No Turning Back (14 page)

Chapter Fourteen

Declan waited until he reached the edge of his patience before storming over to Leah’s house that night. Irrational as it was, he’d resented the hell out of her job as he spent the afternoon working off some extra energy in the yard and generally grumbling in a haze of sexual frustration. He took a few minutes after lunch to fantasize about what he planned to do with her and nearly impaled himself on a stack of split and rotting lumber when he wasn’t looking.

That sure would have killed the mood.

Women
. Make that one woman, Leah. When he thought about that hair, the face, the smoking body, his dick got hard while his brain went soft.

Somehow he’d held off the whole way to seven that night without dropping by. He thought about texting, asking her to dinner, but he knew they’d never make it to a menu. His body was primed and his brain calculating the fastest way to get her clothes off.

He leaned on the doorbell, letting it chime four times before easing up. That would annoy the hell out of any sane person. The goal was to get her to the porch as fast as possible. He didn’t care who saw him standing out there. He just wanted in.

He listened for sexy heels clicking against the hardwood floor, but nothing happened. His hand was halfway to the bell again when the door flew open.

She wore a disgruntled what’s-wrong-with-you scowl. “Declan?”

“You expecting someone else?” If she said yes and some dude appeared behind her, he’d probably beat the guy senseless.

“I wasn’t even expecting
you
.” She angled her body in the small opening and showed no signs of letting him inside. “What are you doing here?”

A non-welcome. Interesting. He refused to let it sidetrack him. “I thought we settled this earlier today.”

“Yeah, but, I didn’t know you were coming tonight.” A hand went to her hair and she combed her fingers through the strands.

Ah, that could explain it. Maybe the stunned expression had to do with some girly thing about not fixing her hair first. As if he gave a shit about that. “You actually thought I was going to stay away?”

Her hand wrapped around the doorknob, blocking his entrance, as she bit her lower lip. “Not really.”

The lacy slim-fitting shirt she had on caught his attention before his gaze skipped down to her bare feet and toenails painted a color so dark they looked black. “Remember the talk about licking and touching—”

“Have you eaten?” she asked at the same time.

The dirty comment hung right there but he let it drop without touching it. No need to be crude and that wasn’t really his style anyway. Talking to a woman wasn’t the same as talking to a guy in his unit and he was just civilized enough to know that. “I’m not hungry.”

“Declan.”

“Yes, Leah.”

“We should think this through before we—”

Enough of this crap
. “Stop talking.”

With a hand against her stomach, he swept her inside the house and followed. A backwards kick and the door slammed shut. A second later, he had her pinned to the family room wall with her arms next to her head, his fingers laced through hers and his mouth traveling over her lips. Need rumbled through him like brushfire bursting into flame.

His tongue licked over her lips then dipped inside, meeting hers. The kiss, deep and demanding, continued until her hips pressed against him. He’s been half-hard all day and the touch of her soft body against his, the brush and the friction, sent his nerves revving.

He kissed her until a tiny moan escaped her lips and her body twisted against his. When he couldn’t stand even the thin barrier of clothing between them, a hand slipped over and dove into her hair. Soft and silky, just like the rest of her.

Hands toured and sharp breaths clashed. Her fingers trailed down the deep groove between his shoulder blades and a bell rang in his brain. He had to have her now, ten seconds from now, but no longer. His mouth never left hers as his palms swept over her top. The shirt fit close to her skin and tucked into her pants. With shaking hands, he yanked it out. The flimsy material ripped under his fingers.

“Damn.” He lifted his head, gasping as the air pounded in his lungs. “I didn’t mean—”

“I don’t care. Tear it all off.” She pressed her hand against the back of his neck and brought his mouth back to hers.

When his fingers hit bare skin, he shifted their position away from the wall. Walking her backwards, he guided her toward the bedroom, stumbling as they banged into furniture and tripped in their frenzied need to rub against each other. The room whizzed by with their mouths locked in an endless kiss.

They bounced and turned as he got them as far as the small hall leading to the bedroom. The door was closed but the fire brewing inside him made him think he could bust through it. Her fingers slipped to his belt and he debated taking her right there against the wall. Legs wrapped around his waist, her cheeks flushed as he pushed inside her. The temptation drove through him as his hands roamed up her back and his belt buckle clanked as it fell open.

Bed
. He wanted her in a bed. They could try a wall, the kitchen table. Hell, on the front porch while the entire neighborhood watched for all he cared, but the first time he wanted a mattress. He’d dreamed of this moment and planned to take his time. Tasting every inch, learning every part of her.

He lifted his head long enough to place a line of kisses down her sexy neck. Her head fell back against the wall as her fingers speared through his hair, holding him close. Without breaking contact, he reached over and grabbed for the door to her bedroom. He pushed but it hit against something with a hard thunk.

“What the hell?”

Her body went still under his hands and her head shot up. “How did we get . . . Declan, no.”

Those eyes, all cloudy with passion a second ago now grew wide as the blood drained from her face. White skin, nail-clawing grip on his forearm, it didn’t take a genius to know something was very wrong.

His gaze shot to the six-inch crack and the boxes he could see stacked on the bed inside. “What’s going on in there?”

“Let’s go back to the family room.” She tugged hard enough on his arm to wrench it out of the socket.

Just in time, he slipped out of her grasp and shoved against the door, pushing his way in the small entrance space. His gaze ran over the room. Focus went to the boxes. There had to be six of them littered around and taking up most of the walking and sleeping room.

“What are you doing, moving or something?” The idea made his stomach roll, but he refused to examine that now.

While he scanned, he noticed she hadn’t followed him inside. She stood at the door, staring at him, as she gnawed on her lower lip. With her shirt untucked and her toes curled under, she seemed younger and so uncharacteristically unsure. Her shoulders fell and her body shrank in front of him.

What was happening here?
“Leah, I don’t—”

Then it hit him. The quiet. The strange shadow. The blocked view. A whiteboard, so out of place yet there it was, huge and spanning the entire space between the end of her bed and her chest of drawers, leaving only a thin walking path.

Photographs and newspaper articles, handwritten notes and lines in different colors connected items together. He zeroed in on the picture at the top middle. A photo of his back as he stood over Charlie’s grave. Declan remembered the day, and how he told the marker everything he’d wanted to say to Charlie’s face. Declan barely recognized his own bent-over frame but he knew that jacket. It hung in the hall closet at Shadow Hill right now.

The whole messed-up scene had him blinking. “What the hell am I looking at?”

“Declan, please. Let’s go to the family room and talk.” Her voice bobbled as she spoke.

For the first time, the room came into sharp focus. This was some sort of Anti-Charlie War Room. The place where she kept all the information she’d gathered on his family—on him—over the years. Whatever hideous plan she was going to launch against them in support of regaining Shadow Hill, it all started here.

He turned around and ripped the top off the nearest box. Files lined the inside, stuffed to overfilling and pushing the sides out to near-breaking. The tabs had names, most familiar to him, many belonging to relatives. He saw his name in what he guessed was her bold half-print writing.

“I can explain.” She reached out with a shaky hand.

He jerked his arm away before she could make contact. No way did he want her touching him. He didn’t even want to look at her right now.

Fury exploded inside of him, spewing in every direction until the white-hot flame burned through him. “You conniving bitch.”

“I never lied to you.” She wrapped her arms around her body.

So vulnerable.

Such a damn liar.

No way was he falling for any of it a second time. “You told me you had an investigator look into Callen’s background.”

“That was part of it.”

But that was just a small piece. Declan saw that now. They got hateful calls and mail every single day from people who claimed Charlie turned them into victims and now wanted revenge. At least with those people, Declan saw it coming. The hatred was right there in the profane sentences and numerous threats.

Leah’s attack was so much worse. Lethal and unexpected with the power to knock him down.

It all jammed up on him until he had to get it out. Fueled by an anger he hadn’t known in years, he grabbed files, snapping them in the air and throwing them one at a time at her feet. Papers whooshed out of the sides and floated to the floor. She never moved. Didn’t try to catch anything or keep him out of the boxes.

“You’ve been collecting this for how long?” If she lied one more time he didn’t know what he’d do. He’d never hurt a woman, but he had no idea one would ever have the power to destroy him.

“It’s not—”

“Not what, Leah? It’s fucking crazy, is what it is. It’s scary. You know that, right?” She opened her mouth but he jumped right back in as the words tore out of him. “Were you going to sleep with me then add your rating to one of these files? Is that it?”

“Of course not.”

“Maybe post it up there on the board with whatever else you’ve gathered about my past?”

“Declan, I . . .” She wiped her hand over her face. “I don’t know how to make you understand.”

She jumped and looked back up when he slapped his hand against the whiteboard and watched it rock. It took all he had not to tear the thing apart, rip the wood with his bare hands and throw it all on the floor.

Tension and a dark roaring anger rumbled through the room. “This is unbelievable.”

She leaned against the door frame, her body curled in and tucked. “I wanted to tell you.”

Her whispered words crashed against him and he fought them off. Even now after seeing this, the urge to hold her and shake her until she agreed to stop this nonsense floored him. All his energy centered on standing there, holding his ground, and refusing to buy into the lost-kitten look she had going on. But, damn, he was tempted and that stupid show of weakness made him furious.

“When did you plan to come clean, Leah? You had every chance. We’ve seen each other almost every day since I got to town.”

“I couldn’t figure out how or when.”

“How about after I told you about my mom or opened up about being Charlie’s kid? Or when I kissed you? Or when I nearly ripped your clothes off and took you in the work shed?” So many things he’d never shared, all those emotions floating to the surface. He’d handed the information right to the very person determined to gather it and then fire it as a weapon. He’d made it all so easy.

She blew out a long breath. “Everything started racing and I lost control. This began long before I met you. It has nothing—”

He pointed at her, willing her to stop talking. “Do not say it has nothing to do with me. It has everything to do with me and you know it.”

She held his gaze with tortured eyes for a second then looked away.

“You want to be angry about the past, fine.” He refastened his belt and blinked away the memory of her hands trying to strip it off. “Wallow in your hate for all I care. But this? Don’t try to pretend this is about anything but destroying my family.”

“I’m trying to balance everything and make everybody happy.”

“Happy? Do I look happy to you?”

She dropped her hands to her sides and came to him. Her fingers wrapped around his forearms and her eyes pleaded as she talked. “Please, listen to me.”

The only way to do this, to keep his shield up and strong, was to walk away. “We’re done with that. You had every chance and—”

“Declan.”

He peeled her fingers off his arms and set her back a straight-armed distance away. “I’m not going to let you go after my brothers. You want a fight, you got it.”

“I want you.”

“Too late.” And he walked out the door before his steps could hesitate or his body to could call out to her. Those days were over.

***

Two days later, days without any contact from Declan or even a glimpse of his strong back, she stepped inside her father’s house and closed the door. The idea of food made her dizzy with nausea. Her stomach was raw and her nerve endings prickly as if they were exposed.

The texts she sent Declan went unanswered and the idea of going over there, walking right into the lion’s den, scared her to death. By now the Hanover brothers knew what she’d been doing and she’d been branded their enemy. That’s how her family worked and she guessed the Hanovers weren’t any different, especially since she handed them such deadly ammunition to fire at her.

She had no idea what was happening in Declan’s head or with the house. She couldn’t feel anything except the headache pounding her brain that refused to go away and the thumping in her palms from the blisters she got ripping the whiteboard down. If she could have burned the thing without taking her house along with it she would have. Instead it sat in pieces all over her bedroom while she spent the few hours per night she did sleep sitting in a chair in the family room.

Footsteps shuffled as her dad popped out of his study and into the hallway. “It’s about time you showed up.”