Текст книги "In a Bad Way"
Автор книги: Karin Tabke
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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 23 страниц)
Chapter Fourteen
The ride heading east on the San Mateo Bridge was the polar opposite of the ride west. Izzy and Flynn had not spoken a word to each other since they’d mutually agreed to go to their respective homes. There was nothing to say.
Flynn couldn’t accept her past, and Izzy couldn’t change it. Even if she could, she wouldn’t, because the irony of it was, it had led her to him. These last twenty-four hours had been the most amazing twenty-four hours of her life. Now it was over. And it hurt.
Nothing, aside from her mother dying in her arms, had hurt this bad. Not even losing the sister she loved.
As the night scenery sped past her, Izzy tried to process who she was now. Because she was not the same woman she was yesterday. Her promise to herself to find Alex had led her down a dangerous path and into a quagmire of emotion she was ill-equipped to handle. She’d agreed to make a sex tape for information. She’d stripped down to her bikini bottoms for a room full of cops, attempted to drug one of them, got caught by him, almost got arrested by him, then subsequently lost her virginity to him.
The external escapades paled compared to what she had experienced internally. Her heart, that thing she had protected for so long, had cracked open. It ached. Badly. Painfully so. Flynn had filled her with more than his glorious penis; he’d filled her with hope, abandon, happiness, need, and a burning desire to be cherished not for her birthright or her job, but for herself, the stripped down to the raw center Isadora. He’d peeled away her layers, revealing parts of herself she hadn’t even known about, and then walked away because he didn’t like what he’d discovered.
How was she supposed to recover from this? How could she not yearn for his strong protective arms around her, his warm body taking her where she knew she would never go again? He made her laugh, he made her swoon, he made feel like the most beautiful woman in the world when he looked at her with those electric blue eyes that melted her to her very core.
Her chest constricted as she fought desperately to silence the sob that threatened to give her away. She wished she were alone so she could cry.
She sniffed. Cry? The last time she’d cried was when her mother lay in her arms and took her last breath. She’d promised herself then that she would never allow anyone to get to her heart the way her father had gotten to her mother’s. And what did she do? The same damn thing. Except she wasn’t going to throw her pride and self-worth out the window and go crawling back to a man who didn’t regard her as his equal. Her pride was intact. No way was she going to walk through life broken, the way her mother had.
Her phone chirped in her purse, indicating she’d received a text message. Had to be a wrong number; no one called her, except the professor and Charlie. Or sometimes Andre to work an extra shift. Professor Gamble was in the UK, Charlie was in Santa Cruz, and the club was closed on Sundays.
To take her mind off her broken heart, Izzy slid the phone from her purse. The text was from Charlie:
Came home 4 clothes 2 find a fairly hot gigantic dude pounding on the door looking for u. What’s up with that?
Biting her lip to steady her nerves, Izzy’s stomach did a slow roll. Andre wanted his video. While Charlie knew she was a cocktail server, he didn’t know where. Not that he would judge. He got judged enough on his own, so he was the last person who would call her out.
What did he say? she texted back.
Just wanted to know where u were. I told him even if I knew, I wouldn’t tell a rude Russian. ;) Where r u anyway? Def not with a hot guy, so what’s up?
Izzy smiled. Charlie had no filter. She loved him like the brother she would never have. He knew all her secrets. Well, most of them.
Actually, I WAS with a hot guy. He’s bringing me home now.
Excuse me while I pick myself up off the floor! Did you do it?
Several times ;)
30
Oh, I am so not going to leave until I meet him.
We broke up so not sure what kind of reception you’ll get.
Oh sweets, I just want to meet the man who cracked your chastity belt code! I promise I’ll scat as soon as I do. Xoxoxo
PS, wait a minute! You hand over the coveted cherry and he dumps you? What a prick. Sorry, sweets, but I’m going to let him have it.
No, not his fault. Mine. Plz don’t say anything.
Just like you to take the blame.
It’s complicated.
Isn’t it always?
Izzy sat staring at his last text. He had no idea.
“Is everything okay?” Flynn asked, his deep voice startling her.
Looking out the window, she said, “Craptastic.”
He didn’t respond and she was glad. No damn it, she wasn’t! She wanted him to fight for her! To tell her he didn’t give a shit that his friends had seen her boobs.
Izzy swallowed hard. His friends and those guys at the restaurant weren’t the only ones who had seen what God gave her. No, there had been another party there that night, and when they saw what was going on...
“Those guys back at the restaurant?” she said her voice low and emotional. Might as well come clean. Not like she had anything to lose. “They weren’t the only ones that night.”
She turned to look at Flynn. His profile was tight, his jaw so hard she thought he might crack it. “While I stood there refusing to cover myself or take the bait, the dancers on the stage behind me stopped dancing when they realized they’d lost the attention of the crowd. It didn’t take long for half the club to get in on the sideshow.” Inhaling deeply, she let out a slow erratic exhale. “They started throwing money at me, catcalling, promising me more if I got up on the stage.”
“Did you?” he choked out.
“No. I continued to stand there with my hand out. After about five minutes of me not backing down, the crowd began to thin. My top was tossed to me in shreds. It was ruined, but Crystal, one of the dancers, gave me a bar towel and I walked back to the dressing room, changed, and went home.”
“Why did you tell me that?”
“I thought you’d want to know that those guys, your friends, and you aren’t the only ones who have seen my boobs.” She turned back to look out the window. “Probably like fifty or so more. And Andre because he was standing there. But that’s it. Oh, and Charlie my roommate, but he doesn’t count. Well, and the girls I work with, but they don’t count either, do they?” she asked, looking at him.
A small tic flicked in his cheek.
When he didn’t answer she said, “Anyway, that’s it.”
Still he didn’t comment. Not that she expected him to. “Oh, wait, I forgot about the time I was at the gym in the Jacuzzi. When I stood up my bathing suit top filled with water and the girls kind of popped out. But the guy sitting there was old. Maybe eighty or so. Although he winked and gave me a thumbs up, I don’t think if he ever saw me on the street he’d make a big deal about it. He’s probably seen so many boobs in his life they’re all a blur. Besides, he was a gentleman about it.” She sat back into the seat. “I didn’t realize the girls were so popular,” she said to herself.
Izzy didn’t say another word, but neither did Angry Man. As they pulled up to her little house, she reached for her bag in the backseat. By the time the car rolled to a stop, Izzy was ready to get out and never see Flynn again.
“I’ll walk you up,” Flynn said, his voice hard, emotionless.
“Thanks, but I can walk myself up.”
She pressed her hand to the door handle, turned to him, and said, “Thank you for not arresting me, and thank you for the best twenty-four hours of my life.” She pushed the door open and as she slid from the seat, she turned back and added, “I think it’s safe to say we don’t need to wait until the end of the week to evaluate our arrangement, so don’t stress about it.” She shrugged. “Not that you were going to.” When she was out of the car, she leaned back in before she closed her door. “And, Special Agent Ryker, I don’t expect you to continue to help me find my sister. But I am going back to the Oakland police department tomorrow and tell them what you’ve told me. Maybe that will light a fire under their butts.” Izzy couldn’t turn off her diarrhea mouth. “Okay, so bye.”
She shut the door and suddenly, she wanted as much space between them as humanly possible. She ran up the sidewalk to the porch where Charlie stood waiting for her. She threw her arms around his neck and did everything she could not to fall apart. But a sob escaped. His arms wrapped around her, tightening protectively. She heard the car door open. Then she felt Charlie’s breath hitch.
“He’s getting out, Iz.” The door shut. “If he’s half the stud that car is—Oh, hell no and hello, tall, dark and—hot damn, girlfriend, I don’t blame your cherry for pouncing all over that. Does he have a gay twin brother?”
“Isadora,” Flynn’s deep voice called as he approached. “Is everything all right?”
Charlie pushed her behind his five foot seven, one-hundred-and-forty-pound body. “How can you ask if everything’s all right when you’re the one that made Iz cry?”
When Flynn didn’t respond, but stared at Charlie like he wanted to stuff him a hole somewhere, Charlie kept at him. “I, a person who cares about her, would never do that. Obviously you don’t care about her since you made her cry. You need to leave. Now.” Izzy had never heard Charlie angry before. His voice held no room for argument.
“Isadora?” Flynn asked.
Izzy sucked it up as best as she could, even though she was feeling like a little girl who was just uninvited to the popular kid’s party. Moving around Charlie, she clasped his hand tightly as she faced Flynn. Her heart did a crazy stutter step. He was so handsome. Potent male personified. God, she was going to miss every nuance of him. “Everything’s fine, please leave.”
He stood for a long, drawn-out minute holding her gaze. The hot sting of tears built up. Blinking furiously to keep the damn tears at bay, rigidly, she stood her ground, offering him no concession. He either found a way to deal with her past or he didn’t.
Judging by the tightness of his features and the angry burn in his eyes, she doubted he’d come to terms with her past any time soon. Men like Flynn didn’t. Their egos couldn’t handle it. To him she was damaged goods. A blight to his high-society name. Just like she was a blight to her father’s name. Birds of a feather flocked together, Momma had warned her.
“Good night,” he bit out, then turned on his heel and walked away. The sound of his retreating footsteps crushed her heart. Forlornly, she watched Flynn’s tall body as his angry stride took him farther and farther out of her life. When he moved around his car and came around to the driver door, he stopped and stared at her on the porch for a long minute. Hope swelled in her chest.
“Oh, tall, dark, and craves some, wants to come back to momma real bad,” Charlie crooned. “He’s been a bad boy and he can’t figure out how to make it right and retain his pride at the same time.”“He’s not coming back,” Izzy whispered.
Flynn ducked into his car and roared off. She stood there until she could no longer hear the deep purr of the engine.
Charlie turned and took her against this chest. “Let it out, sweets. Let it all out, then we’ll talk about it.”
Chapter Fifteen
Flynn gunned the Vette, wanting the tightness in his chest to ease. Anger, frustration, guilt, fear, jealousy, and something else he couldn’t put a name to twisted him up inside. Nothing had trained him for what he was experiencing at that moment. He’d never been so furious in his life nor felt so helpless. He was a self-admitted control freak. He didn’t like surprises or people’s actions having a negative emotional impact on him. To make sure that didn’t happen, he controlled the people around him and limited not only their emotional influence on him, but his on them. It was why he loved being a federal agent. The law gave him the room to control the bad guys, not the other way around.
Flynn didn’t know any other way. Growing up with an absentee father who made no effort to hide his women—his strippers—had resulted in Flynn’s developing a protective nature. Not for his father, but for his mother, who’d taken her husband’s infidelity with the stiff upper lip of her Boston upbringing, even when his father had brought them to the table when his mother was in the house, for God’s sake!
Those women were raucous, bawdy women who saw a golden goose in his old man. To hang on to it, they went to great lengths to win the Ryker boys over with exuberant shows of affection. Mal was mesmerized by them, but Flynn refused to speak to them, which earned him an ass-kicking. Flynn’s heart had slammed shut when his mother died too young. Flynn would never forgive his old man for killing her.
His disdain for women like the ones his father brought home went deep. How the hell he’d gotten tangled up with one was beyond his comprehension. He could only blame it on one thing: lust.
He’d been celibate for months, working a task force that didn’t give him time to sleep, much less socialize. He was overdue for a healthy romp. Let’s face it, Pink had caught all their eyes. Flynn saw the way the single guys in the room watched her. He knew damn well the same thoughts and images that had thundered through his mind straight to his groin had thundered through theirs, too.
Flynn slammed his hands against the steering wheel. He winced at the pain that shot through his left hand. “Why the hell does she have to show off her tits?” he yelled at the dashboard.
Part of him knew he was being unfair.
Izzy wasn’t a stripper, she was a cocktail waitress at a bikini strip club. Nothing like the women his father had fucked. Not typical of the breed at all. Not even close. She had a Marilyn Monroe naïveté about her. Hell, she even looked like her. Big doe eyes, little nose, cupid’s bow lips, skin as smooth as silk. Knockout curves. Pink was just a younger, more contemporary, spicy version of the icon. That breathless voice and ethereal innocence drew him to her like a moth to an open flame. That she did that to him drove him nuts. The insanity controlled him, not the other way around.
That loss of control compelled him to keep reminding himself—she was working the floor at a strip club, strutting around in a barely there scrap of a uniform leaving nothing to the imagination. And she had attempted to drug him and make a damn sex video! He got it, it was for her sister, but where was he supposed to draw the line on how far he could go with it?
It was his lust that had him seeing more in her.
So why did he pound the shit out of that guy at the restaurant? He’d never fought over a woman or for one.
His hand throbbed each time he clenched the steering wheel. The pain was worth breaking that bastard’s nose. He’d do it again. The wounded animal sound that came from Pink when she realized what was happening to her cut him in half. Didn’t matter that she should expect that type of thing to happen; the pain in her eyes had been too much for him to ignore. Dude had to pay.
Flynn roared down his street and into his driveway, coming to a screeching stop at the garage door. Rigidly, he sat there in his car, the engine rumbling beneath him, not ready to call it a night. Neither was Flynn. He’d toss and turn until the sun came up, unable to get the smell of bubble gum out of his head.
“Fuck it all to hell.”
He shifted into reverse, backed out of the driveway, then downshifted and headed downtown.
Simon’s text earlier in the day had given him some cursory info on Sorlov, with the promise of more intel to come. Flynn wanted more now.
A pot of coffee and hours later Flynn sat glued to his computer screen in his office at the FBI Field Office in Oakland. Pink was in way over her pink and blond head.
Boris Sorlov aka Vladimir Chermensky, a Ukrainian-born terrorist, was not only on the FBI’s radar, but there was a task force in place, comprised of men Flynn had worked with, some of whom had gone deep and infiltrated the terrorist’s infrastructure. Surf’s Up was just one of Chermensky’s numerous enterprises.
The Ukrainian’s criminal tentacles were many and far-reaching: Predominantly human trafficking, arms, drugs, classified information gathered and sold to the highest bidder, in most cases the Chinese. And Pink was smack dab in the middle of it. Had her sister stumbled onto something that got her into trouble? Had Chermensky made sure she would never speak of it? More curious to Flynn was the question of why the hell hadn’t the senator reported his daughter missing. Flynn had double-checked the state and national data banks. Nothing. He checked Alexandra Chastain’s last known address. Her parents’ Piedmont address. Didn’t make sense.
Flynn sprawled back in his chair, and locking his hands behind his head, he stared up at the ceiling and said out loud, “Okay, if I was a senator up for reelection next year and my only child was stripping at a club in San Francisco’s notorious Tenderloin and suddenly went missing, why wouldn’t I report her missing?” Flynn popped up in his chair. “Because once her disappearance was public, so too would be her last place of employment.”
Bastard was keeping it quiet, just like he’d kept his parentage of Pink quiet. Flynn shook his head in disgust. And he’d voted for the guy!
While Chastain wouldn’t win any Father of the Year awards, Flynn assumed that the old man would have hired a private investigator to find his daughter and quietly bring her home. Maybe he had. Once he had more information from the task force, he’d see about paying the senator and his wife a visit.
The irony of this was that Pink, who had been shunned by her cowardly father and sister, was the brave one making the sacrifices. While Flynn was sure Pink didn’t know she was working for a terrorist, who ran girls from the city overseas for Christ’s sake, she knew enough to know he was a sleazebag. It hadn’t stopped her from searching for the sister who hadn’t given Pink the time of day until she needed help.
Shaking his head, Flynn tried to understand why anyone would do that. He knew he wouldn’t. If his father came crawling to him begging for even a minute of Flynn’s time, Flynn would walk away without giving it a second thought.
Isadora Fuentes was proving to be quite a puzzle. One, he told himself, he should leave alone.
Forcing himself to do just that, Flynn turned all his energy back to researching the information the taskforce had compiled over the years. Three hours later he glanced at his watch. Almost seven in the morning, the troops would be showing up soon. When they did, armed with the information Pink had given him and what he’d read of the files, Flynn was going to request permission to join the task force and get Pink the hell out of that rat trap of a club.
Before he could start the next pot of coffee and get on it, his cell phone rang. Damn it, his gut hitched, thinking it might be Pink. It was Simon.
“Hey, what’s up,” Flynn answered glumly. Then he literally shook himself. He needed to get over it and focus.
“What, no ‘good morning’? No, how was your weekend? No, are you a dad yet?”
“Sorry, man, I’m a little preoccupied. Are you a dad yet?”
“No, asshole, Kat’s not due for another three months.”
“Then why’d you say—” Flynn shook his head. “Never mind.”
Simon laughed. “How’d it go with the little drug-slipping stripper?”
Flynn clenched his jaw. “I called her out, she apologized, I let her go.”
“Really?” Simon asked, surprised. “That’s it?”
Flynn was a by-the-book guy. He should have arrested her; had he, he wouldn’t be moping around like a lovelorn sap and she’d be safe in jail.
“The way you were tripping all over your hard-on for her, I thought you might’ve dipped your toe into that pond of bodaciousness.” Simon laughed, enjoying his ribbing. “I’ll let the boys know she’s available, then. They were howling like dogs for her after you absconded with her.”
Flynn’s jaw nearly cracked from the pressure of his anger. “She’s not available.” Yeah, he just said that.
“Anybody I know?” Simon asked, humor hanging on each word. Simon was one of the most intelligent investigators Flynn had ever worked with. His case closure percentage was somewhere in the ninetieth percentile. Flynn might be lying to himself, but Simon wasn’t buying it.
“No,” Flynn bit off.
“Well, son, you need to let her and her boyfriend know that she’s in with unfriendlies. After I texted you yesterday, I did some digging. Boris Sorlov is an alias and he’s not who he purports to be. Dude is bad news. Even if Wild Style didn’t pique your interest, she needs to get out of there or she’s going to end up as some Russian crime czar’s play toy. Sorlov has been moving girls out of Surf’s Up for years.”
“I’ve been working it on my end all night. Evidently there’s a task force in place.”
“Hit up Justin, he’s the SFPD liaison and working it hard. He can bring you up to speed.”
“Thanks, man,” Flynn said.
“Any time, and Ryker?”
“Yeah?”
“As an expert on the opposite sex, and a trained observer, I think I can say with some accuracy that your little stripper wasn’t like the rest of them. Not even close. Hell, she tried drugging you.” He laughed. “If she copped to it and you didn’t arrest her, I’m thinking she was put up to it.”
“She was. By the club manager. She did it to get information on her sister, who disappeared from the club a few months ago.”
There was a lengthy pause on Simon’s end. Finally he said, “You have a problem with the 'she’s a stripper’ part?”
“You were there, she took her top off in front of all the guys,” Flynn bit out.
Simon laughed again. “It’s just skin man, you need to—”
“I don’t need anyone who’s seen her tits to tell me that it doesn’t matter.”
“What is it with you feds and your egos?”
Flynn snapped. “So if Kat did a lap dance for me and rubbed her tits in my face, you’d be able to overlook that?”
There was a long pause before Simon said, very slowly, “I’d get over it because she mattered to me. She’d deserve that from the man who loved her.”
“I just met Pink, I don’t love her!” He didn’t love anyone.
“I’m not saying you do, what I’m saying is that if she matters, at all, she deserves to be valued for who she is, not what she does. That said, if that had been Kat, I’d knock your teeth out if you ever mentioned the lap dance or her tits to me, her, or anyone we mutually associated with.”
“So you’d live with the elephant in the room?”
“There’s only an elephant in the room, brother, if you put it there.”
Could have knocked Flynn over with a feather. Simon West was the most possessive, protective man Flynn had met. If anyone looked at his wife wrong, Simon took care of business. How could a man like that accept his wife’s tits being on blast?
“It’s not relevant. There’s nothing between us.”
“If you say so. But just in case there is, give Justin a call, and he’ll bring you up to speed on Sorlov.” Simon hung up.
Flynn stood staring at the phone. His friend’s words echoed in his head.
There’s only an elephant in the room, brother, if you put it there.
There wasn’t an elephant in the room, there was the lusty vision of Pink’s breasts and her air-humping his coworkers in the room!
Flynn jammed the phone into his back jeans pocket and rummaged through his bottom desk drawer, taking out the spare shaving kit and clean button-down shirt and tie still in the package from the dry cleaners. He kept the items on hand for when he pulled an all-nighter.
As he made his way to the men’s room, the support staff and agents began to arrive. None of them seemed surprised to see him. Indeed, he’d spent many a night here. He gave his SAC, Rod Mills, a nod in the hallway as he pushed the men’s room door open.
Twenty minutes later, clean-shaven, teeth brushed, hair combed, and wearing a fresh shirt and tie, Flynn strode from the restroom as Mills marched toward him.
Boss man didn’t look happy.
“Ryker, tell me what the hell happened at La Costanera last night.”
Flynn stopped in his tracks. That was the restaurant where he’d taken Pink. The same restaurant where he punched the guy who’d bothered Pink. Someone must have caught his plate. Even though it was registered classified, the locals had the database to track him down.
“I punched an asshole’s lights out.”
“You broke that asshole’s nose.”
“He deserved it.”
His SAC raged on, “That asshole happens to be Allen Stiles, CEO of Leye, a little tech company in Silicon Valley that grossed a half a billion dollars last year! He wants a personal apology or he’s going over my head to get it.”
Damn if Flynn would apologize to that ass–hat. “He’ll get an apology from me after he apologizes to—Pin—my girl.” The minute the words “my girl” came out of his mouth, Flynn’s stomach did a hard roll. WTF?
“Come again?” Mills asked.
Flynn clarified. “He disrespected my—date. He was belligerent, and used words likely to evoke an immediate and violent response. Here in California, I think it’s section four-fifteen of the Penal Code.”
“And that caused you to break his nose?”
“All I did was use necessary force to overcome his resistance to stopping what he was doing.”
Mills smirked. “Are you serious? I suppose you started yelling, stop resisting, stop resisting, too.”
Straight-faced, Flynn answered. “No, sir, my necessary force ended the entire unpleasant encounter. I’m guessing the CEO of Leye doesn’t want his face splashed all over the front page of the Chronicle for drunk and disorderly. In fact, I’m sure his stockholders don’t.”
Mills shook his head and said, “I’m not doubting you, Ryker, but I’m going to need the whole story from the beginning. My office.”
Izzy woke up puffy-eyed and exhausted. She’d spent the night getting drunk with Charlie as she wistfully and tearfully recanted the best twenty-four hours of her life, leaving out the part where she tried to drug Flynn and the my-real-last-name-is-Chastain part.
“Oh, sweets, I don’t know if I should go beat him up or give him a hug,” Charlie had said, hugging her close in his bed last night. After they’d put on their PJs, popped popcorn, uncorked a few bottles of wine he had stashed, then snuggled together under the sheets like two besties, Izzy spilled her guts.
It was cathartic, and long overdue. Charlie already knew she was a love child, but he didn’t know names or that she had a half sister. Withholding her sister’s last name, Izzy came clean about why she was working at Surf’s Up. Telling someone who cared about her that she had stripped for a room full of lusty cops—then brought one home and essentially had a one-night stand with him—without being judged for it, made her feel like the huge black cloud that had followed her for years had been blown away. It was still there, hovering on the horizon, perhaps it always would be, but for now, the sun shined through it.
“Give him a hug? What for?” she cried. “He’s a bully, and a strippist!”
“Strippist?”
“Yeah.” She hiccupped. “Like a racist except he’s prejudiced against strippers.”
“Well, sweets, from what you told me he did to you in that little bed of yours, I’d say he was a stripvert.”
“Stripvert?”
“A perv for strippers,” Charlie wagged his dark brows. “And not in a bad way.”
“That doesn’t make sense. I still don’t know why you want to hug him.”
Charlie hugged her close. “Personally, I’d love to get my hands on that hunk of burning love. But since this isn’t about me but you, I’d hug him because he broke through that ice palace you’ve built.”
Throwing popcorn at him, she shook her head and rested back against the headboard. “I don’t have an ice palace.”
“Oh, you are so in denial, Queen Elsa. Shall we sing 'Let It Go’ or,” Charlie burst into a fit of giggles, “'Pop Goes the Cherry’?”
She smacked him good-naturedly, but he’d managed to make her smile, then he pulled “Let It Go” up on his iPhone and at the top of their lungs, they sang the song until one of their neighbors pounded on the back door for them to shut up before he called the cops. Then they pulled the sheet over their heads and whisper sang it.
That was the last thing Izzy remembered until she woke to the delicious aroma of coffee. Smiling, Izzy’s first thought was of the previous morning, waking up with Flynn’s hard, erect body beside her. Moaning, she stretched and realized she was still under the sheet.
“Wake up, Elsa,” Charlie called and yanked off the sheet. He stood smiling down at her, a steaming cup of coffee in his hands. He swept the cup beneath her nose and said, “If you want it, you need to stop pouting.”
To which she pouted.
“Oh, hell, I’d be pouting over that lost penis, too. Here.” He handed her the mug.
The memory of Flynn thrusting deeply into her made her catch her breath.
Charlie’s eyes narrowed and he pursed his lips. “Wow, he must have been off the hook amazing.”
Izzy took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “He was,” she said softly. To steady her trembling body, she cupped the mug with both hands. Taking a sip, Izzy closed her eyes and savored the rich brew. She was an addict. There was only one thing she wanted more and that she couldn’t have.
“You’re the best friend ever,” she said quietly, smiling up at him.
“I know,” Charlie said as he plopped down beside her. Taking the mug from her, he set it on the nightstand, then took her hands into his and looked pointedly at her. “Look, I’m going to say something that’s none of my business, but well, do you even care? Because let’s be honest here, since when have I minded my own business?” He laughed, but quickly settled back into a serious mien. “I know men and how they think. Doesn’t matter if we’re gay or straight, when it comes to what we want but can’t have, we all act the same. And I’m here to tell you, sweets, that Special Agent of yours has it bad for you. It was written all over every exquisite inch of him last night. He sooo didn’t want to leave you. My straight-dar is screaming he’s been hurt before. Bad. Maybe irrevocably. Such a waste if that’s the case. He needs someone who is willing to be patient with him. Show him how to love.” Charlie shook his head. “He’s got an ego the size of California, too, and I think, my pet, he is having a huge problem dealing with the fact that his friends have seen your glorious breasticles.”
