Except for the fact that a false emergency call was probably a felony, it sounded like a heck of a plan. This was sort of an emergency, wasn’t it? After all, getting rid of Nat really was reaching critical status. So maybe she should...
No. She was a responsible business owner. She paid taxes. She shopped for groceries and voted when she remembered.
But she did not make fake emergency calls.
She took a deep breath. “Let’s just work on the catalog. I’ll call again in a little while.”
Joan nodded and brought over an archival box filled with French postcards from the twenties and thirties. “I thought we could scan these and do an illustrated catalog.”
Ronnie pulled out one of the sepia cards, lightly running her finger over the edge. Unlike the ones that often turned up at flea markets or on eBay, these were in pristine condition, their edges clean, the images crisp. Someone—the photographer, probably—had hand-tinted each card. Just a touch to highlight the model’s jewelry, the ribbon in her hair, the nightgown pooled at her bare feet. The effect was dreamlike. Sensual.
Joan started pulling cards out of the box and laying them faceup on the table. “They’re not quite as erotic as the Rojan lithographs, but that’s okay, right?”
Ronnie nodded, pulling her thoughts back to the conversation. True, the lithographs tended to feature couples lost in their own private passions, while the postcards each featured a single woman. But, to Ronnie, the cards were just as alluring.
She plucked one out of the box. A nude woman, wearing nothing but a long strand of beads, reclined on a chaise longue, one arm behind her head, a coy look on her face. A sultry siren tempting the man behind the camera. “These cards have secrets,” she said, passing it to Joan. “That’s why they’re so erotic. It’s like we’re sharing a private moment between the woman and her lover.”
“I guess that makes her an exhibitionist and us voyeurs,” Joan said, grinning as she pulled up a chair.
Ronnie laughed. “Maybe it does.”
“So,” Joan said, leaning in closer, “have you ever done anything like that?”
“Exhibitionism?” Ronnie asked, sure her voice was squeaking. “Not hardly.”
“No, no, no.” Joan rolled her eyes. “Not for all the world.” Her devious smile lit up her entire face. “For just one guy. Burt? Anybody?”
“Have you?” An obvious avoidance tactic, but maybe Joan wouldn’t notice.
The bell in the main room jingled, cutting off Joan’s response. Instantly, she hopped to her feet, pointing a finger at Ronnie. “You stay. See if you like the other stuff I picked for the catalog. I can handle a customer.” Then she slipped out the door. A second later, she was back, peering around the door frame. “And the answer to your question is yes. Andy might have been a jerk out in the real world, but in the bedroom he was blue-ribbon material.” She winked, then disappeared again.
Alone, Ronnie gazed at the image of a 1920s ingenue, coy and flirtatious. The woman was perched on the edge of a padded bench, looking almost ethereal as yards of diaphanous material swirled around her.
What would it be like to be that woman? To feel the caress of her lover’s eyes on her, to know that he wanted her, and then to open her arms in silent invitation?
She closed her eyes, her body tightening as she imagined the press of her dream lover’s body against hers. His hands in her hair, trailing down her shoulder. She’d conjured the dream man the same night she’d walked out on Burt. Her ex-husband may have known all about sex, but her imaginary lover knew all about her.
A composite of the men she read about in her books, today he had the face of a certain sexy detective. Her dream lover was a man who wanted to please her, who was so in tune with her—body and soul—that he could almost read her thoughts. A man who knew if she wanted him to kiss her hard and take her right there on the kitchen table, or if she needed it slow and languid. A thousand caresses. Soft words and even lighter touches. Hours of exploration. Teasing and tempting until she couldn’t stand it anymore and she begged, begged, for him to enter her.
The man in her fantasies played her body like a symphony. Compared to him, Burt had played her like a ukulele.
She wasn’t asking for true love. Hell, she wasn’t even sure it existed. And the thought of committing to another man...
She shook her head. Right now? No way. But, oh, how she wanted passion. The heart-pounding, blood-boiling, loins-throbbing kind of desire she read about in her books.
She glanced back down at the woman on the card. “I bet you don’t have any problem finding lovers,” she said.
“Excuse me?”
Oh, hell. That was a male voice, and it most definitely didn’t belong to her brother. She felt her face warm, and she looked up...straight into the amused face of Detective Parker.
She swallowed, her cheeks heating in what surely had to be a blush red enough to start a fire. She flashed the postcard for him to see. “I was talking to her,” she said, then mentally kicked herself for such an idiotic comment.
“So I gathered.”
The corner of his mouth twitched, revealing a sexy dimple, and she cursed herself for noticing. Damn the man for materializing when she had erotica—and him—on the brain.
“I’m not exactly sure what a two-dimensional woman needs with a lover,” he added, “but I have no doubts she’ll find one.” The twitch turned into a full smile and the dimple deepened. “But if you want to help her get lucky, I’ve got a copy of Fortune in my car. Maybe she’s into two-dimensional, entrepreneur types.”
Swallowing a laugh, she tried to glare at him. “I spent the entire morning being furious with you. Waltzing in here unannounced and making me laugh isn’t fair.”
Immediately, the smile vanished, replaced by a firm mouth and apologetic eyes. “I’m sorry about earlier,” he said, pulling out a chair. He sat opposite her at the table, and she had the unreasonable urge to reach out and touch his hair. “Unfortunately, I’m still not going to be a lot of help.”
Still? He hadn’t even tried to help earlier. Instead he’d just tormented her.
Even so, something about those pale gray eyes called to her, silently telling her he was sorry, that he did want to help. And that if she kicked him out now, she’d be making the biggest mistake of her life.
Well, maybe that was a little melodramatic, but she did want to hear what he had to say. And, frankly, she hoped it was good. She took a deep breath, then took the plunge. “Okay, give. What are you talking about?”
“Your robbery. No fingerprints, no motive, no suspects. Nothing missing—”
“That I know of.”
“Nothing expensive, then. Nothing obvious.”
She nodded. “Right.”
He shrugged. “That leaves us with nothing to go on.”
“You could have just told me that this morning, instead of putting me through the erotica edition of Trivial Pursuit.”
“Right.” He shifted in his chair, looking distinctly uncomfortable. “Sorry about that.”
“You should be.” She grabbed up a small Rojan print—the one showing a couple in the back of a limousine, the man in a trench coat, intimately touching his companion, and the woman in a garter and stockings, her skirt around her waist. She waved the print in front of him. “I’m sorry if my life’s work offends you, but at least you could be professional, even if this kind of thing rubs you the wrong way.”
Coughing,