Red Silk Scarf (23 page)

Sullivan’s eyes
holding hers relentlessly were beseeching her to enter his arms where the
emptiness, the ache, the guilt would be eased.
 
Unbelievably, he was offering what she so desperately needed.
 
The problem was Cassidy knew he'd absorb her
within himself as he did whenever they were close.
 
There was no way she could let down her
guard, especially under the circumstances.
 
Not when Ben was . . . She was experiencing a vulnerability she'd regret
later, that's all.
 
With an almost
audible thump, her chin found her chest, her voice more breath than sound.
“Please take me home,” she managed somehow.

Surprising even
himself, without an argument, Sullivan complied, saying nothing in the car, purposely
staying as far away as possible in the elevator, several steps behind in the
hallway.
 
Not once did he offer to unlock
the door despite the tremulous hand making the task formidable.
  
It was his eyes, never abandoning her, those
knowing penetrating eyes that forever induced an odd uneasiness making the
silence grow tense and alive with anticipation and possibilities.

Bravely and
quickly, Cassidy moved to the center of the living room far enough away from
the door, from Sullivan.
 
She wouldn't look
at him, wouldn't cry.
 
Her secret plan
when she turned around was a simple thank you then she’d send him on his
way.
 
Squared shouldered, demeanor
falsely composed, upon turning had she moved an inch she would have collided
with Sullivan's chest.
 
Responding
helplessly to the close proximity her breath came as a gush.
 
She blushed violently.

Lifting an
anguished face to his, feeling the heavy weight of sorrow's tears, Cassidy shot
the ceiling a pitiful glance.
 
“Thank
you.
 
Please . . . go,” her voice cracked.
 
A statement Sullivan would not have heard if
not for their closeness.
 
Defying her
will tears came, one after another trickling down her cheek that plucked his
heart from its cavity.

Shockingly,
emotional week ness struck him. “People giving up their lives to save others
are the cornerstone of civilization, Cassidy.
 
Sacrifice was something DeMarco knew and understood.
 
In the end, he was a brave man who must have
loved you very much.” Sullivan’s insight stung unbelievably. “Like me, in time
you'll learn what doesn't kill you makes you stronger,” softly spoken words
like a feather stroking her wounded soul.

Sullivan didn't
know who programmed the sermon, or who helped him speak.
 
The only thing on his mind was how just
looking at Cassidy made him feel so unworthy.
 
A peculiar thought considering she was a “Prostitute” a profession he
detested and whose services he vowed never again to require.
 
However, at the moment, he was so totally,
completely helpless and hungry for what Cassidy could offer, no, more like
starved for her and in her eyes, he saw the same hunger.
 
With his dream of making love to her now
hovering on the cusp of fulfillment, he opened his arms.
 
He never believed she’d so willingly crawl
into them, into his heart.
 
Fear rushed two
sets of eyes as she wrapped her tiny arms around his waist to draw him tighter
against her breasts, the jolt physical, mutual, both throbbing, aroused, and
sick with desire.

Absorbing her
grief, feeling his body swell in response, brought him close to tears
himself.
 
“Sh, sh,” his quivering lips
puffed, as arms rocked, hands shaped her back, and his shirt absorbed
liquid.
 
A magical, powerful liquid that
penetrated material, skin, muscles, bones, and created such an ache he fought
for breath.
 

Despite wanting
her, he couldn't behave like a bull, Sullivan reasoned, a desire that
temporarily over ruled his better judgment tightening his hold one second then
setting her back the next.
  
Still, a
hand needing to touch her held her face as the other smoothed back her
hair.
 
Meager acts that made fingers
restless.
 
Sliding to the nape of her
neck, they curled around to massage away the tension he forever erupted.
 
Why he didn't know, for Cassidy’s razor sharp
eyes were enough to put the Devil in his place, her tongue like a Rattlesnake.

 
As expected, Cassidy resisted the slight tugs
that would have brought her lips to his, yet in contradiction accepted the
thumbs finding her cheeks.
  
Reactions
that made the briefest smile curving his mouth soon melt into a hot and
dangerous gaze.
 
She was magnificent, he
thought, watching her with helpless delight.
 
A cocky little thing who, thrived on taking chances, liked control,
never believed she could be so vulnerable.
 
Like a sledge hammer reality hit, no man could make her bend to his
will, not even him.
 

Yes, they were
very much alike.
 
By now, his brain
should have known better than to cave into such magnetism, the intensity of
their desire too real, both wanting the other, needing the other, badly.
 

“I'm sorry.
 
I'm sorry.
 
I'm sorry,” lulling words that eased her tension and drilled to her
core.
 
She needed something, to fill that
gigantic pocket of emptiness, to shield her from what was yet to come.
 
By the time his lips branded empathy into
every patch of her skin, Cassidy was a mass of flames.
 
She no longer needed his hands for stability,
her arms around his neck worked just fine.
 

While his lips
and tongue did unspeakably things to her submissive mouth, his masculine
demanding hands and fingers did other marvelous, erotic, breathtaking
things.
 
Despite feeling helpless with
delight, the smidgeon of her that knew better battling for prominence made her
step back.

Gazing deeply
into her eyes, Sullivan’s dazed expression began sobering little by
little.
 
“Cassidy,” he groaned, part
threat, part desperation.
 
“Your fierce
spirit baffles me, and makes me wonder what it would be like to have you.”

Seeing her own
desperation in his eyes Cassidy wondered how and when Sullivan became her
strongest week ness, and yet bravery in the face of fear.
 
Then again, she didn't want to know, she
wanted it over, finally over.
 
“Ben,
forgive me,” she silently begged while swinging up on her toes suddenly glad to
be wrong about Sullivan.
 

Sullivan having
his way with her was all right, his aggression offered equal rights to have her
way with him.
 
Hoping she appeared
experienced, feverish hands searched for the body parts she dreamed of
touching, each discovery better than her imagination.
 
Passions crusade hastily rendered them naked,
a fact Cassidy became aware of only when her bare back collided with the
coolness of the wall where hard muscle pressed against soft skin and a powerful
thigh parted her legs making the physical change in him all too evident.
 
Every long, lean inch of Sullivan felt
wonderful as she quickly memorized the slow easy movements he
orchestrated.
 
An unfamiliar rhythm that
created darts of pleasure, a fervor building so quickly so frantically his hand
searched for the space beneath her knee.
 
Fingers gripping and pulling lifted her leg to align the part of her
that could soothe the part of him in the most agony.
 
At the same time, his tongue found its own
entrance.
 
Cassidy would have screamed
from the ecstasy worming its way inside her from opposite directions, probably
did, but Sullivan’s mouth captured them all.
 

Easily lifting
her, with her legs clamped around his waist, one of his arms instructed the
moves, a hand on her buttocks pressing and kneading, another playing out lascivious
fantasies against her breast.
 
Each
swallowing the others gasps and whimpers bodies doing the same increased the
speed of motion until both succeeded in possessing the other.
 
As Sullivan exhaled roughly, unsteadily
against her swollen mouth, and she sobbed beneath the intense rhythm, one
unexpected thrust stole their breaths, a time when hearts melted into a
whirlpool that heaved and sucked at an overflowing liquid.
 
Just as Sullivan predicted the inevitable had
its way.

Any sane person
would have ended it there, but the flames refusing to die moved them to the
shower where he lovingly shampooed her hair and washed her body as if
worshipping a Goddess.
 
All the protests
Cassidy may have muttered he kissed into oblivion.
 
Though some of his movements were now
familiar, others were not.
 
Actions both
shocking and exotic at the same time as both did to the other things she only
heard about, read about, and fantasized about, glorious, things that would have
been frightening if not for Sullivan's expertise.
  
Though his experience proved that she wasn’t
the only woman he’d taken so wantonly, it made her more determined to be the
last.

What seemed light
years later, when Cassidy believed she'd learned everything there was to know,
was certain she could take no more, carrying her to the soft mattress he
surprised her again as they shared an intimacy that joined their bodies, minds
and souls.

Sullivan, wielded
his tools of trade expertly, used them against her to build an impenetrable,
invisible shield she had no defense against.
 
After today, Cassidy could find someone to hold her, but she'd always
want more, what only Sullivan could offer, a man who liked sex frequently, slow
and well done.
 
Through it all, there
were no words of love, or promises, only primitive guttural sounds escaping on
puffs of ecstasy.

Lying beside
Cassidy, though Sullivan was screaming she couldn’t hear him.
 
Indeed, she was the best of them, the last of
them.
 
Despite his suspicions, the
reality angered him.
 
When would he accept
he'd never be as good as his father, never live up to his mentors'
expectations?
 
Falling for a prostitute
wasn't part of the plan.
 
Even if she
gave up her profession, they could never be together.
 
He could never trust her, or she him.
 
One day they'd do to each other exactly what
Mark was doing to Margie and he despised cheating.
 
Now pulling him apart piece by piece were
things he needed to tell Cassidy, thing’s she didn't know, if she did . . .
What, in hell, was he thinking? Had she completely brainwashed him?
 
They had no future.
 

Everything that
seemed so perfect was only a temporary fix, Cassidy reflected.
 
Like the most powerful drug, the aftermath of
sex had dissipated bringing reality back in vivid colors.
 
Ben was dead.
 
To save official’s embarrassment they would not reveal Ben’s
identity.
 
They would sweep all his good
intentions into the gutter.
 
Ben died
exactly as his disguise dictated, a pimp, a drug pusher, a drug addict, a
killer.

Everyone knew
when assigned to this case, if death occurred there would be no funeral, no
flowers, no eulogy filled with praises, no public display of mourning, no
rewards for heroism.
 
No one would learn
the details behind solving the mystery, or the identity of those trained to pay
the price.
 
It was their “Job,” something
“Expected,” as if dying a violent death was preordained just waiting for the
destined moment.

Cassidy’s job was
finished.
 
With the snap of her fingers,
she'd return to her family, home, and job.
 
L.A., would never know what happened to her, wouldn't miss her, wouldn’t
care, nor would she.
 
Somewhere along the
way, she'd lost her identity, never again to be the same Cassidy Ilene
Brady.
 
After twenty-six years, three
weeks had transformed her life, the problem now was, the worst was yet to
pass.
 

Tough times
dictated no clemency.
  
Dan would insist
on charging all officers involved in illegal activities, Sullivan and Mark
among them.
 
She’d have no choice but to
testify, and wondered if she could.
 
Looking into the eyes of the men who in their own way touched her heart
while ripping away their jobs, dissecting them and their families would be
heart wrenching.
 
It was peculiar that
such thoughts were entering her mind now when she’d been through it so many
times before.
 
The differences then, they
were people that she didn't know and therefore she didn't care.
 
Cut and dried, she did her job.
 
A job she'd allowed to make her as cold and
callous as Dan.
 
A job she no longer
admired.