by Jodi Thomas
“I bet that was so exciting,” Border said. “What happened? That is, if you can tell me. I bet it was wild.”
In a bland tone, as if she were talking to a child, she answered, “My team walked into a trap at an old warehouse we thought was empty. We were caught in cross-fire. Everyone died except me. I walked away without a scratch.”
No one in the car said a word until they were inside the bed-and-breakfast. Even then when they ate from plastic leftover cartons, no one mentioned anything about a shooting, past or present.
Chapter 43
AFTER THE BAND LEFT MARTHA Q’S PLACE, RICK WASN’T surprised to find Trace in the dark drawing room studying the movements beyond the window. He could tell by her stance that she was on guard, watching, protecting, even though the doors were locked and the security system was on.
“You all right?” he asked as he moved to her side.
“I’m thinking when he comes again, he’ll hit somewhere quiet, someplace where you’re alone and he’ll have no distractions. Tonight wasn’t planned out. He probably saw us come in and went out to his car or truck for the gun. He wasn’t thinking about the people, only you.” She watched one of the sheriff’s cruisers pass slowly in front of the house. “He knows he made a mistake tonight. His next hit will be planned. When he comes again, he’ll be better prepared.”
“Don’t you mean ‘if’ he comes again? Maybe tonight’s failure will turn him off and he’ll give up.”
“You’re dreaming, Matheson.”
He leaned very near her ear. “If I were,” he whispered, “you’d be naked.”
She pushed away. “Get serious. Whoever’s out there isn’t stopping until you’re dead. He proved that tonight by risking firing at you in a crowd. He’s insane, and each attempt drives him a little farther over the edge.”
Rick leaned against the frame of the window. The night was so still it could have been a Thomas Kinkade painting just beyond the porch. “I’ve been around guns all my life and I’m guessing you have too. What are the chances of someone firing three shots in a crowded bar and not hitting anyone?”
“He hit Tannon Parker.”
“I heard the third bullet ricochet off the roof. I think that hit was an accident. The shooter was aiming at the roof.”
She moved closer, keeping her voice low. “So you’re saying the gunfire was meant to frighten you, not kill you?”
He nodded very slowly as if letting the idea sink in.
“What about the car through the diner window? I was there. It was no accident.”
“Yeah, but we were the only ones there. Think about it, Trace. I was sitting facing the direction the car came from. I would have had to be asleep not to see it coming.”
Trace thought for a moment, then nodded. “So you think someone is not trying to kill you, that they just want to scare you to death.”
Rick bumped his shoulder against hers. “I think whoever is out there is trying to scare me into changing my behavior. All I can’t figure out is what they want me to do or not do. Maybe my moving out of town would make them happy. If I had a case, I’d think they’d want me to abandon it and run. If I were dating anyone they’d be sending a message for me to get lost.”
“So, since you’re not dating and you don’t have any clients except the Peterses, the only choice left is get out of town.”
“You offering to take me in?”
She laughed. “I can’t even keep a plant alive. You could always consider the possibility that someone just picked your name out of the phone book or the school annual. Maybe it’s not you but just a random target he’s selected.”
Rick moved his hand along her back. “Nope, it’s personal. He picked me. I just don’t know why, but the guy had to have studied my habits.” Rick leaned in close and touched his body to hers. “How about kissing me like you did before we went into the bar?”
She started to answer, but his mouth covered hers and they were both lost. He loved the feel of her against him, and he knew she felt the same way. She’d be gone in a few days and he’d either be dead or moving on with his life, but either way Rick knew he’d be missing her all the way to cell memory level.
With one hot kiss, she’d become the benchmark of what he wanted. Since the eighth grade, he’d probably kissed a hundred or more girls, but not one could measure up to the way she reacted to him.
He pushed her toward the couch and leaned down over her body as she relaxed against the dozen pillows.
“We can’t be doing this,” she said as she pulled his shirt open. “We have to stop.”
“Yeah, right,” he laughed as he tugged her boots off.
She bit into his shoulder as he moved his hand down her back until he cupped her bottom. With one tug, he straightened her flat on the couch and lowered himself above her. Loving her was a battle of passion with both giving and taking. Both holding back before surrendering. Both demanding all that the other could give.
He felt like he was touching flames. No, not just touching, diving into the fire. Being here, touching her was a hundred times better than any fantasy he could have imagined. Her body fit against his. Her breathing matched his. Her passion exploded against him. Making love to her was like riding the rapids down the Grand Canyon or skiing a few feet ahead of an avalanche. There was no stopping, no slowing down, no time to think. The knowledge that she was running full speed with him made his heart pound so hard it threatened to crack his ribs from the inside.
When it was over, clothes and shattered minds lay around them. For a few minutes, Rick simply fought to breathe, then he rolled to his feet.
She lay among the pillows, her long body beautiful in the moonlight. For the first time since he’d known Trace, she was still, completely still, totally relaxed. He moved his hand along her body, damp with sweat, and a spark of fire began to burn atop the coals of the last blaze. She opened her eyes and in the green depths he saw a fire building also.
“Come on,” he whispered as he leaned over and lifted her up. “We’re taking a shower. I’m not sleeping with you while we’re both sweaty.”
“No,” she complained, but her body was limp as a rag doll. “I’m not sleeping with you.”
He pulled her into the warm shower and began washing her, allowing his hands to move slowly over her.
She took turns moaning her pleasure and swearing she would not sleep with him.
They were still arguing when they moved out of the shower, but he was laughing as he tossed her on the bed. Something about knowing that a woman could easily kill you a half dozen painful ways if she wanted to makes a man completely secure in bullying her.
“I’m not staying,” she said as she sat up.
“Yes, you are,” he answered as he laid his arm across her and pulled the covers up. “So shut up and go to sleep.”
“Why?” she challenged, without fighting back.
“Because, Trace Adams, I’m crazy about you, and unless you plan to shoot me, you might as well get used to having me around.” He laughed as she rolled against him. “I tell you what, how about you sleep and I’ll watch over you for a change?”
He patted her bottom. “Now stop moving around. Forget about leaving and go to sleep.”
To his surprise that was exactly what she did.
Chapter 44
SATURDAY MIDNIGHT
TANNON DIDN’T LIKE THE WAY DR. ADDISON SPENCER looked at him when he walked into the emergency room. He decided she probably had him marked as a troublemaker since this was his second wound in two days.
When he told her it happened in a bar, he didn’t do much to improve her opinion. While she worked, he tried asking about Tinch Turner. Everyone knew it was just a matter of time before the two of them tied the knot. She might be a big-city girl used to living with a boyfriend, but Tinch was small town. He’d want a ring on her finger.
The doc looked up from the bloody arm. “Looks like the bullet just grazed across your skin. It’s deep. Probably leave a scar but n
ot deep enough to require stitches. You’re a very lucky man, Mr. Parker.”
So much for small talk, Tannon thought. “The sheriff will be disappointed that you don’t have to dig a bullet out of me.”
Addison finally smiled. “We gave up digging bullets out a hundred years ago. It’s called surgery if needed, which you don’t. I’d send a few prescriptions home with you, but I’m sure you’re not halfway through the bottles I gave you yesterday.”
As she cleaned and bandaged his arm, she finally answered his question. “Tinch is fine, by the way. He’s probably sleeping in his pickup out back waiting for me to finish my shift, which was over two hours ago.”
“I’m holding you up.”
“You and a dozen others. This must be a full moon—you wouldn’t believe the crazy things going on tonight.”
“Yes, I would.” Tannon leaned back and closed his eyes. “Tinch and I are friends, or at least we were when we were kids. I’m real glad to see him happy again. I’m glad he found a woman like you, Addison.”
“A woman like me?” Addison frowned, and he wouldn’t have been surprised if she told him to call her Dr. Spencer.
Several compliments came to mind. Addison was beautiful and obviously very bright, but he had a feeling that wouldn’t be something she’d care to hear, so he said the only thing that matters: “a loving woman.”
She accepted the compliment as she finished taping his arm. When they walked out into the lobby, she saw Emily rushing toward them and said, “It appears, Mr. Parker, you’ve found the same kind of woman.”
Tannon grinned. “I have and I plan to do my best to keep her, but she doesn’t know it yet.”
Emily hugged him tightly, asking one question after another without giving Tannon any time to answer.
Dr. Spencer stepped back and smiled. Her words were soft, but he heard them. She said simply, “I think she knows.”
Tannon answered all Emily’s questions as they drove back to his place. It had been her idea to go to the bar to hear Beau play and now she kept blaming herself for his wound.
They didn’t touch as they rode up the elevator. When the door opened he said, “You’re staying with me tonight.” It was a statement. He couldn’t let her leave after coming so close to losing her.
“All right.” She fumbled for the pain pills the doctor had handed her in case Tannon needed them.
“I don’t want those,” he answered before she asked.
“All right,” she said, and set them on the counter. “Can I get you—”
“Emily, stop mothering me.”
“All right.”
“And stop saying all right. Everything is not all right. You were frightened and I’m mad.” He hadn’t meant to yell, but even he could hear the words bouncing off the wall and back at him.
She stood there looking adorable in her wool coat and wool gloves and wool scarf. He hadn’t even thought of the jacket he’d left in the bar. If a snow slide rolled off the Rockies and smothered the whole town, she’d be the only one in Harmony prepared.
“Are you mad at me, Tannon?” She moved her hands as if winding invisible yarn.
He forced the muscles in his jaw to relax but he couldn’t manage a smile. “No. I’m not mad at you, honey. I’m mad at whoever fired those shots. I almost lost you. Oh, God, if I’d lost you again…” He couldn’t finish.
She raised her hand and brushed her glove along his cheek. As always she understood him far better than he’d ever understand her.
Pulling her to him, he lifted her off the floor and just held her as tight as he dared. “If I lost you, I think I might go mad.” He was afraid if he told her just how much she meant to him that he’d frighten her even more than the shots in the bar had. She’d always been his normal, his balance in a world that didn’t make sense. Even when they’d been apart at college, he’d known she was there and once they were both back in Harmony, just knowing she was safe a few blocks away in the library had balanced his days.
He lowered her slowly. “Can we go to bed? It’s been a long day.”
“All…of course. You’re probably exhausted.”
She disappeared into the bathroom and he slowly stripped his clothes off and crawled into what was now his side of the bed. Between his hand and his arm, a slow ache thumbed against his right side. Taking a few aspirin, he washed them down with bourbon and water. He took his time letting his muscles relax. He’d spent his entire adult life learning to be hard and cold and all business. Now he was going to have to learn to be kind. It wasn’t enough that he protected her, that he’d die for her. He needed not to frighten her with his dark moods.
He waited for an eternity for her to step out of the bathroom, and finally she emerged wearing his shirt. He knew they needed to talk. They needed to get out all the unsaid words they’d both held back for years. He had to tell her he was sorry he hadn’t been there for her fifteen years ago. He had to know that she’d forgiven him before he could let his heart completely go.
Part of him wouldn’t blame her for walking away when she learned that he’d been the one who’d found her that night and walked away without ever talking to her. He’d left her at the hospital. He should have been there to stop the fight. He should have been there as she recovered. He should have always been there for her. If he had, maybe she wouldn’t be so shy now. Maybe she wouldn’t be afraid of relationships. Maybe she wouldn’t be afraid of the dark.
But right now, with her standing in the glow of the streetlights in his shadowy bedroom, all he could think about was holding her. Reason told him he couldn’t silently wash away all the pain she’d suffered, but reason wasn’t his strong suit right now. He’d been there for her tonight and maybe that could be a place where loving could start.
“You want to sit on the couch tonight or in bed when I take my time kissing you good night?”
“In bed, but don’t close the drapes. I like it when I can see you. I don’t like the dark.”
He knew why. He remembered her screams in the back parking lot by the stadium. The night had been so dark between the car and the back fence he couldn’t tell where she’d been hurt until car lights flashed over them. “There’s nothing in the dark but me. You’re not afraid of me, are you, Emily?”
“No, I’ve never been afraid of you.” She moved toward the bed.
“Then what are you afraid of now? The shooting is over. The doors are locked and I flipped the switch on the elevator. We’re alone and safe.”
“I just don’t like the dark.” She puffed up her pillows.
He remembered her apartment. The lights in every room were on when he’d entered.
“Emily, tell me about the night you were attacked. Tell me about the time your mother always called ‘the accident,’ even though everyone in town knew it was no accident.”
“I don’t want to talk about it. Mom said if I never talked about it I’d forget all about it in time. I’d heal. It was only a few minutes of my life, but somehow everything seems measured in the before and after of that one slice of time.”
He sat down on the bed and brushed his hand over her hair. “And did you heal?”
She turned away. “I don’t want to talk about it. Let’s go to sleep.”
When he reached for her arm, she pulled away. “I don’t want to be touched tonight. I’m tired. I’ll kiss you good night in the morning.”
Tannon knew he’d lost the battle, and if he wasn’t careful, he’d lose her too. “If that’s the way you want it.”
“That’s the way I want it.”
“Then good night.” He forced any anger or frustration from his voice and hoped she didn’t hear how mad at the world he felt. She was so gentle, so kind. Nothing or no one should ever hurt her.
She was here in his bed, wasn’t that enough for a while? He didn’t have to force her to talk. He didn’t have to push her into being more than they were now. Now was good. Hell, now was the best time in his life. Work was still demanding more hours than w
ere in a day. His mother wouldn’t be out of the hospital for at least another week, but she was well enough to complain. But Emily was safe beside him and that mattered all the way to his core.
He had no idea how long he lay watching the lights of town. An hour, two. Finally, he felt the bed shift and she rolled toward him.
“Hold me,” she whispered. “I don’t want to talk. I just want to feel safe.”
He gently wrapped her in his arms and they both fell asleep. Holding her was all he wanted, and if feeling safe was all she wanted, he decided he could live with that. As he drifted off, he swore there would never be another time when he wasn’t there to protect her from harm. He’d been there tonight and he’d be there again. Maybe one day he’d get up enough courage to tell her she was the best part of him, she always had been.
A little after dawn he awoke with her kissing his neck and her hand brushing his chest.
“Morning,” he mumbled. “You the new alarm clock?”
She continued kissing him, moving up to his cheek. “Your beard tickles.”
“I could go shave and be back in five minutes.”
She laughed against his ear. “No. We have to get up.” She rolled from the bed. “Mind if I take a shower here? Then all I’ll have to do is change clothes when I get back to my place.”
“Help yourself.” He yelled as she disappeared into the bathroom. “You could move a few things over. My closet has got plenty of room. That way you wouldn’t have to make a run to your place every time you sleep over.”
“No,” she answered. “That would be too much like we were living together.”
She closed the door before he had time to answer. Tannon buried his face in her pillow and took a deep breath of the honeysuckle scent left by her hair. Of course they couldn’t look like they were living together; after all, they were only sleeping over at each other’s place. They were just friends.
He listened to the shower, wishing he’d offered to share rather than let her go first. When the water stopped and she walked out wrapped in one of his big towels, he thought this just-friends arrangement would surely put him in an early grave. If she hadn’t disappeared into the kitchen to make coffee, he might have lost what little reason he had left. This sleeping-over arrangement was a thorny heaven.