The Acceptance s-2 Read online

  “What do you mean that you’re hardwired to react?”

  That got her gaze on his. He tried to look passive, when Gaby knew Luther was anything but. “Can you handle the truth?”

  In some infinitesimal way, he hardened all over. “Yes.” Gaby twisted her mouth. Maybe Luther believed that calumnious statement, but she knew better. If she gave him the whole truth, he’d be calling for the guys with the straightjacket.

  A quarter-truth would serve for now. Later, if he didn’t freak out too much, she could share more.

  Oh God, what was she thinking?

  “Don’t think,” he said, as if he’d read her mind. “Just open up to me.”

  “You asked for it.” Slipping her fingers through his belt loops, Gaby urged him closer. Feeling Luther, being with him, filled her with copious emotion and turned his aura effulgent. She liked that.

  Watching him, Gaby nudged her pelvis into his hips— and saw the slight tightening of his facial muscles, felt the quickening of his pulse.

  No time like the present. “When evil is near, I know it.”

  Jerked from her deliberate enticement, Luther studied her face, nodded. “Explain evil.”

  “Why? You know evil, Luther. You’ve dealt with it plenty of times.”

  “I want to hear your definition.”

  “Fine. There are bad people, and then there are true corruptions passing themselves off as humans. They don’t deserve to breathe the same air as others. They don’t merit rehabilitation, or a life in prison, or even an easy death.”

  Some of the erotic energy flowing through his aura began to fade. His hold now felt more restraining than tender, his fingertips pressing into her nape.

  Gaby defied him with a look. “What’s the matter, cop? Too much for you?”

  Challenged, Luther held silent for a heartbeat, then he relented. “Yes, I’ve known evil like that. It’s a sad hazard of my profession.”

  Poor Luther. He wanted so badly to accept her, that he tried to find correlations in their lives and attitudes. “Did you know that evil as soon as you saw it?”

  Distant memories passed over his features. “On occasion. Most often, no.” His eyes narrowed. “People can be deceiving.”

  Not to paladins. Not to freaks like her. “They don’t deceive me, Luther.” Just to keep him off balance, Gaby lifted to her tiptoes and kissed his mouth hard and fast. “Ever.”

  Wary now, Luther set her away from him. “And when you recognize evil, what do you do about it?”

  “Me?” Leaving him no illusion as to her facetiousness, Gaby said, “But Luther, I’m just a woman. Whatever could I do?”

  Rather than take the bait, Luther dragged her back to him and this time the kiss was slow and deep, scorching hot, mesmerizing.

  Claiming.

  Gaby thought about struggling . . . but what the hell?

  She needed this.

  She needed more. Of him.

  Little by little, she understood that sexual need caused at least part of her frustration, sleeplessness, and fractious demeanor.

  For Luther.

  When he ended the kiss, Luther also ended all contact. He released Gaby, stepped back two paces, and watched her.

  Collapsing against the wall, Gaby touched her now swollen and tingling lips.

  And sighed.

  Maybe sharing with Luther wasn’t so unthinkable. Maybe, just maybe, she could ease him into the abomination of her life.

  “Wow. I’m starting to like that more and more.”

  He didn’t smile. “When Bliss said that she knew you’d be there, what exactly did she mean?”

  With sexual awareness coursing like hot lava through her veins, Gaby watched Luther with new eyes. “You’d have to ask her.”

  He tried a different tack. “What do you think she meant?”

  Oh no. Not so soon. It was time to get out from under Luther’s spell.

  Willing strength into her bones, Gaby pushed away from the wall. “Bliss was drugged, disoriented.” Gaby turned and started down the long corridor. “Who knows what she might’ve meant? Maybe she said that just because . . . I’m a friend.”

  “And her description of the room?”

  “She fantasized it because of her fear. For her, that’d be the worst to happen, so in her mind, she knew it would happen.”

  “You believe that?”

  No. She believed Bliss. “Maybe.” In only a few steps, Gaby decided, What the hell? He wanted to know more, so she’d tell him more. “I do believe in mind reading, though I’m not a mind reader myself.”

  Rather than doubt her, Luther nodded. “How does it work?”

  “I’ve never really studied it, so I’m not sure. But I do know that people have auras, and a lot is revealed through an aura.”

  “You’ve mentioned auras before.”

  Gaby peered up at him. “Right now, your aura is a muddy shade of violet. Want to know what that means?”

  “Sure, why not?”

  “Violet usually represents the ability to handle affairs with practicality. But that darker shade is pure erotic imagination.” Gaby tilted her head at him. “You’re asking about Bliss, but your thoughts are divided.”

  “Guilty.” Not the least bit ashamed or hesitant, Luther said, “I always want you. I’ve told you that. But now’s not the time, so back to Bliss . . .”

  Wow. He did know how to keep her off-kilter. “My theory is that fear naturally heightens sensory perception, so even someone unfamiliar with reading auras could pick up on them when scared witless. Bliss said the woman who took her giggled. That sounds pretty fucking sick to me, so I figure she was giving off some glaring vibes on her intent.”

  “And the room?”

  “If there is a room, and the demented bitch was thinking about taking Bliss there, she might have picked up on that.”

  He chewed his upper lip before saying, “Okay, I can buy that, I suppose.”

  “Yeah, right. People like you are the reason that the abstract prospects of the human mind and the intangible realm behind matter are treated as hocus-pocus.”

  Luther whistled. “All that, huh?”

  Her temper sparked. “Don’t poke fun at me, Luther.”

  “Actually, I was thinking there are many depths to you. Some of them are a little loony, but somehow you make it all sound reasonable, and believable.”

  She stayed silent, but Gaby felt the nearly tactile sensation of his narrow-eyed attention on her face.

  “So, let’s try this another way.”

  Oh shit. Why couldn’t he just give it up?

  “How did you know Bliss was in trouble?”

  Gaby’s heart tripped. She walked faster, harder. Questions on Bliss she could handle. Questions on her own preternatural acuity were hitting too close to home. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “When she was being attacked, somehow you knew it.” Stewing over his own memories, Luther thought it out without Gaby’s help. “You couldn’t see her, and you couldn’t hear her. But somehow you knew what was happening all the same. And that isn’t the first time it’s happened with you.”

  “Don’t be—”

  “We were talking,” Luther reminded her, “then you suddenly went on alert. I saw it in your face that something was wrong. I didn’t know what—but you did.”

  Gaby kept walking.

  Luther kept pace with her. “At first, your movements were a little jerky, as if you hurt all over. But then you were facile, and so fast, I could barely keep up.”

  “You’re a slowpoke wimp, what can I say?”

  “No, Gaby. I’m in good shape, and you know it. My legs are longer and stronger than yours. I have more power. But you outran me.”

  Gaby snorted. “If this is about wounded ego, Luther, I don’t have time.”

  “It’s about you, Gaby.”

  “A boring subject.”

  But Luther wouldn’t let it go. “You somehow knew Bliss was being threatened, didn’t you?”
/>   No, no, no. “No.”

  Luther snagged her arm and they both stopped.

  “Tell me another truth, Gaby. Did you know that evil had her?”

  Chapter 8

  Tonight, one way or another, Luther knew he had to get some answers. Women’s lives were on the line, and somehow Gaby was involved.

  He didn’t know how, but he knew he had to keep her safe—whether she wanted his help or not.

  Gaby kept her back to him, but she paused.

  Luther didn’t push her. He just waited, and after a moment of visibly churning thoughts, she said, “I’ve heard that most cops have intuition. Do you?”

  It wasn’t what he’d expected, but the answer was easy enough. “Sometimes.”

  Rubbing the back of her neck and flexing her shoulders, Gaby considered his response. “Sometimes, huh?”

  “It’s not the same as what you’re saying, Gaby. I get a bad feeling, but I don’t see things clearly. They aren’t spelled out for me.”

  “No, of course not.” Glancing over her shoulder at him, Gaby said, “But do you get that kick in your gut, that churning sensation in your blood when you just know something is wrong?”

  Damn it, he did. But not the way it seemed she had.

  Her light blue eyes pinned him. “Do you trust your instincts?”

  No need to hesitate on that one. “Yes.” Luther had never ignored his own instincts. They were sharper than most, which is why he made a damn good cop.

  His instincts insisted that Gaby was up to something. If only he knew what.

  “Well, so do I,” she told him. “You want the truth, Luther? Fine. I knew something was wrong.” She emphasized, “Something. Not that it involved Bliss, and not what it might be.”

  Luther could usually spot a liar, but with Gaby . . . he just didn’t know. She appeared truthful, sincere.

  Believable.

  A small part of his subconscious insisted that the mentally insane often used sound logic as well.

  No. He wouldn’t think that. Gaby was, despite her upbringing and lack of formal education, more intelligent and lucid than almost anyone he knew. It was her astute perception of her surroundings that colored everything.

  “My stomach cramped and my muscles burned and everything that’s a part of me screamed that I had to hurry.” Gaby didn’t blink. “So I did.”

  What she described matched the way she’d looked. And that scared him. For her. “Does that happen to you often?”

  “Often enough that I hate it.” She started walking again, but the burst of energy was gone, leaving her to plod along tiredly. “But not often enough for me to make a real difference in anything.”

  What the hell did that mean? Why would Gaby, an orphan, an eccentric loner, want to make a difference to the society she so openly scorned?

  Seeing the droop to her normally proud shoulders, Luther decided not to ask her, not right now. He’d pushed enough for one night. Although he knew she’d deny it, she looked exhausted enough to keel over.

  “We both need sleep.” Luther slipped an arm around her supple waist. “Come on. Stewing over this won’t help Bliss. The hospital staff will keep her safe tonight, and tomorrow, we’ll come back to see her to Mort’s together. She’ll be fine.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  Gaby said nothing on the way out of the hospital. That worried Luther. He was used to her mouthy ways, her caustic wit, and her never-ending harassment.

  She was likely plotting, maybe not against him, specifically, but for certain she wasn’t including him, as per their agreement.

  “Listen up, Gaby.” When she turned tired eyes toward him, Luther almost softened. Only the need to know she’d be unharmed kept him from retrenching. “I’m going to drop you off at your apartment, and I damn well expect you to stay there.”

  She looked away. “I don’t have any plans to leave.”

  “Then how about making plans to stay?”

  She shrugged. “I watch over the women, Luther. Some of them work throughout the night. If something happens—”

  “You’d know it?”

  “Maybe. But not necessarily.”

  Luther still wasn’t sure about her supposed exceptional intuition, but he wouldn’t discount it. Throughout his career as a cop, he’d seen a lot of inexplicable things, and too many times his instincts had saved his ass. If Gaby had those same instincts, only amplified to an extreme level, then that would explain a lot.

  And maybe he was just grasping at straws, wanting to trust her, to believe in her, in any way possible.

  While heading across the parking lot, she moved closer. Her hand bumped Luther’s, so he laced his fingers with hers.

  The lot was quiet, dark. A fat silvery moon was poised low in the sky, surrounded by a million illumined stars.

  It could have been a romantic night. From Luther’s perspective, any time alone with Gaby lent itself to sexual thoughts tempered by emotional need.

  She brought out the extremes in him. He couldn’t understand it, and he couldn’t fight it.

  They’d almost reached his car at the farthest end of the lot when she said, “Most of the johns can be cruel, you know. They hurt the women just because they can. They’re mean, nasty, and sometimes they cross the line. But they’re not necessarily evil, just wretched human beings.”

  So her intuition didn’t allow for mundane, ordinary, everyday evil? Realizing his own thoughts, Luther shook his head. He’d believe in her—to a point. But he wasn’t ready to buy in hook, line, and sinker.

  He decided she needed a little clarification on her observations. “Men who pay for sex are not the best of men, Gaby. Don’t judge everyone by them.”

  “I wouldn’t.” At his car, she circled around to the passenger’s side, then stopped and turned to face him. “But I can’t judge all men by you, either.”

  Luther told himself to get in the car, to take her to her room so she could get the rest she needed. But his feet wouldn’t budge. There was a magnetic pull to Gaby, and he always felt helpless against it.

  They stood in shadows, the chill evening air still around them.

  She tipped her head and looked . . . around him. “You’re aroused,” she said.

  Like a moth light-struck in her glow, Luther braced his hands on the car around her, caging her in. “You think so, do you?”

  Totally relaxed and almost sleepy, Gaby rested against the car. Her expression never changed as she nodded. “I see your aura, so I know you are.”

  “Ah. Yeah, I’d almost forgotten.” Many times now, Gaby had commented on auras—always, for him, in a complimentary way.

  “Your raw energy is really dancing, Luther. It’s shimmering around you, all excited and jittery and warm.”

  Damn. She seduced him, destroyed his better intentions, without even trying. “It’s been established, honey, that I always want you.”

  Not one for shyness, Gaby stared into his eyes. “It’s pretty frustrating for me. I don’t want to have sex with you. Hell, I’m still not entirely sure I understand the lure of sex. If you want the truth, what I’ve seen is interesting, but also a little disgusting.”

  “What you’ve seen is the dregs of society copulating.” Luther couldn’t keep his gaze off her small breasts. “That’s nothing like a man and woman making love.”

  “Oh please. Don’t even mention love. I don’t know what it is, don’t even believe in it, and it sure as hell has nothing to do with a man sticking his dick into a woman until he grunts and moans.”

  Luther pulled back. Damn it, her coarse ways weren’t new to him. But her porn-star descriptions still had the power to shock him clean down to his toes.

  She rolled her eyes. “Sorry. I can see I said too much. My point is that I want something, but I’m not sure what, and it’s all pretty damned confusing and annoying and I don’t like losing sleep over it.”

  An idea came to Luther.

  A horrible, wonderful, masochistic idea. His heart thumped
; his dick got hard. He licked his lips, leaned in a little closer, and said, “How about I prove a point to you, Gaby? We won’t have intercourse, since you say you aren’t ready. But . . .”

  Her brows knit together. “But what? What are you thinking?”

  To regain his calm, Luther closed his eyes for just a moment. It didn’t help. His plans became visual, and he saw Gaby, what he wanted to do to her, what he eventually planned to do to her.

  And the end result: Her blue eyes glazed with amazement, her body warm and fluid and . . . wet.

  Shit. He had it bad, no denying that.

  When Luther opened his eyes it was to take a quick look around the empty parking lot while he considered their isolated position. Even if someone did show up at this ungodly hour, his car would block any view of them, of what he’d be doing to her.

  He inhaled, girding himself.

  “Oh for crying out loud!” Gaby exploded. “Are you planning a murder or worse? What the hell are you up to, cop?”

  In response, Luther put his fingertips on the inside of her right knee.

  Her eyes widened.

  “I can ease your frustration, Gaby. I can make you feel things you didn’t know existed.” As he spoke, he trailed his fingertips higher—under the edge of her skirt, and up to the elastic leg band of her panties.

  The cotton was soft, but unadorned—like Gaby. But then, what else would he expect her to wear? Lace? Silk? Not likely.

  She held herself perfectly still, watching his face the way a trapped mouse would watch a cat.

  “You already feel it, don’t you, honey?”

  She swallowed, lifted her chin. “Maybe.”

  Yeah, she felt it. His chest expanded with satisfaction— and his body hurt with lust. “Put your arms around my neck.”

  With a surprising eagerness, Gaby did as he instructed. Luther kept his right hand between her legs, and with his left, tipped her face up more to accommodate a devouring kiss. She stood only three inches shorter than him, and he knew her to be a very capable woman.

  But now, right this moment, she felt fragile and very delicate. Her compliance filled him with steam. With their mouths melded together, her tongue came out to mate with his, urging him on, easing the way for his lesson.