Deadly Fall (23 page)

“I know.” She bit her bottom lip.

“Then why?”

“I thought I would find something.”

Two steps and he was right in front of her. “Something the police would miss?”

“Perhaps.”

“What?”

Augusta quelled the urge to squirm in her seat. She wanted badly to get up, cross the room and walk out the door, but that would be blatant cowardice.

“I didn’t think anyone would find the safe. It’s fairly well hidden.”

“Did you take anything out of it?”

She shook her head. “No. That was the strange part. It was completely empty. Once I saw that, I went through the place to look for Drew’s BlackBerry, but it wasn’t there, so I thought the NYPD already found it and took it.”

Nick rubbed his face with his palms, then slid all ten fingers through his hair, leaving behind dark spikes of hair that remained standing. “When were you going to tell me all this?”

“I’m telling you now,” she pointed out carefully, not meeting his eyes in the mirror. “Besides, it turned out that there wasn’t much to tell. I told you the safe was empty. Had I found anything important, I would’ve brought it to you.”

Hands fisted on his hips, he turned away from her, as if he couldn’t bear to look at her any longer. “You’re never going to trust me, are you?”

“Nick, I’m—”

“And, damn it, don’t apologize,” he snapped, whipping his head back and pinning her with a piercing blue glare. “Just tell me why. And what. What the hell do I have to do to prove myself to you?”

The heat of anger rushed through her, gathering in her chest. Drew’s murder, Adam’s anger, Nick’s expectations. God, it was enough to make any less controlled person want to scream—or crawl somewhere and hide away. Stiffly, Augusta pushed back from her vanity and stood. He was standing, and so should she.

“I’ve known you less than a week.” The words were low and fierce, her chest rising and falling with the effort to keep her voice even. “You can’t expect me to trust you with every little thing in my life.”

“You know and I know that how long we’ve known each other is not relevant.” He took a step toward her. Augusta found the edge of her vanity and clenched it hard with her hands. “You and I—” He broke off, too angry to find the words. A deep breath, then, “I don’t make a habit of sleeping with people I’ve known less than a week.”

“Well, I did,” she said softly, a touch derisive. Before the stunned expression left his face, she pushed on. “You don’t know me, Detective Markov. For your information, it’s a miracle I trust you at all. My experiences with the police have not recommended your breed to me.”

When she would’ve turned and walked away from him, Nick caught her upper arm. “Tell me,” he ordered, voice harsh. “Tell me what happened in San Francisco.”

She stiffened, then tipped her head back to search his face. The anger was still there in his eyes, but it was tempered with concern…and something very close to hurt. She broke away from his gaze. She couldn’t afford to break down, no matter how tempting it was to lean on those broad shoulders. Who knew how long it would take to compose herself again if she gave in to all those emotions?
Would
she be able to compose herself afterwards? She had years of practice at shielding herself, at not remembering the past. Would she be able to relive her textbook, daytime-talk-show problem for him, especially with all her mental self-defense systems rebelling against the very thought of it?

“San Francisco is not going to help you find whoever killed Drew,” she said without inflection.

He caught her other upper arm and drew her closer to him until her bathrobe brushed his jeans. “Not everything I do is about solving the case.”

Oh, God, the tightness in her throat made it difficult to get air in and out of her lungs. She tried to pull away from his hold to no avail. It took a second to beat down the panic that threatened to close her air passages completely.

“Don’t try to save me.”

“Let me make that decision.”

She could only shake her head.

“I need to hear it from you.”

“I’ve already dealt with what happened in San Francisco.”

His lips thinned. “Stop lying to me.”

“Stop pushing me and I will,” she snapped, glaring at him.

“No,” he stated firmly, tightening his hold. “I’m going to keep pushing until you tell me why you have more trust issues than any veteran cop I know.”

“We’ve been over this before. Why do you keep bringing it up?” she cried, a hint of real desperation tingeing her voice as she tried to wrench herself from his grasp. It was a futile attempt at escape and it only added to her mounting desperation. “Why can’t you just let it go?”

“Because I love you,” he said harshly, as if the words were dragged from him. “And I’ll be damned if I accept your lack of trust without a good reason.”

The stricken look in Augusta’s eyes was not the most flattering response to the first declaration of love he had ever made to a woman, but Nick resisted the temptation to shake her.

“I can’t.” Her gaze dropped down to his chest. “I can’t do it, Nick. Please don’t make me.”

He hated like hell that he managed to reduce her to pleading. Nick looked down at her bent head and felt the pain stab through his chest, then rip down to clench like a fist in his stomach. Her voice was so small, so fragile, so unlike the front she normally presented to the world.

Nick drew her even closer to him, until her body was flush against his, gently enfolding her in his arms as if she was very breakable. She made no move to get away from him. And when her fingers fisted in his shirt by his sides, he knew he’d finally scaled that wall she’d erected around herself.

Lowering his head down to hers, he whispered in her hair, “It’s okay to lean on someone else for a change. It’s not a sign of weakness.”

“It’s a long story,” she said into his shirt, her words barely above a whisper.

Bending down, he lifted her in his arms and carried her the short distance to the bed. He settled down on the bed, back against the headboard and Augusta cradled in his arms.

She didn’t start immediately. He took her fists in his hands and waited.

“My father died in a boating accident when I was three,” she began, “I don’t remember much of him and I can count on one hand the number of times my mother made reference to him. I don’t think it was a happy marriage, but my mother wasn’t the type of person who could handle being alone. She was raised to believe a man had to take care of her. Apparently, after my grandparents died, she married the first rich man who proposed, my father. She remarried twice after he died. Her second marriage ended in divorce after seven years. Joe’s a nice man. Not overly affectionate, but I wasn’t his biological daughter.

“Her third husband—“ She faltered, took a breath. “She married husband number three when I was eleven. He was a high-priced corporate lawyer before becoming a district judge. They were content with each other as long as they both remembered their roles. He made the money and she spent it. Occasionally, they’d argue. My mother was a very dramatic and highly emotional person. Each and every argument was a scene worthy of Scarlett O’Hara.”

* * * * *

Augusta hid in her bedroom, wanting to get away from all the yelling and screaming and flying projectiles in the other room. She wanted to slap her hands over her ears to keep out all the noise, but that was too childish for her. Instead, she sat on her bed, clutching her comforter to her small body. Soon there was the sound of doors slamming shut. Not given to tears, she sat there thoughtfully, staring at nothing in particular. Then she did what she always did when depressed—she curled on her side on the bed, pulled the comforter over her head and slept.

She was woken minutes later by a large, soft hand rubbing back and forth on her shoulder and a male voice saying, “Shh. Be quiet, Augusta,” over and over again.

It was her stepfather. Augusta wished he would go away and let her sleep. However, he didn’t go away. Instead, he pushed her onto her back and laid down on top of her, crushing her into the mattress, still telling her to keep quiet.

Augusta, confused and not just a little scared, didn’t know what to say or what to do. Then his mouth covered hers, and she instinctively rolled her lips inward and kept them sealed, not wanting his disgusting tongue inside her mouth. She kept her little body rigid and silently fought this intruder, but it was futile, absolutely, completely so. She couldn’t fight the wandering hands or the suffocating weight. But she didn’t cry. She needed all her strength and, besides, no one who cared was here to hear her.

* * * * *

Nick swore, the words low but intense. His hands clenched, imagining a neck caught in their fatal grip.

Augusta, caught in her own nightmare, didn’t notice and went on, lower lip trembling slightly. “He tried to…touch me again, but I always made sure never to be alone with him. And I even took to keeping my father’s Swiss Army knife with me. But I couldn’t tell anyone…”

* * * * *

“
Augusta, you can’t tell anyone what happened. Do you understand? It’s our secret.”

Augusta tried to control the trembling of her lower lip, but couldn’t. All she could do was cower in the corner with her blanket wrapped securely about her. She knew it wouldn’t stop the monster in front of her, but it gave her the false illusion of comfort and security. Her mommy would come soon. Her mommy would protect her.

“
Do you understand? You can never tell anyone what happened. No one would believe you. You liked what I did, didn’t you, Augusta? Augusta?”

She flinched away from the touch on her cheek. She clenched her eyes shut, wanting to shut him out. But he was still there, his voice not leaving her alone.

“
Augusta, you mustn’t tell anyone.”

She nodded. But it was only to make him go away. She wanted that more than anything else. No, she wanted her mommy to come and protect her even more.

* * * * *

“But I didn’t tell my mother. I wanted to, but I was so afraid that bastard was right and my mother wouldn’t believe me.” Her voice softened, and it tore him up inside even more. “I wanted to tell her, tell anyone, but every time I tried, my throat would close up and no words would come out. It was trapped inside of me and I
couldn’t
tell anyone,” she whispered, her voice breaking on the last word.

Augusta sat up, needing to take a deeper, calming breath, but she remained in his lap. “I had no one to go to,” she continued, more composed. “My father was dead and I didn’t know of any aunts or uncles.” Her laugh was rough and raw. “My mother thought I was an ingrate because I started to avoid being alone with her husband to the point of rudeness.”

Her breath shortened in remembered anger and Nick could see her jaw muscles clenching. And he doubted if she even knew her fingers were digging into his sides. “One day, I was sent home from school because I went ballistic when the gym teacher grabbed my arm. When I got home, my mother started in on her speech about my poor attitude and ingratitude and everything else under sun. It made me so angry that I blurted out why I-I
loathed
her damned husband so much. And she didn’t believe me.” Her eyes lowered, and she shook her head, as if she was seeing the scene all over again, as if the revelation of her mother’s disbelief still astounded her. “That son of a bitch was right all along. My mother called me a liar. She told me that I was either making it up or that I remembered it wrong because I was so young or maybe I misconstrued something.
Damn her.
I remember everything that happened like it was yesterday. I wish to God I didn’t, but it’s there.” Her voice became a whisper. “It’s still there.” Augusta wiped angrily at her tears with both hands. “Nothing I do ever makes it go away for good. Absolutely nothing at all.”

She turned her face to him, dark eyes a swirling mix of vulnerability, bitterness and fury. And angry accusation. Then her wet lashes swept down and she turned away from him.

Nick’s hands balled into tight, hard fists. He wanted to hit something—someone—with his bare knuckles. He wanted to meet her monster of a stepfather in a dark alley and leave him beaten to a bloody pulp on the trash-littered ground where he belonged. He wanted the sick son of a bitch in a jail cell with two or three inmates desperately needing a way to get off. He wanted to go back and prevent Augusta from ever being a victim.

Instead, all he could do was sit here and try to hold her, picturing what he would like to do to avenge her and protect her from future hurts. Nick took a deep breath. His rage wasn’t what she needed now. God, what did she need? Had it been anyone else, he would’ve recommended a psychologist in a heartbeat. But this was Augusta.

There was silence as she brought her emotions under some semblance of control and Nick watched her, grappling with his own rage and helplessness.

“A week after my thirteenth birthday, he came to my room again after everyone was asleep. He…I…” She paused, lips parted to draw in deep gulps of air. “I had my father’s Swiss Army knife under my pillow, and I used it on him. I didn’t know what I was doing. I was hysterical when I woke up and couldn’t breathe. He had covered my mouth with his hand. And he was pulling off my clothes. I didn’t think. I just reacted.