hung it from a peg on the pantry door.
She flashed him a dazzling smile as she settled into her own seat at the table. “Let’s eat, shall we?”
Chad needed no further prompting. He dug into the spiced lamb with enthusiasm, letting out a moan of almost sexual satisfaction as the tender meat penetrated his taste buds. Similar moans accompanied each of the next several bites.
He paused long enough to take a deep breath and say, “Allyson, dear, you have outdone yourself.”
Allyson received the compliment in what had become her usual way, by smiling sweetly and saying, “Thank you, sweetie. When we’re done eating, you can thank me again by fucking the daylights out of me.”
The eye contact between them in that moment was electric. Chad sucked in a hissing breath through clenched teeth. Talking dirty at the dinner table was one of Allyson’s kinks. No dinner ever elapsed without some amount of what she called“naughty talk.”
Chad returned her smile and said, “I’d like that.”
Allyson licked her lips after another delicate sip from her wine glass.“Of course you would. But I think I’ll sit on your face for a while first.” She laughed softly as she dipped a spoon in her curry. “After all, you’ll want to show your appreciation for all my hard work, won’t you?”
Dinner continued in that manner for a time. Moments of relative silence during which they enjoyed the food, followed by increasingly ribald verbal exchanges. Chad ’s body was vibrating with need by the time he finished his meal. His fork clattered on the plate and their eyes locked across the table again.
Allyson smiled. “We’re going to the bedroom. Fuck cleaning up. It can wait.”
Chad nodded his enthusiastic agreement. “Yes.”
He hurried around the table and pulled Allyson into his arms, her body slamming against his as she hooked her arms and a leg around him. Their mouths met. Their tongues danced. They gasped and moaned. Chad ’s erection thrust against the fabric of his trousers. Allyson squealed as she felt it and writhed against the hardness, making Chad shudder and reach for the hem of her dress, snatching it up over her ass.
“Hell with the bedroom,” Chad managed between gasps. “I want you now. Right here.”
A sound like a growl emerged from Allyson’s throat and a corner of her mouth curled in a carnal snarl. “Yes. Yes. Do it.”
Chad spun her around, grabbing a handful of her dress and pushing the flimsy bit of fabric up over her ass as she braced herself against the table.
She looked back at him over her shoulder, biting her lip as she said, “Hurry. Hurry.”
Chad was reaching for his zipper when they heard the heavy double knock.
THUMP-THUMP.
Someone was at the front door, pounding the wood with the base of a fist rather than using the brass knocker.
“God-DAMMIT!” Allyson slapped an open palm against the table top and stood up straight. “Who the fuck could that be?” She glanced over her shoulder at Chad again. “Please tell me you’re not expecting anyone. You would’ve told me, right?”
Chad frowned. “Who would I be expecting?”
The question was rhetorical. Allyson was the only person he’d allowed to get close to him since moving to the Atlanta suburb of Buckhead. He had no friends. The friends he’d had in his former life in Tennessee were either dead, estranged, or missing. And he’d made no new friends here. He was a financial analyst for Aerodyne in Atlanta, where he met a lot of people, but he’d intentionally maintained an air of aloofness with his fellow employees. And he met all gestures of potential friendship with a wall of coldness. With Allyson as the one welcome exception, of course.
THUMP-THUMP came the double-knock again.
Chad groaned. “Christ. You know it can’t be anyone I know.”
Allyson sniffed. “Well, I don’t have any friends here either, remember?”
It was true. Allyson had moved to Atlanta only a week prior to Chad ’s relocation there. They had met by chance at a coffeehouse, the chemistry between them instant and undeniable. And since then they’d been too involved with each other to bother meeting new people or getting entangled in the local social strata in any way.
THUMP-THUMP-THUMP!
“Fuck!” Chad moved past her, anger boiling inside him again as the knocking intensified. “Okay, time to get rid of this asshole.”
“Be careful.” Allyson hurried after him, the slap of her bare feet on the kitchen tile becoming a whisper as tile gave way to living room carpet. “For God’s sake, Chad, don’t just open the door. It could be anyone. Remember that home invasion last week.”
Chad ’s hand paused on the doorknob. She was right. He’d read the newspaper stories. A wife and daughter had been raped. The wife’s husband was tortured until he’d given up the combination to the safe in his office. No one was killed and everyone had said how lucky that was for the victims. Except that Chad knew that was bullshit. Those poor people would carry the mental scars of that night with them the rest of their days.
It had happened in this neighborhood. And the perpetrators had not been caught. They were still out there.
Somewhere.
THUMP-THUMP.
And this stupid fucking door didn’t have a peephole.
Allyson nodded and hurried out of the room. She came running back a moment later, a slim, silver cell phone clutched in one slightly trembling hand. Chad flashed her a reassuring smile and shifted his attention back to the door as the most insistent knock yet rattled the thick slab of wood in its frame.
Chad cleared his throat and made his voice loud, projecting it the way a stage actor would:“You can stop knocking, asshole! Who are you and what the hell do you want?”
The knocking stopped. Chad held his breath and sensed Allyson doing the same. Then he heard a very dim, muffled sigh. A tired sound. A weary sound.
Chad frowned. There was something faintly familiar about it.
Something- Chad ’s hand closed around the doorknob and yanked the door open. Allyson let out a gasp of surprise, but Chad barely heard it.
He gaped at the figure standing on the darkened front porch for nearly a full minute before managing to say, “Oh…shit…” Then he broke into a broad grin. “I can’t believe what I’m seeing.” He stepped back and waved a hand toward the interior of the house. “Come on in, man.”
The dark figure stepped forward into the light. The wryest of smiles touched the very edges of his mouth. He looked better than the last time Chad had seen him, years ago. Leaner and less haggard. The bushy mane of gray-flecked brown hair had been shorn to a longish shag. He looked especially great for a man in his early sixties.
Chad shut the door as the man stepped into the house. “Christ, Jim, I can’t believe how good you look. Last time I saw you-”
The man Chad had once known as Lazarus shrugged. “Being an unrepentant sinner is a well-documented course to a healthier life.”
Chad ’s grin remained in place as he turned to introduce his friend to Allyson. “Hey, honey, this is the man I’ve told you about-” His grin faltered as he registered her sullen expression. “Honey-?”
“I don’t care who the fuck this is.” Sullen, nothing. She was fuming. “We were in the middle of a nice, quiet dinner. I can’t believe you’re inviting this person in, regardless of who the fuck he is.”
“Honey, I’m sorry, but-”
“Whatever.” Allyson brushed past him and yanked the door open again. Her face was a tight mask of controlled fury as she turned toward him. “You boys catch up. Jerk each other off. Whatever, I don’t fucking care. I’m going for a walk.”
She stepped outside and slammed the door behind her.
Chad gaped in disbelief at the door for a long moment. He’d never seen Allyson so angry about anything. He understood her frustration about the interruption. He still felt some of that, too, a rippling undercurrent of unspent sexual energy. But storming off like this-well, it seemed a bit out of proportion.
Jim cleared his throat. “Sorry to cause you trouble, friend. But there are things we need to talk about.”
Chad turned and looked at his friend, a ghost of the faded grin returning to his face. “Okay, but I think I need a drink now.”
Chad led the way to the living room and the liquor cabinet.
Allyson waited until she was two blocks from the house before flipping open her cell phone and punching in the number she’d memorized so many months ago. She held it to her ear and listened as it rang and rang.
She cursed as she counted a tenth ring and considered hanging up. But she couldn’t do that. The time had come and she couldn’t afford to turn back now. She made herself wait some more and her patience paid off as the phone was at last answered on the twentieth ring.
A tired male voice said, “Yes?”
Allyson snapped at the man: “What the fuck took so long?”
A pause. Then:“Who is this?”
“This is Allyson fucking Vanover. You recognize that name, don’t you?” Her voice was shrill, rendered almost brittle from the combination of fear and anger coursing through her. There was another strong emotion at work, as well, one she couldn’t afford to think about, not if she meant to see this through. “After all, you’re the reason I’m in fucking Atlanta, remember?”
The man sighed. “Of course. I do remember. I told you-”
“You told me to call this number only if I had news. This is the first time I’ve called, but trust me, the news is big.”
The man’s attitude changed immediately. His voice resonated with eagerness as he said, “Do you mean-”
“Yes.” Allyson paused. She allowed a final pang of regret to pierce her deeply. Then she made herself say, “The man you’ve been looking for, the one you told me to keep an eye out for…he’s here.”
“Excellent. Are you still at the same location?”
Allyson hesitated only a moment, regret stilling her tongue a second longer than necessary. But she knew it was too late for second thoughts. The wheels had been set in motion. Regardless of what she said from this moment forward, there was nothing she could do stop it.
“Yes. It’s the fourth house on the left on Jacobsen Avenue. 505 Jacobsen Avenue.” Her hand was shaking. She forced it still. “There’s a late-model silver Porsche parked on the road in front of the house. Your people won’t be able to miss it.”
