Cuff Me (9 page)

J
ill and Vincent made a solid go of it, but ten minutes after leaving Holly Adams’s house, they realized that trying to make it back to Manhattan in a near blizzard was stupid and dangerous.

“There,” Jill said, squinting through the white blur of their windshield. “I think that’s a motel up on the right.”

“‘Motel’ is a strong word,” Vincent said as they inched closer, pulling into the near-deserted parking lot.

Jill reached for the door handle, but Vincent gave her a skeptical look. “You do know that deserted motels like this are where people come to die, right?”

She leaned over and patted his thigh. “You’ve got a gun, big guy.”

The woman behind the reception desk had both the whitest skin and the blackest hair Jill had ever seen. Add to that a complete inability to smile, an obvious disdain
for her job, and a disarming habit of maintaining eye contact for three beats too long, and Vincent had a pretty solid point about the whole death-in-motel theory.

The place was seriously creepy.

“Good thing Holly served us a big old meal so we won’t have to worry about dinner,” Jill said as they made their way to their side-by-side rooms.

“Or not,” she muttered, watching as Vincent stopped in front of a vending machine, pulled out some cash, and began punching buttons for everything from mixed nuts to M&M’s.

Their rooms were on the first floor. “This is me,” Jill said, pointing at 104. The “0” was missing, but as long as the bed was clean and the bathroom spider-free, she’d make do.

Vincent nodded at 105. “I’m next door if you need anything.”

“I’ll be good,” she said. “I have every intention of taking a hot shower and then watching some truly appalling old movie on TV.”

“And calling Tom,” Vin said.

She’d started to put her key in the lock but glanced over her shoulder in surprise at that.

“Sure,” she said, a little confused by the sudden and unprompted mention of her fiancé. “And calling Tom.”

She hadn’t thought much about it actually. But they talked most nights, so yeah… she’d check in.

Vin nodded once before taking a couple steps toward his own room. He passed before entering, glancing at her once. “If you hear me scream… save me?”

Jill grinned. “You got it, partner. Be brave in there.”

Then, to her utter surprise, Vincent Moretti smiled at
her. Not a big toothy grin… the man didn’t have any of those… that she knew of.

But it was a definite smile. As rare as it was beautiful.

She stood there for several seconds even after he’d shut his door, still feeling a little off balance.

Jill shook it off and went into her motel room. It was about what one would expect from a roadside motel in a town whose borders took all of five minutes to drive through.

The carpet was less than pristine. The bedspread was standard, ugly floral print. The pillows looked flat, the lighting horrible.

But it was clean—ish. No hairballs in the bathroom, no dead bugs on the nightstand. Jill abandoned the shower idea after remembering that she’d have no clean underwear to put on after.

Instead, she set her gun in the drawer of the nightstand, pulled off her boots and bulky sweater, and settled back on the bed in her white camisole and pants. She made herself as comfortable as possible against the two pathetic pillows and pulled out her cell phone.

And got Tom’s voice mail.

She settled for a text.
Call me when you get a chance. Interesting day.

Jill started to set the phone aside, then paused, and wrote another message.

Love you.

She stared down at her screen for several moments, wondering if maybe he’d respond right away with a “love you too” as he usually did.

Nothing.

Jill shrugged. Tom was still in Florida, in the last phases of that deal before he’d shift his attention to
Chicago. No doubt he was out schmoozing some businessmen and -women.

He wanted her to fly down next weekend. She hadn’t seen him since last week when he’d come up to meet the Morettis, and she tried not to let herself get freaked out by the fact that since he’d slipped a ring on her finger, they’d been apart more than they’d been together.

She
should
go down to Florida. There was no reason not to make the short trip. She wouldn’t have to miss work if she kept it short, and she could totally go for a dose of sunshine.

And it was important—vital—somehow, that she keep Tom fresh in her memory.

And her in his.

“You’re being ridiculous,” she muttered to herself, tapping her fingers against her mouth. “You’re marrying the man. It’s not like he’s going to forget you.”

Jill dropped her hand to her lap and stood staring at the wall, wondering if this is what people meant by prewedding jitters.

Granted their wedding was still several months away, and she didn’t have jitters so much as…

She didn’t know what. But it was
something
.

Not in the mood to deal with it, and blaming it on the fact that she was in a small, gross motel without any clean clothes in the middle of a snowstorm, she reached for the TV remote.

“Are you freaking kidding me?” she said ten seconds later.

Every single channel was doing the staticky thing.

She pushed all the standard “fix it” buttons on the remote. Nothing. Got up and fiddled with a few things on the TV set itself.

Still nothing.

A call to the front desk confirmed her worst nightmare.

“Our fix-it guy could normally be here in a half hour, but in this snow…”

“I can take another room,” Jill said. It’s not like she had any heavy luggage that had to be moved.

“Well… I think 219 is clean, and 201 is supposed to be…”

Jill pulled at her ponytail in irritation. “Never mind,” she muttered. “Do you guys have any books? You know, a shelf of books left behind?”

Maybe she could read. A nice mystery or romance would do just the trick…

“Books?” the receptionist said.

Jill closed her eyes. “Forget it. Thanks anyway.”

She hung up the phone and gently banged her head against the wall behind her. She could probably just go to bed early… get caught up on some sleep.

Jill glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It wasn’t even seven o’clock.

Standing, Jill pulled her sweater and boots back on, grabbed her gun and purse.

Ten seconds later she was knocking on Vincent’s door.

“I came to save you—” she started to say the second the door opened.

And then she broke off.

And stared.

And stared some more.

Vincent Moretti was shirtless.

Jill didn’t trust herself to speak.

Because the only word her dazed mind seemed to be able to come up with was
mouthwatering
.

H
e hadn’t meant to open the door without a shirt.

But taking in Jill’s stunned expression, he was glad that he had.

Call it payback for her
raunchy sex
comment at Elena’s party that had kept him up for more nights than he cared to admit.

Jill still hadn’t lifted her eyes from his torso, and he put his hand on the doorjamb, leaning just slightly.

When her eyes finally met his, he was wearing an all-out grin.

“Why are you… panting?” she asked.

Why are you?
he wanted to ask back.

Instead he shrugged. “Doing some push-ups.”

“You do those every night?” she asked.

“And every morning.”

Actually, his twice-daily workouts were usually a good
deal more than push-ups, but he was in a tiny-ass motel room. He did what he could.

“Huh.” Her eyes drifted lower again.

He smirked. “Can I help you with something, Henley?”

“Um…”

There was a very satisfying pause, and Vincent felt his grin grow wider.

She pointed to her room. “My TV’s not working.”

Damn. Not what he was hoping she’d say.

“Ah. What room are they moving you to?” he asked, assuming she was stopping by to tell him of her relocation.

“They’re not.”

And then she ducked, slipping under the barricade his arm had made across the doorway and entering his hotel room.

“Um, okay.” He shut the door and turned to face her.

She’d already found the remote on the nightstand and wiggled it at him. “You mind?”

“You’re watching TV
here
?”

“Why not? If you need to finish your push-ups, I’ll promise not to watch.”

“
Really
,” he said dryly.

“Nope.” She grinned. “Not really. Seriously, Moretti, that’s an impressive upper body you’ve been hiding from me all this time.”

“I’d be happy to implement shirtless Saturdays if you are.”

“Eh, you’re getting the bad end of the bargain there, my friend. The only exercise I do on a daily basis is lifting beverages to my face. Coffee in the morning, wine in the evenings—”

Vin tuned out her rambling. He was too busy picturing shirtless Jill, and somehow he didn’t think he’d be disappointed.

Jill was slim, yes, and her small breasts were not exactly the type to land the
Sports Illustrated
swimsuit cover, but Vincent had never been a boobs guy.

He liked his women on the smaller end of the spectrum, liked when he could lift them, hold their tight, perfect ass in his hands as he…

The TV turned on and his dirty thoughts scattered.

“I guess you’re staying then,” he muttered.

“It wasn’t really ever up for negotiation,” she said, her mouth full of M&M’s as she flipped through the stations.

“Thought you ‘couldn’t possibly eat’?” he said.

She shot him a patient look before patting the mattress next to her. “Come watch this stupid movie with me. It’ll help ease your bad mood.”

He glanced at the TV. “Isn’t this
Transformers
, or something equally awful?”

She wiggled her eyebrows at him. “You know you want to.”

And in spite of himself, he did.

Not the movie so much, but the idea of relaxing beside someone else, even if it was in a shitty little motel room with no clean clothes and a fucking blizzard outside, held a strange appeal.

Vincent walked around the bed and sat beside her, both of them propped against the headboard. And he realized he was wrong. It wasn’t relaxing beside someone that appealed.

It was relaxing beside Jill.

She glanced over at him, then did a double take before bouncing off the bed and grabbing his undershirt from the chair in the corner where he’d set it.

Jill flung it at him, and he caught it just before it whacked him in the face.

“Put that on,” she ordered.

“I usually go to bed shirtless,” he said, flexing just to mess with her.

“And I usually watch TV pantless,” she shot back.

Vin lifted an eyebrow. “I’m game if you’re game.”

She pointed at him. “Get dressed, Moretti.”

He complied, but only because an annoying thought cropped up. “Did you talk to Tom?”

Jill was in the process of flinging herself on the bed, but she faltered a little at that. “You sure are concerned with the state of my relationship.”

“Just making conversation,” he muttered, turning his attention back to the TV. It was commercials.

“Since when?” she asked, pressing the issue. “Since when have you ‘just made conversation’ with
anyone
?”

There was a sharper-than-usual edge to her voice, and Vincent scooted down so he was lying on his side of the bed, head propped on his hand, facing her. “What’s going on, Henley? You’re testy.”

She fished out an M&M, started to lift it to her mouth, and then frowned at it.

“Everything okay?” he asked, tongue in his cheek. This disgruntled version of Jill was kind of… cute.

“I don’t like the brown ones,” she said, as though this were completely reasonable.

She held it out to him between two fingers, and Vincent surprised them both by leaning forward and nipping it out of her fingers with his mouth.

The lips-to-fingers contact was brief. A second at most, but he felt it in his gut. Heard it in her intake of breath.

Vin lifted his eyes to hers, but the second he did, she
looked back at the M&M’s bag, shaking it violently until she found a blue one.

She rattled the bag again, going at it like a raccoon with a take-out bag, and he reached out, touched her hand. “Jill?”

Abruptly she dropped the bag of candy and scooted down until she was flat on her back on the bed. She flung both arms over her face, the crook of her crossed elbows hiding her eyes.

He didn’t ask her what was up. Didn’t push. Just sat and waited. She was still for several minutes, and then she rolled over onto her side to face him, propping her head on her hand, mimicking his position.

“Do you think I’m making a mistake?”

His chest clenched.
Don’t ask me that.

But her gaze was level, her voice steady. She really wanted to know. Wanted his opinion.

He fished an M&M out of the bag—a brown one—to stall. “I assume that we’re talking about your shotgun wedding?”

She nodded.

“What’s going on? Trouble in paradise?”

“Not really,” she said, glancing down at the bed. “We’re not fighting. It’s just… we never see each other.”

“Which sucks,” he said slowly. “But plenty of couples make long-distance work, at least in the short term.”

“Yeah, because you know so much about couples,” she said crankily.

“It’ll get better,” he forced himself to say. “Just throw yourself into the wedding planning. Remind yourself all the reasons that these tough months are worth it.”

Jill smiled. “I think you might be the first guy in history to tell a woman to throw herself into wedding planning.”

“Yeah well… I’m not the one you’re marrying, now am I? I won’t have to deal with the worst of it.”

He intentionally kept his voice light, but her smile dimmed, just a little, before she seemed to force herself to recover. “Very true. And yet you
will
have to see me every day, so you just remember this little chat while I’m talking to you about chair covers and canapés and white lingerie.”

“That last one, I’m down with,” he said.

She smiled, and he smiled back. “You sure you’re okay?” he asked.

“Sure. Just been getting a lot of the jitters lately,” she said, rolling herself into a seated position and crossing her legs on the bed.

“Movie’s back,” she said, reaching for the remote and turning it up.

Okay then.

The conversation was apparently over. Usually it was him finding ways to stop talking, but tonight, he wanted to keep the conversation going. He wanted to know more about what was going on with her and Tom.

Wanted to hear more about these second thoughts she was having.

Instead, he reached for a candy bar and tore it open with his teeth as he turned his attention toward the noisy, brainless, yet fully entertaining movie.

Forty minutes later the credits started rolling and Vin waited for Jill to turn the channel.

And waited… and waited…

“Yo, Henley—”

He broke off when he glanced over and saw her. She was sound asleep.

Vincent gently pulled the remote out from under her
hand and turned down the volume, thoroughly amused when he heard gentle snores coming out of his partner.

Jill Henley snored. How…

Cute.

It was cute.

He grinned to himself, reaching for his phone so he could capture it on video and use it for some good-natured blackmail in the future, only to find that his thumb didn’t hit Record like he meant it to.

Instead he found himself putting the phone away.

And then he looked at her. It was probably creepy, a man staring at a sleeping woman who was not his wife or girlfriend, but he couldn’t look away.

Jill looked younger than her age, even when awake. She had a girlish face and figure that gave her a perpetual twenty-three look, something he knew she loathed and loved in waves.

But sleeping, she looked… womanly.

Not old, not haggard, but as though she held all of the secrets of the world in her dreams; secrets only she knew.

Secrets that he wanted to beg her to share.

She made a smacking sound with her mouth and then rolled onto her side, one hand sliding up under her cheek, the other…

The other reached out toward him.

He froze, staring down at her small hand where it lay between them on the bed.

She hadn’t been reaching for
him
, obviously. She was asleep. Didn’t know that he was there.

And yet, he suddenly found it hard to swallow. Found it hard to look away from her pointy little nose, and the way
a few strands of straight blond hair escaped her ponytail to lay against her cheek.

Before he realized what he was doing, he slid his hand along the bed until his fingertips were millimeters from hers.

And then he touched her hand. Just softly. His fingertip against her knuckle, the rough pad of his finger against her smooth skin.

He allowed himself to linger, just for a moment, his finger tracing each of hers. Drawing circles on the back of her hand.

Vincent wanted to flip her hand over. Wanted to touch his fingers to the nerve endings of her palm. Wanted to press his lips there. Wanted to lever himself over her, and—

Vincent pulled his hand back. Slowly.

He squeezed his eyes shut.

The touch had been almost nothing—it was less than chaste.

And yet he thought of it, long, long into the night.