by Nora Roberts
She came back to the couch, afraid her legs might go weak again when she told the rest. “Thats the thought that came into my head—and then I heard voices. Off in the distance, but familiar. And I thought, this isnt real. Its just a trick. Thats when it happened. Oh, God.” As her chest tightened again, she pressed her fists between her breasts. “Oh, God.”
“Easy now.” He closed his hands over hers, squeezing lightly until she met his eyes. “Take your time.”
“Storm came in. Thats a mild word for it. When I realized it wasnt real, the world went to hell. Wind, rain, dark, and the cold. Jesus, Jordan, it was so cold. I starting running. I knew I had to get away, because I wasnt alone after all. He was there, and he was coming for me. I got back to the beach, but the ocean was insane. Walls of black water, fifty, sixty feet high. I fell. I felt him over me, around me. That cold. And the pain. Horrible, tearing pain.”
Her voice was breaking. She couldnt stop it. “He was ripping out my soul. I knew Id rather face anything but that, so I jumped into the sea.”
“Come here. Come here, youre shaking again.” He gathered her close.
“I woke up, or came back, whatever it is. In the tub, strangling for air. The bathwater had gone cold. I dont know how long Id been out of it, Jordan. I dont know how long he had me.”
“He didnt have you. He didnt,” he insisted when she shook her head. Gently, he eased her back so he could see her face. “A part of you, thats all. He cant get the whole, because he cant see the whole. A fantasy, like you said. Thats how he works. And he cant push you into it so deep that a part of your mind doesnt surface again and question. And know.”
“Maybe not. But he sure knows how to go for the gut. Ive never been that scared.”
“Once you move past that into pissed-off, youll feel better.”
“Yeah, youre probably right. I want a drink,” she decided and pushed away from him.
“You want water?” He realized she was coming back fast when the question had her curling her lip at him.
“I want a beer. I never had my bath beer.” She rose, seemed to hesitate. “You want one?”
Still watching her, he laid his fingers on his own wrist as if checking for a pulse. “Yeah.”
He liked the way she snickered at him before she walked away. It was a normal sound, a Dana sound. Thered been nothing normal in the way shed collapsed on him.
If he hadnt come by… but he had, he reminded himself. He was here, she wasnt alone. And shed gotten through it.
He got to his feet, took his first real look around her place. Pure Dana, he thought. Strong color, comfortable furniture, and books.
He wandered after her, leaned on the wall. More books, he noted. Who but Dana would keep Nietzsche in the kitchen? “First time Ive been in your place.”
She kept her back to him as she opened two beers. “You wouldnt have gotten in this time if I hadnt been wigged.”
“Despite that lack of welcome, I like it. Suits you, Stretch. And because it does, I dont suppose youd consider bunking at Flynns for the next little while. I can take my stuff over to Brads and hang there if thats a factor.”
She turned back slowly. “Are you being accommodating because I was hysterical?”
“Im being accommodating because I want you to feel safe. To be safe.”
“No need to put yourself out.”
“I care about you.” He shifted, blocking her exit before she could move past him. There was a quick flash of rage over his face, almost as quickly banked.
Where had that been hiding? she wondered. And how did he tuck it away again?
“I care, Dana. Just for a minute, one damn minute, set aside the way things ended up. We cared about each other, and if youd feel safer at Flynns, Ill get out of your way.”
“All the way back to New York?”
His mouth thinned as he took one of the bottles out of her hands. “No.”
Maybe it was unfair to poke and prod at him. But what the hell did she care about fair when it came to Jordan? “I wouldnt feel safer at Flynns—with or without you around. In spite of my condition when you knocked on the door, I can take care of myself. I did take care of myself. I got out of it without your help. And nobody, not you, not that bastard Kane, is going to run me out of my own apartment.”
“Well.” He took a sip of beer. “”I see youve moved to the pissed-off stage of tonights entertainment.“
“I dont like being manipulated. He used my own thoughts against me, and youre using old feelings. We cared about each other?” she shot out. “Maybe we did, but remember, thats past tense. If you want to be such a nice guy and get out of my way, then get out of it now. Youre crowding me.”
“Ive got things to say to you, and if Ive got to block you in to get you to hear them, then thats the way it is. I didnt know you loved me. I dont know what it would have changed, I just know it wouldve changed… something. Just like I know I wasnt ready for it. I wasnt smart enough or steady enough.”
“You were smart and steady enough to do what you wanted.”
“Thats exactly right.” With his eyes locked on hers, he nodded. “I was self-absorbed, broody, and restless. What the hell did you want with me, anyway?”
“You idiot.” Because shed lost her taste for it, she set the beer aside. “Youve just described the sort of guy every girl falls for at least once. Then you add those whiffs of recklessness, the brain, the looks, and the chemistry, and I didnt have a chance. How can you make a living writing about people when you dont understand half of them?”
When she tried to push past him, he took her arm. The look she sent him could have melted steel. “Buy a clue, Hawke. I said girls fall for once. Girls generally evolve into smart and steady women who put away the childish things like self-absorbed assholes.”
“Thats good. I prefer women.” He put his beer on the counter. “Ive always preferred you.”
“Do you think that makes my heart gopitty -pat?”
“Not yours, Stretch. But this might.”
He caught her face in his free hand, allowed himself the perverse pleasure of seeing her fury leap out of her eyes, then covered her mouth with his.
Thank God, he thought, thank God she was angry enough that he could do what he hadnt been able to do when she was pale and shaken.
Thered never been a taste hed craved the way he craved Danas. He had never understood it. And never worried that he should. It simply was. She might rake him to the bone for it, but he had a point to prove. To both of them.
He wasnt gentle. Shed never seemed to expect or need gentleness from him. He simply pressed her back to the wall and took.
Heat flooded her, as enervating and nearly as terrifying as the cold shed experienced earlier. There was no point in lying to herself, she wanted to feel this involved again, this aware of self, this needy.
But lying to him was a different matter entirely, so she shoved at him, struggled with herself, and refused to yield to either.
He laid a hand on her heart, and with his mouth only a breath from hers now, stared into her eyes. “Yeah. That got it going.”
“Get this. Its not going to happen. Its never going to happen again.” “Somebody once said, „Whats past is prologue.”
“Shakespeare, you ignorant jerk. The Tempest .”
“Right.” Amused admiration flickered over his face. “You were always better at remembering that stuff than I was. But, in any case, Im not looking to repeat myself. However much were the same, were that much different. Were not the same people we were, Dana. I want a chance to see who we would be together now.”
“Im not interested.”
“Sure you are. Youve got a curious mind, and youre wondering, the same as I am. But maybe youre afraid that being around me will prove too much for your self-control.”
“Please. You arrogant pig.”
“Well, then, why dont we test your self-control and satisfy my curiosity, and have ourselves a date?”
Hed managed to thr
ow her off. “A what?”
“You remember what a date is, Dane. Two people going out to a prearranged location.” Idly, he ran the lapel of her robe between his thumb and forefinger. “Oh, I see, you thought I meant wed just jump straight into bed, rock and roll. Okay, if thats the way you want it—”
“Stop it.” Baffled, annoyed, and more than half amused, she elbowed him aside. “I was not thinking about sex.” And because that was a complete lie, her tone was aloof. “Theres not going to be any rock and roll, as you so succinctly put it. And the idea of a date is just ludicrous.”
“Why? Youd get a free meal out of it. And the added pleasure of being able to shut me down when I put the moves on you, and send me home sexually frustrated.”
“That does have some appeal.”
“Saturday night. Ill pick you up at seven-thirty.”
“How do you know I dont already have a date for Saturday night?”
He grinned at her. “I asked Flynn if you were seeing anybody. I know how to do my research, Stretch.”
“Flynn doesnt know everything,” she retorted as Jordan strolled away. “Wait just a damn minute.” She rushed out into the living room, caught up with him at the door. “There are some basic requirements. The meals in an actual restaurant. No fast food, and not the Main Street Diner. And when you say youll pick me up at seven-thirty, that doesnt mean you get here at seven-forty-five.”
“Agreed.” He paused. “I know theres no point in asking if you want me to stay, bunk on the couch. But you could call Malory, and I could hang out until she got here.”
“Im okay.”
“You always were, Stretch. See you.”
Thoughtfully, she locked the door behind him before wandering back to the kitchen to pour the warm beer down the sink. It seemed to be her night to waste beer.
She didnt know if any of it brought her closer to the key, but shed certainly learned some new things this evening. Kane already knew she was searching for the second key, and hadnt wasted any time putting the whammy on her. Hed wanted her to know he was watching.
And didnt that mean he was worried that she had a good chance of succeeding?
Yeah, that made sense. Malory had shut him down once. So maybe he would be less cocky this time up. And more vicious, she mused.
Shed learned that Jordan still had that core of decency that had always attracted her. Shed been scared, nearly ill with fear, and hed given her exactly what she needed to find her feet again without making her feel foolish or weak.
She had to give him credit for that.
More, she admitted as she went to clean up the mess shed left in the bathroom, she had to give him credit for being honest enough to say hed been selfish.
She could still hate him for it, but she had to respect the fact that he acknowledged it.
She had to bear down hard just to cross the threshold into the bathroom. It gave her the willies to see the book still floating, bloated with water, in the tub.
It was symbolic, she thought, that hed invaded this most personal of rooms. It told her there was no place that she would be completely safe until the key was found or the month was over.
She pulled the plug, watched the water begin to drain.
“Just have to deal,” she ordered. “And it wont be so easy to scare me next time. Ill deal with you. With Jordan. With myself. Because I learned one more thing tonight. Goddamn it, Im still in love with the jerk.”
It didnt make her feel any better to say it out loud, but it did help to put her bathroom to rights again. Her apartment, her things, her life, she thought as she went into the bedroom.
As far as Jordan was concerned, it was much more likely that it was the memory she still loved. The boy, the young, wounded man whod been her first love. Didnt every woman have a soft spot for her first true love?
She settled on the bed, took her bed book out of the nightstand drawer. The paperback she kept there was only a front. The one she opened was Cold Case , by Jordan Hawke.
Wouldnt he crow if he knew she was reading his latest book? Worse, if he knew she was enjoying every damn word.
Maybe she was still in love with the memory of the boy, but she would rather eat live slugs than have the man discover that shed read every one of his books.
Twice.
Chapter Six
THEY started work on the porch, taking advantage of the fine fall weather andZoes experience.
By unanimous agreement, Dana and Malory had elected her the goddess of remodel. In their oldest clothes, and with new tools for Dana and Malory, they worked atZoes direction prepping the porch for paint.
“I didnt know it would be so much work.” Malory sat back on her heels and examined her nails. “Ive ruined my manicure. And you just gave it to me a couple of days ago,” she remindedZoe .
“Ill give you another. If we dont scrape and sand off the peeling paint, the new paint wont stick right. It needs a good, smooth, porous surface, or well be doing this again in the spring.”
“We bow to you,” Dana toldZoe , and watched her wield the little electric sander. “I always thought you just sort of slopped the paint on, then waited for it to dry.”
“That kind of thinking is why you bow to me.”
“Its already gone to her head,” Dana grumbled and attacked curls of peeling paint with her scraper.
“I wouldnt mind having a little crown, something delicate and tasteful.” Even as she spoke,Zoe kept one eye on her underlings. “Its going to look great. Youll see.”
“Why dont you entertain us during the drudgery?” Malory suggested. “Tell us about dinner with Brad last night.”
“It was no big deal. He just played some video games with Simon, ate, then left. I shouldnt have gotten so worked up about it. I just havent had a guy over in a while. And Im not used to cooking for millionaires. I felt like I needed finger bowls or something.” “Brads not like that,” Dana protested. “A guy with money can still be normal. Brad used to eat at our place all the time when we were kids. And we hardly ever used the finger bowls.”
“Its not the same. We didnt grow up together, for one thing. And your family and his have more in common. A hairdresser who grew up in a trailer in West Virginia doesnt have a lot to say to the heir to an American empire.”
“Youre not being fair to him, or yourself,” Malory told her.
“Maybe not. Just realistic. Anyway, he makes me nervous. I guess its not only the money, really. Jordan has money, he must with all those bestsellers. But he doesnt make me so nervous. We had a nice, easy time together when he came over and fixed my car.”
Dana lost her rhythm and ended up with a splinter in her thumb. “Your car?” Scowling, she sucked viciously at the thumb. “Jordan fixed your car?”
“Yeah. I didnt know he used to work on cars. He really knows his way around an engine, too. He just came by the other afternoon with all these tools and said why didnt he have a look at my car for me. It was really sweet of him.”
“Hes just a big sugar cookie,” Dana said with a smile that clamped her teeth together.
“Oh, dont be like that, Dana.”Zoe switched off the sander, angled her head. “He didnt have to bother, and he spent over two hours messing with it, and wouldnt take anything but two glasses of iced tea.”
“I bet he ogled your ass when you walked in the house to get it.”
“Maybe.”Zoe worked hard to keep her face sober. “But only in a healthy, friend-of-the-family sort of way. A small price to pay for saving me another trip to the garage. And the fact is, my car hasnt run this well since I bought it. Actually, it didnt run this well then, either.”
“Yeah, he always was good with cars.” And generous with his time, Dana was forced to admit. “Youre right, it was considerate.”
“And sweet,” Malory added with a meaningful look at Dana.
“And sweet,” she mumbled.
“He let Simon hang around him when he got home from school, too.”Zoe flipped the sander back on, bent to her
work. “Its fun to see Simon pal around with a man. I guess I have to say Bradley was nice to Simon too, and I appreciate that.”
“So neither of them put the moves on Simons mother?” Dana wanted to know. “No.” With a half laugh,Zoe scooted farther down the porch. “Of course not. Jordan was just doing a favor for a friend, and Bradley… its not like that.”
Danas opinion was a long hmmm as she got back to work.
By lunchtime the porch was sufficiently prepped to passZoes inspection. They gave their tired muscles a rest and sat on the sanded boards eating tuna sandwiches.
With a mornings work behind them, the sun bright, and the mood mellow, Dana decided it was time to tell them her experience of the night before.
“So… I had a little run-in with Kane last night.”
Malory choked, grabbed for her bottle of water. “What? What ? Weve been here for over three hours, and youre just getting around to telling us that?”
“I didnt want to start off the morning with it. I knew wed all get freaked again.”
“Youre okay?”Zoe laid a hand on Danas arm. “Youre not hurt or anything?”
“No, but Ive got to tell you, the little brush I had with him before was nothing compared to this. I knew what happened with you, Mal, but I still didnt get it. I do now.”
“Tell us.“ Malory shifted so she andZoe flanked Dana.
It was easier this time. She was able to relate the experience more calmly and with more detail than shed done with Jordan. Still, her voice shook at times, and she had to reach for her Thermos of coffee, sip slowly to ease her throat.
“You couldve drowned.”Zoe put her arm around Danas shoulder. “In the tub.”
“I wondered about that. But I dont think so. If he could just, well, eliminate us, why not have us walk off a cliff, or step in front of a truck? Something like that.”
“Boy, thats really cheery.”Zoe stared out at the street, nearly winced when a car drove by. “Im so glad you mentioned it.”