Sweet as Sin (19 page)

John Murphy, I love you. The Sugar Shack’s
Dark Cravings are up and running, hopefully
straight to the bank.

She broke the speed limit racing toward Elmcrest but home wasn’t her destination. Her feet pounded on the deck steps and she thrust the door wide with a cheek-splitting grin on her face.

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205

“Murphy?”

“In here.” A voice called from the living room.

He pulled himself from his reclined position on the couch with a naughty grin. “You’re early.

Come here.”

The pulsing music that was so not his taste flowing from the TV drew her eye. Scantily clad models pranced down a catwalk, hips swiveling to show off the latest in lingerie. She rolled her eyes.

Like real women wore six-inch heels while parading around in their underwear. How any woman could walk around in those bits of

interconnected thread and expose what they were born with amazed her. It also apparently

enthralled John as his eyes slid back to one blonde model strutting around in a pink thong and little else.

“You are such a man,” she groused, grabbing the remote.

“Hey, I was watching that.”

“
Was
being the correct word. You don’t need them. You have me.” She clicked the TV off, tossed the remote away, and twirled onto John’s lap.

His hands went immediately to her hips. “You weren’t here and I was thinking about you. There was this one black number that had a chain going up her…” A devilish glint appeared as he cupped her ass. “How do you feel about leather, Liv?”

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“I think it would chafe places that you

wouldn’t want chafed.” Grass clippings clung to his shirt and she brushed them away. “You smell like a golf course. Go change. I’m taking you out to celebrate.”

“Celebrate what?”

“You. Remember that clock cake you drew? I think it started then, really. I was looking through one of your sketchpads—quit playing with my ears and listen—”

John hummed, dragging his tongue down her neck to the place behind her ear that sent shivers up her spine.

“There are things in there that can really translate to baking—Murphy, I’m trying to tell you—God, do that again.”

“This?” A shudder worked her shoulders. “Or this?”

“Oh, that.” Her eyes closed and her mind

scattered. It took effort to angle away from his mouth. “Anyway, it sparked something inside my head. Something that said ‘dark’ and ‘current’ and

‘very profitable.’ I came up with an idea for a new line. It’s younger and fresher and, God, Murphy, it’s going to be like a shot of adrenaline to the Shack. I named it Dark Cravings and I have you to thank for it.”

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A slow grin crept out and he pulled her tighter to him, situated her thighs around his hips. “That’s great.”

“This is going to be huge, Murphy, I can feel it.”

His hand delved under her skirt. “I can feel it, too.”

She poked him in the ribs. “Stop. Go change.

Where do you want to go for dinner?”

“Honestly?”

“Anywhere you want. You pick. This is on

me.”

“Let’s order Chinese and stay in.”

Livvy deflated. “You are such a hermit.”

“No, I’m horny.” His chuckle danced along her skin.

She rolled her eyes. “That’s what you get for watching underwear models.”

John rocked into her. The growing ridge in his shorts pressed against her in delicious temptation.

“No, that’s what I get when I think about you wearing that underwear…and me taking it off you.”

“Murphy, I want to go out.”

“Liv,” John sighed exasperatedly. “I don’t want to go anywhere tonight. If it’s my choice then I want spicy Hunan chicken, hot and sour soup, and you naked.”

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She leaned forward and licked along his jaw.

“Come on, champagne, a nice steak, something along those lines?”

John pushed her back. A wicked glimmer lit in his eyes as he opened the buttons on her shirt. “I don’t like champagne and I can grill my own damn steak. There are a hundred ways you can thank me and I never have to leave this spot.”

“Spoilsport. You’re killing a really good excitement high here.”

“If you want excitement…” John pulled the tails of her blouse loose from her skirt and slid his hands up her stomach.

“I also want to talk to you, butter you up, ask for a favor.”

“Butter sounds interesting. Slippery though.”

Along her thighs, his fingers teased slow lines that left goose bumps in their wake. “And I am all ears for any
favor
you want.”

She shook her head. John had a one-track mind right now. A track that was making her wet and needy. “Murphy, I need your help. This is important to me. Have you heard a word I’ve said?”

He nibbled a tingling path down her neck.

“Mm-hmm, got it. Clock cake, Shack, new line, Dark Craving. I’m having a dark craving myself right now.” His tongue dove into her mouth, tempting hers to come and play.

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Her fingers sank into his hair. “The new line i—” A gasp ripped from her throat as he rolled her tight nipple between his fingertips. “I’d like to use y—” He licked a line down her neck, sucking and nipping until her breath came in harsh pants.

“About the sketchpa—” His tongue traced over the upper curve of her breast. “I want to base the—”

“Liv, stop talking.”

“Wait, I need to know if you’re okay with me doing this.”

“Honey, you can do whatever you want if let me do what I want.” He tugged the blouse from her arms and nipped along her shoulder. “And I want to do some things right now.”

“Murphy, you have no idea how much this

means to me. It’s going to be fabulous.”

“It always is fabulous, Liv.” Reaching around her back, he popped the hook on her bra. “I love your underwear, know that? It’s like a Victoria’s Secret catalog come to life.”

Cupping her palms over her breasts, she held her bra in place. “If you like it that much, I have another amazing idea.”

“I’m listening.” He nibbled at her thumb.

“Move your hands.”

“No. Sit back and leave my boobs alone a

minute. How would you like your own private lingerie showing as a thank you?” Grinding her 210

Sweet as Sin

hips against his erection, she tongued his lips. “I have a few things you might be interested in.

Stockings and garters, thongs, demi-bras and boy shorts. Red, black, white, a few pastels and—” she dragged her lips along his neck, “—one hot purple number I know you’ll love. It’s a split-crotch thing that I haven’t been brave enough to wear yet.

Sound spicy enough for you?”

Every muscle in John’s body drew taut. “You have those here?”

“No, at home. But I’d have time to go grab an overnight goodie-bag while you call the order in.

I’ve also got a pair of black stiletto heels that I can barely walk in.”

He pushed her off his lap. “Go Liv, now.”

He was dialing the phone before she got to the door.

“Don’t forget the egg rolls!”

Each hand-drawn sketch was photocopied, the smaller scribbles getting separated onto their own sheet inside a plastic liner. The liners filled a thick black album, each one with a barcode and a design name. She mimicked Meagan’s lips and the album now sported a black lipstick kiss above the funky font title. Using specially bought artist pencils, Livvy colored the copied pictures. The simple act of coloring felt childlike but she poured Inez Kelley

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adult concentration into making them perfect, blending shades and shadows.

They were rough drawings never meant for

more than occupying John’s idle hands, so she tweaked most of them, polished and refined a few lines, completed a few half-drawn ones. She hunched over John’s dining room table and transformed his trash into her promise. He wrote in the study, yelling teases down the hall, calling her a workaholic. It wasn’t that she was a workaholic. It was that she had the same fizzy feeling she had before the Shack opened.

That same fizz in her gut bubbled when she proudly tacked photos of Meagan’s completed casketmobile cake on the exhibit board and privately framed herself in original impish form in her office. Pamphlets were printed, prices set and dark-colored fondant reordered. She paid Justine’s teenaged grandson a small fortune to update her website and add a Dark Cravings page. He had a slew of ideas and rapidly outlined his suggestions.

Livvy took them and placed three ads online.

Then she crossed her fingers and waited.

Meagan Florici’s not-so-sweet sixteenth party was on Saturday evening with over two hundred guests, mostly friends from her posh private school. Sunday, the Shack received over a hundred unique hits to the website. The server crashed twice but came back up within minutes.

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Monday she got walk-ins asking to see the Dark Cravings book. One college girl ordered the reshaped clock cake for a steampunk sorority welcome-back-to-school party.

Wednesday, a twelve-year-old boy fell in love with the blue-and-black striped dog that walked on three legs and a pooper-scooper. His doting parents hadn’t blinked at the specialty price or the chocolate dog turds on the cake top.

Thursday, she retooled one design to create a wedding cake in black fondant. The bride’s tears left inky eyeliner tracks down her ultra-white cheeks. By Friday, Livvy had orders scheduled through October.

Dark Cravings was an official success.

“Murphy, how many people are going to be here?

I don’t think I brought enough cookies.”

Gina’s house was a sprawling two-story

Colonial with acres of grass stretching in either direction. Livvy stared in appreciation as John drove around the back. Already several dozen people were milling around, and a huge grill stood ready beside a humongous smoker. Picnic tables were scattered across the lawn and a DJ was setting up his equipment under a striped tent. A portion of a back field had been roped off for parking and John backed next to a huge lazy pine.

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“Maybe a hundred, give or take. It’s a big deal every year.” His distracted voice brought her eyes back to him. Back and forth, his jaw worked and he stared out the windshield. She rubbed her palm across the hard muscles of his arm.

“You okay?”

He nodded and climbed from the truck before she could ask anything more. He already had the tailgate down and was pulling out the oversized blue cooler with the Sugar Shack’s logo when she stepped close. One hand rested on the cooler top and she took the opportunity to slip her arms around his waist on that side. In the past few weeks, they’d grown so close she could feel the unease inside him like a fresh burn.

“Talk to me, Murphy.”

He reached for a stray curl that had fallen from her hairclip and twined it around his finger. The blush of new romance was a heady cocktail and both seemed intent on guzzling every drop. Livvy watched as each tiny sliver fell from the steely wall surrounding his innermost self. With every piece, he gave more of himself to her and she eagerly gathered each bit. His touch, his taste, the smell of his skin was embedded in her heart, a heart that ached for him and his discomfort.

“I don’t belong here anymore. I quit over a year ago.”

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“But you worked with these people for over a dozen years, they’re friends. You said a couple of you emailed and called—”

“It’s just different now. I’m not one of the crew anymore. Things have changed. Look, Liv, they know I quit to write, I never hid that. But they don’t know I write under Flannigan and I’d rather keep it that way.”

“Why?”

Broad shoulders rose in a slight shrug while his eyes soared to the tree line. “J. B. Flannigan writes monster stories for kids. John Murphy writes tough-guy, kick-ass heroes with a heavy erotic twist. Which do you think a bunch of construction workers would prefer? I mean, if someone asked me to my face, no, I wouldn’t deny it, but I’d rather not draw too much attention to it. People change when they find out.”

Livvy scrutinized him, the slight breeze lifting the front locks of his ebony hair. He preferred dark to white meat, loathed golf and had a stubborn streak three miles wide. His favorite movie was
Schindler’s List,
he was ticklish in only one place and had a fondness for motor-head repair shows. All these things she’d discovered since becoming his lover. Yet there were still so many puzzle pieces of him she hadn’t figured out.

Jondi and John were one and the same but he protectively shielded the monster and their tie Inez Kelley

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from most people. John’s picture had never even appeared on the books’ dust jackets, only a photo of his pencil-gripped fingers sketching the creature.

Her sigh brought his gaze back to her face.

“You’ve had more success as Flannigan but if you don’t want me to mention it, okay. Your secret’s safe with me.”

A shadow crossed his face. The hand from her hair traced a line down her cheek before resting on her lips. She kissed his fingertips and he smiled.

A sense of having passed some weird test filled her. She had to force her lungs to breathe as he pulled the cooler from the truck and headed to the house.

Inside, chaos reigned. Children darted in and out the wide-open patio doors while harried mothers chased after them. John called to his sister from the patio and held up the cooler. At her quizzical look, Livvy slipped into the muggy kitchen. The scent of Old Bay and butter assaulted her and she dodged two toddlers dripping with watermelon juice. “I wasn’t sure what to bring.

It’s just some cookies and stuff from the Shack.

Where do you want them?”

Gina smiled, her face glowing with the sheen of steam from the boiling kettles. “There’s a table set up over next to the grills for desserts. You didn’t have to do that, Livvy, but thanks. Would 216

Sweet as Sin

you mind grabbing a basket here? The shrimp are getting ahead of me.”

John disappeared with the cooler and Livvy scooped pound after pound of small shrimp from a kettle, dumping each basket into an ice bath.