by Laura Taylor
His jaw went so tight, a muscle twitched.
A painful possibility entered her mind, and she thought of what it would do to her mother. "He isn’t dead. Please tell me that Sean is not dead. Please."
Nicholas narrowed his gaze. "That’s an odd thing to say."
"Why?"
"You seemed convinced he was alive this afternoon when you were hammering on my front door."
"I haven’t seen him since my fifteenth birthday, and I’m thirty now. It’s been years since his last letter." She swallowed against the emotion threatening to choke her. "I need to believe he’s alive."
"He’s alive," Nicholas said sharply. "Leave the man in peace. He’s not prepared to deal with people who think they can fix everything with a strong dose of TLC."
"I will not leave him in peace!" Hannah exclaimed. "And I will not leave you in peace, Mr. Benteen. Sean has a family, and I’m part of that family. We love him, and we miss him."
"Then he’s a fortunate man, isn’t he? The real question is… does his family love him enough to honor the choices he’s made?" He grabbed her chin when she looked away, forcing her to meet his gaze. "Do you love him enough to allow him the luxury of being himself? Or will you track him like a hunter who feels compelled to run an animal to ground just for the sport of it? Sean Cassidy is doing what’s right for him. Can you and your family respect his choices and decisions? Can you and your family move beyond your own self–interest and just leave him the hell alone? Because…" He broke off, making an obvious effort to tamp down his emotions and lower his voice. "… because that’s what he needs from you."
She heard pain and anguish, and she sensed that he’d spoken of himself, not just her brother. She wondered what had happened to him. She also feared that Sean might feel the same way, perhaps even behave in the same hostile manner once she found him.
Why? she wondered. Why had Sean avoided all contact with his family for so many years? Shaken by her own thoughts and by Nicholas Benteen’s intensity, Hannah felt the sudden urge to reach out and offer comfort. She resisted the impulse. He was not, she decided, the kind of man who would welcome empathy or compassion. It would translate to weakness, a quality he wouldn’t be able to tolerate in himself.
"Sean needs us," Hannah insisted.
"How can you possibly know what Sean needs?"
She looked away for a moment, then met his hard gaze. "I just know. I can feel it."
She blinked in surprise as he set aside his knife, leaned forward, and placed his hands on either side of her head. Hannah exhaled an uneven breath, but she remained focused on his unyielding features.
Something unexpected and wild stirred inside her as she stared up at him. Shocked by the currents of desire and anger mingling within her, she told herself that the close confines of the van, his overt sexuality, and her simmering anxiety were just making her a little crazy.
"You feel need? You think you understand need, Hannah Cassidy? You don’t even know the definition of need."
His low, rough voice sent a shiver up her spine. He shifted his hips forward, his arousal even more blatant now. His body heat encompassed her, scorching her even as he bracketed her head with his hands.
"I know when the people I care about need my love," she whispered.
"Lucky them."
"You’re trying to intimidate me," she accused.
He smiled, but it was a predator’s smile. "Are you intimidated yet?"
"Absolutely not, since I refuse to give you that kind of power over me." She glared into the wintery depths of those eyes of his. "There’s no reason for you to behave this way."
"Cause and effect," he said. "Deal with it."
"Because you can’t?" She exhaled, angry and frustrated. "Get off of me. Right now."
Grudging respect sparked in his gaze, but he didn’t budge. If anything, he seemed amused.
Hannah throttled back her temper. "Alright, I’ll admit that people who know me really well think I’m too persistent for my own good, but that’s the way I am. It’s too late to change, so I won’t apologize for being assertive. It serves me well in my personal life and in my work."
He went utterly still. "Work?"
Hannah made a disgusted sound. "I told you before, I teach first grade in St. Louis. Sometimes I have to fight for the children," she explained, passion rising in her voice. "Especially if they’ve been harmed by people who are supposed to love them or by a system that’s designed to meet their needs and that seems destined to fail them. They have no one else."
"Great. A crusader."
She heard his contempt and instantly bristled. "No, damn it, just a woman who believes in right and wrong. I have standards. Don’t you?" she challenged, her green eyes filled with the fire of the fiercely committed.
Nicholas straightened and reclaimed his knife, but he didn’t answer her question.
"Why are you so suspicious of me? I want to understand."
"You’ve invaded my property, you’re demanding to be given information I do not have, and you refuse to leave. I consider your behavior aggressive and intrusive."
She laughed, pure disbelief in the sound. "What do you call what you’ve been doing to me for the last half hour?"
"Protecting what is mine. Like any territorial animal."
"You’re a man, not an animal." And you’ve been wounded one too many times, she realized with the insight of a woman who’d spent most of her free time during the last ten years dealing with battered children.
"And you’re trespassing," he repeated in a voice riddled with tension and distrust, "which is a violation of the law and my privacy. People are shot for less in this part of the country."
Hannah shifted, inadvertently bringing her hips into even more intimate contact with the blunt ridge of male flesh pressed against her pelvis. She froze, her eyes darting to his face. A sudden flood of heat consumed her, sucking the air from her lungs, searing her veins, and making her more than a little lightheaded.
"You’re so… large," she whispered faintly as he loomed over her.
He smiled at her—a slow, hot, and completely unexpected smile that threatened to unhinge her senses.
"So I’ve been told, but usually by my lovers."
Embarrassed by her thoughtless comment and annoyed by the sexual gleam in his eyes, she protested, "That’s not what I meant, and you know it."
"Freudian slip?"
"No, damn it! I meant that you’re really big… you know, tall, muscular, broad shoulders… big!" She clamped her lips together and tried to wiggle free of him. Exasperated when she failed to dislodge him, she muttered, "You’re also very heavy."
Nicholas drove his hips against her, pinning her down and drawing a muffled gasp from her. "And you’re a fool to squirm beneath a man who hasn’t had a woman under him in a very long time."
"You wouldn’t harm the sister of a friend." At his skeptical expression, she added, "I can prove my identity, if you’ll let me."
"You’re presuming an awful lot, aren’t you?"
"Instinct," she snapped. "You’re protective of Sean, not angry with me. It’s not in your nature to harm an innocent person, if you can help it. Your conscience won’t let you." The expression on his face assured her that he knew she was speculating, but she didn’t intend to admit the truth even if he challenged her.
"Proof," he prodded.
"I have photo albums with pictures of Sean before he left home, as well as pictures of the entire Cassidy clan. I thought he’d want to see them. I also brought some of the letters and postcards he sent to us." She glanced at his knife and then up at his face. "Family pictures don’t lie."
"Everything can be manipulated. People, situations, photographs, you name it. There are a thousand and one potential versions of the same truth, Hannah Cassidy, if that’s even your real name."
"I want to sit up."
"No sudden moves," he cautioned.
She nodded. Amazed by his wariness, she looked first at the gleaming
blade he gripped and then back at his hard–featured face.
Finally, he shifted to one side, grabbed the front of her sleeping bag, and jerked her upright. He made her feel as inconsequential as a sack of grain.
Hannah kept her eyes glued to his face as he slowly lowered the zipper of the sleeping bag. Although still clad in a heavy sweater and leggings, she breathed in sharply when she felt the back of his hand skim down the center of her chest.
Nicholas halted the zipper at her waist. "Keep your palms open and exposed as you lift your hands to a position just above your head."
"I’m not a criminal." Despite her comment, she followed his order. She stiffened, shocked as he conducted an upper body search with a clinical efficiency that both startled and enraged her. His hands felt cold and impersonal. For the first time that night, she felt violated. She finally grasped the depth of his suspicion of her.
"Lift your purse off the floor. Dump the contents into your lap, and then hand the purse to me."
She nodded, still too shocked by his behavior and the entire situation to object. But her mind raced a hundred miles an hour as she tried to understand the reasons for Nicholas Benteen’s attitude.
She moved slowly, keeping her hands exposed to his gaze as she leaned forward and caught the leather strap of her purse with her fingertips. After following his orders to the letter, she watched him flip through the contents of her wallet.
He glanced at her driver’s license. "Lousy photo."
"I had the damn flu, for heaven’s sake."
His lips twitched as he inspected each item in her lap, scooped everything back into the leather shoulder bag, and then shoved it beyond her reach.
She watched him, her eyes on the shadowed contours of his face as she quietly asked, "Has Sean become like you?" Apprehension filled her, making her throat ache with sudden unshed tears as she waited for his answer.
Nicholas flinched.
She saw pain flash in his startled gaze, but the telltale emotion disappeared, leaving her to speculate about what had happened in his life to make him so wary and defensive. She suddenly regretted her blunt question as well as the possibility that she might have hurt him.
She just as quickly felt like a fool for allowing herself a sympathetic response to a man who’d provoked, threatened, and then terrorized her with ease. She knew she owed him nothing other than the civility and good manners her mother had drilled into all of her children. Unfortunately, a part of her wanted to give him much more. Hannah exhaled a shallow breath, banished the insane thought from her mind, and kept her conflicted emotions to herself.
After devouring the contents of the photo album with an attitude that went far beyond simple curiosity, he set aside the leather bound photo album.
"Now do you believe I’m telling the truth?" she asked.
"A photo album doesn’t prove anything."
"Of course, it does! It proves that I’m who I say I am. Hannah Cassidy, Sean’s sister from St. Louis. Who else, other than a close relative, would travel almost two thousand miles, tolerate being scared half to death by a knife wielding lunatic, and then put up with the interrogation you’ve just conducted? Certainly not a stranger off on some lark."
"Driver’s licenses and credit cards are easy to fake. You’re either a hell of an actress or very sincere. Only a sincere person could be so stupid."
"I am sincere."
"What’s the family matter you mentioned this afternoon?"
She hesitated. "It’s private and very personal."
"Too bad."
"I don’t know you, Mr. Benteen. In my family, we protect the privacy of those we love."
"And where I come from, Hannah Cassidy, we’re willing to kill in order to protect our friends."
She blanched. "Can’t you give me the benefit of the doubt and believe me when I tell you that Sean is my brother?"
"Hardly."
She exhaled softly as she tried to think of another way to deal with him. "Do you have a family, Mr. Benteen?"
"That’s none of your concern."
He suddenly jerked her forward until their faces were just inches apart. Hannah stared at his lips, and then looked up. He glared at her, his penetrating gaze so intense that she blinked and then closed her eyes. A sigh washed past her parted lips. She felt his grip on her upper arms tighten, and the heat emanating from his body reminded her of a furnace.
Hannah managed not to plead with him to release her. Instead, she concentrated on the sound of her heartbeat as it thundered in her ears. And she tried to ignore the chaotic throbbing of every pulse point in her body.
He pushed her backwards, his large hands like weights atop her shoulders as he held her in place. "This is my land and my home. You’re trespassing. I want you gone, lady."
"I can’t," she whispered. "I must speak to Sean. Please help me."
He hissed a curse.
The word was so vicious, Hannah cringed, but she refused to back down in the face of his anger. She reminded herself that he was just frustrated with her. She’d caused and then dealt with that reaction in others for most of her life, so she would deal with it now. "You can come home with Sean, if you’d like." Reaching out, she flattened her hand against his chest. The rapid beat of his heart hammered an invisible tattoo into her open palm. "We would all welcome you as his friend."
Nicholas stared down at her slender fingers as they rested against his chest. Then, he lifted his gaze to her face. "You are not real," he told her. "Either that or you live in some fairy tale world where reality is an alien concept."
"Don’t dismiss me because you don’t know or understand me. That’s not fair."
He shoved aside her hand. "Life’s not fair. I know, because I’ve dealt with the results of the actions of self–serving crusaders who invariably turned into greed–driven bastards for most of my adult life."
"People aren’t perfect, but your problem is that you obviously expect the worst of everyone. As a result, that’s what you get. If you weren’t so cynical, you’d be a far happier man, and you wouldn’t be living out here in the middle of nowhere like some hermit."
"It’s late, I’m tired, and I’ve had enough of you and your convoluted reasoning. Are you ready to leave?" he asked, his tone of voice reminiscent of taut piano wire.
She lifted her chin, clenched her fists, and glared at him. "I’ll leave once you’ve told me everything you know about my brother, including how to find him."
"You’ll wind up buried in a snowdrift," he said.
Hannah considered his warning. "Perhaps I could park in your garage." She grinned. "That way, you won’t have to go to the trouble of digging me out."
"You’ll dig yourself out or you’ll freeze to death. Your choice."
She sighed. "I’ve already made my choice. Sean comes first. I’ll do whatever it takes to find him."
"Whatever?" His eyes darkened as he glowered at her.
"Whatever," she confirmed, heart racing and nerves coiled into knots. However, she contemplated him with what she hoped was an unruffled expression.
Nicholas shoved his knife into the leather sheathe strapped to his lower leg, kicked open the rear door of the van, and barked a one–word command. "Out!"
Shocked, Hannah scuttled backward, but she didn’t get very far. As she fought to free herself from the sleeping bag, Nicholas seized her. He subdued her flailing arms, stripped the sleeping bag from the lower half of her body, and then dragged her out into the cold and falling snow in less than five seconds.
"What do you think you’re doing?" she shouted as she sank into knee–deep snow.
After slamming shut the van door, he lifted her and tossed her over his shoulder, driving the air out of her lungs. He set off into the darkness as Hannah gasped for breath and hammered his back with her fists.
3
What in the hell am I doing?
Nicholas asked himself that question at least a dozen times as he hauled Hannah Cassidy into his home and kicked the fro
nt door closed with his booted foot. He decided that hell would probably freeze over before he came up with an answer that satisfied him.
He subdued her squirming body, eased her off his shoulder, and slid her down the front of his body. She flowed over him like molten satin. He cursed himself for wanting her even as he inhaled the subtle fragrance of her skin and savored the feel of every curve and hollow of her petite figure.
Hannah tried to pull free once her feet touched the floor. Nicholas jerked her forward. She slammed against him. He held her still, molding her against his powerful frame with one hand at the base of her spine and the other curved carefully at the back of her head. He didn’t want to harm her. If anything, he simply wanted to indulge himself just one more time with the luscious feel of her.
Nicholas closed his eyes. He gently flexed his fingers in the dense silk of her hair, marveling yet again at the soft texture of each strand and the warmth of her scalp. He ignored her protest, an inarticulate sound that conveyed equal parts outrage and confusion.
Nicholas understood the depth of her frustration with him. He already knew she possessed the ability to turn into a hissing feline in the blink of an eye. His conscience continued to nag at him with the suggestion that he might have misjudged her. Her manner since her arrival shouted her innocence, but the betrayals and violence of his past thwarted his desire to believe that she might really be as innocent and forthright as she appeared.
Hannah renewed her efforts to free herself, wriggling back and forth against his hard body. He felt a rush of heat spill into his bloodstream, and he knew he was in danger of losing his legendary control.
He shuddered, suddenly as angry with her as he was with himself as she twisted against him. Gritting his teeth, Nicholas separated their bodies. He seized her shoulders and gave her a firm shake.
She lifted her head, her expression mutinous, her blazing green, cat eyes shooting sparks of fury. He nearly smiled. He admired her stubbornness and sense of purpose, but he couldn’t dismiss her quest and his own personal commitment to Sean’s safety.