Liar, Liar, Heart's Desire Read online

  “If what?”

  “If he could have a . . . a three-way.” The last came out as a whisper.

  His mouth opened, but words failed him. Not that he didn’t have questions. He just didn’t know which one to ask first. He finally settled for, “So that’s the real reason they were there.”

  Cleo nodded. “Except Jada didn’t want to.”

  “Ah, hell. Did she tell Annaliese that?”

  “Yes. But probably not very forcefully. Annaliese told her not to sweat it. Everything would be okay. Jada felt guilty enough about gambling the money away that she agreed.” Cleo rushed on as though afraid she wouldn’t get the chance to explain if she didn’t. “You have to understand. Annaliese doesn’t think sex is a big deal.”

  “Yeah, I kinda got that already.” And until that moment, he’d kind of admired that about her.

  “She doesn’t understand why people make such a fuss about it.”

  Neither did he as long as they were consenting adults, but it sounded as though Jada had consented under pressure.

  “And Jada, well, sometimes, you have to be a mind reader with her,” Cleo said. “Annaliese is usually really good at it. If she’s not distracted.”

  He felt for Cleo. She was trying so hard to find a way to justify her mother’s actions.

  “Had they ever done anything like that before?”

  Cleo rubbed her forehead. “I’m not sure. Jada mentioned a woman’s name, but I was afraid to push too hard.”

  He drew a deep breath and expelled it through his nose. “So they had a threesome with Sebastian.”

  “No.”

  He hiked an eyebrow.

  “Jada usually does what Annaliese tells her to, but . . . she really didn’t want to this time, so she—” Cleo swallowed hard. Every time the drugs in Sebastian’s system had come up, she’d done her damnedest to ignore that image of her mother with the prescription bottle in her hand. Fat lot of good that had done her. “She filched Annaliese’s muscle relaxers and mixed some in Sebastian’s drink. He almost caught her doctoring it. That’s when she dropped the prescription bottle, and it rolled under the bed.” And that was undoubtedly the damning evidence the DA’s office had hinted to Danny Bonner about.

  Alec swiped his hand across his jaw. That explained why Sebastian had suddenly gotten “sloppy drunk.” And why it had been so easy for someone to drown him in his tub.

  For a few seconds, he thought Annaliese’s problems were solved. Jada could alibi her. Then he realized how that would play out. The DA would go after Jada hard, trying to punch holes in her story. She would get confused. Her story would start to sound phony. They’d probably throw her in the cell with Annaliese. He lifted his eyes to meet Cleo’s and saw the same conclusion reflected there. “No one’s going to believe they didn’t drown him.”

  “I know,” she said in a flat voice.

  “As soon as they find out Annaliese owed him money, it’s going to look like they didn’t want to pay him off.”

  “I know.”

  He lifted his head and met Cleo’s gaze. “They’ll get life in prison.”

  “I can’t let that happen.”

  “How do you plan to stop it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  They needed a plan, but they were already talking to everyone they could who was connected to Sebastian. Alec couldn’t think of anything more they could do.

  He mentally reviewed everything Cleo had just told him. Twice. Something was wrong with the story. He had to think it through again before he realized what it was. “Where did Jada get the idea to drug Sebastian?”

  Cleo looked at him blankly. “I don’t know.” She sat up straighter. “But you’re right. That doesn’t sound like something she’d come up with on her own.” She got up and walked into the living room.

  Alec debated whether he should follow or not. He wanted to, but he didn’t want Jada to feel as though they were ganging up on her.

  ~***~

  In barely a minute, Cleo was back. She sat back down at the kitchen bar and said in hardly more than a whisper, “She says Willa told her to do it.”

  “Willa? Are you sure?”

  “That’s what she said.”

  “But if Willa told her that, then . . .”

  “She knew about the threesome.” Cleo compressed her lips into a thin line. She felt sick about how much she’d trusted Willa.

  “Maybe.”

  “What do you mean maybe? When’s the last time you had a conversation about how to slip someone a Mickey?”

  “Probably the last time a news story broke about someone getting roofie raped. Come on, Cleo. Hang on to your objectivity. Maybe Jada told her about the threesome, but maybe she didn’t. Maybe she was fishing for ideas.”

  “She’s not that devious.”

  “No, not like we can be. She’s childlike. Haven’t you ever noticed how kids can skip from topic to topic with a logic that makes no sense to adults?”

  “No, I’ve never noticed that.”

  “You haven’t spent much time around kids then. Trust me. I have nieces and nephews. Their minds are a maze.”

  Maybe he was right. Maybe Willa hadn’t mentioned this because she didn’t see the connection. Cleo badly wanted that to be true, but she couldn’t quite accept it on faith the way Alec seemed to. “I still need to talk to Willa.”

  “I’m not saying you shouldn’t. Just figure out how to ask without tipping your hand.”

  They looked at each other for several long moments.

  “You’re right, but I can’t wait on this.” Cleo reached for her phone and dialed Willa.

  Alec stood and moved behind her. He put his hands on her shoulders and started to knead.

  His hands were magic. They had to be because, somehow, as they kneaded the muscles in her shoulders and neck—muscles she hadn’t even realized were tight as steel bands—they began to loosen.

  The call rang through to Willa’s voicemail. Cleo left a message asking Willa to call her back then laid the phone on the counter and leaned back into Alec’s hard chest. As good as the massage felt, she didn’t feel relaxed. Maybe relaxed was too much to ask given the circumstances.

  “You need a night off,” he said.

  “We did that last night.”

  “No, you worked on a puzzle while you told me about Sebastian. That wasn’t a night off.”

  “So what do you want to do?”

  “I don’t know. We could watch a movie.”

  Maybe he was right. Too many pieces about the people she’d thought she knew were floating around untethered in her head. If she stopped poking at them, maybe they’d settle down and fall into place. “Okay.”

  “Great. What was the movie you wanted to watch?”

  “I don’t care. You pick something.”

  At his request, she made popcorn while he browsed Annaliese’s DVD collection. As always, the popcorn smelled so much better than it tasted.

  “Oh wow,” he said as she set a big, stainless steel bowl of popcorn on the coffee table. “She has The Haunting. The 1963 version.”

  That’s what she got for letting him choose the movie. “I guess that’s as good as anything.”

  “Don’t you like a good scary movie?”

  “I’m not into blood and guts.”

  “You’re thinking of slasher movies. This is a ghost story. One of the best ever made.”

  Ghosts. What a perfect movie for a tabloid reporter. She almost suggested he could use the movie as research for a story, but she didn’t want to give him ideas.

  As soon as she loaded it, he turned off all the lights but one and sat down, turning so his back was against the arm of the couch. Then he coaxed her into sitting between his outstretched legs, so he could continue the backrub he’d started in the kitchen.

  She pulled the bowl of popcorn into her lap as the opening credits started to roll. “It’s in black and white?” She was already not a fan.

  “It’s an old movie,” h
e said as he reached around her to grab a handful of kernels. He threw them in his mouth then went back to working on the muscles in her neck.

  ~***~

  She had a knotted muscle right where her neck met her shoulder. Cleo’s moan encouraged Alec to dig in, trying to break it loose.

  When she moaned again, he leaned forward, so he could whisper in her ear, “Shh. I can’t hear the movie.”

  “You just want me to watch this because you think I’ll get scared and cling to you.”

  “Scared by a movie? You?” He snorted. “That’ll be the day.” But he liked the idea of her clinging to him.

  His hand brushed her bare upper arms. Her skin was chilled. “You’re freezing.”

  “It is cold in here.”

  He paused the movie as she pushed herself up and went to the thermostat.

  “Sheesh. It’s set at sixty-three.”

  “No wonder you feel like a popsicle.”

  She kicked the thermostat up then disappeared into the bedroom to reappear a minute later clad in sweatpants and a T-shirt that would have been big on him, carrying an afghan over her arm.

  “What are you wearing?” He wasn’t proud of the almost whiney tone in his voice.

  “My new pajamas.”

  He stuck out his lower lip like a pouting child. “I like the nightie you’ve been wearing.”

  “Yeah, well, I like this,” she said as she settled back between his legs and spread the afghan over them both.

  “Meany,” he muttered.

  He caught the ghost of a smile on the corner of her mouth as she turned her head toward the TV. He started kneading her shoulders again and tried to focus on the movie.

  He’d first seen The Haunting when he was fourteen. It had scared the crap out of him though he’d been at an age where he’d have died before he admitted it. He’d seen it a couple of times since and even read the book. He’d been riveted each time.

  But during none of those other experiences had anything as distracting as a hot, warm female been pressed against him. If there had been, he’d never have even noticed the scary scenes.

  He couldn’t help growing gradually hard. Uncomfortably hard, since he wasn’t going to do anything about it. Just as he hadn’t done anything about it since Annaliese’s arrest. The last thing Cleo needed now was him pawing her. What she needed was a friend to hold her and to offer comfort.

  Mierde. This was dangerous territory. When had he stopped seeing her as Cleo with the killer body? A woman he wanted to tup?

  Tup?

  Oh holy hell. Now Nigel’s Britishisms were invading even his dirty thoughts?

  Fuck. A woman he’d wanted to fuck.

  Get back on point, he admonished himself. The issue here was, he had stopped seeing Cleo only as the owner of a hot body and started seeing her as . . . Cleo. A complex, sometimes edgy woman he liked. A lot.

  Which could get awkward when they went back to Denver.

  So he should leave her alone. Put their relationship back on a more professional level. Be a friend to her. It should be easy. Well, relatively. After all, she wasn’t a mystery anymore. He’d never have to think of her as the one that got away. The conquest he could have made but hadn’t. They’d been to bed together. That should be enough.

  Except it didn’t feel like enough. His cock clearly agreed with him because even as he’d logicked his way through the reasons he should back away, it didn’t stand down.

  More than anything, more than his own physical satisfaction, he wanted to touch her. To make her feel good. To make her forget her life was teetering on the brink.

  If he looked at it like that, he could almost convince himself it was a noble cause.

  Chapter 10

  With its open weave, the afghan wasn’t much protection from what felt like subarctic temperatures, but the room was slowly losing its chill, and Alec’s warm hands on Cleo’s neck and shoulders were starting to relax her. When his hands finally gave out, she settled in, leaning back into his chest.

  “Better?” he asked.

  “Mmhm.” She shifted to get closer to the heat he was putting off.

  He grunted.

  “I’m sorry. Am I mashing your delicates?”

  “You’re fine.” But he said it through clenched teeth.

  She shifted again, trying to ensure he had enough room.

  The noise this time was faint, more suppressed moan than grunt. He grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back against him. “Be still. Watch the movie.”

  She laid her head back on his shoulder and tried to focus.

  He was right. The Haunting wasn’t a slasher movie. The beginning was actually a little slow and she almost dozed off, but then spooky things started happening to the characters staying in the creepy old mansion. Cleo shifted onto her side, so she could hide her face against Alec’s chest when it got too scary. He held her close when she did, making her feel warm and protected.

  The third or fourth time she took a dive into his chest, his hands found their way under her T-shirt to stroke her skin. She liked the way his hands felt on her and kept her face buried longer than she needed to.

  When the next scary scene came up, she decided she couldn’t take it any more. She only knew one reliable method to distract a man, so in spite of her earlier promises to herself, she fingered one of the buttons on his shirt.

  Oops.

  Three buttons in, he still hadn’t noticed, so she licked his chest. He jumped so violently she thought they’d levitated off the couch.

  “¡Madre de Dios!”

  She giggled, slid a hand behind his neck, and pulled his face down to hers.

  “Mmm.” His hand slid around and found her breast. After a few moments of kneading—of an entirely different kind than he’d done on her shoulders—his hands slid to her stomach, and he broke the kiss. “That’s nice.”

  “But I shouldn’t interrupt your movie,” Cleo said. She didn’t sound contrite even to herself.

  “I’ve seen it before. I know how it ends.” He lowered his mouth to hers for a long, slow kiss.

  She felt movement against her hip and knew she’d caught more than the attention of his lips.

  His hand slid lower, under the waistband of the sweats. He played with the curls there then slid lower still and brushed against her sweet spot.

  She moaned against his mouth.

  “Just lay your head back and let me make you feel good.” He dragged a finger through the moisture between her legs.

  His touch started soft, dancing close to the place she most wanted him with an occasional foray to flick her piercing. He was good at this, this build up of anticipation.

  And then he spoke softly into her ear. She tensed, expecting the bubble to burst. She’d momentarily forgotten what a Chatty Cathy he could be, and it always pulled her out of the moment, but then she realized he’d spoken in Spanish.

  The time she’d spent south of the border had made her fluent, but that portion of her brain seemed to be offline.

  He spoke several more times as he continued to tease her, his finger circling her hot button. Without the ability to interpret and evaluate the need for a response, his voice, so deep and soft yet sexy and roughened with desire, heightened her awareness of him. She wasn’t having this experience alone. He was there with her. It was intimacy on a level she’d never had before.

  The tip of his fingers found her pleasure center, and her focus contracted.

  His hand stilled. She waited, anticipating his next move. It took forever in coming, and then . . . It was only a twitch, but in exactly the right place. She caught her breath and waited for it to come again. This time it was a steady pressure that lasted . . . not nearly long enough.

  And that’s the way it continued. A moment of pressure followed by a gasp of air. A husky, encouraging voice speaking Spanish in her ear.

  It took a break in the rhythm and Alec whispering, “Shh,” for her to realize she’d heard a sound that didn’t come from him or the
TV. A sliver of light spilled from the bedroom door on the second floor above them.

  Jada was already coming down the stairs. “Why is it so dark in here?”

  The language center of Cleo’s brain was still offline, so she was grateful when Alec said, “It’s atmosphere for the scary movie we’re watching.”

  “Oh, I can’t watch those,” Jada said. “They give me nightmares.”

  “Do you need something?” he asked as Jada reached the bottom of the stairs.

  Marveling at his ability to articulate complete sentences, Cleo struggled to get her brain functioning again.

  “A glass of milk,” Jada said, but she stood and watched the screen.

  Under the cover of the afghan, Alec flexed his finger. Cleo stopped breathing. He did it again, and unexpectedly, she was at the brink of an orgasm. It took every ounce of willpower she had to grasp his forearm, trying to signal he shouldn’t do that, but his arm wasn’t the problem. It was his finger, and she didn’t have control of that as he proved when he did it again.

  She gasped as every muscle in her body tightened, reaching, straining for release.

  Jada moved into the kitchen, and he did it again.

  “Stop,” Cleo whispered, surprised she could form the word. Astonished she could form that word because the very last thing in the world she wanted was for him to stop.

  “Why?” he asked low in her ear.

  “B-because . . . Jada . . .”

  “You’re afraid she’ll know what we’re doing?”

  “Y-y-yes.”

  “And that would bother you?” He flicked her piercing.

  She drew a ragged breath. “Yes.”

  “Why?” He did it again.

  Her body went taut and it took a moment for her to relax enough to say, “W-w-why?”

  “Yeah. She already knows we share a bed. Do you think she believes we haven’t had sex?” He flexed his finger. “Do you think she doesn’t know”—his voice dropped even lower—“I’ve found ways to satisfy you?”

  He nuzzled her ear through her hair and a pulse ran through her body. “Or maybe what bothers you is you kinda like that I’m turning you on with someone else in the room.”