Falling for Her (20 page)

From the beginning, he’d judged her and found her lacking without ever giving her a chance to prove otherwise. As for lying about her name, he now understood why she’d changed it. Not that she’d owed it to him to tell him. He’d given her little reason to think she meant anything to him beyond a few hours of mutual enjoyment.

“Does he think you still have the money?”

“I don’t know. Probably, but it doesn’t matter. He’d want me back with or without it so he could properly punish me. He-he thinks he owns me.”

Her voice trembled, and the tears pooling in her eyes had his burning. He blinked them away and did some fast thinking. If the man had near-drowned her and put a whiplash scar on her back, he was clearly dangerous. But—and it was the big but—she couldn’t, nor shouldn’t, have to run and hide the rest of her life. She had him and K2 to protect her, and a small town chief of police would be no match for them.

That was part of the reason for the decision he came to. The other part: he just couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing her again. The beautiful, wounded woman was his, flaws and all.

“Get your stuff ready. We’re going home.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

N
o. I won’t put you and your friends in danger.” Sugar scrambled to the end of the bed. “I have a plan and enough money. You don’t have to worry about me.”

Jamie exhaled a long breath, as if she was trying his patience. “I’m not giving you a choice, sweetheart. And before you get all huffy, consider that you have me and the K2 team on your side. We are badass bad, and your Rodney Vanders, cop or no cop, doesn’t stand a chance against us.”

“He’s not mine.” The longing to give in, to stay with Jamie and to have the baddest guys she could think of at her side, almost had her saying yes. She shook her head. “These are my troubles, Jamie, and I won’t dump them on you or anyone else.”

Never mind that she still hadn’t told him everything. Would he be so willing to be her champion if he knew the worst?

He shook his head as if she were an errant child in need of a scolding. “Sugar, don’t ask me to walk away. I don’t think I can. If you insist on going on to wherever it is you’re planning to go, I’m coming with you. We can hide together.”

“You don’t mean that.” Jamie go into hiding? He would wither and die.

“Yes, I do. Which will it be?”

Still dazed by the speed at which she’d been hustled back to Pensacola, Sugar stood in front of Jamie’s door waiting to learn why she was at his house instead of her condo. Although the drive back should’ve given her plenty of time to think, her mind had closed down on her. Jamie had stayed behind her the entire way, and when she’d put on her blinker to turn for home, he’d come up beside her, blown his horn, and motioned her to follow him.

Now what?

“You forgot something,” he said, walking up with her suitcase and laptop bag in one hand, and her cat carrier in the other.

So she was staying with him? Her knees almost buckled from relief at not having to spend the night at her place, alone and peeking out the window until daylight, watching for Rodney. He was near. She could feel his evil creeping up on her.

“I didn’t know. That I was staying here, I mean.” Did her voice sound as pathetic and needy to him as it did to her?

“You are. At least, until this is resolved.” He handed her the carrier, then dug his keys out of his pocket. “If nothing else, Junior travels well,” he said as he unlocked the door. “Maria’s cat yowls like a banshee at the mere picture of a car.”

He was trying to cheer her up, and she dutifully chuckled, appreciating that he cared enough to attempt the impossible. She was scared out of her freaking mind and eyed the road they’d just come in on with longing. The smart side of her brain screamed that she should be halfway through Texas by now.

The dumb side wanted to be with Jamie even though she didn’t see a future for them; there were just too many unknowns where she was concerned. As for him, he was like some kind of knight of old, out to right a wrong; then he’d be off on his next adventure.

It was stupid of her and unfair to him not to tell him everything. Before much longer he’d find out anyway, and he’d hate her for lying to him. After a good night’s sleep, she promised herself she would tell him. At the moment, though, she was dog-assed tired and not thinking straight. Once she was coherent again, she’d give him the whole truth and nothing but. So help her God, and all that.

“The guest bedroom’s this way.”

Sugar blinked, finding herself standing in the middle of his living room. The guest bedroom?
What’d you expect, Sugar? That he brought you here to play house with him?
As she followed him, she glanced around, taking note of his furnishings. The décor reminded her of the eighties, with the blue-and-white Laura Ashley prints, even a well-worn, blue fabric recliner. Except for the wide-screen TV, it certainly wasn’t what she would’ve expected Saint’s home to look like, or any single man’s for that matter. It was like . . . it was like he’d re-created a place from his past.

As he led her to the guest room, her gaze roamed over his back, his wide shoulders, then down to his trim waist, and lean hips. Such a contradiction in what he showed the world and what was inside him. For the first time, she thought she understood him. He was stuck in the past, in a time when he’d had it all—loving parents, a bright future, and the homecoming queen for a girlfriend. And she thought she was screwed up. It was good to know, though, that he was human after all, and not the perfect, blue-eyed angel she’d first thought.

Or, a past girlfriend had decorated his home to look girlie, and he just hadn’t gotten around to changing it.

“This is pretty,” she said when she took in the white dresser, white headboard, the patchwork quilt in blues, greens, and peach.

“Do you think so? My mom kept a room like this for guests.”

His question was so serious, as if her answer really mattered to him. “I do.” And he hadn’t cared enough about some other woman to let her drape his home in Laura Ashley prints.

“I figured she knew better than me how a guest room should be decorated.” There was longing in his eyes as he glanced around the room.

Yep, he was messed up. Impulsively, she lifted onto her toes and brushed her mouth over his, drawing back before he could push her away. “It’s lovely, Jamie. Really.” She’d give anything to be the one to help him put his past to rest, but that had about as much chance of happening as her marrying her secret crush, Prince Harry.

His face lowered toward hers, and she thought he was going to kiss her, thought, yes, please. But he pulled back, stepping away. “You have your own bathroom. Why don’t you get settled, then we’ll decide what to do about dinner.” He caressed her cheek with the back of his hand, then left.

Sugar set the carrier on the bed and opened the door. When her cat strolled out and meeped, she picked him up, and hugged him to her chest. “He’s pretty messed up, Junior, but I don’t care. Let’s take a bath, then we’ll go see what he’s got to offer for dinner.”

There was no bathtub to luxuriate in, but the shower felt almost as good. Surprising her, Junior pawed at the glass door. Opening it a little, he jumped in and chased droplets of water from one end of the tiled floor to the other, not seeming to mind he was getting soaked.

“Silly boy. Don’t you know you’re a cat, and you’re supposed to hate water?” He never had, though. To him water was as fascinating as his toy mouse. “Maybe our new home, wherever that ends up being, will have a shower for you to play in.” She laughed when he reared up, his paws high in the air, then pounced on a soap bubble slithering toward the drain.

After drying off, and choosing something to wear from her meager supply, she went looking for Jamie.

“He’s wet,” Jamie said when she walked into the living room with Junior wrapped in a towel.

“Well, yeah. We just took a shower.”

“Okaaay.” One corner of his lips twitched. “If you wanted a shower partner, you could’ve checked with me.”

Oh
. She tried to think of a clever comeback, but the man stole her wits sitting there in the old-fashioned recliner—a root beer dangling from his fingers and his bare feet hanging over the too-short leg rest—and wearing a lazy smile on his face. He wasn’t the same unsmiling man who’d showed her to the guest room before briskly walking away. Truthfully, he was wearing her out, hiding behind the walls he’d built around him one minute, flirting with her the next. How was she supposed to know what to expect at any given time, or how to act around him?

Still not sure of his mood, she perched on the edge of the blue-and-white print sofa. It was weird, this feeling she was sitting in some grandmother’s living room instead of one belonging to a he-man warrior who faced danger without a blink of his eyes. Talk about contradictions. Her gaze flitted around, settling on a collection of bells, some of them crystal, some porcelain, and a few brass.

“They were my mother’s. She loved collecting them. Made it easy to know what to get her for Christmas.”

The wistfulness in his voice tugged at her heart, and suddenly, she missed her mother with an ache that brought tears to her eyes. What a sad pair the two of them were. “They’re lovely.”

He cleared his throat. “Unless you want moldy cheese, potato chips, and a root beer for dinner, we need to make a trip to the grocery store.”

Subtly clearing her own throat, Sugar forced a smile. “Sure. Could we make a stop at my condo so I can pick up a few things? I kinda packed lightly. If I still have a job, I’d like to go to work tomorrow. Guess I should call Maria, and see if I can take back the e-mail I sent her.”

“I’ve taken care of it. Called when we were driving back, and she said to tell you she expects to see your smiling face at K2 first thing in the morning.”

Well, she wasn’t so sure about that. What if she had to run again? Was it fair to expect Maria to spend time training her if she wasn’t sure she’d stay? The only way she’d feel right about it would be to lay it all out and let Maria decide. Looked like a day of true confessions ahead. Both Jamie and Maria would get the full story, and more than likely, they would send her on her way, both relieved to be rid of her.

“Let me grab my shoes and purse,” she said, setting a sleeping Junior next to her on the couch.

Although she wore leggings and a loose T-shirt, except for the addition of a bra, she decided not to change. Not like she had much to choose from anyway. She pulled her damp hair up into a short ponytail, and other than some lip gloss, skipped applying makeup. Slipping her feet into a pair of flip-flops, she slung her purse over her shoulder. At the bedroom door, she stopped, considered, and then went to her suitcase and retrieved her stash of money, along with her gun and fake identity. After stuffing them in the bottom of her purse, she returned to the living room.

Jamie gave her the once-over, then grinned. “You look like a teenager.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll go change.” What had she been thinking? Like he would want to be seen with a woman dressed like she was fixin’ to clean house or something.

“Take it as a compliment, Sugar, the way it was meant.”

Then he prowled toward her, his gaze capturing hers, freezing her like the proverbial deer in the headlights. Then he was kissing her, and she dropped her purse to the floor and wrapped her arms around his neck. His fingers grasped her hips, pulling her against him. Their tongues found each other, and hers rejoiced in the taste of him as flavors of lemon and root beer burst through her mouth.

As she slid her hands up, gliding them over the bristles of his short hair, she pressed her body into his, felt the tingles in her breasts, in her oversensitive nipples, felt his erection pushing against her stomach, low and almost right where she wanted to feel him. She trembled from need for him.

A moan filled the air between them, one she realized with gratitude came from Jamie. Desperate to show him she loved him without saying the words, she climbed up his body, and wrapped her legs around his waist. His arousal pressed against the part of her that would only and ever belong to him.

“Store,” he gasped, the one word vibrating over her lips.

“Store?” She sucked on his tongue, wanting to crawl under his clothes and put her hands all over his body. She wanted to press her fingers into the muscles she knew existed in his arms, his chest, his abs, his legs. She’d explore him, taste him, love him until he’d never want any woman but her.

He put his hands on her waist and lifted her into the air, then set her on her feet. “If we don’t go now, we won’t. I hurt for you, Sugar.” He took her hand and pressed it against his erection. “See?”

She nodded, too dumbfounded to do anything but nod like some kind of head-bobbing toy. He could remember they needed to go to the store? After the most explosive kiss ever?

“If we don’t go now, we won’t.”

“Ya just said that,” she said, proud she was following their conversation, something she considered a miracle when all she wanted was to climb right back up him and finish what he’d started.

His laugh was shaky as his hand blatantly readjusted his jeans. “You’ll be the death of me yet. Let’s go get our errands out of the way. Then . . .” He winked. “Then we’ll have all night for, um, whatever.”