Black Ties and Lullabies, page 4
He came to his feet, kicking off his shoes. He unbuckled and unzipped, dropping everything from the waist down, only to catch one foot in the leg of his pants as he tried to pull them off. He lost his balance and hopped on the other foot to his oversized leather sofa, letting out a string of curse words all the way there. He fell onto the sofa and finally jerked off his pants, pausing only to retrieve the condom from his pocket and put it in place. Breathing hard, he turned to see Bernie glaring down at him like an Amazon woman hell-bent on revenge. She still wore her dress, but she’d kicked off her shoes.
And her panties dangled from one fingertip.
With a flick of her wrist, she tossed them aside. She took three hip-swiveling steps forward, smacked her palm against his chest and shoved him to his back on the sofa. In the next breath, she was straddling him, gripping his shoulders as she slid herself along the length of him. Once. Twice.
Then again.
And again.
He sucked in a breath, astonished at the sheer carnality of it, at the unbelievable sensations she was creating. On the next stroke, she shifted her hips and took him inside.
Holy shit.
He closed his eyes with a heavy groan. She rose, almost sliding away from him, only to slam her hips down again. She began a steady rise and fall, slowly picking up the pace until her strokes were hard, fast, and punishing. At the same time her dark-eyed gaze bored into him so completely that she could have pinned him to the sofa with that alone. His entire adult life, the instant he had felt another human being reaching for control over him, he had cut that person off at the knees and done everything in his power to ensure that he or she never tried to run over him again. But right now, with his head swimming in a sea of alcohol and lust, all he wanted was her next ferocious stroke. He remembered earlier in the evening when he’d wondered if there was a woman inside her somewhere.
He wasn’t wondering now.
Then her gaze seemed to lose focus. A crimson flush spread across her chest, then rose to suffuse her cheeks. Still riding him relentlessly, she squeezed her eyes closed and ducked her head, as if she’d forgotten all about him and was lost in sensation. The raw sexuality of her expression, the pressure she was creating, the heat, the friction, the astonishment that it was Bernie on top of him right now, bringing both of them to a place he’d never counted on—all of it was pushing him to the edge so fast it shocked him.
Seconds later, a wave of indescribable pleasure hit him with the force of a battering ram. He gripped her thighs and thrust his hips up off the sofa, driving up into her as she drove down onto him, jerking convulsively as searing pulsations tore through him. Seconds later, Bernie threw her head back, clasping his shoulders with savage force. He knew he’d have bruises in the morning, but he didn’t feel the pain. All he knew was that the woman who usually controlled every move she made was suddenly shuddering like a leaf in a violent wind, a groan of satisfaction ripping from her throat.
Then little by little, the shuddering stopped. She dropped her chin to her chest, her hair clinging to her sweaty temples, her breath coming in short, shallow gasps. Then she raised her head and opened her eyes to look down at him.
For a moment, she seemed lost. Disoriented. Those eyes that spent all day every day narrowed sarcastically slowly widened with bewilderment. Her mouth dropped open slightly, as if she wanted to say something but the words wouldn’t come. It was as if a window had opened just enough for him to catch a fleeting glimpse of the woman inside, and she was as stunned as he was at what had just happened.
And then the telephone rang.
She jerked around to look at the phone, then turned back to him. In the blink of an eye, her expression became hard and impenetrable again. She moved away from him and rose from the sofa, giving her skirt a couple of quick tugs to put it back in place as she walked over to pick up the phone.
He sat up slowly, making out just enough of what she said to know that the danger was over. After she hung up, she turned and walked back across the room, grabbed her shoes, and put them on. She scooped up her panties, stuffed them into her purse, and headed for the door.
“Wait a minute,” he said. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“Anywhere but here.”
“But you’ll need to talk to the police.”
“I no longer work for you.”
“The hell you don’t.”
“I’d have to be willing to take a bullet for you. As of right now, I’d step aside and let the bullets fly.”
“But—”
“I told you I’m done with you. Once and for all.”
Jeremy felt the strangest trickle of desperation. But why did he care if she walked out? He wasn’t completely sure. He only knew that women didn’t walk away from him. He walked away from them.
“So you’re done, are you?” he said.
She unlocked the door. “Completely.”
“I notice you didn’t mind screwing me on your way out the door.”
Bernie froze, then slowly turned back, her expression cold as ice. “You started it, Bridges. I just finished it.”
God, how she’d finished it. He felt as if he’d been hit by a freight train.
“And by the way,” Bernie said, “if you ever get the urge to tell anyone what happened here, I’ll deny it to my dying breath.”
With that, she turned and left the room, closing the door behind her.
Jeremy just sat there, furious that she’d had the nerve to leave. Most of the women he’d been with barely climbed out of bed before they were on the phone to tell their friends they’d screwed a multimillionaire, so Bernie’s reaction stunned him. Then again, in the past half hour, pretty much everything about Bernie had stunned him.
He went to the bathroom. Cleaned up. Yanked on his pants. He knew the cops were out there waiting to talk to him, but he couldn’t seem to focus on that. Instead he went to the bar, anger and irritation still eating away at him. He picked up the bottle of Crown, but instead of pouring a drink, he slammed down the bottle, grabbed the glass, and hurled it across the room. It hit the wall and shattered into a thousand pieces, which did not one blessed thing to make him feel better.
Damn it. Why should he even care what she thought of him? There were dozens of bodyguards in this town who could do everything she could, and without the endless barrage of insults she fired at him. But for some reason, when he imagined a big, nameless guy shadowing him saying, “Yes, sir,” and, “No, sir,” he felt sick inside.
He shouldn’t have pushed her, but he hadn’t been able to stop. From one second to the next, he’d gone from lobbing his usual sarcastic remarks at her to wanting her so badly he’d do anything to have her. What the hell had gotten into him? Whatever it was, it had made him feel helpless and exposed and out of control, which meant he needed to bury it thoroughly and completely so it never saw the light of day again.
When she came back—and she would come back, because money talked—he’d be calling the shots again, and everything would be back to normal.
Chapter 5
Bernie pulled her SUV into a parking space at her apartment complex, glad the day was over. Since early that morning, she’d been on a security detail for a high-profile chef on his whirlwind book-signing tour of the Dallas metroplex. Why his publisher thought he needed security, Bernie didn’t know. Forty-something housewives hoping to get an autograph of the star of their favorite Food Network show didn’t exactly pose a security risk. Boredom set in about the time she picked him and his publicist up at the airport that morning, and it didn’t end until she driving out the north exit of Dallas–Fort Worth airport eight hours later. But Bernie was paid to stay vigilant, and that was exactly how she’d behaved.
The biggest drawback to her assignment today, though, was all the food talk she’d had to endure. Since late morning, even the thought of eating had turned her stomach, the nausea fading in and out, never quite taking hold, but never really going away, either. She felt somewhat better now, but maybe that was only because she was no longer hearing a certain chef repeating his story about going to Osaka and eating whale testicles.
She got out of her car and started up the stairs to her apartment. She put her hand on the iron railing. It shuddered beneath her hand, practically falling out of the wall.
With a muttered curse, she climbed the rest of the stairs, pulling her phone out and hitting speed dial eight. How bad was it to have the manager of her apartment complex on speed dial so she could complain about the latest code violation?
Five rings, no answer. Of course not. The last person Charmin wanted to talk to was Bernie.
Without a doubt, Charmin Brubaker was the most unpleasant, unmotivated, unlikable person Bernie had ever met. She spent a good portion of her day on the Internet playing Mafia Wars on Facebook. She had permanent orange Cheetos stains on her fingers. And whenever a tenant requested something, she went out of her way to “lose” the order three or four times before finally doing something about it. And since the owner, Harvey Farnsworth, was a tightwad who didn’t mind letting costly repairs slide, Charmin’s incompetence didn’t bother him in the least. As long as she kept the occupancy rate up and the delinquency rate down, she could run a prostitution ring for all he cared.
Charmin had successfully browbeaten most of the tenants until nobody wanted to go head to head with her. Bernie had no such fear. If there was one thing she hated, it was seeing somebody like Charmin screw people who couldn’t help themselves. Evidently that was the kind of person you turned into when your mother named you after toilet paper.
Bernie reached the landing in front of her apartment just as she heard the beep to leave a message. “Charmin. This is Bernie Hogan. I want these railings fixed. The one by my apartment, and the ones in buildings five and nine, too. If you don’t fix them, I’m reporting you to the city. Again. Old people live here, Charmin. They need those railings! Do you hear me? Now, fix them!”
With an angry huff, she disconnected the call, shoved her phone in her pocket, and stuck her key into her door.
“Hey! Who you calling old?”
Bernie spun around to see Ruby Wilson standing in her doorway, a Marlboro hanging out of her mouth and her gnarled fingers wrapped around a bottle of Bud. A Hawaiian shirt was stuffed inside the stretchy waistband of her denim pants, which were pulled up under her breasts. She had a face that looked like a relief map of Appalachia, and every time a puff of cigarette smoke wafted past it, a dozen more skin cells gave up the ghost.
“Ruby. You’re eighty-two. Most people think that’s old.”
“Yeah? Well, you’re almost forty. Some people think that’s old.”
“Okay, then,” Bernie said. “We’re both old. And we both need that railing fixed.”
Ruby took a long drag off her cigarette. “That Charmin’s a real bitch. Wish I knew how to do one of them evil eyes, or stick a voodoo doll, or something. That’d teach her.”
No, if Ruby fell and broke a hip and sued, that’d teach her.
“I’ll follow up with her tomorrow,” Bernie said. “In the meantime, don’t touch that railing.”
Ruby sighed. “Guess I’ll have to build in an extra ten minutes just to get down the stairs.”
“Just be careful, okay?”
Ruby nodded. “Goin’ to the Choctaw on the bus tomorrow with my girls. If you’re not workin’, why don’t you come along?”
Oh, yeah. Sounded like a blast. Going to a casino and plugging nickel slots with three chain-smoking senior citizens. Ruby had won a five-hundred-dollar jackpot on her sixty-seventh birthday, and she’d had the once-a-month habit ever since.
“No, thanks,” Bernie said, her stomach still upset enough that an hour-long bus ride on the Casino Express sounded like torture. “I’m sticking close to home tomorrow.”
“Okay. Holler if you change your mind.”
Bernie went inside her apartment, found a bottle of Pepto-Bismol, and downed a dose. She took a deep breath. Let it out slowly. The queasiness was starting to subside, so it probably wasn’t the flu, which was a very good thing. She had a week-long assignment starting on Monday. She hadn’t missed a day of work in years, and she wanted to keep that record clean, because she’d never taken kindly to being thought of as the weaker sex. Men accepted any kind of sickness from other men—flu, cold, migraine, hangover, bronchitis, poison ivy, blue balls, anything—but the moment a woman was sidelined, it was because of female problems. She could have a flesh-eating bacteria that had consumed one leg and was starting on the other one, and they’d still say she hadn’t shown up that morning because Aunt Flo had paid her a visit.
She went to her fridge and grabbed a bottle of Gatorade to drink as she flipped through her mail. Electric bill. Postcard with a coupon for an oil change and lube. Solicitation from a local real estate agent. Weekly grocery ads.
Wait. A copy of Home & Hearth? Where had that come from?
She checked the mailing label, figuring the mailman had gotten it wrong. Nope. There it was. Her name and address, as if she’d subscribed. She thumbed through the magazine, saw the headlines, and realized she didn’t need to read the articles to know the answers.
“Secrets to an Always-Clean House.” Ajax, a sponge, and elbow grease.
“Real-Life Exercise Strategies That Work.” Weightlifting, kickboxing class, and five-mile runs.
“Dinner in Under Ten Minutes.” Lean Cuisine in the microwave.
She was sure this magazine had good advice for most women. She’d just never been like most women.
Suddenly her phone rang. She looked at the caller ID, and when she saw her cousin Billy’s name, her stomach felt even sicker than before. She waited until he left a message, then picked it up.
“Hey, Bernie, it’s Billy. I need your help.”
Bernie sighed. Of course he did.
“I applied for a job, and I need a reference. They’ll be calling you tomorrow. Can you tell them I’m a good guy? Hard worker, and all that?”
Translation: Will you lie for me?
“Now, I swear it won’t be like my last job at the video game store. That wasn’t my fault. My boss was a real bastard who had it in for me. No matter what he said, I did not steal that copy of Assassin’s Creed. Somebody must have put it in my backpack. So this time it’ll be different. I swear. It’s a job at an auto parts store. You know I love cars. This is my dream job, Bernie. You have to help me.”
Dream job? Not likely. Her cousin Billy’s dream job didn’t exist, unless there was an opening somewhere for a TV-watching, pot-smoking, freeloading deadbeat.
So what was she supposed to do this time? If she told them he’d be a good employee, she’d be lying through her teeth. If she didn’t, he might not get the job, and within a few weeks, he’d be on her doorstep asking for money.
She was damned if she did, damned if she didn’t.
She just wanted him to take care of himself. That was all. Just get a decent job and hold on to it. Was that really too much to ask?
She heard a knock at her door. With a heavy sigh, she went to answer it. Looking out the peephole, she saw her mother. She was wearing her mint green dress and carrying a small white box, which meant she’d come from some church function and Bernie was going to have to hear all about it. She loved her mother, but sometimes it got to be too much.
Bernie opened the door, and Eleanor Hogan strode inside. “When I was getting out of my car,” she said, “I saw a man lurking by the stairs with a bunch of little silver rings in his eyebrow. Just one eyebrow. Would you tell me the purpose of that? Five rings in one eyebrow and none in the other?”
“So you’d rather see him put five in each eyebrow?”
“Heavens, no. But at least that would make sense. And that odd little woman across the way was looking at me through the window as I was coming up the stairs.”
“Ruby is harmless.”
“I’m sure she’s very nice,” Eleanor said. “But she was smoking and drinking, of all things. At her age. That can’t possibly be good for her.”
“Wait a minute,” Bernie said, suddenly remembering. “The stairs. You have to be careful going back down, Mom. That railing is broken.”
“Everything’s broken around here. This isn’t a decent place for a woman to live. If I were you—” All at once Eleanor stopped short and stared at Bernie, her brow furrowed with worry. “Bernadette? What’s wrong? You’re white as a ghost. Are you sick?”
“No. Of course not. I’m fine.”
“There’s Pepto-Bismol on your kitchen counter. Do you have stomach problems? Nausea? Gas?”
Bernie sighed. “I really don’t want to discuss my gastrointestinal system with you, Mom.”
Eleanor put her hand against Bernie’s forehead. “Hmm. No fever. You didn’t eat at that new restaurant on Branson Street, did you? Sushi is unnatural. Only grizzly bears should eat raw fish.”
“No, I didn’t eat sushi. I’m fine now. The Pepto Bismol did the trick.”
“You’re still pale.”
“That’s because the Pepto-Bismol pink hasn’t made its way to my face yet.”
Eleanor looked unconvinced. “Okay. Just be careful. Get plenty of rest. So many terrible things are going around this season.” Then she spied the copy of Home & Hearth on the counter between Bernie’s kitchen and dining room. She set down her purse and the white box and picked it up. “Oh, how nice! You’ve started getting the magazine. It was only an extra eight dollars to give a gift subscription when I renewed mine. I couldn’t turn down a bargain like that.”
Bernie heaved a silent sigh. She should have known.
In recent years, her mother had begun to recognize the futility of overtly begging her daughter to marry and procreate, so her game plan had shifted to subtle hints. Bernie couldn’t imagine that her mother actually believed she’d sit down with a Home & Hearth, read an article or two, slap her forehead, and say How could I have been so blind? This is the life I want! But that was her mother. She stuck to hope like gum to a tennis shoe.
“Did I tell you Katherine’s daughter Susan was getting married at the church this afternoon?” Eleanor said. “I wouldn’t have chosen yellow Gerbera daisies for a bridal bouquet, but it was lovely just the same.”
