The Bride Takes a Powder (12 page)

With a sigh, her head dropped onto
his shoulder, and she tipped her face to kiss him under the chin. He clasped
her breasts and plucked her nipples, watching them rise and harden into deep
raspberry buds.

"Are you out of rubbers?"

His cock flexed at her soft shy
question.
Yes!
"I don't think
so. Why do you ask, sweetheart?"

She shimmied her ass against him. "Well,
if you don't want to…"

"Get on that bed, baby, on
your hands and knees," he ordered gruffly. She hesitated. He figured what
she was afraid of. "It's all right, sweetheart." He'd never taken a
woman's ass before and wasn't going to start right now. "Not that. But go."
He frog-marched her to the bed, and she stretched out on her stomach.

Kneeling above her, he pulled her
bottom up. His shaft ached like the devil, his balls were already retreating
into his groin. Damn, he'd just had her for hours, and he still wanted.
Just take it easy, boy. You'll get what you
want.
Bent over like that, she looked so vulnerable. She had no control.
Oh, she could stop him with a word or gesture, but she wouldn't. She trusted
him. His heart sang. She believed in him.

He slid his palms down her spine to
her round pink cheeks, caressing them, subtly brushing his thumbs down the
center. Just because he wouldn't take her that way didn't mean he didn't want
to see that mysterious secret hole. "Baby," he rasped. He heard her
moans, felt her body quivering, glanced up to see her head rolling against the
pillow. Leaning forward over her, he cupped her dangling breasts. Her groans
heightened, muffled in the pillow, her ass pressing more tightly back against
his cock.

"Damn, baby, you make me want
you over and over." Kissing her shoulder, he pulled back, slid his fingers
down to her passage, pressing and caressing the weeping opening until he had
her shimmying and sobbing for him to do something, damn it! She was so wet as
he pushed teasingly into her highly sensitive, nerve rich sheath.

"I can't wait," he
growled. Nudging her thighs farther apart, he pulled her higher and thrust.
Thrust hard until he felt the hot wet tissues of her sex against his thighs. "Damn,"
he growled. "Rubber." Pulling out, he cast about wildly for condoms.
There were none left. "Shit, I thought I still had some."

"Please, Mike. I'm all right.
You're all right. I'm on the pill. Come back…"

In that instant his head exploded.
For one second he'd been bareback inside her. Every guy's wish and now it was
granted to him. The sensation of flesh in flesh. "Yes, baby, I'm all
right." Then he was back, hard as he'd ever been in his life and as deep
as it was possible to be.

Faster and harder, he took her with
a voracious appetite he'd never known, gripping her hips to keep her in place.
Her pillow-muffled shrieks made him feel like a king, a sexy hot king. Thank
God she'd buried her face in the pillow.

His climax came fast, too fast, and
her muscles clutched and convulsed around his shaft. "Jesus fucking
Christ!" With a loud groan, he collapsed on top of her, their heavy
gasping the only sounds in the room. Then she toppled, bringing him down too.
It took a huge effort for him to finally disengage, pulling his cock from her,
still hard, flushed dark with infused blood, and glistening from her juices. He
rolled to his back and lay there with what undoubtedly had to be a shit-eating
grin.

"Don't look so smug," she
warned, her voice rusty.

"Smug! I'm not smug. I'm
satisfied," he mumbled, making the extreme effort to roll to his side,
wrap an arm around her, and pull her against his body. "Aren't you?"

She touched his cheek, lightly
rubbing his morning bristles with the backs of her fingers. "So manly."

"All the better to please you,
m'dear."

"Oh, you please me."

Her sigh told him everything. "Damn
it," he groaned, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "I have to go. That
meeting with Moira."

She watched him dress. "Call
me the minute it's over. Everything will be all right. I believe in you, Mike."

It hurt to leave her. He cursed all
the way back to the bar, because he had to go home and change for the meeting.
She was amazing. A shrieker. He smiled at that memory. They'd both had to cover
her mouth at various times to quiet her. His apartment above the bar was a
possible location for next time since no one else lived in the building.

***

His mind was still whirling when he
sat down for his interview with Moira. They both needed to keep their personal
relationship out of this, one of the hazards of living in a small town.
Everyone knew everyone else, and it was hard to keep the proper distance in a
situation like this.

"I'm recording this interview,"
Moira began.

"Okay." What else could
he say? It wasn't like he could refuse.

Then she recited the proposed
indictment and noted that he was one of the teachers mentioned.

Furious and hurt to the quick, he
stated emphatically, "For the record, I was not involved. What are the
dates of these cheating parties you talked about last night?"

"There are six dates beginning
last November and continuing through two weeks ago."

"Two weeks ago?"
Not that long ago. Damn! Why did I not ever
notice anything?

"Yes." After listing the
dates, she asked, "Can you account for your whereabouts on those dates?"

"Five of them I know for sure
I was at the bar, and many people there would be witnesses." The sixth
date was a Saturday in November, and he didn't recall what happened that day.
Sometimes on Saturdays he worked out, drove around the countryside, played basketball.
"The last one I'll have to think about." He just couldn't remember on
that one.

"Think about it, Mike, and let
me know as soon as possible." Moira ended the interview, turned off the
recorder, and got personal. "Mike, I'm sorry about this. I know you and
trust that you weren't involved, but the accusation was made. I'm required to
investigate it and can't play favorites."

"I know, Moira." They
shook hands, and on the way out he scowled at the others in the waiting room.
Some of them might be innocent also, but one or more lied about him. He'd
thought they were all friends or at least friendly coworkers. It disturbed him
that he'd been such a trusting, oblivious fool about the whole thing.

Leaving the courthouse, he ran into
Marc Rahn, Sheriff Rahn that is. Best friends in high school and football
teammates, they'd lost touch with each other when Marc left town after his
parents had been killed in a car accident. After graduation, he'd joined the
Marines and made it a career for ten years with several deployments to the
Middle East.

"Hey, Marc, how're you doing?"
The two men shook hands. "How's Phoebs?"

"She's great. A little ornery
though. She feels immense but has no idea how beautiful she looks pregnant."

"I'm so happy for you, buddy."

"Thanks but I'm a little
nervous. I wouldn't say this to anyone else, but the baby will be so little.
What if I drop it or leave it somewhere?"

Mike laughed and gave Marc a
friendly punch on the shoulder. "You won't do any of that. You'll be a
great dad, don't you worry."

Marc just smiled, then turned
serious. "What's going on with this?" With a nod of his head he
indicated the courthouse. "How can anyone say you were involved?"

"I don't know. I wish I knew
who accused me."

"Yeah. I know how you feel."

Marc's folks had been killed by a
former B Falls cop when Marc was a teenager. Butch Wilcox had run the Rahns off
the road one winter night and into the Falls River. Butch's father had been
buying up stores, the Rahns hardware store being one, to build the resort. Mr.
Rahn didn't want to sell so Butch thought to speed up the process by getting
rid of him. The whole thing was thought, for ten years, to be an accident until
Marc came home to find the truth once and for all. It turned out that a
mentally ill Butch almost killed Phoebe after admitting to his crime. He was
now incarcerated in a prison mental ward with little hope of getting out.

"I'm sure you'll be
vindicated."

"There were six dates of
cheating parties. Five of them I was at the bar. The sixth I'm going to have to
think about."

"Were you with me?"

"No. It was a Saturday
morning. I'll just have to look over my records and calendar. It was four
months ago." Mike shook his head.

"By the way, what do you think
of Norah Ballard?" Marc asked.

Mike wanted to smirk and crow about
the woman he'd just had hot and dirty sex with. But he shrugged, not ready to
let Marc or anyone else know how deeply he was already involved with the
runaway bride. "I don't know what her plans are or how long she'll be in B
Falls."

"Then you didn't see the news
report on the weekend?"

"Unh, yeah, I did."

Marc nodded. "Okay. If you
need anything, you let me know, won't you?"

Mike silently thanked Marc for
dropping the subject. One scandal was enough for now. "Sure, and thanks,
Marc. I appreciate it. Give my best to Phoebs. She's the best jazz singer
around."

Marc slapped him on the back and
gave a nod of agreement before he climbed the steps and entered the Court
House.

Mike sauntered over to Hickory
Street and walked south to the river. The water was getting higher and higher,
almost over the banks, almost to flood stage. Some of the businesses along the
river had started to store sand bags. Ollie's wasn't located directly on the
river, but it was upland a little with a hundred yards of open ground leading
to the banks.

"Dad." He found Ollie in
the kitchen cleaning the griddle and changing the oil in the fryer. "We'd
better get our sandbags filled and ready to go. The river's almost at flood
stage."

"I've ordered the sand to be
delivered this afternoon."

"Good, you're ahead of me. I
guess I'm distracted."

"No wonder, son. The truth
will come out, but do you think you should get a lawyer?"

Mike grinned wryly. "That's
what Norah says."

"Well, she's a lawyer. Maybe
her advice is spot on."

"I suppose I should, but it
just feels defeatist, like it would show I'm afraid."

"I'm sure you
are
afraid, Mike, and you should be
worried, but you need to protect yourself too."

"Yeah, okay, Dad. Ben
Cartwright is new in town and has a good reputation." He rubbed the back
of his neck. "Hell of a name."

"Yeah. Bet he doesn't get
kidded much." Ollie chuckled. "Isn't he dating Moira?"

"Not dating, as far as I know
but he
is
interested in her. It's
pretty hard in a small town to find someone who doesn't have a relationship
with someone else."

"Why don't you call and make
an appointment with him?"

"I'll think about it, Dad."
He wondered what Norah was doing. Even though his career was in disarray, he
couldn't get her out of his mind. His skin heated, his cock hardened every time
he thought about their lovemaking last night. Lord, she was sweet and sexy, but
it was possible he was only a distraction while she sorted out her real life
back in Chicago. Maybe it wouldn't be wise to get any more involved with her.

Ah yes, wise words. Too bad he didn't
listen to his own warnings.

Chapter Eight

After Mike left, Norah wallowed in
bed a while longer, dozing. She could barely move her limbs anyway, and more
significantly she didn't want to give up the rich musky scent of their
lovemaking. Smirking, she thought that would be a sought-after scent for a
perfumery to create. And she almost forgot to compare Mike with Garrett. It was
becoming less of a shock to her that the memory of Garrett was fading. And
there was less guilt.

Finally realizing she was hungry,
she stretched luxuriously, got out of bed, and sauntered to the bathroom for a
shower. With nothing in the apartment she especially wanted to eat, she grabbed
her purse, umbrella, and a book to head to Java Joe's. But she stopped for a
moment to look at the river. The rain had let up for the moment, but toward the
west, gray bands of dirty-looking thunderheads rolled across the sky. She'd
never seen so much rain, more than any other spring she could remember. The
river was seeping over the shoreline in some places and flowing heavily over in
lower spots.

Just before she turned into the
shop, from the corner of her eye she spotted a very familiar black Jag turn the
corner from the highway and onto the street right in front of her. "Shit!"

Garrett.

After the turn, he glanced up and
spotted her.

Caught.
Damn.
Obviously her parents told him where she was. Why would they betray
her like that?

She charged toward the car as he
pulled into a parking space. Not waiting for him to emerge, she approached the
driver's side and hissed, "What in God's name are you doing here? Just
stay in the car and drive back to Chicago."

"I'm not going anywhere."

"How did you find me? Did my
folks tell you?"

"Yes." He climbed out of
the car shoving her back with the door. "I told your father that I should
know where you are."

"No apology for humiliating
yourself. And me?" He did put on a sheepish expression, briefly firming
his lips and glancing to the ground, an expression she'd never seen before on him.
He was such an arrogant prick. Could he actually be repentant?

"We were just having fun. It
was my bachelor party."

Nope,
not repentant.
"Fun? Getting drunk and undressed and arrested?"

"How was I to know there'd be
a raid?"

"Well, maybe if you'd acted
with some decorum in the first place, this wouldn't have happened."