Imminent Danger (Adrenaline Highs) (11 page)

“Matters to me,” he murmured. He fumbled for her hand and found it. Closed his fingers around hers. “Thanks.”

She barely heard the word before he got it out. Then he was fast asleep. Abbey gently took her hand back and set her watch alarm for another two hours. Now she should go back to her own room. Blake was asleep and wouldn’t know either way if she stayed or left. But she didn’t move. Couldn’t move. In fact, she did the thing she’d never thought she’d ever do. She slid her hand back into his. He didn’t budge, so she eased a little closer to get a better view of their clasped hands.

He had more road rash on his knuckles and a fresh surge of sympathy oozed through her veins. His big hand engulfed hers. It was warm and strong even as he slept. He was always so strong, so competent and sure. From the first day she’d met him he’d been in control. He didn’t have a shy bone in his body. His very hot, cut, gorgeous body.

God, just thinking back to the afternoon when the EMT had sliced off his shirt, she’d wanted to run her hands along the divide between his chest and abs. She’d wanted to taste his skin in those little valleys.

Who are you?
It was a good question to ask herself since she’d never thought she’d have these feelings or urges. Ever. Of course it didn’t mean she’d ever make good on them either.

Though they’d iced the whole side of his body where he’d slammed into the tire, the bruise on his face was already showing. His cheekbone and eye were going to be a solid purple and black tomorrow. Her lids got heavy as she watched him. Poor guy.

Abby’s watch alarm went off—the sound of an old time European ambulance—and she jolted awake and shut it down. The room came into focus and it wasn’t hers. A wave of heat flushed her skin. She’d fallen asleep in Blake’s bed. Next to him! Her panic faded as she turned to him, his eyes closed, his breathing steady. A wave of embarrassment washed through her quickly followed by remorse for having to rouse him from sleep again. She yawned and gently touched his shoulder. “Blake?”

“I’m awake. Who could sleep through that siren of an alarm?” he asked in a sleepy croak.

Grinning, Abbey cocked her elbow and leaned her head on her hand. “My sister for one.”

“No way. I don’t believe you.” His gorgeous blue eyes opened and stared right at her.

“Honest to God, truth. Bernie can sleep through an earthquake.”

“Bernie?” he asked.

“Short for Bernadette. She’s my big sis.”

Blake gingerly adjusted on his side, bent his arm under his head to see her better. “How much bigger? By how many years?”

“Four.”

“How come you never told me about your sister?”

“I don’t know.” She shrugged. “It’s not important. It’s just never come up.”

He watched her so closely, as if he could figure out her life story if he stared long enough. “Tell me something else about you.” His voice sounded sleepy and sexy and Abbey wished she were brave enough to let herself go with him.

“Like what?” At his impatient glare, she smiled. “What’s to tell? Really? I work for Julie, I’m a dancer, I have one big sister and my parents moved to North Carolina to be with my Dad’s parents a couple of years ago. That’s my story.”

“You just told me the
only
things I
already
knew about you.”

She hadn’t told him any of that besides Bernie. “How could you already know?”

He rolled his eyes. “Seriously, you’re going to ask me that knowing I work for Troy, a private investigator?”

“Does that mean you were investigating me?” She didn’t know if she should be angry or flattered.

“No,” Blake replied. “It means I wanted to know more about you because you won’t ever talk to me.”

“That’s not true,” she argued. He made a wide-eyed face at her and she had to come clean. “Okay, maybe sometimes I’m not great at conversation.” One dark eyebrow lifted a fraction. “Maybe more than sometimes,” she admitted. But if he tried to get more out of her now, she’d be out of here faster than he could blink. In fact, it was way past time for her to leave this bed. She lifted her head and eased back.

“Don’t. Please, Abbey. Just stay. I promise I won’t ask you any questions. Just stay with me. I sleep better with you here.”

She shook her head and fought back a tired grin. “You’re sleeping because you tangled with a Hummer, you’re loaded up on ibuprofen and you’re wiped out.”

“You take the comp out of compliment, you know that?” he asked.

She settled next to him again and they watched each other for a long minute. “Well this is fascinating,” she murmured.

“I don’t believe it,” he said in a lazy drawl. “Two jokes in one day. I must have landed in an alternate universe.” Keeping her grin under wraps wasn’t possible and he smiled back at her. “Do you have any idea how fucking beautiful you are when you smile like that?” His raw whisper hit her on a cellular level.

Heat burned up her cheeks and she blinked. How was she supposed to answer that? “You make it sound like I never smile.”

“If you do, it’s not when I’m around. You have no idea how much I want to change that.”

“Blaaake.” She drew out his name, a warning to stop because she didn’t know how to make it any clearer that nothing was going to happen between them.

“Abbeeeey,” he replied softly. He was too sweet and she smiled from the warm fuzzies at the way he said her name.

“That’s what I’m talking about.” He watched her for a second and sighed. “Okay fine. You don’t want to talk about you. Let’s talk about me.” He rolled onto his back. “What do you want to know?”

Now this she could handle. “I know you have an older sister, two older brothers and Brendan is your twin brother, but who’s the older twin, you or Brendan?”

“Me, of course. Thank God. It’s about the only thing I have to lord over him.”

“Spoken like a true big brother.” She grinned at his sidelong glance. “I met your sister.”

Blake shifted on his back and tried to adjust his pillow, and Abbey leaned in to help him when he grimaced in pain. “When?” he finally asked when he was comfortable enough.

“During filming. Julie introduced us one afternoon. I only saw her a few times, but she seemed really nice.”
Payback
was a true story based on Jess Bryant’s life. A story that involved not only her husband, but her whole family, including Blake.

“My big sis. I’m really proud of her.” The slight curve of Blake’s lips hinted at a grin. “She worked herself into the ground for that film.”

Abbey still didn’t want to ask him about being kidnapped. The topic opened the door to sharing, and she wasn’t great at talking about herself, but remembering the movie and seeing Blake so banged up now had her emotions riding a thin line.

His whole family had gone through hell and she didn’t know what to say. “That whole ordeal must have been a nightmare.” Without even thinking, she reached out and took his hand.

Blake could’ve died and gone to heaven right at that very minute. The way Abbey said his name made every wish, dream and fantasy he’d ever had about her seem like a possibility. It was the first time Abbey had ever reached out to him while not in a crisis. He would’ve made a joke about it, but doing so would only push her away. He knew her well enough to guess that.

It had bothered him that in all this time she hadn’t said one goddamn word in sympathy for his being kidnapped and tied up for the better part of four days. Her lack of interest had actually curbed his rampant desire to get her under the sheets.

Watching her wide green eyes shining in sympathy and concern made him feel like a total heel for being mad at her all those months ago. Time had pretty much gotten him over the anger, but he’d filed it away as ammunition whenever he got soft around her, whenever he’d catch himself staring and daydreaming about touching her or kissing her.

“You don’t need to look at me like that,” he said softly.

“How did you…? How are you? How did you deal with that?”

He saw her looking at his ears. “You’re thinking of Brendan. My ears are fine. Intact.” The names had been changed in the movie so only people really close to the family knew it was about them.

“But still. The ending of the movie. Is that what really happened?”

“You mean, did the whole family get shot?” He nodded. “All true.”

That sympathy was back as Abbey’s brows knit together. “And everyone recovered from it okay?” She adjusted from sitting on her shins to crossing her legs in front of her. Her mile long legs gleamed in the moonlight streaming in from the window and he fought the urge to reach out and touch all that soft skin.

Blake couldn’t help but grin at her tone. “You did see the movie, right?”

She smacked his arm. “Don’t make fun of me. It was still a movie and just because it was based on true events doesn’t mean that’s what actually happened.” She glanced up to the ceiling. “Whenever I ran into Jess while doing stuff for Julie, she was so nice to me. Like we were friends or something.”

“You talked to her?”

“Not a ton, but a couple of times. She was kind of busy, producing and directing.”

Blake nodded. “Yeah, she worked her ass off. Tanner and she didn’t go on their honeymoon until after she’d finished up in editing. Jess had actually cornered Blake midway through production when he’d visited the set and asked him point blank what the situation was with Abbey. He hadn’t been able to hide his feelings from his sis. Jess had a made a point to talk to Abbey a little bit more just to see if she passed inspection. “She liked you,” he said.

Abbey narrowed her eyes at him.

He laughed and regretted it instantly when a shock of pain zipped through his chest. “I’m serious. She thought you were very nice and very good at your job. She thought it was sweet how much you take care of Julie.” He squeezed her hand. “You’re very good at taking care of the people you care about.”

She dipped her head, shy. She really didn’t know how to take a compliment. He felt her slipping away.

“Did you meet my brother-in-law? The Monster.”

She met his gaze, a smile growing on her lips. “You really called him that?”

“We called him a lot of things,” Blake admitted. “We weren’t sure about him in the beginning. Actually, after our first introduction to the guy, we wanted to kill him, but he grew on us. He’s really good for Jess. They make a great team.” He envied Jess her relationship with Tanner. They reminded him of his parents. He wanted something like that for himself, which was why he’d tried his damnedest to keep away from Abbey. She didn’t want anything to do with him and life was too short to force a feeling that wasn’t there. He wanted someone who wanted him, someone he could confide in through the good and the bad. He’d been doing really well until she’d run into his arms like a tight end headed to the end zone. And boom, he was right back in the palm of her hand, needing to comfort her, needing to keep her safe and wishing like hell that she felt the same way.

“Julie introduced me to Tanner in the very beginning, but I never really talked to him after that. He was pretty busy too. I read that this was their first project together.”

“Yep. Jess jumped in with both feet and dragged Tanner with her.” He grinned at the picture. His tiny, big sis, dragging her giant of a husband anywhere always made him smile.

“The guy that kidnapped you is still in prison?” she asked.

“For a very long time,” Blake confirmed.

“And the guy that nearly ran us over today… You think he remembers you too?” she asked.

Blake nodded. “It’s possible. Yeah.” He hated the worry in her pretty eyes and squeezed her hand. “Hey, it’s going to be all right. We’re safe here. Troy made this place a fortress.”

“But what happens when we’re not here? I can’t hide out at Julie and Troy’s house until I’m old and brittle. I have a life to live.” She closed her eyes and shook her head as if something else was behind the words.

“Don’t we all,” Blake said around a yawn. His involuntary stretch sent a fresh wave of pain across his middle.

Unfortunately, Abbey had a sharp eye on him. “You can have a couple more ibuprofen if you want, then you should go back to sleep and get a few more hours of rest.” Abbey reset her watch alarm and shifted like she might leave.

“I’m okay. Will you stay?” Blake closed his eyes and squeezed her hand. He hadn’t been lying. He did sleep better with her next to him. The fresh citrus scent of her seeped into his pores with every breath and relaxed him like a full body massage.

She exhaled a long-suffering sigh, but he gave her a pitiful look and she caved with a tilt of her head. “Fine. But I’m not staying all night long. Just a few more minutes.” She propped up a pillow against the headboard and leaned against it, still sitting up.

“Few more minutes is good,” he mumbled and passed out again.

A light sensation along his neck woke him slowly. Something was different, but he couldn’t figure out what. He didn’t budge as he let his senses come to life. First, his pillow was different, not as fluffy. He caught the fresh scent of Abbey and wanted to inhale all of her. He liked that she was still here with him. But wait…she was more than here. He had his arm wrapped around a different pillow. A moving pillow. A breathing pillow. And his hand wasn’t wrapped around a pillow, it was cupped around…a hip. He concentrated on the soft sensation along his neck, the way the caress sent every nerve ending alert and begging for more. He took another whiff, careful to keep his breathing even, careful to make sure Abbey thought he was still asleep. Because somehow, he’d ended up laying his head on her stomach and instead of shoving him off or away, she’d let him stay. That light caress against his neck was her fingers gently weaving through his hair. He didn’t want to move, could barely manage to get air into this lungs knowing it was Abbey touching him now.