Weddings Can Be Murder (5 page)

“Because it hurt my eyes.”

It had hurt his eyes, too. Not the light, but seeing her. His mind had photographed the image of her standing there looking a lot scared and even more beautiful. And seeing a scared, beautiful woman had thrown his want-to-be-a-hero instinct into high gear. Ah, but it had been that instinct that had gotten him so deeply in trouble with Amy.

He inhaled and let it out slowly as Katie Ray’s image flashed in his mind again. He couldn’t recall exactly what she’d been wearing or what color it was, but damn, if he couldn’t recall that the body beneath her clothes was curvy in all the right places. So curvy that in that flicker
of a second, he’d re-dressed her in a few of Victoria’s little outfits. The green, sheer one. Or blue, to match her eyes.

Not that the color of her outfit or her eyes mattered. It was the color of her hair that did him in. And it was long. God, he loved long, red hair. Especially the dark auburn shade. He remembered its texture. Silky soft, sweeping down her back. So exquisite it’d taken major willpower not to run his hands through it. To bury his nose in the strands and breathe.

He shook his head to clear the images from his mind. “Fine,” he growled. “Leave it off for a minute, but then it’s got to come back on.”

He had to find a way out of here. No way in hell did he want to spend the next thirty-six hours with a soft-feeling, sweet-smelling female who’d already managed to get under his skin. One who evoked his want-to-be-a-hero instinct.

Why the hell had he told her about his mother? Okay, he knew why. Because he’d heard a familiar pang of grief in her voice. Because…their throwing-up adventure had thrown him back to the chemo days.

You don’t have to come in here
, his mom would say. But he hadn’t been able to stay away…not when he knew she needed him. So they would sit on the john floor, take turns throwing up and laughing about it. Fuck, it hurt to remember. So he pushed those thoughts back into the darkness where they belonged. Thoughts of Red stormed in and took their place. Of how she’d smelled, of how soft—

He blamed this on the be-a-gentleman gene that he’d inherited from his dad—the one he wished he could get surgically removed.

Not that the gentleman gene was as dangerous as the hero instinct. He’d wanted to be Amy’s hero. To save her. He’d failed. Just as he’d failed to save his mom.

No! He’d already shut down those thoughts.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

“Ready for what?” Her soft reply whispered over him. Damn, even her voice made his jeans feel tight. Of course, it probably wasn’t just her, but the fact that he hadn’t buried himself inside a woman in over a year. Damn he missed that, too.

“Turn the light back on, Red.”

Les smiled up at her hero of the hour. “I appreciate your getting rid of him.”

“My plea sure.” His bedroom eyes twinkled.

Plea sure.
Remember that?
She did remember…vaguely.

“I’m Leslie.” She extended her hand. His warm palm melted against hers, and she saw a flash of brightness and heard a big…crash of thunder. Just a storm outside—not emotional fireworks. Then came another lightning flash, but she barely noticed.

She barely noticed that the bar went utterly dark, that the electronic hum of the heater, the TV, and the ovens in the kitchen all stopped. Ah, but she noticed how his palm fit against hers, how his musky, masculine scent filled her lungs. The silence hung, but only for a flicker of a second, because the groans and moans of people wanting their dinner chased it away.

“I think the storm has finally arrived,” Les said, feeling jumpy, not from the weather, not from the darkness, but from a closeness and sexual awareness she hadn’t felt in ages.

“Yeah.” The man’s voice rang deep, husky, close. He continued to hold her hand. “Are you scared of storms?”

“No.” The whisper of his breath caressed her cheek.

“Are you sure?” His thumb passed over the back of her hand. “Because you’re trembling.”

Air caught in her throat. His touch, so simple, sent messages throughout her body. Messages that said she’d gone too long without feeling this. Feeling alive.

“Maybe I’m a little scared,” she lied. Or was it a lie? What was the emotion dancing in her stomach if it wasn’t fear? And just what was she afraid of now?

The lights flickered back on. The crowd in the restaurant cheered and the magic of the moment evaporated like a drop of water on a hot, sunbaked sidewalk. But in spite of the cold and storm outside, Les felt hot. Not sexually hot. Okay, maybe she did feel that way a little. But mostly the heat was like…like she stood too close to a flame. And who wanted to get burned?

The hero holding her hand pulled away. Almost too fast. Les tucked her hand in her lap and the diamond ring between her breasts felt colder than before.

She glanced at her watch and fiddled with the band. Five thirty. Where was Katie? She didn’t look up but felt the man staring. “My friend’s late.”

“Mine, too,” he said, and just like that he poked his nose back into the paper. Something about his fast retreat told her that, while they might have had a moment, even a magical one, he wasn’t interested in taking it any further. And while she hated admitting it, further didn’t interest her, either.

“Thanks again.” She butt-scooted off the chair and went to wait in the crowded restaurant. Crowded—lots of people, where she waited alone, where she realized how lonely she really felt.

After trying to call Katie and getting no answer, Les wondered if she should just go to Katie’s house and wait. It wasn’t like her to be late. Katie was…well, a bit of a perfectionist. Not that she expected so much from other people, but just from herself.

A trickle of uneasiness slid down her spine.

“Where are you, Katie?”

Katie hit the switch and the light flooded the room again. She blinked. Carl blinked. They stared at each other like strangers. And they were strangers, but not really.

For the last—she checked her watch—hour, they’d been together in the dark. She’d hit him, scratched him, kicked him. They’d shared memories about the death of a parent, or in her case, parents. And, oh yeah, they’d thrown up together. Not that it meant anything, but oddly, it did. Les was the only other person alive who even knew about her nervous-stomach situation.

Funny how being trapped in the dark with a stranger could seem so, well, intimate. She felt herself blush.

The silence grew awkward. Carl’s gaze shifted around the room. “Pay dirt!”

“What?” Katie folded her arms over her chest, hoping to snatch a bit of warmth.

“There’s a door behind this stack of boxes.” He pushed the stack away far enough for him to slip between them and the wall. The sound of a doorknob turning filled the room.

“Is it locked?” Katie moved in and peered through the crack. What she saw made her take a quick step back. Carl held a gun in his hands.

“I didn’t know you had a gun,” she accused, remembering the feel of that cold metal against her ear earlier.

His brown-gold eyes cut to her. “You’re not going to freak out on me again, are you?”

“I didn’t ‘freak out.’” The Rays didn’t freak.

“Yeah?” He touched his scratched face. “How did I get these?”

Well, if they did freak, they apologized
. “I already said I was sorry.”

“Yeah, you did. Go stand over there.” His voice lowered, and her heart skipped a beat.

“Why? Did you hear something?” Her words seemed to ring too loud. While the room rang too quiet.

“Just do it.” He breathed the words like an order.

“You’re a tad bossy,” she muttered, but moved back. Hands clenched, she listened. The click of a knob filled the silence. The sound of a metal door squeaking open came next. Followed by the sound of footsteps—Carl’s footsteps. His footsteps walking away, while her size sevens were left behind. Alone. And alone sucked. Bossy or not, she wanted him back.

“Carl?” she whispered.

Carl didn’t answer.

From his car, parked down the street, Tabitha’s murderer stared at the dark house and remembered two people were still in there. Panic started to drum through his chest. Closing his eyes, he banged his head on the steering wheel. What should he do? What should he do? If they had cell phones, the police would already have arrived. Then again, he remembered Tabitha complaining about no cell phone service on her block. Maybe they were really trapped. He still needed to take care of them. But maybe not just now.

He had time. Time to think straight. Time so he could focus. Time to make the laughing stop, because the laughing always messed with his thoughts and he didn’t want to make a mistake. He couldn’t make a mistake.

Time to check on his next bride. He picked up his phone and dialed her cell number. It rang…and rang twice more before going over to voice mail. He punched in her home number.

No one was there, either. Where was she? Her answering machine picked up. “Hi, you’ve reached Katie. I’m sorry I’m not home right now, but leave a message and I’ll get back to you.”

Hearing her voice made him remember seeing her for the first time. She had sat across his desk and smiled at
him so prettily. Just remembering made his body tighten with need. Need to see her in her dress, to see the fear in her eyes, to control her, to hear her cry and beg him to forgive her.

Did he have time?

Les checked the time again. Katie was more than an hour late. Where was she? She tried Katie’s home phone again. No answer. Snagging her purse, she walked out of the restaurant, giving the man still waiting at the bar a quick glance.

Then, remembering Katie’s key, she checked her pocket to make sure she hadn’t lost it. It was still there. Pulling her jacket closer, she walked out of the restaurant and took off for her car.

“Carl?” Katie called out his name again and held her breath and waited, praying she wouldn’t hear shots being fired or him screaming out. She counted to ten and then couldn’t stand it anymore. “Carl?” She called louder.

“Yeah.” Footsteps echoed. “Good news. Bad news.” He walked out from the small opening between the boxes and the wall.

“What?” she asked, and noticed he’d put away the gun.

“The good news is, if you have to p…use the bathroom, you can go. The sink’s not working but the toilet is. Bad news is there isn’t a way out.”

“Not even a window?” She wrapped her arms around herself to ward off another chill. That’s when she noticed all he wore was a black, short-sleeved polo shirt and jeans. He had to be cold.

“Afraid not.” He ran his hand across his chin, where his five o’clock shadow seemed to have gotten a couple hours’ head start. A rasping sound filled the room.

“So we’re stuck in here,” she muttered, and had one of those I’m-going-to-cry moments. Of course, she wasn’t
really going to cry. Or at least she was going to try really hard not to.

He studied her. “I’m not giving up yet.”

“Aren’t you cold?” Her words created a puff of vapor.

“Where’s my coat?” He looked at her with a pinched brow.

Turning around, she grabbed his coat from the floor and handed it to him.

“Not for me. Put it on. You’re freezing.”

“I’m not that cold,” she lied.

His gaze lowered to her breasts. “Could have fooled me.”

Vaguely remembering he’d already pointed this out, she went on instant nipple alert and pulled the ends of her sweater over her breasts. “That’s rude.”

“But true.” He took the jacket from her. “A damn shame your wedding planner was too cheap to heat the whole house.”

“Probably would cost a fortune to heat all of it,” Katie defended Tabitha because…because it felt wrong not to.

With the coat still in his hands, he stepped closer. But instead of donning the coat himself, he slung it over her shoulders and gave it a quick tug to cover her breasts.

She stood there trying to decide whether she should argue about accepting it. A firm believer in picking her battles, she decided this wasn’t worthy. The fact that the jacket felt so good had nothing to do with it, either. Well, almost nothing. She snuggled deeper into the coat’s warmth and tried not to think about how good that masculine warmth had felt to lean against.

Carl walked over to the door that led to the hall and studied the doorknob. Kneeling, he checked out the lower door hinges.

“If I had the right tools, I might be able to take the damn thing apart.” He glanced over his shoulder at her.

She had slipped her arms into his jacket and it now hung open. Noticing his gaze fall to her breasts, she zipped it up.

“Thank you,” he muttered, and refocused on the door.

“You know,” she said, “we might find some tools in these boxes.” And something to wear, so he would wear his coat. At least then she wouldn’t have to smell him all around her. “We should go through them.”

Her attention shifted to him again. Still kneeling, with his back to her, he wore his dark brown hair combed straight back. It was thick and hung to the back of his collar, the edges flipping up. His shoulders were wide and his torso tapered into a thinner waist.

He glanced up and his thick eyebrows arched. “Good idea, Red.”

Holy Monet
. He really did look like Banderas. Enough like him that the sexual fantasies Katie had woven over the years started playing again in her mind. His taking his shirt off. His taking her shirt off. His doing more than looking at her breasts. His hands…his mouth…

His brows pinched. “You okay?”

“Yes. Why?” she managed to squeak out.

“You got a really strange look on your face. You’re not going to puke again, are you?”

“No.” Oh, great. So her turned-on look resembled a throw-up look. Not what any girl really wanted to know. Guilt and embarrassment had her nipping at her bottom lip.

He continued to study her. “Let’s do it.”

“Do what?” she asked, still chasing a few of those sexual images from her mind.

“Search the boxes. I’ll unstack. You start going through them.”

While waiting for him to hand her the first box, she struggled to find a safe mental, and verbal, topic. Her gaze caught on the prisonlike walls. “Who would build a house like this?”

“He was a nut job—thought the government was out to get him, built it to keep people out.”

“How do you know?”

“I grew up close to here. Rumor was the place was haunted.”

She glanced at him again. “Oh, that makes me feel good.”

“Scared of ghosts?” He set a box by her feet and smiled. His smile was near perfect.

“Ghosts, I can handle. Real people scare me.” Along with sexy men who had her forgetting she was engaged. That in less than two weeks—Right then her stomach soured. She almost suggested he look at her face again so he might know one look from the other.

“Me, too,” he said.

“It looks like a prison on the inside.”

“Maybe he thought he might have to take prisoners.”

“I can’t believe Tabitha likes,
liked
this place.” Her breath hitched. She’d rather think about sexy smiles than remember that Tabitha was dead. That the wedding planner’s body lay out there covered in blood. That the guy who did it might still be out there.

“Here, start on this box,” he said, as if he understood her situation. He scooted the box with his foot.

Katie got down on her knees and opened it. She found a few silk plants and some hand-painted ceramic planters. While she repacked the items, Carl pulled down the other boxes.

Katie’s mind went back to Tabitha and she felt guilty for being upset with the woman right before, before…
Think about the good stuff
. Closing her eyes, she remembered how Tabitha always lit up when she saw a piece of art that she loved.

She opened her eyes and sensed Carl looking at her.

“You okay?” Concern flickered in his golden brown gaze.

“Yeah.” She felt caught by his regard. Warmed by it. And at this room’s temperature, it took a lot to be warmed.

He nodded. “What do you do for a living, Red?”

“I manage an art gallery in Houston.”

“Are you an artist, too?” He set another box down.

“No.” The one-word answer came too quickly, too boldly.

He chuckled. “So what kind of art do you do?”

She frowned. “I tried to paint, but I sucked at it.”

“Well, I see a lot of sucky paintings in museums. Once, at a street fair in Mexico, they had an elephant doing paintings. He wasn’t perfect, mind you, but good enough that I actually bought one.”

“So you’re a true connoisseur, are you?” she asked.

“I know what I like.” His gaze roamed her.

His blatant innuendo had her feeling jittery. But a part of her sang.
Antonio likes me. He really likes me
. Not that it changed anything, because she loved Joe. She did. Besides, if she allowed herself to get anything close to turned on, he would probably accuse her of preparing to throw up.