That made him laugh. “This weekend is the furthest thing from a waste I can imagine.”
“But you were going to get that done, and then I showed up. Torpedoed your real life.” This is way better than my real life.
But it reminded him that he had a real life, and he couldn’t pretend he didn’t. And if they were going to do something as official as have a first date, he had to make sure she knew what she was getting herself into.
“Get dressed,” he told her. “I’ve got something I need to tell you.”
* * *
He’d left her alone in the bathroom to get dressed. Who said, “I’ve got something to tell you,” and then fled the scene? That was bad manners.
In the empty, echoey bathroom, her feet cold against the ceramic floor tile, Nora’s vivid imagination had a field day.
I’m married. I’m an alcoholic. I’m a recovering ax murderer.
Maybe he had a few kids by a previous marriage. She could handle that.
But if it was really bad, she could still walk away, right? A midnight kiss, a few phone calls, some phone sex, plus the sex on the floor of his front hall and in the shower—surely she was not in so deep that she couldn’t extricate herself.
Surely.
She shook her head at herself. If it’s really bad, Nor, you need to walk away.
But all the other bits of her brain, the ones that should have said, Uh-huh! Yeah! We hear ya! We will!, were silent.
She stepped out of the master bath and into his bedroom, which occupied most of the upper floor of the house, under the eaves. Skylights everywhere, a low platform bed against the far wall. His quilt was black and white and the walls were gray, and—maybe it was the faint masculine scent of soap and aftershave—the room reminded her of men’s dress clothes. Of the excitement of seeing a finely dressed man appear before you when the last time you’d laid eyes on him he was a grubby guy in jeans.
Being with Miles felt that way all the time, she realized. The treat of his physical beauty, the way he was so assertively male. A lean grace to how he moved, how he spoke, how he treated her, his demeanor as pleasingly hard as male muscle.
Right now he was standing in the middle of his bedroom, wearing a pair of jeans low on his hips and nothing else, and that would be how she would fantasize about him tomorrow night when she was back in her bed by herself. Flat abs, the slanted ridge of muscle at his hips that dove under his waistband, the trail of curly dark hair that directed her gaze downward. And when she tore her focus from his crotch and looked back up, the planes of his pecs with their dusting of half curls. Her own nipples tightened, remembering how that hair had felt.
When her eyes finally met his, she found that he’d been watching her watch him, and her breath caught. But he shook his head, as if to say, Not now.
His face was so serious, it made her stomach hurt.
“I’m a suspect in a criminal investigation.”
Her vitals went nuts then, a flurry of manic heartbeat and tight chest and shallow breath, while her brain made fight-or-flight calculations. Door that way, large, well-muscled male between her and all exits. Oh, my God, what kind of self-destructive lunatic flies from Boston to Cleveland and enters a strange man’s house on her own?
“Nora, wait. Embezzlement. Embezzlement. I should have said that—”
“Oh, Jesus, don’t do that! I was thinking rape, assault, battery, serial murder of girls in shower stalls, where you scalp them and hang the scalps from your shower rod and—” Embezzlement. “Is embezzlement a felony?”
He pulled his shirt on, and his face popped out, grim.
“What they suspect me of is, yes. They suspect me of embezzling more than three hundred thousand dollars from the organization I work for.”
Three hundred thousand dollars. That was quite a hunk of change. Not murder or rape or assault, but a serious crime.
“Did you?”
She was surprised by how calm she felt, now that the painful adrenaline rush of a few moments ago had passed.
He’d looked away from her, into a far corner of the room, and there was a struggle behind his expression as he said, “No. But it’s messy. That’s why I’m taking the leave of absence. It wasn’t voluntary. I was suspended without pay. I had the best access, and the time frame of when I bought this house is suspicious. For a while my lawyer’s primary focus was on clearing me, but we’ve shifted to working on my defense, because he’s pretty sure I’m going to be charged, by the beginning of January at the latest. Unless they find another logical suspect.”
He said it matter-of-factly, but she saw in his eyes that this was the source of the sadness. There was nothing matter-of-fact in his feelings about the situation.