by Lisa Childs
A twinge of pain struck her heart. “You don’t want to be involved at all?” she asked. She’d known that Nick didn’t love her, but she thought he at least cared—about her, but also about their baby.
“I don’t know how to be involved,” he said. “I never had a father.”
And he hadn’t had much of a mother, either. Annalise had been taking the blame for not getting rid of the woman’s things. But it was Carla who’d stolen something from a drug dealer. What had she taken?
“Do you want to be involved?” she asked. That was the important question.
Her belly shifted beneath his hand, which he’d pressed against it. And his blue eyes widened with surprise and wonder as they had every time he’d felt the baby move. He reacted like it was a miracle.
Maybe it was. She had never expected that Nick—who had always griped at her for touching him—would make love to her with such passion that they made a child together.
He was looking at her now—and the surprise and wonder was still in his gaze. Along with something else...
But she was probably only imagining it. Nick didn’t love her. As he’d said a million times, he didn’t even know how to love.
Nick didn’t love her. But he wanted her. His hands moved from her belly to her breasts. She wore only a light nightgown. Her nipples puckered through the thin material. He brushed his thumbs across them.
She bit her bottom lip to hold in the moan that burned the back of her throat. But then his mouth was there, his teeth nipping lightly at her bottom lip, too. She gasped at the delicious sensation, and his tongue stroked soothingly over her bottom lip before sliding inside her mouth.
He kissed her deeply, passionately—so passionately that her knees weakened and she trembled. He swung her up in his arms and carried her to the master bedroom.
“What are you doing?” she asked. He hadn’t answered her last question, hadn’t told her whether or not he wanted to be involved in their son’s life.
Or was this his answer?
“You told me to get some rest,” he reminded her. He laid her on the bed, then stripped off his clothes.
Somehow she doubted he was going to get any rest. And neither would she. But she would rather have Nick than sleep any day.
She held out her arms, reaching for him, tugging him down onto the bed with her. His erection prodded her hip. But he held back, held on to control, and made love to her. He touched her everywhere, his fingertips gliding over her skin. And he kissed everywhere he touched.
He made love to her with his mouth. She squirmed against the mattress, clutching at him as she sought the release she needed from the tension he’d built inside her body. Finally it broke, and she cried out his name.
Nick tensed. She knew he needed it, too. He needed her love. She showed it in her touch, in her kiss.
She made love to him with her mouth. But he pulled back and pulled her down on top of him. He helped her straddle him and take him deep inside her. His hands on her hips guided her, teased her.
Until she felt that unbearable pressure building again. She needed it to break. Needed Nick...
She rocked against him, and her body shuddered as the orgasm overwhelmed her. She’d never felt the pleasure Nick gave her. She’d never felt that soul-deep connection with anyone else.
Only Nick...
Could all of that be only her imagination—like the love she’d thought she’d glimpsed in the depths of his blue eyes? Or was it possible that Nick loved her but didn’t know how to express it? Or maybe he didn’t think that he could express it right now because he didn’t know if either of them would survive the danger they were in.
* * *
The ding of an incoming email jerked Nikki awake. Not that she’d been sleeping on purpose. She must have nodded off at her computer. She straightened up from slumping over her desk at the Payne Protection Agency.
She had come back to Logan’s offices because it was where she’d worked the longest. She didn’t have her desk set up yet at Cooper’s—because she didn’t want a desk job anymore. She wanted fieldwork, wanted to be a real bodyguard. Not a computer nerd.
But being a computer nerd had its perks, too. She opened her email with a cry of triumph. She’d told Nick she would get the transcript before him, and she had, but probably only because she’d hacked his email and stayed awake until it came in.
She felt a momentary flash of guilt. But it wasn’t as if she wasn’t going to tell him what she learned. It wasn’t as if she didn’t trust that he would have told her what he’d found out.
He would have.
Probably.
But then again, he was Nick, and he was used to being a loner. Used to making his own plan and carrying it out like he’d tried to at the storage unit.
Everyone else had been upset with him for going rogue. But Nikki had understood. He’d had an opportunity, and he’d taken it. He would have been a fool if he hadn’t at least tried to take down the man who’d been terrorizing Annalise.
He loved her. He looked at her the same besotted way her other brothers looked at their wives. The way the Kozminskis looked at theirs.
Did Nick know it, though?
From what she’d found out about his biological mother, Nikki suspected he’d had very little love in his life. Just Annalise...
She reminded Nikki of her mom. She was that affectionate, that nurturing. So Annalise’s love would have been enough.
Why hadn’t Penny been enough for Nikki’s dad? Why had he betrayed her with a woman like Nick’s mom? She flipped through the transcripts that painted a vivid picture of Carla Monelli. Rus had been the last name of the US Marshal who’d relocated her after she’d testified against Darren Snow.
She had probably seduced him, as well. She’d been beautiful with that kind of waiflike vulnerability a lot of men found irresistible. Nikki was petite like her mom, but she had never been vulnerable and never would be. Not physically and sure as hell not emotionally.
Penny was tough, too. She’d had to be or she wouldn’t have survived all the pain she had suffered because of a man. Even before he’d been killed in the line of duty, Penny had lost Nicholas Payne.
To Carla...
A woman who would have done anything to feed her addiction. But that addiction might have been men as well as drugs. Nikki’s heart ached for the childhood—or lack thereof—that Nick must have had. With a woman like Carla, he would have had to be the responsible one. The adult.
No wonder he was as independent as he was. He was used to having to take care of himself. And her...
But Carla had done something to take care of herself. She’d taken something for insurance. Testifying against the drug dealer had gotten her away from the abusive man as well as setting her up in a new life, in a new city, with a new name and a house and a job.
Maybe she’d thought she would have a man with her, maybe Nikki’s dad. But he had stayed with his wife. She hadn’t entered the witness protection program alone, though. She’d been carrying Nick and whatever she had stolen from the Iceman.
Money?
Nick had doubted it. He’d said she would have used it for drugs. He’d said she would have pawned anything of value, as well. So what was it?
She had testified against Darren for witnessing one murder. But he’d been suspected of several others. What if the gun that he’d used was found?
Nikki snapped her fingers. That was what she’d taken. Hell, Nick should have figured that out. Not long ago, he’d sent Garek Kozminski undercover to find a gun to link Viktor Chekov to a murder.
That gun had implicated another killer entirely, though. But Nick had still brought down Chekov. If he found this gun before Darren Snow found it, he could send the recently paroled killer back to prison. No wonder the Iceman was so desperate to get it a
way from Nick.
As Nikki had learned over the years, desperate men were incredibly dangerous. Nick had to be careful. But he wasn’t the only one. Anyone helping Nick was in danger, too. Nikki had already been hurt. She touched the bruises on her face. Her skin was tender and swollen. And the stitches pulled at the cut on her temple. Pulled and itched.
She resisted the urge to scratch them. Barely.
A few bruises and a little cut were no big deal. Annalise had gotten a concussion, and Nick had been shot. The Iceman was definitely dangerous.
To all of them...
She had no more than considered the thought when she heard it—the sound of someone rattling the outside door, trying to get in. It was too early for anyone else to be arriving at work. Even Logan didn’t come in this early—at least, not since he’d married Stacy Kozminski.
No. It had to be someone else breaking in.
Maybe someone who had realized that she’d been helping Nick—that she had the answers he wanted. She reached for her weapon. This time her hand shook less than it had before. She was getting used to pointing the barrel at someone, getting used to firing.
Because she knew with a killer like the Iceman, she would get only one chance to protect herself.
Chapter 23
Nick must have been given an old key when he’d hired on to Payne Protection, because it had stuck in the lock. He’d had to wiggle it to get it to turn. He’d thought he had seen Nikki’s coupe in the lot, but the door had been locked.
She might have locked it for protection, though. With a killer like the Iceman on the loose again, they were all in danger. Maybe it was that anticipation of danger that had him ducking the second he heard the cock of a gun. But the bullet had already been fired, so he was too late to avoid a hit.
If Nikki hadn’t jerked the barrel at the last moment and sent the bullet into the wall above his head, he would have been hit.
“Damn it!” she cursed. “You need to stop sneaking up on me!”
“Agreed,” Nick said. “You’re too damn trigger-happy.”
“I am now,” she agreed. “Getting shot at tends to make you that way.”
He chuckled. “I can’t argue with that.”
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “I thought you were going to get some rest.”
“Thought you were, too,” he said.
He had known she wouldn’t rest, though. That was why he was there. He’d figured she wouldn’t have been able to stop working the case. And he hadn’t wanted her to be alone and vulnerable.
He had left Annalise alone, but only in the bed they’d shared. Parker had taken over the couch in the living room. He would make sure nobody got past him to get to her.
“You knew I’d be here,” she said. “You’re just like Mom.” She snorted. “Which is weird and impossible but totally true.”
He wished he was like Penny Payne. She had no problem showing her affection and warmth for others. But that was for her family. She hadn’t given her heart to another man.
“I knew you’d be here,” he said. “And I figured you hacked my email.”
Her face blushed a bright pink, which highlighted the darkness of her bruises. He felt too bad about her injuries to get mad at her for invading his privacy.
“You got the transcript,” she said. “I found some other stuff.”
“Like...?”
She had two computer monitors. One held the trial transcripts from his email. Another displayed a montage of old photos. She pointed first to the transcripts, to the part she’d highlighted about the missing murder weapon.
He cursed. How had he not realized it?
And of course his mother wouldn’t have dared to pawn a murder weapon. She wouldn’t have wanted to be implicated in those crimes. It would have blown her new identity and the arrangement she’d had with the River City district attorney.
“Ironic, huh?” Nikki asked. “You were looking for a gun to nail Chekov, and your mother had one this whole time.”
“But where?” he wondered. Growing up, he’d never seen a gun in their house. She must have hidden it somewhere and hidden it well.
“We’ll figure it out,” Nikki said. “The good news is that the Iceman hasn’t found it yet or he wouldn’t still be looking.”
That was good news. But they had to find the murder weapon before he did. If he got to it first, he would destroy it, and if they couldn’t tie him to any of the destruction at his or Annalise’s homes or to the attempts on their lives...
Then he would remain a free man.
The transcripts had nothing else to reveal, so Nick turned to the photos. Carla had once been beautiful, with huge, vulnerable dark eyes. The other photo could have been Nicholas Payne. It was a mug shot, though. Of course Payne had been undercover when he’d met Carla, when he’d turned her against her lover. How complete had his cover been?
But he leaned closer and read the name on the booking. Darren Snow. His breath hissed out. “Damn...he looks like...”
“My dad,” Nikki said.
“He looks like I did at that age,” Nick admitted. “Maybe your dad didn’t cheat on your mom. Maybe Darren Snow is my dad.” The thought filled him with dread, but he knew it would make Nikki happy.
She shook her head and dismissed the idea. “You’re my dad’s son,” she said. “After you showed up in town, Mom told me that she’d always known he had cheated on her with your mom. He told her about it right after it happened.”
“Why?” Nick wondered. “Did he think it was honorable to tell her the truth?” He could find no honor in a man who’d cheated on a good woman.
Nikki shrugged. “Maybe he couldn’t live with what he’d done.”
Or he had been looking for an excuse to leave. Maybe he’d thought that Penny would throw him out once she learned the truth. But instead, she’d forgiven him.
“I don’t know how she forgave him,” he said.
Nikki sighed. “Me neither. I want to think it’s because she loved him.”
“You don’t think she did?”
“Times were different back then,” Nikki said. “She was pregnant with Cooper. She already had twin sons less than two years old. Maybe she stayed with him because she didn’t know if she could handle raising kids alone.”
“She handled it after he died,” Nick reminded her. “I think she loved him.” Even though he hadn’t deserved her or her love—kind of like he didn’t deserve Annalise or her love.
But Annalise loved him. He couldn’t deny her feelings. She’d always made them blatantly clear, and never more so than when they made love and she gave herself so generously to him. No. He didn’t deserve her.
Nikki touched her computer screen and pulled up a picture of their father in his River City police department uniform. His black hair was cut short in the photo, like Nick’s and Cooper’s, and his eyes were the brilliant blue Nick saw every time he looked in the mirror or met one of his brothers’ gazes.
“You’re his son,” she said. “The same as Logan and Parker and Cooper. He wouldn’t have lied to her about cheating. He wouldn’t have hurt her like that for no reason.”
“But he hurt her.”
“He did,” she said. And she glanced up from the monitor. “Not you.”
Since he had showed up in River City a year ago, he’d had a heavy pressure on his heart. He had regretted how his appearance had affected the Paynes. Mostly he’d regretted how much he had upset Nikki. And he’d never thought she would get over her resentment of him.
Had she? It felt as if she had finally let it go.
She looked at the picture of their father again. “You’re his son. You’re my brother.” She didn’t glance up at him now, and her bruised face had reddened with embarrassment over getting emotional.
> Poor Nikki. She always thought she had to be as tough as her brothers, that she couldn’t show any of her emotions. She had probably mistaken having emotions for weakness.
Nick thought it was a strength, one he didn’t possess himself. He cut her a break and teased, “Wow. You must really want to go with me to find the gun.”
She looked at him then and laughed. But her laughter quickly faded. “Of course I’m going. You wouldn’t even have known what you were searching for if it wasn’t for me.”
Actually, he would have once he’d read the transcript she’d hacked from his email. He didn’t point that out, though. He liked this new relationship with his sister. He liked that they finally had one.
“I have a more important assignment for you,” he said. “I want you to protect Annalise. She’s going to want to go along as badly as you do.”
Nikki opened her mouth as if she was about to argue. Then she smiled instead, as if she knew something he didn’t. But he knew...
Annalise was sweet and loving, but she was stubborn as hell. She’d had to be, or she would have given up on him years ago. She was going to insist on going.
* * *
Annalise had awakened alone hours ago. Maybe that was why she was so angry. Nick would let her close physically but never emotionally. He kept running away from her.
Now he was trying to run even farther.
Back to Chicago.
“I have to go,” Annalise insisted.
They were all there in the living room of Milek’s condo. There was no mistaking this meeting for a family one. The Payne Protection Agency meant business today. Guns were spread across the coffee table and the granite counter along with surveillance equipment. Intent on getting their gear ready, they were all pretty much ignoring her, just as Nick always had.
Just as she always had, she pestered him. She clasped her fingers around his forearm and turned him toward her so he had to look at her. So he had to listen.
“I put your mother’s stuff wherever I could find room,” she said. “It’s spread between three storage units along with all kinds of other things I use for staging houses. You’re going to waste too much time looking at the wrong things. I can tell you what’s mine and what was hers.”