SEDUCTIVE SUPERNATURALS: 12 Tales of Shapeshifters, Vampires & Sexy Spirits (143 page)

“It is your business,” Carmen said, “I only work for you.”

“Sure, you do. Hey, before you go out tomorrow, why don’t you swing by here? I’ve got some great new window washing fluid I want you to try out.”

“Leave it on the porch,” Carmen ordered, “I’ll have Rosario pick it up on her way home.”

I almost saluted, but the sarcastic gesture would have been lost on her since she couldn’t see me. So I just let it go and hung up.

Now that I had the afternoon to myself, all I had to do was start working on the bid for Magic Nights. Of course, when I say working on the bid, I mean that I was gathering everything together for Thea to figure out when she got home from school. Why have a math genius daughter and not use her?

But first, the bank.

* * *

La Sombra Trust stood on the corner of PCH, (Pacific Coast Highway for those not in California), and Fifth. It had been standing there for more than a hundred years. And that’s when its parking lot had been built. Back then apparently, you didn’t need much room for your horse and buggy. Or, horses were way smaller than cars. And, people were probably more civilized then, taking turns.

Not now.

The bank parking lot was a free for all and anyone who didn’t arrive ready to fight for one of the all too few slots was forced to park down at the pier and hoof it. Well, I’d already had my ass whupped for the day and no way was I going to walk an extra three blocks just to make a deposit that I should have made over the weekend.

So I did the parking lot cruise. Me and four other cars, looking like the slowest parade on the face of the planet. Each one of us was willing to cheat the other out of the first opened up space. It was like playing musical chairs with cars.

Up and down the two narrow aisles, we all crawled at like two miles an hour, hawk-eyed, waiting for
somebody
to give it up and go home. But apparently, the bank was giving away money today, because nobody was budging. Even the two handicapped spaces were full up.

The man driving the car in front of me stopped suddenly, forcing me to do the same as his wife slowly climbed out. Using her walker, she clomped up to the driver’s side window of the guy nesting in handicapped to shout at him, “Do I get a turn before I die?”

I knew exactly how she felt.

The guy in the parked car however, was unmoved.

And so, apparently, was everyone else. My radio was blasting out an old Beach Boys tune, and I had my windows rolled down to catch the last of the afternoon breeze off the ocean.

That’s the only reason I heard it.

An engine. Running a lot faster than anything else in that lot was. It sounded like someone was gunning it. You know, pressing down on the gas pedal to make your engine sound like it was a tiger ready for its five hundred pound steak?

The old lady with the walker lifted her nose like she was trying to sniff out trouble. Then she bolted for her car, (well, shuffled really quickly), climbed back inside and her husband moved off.

“Good,” I muttered, still wondering where the hell the idiot with the racing motor was, “at least I’m moving again. I’m not parking, but I’m moving.”

And
that’s
when I noticed that I was suddenly the only car in our parking parade. The guy behind me had backed off about fifty feet—apparently there was a parking space I’d already passed and he was gonna get it—and the old guy in front of me had swung around the edge of the lot.

A woman stepping out of the bank ahead of me lifted one hand and pointed while she shouted, “LOOK OUT!”

Who? Me?

I looked up into the rear view mirror and my eyes popped open. An old Chevy that had more rust than paint on its body came around the lot, aimed right for me. That gunning engine roared, I caught a glimpse of the driver—young with a nasty little goatee—and then it felt like a wall the size of Kansas slammed into the back of my little VW.

“CRAP!” I shrieked loud enough to break glass, tightened my grip on the steering wheel and felt my head whip forward and back again with the impact. My poor little car was shuddering as badly as I was.

The Chevy blasted past me and I was pretty sure the driver flipped me the bird on the way past, which was just insult to injury, in my opinion.

When my shaking stopped, I was pissed, naturally enough, but there was nobody around for me to bitch slap.

Just to add the topper to all of this, the guy behind me in the parking parade whipped his Caddy into the now empty space that my attacker had left behind.

Then my airbag burst open, and crashed into my face.

Perfect.

* * *

Finally got the deposit made, listened to a lot of sympathy from the very people who had moved their own cars out of the way before I got slammed, and then took my little yellow bug to my favorite mechanic. Well, my only mechanic.

Joey Paretti went to school with me, and he always could fix anything. A few years ago, he’d taken over his father’s shop, and he was the go-to guy for any car calamity. Thankfully, he too assigned me a million and one easy payments, and I left my poor bug with him and drove one of his ‘loaners’ home. A 97 Nissan Sentra, it was a nice enough car, but it felt way too much like a grownup’s car. Wasn’t it bad enough I’d turned 32? The sedate silver car didn’t suit my style at all. Not that I actually
had
a style. But you know what I mean.

Anyway, Joey promised to get my baby back to me in a few days and my insurance agent promised my premiums wouldn’t go up. Right. And any day now, Prince Andrew would be dropping by my house for a quickie.

Still, after a so far, rotten day, my own house was clean, bills were paid (barely) and I had my bowl of microwave popcorn (movie butter flavor) for lunch sitting on the table in front of me. I dropped a handful of the popcorn onto the floor for Sugar and while she made like a Hoover, I got up to answer the door bell.

I tugged my black tee shirt down over the waist of my jeans, hurried across the room and smashed my little toe against a chair that had been in the same place for ten years. Pain whipped through me with stars blinking on and off in front of my eyes, and still whimpering, I opened the door.

Oh, God.

Devlin Cole. Big as life and twice as yummy, was standing on my front porch. Tears were in my eyes, my toe was throbbing and long ignored parts of my body were suddenly alive and humming.

He was wearing all black today. Black Slacks, black, open collared shirt and shiny black shoes. He looked way too good and suddenly I was wishing I had taken more time with my hair and maybe a little makeup wouldn’t have been out of line.

“Hi.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Hi back.” I looked past him and saw a silver gray Porsche parked at the curb and almost whistled. If the Marchetti boys across the street were home, any minute now they’d be outside drooling on Devlin’s car.

Shifting my gaze back to the man still watching me, I managed to croak, “Did we have an appointment?”

“No,” he said, and his lips twitched, like he wanted to smile but was holding back. Too bad. He has a great smile.

“Then...”

“I wanted to talk to you about having your company do the cleaning at my house, too.”

Okay. This is good. More work, always a plus. But why come by my house? Why not call? And why did I care? There was a gorgeous giant of a man standing on my front porch and I’m gonna be picky about why he’s there?

I don’t think so.

“Sure. Come on in.”

He walked into the house and I got a good whiff of him as he passed. God, he smelled good. Almost better than chocolate. A second later, I heard the scrabble of Sugar’s nails on the wood floor and tried to move fast enough to head her off before she could shove her nose into Devlin’s crotch.

I was too late. When Sugar’s on a greeting mission, she’s hard to stop.

But then Devlin managed it with a word.

“No.”

The look of stunned surprise on the dog’s face should have been funny. Sugar had never heard that word, but I could tell she didn’t like it. She tried to put on the brakes, but couldn’t find purchase. Her eyes got wide with panic behind her black and white hair, her nails skittered, her butt hit the floor and her momentum sent her sailing past us to slam into the round table sitting beneath the front window.

The table tipped, the blue glass vase I’d found at the swap meet upended, rolled to the edge of the table and crashed onto the floor, shattering glass, rust colored china mums and water across the floor in a veritable river of destruction.

Sugar stood up, shook herself all over then walked out of the room, head high, like she was trying to convince us she’d done that whole slide and spill thing on purpose just to entertain us.

I didn’t even look at Devlin. It was his own damn fault for coming to my house. I project businesslike and competent when I’m out in the world. In my own habitat, it was a whole different story.

“Welcome to my world,” I said and dropped to my knees to gather up the remaining scraps of a crystal, cobalt blue antique vase.

“Your dog’s clumsy,” he said and stooped beside me, giving me a hand with the cleanup.

“Yes, but on the upside, she eats enough for three dogs and poops with appalling regularity.”
Crap.
Shut up, Cassidy.

I shifted him a look and found him watching me. “You don’t have to help.”

He took the jagged pieces of glass from my hand and picked up what was left off the floor. “You get the flowers. I’ll take this, you could cut yourself.”

Wow. Gorgeous
and
thoughtful. Okay, a little authoritarian, but nobody’s perfect.

While he carried the trash to the trash, I gathered up the flowers I’d just bought two days ago and followed him to the kitchen. He’d already yanked off a handful of paper towels and was turning for the living room again.

“You know, with as good as you are at this, you don’t really need someone else cleaning up after you, do you?”

He gave me a half smile that sent a few delicious little tingles bubbling through my veins. “I prefer having an expert.”

“Right. Well, that’s me. Expert at cleaning. Of course, as you can see, I get a lot of practice around here.” Sugar was under the kitchen table giving Devlin a death glare, like she blamed him for the entire incident.

My dog. In denial.

I took the paper towels from him, walked back to the living room and got busy cleaning up the spilled water. He was standing right beside me and I could actually
feel
his eyes on me. My temperature spiked a little and the small hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up. Not in a bad way.

“So,” he said when I’d finished and was standing up again, clutching sodden paper towels in one hand and catching the drips with the other, “Can I interest you in coming to the house to take a look around?”

“Now?”

“Unless you’re busy.”

“No,” I said, then realized I should have said I was all backed up—so many customers. But then he’d think I didn’t want his business or I was too busy for it, and the truth was, I really wanted to see his house. Like his club, Devlin’s house was a mystery. Big and beautiful, it sat on a cliff overlooking the ocean and every time I drove down the Coast Highway I looked at it and wondered what it was like inside.

I was, though, a little surprised he didn’t have a housekeeper. A man alone, a place that size. So I asked.

He shrugged. “Actually, I do.”

“So why do you need me?”

He reached out and tucked a strand of my hair behind my left ear and when his fingertips stroked against my skin, I swear I saw fireworks. Big red and blue ones bursting in front of my eyes. I really hoped it wasn’t blood vessels exploding.

“Truth is,” he said, “I don’t need you to clean my house. I just wanted to see you again and needed a reason.”

WHOA.

This is more than Flirting 101, Cass, I warned myself. This is graduate courses. This is like Masters caliber flirting. And you are so not prepared. I’d been spending most of my time over the last few years with kids and dogs and dirty houses. Not exactly the life of the party. And hey, I’d
never
had a man like Devlin flirt with me. This was some serious pressure.

Think of something clever to say. Be brilliant. Witty. Or at least, not mute.

“I uh...”

Great. Good one.

“You seem surprised.”

“Kind of,” I admitted and knew an instant too late that that was the wrong attitude to take. I should be acting like I go through this all the time. Like every day I have to beat off rich, gorgeous men with a stick.

Oh.

Maybe I should reword that a little.

“Why?” he asked and took a step closer. Was it hot in here? Seriously. Did all the air leave the room, because I suddenly couldn’t catch my breath and it felt like my eyebrows were smoldering from all the extra heat shooting off the top of my head.

“When we spoke yesterday,” he was saying and swept me up and down with a gaze hot enough to set fire to my jeans, “I felt...something between us. Didn’t you?”

LUST? Could it be
lust
he felt between us? Cause, hey, I was right there with him. Bone numbing, blood firing, mind expanding lust that was at this moment, setting up shop in my hoo-hah and limbering things up, just in case.

Cassidy, you slut. My stern, talking to myself voice was silent, but effective. Just a few hours ago, I’d been drooling over Logan. Now here I was letting my hormones do a two step trying to get Devlin’s attention.

Slut.

For sure, I was going to Hell.

God. I squeezed the wet paper towel in my right hand and my left filled up with water. Moving on automatic pilot, I scurried to the kitchen, tossed the mess into the sink, then grabbed a dishtowel to dry my hands.

Devlin was right behind me. He was probably following the thundering pound of my heartbeat. Man, I really had to get out more.

“You know,” I said when I thought I could speak without slobbering, “It probably isn’t a good idea for us to have a personal relationship if we’re working together.”

“We’re not.”

“We’re not?” Crap. Should have had Thea do the bid up last night and hustled it over to him today before he could back out. Visions of lovely piles of money were fading right before my eyes and even took some of the shine off the nice little body buzz I had going.