After finishing the task I come face-to-face with Mark, and I’m jolted by the dominant force of his presence. His blond hair is still damp, lying in ringlets around his classically handsome face, and his amazing body is perfection in a dark blue suit paired with a red tie.
He glances at the empty garment bag and the closet, then back to me. “What are you doing?”
“Making sure you know I’m not ordering you to leave.”
“Then you’re not as smart as I thought you were.”
“On the contrary,” I say, unfazed. “I’m not as shallow-minded as you apparently think I am. I can see beyond my own hand.”
He arches a brow. “And my hand?”
Unbidden heat simmers in my stomach, and I don’t understand this reaction—or many of my reactions to Mark Compton. Shoving it aside, I softly add, “I can see beneath your skin.”
His eyes darken as he steps closer, our knees brushing. “Who was he?”
“Who?”
“The man you went on the pill for.”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes.”
I believe his need to know is just about being a control freak, and I don’t hold back. It’s not some golden secret, especially around Riptide. “Nathan Monroe.”
He arches a brow. “As in the new ‘it’ artist?”
“Yes, though I dated him while he was still a starving artist. When he found success, it went to his head. He became a conceited jerk. The only plus in his corner afterward, at least per my father, was that he could finally pay his own bills.”
“He hit big six months ago. So you broke up when?”
“Five months ago, and your mother cheered me on as I dumped him. She’d helped me get him some notice.”
He stares at me, his expression unreadable. “I’ve always said my mother is the biggest bitch on the hill, and the kindest flower in the garden.”
“I get the feeling her son has the same characteristics.”
“I’m no flower, sweetheart.”
My stomach flutters with the unexpected endearment.
“In fact,” he continues, “you’ve all but called me the same conceited jerk as your ex.”
A knock sounds on the door and, unwilling to let this end yet, I step so close that I can feel his body heat. “You can be,” I agree, “but the difference between him and you is that he really was a jerk. You use arrogance and control to hide the real you. But I’ve seen you. I know you.”
He stares down at me for several beats before his hand closes around the back of my neck and he crushes my mouth to his in a long, deep kiss. Then he says, “In a way, no one else has. No one. You know that, right?”
“Yes,” I whisper. “And you know I’d never betray that trust.”
The air shifts between us, and I can almost feel the bonds between us weaving tighter. “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have told you what I did in the shower, nor would I be standing here.” He leans in to kiss me again, his mouth almost to mine when his phone rings, and another knock sounds on the door.
We both groan. “I’ll get the door so you can get your call,” I say.
He sighs and releases me, reaching into his pocket to remove his phone. “Are you in Long Island yet?” I hear him ask before I turn down the hallway.
As I reach the door another knock sounds, and I ask, “Who is it?”
“Jacob.”
I unlock the door to discover that beside him is a pretty brunette with warm brown eyes who is dressed in black slacks and a black silk blouse. She extends her hand to me. “Hi, Crystal. I’m Kara Walker.”
I take her hand and, being someone who has instant vibes with people, I already like her. “Hi, Kara,” I say, stepping to the side to allow them to enter. The door shut, I ask, “Is Kara taking over for you today, Jacob?”
I don’t miss the slight flex of his jaw as he answers. “No,” he says. “We’re both escorting you to the hospital.”
Suddenly, Mark’s need to stay here to “protect me” hits home. “We need two escorts?”
“Better to be safe,” Jacob says noncommittally.
I cross my arms. “What don’t I know that I should?”
“The question is more like, what don’t we know that we should,” Kara replies, keeping her voice low, clearly to keep Mark from overhearing.
“That’s exactly right.”
We all turn at the sound of his voice to find him standing at the end of the hallway, the look on his handsome face as irritated as his tone is as he adds, “Stop worrying about an angry claim I made about vengeance after hearing Rebecca was dead. Start worrying about where the fuck Ava is. Answer that question, and this all ends. Then we’d have justice, and no need for two bodyguards.”
* * *
Mark and I ride to the hospital in the back of the Escalade, with Kara and Jacob in the front. Without the prior day’s snow to contend with, it’s a short twenty-minute drive. The silence in the vehicle is uncomfortable, Mark’s reprimand of Jacob and Kara sitting with us like an extra companion. Yet one thing stands out for me. The way Mark’s knee rests against mine, and the words he told me: You’re the one thing keeping me grounded. He’s on edge, and I’m guessing it’s about that phone call he took.
Jacob parks the truck and he and Kara open their doors. When Mark reaches for his, I grab his arm. “I need to talk to you alone for a second.”
His eyes narrow on mine for a moment before he calls out to Jacob, “We need a minute.”
Jacob and Kara shut their doors and seal us inside. Immediately, I turn to Mark and settle my hand on his leg. “What’s wrong?”
His attention goes to my hand on his leg, lingering there before I’m fixed in an unreadable gray stare. “Were you aware that I don’t allow people to touch me?”
Confused, I stutter, “W-what?”
“I don’t allow people to touch me. Except you.” He covers my hand with his own. “That first evening you picked me up at the airport, you kept touching me, and I let you. I didn’t know why then, and I don’t know why now.”
I’m still confused. “You mean no one after Rebecca went missing, right? She obviously touched you—as did previous partners.”
“I never let her touch me freely. It was part of the Master/submissive roles we played.”
Emotion wells in my throat at the certainty that to Mark, BDSM is far more than the pleasure and games. It’s a disconnect, a withdrawal from everyone but his parents. But then again, he lives in another state. Isn’t that a withdrawal, too?
“You know you’re inviting me to ask you why,” I say cautiously.
“Playing the Master role helps me control what I feel, and when I feel it. Except, as I said, with you.”
“I just happened to be in the right place when you needed someone.”
“I’ve tried to tell myself that, but there were other people just as present, and other ways I could have dealt with all of this. I kept returning to you. I keep returning to you.”
“Is that what’s bothering you right now? The way that I’ve seen more than you want me to see?”
“No. It’s about me having the control I need to ensure my mother doesn’t see too much of what I’m worried about.” His lashes lower and he inhales. “I don’t know what the fuck is the matter with me.”
I cover his hand where it covers mine, and the fact that he lets me means so much more than it had before. “It’s called being human,” I say. “It’s the curse and blessing we all face.”
He looks at me. “I used to believe I managed it better than others.”
“You do. And you’re demonstrating that by actually being in the moment.” I remind him of his own words. “What we deny owns us. You can’t control what you don’t first own and face. You simply delay the moment it owns you.” I tilt my head to study him. “You weren’t like this when I went to answer the door to let Jacob and Kara in. Did they overlook something that set you off?”
“It’s a general frustration that I’m paying so
damn many people to get no answers. That, and the kid woke up before Luke got to the hospital. The police are questioning him, and I have no idea what’s being said.”
I think of the extra phone he keeps so guarded, and that, along with the sense of helplessness I read from him right now, feeds my worry that whoever he talks to on those calls is trouble waiting to happen. “Mark, about that—”
“It’s late,” he says, glancing down at his watch, and I have this sense of a door shutting. “Thirty minutes until treatment. We need to go inside.”
I don’t push, because he’s right. But I think Jacob is right, too. Mark’s navigating dark and stormy waters, and I’m either going to pull him out, or drown with him. I don’t know which.
* * *
Jacob and Kara frame us as we stop at the security desk by the private elevators and sign in. A few moments later we crowd into the rather small elevator. “Stay in the waiting room,” Mark orders them when we exit onto the treatment floor. “I don’t want my mother any more upset than she already is.”
“I’ll stand guard downstairs by the security desk,” Jacob says, “and let Kara hang out up here.”
Kara glances from me to Mark. “If you have to tell your parents I’m here, you can always say that Crystal and I bonded when Walker took over Riptide, and I’m working a job here at the hospital. It’s not a lie; I am. It just happens to be you. And if Crystal and I have coffee together, that will reinforce it.”
Mark grimaces but I nod. “Your mother is always after me to have a social life, so this is perfect. It works.”
He cuts Kara one of those steely gray stares. “I’m warning you. Don’t go feeding her with Blake’s bullshit, which I assume is yours as well. You won’t like the results.” His fingers close on my elbow and he starts walking out. “Let’s get to the room.”
“That was rude,” I say.
“It was honest, sweetheart,” he says. “I don’t give bullshit and I don’t take it.”
“Stop viewing me as some wimpy toddler who can’t make up her own mind and needs to be protected from her own shadow.”
“Wimpy toddler?”
He dares to look amused, and I’m pretty sure the sound that follows from me is a growl.
“Did you just growl at me?”
“Yes. I did.”
He leans in. “Save that for when we get home.”
I swallow hard on the word “home” and promise myself not to read more into our arrangement than a temporary sharing of a lot of naked moments. “Only if you save that attitude you just had for never.”
“I can’t promise that.”
“Then I can’t promise a growl later.”
His eyes darken, lips quirking slightly. “I can. Count on it, Ms. Smith. But right now, my mother needs us both. She doesn’t know there’s something between us, though, so we need to think through how and when to tell her I’m living with you. I don’t want her to think that if something goes wrong between us, she loses you. I don’t want you to think you lose her, either.”
“There you two are!”
Once again, Mark’s father has managed to appear at a pivotal moment in a conversation between us. We turn to find him approaching with a tray of coffee.
“One of the nurses went to Starbucks. I ordered everyone’s favorites.” He glances at Mark. “Your mom’s pretty eager to see you this morning.” He enters the hospital room and Mark is unmoving, staring after him.
Reading his apprehension, I reach up and rest my hand on his arm. “She needs you. She probably regrets last night.” I motion to the door with my head. “Come on. You kept me up all night—I need that coffee.”
He inhales, his broad chest expanding beneath his suit jacket. “Coffee it is.” His hand goes to my back and he guides me forward.
I enter the room to find Dana eagerly watching the door, her eyes touching me and then going beyond to settle on Mark. Giving her the moment she’s obviously seeking with her son, I go to where Steven has set the coffee tray on a rolling hospital table.
“White mocha for you, right?” he asks.
“Good memory,” I say, smiling, always charmed by the way he treats me like family.
He lifts a cup and glances at the writing. “Plain latte with an extra shot. This one is Mark’s. Dana didn’t want anything.”
I crinkle my nose. “Plain is just so . . . plain.”
He laughs. “Yes, it is.” He holds it out. “Can you hand it to him?”
“Of course.” I accept the cup, but hesitate as I note the dark circles under his eyes. “How are you?”
“Tired. But I bet Dana that I’d beat you at tic-tac-toe this morning, so hand off that cup and let’s get to it.”
I laugh at what has become a six-month war between us. “You’re on.” Turning, I plan to hand Mark his coffee, and find him squatted down by Dana’s chair, his head dipped low, her hand on his face as she whispers something to him. He lifts his head and looks at her, nodding and then squeezing her hand. “I love you,” he says, and my heart squeezes at the rawness of the emotion in his eyes and roughing up his voice.
“I love you, too, son,” Dana whispers.
Mark’s gaze lifts abruptly, meeting mine, and he does nothing to mask the heartache in his eyes.
I lift the cup. “A plain latte?”
“Yes,” he says, pushing to his feet and stepping toward me.
I hand him his cup, the brush of our fingers sending a shiver down my spine. And judging from the glint of arrogance in Mark’s eyes, my reaction doesn’t go unnoticed. Determined to put him back in his place, I say, “Plain and strong. I guess that’s what a macho man like yourself needs to feel extra macho.”
“Oh, how you have him figured out,” Dana chimes in, her laughter filling the room.
Mark’s expression flickers with a moment of pure joy at her reaction, but he doesn’t miss a beat in his reply. “I prefer my coffee like I do my women—without the sugarcoating.”
If I had any doubt that comment was meant with naughty intentions, the totally inappropriate way he’s looking at me, like he wants to lick the proverbial sugar off me, douses it. And I have an equally inappropriate response of being warm and tingly all over.
“I’ll tell you what’s not sugarcoated,” his father inserts, and aware that Dana can see my reaction to her son, I whirl around and say, “Your wife when she talks baseball with you.”
He snorts. “Isn’t that the truth. But not what I had in mind.” He sets a pad of paper and two pencils on the table next to my coffee. “Game on.”
“Tell me he’s not trying to get you to play tic-tac-toe,” Mark says.
“You just hate when I’m right, Steven,” Dana says in reply to the previous exchange, while I nod my confirmation at Mark.
“I just let you think you’re right,” he counters, eyeing me and tapping the table. “Come here, Crystal Smith. Today is the day I kick your butt.”
“Remember our bet,” Dana says in a singsongy voice I haven’t heard her taunt him with in months. “If she wins—”
“I remember,” Steven says quickly.
Dana looks at Mark. “Crystal always kicks his butt.”
Mark arches a brow at me and I shrug, moving closer to his father, lowering my voice. “What’s on the line? Should I throw the game?”
“No,” he says indignantly. “And if I think you do, I won’t respect you in the morning.”
“But you’d win the bet.”
“Hey,” Dana says, sounding remarkably energetic. “Whose side are you on?”
“I’m going to win,” Steven insists. “I figured out how you beat me. My new pitcher showed me your trick.”
Mark settles onto the arm of his mother’s chair. “I assume you know he does this to all prospective pitchers.”
“I’ve heard,” I say.
“They need brains,” his father counters, “and not the kind that recites Shakespeare. They need to be able to process and problem-solve under pressure.”
> “This isn’t much pressure,” I say, placing my X on the grid he’s drawn.
“You’re here by choice,” Mark points out. “My father tells them if they lose, then their dreams end with the tic-tac-toe of his pencil.”
“That’s kind of cruel,” I say, watching as Steven makes a poor choice for his move.
Mark laughs. “No wonder you like her, Mother. She’s just like you. She holds nothing back.”
“I find it real and honest,” Dana says, and my pencil stills as Mark’s words play in my head: the only honest thing in my life. Somehow I manage a laugh. “My brothers just call it bitchy.” I glance at Steven and feel a little sorry for him as I draw a line and say, “Tic-tac-toe.”
“Impossible,” he grumbles, as Mark and Dana burst into laughter. Steven draws another game grid. “Again.”
I sigh and we play again, with the same outcome.
He scrubs his head and then motions to Mark. “Come play, son.”
Mark stands up and shakes his head. “You’re just looking for an ego boost.”
I claim his spot on the arm of Dana’s chair and ask her, “Ego boost?”
“Mark hardly ever beats his father. It’s like he has some sort of mental block. I bet they played fifty games last Christmas, and Mark only won seven or eight.”
“Nine,” Mark calls over his shoulder, sounding casual and accepting of his losses.
The square isn’t fitting in the circle here. Something isn’t right, an observation I feel tenfold when I watch Mark lose two games in a row.
“Are we ready?” Reba calls as she rolls a wheelchair into the room, and my chest tightens when I see her red scrubs.
“Ready to get it over with,” Dana says. “I want to trade in my wheels for high heels.”
As Mark and Steven join us, I remind her, “At least you’re done for the weekend.”
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