Of course she might have something to say about that. She’d fought him like a banshee.
No matter.
He loved it when a woman fought, when she didn’t know what was best for her. He could show her what was best, show her
he
was best.
Oh, yeah.
He’d show her.
***
Alex had the car door open before Tony threw it in park. He jumped out, ignoring his knee and the cane lying on the floor.
Two cruisers sat in front of his apartment complex, their red-and-blue lights twirling. Tess was talking to Jackson, her arms wrapped around her middle, her back to the street so she didn’t see him.
Upton stepped in front of him. “She’s fine,” he said, softly but firmly. “Alex, look at me.”
He tore his eyes from Tess and looked at Upton.
“She’s holding on just fine. Let her finish her report to Jackson, then you can go to her.”
“What happened?”
“Jackson got a call about a woman being attacked. As soon as he discovered it was Tess, he called me. Apparently some guy entered your apartment while she was there.”
Oh, God. Oh, shit.
“Did you catch him?”
Upton hesitated. “We’re still looking, but we have something to go on. Not many men wondering the street with a bloody nose and clutching his balls. She’s a trooper, Juran. She fought back and got out. You should be proud of her.”
Tess clasped her arms tighter around herself and shivered. Jackson awkwardly patted her on the shoulder and walked away. She pushed a strand of hair out of her eye and looked at the apartment building, the unnatural paleness in her cheeks a stark contrast to the bright red of her hair. She sniffed and rubbed a finger under her nose.
“Tess?”
She spun around, her hand going to her mouth, fear flaring in her eyes. He closed the distance between them and folded her in his arms.
She laid her cheek on his chest. “Take me home,” she said, her voice whispery thin.
Alex stroked her hair, his gaze scanning the area, looking for anyone out of place.
“Please, Alex, take me home.”
Tess first. Let the cops deal with the guy
. “Sure, baby.”
He tucked her in the crook of his arm and helped her into the van, then took the keys from her lifeless fingers and climbed in the driver’s side. Tony appeared and handed Alex his cane through the open window.
“You okay to drive?” He glanced at Tess.
“Fine,” he said.
Upton stepped up next to Tony. “She going to be okay?” He tilted his head toward Tess.
Alex inserted the key in the ignition. “Just catch the bastard.”
Alex shut off the engine and turned to Tess. All the way home she’d stared out the front windshield with her hands twisted in her lap. He’d competently dealt with hysterical females before, but Tess’s expressionless face unnerved him.
“Tess?”
She turned to him, her face pale, one hand on her stomach. “Keys.”
“Tess—”
She held out a shaking hand, the only indication of her controlled emotions. “Keys.”
With a sigh, Alex handed them over. She scrambled out of the van and, slipping and sliding over the melting ice, hurried to the front door. Alex grabbed his cane and followed Tess inside, wishing he could move faster.
Her coat lay on the floor. Gloves, a scarf and shoes trailed a path down the hall. Othello came to him and whined, his big brown eyes concerned.
Alex found her in the bathroom, crouched over the toilet, retching. He wet a washcloth and clumsily sank down beside her to wipe her face and pull her hair out of her eyes.
When the worst of it seemed to be over, she leaned back on her heels and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Alex handed her a glass of water and she rinsed out her mouth. “Feel better?”
“No.”
Alex took her hand and stood, using the wall as support. “Want to lie down?”
He led her to the bedroom where he pulled down the covers. Hard to believe that just this morning they’d lain there in each other’s arms and laughed.
Tess curled into a ball and tugged the blankets over her shoulder. Her body shook and she closed her eyes. One lone tear traveled across her cheek, soaking into the pillow.
“Don’t go,” she whispered. “Don’t leave me alone.”
“I won’t.” He limped around the bed, toed his shoes off and climbed in next to her. Once again he hadn’t been there when she’d needed him. Once again he’d failed her.
When he closed his eyes, Jason’s eyes stared back at him—accusing, unseeing. He drifted into that no-man’s-land of being half-asleep, half-awake, that place where nightmares easily took over.
He lay on the cold ground, blood pouring from his leg, the sound of receding footsteps echoing off the metal walls and looked at the lifeless eyes of Tess.
In his dream a scream ripped from his throat and ended on an agonizing sob. He reached for her and his hand, searching for something he feared he’d never again hold, folded into a fist and dropped to the pavement while sirens blared in the background.
***
Tess opened her eyes to find Alex sitting in a chair reading a book, his feet propped beside her on the bed. He wore the glasses he’d had on the night he’d baked her cookies.
He turned the page and glanced at her, then stilled. “You’re awake.”
“When did you start wearing glasses?” Beneath the covers, she pulled her knees up to her chest, making herself as small as possible.
“Before Thanksgiving.” Slowly he bent the corner of his page and closed the book with a soft
thwap
. “I hate them, but I can’t read without them.”
“I like them. They make you look—”
“Sexy?” He smiled, although his eyes were serious behind the lenses.
She smiled too, or at least tried. “I did everything you told me to. All those self-defense moves. They work.”
He blew out a breath and took his glasses off. “Jesus, Tess.”
“He was going to rape me.”
Alex closed his eyes and dropped his head back. “Shit.”
“Thank you. For teaching me.”
He slid his feet to the floor and moved to the edge of the bed to brush her hair off her face. “Do you feel sick anymore?”
She shook her head and looked at the wall.
“Do you think, maybe, you should talk to someone about this? Maybe see a doctor to make sure you’re okay?”
“No.” She didn’t want to talk about it to a stranger, didn’t want a doctor probing her when she knew she wasn’t hurt.
“Maybe you should. I mean, I’m here and I’ll listen, but I’m not a professional.”
“No.”
“Tessie.”
She swung her gaze to his. “No.”
***
The next few weeks were hell for Alex. At night he held Tess while she cried and during the day he hovered. She hated the hovering, but he couldn’t help it. When he let her out of his sight, his chest got tight and he found it hard to breathe. Like a panic attack.
“I thought the door had popped open when the furnace kicked on,” she said one day. She was mixing some sort of batter and he was sitting at the kitchen table reading the newspaper. It took him a while to figure out what she was talking about and when he did, he couldn’t move.
“I think that’s when he entered the apartment.” She measured salt and poured it into the batter.
That day set a pattern. Tess seemed to feel more comfortable telling him what happened in bits and pieces and only while she was baking. Of course he’d read the report, but this was different. This was Tess working it out in her mind, and he was lost as to how to help her.
“I could feel his erection pressing into me. That’s when I knew he wanted to rape me,” she said another day.
The coffee Alex had been drinking churned in his stomach. “Tess,” he said, the word strangled. But she didn’t seem to hear.
“I grabbed his balls.”
“Good for you.”
And she smiled. The first real smile he’d seen since that day.
They hadn’t made love. She didn’t push him away, in fact, wanted him to hold her, but they hadn’t made love and it angered him that someone had taken that connection away.
Slowly, as the pies, cakes and cookies began to fill every available space on the counter and as the days lengthened, Alex began to see a change in Tess. An acceptance. A moving forward. He still wanted her to see a professional and she still refused, but he could see a difference. More smiles. A little laughter. Less holding at night and more sleeping. The nightmares diminished.
But they still hadn’t made love.
Chapter Fifteen
Othello bounded through the snow, alternately barking and sniffing at whatever caught his attention. Alex buried his hands in the front pockets of his jeans and blew a vapor of breath into the cold morning air. He sniffed and stamped his feet. He was damn cold, yet not ready to go inside. He’d come to hate it when Tess baked. He could feel himself tense up, waiting for the next bombshell she would drop. Today, he stayed outside with Othello. Valentine’s Day had passed weeks ago and with it the flurry of baking that Tess had to do for her clients. Yet they had more food than they knew what to do with. She’d even given stuff to Tony, but he was overloaded so he took it to the homeless shelters.
Othello lifted a leg to water the dead rose bush next to the house, turned to inspect his handiwork, then trotted off.
The soft crunch of snow and slight movement to his right caught Alex’s attention. Just as he turned, something cold and hard smacked him in the face, obliterating the world into white.
Tess’s laughter rang through the still air. Alex spit the snow out of his mouth and pulled his hands from his pockets to wipe off his face. Othello barked and ran circles around Tess. The cold had turned her cheeks rosy and her nose red. Her fiery hair spilled out from beneath a pink knit hat. Bright green mittens covered her hands. She was a study in color and it thrilled him to see her out of the kitchen and laughing for once.
With a growl, he scooped up a handful of snow and patted it into a perfect projectile. “You should know by now not to mess with the best snowball fighter around.” He advanced, tossing the snowball from hand to hand.
Tess shrieked and bolted for the tree.
Alex loped after her. Othello streaked after her, barking. He wasn’t worried. They were in a fenced yard. She had nowhere to run, nowhere to hide.
Tess stopped and turned, her hands held out. “Now, Alex…”
“It’s a little late for peace negotiations, Tess.”
She backed up a step and giggled again, the sound so wonderful it made him weak in the knees. “Your knee.”
“Never felt better.” Except for the weak-in-the-knees part but that had nothing to do with his surgery. He tossed the snowball in the air again and smirked. He barely limped anymore and used the cane only when Tess got bitchy about it. At his next visit to Dr. Ford he would ask about returning to work. It was almost March and he was more than ready. But first, he had a war to wage with his wife.
Alex launched his weapon and Tess ducked, but he’d anticipated the feint and aimed correctly. The snowball hit her square in the back. Tess dropped to one knee and grabbed a handful of snow. He did the same.
“One to one, Tessie. Give up.”
“No way, Juran.” She squished the snow together and made an oval-shaped ball. She threw it and it came apart before it ever reached him, snow blowing everywhere.
He snorted. “You’re such a girl.”
“I seem to recall there’re times you like that about me.”
Oh, yeah. Snowball-throwing aside, he definitely liked her as a girl. But it’d been a long time since he’d seen that side of her and her words, thrown at him in fun, stirred him. His jeans suddenly became tight.
He advanced. Tess retreated. Othello stood between them looking back and forth. Alex took another step forward and Tess smiled, her expression mischievous.
“Come on, big boy,” she taunted, wiggling her fingers at him. “Bring it on.”
“Tessie, baby, your mouth just wrote a check you can’t cash.”
Her eyes got wide, mocking. “Oooh, big words, from a big man.”
He ran. She laughed and turned. Othello jumped in front of her and Tess went down. Alex fell on top of her, pinning her to the cold, snow-covered ground.
“Uncle,” she gasped, pushing hair out of her face with those bright green mittens.
“Ha! There’s no
uncle
in war. You’re my prisoner now.” Alex flipped her onto her back and pressed his weight into her.
Tess laughed and, too late, he realized he’d made a grave tactical error in not disarming her. She stuffed her snowball down the front of his shirt.
“Oh, Tess, that was a mistake.”
“Yeah? Watcha gonna do about it?”
He pretended to think about it for a moment. “Shoving snowballs down your enemy’s shirt calls for strict disciplinary procedures. I’m sorry, honey, but I must follow orders.”
The warmth of her body, even through all the layers of clothes, and the melting snow dripping down his chest branded him. The silky strands of her red hair contrasted sharply with the white snow. He nestled himself between her thighs and nearly groaned with a built-up need he’d been keeping in check.
“Orders?” The question came out on a tiny gasp of air. Her gaze traveled over his face and fixated on his mouth. He rocked his hips and her breath got a funny catch to it. Crap, if he didn’t watch it, he’d come right here with snow melting inside his shirt.
“What kind of orders?” she asked a little breathlessly.
“Orders from the top.” His gaze drank in her cherry red lips and he dipped his head to taste. Lightly he passed his own lips across hers, barely touching.
“Torture.” He licked her lips in a silent request for an invitation inside. Tess moaned and wrapped her arms around his neck. Her tongue met his and he swore the snow melted underneath them.
“Please, Alex.”
His breath puffed out, condensed and blew away with the slight breeze. “Please what, Tess?”
She looked at him, her gaze serious, searching his face. “I love you.”
“God, baby, I love you too.”
His erection pushed against his fly, making it damn uncomfortable, but he couldn’t move, couldn’t break contact with her. Othello nudged his cold nose between them and licked Tess’s cheek. She laughed and Alex flopped over onto the wet snow, his arms spread out. He blinked at the bright sun. If he didn’t get some action soon, he was going to die.