Tangled in Tulle: Tulle and Tulips, Book 1 (8 page)

“What are you up to?” She glanced down at her blouse, jeans and slipper shoes and then back at him still in his suit. “I’m not exactly dressed for the kind of scene you are.”

“You’re perfect.” Rather than wait for an argument, he turned her back toward her office and gave her a little nudge. “Get your keys. Meet me out front.”

He was almost to the entrance when she called out. “I don’t appreciate being given orders.”

Too bad.
He didn’t look back at her. He didn’t stop. He did shrug.

“Don’t keep me waiting, Lori. Even Job had his limits.”

In the outer hallway, away from anyone’s curious eyes, and Lori’s cautious ones, Trevor broke into a jog, pulling his tie and jacket off as he went. At his car, he pulled a blanket from the trunk and lowered the top.

Step one in reminding Lori how to enjoy life—have her feel the wind in her hair. Step two—keep her off balance.

Chapter Eight

Trusting the vacancy that had been in Trevor’s gaze was scary. If he’d had a glint of wickedness or hint of arousal she’d have known how to act. She should be prepared anyway, thanks to the government’s training, but Trevor rattled her foundations. Yet instead of second-guessing him she doubted herself.

“Good evening, Lori.” Daniel, the night guard, smiled from behind the front security desk as he looked from her to Trevor waiting in a sleek Mercedes convertible at the curb outside and back to her. “Did Mr. Masters talk you out of your cave?”

“I guess you could say that.”

“Good. You work too hard. Though I’ll miss seeing you on my evening rounds.”

“Try to manage.” She liked Daniel. He was cute and his flirtations did nothing for her, which made him the best kind of man. Safe. Trevor was anything but safe.

A blast of cold smacked at Lori as she pushed open the giant lobby doors. She pulled her jacket closed. Trevor had shed his tie, but other than his suit jacket he sat with the car top down as if it was summer. Given his mood inside—playful, carefree—he wouldn’t care about the chill. He probably wasn’t even noticing it.

“New car?” She remembered him having a four-door sedan suitable for driving business associates before.

“Yeah.” He leaned over and opened her door from the driver’s seat. “I decided to shed a little of my practicality.”

“Could we slip a little of it back on and raise the top?”

He smiled and patted the seat. “Live a little.”

She stepped closer and rested a hand on the door, but didn’t get in. “By freezing or by destroying my hair with windblown split ends?”

“Nothing a pair of scissors and a trim won’t fix.” He took her hand and tugged her into the car. Lori pulled her knees up, lifting her legs before her shins scraped along the door. She slid a little on the leather seat and had to grip the dash to steady herself. Trevor chuckled as he leaned over her to pull the door shut.

With his torso brushing hers, his lips lingering close, he stared into her eyes. Her slip-n-sliding belly skidded. Her teeter tottering heart trembled, transfixed on an upward totter. He was going to kiss her.

She licked her lips and canted forward. Cravings crashed through her, dared her to suggest they head back inside for some alone time.

“Buckle up.” Trevor patted her leg and sat up, leaving her hungry and confused.

“Where are we going?” She reached for the seatbelt. That was twice now he hadn’t taken the kiss. Twice he’d riled her up, flipped the switch on her arousal, and turned away. There wouldn’t be a third.

Trevor reached into the backseat and pulled out his silk tie and a blanket. “Cover up. Pull your hair back. Enjoy the ride.”

Her heart melted into a clichéd pile of goo as the weight of his expensive tie, relinquished for scrunchie-like purposes, settled in her palm before he pulled away and headed in the direction of the beach.

Tying her hair back, she turned to study him. Powerful and confident, relaxed and at peace, a smile danced on the edges of his lips. Wind rushed through his hair, passing Christmas lights and the moonlight kissed his skin. “You’ve changed.”

“So have you.” Before, he’d been protective about his clothes. Cautious to the point he’d always folded his tie and jacket when removing them. And he’d never rolled his sleeves. Only after he’d changed into jeans or shorts had he relaxed. Now, still in his suit, he was more relaxed than she’d ever seen him.

“A few rough months will do that to a girl.”
Rough. There’s an understatement.

“Make you more serious? Dark?” he asked.

“And you more carefree?” she countered.

A brightly lit fairground with a circling Ferris wheel loomed in the distance, growing larger each mile. Anxious with anticipation, her belly rose and fell, rose and fell and before long its circling and turning had synchronized with the wheel of happiness and fear.

Happiness because the crowds drawn in by the bright lights were most often smiling. Laughing.

Fear because crowds were unpredictable. A melting pot of predators watching for dropped guards. Dangerous.

The circling lights blurred. “It’s about finding the balance.”

“What?” She blinked free of the thoughts with bad memories trailing close behind.

“Life is scary. There are good times and bad. Easy and hard. We need to find a balance which allows us to enjoy the experiences.” He took her hand, linking their fingers as he gripped the gearshift using their hands as a unit. “I learned that from you, Lori.”

“How?” Their time together always revolved around work, with a little sex tossed in. They’d had a few intimate talks, though necessity of her life had kept her holding back. How could he have learned any life lessons from her?

Trevor pulled into the fairground parking lot and found a free space. Lori’s gaze ping-ponged between Trevor and the Ferris wheel, the Ferris wheel and Trevor. Her stomach somersaulted. The shouts and screams of the crowds, the scents of greasy food, the clinging and clanging games and rides, Christmas carols blasting through static filled speakers blended into a cacophony of racket that danced dreadfully on the air closer and closer.

Her turning belly raced end over end. Her heart clamored. Her eyes heated. She tugged at her hand but Trevor held firm.

“We had a regrettable ending before, Lori.”

“Is that what you call me almost getting you killed?” Trapped without escape between the rock of Trevor’s determination and the hard place of a carnival she wasn’t sure she could face, though she knew she should, Lori squeezed her eyes tight and willed the earth to consume her.

It didn’t. The noises rose and moved closer. Her heartbeat sped. Then Trevor’s palm came to rest on her neck. Warm and settling like when he walked alongside her with his hand on her back the connection grounded her. The pulse points in her body still throbbed, but her ears cooled a degree or two.

“The only part of my accident I hold you responsible for, Lori, is the prevention of it being worse. I understand your need to hold things back, but almost having everything taken away, losing you, reminded me of the importance of pleasure. I only want to give you back what you’ve given me. I want to see you happy.”

His tone drifted with delicious sincerity on the air and soothed her. The terrifying edge of the noises receded. When she dared to open her eyes, scared to discover she’d read him wrong, she found an answering sincerity. She just wasn’t sure she knew how to be happy. Or if she deserved it.

The parking lot of a fairground was not the place to face the past or reveal herself to Trevor, but the time for avoidance to end had arrived.

“I wish I could explain everything to you as much as I wish I could accept what you’re offering.” It was another burst of unexpected truth.

Rather than giving platitudes or trying to coax free explanations, two moves she fully expected, he released her with a slow nod. Easily and unhurried, he went through the motions of closing up the car. Then he got out.

Sequestered in silence, Lori stared ahead. Her heart sped again with the unknown.
What’s he going to do?

She lifted a shaking hand to the door but before she could engage the locks, Trevor pulled the door open and extended a hand. “Don’t try hiding from me.”

“I’m not going in there.” She crossed her arms and continued to stare ahead. Maybe if she acted mutinous enough he would change his mind about wanting to spend the evening with her because not going into the fairground was certainly her preference.

“It’s a fun place. Stop being petulant.” He untangled her arms and pulled her out. He handled her gently, but his unwillingness to argue was clear.

“I have…issues with this place.”

“Noted.” He wrapped an arm around her waist and held her close.

“I don’t like crowds.” Not since she’d tried to hide in one at this fairground.

“Okay.” He led her away from the crowds and noises, away from the carnival and toward the moonlit beach. His hand drifted to the small of her back. “While being alone with you is a risk it’s one I’m willing to take.”

“I have work I should be doing.” Where were these arguments earlier when she could have avoided the inevitable possibilities of this night? Why had she left her office?

“Me too. It’ll be there later.”

Relaxation should get easier as they moved away from the noise of the crowd. Oddly, the quiet was worse. It held more mysteries. The heat which had receded from her ears returned, spread down her neck, over her cheeks.

All the training she’d had, every piece of advice on how to effectively lie, the practice of mastering her bodily reactions like not reacting to the being-watched-itchy-skin sensations… They all vanished leaving her as unprepared and unarmed as any civilian woman in the arms of an amorous lover.

“Trevor…” She rolled her shoulders but the tough to reach spot between the blades continued to itch. It wasn’t the you’re-being-watched kind of sensation so much as a he-knows-your-secrets type. She hated both.

“Lori.”

“Why are you pursuing me?” she interrupted. “Why can’t you see how wrong I am for you?”

He shrugged.

“There is a better woman out there for you.” A quiver of jealousy threatened her composure, but she squashed it. “A woman who would love to go to carnivals with you.”
One who isn’t a freshly peeled walking wound.

“Sure.” He paused at the beach’s edge and toed off his shoes. His stare locked on her as he raised one foot and then the other to remove his socks and roll up his slacks.

“You leaving those shoes on?” he asked with a glance at her heels.

“I’m not walking on the beach with you. Besides, it’s cold.”

“Okay.” He shrugged and began walking. “I’ll give you a ride home when I get back.”

Again he didn’t argue or try to win her over. Damn, but he seemed perfectly content to leave her there. Alone. In the dark.

She looked toward the car, now unseen. Toward the fairground, the cacophony of noise once again rising. Toward Trevor’s retreating back. Toward the dark path leading to a place bright enough to call a cab—not that she had her wallet or any cash. She’d apparently forgotten all her training.

By the time she’d decided and shed her shoes, she had to run to catch up with him. “You have a strange way of treating the woman you claim to want to marry.”

He shrugged again.

“You bring me out here and then leave me.”

“I brought you for a fun time at a carnival. You said you didn’t do that scene well.”

“I don’t.” Lori found herself fisting her hand despite his apparent serenity. There was no way he could be as relaxed as he pretended.

“Why not? You used to be lighthearted, ready for fun.”

“I was taken…” She bit her tongue, surprised again at how easily she spilled truths to him.

“From that theme park?” He spoke so quietly she felt rather than heard the question.

His hand came to rest at her back. “I know you were taken hostage.”

“What else do you know? What else did Breck tell you?” Clearly more than she’d thought.

“That you were in bad shape when they found you, you needed time to recover, and you testified against the people you should’ve been able to trust.”

His sympathetic tone, as if he felt sorry for or pitied her grated. She stiffened her spine and knew her voice would be hard. “Those people betrayed me. They lied to me, used me to kill men, then tried to kill me.” She had fallen for their claims, believed she was working for the government. She’d been a pawn in corruption.

“You couldn’t have saved Channing.” Trevor stopped walking and turned to face her directly. “But you did save me.”

“Not without landing you in the hospital broken and comatose. Those Channing left behind still grieve.” She still grieved. Channing Harris, a brilliant researcher and man with high morals, had become a friend.

“That’s not going to change. Yet my involuntary attempt to kill myself led to an FBI undercover operation, which resulted in the arrest of everyone involved. It resulted in your freedom.”

“You have some chatty sources.” A half-expected reality given the close friendship between Trevor and Breck.

“Not chatty enough.”

“You knew about my captivity.”

“Because Breck grew tired of watching me hunt for you.” A shadow crossed Trevor’s face. “Not that his information helped.”

His hands held her arms, warm and solid, saying he’d be there as long as she wanted.

His unspoken constancy, his willingness to forgive her anything and his complete lack of judgment wriggled into a corner of her brain and heart and soul. Part of her canted toward the glowing warmth of the sentiments. The controlled part she’d listened to for years—and especially needed to mind now—pulled her away from sentimentality and entanglements. Pulled her away from Trevor.

“I can’t handle what you ask of me. It’s too much. It’s too fast.”

She stepped back, breaking his hold, and hugged herself. Trevor’s shadowed face darkened and his shoulders dropped.

“I haven’t hidden my hopes or feelings, but I don’t recall having asked for anything.” Defensiveness crept along his tone, almost unnoticeable, but not entirely.

“You ask even without words.” She turned away and walked along the surf. The chill gripping her bones wasn’t entirely due to the December night air. He followed.