Drop Dead Gorgeous (15 page)

I stood tapping my foot—very gently—for a while, my arms crossed. What the hell was so funny? I began to get annoyed. I like a joke as well as anyone, but first I have to know what it is. Then I began to get pissed, because I got the feeling he was laughing at me. I got this idea because he kept pointing at me, then breaking into fresh fits of mirth. Finally I was angry.

First, let me point out that if flouncing hurts, marching is out of the question. I had to settle for merely walking, but with attitude, over to glare down at him. "Would you
stop
?" I shouted, thinking seriously about pinching him. "What's so funny?" Things were not going my way, and that is so not on my list of favorite things. Evidently I'd overlooked something, and Wyatt is an expert at finding loopholes—or completely ignoring what I tell him. In retrospect, making him worry about the flowers for the wedding didn't seem mean at all.

"You," he wheezed, wiping tears from his eyes. He sat up and reached for me, but I hastily stepped back out of reach. I can't fight if he's touching me, because I get sidetracked. He fights dirty, using my weaknesses against me by going straight for my neck, like Dracula focusing on an open vein. Forget my breasts; touching them does nothing for me. But man oh man, my neck is a big-time erogenous zone, and Wyatt knows it.

"I'm so glad you find me amusing." I wanted to pout, and I also wanted to kick him. You'll notice I was having these violent thoughts, but I did not act on any of them. I'm not a violent person.
Vindictive, maybe, but not violent.
I'm also not stupid. If I ever get violent with someone, it isn't going to be a muscular, athletic guy who's ten inches taller than I am and about ninety pounds heavier, if not more. That's if I have a choice.

His shoulders began shaking again. "It… it's just the very idea—"

"That some men believe their partners' pleasure is more important than their own?" I felt very indignant that he'd be laughing about this. I thought it was a great idea.

He shook his head.
"N-no, not that."
He took a deep breath, his green eyes brilliant from mirth and moisture. "It's just that—
You
came up with this idea as a way to pay me back because you thought I'd go nuts with frustration."

"Oh? You mean it won't bother you at all?" I couldn't believe him. I know Wyatt, and "horny" is his middle name. Not literally, of course, though wouldn't that be interesting on his birth certificate?

Lazily he got to his feet, hooking an arm around my waist before I could scoot even farther away. I was slower than usual, because I had to be careful, and he moved with the quick grace of the true athlete. He pulled me close, wrapping his other arm around me, too, and lifted me on my tiptoes so my hips fit right against his. He had a hard-on, of course—big surprise there. The tingles that started zipping through me were no surprise, either.

"It would bother me," he drawled, "if it happened. Picture this: I'm on top of you. We're naked. Your legs are around my waist. I'm kissing your neck. I've been fucking you for, let's say, twenty minutes or so."

Twenty minutes? Man, I need to turn on the air-conditioning on, because the temperature in the condo was suddenly too high. My nipples were tingling now, because even though I don't much like having them touched, they weren't dead. Most of my parts were tingling. I took this to mean I was in trouble.

He bent his head down so his hot breath washed over my neck as he kissed the hollow below my ear.

Somehow I was a little off balance, so I had to cling to his shoulders to stay upright—except that wasn't really working, because I wasn't exactly upright, but I just kept on clinging. "You wouldn't be able to
stop
me from coming," he murmured, kissing down the side of my neck. "You wouldn't even
think
of it."

Think of what
? I wondered fuzzily,
then
jerked my wandering mind back on topic. See, this is what he does when we're fighting, he distracts me with sex. I admit to sometimes deliberately starting an argument because I like the way he fights; I'm
not
stupid. The problem is that he uses the same tactics when I'm serious. He likes that I have such a difficult time resisting him, because he isn't stupid, either. After we've been together a couple of years I figure the intensity will fade and we'll have to find another way to settle our arguments, but until then the best way to fight fire was to set a backfire.

I stopped clinging with one hand, and sent it roaming over his shoulder and down his arm, to his ribs, down some more—slowly, slowly, trailing my fingers, pausing to rub, then finally going for the bull's-eye. He shuddered as I stroked him through his jeans, his arms tightening around me.

"God almighty," he said in a strained voice, stopping his assault on my neck as he concentrated on my assault on him. He hadn't had any relief in a few days, and I figured he was
more needy
than I was, especially considering how generous he'd been with me the day before.

Yes, if I were fair-minded, I'd either give him the same relief or stop teasing him. Get real.

Probably our game of tease would have stopped being a game and we'd have ended up in bed—or on the couch—having the most careful,
nonjostling
sex we could manage, if his cell phone hadn't rung. He had it set to a real, old-fashioned ring-ring sound, just like an ordinary phone, and in my dazed state I thought my home phone was ringing. I fully intended to ignore it, but instead of continuing with what he was doing he immediately released me and pulled the phone from his belt.

The worst thing about being involved with a cop is the hours. No, the worst thing would be if he'd been on the street and in constant danger, but Wyatt was a lieutenant, which meant he wasn't involved in any dangerous stuff any longer—thank God—but it also meant he was on call just about all the time. Our city isn't a hotbed of crime, but still he got called out, on average, three or four nights a week. Weekends were no exception.

"
Bloodsworth
," he said in a slightly clipped accent, the result of his years spent playing football up North, his attention already completely focused on the situation being related to him. I started to move away from him and he caught my wrist, holding me in place. Okay, so maybe he wasn't completely focused.

"I'll be there in ten minutes," he finally said, and closed the flip-top on the phone.

"Hold my place," he told me, bending his head to give me a firm, warm kiss that involved some tongue. "When I get back, I want to pick up where we left off." Then he was gone, firmly closing the front door behind him. A few seconds later I heard the Avalanche roar to life and the wheels bark a little as he shot away from the curb.

Sighing, I went over to the door and locked it. Without him here distracting me, maybe I could think of some way to simplify my immediate future. Breaking a leg might work, because then the wedding would be put off until the cast was gone. Breaking
his
leg sounded even better. But I'd had enough of pain; I wanted to concentrate on the good stuff, on getting married, settling into our routine together, having a family.

Instead I had to concentrate on playing marriage counselor, a job for which I wasn't remotely qualified.

Manipulation, on the other hand… a little emotional blackmail here, a little guilt there… I could do that.

I called Mom. "Where's Jazz living now?" I asked. I didn't explain the problem to her—she was, after all, Sally's best friend. This was between Wyatt and me, our own private bone of contention.

"With Luke," Mom replied. Luke is the third
Arledge
son. The kids were refusing to take sides, which was annoying Sally and Jazz, who both felt misunderstood and completely justified in their actions. "I gather Jazz is putting a crimp in Luke's style."

Luke was also the wildest of the
Arledge
bunch. I don't mean wild as in drugs and getting into trouble, I mean wild as in definitely not tamed, uninterested in settling down, and with a social life that should have already caused permanent damage to his back. He wouldn't at all be happy to have his father living with him.

Why on earth had Jazz picked Luke to live with? Any of his children would have opened their homes to him. Matthew and Mark were both married and had families, but they also each had guest bedrooms, so the arrangement wouldn't have been horrible. John, the youngest, was working toward his master's degree and lived in a rented house with two other graduate students, so maybe living with him wouldn't have been so great. Tammy had been married about a year, and she and her husband had a large house in the country, but no children, so there was plenty of room there.

On the other hand, if Jazz wanted to make Sally fret about what he might be doing, living with Luke was the way to do it.

That gave me hope, because if Jazz was trying to make Sally jealous, then he hadn't walked away from the marriage. He was mad as hell, though.

Luke would be more than willing to help, I thought. If Jazz was cramping his style, he'd want his father out of there, and what better way to accomplish that than by helping me? I was doing a good thing here; who wouldn't want to help?

I looked up Luke's number in the phone book, then thought better of the idea and called Tammy instead. Caller ID makes being sneaky more complicated, and I didn't want Jazz to see my name on Luke's phone.

Therefore, I needed his cell number.

When Tammy answered I explained what I was trying to do—though not why—and she thought it was a good idea. "God knows
we
haven't been able to get anything accomplished," she said wearily, meaning her and her brothers. "Mom and Dad are so
stubborn,
it's been like beating my head against the wall. Good luck." She gave me Luke's cell number, we chatted for a while longer about the different arguments that had been used against her wayward parents,
then
hung up.

When Luke answered his cell phone, I went through the explanation again. "Hold on," he said,
then
I listened to a variety of noises that ended with the sound of a door closing. "I'm outside now, where I can talk."

"Jazz?"
I asked
,
just to make certain. I didn't have to elaborate.

"Oh, yeah."
He sounded weary.

"He won't be suspicious because you've gone outside to talk?"

"No, I've done that a lot lately."

"Is he seeing anyone? Making noises about actually filing for divorce?"

"Nada.
For one thing, he can't live with me if he's going to cheat on Mom. And for another, he gets sick to his stomach and throws up when he starts talking about them not ever living together again. This whole fu—" He caught himself before the f-bomb exploded. "—
situation
is stupid. They love each other. What the hell this standoff is accomplishing is beyond me."

"They're showing each other how upset they are," I explained. I sort of understood it, except they were going to extreme lengths to make their separate points.

"They're also showing the world that they're idiots." Luke was definitely not a happy camper.

I bypassed that comment, not wanting to get into the question of idiocy. Personally, I was on Sally's side. Luke wanted his parents to work things out, but he was a guy; he probably thought his mother was taking interior decorating too seriously. I'm not sure it's possible to take decorating too seriously, but I'm not a guy.

"Has Jazz said anything that might hint how he wants this to play out? Does he want Sally to apologize, or just call and ask him to come back?"

"In a way, this is all he talks about, but he doesn't say anything new, you know? It's the same thing, over and over again. He was trying to do something nice for her and she blew up in his face, wouldn't listen to reason,
then
she went crazy, etcetera, etcetera. Anything useful there?"

Only that Jazz still had no appreciation for how hard Sally had worked collecting and refinishing her antique furniture. "Maybe," I said. "I have an idea, anyway. How about your mom? What has she said? What's your take, as a guy, on this whole thing?"

He hesitated, and I knew he was struggling to be fair, to not take sides. Luke's a nice guy, despite his hot sheets. As far as I was concerned, his sheets qualified as community property, and by that I mean an
entire
community. When he finally did settle down, I thought I should probably advise his chosen love to burn all his sheets, because that kind of nasty can't be boiled out.

"I kind of see both sides," he finally said, pulling my thoughts away from laundry problems. "I mean, I know Mom worked really hard refinishing the furniture, and she loves antiques. On the other hand, Dad was trying to do something nice for her. He knew he was clueless about decorating, so he went to an expert, and he paid a small fortune to have their bedroom redone."

Okay, this was interesting; my vague idea was getting firmer. I also had an ace in the hole I could pull out if my idea didn't work.

My phone beeped to let me know there was an incoming call. "Thanks, this has been a help," I said.

"No problem.
Anything to get him back home."

We said our good-byes and I flashed to the incoming call. "Hello."

There was a pause, followed by click, then a moment of dead air, then finally the dial tone. Puzzled, I checked the Caller ID, but since I'd already been on the phone the call hadn't registered. Mentally I shrugged; if whoever it was wanted to talk, he or she could call back.