Spontaneous - Brenda Jackson [45]
“Anything else?”
“I spoke to Chev. He’s meeting with prison officials today to request time with Stein Green. Hopefully, the man will be cooperative. In the meantime, I’ve located a current address for Edward’s old girlfriend. She still lives in the area, so I think I’ll pay her a visit. I’ll let you know what I find out.”
From the first, Landon had assumed the disappearance of Villarosas’s second wife was a hit job, a good old-fashioned murder for hire. And if that was the case, it was probably the same for Edward’s first wife, as well. But without a concrete motive or a dead body, the police hadn’t been able to come up with anything that would stick.
Duan couldn’t wait to hear whatever Chevis could get from that guy in prison. Was he the man Mandy had met up with that day? Had he been a lover or an assassin?
“Villarosas and I are going fishing tomorrow,” Duan said. “I’m going to engage him in a lot of conversation, but I don’t expect him to say much. He’s been pretty tight-lipped around me.”
“Yeah, but there’s that one chance he might lower his guard and say something meaningful.”
“If I can be so lucky,” Duan said.
“Well, with all of us working on this, something has to give sooner or later,” Landon replied.
Duan certainly hoped it was sooner. He and Kim were supposed to leave next Sunday and he knew she had no intention of doing that without letting her mother know about their suspicions of Villarosas, proof or not.
“Let’s hope so,” he said.
Moments later, he ended the call and softly opened the door to walk out of the bathroom. But he paused when he immediately picked up the scent of a woman. His woman.
His heartbeat thundered in his chest. This was the second time he’d thought of her as his woman. But then, he would be the first to say his relationship with Kim was rather unique. What was supposed to have been a one-night stand had evolved into something a lot more. The thought of them parting ways on Sunday sent something plummeting deep in his gut. He couldn’t imagine a day of not seeing her, not being with her.
He glanced across the room and saw her standing at the window. She had put on his T-shirt and had her back to him, unaware he had come out of the bathroom. That gave him a chance to just stand there and stare at her, feeling his body getting aroused in the process.
Like most men, he’d always had a pretty healthy sexual appetite, but with Kim his craving for sex was downright voracious, as insatiable as it could get. She would tempt him to no end, and the more she did, the more ravenous he became. But with her there were other things that turned him on, as well. Like the way she would lean into a kiss whenever his mouth descended on hers, and the way she would smile at him for no reason at all.
Then there was the way she would open up to him whenever she told him about her past. She had allowed him to feel the pain of her childhood, and miraculously, he had allowed her to feel the pain of his, which was something he hadn’t ever done with any woman. His relationship with his mother—or his lack of one—was something he’d kept bottled up inside him. But with Kim the conversation had come easily and without any anger or feelings of guilt.
And with Kim he could have fun, like the time they’d gone fishing in the Keys on Terrence’s boat, and earlier today at the fair. With a host of other folks around them, they had strolled from ride to ride, vendor to vendor, and for a few hours he had forgotten that their attachment to each other had been nothing but a show. For that period of time their relationship had seemed real.
Then there was the time when they had sat together on a bench waiting for her mother and Villarosas to get off one of the rides. He and Kim had shared a bag of cotton candy, and he’d gotten turned on watching her tongue dart out of her mouth to lick away the sticky and sweet confection from her lips. Unable to resist, he had leaned