"I didn’t say something was behind us, I said you missed something."
"What?"
"Food," Cameron said firmly. "You need some. And I’m hungry. I want some. I also want a bathroom, a painkiller and some distraction. Making love with you would probably come under that heading, but we’ll have to get out of the car to do that, because I’m not as young today as I was yester—"
Acasia kissed him. It was full of let’s–shut–him–up enthusiasm rather than finesse, but it worked. Cameron raised his hands and dragged her closer with the barest touch. He wanted her badly, needed her, needed the purely physical reminder that she belonged to him, with him. But not here. Not now. Later.
He pulled back at the same time she let him go, facing forward as she readjusted her expression into one of calm. She paused before putting the car in gear to drag her fingers lightly over the inside of his thigh.
"Is that better?" she queried solicitously. "Are you distracted now?"
Cameron made a strangled sound, and Acasia patted his leg.
"That’s what I thought." Then she blew her advantage as they pulled away from the side of the road by asking anxiously, "That sign did say ‘Lodging,’ didn’t it?" and making Cameron laugh.
* * *
"Rhiannon? You’re taking us—" Words failed Cameron. It had occurred to him, belatedly, that he hadn’t told her where they were going, that he didn’t know her plans for them, only that he could guess they’d be very different from, and more complicated than, his own. In disbelief he stared across the wobbly cafe table at Acasia.
They’d stopped at a gas station that doubled as a convenience store, taking advantage of a gift shop selling souvenir sweat suits to replenish Cameron’s wardrobe before settling down to eat at the restaurant next door. Acasia chose a thick, juicy hamburger, corn on the cob and French fries. Cameron felt the pull of the stitches in his cheek, glared at her and ordered eggs, toast, hash browns and Jell–O.
"Rhiannon?" he asked again, and wondered why he was so surprised. Great minds aside, it never paid to underestimate Acasia Jones.
Acasia hunched uncomfortably and nodded. She’d expected some reaction to her announcement but this wasn’t it. "Yeah. You invited me, it’s home ground for you, you know where to hide, and I have the blueprints. Security’s tight, but not perfect. I can get you through—" She glared at him in disgust. "What are you laughing at? It’s a good plan. Your own security people won’t know we’re there unless you tell them."
"It’s not—" Cameron choked on a mouthful of eggs, grabbed gingerly for his glass of iced tea and gasped as he swallowed.
"Be careful, you’ll hurt yourself."
"I already have." Cameron laughed, and he put a hand to his side and cleared his throat. "Oh, God, I needed that. I’m sorry—really. I’m—" He coughed again and carefully picked up his napkin to dab at his mouth. "I’m sorry. It’s not the plan. It’s… Never mind. It’s not what I expected."
"What did you think, I’d put a big red S on my chest and drag you around the country like a turtle on its back, six–guns blazing?"
"Something like that."
"Oh, well, thank you very much. Mr. Diplomacy. Who the hell do you think I think I am? I want you safe, not emasculated."
Cameron ducked his head and made an odd choking noise behind his hands.
Acasia glared at him. "What?"
"Nothing. Really." He tried to control the urge to laugh and failed. "I just got a picture of you saying that to Father McDowell, the debate coach."
"Father McDowell?" Acasia’s dignity was supreme. "Why would I have said a thing like that to him? He didn’t handle comments like that well."
"Mmm, that’s exactly why you would have said it. You called it something like, ah, ‘controlling a man by his weaknesses.’"
"Not controlling, gauging. Gauging a man by his weaknesses. And he had a few to gauge."
"He cringed every time you walked into a room. I think you were the only student he ever kicked out of his history class but still wanted on the debate team."
Acasia propped her elbows on the table and stared back over the years. "The man was a masochist."
They regarded one another with pleasure, sharing pure, uncomplicated memories, smiles lingering at the corners of their mouths.
Acasia’s dimmed first. "That was a lifetime ago."
"No, only half." Cameron brushed the back of her hand. "The worst half."
Something like an apology traced her features. "Cam, I—"
"Finish your dinner, Casie."
They lingered over a dessert neither remembered having later, shopped for breakfast groceries, strolled together back to the car and drove down the road to settle in for the night at one of the tiny efficiency cabins scattered behind a roadside motel. For the first time since their paths had crossed again, there was no sense of urgency, no sense of things lying in wait. They could look and touch and talk and savor. Quiet came easily, without demands. They were together, and that was enough.
Behind the cabin, the sun fell. Nestled between Cameron’s legs on a wooden glider, Acasia watched the sunset paint the earth in deepening shades of gold. "Is it always like this?"
Carefully Cameron rubbed his jaw in her hair. It smelled clean and warm, felt as soft as flax. She felt good, too, cuddled into him, and he snuggled her nearer, ignoring the twinge in his muscles, the sting along his chest and arms. He wanted her close, secure, happy—uncrowded by reality—for as long as possible. He needed it. "Is what always like this?"
"The sunset."
He brushed kisses down her jaw, urged her mouth to meet his. "Depends who you’re with."
Their kiss ran long and deep.
"Don’t hurt yourself," she whispered against his mouth.
He trailed his right hand down her throat. All he wanted to do right now was to make love with her, to lose himself in her. "I’d rather be damned if I do than if I don’t." He slipped his fingers inside her collar, then ran them inside the line of her bra. Memories of the morning clung to the back of his mind, a tiger waiting to pounce if he turned his back on it. His fingers stumbled over themselves to release the front closure of her bra; his tongue penetrated her mouth. The sun was an explosion of flame in the corner of his eye, and his mouth grew rough on hers as he twisted her toward him, grinding one thigh between hers.
His need frightened Acasia, but she understood it. She’d been here herself once. This was what she hadn’t wanted to bring to him in London: this absolute need to consume someone else in order to survive. He would hate himself if she let this go on.
She pushed at him, exerting all her strength to pull herself away. His arms hardened around her. "Stay."
"Come inside. Come to bed." She drew him out of the glider and up the single step to the cabin with her. She leaned hard on the door, shutting it tight.
His back to her, Cameron waited in the center of the room, fists working. Acasia moved to him, pressing kisses into his shoulder, the nape of his neck. His muscles corded at her touch, but he didn’t turn.
"I need you so bad tonight, lady," he said.
She pulled his sweatshirt up, urged him out of it. "I’m here."
"Don’t let me hurt you."
Acasia unbuttoned her blouse, then slipped out of her skirt and stockings. "You won’t." She pushed at the waistband of his sweatpants, but he arrested the movement, gathering his breath.
They stood together quietly, absorbing one another’s warmth and presence. When Cameron turned his head, Acasia was there, waiting. Their mouths brushed together, testing the waters, unhurried, then desperate, reckless to share life. They fell onto the bed, and time ended; bangs and burns were forgotten. Cameron turned onto his back, and Acasia rode him, moving like lightning, housing him deep inside her. They were light; they were form; they were liquid; they were fire. One moment it was as if they stood on the edge of an abyss about to fall in, then a sudden explosion split the sky, leaving them shattered, but joined, more whole than before.
"You’re going to pay for this," Acasia whispered when Cameron stopped her from slipping off him. "You’re going to hurt in the morning."
He kneaded the small of her back, holding onto her. "Don’t leave me, Casie. I need you tonight."
Acasia stared down at him, swamped by needs she didn’t want to recognize. He could swallow her whole, and she didn’t want to let him. When his hand tangled in her hair to draw her to him, she dug her hands into the sheets on either side of his head, resisting for a moment. He rolled his hips into her, filling her with himself, and she moaned, half in pleasure, half in protest, and moved with him, loving him….
* * *
He dreamed that night of running, of being chased by, and chasing, something he couldn’t quite see. His skin burned, his muscles screamed, and he tossed without waking on sun–dried cotton sheets that scratched no matter how he lay.
From a chair by the window Acasia watched him twist and turn, her expression hard. She’d known the nightmares would find him eventually. She’d hoped to get him to Rhiannon first, where familiar things, familiar work, might help displace the taunting dreams, make it easier to adjust, to face himself. But maybe being a survivor wouldn’t affect him as it had her. Maybe they’d been through the worst of his nightmares. Maybe the harshest things he faced in his sleep were rough sheets, sore muscles and a few burns. Maybe getting him away from the hospital before Paolo, the law and the press had had a chance to further question and probe and examine—and blame—would deflect the guilt, the waking nightmares, the claustrophobic sweats…
The need.
She rubbed her face and shut her eyes, and Lisetta confronted her, debilitatingly needy, emotionally helpless, clinging—frightening in the way she needed to make Acasia responsible for her life. Well, it wasn’t her fault, damn it! She wasn’t responsible to anyone for anybody’s choices but her own. Nor for anybody else’s needs.
Especially when she couldn’t handle her own.
* * *
When Cameron woke, she was gone.
Painfully he rolled over to look for her, but the one–room–with–bath was vacant. He felt battered for a moment, then empty, before he caught the glint of sun on blond hair through the crack between the curtains. She wasn’t gone. She’d merely escaped for the moment.
He used one elbow to jack himself up, and what had begun as a dry chuckle ended in a grunt of discomfort. Acasia had warned him that he’d pay for loving her last night. Maybe knowing what shape he would be in this morning explained some of the reluctance he’d sensed in her. Some, but not all. He’d wanted to assure himself that he wasn’t alone in this, that Acasia was with him.
She was comfortable with action. Emotions, as she’d once told him, weren’t her forte. She must have felt buried under his, but she’d stayed with him anyway. He’d never doubted that she loved him, and he’d always known that, despite what she thought of herself, she was made more of courage than of bravado.
He heard the click of a car door opening. With an indrawn hiss of breath, he hauled himself upright and dropped his feet over the side of the bed in one quick movement, reaching to push aside the curtains with a silent oath. Whoever had said it hurt less if you got it over with fast had lied. He peered through the window at the overcast morning. She was checking under the axles and chassis. Cameron had observed the drill too often not to recognize it now. As fast as he was able, he found his pants and jerked them on.
He reached her as she slid the key into the lock on the driver’s door, stilling her hand before she turned the key.
"Uh–uh," he told her. "I’ll do it."
Acasia didn’t waste energy in protesting, merely eyed him calmly, twisted her hand under his and unlocked the door. "You look like hell," she observed. "Didn’t you sleep well? The car’s pretty much packed, but I left that coffee cake we bought on the table for breakfast. While you get it, I’ll start the car."
He wasn’t in the mood to play a game of distract and conquer this morning. He loved every inch of her stubborn, ornery hide right where it was, and in spite of the
I can’t right now but maybe someday
aspects of her character. To consider the reality that she could become another Byrd for him—or for anyone—left him cold. He had no intention of letting her start the car.
"The keys, Casie."
She could see that he was afraid for her. She’d hoped he hadn’t heard her go out. She hadn’t wanted to remind him of Byrd. But checking the car before she started it was a habit yesterday demanded she not break.
"I didn’t miss anything, Cam."
"Just in case you did, I don’t think I could stand it."
There it was again, that damned catch–22 and its parade of ifs. She held the keys, and therefore the choice, and it was either stand here arguing or make a decision she might not be able to live with. I’d rather be damned if I do…
She handed the keys to Cameron. "You turn it on, but I’m staying here."
It was a melodramatic, deadly, silly scene, a routine to be played out, a bluff to be called. Cameron knew she wouldn’t budge. A humorless grin lifted the corners of his mouth.
"If you say ‘See you in hell,’" Acasia warned him, "I’ll punch your lights out."
"Toughie," Cameron said, and slid into the car, stuck the key in the ignition and turned it.
The Mercedes purred to life without a whimper.
Acasia took a thankful breath and rubbed a hand over her mouth. "Gee, it must be hell to wake up with you every morning."
"Likewise, I’m sure," Cameron returned politely.
Acasia scuffed a line in the dirt, feeling suddenly old and tired. Why was it that morning always had to show up all the night’s illusions? They could neither of them afford the cost of what staying together might do to them.
"If we start now, we can probably make Rhiannon sometime tonight," she said sadly.
"If we push it," Cameron agreed. He eased himself out of the car, stiffer than ever, the picture of a future with Acasia all too clear. The moments he didn’t spend wondering what kind of danger her own doings placed her in he would spend wondering what kind of danger she faced being with him. She was not—would never be—a restful person. If anything happened to her…