HE SURELY COULDN’T have meant what I was thinking. I had seen so many sides to Vesper Cross in the space of a couple of hours that it was starting to make my head spin.
Noah reached from the back and pointed over my shoulder. “His car is right up the street. There on the corner.”
At the end of the street, a thick cluster of police moved as a mass around a group of cars. Butler ducked into the middle vehicle. Some of the cops got aboard the SUVs front and back.
I knew that it was coming. I just got a sense of it. Still, the manner of it surprised me.
Two black vans rushed by and stopped to box the three cars in. The Kevlar-covered beetle barreled out of the one at the back. From the front of Butler’s car, two cops got out and stepped away. The car in front moved forward and the car behind moved back, leaving Commissioner Butler’s car isolated. All of the other cops backed away from the vehicles.
They all just stood still and watched. The rear window of Butler’s car rolled down and I caught a glimpse of the rage on his face. He must have seen what was coming. He had a gun pointed out. The Wrecker slung two grenades into the back of car and backed away.
I was still amazed at the speed he moved back into the van while Paul Butler’s car was enveloped in a pair of bright flashes, followed by a blossom of yellow, orange and red flame.
I was surprised at how level my voice was as Vesper asked, “Was that what you were thinking?”
I said, “You set him up. You turned him into a loose end and you knew they would dispose of him to fix the problem.”
“Damn, girl.” Noah voice was halfway between shock and admiration.
I laughed. “Welcome to the dark side.”
Her eyes were steady. “I remember the pictures of that young girl, Gina Haddon Tate. When she was alive, and after they found her. I rolled the dice but, inside, I really didn’t want to see him to get away with that.”
I asked her, “The other evidence, all of those files?”
“I’ll arrange for my old SAC in St Louis to come into possession of it. He’ll be able to sort the guilty from the innocent. I trust him.”
I didn’t hear Butler’s end of their conversation, but I thought I caught what was going on. “Did Butler say he had something on you?”
“He did. But it can’t be true. I mean, he may have something, but it would have to be fabricated. I’ve never done anything bad.”
That got a smile from Noah and me when I said, “Not until now.”
She even twinkled back. “This could be kind of a gray area.”
We took Noah to where he said his car was parked. It was a reinforced Hummer painted in dark urban camo. I shouldn’t have been surprised, but it was such a caricature it made me chuckle all the same.
He leaned back in the window to Vesper. “You kids fix up for any more adventures and exploits, give me a few day notice and I’ll get out of the country.” He slapped the roof of the car and his eyes sparkled at her. “You’ll be going back to being a good girl now I expect.” As he turned to leave, he hesitated then came over to my window.
He leaned down to ask me, “Did you ever figure out why that Russian wanted to put you and me together?”
“No, but I had an idea.”
“Me, too. Call me sometime, OK?”
I waved as he climbed up into his Hummer.
Vesper looked over at me. I figured this was about as far as our roads ran parallel. I regretted it, but there it was. Whatever I had felt for her, I hadn’t ever been sure that I could trust her. I wondered if she didn’t feel the same way about me. I surprised myself, thinking what a shame it was, to let such a great woman walk out of my life.
But there it was. I held out a hand to her as I said, “Well, don’t think it hasn’t been fun, Special Agent Cross.”
“I’m starving,” she said. “Know where I could get a decent salt beef sandwich on rye?”
“Mustard?”
“English.”
“Pickles?”
“Sweet.”
“You got good taste in a sandwich.”
“Come to think of it, mountain man, that’s not all I’ve got good taste in.”
That look in her eye, I still remember it. The thought of it still makes me hard, too.
I drove into an underground parking lot, near the deli on Broadway.
Just as I was about to get out, she leaned across. “Horse,” and she put her hand to my face. Her fingers turned my jaw. Pulled me to her. Her kiss was soft, soulful and tender, but strong. And long.
It made me ache to know that I was losing her. No woman had made me feel this way before. And I knew that no woman was going to make me feel the way that she did, ever again. However inconvenient and uncontrollable these feelings were, it hurt to know that after today, I wouldn’t feel them again.
Her hand slid down my trunk and I pulled her closer to me, but she peeled her lips away from mine. My cock was rigid. It stood and ached for her.
Her voice was playful, with an edge. “There’s something I need.”
The tips of her fingers stroked my jaw, my chin, my cheeks and my neck. Meanwhile, her other hand opened my belt and the front of my pants.
As she slipped her hand into my shorts, her eyes flashed and her tongue flicked along the width of her wicked grin. She sighed as she opened her shirt and reached in to feel her skin, her trembling pulse and the warm softness of her breasts.
She hauled my cock free and it jumped to stand, tall, hard and proud. Her eyes widened as she licked her lips again. Her fingers slid down to the base of it and she squeezed, staring at it, with her eyes glistening.
Her mouth moved as her fingers held and squeezed the hardening pole. My need for her grew inside me as she looked and sighed with such marvel. I cupped and held the swelling loveliness of her breasts. My fingers drew little gasps from her as I circled her hardening nipples.
When she leaned down, her hands pulled and rubbed the skin, held and stretched it and slid down to stroke and weigh my balls. The warm breath of her voice fanned my twitching cock. “How will I ever get used to you?”
Always the surprise. My whole world flipped. Again. I thought that, like me, she was getting geared up for the farewell firework display. The longing, never again beats and thrusts, the closing climaxes. The finale fuck. I was quite into the idea. In a bittersweet kind of a way. I’m not a bittersweet kind of a guy, not usually, but with Vesper, it seemed, doors had opened to a different kind of Horse.
The light sensation, the first brush of her breath ignited me. My head slammed back into the seat and shook from side to side when he planted her lips on the head it, her tender, wet mouth stretched over the thick shaft. I couldn’t stop my hips from rolling. I held back.
I didn’t want her to choke. Not unless that was her thing. I hadn’t ever thought about that before. She made me go all kinds of places for the first time. And now this would be the last. The last of our first times.
No woman took me in her mouth like Vesper did.
She had to stretch just to get her lips all the way around it. Then, as she slid down along the pulsing length of hot ridges, her tongue slipped down along it, lapped and drew it deeper.
I watched in amazement and swelling joy as her lovely face slid down my shaft, down until her mouth gushed on me. Until my head was nuzzled all the way back in her mouth. Until I felt the back of her tongue and the slope of the back of her throat.
Her lips were stretched wide and almost halfway down my shaft. She made a push and I felt her slip me into the soft, wet grip of her throat. A gasp vibrated from her and into my thick pole.
She pressed farther, deeper. Feeling her surround and hold me, seeing myself swallowed whole, it was a fight to keep my hips from bucking right into her. When her lips reached the very base and she sucked, slowly, all the way back up, I let out a moan.
My fingers ran into her hair and through it. I held her gently. My body wanted to shove her, to push her head down once more. I knew she would like that, but her mouth felt so good on me, and I got a charge out of feeling her hunger. Her urge. Her desperate need.