Pitch Black

by Leslie Parrish

  She had somehow managed a cordial tone as she handed him his gloves. “Don’t forget these. Thanks for letting me borrow them.”

  As he took the bunched leather, his fingers touched hers ever so lightly. She managed to maintain an impassive expression, despite the way her fingertips sizzled in reaction to that brief, innocent brush of skin on skin.

  “You’re welcome,” he said in a low growl, waiting for her to let go.

  She forced herself to. And then, with a simple good night, he was gone.

  The moment she closed the door behind him, Sam heaved a disappointed sigh. She stood there for a long moment, trying to go back three days in her mind, to before her world had turned so upside down. Wondering how things could feel so off-kilter in such a brief amount of time. She felt like a different person, as if the real Samantha Dalton was finally showing her face again after her long, self-imposed period of penance and isolation.

  Penance for being stupid enough to get involved with someone who she knew would inevitably hurt her. Isolation to try to prevent it from happening again.

  So why on earth was she getting hung up on a man who had been shot by a woman less than six months ago and now refused to talk about it?

  “You’re crazy,” she told herself. “And you’re lucky he left.”

  The words might have emerged from her mouth, but they didn’t sink into her mind or her heart. Because when a knock sounded on the front door a few seconds later, she yanked it open without a single hesitation, not knowing why he had come back, just glad of it.

  The first thing she noticed: Alec wasn’t frowning. In fact, if she had to name it, she’d call his expression rueful.

  “Is something wrong?”

  He stepped inside, closing the door against the cold. Looking down at his own hand, Alec made a small sound that could have been either groan or laugh-or both; then a smile widened the sexy mouth. “Uh, Sam?”

  “Yes?”

  He lifted the bundle of leather she’d given him a couple of minutes before, holding the glove by a finger. Glove. Singular. “Black hole of death strikes again, huh?”

  “Oh, God, I’m so sorry.” A quick, frantic glance confirmed the mate was lying on the floor nearby.

  Grabbing it and handing it to him, she noted a glint of wicked amusement in his eyes. The brooding, angry man from the car was gone, as was the frustrated FBI agent, at least for the moment. Here was the flirtatious charmer she’d glimpsed a time or two since they’d met. The one who took her breath away.

  “No wonder you have a dozen odd gloves. You steal ’em one at a time, huh?”

  The change of mood had been so quick and unexpected, Sam could do nothing but laugh in response. Alec hadn’t exactly returned for a passionate kiss or a promise that they were going to do something about this thing they were both feeling. But he was smiling. Which, in her book, was a pretty good second choice. “It wasn’t intentional, I promise.”

  “It’s okay. I never wear them and could have lived without them.”

  She tilted her head, eyeing him curiously. “So why did you come back?”

  He didn’t reply at first, merely staring at her. A battle seemed to wage behind his eyes, as if he honestly didn’t know what to do-something she doubted was a frequent occurrence for this competent man. Finally, when she had half decided he was just going to turn around and walk back out without another word, he admitted, “Because I didn’t want to leave you here to build this up in your head even more than you already have.”

  “Oh, you’re a mind reader now?”

  He leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb. “It wasn’t too hard.”

  “Are you profiling me?”

  “Any guy who’s ever wanted a woman would know what you’re thinking, Sam.”

  She tried to stay huffy, but melted a little instead at his admission that he wanted her.

  “You wear a shield that says, ‘Back off.’ When you finally dropped it in the car, you didn’t deserve to think I hadn’t even noticed.”

  “I knew you noticed,” she shot back. “I just figured you were too chickenshit to do anything about it.”

  His quick bark of laughter told her the insult had rolled right off. Lifting a hand to her face, he smoothed back a strand of her hair, rubbing it lightly between his fingers. “So you knew exactly what I was thinking, huh?”

  She swallowed hard, fighting not to curl her cheek into his palm. “Yep.”

  “Okay.” He dropped his hand again. “But in case there’s any last doubt, let me clear it up. The answer is yes. I did want to haul you onto my lap and kiss the taste out of your mouth.”

  The strength drained from her legs, and she leaned against the back of a chair. She’d been wanting some physical connection; now she wondered if she had bitten off more than she could chew. Then again, choking on someone who excited her as much as Alec didn’t seem like such a bad way to go.

  Someone else’s weak, breathy vocal cords asked, “Why didn’t you?”

  “Because this whole thing has been a little crazy. Fast. Unexpected.” He shrugged in resignation. “What can I say? I was trying to be a nice guy.”

  She waited, wondering if there was more to that sentence.

  Now do you not want to be a nice guy?

  The words didn’t come. Instead, he cleared his throat and straightened again. “I just thought you should know that. It’s not lack of interest; it’s lack of ability to focus on much of anything except the job right now.”

  “I get that,” she murmured, meaning it. “Thank you for coming back and telling me.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  He didn’t say anything else, didn’t offer promises or make plans for what might happen later, when things were a little less crazy. Instead, he just stood there by the door, his hands shoved into his pockets, visibly torn about how to proceed.

  Sam took the decision out of his hands. “I don’t have any scotch. And I don’t own a video game system.”

  His eyes narrowed in confusion.

  “But if you can stand tequila, I do play a pretty good hand of Texas Hold ’Em. No strings. No making things any more crazy. I just thought, if you want to blow off some steam, and extend our less-than-three-day relationship by an hour, you’re more than welcome.”

  Relationship. A strange word to describe what was going on between the two of them. But she couldn’t take it back, and she couldn’t regret saying it.

  He didn’t step forward. Nor did he turn away. Instead, he did something much more unexpected. “It wasn’t what you were thinking.”

  “What?”

  “The shooting. I didn’t have an affair with a witness, or do anything inappropriate with her.”

  Embarrassed that he had so correctly guessed where her suspicious mind had gone, she put a hand up, palm out. “You don’t have to tell me this.”

  He ignored her. “We were chasing a man suspected of kidnapping and multiple homicides. I’d gotten friendly with his mother, felt sorry for her, you know?”

  Feeling like the world’s biggest witch for what she’d thought of him, she mumbled, “Alec, really…”

  “I let my guard down. When we got too close and she knew we were going to nail him, she pulled out a semiautomatic and started firing. I took two in the chest, one in the shoulder. Another agent took one straight through the heart. I came home afterward. He never did.”

  Oh, God.

  He continued, not hesitating to allow her to express any sympathy she knew he didn’t want. “I’m not telling you this for the tequila, because one shot would put me out for the night and I have a long drive home. I just wanted you to know.” A hint of promise darkened his eyes. “For next time.”

  Next time. Meaning he believed there would be a next time. Or, in their case, a first time.

  Someday.

  “I understand,” she replied softly. “Thank you for confiding in me.”

  The trust he had expressed in her, and the knowledge that they had taken a step f
orward, moving closer to what she thought could be something special, made her want to return the favor. Her fingers curled tightly into fists by her side, she admitted something very few people knew. “I was the one holding the golf club.”

  His brow furrowed in confusion.

  “I beat up my own laptop.”

  “Oh.” Alec didn’t make some flip comment like, Should I be scared? as if knowing what it had cost her to make the admission. And realizing how far she must have been driven.

  “My husband’s wasn’t working right…”

  “You don’t have to get into this,” he said, echoing what she’d told him.

  He hadn’t taken the easy way out. Neither would she. “So he borrowed mine to take on a business trip.”

  He shook his head in disgust, obviously knowing where the story was headed. It wasn’t an uncommon one. “Internet porn?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Online sex?”

  “Yeah. But only as a substitution for the real sex they were having at home.”

  “Bastard.”

  “His girlfriend didn’t want him to feel too lonely, so she sent lots of pictures. Some of her, some of him, some of them together. All of which I found when I got the laptop back.”

  “Jesus,” he muttered, looking as though he wanted to tug her close, but not doing it. As if he knew she needed to get it all out now, if only so they would never have to talk about it again.

  “Can’t say I wasn’t a little shocked.” She managed a dry chuckle, surprised she didn’t have to force the laugh. Maybe she really had healed if she could actually find amusement in this for the first time since the night it had happened. “I guess he was lucky not to be there. The computer took the brunt of my seven-iron wrath.”

  He wasn’t fooled by the attempt at humor. Shaking his head in disbelief, he said, “What a fucking moron. First for doing it, then…”

  “For not deleting the evidence?” she asked, certain he had thought of it as a law officer, but hadn’t wanted to say so for fear of sounding insensitive.

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh, he deleted it. He just forgot to empty the recycle bin.”

  “Repeat: fucking moron.”

  Yes, he had been. Because while she hadn’t been perfect, she had tried hard to be a good wife and to make her marriage work. Right up until the moment she got slapped in the face with the kind of close-up pictures of another woman no heterosexual female would ever want to see.

  “He was rich and spoiled and used to getting whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it. One day he wanted me. The next he wanted her. It was pretty open-and-shut in his mind.”

  “Too bad the son of a bitch did it on your computer. Whacking the hell out of his would have been much more satisfying.”

  “Probably. But the claims he made during the divorce were bad enough. Painting me as a vindictive, low-class psycho who destroyed his belongings would have made things worse.”

  This time, he didn’t hold back. Alec stepped closer, put his hands on her shoulders, and drew her to him. Sam resisted for half a second, by habit now, rather than mistrust. Then she relaxed into him, amazed at the feel of physical connection she’d told herself she didn’t miss.

  He was hard and strong, the rugged planes of his body such a contrast to the soft curves of hers. Yet they fit together perfectly. With her cheek pressed into the angle between his shoulder and neck, and every inch of her pressed against the rest of him, a sigh couldn’t have fit between them.

  Alec didn’t take things any further, and she didn’t ask him to. His hands remained above the waist; their mouths did not connect. She simply took what he was offering, enjoyed it while it lasted. Then, with a nod of silent gratitude, she stepped away, giving them both the space she suspected they needed to keep their heads on straight.

  “I appreciate your telling me,” he said as they eyed each other.

  “I appreciate your listening.”

  “I guess we’re both carrying a lot of baggage.”

  “I guess.” Wanting to make things clear before they went any further-if they were going any further-she said, “I might be ready to put that baggage down finally. But that doesn’t mean I want to pick a new set up right away.”

  He got it immediately. “I’m not exactly ready to go on a long trip anytime soon myself.” He probably had as much reason as she did to avoid romantic entanglements, because of both his physical scars and the breakup he’d mentioned earlier tonight.

  “No long trips,” she murmured, “meaning an overnight one here or there might be okay?”

  He didn’t laugh, because she hadn’t been flirting. Though couched in innuendo, her meaning had been straightforward, and they both knew what she was saying. “Yeah, Sam. I think it might.”

  She let out a slow, easy breath, wondering why she wasn’t dizzy with nervousness. She had just blatantly propositioned the sexiest man she’d ever met, asked him to have a short-term fling with her, and he had accepted. But her emotions were in control, her mood relaxed. They could have been talking about getting a bite to eat rather than having the one-night stand they had both just admitted they wanted.

  Maybe the lack of tension was because she had known this was coming from soon after she’d met him. And because desperately wanting someone as emotionally unavailable as she was seemed safe. They would have no entanglements, no expectations, no emotions that could leave her crushed and devoid of any feeling at all, the way she’d been just one year ago.

  An affair with Alec would be a perfect way to finish the healing process and begin to move on. To become whole and complete again, a fully realized woman, in an intensely pleasurable way.

  “But not now. We’ve got to get through this case first,” he said, though he didn’t sound happy about it. Crossing his arms as if to prevent himself from reaching for her, he added, “You’re a potential witness, and that has to be my focus until we catch this guy.”

  “I get it.”

  She did. Just the knowledge that they were going to share something intimate and sexual was enough for now.

  That didn’t mean she was ready for him to leave. Though she saw the fatigue in his face, she wanted him to stay. She wasn’t desperate and physically hungry like she’d been in the car. This was softer, gentler. She just wanted to spend some time with the man.

  About to ask him if he still wanted a hand of poker, with coffee instead of alcohol, she remained quiet when a ringing sound came from his pocket. Alec flinched, equally as surprised someone would be calling on his cell at this time of night.

  He quickly grabbed it, checking the caller ID. Opening it, he snapped, “Wyatt? Has something happened?” He immediately fell quiet, listening. Seeing his body tense, she knew something had, indeed, happened. “When, tonight? Do we know which cell tower? Any way to pinpoint it further?”

  More silence, except for the low, muted rumble of his boss’s voice through the receiver. She could make out no words. Whatever Agent Blackstone was saying, however, had Alec alert and on edge. Finally, he nodded. “Okay. I’ll be there early. If you need me before that, just call.” Then he cut the connection.

  “Everything okay?”

  “I don’t know yet,” he admitted. He said nothing more, obviously not able to talk about it. She had been part of things today, personally drawn into the situation by the very suspect they were chasing. She had no further claim in it, however. So she had no right questioning him.

  “I really need to go. I’ve got a long drive and an early morning.”

  “I understand.” She opened the door, stepping out of his way to let him go. “Thanks again for coming back up to clear the air.”

  “You’re welcome. Good night, Sam.”

  She fully expected him to walk right out, since he’d set the boundaries between them until the case was over. Instead, he did something far more surprising. Without warning, he slid his hands into her hair, tugging her close. With a low groan of surrender, as if he simply couldn’t help
himself, he covered her mouth with his, kissing her hard, fast, and deep. His mouth was hot and demanding, his hunger for her so obvious her whole body went weak.

  He let her go abruptly. Sam sagged back against the doorframe, stunned, excited, anticipatory.

  All of those feelings doubled when he spoke again, his voice almost shaking. “As soon as this case is over.”

  The man wanted her desperately. How amazing.

  He left without another word. Though it was freezing cold, Sam walked outside onto the landing, watching him go again, feeling much different than she had the first time. His pace quick, he jogged down the steps. He looked up only once, after he was behind the wheel. With a quick flash of that sexy smile, he started the car and took off.

  Once he was gone, she quickly went back inside. She had been standing out there under the bright security lights, fully visible from the dark street below. It had been a disconcerting feeling: almost like being exposed, as if anyone could have been watching her from the shadows.

  She laughed at her own vivid imagination and shrugged off the odd thought. After all, it was late; every window around here was darkened, not a soul out in this bitter weather. And she wasn’t exactly the most exciting personality in Baltimore.

  Who would possibly want to watch her?

  10

  After the murders of Ryan Smith and Jason Todd, when investigators realized the boys’ cell phones had not been in their submerged car with their clothing, the families had been instructed not to cancel the accounts. Nobody had believed the Professor would be careless enough to use one of his victims’ phones, but you never knew.

  So when word had come in that Ryan’s phone had been used last night, Alec had been anxious for the details. Wyatt hadn’t known much, certainly not enough for any members of the team to head back in at one in the morning. Going home, Alec had grabbed a little sleep, then returned to headquarters.

  Taggert and Fletcher were already there, as, of course, was Wyatt. They all looked up and greeted him, Wyatt with cordiality, Dean with a noncommittal nod, and Lily with a friendly smile. No glares. No turning away, like what he might have gotten at the BAU. Progress.