by Nora Roberts
“I appreciate the sentiment.”
“That’s a man’s reaction. I’d have preferred to handle it myself. It was humiliating to know that I hadn’t fought back, I just froze.”
“Someone holds a knife to your throat, freezing is the intelligent choice.”
“I was more frightened than hurt,” she murmured, and stared hard at the surface of the table.
“I’m sorry you were either. He didn’t go for the house?”
“No, just grabbed my purse, my briefcase, slugged me, and ran.”
“Jewelry?”
“No.”
“Were you wearing any?”
“Yes, I was wearing a gold chain and watch—the police wondered about that too. But I had my coat on. I don’t suppose he saw them.”
“This watch?” He held up her wrist, examining the slim eighteen-karat Cartier. An idiot could fence it for a grand, minimum, he mused. “A hit and grab like that doesn’t sound like an amateur who’d miss this sort of easily liquidated asset. And he doesn’t force you into the house, steal any number of excellent and portable items.”
“The police figured he was someone passing through, short of cash.”
“He might figure you had a couple hundred on you if he was lucky. Not worth armed robbery.”
“People kill for designer tennis shoes.”
“Not this kind of deal. He was after your ID, darling, because someone didn’t want you to get to Florence too soon. They needed time to get to work on the copy, and couldn’t afford you underfoot until they had it under way. So they hired a pro. Someone who wouldn’t be messy or make stupid mistakes. And they paid him enough so he wouldn’t be greedy.”
The explanation was so simple, so perfect, she only stared, wondering why she hadn’t made the connection herself. “But the police never suggested that.”
“The cops didn’t have all the data. We do.”
Slowly, she nodded, and slowly the anger began to inch up into her chest, into her throat. “He held a knife to my throat for my passport. It was all to delay me. To give them more time.”
“I’d say the probability ratio is very high. Run through it again for me, step by step. It’s a long shot, but maybe some of my connections can tag your man.”
“If they can,” she said soberly, “I don’t want to meet your connections.”
“Don’t worry, Dr. Jones.” He turned her hand over and kissed her palm. “You won’t.”
• • •
There was no place to buy a bottle on Easter Sunday. When he caught himself driving around and around, looking for one, Andrew began to shake. It wasn’t that he needed one, he told himself. He wanted one, and that was different. He just wanted a couple of drinks to smooth out the edges.
Damn it, everybody was on his back. Everything rested on him. He was sick to death of it. So fuck them, he decided, tapping his fist on the wheel. Fuck them all.
He’d just keep driving. He’d head south and he wouldn’t stop until he was damn good and ready. He had plenty of money, what he didn’t have was any fucking peace.
He wouldn’t stop until he could breathe again, until he found a goddamn liquor store that was open on a goddamn Sunday.
He glanced down, stared at the fist that was ramming over and over into the steering wheel. The fist that was bloody and torn and seemed to belong to someone else. Someone that scared the hell out of him.
Oh God, oh God. He was in trouble. With his hands trembling, he jerked the car to the curb, and leaving the engine running, rested his head on the wheel and prayed for help.
The quick knuckle rap on the window had him jolting up and staring through the glass at Annie’s face. Head cocked, she made a circling motion with her finger, telling him to roll down the window. It wasn’t until he saw her that he realized he’d headed for her house.
“What are you doing, Andrew?”
“Just sitting here.”
She shifted the small bag she carried and studied his face. It was a mess, she noted, bruised, sick in color, worn out. “You piss somebody off?”
“My sister.”
Her eyebrows rose high. “Miranda punched you in the eye?”
“What? No. No.” Embarrassed, he probed around the ache with his fingertips. “I slipped on the stairs.”
“Really?” Her eyes were narrowed now, focused on the fresh cuts and seeping blood on his knuckles. “Did you punch the stairs?”
“I . . .” He held up his hand, his mouth going dry as he stared at it. He hadn’t even felt the pain. What was a man capable of when he stopped feeling pain? “Can I come in? I haven’t been drinking,” he said quickly, when he saw the rejection in her eyes. “I want to, but I haven’t been.”
“You won’t get a drink in my place.”
“I know.” He kept his gaze steady. “That’s why I want to come up.”
She studied him another moment, then nodded. “Okay.”
She unlocked her door and walked in to set her bag on a table covered with papers and forms and files, some of which were anchored with an adding machine.
“I’m doing my taxes,” she explained. “That’s why I went out to get this.” She took an economy-sized bottle of extra-strength Excedrin out of the bag. “You got a Schedule C, you got a headache.”
“I’ve already got the headache.”
“Figured. Let’s do some drugs.” With a half-smile, she turned to pour two glasses of water. She opened the bottle and shook out two tablets for each of them. Solemnly, they swallowed.
She moved back, took a bag of frozen peas out of the freezer. “Put that on your hand for now. We’ll clean it up in a bit.”
“Thanks.” He might not have felt the pain when he’d pounded the steering wheel, but he was feeling it now. From wrist to fingertip his hand was one obscene scream. But he bit back the wince as he laid the cold bag over it. He’d done enough to damage both ego and manhood in front of Annie McLean.
“Now, what did you do to piss off your sister?”
He very nearly lied, made up some idiotic sibling spat. Ego and manhood aside, he couldn’t manage to lie to those quiet, assessing eyes. “It might have been getting stinking drunk and humiliating her in front of her new boyfriend.”
“Miranda’s got a guy?”
“Yeah, sort of sudden. Nice enough. I entertained him by falling down the stairs, then throwing up part of my stomach lining.”
Sympathy fluttered in her stomach, but she only cocked her head. “You’ve been a busy boy, Andrew.”
“Oh yeah.” He tossed the bag of peas into the sink so he could pace. He had jitters tangled around his jitters. Couldn’t keep still. His fingers patted at his thighs, at his face, at each other as he prowled. “Then this morning, I decided to round things out by jumping all over her about work, family problems, her sex life.” He traced his fingers over his cheek, remembering the jolt of shock when she’d slapped him.
Because she caught herself taking a step toward him, Annie turned and rooted out antiseptic from a cabinet behind her. “It was probably the sex life crack that did it. Women don’t like their brothers poking into that area.”
“Yeah, maybe you’re right. But we’ve got a lot of trouble at the Institute. I’m under a lot of stress right now.”
She pursed her lips, glanced down at the piles of papers and forms, the envelopes of receipts, the worn-down stubs of pencils, and the reams of adding machine tape. “If you’re breathing, you have stress. You drink yourself blind, the stress is right there when your vision clears up.”
“Look, maybe I’ve got a little problem. I’m going to deal with it. I just need to take a little time, give my system a rest. I—” He pressed his fingers to his eyes, swayed.
“You’ve got a big problem, and you can deal with it.” She crossed to him, took his wrists and tugged his hands down so he would look at her. “You need a day, because it’s only today that has to count.”
“So far today sucks.”
She smiled, rose on
her toes to kiss his cheek. “It’s probably going to get worse. Sit down. I’ll doctor those knuckles, tough guy.”
“Thanks.” Then he sighed, said it again. “Thanks, Annie.”
He kissed her cheek in turn, then rested his head against hers just for the comfort of it. She still held his wrists, lightly, and her fingers felt so competent, so strong, her hair smelled so fresh and simple. He pressed his lips to it, then to her temple.
Then somehow his mouth was on hers, and the taste of her was flooding his ragged system like sunlight. When her fingers flexed in his, he released them, but only to frame her face with his hands, to draw her into him, hold her there while the sheer warmth of her soothed like balm on a wound.
So many contrasts, was all he could think. The tough little body, the soft sweep of hair, the clipped voice and generous mouth.
The strength and the softness of her, so endearing, so familiar. And so necessary to him.
She’d always been there. He’d always known she’d be there.
It wasn’t easy to break free. Not from his hold—she could have easily stepped away. His hands were gentle as bird wings on her face. The mouth both needy and tender.
She’d wondered, had let herself wonder once, if it would be the same. The feel of him, the taste. But that was long ago, before she’d convinced herself that friendship was enough. Now it wasn’t easy to break free of what that one long quiet kiss stirred, what it asked, what it took out of her.
She needed all of her strength of will to step back from the slowly kindling need he’d brought back to life. A need, she told herself, that wouldn’t help either of them.
He nearly pulled her back, was already reaching out blindly when she held up her hands, palms out, in warning. He jerked back as if he’d been slapped a second time.
“Oh Christ. I’m sorry. Annie, I’m sorry.” What had he done? How could he have ruined the single friendship he didn’t think he could live without? “I didn’t mean to do that. I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.”
She let him wind down, let the miserable guilt settle on his face. “I bounced a two-hundred-pound man out of my bar last night because he thought he could buy me along with a beer and a bump.” She clamped her hand around Andrew’s left thumb and gave it a quick twist. His eyes widened, his breath hissed as she held it. “I could have you on your knees, pal, whimpering if I gave this one little digit a good yank back. We’re not seventeen anymore, not quite so stupid and a hell of a lot less innocent. If I hadn’t wanted your hands on me, you’d have been flat on your back, checking out the cracks in my ceiling plaster.”
Sweat began to pearl on his forehead. “Ah, could you let go?”
“Sure.” Obligingly, she released his thumb, and kept her eyebrows arrogantly cocked. “Want a Coke? You look a little sweaty.” She turned and stepped to the refrigerator.
“I don’t want to ruin things,” he began.
“Ruin what?”
“Us. You matter, Annie. You’ve always mattered.”
She stared blindly into the refrigerator. “You’ve always mattered too. I’ll let you know when you ruin things.”
“I want to talk about . . . before.”
He waited while she popped the tops on two bottles. Grace in economy of motion, he thought, a steel spine in a well-toned body. Had he noticed those things before? Noticed the little flecks of gold in her eyes? Or had he just stored them up so they’d all come to him in a flood in a moment just like this?
“Why?”
“Maybe to face things—something I didn’t realize until lately was stuck inside me.” He flexed his fingers, felt the ache. “I’m not in the best shape right now, but I have to start somewhere. Sometime.”
She set the bottles on the counter, forced herself to turn, to meet his eyes. And hers were swimming with emotions she’d struggled to keep locked in for years. “It’s painful for me, Andrew.”
“You wanted the baby.” The breath he released hurt his chest. He’d never spoken of the baby before, not out loud. “I could see it in your face when you told me you were pregnant. It scared the hell out of me.”
“I was too young to know what I wanted.” Then she closed her eyes because it was a lie. “Yes, yes, I wanted the baby. I had this idiotic fantasy that I’d tell you, and you’d be happy and just sweep me up. Then we’d . . . Well, that’s as far as it went. But you didn’t want me.”
His mouth was dry as dust, his gut raw. He knew one drink would smooth it all away. Cursing himself for thinking of that at such a time, he snagged one of the bottles off the counter and gulped down soda that seemed sickly and sweet. “I cared about you.”
“You didn’t love me, Andrew. I was just a girl you got lucky with on the beach one night.”
He slammed the bottle down again. “It wasn’t like that. Goddamn it, you know it wasn’t like that.”
“It was exactly like that,” she said evenly. “I was in love with you, Andrew, and I knew when I lay down on the blanket with you that you weren’t in love with me. I didn’t care. I didn’t expect anything. Andrew Jones of Jones Point and Annie McLean from the waterfront? I was young, but I wasn’t stupid.”
“I would have married you.”
“Would you?” Her voice went chilly. “Your offer didn’t even hit lukewarm.”
“I know it.” And that was something that had eaten away at him slowly, a nibble at a time, for fifteen years. “I didn’t give you what you needed that day. I didn’t know how. If I had, you might have made a different choice.”
“If I’d taken you up on it, you would have hated me. When you offered, part of you already did.” She moved her shoulders, picked up her own Coke. “And looking back, I can’t blame you. I’d have ruined your life.” The bottle froze halfway to her lips as he stepped toward her. The hot glint of fury in his eyes had her bracing against the counter. He snatched the bottle out of her hand, set it down, then took a hard grip on her shoulders.
“I don’t know how it would have been—and that’s something I’ve asked myself more than once over the years. But I know how it was. Maybe I wasn’t in love with you, I don’t know. But making love with you mattered to me.” And that, he realized, was something else he’d never said aloud, something neither one of them had faced. “However badly I handled things afterward, that night mattered. And damn it, Annie, damn it,” he added, giving her a brisk shake, “you might have made my life.”
“I was never right for you,” she said in a furious whisper.
“How the hell do you know? We never had a chance to find out. You tell me you’re pregnant, and before I can absorb it, you had an abortion.”
“I never had an abortion.”
“You made a mistake,” he said, tossing the words she’d once heaved at him back in her face. “And you fixed it. I would have taken care of you, both of you.” Pain, long and shallowly buried, cracked through the surface in pummeling fists. “I would have done my best for you.” His fingers tightened on her arms. “But it wasn’t good enough. Okay, it was your decision, your body, your choice. But goddamn it, it was a part of me too.”
She’d lifted her hands to push him away and now curled them into his shirt. His face was sheet-pale under the bruises, his eyes burning dark. The ache around her heart was for both of them now. “Andrew, I didn’t have an abortion. I lost the baby. I told you, I had a miscarriage.”
Something flickered deep in his eyes. His grip relaxed on her shoulders, and he stepped back. “You lost it?”
“I told you, when it happened.”
“I always thought—I assumed you’d. . .” He turned away, walked to the window. Without thinking he yanked it open, and resting his palms on the sill, dragged in air. “I thought you told me that to make it easier on both of us. I figured that you hadn’t trusted me enough to stand by you, to take care of you and the baby.”
“I wouldn’t have done that without telling you.”
“You avoided me for a long time afterward. We never talked about
it, never seemed to be able to talk about it. I knew you wanted the baby, and I thought—all this time—I thought that you’d terminated the pregnancy because I hadn’t stood by you the way you needed.”
“You—” She had to swallow the hot ball in her throat. “You wanted the baby?”
“I didn’t know.” Even now he didn’t know. “But I’ve never regretted anything more in my life than not holding on to you that day on the beach. Then everything drifted, almost like it never happened.”
“It hurt me. I had to get over it. Over you.”
Slowly, he pulled the window down again. “Did you?”
“I made a life for myself. A lousy marriage, an ugly divorce.”
“That’s not an answer.”