Cover Me (16 page)

“Do you really think I need—”

“It’s not going to hurt a thing,” he assured her. “And I’m going to be here all night.”

For some reason she thought that should worry her, but it didn’t. The fact that he was going to be here, in her house, keeping her safe,
made her feel better than any tranquilizer ever could. “Okay,” she said, taking the tablet from him and swallowing it with the water.

“Good job,” he said with a smile, setting the glass on the bedside table, then stepped back around the bed and over to the door. He put his hand on the light switch. “Try to relax and let the tranq work. You’ll be asleep in no time. I’ll be out in the living
room.” He flipped the switch and turned out the light.

Immediately the darkness closed in around Molly and she felt the man’s hands again, his sour breath, his soft belly against her side as he pushed her down. Felt again the toe of his shoe as he kicked her. “Ray—” she gasped.

He reappeared instantly. “What is it, hon?”

“Don’t leave me.”

He didn’t answer right away. She saw
his head go down briefly, then back up. “I’ll get a chair,” he said.

“Lie down with me?” she asked. “I just—I just don’t want to be alone. I’m just really scared right now.”

He was silent. Oh, dear, she’d made a mistake. “It’s okay if you don’t want to,” she said quickly. “A chair would be fine.”

Without a word, he sat down on the bed, kicked off his shoes and lay on top of the
covers next to her. She could feel his heat warming her. She slid a hand out from under the covers and grasped his.

“Is this okay?” she asked in a whisper as she intertwined her fingers with his.

“Sure,” he muttered.

“Thank you,” she said quietly. “For everything.”

Chapter Five

Ray didn’t sleep—not much anyway. He lay still, next to Molly, until he heard her breaths even out into the long, smooth breaths of relaxed sleep. He didn’t want to let go of her hand, but his arm was beginning to cramp.

Carefully he extricated his hand from hers. She had fallen asleep on her back. Her lashes fanned her cheeks and her mouth was slightly open.
Without compressed lips, pinched nostrils and fear dimming her usually bright eyes, she looked young and lovely, like the girl he’d known before Katrina.

The same question he’d asked himself earlier came back to him. What would have happened between them if there had been no storm? He hadn’t seen her since that Saturday night when he’d talked her into giving him copies of the evidence that
proved that Martin Hennessey was guilty of skimming LDAT grant moneys. If he had seen her Monday, he was sure she’d have oozed hatred and resentment. That was certainly her attitude the day before.

Watching her as she slept, Ray found himself unable to look away from her soft, beautiful face, the peachy glow of her skin, the delicate curve of her jawline and the luscious
amuse-bouche
of her
earlobe. He was feeling things he hadn’t felt in eight years, since the last time they’d made love, on their last night together.

Surprise changed to dismay as the truth dawned on him. He’d never gotten over her. She’d been young, and so had he. He’d been smart, too—smart enough to know that seducing Molly was wrong, but not smart enough to understand that she would hate herself a lot more
than she hated him if he coaxed her into giving up her brother. He hadn’t known it then, but he knew it now.

He’d seen it in her face the instant she’d looked into his eyes in the middle of Canal Street. She resented and hated him because he reminded her of what
she
had done.

He squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head. If he had it to do over again, knowing what he knew now, he wouldn’t
seduce her to get evidence against her brother—would he?

“Ray?”

The word whispered across his mind like the brush of a feather or a quiet, sweet breath. “Yeah, hon?” he whispered back. “How you doing?”

“Better.”

“Do you want that other Xanax tablet?”

She yawned. “No,” she said, her voice sounding amused. “I think I’m relaxed enough.”

“Good. Want me to go away so you
can sleep?”

She didn’t answer.

He leaned up on one elbow. “Mols? Everything okay?”

“No,” she said finally. “I don’t want you to go away.”

“Okay, then. Go back to sleep.” He lay back down and stared at the ceiling, thinking it was going to be a long night. Because there was no way he’d sleep a wink with Molly there beside him in that filmy pink-and-white nightgown. He listened
to her breathing even out again. Then he closed his eyes and tried to clear his mind, but it was stuck in a loop, replaying the sight of her crumpled on the floor during that split second before he saw that she was alive. During that instant, he’d felt as though his heart had been ripped from his chest.

“Ray?”

He opened his eyes and glanced sideways at her. “Yeah?”

“Could you hold
me—just for a little while?”

He gritted his teeth.
No!
he wanted to say. How much willpower did she think he had?

“Yes,” he said aloud. He could hold her, but it was going to be torture. For a moment, he lay there, at a loss as to what to do next. Did he get under the covers? Would she come out from under the covers? Either way, it didn’t look good for his willpower.

“You should
get under the covers,” she said as if reading his mind. “You should take your jeans off. They’re going to be uncomfortable.”

No, I shouldn’t,
he thought, even as his hand went to the button and zipper at the front of the jeans. He got up, slipped the jeans off over his already growing arousal, then turned the cover down and climbed into the bed. “I’m not sure this is a good idea,” he said
as he tentatively reached out for her. He didn’t want to get too close, so he hoped she’d be content with just his hand across her belly.

“Me, either,” she said, laying her hand on top of his. “Ray, how did you get here at the exact right time?” she asked thoughtfully.

“I drove by to check on you, to be sure everything was all right.”

Her fingers curled over his. “And how did you
know it wasn’t?”

He took a deep breath. “Your lights were on, but I didn’t see you inside anywhere, and I—I just didn’t like it. I had a funny feeling there was something wrong.”

Molly propped herself up on one elbow and held his hand there, at her waist. “You rescued me,” she said, then she leaned forward and gave him a kiss on the lips. It wasn’t a long kiss. As kisses went, it was
pretty chaste. But the feeling of her soft lips against his sent a surge of desire as strong as Katrina’s floodwaters raging through him. He shook his hand free of hers, reached up to wrap his fingers around the back of her neck and kissed her. He held himself back, pressing his lips as gently, as chastely, against hers as she had against his.

She drew in a sharp breath that felt cool against
his mouth. “Ray?” she breathed. It was a question, but he didn’t know if it was directed at him or at herself.

“Mols,” he muttered, then dived headfirst into her embrace. He kissed her fully now, openmouthed, tasting her with his tongue, flirting with hers and nipping at her lips.

She collapsed back onto her pillow, pulling him with her, and opened up to him in a way she hadn’t known
how to before. He felt guilt engulf him as he noticed and recognized all the differences between the girl he’d known eight years ago and the woman he was kissing now. There was an achingly sweet newness about a girl who had never made love before. A self-conscious, awkward eagerness that is completely lost after that first time.

But this woman, this Molly, turned him on in ways the girl never
had—never could have. He pressed himself close to her, letting her feel how much he wanted her. She moaned, a knowing, yearning moan that encompassed a full understanding of what it was she craved.

He gazed down at her, seeking her true feelings in her eyes, but she closed them and reached for his mouth with hers.

A small gasp escaped her lips.

“You’re hurt—” he started, pulling
back.

“Shh,” she whispered, “I’m fine.” She moved his hand to her breast.

He caressed it, rubbing his thumb back and forth across her nipple. Her back arched, giving definition to all the exquisite curves and valleys and hills that made her body a woman’s body. He kissed her more deeply, sliding his hand beneath her back and pressing her breasts into his chest.

“Hang on,” he muttered.
He held on to her and flipped over so that he was now lying on his back and she was atop him. “This’ll make it easier for you to keep from hurting your ribs.”

Faint surprise widened her eyes but lasted only a split second. She smiled languidly and bent down to take his earlobe between her teeth. The unexpected pleasure/pain combination slid across his nerve endings, spiraling quickly down
his spine to his groin, where it caused his arousal to pulse with desire. He gasped and raised his head until he could delve his tongue into the soft, deep indentation at the center of her collarbone. He licked and sucked, then nibbled his way along the bone until he heard her breathing hitch and speed up.

She curved her back and tried to coax him to kiss her by planting little tongue kisses
along his jawline and neck. Then she bit down on his earlobe again.

“Ah—Mols!” he cried, almost losing it. But a second later he was back in control and he trailed his tongue down the center of her chest until he was in the deep cleavage between her breasts.

He found her left nipple and suckled it until she moaned and begged him to stop. Then he turned to her right breast, sliding his
tongue around and around, teasing at the dark pink edge of her areola, but not touching the nipple itself as he ground his arousal against her inner thighs. He stopped and looked at the swollen pink nub. He breathed on it, eliciting a gasp of delight from her. Then finally he took it into his mouth and sucked on it until he could feel it throbbing with reaction. He bared his teeth and grazed the
tip, then bit down.

Molly couldn’t stop the quiet scream that burst from her throat. Her back arched as his teeth scraped across the sensitized tip. She felt his arousal against her and felt herself contract in anticipation. “Ray,” she moaned, “please.” She put her palms against his chest, and his nipples pebbled against her skin. “Now!”

He lifted her, then lowered her slowly onto his
arousal. She felt his hardness probing, sliding, filling her, inch by inch, until she finally sank down upon him and their bodies melded and fused and she couldn’t for the life of her say where she ended and he began.

He’d barely begun to move inside her when her yearning swelled and grew to a fever pitch. Her heart was pounding so fast she could barely breathe. Somewhere in the recesses
of her mind was a vague sense of soreness and pain in her side. But in the next second, any hint of pain was lost in pleasure as he thrust hard, filling her completely. What had been yearning and need exploded into a blissful crescendo of pleasure unlike anything she’d ever felt before.

The next thing she was aware of was Ray pulling her close with an arm behind her head, so that she could
nestle in the curve of his shoulder. Before she could rouse herself enough to say anything, he was breathing quietly and evenly. Smiling, feeling more wrung out and satiated than she’d ever felt before, Molly splayed her fingers across his taut abdomen and drifted off to sleep.

* * *

R
AY
AWOKE
TO
THE
SOUND
of a phone ringing. By the time he opened his eyes, Molly was rushing out of the
bathroom with a towel wrapped carelessly around her, her hair damp and tousled and her eyes still heavy with sleep. The sight of her aroused him and he wanted to pull her onto the bed and make love with her again.

But she went straight to her bedside table, searching for her phone. When she didn’t find it, she grabbed her pink kimono off the floor. She let the towel drop and tossed the kimono
around her with an unconscious grace that made him instantly hard, then she rushed from the room.

He heard her answer the phone. He got up and quickly pulled on his jeans. By the time he got to the bedroom door, there was panic in her voice.

“What? Oh, my God, when?”

He got to the kitchen in time to hear her say, “What do you mean, last night?” Her fist clenched at her side. “He’s
not in the hospital?” Her voice rose in pitch and volume.

“I’ll be right there,” she said through clenched teeth. “You tell him I’ll be right there.” She hung up and stood there, frowning at her phone’s blank screen.

“Mols? What is it?”

“It’s Martin. He had a heart attack—around midnight
last night.
” She brandished her phone in a frustrated gesture. “That was Flan,” she spat. “He
let Martin leave the hospital.”

“I’m sorry, hon,” Ray said. “He’s had other attacks?”

“No. He’s never sick. I don’t know what happened.”

“And Flan?” he asked. “Is that his campaign manager?”

“Right. His name is Flannery Thrasher,” she said sourly as she headed toward the bedroom. “They apparently were talking when Martin had the attack. Thrasher probably caused it.”

“I’ll
drive you,” he said.

She grabbed a dress from the closet and slid it over her head. “No. I don’t want you around my brother. He knows who you are. Seeing you will upset him. I need to make sure he’s okay. I’m going to try to get him to go back to the hospital.”

She compressed her lips as she slipped her feet into low-heeled sandals. “I can’t believe the hospital let Flan take him home.
I’m next of kin. Why didn’t they call me?” She started out of the bedroom, then turned back. “Could you please make sure the house is locked?”

Her sandals clicked on the hardwood floors as she left, slamming the front door behind her. Once she was gone, Ray dressed. He took a long look at the guest bedroom, where files and papers, pens and notepads were scattered all over the floor. He’d
talked with the police officers about the break-in and Molly’s assault, but once they’d left, his entire focus had been on her.

Now he crouched and looked at the file folders that had been thrown onto the floor. There were the typical folders found in anyone’s file cabinet. He saw one labeled Martin, but when he sifted through the papers near it, he found only a couple of photocopies of newspaper
clippings that pertained to her brother. The thief must have taken the rest.

He sat back on his haunches and surveyed the room. Molly had said he got the papers. She’d meant the incriminating memos and notes she’d taken from the LDAT files eight years ago. That proved Martin was guilty of embezzlement. Ray cursed and ground his right fist into his left palm.

Without those papers, the
amount of evidence Ray had wasn’t enough even to convene a grand jury, much less indict Hennessey. Of the four most influential people on the LDAT, Hennessey was the only one who’d never had to pay for his crimes. Remy and Mack had taken down Barnaby and Barrow. Patrick Flay was presumed dead. But the man who’d masterminded the crimes was still free to lie and cheat and steal from the people of New
Orleans. And within a few months, as governor, he’d have enough power to spread his corruption through the entire state of Louisiana.

Ray felt the despair and humiliation that had overwhelmed him as the FBI helicopter airlifted him out of the death and destruction of Hurricane Katrina.

But he would not fail the people of New Orleans this time. He would bring Hennessey down, even if it
destroyed any chance he might have with Molly. And God knew he wanted another chance with her. Last night had proved that to him. He still wanted her, still desired her, still wondered what his life would be like if they’d met under different circumstances.

He scrubbed a palm across his face. He needed to focus on his next move if he was to have a prayer of stopping Molly’s brother. When
he opened his eyes again, he spotted the small fireproof safe sitting in the bottom of Molly’s closet. The door was open and he could see from fifteen feet away that it was empty. The thief had obviously forced her to give him the combination.