Fatal Affair: 1 (Courthouse Connections) Read online

  Fatal Affair

  Ann Jacobs

  Book 1 in the Courthouse Connections series, a spin-off from Lawyers in Love.

  Lanie Winstead is sort of married to a senator who isn’t what he seems. And she’s carrying on a torrid affair with hot corporate lawyer JD Ackerman. Something’s got to give when her affair is brought to her inattentive husband’s attention.

  But wait. Suddenly the senator is dead and secrets start unraveling as Lanie is accused of his murder. JD will do anything—anything—to protect his lover, even if it means revealing a tangle of lies and deceptions that will tear them all asunder.

  Inside Scoop: Contains a graphic gay BDSM scene, not for the faint of heart.

  A Romantica® suspense erotic romance from Ellora’s Cave

  Fatal Affair

  Ann Jacobs

  Chapter One

  Everybody seemed to be paired off after the morning session, most of the lawyers combining a weekend of continuing education at this luxurious beach resort on Key West with a getaway with a significant other.

  Lanie Winstead sighed. She had a husband—sort of—but no significant other. Still, she felt weird, having told Wayne yesterday morning before coming here that she couldn’t go on any longer with the marriage-that-never-had-been. Adrift, twenty-eight years old with a fledgling law practice and her husband’s blessing to go her own way while he went his, she envied the couples who seemed to take their happiness for granted.

  Alone. That was how she felt now but it wasn’t all that much different from the way she’d been for the past eight years, envied for being married to the popular state senator. At the same time she’d had to take care so no one would guess that they lived separate lives but for the public moments they shared in the limelight of political rallies and other media events.

  Restless, she finished the fruity drink she’d been sipping and headed out for a walk along the beach. Unlike some of the unescorted women she’d talked to during breaks in the seminar schedule, she hadn’t come alone to troll for a bedmate. Not that she couldn’t, of course, because even before she’d asked Wayne for a divorce they’d both been free to enjoy sex whenever, however and wherever they chose—as long as they did it discreetly.

  When she stepped onto the long pier that jutted out into the Gulf of Mexico, she spotted what looked like another solitary soul who’d escaped temporarily from the Florida Bar’s continuing education seminars. She couldn’t put her finger on exactly what it was that had attracted her attention to the big, dark-haired corporate lawyer. He looked more like an NFL player than the successful corporate attorney he was—a partner in the prestigious Tampa firm of Winston, Roe and Associates. She didn’t know him well, but they’d been introduced at a recent fundraiser for Wayne’s re-election campaign.

  She couldn’t deny that sex appeal oozed from every inch of his muscular six-foot six-inch frame. A lot of his appeal was in his dark-brown wavy hair that tempted her to run her fingers through it. What drew her to him most, though, was the shuttered expression in eyes that reminded her of rich, dark chocolate. She looked with envy at a fringe of eyelashes she knew most women would die to have for themselves.

  But it wasn’t just that JD Ackerman looked good enough to devour whole. The look of sadness in his gorgeous eyes made her want to gather him in her arms, comfort him and wipe away the quiet despair that shadowed his expression.

  As though he were a magnet, he drew Lanie closer until she stopped beside him and looked out over the calm aqua water. A few yards away a pair of bottle-nosed dolphins cavorted, apparently oblivious to the gentle waves, the Gulf tide’s ebb and flow. A pelican swooped across the surface of the water, dived, came up with a hapless fish.

  JD turned to her as though he’d just noticed her presence at his side. “You’re Elaine Winstead, aren’t you? I noticed you in the lecture on torts this morning.”

  At the deep, compelling tone of his voice, she met his gaze and thought she saw the slightest easing of whatever it was that made him so sad, perhaps even the beginnings of a healthy interest in her as a woman. “Yes. My name is Elaine but everybody calls me Lanie. If I’m not mistaken you’re JD Ackerman. I believe we met at a political event a few months ago.”

  “You’re right. I’m surprised the senator didn’t join you this weekend. It’s a great place to bring a spouse—almost like a tropical honeymoon paradise.”

  Yes it was, only not for the sort of couple she and Wayne had been. “Wayne and I have separated. Not many people know it yet though.”

  “I’m sorry. Losing a loved one is difficult, however that loss occurs.” He paused as though wondering if he wanted to continue their conversation. “Would you like to join me for a walk along the beach?”

  “I’d like that.” She glanced at his left hand, saw the telltale pale circle on his finger that said louder than words that he’d worn a ring there for a long time and removed it very recently. “I take it you came here alone too.”

  “I do pretty much everything by myself these days. My wife died a little over a year ago. We weren’t blessed with children.”

  “God, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  He stopped and rested both hands on her shoulders. “Yes you should. When I saw you walking along the pier looking a little bit lost, I felt something other than grief for the first time since Miriam died. Before you came up to me, I was thinking how it would feel to dive into the water, swim and swim and swim until I couldn’t go any farther—how it would feel to let the Gulf claim me.”

  “You were thinking of joining your wife?” Lanie couldn’t believe that. Not really. JD was too strong, too alive…

  “No. Not that. I don’t believe in resurrection or life after death, not really. I was thinking more about…just ending a life that I’d begun to believe was no longer worth living. Does that shock you?”

  She’d never known love like he must have lost. Never known love at all except the silent devotion of the felines Wayne always complained she treated like children. For long moments she held JD’s solemn gaze, trying to formulate an honest reply.

  “Yes. No. I don’t know, JD. I’m glad I came along, though, if me running into you helped make you want to stick around.” She tried for a light tone as she twisted the engagement and wedding rings Wayne had insisted that she keep, realizing she had nothing other than casual friendship and perhaps the use of her body to drive away the pain that still was evident in the faraway look on JD’s handsome face.

  Not now in any case.

  “It did. How about that walk? I’m game if you are.” He dropped his hands off her shoulders and took her right hand in his left as he adjusted his long stride to accommodate her shorter one.

  * * * * *

  Afternoon conference sessions forgotten, they walked for hours along a nearly deserted stretch of white sand dotted with sea grapes and driftwood. Near the water they paused to look for shells in piles of seaweed left ashore by an earlier high tide. Holding hands now, their fingers laced together as the tropical sun gave way to a harvest moon, they were mostly silent yet she soon felt they were kindred souls.

  Pausing and focusing out over the calm Gulf waters, he told her about his wife’s long illness and death, as though by doing so he relieved some of the burden on his heart.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sad for Miriam. By the time she died, she’d spent the last six months begging for death with every breath. I felt relief for her when she died but that didn’t stop me from grieving. I still wake up some mornings reaching out for her—we were that close. I’m sure that separating from a spouse is almost as hard,” he told Lanie with a hint of a smile on
his handsome face.

  She shook her head. “No grief here. Maybe a few regrets but my separation put an end to an untenable situation.”

  “Now I’m the one who’s sorry for making you look so deep in thought.”

  “Our marriage was always one of mutual convenience.” Lanie hoped that was sufficient explanation for her lack of the angst that seemed to go with the breaking-up of marriages.

  Although she’d known JD for only a few hours, it felt to her as if they were old friends, comfortable with each other despite an undercurrent of sexual tension that grew stronger with every moment—so strong it became impossible to ignore.

  It seemed right, perfectly natural, when JD bought a beach towel and something in a shiny foil package from a nearby vendor. When he found a deserted section of sand that was sheltered on two sides by a stand of sea grapes, he bent and spread the towel. “Join me, Lanie,” he said, stretching out his long body until his lower legs hung over the end of the towel in the powdery sand.

  When he spoke, a quiet but unmistakable demand, she couldn’t help but obey. She drank in the beauty of his taut, muscular body as she kneeled beside him and traced the length of a whitened scar that went from his left shoulder blade nearly to his armpit. “That must have hurt,” she said, meeting his intent gaze.

  “It did. I tore up my shoulder playing football my senior year in college. What’s hurting me now is this, though.” He took her hand and dragged it across his belly, over his swim trunks and on to his impressive cock, letting out a groan when she encircled him with both hands and explored his turgid, throbbing length. “It’s been a long time since I wanted to make love, but you can tell how much I need you now.”

  His frank need fueled her own. A need to make love, he’d said, not fuck, though the emotion he was feeling certainly couldn’t be love in the hearts-and-flowers, happily-ever-after sense that fantasy authors tried to sell in the romance novels she’d read. JD wore his grief like a shroud that he was just beginning to shed.

  No, what was happening between them wasn’t love. But that didn’t matter. “I want you too.” The size and strength of his erection scared her a little but she didn’t care. She’d welcome any pain that might accompany the pleasure he’d give her.

  It had been years since Lanie had had sex, since before she’d married Wayne. Her experience before that had been sketchy at best, furtive fucking in the backseat of a boyfriend’s car when they had both been teenagers. She was no teenager now, and JD certainly was no horny, groping kid. She couldn’t say whether the little shudder that went through her body was from anticipation or fear.

  JD traced the rings she still had on her right hand, where she’d put them when Wayne had pressed them into her palm as she left. “You’re sure? Are you having second thoughts about reconciling with the senator? If you were mine, there’d be no way I would let you get away.”

  “I’m very sure. My marriage has been in name only for a long, long time.” It was never anything else, she added silently. To cover her nervousness, she pulled off the oversize white cotton shirt she’d had on over her bikini. “Touch me. Please.”

  The way he looked at her, as though she’d given him a treasured prize, made her go warm and liquid inside. After caressing her with his heated gaze, he explored her body with gentle hands.

  “You’re beautiful. I’d love to keep touching you this way all night long, but if I don’t get inside you soon I think I may just curl up and die.” His massive hands were a little shaky as he finished undressing her as eagerly as a little kid might dig in to a much-awaited present from Santa. “Come here and kiss me.”

  She met his gaze, saw raw desire…but something more. A profound need that made what they were doing more than scratching an itch, more than a chance sexual encounter in a tropical paradise miles away from home and everyday reality. He seemed anything but a stranger when she stretched out beside him.

  And then she kissed him.

  He tasted good, like citrus aftershave and coconut sunscreen flavored with a little salt from the sea breeze. His lips, which she’d thought had a hard set to them, felt as soft as velvet, a stark contrast with a day’s growth of coarse facial hair.

  He rolled her over on her back and got rid of his swim shorts. She’d never understood the appeal of a naked man, but then she’d never before seen one who looked as good as he did. He was so gorgeous that she wanted to taste him all over as she watched him tear open the condom and roll it down over the erection that seemed to grow bigger and harder before her eyes.

  “It’s been so damn long for me…hell, I want you so much that I’m likely to go off like a cannon.” He leaned down and kissed her hard, then managed an incongruously sweet smile. “I hope that if I do you’ll give me a chance to do it again—with a little more finesse than I’ll be able to manage now.”

  She nodded. “That sounds great to me.”

  Holding her gaze until their lips met, he kissed her again. Then, slowly, he lowered himself over her. She loved the heat, the weight of him as he nudged her legs apart and lay between them. “Feel how much I want you, Lanie. There are so many things I want to do to bring you pleasure, things I will do when we’re in the privacy of a bedroom instead of out here where anybody could walk by.”

  Lanie gasped when he entered her in one quick, hard thrust.

  JD stopped immediately, mumbled an apology against her lips. “Sorry, sweetheart. I wouldn’t have hurt you for the world.”

  The pain soon ebbed, leaving her with a full feeling, a need for all he had to give. “Make love to me, JD. Please.”

  When he began to move she wrapped her legs around his lean waist. Nothing mattered but the way it felt, the ebb and flow of his body in hers, much like that of the tide going in and out.

  So this was what good sex was all about. If she’d known, she never would have gone without for so damn long. A tingling sensation started in her pussy and spread. Oh God, did it spread.

  “Don’t stop. Don’t ever stop. That feels incredible.” She clutched him harder, strained against him as wave after wave of delicious sensation coursed through her body.

  “Go with it, sweetheart.” He fucked her deeper, harder as she writhed beneath him. “Come for me again. Oh fuck, I can’t hold back.” He stiffened above her, his muscles bulging as he let go. As she lay there, she cradled his spent body against her, enjoying the quiet afterglow.

  I just had my first climax, she thought, listening to the pounding of the Gulf on the nearby shore that mocked the rhythmic thump-thump of his heart and hers in perfect harmony.

  * * * * *

  So close, yet so far away.

  JD followed Lanie’s Honda as they made their separate ways home after the conference ended on Sunday morning. It amazed him that she occupied his mind so fully that he didn’t think to miss Miriam sitting on the seat beside him, talking a mile a minute about everything and nothing as she’d done before becoming ill.

  Instead he replayed sex on the beach with Lanie in his head, growing hard as he recalled her eager but inexperienced response. She had beautiful breasts he could practically taste even now, pert pink nipples that he found intriguing because they’d been pierced but she wore no jewelry in the delightful nubs.

  The inconsistencies about his lover intrigued him and he could hardly wait to explore her fully, inside as well as out.

  He understood why Lanie wanted to keep their relationship quiet until her divorce was granted. He didn’t blame her but damn it, he wanted to shout out to the whole world that he’d rejoined the land of the living, that he was alive and in lust and looking forward to a future that for so long had seemed incredibly bleak.

  Lanie, married for eight years and almost thirty years old, had an innocence about her that made JD eager to teach her all the kinky pleasures he’d practically forgotten—ones to which she had apparently never been exposed.

  He had a court appearance scheduled for tomorrow, or he’d have tried harder to persuade Lanie to extend her
stay by another day. For the first time in longer than he could recall exactly, he’d rediscovered a passion for something other than the law.

  Lanie had said she’d meet him tomorrow at Bennie’s Place, the bar and grill across from the courthouse where attorneys of all varieties gathered during breaks in trials. Not that JD did trial work all that often. Since he limited his practice to corporate law, he performed most of his work for clients in Winston-Roe’s offices in a high-rise building. He couldn’t complain. The breathtaking view of the Hillsborough River and University of Tampa’s famous minarets was a nice job perk.

  Fortunately from a personal standpoint, an executive of one of his corporate clients had run afoul of state regulations. He had involved his employer in civil litigation that might drag on for months before a settlement was reached. Hence JD would be spending considerable time in the courthouse for the foreseeable future.

  He’d get to see Lanie often, because from what she said, he gathered that her solo practice consisted mostly of low-level criminal defense cases, with a few wills and personal injury cases tossed into the mix. That meant she spent a lot of time in the seat of the Thirteenth Circuit Court.

  She beeped and waved when she turned off I-75 toward Plant City, where she still lived in the senator’s house, while he headed in the opposite direction, toward downtown. He could hardly wait until he could be with her again.

  Not just for sex, although the sex had been incredibly good. Maybe he’d see about renewing his membership at the exclusive Cigar City Club. He hadn’t had the heart to visit after Miriam had become too ill to enjoy the BDSM play they’d both enjoyed. After her death he’d avoided the place because it only exacerbated his sense of loss. Now, though, he could imagine taking Lanie there, tutoring her in the fine art of submission in a place where discretion was the watchword.

  He had a feeling that once initiated, Lanie would love the kink that had been so important to his sex life. The club could give them freedom to play without being afraid of showing up in the tabloid media the next morning.