by Nora Roberts
“What way would that be, Malachi?” She fluttered her lashes at him, and the eyes behind them were cold steel.
“We’ll just see about all this.” He lurched to his feet and strode off into the kitchen after Jack. “I’m going to need a word with you.”
“Figured that. Just let me take care of this.”
Malachi frowned as he watched him work. He had no idea what the man was doing with the little tools and bits of equipment, but it was very clear Jack knew.
“Hand me the small Phillips head bit out of the kit there,” Jack asked.
“You screwing this into the wall?” Malachi handed over the bit, watched Jack fit it onto a mini cordless drill. “She won’t care for that.”
“Little sacrifices, big payoff. She’s already swallowed more than a couple of holes in the wall.” He fixed the phone jack in place, ran the line, then, taking what looked like a palm-sized computer out of his bag, ran a series of numbers through it.
“You can use this to contact your mother,” Jack said conversationally. “But I wouldn’t mention to the doc that the phone company’s getting stiffed on the long-distance calls. She’s a straight arrow. Your mother’s phones are clear. Or were when I was there and checked them out. I showed her what to look for, and she’ll be doing a check twice a day. She’s a sharp lady. I don’t think they’ll get past her.”
“You form impressions quickly.”
“Yeah. This is set. Reach out and touch someone,” he added and packed up his tools.
“Then why don’t we step into my office?” Malachi suggested, and grabbed a couple of beers out of the refrigerator.
From her seat on the sofa, Rebecca had a clear view of small dramas. She watched her two angry brothers split off into opposite directions, Gideon into the little room to the right, where Cleo had gone. The door slammed smartly behind him. And Malachi out the front door of the apartment with Jack. That door closed with ominous control.
“It seems everyone’s gone off to argue without us.” She stretched, yawned again. The flight had tired her out more than she’d realized. “Why don’t I help you tidy up this disaster we’ve made of your home. You can tell me what’s brewing with my brother and Cleo, and what’s brewing with my other brother and you.”
Tia looked blankly around the room. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“Pick your spot,” Rebecca told her. “I’m good at catching up.”
“WHAT DO YOU mean you’ll go?” Gideon demanded.
“Makes sense.” Cleo stuffed clothes into her bag. “We’re crowded here.”
“Not that crowded.”
“Enough that you’re sleeping on the goddamn roof.” She heaved the bag onto the daybed and turned. “Look, Slick, you don’t want me here, in your face. You’ve made that crystal. So splitting off makes it easier all around.”
“It’s that easy for you? The man says I’ve got room and you jump over to him?”
Her cheeks went ice-white. “Fuck you.”
She grabbed her bag again, and so did he. For ten bitter seconds they waged a fierce tug-of-war. “I didn’t mean it that way.” He wrenched the bag free, heaved it aside. “What do you take me for?”
“I don’t know what I take you for.” Despite Malachi’s earlier advice, she’d had no intention of using tears on him and was furious that they were blurring her vision. “But I know what you take me for. A liar and a cheat, and a cheap one at that.”
“I don’t. Damn it all to bloody hell, Cleo, I’m angry with you. I’ve a right to be.”
“Fine. Be as pissed off as you want. I can’t stop you. But I don’t have to have it shoved down my throat every day. I screwed up. I’m sorry. End of story.”
She started to shove by him to retrieve her bag, but he caught her arms, tightening his grip when she tried to jerk away. “Don’t cry. I didn’t mean to make you cry.”
“Let go.” Tears were spurting out faster than she could blink them back. “I don’t blubber to get my way.”
“Don’t cry,” he said again, and his grip gentled to a caress. “Don’t go.” He drew her in, rocked her in his arms. “I don’t want you to go. I don’t know what I want altogether, but I know I don’t want you to go.”
“This isn’t ever going to go anywhere.”
“Stay.” He rubbed his cheek against hers, transferring tears. “And let’s see.”
She sighed, let her head rest on his shoulder. She’d missed this. God, she’d missed just this simple connection so much it ached in the bones. “You can’t go soft on a woman just because she drips on you, Slick. Just makes a sap out of you.”
“Let me worry about that. Here now. Here.”
He skimmed his lips over her damp cheek, found her mouth and sank in, soft and slow.
The tenderness of it had her muscles trembling and her belly doing one long, lazy roll. Even when he deepened the kiss it was all warmth, without any of those edgy flashes of heat she expected, she understood.
For one of the first times in her life she stood poised on absolute surrender, with a man in total control of her. Heart, body, mind.
It terrified her. And it filled her.
“Don’t be nice to me.” She pressed her face into his shoulder as she struggled for balance. “I’ll just screw it up.”
Not as tough as she pretended, Gideon thought. And not nearly as sure of herself. “Let me worry about that as well. You’ve only one thing to do at the moment,” he added, and tipped her face back to his.
“What?”
He smiled at her. “Unpack.”
She sniffled, and hoped to get a little of her own back. “Is that how you get what you want? By being nice?”
“Now and then. Cleo.” He cupped her face in his hands, watched the wariness come back into those deep, dark eyes. He didn’t mind it. If she was wary of him, she was thinking of him. “You’re so beautiful. Seriously beautiful. It can be a bit disconcerting. Unpack,” he said again. “I’ll tell Burdett you’ll be staying here. With me,” he added. “You’re with me, Cleo. That’s something we’ll both have to deal with.”
ON THE ROOF, Jack took stock. One way in and out, he considered. That made this area either a trap or a solid defense. It might be wise to set up a few measures here.
If a man didn’t anticipate a war, he always lost the battle.
“Hell of a view,” he commented.
“Got a smoke?”
“No, sorry. Never picked up the habit.”
“I quit.” Malachi rolled his shoulders. “Some time ago. I’m regretting that right about now. Well then, let’s have first things first.”
“That would be Rebecca.”
Malachi acknowledged this with a nod. “So it would. She shouldn’t be here in the first place, but since she is, she can’t be staying with you.”
“Shouldn’t. Can’t.” Jack turned his back on the view and leaned on the safety wall. “If you’ve used those words with her very often, I bet you’ve gotten some interesting scars.”
“True enough. She’s a perverse creature, our Becca.”
“And she’s smart. I like her brain. I like her face,” Jack added, eyes direct on Malachi’s. “I like the whole package. That’s a problem for you, her being your sister.” He took a pull from the bottle of Harp. “I’ve got one of my own, so I get that. Mine went off and married some guy despite the fact that, in my opinion, she had no business even knowing what sex meant. She’s got two kids now, but mostly, I like thinking she found them under a berry bush. Probably in the same patch where my mother found us.”
Amused, Malachi dipped a hand in his pocket. “You grow berries in that flat of yours?”
“Let’s put it this way. She’s taking the spare room. Her choice. It stays her choice, either way. I gave your mother my word I’d take care of her. I don’t break my word. Not to someone I respect anyway.”
Malachi was more than a little surprised to find himself relaxed. More yet to realize he believed Jack was as good as his wo
rd.
Maybe, just maybe, they’d forge that unit.
“I suppose this saves me from a bloody battle with Rebecca. But the fact remains, she’s an impulsive, head-strong girl who—”
“I’m in love with her.”
Malachi’s eyes widened, his thoughts scattered. “Jesus Christ, man, that’s fast work, isn’t it?”
“It only took one look, and she knows it. That gives her the advantage.” He paused. “She’d use an advantage when it comes to hand.”
“She would,” Malachi agreed, not without sympathy. “If need be.”
“What she doesn’t know, and what I haven’t figured out, is what I’m going to do about it. I’m not a fatalist. I think people drive the train.”
“So do I.” He thought of Felix Greenfield, of Henry Wyley, and a sunny afternoon in May. “But we don’t always choose the tracks.”
“Whatever the tracks, we’ve got our hand on the switch. If that wasn’t the way it worked, I’d believe that those statues, the circle they’ve made, have something to do with what happened to me when I looked at Rebecca. Since I don’t, I’ll just say I’m in love with your sister. So you can stop worrying that I’ll let anything or anyone hurt her. Including myself. That do it for you?”
“I’m just going to sit down here a minute.” He did so, drank contemplatively, then set the bottle on the little iron table by his chair. He bounced his palms off his knees while he studied Jack. “Our father’s gone, and I’m the oldest, so it falls to me to ask you . . .” He trailed off, dragged his hands through his hair. “You know, I’m just not ready for it. Let’s have part two of this particular discussion at some later date.”
Jack tipped back his beer again. “Works for me.”
“You’re a cool one, you are. Better for her that you are. So let’s move on to another area. The Fates.”
“You’ve been in charge.”
Malachi leaned back, cocked a brow. “This is a family affair for us, Jack.”
“Never said different, but you’re in charge. When push comes to shove, the others look to you for the answer. That goes for Tia, too. Probably Cleo, though she’s the wild card.”
“She’s had a rough go, but she’s steady enough. You have a problem with what you see as the pecking order here?”
“I might have, except I get the impression you know how to delegate, and how to let everyone play to their strengths. I know what mine are. I don’t mind taking orders, Sullivan, if I agree with them. And I won’t mind telling you to fuck off if I don’t. Bottom line, I owe you. Felix Greenfield,” he continued. “And I want the Fates. I’ll work with you so we all end up with what we want.
“Next on the bill,” he added. “It’s a little too loose for my liking to keep Cleo’s Fate in Tia’s refrigerator. My apartment’s got the best security money can buy. I want to keep it in my safe there, along with mine.”
Picking up his beer, Malachi passed the bottle from hand to hand as he thought it through. Trust, he thought. Without it, they’d never solidify. “I won’t argue with the practicality of that, but to say you’d then have two of three in your hands. What’s to stop you from going after the other on your own, or even negotiating with Anita? No offense.”
“None taken. Going after the other alone would be tricky, logistically. Not impossible, but tricky. Moreover, Rebecca wouldn’t like it one damn bit, and that matters. And finally, I don’t double-cross people I like. I especially like the doc.” His grin was fast and wolfish.
“As do I.”
“Yeah, that comes through clear. As for dealing with Anita, I don’t negotiate with sociopaths. And that’s just what she is. She gets the chance, she’d take any one of us out, cold blood, then go have her weekly manicure.”
Malachi settled back again, drank again. “Agreed. So, we won’t give her that opportunity. We’ve all got some pondering to do.”
“Why don’t we take twenty-four hours? Then we can give Tia a break and meet at my place tomorrow.”
“All right.” Malachi got to his feet, held out a hand. “Welcome aboard.”
“YOU AND MAL were involved in your private and manly discussion for some time.” Rebecca angled in the seat of the tanklike SUV Jack had driven uptown. “What was it about?”
“This. That. The other.”
“You can start with this, move along to that.”
“It comes to mind that if we’d wanted you in on the discussion, we’d have asked you up on the roof.”
“I’m as much a part of this as anyone.”
“Nobody says different.” He turned off Fifth, headed east to Lexington, watching his rearview mirror as a matter of course.
“And as such, I’ve a perfect right to know what the two of you had your heads together about. This is a team, Jack, not a group made up of roosters and hens.”
“It has nothing to do with the way you button your shirt, Irish, so cool the feminist jets.”
“That’s insulting.”
He headed south awhile, then jogged east again. No tail, he decided, and no surveillance on Tia’s building that he could spot. That could change, but for now, it was handy.
He let Rebecca stew while he wound his way back home. He circled the building, keyed in the code for the garage he’d had built to his personal specs. The reinforced steel door rose, and he guided the SUV inside.
He had his Boxster stored inside as well, along with his Harley and his surveillance van. A man, he thought, had to have some toys. Storing them in a public garage had never been an option for him, and not simply because the yearly rate would have outstretched the cost of sending a kid through Harvard Law, but because he wanted them close. And under his own system.
He climbed out, reset the locks and alarms on the door, on the SUV, then uncoded the elevator. “You coming up?” he asked Rebecca. “Or do you want to sulk in the garage?”
“I’m not sulking.” She sailed by him, crossed her arms over her chest. “But it would be a natural enough response to being treated like a child.”
“Treating you like a child’s the one thing I don’t have in mind. Okay, take a pick. You want the rundown of this, that, or the other?”
She tipped her head up, wishing she wasn’t amused. “I’ll take this.”
“This would be your brother expressing his concern that you’re staying here with me.”
“Well, it’s none of his flaming business, is it? And a nerve he has, too, when it’s plain he’s cozied himself up with Tia. And I hope you told him so.”
“No.” Jack pulled open the elevator door so she could stomp into the apartment. “I told him I was in love with you.”
She stopped dead, spun around. “What? What?”
“Which seemed to ease his mind more than it eases yours. I’ve got some things to do. Be back in a few hours.”
“Back?” As if to catch her balance, she threw her arms out. “You can’t just leave after you’ve said such a thing to me.”
“I didn’t say it to you. I said it to your brother. Stretch out, Irish. You look beat.” And with this, he closed the door, locked her in and left her stammering curses at him.
He didn’t go far. It was only one flight down to the base he kept in the building. He worked from there when it was convenient, or when he was simply restless in his apartment upstairs and wanted a distraction.
Right now he wanted both the convenience and the distraction.
It was a comfortable space. He’d never seen the purpose in spartan work areas when there was a choice. There were deep chairs, good lighting to make up for the lack of windows, the antique rugs he favored and a fully equipped kitchen.
He went there first, started coffee and, while it brewed, accessed the messages that had come through on his various lines. He booted up one of the computers ranged over a long L-shaped counter, called up his e-mail and listened to the electronic voice read it out while he fixed the first cup of coffee.
He answered what couldn’t wait, put aside what could,
then shifted to the personal messages. The e-mail from his father made him grin.
The aliens, having performed hideous medical experiments—of an embarrassingly sexual nature—on us, have returned your mother and me to Earth. You can hear all about it on Larry King. Now that I have your attention, maybe you could spare five minutes to get in touch. Your mother sends her love. I don’t. I like your sister better. Always did. Guess who.
With a laugh, Jack sat down at the keyboard. “Okay, okay.”
Sorry to hear about the alien experience. Typically, they insert tracking devices in their abductees. You may want to chew on tinfoil while having any personal conversations, as this is known to jam their frequencies. Just FYI. Recently back in NY. Am keeping gorgeous Irish redhead prisoner in my apartment. Possibility of exotic sexual favors from same may keep me busy for the next couple weeks. Love back to Mom. None to you. I’m not even sure you are my father. You guess who.
Knowing his father would crack himself up reading the post, Jack hit send. Then got down to work.
He ran a modified check on Cleo, enough in his estimation to placate Anita. On a separate computer he started a background check on her for himself.
He’d already come to the same conclusion as Tia, as Malachi. The six of them were going to have to work together as a single entity. He had no problem with team-work, but he wanted to know all there was to know about the team.
While the data scrolled, he rolled over to the monitors and, telling himself it was best all around if he kept an eye on Rebecca, engaged the cameras he had installed in his own apartment.
She was in his office, at his computer, and she looked steamed. Curious, he turned on audio.
“Bugger you, Jack, if you think I can’t get by your bloody passwords and blocks.”
“If you can, Irish,” he replied, “I’m going to be very impressed.”
He watched her awhile, noting the rapid streak of her fingers over the keyboard, the curl of her lip as she met another obstacle.
Most women, in his experience, when left to their own devices in a man’s space would poke in drawers, closets, examine the contents of the medicine cabinet or the kitchen cupboards. But she’d gone straight for the information highway.