by Naima Simone
“She’s moving in with me.”
The plea transformed into an eat-shit-and-die glare. Of course he doubted Little Miss Perfect would’ve phrased it like that, but her fierce glower definitely telegraphed up yours. And here he was only trying to help her out.
“What did you say?” Noah snapped. His eyebrows arrowed down in a deep vee, his lips forming a sneer. “What the hell is he talking about, Greer?”
“Noah, please,” she hissed. “We’re in a place of business. Could you try to keep your voice down?”
Rafe glanced over at Sara, who didn’t even pretend she wasn’t listening—and wasn’t captivated by the drama. One thing about their firm, the employees were like an extended family. And that included cracking one another’s balls and being in one another’s business.
“Fine,” Noah bit out but at a lower volume. “What the hell is he talking about?” he repeated.
“He’s talking about her living with him while he tracks down the asshole who’s been stalking her,” Rafe drawled.
She tossed him another dirty look. “You. Are. Not. Helping.”
He heaved an aggrieved sigh and threw up his hands. Behind him Sara snickered.
“You can’t be serious.” Again Noah grabbed her hands, lightly shaking them. Frowning, Rafe shifted closer behind her. “Honey, I know you’re scared. I get that. But this? Staying with someone you barely know? This is crazy.”
“I can’t stay with Ethan any longer. I brought a nutcase straight to his door, potentially putting him and Jason in danger—”
“You know I don’t care about that, sweetie,” Ethan said softly. “Neither does Jason. You don’t have to leave.”
“I know. And I love you for not caring about it. But I do. And Raphael’s the best choice. Security, protecting people—it’s what he does. And I’m pregnant. I don’t have only myself to consider any longer.”
Rafe remained quiet as she repeated almost verbatim the reasons he’d lobbed at her in his office. Truth rang in her rationalization, and if he hadn’t had a front-row seat to her initial vehement objections, he would’ve believed the live-in solution had been her idea.
“You know you can stay with me,” Noah insisted. “Endangering Ethan wouldn’t be an issue, and you wouldn’t have to live with a stranger. You’ve just gotten out of the hospital. You need to be around people you trust, who can care for you—”
Shock jolted him. Something close to panic chased it like a lovesick girl on a school playground. Hospital? She hadn’t said anything about being in the hospital. “When were you admitted? The baby?” Was that dread curdling his gut like sour milk? Don’t get too attached. Might not be your kid. And even if it is, she’s going to jump ship so fast, taking the baby with her, you won’t even see the dust. Keep your distance. Right, right. Got it… “Are you two okay?”
She squeezed her forehead between her thumb and fingers. “Yes. I went to the emergency room last night because of a bad migraine. The baby’s fine.”
“And you need to reschedule your appointment from this morning as soon as possible. You need someone by your side who cares for you and the baby,” Noah insisted, recapturing her hand.
“Noah, please. I know.” She extricated herself from his grasp, and once more that note of weariness crept into her voice.
“Back off,” Rafe wanted to growl at her friend. Couldn’t he see the strain his objections placed on her? Objections that smacked of more than a protective streak. The oversolicitous attention. The way he stared at her as if a bomb could go off in the building and he wouldn’t notice the slightest tremor. The resentful anger directed at Rafe. It all smacked of more than simple friendship. At least on Noah’s part. “Listen, Noah, I appreciate your offer. I really do, but…”
“I agree with Greer,” Ethan chimed in, saving her from rejecting her best friend. “In this case, Mr. Marcel is the best choice. His field is security, and just as importantly, he’s the baby’s father. It’s his right to protect his child.”
“We don’t know that for sure” hovered on the tip of Raphael’s tongue. But the protest stayed there. Maybe because he didn’t want to give Noah the satisfaction. Maybe because it was none of Noah’s or Ethan’s business.
Maybe because uttering the words would’ve seemed like a betrayal to Greer.
Which was ridiculous. Still…he kept quiet.
And when the tension seeped from her body, he was grateful that once in his life he’d followed his friends’ instructions and shut the hell up.
“Why am I not surprised you are in the thick of whatever is going on out here?”
Rafe turned at the wry question. Chayot Grey, one of his three best friends and co-owner of their firm, stood in front of Sara’s desk. In spite of his sarcasm, he really didn’t appear shocked or concerned about finding Rafe in the lobby area with three strangers. Not that he was prone to drama, especially in the office, but of Gabriel Devlin, Malachim Jerrod, Chay, and himself, Rafe was the one voted Most Likely to Be on the Receiving End of a Shotgun. No one knew the ins and outs of him like Gabe, Mal, and Chay.
The four men had been friends since birth—literally. Their mothers—Ana Devlin, Pam Jerrod, Evelyn Grey Sheldon, and Sharon Marcel—had met and befriended one another at Boston Children’s Hospital during workshops and prenatal appointments for their high-risk pregnancies. Despite their different social and economic backgrounds, they remained close. The sons they considered miracles and named after angels had inherited that friendship.
And the bond had been cemented in terror, secrets, and murder.
Twenty years ago, Chay had killed his mother’s boyfriend at the time, Richard Pierce, in self-defense. Rafe, Mal, and Gabe had helped cover up the crime, then sworn to never reveal their secret. The police wouldn’t have believed the wealthy businessman had tried to rape Chay.
The secret had ended up coming to light several months earlier, and they had gone to the police and confessed. Gabe, Mal, and he had ended up pleading as minors and receiving probation. Chay, also convicted as a minor, ended up with probation as well due to the extenuating circumstances since Leah—a private investigator and Gabe’s fiancée—had unearthed proof of Richard’s evil during her investigation.
Whenever Rafe thought of Richard Pierce, he wished he could bury the motherfucker all over again.
Snuffing out the fury to a simmer, he summoned a light tone and smothered all hints of anger from his voice.
“Hey.” He held up his hands in the age-old sign of it wasn’t me. “I didn’t do anything. Well,” he peered down at Greer, “maybe I did something.” He expected her furious scowl this time, and she didn’t disappoint. “Chay, you remember Greer Addison, don’t you? The other two are her brother, Ethan, and friend Noah Granger.”
“Nice to meet you.” Chay nodded toward the men and smiled at Greer. “And it’s nice to see you again, Ms. Addison.”
“You, too, Mr. Grey.”
“Please call me Chay.” His hazel eyes returned to Rafe. “Is everything all right?”
Rafe slid his hands into the front pockets of his pants and rocked back on his heels. “Ominous letters. Vandalized car. Surprise pregnancy. You know”—he flipped his hand from side-to-side in a so-so gesture—“meh.”
To his credit, Chay didn’t utter the WTF the blasé announcement warranted. Rafe didn’t doubt he’d get a call later once they no longer had an audience.
“Okay,” Chay said blandly. “I guess you’re going to need a few days out of the office then.”
“Just what I was telling Sara. Don’t worry, though. I’ll work from home.” While Mal’s law firm had taken a hit in clients in the wake of their confession, Rafe and Chay’s firm had increased in clients. He silently snorted. Guess people figure if they were willing to go to extreme means once, then they were the perfect “by any means necessary” security firm.
A faint smirk played around Chay’s lips. “Oh, I’m not worried about you. Greer on the other hand…” He stretched his arm out,
offering her his hand, which she shook. “If you find yourself feeling the slightest bit homicidal, just give me a call.”
“I’ll place you on speed dial,” she muttered, earning a chuckle from Chay. And the sound of it was welcome. With his darkest secret aired for public consumption—including to the mother he’d tried to protect from the truth—he’d become even more quiet, more withdrawn, and private. Even with his three best friends.
It wasn’t fair, damn it. Chay had been through enough, had suffered the hell that no one—especially an innocent child—should. Not that Chay had ever admitted to any of them that Richard’s attempted rape hadn’t been the first time. But he, Gabe, Mal…they’d seen the differences in their best friend weeks before that blood-drenched night. The loss of laughter, joy…innocence. Rage roared through Raphael, and he had to forcibly tamp it down.
Noah moved closer to Greer, blocking out the rest of them and recapturing Rafe’s attention. “Greer, please reconsider,” Noah murmured. Rafe frowned as he cupped her upper arm and lowered his head toward hers. “This isn’t nece—”
“Ethan, I have a guy headed over to your house to install a few more security measures just in case this person returns. While he’s there, Greer’s going to pack up her stuff. You want to meet us there?”
Her brother didn’t hesitate but nodded and turned toward the door. Noah glanced at Ethan’s retreating back. “Hold on, Ethan, I’m coming,” he called after him before pinning Greer with an intense, hard stare. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, Noah. I’m sure.”
He sighed. “Fine. I’ll call you.” He brushed a kiss across her forehead, stabbed Rafe with a hot glare, then followed Ethan out of the office, taking all of the tension in Rafe’s body with him. The blond was too damn intense. And touchy-feely. He didn’t know which bothered him worse.
She whirled around, fury narrowing her eyes, tautening her mouth.
“Those two are my closest friends,” she snapped. “Did you have to be such an ass?” Not waiting for his response, she wheeled around and stormed across the reception area. She yanked the door open, paused, and shot him another of those green death rays. “And for the record? All the Die Hard movies after two sucked.”
Shock slapped him in the face. He might’ve gasped.
“You take that back,” he shouted. But she ignored him and slammed the door shut after her. The hormones. It had to be the pregnancy hormones that made her say something so mean. So…so sacrilegious.
Growling a “shut the hell up” to a laughing Chay, he stalked after her.
The woman had lost her damn mind.
Chapter Nine
Blood. Bright. Wet.
Gaping, ragged tears in flesh.
Bile. Hot. Burning.
Pain. Blinding, hot pain.
Greer jerked awake, jackknifing up. Harsh bellows echoed in her ears, lifted and lowered her sweaty chest. She blinked, but darkness greeted her, the images that had been so sharp fading into dim obscurity. Desperately, she tried to clutch at them, but they filtered through her mental fingers like wisps of fog.
She groaned, half sobbed, and tunneled her fingers through her hair, cursing the black hole in her head. This fucking black hole. God, why didn’t her brain make up its damn mind? Either let her have a tear in her memories that encapsulated a murder, or give her the damn hours—the truth—back. But to torment her with trickles and flashes but still leave her damaged, lost? Broken. She hated feeling so…broken. All her life she’d been made to feel that way. But now? Now she actually was.
One night, damn it. Just one night without the nightmarish visions that had plagued her every night for the last two weeks but never stuck around after she woke. At least this time the episode wasn’t followed by a teeth-grinding headache. Like the one that had sent her to the hospital the night before. Inhaling deep, she tried to calm her racing heart, shove back the fear that still crawled under her skin, curled in her stomach.
Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. Consciously calm the body. Starting with the toes, legs, chest, arms, fingers. Heart. Head. Relaxation techniques, the doctor assured her, would help with the stress and tension that were probably triggering the migraine attacks and nightmares.
Groggy, she slowly reclined until her head met the pillow, damp from her sweat and probably tears. She stared at the shadowed ceiling. Frustration and grief swelled, a tidal wave she allowed to crash over her, through her. The faint pulse of the headache she’d hoped to avoid echoed in the back of her head. Leave it. Just leave it for tonight. Tonight other things demanded her attention. A mutilated doll. Rafe. Packing her belongings. Leaving Ethan’s house. Arriving at Rafe’s.
Falling asleep in the guest bedroom.
Groaning, she pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes and rubbed. Hard.
God, she was tired. Stretching across the bed for a short nap was the last thing she recalled. It seemed as if all the worry, dread, and fear of the past four months had crashed down on her shoulders at one time. The onslaught of emotion had dragged her down to the sleigh bed with its simple but pretty white quilt, still numb and shell-shocked over the turn of events at his office. The late afternoon rays that had streamed through the huge bay windows had disappeared, replaced by milky beams and pockets of darkness. When she’d lain down, she’d thought dozing past an hour an impossibility. A restful sleep had been almost nonexistent since her life had morphed into a Snapped episode.
Maybe it’d been the twenty-five-minute drive from Boston to Rafe’s Chestnut Hill home with its wooded lot and illusion of complete privacy. Maybe it’d been the glimpse of the security system that had appeared complicated and state-of-the-art even to her untrained eye. Probably both. But in that place in her heart where she couldn’t deceive herself, she admitted the distance and Fort Knox system were secondary to the man who owned the home she slept in.
There was just something about him. Aside from the hair, piercings, and tattoos, because none were particularly unusual. The something surpassed clothing or hairstyle. It was in the ever-moving, alert survey of his surroundings. The loose-limbed, smooth stride that reminded her of a stalking feline—graceful, unhurried, but dangerous. As if he could explode into lethal motion at any given second. Add them all up, and he exuded “fuck with me at your own risk.”
Yes, maybe she couldn’t exactly define the something. But whatever the elusive thing was, it allowed her to sleep like the baby tucked under her breast. Until the nightmares, that is.
Gingerly, she scooted back, sitting against the headboard. And groaned again. But not out of fear. Oh, God. She pressed her palms to her stomach as it pitched and rolled in a sickening wave. Greer remained still for several moments, hoping against hope that tonight would be the magic night the sickness disappeared. That if she didn’t move, the churning would calm, and she could go back to sleep. Oh, God. Not happening. She moaned, rolling to the end of the bed as her belly gave a hard lurch. She left the bedroom and swayed down the hallway to the bathroom Rafe had pointed out earlier.
As soon as she flicked the light switch, her stomach rebelled. She rushed across the white tile and had barely managed to flip the lid before the grilled chicken and salad she’d eaten for lunch made a guest appearance. She shook, flushed and aching. Her stomach wrenched hard as irrational fear for the baby’s safety spiraled through her. No way can this be healthy—
A cold cloth was pressed to her forehead. She groaned, unable to hold in the grateful moan as blessed coldness combated her heated skin and won. Curling her fingers around the edge of the toilet, she emitted a little sob as another wave hit her, and once more she bent over the bowl.
“Shh. Easy. Try to relax. Don’t fight it,” a sleep-roughened voice murmured. Rafe rubbed slow, wide circles over her back, continuing to soothe her with his gentle touch and low assurances.
She’d been so preoccupied with purging everything she’d ever eaten—as well as an internal organ or two—she hadn’t heard him enter the room.
In a far corner of her mind, it occurred to her she should be embarrassed. But hell, she was too sick to be humiliated. Too weak to ask him to leave. And besides, she welcomed his presence. For the first time she wasn’t going through this by herself. Ethan had been concerned about her, had empathized, but he’d never breached the bathroom door to comfort or hold her. But Rafe had. Even with how he felt about the situation—her, the pregnancy, being in his home. Her eyes burned with the threat of tears. Until this moment, she hadn’t realized she’d wanted someone there. Someone to assure her that she would be okay, that she could get through this. That she was strong enough.
She sagged to the edge of the tub, exhausted but finally finished. Throat raw, stomach as tight as a vise grip, and legs like noodles, but she was finished. Rafe flushed the toilet, and seconds later nudged a squat glass of water into her hand.
“Rinse, don’t swallow. I’ll be right back.”
She followed his instructions, and when he returned to the bathroom with a robe from her unpacked suitcase, she’d just swished the last bit of water in her mouth, washing away the acrid, nasty aftertaste of bile. Silently, he helped ease her to her feet and into the robe. She shivered as the warmth from the terry cloth embraced her, and chased away the clammy chill left behind by sweat drying on her skin.
He guided her to the living room, slowing his stride to match her slower hobble. Carefully, he lowered her to the couch, and she curled her legs up under her. He tugged a throw from the back of the sofa and tucked it around her knees.
“Be right back,” he said before leaving the room.
She stared after him, the “okay” stuck in her throat. A few minutes ago she’d been too busy waving a not-too-fond farewell to her lunch to pay attention to what Raphael wore—or wasn’t wearing. But as he leaned over her, wrapping the cover around her thighs, every sense, thought, and nerve was solely focused on him. The soft swish of long dark hair as it swept forward, brushing his high cheekbone and hard jaw, barely grazing the slope of his shoulder. The dark, heavy scrollwork accented with punches of blue and red that covered his arms and shoulders. The sexy contract and release of muscle under golden skin—skin that stretched tautly over his bare shoulders, chest, and abdomen. The silky trail of hair that started under his six-pack, forked around his navel, and disappeared beneath the waistband of the black sweatpants that rode low on his narrow hips.