Love with the Proper Stranger (17 page)

“Tomorrow? I’m sorry, I can’t—”

The line was dead. Serena had hung up without even saying goodbye.

CHAPTER EIGHT

A
LIGHT WAS ON IN
Mariah’s cottage.

Miller stood on the beach, gazing up at the house, wishing he’d been able to sleep. He wished he hadn’t given up and climbed out of bed. He wished he hadn’t roused Princess and brought her out onto the beach. He wished he’d walked in the other direction.

Most of all, he wished he could erase the memory he had of Mariah’s face as she turned away at lunch. But the hurt and disappointment in her eyes had been burned into his brain. There was no escaping it.

He shouldn’t have come out here.

But something had pulled him in this direction. Something strong. Something he couldn’t resist.

Nothing had gone right tonight. He’d planned to take Serena to dinner and ask her to marry him. But she’d called and left a message, canceling their date. She hadn’t told him where she was going or when she’d be back—just that she had to go to the mainland to take care of business and that she’d be back soon.

His first thought was that she was on to him. Somehow, she’d made him. She knew he was FBI.

She was dangerously smart, and he had screwed up all over the place with this case, starting with his obsession with Mariah and continuing with his failure to stick to his cover story and play the part of the invalid
at the Foundations for Families building site. He knew what chemotherapy did to a person, and it was highly unlikely that, had he had the treatments he was pretending to have had, he would’ve been able to rescue that eight-year-old from the tree, let alone Mariah.

Yeah, and then there was his telling Mariah about Tony. That was a real stroke of genius. He’d actually told Mariah that Tony was a
cop
. What had he been thinking?

He
wasn’t
thinking. He was reacting. He was feeling. He was wanting. He was leading with a part of his anatomy that didn’t have a very high IQ.

And that was how agents got themselves and their partners killed. And God help him, he may not give a damn about his own life, but he would not—
would not
—bury another partner.

He gazed out at the horizon, squinting to make out where the sky ended and the ocean began. A light haze obscured all but the brightest of the stars, and a steady breeze blew off the water, carrying with it a salty mist. It was almost cold.

He was exhausted, bone weary, yet he still couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t sleep because he was afraid to sleep. He was afraid to fall into his nightmare. Afraid to gaze down into Tony’s sightless eyes. Afraid to hear Tony’s voice, tight with fear. Afraid to face his own guilt.

Princess was halfway up the path that led to Mariah’s, looking back at him with a quizzical expression on her fuzzy face.
Aren’t you coming?

“No,” Miller said, softly but firmly. “Come back here, Princess.
Now
.”

But the dog either couldn’t hear him over the wind
and the surf, or maybe she simply chose not to hear. She trotted steadily toward the shelter of Mariah’s deck.

Miller went after her, breaking into a run, but she was too far ahead. As she started up the wooden steps of the deck, she barked sharply. Once. Twice.

Damn
. That was all he needed—for Mariah to know he was here, skulking around outside her house, hoping for what? To get a glimpse of her? To talk to her? To kiss her? To fall back with her onto her bed? To lock her bedroom door and never come out?

All those things.
Dammit
, he wanted
all
those things.

“Princess, get your butt down here,” he hissed, starting up the stairs after her.

The door slid open. “Hey, what are
you
doing here?” Mariah greeted his dog. Her voice was not so friendly when she turned and spotted him, frozen on his way up the stairs. “John?”

He climbed up the last few steps, silently cursing Princess, silently cursing himself. “Hi. Yeah, it’s me. I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to bother you, but the dog has a mind of her own.”

Mariah looked incredible. She was wearing those same cutoffs she’d had on at lunchtime, the same clingy T-shirt. Her legs were long and tanned and looked as if they’d be deliciously smooth to touch. She’d pulled her hair up and off her neck, holding it in a messy bundle on top of her head with one of those giant bear-trap-type clips.

But she also looked tired—her normally sparkling eyes were shadowed. She looked wary and leery and not at all happy to see him.

As he watched, she took a breath, and the slight movement made her breasts strain against the cotton
of her shirt. God, what he wouldn’t have given to pull her into his arms.

She glanced back inside the house, twisting slightly to look at the clock on the wall. “It’s after one. Couldn’t you sleep?”

Miller shook his head. “No. I never can. Sleep, I mean. Except for that one time here…”

She was silent for several long moments, just gazing at him. He couldn’t read her eyes, couldn’t read her body language. He had absolutely no idea what she was thinking.

“It’s cold tonight,” she finally said. “Why don’t you come inside?”

She turned and went in, not waiting for him to answer.

Miller knew he should take Princess and go. But he’d left everything he knew he should do behind a long time ago. And Princess was already curled up in the dry, protected corner of the deck. So instead, he followed Mariah into the house and closed the door tightly behind him.

It was outrageously bright in there after the darkness of the beach. Mariah had brought most of the lamps from other rooms over to the dining table near the sliding doors, and that part of the house seemed to glow. He stepped past the lights and into the dimness of the living room.

“How’s your back?” he asked awkwardly, wishing that she would ask him to leave. It would make everything so much easier if she just kicked him out.

“It’s fine.” She was standing in the middle of the room, arms folded across her chest, watching him.

“What are you doing… you know, up so late?”

“I couldn’t sleep, either,” she admitted. “I thought I’d put some of my pictures in albums. I’ve been trying to organize them.” She gestured back toward the dining-room table. Photos of all shapes and colors were spread across its surface, along with albums of all sizes.

Music was playing softly in the background. It wasn’t soft music; it was just turned down low, as if she’d adjusted the volume when she heard Princess out on the deck. A slide guitar wailed over a heavy country backbeat. Vocalists in tight harmony came in—singing about a girl with a tattoo in the shape of Texas. Miller had to smile.

“You know, I always pictured you as being so serene, with your stress-reduction exercises and your crystals,” he told her. “I guess I always imagined that when you were alone you’d listen to New Age music—not kickass country.”

She smiled very slightly. “Oh, please. I thought you knew me better than that. New Age music puts me to sleep.”

“Maybe we should both try listening to it, then.”

Mariah turned away from him and sat on the end of the couch, her legs underneath her, tailor-style. It was dim in the living room, with all the lights moved into the dining area. She looked mysterious sitting there, shadows falling across her face. “Tell me about the test results.”

Miller stepped away from the table and farther into the darkness of the living room. He sat down in the rocking chair opposite her and cleared his throat before he told her a lie. Another lie. There had been so many, yet at the same time, he’d told her more about himself
than he’d ever told anyone. All those memories of his mother…

“There’s not much to tell. My blood tests show vast improvements. If it keeps going like this, I’m going to be considered in remission. If the cancer doesn’t recur in five years, I’m going to be considered cured.”

He sounded bitter. He
was
bitter. He knew so much about Hodgkin’s disease and about the so-called survival rate because his mother had been one of the ones who hadn’t survived. She’d been in remission. She’d even been pronounced cured. And still, she’d relapsed and the second time around, the cancer had won. She’d died.

“Five
years…
?” Mariah leaned forward. “John, you’ve got to stop worrying about it. You can’t not sleep for five years.” She sighed. “Have you considered going into therapy?”

He wanted to sit next to her on the couch. God, he wanted her so badly he could barely speak.

Why was he here? What was he doing here? There was nothing—absolutely nothing—good that could possibly come of this. Nothing but a few brief moments of comfort, a temporary respite from the hell his life had become. Mariah could give him that. But what about her? What about all that he’d be taking away from her in return?

“I know you don’t think so, but I’m okay about the Hodgkin’s. It’s not even real to me.” Miller stood up swiftly, aware that he was saying the wrong thing again. What was he telling her now? Damn right the cancer wasn’t real to him, because it
wasn’t
real. But it
was
real to Jonathan Mills.

Except he
wasn’t
Jonathan Mills. He was John
Miller. John Miller was the one who couldn’t sleep, the one with the terrible nightmares. He was the one with all the guilt, all the suffocating blame. He was the one who had come here tonight, seeking her out.

Mariah stood, too, looking at him, her eyes wide. “John, are you all right?”

He shook his head. “No. I have to…” What? What did he have to do? Run away. God, he never thought he’d ever run away from anything. But here he was, forced to run from the one person who maybe could save him, given the chance.

But he couldn’t give her—or himself—any kind of a chance.

She was moving toward him slowly, the way someone would approach a frightened animal. “John, when was the last time you slept?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know.” But that was another lie and he was tired of lying to her. He knew damn well when he’d last slept. “It was here,” he said. “That time I was here.”

Her eyes widened. “That was over a week ago!”

“I’ve had some naps since then, but…” He shook his head.

“But you wake up with that nightmare, and then you can’t—or won’t—go back to sleep, right? My God, you’re shaking!”

He was. He jammed his shaking hands into the front pockets of his jeans and turned toward the door. “I have to go.”

Mariah blocked his path. “Let me call Daniel to come and get you.”

“No, I’m fine.”

“You are so
not
fine. Look, just sit down. On the couch.”

Miller didn’t move.

“Please? John?”

He sat.

She sat down next to him. All he could think about was how badly he’d wanted to sit next to her. Well, now here he was.

“Talk to me,” she said quietly. “Tell me about Tony. Why do you blame yourself for his death? What really happened, John?”

Miller turned to look at her, and with a flash of clarity that nearly pushed him down onto the floor, he knew why he wanted to be here, why he wanted to be with Mariah so desperately.

Why do you blame yourself for his death?

He did. He blamed himself. And yet he knew that Mariah would forgive him. He knew that without a doubt. Mariah would tell him that even if it
was
his fault that Tony had died, even if he
had
been to blame, even if there was something he could have done to save his partner and best friend, she would
still
forgive him.

He should have gotten out of the van sooner. He should have known there would be a snafu with the backup. He should have anticipated the fact that the choppers wouldn’t arrive. His list of recriminations went on and on, but regardless of its length and content, the bottom line was the same.

He’d failed.

But Mariah, with her gentle smile and warm eyes, would forgive him for failing. She would forgive him his mistakes, forgive him for being human.

God help him, he wanted that forgiveness. He
wanted to hear her say it. And he knew with that same flash of clarity, brighter than all the lights gathered around the dining-room table, that he had to get out of here, and soon, or he’d break down in tears, crying like a baby. Crying for Tony, and crying for himself—for everything that he’d lost that awful night two years ago. Crying because the one time it had really mattered, the one time his reputation of never failing, of not accepting the word “impossible,” of being “The Robot” with his superhuman ability to get the job done—the one time that would have really made a difference, reality had stepped in and Tony had died.

He knew he had to get out of there, but Mariah reached out and took his hand, and he couldn’t move.

“I couldn’t save him,” he told her, his voice hoarse.

She touched his face. “But you tried, didn’t you? You
were
there.”

Miller had to close his eyes to keep his tears from escaping. “I didn’t see it. But I heard them kill him. God, I heard him die!” He turned away as more than two years of pain and grief and rage erupted in an emotional cataclysm. His tears burned his face and his lungs ached for air and his body shook as he broke down and wept. “I was too late. I got there too late.”

Miller felt Mariah’s arms around him and he tried to pull away, tried to stop his tears, tried to shut himself off and push everything he felt back down inside him. He might’ve succeeded had she not held on to him so tightly.

“What if you’d gotten there earlier?” she asked, her voice as soothing as the gentleness of her hands in his hair. “How could you have stopped them from killing him? What would you have done?”

He knew the answer—and he knew that she knew it, too.

“You probably would’ve been killed, as well, wouldn’t you?” she asked quietly.

“Yes.” Not probably. Definitely. He would’ve died. It was only because he’d arrived after most of Domino’s men had emptied their bullets into Tony’s head that he’d managed to take them all out without being killed himself. If he’d shown up any sooner, he would’ve been lying on that concrete floor, just as dead as Tony.