Bad Girl by Night (10 page)

Taking a deep breath, he tried the game again—a challenging and advanced variation on Tetris, an old favorite from when he was a kid. And . . . damn it, he lost again, that quick, because he couldn’t even concentrate on the little shapes on his screen—in his mind he kept seeing her looking up at him with those big, hazel eyes while his cock was buried deep in her warm, wet mouth. He kept hearing her whimper and moan when Colt had been licking her, or fucking her. He kept feeling how tight and hot her pussy had been when finally he’d gotten his turn there. Shit—no wonder he couldn’t concentrate on a stupid game.

Time to give in. To his baser needs.

Not that there was anything wrong with a little masturbation, so maybe he shouldn’t consider it “giving in.” But after she’d pissed him off so badly yesterday, he’d wanted to make a clean break from her. She’d come off as a bitch, and he just . . . aw hell, maybe he simply didn’t like feeling as if she was
still
controlling his sex. Even from a distance now, which seemed even worse.

Nonetheless, he needed to take a shower before work anyway—so he headed in that direction. Within moments, he stood under the warm spray, eyes closed, soaping up his body . . . soon concentrating on soaping up his hard cock.

He imagined his hands were hers. She’d had damn good hands. Then he imagined his hands were her mouth—God knew she’d liked sucking him, so it was easy enough to fantasize that she was in the shower with him, on her knees before him, sliding those moist lips over his erection. Sliding up and down. Looking up at him, just as she had that night.

Only now . . . since they were in the shower, she looked . . . a lot more like Carly than Desiree. Sucking him. Sucking him until he bit his lip, let out a groan. Sucking him with that same wild abandon and enthusiasm. Sucking him longer, better, than any woman ever had. He envisioned his hands in her wet hair, around her head, pulling her to him, again, again. Glancing down to see that she loved it. Wanted more. Wanted him to come in that hungry little mouth of hers. Wanted him to shoot straight down her throat.

Aw—hell yes. He was coming. Between her pretty lips. And she was swallowing it without a flinch, drinking it, even sucking him dry.

Finally, he opened his eyes, let out a long sigh, leaned back against the tile wall of the shower.

Shit.

He wanted her again, too damn much. He wanted to know her story—
also
too damn much. He knew there was more to her now, and he couldn’t seem to stop aching to find out what. Was it a game she’d been playing? Or was she leading some kind of double life—cheating on a husband or a boyfriend?

He closed his eyes again, this time trying to shut it all out, make it go away. Surely there would be other girls in town to date. With a little time, he’d lose interest in this one—he’d quit caring what her story was and eventually just chalk the whole thing up to being one of those occasional bizarre occurrences in life. After all, whatever the situation was, there was drama involved, and he hadn’t come here for drama. He’d left the city because he was
tired
of drama.

As he dressed in his new navy blue uniform, checked his weapon, and strapped on his gun belt, he felt better, almost convinced that he would tire of fantasizing about little miss Carly soon enough. He had a new life here, a new job, and that was what he needed to focus on. And meeting some other single girls would help.

So far, his shifts for the Turnbridge Police Department had all been about training, and this one was no different. He was going out on night patrol with another cop around his age, Tommy Gwynn.

As they rode along in Tommy’s cruiser, he showed Jake the route they covered hourly and pointed out the few homes and other places where disturbances had occurred in the past, explaining at the same time that it didn’t mean they were likely to occur there again. “But we don’t get much trouble here, and I gotta show ya
somethin’
, right?” he said with a laugh.

Jake had known life as a small-town cop would hold less action than his work down in the Motor City, but he was beginning to realize it might be a
lot
less.

After Tommy told him about a few law-related scuffles that had taken place here over the years, talk turned to more personal things. Jake learned that Tommy was married with two kids, ages ten and eight, and he’d grown up in Turnbridge but had done a stint down in Saginaw for a few years when his children were little. He’d liked working in a larger city, but his wife had missed her family and wanted to come home when it was time for their oldest to start school.

“I won’t lie to ya,” Tommy said, “it’s a quiet job mostly, but there are good people here, and when they need ya, it feels good to help ’em out. What I’m sayin’ is—we might not get many calls, but when we do, I think it matters a little more because the person on the other end is usually somebody you know—your neighbor, or the guy who cuts your hair, or the woman who poured your coffee yesterday. Know what I mean?”

Jake nodded. “I think so.” Tommy was saying it was impossible to be a cop here without getting to know everybody. And Jake imagined—to his duress—that included the shopkeepers on Main Street, too.

“So,” Jake ventured, “are there any single girls in this town? Or do I need to go somewhere else if I want to have a love life?”

Tommy cracked a grin. “Eh, there are a few. But if you’re lookin’ for a little love connection on a Saturday night, there’s a watering hole over in Cherry Creek I can recommend.”

Why did that answer disappoint him for some reason? “What about Carly Winters?” Aw shit, where had
that
come from?

Tommy slanted him a look. “What about her?”

Jake tried his best to sound casual. “Just wondering what her situation is. Is she dating anybody?”

“Her? No way.” Tommy laughed. “And sorry to break it to ya, partner, but she won’t date you, either.”

Jake lowered his chin, curious. “How do
you
know?”

“Carly doesn’t date
anybody
. Ever. I asked her out once myself back in the day, before I started seeing Tina. Turned me down flat.”

Now
Jake
let out a chuckle. “And if she won’t date
you
, that means she won’t date anybody?”

“Let’s just say,” Tommy began, undaunted, “that her last name suits her.”

Jake raised his eyebrows in Tommy’s direction, wondering what that meant.

And Tommy said, “You know. Winters. Frigid.”

It left Jake positively speechless. Carly Winters might be a lot of things, but frigid sure as hell wasn’t one of them. “Uh, what makes you think so?”

“A good friend of mine, Chuck Gardner, was her high school sweetheart. They dated for two years, and it was serious—they went to the senior prom together, she gave him her virginity afterward, and they were talking marriage. But what it boiled down to is—she just wasn’t into sex, and it caused problems.”

It was all Jake could do to keep his jaw from hitting the floor. “Really? She wasn’t into sex?”

“Chuck didn’t give me every detail or anything, but . . . I got the idea she ran hot and cold—like she’d act all hot and ready, but when they actually did it, she was a cold fish. One time she even cried and wouldn’t tell him what was wrong, and it made him feel like a jerk, like he was hurting her or something. He was crazy about the girl, kept trying to make it work, but she finally broke up with him. After that, she dated a couple other guys, but not for long—and as far as I know, she hasn’t gone out with anybody since she was about nineteen or twenty. We’re talking, like . . . twelve years or some crazy-ass amount of time like that. Some people in town think she’s a closet lesbian.”

“Nope,” Jake said before he could stop himself.

Pulling to a stop at the one traffic light in town, Tommy turned to look at him—and Jake regretted sounding so sure. “How would
you
know?”

“Uh, I just don’t think so,” Jake fudged. “I mean, have you seen the way her jeans hug her ass.” That was hardly a good reason not to think she was a lesbian, but it was all he could come up with at the moment.

“You don’t
want
to think so,” Tommy said, as if he were the voice of wisdom, “but trust me. I’ve known the girl all my life and she’s just not into guys. Might not be into girls, either—I have no idea—but she’s definitely not into guys.”

That’s what
you
think.

As the police cruiser rolled slowly up Main, Jake’s eyes were drawn unwittingly to the dark, brick, two-story building that housed Winterberry’s. A dim light burned in a second-floor window.

“Where’s she live?” he asked Tommy absently, eyeing that light.

And Tommy pointed, conveniently enough, to the window Jake was already watching. “Up there. Inherited the business from her dad when he died about seven or eight years ago—and she turned the second floor into an apartment.”

“But I wouldn’t waste my time if I were you, bud.”

But actually, Tommy Gwynn was right—he shouldn’t waste his time. He’d already decided not to, after all. So what the hell was he doing asking about her in the first place? Finally, to shore up his decision, he said, “Sounds like good advice.”

“Hey, maybe some weekend night when we’re both off, I’ll get a boys’ night out together and we’ll head over to Cherry Creek.”

“Your wife won’t mind?”

He shook his head. “We both take a night out on our own every now and then. And just ’cause I can’t touch don’t mean I can’t look,” he concluded with a wink. Then he said, “If it’s all the same to you, I’m thirsty and this is about the time of night I tend to stop in at Schubert’s for a root beer.”

Actually, getting out of the car sounded good to Jake. In Detroit, he’d been a motorcycle cop, and spending so many hours in the car would take some getting used to. “Let’s do it,” he said.

Although after Tommy pulled to the curb and they both got out, Jake said, “I’ll catch up with you inside in a few minutes. I need to stretch my legs, take a walk or something.” It was the truth.

“Sure thing, man,” Tommy said, and they headed off in separate directions.

Jake liked Gwynn, thought he was going to be easy to work with and would maybe be his first real friend here. But he wasn’t thinking much about friends as he traveled the Main Street sidewalk in the cool summer night air. Instead he was wondering why the hell Carly Winters hadn’t dated anybody since she was twenty. And why, instead, she turned herself into someone else to have wild sex with guys she didn’t know. He could see how maybe a girl might want to dress up, go someplace new, get lucky, get laid. But why the fake name? Why the whole different personality? The more he learned about this woman, the less sense she made.

Unless . . . naw, he didn’t want to go there, didn’t want to think those thoughts.

Even if, when he added what he’d just learned to the whole Desiree conundrum, it seemed like . . . a big warning sign. And Jake knew something about warning signs.

And yeah, he’d just reminded himself—again—that he was done with her, that her issues were none of his concern, but that didn’t stop his feet from leading him the few blocks to her building. He stood across the street, just looking up at the window, at the light, trying to catch sight of her. He had no idea why. And damn, he
was
beginning to feel a little like a stalker.

Still, even that sobering thought didn’t tear him away—at least not just yet. Standing beneath a streetlamp, he realized that if she happened to glance out, she’d see him, too.

Talk about good advice.

“Okay,” he murmured, actually answering himself out loud, then turned on the sidewalk—to find himself face-to-face with Carly Winters.

S
he looked as surprised to see him as he was to see her. Clearly, he wasn’t the only one taking a quiet walk in Turnbridge tonight.

“Carly,” he said, soft, deep.

She sucked in her breath as if surprised to hear him call her by name—or at least by the
right
name.

She looked like she might dart at any moment, so he said, as gently as he could manage, “Please don’t run away from me.”

His eyes locked on hers, which shone beneath the streetlamp as big and expressive as ever. She wore her long hair loose tonight, falling around her shoulders, messy, pretty. She’d tied a long cardigan sweater over her top and blue jeans, wearing something plain and dark underneath. So simple looking, this girl. And yet . . . so damn complicated.

And as he stood there, probably three feet away from her, he still wanted her. No matter how simple. No matter how complicated. He didn’t like it, but he couldn’t deny it, either. The same chemistry that had drawn them together so easily that night in Traverse City flowed between them now, hot and palpable. The same but different.
Very
different.

Would she be surprised to know he thought she was prettier like this than on the night they’d met? She’d been a knockout as Desiree, but in all truth, that night she’d been the kind of woman you thought of fucking, not spending time with. Here, now, she looked like the kind of woman he wanted to be with, talk with . . . and yeah—fuck, too. But again, it was so very different from the first time.

He swallowed, trying to find words. “Listen, I—”

“I’m sorry—I have to go,” she said quickly, then stepped down off the curb and moved briskly across the street before disappearing inside her building.

Jake stood silently watching, torn inside. In too many different directions.

He burned to know what made this woman tick. He ached desperately to take her to bed. And he knew it would still be a hell of a lot smarter to just walk away and leave it all alone.