Czytaj książkę: «Joyride»

1

CORINNE MCCOURT STOOD in front of the full-length mirror and checked out her naked twenty-eight-year-old body. At five-six—give or take a few inches—she wasn’t exactly statuesque, but had strong legs thanks to her morning runs and a compact behind thanks to genetics. She looked at her rounded breasts and wished her live-in fiancé Tony Borgeson felt thankful for them again. Once upon a time he’d called them his “luscious vanilla double scoops.” She tilted her head. “They still look scoopable,” she whispered, hating the question in her voice. What happened? Five years ago, when they first got involved, he couldn’t scoop enough. She’d nicknamed him Bulldozer.

These days she was lucky if she got even a little dozer.

Playing with the gold heart pendant around her neck, Corinne surveyed the full-length mirror she’d installed a month ago—one of her recent ploys to put some va-va-voom back into their relationship. She’d read in a women’s magazine where couples and mirrors could be a lethal libido combo that ignited the fires of love.

Unfortunately, the only thing mirrors ignited in Tony was admiration for himself. Every morning, he preened in front of that mirror more than a pet parakeet she’d had as a kid, checking out everything from his stylish tie to his killer smile. She once reminded him that he sold computers. Who cared about his smile? Never breaking eye contact with his reflection, he’d announced that a sale was a sale—whether it was lawn mowers or laptops—and first impressions were everything.

She looked down at her very unimpressive tummy. To think most women complained their stomachs weren’t flat enough! Not Corinne. What she’d give to have a round tummy. Round and full with child. Growing up as an only child, Corinne had dreamed of having a large family of her own. A family who stayed put, like Tony’s large Italian family who’d lived in this section of Denver for generations. Unlike Corinne, who—due to her mother’s various marriages and near-marriages—had moved six times by the time she was nineteen.

She slid her fingers over her midriff, remembering her girlfriend Cheryl, when she’d been eight months pregnant, saying her baby was crowding her heart. “I want my heart crowded, too,” Corinne pleaded softly. Which meant she had to pin the wedding date—something Tony swore he wanted to do but never got around to—and rev his engine just the way he revved his precious Ferrari, which he’d nicknamed “Baby.”

His choice of a nickname had always confused Corinne—didn’t he realize how much she wanted a baby? Their baby? But remembering her mother’s words (“If you want a man to do something, honey, show ’im. Don’t tell ’im.”), Corinne had kept her mouth shut. She’d never been as flamboyant as her mother, so showing wasn’t easy for Corinne. But today, despite her flutterings of anxiety—mixed with excitement—Corinne was going to show, really show, the things she wanted. Passion. Intimate communion with her hubby-to-be. And, eventually, there’d be…

“…A new baby,” Corinne murmured. Yessiree, with her new va-va-voom plan, she’d be married and pregnant before Tony ran out of killer smiles.

To get things va-vooming, her best pal Kyle had suggested she borrow his book How to Make Your Man Howl. Playing by the book, following all the rules, were right up Corinne’s alley…but the sizzingly sexy ideas in How to Make Your Man Howl nearly curled Corinne’s already wavy hair. Okay, previously she’d attempted some sizzle by hanging the bedroom mirror, but that act had challenged every cell in her inhibited body. She’d been so anxious nailing the mirror to the wall, the darn thing hung at an angle. And her desired result had backfired. Tony, preoccupied with the angle instead of the ardor, instructed her to next time hire a carpenter.

After the mirror idea cracked, Kyle reminded her that How to Make Your Man Howl had worked wonders in his relationship with Geoff. And if a gay man didn’t understand what made men tick, who did?

So Corinne had flipped through some of its chapters: “Handcuffs Aren’t Just for Criminals,” “Getting Wild in the Outdoors,” “Be a Gift—Let Him Unwrap You.” Corinne wasn’t sure about the handcuffs. They didn’t look very sexy in cop flicks. And outdoors? Her neighbor, old Mr. Valdez, might have a coronary. But being unwrapped? Heck, everybody in the world undressed every day…according to the book, all she had to do was think sexy in the process.

So she planned the grand unveiling for today. Normally, every June 8, she attended her company’s annual picnic. Corinne had been at Universal Shower Door almost as long as she’d been with Tony—five years, give or take a month. And every annual picnic she showed up with her annual dish, Jell-O Surprise.

But not this year.

This year she was going to serve Corinne Surprise when Tony came home for lunch. A hot thrill zigzagged through her as she imagined his look of shock, then hot arousal, when he found his fiancée, the gift!

Corinne glanced at the clock on the nightstand. Eleven-ten. Tony would be home in twenty minutes. Gift-wrapping time! She grabbed the cylinder of clear plastic wrap she’d purchased this morning at the supermarket. With trembling fingers, she began crookedly wrapping the slick material around her. Well, so what if it wasn’t on straight. Unlike the mirror, this plastic stuff wasn’t meant to stay on long. Minutes, tops.

Humming one of her favorite Céline Dion tunes, Corinne checked her progress in the mirror. She imagined her sleek lines as the lines of his precious Ferrari—the glossy, shimmering coating like the slick, soapy water that sluiced over the car’s body when he washed it. Except, unlike with his Ferrari, Tony would lose control with Corinne and tear off the plastic. And amid the ripping, groaning and howling, she’d tease him to take extra care with her bumpers.

Me, teasing like that? She pressed a fingertip against her bottom lip, as though pushing back the forbidden thought. Then she dropped her hand and giggled softly. “I’ve installed a mirror, dressed hot in freezer wrap. Maybe the new Corinne sometimes jokes during lovemaking, too!” She was liking this new side of herself. Maybe, after the let-’er-rip sex, she’d even be bold enough to demand they set a wedding date. After all, Tony’s large Italian family expected it, so with a little sizzling encouragement, Corinne would help nail that expectation. Gee, considering she was on the brink of nailing a date, what should she ask for? Five months from now? Five weeks?

She checked the clock. Five minutes to show time! She finished wrapping herself, then reached for her sewing basket to retrieve a pair of scissors. As she fumbled through spools, fabrics and buttons, it struck her as funny how, after years of sewing practical skirts and demure blouses, here she was snipping off the end of a clear plastic minidress that showed way more than her intentions!

After cutting a slit so she could walk, Corinne turned to the mirror and checked out the overall effect. “They wouldn’t call me Inconspicuous Corinne at work now!” Her breasts swelled over the minidress like two luscious scoops. Her perky nipples pressed through the clear sheath. And below, through layers of shimmering plastic, you could see a curly triangle. She gave her head a toss, liking the tousled effect of her newly colored shoulder-length glossy blond hair. Wilder, more daring than her normal red hair, which was turning a sedate auburn. Plus this new, sassy blond was almost the same color as Tony’s Ferrari—that rare “hot gold” he bragged about to his pals.

“Now for the pièce de résistance,” she gloated, tiptoeing to the closet. She’d bought a pair of black stiletto heels especially for this occasion. On her allowance, she’d have had to save for weeks to buy these shoes. But Lady Luck had been on her side—they’d been half price. When the middle-aged salesman said their price was slashed because women never wore heels like this anymore, she’d felt her face burn hot, certain he knew she was buying them for sex. When he’d asked her to walk in them, she’d stumbled a few feet, stopped, and swaying a little had squeaked, “They’re perfect!”

Okay, it was going to be a challenge walking in these skyscrapers again, but she was a woman on a mission. A make-love-to-her-fiancé mission. A get-married mission.

A make-a-baby mission.

Slipping into the high heels was tougher than she remembered back at the shoe store. The arch was so high, she had to shove her foot in. Reminded her of the time she’d shoved her wild cousin Sandee through the back window of some guy’s Chevy. That had been fifteen years ago when Corinne and her mom moved to a small Texas town, following her mom’s divorce number two, to be close to the only family Corinne had ever known—Aunt Judy, her mom’s identical twin, and Judy’s daughter, Sandee. Since those teenage years, Corinne rarely saw Sandee, who now lived in Las Vegas, although they had occasional phone calls where they girl-talked for hours. One of those calls had been just last week…Sandee had been worried about a bump and run, but didn’t give details. And Corinne didn’t pry, although she’d been dying to ask questions because Sandee’s bump and run sounded like a possible chapter in How to Make Your Man Howl.

“Eiiyyy!” Corinne emitted her own howl as she teetered in the heels. Stumbling a few feet, she grabbed the mahogany bedpost and caught her balance. Holding on to the smooth wooden pole, she sucked in several shaky breaths. This is crazy. I won’t look like a hot babe if I’m teetering and stumbling, flailing my arms for balance. For a stinging moment, she thought she was going to cry.

No! She pressed her lips together, careful to not smudge her lipstick. I want to be married. I want a baby. I’m going to be sexy if it kills me! Realizing her last thought, she started giggling uncontrollably. “I look like a walking—well, stumbling—ad for How to Make Your Man Howl,” she whispered to herself. “If this kills me, at least I’ll go out of this world looking like one burning hunkess of love! Talk about ‘showing’!”

Grinning with a surge of confidence, she straightened, let go of the bedpost, and teetered toward the foyer.

Scratch. Click.

Tony’s key in the lock!

Corinne almost tripped as she skidded to a stop in front of the door. Show time! She stood, spread-eagled. What to do with her hands? She flashed on the chapter “Bondage—It’s Not Just for Breakfast Anymore.” Shakily, she held her hands above her head, wrists crossed.

The door creaked open. Corinne closed her eyes and breathed in deeply, forcing her double scoops high. She felt like an overheated car engine, ready to rip loose and roar…

“Stop it!” squealed a nasally woman’s voice. “Wait’ll we get inside, Tiger Boy.”

Tiger Boy? Corinne opened her eyes. Some frizzy-haired blonde, her body squeezed like a sausage into a low-cut pink number, was nuzzling and rubbing against…Tony!

He looked up, his dark eyes meeting Corinne’s. His killer smile died. “This isn’t want you think,” he said sharply, gesturing emphatically with the hand that wasn’t around the blonde.

Corinne’s insides shattered, like a splintered mirror. Think? She couldn’t even breathe. Hell, she couldn’t even move! Feeling ridiculously vulnerable, she wanted to cover her nearly naked body but her hands felt soldered to the top of her hot-gold head.

The blonde reared back. “What the hell—?” She turned to Tony. “Is that your cleaning lady?”

“Cleaning—?” A burning rage tore through Corinne, thawing her frozen state. Dropping her hands, she fisted them in front of her. She’d never hit anyone or anything in her life—but right now she could probably cream Mike Tyson. “That’s right! I’m the cleaning lady, the seamstress, the washer woman…everything but the banker because ol’ Tiger Boy here takes my checks and only gives me a frickin’ allowance.”

She’d never seen that look on Tony’s face. Slack jawed. His eyes wide, dark. For a hotheaded Italian, he was suddenly acting very, very cool. No, make that shocked. And not at her gift-wrapped getup, but at her reaction. Corinne had never yelled at him. Never spoken her mind. Well, she’d only just started!

As she stepped from one high-heeled foot to the other, like a runner prancing before a race, a drop of sweat rolled down her chest and disappeared between her plastic-wrapped scoops. In the back of her mind, it hit her that suddenly she wasn’t teetering. “To sum it up,” she continued, not caring that she was yelling, “I’m the wife-who-wasn’t!” She fought the urge to cry and scream as she finished. “And obviously, I’m also the last one to know!”

“Tony,” whispered the blonde, “I think your cleaning lady is helping herself to the liquor cabinet—”

Tony cut her off. “Baby,” he said, tossing his keys on a side table. “Why don’t you go into the other room…”

Baby. Corinne could almost forgive the nickname for his car—but for another woman? While his fiancée was so desperate to get married and have a baby?

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” The blonde jabbed his chest with an inch-long crimson nail. “You bring me to your house for a nooner and we’re greeted by some plastic-wrapped maid with a deranged wife fantasy?”

Corinne’s heart twisted. Plastic-wrapped. Like leftovers. But the blonde had one thing right. Corinne definitely had a deranged wife fantasy. She’d been a fool wanting to marry this two-timing, self-absorbed Tiger Boy…who had a lot of nerve wearing that crucifix his mother had given him, as though he needed protection from the evil in the world!

Corinne glanced at his car keys on the table. Tony and the blonde were yelling at each other as though Corinne didn’t exist. Here she was, dressed like some kind of hausfrau hooker, and she was still being treated like Inconspicuous Corinne.

Well, no more!

Minutes ago, she’d shakily wrapped herself in this getup, thrilled at her audacious first step at shedding her inhibitions. Well, forget first steps. She was taking a flying leap!

In a rush of movement, Corinne snatched the keys off the table. In a stiff-kneed speed walk, she beelined past the arguing couple and across the lawn to the Ferrari parked in the driveway. Jumping inside, she shoved the key into the ignition. As the engine roared to life, Tony tore across the lawn, yelling a string of profanities—some Italian, some English.

Corinne didn’t try to decipher which was which as she shoved the gear into reverse and squealed down the driveway, smoking rubber obliterating the vision of her home, her husband-to-be, her future. In a moment of dread, mixed with a strange anticipation, she realized she was shedding more than her inhibitions, she was shedding her entire life.

As she ground the gear into first, she stuck her other hand out the sunroof. “Bye bye, Baby!” she yelled before punching the gas.

A MANILLA FOLDER LANDED with a slap on Leo’s desk. “Guy claims an oversized redhead stole his classic Studebaker,” said a gravelly male voice. “More like a classic bump and run. Couldn’t have been Lizzie ’cause she had a thing for Acura Integras.”

Leo slugged a mouthful of scalding coffee. Too hot. But damn if he’d let on he’d just singed a layer of skin off his tongue.

“Sorry,” Dom murmured, rubbing his temple. “Shouldn’t make Lizzie jokes. Bad taste.”

Real bad. Leo coughed and stared at the folder, pretending to be absorbed in this Studebaker case, but his mind was on Elizabeth—Lizzie—his former wife. Everybody had known how much he loved her. Hell, everyone loved her. She’d had a knack for getting to people with her infectious devil-may-care style.

And just as everyone had known Lizzie, everyone knew the story. How he’d been on a raid and discovered his devil-may-care wife was no angel. Caught her in a drug-bust sting. How he’d been shot at damn near point blank range because he’d been tunnel-visioned on his wife, unable to move, to digest the hellish reality. After getting out of the hospital, the department had pressured him to see a shrink but it had ripped his gut apart to talk about her, so he’d stopped going. Since then, he never talked about her to anyone else. Except Mel, the parrot, and then only after a few drinks.

But even then, he never called her “Lizzie.” Always “Elizabeth” as though saying her full, Christian name could distance the devil.

“When do I get a real case, Dom?” asked Leo, changing the subject. “I’m thirty-five, your best detective, and you’re assigning me senior citizen nits. Next I’ll be tracking a stolen walker.” But in Leo’s heart, he wondered if he even wanted a “real” case. He figured he kept asking because being a cop was the only job he’d ever known.

Dom lifted his eyebrows, which lay like a fuzzy caterpillar across the captain’s brow. He opened his mouth to respond, but Leo cut in.

“If you’d gotten shot because your wife was…” The rest of the sentence tasted bitter, so Leo let it hang. Defensive. Again. One of his newer, more pleasant personality traits since the crash-and-burn of his marriage, his life. “Forget it.” He picked up a pen. “Studebaker,” he repeated, writing the word on a legal pad. “Overage geriatric owner. Oversized—whatever that means—redheaded thief.” He stopped writing and looked up. “And who said Vegas has become nothing but a big family town?”

Leo had lived here all his life. Watched his dad walk out on the family. Watched his mom raise her two sons single-handedly, one of whom was hell on wheels. By seventeen, Leo had been an accomplished delinquent who specialized in hot-wiring cars for joyrides…but his hobby came to a screeching halt when his mom remarried, this time to a cop.

At first Leo hated his new stepfather, whom Leo called “Hobo Cop” behind his back. But despite Leo’s attitude, his stepdad never wavered on dishing out discipline…or love. One day, Leo accidentally called this man “Dad.” And when the man, in return, called him “Son,” Leo knew he wanted to grow up to be a cop.

Which he became. And after that, a hotshot detective. But now he was on desk duty, his career stalled. Just like his life. Some days he wanted to start over, pack up his antiquated Airstream and head out to some new frontier, finding a small ranch in which to spend the rest of his days. Especially while recovering from the shooting, he’d had a lot of time to indulge in this fantasy. In his darker moments, it’d given him hope to plan how long it’d take to save for a down payment on this ranch…he’d figured two years would nail it…

The sound of Dom shoving aside a bag of pretzels and a half-eaten Twinkie brought Leo back from the ranch fantasy to the desk reality. “You should eat better,” Dom grumbled, planting himself on the edge of the desk. Crossing his arms over his uniformed chest, Dom continued, “I know you hate desk duty. Trust me, if we had our way in the precinct, we’d pay you to stay home.” Dom grinned, then turned somber again. “It’s tough enough getting shot—worse being forced to take a paid leave. Let me remind you that you were to remain on leave for a full year, but not Leo Wolf-man—”

“I would’ve had to take my parrot to AA if I stayed home one day longer.”

Dom cocked his eyebrow, which looked as though the caterpillar was arching its back. “He wouldn’t drink wine if you didn’t pour him a glass.”

“Hate to drink alone. Besides, Mel gets cranky when he’s sober.”

“A parrot named after Mel Gibson,” Dom muttered, shaking his head.

“My alter ego. He gets to see real action in those cop flicks with Danny what’s-his-name. Not sit behind some desk playing male secretary.”

“You’re not a secretary, you’re a detective.”

Leo did a dramatic double take. “And these four months I’ve been fetching coffee and typing with two fingers, dreaming one day I’d be promoted to office manager.”

Dom heaved a sigh. “Why don’t you stay home and let Mel do desk duty? At least he doesn’t talk back…too much.”

Leo had bought the parrot after Elizabeth took the furniture, Acura, even his hallowed collection of Hot Wheels while Leo was in the hospital recuperating. He hadn’t really cared that she cleaned out the place—saved him dumping anything that reminded him of her. But when the hospital released him to go home, it had been lonely.

Damn lonely.

That’s when he’d decided to buy a pet. One that wouldn’t be underfoot all the time. A parrot seemed perfect. A flying, lighthearted, conversational pet. Unfortunately, Mel preferred to walk, had the attitude of a curmudgeon, and wouldn’t talk unless he felt like griping. The two of them housebound was like a bad remake of Grumpy Old Men.

Old men. Leo glared at the folder. “I didn’t become a detective to follow up on old lady purse snatchers and old men car nabbers.”

“Give me a break, Wolfman. You’ve been through a trauma—the department’s easing you in. Think of this as a promotion. You’re graduating from purses to Studebakers.”

Dom had a point. But Leo wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of admitting as much. “When I wrap up this Studebaker mystery, give me something I can sink my teeth into.”

Dom squinted at Leo, as though to see him better. After a pause, he stood up and brushed some pretzel crumbs off his pants. “Wrap this one up nice and neat, and we’ll talk.”

Dom’s word was better than a signature. “We’ll talk” meant Leo had a chance to break out of desk hell. “Deal.”

CORINNE STOOD ON the porch of her best buddy Kyle’s apartment and jabbed at the doorbell. She prayed he’d answer the door—she wasn’t in the mood to flash his partner, Geoff, who despised her. Kyle had once explained that Geoff got jealous of the time Kyle and Corinne spent together—that Geoff viewed Corinne as “the other woman.”

“Me, the other woman,” she muttered, holding one hand over her breasts, the other over her thighs, not sure if she was really covering anything at all. “I can’t excite my fiancé, but a gay man views me as competition.”

The door swung open. Kyle, a chocolate-dipped strawberry in his hand, leaned over a little, a look of shock on his face. “Corinne?” His gaze wandered down her plastic-wrapped torso. “What are you doing dressed in company property?”

They both worked at Universal Shower Door, which had a sideline of shower curtains as well. “Like it?” she asked in a high-pitched squeal that bordered on hysteria. “I’m also wearing curtain rings as earrings!”

Kyle gently pulled her inside. “Honey, honey, honey,” he murmured, holding her close.

That did it. She’d been strong facing Tony’s infidelity. And nothing short of courageous driving across Denver in a see-through getup while madly pumping pedals in stilettos. But right now, she was tired of being strong. Sinking against Kyle, she sputtered tearfully, “Tony. Gift-wrapped. Blonde.”

Kyle paused, then said quietly, “If Tony has a thing for gift-wrapping blondes, he should be ecstatic that his fiancée now has beautiful golden locks…” He stepped back and looked into her eyes. “What happened, honey?”

She swallowed, hard. “I took your advice and made my man howl, all right—I stole his macho sports car.”

“You stole Baby Ferrari?”

“Yes, stole,” she admitted, “and I’m never returning it or me to him. From now on, I’m my own woman.” She hadn’t even known she felt that way until she’d blurted the words. It was as though her shattered insides were resolidifying into a new Corinne. But her bravado shrank a little. A new Corinne with no home. No money. No clothes. “I’d ask to stay here, but Geoff would freak—”

“To put it mildly.”

“I’m in a bind.”

Kyle looked her up and down. “To put it strongly.” He dangled the strawberry between them. “Want a bite? Sweets for the…” He looked her up and down. “…spicy?”

“No thanks.” She grinned. Only Kyle could make her laugh in the middle of a life crisis. Gesturing toward the road, she said, “I can’t park that Ferrari on a public street—when Tony figures out I’m not returning, he’ll call the police, and they’ll find it faster than Geoff can say ‘the other woman.”’ She sucked in a ragged breath. “Tony’s been fooling around on me. With a dumpy blonde with the most nonluscious vanilla scoops you’ve ever seen!” The image of that over-packed blonde hurt. Deep.

Kyle waited a moment before responding. “Dumpy?” He snorted dramatically. “He should be jailed! As for those nonvanilla scoops—”

“Nonluscious—”

“We should sic the Baskin and Robbins police on him!”

“And tell them to stick him in a freezer, dressed only in a pair of his tiger-striped G-strings.” No doubt that’s where Blondie got “Tiger Boy.” Corinne was tempted to add a few more imaginative punishments for Tony when she heard a noise inside the apartment. “Who’s here?”

“Geoff and a few friends.”

“What’re they doing here?”

“Well, Geoff lives here. The others are a few out-of-town friends who’re spending the week with us.”

“Oh God.” Teetering a little on her high heels, Corinne grabbed Kyle’s arms for balance. “What am I going to do? It’s bad enough I’ve stolen Tony’s Ferrari. Now I’m naked in an apartment filled with strange men.”

Kyle chuckled. “All men are strange, darling, but these happen to also be gay. So trust me—you’re safer than a meatball at a vegetarian banquet.” He nibbled on the end of the strawberry while looking her over. “We need to get you into clothes—” He met her eyes. “—then plan what’s next in the life of Corinne Mc-Court.”

Kyle offered her his arm. “As we have to pass through the dining room to get to the bedroom where we can raid Geoff’s closet, I suggest we pretend you’re Judy Garland and I’m Fred Astaire strolling along in the Easter Parade.”

“Was Judy naked?”

“Yes, but she wore a hat.”

“You’re lying.” She took Kyle’s arm. “This isn’t fair. You’re fully dressed. I’m almost nude.”

Kyle shot her a whimsical smile. “Trust me, darling, no one will notice.”