“What about Rachel?”
He rolled his eyes. “Tam,” he said. “Rachel’s with Tam.”
Becca’s eyes got huge. “No way!”
He couldn’t help but grin. “Way,” he said. “They hit it off. Now they’re inseparable. Who’d have thought, huh?”
“Oh, God. That poor little girl!” Becca said, dismayed.
“It’s OK. Tam’s good to her, in her own weird way. Rachel worships her. And there’s something to be said for a mom who could take out a squadron of Delta Force soldiers using nothing but her tits and her earrings. The McCloud crowd thinks it’s a great joke. I saw them at the party. They look good together. Surreal, but good.”
His hands darted out and grabbed her wrists before she could jerk out of range. He pulled them forward to examine. The scars from the cuffs were still angry red. In time, they would fade.
But she would always bear the marks.
“Do they hurt?” he asked softly.
She yanked them back. “They’re fine. Please, Nick. I’ve got a garden party this afternoon, and I’ve got to finish my prep, so—”
“I’ve had enough chitchat too. I’ve figured out that catching a bullet for you hasn’t earned me enough points for you to take me back. But it sure as hell ought to earn me a fucking private conversation.”
Becca’s eyes fell. She bit her lip. The blond girl’s eyes got big.
“I’ll say what I need to say in front of an audience if I have to,” he went on grimly. “But you’re the one who’ll be embarrassed. Not me.”
“Manipulative bastard,” she whispered.
“Um, Becca? Should I, like, go?” the girl faltered.
“No, Cheryl Ann. Mind the desk,” Becca said. “You,” she jerked her chin at Nick. “Come on in here. If you must.”
She would be calm. She was strong now, she told herself. She’d been through the fire, and she’d emerged hardened, tempered. Tough.
For awhile, after that awful night, she thought she might never feel again. Anything, good or bad. She’d been relieved at the time. She hadn’t cried since then. Hadn’t crumbled once. She’d kept it together.
She was glad he was behind her on the stairs so he couldn’t see her face. Glad, too, that she was wearing this gauzy blue sundress. Not that she wanted to attract him. But looking nice gave a woman a slight advantage, and she needed every advantage she could get.
He was so…oh, there was no word for how he was. No defense against it. It wasn’t fair, for him to come here and flaunt his mojo at her. Throbbing all those intense male vibes at her on purpose to muddle her and scramble her. Looking at her with his trademark gaze of smoldering volcanic desire. Making her weak with longing.
She couldn’t give in. He was too hard for her. He was a rock that she would break herself on, and she was shipwrecked already. Still in salvage mode, trying to find all the chunks of herself.
She led him into the shabby accounting office above the kitchen space. It was sparsely furnished, just a desk heaped with paperwork and a folding chair. She shut the door.
Nick opened his mouth. She held up her hand to forestall him. “Before we say anything, let’s just get one thing straight. Thank you.”
He frowned. “Huh?”
“Thank you,” she repeated, her voice stiff and mechanical. “I have a lot to be thankful for. What you did on the island, to begin with. Saving Josh and Carrie, and those others. Coming back for me, getting shot for me. It was very brave and noble. Very heroic.”
He waited. “And?”
She threw up her hands. “Isn’t that enough for you?”
“I sense there’s more,” he said. “Let me have it.”
“No,” she said. “There isn’t. That’s the point, Nick. It ends right there. Thank you. Period. Stop.”
He shook his head. “Oh, no,” he said. “It can’t end there.”
“Oh, yes it can,” she said. “I will be the first to admit that you deserve a medal for what you did—”
“But I don’t deserve you?”
Doubt gripped her, anxious, sucking, awful. Oh, God, why did it hurt so much? How could it be so painful just to do the right thing?
She forced herself to remember the dense darkness of the warehouse. The pit of despair she was still trying to climb out of.
Some things could not be forgiven. Ever.
She would always have that darkness in the back of her mind now. She would always be hearing the rustling of the rats, feeling that shrinking helplessness, the rage, the hurt, the horrible fear.
She shook her head. “No, Nick. I can’t do it,” she whispered. “I cannot risk you. You are too dangerous for me.”
“No, I’m not,” he said. “I would die for you. I tried to.”
Her belly contracted in pain. “Oh, God. Stop. Don’t do this to me.”
“I know you’re angry.” His voice was low, careful. “Try to see it from my point of view.”
“No.” She took her hands away from her wet eyes and glared at him. “I’ve given that up. This isn’t about me being angry. This is about me surviving. I have to put my own damn point of view first for that. My point of view wasn’t pretty. I still feel the rats nibbling my shoes.”
A muscle pulsed in his tight jaw. “Jesus, Becca. I’m sorry.”
“You should be.” She turned her back on him.
She didn’t hear him move, but she felt that hot force field buzzing around her, making her hyperaware of his nearness.
“A very wise, kind person gave me a lecture once,” he said quietly. “She told me that deceiving and betraying are sins, but that being deceived and being betrayed were mistakes. Bad breaks.”
“Maybe. I was the one who was betrayed, though,” she said.
“Not by me,” he said. “I did the best I could with the information I had. But like you said yourself. I’m not God. And I’m so sorry.”
“I’m sure you did do the best you could, Nick,” she said stiffly. “It’s not your fault your best just wasn’t good enough.”
She could feel the silent hurt she’d caused radiating off him.
He stepped back. The silence yawned, creating a distance that widened, deepened, making her heart burn, ache. Break.
“OK,” he said flatly. “I hear you. I won’t bother you again.”
The warped door scraped open, and clicked shut after him. She heard his boots descending on the creaking stairs.
Grief roared up, and morphed unexpectedly into fury. Why her? Why should she suffer like this? What had she done to deserve it?
Ping, something pulled too tight and snapped inside her like piano wire. She lunged for the door and yanked it open.
“Goddamn you, Nick Ward,” she yelled.
He turned at the foot of the stairs, and stared up, startled. “Huh?”
“Do I mean so little to you? Is it that easy to walk away?” she raged. “Say ‘I’m sorry’ and slink off, telling me you won’t bother me again. Hah! Bother me? To hell with you! Sniveling goddamn coward!”
“Uh, whoa.” He looked nervous, but intrigued. “I thought you wanted me to…well, shit, Becca. What do you want me to do?”
“Use your tiny, shriveled pea brain, and figure it out!” she yelled. “Can you handle how pissed off I am at you, Nick? Because I am so pissed. I am royally, severely pissed, and that won’t just go away just because you say you’re sorry! So forget it!”
His lips twitched, but he wisely suppressed the smile. “I’m one tough son of a bitch,” he said. He took a step up the stairs. “I can take a whole lot of abuse.”
“Oh yeah? But can you take me, Nick?” Her voice shook with emotion. “Do you have the guts for that?”
He climbed the stairs, staring intently into her face. “I can take you,” he said. “Hell yes. It’s giving you up that I can’t take.”
“Oh, yeah? Well, let’s just see.” She gestured imperiously for him to get back into the office. She slammed the door shut, crossed her arms over her chest and barred the exit with her body. No way was he getting away from her before she got her ya-yas out.
“What’s with the screaming harpy act?” His eyes were wary.
“News flash, Nick,” she said. “It’s not an act. I am a screaming harpy. What you see is what you get. So cope.”
An appreciative grin spread over his face. “You’re hot when you’re feisty,” he said. “I fucking love that.”
She shoved at his hard midriff, but did not succeed in budging him. “Only an idiot would say that to a woman as pissed as me.”
“I never claimed to be a rocket scientist,” Nick admitted. “You know me. Mouth opens, truth falls out. Plop. Whether it’s in my best interests or not.”
“Then I suggest you keep your big mouth shut,” she snapped. “Let me see your scar.”
He looked startled, but pulled up his navy T-shirt over his lean torso obligingly enough. She kept her face impassive as she looked at the long, jagged, angry weal, the marks of the clamps and the stitches. It made her heart hurt. She wanted to press her lips against it.
But he wasn’t getting off that easy. She brushed her fingertips over it. He sucked in a harsh breath.
She whipped her hand back, alarmed. “Did I hurt you?”
He shook his head. That hot glow in his eyes was all too familiar. She let her eyes roam over his body, lingering on the thick bulge in his jeans. His eyes followed her gaze. With one swift gesture, he peeled the T-shirt right off, letting it drop from his wrist to the scarred linoleum.
Showoff. Doing a double whammy on her, flaunting his gorgeous bod and his heroic bullet wound at the same time.
It shamed her to her bones that it was working so well.
“Put that back on,” she said breathlessly. “Exhibitionist jerk.”
He shook his head, grabbed her hand and placed it on his scar again, trapping it under his own. “Do that again,” he said. “I liked it.”
She tugged, in vain, on her hand. “You think I give a damn what you like, Nick Ward?”
“I know that you do,” he said.
She wrenched her hand away with a growl of rage, and hauled off, as if she were going to hit him. She stopped herself, muscles locked.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Hit me. Whale on me, if you want.”
“I can’t,” she said crabbily. “You’re wounded, goddamnit.”
“That’s OK. I’m tough. I can take it.”
Oh, God. Something about the stoic acceptance in his voice just broke her heart all over again. That was the heart of the problem with Nick. He was always expecting a blow. Always braced for it. Never surprised when it landed.
She wouldn’t be the one to deal him that blow.
Tears were sliding down her face, her throat melting into a shimmering hot coal. “I don’t care if you can take it or not,” she said shakily. “You’ve taken enough, goddamnit.”
Of all times for the big thaw to come crashing down on her. Damn, damn, damn. This was so undignified. She grabbed tissues from the desk and hid her face in the fluffy wad of paper.
Nick pulled her against his hard, naked chest, wrapping her in the steely strength of his arms. His skin was feverishly hot.
It took a while for the backed-up tears to move through her. There was a lot to cry about: that awful night, that day that she’d steeled herself to leave him at the hospital. All the times she hadn’t let herself call to see how he was. The sleepless nights, staring at the ceiling.
She’d tried so hard to let him go. But she couldn’t.
And she wouldn’t. The relief of giving in was so sweet, such a liberating rush of emotion, she thought for a moment that she might swoon, like a Victorian maiden. But Nick held her up. He didn’t get bored with her protracted crying jag, either. He seemed glad for the excuse to touch her. He buried his face in her hair. Rubbed her back as if trying to memorize every bump of her spine, every muscle, every rib.
The tears moved through her and trailed away, leaving her limp and soft. Very light, as if she might float up and away if he didn’t keep a tight grip. Never one to waste an advantage, Nick tilted her head back and started kissing her wet, closed eyelids, her flushed red cheeks.
“Stop that,” she whispered. “We haven’t made it that far yet.”
“No? How about this, then?” He sank to his knees, staring up at her body. “I love this view. Your gorgeous tits, from below.” His hands swept up the outside of her thighs under her skirt. He hooked her panties with his thumbs and yanked them down around her ankles.
She sucked in a breath. Oh, whoa. No way. Not a chance.
She stumbled back, her bottom fetching up against the desk as he tossed up her skirt and pressed his hot face to her muff. He parted her labia gently with his fingers and his eager tongue licked and probed.
Her knees almost gave way and dumped her on the floor as the sensations swirled in her lower body, a liquid shimmer of heat, of light.
She panicked. She couldn’t bear it, as raw and emotional as she felt. She pushed his face away. “No. Please. Don’t, Nick.”
“No?” He wiped his mouth, looked up at her. “Pretty please?”
“Can’t take it,” she said, unevenly. “It’s too much. I’ll come apart.”
He stood up, standing between her parted legs so the length of their bodies was flush, touching at every point. “Sorry,” he said. “Oh, wait. It pisses you off when I say I’m sorry. Everything pisses you off.”