I helped him, tugging at the zipper, slipping my fingers inside and running my fingernails against the underside of his rigid cock. He closed his eyes for a second, but then his eyes were on me again.
“You are so beautiful,” he said.
“You’re not so bad yourself.”
He smiled again. “I don’t think I’ve gotten such a nice compliment.”
“I doubt that. I’m sure some of your clients—”
He groaned. “You’re not going to let that go, are you? Tell you one thing…”
I tugged at his pants, pulling them free and watching them slide slowly over his hips. Then I slid my hands under his boxer briefs, smiling when he groaned again.
“I want you,” I said softly.
He pushed me back against the mattress. “Say it again,” he said, as he climbed onto the bed, kneeling over me. “I want to hear you say it again.”
I reached up and touched his cheek. “I want you.”
He kissed me deeply, a kiss that was more than just a touch. It was one of those kisses that touched you in places that can’t be reached any other way. I wrapped my legs around him and pulled him down to me, kneading my fingers into his muscles. He slid inside of me carefully, gently. And then he began to rock his hips. It was slow and gentle, less physical than it’d been before. This was the man who took my virginity, the love of my life who was so gentle, so caring. It was an experience so different from those of my friends that it made everything that came after pale in comparison. Not that much came after.
My heart just wasn’t in it. Donovan was…he was just Donovan.
***
That dream that I’d had the night before that left me feeling uneasy was back. It was a jumble of images, things I couldn’t grab even if I’d wanted to. And the truth was, I really didn’t want to. There was something that frightened me beyond words. I couldn’t begin to describe it.
It began at a diner in downtown Santa Monica that I frequented. I was sitting on the patio, as I often did, and someone joined me. I couldn’t see this person’s face, but I had a sudden sense that this person meant me harm. And then it shifted. I was inside a car and I needed to get out for reasons I didn’t know, but I couldn’t find a way out. The windows wouldn’t break and the doors wouldn’t open.
The dream shifted again. I was in the bank, laughing at something a customer had said. But then this overwhelming sense of dread washed over me and I began to scream with a terror that I could feel clear down to my bones.
“Kate! Wake up, Kate!”
I heard his voice, but I couldn’t make my eyes open. The panic was just overwhelming, making me feel as though I was drowning. I’d never had such a nightmare before. I had bad dreams, dreams about Joshua, but never anything like this.
“Kate!”
And then I was just conscious. I sat up, gasping for air. Donovan was behind me, his lips next to my ear.
“You’re okay, baby.”
I turned and threw my arms around him, burying my face against his shoulder. Feeling his arms around me dispelled some of the dread and the panic, but not all of it. It seemed to settle around my heart with big, long, cold fingers.
“You’re okay,” Donovan just kept whispering over and over again until I slowly began to believe him.
Chapter 22
Donovan
“I’m the one who’s supposed to have the bad dreams,” I said, setting a cup of steaming coffee in front of Kate.
“Must be the crazy bomber who’s after me.”
“Maybe.”
I sat in a chair across from her, afraid if I was too close to her I would be too tempted to touch her. She looked up, a little smile telling me she understood.
“Tell me what you remember about that night.”
She shook her head. “I told you already.”
“No. You left something out.”
“Donovan—”
“You forget, I’m the one with the stellar lying ability. Not you.”
That small smile widened. “I remember you had the entire senior class convinced that you were related to Brad Pitt.”
I chuckled. “Yeah. Best three weeks of my life.”
She studied my face, then her eyes slowly fell to her cup of coffee.
“Tell me, Katie.”
She moved her hands restlessly for a moment. Then she sighed.
“I went back to the front door of the bank. I convinced Joe to come out and check the parking lot for me.” She shook her head. “If I’d just gone inside and called the police—”
“It’s not your fault, Kate.”
“Isn’t it? He wanted to stay inside. He wanted to call the cops. And now he’s dead and I’m—”
“On the run.”
She ran her hands over the outside of the coffee cup as if she was trying to warm them. And then she pushed back from the table, slamming her hand on the tabletop as she stood.
“Why can’t I remember? I must have seen his face! I must know who it is. But I can’t wrap my head around it…I just can’t—”
“It’s okay.”
I went to her and enveloped her in a bear hug. We stood like that for a long time. Then she pulled away and marched out of the room.
“Where are you going?”
“I need to be alone for a little while.”
I stood there and watched her disappear into the master suite, her spine straight, her shoulders square, but her head down.
I wished I knew what to do to take this away from her. But what could I do?
***
She went for a lot of walks in the woods behind the house for the first couple of days. I watched from the back deck, confident in the fact that this property was surrounded by several miles of electric fence so she was safe. Physically, anyway. But she was trying so hard to remember what happened that night that it was beginning to drive her a little crazy. And she wouldn’t talk to me about it, which was driving me a little crazy.
I grilled a few steaks on the barbecue while she walked. A bottle of wine and a nice salad to go along. I thought that maybe a nice meal might help her relax.
“Should we be drinking?” she asked when she joined me.
“Can’t imagine why not.”
She nodded, lifting the glass to her lips and taking the world’s smallest sip. But then her eyes widened and she took a much deeper swallow.
“That’s good.”
“Ash has many talents. I guess his dad taught him about wines when he was in his teens.”
“Kind of young, isn’t it?”
“Apparently the super wealthy live under a different set of rules than the rest of us mortals.”
A ghost of a smile appeared on her lips. She took another sip, closing her eyes and sighing as she did.
“How’d you meet him?” she asked. “I mean, obviously you met in the military. But what were the circumstances?”
“He was my warrant officer.”
“Warrant officer?”
“He was like the team leader’s second-in-command.”
She nodded, watching me with naked curiosity in her eyes.
“It was my second tour of duty and I was assigned to Ash’s team. We spent eighteen months together, him and me and the rest of our team. Did things…” I hesitated, but she didn’t seem to notice. “When I re-upped for another tour, I was assigned to the same team.”
“How many times did you go over there?”
“Four.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Why?”
I looked down at my glass of wine and swirled the bloody red liquid around the clear crystal bowl. I’d asked myself the same question a few times. But I never really came up with a satisfactory answer.
“I guess I didn’t have a reason not to.”
She didn’t say anything. I didn’t really think she would.
I got up to check the meat, turning it over to keep it from burning.
“What about the others. How do you know them?”
“I did
n’t. Not until Ash called and said he was starting a security firm.”
“Really?”
“I’d heard of Kirkland. He was a Green Beret with another team. But, as you’ve seen, he tends to be memorable. People were talking about him over there, over here, talking about his charm and his recklessness. And, I guess, Ash reached out to him because of that.”
“What about Joss?”
“Ash knew her in boot camp.”
“Was she a Green Beret?”
I glanced at her. “Unfortunately, Uncle Sam doesn’t allow women to be Green Berets. But she would have made one hell of a team member.”
A cloud of jealousy floated across her eyes. Did she think my admiration of Joss meant something more than it did? Did she really care enough to be jealous?
She turned slightly and took another long drink from her glass. I picked up the bottle and carried it over to her, pouring her another healthy slug.
Drunk might not be such a bad thing for her tonight.
“Do you remember the summer the three of us spent at that summer camp in San Francisco?” she asked a couple of minutes later.
“I do.”
“Do you remember the sunburn I got that day on the beach? I was so arrogant; I thought I knew what I was doing when I went out there without sunscreen because I live on the beach in Santa Monica. And that counselor kept telling me it was different down there, that the overcast was sometimes worse than a bright, sunny day?”
“You spent the first night in the infirmary with tea packs on your back.”
“And you snuck in and sat with me until the pain pills the nurse gave me kicked in.”
“I stayed the whole night. I didn’t leave until I heard the nurse coming in the next morning.”
“Really?”
I nodded as I turned to lift the steaks off the grill. “I knew if I got caught, we’d both be on the first bus back home. So I climbed out the window, but my shoe got caught on the sill. I thought for sure we were screwed.”
“How did you get out?”
“Shoe popped loose at the last second.”
“Lucky.”
“Always was back then.”
I set a plate in front of her and took a seat across from her, cutting into my steak to make sure I hadn’t overdone it.
“I think that’s when I started to think of you as more than just my brother’s bad-boy friend.”
I looked up. “That was eighth grade.”
“It was.”
She blushed a little as she turned her attention to her food.
We both ate a few bites before she finally looked up at me again.
“Did you ever tell Joshua about us?” she asked.
I studied her face, wondering if she really wanted to know. Then I leaned back, setting my utensils down on the edge of the plate.
“I started to a couple of times, but it seemed like something always interrupted.”
“I did, too. But I would chicken out right before the words came out. I didn’t want him to look at you different, you know?”
I nodded. “I didn’t want him to feel differently about you.”
“Do you think he ever suspected?”
I thought about all the times we would steal kisses whenever Joshua left the room, how many times he came back sooner than we expected and found us sitting too close together. There’d been a lot of that the last few months of school. A lot of excuses and outright lies.
“He might have, but if he did, he never said anything to me.”
“Me either.” She pushed the greens around her plate as though she’d lost her appetite. “I regret not telling him.”
“Why?”
She shrugged. “I think he had a right to know.”
I picked up my fork and knife, slicing into the meat again.
Before graduation night, I couldn’t remember a time when Joshua wasn’t a part of my life. I knew, logically, that there were seven years before that were empty. Seven years when I was alone with my parents and the succession of nannies they hired, always seeking that one nanny that would manage to allow them to forget they’d sired offspring at all. I knew there’d been loneliness and boredom. But I couldn’t really remember it.
Joshua was outgoing and free spirited. He was the complete opposite of me those first few years. However, there was something about being in his presence that helped me become something more than the scared little boy who went out of his way to avoid his parents’ displeasure even though it was often impossible. I pissed my parents off by simply existing. Being Joshua’s friend showed me that it wasn’t my fault, that I didn’t have to define myself by my parents’ narcissism.
She was right. He had the right to know.
“Do you regret it?” I asked. “What happened between us in high school?”
Her fork stilled on the plate. “I thought I did,” she said softly. “For a long time, I was so angry at you that I thought I did. But now…I’m not sure I do.”
“For what it’s worth, I don’t.”
She looked at me, her eyes shimmering with tears.
“It’s worth a lot.”
We stared at each other for a long moment, and I got lost in those eyes, in her eyes. I remembered that she once asked me why it was that I liked to look at her so much. I told her it was because she was beautiful. But it was more than that. Looking at her made me feel like I’d found the home I’d been searching for almost since birth. Looking at her made me feel safe. The expression in her eyes when she looked at me, when she stared at me with this sort of adoration, finished whatever it was Joshua’s friendship began. She was my future, and as long as she was by my side I knew it was a good future.
For the first time since then, I felt that way again.
Chapter 23
Kate
I couldn’t stand the way he was looking at me. I didn’t deserve the naked affection I saw in his eyes. I didn’t deserve to be loved that way.
I dropped my utensils and stood, grabbing my wine glass as I made my way inside the house.
“Kate,” he called, as I disappeared from sight.
I didn’t know where I was going. There was nowhere to go. I paced in front of the massive fireplace, my thoughts so wild and unorganized that I found myself wondering why someone would need a fireplace so large. What do you burn in something like that? You could probably fit a dozen people and an entire tree trunk. What do you need with that?
“Kate,” he said again, coming into the room but staying back, not even trying to touch me. If he had, I would have lost it. I would have become a blubbering fool.
“Why are you here with me? Why are you putting yourself at risk for me?”
“It’s my job.”
I glared at him because I could hear the laughter in his voice. I drank the last of the wine in my glass—and, oh, my God! It was so good!—and thought about tossing the glass at the stone of the fireplace. But it didn’t belong to me, and I couldn’t intentionally bring myself to break something that looked so expensive, especially when it wasn’t mine. So I set it down, carefully, on the mantelpiece.
“You shouldn’t be here. After the things I said…such awful things!”
“You’ve never said anything that bad.”
I shot another glance at him, only growing more agitated when I saw the twinkle dancing in those clear sea blue eyes.
“You know what I’m talking about. I told you to disappear.”
“You were hurting.”
“We were both hurting.” I shook my head, the memory of the scar on his back haunting me. “You went to war, and you could have been killed!”
“A little dramatic, don’t you think?”
I spun around, gesturing at my own back. “I’m not blind. I’ve seen the scar.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, looking so formidable that it was almost hard to believe someone so strong could be wounded. And that wall that he wore when I touched a sore spot, when I asked a question he wasn’t ready to an
swer, came over his eyes.
“You were wounded.”
“Lots of soldiers were wounded over there.”
“But if you had died, I never would have known. No one would have come knocking on my door.”
“Would you have wanted them to?”
I groaned, that question wounding me more than anything else he could have asked me in that moment. I turned, again not sure where I was headed. I couldn’t even see where I was going for the tears that were blinding me. He caught me before I’d gone very far, grabbing my upper arm and yanking me around at the same time he pushed me backward, and shoved me up against the wall.
“Tell me what this is about.”
I tried to turn my head, but he grabbed my jaw and forced me to look at him.
“Tell me,” he said, almost begging.
“You left me when I needed you most.”
I saw the pain burst open; I saw the rawness of his heart right there in the middle of some stranger’s house. And it hurt so badly that I needed to get it out. I hit him, not because I wanted to hurt him but because I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t hold it in any longer. I hit him over and over again, slamming my fists against his chest. And he let me, standing there with his arms down at his sides. I hit him until the strength went out of me and my knees buckled. He caught me, like he’d always caught me before that night, before Joshua…he caught me and carried me to the bedroom.
I think his intention was to just leave me on the mattress, but I wrapped my fist in his shirt.
“Please, don’t go.”
He stared at me for a long moment, searching my eyes. And then his lips were on mine, the weight of his body slowly settling on mine. Clothes were just an impediment. We tugged and pulled and ripped, needing to be close, needing to be one together.
It wasn’t until he was inside of me, until we were as close as we could ever be, that the pain in my chest began to dissolve. I wrapped myself around him, refusing to close my eyes, refusing to lose any connection with him. And he was there with me the whole way, his eyes glued to mine even when they filled with tears, even when he collapsed on top of me and cried like a child. I held him, cradled him against me, determined to never let go.
VINCENT (Dragon Security Book 2) Page 29