Nobody (Men of the White Sandy) (Volume 3)

by Sarah M. Anderson

  Nobody didn’t move. It was one thing to have had her in his arms—on his lap, essentially—when he’d been too wounded to be considered a threat. But he was better now. Not great, but better. Most people would be afraid of him.

  Not her. “I don’t bite,” she said, her tone light and teasing. “And I won’t make you talk this time. Just … come sit with me. Please.”

  He wanted to do just that, maybe slip his arm back around her waist again and feel the weight of her body anchored against his. It was the sort of thing that probably happened all the time. Rebel sat like that with his wife on a regular basis. There was something about it that seemed normal.

  He wanted to sit with her. She wanted him to do just that. So why couldn’t he make his feet move? Why did he feel like maybe he shouldn’t have come?

  “Nobody?” Her voice was soft in the night—concerned. “Why won’t you come sit?”

  He realized he was crushing his hat. He tried to stop but it didn’t work, so he ducked his head. He couldn’t even come up with a response to a simple question.

  He couldn’t be normal.

  He heard her get up. She was probably going in—had probably given up on him. Just as well. He began to move back into the shadows. He’d go check on Jamie. Yeah, that’s what he needed to do.

  “Don’t.” He startled at how close her voice had gotten. His head popped up. She was walking around the fire. Toward him. “Don’t go.”

  He stood, rooted to the spot as she closed the distance between them. One of her pretty little hands reached out and settled on his side, where the bandage was. “How are you?”

  Her voice was like the trickle of water in his stream, cool and inviting after a hot summer day. “Good,” he managed to get out as her fingers skimmed over his shirt.

  She took another small step toward him, her hand settling on his hip. “Do you need Madeline to look at it?”

  “No, Ma’am. It’s healing.” She gave him a soft smile as she took another step in. His heart began to pound. He didn’t like it. He could face down six men and get stabbed in the gut and not be nervous about it at all, but one woman with wildfire hair made him all jumpy.

  “Did you take the antibiotics?” Her other hand settled around his waist. The only thing keeping her chest from his was his hat.

  Jesus, she was playing with fire. She had no idea what he was capable of. None. “No.”

  He waited for the scolding. At least, that’s what her sister would have done. But not her. Her fingertips dug into the waistband of his jeans, pulling him forward. Into her. “Not even as a personal favor to me?” she asked, her lips curving into the most secret of smiles.

  Nobody set his jaw. She was playing with him, that was all. She was just dancing with the devil in the pale moonlight because this was all a joke. Maybe she got off on him being dangerous. Maybe she was just trying to prove something to her sister.

  She tilted her head to one side, looking up at him through her lashes. He’d read books where the woman would do that and then lead the man over the edge of a cliff. He’d never understood why any man would fall for it—until now.

  It was the same look she’d given him when she’d woken up with her head in his lap. God help him, she wasn’t afraid of him. He didn’t know why she wasn’t, but he was pretty sure he didn’t care anymore.

  “I’m going to kiss you,” she said, her voice barely a whisper as she stood up on her tiptoes.

  His fingers dug into his hat. It was a good hat, but he didn’t mind that it was meeting its death in the line of duty like this. He braced himself for her touch. He would not lose control. He would not do anything that hurt her. “Okay.”

  She stopped then and he was just sure that he’d blown it by opening his big, fat mouth and doing the stupid thing—talking. But instead she just stared at him like—like—like he was the only man in the world. Just him. “Are you going to kiss me back?”

  He didn’t have a clue what he was supposed to say to that. So he didn’t say anything. Instead, he let go of his poor hat and pulled her into his arms and crushed her lips against his.

  She made a little squeaking noise in the back of her throat. Damn it all to hell, this is what she did to him. He made a promise to himself that he wouldn’t hurt her and what did he do? Scare the hell out of her.

  He pulled away, fighting the urge to bolt. “Sorry,” he mumbled, wondering if it was worth it to get his hat before he ran. He let go of her. “I—sorry.”

  “Oh, no you don’t.” The next thing he knew, she had looped her arms around his neck and was holding him in place. “Don’t you dare kiss me like that and then disappear.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you.” There. He’d said what he should have said earlier.

  “Then don’t hurt me.” Her lips brushed over his, a whisper of a touch. Jesus, she was going to kill him. “Just kiss me slow and hard.”

  He couldn’t help the way his arms shook as he tightened his grip on her, her breasts pressed against his chest. It’d been a long time. God, he hoped he wouldn’t screw this up. “Yes, Ma’am.”

  She made a sound that could have been a giggle but could have been a sigh as he pressed his lips against hers. So, so long. Too damn long. Going slow was harder than he’d thought it would be, but he wanted to remember everything—the way she tilted her head to one side and sighed, the way she felt in his arms—the way she made him feel. Strong and real and alive.

  Then she traced her tongue over his lips. He heard a noise and realized that it was him, groaning. She tasted of sweet oranges and sunsets and something wild and free.

  He had to be careful. If he hurt her, he’d never forgive himself. So instead of filling his hands with her ass, he forced his hands to glide down over her clothing. Instead of ripping her shirt off and feasting himself on her breasts, he focused on kissing her.

  Which was a good plan until her teeth nipped his lower lip—not hard enough to draw blood, but more than enough to make his dick stand up at attention. The desire hit him so hard that it worried him. What if he lost control?

  Better not to. “Don’t,” he growled, grabbing her arms from around his neck and holding them to her side.

  She shook her head in a slightly dazed way. “What? Why not?” Then she realized that he had her arms pinned. She raised an eyebrow at him as she flexed her wrists, testing his grip. But amazingly, she didn’t scream or sob in terror. She just licked her lips. “No biting. Got it.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “Then why shouldn’t I?” She leaned forward and he was powerless to stop her as her teeth skimmed along his neck. “If you liked it.”

  His arms shook. ‘Liked it’ wasn’t the way he’d describe it. It made him rock-hard for her. It made him want to do things that he had no business doing to her.

  And the fact that she kept pushing him instead of running away from him—it made him mad. He didn’t know why, but it did. “Why aren’t you afraid of me?” he demanded. It came out meaner than he meant it to, but he couldn’t help it. Why couldn’t she see the dangerous man everyone else did?

  “Why are you afraid of me?” she replied in her quiet tone.

  “I’m not,” he snapped back even as he knew he was. He was scared of this fearless woman. He didn’t like being scared of anyone, especially beautiful women. “You should be afraid of me. I’m a bad man. I hurt people.” These were unavoidable facts. No one would dispute them.

  “You protected me. You keep Jamie safe.”

  “You don’t understand.”

  She stared up at him, all wide eyes and innocence. Could she really not see the truth? “Then make me understand, Nobody. I like you. You’re an unusual man with an unusual talent and a code of honor that’s all your own. A gunslinger from the Old West—minus the gun—just like the hero in a Louis L’Amour book. How does that make you a bad man?”

  He wanted the talking to stop. He wanted to go back to the kissing part and he wanted to let the kissing go on and on until
they were tangled up in each other, unable to tell where his skin ended and hers began.

  But to do that would be to lie to her. And he wasn’t going to do that. Not to her.

  Stupid codes of honor. He would have rather her never known what kind of animal he was but she’d forced his hand, all because she wasn’t afraid of him.

  He couldn’t bear to look her in the eyes. So he roughly pulled her into his chest and put his mouth near her ear. At first she was soft against him, like she was ready for the kissing to start back up.

  “You should be afraid of me,” he began, feeling the goodbye in his throat, “because I killed a man with my bare hands. I did hard time. I am not a good man.”

  Her body went ramrod straight. He let go of her and took a step back. Her eyes were wide-open with shock, her mouth stuck in a silent scream.

  Yeah. His work here was done.

  He turned and began to run. Not away from her—not because he was afraid of her, damn it all. Because that was the best way to keep her safe. To stay the hell away from her.

  “Nobody,” she called out after him.

  He didn’t stop.

  Chapter Eleven

  Melinda didn’t sleep.

  Of course he’d killed someone. Why did that surprise her? He was a rough man living in a rough place. She should probably count her lucky little stars that he hadn’t killed anyone right in front of her the other night.

  But she’d gotten this romantic notion in her head that he only fought out of necessity. Really? Really? God, she was so mad at herself. Of course he didn’t fight out of necessity. It hadn’t been a matter of life or death at the center, had it? No. Just some kids out looking for a little mayhem. And Nobody had gone in like a bull in a china shop. A big bull.

  She’d been so distracted by the stabbing part of the fight that she hadn’t realized how much he’d been the one starting the fight. They could have closed the door and called the cops—or at least Rebel—and then she could have painted over the graffiti. No one had to get hurt.

  She was still sitting at the table when Rebel got up to make the coffee. Shirtless, of course. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He froze, back to her. “Tell you what?”

  “Don’t pull that innocent attitude with me. Nobody Bodine is a convicted killer.”

  He filled the carafe. “Who told you that?”

  “He did.”

  “Did he, now,” he replied in a casual tone.

  She wanted to throw something at him. Something heavy. And pointy. “So let me get this straight, Rebel. I can’t get help for that boy because the best possible option is to leave him in an abusive home so that he can continue to spend quality time with a convicted murderer?”

  Rebel turned and gave her one of those irritating, all-seeing looks. “You didn’t sleep.”

  “Quit changing the damn subject. Why didn’t you tell me about him? Why did you let me think he was just some misunderstood guy with a hard-luck story?”

  But instead of explaining himself, Rebel just kept staring at her as if she’d grown a second head overnight. “He didn’t tell you how it happened.” It wasn’t a question. More of an observation.

  “He killed someone! Isn’t that what happened?”

  “Who killed who?” Madeline stumbled into the kitchen wrapped in a thin cotton robe, her hair a wild nest of curls. “What’s going on?”

  Melinda had forgotten it was Saturday. “Nobody Bodine. He killed someone.”

  Madeline looked alarmed. “Last night?”

  “No. Last night he just—” Kissed me. But she couldn’t say it out loud.

  She couldn’t bring herself to admit that, once again, she’d found the least suitable man in a tri-county area and taken a shine to him. It wasn’t the same thing as Tyrone getting blowjobs on the side, but was it really that different? Her taste in men was horrid. Abysmal. She should hie herself to a nunnery as fast as she could and stop inflicting the world with her romantic disasters. Because they were all disasters. All of them.

  Rebel and Madeline shared a look, which only made Melinda that much madder. “Okay, fine. I kissed him. He kissed me back. And then he told me he was a convicted killer and disappeared off into the night. Another winner, right?” God, she really was going to throw something at the rate she was going. “I sure know how to pick ’em.”

  “Mellie …”

  She cut Madeline off. “No, it’s okay. I totally get it. I’m the outsider here and everyone thought it’d be best if I didn’t know the sordid history of the man who cleans my child care center. I can see why that wouldn’t be an important piece of information to add to the employee profile. I can see why you two have gone to such great lengths to make sure I knew you didn’t think he was a dangerous guy. Because obviously, as a murderer, he’s not, right?”

  “Mellie.” This was less a plea and more an order. “Calm down.”

  “Did you know?” She demanded of her sister. “Or did he not tell you, too?”

  For once in her life, Madeline looked away. “I knew. Clarence told me. But it happened a long time ago.”

  She threw up her hands. “Oh, for God’s sake. Really? That’s your defense?”

  “Calm down.”

  Was she hearing things or was the sanctimonious Rebel Runs Fast actually issuing orders? “I’m not listening to you.” Then, even though some part of her realized it was childish, she crossed her arms and turned her back on him.

  “It is not my story to tell,” he said, pulling a chair up to the table. “So I didn’t tell you.”

  “Bullshit. Still not talking to you.”

  “He was seventeen, from what I understand. I hadn’t returned to the rez yet. I didn’t know him. When I came back home …” There was a new note in his voice, one that was almost wistful. He cleared his throat. “Albert gave me some newspaper clippings. There was a fight in the bar. He claimed self-defense. He lost.”

  She fought the urge to stick her fingers into her ear and go LALALALA.

  “According to the newspaper, Nobody had punched the guy just right and snapped his neck. He was dead before he hit the ground.”

  Her mind took the fight from last week and transplanted it to a bar—except instead of a guy’s arm, it was a guy’s neck. She shuddered. “Oh, and that’s supposed to make me feel better?”

  “She’s like this,” Madeline explained. “She promises she’s not going to talk to you and then does it anyway. It’s really irritating.”

  “Shut up,” Melinda snapped. “You’re not helping.”

  “He was tried as an adult and convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Sentenced to twelve years in prison, paroled after seven with time off for good behavior. Came back to the rez and disappeared into the back country.”

  It was weird to hear Rebel talk like this—just listing the facts instead of being all mystical and psychic over there. “According to the newspaper? What—are you saying he never told you?”

  “Nope.” He slurped his coffee, as if this were just another Saturday morning.

  Nobody hadn’t told Rebel? She felt a little better. But not much. She wondered if he’d ever told anyone about his childhood or if he only trusted her with that. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “It was not my story to tell.” She rolled her eyes at him. “Everyone else here already knows what happened, or close to it. They have made their judgment and nothing will change that. I did not want to rob you of your chance to make your own judgment.”

  She glared at him. Stupid, compassionate medicine man. “Does he know you know?”

  “Of course.”

  “And?”

  Rebel gave her a sad look. “I gave him the newspaper articles and built the fire so he could burn them.”

  Her brain provided the scenery for her—Rebel and Nobody standing around a fire in the dead of night, burning the past away. What a miserable scene. What a miserable life. Or it had been. Was it still miserable? “You’re trying to make me feel sorry for hi
m.”

  He notched an eyebrow at her. “Is it working?”

  “No.” She wouldn’t let her lousy judgment get the better of her and that was final. “Even if it was self-defense, he’s still going around and picking fights like a—a vigilante, for God’s sake. He shouldn’t be around children. He shouldn’t be around that boy.”

  Rebel gave her one of those searching looks that drove her bonkers. “That’s your judgment to make, is it?”

  And she was mad all over again. “Someone should be the grown up here,” she snapped, fully aware that she wasn’t the most mature person in the room. She went over to where the backpack was hanging by the door. It still had the knife in it. She grabbed the whole thing, then headed to the fridge for a couple of bottles of water. “If you won’t step up, then why shouldn’t I?”

  “What are you doing?” Madeline asked with true concern in her voice.

  “I’m going to go find that man.”

  Against Madeline’s protests, Melinda loaded up some granola bars, water, the knife—just in case—and grabbed a hat. His hat. The one he’d left in a crumpled mess right after dropping the mother of all bombshells in the middle of what had, up to that point, been some really nice kissing. Such nice kissing that she would have been just fine if things had gone to second base. And maybe third.

  Melinda seemed to recall her responsible older sister telling a tale about being so mad at Rebel that she wandered off into the plains with no water, no hat and no plan.

  Well, Melinda would be different. She had a plan. Find Nobody’s hidden little camp and drag the truth out of him. It was his story to tell? Fine. He’d damn well better tell it or she’d call social services first thing Monday morning. She wasn’t about to let Jamie live in danger for a moment longer than was absolutely necessary.

  Star, the horse she’d ridden home on, was still munching grass in the pasture behind Rebel’s barn, which sort of surprised her. Nobody hadn’t taken the horse home and Jamie hadn’t come back for her.

  “Here, girl,” Melinda called. When the mare came plodding over, she said, “Do you remember how to get home? You do? Yay! Let’s go home, girl!”