Читать книгу The Baby Scheme - Jacqueline Diamond, Lori Copeland, Jacqueline Diamond - Страница 12

“Is, um, Alli here?” she heard a young man ask, and knew immediately who it was, mainly because she’d invited him.

“Larry! That was quick.” Alli squeezed into the doorway next to Kevin, who showed no inclination to move.

The photographer glanced between the two of them. With his round, freckled face and Harry Potter glasses, he made an amusing contrast to the hard-bodied detective.

“I thought you were staying with a girlfriend.”

“I said a friend,” she corrected, and introduced the two men. They shook hands, which seemed to calm Larry somewhat. He apparently found Kevin intimidating, perhaps because he was scowling.

Okay, she should have asked his permission before inviting someone to his house, Alli mused as she escorted her visitor inside, but he’d been in the garage when Larry called.

“Let’s see what you found.” She slipped a file folder from the photographer’s grasp. He’d offered on the phone to e-mail the document until she’d reminded him that Payne might have managed to access her account.

Inside lay several photocopied pages of a news story carrying Madge Leeky’s byline. It was dated three years earlier.

“It’s about the adoption counselor those two doctors hired,” Larry explained. “It’s all I could find.”

Kevin’s frown eased. “You’re helping with her research?”

“Uh, yeah,” he said.

“Did she explain what the story’s about?” he asked.

“Not exactly,” Larry said. “I don’t care as long as she makes a splash. We all want her back at the paper, except for a few idiots. Like maybe two with the same last name.”

Kevin nodded. “Care for a beer?”

The offer apparently indicated Larry had passed muster. “Say yes,” Alli prompted.

“Okay.”

“Alli?” Kevin asked.

“Sure.” She liked being treated as one of the guys. Well, sometimes.

A pucker formed between the photographer’s eyes as he stared past her at the entertainment center. “What hit your clothes, a hurricane?”

Alli gave a little cough, wishing he could have avoided the touchy subject. She hadn’t missed Kevin’s dismayed reaction earlier to her attempt at livening up his decor.

Her true motive had been more self-defense than aesthetics. Despite the spotlessness of the house, the man’s essence infused the place with he-man hormones. As she’d started to hang her things in the hall closet next to a leather jacket, she’d realized that his pheromones were likely to pervade her clothes forever.

That was all she needed: to carry Kevin’s scent around with her, arousing images of the two of them dancing cheek to cheek and thigh to thigh. Mr. Law-and-Way-Too-Much-Order was not even remotely the kind of guy she wanted imprinted on her psyche.

“I threw them up in the air and that’s where they stuck,” she improvised for Larry’s benefit.

“Unfortunately, I wasn’t around when it happened,” Kevin said. “Do you think it looks too revealing?”

Larry cleared his throat. “I guess you’d know more about that than I would. Right?”

He was trying to figure out the relationship between the two of them, Alli thought, and tried to figure out how to describe it. Reluctant colleagues? Victims of circumstance? People who bucked a trend by moving in together before their first date?

“I think we should have it shellacked and preserved for posterity,” Kevin replied, and headed for the kitchen.

Alli rattled the article in her hand. “I appreciate this. Did you have any trouble checking it out of the library?”

“I didn’t take it from the library. They make you fill out a form to say what you’re working on,” Larry said. “I got paranoid that the editors might start asking questions, since photographers don’t usually research stories. So I tried another route.”

“What route is that?”

Kevin returned with three beers. “I could pour these into glasses if you prefer, but that takes half the fizz out.”

“I like my beer out of the can,” Alli said.

Larry accepted his with thanks. There was nowhere to sit without knocking down her tent, so they stood there sipping while he continued.

“I asked Madge if she remembered any stories about those doctors. She mentioned she’d written one, and she photocopied it from her files without asking who it was for. I think she knew it must be you.”

“Please thank her for me,” Alli said. “I’ll tell her in person the first chance I have.”

They stood there in increasingly awkward silence. At last Kevin turned to Larry. “Want to go to a party tomorrow night?”

That was the last thing Alli had expected him to say. Why would he invite her friend to join a bunch of cops? “What kind of party is this?”

“A casual gathering.” Kevin swallowed more beer before adding, “With plenty of women.”

“Then why did you invite me?” she asked.

“They’re the wrong kind of women. For me,” he added quickly. “But Larry might hit it off with someone. Unless you’re busy?”

The photographer managed a weak smile. “No, I’d like to come.” Alli was surprised, since at social gatherings with staff members, he always stood around looking uncomfortable. “Uh, where and when?”

Kevin wrote the details on a pad and handed them over. “There’ll be plenty of food. When you arrive, just tell whoever’s at the door that I invited you.”

“You’re sure they won’t mind?” he inquired.

“They’ll be thrilled.”

Something was wrong with this picture. Alli began to have an unpleasant suspicion about the whole party scenario, at least as far as it concerned Kevin. However, she didn’t want to air her concern in front of Larry.

She made polite conversation until they finished their beers. Then she escorted her friend outside and thanked him again for the article.

“I’ll keep my eyes open for anything else about those doctors,” he told her.

Alli wanted to hug him. “You’re my lifeline. I miss you and everybody else, with a few exceptions.”

“About this Kevin guy,” Larry said. “Is he…I mean, are you two…?”

“Dating?” She shook her head. “I had to get out of my apartment. Don’t tell anyone, but I think Mayor LeMott was having me followed.” She decided not to mention the shooting. That would be too big a deal to expect him to keep hush-hush. “So here I am.”

“You and Kevin are old friends?”

“Sort of.” Seeing his confusion, she clarified, “He’s a private detective. We’re helping each other on a case.”

“I think he likes you,” Larry warned.

“He probably likes a lot of women,” Alli said. “But not particularly me.”

“Oh, yeah? I’ll bet he doesn’t let them hang their underwear in his living room.”

“I didn’t exactly obtain his permission to do that.” She resisted the urge to pat Larry’s freckled cheek. “Trust me, there’s nothing going on.”

“It’s none of my business, anyway,” he replied. “And it was nice of him to invite me for tomorrow. I would like to meet a girl.”

She hoped Kevin was right about Larry’s chances. “See you at the party.”

“You bet!”

After he drove away through the tree-lined neighborhood, Alli remembered Kevin’s advice, so she borrowed his garage opener and put her car away. When she returned, she found him standing by the fireplace reading Madge Leeky’s article.

“Anything useful?” she asked.

“It’s mostly puffery,” he said without looking up. “But there’s some interesting background.”

Alli strolled to the master bedroom. She kept expecting Kevin to ask what she was doing, but he seemed to be absorbed in the article.

It was time to check out her suspicions about what he had up his sleeve. She intended to be prepared for whatever might happen tomorrow night.

Out of his sight, she opened the master closet, where a row of dry-cleaner–bagged suits and shirts met her gaze. Pairs of perfectly creased jeans lay folded over hangers. Even his sweatshirts appeared ironed.

But there was nothing here to confirm her theory. She didn’t see so much as a forgotten skirt tucked in one corner or a high-heeled shoe left on the carpeted floor.

Quietly, she moved into the kitchen. A peek into a few cabinets and drawers revealed only that Kevin’s passion for order extended to hanging pot lids in place and organizing utensils in plastic trays. The man was seriously in need of some craziness.

The refrigerator offered Alli’s last hope. Opening it, she nearly uttered a whoop of triumph.

On the shelves sat no fewer than three casseroles, which, upon inspection, turned out to be filled with a tuna-noodle dish, a bean mixture and potatoes au gratin. No bachelor since the dawn of time had ever made three casseroles simultaneously.

She found further evidence in the freezer. Foil-wrapped packages fixed with “From the kitchen of” labels had been marked “meat loaf,” “chocolate cake” and “beef stew.”

The scary part was that the labels had three different names on them. These goodies had come from the kitchens of Heloise, Barbara and Betsy.

Kevin didn’t want a date to keep his ex-girlfriend at bay as she’d surmised. He was juggling three women, and he expected to show up with a fourth!

“Having a good time?” his voice asked close to her ear.

Alli gave a guilty start. Although her instincts urged her to brazen it out by claiming she was hungry, she decided not to lie.

Closing the freezer, she pivoted to face Kevin. He stood inches away, a mocking twist to his mouth.

“You haven’t told me the whole truth about tomorrow night,” she challenged.

Was that guilt fleeting across his face? “Certainly not. I haven’t told you anything about tomorrow night.”

Alli decided to force the issue into the open. “Which of them is going to be there, or is it all three?”

“All three what?”

“Your fan club,” she said. “The ladies who bring lunch. The adoring trio of Heloise, Barbara and Betsy. Do they know about one another? Is this some kind of competition? Where does your date for the party fit in, lover boy?”

Instead of reddening with well-deserved shame, the man got a gleam in his eye. “They’re acquainted with one another.”

“What’s the plan?” Alli pressed. “Are you trying to make them jealous or what?”

“I doubt they’ll be jealous,” he said smoothly. Of all the untrustworthy men Alli had ever met, this one had the most nerve! “You’d be surprised how well we rub along.”

“Do you date them on alternate nights? What are they, your personal harem?” She didn’t really suspect him of promiscuity. However, there was the evidence, right in his refrigerator. “You may think this is funny, but I doubt that they do.”

“I don’t consider the situation funny,” Kevin responded levelly. “You want the truth? Those women are hounding me to death.”

“And you never gave them any reason to think they had some claim on you, right?” she countered.

“We used to be close,” he conceded. “But, you know, people change.”

“So you’re not currently dating any of them?”

“Not a one.”

“And they drop off casseroles purely out of habit?”

“Can I help it if hope springs eternal?” he asked.

Alli was tempted to bop him with a utensil. “I know we made a deal, but I don’t want to get involved in whatever game you’re playing.”

“Tell me something.” Stretching out one arm, he leaned against the fridge and enclosed her in a private space. “Which is crueler, to let them keep showering me with food in hopes of winning my heart, or to show up with a tasty dish like you and put a stop to it?”

Being referred to as a “tasty dish” pushed Alli over the edge. She raised one knee to the exact location of his masculine portions. “You want to hear what I think of Don Juans? I think they deserve what they get.”

The next thing she knew, he’d tossed her over one shoulder, fireman style. “Never threaten an ex-cop,” Kevin advised, and hauled her through the house into the master suite.

Alli waited until he’d almost reached the bed before she kicked out, made contact with the bed frame and shoved in the opposite direction. Releasing a string of swearwords, Kevin staggered backward.

As he stumbled, Alli felt herself begin to slide. It occurred to her that she should have given more thought to the fact that, if he fell, she was going down with him.

Or maybe underneath him.

At the last moment, Kevin managed to avoid dropping her entirely. Instead, he ricocheted across the room and flopped her onto the mattress before toppling across her.

He did more than knock the air out of her lungs. He landed in such a position that, had they not both been wearing slacks, they’d have become lovers by default.

Alli could trace every thoroughly male detail of his anatomy. The process was heightened by the fact that he’d become inexplicably but impressively aroused.

If Kevin Vickers expected to add her to his harem, he was the least perceptive man in history. And she intended to leave him in no doubt of that.

KEVIN WISHED he did have a string of adoring mistresses. They might have taken the edge off his desire, in which case he wouldn’t be responding to Alli Gardner like an overgrown adolescent.

He’d only been joking when he tossed her over his shoulder. He hadn’t intended to do anything except set her on her feet once they got in here.

Still, he understood Alli well enough not to let on what he was thinking. He pitied the man who ever became vulnerable to her, even by so much as an apology.

“Is this what you had in mind when you decided to drag me down on top of you?” he asked.

She sputtered. “I was trying to discourage you, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“I judge people’s intentions by their actions, and here we are,” he replied. “So if you’re curious about what those other ladies find so irresistible…”

“Kevin,” Alli said.

“Hmm?”

“I can’t breathe.”

“Sorry.” He rolled off. “Normally, I approach a lady with more finesse.”

She sat up, hair tangling around her face and her emerald top revealing a tantalizing strip of lean waistline. The sight of her made Kevin’s groin tighten harder, entirely against his will.

He wasn’t normally attracted to shoot-from-the-hip women. His type was more like Lisette, who, when it came to intimacies, had waited for him to make the first move, and the second and the third. He’d found her tantalizing at first, until he began to wonder if she ever experienced true passion.

Alli’s boldness tantalized him with possibilities. He’d be willing to bet she could match him every step of the way.