Leave Me Breathless

by HelenKay Dimon

She had him wishing for a mirror. “Didn’t realize I was doing anything strange.”

  “Yeah, well, you are.” She sighed in a way dramatic enough to make the Hollywood crowd jealous. “So, spill it. What’s the emergency?”

  “I’d like to talk to you in a civilized manner.”

  She dropped her head to the side. “Back to using your big words, I see.”

  “Your preference is that we scream across the office at each other?”

  “I’d rather go home.”

  “And do what?”

  Her eyes narrowed into nasty little slits. “Is that your way of asking if I found a job?”

  “Did you?”

  Her chin lifted. “Yes.”

  He was happy for her as long as the job was in the D.C. metro area. If he had to move to get to her, he would. But, damn, he wanted her right where she was. Scratch that. He wanted her with him and he didn’t care where that happened so long as it happened soon.

  “Where?” he asked.

  “Where what?”

  “The job.”

  She dropped her hands as her attitude kicked up. “As much as I enjoy mindless chatter, and I don’t in case that’s not clear, I’d rather you just say what you have to say so I can go.”

  The idea of her leaving broke something inside him. To stall the inevitable he said the first thing that popped into his mind. “Mark gave you a job.”

  “If you knew, why’d you ask?” She frowned as she spit out the question.

  “It was a guess.”

  “Once again your big brain fed you the right answer.”

  A harsh chuckle escaped his mouth before he could stop it. “Snotty as ever.”

  “Good-bye, Ben.” She turned around and headed for the door.

  Desperate to stop her, he stood up and launched into the one thing sure to get her to stay. The door was open. There were lawyers in the hallway. There would never be a less private or less appropriate time, but he was running out of options.

  “It was a murder-suicide.”

  She froze in place with her back to him.

  “You want to know the details, right? That’s what this is about. Sharing.” When she didn’t answer, he kept going. He figured if he talked she couldn’t leave. “My father had been fooling around with Emma’s mother for months. Maybe longer, I don’t really know. At one time that fact mattered, but it doesn’t now.”

  He saw Callie’s shoulders relax. Maybe she had locked her heart off to him, but that didn’t stop her from being nosy. Now that he finally offered her the information she’d been seeking, she listened.

  “Emma remembers when her mom started to leave during the afternoons. She’d go out, make some excuse, and then come home hours later. Since my father worked all the time, I never noticed the change in pattern.” Ben hated that part. The idea that their collective lives ran uncontrolled to this terrifying point in time while he played sports and argued about eating fish. He’d always hated fish.

  Callie shifted until Ben could see the side of her face.

  He decided not to squander this opportunity. No matter how much the words hurt, he’d say them. Relive each moment as if it unfolded in his mind and somehow stay on his feet as the memories battered him. “One Saturday while my father was supposed to be working on some random work project, Mom took us to soccer practice. She forgot something, which she never did. She was anal to the point of obsession. The car didn’t move into reverse until she ran through her mental checklist several times.”

  “What was so important?”

  My fault. The words from his childhood bounced around in his mind. My fault.

  “My extra shirt. She always brought a change of clothing for after the games and practices. Thought it was unsanitary to run around and then go ride in a car to dinner without changing.”

  Callie turned the whole way around until she stood facing him, her sad eyes growing darker by the second.

  If she tried to comfort him now he’d never make it through this. The voice in his head screamed at him to get it all out. “With us being watched by coaches and other parents, she ran back home. The expected hours away from the house watching us run around and then getting us dinner turned into minutes.”

  Callie took a few steps into the room. “You don’t have to say anything else.”

  “Yeah, I do.” He inhaled, fighting off the anxiety that welled up when he thought about that day. That soccer practice. If she had just stayed on the bleachers with the other moms.

  At some point she may have found out about the affair, but it might not have happened in her own bed, right in front of her like some sick punishment. They could all still be alive.

  “The rest is speculation,” he said. “It’s pretty clear she drove up, saw my father’s car, and went in. Neighbors heard the shots.”

  Callie’s tough-gal face fell. “Ben…”

  “My dad was a former military man. Kept a gun in the house for protection and taught us all how to use it. That it wasn’t a toy and should be respected. How’s that for the ultimate irony?” In an act meant to teach responsibility, his father handed his mother the knowledge to end everything.

  “Ben, I’m so sorry.”

  “Moving in with our grandparents, changing schools and names—that all came later. A bunch of mental health people suggested we erase our parents from our lives and move on.”

  “Did you?”

  “Mark is sick in love with Emma and can’t figure out how to spend three days in a row with her before he has to bolt.” Ben shook his head. “Yeah, it sticks with you. Molds and ruins everything it touches.”

  “What about you?”

  “I thought I came through it without any visible scars.” He came around to stand at the front of his desk. He needed her to bridge the remaining gap between them.

  “Now?”

  “I was wrong.”

  She walked across his carpet and came to a stop two feet away. “How?”

  With one sweep of his arm, he could hold her as he’d been dreaming about for days. To keep from acting on the impulse, he grabbed the edge of the desk behind him. “It never dawned on me I had an issue. I love women. Dated and had fun. Sure, I moved on but the breakups were mostly mutual.”

  “I’m guessing you came to your senses at some point?” she asked.

  For the first time in days she hoped. The sensation built, block upon block. He needed to unburden and let her in. If he could give her something, then maybe this wasn’t a fluke or an ego thing.

  “I was running.”

  “From?”

  “Commitment, risk.” He took her hand then. Lifted it to his mouth for a quick kiss. “If I didn’t get entangled, if I convinced myself I just hadn’t found the right woman yet, life made sense. I could look at Mark’s life with a reserved superiority, knowing that I had gotten through the madness that still held him.”

  The barrier she set up around her heart cracked. The promise she made to hate him forever fell away. “This is deeper than being afraid of commitment, which is lame, by the way.”

  He nodded. “Thanks for the support.”

  “You didn’t break up, you escaped. Anything meaningful threatened your comfortable solitude, including me. Rather than take any risk or go back to being insecure, you destroyed and moved on.”

  His life appeared so solid and stable on the outside. She now saw the crumbling. Never was there a man more in need of love. Her heart sat right there ready to give it if he would only reach out and take it.

  “Yes.”

  “Sounds kind of empty,” she pointed out, hoping he would agree.

  “I didn’t think so at the time.”

  Emotionally, he kept walking backward. She bent her head so he wouldn’t see the disappointment and longing. “Okay.”

  He tipped her chin up. “Until you.”

  A rush of relief fizzled as soon as it came. What if this was part of the protectiveness, of not wanting to be the bad guy or hurt anyone? That was a cycle
she refused to join. “Oh, Ben. You never let me in. We had great sex and fun conversation. The intimacy level never passed what you could get from a friend with benefits.”

  His thumb slid over her lips. “I don’t want one of those.”

  She searched her eyes. “What do you want? Do you even know?”

  “You.”

  A gulp of need hung in her throat. She wanted so badly to surrender. But the man was good at words, brilliant at winning arguments. She couldn’t stand to be one more fight, a trophy, and nothing more.

  She stepped back, trying to get a little space and keep her perspective. Being so close to him and to everything she wanted was a seductive lure. “Ben, I can’t be the plaything or office sex toy. I mean, I could for a few months. It’d be fun, but I deserve more.”

  “I never asked for that.”

  “That’s the point. You didn’t ask for anything. You gave even less.”

  He gulped in air. When she tried to explain, he nodded. “That’s okay. I deserved that.”

  “The words aren’t meant as an insult. Not really. But I need something else. Any woman worth having is going to demand more.”

  “I get that now.”

  “Probably not.”

  His eyebrow lifted in question. “Excuse me?”

  She had to smile at the timing. “There are those hoity words again.”

  “Then let me try saying it another way.” He slipped his hands into hers. “I love you.”

  He could have called her a chicken and left her less surprised. “What?”

  He kissed her knuckles, smoothing her skin with his tongue. “I love you.”

  She could feel him trying to convince her, willing her to give him another chance. With his hands and his eyes he made a promise. She couldn’t believe it, but she started to see it.

  “It crept up on me and knocked me blind, but there it is. I didn’t want it, and fought every last drop of feeling, believe me.” He brought her in closer, and this time she didn’t fight it. “My brain insisted the feelings amounted to nothing more than a physical attraction. See, if it’s lust or sex you don’t have to worry about spilling your secrets, about baring it all.”

  The crushing weight lifted off her chest. It was as if the past few days of torment and anguish hadn’t happened. Every dark nook and tiny crevice flooded with light.

  “You love me?”

  “Did you really not know that?”

  She wanted to believe it, but no. Until he said the words, pleading and holding as if letting go of her would destroy him, she didn’t believe. “Ben, you’ve held on to every bit of information, forcing me to beg for scraps here and there. You’re only talking now because you need to.”

  “Right.”

  “You admit it?”

  “I’ll tell you every last detail of my life. Share every minute of the pain that nearly crippled me, that turned Mark into an emotional pile of crap. I’ve done so many things I’m not proud of. The man standing before you now is a huge turn from where he started.”

  She pressed a hand against his heart. “The man I see seems pretty good to me.”

  “I’m not perfect.”

  “Yeah, no kidding.”

  “But for you I’d try to be.” He took her face in his hands. “I will be.”

  The power of his vow and strength of his commitment made her heart burst with happiness. “No one has ever offered to change for me before.”

  “I do love you and will do anything to make you happy.”

  His feelings hovered right there at the surface. He did love her. She saw it in every cell, every pore, and every muscle. He wasn’t hiding it or renaming it or being a clueless guy seaching for the right words. He opened his heart and let his emotions pour out and surround them.

  “How do you know it’s not a bad case of heartburn?” she asked, half in jest.

  For the first time since she walked in, he smiled. “I want heartburn to go away. This, what I feel for you, I want to last.”

  “Sweet talker.”

  He treated her to a long kiss, one that chased away every fear and doubt. One that apologized and stole her soul. When he lifted his head, she tried to pull him back down to her.

  “I’m not sure I’m a forever type of guy—”

  Oh, he was so very wrong about that. “Yes, you are. Any man who is so adamant about fidelity is a long-haul sort.”

  “I don’t know about that. I just know that you crave a home and stability.”

  “So, you do listen.”

  “To you? I wouldn’t dare not to.” He grew serious again. “You want a man who will believe in you and support you. Someone to fight with and name-call. I can be all of those things for you.”

  He threw everything she wanted right at her feet. Only a stupid woman would walk away. And she was not dumb.

  “I just want you to be yourself.” She threw her arms around his neck. “I love you.”

  His face lit up. That stupid grin almost swallowed his entire head. “Never thought I’d hear that again.”

  A giddiness took over her whole body. She wanted to laugh and giggle, and those girlie things were not her. With him, she felt free…and loved.

  “Get used to it, Your Honor, because I plan to tell you every single day.”

  He nuzzled her cheek. “Forever?”

  “Forever for my forever man.”

  Their lips met and the kiss quickly turned hot. Hands, tongue. They were about to break a sacred office rule.

  Ben pointed at the camera in the far corner of the room. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “I thought you liked to work.”

  He winked at her. “With you, I much prefer to play.”

  “I always said you were a smart man.”

  If you liked this book, try Bianca D’Arc’s ONCE BITTEN, TWICE DEAD, available now from Brava!

  Somewhere near Stony Brook, Long Island, New York

  “Unit twelve,” the dispatcher’s voice crackled over the radio. Sarah perked up. That was her. She listened as the report rolled over the radio. A disturbance in a vacant building out on Wheeler Road, near the big medical center. Probably kids, she thought, responding to dispatch and turning her patrol car around.

  Since the budget cuts, she rolled alone. She hadn’t had a partner in a long time, but she was good at her job and confident in her abilities. She could handle a couple of kids messing around in an empty building.

  Sarah stepped into the gloomy concrete interior of the building. The metal door hung off the its hinges and old boards covered the windows. Broken glass littered the floor and graffiti decorated the walls.

  The latest decorators had been junkies and kids looking for a secret place to either get high or drink beer where no one could see. There didn’t appear to be anyone home at the moment. They’d probably cleared out in a hurry when they’d seen Sarah’s cruiser pull up outside. Still, she had to check the place.

  Nightstick in one hand, flashlight in the other, Sarah made her way into the gloom of the building. Electricity was a thing of the past in this place. Light fixtures dangled brokenly from the remnants of a dropped ceiling as Sarah advanced into the dark interior.

  She heard a scurrying sound that could have been footsteps or could have been rodents. Either way, her heartbeat sped up.

  “Police,” she identified herself in a loud, firm voice. “Show yourself.”

  She directed the flashlight into the dark corners of the room as she crept inside. The place had a vast outer warehouse type area with halls and doors leading even farther inside the big structure. She didn’t really want to go in there, but saw no alternative. She decided to advance slowly at first, then zip through the rest of the building, hoping no one got behind her to cut off her retreat.

  She had her sidearm, but she’d rather not have to shoot anyone today. Especially not some kids out for a lark. They liked to test their limits and hers. She’d been up against more than one teenage bully who thought because she was a woman, s
he’d be a pushover. They’d learned the hard way not to mess with Sarah Petit.

  She heard that sort of brushing sound again. Her heart raced as adrenaline surged. She’d learned to channel fear into something more useful. Fear became strength if you knew how to use it.

  “This is the police,” she repeated in a loud, carrying voice. “Step into the light and show yourself.”

  More shuffling. It sounded from down the corridor on the left. Sarah approached, her nightstick at the ready. The flashlight illuminated the corner of the opening, not showing her much. The sounds were growing louder. There was definitely someone—or something—there. Perhaps waiting to ambush her, down that dark hallway.

  She wouldn’t fall for that. Sarah approached from a good ten feet out, maneuvering so that her flashlight could penetrate farther down the black hall. With each step, more of the corridor became visible to her.

  Squinting to see better, Sarah stepped fully in front of the opening to the long hallway. There. Near the end. There was a person standing.

  “I’m a police officer. Come out of there immediately.” Her voice was firm and as loud as she could project it. The figure at the end of the hallway didn’t respond. She couldn’t even tell if it was male or female.

  It sort of swayed as it tried to move. Maybe a junkie so high they were completely out of it? Sarah wasn’t sure. She edged closer.

  “Are you all right?”

  She heard a weird moaning sound. It didn’t sound human, but the shape at the end of the long hall was definitely standing on two feet with two arms braced against the wall as if for balance. The inhuman moan came again. It was coming from that shadowy person.

  Sarah stepped cautiously closer to the mouth of the hallway. It was about four feet across. Not a lot of room to maneuver.

  She didn’t like this setup, but she had to see if that person needed help. Sarah grabbed the radio mic clipped to her shoulder.

  “This is Unit Twelve. I’m at the location. There appears to be a person in distress in the interior of the building.”

  “What kind of distress, Unit Twelve?”

  “Uncertain. Subject seems unable to speak. I’m going to get closer to see if I can give you more information.”