Sandra Brown - Ricochet

When it receded, she lay panting beneath him. A streetlight shone through the window, casting a shadow upon her breasts in the lace pattern of the tattered curtain. A tear rolled from the corner of her eye into the damp hair at her temple, where a vein pulsed. Her hair was a riot of pale silk behind her head. Her lips looked swollen and bruised.

He wanted very badly to lie with her. He wanted to kiss her, wetly but softly and gently. But that would send him to hell for sure. He’d lost his head and responded to a carnal impulse he could later blame on biology. But he would have no excuse for lingering tenderness. He was in full command of his faculties now, and the enormity of his folly crashed down on him.

She opened her eyes and gazed up at him. Murmuring his name, she lifted her hand toward his cheek. Before she could touch him, he pulled away from her and stood up. Keeping his back to her, he readjusted his trousers and haphazardly buckled his belt. He left his shirttail out. He picked up his holster, but didn’t put it on.

He’d gone up against some of the most brutish criminals in Savannah ’s history, but the most courageous thing he’d ever had to do was turn around and look at this woman.

To his relief, she had sat up. Her skirt was back in place. She hadn’t put on her tank top yet, but she was modestly holding it against her chest. That classically feminine, protective pose was seared into his brain for later recall, when remembering how vulnerable she had looked at that moment would cause his heart to ache.

But that was later.

Now, he walked as far as the hallway, where he bent to retrieve his sport jacket and service weapon from the floor. Over his shoulder he said, “Ten o’clock. Have your lawyer with you, and don’t be late.”

ELISE AWOKE, SITTING BOLT UPRIGHT, GASPING FOR BREATH, heart racing.

One second, she’d been in a deep sleep, the next it was as though an alarm had sounded loudly in her head, awakening her with a jolt. Frantically she looked around, and although she was surrounded by darkness, she remembered instantly where she was, and why, and what had happened.

When Duncan had walked out, she’d been so distraught, she’d wept until she cried herself to sleep. She’d slept? She, the chronic insomniac, had fallen into a dreamless sleep? For how long? Half an hour? Longer? Even as she pulled on her tank top, she tried to read her wristwatch, but it was too dark to see the hands. Cato! What would she tell him?

Sweat had dried on her skin, making it feel tight and dry. She wiped her cheeks and felt the salty tracks of tears. She groped along the floor for her underwear. As she stepped into the panties, she realized that she needed to bathe before she saw Cato.

She grabbed her handbag and within seconds of waking up was feeling her way through the dark house, moving as quickly as possible. She must get home ahead of Cato. Otherwise how would she explain her absence? How would she explain her appearance?

There was only one explanation for that. If he looked at her, he would know instantly what she’d done.

God, please let him still be playing cards.

Whatever his mood, she must deal with it. Since Duncan had made plain his intention to follow through with his investigation, she had no choice now except to continue the pretense with Cato that their relationship was one of matrimonial bliss.

She let herself out the back door through which she had come in. The yard was a hardscrabble landscape of wild grass and weeds that chafed her bare legs as she crossed it in a run.

A gate in the cyclone fence at the back of the yard opened into the alley. It was a rutted, unpaved path lined with garbage cans and the detritus of an uncaring community-rusted-out appliances, old tires, discarded furniture, toys, tools, and trash.

The route back to where she’d left her car led her between the two houses that backed up to the one that Duncan had described as Boo Radley’s house. He didn’t know it, but To Kill a Mockingbird was one of her favorite movies. When she was a kid, she had watched it every time it came on TV. She’d probably seen every movie ever aired on television. Comedies, dramas, mysteries, she loved them all. They had been her escape from the grim reality of her life.

This neighborhood boasted several Boo Radley houses. The ones on either side of her were dark, nothing to indicate that she was being watched from behind shuttered windows. But just when she thought she would get past undetected, a cat jumped out from a scrawny hedge, causing her heart to leap. The cat hissed and bowed his back, then darted back into the shrubbery.

Her car was parked halfway down the block. She was relieved to see that none of the windows had been smashed and that the hubcaps were still there. Having her car vandalized would have been tough to explain to Cato.

Passing under a streetlight, she checked her wristwatch again, and when she saw the time, she almost stumbled on the uneven sidewalk. She’d been asleep for hours!

Frantic with anxiety, she dug into her purse and pulled out her cell phone. If it had rung, it hadn’t awakened her. She looked at the readout. Good! No missed calls had been logged.

When Cato had announced his plan to go to the country club, she had told him she was going to take a sleep medication and hopefully get some rest in preparation for the interrogation in the morning. At the risk of disturbing her much-needed sleep, he had said he wouldn’t call.

Well, at least he hadn’t called her cell phone. But he might have called the house.

She considered calling his cell phone to see where he was. If she caught him still at the club, she could say she was just checking on him. But if he was at home, he would demand to know why she wasn’t there, tucked in safe and sound. He would want to know what she was doing out at this hour when she was supposed to be enjoying a medicated sleep. Then what? What would she tell him?

No, better not to call than to risk being put on the spot like that. Her best chance of not being found out was to get home ahead of him. Toward that end, she jogged the remaining distance to her car.

She unlocked it with the remote. It chirped and her headlights flashed once, momentarily relieving the darkness along the deserted street, and reminding her of the strobe lights that had been pulsing during her most recent meeting with Savich.

She opened the car door, tossed her handbag into the passenger seat, and slid in behind the wheel. She hit the automatic lock button as soon as she had closed the door, then quickly started the car and drove away.

Best-case scenario: Cato was still at the club and had done as he said he would and left her to sleep undisturbed. He had played cards into the wee hours last Saturday. Perhaps he had again tonight. Hopefully he had.

A slightly more bothersome scenario: He was still at the club, but had been calling the house to check on her. If that was the case, she could explain that she’d taken two tablets of over-the-counter medication. Stronger than she thought, the sleep aid had knocked her out and she’d slept through his calls.

Worst-case scenario: Cato was at home angrily awaiting her return.

To explain her absence, she could say that despite the sleep aid, her insomnia had been so bad she’d gone out for a drive. That was lame, but at least credible.

But how would she explain the unmistakable signs of lovemaking? Duncan hadn’t been gentle. Neither had she.

“I don’t believe we get to choose who we fall in love with. Do you?”

He hadn’t said anything in response to her question. He hadn’t needed to. His expression had told her what she’d needed to know. What she already knew.

Once triggered, his passion had been explosive and mindless. It had left marks. Unless she was able to make repairs before she saw Cato, he would surely notice her tangled hair and wrinkled skirt, the whisker burns around her lips.