To hide her heartache, Audra sneered. "I suppose that invasion of privacy was a piece of cake, though. After all, you had your hand in my panties first, didn"t you. Your job sounds like so much fun."
Jesse stiffened. "Look, I cleared you. You might be a little grateful instead of nasty."
"Grateful? For what? I wasn"t guilty of anything. Except believing your bulls.h.i.t."
He wasn"t in love with her. h.e.l.l, he probably wasn"t even in like with her. He"d slept with her in the name of the job. She, her heart, they didn"t count. Only her connections to his nasty little crime. And she"d thought he was a good boy?
Audra gulped back the tears clogging her throat and stiffened her lower lip before it could quiver. No way in h.e.l.l she"d give him the satisfaction of knowing what he"d meant to her. To know she"d fallen in love with him.
"Look, Audra, it"s not like that. I mean, yes, I didn"t tell you everything, but I couldn"t."
"Nope, can"t tell the criminals you"re on to them, right? Or should that be on on them? Under them? In them?" Jesse made a sharp gesture for her to stop, but Audra just glared and raised one sardonic brow. Anger was the only thing keeping her from falling to pieces. "Behind them? That was nice, huh?" them? Under them? In them?" Jesse made a sharp gesture for her to stop, but Audra just glared and raised one sardonic brow. Anger was the only thing keeping her from falling to pieces. "Behind them? That was nice, huh?"
"Stop it," he snapped. The way he cringed a.s.sured her she"d hit a tender spot. Good. Now that she knew where to strike, she could get him the h.e.l.l out of her face.
"You"re good at giving orders, Jesse. What rank are you? Bet you"re high up there, a man like you, willing to do anything to get the job done. Or is that do anyone?"
"Audra, quit. Stop demeaning what we have."
"Had." Forcing herself into action, she sauntered over to the front door, making sure she put enough body English into her hips to make a blind man drool. "What we had. We have nothing now. We"re through."
"You can"t do that. Don"t end it like this." Jesse followed her. He put a beseeching hand on her shoulder. She gave his hand a look, then met his eyes. He let go.
"This, whatever it is, is over." She wanted him out before she started crying.
"Audra-" he started.
"No," she interrupted. "I want you to go. We"re nothing. We never were. All I was to you was a suspect, then a means to an end. And all you ever were to me was a dare," she lied.
"A what?"
She took grim satisfaction in the look of confusion on his face. Good, let him feel betrayed, too.
"A dare," she said with relish. "I told you that night in the club about dares, remember? Well, you were mine. All I had to do to keep my Wicked Chick status was sleep with you. I guess I should thank you for the extra credit points. You were pretty good, too."
"I thought that was a blind date."
"Hardly," Audra said with a sneer. "That was a dare. That"s why I went up to your creepy criminal that night in the club. The girls dared me to do the first guy to come through the door. You were close, but he was first."
"Do?"
"Do. Screw. Down and dirty. s.e.x, Jesse. You remember s.e.x, don"t you? You were pretty good at it in there." Audra made a sharp gesture toward the bedroom. "I"d never have pegged you for a cop, being as you came off as such a good boy. But then, you were undercover, weren"t you."
"You went after Larson for s.e.x?"
"You got it." She gave him an evil smirk, then raised a brow. "Or got me, if you prefer. He was my dare, but his little chicken a.s.s ran out. You, by default, were my backup dare."
Brows furrowed, Jesse tilted his head as if he didn"t understand. "Are you trying to claim you only had s.e.x with me for a dare?"
"Exactly."
The anger suffusing his face didn"t even come close to the level burning in her gut, but Audra blinked anyway. For the first time, she felt intimidated by Jesse.
All the more reason for him to leave.
"I don"t believe you." Fists clenched at his hips, Jesse glared at her. "There"s too much between us to be some stupid game."
"What? Your crime? Get real. There"s nothing between us. After all, I just remembered there"s a good reason I don"t do good boys. And I especially don"t do cops."
Audra had to swallow to get past the lump in her throat. Knowing she couldn"t keep herself together much longer, she gestured to the door.
"Go. I don"t want to do this anymore."
"We need to settle this between us, Audra. And I need to find out about that night, ask you some questions about what Larson said to you, if he gave you anything." At Audra"s vicious look, he frowned, then shrugged. "If you can"t do this now, fine. We"ll wait until tomorrow. But we have to talk, Audra. Soon."
Fear pounded in her head as she shook it in denial.
She couldn"t talk to him again. Couldn"t stand to see him and know there was nothing there but a case. It already hurt too much. Not knowing any other way to get him to leave before she completely lost it, she did the only thing she knew how. She pulled her hard-a.s.s att.i.tude around her like a shield and lashed out.
"You try to say another word to me, and I"ll turn you in for s.e.xual hara.s.sment. I"m sure there are some rules in your good boy book against lying to and sleeping with a suspect."
Jesse gave her a long look, then shook his head. "We need to discuss this. But if I"ve learned anything from my sisters, it"s that it"s pointless to push when a woman is so p.i.s.sed she looks like she"s ready to rip my head off. I"ll call you later, we"ll get together and talk."
"Don"t bother. I only had to do you once, and since we"re already well over that quota, I don"t have any further use for you."
He shot her an indecipherable look. One that scared Audra to her very soul. Then with a shake of his head, he opened the door. Once through, his hand still on the k.n.o.b, he looked back.
"You don"t reach a nine and a half on just a physical level, Audra. That"s about emotions. That"s a connection that goes beyond two bodies and s.e.x. It"s about love."
He shut the door behind him with a quiet snick. She stood and stared at the white expanse of wood until it blurred.
It wasn"t until she moved to slide the dead bolt into place that she realized everything was blurry because of the tears streaming down her face.
It looked as if she"d finally found the answer to the ident.i.ty crisis that had been plaguing her the last couple of weeks. Dare achieved or not, she"d lost her bad girl status. Because Wicked Chicks didn"t cry. Especially over men.
14.
"HE"S A COP and he slept with you while you were under investigation?" Bea asked, her breathy voice tinged with shock. "That"s terrible." and he slept with you while you were under investigation?" Bea asked, her breathy voice tinged with shock. "That"s terrible."
"Men suck," Isabel claimed in a rigid tone. Her pale face, hair pulled back in a punishing ponytail and baggy sweats were all clear signs of man trouble. Given her discovery that her first-time fling was a lying cheat, Audra figured the fact that she wasn"t burning a well-endowed male effigy and spitting on the flames was a miracle.
"Be fair," Suzi said with her usual logic, "Audra did a number on him, same as he did her."
"There"s a difference," Bea insisted.
Suzi just laughed. A cynical, mocking sound that played on Audra"s already raw nerves.
After she"d kicked Jesse out, she"d thrown a nice little temper tantrum. Two hours at the gym trying to exhaust her body and a carton of Heath Bar Crunch had only made her angrier. She"d come home and ripped the sheets from the bed to remove all traces of her night with Jesse. Then, when that hadn"t made her feel any better, she"d waited until dawn, and called for reinforcements.
She hadn"t really felt up to company, but she"d known being around her friends would force her to put on her game face and suck up the hurt. And true friends that they were, Isabel, Bea and Suzi had jumped right out of bed-in Suzi"s case, someone else"s-and come right over.
She sat with the other women on the floor of her office, sorting through the mess of designs, trim and beading. With a sigh, she scooped up the shredded pieces of her fall design boards. Like her love life, her career was sucking hard.
"I know," Bea offered, "Let"s spend the day pampering ourselves, then tonight we"ll get dressed up, hit a few clubs and see how many hot dudes we can reel in."
"I thought you were seeing that photographer guy?"
"That wasn"t going anywhere," Bea said. She jingled her wrist, the pale morning sunlight glinting off the diamonds in her bracelet. "I mean, he was just too clingy and weird. I guess I should let him know it"s over, huh?"
Audra groaned. "Jeez, Bea. You haven"t told the guy it"s over yet?"
"Nah. I hate hurt feelings. I keep hoping he"ll clue in when I don"t call him back."
"That"s not fair. If you"re going to end it, do it clean."
"He"s a man," Isabel said with a roll of her eyes. "It probably serves him right."
"You"re a little on the bitter side, don"t ya think?" Suzi asked with a surprised stare.
"I just don"t think this guy had any right to let the relationship go as far as the bed," Isabel insisted, ignoring Suzi"s question. "Men are pigs. Lying left and right just to get a woman into bed."
"Sure guys lie. So do women, it"s not like truth is exclusive to one s.e.x or the other," Suzi said dismissively. "The bottom line is, Audra did her dare. It wasn"t like she fell for the guy or anything. Right?"
She peered at Audra, her face looking oddly young and almost sweet without its usual polished makeup. Blue eyes Audra knew as well as her own were filled with questions. It wasn"t the curiosity that worried Audra, though. It was the sympathy.
"It was good s.e.x," Audra retorted with a shrug. As long as she forced herself to treat it like any other encounter, she could keep away the pain. "A little practice and he"d have hit the fabled ten on the o.r.g.a.s.m scale."
"That good, huh?"
"Yup."
"It"d be a shame to let go of someone who could toast your buns so perfectly."
"Let him go? I never had him." Maybe if she said it enough she"d believe it, too.
"Maybe you should report him," Isabel mused.
"Why? Do they give medals for s.e.xual prowess? He deserves one, sure, but I don"t usually go in for ego strokes, you know?"
"Stop it. You"re as bad as Suzi." Isabel quit straightening and stacking a pile of designs to glare. "Don"t blow this off. Not only did he take advantage of you, you were-are-in danger."
Done sifting beads, Audra closed the lid of the plastic case. She stared down at the rainbow of gla.s.s shapes until they blurred into a kaleidoscope of running colors. She tried to shove the pain back down, but it was like the lid she"d kept on her emotions for so long, once peeled open, refused to shut.
Finally, she looked up and met Isabel"s outraged gaze, her own eyes sheened with tears.
"He didn"t take advantage. You know that. Sure, I was a suspect, but he was a dare. Which of us took advantage of the other?"
Isabel pressed her lips together as she considered, then she shook her head.
"But he hurt you," she said softly. Her own eyes were liquid with sympathy.
"Yeah." Audra drew in a shuddering breath and tried to shrug. But as hard as she wanted to ignore the pain, it wouldn"t go away. "But it wasn"t like he owed me anything. We didn"t make any promises, you know?"
"Oh, my G.o.d, will you stop being so d.a.m.ned fair," Suzi snapped in an abrupt about-face. "Quit it. I don"t give a rat"s a.s.s how he was a nice guy, how he was doing his job or how good in bed he is. Isabel"s right. None of that excuses him hurting you."
Walls crumbling, Audra"s lip trembled for a brief second before the dam burst and tears poured free. d.a.m.n Jesse, he"d totally ruined her Wicked Chick vow to never cry over a man.
When her friends" faces crumbled too, Audra knew she was done. The tears poured free. The other women sniffed, rubbed her back and gave each other helpless looks. Audra still couldn"t stop.
Finally, Isabel got up and went to the kitchen. She came back with a grocery bag. She pulled out sour cream and onion potato chips, pretzels and Doritos, along with a four-pack of wine coolers and a big bag of jelly beans.
"Breakfast of champions," Bea pointed out.
Even through her misery, Audra had to giggle.
"What? No chocolate?" Suzi asked with a watery laugh of her own.
"No," Isabel said quietly with a sympathetic look at Audra. "I"m pretty sure Audra"s had enough chocolate."
Audra eyed the fattening feast spread over the tattered remnants of her designs. "So much for my Wicked Chick status, huh?"
"What are you talking about?" Bea asked, tearing into the chips.
"This heartbreak over some guy," Audra specified. "It"s so totally against all the rules. Next thing you know, I"ll be whining in an Internet self-help group while eating a pint of Chunky Monkey in my flannel jammies."
Suzi snorted, but Isabel just stared.
"Since when do Wicked Chicks follow rules?"
Audra frowned, but couldn"t think of an answer so she shrugged instead.
"You of all people should know being a bad girl is all about att.i.tude," Suzi pointed out as she handed Audra the bag of Doritos. "This c.r.a.ppy one of yours sucks right now. But that"s not a permanent thing. More like a temporary breakdown. We"re all ent.i.tled to those."
"Even you?" Isabel teased.
"Sure. But if it were me, I"d lose the flannel. h.e.l.l, all I own in the sleepwear department is Audra"s stuff anyway. Even if most of it is sweet and fluffy."
They all laughed, but Audra had to blink a few times to keep the tears from starting again. For a bada.s.s friend, Suzi was pretty d.a.m.ned wonderful.
"So what are you going to do?" Bea asked around a mouthful of jelly beans.
"Yeah, are you going to go after this guy? Or are you going to trade him in for three guys and a bag of Doritos?