Unguarded (16 page)

Her eyes were far away again and he knew she had gone back to that time, to that moment, and he couldn't stand it. Couldn't stand knowing that she was sitting next to him, that he was holding her, but she was completely out of his reach. In those moments she belonged to a sadistic monster more than she had ever belonged to him and he wanted nothing in the world so much as to bring her back to the present. To get her as far away from the torturous pain of her past as he could manage.

“Rhiannon, that's enough.” He barely recognized his voice. It had gone deeper, turned feral, and the only thing he wanted more than to bring Rhiannon back to him was to spend ten minutes alone with the man who had totally and utterly destroyed the woman she had been.

She didn't respond, so lost in the past that he doubted if she'd even heard him. “I'm sure you can guess the rest, right? He gagged me, cut me—” she held out her arms so he could see the cuts, as if he didn't already have each and every one of them memorized “—told me that I was digging into things that I had no business being involved in.

“He said he'd been sent to teach me a lesson—and boy, did he ever. When he was done—when he was done, he stabbed me in the abdomen and the side. Not deep enough to kill me but deep enough to make me
bleed like a stuck pig. One more punishment for sticking my nose where it didn't belong. And then he left me and I lay there, for ten hours, bleeding and covered in his filth, praying. To this day, I don't know if I was praying to live—or to die.

“For a while, I tried to attract attention. I rocked the bed, banged it against the wall, but it was my bad luck that the rooms on either side of me were empty. So no one found me until the maid came in to clean at eleven o'clock. She didn't take it well.”

He didn't need to ask how Rhiannon had taken it. She was no longer a journalist, no longer married, no longer able to see herself as the beautiful woman she was. How much of her blindness was due to the scars, he wondered, and how much because of the brutality of the attack?

And he had rolled her over, pinned her beneath him, held her wrists in his hand as he all but ripped the clothes from her body. Was it any wonder she had freaked out? If he could reach it, he would kick his own ass.

But he couldn't, so he had to settle for a totally lame, completely ineffectual apology. “I'm so sorry, Rhiannon.”

She looked surprised. “Why are you sorry? You didn't do anything to hurt me.”

No, but he hadn't done anything to heal her, either, even knowing how hurt she was. Before tonight he might not have known the extent of the atrocities she'd endured, but he'd guessed that she'd been attacked and still he had brought her up to his room.

“The only reason I even told you was because I freaked out like that. I wanted you to understand that
it wasn't anything you'd done. That it was me. All me.” She closed her eyes and he hated the fact that he'd lost that window into her thoughts. Into her state of mind.

“You know, I wasn't always like this. I used to be brave and put-together, really adventurous, you know. Even after the rape, I tried to hold it together—for Richard, for work, for myself. But when he was acquitted—”

“The bastard who hurt you isn't in jail.” It was a statement, not a question.

She shook her head. “No. Like I told you, I'd worked the crime beat for years, so I knew a lot of cops, had a pretty good relationship with them. After the details of what had happened to me circulated, they went out of their way to find a way to charge him. He had an airtight alibi for the night, plus plenty of reasons to explain the trace evidence that placed him in my hotel room. After all, he'd been there before, discussing the case with me. He was sorry about what had happened to me, but the trauma had obviously pushed me around the bend. He was well-respected, a senator's aide. He would never—” Her voice broke, but she continued.

“He would never do anything like that. It became a case of his word against mine, and though the police believed me, they couldn't nail him. They grew frustrated, were overzealous and he got off on a chain-of-evidence technicality. Not to mention the fact that there were allegations of police brutality.

“The funny part was, if I hadn't been the victim, I would have been all over that story—police damaging suspect in quest for rapist. It has a good ring to it.”

Shawn didn't think it was funny—he thought it was
awful. Beneath the calm mask he wore, his stomach rolled and pitched. He didn't think he could take any more, but in the end, he didn't have a choice. It turned out Rhiannon wasn't quite done.

Looking straight at him, her brown eyes eerily calm, she said, “When that happened, it broke something inside me. Broke me. It's been almost three years and I still haven't been able to put myself back together again. I don't think I ever will.”

“Y
OU AREN'T BROKEN.”
Shawn's voice was firm, his eyes resolute as he stared down at her.

“Really?” Rhiannon forced herself to adopt a who-gives-a-damn tone. “I went home a couple of weeks ago and trashed my apartment. I quit journalism and became a party planner because I couldn't do the job anymore. I talked you into making love to me and then wigged out the second you actually tried to do what I asked for. What would you call me? A tease, maybe, except I don't think I've left you very titillated.”

“Stop making jokes about it,” he ground out.

“Well, it's either that or cry again and you're all out of tissues.”

“Rhiannon, stop! You don't need to do this with me.” He'd never yelled at her before, and his tone gave her pause, but only for a moment. She was done being vulnerable, done making a total and complete idiot of herself in front of this man.

“I'm not doing it for you. I'm doing it for me.”

“Really?” The look he gave he was patently disbelieving. “How's that working out for you?”

“Better than the alternative.” She started to stand, to walk away, but then realized she was only wearing his old shirt. If she went anywhere he would see—in stark detail—just what had been done to her. And
after everything that had happened in the past hour, she didn't think she could take that humiliation on top of everything else.

He hadn't been able to stand looking at the scars on her chest and shoulders, had covered her up to hide them. How would he feel if he could see her back and bottom?

But staying here, on this bed—with him, was also out of the question. Because, despite everything, she still wanted him. Still needed him to hold her and comfort her and make her feel safe. She hadn't felt safe in three long years, but those moments, when he'd held her while she cried, had come the closest.

“Do you know where my clothes are?” she asked, quietly. “I need to get dressed so I can leave. I'm so sorry I wasted your time.”

“Where do you think you're going?”

She bristled at his tone, though she figured she deserved it after everything she'd put him through tonight. “Home. I never planned on staying the night—you probably have things to do.”

“The only thing I have to do tonight is to take care of you.”

“That's the whole point. I don't want you to take care of me.”

He shrugged. “Then you shouldn't have come over tonight, bent on seducing me. Once a woman makes love to me, I pretty much feel I've got the right to take care of her if I want.”

“We never made love.”

“Close enough.”

Why was he doing this? She was doing her best to keep it together, to let him off the hook without any
hard feelings, but he wasn't taking the outs she was giving him. After everything was said and done, Richard had practically sprained an ankle in his headlong dash away from her. And now, here was Shawn with the whole sordid story in his lap and he hadn't so much as moved an inch. Nor had he let her move.

It was infuriating, disturbing. Nerve-racking in the extreme. Was she supposed to trust him now that he had seen the real her? Was she supposed to expect him to stick around and just accept this new version of her?

How could she, when no one else had?

On the best days, that kind of trust didn't come easy to her, and today definitely hadn't been a good day. It had been hard enough to come here and ask Shawn to make love to her, to trust that she would somehow make it through that step. And look how well that had turned out.

No, she had to get out of here. If not out of Shawn's house, then at least away from his knowing eyes for a little while. How else was she supposed to get her composure back? How else was she supposed to figure out how to move on after what had almost happened between them?

“Can I take a shower?” she asked abruptly. “I feel—” Dirty. Trapped. Exposed. Frightened. She didn't say them, but then she didn't have to. He could pick any negative adjective he wanted to fill in the blanks and probably get a good idea of what she was feeling. It was a good thing, too, as she couldn't bring herself to voice her emotions.

“Of course.” Shawn jumped to his feet and she realized for the first time that he was still naked.

She averted her eyes, though a big part of her wanted to look her fill. He had a beautiful body, one she'd enjoyed touching very much. But it would have been nice to see him in decent light.

He disappeared for a second, came back wearing a thick navy blue robe that covered him from shoulder to shin. Even as messed up as she was, she couldn't help missing the view—just a little.

Her thoughts surprised her with their sexual bent, particularly considering the fact that she had just completely fallen apart—all because she'd felt his naked body on top of hers and for a minute hadn't been able to distinguish the present from the past.

So how could she still be thinking of him that way?

“The bathroom's through here.” He led her into a room that was about half the size of her very spacious condominium and she tried not to gape, especially when he turned on the shower and water came spurting out of six different heads.

“Hedonistic much?” she asked, watching as he adjusted the water temperature and the aim of the showerheads.

“If you've got it, flaunt it.”

“Absolutely. Who cares about the environment, after all?” Where were these quips coming from and why couldn't she shut up, especially since he'd been nothing but kind to her?

“I have a water reclamation system—all the water from the shower is used to water the plants. So don't feel too bad about it, okay?”

“Sure.” She reached over and casually turned the
main light off, leaving only the dim glow of the secondary light. He didn't say anything, but he stiffened. She was very glad she couldn't see the look in his eyes. She wasn't ready to handle any more questions, or criticisms.

“Thanks.” She turned her back to him and waited for him to leave.

He obviously figured out that he'd been dismissed, because she heard the bathroom door open. “Call me if you need me,” he said.

“I won't.”

“Right.” He cleared his throat. “There are towels in the cabinet to the left of the shower. Use as many as you'd like.” The door closed behind him.

She stared at the running water for a while, trying to work up the energy to move, to think. But she was spent, numb, her emotions completely outside her control. Finally, when the room had almost completely steamed up from the hot water, she whipped his shirt off and held it to her nose.

It smelled like him—spicy and sexy and just a little sweet. For the first time since she'd gotten control of herself, emotions threatened to break through. She pushed them back, dropped the shirt. Feeling was dangerous.

But when she finally made it into the shower, it was as if she had forgotten what to do. She stood there, letting the water pour over her for long minutes. She didn't cry—there were no more tears left inside of her. There was nothing left inside her—she felt like a dried-out husk, like a statue whose heart and mind and soul had turned to stone.

Finally, because she could think of nothing else to
do, she sat down on the long bench that ran the length of the shower, pulled her knees up under her chin, and waited for the water to wash the dirt away.

 

W
HAT WAS TAKING
her so long? Shawn wondered as he paced the length of his bedroom. Back and forth, back and forth. He walked it again and again as he waited for the sound of the shower turning off, the sound of the bathroom door opening.

Finally, after close to half an hour, he knocked on the door. “Rhiannon, are you okay? Rhiannon? Rhiannon, answer me!” Visions of Cynthia hanging from that beam assailed him, followed by a crystal clear picture of his medicine cabinet—equipped with sleeping pills for the bout of insomnia he'd suffered the year before and his favorite five-blade razor.

“Damn it, Rhiannon, are you all right?” he shouted again. There was still no response, so he shoved the door open, terror a knife blade in his gut. When he saw her sitting under the shower, her arms wrapped around her bent knees, he felt a rush of relief followed by a quick surge of anger. Couldn't she have answered him?

But as he got closer to the shower, he realized that no, she couldn't have. She was completely zoned out—whether from shock or self-preservation, he didn't know.

Kicking off the shoes he'd put on when he'd redressed in an effort to make Rhiannon feel a little safer than she would with him in a robe, he opened the shower door and stepped in, fully dressed.

She didn't so much as blink. “Come on, baby,” he
said, pulling her into his arms. “Let's get you out of here.”

“Not yet,” she said in a haunted voice. “I'm still dirty.”

“Oh, Jesus.” He closed his eyes for a moment, then let her slide to the ground next to him, making sure to keep an arm around her waist at all times, to stop her from falling. “Let's wash you, then.”

He reached for a washcloth, once again movingly slowly so as not to spook her. “Do you want me to help you?”

For a long time she didn't answer, then finally she nodded once.

“All right.” He reached for the shower gel, squeezed some onto the washcloth and then wrung it out.

“Come here, baby,” he said, as he ran the washcloth over her shoulders and down her right arm, then her left, doing his best not to notice the scars she was so ashamed of. But the light in here was better than in the bedroom—even set on dim—and he could see the stark, white lines perfectly.

His stomach nearly revolted, not at how she looked but at the horror of what had been done to her.

He tried to keep his touch clinical as he washed her, tried not to notice her small, high breasts and the raspberry nipples that crowned them. It wasn't as difficult as he thought it would be, because with every inch of her body that he covered, he saw more scars, more evidence of injuries. More signs that she'd been brutalized.

It was torture for him, as he crouched at her feet, soaping her thighs and calves and feet. Images burned into his brain forever, pictures of her being tortured by
a madman with a knife. When he turned her around to start on her back he saw the scars there that could only have been made by something striking her repeatedly and nearly lost it. Nearly dropped to his knees and sobbed himself.

But she didn't need pity from him—not now and maybe not ever. She was too strong for that, too proud. So he locked his own emotions away and concentrated on her.

Eventually, he'd soaped up her entire body with quick but gentle strokes of the washcloth and he reached for the nearest showerhead, pulled the wand out of the wall, and started rinsing her off.

When it was done, when she was completely rinsed off—completely cleaned—he reached to turn the shower off. “Come on, Rhiannon. Let's get you into bed.”

“Not yet.” Her hands clutched at his sodden shirt and he pulled her against him, ignoring the discomfort of his clothes and the icy heat of the fury that still burned within him. “I don't want to sleep yet. I'll have nightmares.”

Of course she would. He'd scared the hell out of her tonight. Add in the fact that she'd relived the whole rape for him, was it any wonder she didn't want to sleep?

“Okay, no bed. That's fine. What do you want to do?”

“I want you to touch me.”

He froze, certain he hadn't heard her correctly. After everything that had happened tonight, surely she hadn't just asked him to—

“Please, Shawn. I haven't been with a man in three years. Not since the rape.”

God, how did she stand it? The pain was nearly overwhelming—it threatened to rip him in two. “Rhiannon, I don't think you mean that. You're upset and confused and—”

“I'm not an idiot! I know what I'm asking. I know I freaked out earlier, but I won't this time. I swear.”

“You don't know that. I don't want to cause you any more pain.”

“Don't you want me anymore? Is it the scars? You can turn the lights out—”

“Jesus, stop. Just stop!” The face she turned up to him was pale and tear-ravaged. It showed every one of her forty years and it was still the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen. He cupped her jaw in his palms. “I think I'll go to my grave wanting you, Rhiannon. You're strong and you're beautiful and I don't give a damn about your scars, except to hate that you suffered. But they're a part of you and they show how incredibly strong you really are. How could I be disgusted by them?”

“Richard was.” Her voice was tiny.

“Richard sounds like he was almost as big a bastard as the man who did this to you and I do
not
appreciate being compared to him.”

“I wasn't comparing you, I swear.” She paused, then asked in a tiny voice, “But, if it isn't the scars, why won't you touch me again?”

“Because you nearly had a nervous breakdown in my arms two hours ago? Because I think you need to rest? Because I don't think you know what it is you're asking?”

“Please, Shawn. He's inside me and I can't get him out. He's been in me for three years, in my head and
my body. In my soul. I just want to get him out. I just want him to leave me alone.”

In his mind he went through every vile curse he could think of, and then some he was pretty sure he was making up as he went along. How could she ask this of him, now? He was still shaken by what had happened in the bedroom, and terrified that he would somehow bring her back to that state again. Terrified that he would somehow hurt her again.

He wanted to say no, to tell her they could try again when they had both had time to calm down. Now that he knew what had happened to her, things would be different. He would make them different.