ear during sex.
They were sitting again when he did whisper something suggestive. “Are you hot?” he asked softly, his lips brushing her neck.
“What?”
“You look flushed.”
She followed his gaze to the neckline of her dress. Not only was she hot, she was sweating. While he watched, a tiny bead of perspiration rolled from the base of her throat down into the hollow between her breasts.
She swallowed dryly. He moistened his lips.
“Come on,” he said, urging her to her feet, impervious to God’s watchful eye. Just outside the side door, a set of narrow concrete steps let to an underground tomb where esteemed religious figures had been reverentially interred. The instant they were alone, shrouded in cool, blessed darkness, he pulled her close.
“You did that on purpose,” she accused, refusing to let him kiss her.
“Did what?”
“You know what. Taking me to the back row. Acting all…sexy.”
He laughed, curving his arms around her waist. “I took you to the back row so we could sneak out early. But if austere surroundings put you in the mood…”
“It wasn’t the setting,” she defended, her cheeks burning in shame. “It was you. Your voice. Your hands.”
In the dim light, his eyes went opaque with desire. “My hands?” he repeated, bringing one hand up to her collarbone, rubbing his thumb across the base of her throat. “What about them?” He pushed aside her bodice, exposing the pale upper curve of her breast, which he knew made an erotic contrast with his own dark skin.
She closed her eyes, covering his hand with hers. “What am I going to do with you?” she whispered.
He touched his lips to her bare shoulder. “The possibilities are endless.”
Before he could rouse her to mindlessness, she arched away from his eager mouth and extricated herself from his embrace. “Let’s see if you can channel that energy for another intimate activity.”
“What?”
“Conversation.”
He leaned against the wall inside the tomb, wearing a pained, frustrated expression. “You are such a pain in the ass.”
Smiling, she offered him her hand. He took it, but fell into silence as they rounded the deserted graveyard. “Tell me about your father,” she ventured.
“What about him?”
“Were you close?”
“No.”
She squeezed his hand. “Did he hurt your mother?”
He jerked away from her, misreading the gesture. “Yes, he hurt her,” he muttered. “Thankfully he wasn’t around that often. What other misery do you want to pull out of me? Did he hit me, too? No. He was good to me, the son of a bitch. Taught me everything he knew.”
“About what?”
“Conning people. Picking pockets. Sleight of hand. He was the lowest kind of criminal, a petty thief, but he was handsome, and he was charming. My mother couldn’t resist him. No woman could.”
Sidney swallowed her emotion, feeling as though he was hurling the words at her, pelting her with them. But she’d asked for it, hadn’t she? “What happened to him?”
He shoved his hands in his pockets. “He came by the house just before I got deployed. I threatened to beat the hell out of him if he didn’t stay away from her.” He looked out across the well-manicured grounds, then back at her. “She never forgave me for it.”
“He didn’t come home again?”
“No. A few years later, he got stabbed by a vagrant in the cab of a train. She took the bus all the way to El Paso to see him before he died.”
“Did she make it?”
He shook his head.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“I’m not.”
Sidney wasn’t sure she believed him, and wanted nothing more than to take his hand again, not to read the truth, but to comfort him. She kept her arms at her sides, knowing he would reject the gesture.
Those she cared about the most always avoided her touch.
By the time they returned to his house, it was early evening and Sidney was exhausted. She wanted nothing more than to curl up in a little ball and retreat from the world.
Marc had other plans for her. “I need you to meet someone,” he began. “Get a read off him, if you can.”
She groaned, rolling over onto her stomach. They were in his bedroom, having just eaten dinner, and the combination of cozy bed and full stomach was lulling her to sleep. “Who?”
“My next door neighbor’s drug supplier.”
“Why?” she whined, burying her face in his pillows.
“Because he’s a suspect,” he said, taking the pillow out from under her. “You know that dead cat in your house? It had a bellyful of pot, the kind this guy grows.”
She glared up at him. “You are so annoying.”
He grunted a response, digging through her overnight bag. “Wear this,” he said, throwing a pair of shorts and a purple tank top at her. “No bra.”
“Oh, great,” she muttered, clenching a fistful of fabric. “Are you going to have me jiggle my way to an introduction?”
“Whatever works.”
He drove her truck past the outskirts of Oceanside all the way out to Bonsall. As they wound through the rolling hills of a middle-class neighborhood, she rolled down her window to study the scenery, struck by a wave of nostalgia.
“I grew up near here,” she said.
“I know.”
“How?”
“I do my homework.” As they went miles beyond city limits, the houses became few and far between, and Sidney saw more horses than cars. Finally he pulled off the side of the road. “See that house? The one with the brick retaining wall?”
She squinted down at it. “Yes.” Sidney knew the house well, actually. A friend of hers used to live there.
“Drive down there and slow to a halt, like you ran out of gas. Then bend over and look under the hood.”
Giving him a disgusted look, she said, “Why don’t I just knock on the front door?”
He deliberated for a moment. “Do that if he doesn’t come out.”
“Who am I looking for?”
“A young guy. Your age.”
“What if he’s the one?”
“Then get the hell out of there. And no matter what, don’t go inside the house.”
She sighed. “I don’t enjoy these adventures, you know.”
“You think I do?” Unfastening his safety belt, he got out of the truck seat. “I’ll be right here,” he said, watching her slide over into the driver’s seat. “With my gun.”
To her surprise, his ruse worked like a charm. She rolled the pickup to a stop, popped the hood and looked under it like a clueless bimbo. In less than a minute, she heard a screen door slam shut and approaching footsteps.
Who knew it was so easy to pick up men? She straightened uneasily, wiping her sweat-slick palms against the sides of her shorts.
The man walking toward her stopped in his tracks. “Sidney?”
For a second, she couldn’t place him. He was tall and lanky, his dark blond hair on the long side, face partially hidden by about a week’s worth of stubble. “Derek?” His blue eyes lit up with delight, and she launched herself into his open arms, forgetting her fear.
