Sucking in a deep breath to stop the shudder trying to inch into his voice, he couldn’t believe how out of his element he felt. This should be easy, but it wasn’t. He’d thought saying the horrible thing his dad had done would be easy. That making sure only the bad came out on Garrett Rogers would be a piece of cake. But it wasn’t. For some damn reason it wasn’t. He had to get this over with.
“Long story short—my dad is the person who tampered with the plane. Made sure it went down. Then he took his own life the next day.” Josh lowered himself into one of the soft, comfy chairs across from her.
Bracing his elbows on the tops of his knees, he rested his head facedown in his hands. He’d gotten it out. He waited for her to scream or yell or pound him with her fists. Instead, the room stayed as quiet as solitary confinement.
Raising his head to see if she was still there, he couldn’t believe the look of compassion on her face. A slight tremble at the corners of her mouth as she batted her eyelids. Tiny teardrops on her cheeks. Kneeling in front of him, she took his hands in her own.
“I’m sorry, Josh. Sorry you’ve carried this alone all these years.”
“Sorry? You’re sorry for me?” He jerked his hands away and stepped around her as he stood. He would not take pity. Hers or anybody else’s. “Don’t you understand? My dad killed your parents as sure as if he’d pulled the trigger.”
“I understand. But you’re not responsible for what he did.” Rocking back on her toes, she turned and slid into the chair he had left. “If that’s what you think, then you’re wrong. Dead wrong.”
“You sound like Drake. All these years, he’s tried to let me off the hook. Get me to let go of the past. But I won’t let you or anybody else change my mind.” He heard the growl in his voice. “Wrong or right, I feel the guilt my dad laid on my family. Don’t you see? I feel responsible for ruining your life.”
He opened the doors to the balcony and stepped outside, letting the heat pour through the open doorway into the penthouse. Wind-whipped moisture hit him in the face, and he turned aside. Rain? Stinging pellets of water pecked at his skin as thunder ricocheted through the clouds. Lightning sparked off to the right. Wouldn’t last long, but at least it would wash some of the suffocating heat away. She stepped up behind him, and he tensed. He shoved any thought of accepting her forgiveness into the pit of his anger.
“Look, it’s raining.” Macki’s hand lightly brushed across his shoulder, then she crossed to the rail and lifted her head. Closing her eyes, she opened her mouth and stretched her neck upward, her cheeks rounding into small apple globes as she smiled and brushed her palms across her face. “It’s finally raining.”
Was she crying, or was it the rain flowing down her face? He couldn’t tell. Either way, she kept smiling. What could there possibly be to smile about? He’d just spilled his guts. Thrown enough hell at her to crush a person. Yet, she was still smiling.
Just like the first time he’d ever seen her back in high school, staring up from the ground, on the sidelines, where she’d landed after he accidently knocked her down catching a football pass. She’d been smiling then, too. And when he’d grabbed her hand to pull her to her feet, he’d felt a connection to last a lifetime.
God, she was resilient. He’d never known how resilient until now. Drake had been right. Macki wasn’t devastated.
“There’s something I need to say.” She swept her hair back and tucked it, wet and shiny, behind her ears before turning to face him. “I want to thank you.”
Shaking his head, he stepped back from her, held his hands up in front of himself, palms facing outward. He might not be able to stop her words, but he could stop her touch.
“Hear me out. Sure, on a cop level I’ve still got a lot of questions, but on a personal level, I thank you.” Focusing on the lights of the city, she licked her lips, appearing to savor the taste of the rain. “You see, for years I’ve wondered what I did wrong to push you away. Even after my brain said it wasn’t my fault, part of me still wondered.” A tiny, husky giggle escaped her. “Turns out I didn’t do anything wrong. Thank you for giving me that peace.”
“That’s not why I told you.” He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. The woman who should be damning him to hell was thanking him. He lowered his hands because he had no defense. Was this another form of torture the gods had sent to cut him to the quick? “I don’t want your thanks…for anything. I don’t deserve—”
“I’m not finished.” She raised her own hands. “Ever since you and Drake told me about the real reason the plane crashed, I’ve been wracking my brain, trying to figure out who could have done such a thing. Knowing Coercion Ten had been behind it wasn’t enough for me. I needed a person to put with the crime.”
“So now you know it was my dad, and that makes you feel better?” Josh shook his head, spraying the rain from his face and hair. “That doesn’t make sense.”
“Don’t you see? That’s not the point. I’ve been going crazy trying to figure out if it was a friend of mine or of my parents. Maybe one of the staff here at the hotel. Someone on the police force. Or someone like Roxy who pretended to be my friend when they weren’t.”
She turned and sighed. “The past few days have been horrible. Then, in one statement, you put it all to rest. You gave me the answer I needed. Otherwise, I’d have kept searching for an answer. Maybe forever.”
He understood the unending search. For him, he would never be whole until he discovered the person behind CT. The one who somehow knew his dad needed every dime he could make to keep the two of them going. Someone who knew a big enough offer could turn even a good man bad. Yes, Josh understood the unending search, so for not putting her through such agonizing pursuits, he could feel some relief.
“Can’t you see that when all this happened we were too young to see the gray of things?” Josh asked. “Back then, there was only black and white, good and bad. I had to leave. You can’t possibly believe you would have reacted the same at that time as you have now.”
“Oh, I’m not saying that at all. In fact, if this had all come out back then, I don’t know what I would have done.” She shook her head. “I imagine I would have pushed you out the door. Screamed and yelled. No telling what names I would have called you. What I would have said.”
“You’d have said ‘like father like son,’ just the way you did the other night when you were trying to figure out who’d done it.” He almost wished she’d shout that in his face, but she wouldn’t. By her peaceful expression, he could see she wasn’t lying about how she felt.
She touched his arm. “That was anger talking. Anger and confusion. I’m sorry for everything I said the other night. I’d never want someone’s family to suffer. Never.”
The rain pummeled harder, and she once again lifted her face to greet the storm. “Nothing can bring back my parents. Nothing can change what your father did. But you and I aren’t the same Macki and Josh we were back then. We’ve grown in so many ways. Done a lot of things in our life that we’re proud of. Probably a few we aren’t so proud of, too.”
She swiped her palms down through her hair. “All I’m saying is you’re a man and I’m a woman who deserve to get past the past. For me, the closure came tonight. For you… Well, you have to find your own closure. I can’t find it for you. I only hope that someday you give up your personal battle.”
He wrapped his arm around her shoulders as they both got drenched in the escalating downpour. That much he could give her. That much he could give himself. Hope would have to lie in her corner, not his.
“Come on. We need to go inside.” He pointed at the approaching lightning. Back in the penthouse, they each grabbed a towel from the kitchen to dry off, only he focused on wiping her face instead of his own. “You should go change.”
“Not yet. How come Drake was the one to find your dad?”
“What?”
“The ambulance report said Captain Drake Lawrence found your dad.”
“There�
�s no such report.”
“Yes, there is. I just saw it.”
He flipped open her laptop. “Show me. Where did you see that? Nothing has ever been on the internet, or anyplace else for that matter. Nothing except the small obit Drake made me put in the paper.”
“I read that first. Seemed vague. Then I took a chance and tried to get into some password-protected police and EMT files. My password should have been deactivated three years ago when I quit the force, but it let me in.” She keyed in a duplicate search from before, then the password.
Denied popped on the screen. She entered the password again.
Denied.
He nudged her out of the chair and typed in code letters that should take him deep into the machine’s history. Nothing showed up. He clicked the specialized search key on his phone and held it against her laptop. No history showed for the past hour. Whatever had been there was gone.
CT had succeeded in getting the info to her. Had set him up. Had brought emotions into play. They were closing in for the kill—Drake, Macki, and himself.
Sparks of adrenaline shot through his blood. CT had started the mind game part of planting what they wanted you to focus on. Counting on the fact that you’d believe anything after enough proof. Distract you enough to make you miss a clue.
“Tell me what the form looked like.” On his cell, he connected his secure text to Drake, ready to key in all the information he could glean from whatever she told him.
“The file looked strange, for one thing. Not like any report I’d seen before.”
“What did it say?”
“It had your dad’s name. DOA. Said Captain Drake Lawrence found him and that he’d notify Garrett Rogers’ son.” She looked up again. “Did he? Is that how you first learned what happened?”
“Yes. Drake handled everything that day.”
“And you trust him?” Whipping her hand in front of her mouth, she blushed. “Where the hell did that come from?”
“Of course I trust him. Otherwise I wouldn’t be here.” He keyed more info into the protected OPAQUE line. “Drake will get a kick out of being doubted by his own niece.”
“Don’t tell him.”
“Too late. Besides, you reacted the same way an OPAQUE agent would react.”
The phone binged with a return message.
Josh felt a legit grin fill his face for the first time in a long, long while as he read the damn-it-to-hell reply from her uncle. “Ends up Drake’s not amused. But he said you might make a good agent one day.” He didn’t like the raised eyebrows or the sudden light in her eyes. “Don’t get any ideas, Macki. Now, what else did the form say?”
“Something about it being an accidental overdose, but that’s where it was strange. A different word that started with su had been smudged out and the accidental part written in.”
“No telling how long ago CT planted that info for you to find.”
“Why didn’t OPAQUE find it?”
“In all likelihood, it’s encrypted with your password as the trigger to open. OPAQUE would never have searched with that key because they didn’t have it.” He finished his message to Drake and ended the feed. “My best bet is that once you logged off the site, everything you saw automatically erased. Disappeared into thin air with no tracks left behind.” He smiled. “At least no tracks they think we can find.”
“Can you find it?”
“Tech experts at the office are probably already tapping their computer keys to find a trail. Question is how long it’ll take. Could be all night. Could be a week. Maybe longer.”
He wouldn’t tell her that sometimes it was only in hindsight that codes could be completely deciphered. For some reason, he doubted that would happen this time. Whoever had set this up locally had wanted her to find that information, but they’d give it time to simmer before they made their next move. Time was all OPAQUE needed. One more second of time, again and again and again.
“Well, I’m going to take a bath and crawl into bed. It’s been an exhausting day, and I can’t think about this anymore tonight.” She headed to her bedroom.
“Everything we talked about earlier, you need—”
“I’ve already said what I had to say.” She paused. “But I’ll repeat it one more time, so you understand once and for all. Then, never again.” She glanced back with determination. “Never. Got that?”
Amazed at the difference the day had made in her confident attitude, he nodded in agreement.
“You are not responsible for the past. I’ve already let it go on a personal level. I don’t think any less of you than I did this morning. And I don’t think any more of you for carrying the load all these years.” Stepping into her bedroom, she slowly grazed her palm down the side of the door. “You seem to be the only one hung up on your martyr-responsibility theory. That’s a shame. One hell of a shame.”
Watching the door, he noticed that once again she’d left it ajar. How could she have listened to what he had to say and still offer him the world? That didn’t make sense. He couldn’t have been wrong all these years, could he?
Hell, as much as Drake and the other men Josh trusted in OPAQUE had tried to convince him otherwise, he’d never faltered in the pride he took in carrying responsibility for the past. Like a badge of honor.
But had it been a badge? Or a shield? A shield he’d held in front of himself for years to keep from facing the gray in life and moving on. Damn. A thirty-minute conversation with Macki had not only put a mile-wide crack in his thinking, a world of weight had lifted off his shoulders. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. One thing for sure, she was right when she said this had been an exhausting day. A hell of an exhausting day.
A soft whisper of music floated through the open doorway to her room just like every other night, then the damn vanilla and jasmine enveloped his senses…just like every other night.
This time, the ache in his core grabbed with a vengeance. Tightened and twisted and threatened to take him to his knees. His need pulled him to live for the future, while only a tiny echo tugged him to the past.
His conscience shouted, Close the damn door. Walk over and close her bedroom door before it’s too late.
“Aw, hell.” He hurled his towel against the cabinet. It was already too late. He might never understand why he’d put himself through hell the past ten years. But he knew for damn certain that out on that balcony in the rain half an hour ago, the past had stopped dictating his life.
Breathing in the sweet scents coming from Macki’s bath, he palmed his jawline back and forth, then grinned. He needed a shave.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The oversize tub had taken forever to fill, but it was worth the time as Mackenzie watched the bubbles grow larger. She finally settled in the tub, positioning herself on the molded contours of the bottom until the foam tickled her chin. Resting her head back against the soft pillow inset, she sighed and let the warmth and scent of the bubbly water soothe her from a day she’d never forget.
For the first time in a long time she felt free, felt like she could breathe without any constraints. About time. Because she was ready to move forward and meet the rest of her life. The other thing she felt was alone—more alone than ever before. Tonight, she’d let all possibility of the past fly out the window when she released the young, carefree Josh and Macki of ten years ago.
Now they were a man and a woman—older, wiser, more experienced—who appeared to be worlds apart. Each with their own base to start the future. She smiled deep inside at the unknown filling that vacant view. Somewhere, sometime, there would be a man who filled her with a glow to last a lifetime. She could wait for him, knowing she was okay the way she was. One thing was for certain, she’d know him the moment she saw him. Someday.
Clink-bing. Clink-bing.
She jerked her head toward the French doors leading to her bathroom, zeroing in on the sound. Two crystal wineglasses clinked together upside down in the fingers of one strong hand. Another hand gripp
ed a bottle of wine. Her focus expanded and…
Lord help her, there he was. Agent. Joshua. Slater.
Not the boy she knew ten years ago or the agent she’d met on D Street a few days back, not even the man who’d held her in the rain on the balcony an hour ago. The guy filling her doorway was shirtless, tanned, and tempting. And the expression on his face made her blush to her toes.
She’d never had a man look at her like she was a luxury car with cockpit design, leather seats, and a 625-horsepower engine—bright, shiny, and waiting to be driven.
Damn it to hell and son of a gun, she wasn’t sure she was up to this.
Sleek and solid, his chest and biceps were sculpted in muscle, and something told her the view from the back would show the same for his shoulders. His jeans hugged low on his sides, with just enough view to make a woman’s mouth water. Just enough covered to make her dream.
Part of her wanted to squish completely beneath the bubbles to escape the heat in his dusky blue eyes. Part of her yelled, Hide, be shy, what do you know about satisfying a man like this? Another part yelled, Bring it on! What are you afraid of? She stilled and listened to the “bring it on” voice crackling in her core.
A grin quirked the side of his mouth as his bare feet expertly evaded the fluffy rugs and stepped across the cool granite, coming to a stop next to the tub. He was everything she’d wanted all these years— No, what she’d envisioned paled in comparison to what stood before her now. Because this Josh was hot—holy-as-hell hot.
“You feel you can just walk into my bath?” Her voice sounded sultry even to herself. Soft, sassy, and sultry. She needed to be careful. Not assume too much.
He raised his eyebrows. “Well, you haven’t told me to leave, so I figure we’re okay.” His gaze slid across her and the tub. “Awful lot of bubbles in that thing.”
“What can I say? I like bubbles.” Her fingers paddled to make more.
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