Standing before Edward Hopper’s famous painting, Nighthawks, Miranda studied the couple seated at the counter of the eerie, brightly lit diner. Had they stopped for a cup of coffee after a night out on the town before going home to their bungalow in Brooklyn?
Or was the woman in the red dress a prostitute, the man beside her a john? And what about the lone man, whose face she couldn’t see? All three seemed lost in their own thoughts, allowing her to observe them, but not inviting her into their isolated world.
“Miranda?” A voice stirred her from her contemplation.
She turned to see a man with salt-and-pepper hair, a neatly trimmed beard, and eyes like smoldering coals. “Zeke Parelli?”
“What are you doing in Chicago?” he asked. He gave her a quick hug, pressing her cheek against his Egyptian cotton shirt.
“I’m touring the country, something I’ve wanted to do since before Dad got sick,” she answered, gazing up at him. He must be sixty, but he’s still damned good-looking.
Until she was six years old, her father and Zeke Parelli traveled the East Coast, performing in bars and restaurants, at weddings, corporate functions, and private parties—anyplace that would hire them. Most of the time they sang soft rock classics, Danny Malone’s clear Irish tenor backed up by Zeke’s rich baritone. After a bit too much to drink, however, they crooned old ballads with heartbreaking beauty.
When Zeke sang at her father’s wake, men and women cried openly. Miranda remembered sitting on his knee that evening, Zeke wiping her tears with his handkerchief while he told her stories of the duo’s days on the road, their youthful dreams of stardom.
Dreams that ended when Danny Malone took a job at the GE plant in Lynn, Massachusetts, to support his family and Zeke Parelli became a lawyer with a cadre of questionable clients.
“Lucky I ran into you,” he said. “Why didn’t you’d let me know you were coming to Chicago? I would have arranged to take time off to show you around.”
“It was an impromptu decision. I didn’t know myself that I was coming until two days ago,” she explained.
“At least let me take you to dinner. Are you free tonight?”
Miranda nodded. “I’d like that. Thanks.”
She told him the name of her hotel and Zeke promised to pick her up at seven.
“Wear something pretty,” he said with a smile that held implications she couldn’t quite decipher.
Located in a beautifully restored Victorian brownstone, the Chicago Chop House resonated with the city’s colorful past, when meatpackers, politicians, and gangsters vied for control of the Windy City. The entire staff appeared to know Zeke Parelli and greeted him with deferential smiles.
“This restaurant serves steaks almost as big as you,” Zeke teased Miranda.
He ordered martinis for them both and a bottle of Chilean Cabernet for dinner.
What would Eli think about that? she mused. She hadn’t spoken with him since viewing the vineyard scene in her crystal; he’d left a message on her voice mail yesterday, but she hadn’t returned the call. Let him wonder what I’m up to, while he’s fooling around with his little grape-sucking bitch.
Scanning the appetizers, she noticed cherrystone clams and flashed back to their risqué act in the New Orleans restaurant. The memory triggered sparks between her legs.
I’ll never again eat clams without thinking of him. Under “Desserts,” she spotted an item named Eli’s Cheesecake. Dammit, I can’t seem to get away from the boy.
She slapped the menu closed. “I’ll have smoked salmon to start, followed by spring lamb chops.”
After giving their order to the waiter, Zeke checked his cell phone. “Sorry, I have to make a call.” Ten minutes later, he returned and asked her a few questions about her trip, before excusing himself again. “Sometimes it seems like I’m bound to this phone,” he said.
“Can’t it wait until after dinner?”
Zeke shook his head. “These aren’t guys you keep waiting.”
Twice more during the meal, Zeke left the table to converse with guys who didn’t like to wait. While he was gone, she checked her own messages for word from Eli.
Nothing. Miranda sipped her wine, imagining all sorts of things that could be keeping him busy, none of which eased her mind. The petite woman with the black curls popped up annoyingly in every scenario.
The waiter approached and handed her a long-stemmed red rose. “Mr. Parelli asked me to bring you this with his apologies for not being more attentive to such a lovely lady.”
She sniffed its lush fragrance. Then she ordered dessert, drank some more wine, and forgave Zeke’s frequent absences. For all his wealth, he’s not a free man. I’d hate to be a slave to his masters.
“Let’s go back to my place for a nightcap,” Zeke said. “I have a terrific view I’d like to show you. No more phone calls, I promise.”
You’ve already had enough to drink, the voice of reason warned. But Miranda heard her own voice say, “Okay.”
They rode the elevator to the sixteenth floor of a building on Lake Shore Drive.
Zeke opened the door to his condo and ushered her inside. Entering his living room, she felt as if she were floating on air, suspended in a bubble high above the metropolis. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked Lake Michigan, the lights of the city reflecting off its dark surface.
“Make yourself at home,” he said, as she stepped into an area the size of a basketball court, furnished with Italian leather sofas and Persian rugs.
While Zeke busied himself in the kitchen, she gazed into the distance and tried not to think about what a person had to do to afford such a luxurious lifestyle. She inspected the artwork hanging on the condo’s walls, large garish paintings full of energy, but lacking cohesion or depth. Somewhere an angry young man was spewing his guts onto canvases and convincing people like Zeke, with more money than taste, to invest in the next Van Gogh.
“What do think?” Zeke asked. He handed her a glass of amber liquor that smelled like a sweet, warm summer’s day.
Not wanting to comment on his choice of art, she said, “The view is spectacular.”
He clinked his glass to hers. “So are you.”
She noticed his gaze drift to her cleavage and wondered if maybe she should’ve worn something less revealing for an evening out with her father’s old friend. But the alcohol had melted her reserve, letting old feelings bubble to the surface.
As a little girl, she’d adored Zeke. She remembered dancing with him in her parents’ kitchen, Zeke swinging her high in the air and whisking her around the room until she was dizzy with delight. She recalled the long-haired waifs with their love beads and gypsy skirts who’d fawned after him during his musician days, and how she’d wished he’d look at her the way he looked at them. Well now, that’s exactly what he was doing.
Miranda threw back her head and thrust her chest toward him. Zeke buried his face between her breasts. He set his drink down and slid his hands under her dress, gripping her butt with his strong fingers. With his teeth, he undid the buttons of her bodice one by one. She marveled at his dental dexterity, heat rising from her core as each button gave way to his mouth. How does he do that?
He slid her dress down over her shoulders, revealing her full breasts beautifully displayed in a satin push-up bra. His appreciative gaze made her whole body tingle.
“Who’d have guessed Danny’s little girl would grow up to be such a ravishing woman?” he sighed, running his hands over her smooth skin.
His cock strained against his linen trousers, begging for release. Miranda ran her fingertips up and down it, lightly stroking him through the fine fabric, while his fingers tweaked her taut nipples.
With a lusty laugh, Zeke swept her up in his arms and carried her into his bedroom. Dozens of tiny lights winked like stars in the ceiling. He slowly undressed her, then laid her down on his brass king-size bed. As he removed his own clothing, he hummed Bob Dylan’s song, Lay, Lady, Lay.
Sitting beside her on the bed, he stretched her arms above her head and held her wrists, while he leisurely stroked her breasts and belly with his other hand. Ripples of desire slithered up and down Miranda’s body.
“Now, my dear,” he said, letting his eyes caress her along with his fingers, “I’m going to make up for being so inattentive to you earlier this evening.”
From beneath a pillow, Zeke withdrew a long, red silk scarf. He trailed it up and down her body; the sensuous fabric’s light touch tantalized her like hot breath. She opened her legs so he could brush her pussy with it. As she sighed with pleasure, he looped the scarf around her wrists. Before she had time to react, he tied the other end to the bedpost.
“What…?” she started to protest.
Zeke silenced her with a long, slow, mesmerizing kiss. His fingers slid gently along her seam until she arched toward his hand, moaning for more.
“Relax, dear Miranda.”
His lips and tongue meandered down her neck, shoulders, breasts, and belly. His beard tickled delightfully. Intentionally avoiding her pussy, he continued kissing her thighs, calves, and feet. When he’d finished sucking each toe, he turned her over and began the journey in reverse, up her backside. By the time he reached the nape of her neck, Miranda was mewing like a cat and rubbing her pussy against the silk sheets.
She heard the nightstand drawer open, then the buzz of a vibrator. Zeke ran the pulsing toy over her shoulders and back, to her firm, round butt. He slid it along her crack, just long enough to make her gasp with pleasure, before rolling it down the inside of one leg and up the other. Flipping her over on her back again, he stroked her breasts with the vibe, teasing one nipple then the other. She giggled as he tickled her stomach and cried out when he touched the quivering tip to her clit for a second.
“Please… don’t stop…” she begged when he withdrew the vibe from her pleasure point.
“Oh, I don’t intend to stop,” he said, and chuckled. “I’m just getting started.”
For the next hour, Zeke caressed her body with his hands, lips, beard, cock, a fur mitten, a rough piece of nubby raw silk, and the vibrator, bringing her almost to her peak again and again without letting her come. Each time she teetered on the edge, he stopped his delicious torture until her passion receded. Then he began anew.
He grinned at her. “Women always complain they don’t get enough foreplay.”
Tears ran down Miranda’s cheeks. Her juice leaked onto the sheet. Fire raged through her body, threatening to consume her. Delirious with desire, she gasped, sighed, shuttered, moaned, and pleaded with him.
“Damnit, Zeke, just fuck me,” she demanded finally, squirming beneath his touch.
“I can’t bear it any longer.”
“Surrender, my dear. If you don’t stop thrashing about, I’ll have to tie your ankles, too.” He slapped her pussy lightly several times. “Now be a good girl.”
A shriek ripped through the bedroom. Zeke frowned, listened for a moment, then jumped up from the bed. He grabbed a bathrobe from the closet and threw it on as he dashed out.
“What the hell?” Miranda yelled after him.
The shrieking intensified.
“Zeke!”
Tugging at the scarf that bound her to the bedpost, Miranda struggled vainly to free herself. She tried to untie the knot with her teeth; it refused to budge.
“Shit, shit, shit!”
Zeke burst back into the bedroom. “The building’s on fire. We have to evacuate.”
He hurried into the bathroom and returned with a pair of nail scissors. “Get dressed,” he said as he snipped the scarf, freeing her hands.
He threw on his own clothes, and snatched up his laptop and briefcase.
Miranda could smell smoke as they rushed down the hall, along with other frightened residents. Zeke dragged her toward an EXIT sign. “We have to take the stairs.”
In the stairwell, the smoke was thicker. He passed her a handkerchief to cover her nose and mouth as they raced down the steps. Twice she tripped, twisting her ankle. As they descended, more and more people poured into the stairwell. Finally they reached the lobby, where pandemonium reigned, and shoved their way through the crowd to the street.
A few blocks from the burning building, Zeke hailed a cab for her.
“Talk about coitus interruptus,” she bitched, as he paid the driver to take her to her hotel.