Improper English

  I looked in the mirror.

  “Pubic hair! You can see my pubic hair! Dear God, it’s right there where anyone can see it! I refuse to do this! I refuse to parade around baring all my assets to everyone, and you can’t expect me to! It’s illegal! It’s cruel and unusual punishment!”

  “Alix, calm down.”

  “Alex is a policeman! He’ll probably arrest me for indecent exposure!”

  “We’ll find you another pair of panties.”

  “And if he doesn’t, someone else will. They’ll probably raid the place, and then my picture will be plastered all over the paper with the headline YANK WANNA-BE WRITER IN SEX CLUB SCANDAL. My mother will hear about this, and then she’ll disown me, not that that means much, because she doesn’t really like me now, but this will be the straw that broke her back, but what’s worse, what’s much worse is that no publisher will consider me after I’ve had all my fleshy bits spread across the tabloids! I’ll end up broke and destitute and living in a car because I can’t afford an apartment, so desperate for employment that I’ll have to resort to posing for men’s smut magazines just before I die of malnutrition, friendless, alone, and probably an alcoholic to boot.” I paused long enough to take a deep breath. “I hope you’ll be happy with that end for me, Isabella, because that’s what’s waiting for me if you force me to go out there with everything I own on display!”

  “Alix, will you listen to me? I’m not going to make you do anything you don’t wish to do!”

  The sight of my scantily covered pubic mound haunted me. I closed my eyes and hugged my filled-to-the-brim bodice. “It’s not fair of you to ask me to go out there like this. It’s not fair of you to make me feel guilty for not wanting to go out and have everyone see my pubic hair and bare butt.”

  She grabbed my hand and shoved a piece of cloth in it. I opened my eyes and looked. “What’s this?”

  “Panties. Put them on.”

  They weren’t the same color as the flame red and orange of my outfit. These were pink. “Where’d you get them?” I asked suspiciously, holding them up to see if they looked like they’d fit.

  “They’re Susan’s.”

  “Susan?”

  I looked down to where she was pointing. One of the entertainers I had hired—a troupe of women who specialized in dancing various themed dances for mostly male parties—was clad in a hot pink and turquoise belly dancer outfit. She smiled and gave me a thumbs-up sign. I gaped at her for a moment, then shoved the panties back at Isabella.

  “I’m not going to wear some other woman’s underwear! That’s just gross!”

  “Alix, they’re clean—”

  “No!” I dug through the bag holding the garments I’d been wearing before changing into the gauzy peepshow costume. “If I can’t wear the panties that were meant for this outfit, I’ll wear my own.” I pulled out a pair of black lace undies and stepped into them.

  Isabella eyed my groin critically. “It doesn’t match the rest of the ensemble. In fact, it’s quite noticeable.”

  I glared at her. “I told you I should wear a caftan!”

  I hoped the hat and veil would be enough to keep my identity secret, but the three belly dancing lessons Isabella had given me weren’t sufficient to allow me to keep up with the other professional dancers. They might not be any great shakes as belly dancers, but they were willing to come forward and dance a sinuous, bumping and grinding circle around the birthday boy, whereas I kept to the rear and tried to hide behind everyone else.

  There was one moment when I claimed the limelight. Isabella, the only one among us who really knew how to belly dance, wiggled her way in front of Alex and started shaking her groove thing at him. He looked pleased by the show—very pleased, much more pleased than a man who had had his hand on my knee earlier in the evening should have looked. I gnashed my teeth and clanged the little bells strapped to my fingers with much fervor, slowly but surely pushing my way forward until I was just to the left of Alex, in front of Daniel. The latter was trying to not too obviously enjoy the antics of a longlegged blonde grinding away in front of him. I nudged her aside, bared my teeth at Daniel, and accidentally bumped into Isabella, sending her spinning toward Karl.

  I looked down at Alex and met his emerald-eyed gaze. “Laugh and you die,” I warned him. His lips twitched as he looked me over from head to feet. I clanged my bells at him when he stopped his perusal and peered closer at my black undies. “Eyes up, buster. And stop drooling over Isabella. It isn’t seemly in a man of your elderly years.”

  He laughed at that, and after a few more warning bells chimed perilously near his nose, coupled with the three sinuous hip shakes that were the only elements I could remember how to do, I moved on. Bert wanted to know how hard it was to belly dance, so she got up with Isabella and had an impromptu session, joined soon thereafter by Paula. I glared as the other dancers continued to surround Alex, and plumped myself down next to Ray.

  “This was a rotten idea.”

  “I think it’s a grand one,” she replied, her toes tapping in time to the blare of belly dancing music that filled the private room. “Took courage.”

  I glanced at her in surprise, then sat back to think about that. I supposed it did take courage to arrange to make a fool of myself in front of the man I loved. I slid a glance to the left toward Alex. He was laughing at something Daniel was saying, watching as Isabella encouraged Bert and Paula to join the other dancers.

  “Well, I will say that Alex seems to be having fun. He looks happy and relaxed and isn’t exhibiting the least bit of resistance to being exposed to something out of the norm like he did at the opera.”

  Ray nodded, clapping her hands in time to the music and calling out encouragement as Bert and Paula danced by in the line of dancers.

  “I wasn’t sure how he would like this, but I guess…Hey! No touching! I specifically told you there was to be no touching!”

  I stood up and started toward Susan of the underwear as she gyrated before Alex, doing some sort of pelvic thrust movement at him while curling her fingers through his lovely hair.

  “Back off, sister,” I snarled. Ray caught my arm as I stalked past her, pulling me back to my chair.

  “Don’t.”

  I pushed her hand away. “Don’t what?”

  “Don’t degrade yourself. Black’s not the sort of bloke to play while the cat’s away.”

  I glared at the hussy. She had shot me a smug glance when Ray hauled me back, then continued to dance her crotch toward Alex in a manner that would shame a nymphomaniac. I toyed with the idea of ripping the hair right off her head, but decided Ray was probably right. When I had set up the belly dance, Alex and I were still firmly a couple, and I had imagined how pleased (and aroused) he would be by my participation. I hadn’t for one moment worried that he would be equally turned on by the other women, even Isabella. Now, however, all bets were off, even if Alex was looking a bit embarrassed about Crotch Woman thrusting herself in his face.

  “Oh, yeah,” I growled to myself watching the she-wolf undulate in front of the man whose children I had once hoped to bear. “Brilliant bloody idea, Alix. Just brilliant.”

  Alex saw me home. I didn’t want him to see me home, and told him so in no uncertain terms, but short of shackling him to a chair in the club—something I might have considered had I possessed shackles—there was nothing I could do to stop him from following me into the tube station or a taxi, so I gave in.

  “OK, but you get to pay for it,” I warned him, and climbed into one of the wonderfully roomy black taxis that dart about town. He gave the driver my address on Pentonville Road, and sat down next to me.

  I let him have my best glare. “How’d you know my address, smart boy?”

  He didn’t even glance at me. “Isabella told me where you had moved. Was it a secret?”

  No, drat it, I hadn’t told her it was a secret, and he knew it.

  “No, it wasn’t. Alex, why are you doing this?”

  “Seein
g you home? I was raised to always see a woman to her home after a date.”

  “We weren’t on a date. Tonight was a party, not a date. We are not dating. Comprende?”

  He shot me a quick look out of the corner of his eye, then leaned back against the seat, crossed his arms over his chest, and closed his eyes. “Why did you jump up every time I touched you?”

  “Maybe I don’t like being touched.” I rolled my eyes as soon as the words left my mouth. Lord, I was stupid sometimes!

  “Mmm. Do you know, I’ve found that when witnesses swear to a statement I suspect is false, often it is quite easy to prove or disprove their claim.”

  Uh oh, did he mean what I thought he meant? He didn’t mean…“Ack! Alex, unhand me!”

  “In a minute. I’m investigating your statement.”

  “You are not, you’re groping me.” I tried to push back from where he was holding me to his chest, but I couldn’t do anything but run my hands over him. Helplessly. The new Alix could sometimes be a weak, weak woman, I discovered to my delight.

  He nuzzled the side of my neck and zeroed in unerringly on the one spot guaranteed to turn me to blancmange in his arms. I alternately burned and shivered with desire, with need, but each time I was about to melt into his arms, I remembered my plan. It was too important to mess up.

  “Alex…we’re not…you shouldn’t…oh, just a hair to the left…no, no, you must stop…ALEX! The driver can see you! Remove your mouth this instant!”

  He lifted his head just enough to speak. “No, he can’t.” His mouth returned to my left breast.

  “Actually, I can, but you’re not doing anything I haven’t seen before, so carry on, mate. No, I tell a lie—I haven’t seen that done in a cab before. I didn’t think there was enough room. Is your lady’s hand where I think it is?”

  I rolled my eyes forward to the front of my head and peered over the top of Alex’s hair at the grinning face of the driver in the mirror, simultaneously snatching back my hand from where it had drifted. Of its own accord, I hasten to point out.

  “Alex, stop,” I begged, trying to tug him from where his face was buried in the bodice of my dress. “We can’t do this in a cab. It’s wrong, it’s morally wrong, ethically wrong, and probably legally wrong as well.”

  “You’d be surprised what people get up to in a cab,” the driver chimed in. “All sorts of things, and not a one cared whether it was legally, morally, or ethically wrong.”

  I glared at his smiling reflection and dragged my free hand from where it had slipped under Alex’s shirt, threading my fingers through his silky hair, tugging on it until he came up for air. “Alex, you have to stop! You’re making a scene!”

  He grinned and wrapped one hand around my neck, holding my head still as he prepared to plunder. “I know. Makes a nice change, doesn’t it?”

  I didn’t reply, being too busy entertaining his tongue as it dropped by for a visit. By the time he counted all of my teeth—twice—my objections had evaporated and the only thing I could say when he lifted his mouth from mine was that I needed to buy him an eye patch.

  “Why?”

  I tried to ignore his fingers dancing a fiery finger dance up and down my spine. “You’d make a hell of a pirate.” I hiked up the bodice of my dress and managed to push myself a reasonable distance away from him. The new Alix took several shaky breaths and reminded me that such behavior was unauthorized and would lead to complications I didn’t think I could cope with at that moment. I licked my lips, trying to catch one last taste of him, and told myself to be stalwart. One of us had to be strong, one of us had to be reasonable, and it looked like it was going to have to be me, dammit. “OK, you’ve had your birthday fun. Now it has to stop.”

  He looked disgruntled sitting there in the darkness of the cab, lights from the street flashing over the strong planes of his face, his eyes glittering like a cat’s in the night. I knew that if I didn’t stop him now, if I didn’t steer him from his present path of seduction, I would end up compromising everything I had worked so hard for in the last five days. And the memory of the Old Alix was enough to ensure that that didn’t happen. I looked into Alex’s heated emerald eyes and knew I was doomed unless I stopped him dead. My heart fractured a little more with the realization of what I had to do. I didn’t want to be cruel, but it was clear by his actions and the look of desire in his so beautiful eyes that I was left with no other choice. I summoned a shaky little laugh and tried to pass it off as insouciant.

  “Really, Alex, I would have thought snogging in a cab was beneath your dignity. How the mighty have fallen.”

  Two lines of frown appeared between his brows. Guilt stabbed at me, but I knew I had to do it or I’d lose everything, and I wasn’t prepared to go back to my old life. Not now. Not when I was so close to success. Not for anything would I go back to that.

  I smiled a smile I didn’t feel, and traced a finger along the strength of his jaw. “You know, I owe you an apology.”

  “You owe me several,” he growled, trying to capture my finger, but I pushed him back with one hand on his chest. His strong chest. His manly chest. His chest that was so hot it was scorching my fingers. I wanted to cuddle up to that chest. I wanted to stroke that chest. I wanted to rub myself all over that chest. I snatched my hand back instead.

  “Think so, huh? Well, the one I think I owe you is for scoffing when you told me I could do anything I wanted to do, be anyone I wanted to be. I thought at the time you were just being overly gushy, but now that I’ve had time to make my plans, I see you were right. I can do whatever I want. So thank you, Detective Inspector Alex Black, for being the person who set me onto the path of success. When I get all the fame and glory due me, I will remember it was you who opened my eyes.”

  Alex’s frown was steadily increasing at my bloated, egotistical statement. I didn’t blame him for the unhappy look he cast me. If I had a pin, I would have tried to pop my own ego.

  He took my hand and rubbed his thumb over my knuckles, his eyes wary as he watched me. I never thought knuckles could be sexy before, but mine were suddenly located smack dab in an erogenous zone. I hardened my heart for one last attack.

  “I’m glad you’ve realized your potential, Alix. I have always thought you would be a success at whatever goal you set out to achieve. I assume your excitement means the book is going well?”

  “Oh, it’s not just the book,” I assured him with a Judas smile. “I have this plan, you see, and each step of my plan is detailed on a list. So far, my new strategy has been very successful. I’m almost through my list, and the brass ring is waiting for me.”

  His frown melted into a look of bleakness that had me weeping inside. “Am I to take it that my name does not appear on your list?”

  I thought I’d try for another light little laugh, but I couldn’t summon anything up, not even with all of the new Alix’s weight behind me. I couldn’t lie to him, not to my Alex, but to explain myself would mean my plan had failed before it had a chance, and that would be the end of everything for me. So I told the truth, hoping against hope that he wouldn’t hate me for the rest of his life because of it.

  “I’m sorry, Alex, but I’m not sharing my list with anyone.”

  The love in his eyes had me dying a thousand deaths. “Not even me?”

  I had to swallow twice before I could get the words out. “Not even you. I have to walk my path alone.”

  “You don’t have to do anything on your own,” he said softly, his voice a warm brush of the softest velvet against my skin. I shivered at the contact, the ache inside me building to a level of pain I hadn’t known was possible. “You have me. Come back with me, Alix. Be with me. Live with me. Marry me.”

  He was everything I wanted. He was the perfect man for me, a perfect fit, every facet of our beings a complement to the other. He was my life, my heart, my soul. I would never be complete without him, but to join my life to his now would end up in disaster. It was better to hurt him here and now than to destroy
him later. Wasn’t it?

  The cab came to a halt in front of the gaudy pink door of the student house. I glanced from the door to the mirror where the driver was watching us silently, then to the man sitting beside me, offering me his heart. I hoped he would see the love shining in my eyes as I spoke the words that might well spell my doom.

  “I’m sorry, Alex. I truly am sorry. I have to do this. It’s important to me.”

  “Whereas I am not worth the trouble.”

  I flinched as he tossed my own words back in my face, and reached out to touch him, to comfort him, to cling to him as I told him he had been right, that I had finally seen what a mess my life had been before and how I had taken steps to change it, but he slipped away and held the door open for me. I scooted out of the taxi, my heart dead and cold as he tossed some money at the driver, then turned and walked off toward the train station without a glance back at me.

  “Hoo.” The driver blew out a long breath, looking me up and down. “I knew you Yanks were an aggressive lot, but I never thought you were cruel.”

  I watched as Alex’s dark figure disappeared down the stairs to the tube station. I was beyond tears, beyond something so simple as a mere fatal blow. I had nothing left but myself. So be it.

  I lifted my chin and regarded the driver steadily. “Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  The three weeks following Alex’s birthday passed quickly. I posted my list on the wall and used a big red marker to cross off each item as I completed it. I wrote all day long, and spent most of my evenings at Daniel’s flat, talking, writing, learning. He hadn’t been sworn to secrecy about my work, and one night he mentioned that he had met Alex for lunch.

  I couldn’t bear to ask, but I couldn’t bear not to. My misery must have shown in my face, because he covered my fingers with a warm hand. “He’s fine, Alix. A little heartsore, I think, but otherwise well.”