Playing with Fire (15 page)

“Money was tight then,” he told Cassie, “and I was taking jobs more than an hour away just to bring in the extra cash. I tried to explain to her I was tired, that we didn’t have extra money to blow now that I was supporting both of us as well as my good-for-nothing father.”

“What did she say?” But Cassie could imagine Diane’s reaction.

“She’d just get that sneer on her face and head out of the house, slamming the door as she left without me.” A bitter look twisted his features. “My father was a continuing problem, too. The only good thing was he was seldom home when we were. He slept all day and drank all night.”

“I’m sorry. I really am.” She chewed on the end of her pen. “Was there anything different about Diane right around that time?”

He frowned. “Yeah, I guess. She was edgy in the weeks right before she…died.” A muscle ticked in his cheek. “Something was on her mind, but I thought it was the pregnancy. She was dreading the arrival of the baby, and I already figured out if anyone was going to care for that child, it would be me.”

“Just how were you going to do that, working all day?” Cassie was losing a battle with the anger welling in her.

He shrugged. “I hadn’t figured it out yet. I couldn’t even get her to stop drinking.”

“Didn’t she know about fetal alcohol syndrome?” The anger turned into a cold rage. Cassie’s entire life had been derailed for a child her sister didn’t even want.

“Oh, yeah.” He couldn’t hide his bitterness. “But she was determined to enjoy the high life as long as she could.”

“I’m surprised she didn’t get an abortion. It would have solved a lot of problems.”

“Before she told me, maybe she’d considered it. I don’t know. But when the subject came up, she told me the idea terrified her, although we’d all have been better off. Except, by that time, I was already emotionally invested in the baby, and I’d never have let her do it.”

Cassie got up and snagged two cold beers from the fridge, opened them, and passed one to him. She took her time drinking from her bottle, trying to cool the fury burning inside her.

Damn Diane anyway.

“Most of the time she made it a point to ask me to go with her,” Griff went on, “but not that night. We’d started fighting as soon as I got home. Money and her drinking were the big topics. One thing led to another, and we started screaming some pretty ugly things at each other. Then she just stormed out and screeched off in her car.”

“Did you get the idea she had some place specific to go?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. I keep trying to remember. If I hadn’t been so pissed off, I’d have called around to see where everyone was and find out who she was with. But I was getting to the point where I almost didn’t care.”

“What did she do when she went out by herself?”

He shrugged. “Hang out with the same people I used to run with. Only by then I was looking at things from a different point of view. And like I said, I couldn’t afford it.” He made a face. “Somehow, after finding out about the baby and getting married, it all didn’t seem quite right any more. Or as exciting.”

“Impending fatherhood will do that to you,” Cassie said with a tinge of resentment.

He picked up the hand closest to him, separating her fingers and lacing his own through them. “The whole thing wasn’t anywhere near what I had planned. There I was, in a huge hole I’d dug for myself and missing you more every day. I was sure you hated me.”

Her pulse accelerated at the touch of his hand. She’d tried to hate him all this time, but that had lasted until his kiss. Well, love and hate were two sides of the same coin, weren’t they?

She turned to the laptop again. “She didn’t give you any hint about what was bothering her?”

“None. I knew marriage and the baby were cramping her style, though. Diane was never one to be monogamous.”

Cassie gripped the laptop until her knuckles were white. She’d known exactly what Diane was like—needy and greedy, unconcerned about the lives she ruined.

She wet her lips. “Let’s go back to that night again. Do you think she was meeting someone? Is that possible?”

“I guess anything is possible.” Griff leaned back in his chair, eyes closed. All of a sudden, he leaned forward and opened them. “I almost forgot. She had this little purse, more like something you keep your makeup in, I think. The last couple of weeks, she carried it with her everywhere. When we went to bed at night, she took great care to stash it somewhere. At first, it bugged the shit out of me, and I tried looking for it when she was asleep. Then I just gave up, figuring what the hell.”

“Obviously she had something she didn’t want anyone else to see. Too bad we don’t know what.”

With Cassie’s prodding he filled in the details of the rest of the evening. He’d changed clothes, called Phil, and invited himself over. Two other guys were there, and they all watched a game on television, drinking beer and talking about nothing. He’d gotten home around one, but Diane was still out. Angry and depressed, he’d gone to bed and was immediately asleep. At three o’clock in the morning Barry Dangler and one of his deputies banged on the door and woke him up.

“A patrol car, checking Stoneham Park for late night couples, spotted something in one of the bushes by the ravine.” Griff’s hands gripped the beer bottle. “It was one of Diane’s shoes. They discovered her body in the ravine. Her dress was torn, and she’d been beaten to death.”

“Was she raped?” Cassie made her tone of voice as uninflected as she could.

He shook his head. “No. They found no evidence of it.”

“So tell me how they decided you were the prime suspect? You were in bed when they came to tell you.”

“It wasn’t rocket science. The whole town knew why we got married and what a disaster it was. I guess Dangler just figured I’d had enough and killing her was the best solution.” He pushed back from the table. “Enough. Let’s leave it until tomorrow. I’m sure whoever’s trying to get into this house has something to do with everything, but I’m done talking about it for today.”

“You’re right. Anyway, Dangler said he’d have the incident and autopsy reports for me tomorrow. Maybe I can find something in them. Then we’ll decide where to go next.”

He rubbed his forehead.

“Headache?” she asked.

“Just a little one. A couple of aspirin and I’ll be fine.”

Cassie shut the computer down, got up, and went to stand behind him, rubbing his temples. “I give good head rubs.”

He caught her hands and pulled her around to face him. “Let’s go upstairs,” he said hoarsely. “I’ve got something else that needs rubbing more.”

This time it was different, the first frenzied hunger somewhat abated. They took their time with each other, exploring, experimenting, learning all the little signals that lovers in tune with each other use.

Griffin paid careful attention to every part of her body, touching her, tasting her, kissing her until she was almost mindless. Her breath caught; his tongue stroked deep inside her mouth.

“This is not sex, Cassie.” His voice was hoarse and strained. “You can bet on that. I love you so damn much. Making love with you comes straight from my heart, sugar. “

“I couldn’t be like this with anyone else,” she whispered, and knew the truth of it.

She met him, just as eager as he was, her tongue as heated an instrument as his. Their kisses were almost like the act of sex itself, and heated their blood until they were filled with rivers of fire.

Cassie grew more bold, more sure of herself with him. Before, he had taken the lead, and she’d been the recipient. But her one act of daring the night before had given her a taste of something she wanted more of.

She took his swollen, throbbing cock in her hands, tracing the veins on the sides, sliding over the soft skin that hid the ridged flesh beneath it. Her fingertip slid over the smooth, velvety head in wonderment. With great care she probed at the tiny slit at the top, licking the salty fluid that seeped from it with tiny, delicate laps of her tongue. When she leaned forward and ran her tongue the length of him, he groaned, burying his fingers in her hair, holding her head in place.

“More, sugar.” His voice was thick with desire. “God, your mouth is like warm honey. Do it, darlin. That’s it. Yes, let me feel that tongue. Cassie, Cassie, Cassie. You take me to heaven, did you know that?”

When she took his balls in her hand and did the same thing with the heavy, weighted sac, he almost came off the bed. His muscles clenched with the effort to maintain control, but she was having none of it. The taste of him the night before had just whetted her appetite.

She took a page from his book, running her tongue over the seam at his hips, flitting over his abdomen, down the insides of his thighs. With her fingertips, she sought and found his flat, male nipples, pulling and teasing at the tips as he did to hers, excitement rushing through her as she felt them swell and harden.

She was wild with wanting him, with welding him to her. When he tried to pull her up to lie on top of him, she shook her head, taking him in her mouth again. Then, taking him deep, she tickled and squeezed his balls, feeling them tighten in response. With her hands and her tongue, in the rhythm she’d learned so easily and quickly, she coaxed his orgasm from him with relentless determination. When the hot liquid splashed on her tongue, she swallowed in triumph, sucking deep and hard to get the last salty drop.

“Damn, sugar.” He groaned. “You’re sure a quick learner. I’m a wreck. But I think you did yourself in, darlin’. As tired as I am, as active as we were last night, you didn’t leave anything for yourself.”

She moved up to lay her head on his shoulder, inhaling the musky scent of him. “That’s all right,” she assured him, a tiny grin on her face. “We’ve got plenty of nights ahead of us. I love you, Griff. With all my heart.”

She reached up to kiss him and discovered he wasn’t kidding about being tired. He was already asleep. Smiling, she nestled her body close to his. Even the aching, unfulfilled need was worth it, when she knew she had the ability to give him so much pleasure.

It amazed her she could be so uninhibited with him, so unselfconscious. But she was learning when the love between two people was as real as this, every physical act was an expression of that love.

She was right in what she told him. They had a lot of time to make up for it.

Although she was up not long after sunrise the next morning, Griff was already gone for the day. A note sat propped against the full pot of coffee.

“A full day’s schedule. See you at six. I love you.” He had drawn the outline of a rose on the paper, with one drop of moisture clinging to a petal…a drop of dew.

She knew what it meant for him to have written that. She was sure that, in his whole life, she was the only one he’d ever been this open with, this trusting. This was his way of telling her she could trust him, too. She smiled, pressing the note to her heart.

She called Neil and reminded him to expect her at one and to please have all the papers ready for her to sign. Then she called Donald to check on the funeral arrangements and the cemetery. Next, she called the police station to remind Barry Dangler she’d be by in the early afternoon for the reports on Diane’s death. The bank she’d worry about after she had the probate papers in hand.

The two calls she dreaded making, she put off until last.

When she reached Mike Rivard, he was so silent at the news she was resigning and wouldn’t be coming back, for a minute she thought he’d hung up. “Mike? Are you there?”

“Yes.” He sighed. “I guess you know what you’re doing, Cassie. But you’re leaving me in a real bind here.”

“I know, and I’m truly sorry. It’s just that things here are, well, different than I thought. I have more loose ends to take care of than I expected.”

“What’s his name?” he barked.

“What? What do you mean?” She was startled.

“Any time a reporter as good as you are walks out on what could turn into a plum job, it’s over a girl. Or, in your case, a guy.” More silence. “I hope he’s worth it, sweetheart. I guess I should wish you good luck.”

“Thanks, Mike. You can’t know how much I appreciate the way you’re taking this.”

“Who knows? Maybe one day you’ll decide you like the Florida life again, and we’ll find a spot for you.”

She thanked him a second time. “I’ll have to make a trip back to get my car and close things up. I’ll stop by and see you when I pick up my check.”

“You’d better,” he growled.

She felt a little sad after she hung up. Mike had been good to her, but she had no regrets. She’d given him value for every dollar he’d paid her.

Her call to Claire was both harder and easier. Harder because they’d been so close for so many years and, for the first time, would be going their own ways. Easier because Claire made it so.

“The bad boy must be really good,” she joked. “Six years and the past disappears just like that.”

“I know, I know.”

“Just remember, girlfriend. I was the one who listened to you cry all those months and patched up the cracks in your heart.”

Claire had been her lifesaver. Not just for giving her a place to call home until graduation. She’d introduced her to the right people in Tampa, which made getting her first job a lot easier.

“When this is all over, I’ll tell you the whole story,” she promised, “and you’ll understand.”

“What about your car and your apartment? You can’t just dump them.”

“I have a new lease on my desk I’d need to sign if I were staying. Otherwise, I’m up the end of next month. I think I’ll take next weekend, fly back, and take care of stuff then drive my car back. And the rest of my clothes.”

“Bring that hunk with you.” Claire laughed. “I’m dying to get a gander at him.”

Cassie spent the rest of the morning tearing Diane’s room apart, looking for something, anything, that someone would be searching for. She emptied drawers and checked under and behind them, pulled everything out of the closet, looked under furniture. She even crawled beneath the bed to see if anything was hidden inside the box springs. Nothing.

As she walked out of the room, her cell phone rang, and she fished it from her pocket.