Black On Black (Quentin Black Mystery #3) Read Online Free PDF Page B

like it would be soon. He knew I was waiting for it. I figured maybe that night he’d crack, after dinner.
    Or tomorrow.
    A few days, tops.
    “Come on, doc,” he coaxed. “Don’t be mean.”
    “Mean?” I let out a half-amused snort, hanging the damp towel on the back of a nearby chair. “Says the guy who prefers the couch to having to sleep next to me.”
    I meant it as a joke but he winced.
    He didn’t avert his gaze though, or change expression for more than a blink. Rather, he motioned me over again, pulling on me somehow in that way of his, like invisible fingers coaxing me toward him from across the room.
    “I have my reasons,” he said cryptically. “But why don’t you come over here now, doc...   try and talk me into it again?”
    “Talk you into what?” I said, smiling.
    “Fucking,” he said, blunt. He seemed to feel me flinch. That heat coming off him intensified. “I think you’re starting to wear me down...   in fact, I’m pretty goddamned sure you are. I spent most of this morning fantasizing about you on that couch you were just complaining about...”
    I laughed, shaking my head. “Nope. I asked twice. It’s your turn, Black.”
    “Come on,” he said, his voice cajoling. “Third time’s the charm.”
    I let out another involuntary laugh.
    Walking over to him, I slid into his lap, curling my arms around his neck.
    A plume of heat left him as soon as I rested my weight. He closed his eyes, wrapping his arms around me in the robe. Tugging me deeper into his lap, he let out a contented-sounding sigh once I leaned against his chest, right before he rested his forehead against my shoulder. I could still feel the other thing on him though.
    “Are you okay?” I said, combing his hair with my fingers.
    I’d been asking him that a lot over those few days.
    Like most of those other times, he didn’t answer.
    Sighing a bit, I decided not to ask again.
    Leaning past him, I reached for the heavy-looking envelope sitting on the bed.
    He felt me and immediately stiffened––right before he dove for it, getting there just before me. Before I could try to get past him to wrestle it out of his fingers, he shoved the whole package across the bedspread. He shoved it hard enough that it fell off the edge of the bed, hitting the carpeted floor with a thud.
    When I frowned, starting to climb out of his lap to go after it, he gripped me tighter in his arms, holding me in place.
    “Leave it, Miri. Please.” He pressed his face to my neck. “Please, honey. Please.”
    “Black,” I said. “You need to tell me what’s going on.”
    He shook his head, his face still against my neck.
    Then he looked up. I saw the conflict in his gold eyes.
    Those lighter, almost translucent flecks seemed brighter somehow as I watched him study my face. I saw some part of him that may have wanted to tell me, to talk to me about whatever was bothering him...   to trust me with the truth.
    In the end, some other consideration overpowered whatever flicker of openness I saw there. The look in his eyes hardened. I saw the window close.
    I saw it, and I didn’t do anything.
    I didn’t even say anything.
    I was still watching his face when he pulled my mouth down to his.
    He kissed me tentatively at first...   then, after a bare few seconds, roughly. His hand tightened, clenching in my wet hair. Heat flared off him not long after we started, an intensity that hit at my muscles and joints, rising as he deepened the kiss, pulling me flush with his lap. He used his tongue and lips differently that time, more intimately somehow, almost like he was drinking from me...   an inexorable pull that stole my breath.
    Too much lived there. Enough that I should have been worried.
    More worried, I mean.
    Longing lived there. Desire. That strange pain-that-wasn’t-really-pain. Possessiveness. Emotions more subtle and better shielded from my mind. What might have been memory. I felt him wanting me...   wanting me almost violently,