by Cora Carmack
That answer wasn’t any better. Now she’d know I was watching her long before I talked to her.
She reached up to my shoulder and smiled. She didn’t look suspicious.
“Well, then, you know my name, and I know yours. How else could we get to know each other?”
Her hand slid up my abdomen to my chest, and I tensed, barely holding on to my control. I swayed toward her, touching her lightly just above where her waist was smallest. I wanted to touch her everywhere.
She gripped the back of my neck, bending my head down, and I flexed my hands, trying to stop myself from throwing her over my shoulder and taking her back to my hotel room.
She stood on her tiptoes, and her lips brushed my chin. It was a testament to how much I wanted her that I was a few seconds away from kissing her even though I’d watched her be sick on the street maybe an hour or two earlier.
Her shirt was bunched up in my flexed fists and the side of my hand grazed bare skin. I nearly lost it. I cast my gaze up to the sky and growled, “Goddamn it.”
She wrapped her arms around my shoulder, and then reached a hand up to tip my head down toward hers. I let her, even though I was shouting inside to walk away. I was thinking with my dick instead of my head, and I needed to get that under control. I might not have known the real Kelsey, not really, but I knew her well enough to know that if we slept together tonight, she’d be done with me.
Then I’d lose this job and have to go crawling home back to Houston. Then I’d be the one on a downward spiral.
And what would happen to her if I were gone? Would her father send someone else in my place?
For some reason, the thought of someone else watching her and seeing her the way I’d seen her made me irrationally angry. If I was right about the cycle she was on, she needed someone to look out for more than just her safety, and I didn’t trust anyone else to do that.
And if I was honest, I didn’t want to leave. Not just because I didn’t want to go home, but because I didn’t want to leave her.
It was the fascination, I told myself. I didn’t want to go until I knew her story, until I understood.
It was a good thing I was better at lying to her than I was at lying to myself.
Determined, I pushed her away.
Almost immediately, I wanted to pull her back.
Instead, I stepped away. “You should go. Get some sleep.”
She was breathing heavy, and it drew my eyes to her chest, and fuck.
“What?” she asked.
“You’ve had a long night.” That I would not make any longer.
She crossed her arms over her chest, and I knew that armor was coming back up. “That sounds an awful lot like chivalry to me. Boring chivalry.”
I took another step back because she was still too close for comfort, and my control was a thin, thin line.
“This is you, right?” I asked, pointing to the hostel at her back, even though I knew it was.
“Uh, yeah, it is, but—”
“Good. Then I’ll leave you alone.”
I walked backward, my steps stiff. “Good night, Kelsey. Or Good morning.”
Then I rounded the corner. I walked just far enough that she wouldn’t be able to see me anymore, and then I sagged against the building.
Around the corner, I heard her say, “What the fuck?”
What the fuck, indeed.
I TOOK A long ice-cold shower that night back in my room, mindful that I had crossed enough lines for the evening to not repeat my shower fantasies of her. Then I crashed, glad for the oblivion.
I woke sometime later, the sun bright outside my window and my phone ringing. Bleary-eyed, I answered, “Hello.”
“Mr. Hunt. I see Kelsey is still spending a small fortune.”
I sat up in bed, suddenly alert.
“Uh . . . yes, sir.” How else was I supposed to answer that?
“Well, get me up to speed.”
I swallowed. “Not that much to tell, sir. We’re in Budapest, Hungary. She’s safe.”
“Yes, but what’s she doing? Where is all that money going?”
I hesitated. “Uh, lots of things.”
“Spit it out, Hunt.”
“Dinners,” I answered. “She meets people, and they go out to dinner. Touristy stuff. Museums. Plays. Lots of souvenirs.”
“Really?” He didn’t sound like he believed me.
“Clothes, too.” I added for good measure. “Expensive ones.”
“Of course.” That he believed me about. “Right, well, I have a meeting. You’ll let me know if anything changes.”
It wasn’t a question.
“Yes, sir.”
I hung up and immediately powered up my Kelsey app. I cursed when I saw she was already out and about for the day.
Did that girl never sleep?
After a quick shower, I grabbed my bag and set off in search of her. I expected to find her carbo-loading to fight a hangover (or maybe that’s just what I would have been doing).
Instead, she was having another one of her quiet moments. Large coffee in hand, she was seated on a park bench in a busy neighborhood square. She wore a light sundress, and her hair was as styled and perfect as ever.
She didn’t look tired, not in the slightest.
I parked myself under the shade of a tree off to her left, far enough away that the busy sidewalks should hide me.
She sipped her caffeine in quiet contemplation, studying a fountain in the middle of the square. I didn’t remember it from the guidebook, but told myself I would look it up later. For now, I pulled out my sketchbook.
On the walk over, I’d started thinking about all the drawings I’d done during our trip so far. A few were from landmarks I’d seen in passing, but most were of Kelsey. I still hadn’t been able to get her face just right, so I’d stuck to sketching her in profile when I could.
Most of my drawings I did after the fact, when I couldn’t sleep or while sitting around in a bar. I wasn’t about to pass up the chance to draw her in real time. Maybe that combined with getting to meet her last night would finally help me get the face right.
I zoned out, sketching first the fountain and then Kelsey.
I’d never been trained in art. I mean, I’d taken a class or two in high school, but I hadn’t exactly paid attention. I’d been preoccupied with other things then and drawing still lifes of fruit hadn’t been all that appealing.
I was observant, though, and I taught myself. I’d had a lot of time for trial and error, too. I’d seen plenty of action in Afghanistan, but there’d also been a lot of sitting around waiting, doing nothing.
When I got to Kelsey’s face, I contemplated everything I knew about her: that familiar empty sadness that shone through on occasion, her admission from last night that she was tired, “bone-deep” as she’d put it. When I drew her with that in mind, overlaid with a smile, the drawing came to life.
She was frailer in the drawing than she appeared at first glance, but it worked. Her hair and dress blew in the wind, and she clutched that cup of coffee like a lifeline.
I was probably reading too much into this, projecting my memories of myself onto her, but Kelsey was more than just tired. She was sad. And I was desperate to know why.
When I looked back at her to put some finishing touches on her dress, she was gone. My eyes darted around and found her closer to the fountain, amidst a group of preteen boys.
A bigger boy was holding a book over the water, taunting a younger kid, and I watched Kelsey play him. She pretended to need directions, and then when she had the opportunity, she took the book.
She gave it to a scrawny boy in the group who looked at her like she was descended from heaven. She kissed his cheek, and the kid’s face split open in a smile. Whatever she’d done, she’d just made that kid’s world.
&n
bsp; I was a little jealous.
And my fascination with her was raging like a wildfire.
Her good deed done, she headed for the crosswalk at the corner of the street. I went to the opposite corner and crossed to the other side of the street, thinking I might have better luck following her undetected from there.
I couldn’t help but notice that her shoulders were a little straighter and the smile on her face didn’t disappear once she’d left that boy behind. I found myself smiling in response.
I was right about her being even more brilliant when the darkness wasn’t hanging over her. It was like the sun had appeared from behind the clouds, and I couldn’t have looked away if I tried.
11
MAYBE MY MIND had always been made up, but when I followed Kelsey to some kind of rave at one of Budapest’s famed thermal baths the following night, I knew I wouldn’t be able to stay away from her.
She wore this intricate black swimsuit that wrapped around her body, accentuating the slim circle of her waist before it tied onto her bikini bottoms at the hip.
She was stunning.
There was a lot to look at. Plenty of beautiful, barely covered women. Roman-style columns. Colored lights. Live music. Sideshow acts like fire breathers and a trapeze artist.
Still, I only watched her.
She was there with some girl she’d met in the hostel. They’d gone out to a bar crawl together the night before, and I kept my distance. Kelsey had seemed reserved. When she went home alone, an ugly knot of tension in my chest had unwound. And if her going home alone made me relieved, the thought of her with someone else burned my blood.
So when I saw her talking to a guy in the thermal baths, I didn’t hesitate. I started making my way toward her. Her hand was on his shoulder, and even that drove me crazy.
She saw me, and then practically fell all over herself to put her back to me in the hopes that I wouldn’t see her.
She wasn’t going to get away from me that easily.
The girl from the hostel pulled her aside and then stared openly at me.
Did that mean she knew who I was? Did Kelsey say something about me?
The closer I got, the faster my blood pumped. Maybe it was her or maybe it was my secret, but the adrenaline rush was the most powerful one I’d had since I’d been discharged.
When I stood behind Kelsey, her friend was practically gleaming with excitement. I leaned down to her ear. A wisp of her hair tickled at my neck, and I said, “Nice to see you again, Kelsey.”
She turned around, and I relished seeing her off-balance. More than that, though, her closeness was electrifying.
“How are your cheeks this evening?”
She cleared her throat. “Uh . . . good.”
She just stared at me, like she couldn’t quite believe I was there. I held back a smile. Reaching an arm out to introduce myself to her friend, I made sure to lean in close to Kelsey. Our skin brushed, and she sucked in a breath.
Chuckling, I shook her friend’s hand.
“Hello, I’m Hunt. It’s nice to meet you.”
“I’m Jenny. Likewise. ” She was pretty. She had a similar build to Kelsey’s, but with dark hair and eyes. She could have passed for a local.
“Is that short for Hunter?” Kelsey asked.
I let go of Jenny’s hand and looked down at Kelsey. I still wasn’t quite used to having those brilliant green eyes directed at me. “It’s not.”
She watched my lips long after they stopped moving, and I nearly forgot all about why I wasn’t supposed to kiss her. She made me forget a lot of things.
“So your parents just named you Hunt?”
“Not exactly.”
“God . . . Vague much?”
She was frustrated. Good. That meant I wasn’t alone.
“There you go calling me God again.”
She shot me an exasperated look, and who knew that would turn me on?
Then her guy-of-the night moved right next to her, and that cooled my reaction. What if she was more interested in him? Not that she needed to be interested in me when I’d promised myself I wasn’t going to act on it.
If this was going to work, we needed to be friends. Maybe she would travel with a friend. I only had the rest of our stay in Budapest, though, to convince her, because I couldn’t accidentally run into her in whatever city she visited next, not without arousing her suspicion.
I glanced at the guy at her elbow and then the rest of the group she was with. “I didn’t realize you were here with others.”
Lie.
“You scared of a little competition?”
I laughed in lieu of an answer and was glad when she didn’t even glance at the guy trying unsuccessfully to get her attention.
“What about your other friends?” I asked. “The ones from the other night?”
She shrugged. “We weren’t really friends. But this is Jenny.” She pulled the other girl closer. Was that nervousness that I detected? That was new.
“Yes. We met. A few seconds ago.”
She blanched, and I enjoyed it entirely too much.
“Right. We’re staying in the same hostel.”
She jumped slightly, and I realized that the guy had touched her back. It was irrational and inappropriate, but I wanted to break his arms and use them as chopsticks. “Because we’re sisters. And it makes sense for sisters to stay in the same place.”
I raised an eyebrow. Sisters? Kelsey didn’t need to try that hard to get a guy’s interest. Hell, she’d had my interest when I didn’t even really like her.
Jenny clapped her hands together. “Oookay, I believe it’s time for drinks. I know I could use one . . . Kelsey?”
Kelsey looked at Jenny like she was the Second Coming. But then she looked at me, and she hesitated.
What did that mean?
Was it so obvious that I didn’t drink?
She let out a slow breath.
“One drink,” she told Jenny.
She moved closer toward me, and I knew by the look on the dude’s face the second she passed out of his reach. Barely an inch separated her bare skin from mine, and I was buzzing with it.
“Come with me?” she asked.
There was a roar in my ears that shifted and settled in my chest. Despite my friendship plan, I liked it very much when she looked at me like that, her bottom lip caught between her teeth.
“I would have thought you had enough to drink the other night.”
She frowned, and there I was, being an asshole again. I kept forgetting that she wasn’t as familiar with me as I was with her.
“It’s just one drink. My first of the night. Come have a little fun.”
I hesitated. It had been so much harder to be close to her and alcohol at the same time. Like the temptation was magnified. If I kissed her, I could taste both of the things I’d forbidden myself to have.
She said, “Or I can just catch up with you later.”
She leaned away, and I got over my hesitation pretty quickly. Temptation, be damned. I gripped her waist and pulled her back to me.
“Okay, let’s go.”
I stifled my thoughts of concern and told myself that I could handle it.
Her. The alcohol. All of it.
“Your new friend seems a little reluctant to leave you.”
She looked ahead of us to where the other guy had now joined the group around her friend Jenny.
“He’ll get over it. We literally met like two minutes ago.”
“I know. I saw you when you came in.”
Her head snapped toward me, and her expression was worth admitting that I’d been watching her.
“I really enjoyed that little spin move you did while you were trying to hide.”
“I wasn’t hiding. I just . . .”
She floundered, trying to come up with something, and it was so damn adorable.
“Okay.” She rolled her eyes. “So I was hiding. It’s not every day I make a fool of myself. I wasn’t exactly excited about rehashing that.”
“It wasn’t that bad.”
I didn’t know why it was so much fun to rile her up. Call it payback for her unknowingly torturing me for weeks. Or maybe it was the fire in her eyes.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
I raised my eyebrows in response.
“It’s a room full of women in bikinis. What do you think I’m doing here?”
Her lips twisted into something resembling a pout.
“I meant what are you doing here? With me.”
We reached the stairs leading out of the pool. She stepped up and out of the water, and seeing her slick skin, her suit clinging tight to her curves, was nearly the death of me. I was turned on, and there was no way she didn’t know it.
Her nipples showed through the fabric of her swimsuit, and I wasn’t sure whether that was from the cooler air or from me, but I knew which one I wanted it to be.
My throat was scratchy with desire as I asked, “What was the question?”
“I asked what you were doing here with me.”
I sensed her nervousness again, and it went straight to my head.
“Oh, you mean you asked a stupid question?”
She frowned. “You still haven’t answered it.”
“Yes, well.” I reached out one finger, trailing through the drops of water collecting along her collarbone. “You make it hard to think straight.”
Her eyes lit up, and she pulled me after her. “Come on, soldier. You can finish staring at me at the bar. I promise I’m not going to disappear.”
I took a deep breath and forced myself to look away from the curve of her ass.
“Stupid. So incredibly stupid,” I mumbled to myself.
She led me to one of three bars that had been set up inside the domed thermal-bath building. The rest of her group had gone ahead of us and had already claimed a section of barstools. I gladly took a seat on one as soon as we were close enough.
Kelsey leaned over the bar, and I was exceptionally glad that I was sitting down.