Or hold her close.
“You owe me a smile,” he said instead.
She nodded a slow emotionless nod, then turned away. He saw her inhale, then exhale slowly. Abruptly she turned back around and smiled. But it wasn’t the natural, simple smile he’d been seeking. It was the full sensual smile of her cover pages, slamming him straight in the gut. He felt his breath catch in his throat, while his body went immediately hard. He had to clench his fists against the fire, wanting to curse her even as he wanted to pull her into his arms and show her just what that smile did to a man. His eyes darkened, his feet stepping forward on their own accord.
Abruptly he saw something else flash across her cool arctic face: fear.
He brought himself up shortly, cursing her for looking at him like that after smiling such a smile, and cursing himself for having all the self-control of a rutting boar. To make matters even, he also cursed Les Capruccio for instilling the fear in her to begin with.
Angry and disgusted, he retaliated curtly.
“Too bad that smile isn’t real,” he told her. He stormed past her to the two-liter bottles before he could see the sliver of pain slash unexpectedly across her eyes.
Her gaze fell to the metal gun, hanging so limply at her side, while his words echoed in her head. He was right, after all. The smile wasn’t real. It was merely part of the package meant to hide the contents. Meant to hide the sharp blades of fear slashing through her stomach, the persistent taste of rust and bile in her mouth.
She looked at the gun dully. She’d made the two-liter bottle explode. She had accomplished her goal.
And the man had fallen, fallen, fallen. Down on the gold-patterned carpet, while the soundless scream had echoed through the hall.
Oh, she was capable all right. She could kill a bottle while her insides screamed and the pain raked through her like heated coals. And she could smile a sensual smile, when she wanted to break down in the snow and cry.
And she could look at the tall dark man coming toward her and feel the fear even as her mouth opened with the empty plea of his name.
Why couldn’t she call him back?
The confusion wracked her, but then she slowly stiffened her spine. This was her choice, and this is what she wanted. The gun was merely a tool.
“Are you ready to go?” Mitch said, his voice still cool as he raked her up and down with impatient brown eyes.
She raised her head, keeping her eyes carefully averted. Unconsciously, one hand pressed against her stomach.
“No,” she said at last. “I would like to practice a few more times.”
He paused, his eyes narrowing. He wouldn’t have imagined that. But then, with a shrug, he reached for the gun and reloaded it. He was tired of trying to understand her.
“Fine,” he said curtly. “Five more rounds. Go.”
And she took the gun from him, held it smoothly in front of her and fired five more shots in the brisk New England air.
Chapter 6
B
ut in the dark of night, the control was hard to find.
Every time Jess closed her eyes, she could feel the nightmare hovering just beyond consciousness. And her eyes would pop open again, only to find visions of a tall, dark-haired man haunting her waking moments. She thought she could smell his after-shave, feel the warmth radiating from his powerful frame.
And then her stomach would tighten, and her nerves would tense with a confused mass of overloaded sensations. That tight, restless gnawing in her stomach, those spine-tingling ripples of old fear mixing with new demons. She wanted at once to sink down into the oblivion of sleep and to jerk awake, her hand reaching out to the vision of a man who called her back.
She bolted upright in her bed, feeling her breath coming in gasps while her hands trembled like leaves in the dim moonlight. Too much, her mind thought. It was too much.
Her life had come full circle, moments in time paralleling each other so closely, it was hard to keep the past the past, and the present the present.
She kept seeing his face, Harry’s fat, red-flushed face. All the times she’d looked at him with hopeful eyes. All the times she’d held out her little arms, so happy to see him come home. And then the sudden cracking snap of his palm across her cheek.
Always followed by the tears and the apologies. Never again. He’d never hurt her again. If she’d just behave better, be a little more patient, he wouldn’t lose his temper like that. If she and Mama would just understand...
But each time, the slaps came a little faster, a little harder.
She never knew whether to love him, or to hate him.
Even now she didn’t know.
She swung her feet over the edge of the bed, taking in deep gulps of air. Eventually, her breathing started to slow, but the aching restlessness wouldn’t quite leave her stomach. She hurt, she thought dully. She hurt way down deep in places she wasn’t supposed to hurt anymore. In places so old and dark, it was better not to remember them at all. But the persistent throb was there, the ten-year-old pain refusing to go away.
And in that moment she cursed Les Capruccio and Mitch Guiness and all other men who had ever walked the earth. And she damned them all for interfering with her life, when all she’d ever wanted was to live in solitude—cold and alone, but at least able to sleep at night.
If she closed her eyes now, she would sink into the black pit that had slowly been dragging her back down since the first moment Les Capruccio had walked into her dressing room with his slick smile and damning envelope.
She got out of bed altogether and, without really thinking about it, slowly began to dress. The clock glowed midnight as she crept out of her room. Downstairs she took Bill’s thick jacket off the peg, throwing it over her shoulders. Bill wasn’t due to relieve Jamie until 2:00 a.m., giving her over an hour to collect herself. It seemed tonight was as good a night as any for a little research.
The front door squeaked as she closed it, and she held her breath for a moment. Given the supposed security of the location, she was afraid she’d suddenly look up to find three FBI guns pointed at her. But nothing moved in the house, and after a long moment, she released her pent-up breath.
“Going somewhere?” a distinctly male voice said behind her.
She stiffened immediately, even as she felt her stomach plummet to her toes. Slowly, she half turned to find herself face-to-face with one Mitch Guiness.
“Shouldn’t you be sleeping?” she asked darkly, her own voice not quite able to hide her weariness.
“I could ask you the same,” Mitch replied, sweeping her up and down with his gaze. He’d been listening to her toss and turn for at least an hour from the room next to hers. Then abruptly, there had been the creak of her feet on the floorboards. He knew her well enough to guess what she’d do next. After her five months of hotel captivity, she practically spent all day outside as it was.
“Schoolteachers don’t need beauty sleep,” she answered him, and he grinned his response in the darkness.
“Nice night for a walk,” he said casually. “Damn cold, but at least the sky is clear.”
She nodded, taking a tentative step forward. The dim glow of the half-moon swept over her features, at once illuminating her features and plunging them into darkness. Her dark hair was tousled around her face, softening her finely boned silhouette. And it seemed to him that her eyes looked huge and luminescent, no longer cold but full of haunting shadows and swirling emotions.
His imagination was probably getting the better of him.
Still, his sharp eyes could detect the subtle signs of strain. The burdens of her secrets were catching up with her, he observed. The hour was past midnight, and Cinderella was dangerously close to turning into the ragged housemaid. The gun today had disturbed her. She’d refused to talk about it for the rest of the day, but at dinner he’d seen her hand shake when she’d tried to eat. She’d caught him watching her and had set down the fork with a brittle clank, yet her gaze still hadn’t been able to meet his with its usually cool equanimity.
He should push her now, use his interrogation skills to wrench some of those secrets away from her while he had the chance. But as he watched her peer out into the clear night, shivering against the bitter cold, he couldn’t quite find the desire to push his advantage.
“Trouble sleeping?” he found himself saying softly, his eyes watching her.
Slowly she nodded.
“My mother used to make warm milk with vanilla and nutmeg,” he continued quietly. “Of course, a good glass of cognac works just as well.”
“Did you learn that from your mother, too?” she whispered, her eyes still out on the stars. The emptiness was back, raking through her, and she could feel each tremble in her body. Funny, she was standing a good five feet from the man, yet it seemed she could feel his warmth, smell the faint scent of soap and shampoo. And she wanted to take a step closer, even as she wanted to rail at him for being out here, too, when she just wanted to get away. It seemed the man was everywhere, including the traitorous corridors of her own mind.
“Some talents,” Mitch said with a grin, “I picked up on my own.”
She nodded and the night fell silent. He could practically see the heaviness of her thoughts on her shoulders. And even as he watched, a faint shudder rippled through her.
“It’s too cold to be outside,” he told her gently. “Come on, let’s go on in and I’ll see if I can’t find some cognac.”
She nodded once more, but still didn’t move. He walked toward her, reaching out his arm to her, then froze. Perhaps it was just a trick of light, perhaps the funny effects of a half-moon, but from this angle, her dark eyes sparkled with the suspicious moisture of suppressed tears. And the set of her lips didn’t look so cold anymore, but rather like the tight lips of a woman fighting a huge battle.
He didn’t question what he did, reacting instead on instinct. The arm that had meant to lead her inside turned her against him instead. Before she could utter a word of protest, he drew her against his powerful frame. She went rigid at the first contact, but he soothed her with a small hush.
“You’re just cold,” he whispered. “Stand here just for a moment and I’ll warm you up.”
She should fight him, she thought dully. She should push him away and hit him for daring to touch her so. But instead, his words echoed through her emptiness. She was cold. Cold, so deep down, she thought she might never be warm again. And yet even the warmth scared her, for the ice enclosed things better left entombed. Until she hated the cold but couldn’t risk the warmth. So instead, she stood in Mitch’s arms like a child, not quite able to move, and feeling only the relentless ache that wouldn’t go away or give her peace.
And he was warm. Warm and spicy and soapy. And she suddenly wanted to uncurl her fists against his chest, burying her hands against the solid strength. Slowly she rested her head down against his chest. She could feel the reassuring thunder of a pounding heart, the rich leather of his coat soft against her cheek. He didn’t move, and slowly she relaxed another fraction. He was tall and powerful. She could feel the whisper of his warm breath in her hair, and the ache within her grew.
Her head moved on its own accord, not knowing what it wanted but driven by the mixture of emptiness and fear. Until she shivered even harder, though this time not from the cold at all. And the fear raced down her spine even as she raised her eyes to find his own, dark and soft in the freezing night.
Her lips parted, her breath catching as her gaze came down to settle on his lips, full and sensual. He had a strong jaw, stubbornly set like she knew he could be. And there was the faint shadow of midnight whiskers. They would feel raspy and rough to the touch. Would he press them against her hard, until her soft skin scraped and bruised from the fierceness? Or would they brush against her gently, a tingling and tantalizing blend of rough against smooth, sandpaper against silk?
She parted her lips a little farther and unconsciously arched her neck back. The fear reared harder and she closed her eyes against the intensity.
Mitch saw the lips presented to him so openly, and even as his mind told him this definitely wasn’t right, his head moved of its own volition. He could sense once more that flood of emotions sweeping through her. But the deep blend of shivering confusion and dark pain lent her a mysterious softness that drew him in as surely as a drug.
Gently, tentatively, his lips brushed over hers. She stiffened in his arms, her spine jerking straight. Soothingly, his hands smoothed down her back, willing her to relax. Murmuring soft words of nonsense, his lips swept over hers once more. This time he was rewarded by the soft sigh of her previously pent-up breath. One more time he brushed over her lips, and this time her lips followed his, seeking more. He responded by coming back to the fullness, deepening the kiss ever so lightly.
He felt her tremble, a deep shiver that filled him with need. He arched her neck back a little more, outlining her lips with the gentle teasing of his tongue. Another soft sigh and her lips parted, sending a surging rush of warmth to his groin. This time he did press the advantage, his tongue plunging in to find her sweetness. Far off he heard a soft moan, and he pressed her more tightly against him, fitting the warm curve of her hips more intimately against his own.
Then suddenly she wasn’t pressing against him anymore. The same hands that had flattened against his chest abruptly balled into fists and hit him. With a sharp jerk, she pulled away, practically falling down in her haste.
“No,” she gasped out, her chest heaving in the night. Her eyes were round and huge, the fear engulfing her in waves. “I don’t want this! I don’t want you, I don’t want any man!”
His own breathing was sharp, his blood still thundering in his ears. His eyes narrowed, and he looked at her darkly.
“Sweetheart,” he drawled thickly. “That wasn’t what your lips were telling me just thirty seconds ago.”
She scrambled farther back, wiping the back of her hand across her mouth as if trying to rid herself of his taste. “Get away from me,” she warned.