Rock Chick 01 (10 page)

Then he brushed his lips against mine (that
counted as a half a kiss too, which put me at four kisses from Lee
in one, single day).

“These are really bad guys. They may seem
like imbeciles, but they’re not nice guys,” he said. “You don’t
mess with these guys.”

“They’re scared of you,” I told him.

“I can probably protect you from them, I
likely can’t protect you from yourself. What did you think you were
you doing?”

“I was looking for Rosie,” I said out
loud.

“I thought
I
was looking for
Rosie.”

“If I find him first, then I don’t owe you
anything.”

“You owe me for this afternoon.”

“That wasn’t that hard, you just walked in
and took me out. That’s only worth, say, me making you a batch of
cookies.” His lips twitched. I decided to change the subject.
“Please take me home.”

He shook his head and watched me for a
beat.

“Leave Rosie to me,” he demanded.

I didn’t respond. I may have been shot at,
stun-gunned and kidnapped which would make any logical-minded
person back off. Not me. Now, I was on a mission. I was going to
find Rosie, beat the crap out of him, turn the diamonds over to
Terry Wilcox and then move to Bangladesh to avoid Lee, and,
possibly, Terry Wilcox.

“I don’t like what I’m seeing,” Lee said.
“You look like you looked when your Dad told you that you couldn’t
go to Vegas to see Whitesnake in concert.”

Hmm. That was a good concert and very worth
the month’s grounding I got when I returned.

Lee’s arm around my waist brought me closer,
in direct, full-frontal contact.

“You better be worth the trouble you’re
undoubtedly gonna cause,” he said softly, his lips very close to
mine.

Somewhere along the line I got mesmerized by
his dark brown eyes.

“Of course I’m worth it,” I whispered.

Damn it all! I was losing control and
beginning to flirt.

I tipped my head back and licked my lips, my
tongue touching his lips as I did so.

“Jesus,” Lee muttered.

The door buzzer went.

He ignored it, his hand at my face moved back
to tangle in my hair, his other arm tightened further at my
waist.

I went up on tiptoe to get closer.

The door buzzer went again, this time,
whoever was pushing it didn’t let up.

“Maybe it’s Rosie,” I said.

“Shit,” Lee let me go and walked to the
door.

Two minutes later, the entirety of both our
families walked through the door.

“We’ve decided we’re going to have a
celebratory dinner,” Kitty Sue announced as she came in.

“
You
decided, the rest of us were all
just hungry,” Malcolm said, starting to smile at me then the smile
froze on his face.

Indeed, everyone stopped dead when they saw
me.

“What happened to you?” Dad shouted.

Hmm. I hadn’t seen my face but clearly it
looked as bad as it felt.

Malcolm Nightingale’s sons looked like him,
even now that he was getting older, he looked fit and lean and his
face was still handsome and interesting. He kept in shape by
running, a lot, sometimes traveling around the country to do
marathons.

Tom Savage was tall, with a still-handsome
face, sky blue eyes and most of the time, he could be very
charming. He had salt and pepper hair and had been built like a
defensive lineman when he was young. Over the years, that had given
way to just a bit of a pot-belly fueled by beer and his obsession
for Mexican food.

He turned to Lee. “You hit her?”

I took in a sharp breath at this insulting
question and so did everyone else.

Lee stared at Dad for a beat and then I
watched as his face closed down. He leaned his hips against the
kitchen counter and crossed his arms on his chest and didn’t deign
to answer.

Dad loved Lee, Dad thought about Hank, Lee
and Ally like Malcolm and Kitty Sue thought about me. I knew Dad
even admired Lee.

But Dad was a cop and he knew things about
Lee and his past that I didn’t know, things of which he didn’t
approve. Things that made Lee being involved with his daughter not
a happy circumstance to celebrate.

Regardless, I had the weird and irrational
desire to kick Dad in the shin.

“No, he didn’t hit me. Jeez, Dad,” I
said.

“Of course he didn’t hit her, Tommy. How
could you think such a thing? What happened?” Kitty Sue, ever the
diplomat, brushed off Dad’s idiotic remark and came toward me.

I looked at Ally who had dropped another bag
on the floor. This one was not an overnighter. This one was bigger,
stuffed full, undoubtedly packed with enough of my clothes to get
me through a week of staying at Lee’s, by the end of which I would
likely be pregnant or Lee’s love slave, or both.

If I wasn’t so worried about her and didn’t
love her with every fiber of my being, I would have strangled
her.

“You okay?” I asked.

Ally nodded.

Kitty Sue stopped and looked between the pair
of us. “Oh no, what are you two up to?”

I answered quickly, “Nothing. As for my
cheek,
Dad
, I got hit in the face with some books falling
off a shelf. Lee came over and got me so he could take a look at it
and put ice on it.” I walked to the sink and showed Dad the ice
bag, then, for some reason, I leaned my shoulder into Lee.

Don’t ask me why I did this. I just didn’t
like the way my Dad spoke to him and I didn’t like to see Lee’s
face close down like that.

“You have ice at Fortnum’s,” Dad said.

Oopsie.

This was true.

“Lee’s ice is better,” I replied.

Lame. I was losing my touch.

“I bet Lee’s ice is better,” Ally muttered
and both Kitty Sue and I gave her a killing look.

Hank and Lee were exchanging glances. Hank
sighed and rocked back on his heels. Lee uncrossed his arms and
draped one around my shoulders. I didn’t even try to decipher what
the Lee/Hank glance was all about, it had been a scary enough
day.

And anyway, all I could think was that their
coming over meant I was off the hook with the Lee Nap. It had been
getting pretty flirty there and I needed to restore control.

“Where are we going to dinner?” I asked
happily and Lee’s eyes slid sideways and his look made a definite
promise of “later”, shattering any illusions of my being off the
hook.

“Sushi Den,” Ally answered.

At those two words, Ally and I both
immediately threw up our hands, index finger and pinkie extended in
the famous, devil’s horns, “Rock On!” gesture and squealed,
“Sushi!”

“We’re not having sushi,” Malcolm
declared.

“We decided this. We’re having sushi,” Kitty
Sue said.

“Sushi’s shit,” Malcolm stated.

“Sushi’s good for you,” Kitty Sue
returned.

“Mexican is good for you,” Dad said.

Kitty Sue rolled her eyes.

I went to the bag excitedly.

I loved sushi, but I loved Sushi Den even
more. It was one of my favorite restaurants in Denver. It was on
Pearl Street, next to Pearl Street Grill and across from Stella’s
Coffee Haus.

Sushi Den was made out of cement and glass,
they had hostesses filled with attitude who, with a look, could
make lesser mortals feel small and even suicidal and they had the
best sushi I’d ever tasted. They never took reservations because
they were always wall-to-wall people. Ally and I went to Sushi Den
at least twice a month and had an ongoing battle to out-attitude
the hostesses (with hostesses winning).

“Did you bring me a Sushi Den outfit?” I
asked Ally.

You didn’t go to Sushi Den in jeans and
cowboy boots. Sushi Den demanded something else entirely. Clothing…
black. Shoes… stiletto. I had a full section of my closet devoted
to Sushi Den clothes.

“You bet your ass,” Ally replied.

* * * * *

I woke up in Lee’s bed again and my first
thought was sake.

I didn’t even
like
sake but I drank it
with Ally at Sushi Den because that’s what you had to do.

When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

When at Sushi Den, drink hot sake.

I was on my belly, left leg crooked, right
one straight, left arm bent with my hand resting on the pillow,
right arm crushed between me and what I knew had to be the weight
of Lee’s warm, hard body.

In one night, Lee had perfected a strategy of
keeping me in one place while I was sleeping. He was pressed
against my back, a good deal of his body resting on mine, his arm
around me, his left leg bent into the crook of mine and his thigh
pressed against my nether regions. This was surprisingly not
uncomfortable, it was cozy and warm and made me feel, somehow,
safe.

Fucking hell, how did I get myself into these
situations?

I thought back to our sake-soaked, family
“celebration” dinner and was thankful to discover that I remembered
everything.

Eat, drink sake, eat more, drink more sake,
get drunk.

Let Lee put me in his Crossfire while I blew
kisses to Ally, Hank, Dad, Kitty Sue, Malcolm and the parking
valet

Come back to Lee’s condo, stagger into his
bedroom, take off clothes, confiscate another wife beater, fall
face first in Lee’s big bed because of drunkenness and lack of
Disco Nap, and fall asleep.

With my left hand, I checked the status of my
clothing.

Panties, check.

Wife beater t-shirt, check.

Either Lee didn’t ravish my drunken self or
he dressed me when he was done. I figured it was the former.

My left cheekbone felt tight and there was a
dull ache that, without sake working its way through my system, I
could now actually feel.

I quickly strategized my next twenty minutes
as best as I could without the aid of caffeine.

I needed to get away from Lee without waking
him, call a taxi and go home.

Fine, good, sounded like a plan.

I inched forward, trying to be sneaky.

And failing.

“Un-unh,” Lee mumbled behind me, his arm
tightening.

Foiled at the first hurdle.

I tried again using yesterday’s successful
excuse for escape.

“I need to make coffee.”

Lee’s arm went away, but the weight of his
body was enough to keep me where I was. He slid further onto me,
bent and I felt his lips touch my shoulder at the same time I felt
his hand travel up the side of the thigh of my crooked leg,
stopping at my hip.

“You can have coffee after,” he said in my
ear.

Every muscle in my body tensed even as my
stomach melted.

“After what?”

His hand moved forward from my hip and his
fingers traced the waistband of my underwear just below my
navel.

“This is gonna happen,” he said and I didn’t
need him to explain what “this” meant. Then he said, “Now.”

Holy shit.

Belatedly I felt the evidence of his
determination against my behind and my heart started racing.

Since I knew that such a thing as sex
existed, I wanted to do it with Lee.

Now, faced with the imminent act, I was
terrified.

“I have a hangover,” I tried.

Lee’s lips were at my neck, either he didn’t
hear me or he didn’t believe me and thought my lie unworthy of a
response.

He pressed his hips into my ass as his hand
slid up my belly and I felt tingles shoot down my legs.

Holy, holy, shit, shit, shit.

I sank my teeth into my lip to stop from
groaning as pure electricity raced from everywhere in my body, with
pinpoint accuracy, straight between my legs.

I tried again.

“I have a headache.”

His hand went up my shirt and stopped just
under my breast, his knuckles brushing along the swell of the
underside.

“Probably tension, don’t worry, I know how to
ease tension.”

I bet he did.

I gave it one last shot.

“My face hurts.”

I felt his tongue right behind my ear before
he said, “I can take your mind off that.”

“Lee –”

His hand splayed on my midriff and his weight
and thigh went away. He pushed me on my back and leaned over
me.

“Give me one good reason not to do this,” he
demanded, looking me straight in the eye.

His hair was sexy wild again. His face was
both soft and hard. Soft with whatever-it-was I’d seen the last
couple of days whenever he looked at me, hard with determination
and desire.

In the face of that, without my morning
coffee, I had difficulty answering.

“That’s what I thought.” His head started to
come down when the phone rang.

“Are you gonna answer that?” I asked against
his lips, his arms were going around me, pulling me to him.

“Fuck no.”

He kissed me and I melted into him,
immediately, happily, the fight simply just went out of me. He was
that fine of a kisser.

So be it, I was finally going to make love
with Liam Nightingale.

My whole body rejoiced.

He fell to his back and pulled me over him,
his arms wrapped around me, holding me tight.

The phone rang again and then something
clattered on the night table but he ignored them as he dragged his
lips along my jaw to my ear.

I shivered.

One of his hands slid over my ass while the
other one held tight at my waist.

“I love your ass,” he murmured in my ear.
“I’ve always loved your ass.”

His words shivered through me. I had no idea
he loved my ass, the very thought thrilled me to the core, so much
so, I kissed him for all I was worth.

I heard him groan under my kiss and that
thrilled me too.

The phone was ringing again and the thing on
the night table vibrated and clattered. Lee’s hand was in my
underwear and my hand was at his belly, exploring his washboard abs
on a downward descent.

Then the door buzzer went, three quick buzzes
and then a longer one.