Five #3
I was overwhelmed suddenly with sadness. This really was goodbye, and I was ending forever yet another failed relationship. My track record was total shit.
“Jory.” Aaron whispered my name, trying to step in close to me, reaching for my shoulder.
I stepped back, turned around, and ran. He yelled my name more than once.
I wasn’t ready to go home. I really needed to just sit somewhere, have a drink, and clear my head. Someplace quiet where no one would bother me. And I knew exactly where.
It turned out that I was reaping some serious karma for God knew what.
Or maybe it was someone else’s karma and I was just caught in the crossfire.
There was a drug raid at my favorite piano bar, due to the fact that the owner of the club had apparently been moving quite a bit of cocaine in and out of his place for some time.
And vice detectives had picked tonight, Wednesday night, to bust him.
So I was sitting on the curb in a long row with everyone else who had been inside when the police came swarming through the front door.
There was a barricade of black-and-white cars blocking us from the other side of the street, where a crowd had formed.
It was the cherry on the cake of my day.
When someone gently kicked my foot, I let my head roll back so I could look up.
Turned out I had been wrong: here was the cake topper.
“Hi.” Sam Kage smirked down at me. “What brings you to this den of iniquity, J?”
I groaned, and his smirk changed into a full-blown evil grin. He was enjoying this to no end.
“Since when do you do drugs?”
“I don’t and you know it.” I shot him a look. “Don’t be an ass.”
“Better watch how you talk to me,” he said, crouching down in front of me. “You could be in a lot of trouble here.”
I stared into his eyes. “What are you even doing here? You don’t work vice anymore. You’re a homicide detective now.”
He didn’t answer me.
“Sam?”
“Get up.”
As soon as I was on my feet, he grabbed me hard, fingers digging into my shoulder before he walked me away from the others, down the street, and around the corner to his car.
I pulled free of his grasp and turned to face him, but before I could say a word, he shoved me up against the back passenger-side door and pinned me there.
He held me still with just one hand on my chest.
“Jesus, Sam,” I barked at him. “What the hell are you—”
“Shut up.” He stepped forward so we were only inches apart.
The heat radiating off the man was amazing. I caught my breath; I couldn’t help it. He made a noise in the back of his throat.
“Some things never change, huh, J?”
I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of speaking to him. I stared at the sidewalk.
“Look at me.”
I lifted my head to look up into his eyes and found that he had bent toward me at the same time. When he spoke, I felt his warm breath on my face.
“What are you doing here?”
“I just wanted to sit and relax a little before I went home.”
He nodded, dipping his head lower, inhaling me. “You’re shaking, you know.”
I knew. Nothing I could do about it.
“Maybe I should search you for illegal substances.”
I swallowed hard, trying to get my body to calm down.
“Or maybe I’ll just put you in the back of my car and fuck you till you pass out.”
Just the thought of him holding me down had me desperate for it. When I caught my breath, he wedged his knee between my legs, and then his thigh as he leaned into me.
“Listen, I want you to meet me around the corner at the River Road Bar.” His voice was deep and sexy, sending ripples of heat through me. “You go there and wait, and as soon as I’m done here, I’ll meet you.”
But my brain kicked in and my head cleared.
“Did you hear me?”
I had no intention of meeting him anywhere. This illustration of his power over me was terrifying. No other guy could get me panting and writhing in seconds. No one else had such control over me. I wanted to run away as fast as I could.
He grabbed a fistful of my hair and yanked my head back hard, uncaring about whether or not it hurt. “Do not even think about ditching me.”
“No.”
He kissed the base of my throat. “Your heart is beating so fast, baby.”
I shivered hard.
“Fuck it, get in the car.”
“You’re on duty,” I reminded him.
“No, I’m not. I was just driving home and heard the call. I figured I was close to where you were, so I could check in on you after.”
“How did you know where—”
“I can track your phone. I told you.”
Police detective. I forgot sometimes. “Lemme go,” I ordered. “You’re hurting me.”
“I am not,” he said, his hand moving from my hair to my throat. “I could never hurt you.”
“Get off me,” I snapped, wriggling in his arms, trying to lever myself off the car. He stepped back, and I moved quickly away from him.
“Walk to the bar, J. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
I turned to go, but before I was out of his reach, he grabbed hold of my shoulder and spun me back around to face him.
“God, what?”
His expression was dark, brows furrowed, jaw clenched. “Be there.”
I just stared at him for a long moment before I started walking backward.
“You’re not gonna meet me there, are you.”
I shook my head.
“Why?” he yelled down the street, the space between us significant enough that even if he bolted, he wouldn’t reach me.
“Because of what you just did.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it.”
I shrugged.
“You loved every second of that.”
And if we were being honest, I had, but we weren’t being honest. He stood there watching me, and I turned and walked away.
My body was flushed and hot now that Sam had ignited my libido, so I caught another cab and headed toward one of my usual haunts to pick somebody up. I needed a stranger with no strings attached to quench my desire.
They were playing Billie Holiday standards at the lounge, and the singer had a deep, sultry sound to her voice.
I ordered a snifter of Hennessy and sat at the end of the bar, listening.
When I drained my glass, another one was right there to take its place.
Turning my head, I found a very handsome man smiling at me.
“Finally, you show up.”
“I’m sorry?” I smiled at him.
“You don’t remember me?”
I didn’t, but that happened a lot.
“You picked me up here, like, a month ago.”
I had no idea who he was. “Sure.”
He smiled slowly. “You don’t remember, but that’s okay… I remember you.” I took a sip of my drink.
“But you haven’t been around in a while, and you wouldn’t give me your number.”
I nodded. I hardly ever gave out my number.
“I kept thinking if I hung out here, I’d bump into you again.”
“And now you have.”
“Now I have.”
“Is that a good thing?”
He nodded, leaning forward. “It’s a very good thing.”
“You live around here?”
He nodded. “Yep, real close.”
“Thanks for the drink.”
“You finish it, then you can have another at my place.”
And I was ready to take him up on his offer.
My body was basically throbbing with pent-up desire, and he was as good as the next guy.
At least we liked the same kind of music.
It was something. So I smiled at him and would have continued our flirty conversation, but the hand that slid up my left thigh made me turn my head in the opposite direction.
Sam Kage was there, leaning on the bar, just staring at me and waiting.
I was stunned. “What are you—”
“Excuse me,” the guy began, leaning in close to me. “I was talking to—”
“Fuck off,” Sam said flatly before returning his eyes to mine. His smile was huge. “He’s with me.”
And because it was Sam Kage talking, the guy disappeared. I turned my head to say something nice to my admirer, but he was gone. The detective was just too big and scary.
“Look at me.”
I exhaled sharply and dragged my eyes to Sam.
“Can I sit?”
I shrugged.
“It’s nice in here,” he said softly, sitting down on the barstool beside me, pushing my drink out of my reach. “You like this kinda music, huh?”
“I don’t come here for the music.” I didn’t. It was a meat market, and that was why I was there. “I came to pick somebody up.”
“I see.”
“What are you doing here?” I asked quickly, my voice coming out sharper than I wanted.
“You’re here.”
“But we both know that this isn’t—”
“Lemme drive you home.”
“Absolutely not.”
He leaned close to me, invading my personal space, his knee against mine. “Why not?”
“How did you even know I—”
“Did you know I’m a police detective? You know I find people all the time, right?”
“Shit.”
He chuckled. “You can’t ditch me, J. Come home with me.”
“Sam, you shouldn’t waste your time.”
“I don’t consider any time spent with you a waste.”
“But, Sam, you—”
“What, honey?” he said, looking at me, his eyes locked on my mouth.
“It’s doomed to fail, Sam.”
“I don’t accept that,” he said, slowly reaching for me, giving me time to move away if I wanted.
“You don’t really care, Sam. Not really.”
“I don’t?” He touched my chin lightly, tipping it up so he could run the backs of his fingers down my throat. “Because…I think I do.”
I lifted my head away, and he let me. “You just wanna fuck me.”
“Oh, I wanna do that too.” He chuckled warmly. “But that’s only part of it.”
“How can it be? Sam, you don’t even know me or—”
“You have no idea about anything,” he said, searching my eyes. “I dream about you.”
I looked down at the bar.
“It’s killing me that you won’t just give in.”
I closed my eyes and leaned my forehead into my hand.
“And you’ll let some stranger take you home and fuck you, but me…me you won’t let near you. How does that make any fuckin’ sense at all?”
“A stranger won’t hurt me.”
“I won’t either.”
I scoffed, smiling wide as I lifted my head and looked him in the eye. “Fuck you, Sam.”
He shrugged. “Go ahead, vent at me. I’m ready—lemme have it.”
“You should care.” I took a breath, refusing to cry. “It should mean something to you that I’m yelling at you, that I’m upset.”