Tease Me

She’d lost her home, too, along with her car, her clothes, her computer, hundreds of dollars in beauty supplies and equipment, and all her savings.

She swallowed hard and blinked back tears, tilting her head so they’d drain inward, but it was no use. They spilled over her lids. She swiped them off her cheeks and sucked in a breath that turned into a choked noise way too close to a sob. She jumped out of her chair, thinking to head to the living room to keep Jackson from seeing her dissolve completely.

But he caught her upper arms. “You get to cry, Heidi. You got the rug yanked out from under you. It’s okay.” He pulled her into his arms for a hug—the kind given to a sorrowing friend.

For just a heartbeat, she let herself enjoy the sensation of his broad chest under her cheek, his bay rum and warm man smell, his fingers splayed across her shoulder blades.

But that only delayed the inevitable. She backed away fast. “It is a shock, that’s for sure. But I’ll figure out what to do and where to go…and everything.” Her voice faded as the enormity of her problem sank in.

“You can stay here,” he said with a shrug. “Until you figure it out.”

She froze. Stay here? Her first reaction was relief. That had been the plan, right? This was supposed to be her place. But she couldn’t impose on Jackson, no matter how sincere his offer. “Thanks, but I’ll get a hotel or something.”

“With what?” He looked at her doubtfully.

Good point. She had no money and no credit cards.

“Do you know anyone in Phoenix?”

“My new boss. I’m working at a hair salon. Just part-time, since I’m a student really. Going to ASU…” With no tuition money. And she didn’t exactly want her first words to Blythe to be, “Can I sleep in one of your salon chairs?”

She could call her brothers. On her first day? Three hours after her escape? She didn’t even have bus fare to get home, if she were willing to give up. Which she was not. She swallowed across a dry throat.

If she stayed with Jackson, did that make her weak or merely practical? She needed to know before she said yes.

The doorbell rang. “That’s the police,” she said, delaying her decision. “Maybe they found my car.” She didn’t need the doubt in Jackson’s dark eyes to tell her she was dreaming. She needed something to cling to. Her new life had just taken off down the road without her.

2

JACKSON WATCHED HEIDI race toward the entry hall, around the corner from the living room, the tight bounce of her backside distracting him a bit. He heard the door open and her say, “Did you find my car?” with too much hope in her voice.

He didn’t catch the mumbled response, but her “oh” was so dejected he felt it in his bones. Hell, the car was chopped or halfway to Mexico by now.

She could stay with him for a few days easy. Probably she had family who would come fetch her, poor thing. Though she’d jutted that pixie chin and blinked back tears so fiercely, he figured she’d take some convincing to call them.

She led the cops to the living room where he stood and she cleared the couch for them as though she already lived here. “Were you making coffee, Jackson?” she said. She had a husky voice like that woman on Cheers. Kirstie Alley, wasn’t that her name? It sort of locked into him like invisible hooks on a cholla cactus spine.

“Right. Sure.” He’d have to talk her into staying—for her own good. He sometimes let the girls from Moons live with him when they had troubles with boyfriends or landlords. You always have to be the hero. That’s what his ex, Kelli, said about him. Everybody’s big brother, nobody’s one and only.

What was the point in fighting his nature? If someone needed help, he helped. Period.

These days, maybe, he was the last person who should offer though. His radio station—his dream—had gone belly-up after six months, taking everything he had, everything his parents had given him. He’d thrown it out as stupidly as Heidi leaving the keys in her car. Only he’d written Take Me in shoe polish on the windshield.

To cut his losses and keep expenses down, he’d sold his house in Scottsdale and moved into his rental town house—supposedly investment income. Yeah, right.

But he wouldn’t think about that now. Now he’d brew some java for the sprite in the living room who was about to hear the cops weren’t likely to recover a hubcap.

Leaning over the coffeemaker, he got a blast of scent from his shirt, where Heidi had pressed her face. Flowers and something tropical and it made him go soft inside. She’d sort of folded into him, then stiff-armed herself away—not offended by the hug. More as if she didn’t dare let herself feel better.

He pinched up some fabric and took a big sniff. Mmm. Made him think of down pillows and that lip gloss girls wore in middle school, when the first wave of testosterone had knocked him to the sand. Those middle-school girls. Batting their lashes, pursing their lips, jiggling those curves—not fully aware of their power over him and the other hapless boys under their spell.

Heidi was hot that way. With big eyes that shimmered blue—like the metallic paint on the Corvette he’d rebuilt. She had some stare on her—innocent and all-knowing both.

At least Kelli wasn’t around to give him grief about taking in another stray. She’d cut out right after the station folded and her departure hadn’t hurt as much as it should have. He’d been kind of distant. Still was, he guessed. Gigi had stayed here for ten days and he’d turned her down flat. That wasn’t like him.

But his neutrality would make Heidi feel safe, he hoped.

How could he get her to stick around? She’d hitchhike or sleep in the bus station before she’d take charity or money, he’d bet.

Listening to the coffee hiss into the pot, he watched a fly take a lazy header into a blob of ketchup on the counter. The place was a sty lately, true. Comfortable, but messy. The kind of messy women loved to straighten out….

So she could be, like, a housekeeper. He’d trade cleaning for rent. She’d go for that, he’d bet. She seemed to have a lot of energy. And a cute little jiggle. Mmm. He felt a strange zing. As if something in him was waking up.

She’s your guest, man. Or soon would be. Shut it down.

When the coffee was ready, he loaded the pot and some mugs onto a pizza box and carried it all out to Heidi and the cops.

Heidi stood to help, but when she caught sight of the mugs, she sucked in a breath, then swooped them up, hiding them against her chest.

“What the…?” he said.

Keeping her back to the cops, she raised one mug—a gimmee from the opening of the Toy Box sex boutique, it showed a topless girl—and frowned before she bustled off.

Like the cops would care.

He made small talk with them while she rattled around in the kitchen, finally returning with two white mugs from Moons. If the cops recognized the bar name they’d think worse thoughts than over a couple of naked chests, but the slivered moon design looked innocent enough.

They all sat and drank, while the cops took down Heidi’s statement, and Jackson wondered what kind of a roommate Heidi would be. If tits on cups freaked her out, she’d hate his decor. What if she was a neat freak? Was he ready to never find his stuff where he had put it? Prepared to have the newspaper tossed out before he read it? And no hot water whatsoever? What was it with women and baths, anyway?

At least Gigi had been a slob like him.

Maybe he could get one of the girls at Moons to let Heidi stay with her. Not the best influence, though, the girls. And Heidi struck him as a babe in the woods.

The detectives finished the interview and Jackson walked them to the door. He returned to find Heidi slumped on the couch, elbows on her knees, chin in her palms, looking as though she’d just been turned down by the last foster family in town.

“Maybe you’ll get some stuff back,” he said to cheer her.

“Maybe.” She lifted the pizza box with the coffee crap and climbed to her feet, moving as if the weight of the world rested on her shoulders. “I’ll clean this up, make a few calls and get going.”

“Hold on a sec,” he said to stop her. “Now that you mention cleaning…I was thinking maybe you’d help me out.”

“Excuse me?”

“You can see I need a housekeeper.”

She looked around the room and gave a droll smile. “You think?”

“So, how about I trade you a room for cleaning? Save me calling a service.”

She seemed to doubt his intentions. “Thanks, anyway, Jackson. I’ll ask my boss about…options.” She snatched her lip between her teeth, looked toward the sofa.

He noticed a basket of nachos on the arm. They looked pretty gross—the cheese shriveled and an unnatural orange. “If you weren’t here, I might actually eat those,” he said.

She turned shocked eyes on him. “You wouldn’t!”

“Take the job. Save a life.”

She smiled, then studied him, scrunching up her short nose and the freckles like sprinkled cinnamon that decorated it. “What were you planning to pay?”

Hell, what was the going rate? “Twenty bucks an hour?” he threw out. “Thirty?”

She frowned, ferreting out ulterior motives. “Not more than twenty. Let’s see…I was going to pay Tina three-fifty a month for the room. It would take maybe six hours to clean up the first time, three after that. At twenty an hour, that’s…sheesh…not even close to rent.” She looked suddenly ill.

“Don’t sweat the money now. Get back on your feet and we’ll work it out.”

She sank back to the sofa in despair, jarring the nacho basket, which landed on her lap upside down.

“Damn!” She swept the chips back into the container, leaving a grease spot and a smear of hot sauce on her tan shorts, nicely tight across her thighs. She must work out.

She scrubbed at the spots. “These are the only clothes I own.” Her husky voice cracked and wobbled with the motion and she was chewing her lip raw again.

“There are some clothes in the spare room.” Gigi was careless about her clothes, as well as her men, her rent and her job. “They’re yours.”

She looked guilty and relieved—like a person who’d screwed up her courage to make her first sky dive, but gotten a bad-weather out and taken it.

“Come on,” he said, holding out a hand. “It would have been your room anyway, if Deirdre hadn’t screwed up.” And he hadn’t gone broke and had to move into his rental property.

She held his gaze, a million thoughts behind her eyes. Doubts, hope, worry, but mostly relief. Then she gave him her hand. The contact made them both go still. A surprising jolt skimmed through him. It had hit her, too, he guessed by the color in her face and the way she blinked her big eyes at him.

Then she collected herself, gripped more firmly and yanked herself up, as if he’d boosted her onto a high step, but now she was in charge. He’d felt the heat, though. It lingered like a whisper in his ear.

He led the way to the room and she padded behind. In the doorway, he waved her forward. She looked around, a little daunted. The room was pretty jammed. He’d kept some of the station’s sound equipment and shoved it in here with his own amps, bass and keyboard. There were unpacked boxes from his house—albums, CDs, books, tools, car parts and miscellaneous junk he hadn’t missed in the three weeks he’d been living here. Framed posters and photographs he hadn’t yet hung rested against the walls.

Even the bed was piled high—blues records he’d been sorting for a set at the bar. Though he didn’t have his father’s talent, he had an ear and he used it however he could.

“Wow,” she said, studying the wall of equipment and CDs. She turned to him. “You’re a musician?”

“I fool around. Play a little. I DJ at the bar I manage sometimes.” The customers came for the girls, not the music, but what the hell. He kept up with the local music scene, too. Followed new bands, hung out at recording studios, and played back-up bass or keyboard when he could.

“You manage a bar? How interesting.”

“Sure.” He started to tell her about Moons, then thought better of it. “Check out the clothes.” He opened the closet and picked out the first dress—fake snakeskin, pretty much a shrink-wrap job that had barely covered Gigi’s substantial rack. Heidi didn’t have much up top, but the dress was tight, so she could keep it in place. He held it up to her. “This’ll work.”

She blushed and shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

“You’d look hot.” Every woman wanted to hear that stuff. Truth was, the thought of her wiggling into it made his throat clog. He cleared it.

“Thanks, anyway.” She put the hanger firmly back in place.

“There’s other stuff.” He shoved through the rack of slinky, slithery, see-through, mini, micro, strapless stuff that Gigi had looked natural in. Heidi would look as though she’d dressed as a hooker for Halloween. She was the gingham and rickrack type.

“Shoes, too,” he said, looking down at the floor covered with feather scarves, running shoes and colorful high heels. Definitely Gigi. “This stuff belonged to a friend of mine. Any girl junk she left in the bathroom is yours, too.”

“Thanks, but—”

“If you want cash for fresh stuff, I can give you some.”

“Thanks, anyway. I’ll make do.”

He was probably lucky she’d turned him down. He had little to spare since he’d broken his dad’s number two rule: keep plenty between you and the wolves. That came right after look out for the ones you love. Which his dad had done in spades. All the way through his death. Then Jackson had flushed it right down the rat hole of his dream.

He got that tight knot in his chest, as if someone was punching his ribs from the inside out, but he ignored it, turning to watch Heidi prowl the room. She’d zeroed in on his breast alarm clock, a gag gift from the girls at Moons for his birthday. One nipple set the alarm. The other turned it off.

“That’s a joke,” he said, feeling like a kid whose mother had spotted a Playboy in his bathroom.

“So, you’re a breast man?” The question was direct, as if she’d asked what position he played in football.

“Pretty much.” Yeah, he liked breasts—the way they jiggled when women walked fast in heels, how they felt like flesh pillows in his hands when a woman hung over him in sex, the way the nipples knotted when he touched them. Breasts were miracles.

She crossed her arms tight and spun away from him.

Shit. She thought he didn’t like hers. Hold on, they’re fine. And nice nipples, by the way. Breasts didn’t have to be big to be great. Too late to fix her reaction, though.

She bent over, looking so good that he looked away to be polite, and picked up the framed photo of his dad and the band in 1971, before they went to New York without him.

“This has to be a relative.” She tapped his dad’s picture and turned the time-bleached photo to him, her gaze digging at him. “Your father maybe?”

“Yeah. He played trumpet with Tito Real—the guy beside him. Tito was percussion.” In fact, the poster at her feet was the band after they’d made it big. Wish you were here, man, Tito had signed it. He’d still wanted Jackson’s father to join them. Jackson’s mother had been pregnant with Jackson when opportunity knocked, and his father turned his back. Family tops the charts, chico, he used to say to Jackson whenever the subject came up.

When he was young, the words and the wink that went with them had warmed Jackson like a bonfire on a crisp night. My soul is with you and Mommy. That was his dad’s message.

But as he got older, Jackson was bothered by all his dad had given up for the family. His dad had made a living as a mechanic, but poured his heart into weekend gigs with various bands. Jackson had felt his father’s disappointment like a smoke wreath circling his head, making the man’s eyes water with what might have been.

“Is your family nearby?” Heidi asked.

“My parents are…gone.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.” She didn’t seem shocked and she didn’t look away. Instead, she searched out his eyes, offering support.

Which made him want to explain. “Car crash two years ago. They were driving out here from Chicago and a snowstorm blew them into a barrier. It was quick. Over like that.” He snapped his finger, the sound sharp and short.

“They were coming to see you?”

“Yeah.” They’d poured all their love and all their hope over him, drenched him in it. And nagged and prodded him until it made him nuts. How about settling down with a wife? What about our grandkids? That pain in his chest started up again, so he turned away from Heidi’s gaze. “I’ll clear out this junk for you.”

“All I need is the bed. And just for a couple of nights. I’ll pay you with housekeeping, like you suggested, if that’s okay.”

“Fair enough,” he said and gathered a stack of records, which he moved to the shelves. She took a pile, too, and they brushed arms in the narrow space between the bed and the shelves.

“Sorry,” she said, her eyes slipping away. Definite heat, which made him uneasy because she was so…sweet. Not a virgin—there definitely was a knowing glint in her eye, plus no one this hot could reach midtwenties without getting laid—but close enough to innocence to make him queasy. Naive and wide-eyed and absolutely hands-off to a guy like him. He looked down at the cleared bed, fighting the fleeting picture of her tight body curled up under the spread.

She raised her eyes to his and caught his look. Her cheeks went pink and she grew flustered. “Anyway, thanks for letting me stay.”

“My pleasure.” Don’t say pleasure like that, you ass.

Luckily, her cell phone tinkled, changing the subject. She scrounged around in a pocket for it and put it to her ear.

“Hello?” she said. After the caller spoke, her face tightened. “Oh, yes, I’m here and everything’s great.” Her voice cracked with tension. She glanced at him, asking for privacy, so he left the room but remained in the hall, shamelessly eavesdropping.

“Just getting situated…I’m excited. Sure…I’m tired, that’s all. I start work on Monday…. Everything’s great, Mike.”

Everything’s great? Why was she lying? Someone back home she wanted to not worry about her.

“Tina and I will have a great time. Tell Mark…. Yes, I heard every word. I can use MapQuest as well as the next person…. What?…No. I don’t need money. I saved up what I need…. What?…Oh, I forgot about the self-help books. I promised them to Celia. She’s going to loan them out to the customers…. Yeah, the time will fly. It’ll be Thanksgiving before you know it…. Okay, maybe I’ll come for Halloween.”

He grinned. She’d lied about Tina, turned down money she needed and was fighting off a visit home. There was a story there.

“Sure. Great…I know you do…. I worry about you, too.” She said the last as though she was teasing the caller, but her voice shook. “Gotta go,” she said brightly. “Tina wants to…um…talk. Bye. Give my love to the Lesser Worrywart…. Bye…. Bye…. I’m fine. Really.”

She whispered, “God,” as if to herself, so he knew she’d hung up. He slipped down the hall, not wanting her to know he’d listened in. In the kitchen, he looked for something to bring her, settling for a glass of water and the candy sack.

He found her sitting on the floor, braced against the side of the bed, legs out, staring down at her cell phone.

When she noticed him, she quickly brushed at her cheeks. Shit, she’d been crying.

“So, who was that?” he asked, pretending he hadn’t noticed the tears.

“My big brothers. Worrying about me, as usual.”

He sat beside her, legs parallel, and thrust the open sack at her direction.

“Thanks.” She smiled, pawed around inside the bag, tickling his palm through the plastic, then pulled out two red rectangles covered in sugar crystals. “The signature jellies. Try one.”

He took one from her, the brush of her skin giving him a tiny shock, like the tart fruit at the back of his throat a second later. “Good,” he said as he munched, placing the sack on the floor between them.

She stared at the jelly she’d bit into.

From here, he could easily catch her perfume, mixed with the light scent of clean sweat and whatever tropical stuff she used on her hair, which was straight and thick and brushed her neck, light brown with gold streaks. The freckles made her look youthful, but he figured she was twenty-five. At least five years younger than he was. Not that it mattered how old she was….

“You tell them what happened?” he asked her.

She turned, her hair swishing back, revealing her neck and the soft pulse at her throat. “Heck, no. They’d be doing the big-brothers-in-shining-armor bit. Our parents died when I was young, but my brothers think it’s their duty to carry me around piggyback as long as they can.”

“They’re just looking out for you.” He would do the same thing in their place.

“With handcuffs,” she said.

“That’s love.”

“That’s not trusting someone with her own life, her own decisions, and mistakes and—” She stopped, then forced a smile. “I bet if someone constantly told you what to do, you wouldn’t put up with it for a minute.”

“Depends on what she was wearing at the time.” He waggled his brow, trying to cheer her up with humor.

“Oh. Right.” She blushed, then laughed, a sexy sound in her rough Kirstie Alley voice. “What a mess I’ve made out of my great escape.” She huffed air through her bangs, which flew every which way. “If I’d just grabbed my purse I’d at least still have tuition money. The check’s been cashed. Washed and written over or forged. Happens all the time, the bank manager said.” She swallowed hard and pulled her feet close to her body, bracing her forehead on her knees, wrapping her arms around her shins.

“So what are you studying?” he said to keep her from sinking too low.

She turned her face to rest her cheek on her knees. “Psychology.”

That explained the steady stare—part curiosity, part support. Perfect for picking people’s brains apart. He shifted slightly away. “You want to be a shrink?”

“It’s not contagious.” She smiled slightly. “Counseling scares you?”

“Who wants to be under a microscope?”

“You’d be surprised. I was sort of the amateur therapist for the town. People got a cut, a style and free advice at Celia’s Cut ’n’ Curl.”

“So you worked over their hair and their lives. Sounds like pure hell.”

“Lots of people value neutral help sorting out their troubles.”

“I’d rather have bypass surgery.” Kelli had always quoted Dr. Phil or Dr. Laura or the latest pop psych book she’d inhaled. You’re repressing, blocking, deflecting. Hell, she’d made his quietness sound like a martial art. Now here he sat with Dr. Heidi in the making. His roommate. And she was looking him over again, trying to figure him out. Damn.

“So what’s wrong with being a hairdresser?” he said to distract her.

“Nothing. I’ll be doing hair part-time still. But if I want to be a therapist, I’ve got to do internships, get at least a master’s degree.” She lifted her head from her knees and looked at him more closely, eyes narrowed. Jeez, now she was reading his mind? He tried to clear any stray horny thoughts, just in case.

Then she reached for a strand of his hair and rubbed it between her finger and thumb. “You could use a hot oil treatment.”

“A what?”

Her lips had wrapped around those words like they were pure sex. She seemed to realize it. And liked it, judging by the way her fingers slowed on his hair and her next words were soft and low and deliberate. “For your hair…It’s dry…. The ends are…damaged. I’d be glad to…do it…for you.”

A couple of words dropped out in his head until he heard I’d be glad to do you. A charge shot through him like touching a live battery cable. Innocence was sexy, he realized. A million schoolgirl strip routines couldn’t be wrong.

“You have such nice texture.” Now her voice was huskier. She was flirting with him. Damn.

He imagined her fingers on his scalp, the snip-snip of her scissors near his ear, the tickle of hair sliding down his neck. Maybe he’d have his shirt off and it would cascade across his chest to his thighs like the brush of eyelashes. He pictured her lifting his chin, turning it to the angle she wanted, maybe with a little yank. He’d be eye level with those gentle mounds of breasts with their berry nipples that had tightened against her snug top as they talked.