Released at Sugar and Spice Press Today
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So what do I do now? It was the question that Dominique asked herself while lying across the bed in Andrew’s master bedroom. She was lying on her belly looking out the glass wall to the river. In the summer she knew the blue skies would change the water to a kind of blue. Right now the middle of winter the color was dark and murky. Just looking at it made her shiver knowing that the frigid temperature would make it icy cold to the skin. For some reason it was the only thing that soothed her with all the upheaval and swirling thoughts in her head. At the forefront there was Andrew and the kiss he planted on her only days earlier. Since then she’d kept her distance as much as she could. But with a killer looming in the darkness unknown, there were things to discuss.
He dissected her movements from the beginning when she had the first attack. He was looking for different movements in her pattern, trying to see if she had interacted with the killers without even knowing. He asked her about the people in the coffee shop where she worked. They staked it out, and she pointed out the regulars and the new customers. He took pictures and asked more questions. He was like a pit-bull and was tenacious in his task. They went everywhere, from the pharmacy to the supermarket looking for a link. Then he’d poured over everything at night while they ate. The looks he gave her was another thing filled with blatant desire and want. She honestly didn’t know how to react to that.
The only boyfriend she ever had was not the kind who cared about her. He was a taker and in sex he took and never really worried about her needs. When she kicked him to the curb he told her that she would come back because no one else wanted her. She made sure that if she was alone, he would never be a part of her life again. Dominique built another wall around her heart, and thinking about it she was as fortified as a castle in the old day. Nothing got in except the pain of a killer’s lust for blood.
She wondered how it would feel to let Andrew in, to trust him like he asked her to. His kiss excited her, and she wanted to feel his hands on her skin stroking and eliciting excitement in her body. To feel something other than wrenching pain tearing at her every time a new woman was taken and tortured. It was a risk and one she didn’t know if she was willing to take. It was all so much, and the urge to scream became so fierce she opened her mouth and funneled all her frustration into the one yell. She winced when she heard a crash from downstairs and the loud foot falls of Andrew bolting up the stairs. Note to self don’t yellow when there’s a cop around. He busted in the door with a wild look on his face.
“Is it happening again? Goddamnit, there wasn’t any news of another girl getting picked up,” he said.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry! No, there’s nothing happening. I was just frustrated with I guess everything,” Dominique said.
“So you thought it best to scream whilst you have this whole issue going and a guy who carries a loaded weapon downstairs?” Andrew stepped inside the room. It was the closest they’d been in the bedroom since he kissed her.
She shrugged embarrassed. “I wasn’t thinking. I’m just so over everything. It feels like we’re sitting here spinning our wheels waiting for these bastards to take another woman. I can’t work or go home, and then you kissed the socks of me, and I wondered if it was a fluke to feel like that….”
Oh drat blast it. Dominique shut her mouth tight knowing that she revealed more than she wanted to. One raised eyebrow, it was the only movement before he strode across the room and in an instant pinned her on the bed. She closed her eyes as his lips met hers, and damn it wasn’t a fluke. She moaned softly as his hardness was pressed against her and his tongue penetrated her mouth. It was instinct, reflex to raise her hips to feel more of that delicious hardness in his pants. The kiss assaulted her senses, made her wet and bold. She grabbed his head and angled her mouth over his taking from him as he did from her. It caused him to groan. The temperature in the room seemed to skyrocket, and for the minutes that they tasted and tempted each other, Dominique forgot her troubles.
Andrew lifted his head. “Does that feel like it was a coincidence?”
