Kay David - Obsession

Standing up, he turned to Emma. “Not a very good ending to our evening, huh?”

She wore an expression of distress. “I’m really sorry about this. It’s usually a very quiet street. Nothing ever happens here-” She broke off abruptly, her words stopping awkwardly.

Stepping closer to the sidewalk where she stood, Raul sensed she’d been going to say more, but at the last minute, had thought better of it. He waited to give her another chance, but she stayed silent.

“Has something else happened here lately?” he pushed.

She started shaking her head even before he finished speaking. “No, not that I know of…”

She was so clearly lying and so obviously shaken Raul reacted without thinking, one thought foremost in his mind. What in hell has Kelman done to her already? He reached over, tilting her chin up, so he could look into her eyes. “You could tell me, you know. It would be all right.”

She looked so startled that Raul wondered just what in hell he was doing. She recovered before he could answer that. “Nothing’s happened.” Her voice was stronger, more determined. “Absolutely nothing.”

His reaction made no sense at all, but a sudden sweep of protectiveness, then anger, came over Raul.

He recognized at once how ridiculous the emotions were. He was here to use Emma, just as Kelman was, but emotions were emotions. They came without reason.

Just like the craving to kiss her. He didn’t even bother to fight it this time; he simply gave in, leaning toward her and brushing his lips over hers, telling himself it would be enough.

But it wasn’t. Her mouth was as soft as it looked, and instead of satisfying him, the kiss only made him want more. More of them. More of her. More. He pulled back abruptly, met her gaze, then climbed into the damaged truck and drove off.

EMMA COULDN’T REMOVE Raul’s kiss from her brain, in fact, with each passing day, the moment seemed to grow in importance and take even deeper root. It had been nothing, a mere brush of his lips against her own, but she wasn’t able to erase the sensation, no matter how hard she tried. It wasn’t the feeling as much as the gesture; the brief touch had held the promise of more, and she had to remind herself she didn’t want it.

She had a goal and nothing could stand in its way, including a romantic entanglement. Especially a romantic entanglement with someone like Raul, she amended quickly. A relationship with a man that intense, that focused, would be like standing under a magnifying glass. They’d burn up from the heat they’d generate. She could tell that just from his kiss.

But the more she thought about him, the more confused she got, especially when she realized he’d never asked her about his trade. Had he merely wanted to go out with her? He’d called several times since then, inviting her for drinks or dinner, but each time she’d turned him down.

If she didn’t know better, she might think he was trying to court her. He’d brought her flowers, sent her candy…and the thoughtfulness of the newspaper! Only someone who’d been away from home for a long time knew what that meant. It wasn’t just a paper; it was a bridge to everything familiar, a little link to the stores and the politics and the things you took for granted when you saw them every day. She’d read every inch of it, including the ads.

That night, he’d even invaded her dreams. Finally, about six in the morning, she drifted off into something close to rest only to have the phone sound an hour later. She wanted to ignore the baleful ringing until she remembered it was Sunday and Todd’s turn to call her. She snatched up the receiver quickly; missing the call would have been awful.

Jake’s voice reached across the miles and immediately captured her. “Mommy? Is that you? You sound funny…”

Sitting up in bed, she pushed the hair out of her eyes. “It’s me, sweetheart. I was asleep, that’s all. Remember how I told you it’s not the same time here as it is there? We don’t have daylight saving time like you do-”

He was too excited to listen. “Mommy, guess what I’m getting?” Not waiting for an answer, he continued, “You’ll never guess. Not in a gazillion years.”

“Okay, then, tell me.” She blinked and tried to wake up more. “What are you getting?”

“A pony!” His words rang together in a string.

“Charlotte’s gonna move in here after she and Daddy get married, and she’s bringing all her horses and she said I could pick out one just for me. Not one too big or anything, but one for my very own. Isn’t that neat? I’m gonna call him Ranger. What do you think?”

He stopped to draw a breath, and Emma spoke in the gap, her heart suddenly in her throat. “Are you going to take riding lessons, honey?”

“Charlotte’s gonna teach me.” His voice was puffed up with importance. “She tol’ Daddy she wanted to spend time with me. I heard her tell him. She hugged me and she smells nice.”

The rest of the conversation was more of the same. Charlotte this and Charlotte that. Even Sarah had mumbled something about “’Lette,” her young tongue unable to get completely around the other woman’s name. Hanging up the phone twenty minutes later, Emma spent the rest of Sunday in a fog of depression. She should have been happy that Charlotte was treating the children so well, she told herself, but instead, she was jealous. She wanted to be the one teaching Jake to ride. She wanted to be the one holding Sarah’s hand when she toddled around the yard.

Sitting at her desk at home the next morning, unable to face the day, Emma picked up the phone, called Felicity and told her she’d be working from there.

But she accomplished nothing. Her thoughts tumbled around like clothes in a dryer, going from Raul, to her children and back to Raul.

The memory of the kiss occupied most of her thoughts, but the car accident troubled her, as well. Her unlocked gate was nothing compared to the damage to Raul’s vehicle, yet to have them both happen so close together was unnerving. She’d wanted to mention the open gate to Raul, then at the last minute had decided not to. The incident was so minor she felt foolish even to be worried about it, much less mention it to him.

To top it off, there had been the fight between Kelman and Raul. What kind of woman would those two men have fought over? Emma had called Reina that evening and told her more about the conversation she’d overheard. For the first time in their friendship, they’d exchanged angry words, Reina insisting that Raul was someone Emma should avoid. They’d apologized to each other before hanging up, but the tension was still thick between them.

Emma held her head in her hands and stared out the window. The monkey who lived in the trees next door was scampering from one branch to another, screeching and screaming as he shook the limbs and sent the leaves trembling as if in a storm. The irritating sound echoed inside her head, and for a minute, Emma thought about howling, too. The phone beside her jangled, saving her from her thoughts.

“Emma, I need to talk to you about something.” Christopher Evans spoke without a greeting, and behind her boss’s voice, Emma heard a note of unusual urgency. Typically unflappable, he sounded as if he was trying much too hard not to be worried.

But he was failing.

She couldn’t imagine what might have upset him, but she felt her stomach knot in response, a cramp of nervousness she couldn’t ignore. “What’s going on?”

“That account you opened a few weeks ago for Raul Santos. Have you checked the funding on it?”

“I had Felicity look at it on Friday. She talked to the bank in El Paso and they said everything was fine-or at least that’s what she told me.” Emma hesitated. “Why do you ask? Is there a problem?”