“Jake?”
“We need to talk,” he said, almost growling.
Tia blanched. This wasn’t her Jake, not in any capacity. Not Mr. Persuasive, not the Dom, not the man who bound her to a farmhouse bed, not the broken man she’d held by the lake. Not even the agent who had burst in through a window, wearing a winter hat, carrying a gun.
This man was…pissed. Cold. Hard. His eyes blue steel, the set of his jaw more than stubborn.
“Sit.” He pointed to a chair at the kitchen table. She sat warily.
He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms over his chest. Oh, Chase had nothing on pissed Jake. She’d never be afraid to face Chase after this. “When were you going to tell me about Europe?”
She felt the blood drain from her face. She had forgotten to call Chris, to tell him to forget it. So much had happened. “How do you know?”
“Christian Martin made a few phone calls.”
Shit, her old boss had to go and move on this. “To you?”
“No, to Chase. Who called me, wanting to know what the fuck was up. So what’s up, Tia?” So soft, his voice. Deceptively soft with a note of titanium underneath.
She stared at her hands, at the bare finger on her left. “He made the offer last week.”
“You called him Sunday. After the lake.”
“I was scared.”
“Are you still?”
She looked up then. “Jake—”
“You leave Friday. Which means I can have you on a plane to Vegas tomorrow.”
Oh, no. No
. She flashed back to Friday, under a tree in a certain possessive house’s yard. “I’m not going to Vegas with you.”
“Then I’m going to Europe.”
“No. The point of Europe was—”
“To run, right? To run like hell, after you told me it was time for us both to stop running.” Damn him for being right. “So what happens after Europe?”
“I don’t know?”
“Because I’ll follow you there.”
“You can’t.” And she remembered when she had thought Europe was far enough, and he’d never follow. The look in his eyes told her how wrong she had been.
“I will. I have skills that would make a stalker weep with envy. I have access to a very rich man who thinks the world of you, because you kept a madman from torturing his even richer wife. Chase happens to think you belong with me. So. What happens after Europe? How far will you run, Tia? I have my own money. How far will you make me chase you? Because I will burn through three fortunes to make you mine.”
“Jake—”
“Tell me you don’t love me,” his jaw set, harder, more determined, “and I won’t follow.”
Could she? No, she couldn’t, because that would hurt more than running from the truth. But he wasn’t going to like what she had to say.
Desperation grew, and he stood over her, his size so menacing, even though she knew he would never hurt her. Not that way. Not unless she begged.
He smacked the table with his hand. “I love you. Tell me you don’t feel the same way.”
“You need to sit, Jake. You need to sit so I can talk to you, without you looming and wanting to yell. I can hear it in your voice, and you’re scaring me.”
My God, where did that come from? Jake flinched, then took a seat at the kitchen table. His gaze softened, but his jaw was still clenched, set in its stubborn place.
Tia swallowed but squared her shoulders. She took a deep breath and gave in to the pain of loving him. “I…care. About you. A lot.” Not quite what she wanted to say, but it was a start.
Relief washed over his face, the tension leaving his eyes, the stubborn set to his jaw sliding into a wide grin. He was so happy, and the pain of loving him grew. “I knew it.”
“It doesn’t mean I can stay with you.”
“Tia—”
“Just listen. Please?”
He sat back, his eyes hard again. She took his hand in hers marveling at how large his hands were, yet how gentle they could be on her skin. Hard yet gentle, that’s what she loved about him.
She stared at his hand and how his fingers laced with hers. “One thing I’ve realized over the weekend, and it hit home yesterday, is that I need help. I think I need help first.”
“Help?” Confusion crossed his face.
“I need to talk to someone. Not you. Someone who can help me, because I don’t want to be a danger to myself again. I can’t love you if I can’t learn to love myself, first. And I don’t love any part of me.” It felt good to admit it, like she’d started swimming toward shore, and someone was holding a life preserver for her, still out of reach, but she could see it.
Jake sat back and nodded, looking pleased. “Chase can recommend someone safe to talk to. A professional. I’ll go with you, if you want.”
“I can’t do this with you. I’m sorry.”
He snorted. “Why? I love you, damn it. For better or worse, and I know I said no sickness, but I don’t feel that you’re sick. Yeah, you need to talk to someone. But I don’t see it as sick. You had a shitty life, and it twisted your soul. I love you anyway. Love me back.” The last words were a command, said in that voice she loved so much.
How could she resist? “I’m too twisted to deserve your love.”
He leaned forward. “But you do deserve it. I love that you’re twisted, because you’re insane enough to put up with my fake weddings and house rules. I love that you are wild in my bed, because I know I’ll never, ever be one of those men who has to look somewhere else for entertainment. You are all I can handle.
“I love that you are so beautiful that my heart aches when I see you sleeping in my bed, wearing my T-shirt, riding my horse, and sitting under my tree. I love that you are brave and scrappy, so I don’t have to worry about you when you’re working. It will be just like if we had normal nine-to-fives in a big office. You deserve my love. Every ounce of it. I deserve yours. Give it to me.”
She wanted to give in, so badly. It had been so long since she’d been loved, and loved back that she had forgotten how. How? “This hurts so much.”
“How much pain?”
“Ten.”
He gave a short laugh. “That’s it? You call yourself a masochist? This should be easy for you.”
So smug, he was. A part of her couldn’t help but smile, just a little. “There are limits.”
“Push them. Give in to them. Let me love you. Isn’t this pain better than the pain you felt yesterday, from that shithead? Didn’t my love take that away?”
“Yes.”
Oh, yes.
“Then damn it, Tia. Love me. Don’t be afraid, because this is a good pain. You’re supposed to want this. It won’t kill you or make you bleed.”
Yet, she still felt small. Alone. “I feel as if you’ve wrapped my heart in bondage tape.”
“Bondage tape is nothing to be afraid of.”
No, perhaps it wasn’t. But she felt so alone, and she had to be insane. Love shouldn’t hurt, should it? “Does it hurt you to love me?”
“Yeah.” His answer surprised her. “It hurt more before I confessed. I love you enough to chase you across Europe. On foot. That hurts like hell, because that would be a lot of running. But I’d do it, for you.”
Oh, how he hated running, and the thought of him running, pissed, across Europe made her smile. “But there’s bondage tape.”
“Fitting, isn’t it? Kinky me, loving twisted you with bondage tape? I’ll change the color if you want—yellow? Blue? Red? I’ll wrap it tighter, if your masochistic heart wants it.”
She stared at him, her heart in her throat, tears in her eyes. He loved her enough to wrap her heart in harder bondage tape. She closed her eyes and breathed. In, out. Measured breaths that she took when she was trying to keep from coming under his skilled hand.
Do it. Love him.
She shook her head. “I—”
“It’s three words, Sarah. Three little, easy words, none of them dirty. And when you finally open your heart, it may hurt, but it will be more like the pain you seek. Not this pain. This pain is happening because you don’t believe.”
She believed, though. In him. “You’d be enough of a sadist to love me the way I need to be loved? You’ll wrap me in tape and never let me go?”
“I’ll love you so much, your heart will bleed.”
Oh, those words were music to her ears. She had once thought she wanted him to love her enough to die for her, like Kate loved Chase. But that wasn’t right. Wasn’t twisted enough. This, though. His love would be just as twisted as she was. How very fitting that her love be the same—twisted.
“I love you.” She breathed again, around the pain, around the bondage tape, around the tiny wings her heart had sprouted at one point. He was right—the pain changed, became hotter, brighter, but lighter. This was pain she liked. Pain she could gladly keep. “I love you.”
“Come here,” he commanded softly, his arms open. She went to him, and he pulled her to his lap, kissing her cheek, her lips, her hair. His arms were like home, warm, comforting. Full of love. “Pain?”
“A ten, but you were right. It’s good. Green.”
“No Europe?”
“No Europe. I hadn’t planned to go. I was going to call him this morning and tell him. I’m sorry you got so pissed.”
Jake nodded and pushed her off his lap. He then shifted to the floor on one knee, her hand still in his. “After you’ve sorted out things and have had time to breathe, you’ll marry me?”
Marry?
“I don’t know, Jake. I can’t commit to that yet.” Tia needed time, time to get her head together. But she knew deep inside she wanted nothing more than to marry him.
“You don’t have to commit to any more than just being mine. For now. But when and if you’re ready, I want to marry you. For real.” Jake reached into his pocket and pulled out his old class ring, the bottom portion wrapped in the yarn from his hat. He slid it onto her trembling finger.
“Yes.” The tears began to fall, and Tia pulled him up by his hands. They stood, and he hugged her. She winced, more from the pain of his love than the fact that her side hurt.
“Too much,” she breathed. Way, way too much, but she closed her eyes and leaned into him, inhaling his scent, warming to his heat.
“You married me once, under a very nice tree. As far as I’m concerned, we’re still married. It’d just be formal, that’s all. More for my mother’s sake than mine. She never thought this day would come for me.” He kissed the back of her hand, then the finger that held his ring. “We can pick out something more fitting later.”
She didn’t want to pick out anything else—this was fine with her. She’d fight that battle later, though. “Will you write our vows again?”
He smiled, sort of smug, because she obviously had liked what he’d done at their impromptu wedding. “Do you want me to?”
“As long as you take out the ‘until Monday do us part,’ sure.” And then she laughed, so happy, so…free. The Sarah part of her was free at last, allowed to love. “Pink boutonniere?”
“Pink boutonniere.” He closed his eyes and wrinkled his nose. But then he opened them, and his eyes now crinkled at the corners from his wide smile. “Pink roses for Mrs. Tatiana Sarah Anderson, my wife for real.”
How nice it sounded, to have all of her joined under one name, to one man. “Then I’d be all yours.”
Jake kissed her softly. “Twistedly mine. I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
About the Author
Mia Downing started creating heroes at age four, but her heroes then rode ponies to rescue the princess, and only kissed her on the cheek. Today, Mia's heroes still rescue princesses, but the price of their toys and the expertise of their seduction leads to a lot more than a peck on the cheek.
When Mia isn't busy creating new stories for her readers she fills in as an underwear model for a prestigious lingerie company. She also lives in CT with her family, and enjoys horses and knitting.
Visit Mia Downing at
www.miadowning.blogspot.com
Twitter: miadowning007
Email: [email protected]
To chat with Mia Downing and other Wild Rose Press authors of erotic romance, join us at www.groups.yahoo.com/group/thewilderroses.
Also Available
Spy Games: Endgame
by
Mia Downing
Book 3 of the Spy Games series
Sexy assassin Charlotte Smith doesn't go by the code name Dragon Queen because she's sweet and cuddly. She's cold, hard, and mean and has been training for the past five years to take down the men who destroyed her soul and left her burning for revenge. But when she meets her next assignment at a wedding, her body protests there's much more to life than kicking asses and taking names. Actor Aaron James is witty, hot as hell, and he smells divine. But women with suicidal endgames don't indulge in casual sex, and they definitely don't fall in love.
Since meeting Charlotte at his brother's wedding, Aaron's life has been nothing but trouble. He's plagued by memories of the kiss he stole from her, and he senses underneath her aloof nature and frosty glare is a woman with passion and fire. When Charlotte is assigned as his bodyguard after a botched kidnapping attempt, he's psyched. What better way to get in her panties than have her pretend she's his girlfriend? Until Aaron realizes too late he wants more than her panties...he want's Charlotte's heart.
Prologue
Five years ago...
Chase Sanders walked through the door of the dingy hotel room and chucked his keys on the counter. He always chucked his keys. Jake Anderson, his partner, pocketed them. So Charlotte Smith knew right away, curled in the far bed with her back to the door, which had come in.
She’d rather it be Chase. Jake was a pain in the ass, trying to channel her anger, make her submit. She hated him, but that wasn’t why. Chase would climb into bed and just hold her as she cried. He was the good cop to Jake’s bad cop, but she had no opinion of Chase other than she didn’t hate him.
They were both gentlemen, though, never anything sexual, not from either guy. Which was good, because there were only two beds and they’d made it quite clear they weren’t sleeping together, nor were they sleeping on the floor. She had to bunk up. She always chose Chase’s bed.
The two men had the same end goal—saving her—but different approaches, and they squabbled more than two men should over a woman they weren’t screwing. Chase wanted her to have therapy, and Jake wanted her to submit. Both wanted her to live, to be happy. She wanted them to not care and just let her die.