maybe you’d better switch to orange juice in the mornings.”

Ray stared at the cup of abandoned java on the edge of his desk…Everything reminded him of her. Coffee…extra sweet, a dash of cream. “Man, is Cap done with us yet? I mean, I have to run an errand.”

His partner just looked at him. “You know the drill. Probably won’t be done with the initial processing till noon, then we have to powwow with the DA, and—”

“Yeah, yeah, like about two o’clock, this should be a wrap, right?”

“Brother, you look like—”

“I know what I look like,” Raymond shouted, making heads turn. He mellowed his next response. “I’m just tired, haven’t slept all night. We were out in the streets till almost four, and I need some head-space, feel me?”

Raul just smiled. “How about if I handle the paperwork and see if we can get the DA to move up the meeting by a coupla hours?”

When the reception desk buzzed her, Jocelyn pushed away from her desk with a grunt. All attempts to contact Detective Ray Mayfield had rolled over to damnable voice mail. But she kept calling it and hanging up, just to hear his wonderful voice intermittently throughout the morning.

She trudged down the narrow aisle toward the lobby. If Gail had only buzzed, it wasn’t a 9-1-1 male emergency, and probably just one of her girls who had come for lunch to fuss at her or cry in her cappuccino.

But as she neared the entrance to the lobby, she could see the profile on Gail’s face. Her receptionist buddy was looking forward, eyes wide, mouth hanging open. Jocelyn sped up her pace, and then stopped.

A very clean-shaven Raymond Mayfield was standing there, oozing the essence of fine. He’d changed, had on a thick, winter-white, cable knit sweater beneath his brown leather bomber jacket, and charcoal slacks with a crease in them so sharp it could have cut a sister. She could catch the faint drift of an expensive men’s cologne from where she stood, and had to fight with her knees, willing them not to buckle. Under his arm was a large, oblong white box that said
roses
, loud and clear. Serious florist roses, not from the stand I just happened to pass by, roses. He wasn’t wearing a weapon, either.

“I, uh, didn’t know if you had plans for lunch, and shouldn’t have presumed,” he said quietly, “but things got messed up, and was wondering, even if you didn’t have time for a full lunch, maybe you’d put these in some water and have coffee with me?” His eyes held hers for a moment, and then he looked at the flowers that had not been collected from the reception desk. “But I can’t blame you if you don’t want to,” he said, carefully sliding the box of roses onto the receptionist’s desk.

“Oh, she’s going to lunch,” Gail said, jumping into the middle of things. “These were only left up here because our cubes in the back aren’t big enough to properly display them, hon. I was enjoying them till she took them home, but she needs a ride home to take all these beautiful flowers with her—the bus ain’t gonna work, maybe you could give her a lift?”

“Gail, please, girl—”

“I’d be happy to take her home,” he said, his eyes holding Jocelyn for ransom. “Any time she wants to go.”

Gail shook her head. “Chile, get your coat. I got Margaret covered.”

This time, Jocelyn didn’t argue. She got her coat, said nary a word, and kept walking until she was by Raymond’s side. He didn’t say a word as he opened the door for her and pressed the elevator button. A strong arm slipped around her waist when the door closed. Quiet nestled between them as the elevator filled floor by floor with the lunchtime crowd. She had heard his long messages, each one becoming a little more intense in explanation.

“I got your messages,” he murmured as they exited on the first floor. “Seems things always look one way but are another when it comes to you and me, huh?”

She nodded and smiled as she looked at his navy-blue Crown Victoria that was double-parked haphazardly, in the middle of the day, blocking a lane of traffic on Market Street, flashers on, official business shield in the window. Oh, yeah, this was a 9-1-1 emergency.

“Coffee, my place?” she asked, breathing the question as he opened the door and she slid into the seat.

“Thought you’d never ask, but brought some with me just in case.”

She gripped the oblong box of flowers as her gaze remained fastened beyond the window. Buildings and pedestrians seemed to blur by while he maneuvered his car through the thick midday traffic as though on the way to a crime scene. How could she look at him, really, once she’d spied a sheer plastic drugstore bag on the back seat filled with a can of coffee, a small box of sugar, some Half-n-Half, and a discreetly double-bagged package of condoms? His line of vision was straight ahead—a man on an obvious mission.

By the time he’d pulled into a parking space near her building, she’d almost dented the box from clutching it so tightly. Her voice failed her as he turned in his seat and gazed at her for a moment before speaking. The intensity in his eyes told her what words could never convey. His question left the decision up to her, but his spine-melting gaze didn’t.

“You wanna go for lunch,” he murmured softly, “or coffee?”

She glanced at the package in the backseat. He held his breath.

“Coffee.”

He let out his breath and closed his eyes. “Okay. I brought some.”

His hands were gripping the steering wheel so tightly that all she could do was reach out and cover one of them with a gentle touch. He glanced at her with an expression so pained that it seemed like her touch had burned him.

“You wanna go upstairs so I can put these in water while we wait for the coffee to brew?” Her question came out as a breathless whisper.

He just nodded and turned off the engine and opened his door.

It wasn’t that she was expecting him to round the vehicle and open her door for her or anything; her legs had simply turned to jelly for a moment. However, as he opened the passenger-side door and offered her his hand, just looking up at him, allowing her gaze to lazily travel up his body to his face, produced vertigo. Oh, yeah, she definitely needed to hold onto something. His hand worked…as did the thick arm that instantly threaded around her waist when her feet met the curb.

She wasn’t sure how he did it, but he’d managed to collect his backset parcel, her, and close the door in several deft moves, not letting her break contact with his side. This man was trouble for sure. Her fate was sealed and she was possibly soon to be unemployed—because if he could make moves like that curbside, going back to the office this afternoon was unlikely.

Rather than just melt in full public view of any nosy neighbors, she clutched her flowers and purse to her chest and tried to put one foot in front of the other, and then fumbled at the door for her keys like a maniac.

If she didn’t find her keys in the next five seconds, he was ready to put a shoulder to the apartment building door. Never in his life had a woman made him feel like this. He was trying to be cool, act nonchalant, but the wondrous scent of her poured all over him…just like her smoky eyes were a magnet. The feel of her hugged in close to him created a level of delirium that bordered on the ridiculous. Her soft touch in the car had almost produced a gasp. Jocelyn’s hands felt like satin. He could only imagine what the rest of her felt like.

Trying not to seem too anxious, he stared at her hair as she worked on the locks…had to be velvet. Then she opened the door, temporarily broke the trance, began walking ahead of him, and had him completely hypnotized by her shapely legs and perfect behind sashaying up endless flights of steps ahead of him. Good Lord.

He was tempted to take the stairs two at a time. Throwing her over his shoulder to get to the top and be done with logistics was not beyond him at this point, but he thought better of it. Just one more door…

The moment she stepped over the threshold, he thought he’d pass out. It was the way she’d entered her apartment, backed up a bit, turned to stare at him, dropping the box of roses. He dropped the bag and kick-shut the door behind them.

She started to bend to pick up the fallen flowers and then simply let her purse fall. “You want coff—”

His thumb gently stopped her words. “Yeah,” he said, and then took her mouth. That’s when he lost track of time, but not purpose. He was a goner.

Layers of clothes peeled away, but her sweet, coffee-lacquered mouth never left his. Her buttery skin was the definition of liquid sucrose, and when her hands ran under his sweater, the only acknowledgment he could offer was a deep moan. Coats lay abandoned on the floor. Shoes got kicked off and left idle wherever they fell. He had to break the kiss to get his sweater off, and fought with the decision until he felt her beginning to remove some article of clothing over her head. Only then did he give in to allow his eyes the full feast that his mouth had experienced.

God
Almighty,
coffee never tasted so good…or looked so deep dear, rich-flavor-roasted-to-brown-perfection fine…she couldn’t catch her breath. Never had it had such an adrenaline kick to it either. She was addicted to the substance for life. Forget herbal tea. Yet he seemed just as quietly stunned as she was.

The separation from the kiss had only been seconds. How her clothes got shed was still an unsolved mystery, but she didn’t care…just as long as he didn’t stop kissing her…kept his warm, wonderful touch sending swirls of ecstasy through her. A glance toward the fallen drugstore bag was all it took. As though reading her mind, he’d swept it up, grabbed her by the hand, and was headed toward the room where things could really brew.

A gentle tug pulled her, and somehow she was in the hallway against the wall. Sculpted sinew covered and flattened her. His hot skin burned the length of her. Choked baritone released from his throat, his voice a low rumble of desire eliciting her gasp that became a soft moan…the bedroom seemed so far away. Stumbling together a few feet, they reconnected every two steps. It was a crazy dance of want all the way down the short corridor. The plastic bag hit her side, a deep voice begged apology and made up for it by a slow drag of palm over her hip to cover the offense. Strong, male hands were tangled in her hair, her name tangled on his tongue, muffled by her kiss and her strangled whimper. Jesus, it had been so long, and it had
never
been like this.

Her bed wasn’t even made, but who cared? They fell against it, the contents of the bag strewn amid the jumbled linens. He was her blanket…a hard, hot blanket that slowly slid down her body, finding points along her throat, breasts, and belly that brought tears to her eyes. Passion-heated hands spread her hot thighs, her arch suddenly quenched by a well-placed kiss turned to a maddening suckle. Her eyes crossed beneath her tightly shut lids as one hand frantically patted the bed in search of the illusive box. Coffee was
definitely
ready. “Oh…God…”