Bending the Rules (34 page)

“Oh, those crazy-ass drivers these days,” he said with an insouciance that was belied by the tension in his shoulders, his big hands balled into fists at his sides. “Pedestrians just aren’t safe in the streets anymore. Oh, and guess what? Freddy got back to me right in the middle of all this. Turns out he wasn’t telling the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth after all.”

“Arturo beat him up, too?”

“Yeah.”

“Then he can press charges, right? That will give you something to hold that bastard on—” A bleakness in Jason’s eyes stopped her. “What?” she whispered.

“Freddy doesn’t want to get involved.”

“What? You bent over backward to help him!”

“Proving once again that no good deed goes unpunished.” He ground the heel of his hand into his forehead. “Except…you know what I really think?” He dropped his hand to his side. “I think Freddy might have been involved a lot deeper than as a tagger Arturo was questioning. I think he may have been one of the kids Cory told us came out of the jewelry store after the owner was shot. He was beaten more severely than the other kids. I think he may have made the mistake of telling someone he hadn’t signed up for shooting anybody. But we’ll never know for sure because he won’t admit to anything beyond being beaten for information.”

He jabbed long fingers through his hair and stared down at her, frustration snapping like lightning in his dark eyes. “I know in my gut Arturo’s trying to eliminate the only witness to his crime. But without a license plate number, an eyewitness ID, something, I can’t prove it. And without probable cause, no one will give me the manpower I need to watch Cory around the clock.”

“So that’s it?” she demanded bitterly. “Just…too bad, so sad for Cory?”

“As far as the department is concerned it is. But I put out an APB on Arturo. I have enough to at least bring him in for questioning.” His stubble rasped as he scrubbed the backs of his fingers over his chin and lower lip. “I also called in a couple of favors. I’ve got two patrolmen who will keep the kid’s apartment under surveillance for the next few days. I’m not sure what we’ll do after that, but Iam not failing her the way those Philly cops failed her father. Even if that means I have to hog-tie Cory myself.”

“Cory? Why wouldn’t she do everything possible to help you help her?”

“Because I told her and her mother that she has to stay inside, to keep a low profile, until I can get Arturo off the streets. Apparently the guy doesn’t know where they live at this point, and we need to keep it that way. But little Miss Capelli says that she’ll have to repeat the ninth grade if she misses too much school and that she’ll go crazy, be bored stiff, stuck inside. Bored!” Hegaveher an exasperated look, but he was clearly baffled as well.

Reaching out, Poppy rubbed comforting circles on his forearm. “She’s not quite fifteen, Jason. Kids that age can’t see past Friday night—a week seems like an eternity.”

“Yeah, I get that. Which is why I invited her to see herself in a coffin and her mother left all alone to cry over it. Mrs. Capelli comprehends the concept just fine. She said she’d see to it that Cory stays out of sight, but the woman is holding down two jobs just to make ends meet, so I’m not sure how she intends to do that. But if she can’t, I damn well will. Me and my crew.”

Oh, Lord. Looking at the fire of conviction burning in his eyes, at the steely resolve, she couldn’t believe she’d ever thought this guy was an iceberg. Slapping her hands to his chest, she gave him a shove.

He landed in the chair behind him. “What the—”

Climbing onto his lap, she straddled his thighs, clutched two fistfuls of his shirt on either side of its partially unfastened button placket and pulled him to her as she rocked her mouth over his.

Jason detonated faster than gas fumes meeting a lit Bic. His hands plunging into her hair, he gripped her skull and took immediate I’m-in-charge-here command of the kiss.

She conceded control with a shiver, his dominance arousing her almost beyond bearing. He was all hot lips and hotter tongue as he kissed her, as he told her in blunt language that fueled her fire even further what he was going to do to her. His strong fingers combed through her hair, explored her neck, her back, the curve of her hips, the division of her buttocks. They deftly stripped her of her clothing from the waist down, then touched her, stroked her, gripped her, rubbed.

“Now, now, now,” she chanted as a single talented finger commenced a slow slide up and down the soft, wet slit between her legs, and she rose onto her knees on the chair cushion to fumble between them for his zipper.

A second later his penis sprang free. Wrapping her hand around its base, she positioned herself over it.

Then paused. “If you’ve got a condom, you’d better give it to me quick.”

“Wallet,” he panted, rolling up on one hip to push his pants farther down so he could fish it out. “I’ve been making sure there’s one in it all the time because I can’t seem to keep my hands off—” He sucked in a breath as she rapidly suited him up, then slowly sank down upon him.

His hands slapped down on her butt and splayed wide, gripping her cheeks to hold her tightly against him as his hips hammered upward in short, deep, powerful thrusts.

Poppy tried to hold out, to make it last, but her body wasn’t in an asking-for-permission mode. Not when Jason was hitting all the right spots. Not when she could look into his face and see the fierce concentration as he drew nearer his own climax, as he gritted his teeth and tightened his grasp on her bottom.

Not when he raised her onto her knees with the vigorousness of each new thrust. The sensations, the visuals, brought her—oh, God—so close. And closer yet.

Then he tilted his head back and gazed up at her like carnality incarnate with his slitted, glittering eyes and his lips parted, a hint of upper teeth showing and his tongue pressing his bottom lip.

Her building orgasm ignited with enough pyrotechnics to make the Fourth of July displays at Lake Union and Ivar’s look like pikers in comparison.

Flushed, satiated, boneless with radiating pleasure, it was pretty hard to wish you’d held out.

But that didn’t keep her from being fiercely pleased when Jason immediately growled deep in his throat, his control in smithereens as he shot his hips high one last time and held her to him, groaning long and loud as he ground against her in release.

Seconds later, he sank back into the seat and she collapsed in a mellow heap atop him, her boobs flattening against the hard plane of his chest, her cheek snuggled in the crook of his neck. She was a jellyfish, floating in a warm sea of contentment. “Whoa,” she murmured against his smooth, hot skin.

“No shit.” A laugh rumbled in his chest and his hands caressed the backs of her thighs from the crease where they met her butt, down past the backs of her knees to her calves, then all the way to her ankles. He slowly stroked his way back up again. Down once more, then up; down, then up, in a hypnotic rhythm. “Your legs always feel so amazing,” he murmured, rubbing his cheek against the top of her head. “Smoother ’n butter.”

She sighed, happy in every fiber of her being. She pressed a soft kiss into the bend where his neck flowed into his shoulder, then rearranged herself to press her ear against his chest to listen to the reassuring beat of his heart. “God, I love you.”

Jase jerked as if the words were an electric prod, then forced himself to go still. As though a brilliant white light had exploded warmth inside his chest, his first knee-jerk reaction was Want that.

But he shoved it away. Locked it in an airtight box. Because he was a de Sanges and, face it, de Sangeses didn’t know shit about love.

He’d like to continue blaming that lack on his family, but he couldn’t. He’d had options over the years; he could have chosen to learn how to develop relationships. And he had, with Murphy and Hohn. But he’d steered clear of anything deeper than a weekend relationship with women…and old habits died hard.

Hell, if they even died at all. Because, face it. It was damn late to reverse his entire lifetime’s point of view.

He almost told Poppy she was wrong, that she didn’t love him. But he shut his mouth because he could just see how that would play out. She’d hand him his balls on a plate. She was a woman whose feelings went strong and deep and he wouldn’t insult her by insisting he knew better than she did what those feelings were. It would be better for them both if she didn’t love him. Hell, if he was a better man, he’d wish that was truly the case.

But he wasn’t. He wasn’t a better man at all. Which was pretty damn dicked up, because where did that leave either of them?

Feeling hollowed out, he reached for her hips to move her off him, but she beat him to the punch. She climbed to her feet and stared down at him as she gathered her panties off the floor and stepped into them.

“It’s not a death sentence, Jason.”

She was flushed and tousled, clad only in her satin thong and a baffled smile, and his heart clenched like a fist. “No, it’s not.” His mind went blank for a moment, then he cleared his throat. “And I don’t want you to think that I don’t know it’s an honor and a gift—”

“Oh, please,” she interrupted. “Let’s not do the whole ‘It’s not you, it’s me’ routine, okay?”

“It is me, though, Poppy. I don’t know how to love.” Climbing to his feet, he straightened his clothes. “You think I wouldn’t glom onto you if I did? I’d do that so fast your head would spin.” In a blast of clarity he realized he’d been happy here with her.

But that was getting into sloppy-emotions territory, and that was a place he wasn’t prepared to go—never mind talk about. So he said instead, “You’re great. I really like living with you. I dig the meals we’ve shared and, Jesus, the sex is off-the-scale hot.”

Stiffening, she gave him an incredulous look. “That’s what the two of us mean to you—eating together and rolling around under the sheets?”

“No, of course not. Or at least not only that.” When she shot him a look that made him feel cornered, he demanded, “What the hell is it you want me to say?”

“Not a damn thing, if you need to ask.”

“Are you kidding me?” He was almost grateful for the indignation that sliced through his burgeoning regret. “I hate it when women do that kind of shit!”

She crossed her arms over her bare breasts. “Wonderful. Now you’re lumping me with other women.”

“No. God.” He rubbed the small ache that was beginning to thump between his brows. But he dropped his hand and took an unprecedented plunge, exposing the soft underbelly he liked to pretend he didn’t have. “Okay, you want me to bare my soul like some damn new-age metrosexual?” Taking a breath, he admitted something he’d always known but had managed to shove down deep inside of himself so he wouldn’t have to deal with it. “Look, you met my brother. I’m guessing he told you about how he and Dad and Pops spent most of my childhood—hell, of my life—in the slammer?”

“Yeah, about that—just what does it take to earn your trust, anyway? You didn’t think that was something I might’ve wanted to hear from you?” She narrowed her eyes at him. “So tell me. Would you have ever told me if Joe hadn’t come by?”

Shit. Not voluntarily. Well, maybe. Eventually, probably.

Oh, hell. “I don’t know.” He shrugged helplessly. “That’s a problem, I take it.”

“Your unwillingness to share the first thing about yourself?” She smacked him on the chest. “Dammit, Jason, you’re living with me—sleeping with me, but you haven’t told me about the important stuff that makes you you? Yeah, I’d say it’s a problem.”

“Nobody taught me all these rules!” he roared. His gut rolled but he quieted his voice and admitted something he’d always known but had managed to shove down deep inside so he wouldn’t have to deal with it. “But here’s the thing, Poppy. I don’t know if it’s my family situation or if it’s just me, but the bottom line is, I’m…damaged.”

“What? That’s ludicrous!” Her opinion prompt and her surprise evident, she dropped her arms to her sides. “You’re stuck in the past, maybe, but there’s not a damn thing wrong with you. I’m guessing it weighs on you that the men in your family are in jail more than they’re out. But, Jason, their mistakes are theirs, not yours. You’re clearly nothing like them.”

“How the hell do you know?” It had taken something for him to confess that he knew he was fucked up, and she’d just blown it off? Ignoring the fact that she saw him in a much more positive light than he saw himself, he zeroed in instead on the fact that while he’d allowed her her feelings, she wasn’t doing the same for him. “You spent—what?—fifteen minutes with my brother and now you’re an authority?”

“I know you, and I’ve never encountered a guy so bythe-book. You chose an entirely different path from the one your relatives took, so why would you think you’re anything like them? The only thing you have in common as far as I can see is that your father and grandfather are locked behind steel bars and you’re locked down in a prison of your own making.”

It was a hit out of the blue, and his stomach roiled even as his mouth tightened. “That’s funny,” he snapped. “I don’t remember seeing your psychology degree.”

Hurt flashed in her eyes, but she didn’t snarl back at him as he expected. Instead she tilted her face up to his and said steadily, “You know what I just don’t get? I don’t understand why you won’t see what I see in you. You’ve got such a huge capacity for love in you, Jason. I’ve heard it in the way you talk about your friend Murphy. Felt it in the way you treat me. Seen it in how good you are with the kids. But from where I’m standing, you’re just flat-out choosing to deny it.”