“Warning?”
“Next time, they’ll be on it.” Ohmygod. Ohmygod. She was hearing Witt’s voice. In the back of Hammerhead’s car. “Whatcha gonna do now?”
“I’m going to move closer.” She remembered that she hadn’t, remembered the need, yet the trepidation.
“Better hurry,” Witt urged. Hang up, hang up. Her internal voice screamed. She couldn’t, listened instead to Witt’s husky caress. “Here are your friends. Better kiss me or they’ll know you’re a fraud.” He’d egged her on at first. He’d wanted it as badly as she had. Until she’d pushed too hard.
This time, the rustle of clothing, a soft sigh, hers, the sound of a wet kiss that seemed to go on forever, his breath, hers, then a groan, definitely male.
As horrible as it was to know they’d been taped, Max’s body heated. She pulled her knees to her chest, hugged the phone to her ear, wanting and hating in equal parts.
A muffled plunk, that had been when she’d lost her shoe. With her eyes closed, she could feel him under her hands, against her thigh, taste him in her mouth. And she died a tiny bit inside because she’d brought this on herself, brought it on Witt, however unknowingly.
“What are you doing?” She couldn’t exactly remember what she’d been doing at that moment.
“Your tie’s too tight.” Oh yes. The continued rustle. Oh God yes, she’d started to undress him.
“Taking this a little too far, aren’t you?” Shaky words, but he hadn’t stopped her.
“I thought you liked living on the edge.” She couldn’t remember if she’d stopped to look at him, judging, gauging, assessing. God, she probably had.
“I’m on the edge. So don’t do this now.”
“They’ve got to think we’re ... you know ... doing it. It’s just an act.” A pause, more rustling, her rustling.
“Hey. I said not now. Later.” His tone was urgent with a trace of disbelief.
Max wanted to cry. He had damn near begged her to stop, and she’d been too wrapped up in her own needs to listen. Hearing the desperation in his voice was worse than her memories of the whole incident. No matter what she did, this recollection was forever sullied.
“It’s just for show,” she said. In the background came the slow rasp of his zipper. Then she’d teased him a little more. “Unless you want it for real ... do you?” She’d touched him then, she remembered that. “Tell me to stop and I will. All you have to do is say the word.” A pause, then her voice whispering. “If you can.” To her eternal shame, she’d taunted him, goaded him.
“Damn you.” He cursed her with a low growl.
“Tell me how bad you want it.” She’d wanted him to beg. Then she’d, oh God, she’d put her mouth on him.
“Fuck, please, shit.” Strain stretched his voice thin and harsh.
Knowing they’d been watched was one thing. Knowing the watcher would listen to it over and over and over was, in a word, sickening. So were the sounds, a horrible slurp that should have remained between lovers in the privacy of a bedroom.
She would have to live with the shame of what she’d done to Witt forever. She’d allowed him to be taped, and who knew what the eventual consequences would be. There could be no denying the level to which she’d sunk that night, the trouble for which she’d set Witt up.
“Ah, Christ. Jesus H. Christ.” Witt cried out. Max jerked with remembered power and the very real taste of him in her mouth.
“I do so wish we’d had a camera in the car, Max my darling.”
Bud Traynor. She’d never thought it was anyone else.
“But your voice on this lovely little audio tape is enough to make me come, Max.”
She put her fist to her mouth to keep from screaming.
“You think I’m lying, don’t you, Max, that I’m watching a video as we speak.”
She didn’t answer, yet she couldn’t hang up.
“I’ll never lie to you, Max. I have no reason to lie. I might not tell you everything, but what I do tell you is the truth.”
He would lie, when it suited him. But now that he’d made his little vow, she knew he’d stick to his promise. Because that suited him, too. She believed him. He’d recorded only their voices.
She could be thankful they’d never said names, and no one could prove where the tape had been made. Maybe things weren’t so bad.
“Sweet dreams, my lovely Max.” A click, then the dial tone in her ear.
Fool. Where Bud was concerned, things were worse than bad.
What the hell had he planned for her now?