I can't contain a hungry smile, and Libby side-steps, now even closer to the parlor.
I arch a brow. "I make you nervous?"
She smiles smugly, and the nervousness I thought I saw looks more like impatience. "I have my black belt in Judo. Do you?"
A grin blossoms on my face, but my lips aren't sure what to do with it. It falls right off my face, and I press my mouth into a more familiar solemn line. I adjust the bill of my ball cap, feeling the weight of the last few months. "You'd be right to be nervous. That's a good thing. You never know whose room you could be wandering into."
"So that was your room.”
More statement than question, but I say, “Who’s asking?”
She looks at me strangely, and I realize I've become too paranoid.
"Sorry." I rub my brow, feeling frustrated and tired. "It's been a long...long week.”
I'm shuffling my feet, headed for the parlor, when her mouth does something soft. I want to kiss it. My c**k twitches as she nods, like she's looking in a crystal ball and seeing every sleepless night and f**ked up, dead end day that's led me here, to her kitchen. I'm trying to play superhero and it's just so stupid. I feel revulsion rise in my chest. Then she says, "I believe it." Her words are soft silk, and when they leave her ruby-colored lips, her radiant eyes are on me, gentle and perceptive.
It makes my throat tighten. I remember her that night at the party—the warmth of her, the weight of her. I need to leave, but I’m rooted to the kitchen floor.
Libby's eyes flicker to my clenched fists, and I imagine what I must look like: two-hundred-twenty pounds of head-fucked male, product of an escort and a professional ass**le. But instead of bolting for the Mace, she tilts her head, regarding me like she would a puzzle. "Do you stay at the vineyard often?" she asks quietly.
"Sometimes." I'm not sure why she cares.
The corner of her mouth lifts, a lovely little half-smile that makes me wonder if she has any idea what effect she is having on me. "I'm sure you don't remember this, but you helped me fix my car once, years ago."
I nod, but I don't return her smile. Even then, when she was just a kid, I felt a pull, and the memory puts me off-balance.
She turns and walks into the parlor, and I follow her into the spacious room, decorated in dark browns and reds. She looks over her shoulder as she grabs her keys from a Victorian card table.
I can tell she's thinking about something. She hesitates before casting a troubled look into my eyes. "Did you do that to your room?”
"Do what?" I frown, annoyed at how I can't seem to make myself leave.
"At the party," she says. "Your room was a wreck."
I flinch at the memory, debating only briefly whether to be honest. "I was very angry that night." My voice is ultra-deep; husky. As I drink in Libby, I go back there.
I remember the sensation of choking—a sensation Priscilla sometimes likes to experience with a collar, or—so much worse—my hands around her neck.
I'm holding Libby's stare, hoping she'll see these things inside me and tell me to get going. I notice I'm holding my breath, waiting for her wary dismissal. Instead, her mouth softens again. I wait for her expression to morph into pity or sadness, but she looks serene. "I think there are two sides to you," she says quietly.
She must think one of my sides is a psychopath. At least she won't be disappointed if I ever become an official suspect in the escort disappearances.
Thinking of that, while looking at her delicate face, makes my heart pound uncomfortably, and I realize how afraid I am that it might come to that. I’m completely innocent, I remind myself, but I know better. There’s a common perception, partially true, that rich people are above the law. It’s true for a lot of us, but I have a feeling my notoriety could work against me. I’m the kind of guy prosecutors like to stick a case to. And I've got a dirty past.
Libby can read my mind. I think she can. Her eyes are latched to mine, and I can see my heaviness reflected on her face. She slides her hands into her pockets, stepping closer as she speaks. “What I mean is, most people only see what you want them to see. Like the night my mom’s Porsche broke down."
I remember that night. It was back when I was f**king an escort from Los Angeles. The sex was explosive, but I always felt like shit after, and I'd been relieved when my security manager interrupted over the intercom. A few minutes later, after pulling on some pants, I'd gotten my first glimpse of Elizabeth DeVille. She'd had her hair in a pony-tail that stuck up off the side of her head, and she'd been wearing short red shorts and a light blue tank top with a whale on it.
“You like whales?” I'd asked her when I finished with the car.
Her face had gone all soft and pretty, making me feel more like one-hundred-and-three than the twenty-three I was, and she'd shrugged. “Yeah, but not a lot more than any other animal. I just like saving things.”
The car was a piece of junk that likely wouldn't make it a hundred more miles, so I convinced her to spend the night in my guest house. After Marietta went to sleep I found myself sitting out by the swimming pool, hoping Elizabeth might wake up and come outside. It was ridiculous. Embarrassing, even. When I fell asleep in one of the plastic chairs, I dreamed of Libby DeVille holding my hand.
She's inches from me now, and she's reaching toward my face.
For a second, I feel a thrill of fear I haven’t felt since I was a boy. It settles deep inside my stomach, and I steel myself. Then her hand touches my shoulder, and I start to sweat from every pore.
Her free hand grabs one of mine, and she tugs me closer to her, closing the distance between our bodies with a gentle tug. I lean closer to her, moving in small jerks. I'm getting seriously dizzy, as her thumb touches me between my brows.
"I see a frown mark, though," she whispers, "right here." I blink, surprised to find the soft sensation makes my eyelids heavy.
"I thought you were upset that night," she murmurs as she strokes. "After..." She colors, and I blink my heavy lids.
"I could see you at the foot of the bed, and I was kind of worried for you. I don't know why, but something about you..." That frown is back, visible through my lashes, and someone is scooping out my insides. I feel gutless and emptied, like I might dissolve into a puddle at this woman's feet.
"Something about you just seems sad. I don't know what about poker-playing would make a man sad, but I'm watching these," she says, gently thumbing my frown lines one more time. "Try not to let them get any deeper."