In Death 27 - Salvation in Death

“Here we are, two prideful people. That would be one of the seven deadlies. Want to explore any of the others? Lust would be my first choice.”
    “Lust is always your first choice. And your second, and right down to your last choice.”
    “Sometimes I like to combine it with greed.” Even before he stopped the car, he pressed the release for her seat belt, then gripped her shirt, pulled her over.
    “Hey.”
    “Maybe it’s all that talk about the old days, and youth.” Smooth and clever, he had his seat back and her straddling him. “Brings back fond memories of getting the girl naked in whatever vehicle I could . . . acquire at the time.”
    “You had time for sex after grand theft auto?”
    “Darling, there’s always time for sex.”
    “Only on your clock. Jesus, how many hands do you have?” She bat-ted them away, but not before he’d managed to unbutton her shirt and stir her up. “Listen, if you need a bounce, there’s a perfectly good bed, probably about two dozen of them, in the house.”
    “It’s not about the bounce, or not altogether.” He skimmed a finger down her throat. “It’s about the moment, and recapturing for that brief time, the foolishness of youth.”
    “Speak for yourself. I didn’t have time for foolishness.” She started to reach for the door, with the intention of opening it and wiggling out, but he locked his arms around her, laughed.
    “You never had sex in a car.”
    “Yes, I have. You get ideas at least half the time whenever we’re in the back of one of your limos.”
    “Not the same at all. That’s a grown-up venue, a limo is. It’s sophisticated sex. And here we are, crammed together in the front seat of a police issue, and the lieutenant is both aroused and mildly embarrassed.
    “I am not. Either.” But her pulse jumped, and her breath hitched when his thumbs brushed over the thin cotton covering her breasts. “This is ridiculous. We’re adults, we’re married. The steering wheel is jammed into the base of my spine.”
    “The first two are irrelevant, the last is part of the buzz. Music on, program five. Skyroof open.”
    She narrowed her eyes at him. “It’s not going to work. It’s uncomfortable and it’s stupid. And I have to work in this vehicle.”
    “I can make you come in ten seconds.”
    She actually smirked at him. “Ten,” she said, “nine, eight, seven, six, five . . . oh shit.” She’d underestimated his quick hands, his skilled fingers. He had her trousers unhooked, had her wet and throbbing. And over.
    “Go again,” he murmured, and yanking down her tank, took her breast in his mouth.
    He drove her, hands and mouth, while the cool air washed over her face, while her cry of release echoed into the night.
    Her hands flailed out for purchase as she heard the cotton rip. That cool night air flowed over her bare skin now, a thrilling counterpoint to the heat.
    She let go, he could see it, feel it. Let go of the day, the work, the worry—and more, deliciously more—that odd and appealing line she carried inside her between the should and the shouldn’t.
    Once she’d had no time for foolishness. Was it any wonder he was compelled to give that to her? And all the love that wound through it and made it real?
    His wife, his lover, his sweetheart groping with him in the front seat of a car while the music played and the night shimmered.
    His hand bumped her weapon, and he laughed. Wasn’t that part of it, too? His dangerous and dedicated cop, yielding to him, lost in her own needs. Demanding he give and he take.
    Her mouth was like fury on his, burning away at his control until he was as desperate as she. Until there was only one need, one thought. To mate.
    “I can’t—how do we . . .” Her breath tangled, her body ached as she struggled to shift, to angle, to somehow defeat the confines so that he could fill her.
    “Just move . . . let me—bloody hell.” He rapped his knuckles on the wheel fighting to shift her hips, banged his knees on the dash and was fairly certain she cursed because her head struck the edge of the open skyroof.
    Well, they’d get over it.
    She was laughing like a mad thing when they finally managed to insert tab B into slot A.
    “Oh, thank Christ,” he whispered, and held her, just held her as her body rocked with laughter. “Well, when you’ve finished your laughfest, get to work. I’m pinned here and can’t get things started without a bit of help.”
    “Really?” She could barely get