The Rome Affair

by Addison Fox

  “Jack.” Her hands flew over him—head, face, shoulders—before shifting toward his chest. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “But you fell? He hit you.” Her hands never stilled, as if she could reassure herself he was okay simply by touch alone. “Were you shot?”

  “Bastard caught the edge of my arm.”

  “What?” The word came out on a gurgled scream and she dragged on his sport coat to get to the wound.

  “Kensington.” She continued to drag at his coat, a hard sob rising in her throat as she fought the thick material.

  “Kensington!” He wrapped one large hand around hers and held her still, his voice dropping as he tugged her close. “Baby, I’m all right.”

  From somewhere deep inside she registered his voice and it was enough to still her movements. His fingers were tight bands around hers and she looked into the dark pools of his eyes.

  “I saw you fall.” The words dragged from her throat on another hard sob. “He shot you and you fell.”

  “Shh. I’m fine. Look at me. I’m fine.”

  “But—”

  Jack cut her off and pulled her close with one arm, the other hanging at his side. “Shh now. I’m fine.”

  She wrapped her arms around his waist and clung, the thick beats of his heart pulsing against her chest the sweetest music. He was okay. Or mostly okay.

  The heavy thud of his heartbeat slowed along with his breathing as they sat there, wrapped up in each other. He crooned light, soothing words in her ear but his grip never loosened.

  That same sense of foreboding she’d felt earlier in the car washed over her once again.

  Something was out there.

  And it was determined to take them down.

  * * *

  The heavy crack and snap of a fire in the B and B’s lobby fireplace did nothing to warm her as she sat on an overstuffed couch. The town doctor Signora Barone called once she realized what had happened had finished patching up Jack’s arm, muttering in a mix of Italian and English how lucky the signore was he didn’t need stitches.

  She’d watched the doctor work as Jack’s shirt was removed and the wound cleaned, then covered with ointment and bandage. Through each step, her mind raced over the events of the night on a continuous loop, seeking some answer. Some clue to who was responsible.

  The gunfire as they left the car. The climb over the fence. The chase across the lawn and then more gunfire.

  Each was more tangible evidence of the threat she knew was looming. They’d been lulled into a false sense of security that Pryce wasn’t dirty, but what else could they think? The household knew they were leaving—hell, they practically gave them a bon voyage party before she and Jack departed for the B and B. Someone was acting on Pryce’s orders from the inside. It was the only answer.

  Her gaze dragged to the bandage, bright, stark white against the darker tan of Jack’s flesh. She kept trying to reassure herself that was a good thing. That the bandage meant he was well. Whole. Alive.

  But with every glance it only served to make the cold inside of her intensify until her teeth were chattering no matter how close she got to the fire.

  Jack still hadn’t put a shirt on and she watched where he paced on the far side of the lobby, a blanket half on, half off his shoulders, his phone against his ear. Her gaze drifted from him to where the doctor and Signora Barone stood near the check-in desk, murmuring in a heated exchange. Kensington didn’t miss the looks either gave her as they spoke, and she turned away from their stares, huddling deeper into her coat.

  She should act. Should do something.

  Jack was on the phone with Dante, filling him in on the evening’s events. Although he’d have contacted the officer, anyway, he rushed a call to the police at the insistence of both the good doctor and Signora Barone.

  Jack had been shot and he had his wits about him. All she could manage was to sit and shiver against the blazing heat of the fire.

  “Scusi?” The doctor’s gentle voice interrupted her thoughts as he wrapped a blanket around her shoulders. “You are so cold.”

  The blanket did nothing for the chattering of her teeth and the doctor frowned as he sat down next to her. “You had a scare. May I examine you, as well?”

  His words registered somewhere beyond the litany of events cycling through her mind. “I’m not hurt.”

  “In here.” The doctor’s smile was gentle as he tapped at her forehead. “I can give you something. Can help with the thoughts.”

  She shook her head, the vague sense she didn’t want drugs flitting through her mind, which refused to still.

  Why couldn’t she get a coherent thought in her head? And why was the image of Jack falling to the ground the only thing she could see? And why did that image keep morphing into the scene of her parents, their car mangled in the Welsh countryside?

  “Kensington?” Jack took the seat on her other side, his hand immediately seeking hers. “The doctor’s asked you a question.”

  “What?” She wrapped her free hand around where theirs joined. “What did he ask?”

  “He wants to give you something to help.”

  “No drugs.” She shook her head. That would make her fuzzy. They’d given her something to sleep after her parents had died and it had made everything worse. Had made the sharp grief seem distant and she wouldn’t go back to that place.

  “Then you need to talk to me.”

  “I’m fine.”

  A small smile tilted the corners of his mouth and somewhere through her racing thoughts she registered the fact that the gentle smile didn’t reach his eyes. “You keep saying that but you’re not fine.”

  “It’s just the adrenaline rush. It’ll stop.” The words were meant to sound authoritative but the hard clattering of her teeth ruined the effect.

  “Come here.” He pulled her close with his good hand and she wrapped her arms around his waist. His body heat warmed her immediately, the light, musky scent of his skin warming her from the inside out.

  Kensington fought the urge to press a kiss to his chest, a lingering sense of propriety holding her back.

  “I think we’ll be all right, Doctor.” She tuned out as Jack spoke over her head. She vaguely heard the doctor once again offer tranquilizers and she felt the subtle movement of Jack’s body as he shook his head.

  He ran a hand over her hair before reaching around to tilt her chin up. “Are you ready to go upstairs?”

  “I think so.”

  “Can you walk?”

  The first spot of indignation filled her chest and she stood up to make her point.

  And promptly fell back into a seated position on the couch.

  “Oh, oh!” Signora Barone and the doctor surged forward to grab her arms and Kensington fought the light blush that flooded her cheeks.

  “I’m sorry. Scusi.”

  “No, no.” The doctor patted her back. “It is the rush of the night. The events. You’re safe now.”

  The doctor stayed by her side as she gave directions to her room. His words rattled around her head—you’re safe now—even as she knew it wasn’t true. Despite that knowledge, she kept putting one foot in front of the other, her legs growing stronger with each step.

  Jack walked behind them under the eagle eye of Signora Barone, who kept a firm hand on his arm. It was only when they reached the doors of their rooms that the older woman finally spoke, her tone brooking no argument.

  “Signorina Steele. You sleep with Signor Andrews tonight.”

  Chapter 14

  Jack’s eyes widened at the order from their proprietor. Whereas the woman had given him and Kensington the barely veiled fish eye the past two days, now she was practically shoving them at each other.

  With a
wagging finger and a subtle gleam in her dark brown gaze, her words brooked no argument. “You shouldn’t be alone.”

  He patted the woman’s arm. “Nor should you. I’ve called for security for you tonight. No one will hurt you.”

  “No one will touch me in my home, signore. It is you and the miss I worry for.” He meant his touch to be reassuring, so he wasn’t expecting the wry smile that winged straight back at him. “Keep her safe.”

  The adrenaline high he’d subsisted on for the past hour came to a crashing halt and he could barely nod at Signora Barone before reaching for Kensington’s hand. “Come on.”

  It took all his focus, but Jack lifted his shaking hand and finally got his key into the lock. The heavy old door swung open and he gestured Kensington through, then followed her. He turned to thank the doctor and their hostess, but both were already gone, their footsteps fading down the hall.

  He closed the door, not even having enough energy to shake his head at the older woman’s change of heart.

  Or the underlying message that he and Kensington had brought trouble to her B and B and her village. “We’re lucky she’s letting us stay. A small business like this. She could have easily thrown us out.”

  “She might know she’s safe, but she also knows whatever’s going on in her village isn’t good in the long run.” Kensington stopped, her gaze speculative as she bent down to drag off her ruined boots. Jack was pleased to see her legs much steadier and her teeth no longer chattering. “Maybe we should talk to her and get her insights. She’s got to know more than she’s letting on.”

  “We can’t risk putting her in danger.” He edged his way toward the bed, toeing off his own shoes as he went.

  “We could arrange for her protection. Something more permanent than one night.”

  Despite the exhaustion that dragged at him, he couldn’t hold back a snort. “Yeah, right. You heard where that got me.”

  He rubbed at his shoulder, the move unconscious until her sharp gaze narrowed in on him. “Are you sure your arm’s all right?”

  Kensington had her hand on his forearm, brushing back the blanket on his shoulders to get a look at the large gauze that wrapped his biceps.

  “I’m fine. It burns like a furnace, but that’s about all.”

  Now that he mentioned it and focused on the wound, the pain multiplied several times over, the adrenaline letdown going a long way toward amping up the discomfort.

  “You took the tranquilizer the doctor offered?”

  He shook the small bottle of pills in his pocket. “The good doctor gave me four pills. Two for you and two for me.”

  The heavy frown and narrowed eyes told him all he needed to know. “I’m not taking those.”

  “Me, either. I’ve got headache medicine with a sleeping agent in my bag. That’s all I’m willing to take.”

  “You’re a bad patient.”

  “Right back at ya, Steele.”

  Her gaze dropped to the bandage on his arm and his stomach clenched when a stark look painted itself across the vivid blue of her eyes. “I don’t have a bullet wound.”

  “I have a flesh wound, that’s all. It’s not my first and I’m quite sure it won’t be the last.”

  The casual dismissal had its desired effect and he saw color rise in her cheeks as his words registered. With a snap of her heel she turned and headed toward his small bathroom, her words tossed over her shoulder. “Where’s the aspirin?”

  “Dopp kit on the counter.”

  His gaze dropped unerringly toward her truly magnificent ass and he refused to apologize for the gentle swell of appreciation that broke through the sheer exhaustion dragging at his system. He might not have the strength to act on it, but a man could admire a beautiful woman, that was for damn sure.

  Her voice echoed from the bathroom, breaking the moment. “You have to be the tidiest man I’ve ever seen.”

  “I don’t like clutter.”

  Kensington’s face poked around the corner of the bathroom doorway. Color had returned to her cheeks and for the first time in too many days he saw the bright light of humor reflected in her gaze. “There’s tidy and then there’s tidy. I’ve never seen anything like this. It looks like a cyborg’s staying in this room.”

  “It’s no big deal. I like to be neat.”

  Her grin only got wider. “I grew up with two brothers. Neat does not factor into the male vocabulary. What gives? Have you been sneaking out at night and staying in Signora Barone’s room, leaving yours pristinely clean? She’s got a soft spot for you, you know.”

  “Are you going to get the aspirin already?” The words came out on a hard clip and he wanted to pull them back, even as the broad smile faded from her lips.

  “Sorry. Of course. You’re probably in a lot of pain.” She came back into the room with the pills and a glass of water in hand. “Here you go.”

  He quickly swallowed the pills and willed the medicine to do its job against the hot brand that had taken up residence on his arm. And it was only when he glanced up into her face that he was struck by the effect of his harsh words.

  The urge to ignore the awkwardness and skip an apology rode him like a horse toward the finish line, but somewhere underneath the pressure to walk away was something more subtle. And far more powerful.

  The pressure to stay.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about. You’re in pain.”

  The truth locked up his throat in a tight fist and he swallowed hard. Once. Twice. Then downed the rest of the water.

  “There’s a reason I’m so neat.”

  “Oh?” She kept her tone light but he didn’t miss the sharp interest in that indigo gaze.

  The words clogged in his throat and he wished for more water, but he refused to prolong the moment by crossing to the bathroom to get more.

  Nope. Better to take the hit and keep on going.

  “After my mother left, I thought it was because I’d done something wrong. Wasn’t good enough. Clean enough. Neat enough. So I tried to fix it.”

  “With neatness?”

  “And a maniacal focus on my studies. On being a good student. A good brother.”

  Where he’d anticipated censure—or worse, pity—all he saw was a sweet understanding that tugged at the deepest part of him. “But those things didn’t make her come back.”

  “No.”

  “So why are you still neat as a pin? And why do you still feel you need to take care of everyone?”

  “Some habits die hard.”

  “I suppose they do.” She moved up into his body, her arms wrapping around his waist. She let out a small sigh before laying her head against his chest. “You don’t have to be perfect anymore.”

  And just like that, another layer of his resistance broke, disintegrating into dust.

  No one else knew why he was such a neat freak. He’d driven several administrative assistants to distraction over the years with his obsessive need to have his files in order, and his sisters used it as the basis of several family jokes.

  But never had he confessed—to anyone—the reason why. That young boy still living inside of him, abandoned over his breakfast. If he’d only cleaned up after himself. If he’d only been more thoughtful. If he’d only not been such a horrible burden.

  It all might have been different.

  He couldn’t go back, but no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t quite move past it, either.

  Yet somehow, with some miraculous sixth sense, Kensington understood.

  The desire to wrap his arms around her filled him, but his bandaged limb would have none of it, so he used his free hand to keep her close to his chest. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply into her hair, the mixed scents of honeysuckle from her shampoo and the cooler, rain-soaked a
ir of earlier reminding him of a spring day.

  It felt good to hold her close. He wanted to do more—wanted to do all—but for now, this was enough.

  She pressed a kiss to his chest, her lips lingering over his heart, before she pulled at his waist “Come on. Let’s lie down. We’re both dead on our feet.”

  He let her lead him toward the bed, the light pressure of her fingertips on his flesh going a long way toward waking him from his stupor. And once he had her next to him, her length nestled firmly against his body, he pressed his lips to hers. Tentative, then more urgent, as the taste of her dragged him under.

  Kensington responded immediately, her mouth opening under his as their tongues met in long, luxurious strokes. She was the finest wine, the richest meal, and he savored the moment. Savored what flared between them, a blazing inferno that neither seemed able to quench.

  She broke off the kiss first, but he didn’t miss the underlying air of regret. “I want you, Jack. You have to know that.”

  “A man never tires of hearing it.”

  She settled a hand against his cheek. “Know it’s true. And know that I want you more than I could have ever imagined. But we can’t tonight.”

  He opened his mouth to offer up a token—and tired—protest when she pressed on.

  “I won’t have the ugliness of tonight be the backdrop for the two of us together. I want you, too. But tonight isn’t the time.”

  With one final, lingering kiss, he pulled her under his good arm and settled her against his chest. “Go to sleep.”

  The featherlight snore that rose up to greet him was possibly the first time she’d taken an order from him since they’d begun working together.

  With that thought keeping him company, Jack drifted to sleep right beside her.

  * * *

  Kensington awoke slowly, the hard male chest under her hands captivating as she traced lazy circles over warm flesh. Bright sunlight filtered through the windows but it wasn’t enough to chase the chill of a cold December morning and she burrowed more deeply into Jack.

  Danger lurked outside the room. They’d known it before they even set foot in Italy, but the events of the past few days confirmed it.