Part 11 (1/2)

Then the room tilted in jerky, uncoordinated movements, and the vision changed again.

I found myself in Dom's bed with a man. A great kisser. A wide-shouldered armful with an enviable amount of pa.s.sion, hands everywhere, big hands, knowledgeable hungry lips, and an uber-talented tongue.

I wasn't sure if I was kissing one of Dom's lovers, or Ian, her ex-husband-ugh. Please don't let it be Ian.

I wanted to open my eyes, but they felt glued shut, as could only happen in dreams. No matter, I felt it best not to know the name of my dream-state lover.

Unfortunately turned on, I found it impossible not to return his enthusiasm, all our body parts meeting, dangerously well, ebbing and flowing, a coming together filled with depth and sizzle.

The phantom in my bed cupped my cheeks, held my face in place, made a meal of me, and whispered my name.

My name. Madeira. Not Dom or Dominique.

I woke, pulling from the kiss expecting to look straight into Nick's eyes.

Instead, I was looking into . . . Werner's?

I jumped from the bed as the door opened.

Eve stood for a minute like a doe in headlights, then she barked a laugh and added insult to injury by applauding. ”Sinsational!” she snapped, her grin wide. ”Can I tell Nick? Please, can I tell him? Can I, huh?”

”Has the world gone mad?” I asked, finding my bruise the hard way, by smacking it with the palm of my hand. ”Ouch!”

”Madeira Cutler, you wicked girl.” My erstwhile friend chuckled. ”I've never been prouder.”

Werner had never actually awakened. And I didn't know which made me wince more, the demented porker noises he was making or Eve's satisfaction in them.

”Do you mind?” I asked her as I sat on my side of the bed to clear my head.

”Not at all,” Eve said, closing the door and coming closer to me, her grin making me want to erase it in a satisfying way.

Hands on her hips as she took in the sight of us, Eve shook her head. ”Did you guys smoke a joint or something?”

”No, but I did have crazy dreams, that I'm now afraid might have been real, about zapping Tasers and a man shot down in his prime.”

”Why do you have dry blood on your head? And Werner, too?” she asked. ”You into something kinky? I was gonna ask if you were decent when I came in, but now I know the answer. You're engagingly and interestingly indecent, given that honeymoon-type negligee you're wearing.”

”Stuff it Meyers.”

”Too bad Sir Galahad is boringly, respectably dressed beneath that blanket. Sheesh, what a downer. Way to burst a girl's bubble. There go all my fiendish hopes and dreams.”

Eve rescued my cell phone from the floor. ”What's Nick's speed-dial number?”

Twenty-three.

Fas.h.i.+on is as profound and critical a part of the social life of man as s.e.x, and is made up of the same ambivalent mixture of irresistible urges and inevitable taboos.

-RENe KoNIG Werner looked stoned as he woke with a snort and sat up like his hair was on fire. He also looked like he'd been beaten and left for dead.

Then there was his reaction to finding me in his bed. It was a mix of gladness, shock, and embarra.s.sment.

Wooly k.n.o.bby knits, were that man's pupils dilated or what? I might as well be a two-headed sasquatch the way he was looking at me.

His suit of gray pinstripes, now a wrinkled shambles, gave him the look of a homeless off-duty detective. Given the confusion written on his b.l.o.o.d.y brow, his brain appeared to be working in the way his suit fit, both him and it, off the rack, barely on a hanger, aka hanging by a thread.

The way he regarded Eve and I, he didn't know his own name, never mind ours.

”What I wouldn't give to have planted a camera in this room last night,” Eve said, laughing like she'd been chasing a rainbow and caught it. ”Seriously, where's the fed? Did you trade him in, finally? Thank G.o.d.”

”Can it,” Werner and I said, both with a wince because of our bruises.

He scrubbed his face with both hands, sighed, and looked at me. ”Please tell me that we did not sleep together.”

”We did not sleep together,” I said, trying to convince myself while examining the robe of the peignoir set. Two diaphanous layers did not a covering make. Afraid to grab a wrap or coat from Dom's closet, lest I be given an unwanted vision, I chose a crocheted throw, made of roses in pinks and greens, from the foot of the bed and used it as a shawl. There, now I felt more in charge.

Werner gazed up and down my body, looking rather affronted.

”Well,” I said, ”your pupils may be dilated, but your eyes can still twinkle.”

”You're sure we didn't sleep together?” he asked.

”You so did.” Eve, the Ches.h.i.+re Cat, sat at the foot of the bed, her back against the footboard, ankles crossed, as if she were settling in for a juicy chat.

”We apparently slept in the same bed,” I said, mostly to myself, ”but I have no memory of how we got there. Werner? Do you?”

He opened his hands, regarded his palms, and his eye twinkle returned. ”I have tactile memories.”

I resented the traitorous thrill that skittered up my spine. Oh goodie. Not.

”Give that man a lottery ticket,” Eve said. ”It's his lucky day.”

I closed the crocheted throw tighter over my b.r.e.a.s.t.s as I paced, until I saw the crack in my cell phone, which bothered me, a lot.

Werner raised himself on an elbow. ”Mad, Madeira, did I, I mean, did we . . . ?”

”He means,” Eve said, tongue in cheek. ”Was it as good for you as it was for him?”

”Eve, you're not helping at all,” I said, taking pity on Werner. ”I wish I could remember.” Broken cell phone case-stepped on, thrown, dropped?

”Let's just forget whatever it was that happened,” Werner said, as if that could be the end of it.

Eve rose to the occasion. ”Unless Mad got pregnant.”

Werner and I whipped our gazes her way like we were fine bra.s.s gears moving as one, hungry attack gears, and Eve was dinner.