by Vicki Hinze
His fingertips trembled. “Why couldn’t you contact me?”
Because I was unconscious in the hospital. Because for six months and twenty-seven days I had to go to physical therapy to regain the use of my left arm. Because I learned firsthand the true meaning of man’s inhumanity to man, and I didn’t want to see or talk to anyone—least of all, a man.
Her hand shook. Hard. She pulled it back and hid them both under the table, out of sight. Fighting a tremor in her voice, she managed to get out the truth. “It was impossible for me to contact anyone.”
He stilled, his eyes alert and searching. “Why?”
She squeezed her fists until her nails bit into her palms. Vintage male. Why did he have to push? Why couldn’t he just accept what she had given him?
Resentment gushed up from that secret place where she kept strong emotions buried. She knew the costs of letting them loose. Dissatisfaction, depression, despair. Migraines and muscle spasms. Pain. A price too high to pay. “Isn’t knowing I couldn’t contact you enough?”
Considering it, Seth took two bites of his lasagna and then changed the topic, asking a question of his own. “How does Karl feel about your coming here?”
Definitely suspicious about Karl. “Fine.” Another lie. God help her, she was burying herself in half-truths and lies. “Why do you ask?”
A waiter refilled their glasses. In the silence, the fire hissed and crackled and spat out sparks, as if it too knew she’d been dishonest and protested.
“Because you’ve changed your name.”
How much did Seth know? How much did he suspect? Julia’s throat went dry. Maybe the OSI or Intel hadn’t told him the whole sordid story. Or maybe they had and Seth wanted her to admit it. That, she refused to do. She had been humiliated enough in this ordeal. “Yes, I changed my name.” She lifted her gaze to his, hoping he wouldn’t dare to push her on this.
Seth pushed. “Why?”
“It’s less cumbersome.”
He took a slow sip of wine, watching her over the rim of his glass. She was as outwardly reactive as an ace poker player. The woman had learned well. But she was hiding something; that was evident. And it was something significant or she wouldn’t feel so threatened by his questions. He recognized threatened when he saw it, and she was hanging on to the cliff’s edge by her fingernails, fearing the truth coming out, and fearing him.
He hated that. Hated anyone fearing him, but especially Julia.
This was a new experience between them. One he hoped to get rid of and never see again. “So why not Dr. Julia Hyde? Why Warner?”
She rolled her gaze. “It was a personal choice, Seth. Not a decision affecting the Second Coming.” She stiffened in her seat. “Look, working in the Zone with a name like Dr. Hyde isn’t going to encourage anyone to take me seriously. I’m heading an innovative and very-important-to-your-career project that’s vital to the country, and it’s careening toward crisis mode. I need serious authority and credibility.”
Fat chance. He knew her. And she never had given a tinker’s damn what anyone else thought. Respect for her work. Certainty that a project would help preserve peace and prevent war. That’s what mattered to Julia. Yet, maybe she had thought she would gain more respect as Dr. Warner than Dr. Hyde. Not impossible—especially with her working in the Zone. But he wasn’t sucker enough to believe that was the whole truth. “Remnants of Jekyll and Hyde?”
She blinked hard, then let out a stumbling, “Yes.”
A lie. But he’d let her have it. Whatever was going on with her and her husband would surface soon enough. Yet there was something he couldn’t let slide until she chose to enlighten him. A matter on which he couldn’t accept half-truths or scapegoat answers.
He sighed, dropped his napkin to his plate, and then pulled an envelope out of his jacket’s inner pocket. “You haven’t wanted to explain much. I’m not trying to be an intrusive pig, just letting you know I’m not obtuse. While I respect your privacy, I’m going to have to insist you explain this.” He passed the envelope.
Julia stared at the gray envelope as if it had been contaminated with anthrax and touching it would be lethal. “What is it?”
“It’s a bill for your cell phone.” Seth hated her sounding afraid, but he had to force this issue. “It was forwarded to the office from your home in Grace.”
Julia squeezed her eyes shut. “I didn’t have the apartment address yet.” She took the envelope. “I’ll file a change of address with the company first thing in the morning.”
“That isn’t the problem.” Seth watched her closely. She sounded calm, but looked on the verge of hysterics.
“What is the problem?”
She knew exactly. She was stalling him, grasping for time to concoct a plausible answer. Knowing it put a sharp bite in his tone. “The problem is, this bill is in my name.”
Chapter Seven
Julia couldn’t hold Seth’s gaze.
She tried, but she just couldn’t do it. Now, she understood why the bill had been delivered to him at the office and why he had opened it.
God, when filing her forwarding address with the post office, why hadn’t she thought of that? Why?
“Well, Julia?” Seth riveted her with an uncompromising gaze.
She stared at a column beyond his left shoulder. “I need the phone for emergencies.”
“I don’t care why you have the phone. I want to know why it’s in my name.”
Tears she refused to cry blurred her vision. Damn it, why had he had to find out? In this whole, lousy, drawn-out mess, couldn’t she get even one break? Just one lousy break?
She finally managed to look at him. “Because I didn’t want anyone to be able to trace the number to me.”
Seth’s eyes narrowed, and his square jaw clenched. That response he clearly hadn’t expected, but uncompromising still seemed etched in his face. He would demand answers.
“Who are you hiding from?” A frown creased his brow. “How long have you been using my name? And how else are you using it?”
Because the last two questions were less complex than the first, Julia answered them. “Only for the cell phone. And I’ve been using it for about three years.”
“Since you left?”
“Actually, no. Several months later.” After she had gotten out of the hospital.
“Talk to me, Julia.” Seth lifted his glass. The fire’s flames reflected in it. “I want to understand.”
She risked making eye contact. “I needed the protection. I’ve never been late paying the bills. Never. And no one—except for Jeff—has the number. No one else ever has had it.”
She sounded desperate, near panic, and she felt worse. Even in the cool restaurant, her whole body felt clammy, and the spicy smells of the food had grown overpowering. She was barely holding down the bites she’d managed to swallow.
Seth stared at her, long and hard. “You should have asked first, Julia.”
His dark expression hadn’t lightened, but something gentle flickered in his eyes. An understanding of sorts, or maybe acceptance. Not forgiveness yet, but not the black-thunder kind of hell-raising she had been expecting and dreading since she had put the phone in his name. “I couldn’t ask.” She let him see the truth in her eyes, pleaded for understanding. “You would have insisted on knowing why, and I . . .” Her voice trailed off. Some things just couldn’t be explained.
“You what?” he asked. “You didn’t want to tell me? Couldn’t tell me?” He shoved his plate aside, clearly upset. “What you’re saying is, we’ve depended on each other in the lab for years but, outside it, you can’t trust me with the truth.”
Surprise streaked through her. “No. No, Seth. You’ve got it all wrong. You were already at risk. I couldn’t put you in more danger.” The words spilled out before she thought to stop them.
Seth went statue still. “Are you saying you left New Orleans to protect me?”
“Yes.” Oh, God. She hadn’t meant to say it. How could she have
blurted that out? How had she gotten into this tangle? Julia stiffened, determined to regain control of this situation. “No.”
“Well, excuse me, sugar, but that’s damn confusing.”
Icy rage blasted through her. “Do not call me ‘sugar.’ Ever. I hate it.”
Surprised by the vehemence in her voice as much as Seth, she squeezed her eyes shut, wishing a hole would magically appear beneath her chair and suck her down.
“I apologize.” Regret flitted across Seth’s face but anger still clipped his tone. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
“I know.” She nodded, embarrassed that she had come uncorked at such an innocent remark. “I shouldn’t have snapped. It’s just, well, that particular term”—even now she couldn’t make herself call it an endearment—“is a hot button for me.” She forced herself to look into his eyes. “I’m sorry, Seth.”
“It’s okay.” He set his glass aside. “But which is the truth? Yes, you left to protect me or, no, you didn’t?”
“Both are true.”
He silently stared.
She slumped in defeat. “I left to protect you, but mostly I left to protect me.”
“From whom?”
She pinched her lips together, gave him a negative nod. That question she couldn’t answer. Not without opening a Pandora’s box that had to stay sealed for both their sakes.
“Okay, then.” Seth rested his hands on the table. “When exactly did you realize you needed a cell phone for protection?”
She had to keep it together. She could do it. From the beginning, she figured one day she would get caught. True, as time passed and she hadn’t, the fear had subsided, but she had always known that the possibility still existed. “The day I left New Orleans.” Haunted by memories, she blinked hard and looked into Seth’s eyes. Her hell had started long before then, but on that day, hell and horror had merged forces and descended on her.
Just thinking of it had her leaping from being on edge to raw-nerved. Too raw to sit there another moment. “Can we go outside?” She crossed her chest with her arms, rubbed her left one hard to fight off muscle spasms and chills. “I—I need fresh air.”
It wasn’t Antonio’s. It was the subject matter that had her gasping. Stressed, chilled, and gasping. Sweet heaven, she was going to have to tell Seth the truth.
Well, at least part of it. She wasn’t brave or strong enough to relive it all again. Could anyone be brave or strong enough to look into a past like hers without shutters? Willingly gaze into eyes filled only with pity?
She couldn’t imagine it. Yet, from the set of Seth’s jaw, and judging by his persistence, it appeared he intended to force her to do exactly that.
God, give her strength.
Seth paid the bill then went outside to meet Julia.
She wasn’t in the nook just outside the door, or in Antonio’s garden. Bordered by tall-standing oaks and blossoming Christmas azaleas, the softly lit alcove’s white wicker rockers stood empty. Seth continued the search, but failed to find her. As a last resort, he checked the parking lot. She stood at the passenger’s door of his black Lexus.
Evidently, Dr. Warner had decided she didn’t want to talk after all. Seth hated putting her on the spot. Physically, Julia was a small woman. The top of her head hit him about mid-chest. But he tended to forget her diminutive size because the woman had presence. She walked into a room, and it came to life. She spoke, people listened. She wasn’t frail or retiring or shy—or pushy. She just was, and those around her sensed that what she was mattered.
She got attention with her presence. She kept it with a subtle mystique that lured and then stopped a man in his tracks, before he got too close. By silent command, no one breached her privacy.
Seth had never known her to play games, to lie, or to keep secrets. At least, not until now. But now she thought she was protecting him.
That changed all the rules.
His entire life, he had been the one doing the protecting. He hadn’t always succeeded, but he had always been assigned the duty. Yet never, not once in his thirty-seven years, had he been protected. In his Special Forces work, yes. As much as he protected his team, they protected him. But personally? Seth, the man? Never.
Not until Julia.
Something hard went soft in his chest. Hell of it was, he still had no idea why or from what or whom she had been protecting him.
Determined to find out, he walked toward the Lexus. Julia bounced her backside softly against the car door, rubbing at her left arm and staring up into the night sky, as if seeking divine intervention or the devil’s reprieve. From the look on her face, she would welcome either, so long as it bailed her out.
Seth’s footsteps sounded on the concrete. She swerved a startled gaze at him.
“It’s me, Julia.” He sounded like a damn fool, but the fear on her face was real.
She relaxed and stepped away from the car. “I thought it would be better if we talked at my place. It’s more private. Is that okay?”
Considering he had about given up on their talking at all, anywhere was fine with him. “Sure.”
They retrieved her car from the office, then drove south of the base to her apartment. Light from the outside lamps glinted off the two-story white stucco building and spilled onto the patch of grass between the parking slots and her front door. The place looked as inviting by night as it had in full sun. He had driven the realtor crazy, looking at seventeen apartments before finding the right one, but this was for Julia. It had to be special.
And it was. A huge kitchen and living room with a stone fireplace downstairs and two bedrooms upstairs, all decorated in soft pastels that suited her. Julia loved to cook, and the apartment’s gourmet kitchen had settled it. As soon as he’d seen it, he had known that this was the one.
Julia dropped her keys on the kitchen bar and her purse on the bar stool’s flowered seat pad. “Can I get you something to drink?”
Solemn. Serious. She dreaded what she was about to tell him. He couldn’t imagine why. They had always discussed anything and everything—except her marriage and his childhood. Both were topics she had never brought up, and both were facts Seth would rather forget. “Something cold would be good.”
She walked to the fridge. “Beer, cola, or juice?”
He’d had several glasses of wine. Any more alcohol, and he would have to restrict himself from driving. Julia bent to retrieve the cola from the fridge. Her skirt hiked and hugged her hips. The idea of being stuck here had merit, but she wouldn’t appreciate it. “Cola.”
She passed the can and a glass filled with ice, poured herself some water, and then motioned to the living area. “Let’s sit down. This is going to . . . take a while.”
The tension in her was impossible to miss. He wanted to put her at ease, but if he did, then he’d never learn anything. A comfortable Julia was a reserved Julia.
He sat on the far end of the sofa and stared into the empty fireplace grate. It looked dark and cold, and outside it began to rain. At first, just light drops tapped against the window. But then the rain grew heavy, like feeder bands in hurricane squalls, beating against the glass, and Julia just sat, as silent and wary as a guilty defendant standing in the courtroom, awaiting a judge’s verdict.
He’d hate her. Consider her a fool. A loser. There would be no more camaraderie, no more joint ventures, no more feeling connected. There would be no more respect.
She had to accept it, to expect it—now, before she saw it in Seth’s eyes and heard it in his voice. Before he couldn’t bear to look at her, or showed only disgust.
Thunder crackled. Julia shot a glance at the window, saw the raindrops splatter against the pane and then run down the glass in snaky rivulets. How in heaven would she ever get through this?
One demon at a time. One challenge at a time.
One breath at a time.
Sitting at the other end of the sofa, she smoothed down her skirt. Whatever happened, she would not cry. Regardless of how bad it
got, or how much it hurt, she would not cry. “First, I’m sorry I used your name without your permission. At the time, I didn’t know what else to do.”
She waited, but Seth didn’t say anything, so she went on. “Secondly, I want you to swear to me that you’ll never repeat to anyone what I’m about to tell you.”
He pursed his lips. “Will you believe me?”
The man had no idea what he was asking from her. No idea. “I’ll do my best.” She swallowed hard. “That’s all I can promise.”
“All right.” Seth set his glass down next to the can on the glass-topped coffee table. “I swear it.”
She closed her eyes, prayed for the right words, the right way to tell him this and not destroy herself in his eyes. “I didn’t plan to just up and leave my job, Seth. I told you. I had no choice about the way I left, and I didn’t.” She forced herself to look at him. “You asked why I didn’t contact you. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to, it was that I was incapable.”
“What do you mean, incapable?”
“The day I left, I went to Destin, Florida. I don’t want to discuss why, so please don’t ask. I got there and stopped to pick up a few groceries.” Immediate shopping. God, how she hated it now. “When I came out of the store, it was twilight. I’ve always loved twilight. Nothing is as it seems then, and you can imagine that your life is exactly the way you want it.” She let her gaze drift back to the rain-splotched window. “It was a perfect twilight. Balmy and warm, and the sea breeze felt so good. I let down the car windows, cranked up the radio, and hummed along with Jewel. And I imagined that my life was perfect.”
“Julia.”
“Be patient, Seth. This is . . . hard.” Hard? Hard didn’t begin to describe it. Admitting to yourself that your husband had beaten and nearly killed you, had attacked you repeatedly during your marriage, that was hard. Admitting it to someone else, someone special—whether you wanted them to be special or not—that was hell.