What was the point?
An itch scratched?
How empty was that?
What the fuck was going on with me?
Why was I even thinking about this shit?
I didn't even have to really listen to hear the water in the bath splash around as Sloane moved, and I knew what was going on with me.
That woman naked in the other room.
Why?
That was the question.
All I could say was... something was different.
And that was all I would ever say.
Because in a few short days, she'd be gone.
I'd never see her again.
"What's up with you?" Kai asked, snapping me out of my thoughts.
"What do you mean?"
"You're distracted and want to... talk."
"I talk," I objected.
"You bark and growl and bitch about clients," he clarified.
"Yeah, talking," I agreed, lips twitching a bit.
"Guess Ranger was right, huh?"
"About?"
"He said something about how this woman got hooks in you. Said you didn't even feel them yet, but they're there. And that they're gonna rip chunks of you out when you leave her in Nevada."
"You been smoking, Kai?" I asked, brows drawing together. "'Cause I'm pretty sure Ranger has never said something that sentimental in his life."
"He talks sometimes too. Maybe just not to you," Kai said, sounding like he was shrugging.
And, well, I guess everyone talked to Kai.
That made sense.
He was that kind of guy. Easy to talk to, good for a listen, happy to be a sounding board, never one to lecture or even offer unwanted advice.
Shit.
Maybe Ranger was more than just a guy from the woods with a messed-up past and anti-social personality.
"Hard to talk to someone who is allergic to his phone."
"You could visit him."
"No one visits him. Unless there's a job."
"Don't know what you're talking about; I go down for dinner once every month or two."
"You're shitting me."
"He's a good cook, man. And he makes hot chocolate. From scratch. With milk from one of his cows."
"Wait, what? Since the fuck when does he have cows?"
"Got a whole self-sustaining farm, Gunn. Cows, chickens, goats. When's the last time you were there?"
"Two years I guess." And admitting that made me sound - and feel - like a really shitty friend. "He barely had the house and shed built," I added.
"Gotta go visit. He's got some good shit going on. Clients hate it. He makes them do work," he added, sounding like he was smiling.
And because I could picture that, I felt my lips curving up too. "Can you picture Fenway crouched down in those designer pants of his, milking a cow?"
"That image is perhaps the only thing that makes interacting with him for longer than an hour tolerable. But from what I hear, he's been laying lower than usual."
"I'll believe that when more than a year passes without some huge international scandal sending him our way."
"So, when can we expect you back? Things are getting downright cordial here without you."
I chuckled at that, shaking my head. "A week until I hit the road again. Maybe a little longer. Depends on how all the steps go when we get to her destination. Then another five days trip back to Jersey."
"Alrighty. Keep us updated," he demanded as I heard the distinct click of Jules's heels. He was rushing me off the phone.
"Will do."
"Take care of your girl."
He hung up before I could say she wasn't my girl.
That she could never be my girl.
"Quin?" Sloane's voice asked, making me jerk upright to find her standing there in that goddamn silk robe of hers. And, from what I could tell, nothing else underneath, her wet hair darker than usual, but hanging down for a change, framing her delicate face.
"Kai," I corrected.
"I didn't meet him."
"He's our Messenger," I supplied. "In love with Jules."
"That's sweet."
"Except for the fact that Jules is oblivious."
"Then that's kind of sad," she told me, walking over toward her bed, the smell of the bath stuff still clinging to her, filling the air around her. The urge to press her down and taste every inch of her skin was making it hard to focus.
"Yeah, it is," I agreed, but maybe only a part of me was talking about Kai and Jules. And the bigger part was talking about Sloane and me.
"Hey, Gunner?" she asked a moment later, making me turn to find her looking at me with those light eyes of hers.
"Yeah, duchess?" I asked, hearing the strain in my own voice, a tiredness that I couldn't attribute to the strain of the drive.
"I have no pajamas," she informed me, it being the last possible thing I could have anticipated.
"What?" I asked, sure I misheard her.
"All my pajamas are dry clean only. And I've worn them all now."
My knee-jerk reaction was to tell her she'd have to sleep naked then. But for some reason, I bit that comment back. "I can lend you something if you want. We'll find someplace to dry clean at the next stop."
"Thank you," she said, giving me a relieved smile, like this shit had been weighing on her.
"Here," I started, jumping up, going to grab my duffel, finding one of my rolled t-shirts. "This should be long enough," I offered, handing the gray tee to her.
"Thanks," she said, going off to change.
And when she came out in my shirt, I had the oddest fucking reaction.
This feels right.
The rest of this job was going to take an immeasurable amount of self-control.
NINE
Sloane
I almost wished for a nightmare.
That was silly and maybe even a bit immature.
To need an excuse to get close to him, to have him put his hands on me again, to acknowledge what was going on between us.
But I didn't have a nightmare.
My teeth didn't chatter with cold.
I just lay there staring up at the ceiling for hours, saying nothing, doing nothing, trying to think of nothing.
Eventually, I drifted off to sleep.
And woke up to his hand on me.
Well, just on my arm.
But it counted.
"Are we burning daylight already?" I asked, voice groggy as my hand scrubbed at my tired, dry eyes.
"Just about," he said, giving me one of those soft smiles.
Soft smiles when it was too early to have my guards up to fend off the feelings that bloomed in me from seeing them.
"There had better be coffee if you're waking me up before the sun is even up," I warned him, noticing his hand hadn't moved from my arm, that he was absentmindedly - or possibly deliberately, it was impossible to tell - stroking over the skin there.
"There's coffee," he assured me.
"Ugh," I grumbled, finally fully focusing on him. "Did you shower already?"
"Hit the gym downstairs, grabbed coffee and breakfast, and showered, yeah," he agreed.
"You're a robot," I concluded. "That's the only explanation."
"You'll get used to it."
"I'd just as soon rather not," I said, making a little chuckle move through him.
"Don't make me go all drill sergeant on you," he warned.
"I can take it," I insisted.
Then he was on his feet, ripping the sheets off, making the cool air of the room prickle over my exposed skin.
And I mean exposed.
Because I must have been tossing around in my sleep. His tee was all kinds of bunched around my waist, showing off a few inches of my belly... and all of my legs. And the obnoxiously feminine baby pink silk and lace panties I had on.
"Fuck," Gunner hissed under his breath, his entire body going tense, like he was actively trying to keep it under control, like he was doing his best to hold back.
Instinctively, my legs shifted, dragging his attention up the bare length of them, eyes getting more hooded, hand curling into a fist.
And me, yeah, I had no idea what to say, to do, how to react to his reaction.
I mean, on a logical level anyway.
My body, it knew what it wanted, how to react.
My skin flushed, pink taking over the normal paleness down my arms and legs, and while I couldn't see it, I bet my face and neck as well.
My breasts felt heavier, the nipples getting hard instantly.
A deep, throbbing pulsation started between my legs as my breathing went shallow and too fast, matching my heartbeat.
"Just give me a reason," he demanded, sounding almost, I don't know, desperate? A man like him, desperate? That seemed almost impossible.
"A reason?" Was that my voice? It didn't sound like my voice. It sounded throaty, needy, foreign to my own ears.
"Just give me one reason to turn and walk away right now," he pleaded, his breathing seeming to go as shallow as my own.
I meant to stay silent.
I didn't want to give him a reason.
I didn't want him to turn and walk away.
I wanted him to make good on the promise in his eyes.
But my stupid, stupid mouth found words.
Ridiculous, nonsensical words.
"I haven't brushed my teeth yet."
Yep.
That was what I said.
I swear it surprised me as much as him.
He looked blank for a second, then a small smile pulled at his lips.
"Guess that will work," he said, then turned and did what he said. He walked away.
Away away.
He left the room.
Leaving me there on the bed, body in chaos, mind berating myself for being so darn stupid.
What was wrong with me?
Why would I ruin what I really wanted?
Even if making out without brushing your teeth was pretty gross.
"Ugh," I growled at myself, actually kicking my feet against the mattress in frustration.
What was wrong with me?
I wanted it.
He wanted it.
The moment was right.
And I screwed it up.
No wonder I hadn't been laid in years.
I had become completely oblivious in how to handle interactions with the opposite sex that wasn't work-related.
And, chances were, now that I royally messed this up, there would never be another opportunity.
On the one hand, I understood that even wanting to go there was insane for me. I wasn't a huge fan of casual sexual encounters. And, well, he was most certainly not my type.
But maybe that was the appeal here.
He wasn't my type, but I wanted him. This situation I found myself in meant that all it could ever be was a fling, so there was no worry about the repercussions of my actions.
Hell, even as I was trying to justify it to myself, I didn't believe it.
It was more than that.
There was more than that here.
If there were time to do so, I knew that this had the potential for depth. Actual depth. The kind where I could tell him - the only person in the world who would hear this story - that when I got my period the first time at eleven, my mom threw a box of tampons and condoms at me, telling me that the boys would be sniffing around me like a bitch in heat, and that she wasn't raising No brat of mine because I didn't make him wrap it up.
Or about how when I was sixteen and coming home from a pool party at a friend's house in my modest bathing suit, she had backhanded me so hard that I flew into the end table in the living room, cutting up the side of my face, because I had come in with my tits all out in front of her boyfriend, giving him all kinds of ideas.
Or maybe even about the time she told me when I was eighteen how I completely ruined her life and scared her man - my father - away, that she wished she'd never had me, or had dropped me off at the fire station, or had drowned me in the bathtub.
Maybe I could tell him that.
Maybe I could get it off my shoulders.
Maybe I could know what it felt like not to keep all that to myself.
To open up.
To let him in.
As I got up and brushed my teeth, put on my makeup, my clothes, got myself safely behind my masks again, there was a deep, undeniable sadness at the idea of that lost opportunity.
Why?
I couldn't say.
There could be other men.
Someday.
That came into my life.
But that being said, history had shown me that none had seemed to get it, to understand the persona, that there was a reason for it, that if they just showed me that it was safe to do so, I could open up, I could let it all fall away.
So far, Gunner was the only man who saw through me, who knew there was something painful underneath that I tried to keep hidden, who wanted to see what the other parts of me were like.
"Coffee is getting cold, duchess," Gunner called, as though he knew I had been done for a long time, was just standing there looking at myself until my own reflection became foreign and ugly to me.
"Coming," I said, shoving all my makeup and products back into their bag, slipping on my heels, then moving back out into the main area, finding he had already packed everything else up and left a tip for housekeeping on the dresser. "I can just eat on the run," I assured him, gesturing toward the plate he had set out on the desk.
"And deprive you the use of your beloved table? I think not," he teased, smile curved up, but it somehow didn't quite meet his eyes.
"I didn't use the table last night," I objected.
"You used the nightstand," he shot back.
"Where else was I supposed to put the container?"
"In your hand. On your lap. Seen chicks balance those fucking things on their tits," he informed me, making me snort as I drank my orange juice, a bit worried it might come out of my nose very elegantly in response to that image.
"I don't have much of a shelf here," I informed him, waving at my body. I doubted I could balance a candy bar on my breasts, let alone a takeaway container.
"Got enough," he informed me in that offhand way he talked about basic facts.
It certainly was no high praise, but I must have been starved for compliments, because it made me feel oddly warm inside to hear that.
I picked at the fruit, yogurt, and granola parfait he had gotten for me, liking it too much that he had chosen exactly what I would have chosen for myself out of the many options I knew the hotel would have set up, from omelets to French toast.
"Ready?" he asked when I had tossed what was remaining, grabbed my coffee, and stood.
"Yeah. Can we get my pad out of the back before we take off?" I asked, knowing that whatever I worked on would be a bit shaky depending on the roads, but needing something to keep my focus on other than him, and me, and the chances we would never get to explore.
"Sure," he said, not looking back at me as he hauled up the bags, and made his way to the door.
It was something I would notice for the whole day as we drove.
He watched out the window.
The rearview.
He looked at his phone in its mount to check his course.
But he wouldn't look at me.
Not even when I started shifting in my seat, finding my stomach bothering me more than I thought it should have, enough to wonder if something was maybe wrong.
He didn't even look when I rummaged in my purse to find my pain medicine I knew he knew I hated taking, and popped two.
Not even a look from his peripheral.
Or so I thought anyway.
I woke up to him growling at me, not sure how or when I had fallen asleep, but blaming the pain medicine on principle.
"The fuck is this?" he asked, making me jump, looking over to find my sketchpad in his hands.
"I didn't say you could look through th
at," I half-shrieked, reaching for it, but he just yanked it back away.
The first few pages were purses I had drawn back in my old life. Then my apartment. The cabin. A bit of the hotel room that I didn't finish. One of him giving me a raised-brow look he wore so often.
But then, as my mind had been seeking things to focus on that didn't involve him, I started to sketch other half-finished things. Scenes from my childhood, adolescence, things that maybe I should have purged onto paper a long time ago like this guy a friend of mine was dating who was majoring in psychology had suggested.
Pictures of booze and pills on my kitchen table.
Empty cabinets.
My father smacking around my mother.
My mother smacking around me.
And the one his eyes seemed to be so fixated on.
The one of me fishing something out of the neighbor's trash bin at the street.
An old McDonald's box.
There had only been a few fries in it.
But it was more than I had had all day.
"Gunner, please," I said, voice thick with an emotion I almost didn't recognize at first because it was so new to me. Vulnerability. Complete and utter exposure, and the fear and insecurity that came with that.
"Sloane... what the fuck?" he asked, looking up at me finally. His voice was thick too, lower, almost quiet.
"We were between Food Stamps that week," I supplied, humiliation - though it was certainly not my fault - welling up inside, making my face feel hot. "There was nothing in the house."
"Jesus Christ," he said, sounding genuinely sad for little nine-year-old me. "Why didn't she take you to a food pantry or soup kitchen or some shit?"
"I imagine because she was too drunk to realize I was starving," I said, hearing a snippiness in my tone, not knowing why it was there. I certainly never wanted to defend the woman, excuse her actions.
"Where'd the money for alcohol come from?"
"Honestly? I don't know. I don't want to."
"I get it, baby," he said, the endearment making my belly wobble a little. Not duchess. Baby. It somehow seemed more personal. Especially as his hand went to my leg right above my knee, and gave it a squeeze.
"Get what?"
"This," he said releasing my leg to wave at me. "You. I get it. But this shit, this doesn't define you. You don't need to be embarrassed about it. You were a kid. Your mom was a bitch. Your dad was useless. None of that reflects on you."
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