Conspiracy Game

by Christine Feehan

  He swore under his breath and reached for her, hauling her into his arms. His mouth came down on hers, his kiss rougher than he'd intended when her scent drifted around him and her taste drove him right to the edge of control. He shifted her into his arms, pulling her close, fitting her smaller body into his larger frame, his mouth moving with urgent demands.

  She gave the briefest of hesitation, a slight resistance, and then her arms crept around his neck, and she leaned her body into his, and her tongue, soft as velvet, slid over his in a hot tango. He captured her soft little sigh, and tasted spice and honey, her mouth a dark mystery of heat and passion. He could feel the soft weight of her breasts pressing into his chest. The familiar rush of heat raced through his veins, to settle into a terrible ache in the center of his groin, so that he was full and tight, but along with the physical need, he felt as if he had come home--as if he belonged.

  Taking his time, Jack gentled his kiss, savoring the moment and every separate sensation. The full, painful ache of his body, the beating of his heart, her soft skin and heady scent, the potent combination of sex and something far, far deeper.

  Briony slid her hands to his chest and over the thin barrier of his shirt and traced the letters carved into his body. "I dreamt about you last night." But it hadn't been a dream. She'd been aware of him as she lay drifting, his body wrapped closely around hers, so protective. He'd held her close, one hand over their child as if he could keep all monsters at bay while they dozed. Briony rarely slept, and never with anyone close, yet she had gone straight out, Jack's scent surrounding her, his body next to hers, and it had felt so right--as if, for the first time in her life, she belonged.

  "I dreamt about you too, but I don't think our dreams were quite the same," he said, his voice rueful.

  She caught a glimpse of desperate relief in the shower, a mind filled with lust and need and awakening emotions all jumbled together. Briony pulled away from his memories, feeling like a voyeur.

  "I don't care if you know, Briony," Jack said softly. "I'm not going to hide the fact that it's difficult to be around you and not want you. We're in this together. I don't want you to be influenced by what I feel. I can take it as long as you can." He didn't know if that were true, but he was going to do his best to respect her wishes and do a little old-fashioned courting--whatever that entailed. His thumb slid over her full lower lip in a small caress. "I can wait a long time if I have to."

  Her heart jumped again. Maybe she didn't want him to wait. Maybe she needed him to make the decision for them. Ashamed of her cowardly thoughts, Briony busied herself with looking at the clothes spread out on the table. "How are we going to get past it, Jack?" She glanced at him and was caught and held by the strange look on his face as he watched her folding a pair of soft black cotton pants. "What is it?"

  "You. Watching you do the smallest, most ordinary things makes me happy." He crossed to the sink and poured himself a cup of coffee. "You have no idea how strange that is."

  "What? Feeling happy?"

  "Feeling anything at all. You make me feel, Briony, and that is a fucking miracle."

  Her heart nearly stopped beating, then jumped in her chest, accelerating until her pulse was pounding. "Jack." She said his name softly, wanting it to be the truth--afraid of believing they had a chance. This man could hurt her where no other had ever come close. He'd rip out her heart and she'd never recover.

  "It's the simple truth, Briony."

  Tears filled her eyes. She didn't know what to say--how to react--afraid to take the next step and trust him all the way. To cover her reaction, she held up a pair of designer jeans. "All of these clothes are so beautiful, but nothing I can work in."

  Jack didn't pressure her, choosing to give her some room. "Work? What are talking about?"

  "I'm going to help Ken tile the bathroom."

  "No, you're not." He leaned one hip lazily against the sink. "You don't need to be crawling around on your knees and breathing in chemicals."

  "It isn't that bad, and it will be fun. I've always wanted to learn to tile." She didn't look at him, keeping her voice light and cheerful as she carefully put the purchases back in the bags. She wasn't going to argue with him, even though he was using his drill sergeant voice. She'd overlook it and stay in a great mood.

  "Nevertheless, you aren't tiling the bathroom. If you want to learn, I'll teach you after the baby's born."

  Briony's hands stilled and she turned to face him, holding on to her smile. "Jack. This isn't a dictatorship. I'm quite capable of deciding what I can or can't do. While I appreciate your concern, it isn't necessary to make my decisions for me."

  He nodded his head, his features as always expressionless. He shrugged his broad shoulders. "Well, baby, do me a favor and decide not to tile the bathroom right now. That way there won't be a problem, will there? Would you like me to help you carry those things to our room?"

  Briony drew her breath in sharply, smelled blood, and whirled around to stare at Ken as he stood in the doorway cradling his bloody arm.

  "Give it up, Bri," Ken advised, casually walking to the sink without looking at his brother. Blood dripped down his arm. "Jack's a mule, stubborn as hell, and you're not going to be tiling the bathroom."

  Jack moved fast to Ken's side, taking his arm and turning it over to inspect the cut. The wound was over a particularly rigid scar. "You didn't feel it until it was too late, did you?" he asked his brother.

  Ken shrugged and flashed Briony a small, humorless grin. "You probably should wait until you go to the doctor. You can ask him what you can and can't do and what you can drink or eat, so if jughead starts with the orders you have some ammunition." His eyes begged her not to notice the blood dripping down his arm, to continue their conversation as if Jack wasn't washing the wound and treating it with antiseptic.

  Briony tipped her head back to meet Jack's unfathomable gaze. His expression was unreadable. She winked at Ken as Jack dried the cut and bandaged it. "And if I decide I'm going to do it anyway, what kind of temper tantrum does he throw?"

  A sudden wisp of a smile softened Jack's hard jaw and relaxed his mouth for a fleeting moment. The approval in his eyes warmed her and sent little flutters of excitement to her stomach.

  "I throw a caveman tantrum," Jack answered and swooped her up, lifting her into his arms, caging her against him. "Brute strength, baby. It works when all else fails."

  Ken gathered the packages and piled them high in Briony's lap. "I've never seen an actual temper tantrum," he admitted. "Just do what he says; it's so much easier."

  "We're going to head into town," Jack reminded his brother. "I'll need you to go with us. Another hour and we'll take off. You'll need to be ready for combat, Ken."

  Ken shrugged. "I'm always ready."

  Jack carried Briony through the house toward the bedroom. "Thanks," he said gruffly. "It happens sometimes. The scarring makes it difficult for him to feel anything until it's too late. The scars are all over him--everywhere."

  Briony felt his pain like a knife stabbing through her heart. It took a moment to realize she was in his mind. "He doesn't want pity."

  "Hell no, he doesn't. He'd shoot me first. He insists on doing the tiling, though."

  "He needs to do it, Jack," Briony said, recalling the desperation in Ken's eyes.

  "I know. I don't say anything, but it's damned difficult some days." Jack tossed her on the bed, ending the subject because if they continued to talk about it he might cry like a baby. "Before I left this morning I cleared out a couple of the top drawers and there's plenty of room in the closet. Make sure you take a good look at the spare bedroom so you can tell me how you want to fix it up for the baby."

  "I will."

  "And stay the hell out of the bathroom. I don't want you near the tile saw."

  "Jack." Briony traced the pattern on the cover, looking around her at all the bright packages. Her fingers crept up to her earlobe, stroked the fiery rubies, and slid to her throat. "You can't order me a
round, no matter how charming you are."

  Pain swirled in the depths of his eyes for just a moment. She caught the surge of sorrow in his mind. He turned away from her to open the closet door. "I told you I wouldn't be an easy man to live with."

  "What does that mean?" Briony asked, frowning, trying to grasp what he wasn't saying to her. She sank down onto the edge of the bed. "I'm a grown woman, Jack."

  He glanced at her over his shoulder, rubbed his brow with the pad of his thumb, and sighed. "I'm a control freak, Bri. It's one of the biggest reasons we live here, so far away from everyone. It's why I mostly work alone. I go out on my own and I control the situation. If I work with a team, I run the team. It's who I am."

  "That isn't big news, Jack," Briony pointed out. She pulled clothes from the packages and began removing tags. "It isn't an excuse to take away my rights as an adult to make my own decisions. Control is an illusion anyway. No one can control another person."

  "I control what I can, and it helps to keep everyone safe."

  "You don't trust yourself."

  "No. I realized a long time ago I don't think or react like other people. Under the right circumstances, things could go wrong."

  Briony busied herself with putting clothes in the drawers, all the while trying to grasp what he was saying. Jebediah, Ken, and now even Jack were all warning her about something in Jack that even he feared. She turned to look at his face. Whatever it was, he was more afraid of it than he was of a sniper's bullet.

  "I don't think you'd ever hurt me, Jack. Not ever. You don't have it in you. Is that what you're afraid of?"

  He looked at her, something moving in his eyes. Pain? Sorrow? Haunting fear? She couldn't read his emotion. "I don't know," he answered honestly, ashamed.

  She went to him, framed his face with her hands. "I do. Remember Luther? He hit me with no problem. I made him angry and he punched me. He didn't slap me. He didn't try to restrain me, he punched me with his fist. Maybe if I were your enemy..."

  He caught her wrists and yanked them down, holding them hard against his chest. "That's just it, baby. That's just it." He dropped her hands and went out of the room. She heard the door slam as he left the house.

  Briony let out her breath and sank down onto the bed more confused than ever.

  The cursory knock didn't startle her; she already knew that Ken's stocky frame filled the doorway. "You okay?"

  She nodded. "Where'd he go?"

  "He's probably headed to the shop. He hangs a bag there and works out when the devil rides him too hard." He shrugged. "Either that or he'll soothe himself with woodworking."

  "Why would he think I could ever become his enemy, Ken? I told him I knew he'd never hurt me, maybe if I was his enemy, but never otherwise. He's afraid of hurting me, isn't he?"

  A muscle jumped in Ken's jaw. He rubbed his thumb along a scar down the left side of his face. "He's afraid of hurting everyone. He has to tell you himself, Briony. It has to come from him--and then you have to decide if you're strong enough to live with him."

  "This is temporary."

  He shook his head. "You're deceiving yourself and you know it."

  "He walked out. He said I was a liability. He told me he wasn't the kind of man who would ever have a woman or kid."

  "I'm sure he did say those things. He believes he shouldn't have a family. It doesn't mean that he doesn't want a family. He isn't going to walk away from you ever again."

  "I don't want him like that. Trapped because we were forced together by an outside source and now he's stuck because I needed help."

  Ken leaned his hip against the doorjamb, a gesture very reminiscent of Jack. "What do you think he would have done had you been kidnapped and word got back to him? Even if he didn't think the child was his, what do you think he would have done?"

  Briony plucked at the comforter. "I have no idea. I barely know Jack, and when I think I do know him, everyone warns me off--everyone including Jack."

  "He would have come after you and he would never--never--have stopped until he found you and got you out--or they killed him. Jack would never abandon someone who did what you did for him."

  "My brother helped him get out of Kinshasa. I just slept with him."

  Ken's eyes darkened to a turbulent gray. "Don't do that, Briony. Don't cheapen what you did and don't belittle yourself. You saved his life. He told me what happened."

  "He doesn't owe me anything. If that's why he's doing this..."

  "You're here because you're carrying his child and he never wanted to walk away from you in the first place. He did it for you. He walked out of your life so you could have a normal life. And this time, if you want out--you'll have to be the one to walk away, because he isn't going to do it."

  Briony burst out laughing, but it sounded too close to hysteria, so she hastily crossed to the drawers and began looking through them for something to wear to the doctor's office. "I don't have a normal life, Ken. I can't have a normal life because some megalomaniac dragged me out of an orphanage and experimented on me." Her voice was getting louder, swinging out of control, but she couldn't pull back. "And when he adopted me out, he made certain he could still experiment on me. And as an adult--well..." She threw a sweater into the drawer and spun around, spreading her arms wide to encompass the room. "Here I am. Not like any other mother-to-be. No, I've got a man who doesn't mind having sex with me because of the experiments, but would much rather I didn't come near him, so no, Ken--my chances at a normal life frankly suck."

  "You in here upsetting my woman, Ken?" The voice was pitched so low--so soft--that for a moment Briony wasn't certain she'd actually heard right, because those soft-spoken words sounded like a threat, but her body went still and her heart accelerated into high gear.

  Jack moved into the room. His shirt was off, and a fine sheen of sweat covered his body as though he'd been working hard. Muscles rippled beneath scarred skin, and he crossed to her side, taking a T-shirt from the top of the bureau and wiping his face with it. He looked at his brother over the shirt, his eyes a peculiar silver.

  "I thought you'd already done that," Ken said easily.

  Briony frowned. Ken sounded easygoing enough, but his body shifted slightly into a much more defensible position. She looked from one brother to the other. "Hello! Are you both morons? I'm pregnant. That means emotional. I'm not supposed to be the one with the cool head here. I'm supposed to fall apart at the drop of a hat; it's my prerogative. You two are supposed to smile and nod and agree with everything I say."

  Ken's eyebrow shot up, and a ghost of a smile played for a moment with his mouth, and then disappeared. "Was I upsetting you, Briony?"

  "I'm in a perpetual state of upset," she reiterated. "I've never been pregnant before. I never even thought about having children." She sank down onto the bed again, looking up at Jack. "Never. I have such a difficult time being around people, it never occurred to me the opportunity would be there."

  Jack stood in front of her, forcing her chin up with his thumb so she had to meet his gaze. "You want this baby."

  She nodded, swallowing hard. "It's just scary. Everything is so frightening right now. I wish I wasn't such a coward."

  The pad of Jack's thumb rubbed over her lower lip. "It's all right to be afraid, Briony; fear doesn't make you a coward. Why shouldn't you be afraid?" He crouched down in front of her, framing her face. "I want you here more than I've ever wanted anything in my life. And I have every intention of seeing you through this. You came here because you trusted your own instincts. I'm sure your brothers objected."

  A faint smile teased her mouth. "Strenuously objected."

  "But you knew to come to me anyway. I may be a lot of things, Briony, and I'm hell to live with, but you came to me for protection and that is guaranteed. Just keep trusting me."

  Ken came up on the other side of her, looking so heartbreakingly like Jack. He put one hand on his twin's shoulder and the other on her shoulder. "We're in this together--all the way, Briony. Here
, where we live, we have a policy that it's okay to be who we really are. Jack gets a little dicey sometimes and I have my own demons. If you're afraid or sick or want to stand outside and scream, it's all good."

  Briony nodded, struggling not to cry. She didn't know what acceptance was. She'd never had it. She had always fit into the circus world because her family needed her to--not because it was her choice. She'd fought every day of her life to appear normal. Here, with Jack and Ken, she felt no pain at all being near them. They both shielded her, not only from their thoughts, but Jack had been able to keep her from feeling the effects of violence up close.

  Was it really that simple? She touched their minds and found sincerity. They both had concerns and both were a little leery of the new situation, a woman--nearly a stranger--in their comfortable, safe world, but both were more than willing to accept her and learn how to live with her.

  How to live with her. They were willing to adjust for her. Was she willing to adjust for them? She looked up at Jack, at his peculiarly colored eyes that seemed to go from charcoal gray to glittering silver, depending on his mood. Could she put herself totally in his hands? She already liked and respected Ken. She might be willing to try for Jack--but could she hand Jack her heart when she knew the attraction was because of genetic manipulation? She needed to go slow--take one day at a time and see where it led her. She took a deep breath and let it out. "Thank you both."

  Jack felt relief sweep through him. Briony was afraid, but she was accepting their offer. He didn't know what he would have done if she'd tried to run. "You'd better get ready to go, babe," he said. "It's a long drive down the mountain and we don't want to miss the doctor appointment."

  "We can eat dinner in town," Ken added, flicking his brother a warning glance.

  "I'll cook tonight," Jack offered as he stood up, tousling Briony's hair.

  "We can eat dinner in town. I got up at four this morning and removed the traps and set alarms. I've still got the tile job to do. Don't give me grief on this."

  "See how he whines." Jack appealed to Briony.

  "I'm being reasonable, Bri," Ken protested. "You've never tasted his cooking," he added, following Jack's example and ruffling her hair.