Blindsided, Deo reacted by instinct. She grabbed Nita’s ass and dug her fi ngers in, urging Nita to pump faster between her spread thighs.

When Nita yanked Deo’s shirt from her jeans, shoved both hands up underneath, and squeezed her breasts, Deo’s clit expanded and pulsed.

She jerked her head away and Nita whimpered a protest.

“Keep it up and I’m gonna have to come,” Deo warned, trying to focus enough to see if they were still alone in the dark bend of the lane.

• 139 •

RADCLY fFE

“Oh yes,” Nita grated, pinching and twisting both nipples hard.

“Yes.”

“Fuck it.” Deo’s vision wavered and she closed her eyes. Only the wall at her back and the weight of Nita’s body pinning her to it kept her upright.

Nita plunged her tongue back into Deo’s mouth, distantly aware of Deo groaning, coming or trying not to, she couldn’t tell—all she knew was the fearful pounding low in her belly. She keened as it clawed at her, tearing her insides to shreds. Then, mercifully, the spasms erupted deep in her sex and, throwing back her head, she shouted triumphantly.

“Yes.”

Nita orgasmed twice in rapid succession, riding one peak right into the next, her mind wiped clean by blazing sensation. At last, she sagged against Deo and fought to control her rioting body. If she kissed Deo again right now she thought she might come just from tasting her. She had to stop before she tried to strip her naked on the street.

Deo’s arms trembled around her waist, and her chest heaved as if she were drowning. The part of Nita’s mind still functioning recoiled at the irony—she had meant to walk off her relentless lust for Deo, but she’d ended up assuaging it with Deo’s body.

“I’m sorry,” Nita murmured, pushing herself upright. “You didn’t ask for that. That was inexcusable of me.”

“I’m not complaining,” Deo gasped. “I’m not even sure what happened.”

“Did you even come?”

“I don’t know, I think so.” Deo’s head was still reeling, and she felt as if she had been hardwired into Nita’s nervous system and then electrocuted. “When you came it felt like I was coming, too, but I don’t know if I really was. Jesus, what did you do?”

“It’s been a long time. I lost control.”

When Nita tried to pull away, Deo tightened her grip on Nita’s hips. “What happened to you never wanting to be in the same country as me?”

“Apparently, I was mistaken.”

Deo waited until two shadowy fi gures, laughing softly, passed by arm in arm. “Who is Sylvia?”

“What?” Nita’s face fl amed when she realized she must have called Sylvia’s name. “I owe you a tremendous apology. I’m very sorry.”

• 140 •

Winds of Fortune

“It happens,” Deo said with a nonchalance she didn’t feel. She’d worried a time or two that she wouldn’t remember the name of the woman under her or inside her, but she’d never cared enough about anyone to cry her name in those few moments of complete and total surrender. Feeling irrationally jealous, she pulled Nita back between her legs. “I get that she’s a lover. What else?”

“It’s not relevant.” Nita gripped Deo’s wrists and pushed away.

To her surprise, Deo released her. Free, she had nowhere to go and, instead, stayed where she was.

“Don’t you think I deserve a little more than that, seeing how I just stood in for her?” Deo tucked in her shirt and started to walk toward Bradford.

Where Nita expected anger, she heard resignation, and that made her feel almost worse than anything else that had transpired in the last few disastrous moments. She owed Deo an explanation, since she wouldn’t accept an apology, and she fell into step. “She’s an ex-lover.”

“That part I fi gured out.”

Nita hesitated. She hadn’t told anyone, ever. Because she couldn’t.

And Deo was the last person she wanted to tell, because she hadn’t been thinking about Sylvia. Not consciously. It hadn’t been thoughts of Sylvia that had kept her awake the last few nights and it hadn’t been Sylvia in that bar making her half crazy because another woman had her hands all over her. That had been Deo. And only Deo. But she knew the two were tangled up in her mind, and worse, in her body.

She was grateful for the dark, because all she could see was the glint of moonlight in Deo’s eyes and the outline of her face. And she was thankful that Deo would not be able to see the shame in hers.

“Sylvia is the wife of my brother’s partner and the biggest mistake I ever made in my life.”

“Wait…your brother’s gay and his partner has a wife?”

Nita laughed mirthlessly. “No. My brother’s a cop and his partner on the force is Sylvia’s husband.”

“That sounds like a tricky situation.”

“It’s a cardinal sin. No one messes with a cop’s wife. If I’d been a man, they probably would have taken me somewhere and beaten me until I wished I were dead.” Nita sighed. “Since they couldn’t do that, they cast me out.”

• 141 •

RADCLY fFE

“Your brother?”

“My whole family. They’re all on the force and they all know.

Half the force knows. Sylvia and I were…indiscreet.” Sylvia had demanded sex when they were at a retirement party for one of Nita’s father’s friends. She couldn’t say no, she’d never been able to say no, and Sylvia’s husband had walked into a downstairs bathroom while Sylvia was taking her against the wall. Sylvia hadn’t stopped fucking her despite her husband’s outraged shout, and Nita had climaxed while he watched. “We all pretend it didn’t happen, but everyone is happier if I keep my distance.”

“Jesus. What about her? You still see her?”

“God, no. Even without the uproar from my family, Sylvia…

Sylvia told her husband I had seduced her. He believed her, because he loved her.”

“I guess you did too.”

“Believed her, or loved her? Neither.” Nita stopped walking.

She had said all there was to say. She had been unable to resist what Sylvia made her feel, and after tonight she couldn’t even lie to herself any longer. She still hungered for it. The wild passion, the consuming pleasure, the mind-melting burn of orgasm as it swept through her. Her weakness humiliated her. “I don’t expect you to do the renovations now.”

“Why not?” Deo studied Nita in the light of cars passing behind them. “I’m not angry.”

“You should be.”

“Why? Because we fucked when we both wanted to?” Deo shrugged, feigning calm. If Nita walked away with this between them, she’d never get close to her again, and she wanted to now, more than ever. Not just because of the sex, which had been unlike anything she’d ever experienced. But because she knew what it was like to pull a family apart, to be pushed aside and abandoned in payment for her sins. “That’s business. This is what it is.”

“What it is, is over.”

“All right,” Deo said, forcing herself to leave when she wanted to protest. When she wanted Nita naked in her bed, calling her name when she went blind with pleasure. “I’ll call you when I’m ready to start work.”

• 142 •

Winds of Fortune

Nita watched Deo walk away and want twisted through her. She despaired of ever forgetting the feel and taste of her. Hard muscles and tight-nippled breasts. Hot whiskey and sunshine. Oh God, what have I done?

• 143 •

• 144 •

Winds of Fortune

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Tory tucked the chart from the last patient under her arm and paused when she saw the light fi ltering from beneath Nita’s closed door. It had to be close to ten p.m., and despite taking the day shift all week, Nita had been in the offi ce every night until after Tory had left. It had been so busy, they had done little more than pass one another in the hall, but the few times they’d spoken, Tory had noticed that Nita seemed tense and preoccupied. It wasn’t her nature to interfere, but she hoped they were becoming friends. She knocked on the closed door.

“Come in,” Nita called.

“It’s just the middle of July,” Tory pointed out with a smile. “If you keep it up, you’re not going to make it to Labor Day.”

“I don’t think paperwork is going to kill me,” Nita said, “although there have been times I’ve wanted to kill myself if I had to fi ll out one more insurance form.”

Tory laughed and settled into the chair across from Nita’s desk. “I know. I just wanted you to know I don’t expect you to work eighteen hours a day. You’re doing a great job. I’m really glad you’re here.”

“Thanks.” Nita fl ushed with an unexpected surge of gratitude at the affection in Tory’s voice. Until the debacle with Sylvia the year before, her sister Lena had been her closest friend and confi dant. Now when they spoke at all, it was strained and coldly formal. “So am I. I know we don’t have to decide anything right away, but I already know I want to stay.”

“Good. Then we agree.” Tory tapped the fi le against the edge of the desk and pretended to frown. “In which case I defi nitely don’t want you overworking. It’s Friday night. Shouldn’t you be taking advantage of all the hundreds of women in town?”

Tory’s tone was playful rather than suggestive. Still, Nita stared down at the desk to hide her reaction, because she had been considering just that for the last few hours. The brief, frantic sex she’d had with Deo

• 145 •

RADCLY fFE

had completely turned her inside out. She couldn’t stop thinking about it, about her, and she was as terrifi ed as she was on edge. It was just like the way it had been with Sylvia. She craved the taste of her, the feel of her, and she was constantly aroused. She’d talked to Deo on the phone twice during the week to approve the purchase of materials, and just the sound of her voice had left her wanting to come. It was worse in person.

She’d seen her once when she stopped by the house in the evening. She hadn’t expected Deo to be around that late but she had still been there, checking on the early stages of the project. The sight of her had made her wet and, afraid that Deo would read the lust in her eyes, she’d made some excuse and escaped as soon as possible.

Tonight she had been thinking that if she wore herself out with someone else, a stranger, she could get Deo out of her system. Maybe that’s what she should have done with Sylvia, instead of allowing Sylvia to control her. Instead of meeting Sylvia in some roadside motel every time she called, instead of letting Sylvia walk into the hospital and fuck her in an empty examining room or stairwell or supply closet any time she wanted. Instead of biting into her own fl esh to still her screams while Sylvia went down on her at a family barbecue with Sylvia’s husband just outside the open bedroom window, playing baseball with her brother and the other cops. Sylvia had craved the risk and Nita had craved Sylvia’s relentless, insatiable hunger for her.

Shuddering from the memories, she said hoarsely, “Maybe. Maybe I should.”

She must have given something away in her voice, because Tory tilted her head and regarded her with concern. “Something wrong?”

“No.” Nita feigned a smile. “A case of the blues, that’s all. I think I’ll feel better when I’m settled. I feel like my entire life is packed in boxes.”

“Are things underway at the house?”

“Yes,” Nita said curtly, and then, realizing how that sounded, went on, “Deo has a crew working outside on the roof and the windows and another inside redoing electrical.” She hoped her voice hadn’t trembled when she said Deo’s name, because she hadn’t felt quite steady. “Before long, I’ll be able to live there.”

“You’re not going to try living there while they’re still renovating, are you? God, Reese tried that when she fi rst moved here, and after a few weeks the constant disruption really started to get to her.” Tory

• 146 •

Winds of Fortune

smiled. “Fortunately, I got her to move in with me.”

“I’m sure that wasn’t diffi cult,” Nita said, hoping to change the subject.

“Harder than you might think. I wasn’t too trusting of relationships at the time and Reese…Reese had never been in one.” Tory shook her head. “God, we were a pair.”

“It’s funny,” Nita mused almost to herself, “when you see a solid couple you think that things have always been that way. That they never had issues to work out.”

“We’re solid,” Tory said. “As solid as any two people can be, but we certainly have issues.” She sighed. “I never expected Iraq. I don’t remember Vietnam, and who really imagines a war like this?”

“Where are things with that now?”

Tory grimaced. “Nelson’s illness has just about eclipsed everything else, and now Reese is working double and sometimes triple shifts. We haven’t really talked about it.”