chance of Max Matheson allowing either one to grant Jet the right to move his grandson to D.C. is zero. Jet is a brilliant attorney, but even she has found no way to cut the knot that binds her to her old life.
At a quarter till four, Jet walks out of my woods with her usual long-limbed grace. She’s no longer wearing the sundress she had on earlier, but dark slacks and a white blouse. I’m not sure at first whether she realizes I’m watching her from the patio. The steamer chaise sits lower than my other chairs, which probably does a lot to conceal me. But she knows. She announces this by unbuttoning her blouse as she crosses the grass, then shrugging it off her shoulders and letting it fall as she walks on. Ten steps farther across the freshly mown field, her bra drops to the ground. I assumed she would show up in a very different mood, ready to comfort me for the loss of Buck and discuss the implications of Paul’s suspicion. She may do that yet. But if so, she means to do it naked. By the time she’s ten yards from the patio, she’s wearing nothing but the silver pendant necklace and sapphire earrings I saw at the groundbreaking.
“Sorry I’m late,” she says, standing over the chaise with an expression I cannot read. “I had a couple of issues.”
“It’s okay,” I reply, starting to get up.
She holds up one long-fingered hand in a stop gesture. “Did I make a mistake with my clothes?”
I shake my head, reach up with my right hand.
Instead of taking it, she turns away, cups the cheeks of her bottom in each hand, and pulls them apart. The sight is shockingly erotic. “Are you going to invite me to sit down?” she asks.
“Please sit down.”
She looks back over her shoulder and smiles at last. “Why don’t you get those pants off first?”
Chapter 18
Ten minutes ago, Jet sat astride me on the steamer chaise and worked with focused intensity, reaching her first release in two minutes. Then, with barely a pause, she started again, the second time making sure that I fell into rhythm with her, so that I would finish when she did. A sheen of sweat shone on her dark chest, and her eyes dilated as they sometimes do, losing focus as she approached her second orgasm. Her hands gripped my shoulders, her nails dug painfully into the skin, but I made no sound of complaint.
Afterward, she fell forward and nestled her face in my neck without speaking. Given Buck’s murder, this isn’t what I’d expected of our first few minutes alone, but it’s what I needed. Talking to Quinn took a lot out of me, and the last thing I wanted from Jet was more talk. For her part, carrying on an affair in her hometown is exhausting. Each rendezvous requires a carefully planned escape from the tyranny of routine, involving excuses, outright lies, occasional car changes, and constant vigilance. Unexpected crises like Buck’s murder only add to the burden. But why talk about it? Words become superfluous when every cell in your body is telling you to leap into the frantic fusion of sex and discharge all your anxiety in one frenzied rush.
After breathing into my neck for a couple of minutes, she says, “Are you really okay?”
“I’m kind of freaked out, honestly.”
“Because of Buck? Or Paul?”
“Both. But seeing Buck pulled out of that river started it.”
She flattens her hands on the frame of the chaise and presses herself up far enough to look into my eyes. “You saw his body?”
I nod.
“Bad?”
“Bad enough.”
She lowers her head and kisses my forehead. “I never told you this, but when Paul and I first moved back to Bienville, I ran into Buck one day at LaSalle Park. We sat on a bench and talked for a while, just him and me. This was before I’d had Kevin. In his shy and courtly way, Buck told me that he’d always believed you and I would end up together.”
“What did you say?”
“I told him that I’d always loved you, but it just wasn’t in the stars.” Jet laughs, her eyes shining. “How’s that for cliché?”
“I guess Buck was right after all.”
“You bet your ass he was. And I’ve never been happier to be wrong.”
“I thought you were never wrong.”
She pinches the soft flesh inside my left thigh, and I curse in pain. Before I can pay her back, she flips off the