Edge of Midnight (42 page)

She stomped past the curious glances of the craftsmen, onto the street. She clutched the sweater against the biting wind. No way would Sean make his grand gesture and not hang around to see how she took it. She’d wait ’til he slunk out of the woodwork to take his punishment.

And then. Oh, then. God help the man.

Sean dug his shaking hands deeper into his jeans pockets as he stared past the lemon custard, huckleberry conserve and fudge that crowded the shelves of the Endicott Falls Gift Boutique. He was staring out of the shop window and across the street, at Books & Brew. Liv’s store.

The salesgirls had to wonder how candy and jam could mesmerize him for over an hour. He was so scary, none of them dared ask. He had that Frankenstein look going on, the hospital pallor, the red, nasty scars. All he needed were bolts coming out of his forehead.

He was so scared, his hands were ice cold. His belly churned.

He’d almost given up when he saw Liv’s father sign for the drawings. Old Bart marched out a few minutes later, got into his car and left. All clear.

He’d staked the place out for hours, but he still wasn’t prepared when she came out. His stomach clenched, his heart went nuts, a grassfire spread under the surface of his skin. He stared, hungrily.

Her dark hair whipped in the wind. She was so pale. Way too thin. And she wasn’t wearing a coat, for the love of God. It was blustery and raw out there, but her slender throat was exposed. Most of a shoulder, too. She had only a loose, knee-length sweater around herself.

Maybe the drawings hadn’t worked. He’d hoped to go non-verbal at first, take a detour around arguments. No such luck.

He stumbled out the door to meet his doom. Crossed the street like a sleepwalker. Cars screeched to a halt, beeping indignantly, but he just came blindly on, until he stood before her. As close as he dared.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing here, Sean?” Her voice wobbled. “What sick game are you playing with me now?”

He inhaled. The exhale came out in a series of hiccupping, nervous jerks. “No games,” he said. “I’m throwing myself at your feet.”

She gasped. “Oh, really. Well. You can just pick yourself up and go throw yourself someplace else. Like the Dumpster. Go away, Sean. I don’t want to see you. Ever. Again. Got it?”

It was what he expected. Less than he deserved. Still, he couldn’t do as she asked. It was not one of the options open to him. He sank down onto his knees. She gasped, and skittered back a few steps.

“What the hell?” She waved her hands at him. “Stop it! Get up!”

Mud seeped through the knees of his jeans. He shook his head.

“I don’t believe it!” Her voice was thin, breathless. “You think I’m so stupid that you can charm me with your clown act? You think I’ll let you stomp on me for the third time? Fuck you, Sean McCloud!”

His jaw clenched, painfully. He shook his head again. “I never meant to do that to you,” he said tightly. “Never. I swear to God.”

Liv put her hand over her mouth. Two tears flashed down over her cheeks. He wanted to catch them. Feel their heat. Taste their salt.

She groped for her pocket, but the sweater thing didn’t have one. “Oh, shit,” she mumbled snappishly. “It never fails.”

He reached into the pocket of his shearling coat and pulled out a packet of tissues. He presented them to her with a solemn flourish.

She snatched them out of his hand, pried one out and blew into it. “Get up, you melodramatic jerk. I’m not playing your games.”

“I’m not leaving until you let me talk to you,” he said quietly.

“You’ll be kneeling in the mud for a very long time,” she warned.

“You’ll have fun explaining that one to the Chamber of Commerce,” he pointed out.

Her eyes blazed with fury. “You smart-assed son of a bitch.”

“Sorry,” he said meekly. Shit. He had to muzzle the flip remarks.

The boutique door tinkled. “Um, Liv?” a nervous girl’s voice inquired. “Is everything OK? Should I, like, call somebody?”

“Thanks, Polly. I’m fine,” Liv said coolly.

Sean swiveled his head. Polly was regarding him as if he were a slavering wild beast. “Um…you’re absolutely sure?” she squeaked.

“I’m sure.” Liv honked angrily into her tissue. “Get up,” she hissed at him. “You might as well come inside. The sooner you say your piece, the sooner it’ll be over and done. I have things to do.”

He was relieved to get inside, where the wind wasn’t whipping at those tender pink ears, that exposed throat. He wanted to wrap his warm coat around her, but she’d never go for that in her current mood.

The odor of sawdust, plasterboard, polyurethane and paint tickled his nose. People gawked as they went by, but he was laser-beam focused on that elegant, upright back. Only Liv could wear a paint-spattered gray flannel frock and waffle stomper boots and still look somehow regal.

She led him through the refurbished and refitted café, and into a small back office. It was just a plasterboarded, taped-up cube, not yet spackled or painted. Liv went to the window and stared out, as if she could somehow see out of the thick plastic that was taped over the hole.

He looked around. A space heater blasted stale warm air over his ankles. A hot plate sat on a desk crowded with invoices. A mug, tea bag dangling out of it. A sleeping bag and pillow lay on a cheap couch.

“What the hell is this?” He looked at her, appalled. “Are you sleeping in here? Don’t you have a place of your own?”

“Sure, I have a place,” she said. “Sometimes I lose track of the time. I crash here if it’s late. Some nights I don’t have the nerve to…”

“To go out in the dark?” he finished.

She frowned. “Not that it’s any of your business.”

He swallowed hard. “You shouldn’t be here alone, Liv. Not ever.”

Her snort was eloquently derisive. “Well. Isn’t that just too bad.”

He reached to stroke that gleaming mass of hair. She sensed him moving in on her, and jerked away. “So?” she asked. “How are things?”

He was nonplussed. “Huh? What things?”

“You know. With your family. How is Erin? Margot?”

“Oh. Them. Fine,” he said, relieved to have a starting place. “Erin’s almost there. Few more weeks, and I’ll be an uncle. Connor’s out of his mind. Won’t leave her alone for a second. Drives her nuts.”

“Ah,” Liv murmured sourly. “Good for her.”

He pressed on. “And Margot, she’s good too. Starting to show. She felt the baby move last week. She called everybody, she was so excited.”

“That’s wonderful,” Liv whispered. “Are Miles and Cindy OK?”

“Fine. Miles’s hand and arm are all healed up. Cindy’s good, too. Teaching music in Seattle. Gigging a lot, cutting a new album with her band. She and Miles are a big item these days. Inseparable.”

“Oh. That’s lovely.” Her voice was bitter. “How very nice for them.”

Shit. Every damn thing he said underscored how furious she was.

“The last time I talked to your brothers, they mentioned that there was an investigation in progress,” she said. “To verify if Kevin was…”

“Buried up on the hill?” He said it for her. “No. It was Craig Alden’s body in that grave, not Kev’s. Dental records have confirmed it.”

That startled her so much, she actually turned, wide-eyed. “Oh, my goodness,” she whispered. “So you don’t know where Kev is buried?”

He shook his head. “Nobody left alive to ask. Craig was reinterred, in Tacoma, with his folks. But we left Kev’s headstone up on the hill.”

Her throat worked. “Do you think he could still be alive?”

“Fucked if I know.” His voice was raw. “I’ve done everything I can for him. All I can do is try to learn how to live my life…not knowing.”

“I see.” She turned her back. “Well. Good luck with that, Sean.”

He took a step closer, reached to touch her shoulder. “Liv—”

“No!” She wrenched away, huddling into the corner. “Don’t you dare touch me! Not after three goddamn months of shutting me out! Like I didn’t matter!”

“Not true,” he said. “I thought of nothing but you!”

“Then why?” she almost shrieked. “Why did you do that to me?”

He shook his head, groping for words to describe the hell of shrinking fear, the bottomless, airless pit of self-loathing. The words wouldn’t come. “I was…afraid. For you,” he started, lamely.

She gave him a narrow look. “Excuse me?”

“Stress flashbacks,” he blurted. “I guess that’s what they were. Hallucinations. Real horrific fuckers. They were so real. You would walk into the room, and I would grab you and kiss you, and all of a sudden you were dead, and I was the one that had stabbed you, or shot you, or whatever. I was scared even to see you. Scared that I could still hurt you. I thought maybe Osterman had…that he could still…oh, shit.”

Her hands moved up to cover her mouth. “Oh, God. Sean.”

“I tried medicating it,” he plodded on. “It just seemed to get worse. I thought maybe I’d snapped, gone nuts, like Dad.”

“So you decided to do the hard thing?”

The cool tone in her voice made him wince. He was still in a world of hurt, with no end in sight. He clenched his teeth, and nodded.

“Of course. Expect me to understand,” Liv raged. “You had to be alone. You had to leave me alone. Wrong move, Sean!”

“Was it? What did you want me to say?” he broke in savagely. “Hey, babe, I’ve got this little bitty problem. I keep murdering you whenever I see you. Sounds like a real confidence builder, huh?”

“It’s better than being abandoned!” She lashed out at him, flailing.

He blocked her slap, and the flurry of frenzied blows that followed it, then pinned her hands to the wall. “I never stopped loving you,” he said roughly. “It’s been tearing me to pieces.”

She shook her head. “Let go of my damn hands. I need a tissue.”

He gave her one. She blew her nose, hid her face. “Just go, Sean.”

“No,” he said. “I just can’t do that.”

She dropped her hand, and glared at him. Her curling lashes glittered with tears. He could practically hear her spine stacking up. The look of fury in her beautiful eyes rang all his bells.

“Forget it. You can’t bully me into trusting you again,” she announced. “Let go of me!”

“No.” He scooped her up before she could wiggle away and lifted her, pressing her body against the wall so that she straddled his hips. He dug his fingers into the wind whipped hair, and kissed her, hard.

It was like lightning through a wire, the need that roared through him. The emotion, the sensations. Her soft female heat pressed against his crotch, her shabby skirt twined around his legs. She shivered, fighting him even as her thighs tightened and pulsed around his.

She kissed him back, angrily, hungrily. His heart revved up.

He tilted her face up. “You love me,” he said roughly. “I can make you want me. That’s enough for now. We’ll work on trust later.”

“No way, you arrogant jerk,” she hissed. “You got it backwards.”

“No, I don’t. I understand you perfectly.” He scooped her up, hands under her ass, and carried her to the couch. He sank down, depositing her on the cushions. “But if it’s the only card I have to play, I’m goddamn well going to play it.”

She pushed his face away with shaking hands when he tried to kiss her again. “OK,” she said. “Granted, you can muscle me around. You’re very strong. And yes, you’re good at making me come. But that’s all. It ends there. When you’re done, I’ll still tell you to leave. So leave now. Spare us. It’ll just hurt that much more.”

“No.” He put his hand over hers, rubbing his cheek against it. Kissing her palm, her fingers, that delicate knob of bone on her wrist. “If I make you come once, why not again? And again, and again, and damn, before you know it, sixty-five years have gone by.” He slid his hands beneath the skirt, over the thick wool socks until they gave way to bare, smooth female skin halfway up her thighs.

She swatted at him. “Stop it, you lust-crazed pig. So that’s your plan? Just enslave me sexually for all eternity?”

“Ah, man,” he said thickly. “Sounds like heaven.”

She wiggled furiously. “Smart-ass dog,” she muttered.

“Yeah.” The dress was so loose, there was no impediment to sliding his hand still farther, feeling her cotton panties, the humid female warmth between her thighs, the deep, sexy dip of her waist.

Her murmurs sounded like protest, but her breath was jerky, her cheeks hot pink. His hand insinuated itself under a thermal weave undershirt, and found the tender, jiggling heft of her tits, propped in the scaffolding of a cotton bra. Her nipples were tight.

Her heart thudded, quick and fast, against his hand.

Tears flooded his eyes. He hid his face against her chest, let her paint-spattered sweater absorb them. It moved him to tears. How fucking beautiful she was. How fragile. Her body was a treasure box that held the priceless jewel of Liv Endicott’s soul.

His princess, his queen, empress. His goddess.

A sharp tug, and the cotton of her panties gave way, leaving her hot nest of curls naked to his caressing fingers. He tossed her skirt up over her waist. Oh, man. That soft skin, torn panties clinging to one white thigh, that lovely, hot pink slit in her dark curls. Beckoning him.