Friction (Red Hot Private Eye, Novella, Vol. 2) (5 page)

Raiza took her long hair in her fists and pulled down tightly squeezing out the extra moisture before getting into her car. She did
not
want the seats getting wet. Yes, of course she had had the leather treated for all weather protection, but that didn’t mean she wanted to take a chance.

She opened her car door and she shook her head slightly as a chill ran through her from head to toe. That had been close.
Too close. It had been a calculated risk on her part and she was grateful that it had turned out in her favor.

Pulling out of the underground
parking she tapped the screen on her phone so she could access the monitors now that she had turned them back on. The screen filled with the men she had just left all sitting around discussing her. Well, her body at least. They were all describing what each had wanted to do to her body in graphic, detailed descriptions.

Dream on.

She couldn’t believe how easy men were. You put an unexpected naked girl in front of them and it seemed even hardened, highly dangerous, criminals turned into twelve-year-old boys. These men were suspected murderers, drug traffickers,
human
traffickers, but to listen to them now you would think they were in a middle school locker room.

As she turned onto Pico, she decided that before she headed back to the offices she was going to go home. Take a shower. Call her uncle. Clear her head.

Then
, she would return to work. She stopped before she pressed the icon next to Cristal’s name. It dawned on her that she wasn’t sure if she was supposed to call into Cristal or Dominic. They hadn’t gone over that aspect of the new ownership details in the morning meeting.

Nope
, Raiza thought to herself,
they had been too busy discussing small, insignificant things like the fact that she would now be sharing an office, she would be babysitting, oh and she couldn’t forget the bombshell that she had to go out in the field, which as it turned out, proved to be on a highly dangerous mission.

So with all of that she
hadn’t found out who she should report to now that Red was gone. So Cristal it was, she tapped the screen placing the call.

“Hey, Hot Mama!” Cristal sounded upbeat...chipper, almost.

Raiza was really going to have to get used to this new,
happy
, version of Cristal. The one that had taken over her best friend’s body since she and Dominic had gotten into a serious relationship.

“Hey, Sexy.
Just wanted to let you know that I’m stopping off at home before coming back in.” Raiza did not feel like going into the details now. She knew that they would cover all of it at the debrief and honestly she just wanted to put the radio on and decompress. As much as that was possible sitting in bumper to bumper LA traffic anyway.

“Is everything okay?” her friend/boss’s voice sounded concerned.

“It’s fine. Mateo will fill you in. I should be there in a of couple hours.”

There was a pause before Cristal continued, “Alright, call if you need anything.”

She knew that her friend thought that there was indeed something wrong, but she genuinely appreciated the fact that she hadn’t pushed her for more details. Raiza disconnected the call and turned on some music. She let herself zone out as she drove down the familiar streets to her home.

Just as she was pulling onto her street, Raiza’s phone beeped with an incoming call. She looked down and saw that it was her Tia Leti.

“Hey Tia,” Raiza said as she pushed the answer icon.

Leti began speaking at her trademark rapid pace, “Your Tia Margie is in the hospital. They are running tests but it looks like she may have had a heart attack. Your uncle is with her now. She is seeing a cardiologist in about an hour. I will call you back with the results. Okay Mija.”

“Okay Tia.”

Raiza heard the call disconnect and she smiled to herself. Her aunt had once entered a speed talking competition and placed third. To this day, Leti claimed that if she
had been allowed to speak Spanish (her first language) she would have won. Raiza tended to agree with her.

Her phone beeped again and Raiza looked down at the caller ID. It was Mateo.

She sighed. She knew that she
had
to answer it because he might be calling with information or a question regarding their assignment. Why couldn’t she just go home and take a shower in peace? Was that too much to ask?

“Hello,” she heard frustration bleed into the
two syllable greeting. She needed to lock that down. She never wanted anyone to know when she was having a tough time. Least of all Mateo.

“Where are you?” he barked.

Whoa, for someone who prided himself on manners, he was sure snippy.

“In my car,” Raiza answered, her tone more carefully controlled.

“Don’t be cute,” he sounded really mad. “Where are you?”

“Why?”

“Raiza,” he hissed.

“Yes?” She was quickly losing patience with him.

“Tell me where you are,” he spoke slowly, putting equal emphasis on each word.

“Why?” she repeated.

“God damn-”

She hung up. Raiza was not in the mood for his attitude. If he
wasn’t going to answer her questions then she didn’t need to answer his.

Plus
, Mateo’s deep voice was causing her to feel all those zinging sensations she had been expecting to feel when she brushed past that hottie-in-the-hall. Her body was definitely betraying her today.

She knew she was going to need to deal with him and her unwanted hormonal reactions to him sooner rather than later. They were, God help her, sharing an office now.
But, as of this moment, all she wanted was to take a hot shower. Then she would deal with everything—Mateo, Cristal, and her family. After a shower and clean, dry clothes she would feel like herself again.

Then she could face it all…even her unwanted zinging, zapping, zooming hormones.

---~---

Mateo looked down at the screen of his phone and saw that he
had been hung up on. He walked quickly into Red’s er…um, Cristal’s office.

“Where is she?”

Cristal sat behind her desk staring at her computer screen. Not moving her head from the screen she asked, “Who?”

Normally, Mateo would describe himself as a patient man. Today was not a normal day. All the
same he still needed to remember that Cristal was his boss now. Not that he would be rude to her even if she wasn’t but still, he needed to remember her new position.

“Raiza,” he tried to sound as respectful as possible.

“Why?” A small smirk appeared on her face. He couldn’t tell if Cristal was amused by his uncharacteristic behavior and messing with him or if she honestly was asking him why he needed to know where Raiza was.

“I need to talk to her,” he answered honestly.

Cristal turned in her chair so that she was facing the door where he stood; he now had her full attention.

“Is something wrong?” she asked earnestly.

“No. Not really,” he said through clenched teeth.

Yes! There was something wrong. He
couldn’t believe that Raiza had pulled that little stunt back at the Omni. He had told her to get out several times and she had blatantly ignored him. Was he going to explain that to Cristal? Hell no! He just needed to talk to Raiza.

“Well then, why do you
need
to talk to her?” Cristal’s asked, turning back to her computer screen.

Mateo fisted his hands at his sides and tried to remain as calm as possible. This was exactly why he
never
got serious with women. They could not just answer simple questions. If he and Dominic were having this conversation, it would be over already. Mateo would have asked where Raiza was and Dominic would have told him. That’s it. End of conversation.

This was going nowhere fast and he could feel his blood boiling so he decided he would just go check and see if she was home and if not come back and wait for her here.

“Never mind,” he said as he turned to leave.

“Mateo,” Cristal called after him.

Mateo turned back around waiting to hear what she had to say to him.

“She’s at her house.” A small smile crept up Cristal’s face before she instructed, “Play nice.”

Mateo was going to defend the fact that this was work related and had nothing to do with playing nice, but she had already turned back to her computer screen and honestly Mateo didn’t want to waste his breath. He knew Cristal was going to believe whatever she wanted to anyway.

As he was walking down the
hall he heard Dominic call his name, “Kostas.”

Mateo stuck his head into his old office, now Dominic’s office. “What’s up?”

“Did you just get back?” Dominic asked lifting his head from a pile of paperwork that was stacked on his desk.

“Yep,” Mateo answered.

“You heading back out?”

“Yep,” Mateo repeated.

Dominic nodded and then looked down at the files he was working on.

See
that
was a normal conversation. No “why”—just exchanging information.

Mateo headed out to his truck. He knew that he needed to calm down before he spoke to Raiza.

Logically, it was the right move. There was no way she was going to listen to him if he didn’t speak to her calmly. And he needed her to hear what he was going to say.

Strategically, it was the right move. They
weren’t just co-workers now. They shared an office. If he started things off on the wrong foot, day one, he knew she could make his life at work, well shall we just say...unpleasant.

Professionally, it was the right move.
Technically she hadn’t done anything wrong. She had completed the job. Period. He knew that is how Cristal, Dominic, and, hell if he was there, even
Red
would see it.

Unfortunately
however, right now, all of that logic, strategy, and professionalism was being overridden by the consuming desire to scream at her to
never
put herself in that kind of danger again.

Mateo knew himself, and—although he would like to believe that when he saw her, he would behave logically, strategically and professionally—he knew that, most likely, consuming desire would win the battle.
Yep , he was almost sure of it.

Mateo had been standing outside Raiza’s front door for almost ten minutes now. He knew that she was inside. Her car was in the driveway. He had called her cell phone and he could hear it ringing through the front door.

The longer he stood out there the more worked up he got as questions flew through his head like boomerangs, going out into the atmosphere then coming back again and again.

Was she ignoring him?

Was she hurt?

Was she asleep?

Was she ignoring him?

Was she hurt?

Was she asleep?

He had no idea what the answers to those questions were, but he did know one thing for sure. She had ninety seconds to answer the door or he was going in.

Just as he lifted his hand to
knock again the door flew open. The first thing that he became aware of was the scent that hit him smack dab in the face. It was feminine, fresh, and flowery.

The next thing he noticed was that she was in a towel. His mouth began watering as his eyes roamed down the bare skin of her shoulders to the round mounds of her breasts peeking out above the fluffy pink cotton towel. Her dark hair fell over the cloth material, cascading like a waterfall.

His eyes lifted to meet hers and he saw that, even though she was glaring at him and clearly not happy about his unannounced arrival, she looked soft and sweet. With no make-up on and her hair falling wet around her face, she looked hotter than should be legal.

She
didn’t speak, just glared. Clearing his throat he tried to make himself recall why he was there. But his brain was having a hard time coming up with an answer.

Finally she broke the silence, “What do you want, Mateo?”

That was a loaded question
, he thought. Visions of all the things he wanted to do to her flashed in his head.

He heard a car horn beep behind him and he turned and saw one of Raiza’s
neighbor’s pulling into his driveway, waving at her. When Mateo looked back he saw Raiza lifting her hand and waving it slightly. The motion of her arm caused her towel to slip down just a millimeter but that was all it took to make Mateo’s need explode like a volcano.

“Can I come in?” he asked. He heard his voice drop a couple of octaves, the way it always did when he
was turned on.

Raiza’s eyes widened in awareness.
She didn’t speak, just nodded and stepped back to allow him room to walk in. His large frame pushed past her and when she shut the door behind her, he knew that she was feeling their connection.

Her chest was rising and falling at a rapid pace and her lips
were parted and swollen. There was a flush in her skin and her eyes had become heavy-lidded. Mateo knew that he needed to take advantage of this opportunity. He had things he needed to say to her, things he had specifically come to this house to say, but, hell—they could wait. Right now, he was going to show her how he felt about her, and it wasn't going to be with words.

He took a slow step toward her, and then another. He expected her to take steps backward, in sync with the steps that he was taking toward her—not out of intimidation, or wanting to get away, but just because that was human nature in these little dances. That
was the innate choreography that was imprinted on our DNA.

Not Raiza, though.

This made him want her that much more. Desire pulsed through him fiercely. Not able to stop himself he growled, “Do you know how bad I want you? Do you have any idea how sexy you are?”

She turned her face up to him, looking him in the eye, decisive and clear eyed as he continued stepping toward her.

When he was a few inches away, she very deliberately pulled her towel off and held it to the side. After letting it dangle for a few endless seconds, giving him the opportunity to take in the splendor of her naked body, she dropped it on the floor and snaked her arms around his neck, reaching up and pressing her lips against his, grinding her hips against him.

Damn.

Apparently she, too, had decided to seize the moment.

He felt himself harden immediately, both in response to the purely physical sensation of her hips grinding up against him, and to the overall knowledge that he was finally...
finally
...about to make love to her.

After four long, hard (no pun intended) years of wanting her—wanting to kiss her, wanting to touch her, wanting to feel her skin against his skin—it was finally happening.

And, since he didn't know what the future held for them, and therefore this could conceivably be the only time that he would have the opportunity to do all of those things, he planned to make it count. He was going to touch every inch of her, kiss every inch of her, lick every inch of her...treasure every inch of her. He was going to remember every instant of this encounter, and he was going to enjoy every moment of it, too.

His hands began to roam up and down her naked torso, entranced by the silky smooth feel of her skin beneath his fingertips. His breathing was speeding up and he could feel his
heartbeat racing and beads of sweat beginning to form on his forehead, as he felt his tongue shoot into her mouth with an urgency that he did not feel quite in control of.

Dammit! He wanted to draw this out, to savor each moment, but it seemed his body had different ideas. His body wanted Raiza, and wanted her now.

With a shuddering gasp of lust, he surrendered himself to his desires and pressed one hand to the back of her head, deepening the kiss even further. Their mouths ground against each other, tongues intertwined, for several moments before she finally tore herself away and, with a sardonic little smile on her face, said, “It's not fair.”

“What's not fair?” he asked, concern immediately flooding him. He expected her to say something like, 'It's not fair that something so wonderful is happening on such a terrible day,' or 'It's not fair that we've wasted four years of our lives when we could have been doing this all along.'

But what she
actually
said was, “It's not fair that you get to see me naked, and I can't see you,” and began to tear his clothes off.

Hell, that
worked too.

Before he knew it, she had pulled his tight black t-shirt over his head, and stripped him down to his boxer briefs. She
was just tossing aside his last sock when she turned back and saw his thumbs hooked in the waistband, getting ready to slide them over his hips.

“Uh, uh, uh,” she admonished, giving him a playful look and wagged her finger at him. His dick twitched and hardened even further at the playful interchange. Damn. This girl really knew how to get to him, and not just with her looks – with her intelligence, with her personality – with every damn thing about her.

Raiza dropped to her knees in front of him and licked her lips, a gesture which made him get even harder than he already was—something that, even 10 seconds ago, he would've said was absolutely impossible. She slid her fingers slowly up his legs, slipping her hands around his torso to his ass, and then sliding them back around to the front, trailing maddeningly softly around the hard shape of his dick, pressed against the fabric of his boxer briefs.

He reached his
hands down, out of instinct mainly, not even knowing what he would grasp—her wrists, her head—just feeling like he needed to get a hold of her, needed to touch her, needed to gain some measure of control. However, he had forgotten who he was dealing with. The Queen of Control.

Her hands snapped up and grasped his wrists in an iron grip, and she tilted her head back so that she was looking straight up into his eyes.

“Uh, uh, uh,” she repeated, that playful little half smile still plastered to her lips. His breathing sped up even further until he thought he might hyperventilate.

She let go of his wrists and he reached up and threaded his hands together behind his head so that he
wouldn't make the same mistake twice. Hell, if she wanted to be in control of this encounter, he wasn't going to argue—it was good enough for him that the encounter was happening at all—she could do whatever she liked to him, as long as it involved the two of them finally making love.

Apparently satisfied that he was going to behave himself, she turned her attention back to his boxer briefs, increasing her focus on the thick outline of his manhood—thank God! She toyed with him, grasping him, rubbing him, massaging him—all the time while he
was trapped behind the prison of cotton that his boxer briefs represented.

God!
This was torture! Sweet torture, but torture nonetheless. His passion was building up to a breaking point, and he wasn't sure he could control himself if that happened.

Then, at the instant that he thought he could not take it anymore, she hooked her own fingers in the waistband of his boxer briefs, pulling them down over his lower body slowly, sensuously, trailing her fingernails over his skin as she went, sending electric impulses of lust exploding out from the point of contact straight to his now-freed manhood.

As soon as she had slid the boxer briefs of all of the way off of him and tossed them aside, she immediately took his throbbing member in her mouth, which drew a growl from deep within the depths of his chest. It was the sound of lust and longing more desperate and ragged than he thought he had ever heard himself make. Raiza had brought him to a precipice of desire that he had never before approached.

The feel of her hot mouth surrounding him, enveloping him, was almost more than he could take. Forgetting her previous admonition, his hands flew to the back of her head and he entangled his fingers into her damp, silky soft hair. She didn't seem to mind this time, in fact the movements of her tongue seemed to become even more frantic than before—which he took as a good sign that he was doing something that she enjoyed, and that caused a desire to build up within her, as well.

Raiza began to move her head up and down, up and down, her hot mouth tightened on his penis, her hands tight on his ass as she controlled the movements of his hips thrusting.

God, she really
did
need to be in control of every single little thing, didn't she?

He knew that this quality in her would probably make
a lot of men feel emasculated, but Mateo felt anything but. Hell, he figured as long as the things she needed to be 'in control' of continued to include 'the best way to suck his dick,' she could be in control all day and all night, he would not be complaining!

When she had used her mouth on him for several bliss-inducing moments, she drew her head back and surveyed what she had created – one extremely engorged penis.

“There,” she said proudly, “I think I've gotten you ready for me now.”

His head was so lust-fogged that he
didn't even really process what she was saying, and he didn't put up one bit of a fight when she pushed him backward onto her couch. She bent over him, sliding on a condom that she had gotten out of her side table drawer, and he took the opportunity to reach over and begin to play with her nipples.

Her hands froze, and then her fingertips began to tremble.

Her eyes closed and her breathing quickened, her face flushed.

Mmmm
...he liked this reaction. He liked it a lot.

“God, you're gorgeous,” he breathed as he pulled her closer to him and took her nipples in his mouth, first one lovely, distended button and then the other. His hands roamed her back, buttocks, and hips as he suckled her breasts in his hot mouth, flicking the hard tips with his tongue. Raiza began to moan as her head fell back, her entire body trembling under his touch.

He slid two of his fingers between her legs, marveling at how slick and hot she was there.

“Oh, baby,” he gasped, “You're so wet for me. I love it.”

Rather than causing her to get lost further in their erotic coupling, however, these words seemed to have the opposite effect – they snapped her back to herself.

Raiza
lifted her head from where it had, just seconds before, been tossed back in abandon, and the look on her face was one of disbelief, as if she couldn't quite wrap her mind around the fact that she had just been so lost in sensation.

Before he could ask her about it, though, she had taken him in her hands and quickly completed her task of rolling the condom down his shaft. As soon as it was on, she straddled him and lowered herself onto him, groaning as he slipped into her, inch by inch.

Then, he was too lost in sensation to say anything – or
think
anything, for that matter. Nothing existed for him but Raiza's body and his own, and their coupling, which was becoming more frantic by the moment.

She rode him, slowly at first, but her pace quickly became frenetic.
God, he couldn't believe how amazing it felt, her muscles contracting around him as his hips rose to meet her with each imminently pleasurable thrust – and how amazing it looked, seeing his iron-strong shaft disappearing inside of her, watching her perfectly-formed breasts bouncing up and down as her hips rose and fell on him, the look of utter concentration on her face.

God!
He didn't know how much longer he was going to be able to hold out. Her body, and the way that her body was making his feel, was quickly bringing him to the point of release. He didn't want to come before her. He wanted to give
her
a mind-numbing, bone-crushing orgasm before he gave in to his own – but, Lord, he just didn't know how much more control he had at his disposal.