by Hill, Teresa
“Not if he’s like every man I’ve ever met,” Dani said.
“I’ve used every low-cut top and push-up bra I have on that man. Are you sure he doesn’t have a girlfriend?”
“No, not sure. But what kind of girlfriend would let him hang out in a bar every night without a fight?”
“True. Maybe, he’s just really into you.” Jill gave Dani a smart-assed smirk.
“No way.”
“He’s turned down every other woman in here between eighteen and forty-something. Explain that.”
“Like you said, vow of celibacy?”
“Right. I think I’m gonna go ask him.”
“Jill? No — ”
Mace turned around and looked at the two of them, curiosity on his face.
“At this point, I have nothing to lose by asking,” Jill said.
“Please, don’t.”
They watched Mace, and he watched them.
“Maybe, he’s been waiting for you to go over there and talk to him.”
“No. He’s pushy. He’d barge right in and say what he wanted.”
She wondered if he could read lips, but his gaze was steady and his expression gave little away.
“Nico thinks he’s watching out for you. You know, making sure none of the boozed-up guys hassle you. I heard Nico promise Mace something one night as he was leaving, and I think it was that Nico would walk you to your car when your shift was over.” Jill gave Dani an exasperated look. “Go talk to the man. See what he wants. Do it for me. I mean, I love looking at him and flirting with him, but I can only take so much rejection and disappointment night after night.”
“You look like you’re all torn up about it.” Dani said, knowing no one was happier than Jill to have him here.
“A girl can’t let that kind of thing show. I have some pride. You should, too. Go talk to him.”
“If that is what he’s wanted all along – you can’t reward this kind of behavior. Look at him. He must get whatever he wants way too much of the time.”
“Okay, I’ve tried to be nice and give you some space to get right in your head with it, but that’s over. You wait for him to walk in the door and you stare at him when he’s here. You hate it when all the bar babes go after him. You don’t like it when I get within two feet of him — ”
“I do not!” Dani protested.
“Save the act for someone who might believe it.”
“I’m not acting,” Dani insisted. “I can’t think about him that way. I can’t look at him that way — ”
“You already do think about him and look at him that way. The only question now is how long are you going to keep lying to me and yourself about it?”
“Jill … I don’t make good decisions about men.”
“Who does? And even if a girl did, I doubt she’d be able to around him. Did you see his ass the time he came in here wearing something other than cargo shorts?”
He’d been wearing running shorts. Dark blue, nylon, loose everywhere except over those mouthwatering hips of his.
She’d dropped a glass full of expensive whiskey when he’d turned around, presenting her with his rear view. His snug t-shirt clinging to pretty muscles hadn’t been bad, either.
“I can’t think like that,” Dani said.
Jill rolled her eyes. “You had a bad break-up, right? We’ve all been there. We get over it.”
“No. He died.” Dani nearly choked getting the words out. Jill wouldn’t stop pushing Dani toward Mace unless she knew why Dani couldn’t do it. “It hasn’t even been a year. I can’t fall for another guy and lose him.”
“God, I’m sorry. I thought it was just … like I said. Bad break-up.”
“I don’t tell people. It’s easier for me. People don’t get weird around me.”
“I won’t. I swear. And I’m sorry for giving you a hard time about Mace. I had no idea.”
“I know. I just … He scares me. He’s been too nice to me. He seems too good to be true, and that’s exactly what I thought about Aaron.”
“Did you love him?”
Dani nodded. “He was Navy, too, like Mace, but Aaron’s job wasn’t anywhere near as dangerous as Mace’s, and Aaron was killed anyway, so … You have to understand that.”
“I do. I’ll get rid of him. Is that what you want?”
“Yes.” Dani forced out the word, but didn’t sound convincing even to herself. She bit her lip and glanced over Jill’s shoulder to Mace.
He wasn’t missing any of this conversation. He might not know exactly what they were saying, but he could see it was intense and Dani was upset. He looked ready to come charging to her rescue any second. She forced her gaze away from him and back to Jill.
“I’ll take care of it.” Jill shot Dani a reassuring look, then walked over to the bar, every bit of flirtatiousness gone. She was all business and determination.
Dani couldn’t hear what Jill said, but Mace didn’t like it.
“What happened? What’s wrong with her?” he said loudly enough for the whole bar to hear.
Dani groaned and closed her eyes.
“No,” she heard Mace say. “I’m not leaving. She can tell me herself, if that’s what she wants, and I’ll do it. But that’s the only way.”
No great surprise there.
When Dani opened her eyes, Jill was still arguing. Mace, jaw clenched, was staring at Dani, paying no attention to Jill. At least Nico wasn’t behind the bar at the moment, listening to this argument, too. But that wouldn’t last long.
Dani hurried over. “Thanks for trying. I’ll take it from here.”
“You sure?” Jill asked.
“Yes.”
Jill hadn’t taken the first step away when Mace demanded that Dani tell him what was wrong.
“You,” she said. “You’re here. Again. Night after night. Have you developed a drinking problem?”
“With a two-beer limit? I don’t think so. What happened to upset you?”
“You. You being here all the time, when I don’t know what you want, upsets me.”
“I just want to know that you’re okay.”
“Mace, I’ve lived twenty-four years without you around to watch out for me, mostly with nobody doing that. Until Aaron came along, I was pretty good at it. I don’t need a keeper.”
“Everybody should have someone looking out for her. Or him. Everybody. You shouldn’t have to always do that for yourself.”
“God, do you live in the real world? Most of the people I know don’t have anybody but themselves.”
“I worry about you.”
“Well, you should probably talk to somebody about that. Not me. A therapist.”
“Yeah, I probably should.”
Was he joking? Dani couldn’t tell.
She caught a flash of something in his expression. Sadness? Something deeper? A bleakness? She didn’t like thinking about him feeling that way.
Whatever it was, it passed quickly. He didn’t like her seeing it. So, he had secrets of his own.
“You’re really okay?” he asked.
She nodded, but maybe she wasn’t convincing. He shot her an exasperated look.
“It’s not that easy to lie to me,” he said. “What happened?”
“Nothing. Jill wants to know if you’ve taken a vow of celibacy.” She blurted out, no filter at all, in her desperation to change the subject.
Behind the bar, Joey was hanging around close enough to hear, and he snorted.
Mace gave him the death-stare. Joey threw up his hands in surrender and walked all the way to the end of the bar.
“I’m not celibate,” he said slowly and softly, with a wickedly sexy grin on his face.
“Just pickier than most guys?” Dani couldn’t help it. If he wanted to keep barging into her life, she’d barge into his. “We’ve watched you turn down a lot of girls.”
“What’s wrong with being picky?” He doubled down on the sexy and added a hint of smugness that made her want to smack him.
/> “Nothing.”
Men should not be as pretty as he was, and no man who looked that good should also be charming or smug. Although the smugness did help her stay annoyed with him.
“Look, we can stay right here and keep talking about my sex life if you really want to. Although, sadly, there’s not much to talk about. I’ve been deployed for the last three months.”
Why he hadn’t taken care of that little problem by now? He’d been back from overseas for at least a week. Most guys would get right on that within hours of landing on American soil.
If what he’d said was true, his patience baffled her.
Patience or pickiness. He’d turned down blondes, brunettes, and Dani was pretty sure a redhead had been in there, too. Tall, short, skinny, curvy, white, Hispanic, black, Asian. From young to women who had to be at least ten years older than he was.
“What kind of girl could you possibly want who hasn’t been here offering herself to you this week?”
“I like women with purple hair who love to dress in leather and want me to tie them up with red plaid Christmas ribbon. That’s what does it for me.” He kept a straight face.
Dani’s mouth fell open. “Really?”
“Jesus, are you kidding? Christmas ribbon? What kind of sorry-ass bondage is that? Anybody could get out of Christmas ribbon. I don’t have a type, and I certainly don’t have a checklist.” He paused abruptly, then looked away.
“Okay, something is on the checklist.” She caught him glancing at her chest and looking uncomfortable. “Breasts? A checklist item can’t be that generic. All women have breasts.”
“I like women. Most all women. I don’t have a checklist, but I’ll tell you what I was thinking about just now if you tell me what happened that upset you.”
“Nothing is wrong. I come to work. I go to my house and go to sleep. That’s mostly it. I’m boring. Nothing happened.”
He reached out and lifted her hand while bending her arm at her elbow. The fingertips of his other hand brushed softly against the short sleeves of her little cotton top. She shivered at his touch, until his eyes went dark and very pissed off.
Dammit. She still had fingerprint bruises on the inside of her upper arm. Randy had grabbed her a couple of days ago when she’d tried to slip by him in the hall.
“Tell me again that nothing happened.” His voice was scary quiet.
She tugged her hand out of his grip. “It’s no big deal. Randy gets off on thinking he’s big enough and strong enough to scare women, likes to think he’s in charge. Believe me, it’s not that unusual a trait in guys.”
Mace looked furious.
“Stop it. He grabbed me for a second, and then he let me go. I deal with crap like that all the time here. Guys get drunk, and they get grabby.”
“We have to get you out of that apartment and away from this job.”
“We don’t have to do anything. You have to calm down.”
“I’m calm. I’m just pissed as hell. You can’t keep living like this.”
“Tons of women live just like this. Or with worse.”
“You don’t have to. Not anymore.”
“What does that mean? You’re going to fix everything for me? Don’t do me any favors. I ended up here because I let myself believe for a while that a guy was going to change my life, that he was going to make everything better. I won’t make that mistake again.”
“Dani, I wouldn’t let you down. I wouldn’t let myself. Not again.”
“Look, I’m sorry you feel guilty that you survived and Aaron didn’t. But you’re taking this way too far. Seriously, I think you need to talk to someone. I’m not your responsibility. I’m not anyone’s but my own. That’s how I can feel safe, if I’m strong and handling things on my own.”
“Jesus, you’re the most frustrating woman I’ve ever met.”
“Maybe it’s payback for all the women you frustrate every day. Go home. Do whatever you do to cool off and calm down.”
“Knowing he’s there in that house with you every night?”
“Not this weekend. He and Karen went to a music festival in Florida, won’t be back until Monday night, so we should both sleep better, right?”
“I don’t know how you can joke about this. It’s not safe.”
“Life isn’t safe. But I refilled my pepper-spray keychain, and I sleep with it under my pillow.”
“And you think you’ll always have time to grab it before he grabs you?”
“I got you, didn’t I, big, bad Navy SEAL?” She couldn’t hide the bit of delight she took in that at the moment.
He did not think that was funny.
Not at all.
“Sorry,” Dani said. “To be honest, I hate that I did that to you. It looked like it hurt so bad.”
“Not as bad as what Randy might do to you.”
“Not before Monday night. Now, it’s really time for you to go. I have work to do, and when I’m done, Nico will walk me to my car. When I get to my apartment, Leah will be there and Randy won’t be. So, if there’s nothing else … ”
He slapped some money on the bar and walked out, shaking his head and mumbling curses under his breath.
Jill rushed to Dani’s side. “Did you really ask him if he was celibate?”
“Yes. He says he’s not. Just picky. So picky he didn’t get any the three months he was deployed and none since he’s been back.”
“Holy shit,” Jill said. “Nobody’s that picky.”
“Apparently he is.”
* * *
Chapter Ten
Mace
He saw red as he left, wondering how the hell she could stay in that apartment and how badly he could bungle things with one woman.
She looked like she’d be happy to never see him again. But he had to see her again. He hadn’t told her about Harold Hopewell and his will, but if he tried now, she’d say she was never Aaron’s wife, so the money wasn’t rightly hers.
Mace had a friend trying to find a hacker who could figure out whether Lieutenant Carson had some kind of cloud storage account. If he’d backed up his phone and tablet automatically, all the photos he and Dani had taken in Greece should be there.
The photos could lead Mace to the island where Dani and Aaron got married — kind of got married. All Mace needed was a photo with something recognizable, a landmark, a name, that would lead him to the right place. There he hoped to find something to prove to Dani that Aaron wasn’t the lying jerk she now thought he was.
Mace had also called in a favor in the GSG 9, Germany’s anti-terrorism agency. The head agent in charge of investigating the train bombing had interviewed Mace in the hospital in Germany and later in the U.S. The agent had promised to give Mace a hand if he ever needed one.
Aaron must have had his phone and iPad with him on the train. He’d been returning from Greece with Dani, where he’d had them, and the GSG 9 probably still had them. They would have wanted to know everything about him and all the victims, to make sure they had no connection to the shooter, that it truly had been a random event.
The guy had turned out to be a German citizen with no ties to terrorists. He’d cracked after his wife left him and took their two children. His family had been on the train, although not in the car where the shooter began his attack.
Mace figured the GSG 9 also had any documents Aaron was carrying on the train. Maybe even a fake marriage certificate. If not, then something that would put Mace on the right trail to easing her broken heart. Then he could tell her about the money and convince her to take it.
She wouldn’t have to work at that bar, dealing with drunken customers and getting off work at two in the morning. Hell, she wouldn’t have to work at all, unless she wanted to.
She could rent a new apartment, buy a condo, buy a house, whatever she wanted. No more of that asshole Randy grabbing her and leaving bruises on her, doing things that made Mace crazy to think about.
Her life would stop being the scary mess it was now, and then m
aybe he wouldn’t feel so guilty about the man she loved dying on Mace’s watch on the train.
Maybe.
Guilt was a powerful thing. He’d been known to sip a little bit of that poison every day for far too long.
None of his friends had found the right hacker yet to follow the electronic trail, and the guy at the GSG 9 had said only, “Let me see what I can do.”
It was all taking too damned long. Mace felt like he was about to explode.
If only he could get her into a safer place to live. Mace could pay for it. He was a multimillionaire, thanks to Harold Hopewell, although it was hard to remember that and even harder to believe he should be one. His money was parked in an investment account that one of Harold’s money guy’s managed. Mae hadn’t touched it. It freaked him out.
He hadn’t saved the old man’s life on the train. He’d told Harold what to do, and Harold had done it. If anything, Harold had helped. He’d used Mace’s phone to call for help and relayed messages from Mace to the authorities. Harold had held pressure on Mace’s bleeding shoulder while Mace was trying to staunch the wounds on Aaron’s torso.
But the kid bled out anyway.
And Mace hadn’t done what he and Harold had promised each other they’d do, not until now. She’d spent ten months alone and lost, her life falling apart. Mace had let that happen.
The old man should be pissed at Mace, not leaving him huge sums of money.
He kept seeing the bruises on Dani’s arm and knew he had to do something right now.
Sometimes people looked at problems and made solving them overly complicated, he knew. He wanted to help Dani in a lot of ways, but the urgent thing was to get her out of her that house.
What was the simplest way to do that?
Find her a new one.
Yeah, he’d do that and worry later about getting her to accept it. He had the money, even from his own savings. He was gone so much with the SEAL teams that he’d never had the time to spend much.
He knew where he wanted her, too. In his condo complex, so he could keep an eye on her. He liked helping people. Why wouldn’t a guy help someone else when he could? The world would be a much nicer place if everyone did that.