foot in his hands, rubbing the arch in a massage that felt so good.
He pressed a kiss where he was massaging before moving his lips slowly up her leg. He kissed the edge of her panties, just over her navel before moving up her body to pop her breasts from the top of her bra right before closing his mouth over one of them. She rubbed herself against his jean-clad body and reached for his button. He quickly yanked her panties off before he removed his clothes with an economy of moves that was very much appreciated. And then he took his good sweet time expressing himself.
Trace went back to the cooking school after their fabulous lunch break. Ember went to work on her book and was just getting into the scene when her phone rang. She wasn’t going to answer it until she saw that it was Lena. Her stomach dropped, even as she felt joy that Lena was finally returning her calls.
“Hello.”
“Ember, it’s Lena.” She paused for a moment, then said, “Look, I’m sorry I haven’t called you, I’ve just been busy with my own stuff.”
“I understand.”
“How was the wedding?”
Maybe it was silly, but Ember couldn’t help her smile. “It was beautiful.”
“You’re happy, right?”
“I am. How about you?”
“I’m getting there. You were right about Todd. I know that now and I’m sorry.”
Progress, Ember thought. “Thanks for saying that.”
There was a moment of silence. “I’m really calling you at Dane’s request.”
Ember totally didn’t see that coming. “Dane?”
“I know. He was high and his judgment was seriously off. He’s the first to admit it.”
Ember couldn’t help the anger she felt remembering the night he’d dragged her from Sapphire with the intention of . . . she didn’t even want to think about it.
“You have every right to hate him, but he asked that I pass something on to you.”
Only out of curiosity as to what Dane could possibly think she’d find interesting, Ember said, “Okay.”
“He knows the cops are looking at Seth for Heidi’s murder, but he knows for a fact that she was blackmailing someone in his family and, though he doesn’t know who for sure, he thinks it was his dad.”
Ember couldn’t deny Dane’s timing was impeccable, but why would he want her to know this? She asked Lena.
“Heidi and Dane had a little blackmailing deal going on. Small potatoes, pretty harmless stuff and not very big payouts, but Heidi escalated it. She wouldn’t tell him how she’d come to know certain things. So when she took the blackmailing to the next level, Dane stepped back. He’s concerned the killer doesn’t know that.”
“And he’s worried the killer may come after him,” Ember finished.
“Yeah, the more people looking into who stood to gain the most with Heidi’s death, the sooner the killer will be caught.”
“Why doesn’t he just go to the cops?”
“Fear of his family. And since he knows from Heidi that you have a PI in your family, he figured you were the next best thing.”
“I don’t know how much we can help, but I’ll pass the information along.”
“I better go.”
“Okay, thanks for the information and the call.”
“Yeah. I’ll talk to you later.”
Lena hung up before Ember had a chance to reply. She stared at her phone for a long time in mild shock, wondering if perhaps that was a step toward them being friends again, and then she called her uncle and relayed the news.
I contacted Belinda Carmichael, the senator’s estranged wife. It took some time to get through to her. Her sister Lily is a hell of a guard dog and when I finally was able to speak to Belinda, she wasn’t any more helpful. I suspect that was because of fear, but of what I am not sure,” Josh said to Lucien at lunch. “She painted a picture of her husband as a serial adulterer, though I suspect she was exaggerating his affairs because there’s a lot of bitterness there; but nothing she told me would be profitable for a blackmailer. She had threatened to leave, but it was the judge who objected because of how that would look to the public.”
“And yet she left. How did that happen?” Lucien asked.
“Apparently she had something to use as leverage against him and he agreed to let her go. The cost of her leaving was giving up her son and maintaining her family’s silence about whatever she had on him.”
“So maybe Heidi learned whatever it was Belinda had on the judge,” Lucien concluded.