Page 30 of Dangerous Secrets

Nick started slow, languid pulls and thrusts, lazy and leisurely, his chin nestling against her shoulder. Breathing relaxed and deep. Heart thumping hard and slow against her back. Muscles hard but not tense.

Experience told her that he was settling in for the long haul and could keep this up for hours. Recent experience. A lot of it.

She couldn’t keep it up for hours, though. No, in an instant her heart started racing, heat prickled in her veins, everywhere he touched her, inside her vagina, against her back. The musky smell of sex clouded the air. She was starting the slide . . .

The phone rang.

Nick stopped for a moment on the outstroke and Charity wanted to scream. So close, she was so close! She needed him back inside her, now. A whimper escaped her. Her thighs shook. She tightened around him and felt an answering surge.

The phone rang again. Nick was still, unmoving. What was he waiting for? His penis was barely in her, at her entrance and her sheath contracted sharply, anxious for him to fill her again.

The phone rang again.

It was just far enough away so that she couldn’t stretch out and turn cell off. If she reached for it, she would pull away from Nick’s penis. Unthinkable.

The phone rang again.

Her heart pounded, her lungs felt tight. She was shaking all over now. So close. She was so damned close?—

Her eye happened to fall on the big clock on her dresser drawer. Twelve fifteen. Past midnight. Who on earth?—

Suddenly, reality crashed in on Charity, chilling her.

The only person who would call her at that hour was Uncle Franklin. And there could only be one reason to call. He needed her.

Charity moved, pulling away entirely from Nick’s penis, worry rising in her like a dark tide, so overwhelming she didn’t even have time to mourn leaving his embrace.

“Sorry,” she gasped and lunged for the cell. Finally she could see the monitor. UNCLE FRANKLIN. “I have to get this.” How long had it been ringing? Was she too late?

“Hello?” her voice sounded breathless to her own ears.

“Charity?” Uncle Franklin’s soft, quavering voice sounded dim, as if he were speaking from the bottom of a well. Her anxiety ratcheted up a notch.

“Uncle Franklin? What’s wrong?”

Holding the handset between her ear and her shoulder, Charity scrambled to get dressed. Whatever had happened was bad. She needed her clothes for this. Panties—where Nick had thrown them in a corner. Pants—over a chair. Sweater—at the foot of the bed.

“Your aunt, honey. She’s gone. I don’t . . .” Uncle Franklin’s shaking voice drifted off, the last word said away from the phone.

“Uncle Franklin!” Charity’s voice was sharp with worry. “Where? Where has Aunt Vera gone?”

Silence.

Desperately hopping on one leg to pull on her pants, Charity spared a second to look out the bedroom window at the heavy sheets of snow falling from the sky. A delight while in bed with your secret lover. A nightmare for an elderly and confused woman.

Uncle Franklin’s voice came back, a little stronger. “I’m sorry, honey. I thought I saw her out the window, but I was mistaken.”

“How long has she been gone?” Boots. Charity looked around frantically for boots. She dived for the closet and pulled out a pair of waterproof boots, shaking with urgency.

“I-I d-don’t know.” Uncle Franklin’s voice shook so badly she could barely understand him. “I woke up and wanted a drink of water. But I’d forgotten to put my usual water bottle on my bedside table because we had a leak in the downstairs bathroom and I had to call in a plumber, and by the time he left, it was time for dinner and I just completely forgot.”

He could keep this up forever. For an instant, Charity mourned the Uncle Franklin she’d known all her life. Judge Franklin Prewitt, sharp-minded, sharp-tongued. Steely intelligence wrapped up in a take-no-nonsense demeanor. Rapier wit which he often flashed in court. Woe betide the defense attorney who hadn’t done his homework. He’d leave the courtroom with his hide in strips.

She saw that man less and less.

And Aunt Vera—elegant, ironic, well-read. Devotee of chamber music and the theater. Who read Rimbaud in French and Isabelle Allende in Spanish. That Aunt Vera was gone forever.

“I’ll g-go outside and l-look for her?—”

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