Jayne grabbed him by the arm, stopping him as much by her grip as by the fact that they never touched each other at all anymore. He stared down at her smooth hair and furrowed brow.
Her Chanel perfume wafted up again, another thing that hadn"t changed. He remembered the scent well after buying the requisite bottle every Valentine"s Day.
Her trembling, however, tugged at him far more than her scent.
Don gripped her shoulder. "Jayne?"
"It"s all over the news. I had to hear it on the car radio that someone tried to kill our daughter. And then when I spoke to her, she tells me this threat has been going on for days? You let her wander around without knowing what kind of danger she was in."
And Jayne didn"t even realize the worst of it.
"She knows now."
"When did you tell her?"
He forced himself not to look away like some disobedient toddler about to pitch the remote control in the commode. Lord, but Shay had been cute when she waterlogged their electronics. "We couldn"t risk her tipping anyone off."
"We? We?"
"The FBI, the government." He was skating on thin ice acknowledging that much. He couldn"t go so far as to out the air force or how he, a CIA agent, had tangled himself up in an operation on U.S. soil.
She shrugged free of his hand on her shoulder. "d.a.m.n you and d.a.m.n governmental obligations. I put up with your BS when you were ignoring me. But when the job comes before your own flesh and blood, our children you are biologically obligated to protect . . ."
She shoved against his chest. Once. Twice. Hard.
He captured her wrists. "I"m doing what I think is best for her."
"You"re doing what you always do." Her fingers curled into fists against him, digging deep until her manicured nails disappeared altogether. "You view the world through a.n.a.lytical eyes, because it"s easier than actually feeling anything."
"What the h.e.l.l do you mean by that?"
She pulled her arms free slowly, eying him with incredulity. "Are you really so clueless that you don"t get it? Even your children know. I believe the air force suspected, too, but you were of better use to them numb."
Numb? She thought he was some robot? Just having her here and talking about Shay in danger had him roaring inside with h.e.l.lish memories of that night their daughter had tried to kill herself.
The doctors had all made it clear Shay hadn"t been "acting out." She"d been serious. Days after that boy Tommy had died, she"d taken amphetamines bought off some street corner, filled the tub with icy water, and made a longitudinal cut along her wrist to sever more arteries and veins.
Anger, impotence, and yeah, pain threatened to explode him. "Screw you, Jayne. And screw this. I don"t need you probing around inside my head. So what if I don"t go all Joe Sensitive like that nice, safe accountant you"ve been dating? For all his sensitivity, the loser took six f.u.c.king years to put that engagement ring on your finger, and he still doesn"t have the b.a.l.l.s to set a date."
Don turned to s.n.a.t.c.h up his antacids.
"Ever heard of PTSD?"
That, he couldn"t let pa.s.s. He turned back to face her. "Yeah, I"ve heard it from you non-f.u.c.king-stop, even after we divorced. You"re the one who needs to listen. I wasn"t a POW. I never got shot down. I may have been . . . overtaxed at times, but that"s a long way from PTSD."
"You keep telling yourself that." She stood her ground in her pretty flowered skirt with her cotton top hugging her willowy body, pearls at the neckline. "Just like others told themselves because they were afraid of missing out on a promotion. I had to stop caring about you a long time ago, but I do care about our children and what happens to them."
Like he didn"t? That horrible night still fresh in his mind, he felt anything but emotionless. "Ah, I see where this is going. You"re blaming me again for Sean"s aimless life, for Shay slashing her-"
"Stop." Just that fast her composure faded. Tears swelled in her blue eyes. "Do not go there just to hurt me so much I can"t think. I"m talking about today. Right now. Making sure that you"re doing everything you can to keep our baby girl safe." Her voice faltered. "I can"t risk her again," she gasped. "I can"t-"
Ah h.e.l.l.
He reached for her. She shoved at his chest again, but this time he didn"t restrain her hands or move away. He just tucked her against him, her tears flowing so fast now they soaked through his shirt to sear his skin. There came the guilt pouring over him in buckets full. He hadn"t just failed the kids. He"d failed her.
"Jayne, honey, shhh. It"s okay, Jaynie. She"s okay now. Strong and whole." Probably more so than him if he took his ex-wife"s a.s.sessment of his mental stability to heart. His arms twitched tighter around her. "We"ve got everything under control. She"s being protected. n.o.body"s going to get through Vince Deluca."
She swiped her wrist under her nose and sniffled. "Vince, huh? You always did have a lot of faith in him, even when other people didn"t. I admired that about you."
There was a time he and Jayne had liked a lot of things about each other.
"Vince is a good man." Don reached into his back pocket for his handkerchief and pressed it into her hand, the same way he"d done the day he"d proposed and she cried her eyes out then, too.
And it hadn"t taken him six years to pony up the ring or the date.
"Thanks." She knuckled away the tears, her fingers stained with mascara. She inched back, a wobbly smile in place at odds with the tear streaks in her makeup tugging at something inside him. "I can"t believe you still carry these."
"A guy never knows when he"ll have a pretty girl crying on his chest."
"Girl?" She snorted on another sniffle. "Good Lord, Don, I haven"t been a girl in . . . I don"t even want to say how long."
Something shifted inside, something that compelled him to say, "You"re still pretty, and you know it."
He only looked into her eyes for less than a second, and then he was kissing her.
When had he even lowered his mouth to hers? He"d just acted by instinct born from years of marriage. Her mouth felt the same, soft and fitting at just the perfect angle to give him access, and he couldn"t stop his response to her, to the familiarity triggering some sort of sensory memory.
Feel those subtle curves.
Taste her peppermint toothpaste.
Smell more of her Chanel scent until it was as if she filled every inch inside him.
His body went on high alert, and d.a.m.n it, d.a.m.n it, d.a.m.n it, he needed to get his head on straight and his a.s.s in gear. He deserved every bit of that guilt she"d been heaping on him.
Ca.s.serole churned uneasily in his gut even long past when it should have been out of his system.
He broke away. No easing or niceties. He had to put an end to this. He set Jayne away from him, both of them gasping. She looked as horrified as he felt.
"Don, that was wrong."
"I know, and I am sorry. It won"t happen again. I"m doing everything I can to keep Shay safe, and I"ll make sure you"re kept in the loop as much as is legally possible." He gripped his bedroom doork.n.o.b. "I have to shower. You can see yourself out."
The front door clicked closed before he even made it to the bathroom.
No more rides around town on his bike.
No more leaving Shay out there in the open.
Vince would make sure she stayed in protective custody until she delivered her congressional testimony and they had had the people responsible for these threats in custody.
She rode in the rental car beside him, staring out the window at Lake Erie, picking nervously at her clothes, covered in grime from hitting the dirty parking lot. "I don"t think I"m ever going to get over the horror of how that dear old guard died in my place."
Words weren"t going to fix this one. Vince kept driving.
The FBI had arranged a safe house setting for her at a hotel, even transferring her dog to a kennel and gathering necessities for her rather than risk showing her face anywhere.
Vince turned on a side road, each glowing streetlamp taking them farther from the East Side. He couldn"t even think about how close she"d been to those bullets, how close she"d come to turning that car key. Sure, he"d been in the vehicle with her, but he"d faced death often enough in his life to shake off the near brush.
Her near misses with the bomb and the drive-by, however, shook him to his boots at a time when he was already reeling from the impact of her mouth on his. He eyed the rearview mirror, checking again for a tail.
Still clear.
Within the next five minutes, he would have her locked up and secured in an exclusive hotel with police protection throughout the building. He would feel better if he could stay with her 24/7, but he still had a job to do, a job that would hopefully put an end to all of this.
Even now, Don had his people following up leads.
Vince winced from thoughts of Shay"s dad. Thinking about her father only brought back old scripts of staying away from Shay out of respect to him. Old habits were tough to break.
But after that explosive kiss against the car, he suspected this was one avenue he would have to travel if he ever expected to put thoughts of Shay to rest. She, however, didn"t appear so inclined.
He paused at a stoplight right outside the hotel, even though the street was deserted so late at night.
Sighing, Shay shifted her eyes from the window to his face. "It"s going to be a long night if you"re not talking to me."
"Fine then. What do you want to talk about?"
She tapped her chin, eying the hint of a goatee he"d shaved into his five o"clock shadow. "I thought military guys couldn"t have any facial hair other than a mustache. My dad was always complaining about having to shave so often."
Ah, she wanted to make small talk to dodge the obvious. Still not willing to acknowledge what had happened between them. Something rare, by the way.
Her avoidance spoke more of how much the kiss had rattled her.
He stroked his short beard. "We call this category one relaxed grooming standards. There are situations where something like this is acceptable. Suddenly my bald head doesn"t look so hard-core military, does it?"
"You"re right." She fidgeted with the sleeve of the shirt he"d bought her just the night before, nodding toward his arm. "Just that small change and the biker tattoo peeking from under your sleeve would throw me off the track if I pa.s.sed you in an airport."
His biceps flexed. Sometimes he forgot the Chinese lettering was even there. "When I look like this, I"m not such a glaring target for people hating on the military."
"How much more can you let it grow in?"
"Depends on the a.s.signment." The light changed, and he drove ahead, shifting gears, his knuckles brushing her knee. "Special Ops dudes looking to blend into the Afghani coun tryside can go category three, with bushy beards and long hair."
She scooched closer to the door. "I can"t envision you with long hair."
"There"s not much to grow out." He ducked the car into the underground parking garage.
"Ah right, you don"t do this"-she stroked her hand along the air over his head, not touching his shaved scalp, but she might as well have-"to look bada.s.s."
His fists clenched around the steering wheel as he whipped the car into a reserved spot by the elevator. "Do that again, and we"re going to finish what we started right here."
She twisted her fingers in her lap, but her eyes held, pupils widening with undeniable desire. "We should find something else to talk about."
Shay could play at small talk, but her body betrayed her with signs of arousal, like her widened pupils and the flush to her skin. The beading of her nipples just visible through the whispery flowing shirt he"d bought for her at Wal-Mart. The way her tongue kept tipping along her lips as if tasting, remembering.
He turned off the car and faced her, arm draped over the wheel. "You"re still pretending to ignore the fact that we were a tongue stroke away from saying to h.e.l.l with it all and getting busy in a public place. Admit it. You"re as completely turned on as I am. It"s been an edge-of-the-universe day, and adrenaline is still stinging through your veins. Even beyond that, what we felt was abso-f.u.c.king-lutely more than any sane person can resist."
Leaving her slack-jawed, he slammed out of the car and around to her side. He gripped her arm to help her out and to keep her safely by his side.
Her chest rose and fell too fast to be mistaken for anything but arousal. "Vince-"
"Not now." Keeping her out of danger was his number one priority.
Vince hauled b.u.t.t through the parking garage and into the lobby. His local contact had already signed them in under false ident.i.ties and given him a room key, so he headed straight for the elevator.
He would figure out what to do about the raging attraction between them once he got there. Sadly, it would most likely lead to a raging fight instead. G.o.d help them both, he needed an outlet for the building steam.
He entered the elevator-empty and safe-and punched the b.u.t.ton for the twelfth floor. The doors started to slide closed only to b.u.mp back open again. A panting young couple in bathing suits charged inside. Since they weren"t carrying even so much as towels or a beach bag to conceal a weapon, he decided they were safe enough. That woman couldn"t hide even a nail file in a string bikini at least two letters too small for her cup size, much less anything with more lethal firepower.
Vince tucked Shay to his side, silencing her tiny huff with a quick scowl. The couple wedged themselves in a corner and promptly tangled themselves around each other.
His eyebrows shot upward. Shay stiffened against him.
Vince shifted. "Uh, dude, what floor?"
The overeager swimmer came up for air only long enough to gasp, "Fourteen."
Fan-f.u.c.king-tastic. They would get to hang out here in close confines with a peep show.
Overeager dude grabbed near-naked woman"s a.s.s. If she wriggled much more, her silicone implants would fall right out of her top. Between kisses and strokes they mumbled rambling little sighs.
"Want you."
"Can"t wait."
"You"re so hot."
"Soon, baby, soon."
It would have been funny if it weren"t for the fact his s.e.xual frustration had pegged out halfway to the hotel. He hauled in air that suddenly felt about a hundred and ten degrees. The man"s hand slid from her waist to cup her hip.
Vince glanced at Shay, and tiny pearls of sweat dotted her brow. Her tongue started playing peekaboo again.
Ding.
The doors opened. Shay sprinted forward. He grabbed her hand and tugged her back against his chest while he checked both ways down the hall. Clear, other than one man he recognized as the guard a.s.signed to watch over her. The man didn"t so much as glance up from his paper, looking the part of a disgruntled husband hanging out in the hall for peace.
Vince slotted the key card in and out. The green light flashed. He swung the door wide and clicked on the lights. The room was exactly what he"d ordered, the s.p.a.ce expansive and open so he could see in a glance that no one lurked. A dim light glowed over by the king-size bed. He swept a hand for her to enter.