The Acceptance Page 8

  It was the oddest thing to have another woman touching her, but the hookers were a familiar lot, free with physical contact. They did each other’s hair and makeup, modeled clothes for one another, gave advice, and all in all, grossly intruded into Gaby’s personal space.

  Gaby would never get used to it, but she had learned to tolerate it.

  Sort of working? “What does that mean?” She tried to twist around to see Bliss, but enrapt in her chore, Bliss didn’t release her hair, and Gaby gave up. “Who was she with? Can you describe the guy?”

  “Actually . . .” Bliss put the tie in, securing the short ponytail. “It wasn’t a guy. Lucy was talking to a girl.”

  Whoa. Okay, Gaby knew some of the ladies did whatever, and whoever, for cash. But she hadn’t known Lucy to favor other females.

  It seemed more likely that she’d made an incorrect assumption. She turned toward Bliss. “For business? Or was she maybe chatting with another hooker?”

  “Neither.” Bliss laughed, reached out, and tugged a few strands of hair loose over Gaby’s ears. “There,” she said. “That’s real pretty.”

  Pretty would never be a word ascribed to Gaby. The compliment left her prickly with embarrassment. “Then who was she?”

  “I dunno. I’d never seen her before. I’m pretty sure she wasn’t from around here.” Bliss licked her thumb and wiped a spot on Gaby’s forehead.

  Swatting her hand away, Gaby asked, “Why do you say that?”

  “She was young. Not really pretty, but . . . sort of refined-like.”

  “Dressed fancy, you mean?”

  “No. She was dressed real plain.” Bliss smoothed a wrinkle out of Gaby’s shirt. “The reason I noticed is because—” Suddenly Bliss’s eyes widened and she looked beyond Gaby.

  Gaby stiffened, waited.

  “Gaby.”

  And there it was, that voice she’d never forget, the one she sometimes heard in her dreams, and in her daydreams.

  The voice that made her stomach punchy and her breath short.

  How the hell had Luther gotten so close without her knowing it?

  Bliss met Gaby’s gaze, giggled at her expression, and rolled her eyes. She stood and smiled widely. “Hey there, Luther.”

  “Hello, Bliss. How are you?”

  “Fine, thank you.” She smiled over the formality, which was surely foreign to her.

  “I’m sorry to interrupt you two girls during such a fascinating exchange—of words and deeds.”

  Bliss giggled again. “I was jus’ fixin’ her hair.” Around Luther, Bliss’s lack of good grammar became more apparent than ever.

  “You did a beautiful job.”

  Beaming, Bliss asked, “You’re on the wrong side of town, ain’t ya?”

  “For a reason.” Luther’s big hands settled on Gaby’s shoulders with warm weight and outlandish possession. “I’m sorry, Bliss, but would you mind if I had a moment alone with Gaby?”

  Gaby, who still hadn’t turned to face him, couldn’t seem to get her vocal cords to work. How much had he heard? How much had he seen?

  A tidal wave of heat washed through her. Insane! Since when did she give a shit what others thought of her?

  Since Luther, that’s when.

  Before Gaby could object, the decision was taken away from her.

  “Be my guest.” To Gaby, Bliss said, “We can talk later.” She gave a fingertip wave and headed off.

  Gaby watched as Bliss made an almost immediate assignation with a young man who appeared to be waiting specifically for her. Then she felt Luther’s fingers gliding over her ponytail and she shot to her feet.

  Jerking around to face him, she scowled. “What the hell do you want now?”

  His hand fell from her hair to her cheek and lingered there. Looking at her mouth, now set in hard lines, he said simply, “You.”

  For a nanosecond, Gaby’s tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. Bliss’s presumptuous way of primping her hair was disconcerting enough. For Luther to continually state a sexual desire for her rocked her very foundation.

  Ill humor combusting, Gaby shoved Luther away from her. “Hands off, cop. I’m pissed at you.”

  “You always are.” He smiled and sighed. “So what’s the problem this time?”

  Grumbling, because she couldn’t dare admit to missing him, maybe even needing him, Gaby said, “I doubt you want to hear it, and it’s for certain I don’t want to hear your solution for it, so forget it.”

  “Not this time.” He caught her hand and pressed money, wrapped around a note, into her palm.

  “What’s this?” Gaby started to separate the cash from the slip of paper, but Luther’s hand curved over hers.

  Leaning close, he breathed into her ear, “You’re in disguise as a hooker, if you’ll remember. Well, I’m just keeping up appearances.” His hand tightened. “You should do the same.”

  Heady with the richness of his scent in her nostrils, Gaby took a moment to gather her defenses against his effect. When Luther separated from her again, she looked at his face, and saw too much.

  No one could call her a dummy. Aware of Luther’s urgency, Gaby smiled. “Sure thing.” She stuck the cash and the note in her pocket. “Let’s walk.”

  His body didn’t budge. “I thought maybe we’d go to your room.”

  “You thought wrong.” Her eyes narrowed. “And the next time you go poking around up there, I’ll have something to say about it.”

  Luther went still, decided against subterfuge, and shrugged. “How did you know?”

  Gaby couldn’t say for sure, but when she’d first returned to her rooms, she’d sensed that someone had been there, snooping around. The door hadn’t been disturbed, so no one had entered, but only because she’d made it so difficult to do so.

  “I’m astute—and you’re far from stealthy.” She looked behind her at a noisy duo of men haggling price with Jimbo. “Now do you want to get away from here, or what?”

  With a strange sort of affection, Luther said, “You are so damn difficult.”

  Still watching the prospective johns, Gaby shrugged. “Not to people who leave me alone.”

  “And that,” Luther said, taking her hand, “is something I can’t do.”

  Gaby shot him a look, but he’d turned away and was determined to take her with him.

  Did he infer an affection, or duty to his job as a cop?

  She gave token resistance as Luther, maintaining his hold, towed her down the dark stretch of roadway, but they both knew if she wanted loose, she’d be loose, and he’d be hurting.

  At least, she knew it.

  Luther persisted in the farcical theory that he could hold his own against her.

  And usually he could—because usually she hesitated to hurt him.

  “You can let go now,” Gaby told him.

  “I don’t want to.”

  His big hand swallowed hers, warm and secure in an extrinsic way. Gaby rolled in her lips, fought with herself, and said, “Okay.”

  The night breeze carried the cries of a baby. Somewhere nearby, glass broke. A car alarm went off, adding shrill stridency to the chronic bedlam.

  Fingers entwined, they walked on.

  The mood was nice—and deceptive.

  With her left hand, Gaby retrieved the note and read it. Her innards churned. A prostitute has been murdered. I have to talk to you.

  So, after seeing the body on the riverbank, Luther had rushed to her? Why? Did he suspect her of mutilating that poor girl, or did he hope to grill her for information on it? She’d covered her tracks, so surely he couldn’t know she’d already been there, that she was the one who’d called it in, that she—

  “I was worried, Gaby.”

  They were two blocks away and around a corner. Thoughts stalled with his admission; Gaby scowled at him. “Worried about what?”

  “You.” Before she could react to that, he held her face in hot palms, his long fingers tunneling into her hair, and he kissed her hard and fast. “
Sick with worry.”

  Damn, but every time he put his mouth on hers, he tasted better. Hotter.

  She was fast becoming addicted.

  Confused, and a little turned on, Gaby had to remind herself to be cautious. Luther couldn’t know she had prior knowledge of Lucy’s death. “Is kissing your answer for everything? Anger, worry, lust—”

  “Around you, yes.”

  “Huh.” Mouth twisting, she said, “That’s kinda sad, Luther.”

  He laughed, but there wasn’t much humor in the low, rumbling chuckle. “Somehow, in some indefinable way, you’re irresistible, whether you want to admit it or not.”

  Cocking a brow, Gaby looked down at her long, lanky, curveless body. “You’re so tired, you can’t see straight. Is that it?” He did sound exhausted. And strained.

  “I’m fine.” He nodded at the note in her hand, then gestured her toward a bench where they could talk. “Let’s sit down.”

  “I could use a rest.” Gaby sauntered past him and slouched onto the bench. Legs straight out, arms folded over her middle, she examined the toes of her boots. “So you were worried, huh? Wanna tell me why, or were you just planning to smooch?”

  Luther sat beside her, but he didn’t relax. Elbows on his thighs, his hands hanging between his knees, he looked defeated with concern. “I know you have enemies, Gaby.”

  “Yeah, who doesn’t?” She couldn’t be sure, but she assumed everyone, even normal folks, had others who detested them. Human nature wasn’t forgiving or accepting. The most pious in society were generally also the most harshly judgmental.

  Turning his head to look at her, Luther said, “You read the note.”

  “Yeah.” Gaby chewed her upper lip. “So a hooker was murdered, and you’re talking about it to me . . . why?”

  “She was cut up real bad. Beaten. Probably tortured.”

  Gaby knew all that, and still, hearing it from Luther’s mouth, seeing the turbulence in his aura, pained her.

  “Who was she?”

  He studied her in silence for several long moments. “You know her, Gaby.”

  Trying to hide her reaction, Gaby drew in a breath. “One of the girls in my motel?”

  His smile quirked. “So now it’s your motel?”

  Annoyance pinched her face. “No. But I stay there. That’s what I meant and you know it so stop being an asshole.”

  He sighed. And he took her hand, cradling it on his thigh, offering an unfamiliar comfort. “I’m pretty sure she stays there. She was out front the other day when I came around asking about you.”

  Eyes widening, Gaby asked, “You did what?” She tried to pull her hand back, albeit without much determination, and Luther held on.

  “Her body was dumped in the river, but she was dead before that.” He lifted her hand to his mouth and kissed her palm. “I’m sorry, Gaby, but when I got on the scene and realized where I’d seen her, all I could think about was that maybe it was a warning.”

  Caution kept her temper in check. “To who?”

  Luther slumped, holding her knuckles to his forehead. “Carver wants revenge on you.”

  Alarms shrieked throughout Gaby’s system. “What the hell do you know of that?” More frantic now, she tried to free herself. They ended up in a real struggle that brought them both off the bench.

  Luther locked his arms around her, squeezing the breath from her lungs. Gaby knew she could head-butt him, knee him in the crotch, any number of moves that’d get her free real quick.

  But oddly, his need for the embrace quelled her more violent tendencies. “Luther?”

  “I hate this, Gaby.”

  “This?”

  In a sudden turnaround, he thrust her back from him, and began to vociferate in a mean snarl, “Fearing for you, because you’re too goddamned stubborn to fear for yourself. Trying to protect you when you fight me every step of the way. Wondering how to get through to you, if I ever will, or if eventually I’ll show up only to find you—”

  His pain and frustration became her own.

  Which meant his lust became hers, too. After all, he’d taught her what she knew of the volatile, volcanic emotion. For her, Luther and lust were synonymous.

  Gaby threw herself against him and plastered her mouth to his. His hands clamped on to her shoulders as if to push her away; instead, he crushed her closer.

  His tongue pushed past her lips. One of his hands went to her tush and, in a display of his awesome strength, he lifted her off her feet, meshing their lower bodies, letting her feel the steel of his erection.

  “Luther?” Her head swam, her blood burned. And at the root of all sensation was a powerful need that she didn’t know how to appease.

  “God, woman, you make me insane.”

  He kissed her more gently this time, again using his tongue to taste her deeply, slowly. So hot.

  But by small degrees, he left her, a wet kiss, a small lick, a kiss to the corner of her mouth—and he was gone.

  Eyelids heavy and heart thumping, Gaby tried to focus beyond the haze of desire. “Luther?” she said again.

  He let out a long, aggrieved breath. “I hate myself for saying this, but the timing is off for what I want to do. And history being what it is, that makes me wonder if you distracted me on purpose.”

  A splash of ice water couldn’t have done more to cool her ardor, or bring her out of the sensual fog. Arms crossing under her breasts, Gaby struck an obstinate pose. “Come again?”

  Cynical and bitter, Luther ran both hands through his hair. “Enough, Gaby. If after I’ve gotten some answers, you want to pick up where we left off, you know I’m more than willing.”

  “Ha!”

  His teeth locked and his eyes burned. “But first, I have questions, and God help you, you will answer them.”

  She turned on her heel and started away.

  “I’ll arrest you.”

  That brought her back around. “For what?”

  He closed the small space she’d just gained. “I have a firsthand account of you attacking Carver with a knife.”

  That had to be a lie. No one had seen her go near Carver. She’d made sure of it. Confidence wavering, she went on tiptoe to say into his face, “Bullshit.”

  He didn’t withdraw, and this close, Gaby saw the golden flecks in his brown eyes sparking with ire and determination.

  His aura, usually the golden hue of great control, now wavered with quick-tempered red, swirling around Gaby, engulfing her.

  Luther meant business, no doubt about it.

  “You have the knife. I have a dead prostitute sliced up and thrown in the river. Put those three things together, and you’re the closest lead I have.”

  Damn. It did sound plausible. If she didn’t know herself, she’d be looking at her as a suspect, too.

  Taking advantage of her moment of uncertainty, Luther cupped her chin. “Trust me, Gaby. I’ll either get my answers, or I’ll haul your skinny ass to the station tonight. Late as it is, you won’t be out of there until morning, at the earliest. Longer, if someone other than me decides you sound guilty as hell.”

  An invisible fist squeezed her windpipe. She couldn’t swallow, could barely breathe. Giving herself over to Luther’s dark gaze, she asked simply, “Do you believe I killed her?”

  “No.”

  Relief washed over her. “Then—”

  “But I think you can tell me things. And Gaby?” He kissed her again. “You will. Right now.”

  Oren watched the skinny girl and the tall man exchange money, whisper, and finally make off for their trick.

  So she was a whore, like the others. Somehow, he hadn’t figured her for that type. She was too . . . off-putting to be in the flesh trade. And too skinny. Too plain.

  In his experience, even the homeliest whores had curves. Big chests and bigger posteriors, welcoming smiles and tired eyes. They wore revealing clothes and painted themselves to advertise their trade.

  Not that woman.

  No, her eyes weren�
�t tired at all. They were laser sharp and she just watched everyone and everything with a hatred that cut clean.

  Maybe it was a specialty of hers, that antagonistic attitude. Did men pay her extra for it?

  Did she, like he, favor dominance?

  Interesting. Oren smiled at the thought.

  Perhaps later, when the need arose again, he’d take her and see just how well she fared as a supplicant. Breaking someone as strong-willed as her would last longer, and provide extra enjoyment.

  But for now . . . yes, the youngest of the whores finally finished her duty with her most recent john and returned outside.

  With the pimp otherwise occupied and the skinny watchdog off with her own trick, Oren finally had his chance. He waited near the corner, out of sight, until she strolled toward him.

  “Excuse me?”

  She looked up, tipped her head at the sight of him, and frowned. “Hello.”

  Putting just the right quaver in his voice, Oren said, “Could you . . . you help me? Please?”

  She looked behind her, fretted, and then came toward him. “Help you how? What are you doin’ out this time of night? You don’t look like you belong around here.”

  “I don’t. I’m lost, and I’m scared.” He let his bottom lip tremble. “I want to go home.”

  “Shhh, now. It’s okay.”

  She started to touch the hat on his head, and Oren stepped out of reach.

  Luckily, she read that as fear. “I’m Bliss. What’s your name?”

  Oren thought quickly, and said, “Matt.”

  “How old are ya, Matt?”

  “Twelve.” He shuffled his feet, peeked at her from under the brim of his cap. “I was with my older brother at a party, but I got mad at him and decided to walk home. Now I’m lost and my mom will kill me if she finds out.”

  The stupid cow melted with sympathy. “Well, we won’t let that happen, will we? If you want to come with me, we can call your brother and—”

  “No!” Covering up, Oren said, “I don’t know his number. But he’s probably still at the party. If you walk me back there, I can pay you. I promise.”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  “But I want to. We’re rich. My brother throws away money. He’ll give you some, I swear. He doesn’t want my parents to find out that he let me leave, or he’ll be in trouble, too.”