He’d never treated a women that way in his life. Had never so much as lifted a finger in anger. The lessons of his childhood were far too deeply ingrained for him to ever want to watch someone weaker than himself cower in fear.
And yet he’d tried to intimidate Gabby. All five-foot-nothing of her. He’d been so angry—furious—at her refusal to be smart about her safety that he’d lost it. She was all lip and attitude—and she wouldn’t stand a chance against anyone out to hurt her. Yet she stubbornly refused to believe it.
The thought of her trying to fend off some desperate junkie or opportunistic hood made his blood run cold.
He’d gone into her office with the intention of showing her how vulnerable she was, to prove to her that being feisty and mouthy was no defence against superior strength. But she hadn’t backed down. She’d stood her ground, glaring defiance at him with those golden-brown eyes of hers and refusing to so much as flinch. He’d pushed and pushed until he was so close he could feel the adrenaline vibrating through her body—and the excitement.
Her pupils had been dilated, her breathing shallow. Her body had been hot against his as he’d pressed her against the desk.
Then she’d tried to slip away from him and things had gotten really crazy.
He grit his teeth as he remembered the way he’d slammed her against the wall and pinned her there with his body weight.
You’re a real freaking hero, you know that?
He’d hurt her. He’d bullied her and manhandled her and then he’d rubbed his freaking erection against her and—
Jon punched the wall. Hard. The plaster cracked but didn’t give. He shook his hand out. The anger drained away as abruptly as it had flooded him and he sank onto the couch.
He dropped his head into his hands.
Images flashed across his mind’s eye, but the one that stuck was the look on her face when she’d told him to go. She hadn’t even been able to look him in the eye, she’d wanted him gone so much.
And why wouldn’t she? He’d behaved like an animal. Like Robert Adamson’s son.
“Jesus.”
He shot to his feet. He didn’t want it to be true. Didn’t want to be the man he’d undeniably been tonight.
Angry. Out of control. A slave to his passions.
He grabbed his keys and headed for the door. Everything in him wanted to drive over to Gabby’s and beg her to forgive him. But there was nothing he could say that would take back what had happened and she’d copped enough of his crap for one night.
The lights were still on at Tyler and Ally’s place. He strode up the path and waited tensely for someone to answer the door. He heard footsteps, then a short pause and the rattle of a door chain being disengaged. The door swung open.
It was Ally, dressed in bright pajamas, a pair of reading glasses on the end of her nose.
“Jon,” she said. Her welcoming smile faded as she took in his tense posture. “Is everything okay?”
“Is Tyler around?”
Her brow wrinkled with concern. “I’m sorry, but he’s helping a mate pick up a fridge or something. He should be back soon, though.” Damn.
He glanced toward his truck, trying to think. He didn’t want to be in his apartment. And he was afraid to go to the pub.
“Come in,” Ally said, her hand closing around his forearm. “Wait for him.”
He didn’t want to wait, but he didn’t know what else to do so he let Ally lead him into the house.
“I’ll make you a coffee.” She didn’t release his arm, almost as though she was afraid he’d run off if she did. “Or maybe you’d like a hot chocolate?”
“What I’d really like is a bottle of Scotch.”
She smiled sympathetically. “Yeah. I know that feeling.”
She pushed him toward the couch and crossed to the kitchen to put the kettle on. He sat on the edge of the seat and looked at his hands. He had no idea why he’d come here. Gabby was like family to Tyler and Ally; the moment his brother heard what had happened he’d punch Jon’s lights out.
Maybe that was why he was here—to cop to a little of what he’d dished out tonight. To get a little of what he deserved.
Ally returned and sat at the other end of the couch.
“Have you eaten? Do you want some cheese and crackers? Or I could make you a sandwich?”
“I’m fine. Thanks.” He examined his hands, rubbing the thumb of his left hand over the newly bruised knuckles of his right.
“Listen, Jon, if you want to wait for Tyler in peace and quiet, I can disappear. I’ve got some edits to do on my column, it’s not a problem.”
“I don’t want to keep you from your work.”
“That’s not what I was saying.” She sighed. “You Adamson men. I swear, it’s like pulling teeth getting you to talk about anything.”
He glanced at her, then at his hands. He didn’t want to talk to her about this. It was too ugly. He was too ugly.
“Something happened with Gabby tonight,” he said, surprising himself as well as Ally.
“What sort of something are we talking about? A conversation? A fight? The opposite of a fight?”
He shifted uncomfortably.
“Both,” he eventually said.
“A fight? And the opposite of a fight?”
He sighed, ran a hand over his head. He might as well get this over with. Cut to the part where she stared at him in horror.
“I’ve been working late so I can be around when Gabby locks up. I knew she wouldn’t be too keen on anyone looking out for her, so I’ve been making up excuses. Well, apparently I suck as an actor because she called me on it tonight and sent me home.”
“Sounds like Gabby,” Ally said with a small smile. “But I’m willing to bet you didn’t go home, right?”
He shot her a look. “Why do you say that?”
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but stubbornness runs in the Adamson blood. And you’ve got that whole older-brother-protective-thing going on. A pretty deadly combination.”
He frowned. Obviously Tyler hadn’t told her how he’d bailed on him when they were in their teens. Hardly the actions of the protective older brother she was painting him as.
“You know what that neighborhood is like. Smashed glass in the gutters, syringes. Once all the factories close for the night, there’s no one around. It’s dangerous. I couldn’t leave her there on her own.”
“So you guys had it out, huh?”
“I told her I’d go if she could prove to me she could take care of herself.”
“I bet that went down well.”
“She told me to go to hell. So I decided I was going to show her why she was wrong. I backed her up against the desk—”
He shot to his feet. No way could he describe what had happened next. It was too personal. Too visceral. Too shameful.
Ally simply waited. He stood in front of the couch, head lowered, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. He told himself he should go, but instead he found himself talking again.
“She wouldn’t back down. We…we fought. Physically, I mean.” It was hard to push the words past the tightness in his throat. “She tried to get away from me, I slammed her into the wall. Then we— Then things changed.”
“This is the opposite of fighting bit, right?”
He looked at her. She didn’t look even slightly appalled by what he’d told her. “Yeah.”
“Well, then. Tyler owes me fifty bucks.”
Jon stared at her. He’d confessed to throwing a ninety-pound woman against the wall, to fighting her physically, and Ally was pleased that she’d won a bet?
“I could have really hurt her.”
“Did you hurt her?”
“I pushed her against the wall.”
“I bet that would have really pissed Gabby off.”
He thought about the way she’d bitten him. “It did.”
Ally patted the couch. “Sit. You’re giving me a crick in my neck.”
He sat.
“You’re giv
ing yourself a hard time because things got physical with Gabby, right?”
Wasn’t it obvious?
“I could have hurt her,” he said again.
“But you didn’t, Jon.”
“Things were out of control.”
“Right.” Ally nodded. “That’s important for you, isn’t it? Being in control?”
Wasn’t it to everyone? As far as he was concerned, taking responsibility for your own actions was the most basic requirement of adulthood.
“Typically the children of abusive parents go two ways,” Ally said thoughtfully. “Some of them become abusers themselves, perpetuating the misery. And the others do everything in their power to break the cycle. It constantly amazes me that you and Tyler are the people you are, given what you came from. That even though you were given so little love and compassion, you’re both good, good men.”
He shifted uneasily. “This isn’t anything to do with any of that.”
Ally spoke very gently. “I think it is, Jon. I think it’s everything to do with why you’re upset tonight.”
He checked his watch. “I should let you get to bed. It’s getting late.” He stood.
Ally looked up at him ruefully. “Pushed you too far, huh?”
“It’s late.”
Ally stood. “Can’t tempt you with some ice cream?”
“Thanks, but I’m not really an ice cream fan.”
“Huh. Interesting. Gabby’s not mad about it, either.”
Jon collected his keys and phone from the coffee table. “Don’t turn this into some big romance, Ally. Gabby and I… Even if she doesn’t hate my guts after tonight, there are a lot of reasons why nothing’s ever going to happen between us.”
Starting with the fact that Gabby still had feelings for his brother.
“What’s your favorite thing about her?”
The question was so unexpected he responded without thinking. “She never quits fighting her corner, even when a smart person would stop. And she’s mouthy.”
Ally’s smile was smug. “I like those things about her, too. Plus she has an awesome ass.”
She shocked a laugh out of him. They walked to the front door in an oddly companionable silence. He opened the door before pausing to say goodbye.
“Thanks. And sorry if I messed with your work schedule.”
He leaned close and kissed her on the cheek. He was about to turn and exit when Ally’s hand caught his wrist.
“Jon. You can come here anytime, okay? Day or night. Whatever. Tyler and I are both here for you. If you want to talk or not talk. Even if you just want to hang out. Okay?”
She stood on her toes and embraced him. He patted her back awkwardly. She sank onto her heels and gave him a wry look.
“One of these days you’re going to hug me properly, you know.”
He looked down at his car keys. “I do appreciate it, Ally,” he said quietly.
“I know. Off you go. I won’t make you any more uncomfortable.”
He descended the steps and started up the path. Halfway to the gate, he pivoted on his heel.
“Don’t forget to put the chain back on,” he said.
“I won’t, big brother.”
He hesitated. He felt as though he was perpetuating a fraud, letting Ally assume he was the typical kind of big brother, the kind who took responsibility and looked out for his siblings. But tonight wasn’t the night to straighten her out.
His brain was less busy as he drove home. Despite how quickly he’d bailed when Ally had brought up his father, the stuff she’d said about self-control being important to him had struck a chord. It was true that he’d always been careful to govern his passions. He never ate too much, never acted in the heat of anger, never let himself get too swept up with a woman. For many years his one vice had been cigarettes, but despite a short relapse recently he’d managed to kick the habit.
In fact, there were only two areas where he’d ever really lost control: with drink, and with Gabby. He was coming to grips with his drinking, but Gabby… No matter what he did, he didn’t seem to be able to keep a lid on himself when she was around. She pushed him in so many ways. And tonight she’d pushed him to the edge and over.
Then stay away from her. It’s that easy.
A pretty simple solution. He’d been making noises about moving on for a while now, but maybe it was time to put words into actions.
One thing was for sure, Gabby would be glad to see the back of him.
GABBY WOKE WITH A SINGLE IMAGE from the previous night etched in her mind: Jon’s face when he’d returned to her office and she’d refused to talk to him. He’d looked…shaken was the only word she could come up with. Maybe even stricken.
At the time, she’d been so busy trying to protect herself that she hadn’t thought about him. She’d let him inside her body, run her hands and mouth all over his, yet she hadn’t considered his reaction.
There was an argument to be made that Jon had most likely been more than happy to escape so lightly from a potentially awkward situation. The fun bit was over; he’d had his thrills. What more could he want?
A lot of guys—most guys—would have been skipping all the way to their cars, thrilled to have avoided a postcoital debrief.
But Jon wasn’t most guys. He had a fierce sense of duty and he always did the right thing. Always. He’d given in to Ally’s cajoling and come to dinner, even though the whole deal had clearly not been his cup of tea. He’d apologized to Gabby about the whole lesbian thing—twice. He’d made up excuses so he could watch over her while she locked up. He’d tried to step in when she was heading for trouble at the Christmas party. He’d been painstaking in his attention to detail in the work he’d done for Tyler.
Jon was a good man. An honorable man. Overbearing at times. Arrogant in his own unique I-know-best way. But he had a good heart, and he’d been decent to her on numerous occasions. Some might even say he’d been kind.
She owed him an apology, and she owed him a conversation. She had no idea what that conversation would consist of. No doubt it would end with them disagreeing. So be it. It had to be done.
She lay in bed girding her loins for a full ten minutes after her alarm went off, then she rolled out of bed and marched into the bathroom.
She gasped when she saw the hickey on her neck in the cold light of day. Last night, the evidence that Jon had been as lost in their mutual passion as she’d been had been comforting. This morning, not so much.
The mark on her breast she could live with—no one was going to see that—but she’d already survived a solid day of being pilloried for her performance at the Christmas party. The thought of enduring another round of teasing and questions and innuendo over the scarlet mark on her neck was enough to make her want to write a letter of resignation on the spot.
Which meant the hickey had to go. The last time she’d had to employ hickey camouflaging techniques had been the first year of high school. She had a vague memory of something to do with toothpaste, but she figured that a scarf tied in a jaunty little bow and some cover-up stick was probably the better bet.
She experimented for twenty minutes with the only summer-weight scarf she owned before she was satisfied she could hide the incriminating mark. Red with white dots, it made her look a little like Maryanne off Gilligan’s Island, but it wasn’t as though she had much choice. She was tweaking her scarf for the fourth time when she caught sight of her alarm clock and made a grab for her keys and headed for the door. She was almost certain that her office still needed a bit more work before it could pass as a place of business again instead of a makeshift bordello, which meant she needed to be the first one in.
Half an hour later, her office was back to its pre-desk-sex state and she was watching the clock, waiting for Jon to arrive for the day so she could do what had to be done.
Her foot jiggled beneath the desk and she glanced up every time she heard the showroom door open. Carl was in first, then Dino. Finally, the door to the showroom swun
g open and she was rewarded with the sight of Jon’s broad shoulders and dark head. Nerves tightened her belly. Her palms got sweaty.
Time to woman up, princess.
She stood, twitching her scarf a little more to the right. In the workshop, Jon hung his jacket over the back of the stool at his workbench and began to set up for the day. She stared at his shoulders, impossibly wide under a white T-shirt, then let her gaze drop to his backside. She’d never truly allowed herself to appreciate it before, but it was great. Really, really great.
A rush of sense-memories washed over her—the rasp of his beard on her breasts, the slide of his fingers between her legs, the resilient firmness of his muscles beneath her hands.
She plucked at the front of her T-shirt, trying to dissipate some of the heat. She was not approaching Jon the morning after their ill-advised liaison with glowing cheeks. That was not going to happen.
She fanned her top a few more times, then plunged into the fray.
Her legs felt shaky as she rounded her desk. She concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other. Through some malicious trick of psychological chicanery, the distance to her doorway seemed to stretch to eternity.
Get it done and over with, you big scaredy cat.
Jon was frowning at some brass cabinet fittings when she reached his side.
“Jon. Hi. Um, would you have a minute to spare?”
He put down the hinge he’d been examining and looked at her. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Sure. When did you have in mind?”
“Now. If you’re free, that is?”
“I’m free.”
“Well, then.” Feeling supremely uncomfortable, she turned to lead him back to her office and nearly tripped over her own feet. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him reach out a hand to steady her—only to hesitate at the last moment.
He didn’t want to touch her.
Something small and sharp twisted in her chest.
“I’m fine,” she said, even though he hadn’t asked.
She waited until he’d entered her office before she shut the door behind her. Anyone passing would wonder why—she never closed her door—but she wasn’t taking any chances with anyone overhearing what she had to say.
She faced him. He was standing in the center of the room, and she knew him well enough now to know that he was far from comfortable. Good. She’d gotten herself so worked up she felt sick—it was nice to know she wasn’t alone.
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