The Trouble with Temptation (20 page)

Swearing, he let her go and rose to pace. After a minute, he stopped by the window and stared outside.

“It’s not that I don’t feel bad for the guy, Hannah,” he said.

“You sure as hell can’t tell by the way you act.”

He turned and stared at her.

She glared at him.

Exasperated and pissed off, he reached for her, but the look she shot at him had him lowering his hands. “You think I don’t understand that he’s hurting? You think I don’t have some idea of what he’s going through?”

When she said nothing, he took another step toward her.

“I lost both my mom
and
my dad,” he said. The years that had passed since that loss made it possible for him to keep his voice steady, but the pain was still there. “It’s a miracle Neve didn’t die in the wreck as well. We
still
don’t know who ran them off the road, so don’t think I don’t understand that the pain he’s got is just eating him up.”

“Then why…” She looked up at him only to suck in a breath.

He didn’t know what she saw on his face.

Slowly, he crossed the floor toward her. The heels of his boots thudded hollowly on the glossy, bare hardwood floors. He went to his knees in front of her and reached up, closing his hands around her ankles and tugging them down. “Answers won’t help,” he said. “I finally figured that out. Yeah, there’s always closure and I’d like to have it, but closure won’t bring my parents back. Maybe they weren’t hunted down and killed like Shayla was, but they were killed, all the same. Knowing who is responsible won’t change the fact that I grew up without them, the same as Neve did. It won’t change the fact that Moira had to grow up too soon and finish raising us. Yeah, I’d like closure, but closure won’t give them back to me.”

He moved into the space between her thighs and lifted a hand to cradle her face. “Now I want him to have answers. I don’t want him wondering for years and years. It’s agony, Hannah. It really is … but I don’t want him having it at the cost of
your
suffering. You’ve been through
enough
.”

“I don’t need you protecting me,” she said. Her heart clenched at the look in his eyes.

“You don’t need it, no. But I want to do it.” He leaned and pressed a kiss to her lips. “You want to remember, and I can understand that. But when it happens—and it probably will—you’ll be in danger.”

It infuriated him to think of it.

It terrified him to think of it.

He’d do whatever he had to if it meant keeping her safe.

Then Hannah shattered the very ground beneath him.

Covering the hand he’d placed on her cheek, she leaned in and kissed him gently. With her mouth still against his, she whispered, “Brannon, haven’t you realized it yet? I’m in just as much danger, if not
more
, by
not
remembering anything. I don’t know what happened, what I saw,
who
I saw. It could have been anybody.”

He pulled away, stiffening.

Tugging his hand from her cheek, she watched him solemnly.

“You’ve got this idea that as long as I don’t remember, as long as the town believes I don’t remember, that I
won’t
remember, whoever killed Shayla will leave me alone. But that’s a stupid way to think. Sooner or later, he’ll get scared. Sooner or later, I’ll remember something, or do something, or say something that will make him nervous and without having those memories, I’m
blind
.”

Her eyes were dark and although she hid it, he realized that the idea terrified her. Brannon pulled her against him, fighting the urge to make promises, to tell her that he’d keep her safe.

What was he supposed to protect her from? A nameless, faceless monster?

Swearing, he surged up but his ceaseless pacing offered no respite from the fury this time. He paced to the window and back, to the window again and when he spun around a second time, he almost plowed into Hannah. Catching her arms, he stared into her dark eyes.

“Tell me,” she said.

He tangled his hands in her hair.

“Tell me.”

He hauled her to him and slanted his mouth over hers instead.

It was a desperate, hungry kiss and it did nothing to ease the raw, ragged ache inside him.

There were more than a few reasons why he hoped she wouldn’t remember.

His stupidity included.

But he couldn’t put her safety at risk, just to protect himself.

Slowly, he drew away, using his tongue to trace the soft lines of her mouth, the arched bow of her upper lip. She sighed softly against him when he broke the kiss. With his brow to hers, he twined their fingers together. “Come on. Let’s go to my place. We’ll talk there.”

*   *   *

“Well.” Moira slid her tongue across her teeth as Charles settled in the seat across from her. Dumbfounded wasn’t
exactly
the word she needed right then.
Shocked
 … closer. “That was … unexpected.”

“He’s suffered a horrible loss,” Charles said softly. “It’s out of character for him, but he’s not a bad sort, Moira. You know that.”

“I’m not talking about him.” She pinned her ex-husband with a level look. “I’m talking about you. Since when were you anybody’s knight?”

Charles had been in the process of picking up his menu, but he stopped. Lowering it slowly to the table, he looked up. He held her gaze only for a moment, but the flash in his eyes made an uneasy feeling twist through her.

It was guilt, she decided. His next words confirmed that.

“It wasn’t that long ago that I almost lost you, Moira,” Charles said quietly. He leaned forward, his dark blue eyes intent on her face.

“Charles, I—”

He held up a long-fingered, elegant hand.

He’d always had beautiful hands.

Okay,
everything
about Charles was beautiful. Elegant, beautiful, and refined.

They’d made a stunning couple and she knew that. But there had been no heat between them, no true passion, the love they’d shared had been just a shadow of what she knew it should have been.

“Please, don’t.” He shook his head and shifted his gaze to stare outside. “I know we’re over. You’ve made that more than clear. But there’s a difference between us being
over
and you being …
gone
.”

His voice went rough and he looked back at her.

The expression on his face was enough to bring an ache to her throat.

He’d never looked at her like that.

Not once, in their entire marriage.

She didn’t know what to say.

“I can understand, to some extent, the agony he must be feeling,” Charles said, picking up his menu and opening it. “It doesn’t give him the right to bully others, though. And it would make me a poor man indeed if I’d just stood there while he manhandled Hannah, now wouldn’t it?”

Moira looked down at her menu.

Taking a deep breath, she reached up and tugged on the top of his menu, forcing him to lower it. “Thank you.”

He quirked an eyebrow. “For what?”

“For stepping up. You know she’s…” She shrugged. “Well, you know she’s pregnant and Brannon’s the father. She’s family now.”

He reached out and patted her hand. “She is. But I’d have done it regardless. Come now. Let’s order. I’m feeling a bit peckish. We’ve got business to discuss as well and I’d sooner get it done here rather than try to do it at the museum.” He winked. “We can’t have two minutes for business there without being interrupted, now can we?”

“No.” She laughed. “That’s the truth. I’m heading out at the end of the week, too. I can’t put this trip off any longer.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Brannon let her inside the condo, but he didn’t move any deeper.

She stood there next to him, just a foot away from the door. She felt crowded by him and it was a sensation that was both intense and intimidating. He was so big, it was like he sucked all the air out of the room and all the light, too. Even the color. Or maybe it was because he was so vibrant, everything just seemed paler, lesser in comparison.

He turned to face her, moving in.

Reflexively, Hannah took a step back, then another.

Brannon kept moving in and she found herself penned up against the door.

“You found my wallet,” he said, his voice gruff.

He reached up and trailed a finger down her cheek.

“You’d been out running and you showed up in just a tank top and a bra, those tight pants you wear. I could see the sweat on you and I wanted to lick it away and peel your clothes off. Just looking at you made me hard.”

She gulped in air. It did no good. She felt a little lightheaded and locked her legs to keep from sliding to the floor.

The finger he’d trailed down her cheek moved to her neck, the callouses rough, rasping along her skin.

“I was in a bitch of a mood and it always got worse when I saw you.”

“I’d noticed,” she said, clearing her throat. Then she scowled. “What changed?”

Brannon lowered his lids until all she could see was a sliver of green.

Then he reached out and placed his hand on her belly. “Isn’t it obvious?”

She sucked in a breath at the feel of his hand on her, fingers protectively spread over the swell of the baby lying within her. She covered his hand with hers, but even as she did it, she shook her head. “The baby’s not enough of a reason, Brannon. You acted like you couldn’t stand me for years. Then I wake up and who is it there with me at the hospital every day?
You
. I mean, yeah, I know we got together that week, but…”

“Stop.” Brannon moved closer, his hand moving from her belly to her hip. “My problems had nothing to do with not being able to stand you.”

Then he tugged her up against him and she felt his cock pressing flat against her as he slid his knee between her thighs.

The contact had her groaning.

“It had to do with wanting you and knowing I should keep my distance.” He rubbed his mouth against her neck. “Relationships aren’t my thing, Hannah. But I … you twisted me up, Hannah. After that week, I couldn’t fight it anymore.”

She wanted to ask him something else, but his teeth closed around her earlobe and tugged.

Thought melted away on a wash of heat.

“You had my wallet,” he said a moment later. “And you snapped at me. Asked me why I was such an asshole. I couldn’t stop myself. I put my hands on you and you put yours on me.”

“I…”

Brannon lifted his head to look down at her.

Hannah licked her lips and his eyes went hot. He pressed his mouth to hers, tracing the path her tongue had taken with his own.

“I want to put my hands on you now.” He said the words against her mouth. “Can I?”

“Oh, hell. Please.”

*   *   *

Hannah leaned against the door as he straightened away from her. Brannon reached for the buttons that ran down the front of her shirt. He wondered if she’d noticed that her breasts were getting fuller. He had. They weren’t quite straining the front of this blouse, but they would soon. He freed the top button, the one below it and then the next, taking his time with each and watching as the pink flush spread up from her chest to her neck and higher.

“You always watched me,” he said, surprised he could even talk.

Her gaze flew to his. There was a glassy glint to her eyes. “Yes.”

“It drove me crazy.”

A smile teased her lips. “You could have closed the curtains.”

“Then you wouldn’t watch.”

She laughed softly. The sound tripped across his skin like a caress and he thought he’d go mad if he didn’t get his cock inside her soon. But he didn’t want this to end.

So he drew it out, teasing them both as he freed her from her shirt and then draped it over the arm of the couch a couple of feet away. Her bra was pale pink, even paler than the blush still staining her cheeks and her breasts strained it to overflowing. “You’re getting bigger,” he said, tracing his fingers along the lacy, scalloped edge.

“I know.” She bit her lip and glanced down. “Half my bras already don’t fit.”

Bracing his hands on the wall, he dipped his head and pressed his face to the valley created by her breasts. He breathed in the scent of her as he nuzzled her and relished the sound of her erratic breathing. A sound that was both a whimper and a sigh escaped her when he reached behind her and freed the catch on her bra.

He had to bite back a scowl when he saw the faint red mark left by the bra’s band. He kissed it softly before cupping her swollen, heavy breasts in his hands. “Fuck, Hannah…”

She cried out when he caught one plump nipple in his mouth.

The sound shot straight down to his cock.

He wondered if maybe he could come just by getting her off—and he thought he wouldn’t at all mind putting the idea to the test. She strained against him, shoving her breast against his mouth as she cupped the back of his head.

He suckled on her deeper, sliding one hand down her back and dragging her closer.

Hannah whimpered and brought her knee up against him.

She started to rock, wordless moans escaping her as she moved against him. He could feel how hot she already was and he wanted to rip her pants away, sink inside her. But she clutched at him and moaned and moved. He recognized what was coming just by the tension gathering in her body, although he didn’t entirely process it. Not right away.

She sobbed his name, twisted her hips.

He drew harder on her nipple.

Her nails tore into his biceps and she came.

Just like that.

Her hips jerked and rolled against him and even though his brain was struggling to take in what was going on, his body was already at work. His right hand cupping her breast, he used his left arm to bring her in closer, rolling his hips to drive his cock against the cleft between her thighs. She sobbed and shuddered, riding the orgasm that continued to ripple through her.

She was wet, so wet he could feel her through her jeans and his own.

A drop of pre-come leaked from the head of his cock and he thought maybe he’d just keep on moving.…

She whispered his name.