"What do you see?" Tyson leaned close to her, his piercing eyes boring into her. "What the h.e.l.l did you do? And don"t give me any of your magic c.r.a.p. I don"t believe in it and I want the real explanation. You did something. You had to have. Shayner said before you were in that room with me, I was a vegetable. After, other than a few cracked ribs and other minor injuries, I was perfectly fine. What the h.e.l.l did you do?"
"c.r.a.p?" Libby repeated. "Our magic c.r.a.p?" Fury shimmered through her body, gripped her hard so that she actually looked around for something to throw at him. She"d endangered her sisters as well as her own life and he called what she did c.r.a.p. "Is that what you call what I do?"
He ran a hand through his hair. "You know, I"m not saying what you do doesn"t have some small validity, I"m just saying it isn"t done with magic. You really don"t believe in witches and voodoo and casting spells, do you? You"re a doctor. There"s a reasonable scientific explanation for what you do."
"Is there?"
"Well, of course. And I want to know what it is."
"Why?"
He shrugged. "Why? Are you serious? Libby, if what everyone says is the truth, you restored by what all accounts was an irreparably damaged brain-my brain. The possibilities, the benefits alone for medicine and science are beyond staggering, if you really could do it. Who the h.e.l.l wouldn"t want to know how you did what you did?"
She regarded him for a long time while the gulls cried overhead and the waves pounded the sh.o.r.e. If her blood pressure went up any more at the utter disbelief in his voice, she was going to stroke out. "You figure it out and come tell me how my sisters and I do that magic c.r.a.p. It will give us all a good laugh."
He glared at her. He was getting angry. He"d come with the best of intentions, but he didn"t want to hear her defend herself or her family. "I don"t care to be the b.u.t.t of your jokes. You"ve got this entire town fooled, but I don"t buy it. Just tell me."
"Why don"t you start with examining the tests? Maybe they were falsified."
"I already did that. They appear authentic. And you were busy in another part of the hospital when I was brought in so I don"t see how you would have had time to tamper with the records."
"You checked to see if I falsified records?" Libby was appalled. She drew in a deep breath. "Go away."
"I had to rule falsifying doc.u.ments out. That"s the oldest scam in the world," Ty said dismissively. "Just tell me how you did it."
"You think I gave you some new drug I don"t share with other brain-damaged patients?" Libby was furious. "I didn"t do a thing. The scan must have been wrong. Maybe there was a glitch in the system. I"m tired and you"re annoying me. Go away."
Tyson let a few moments of silence go by, hoping she"d calm down. "You"re tossing me out because you know I"m going to fixate on this. That"s just mean, Drake." He shaded his eyes and looked up at the cliff. "While you"re at it, explain why you don"t have erosion by your house when every other cliff around here is slowly crumbling. And yes, I took samples of the soil as well."
"I"m intrigued by your scintillating conversation, really I am, but erosion and paint don"t do it for me. I"m reading. I"m resting. Or I was until you came along. If you"re quite done insulting my family, Tyson, why don"t you go back to your lab? I"m sure sleeping on the floor and eating Cracker Jacks while you discover the cure to the world"s most deadly diseases is much more fulfilling than hanging around Sea Haven hara.s.sing the locals."
A slow grin replaced the stubborn set to his mouth. "You"ve been checking up on me. I sleep on the couch, not on the floor, but I do eat Cracker Jacks. Princess Libby Drake is interested enough to check up on me. Who have you been talking to?"
Libby felt the color sweeping up her neck into her face. She ducked her head so her hair fell in a cloud around her as she pretended to study her fingernails. "I run into Sam once in a while and he must have mentioned it."
"Oh, no, he didn"t. Sam doesn"t know anything about my eating habits in the lab and he isn"t interested enough to ask." He sounded triumphant. "You actually asked about me. And when I was brought into the hospital after the fall you came to see me."
She shrugged. "I may have. Why wouldn"t I? We went to school together. I checked in on you and left. You were Shayner"s patient and I was on my way home."
"And I"m supposed to believe you check on all of Shayner"s patients? Sorry, princess, that just doesn"t fly. You had the righteous inflection and that little bite to your tone that usually throws people, but you aren"t throwing me. Not this time. Admit it. You"re interested in me..."
Libby gasped. "I"m so not interested in you. You"re an arrogant-" She broke off abruptly as a shadow pa.s.sed over them, momentarily blocking out the bright sun. Distracted, she looked around. "Something"s wrong."
"Why do you think that?"
"The shadow." She was more than distracted, standing to peer around her.
"It was a bird, Libby, a seagull."
"It wasn"t a bird."
Her alarm was catching and it annoyed him. There was nothing wrong. "C"mon, Drake. Do you really think I"m going to fall for that? You just don"t want to admit, you"re interested in me."
Libby ignored him, lifting her arms straight into the air. At once the wind answered, rushing past them in a small gust away from the sea towards the house on the cliff.
"What are you doing?" Ty asked suspiciously.
"That magic c.r.a.p you don"t believe in. Be quiet for a minute and let me concentrate. Something is really wrong. I can feel it." She frowned, facing the ocean, her eyes restless, quartering the beach around them.
Ty took a long look around, first at the ocean. It was fairly calm and he saw no signs of a coming sleeper wave, let alone a tsunami. What else could be wrong? He glanced up at the sky.
"A seagull might dive-bomb us," he reported, "but I don"t see a plane going down."
She shot him a look that was meant to silence him.
He started to grin at her, amused by her certainty, but his gut reacted, an instinct that told him to move fast. Ty stood up abruptly, circled her waist and dragged her away from the chairs toward the steps. She was slight, but his ribs and smashed sternum protested, feeling like his chest was being ripped apart. He kept moving. He didn"t believe in magic, but he trusted instincts and his own alarm bells were shrieking. A good scientist needed gut feelings and his had been honed by his firefighting training.
They"d taken several running steps toward the path leading up the cliff when he heard a sound from above them. As a rock climber the sound was one he"d heard before. Covering Libby"s head with both his arms, he ran the last couple of steps to shove her against the cliff wall, his body crouching over hers protectively as rocks, dirt and mud rained down on them. He made himself as small as possible, wincing when debris pounded on his shoulders and arms. Dirt poured over them and Libby coughed.
He put his mouth next to her ear. "Try not to breathe."
She didn"t reply but her hand slipped into his. He pressed her head into his chest. She felt small and fragile in his arms, unlike the Libby who seemed so self a.s.sured to him. He tightened his arms and tucked his chin over her head. It seemed an eternity before the rock slide stopped.
He remained holding her. "You think it"s safe to move?"
"Thank you." She straightened, pulling her hand out of his, putting a small s.p.a.ce between them.
He could still feel her body against his, an illusion, but all the same, she felt like she belonged there. "For what?"
Libby stepped cautiously over the rubble and pointed toward the chairs where they"d been sitting minutes earlier. The wooden chairs had been smashed to splinters by several large boulders. "You just had to mention the cliffs eroding, didn"t you?"
The teasing note in her voice robbed him of breath. She looked on the verge of laughter. That was enough to stop his heart. He put his hand over his aching chest. "I had no idea the power of my suggestion was so strong. Next time, I"ll be more careful."
"Jonas mentioned there"d been several slides after the last big rain we had. Sea Lion Cove took a major hit. The cliff is really unstable, but I guess we didn"t pay attention like we should have."
Ty studied the rock face towering above them. "It didn"t look that unstable. There wasn"t even an earthquake. Did you notice the boulders looking as if they might fall as you were walking down to the beach?"
"I wasn"t paying attention to it, Ty," Libby admitted. "I can"t remember the last time any of us looked. Jonas is going to give us one of his many, many lectures."
"Where, exactly, does Jonas fit into your family?" Ty asked. "I remember that he was always around all of you, but he isn"t related, is he?" He reached out to brush dirt from her hair.
Libby raised a hand to try to tidy the ma.s.s of blue-black silk tumbling around her face. Ty caught her wrist, preventing her from fussing. "You look beautiful, even all messed up."
Libby took a breath. Ten minutes earlier she wanted to push the man into the ocean, now all she could think about was kissing him. "That"s a nice thing to say, Ty. I"m not feeling particularly beautiful, so it means a lot that you"d say it."
He shrugged. "I was just stating the obvious. You were telling me where Jonas fits into your family," he reminded. He"d had several bad nights lying awake, remembering the look on Jonas Harrington"s face when he"d seen Libby crushed and bleeding on the hospital floor. Ty still hadn"t been able to erase the image of Jonas carrying Libby down the hospital hallway.
Libby shrugged. "Jonas is family whether he"s related by blood or not. He"ll always be family. I think he"d like to disown us, but he can"t. He"s stuck with us and we drive him crazy."
He could imagine. Jonas was in law enforcement. With the family being outright charlatans, the man was bound to be in a difficult position trying to protect them. Ty didn"t want to think about Libby"s family, only that intriguing smile she"d flashed at him. He took her hand. As silly as it sounded, he liked holding her hand. "Let"s get you back to the house. Do you think you can make the climb?"
"I"m fine," Libby said. She"d had a headache for days, but she wasn"t going to admit it to Ty. She didn"t pull her hand away, acutely aware of the way the pad of his thumb rubbed over her skin causing a small fluttering in her stomach. No one had ever made her stomach flutter before. "I can certainly make it back up the stairs."
Ty tucked her hand against his chest and began the long climb. The stairs had been dug out a hundred years earlier and each generation had helped to make it easier to climb. Somewhere along the way a railing had been constructed on one side. Tyson kept Libby pressed close to the railing for safety. "It"s a good thing you"re feeling fine, I don"t want you using this little mishap as an excuse to avoid our date." He smirked at her.
"Date?" Her voice squeaked. "We don"t have a date."
"Yes, we do."
Libby shook her head decisively. "I don"t go out on dates."
"Well, you"re going on a date with me. I asked. You said yes. Are you backing out?" He challenged. "I know you"re attracted to me."
Libby looked horrified. It was all he could do to keep from laughing. "I am not. What gave you that idea?"
"You did. You said so, when I asked you to go out with me." He tilted his head, studying her face, looking her straight in the eye. "Come on, Drake, in the hospital. You"re not going to pretend you didn"t say you wanted to go out with me."
"What else did I say?" Pure suspicion was in her voice.
"That I"m brilliant. Which I am."
"This isn"t funny, Ty. We never had the conversation. I don"t date."
"Yes, you do. You dated that idiot doctor from the C.D.C. You remember him. He had a toupee."
"He did not. That"s his own hair. And he wasn"t an idiot." She narrowed her eyes, pinning him with her gaze. "How would you know I dated him?"
"Sam. He"s a fountain of information. Remember, he told you I eat Cracker Jacks? And the C.D.C doc was too an idiot. I had one conversation with him and that was enough to tell me he got his position through family connections or politics."
Libby sighed. "Well, I don"t really go out on dates so it isn"t possible I said yes. And I only went to dinner with him once."
"Because he was an idiot," Ty insisted. "Come on, Drake, tell the truth. He was boring, he only talked about himself and he didn"t have a brain."
"Whatever. You know darned well we didn"t have a conversation in the hospital."
He put a hand over his heart. "I can"t believe you"d pretend otherwise. You came into my room and told me to hang on, I had to live because I was so valuable."
Her eyebrow shot up.
"Okay, so you said my brain was valuable, same thing, Drake, whether you want to admit it or not."
"And I said you were brilliant." Sarcasm dripped from her voice.
"Well," he hedged, "not in so many words."
"I"ll just bet not in so many words." Libby spun around and started back up the stairs. She couldn"t remember anything about that day at the hospital. Elle had told her about her conversation with Irene. Irene"s purse hadn"t done the damage. Libby had collapsed all on her own. Elle had known she was in trouble, but no one would be able to tell her if she"d really had a conversation with Tyson Derrick. "You were unconscious."
"No, I wasn"t."
"You were in a vegetative state."
"It was a miracle, according to Dr. Shayner. Maybe just you whispering all those compliments turned me around."
"You"re so full of it." There was laughter in her voice again. "You"re making all this up."
There was something about her laughter that affected him more than he cared to admit. It wasn"t just that she made his body tighten and every cell come alive, it went deeper than that. He a.n.a.lyzed data, and she was messing with more than his hormones. When she laughed, his insides churned and his heart felt lighter. It didn"t make sense, but she was nearly a drug in his system. Just being around her gave him that same rush of adrenaline he was so addicted to.
"Do I look like a man who makes things up?" he countered.
She paused again on the stair above him, turning to look up at his face. Her bottom brushed across his groin as she turned and the dull ache turned into a full-blown pain. He caught her by the arms and held her in front of him.
The smile faded from her face. Ty didn"t realize he was so close, his head bending down towards hers. Her mouth was sinfully tempting, her lips full and soft and parted just that little bit. He saw her eyes widen in shock and then his mouth took possession of hers. He wasn"t thinking. If there hadn"t been an earthquake before, there sure as h.e.l.l was one now.
The earth moved. Maybe it spun. He didn"t know. He didn"t care. He kissed her again, his tongue teasing and dancing until she opened for him. Her mouth clung to his. The kiss deepened. He couldn"t let go, gathering her closer, turning the kiss into something not so gentle. Blood heated, rushed and pounded as if he"d been injected with a potent testosterone-laced drug. He pulled her closer still, needing to touch her soft skin, to feel her heat, to feast on her addicting taste.
Her body moved against his and he forgot all about his ribs and his smashed chest. He forgot all about the new drag and wondering why his safety harness had failed. He simply felt, his body totally alive, every nerve ending sizzled as if he were dangling fifty feet off a rope over a blazing forest fire, intense heat all but melting him. He ravenously devoured her neck, her throat and back up again to her unbelievable mouth. He"d fantasized forever about her mouth, but not a single erotic fantasy had prepared him for the frenzied need to kiss her again and again.
Libby"s arms crept up to circle his neck as she responded with complete abandon to Tyson Derrick"s kisses. She wanted more. Always more. To be closer, to touch his bare skin, to feel his hard muscles, to warm her body against his heat. She needed to feel his hunger matching the sudden flare of her own. It came out of nowhere, a need so deep, so primitive, she didn"t recognize herself. His kisses swept her away from the anchor of responsibility always weighing her down. She floated. She sizzled. She felt s.e.xually desirable.
She was different. In his arms, she was different. No one had ever kissed her like that-as if he were on fire. As if he needed her, had to have her. As if she were everything to him. She ran her hand up his chest and he winced. Sanity returned in a little rash. Libby tried to pull back. His hand wrapped around the nape of her neck to hold her still and his mouth continued to command hers.
Libby"s brain simply shorted out. She lost all ability to think, to reason, tumbling into a well of pure s.e.xual feeling. It was impossible to breathe. They were exchanging air, but it wasn"t enough. Her body burned for his, her fingers tangling in his dark hair.
"Libby." He whispered her name against her lips.
"I can"t breathe."
"Neither can I. I can"t move either. We"re going to have to stand here forever unless you"re willing to go find a nice quiet hidden spot on the beach."
Libby forced herself to pull back. "This isn"t real, you know. I"m drugged. Totally drugged." She pressed a hand to her swollen lips, knowing she looked thoroughly kissed. The shadow on his jaw had rubbed her sensitive skin red and she was suddenly aware of her neck throbbing. She pressed her hand over her skin. "You didn"t dare give me a hickey, did you?"
"Here, let me look." He pulled her hand down. "To be honest, I don"t know what the h.e.l.l I did." He lifted her hair and stared for a long time at her neck, finally leaning forward to press his lips against the offending spot. "I"d say you have a hickey, unless you have a strawberry birthmark."
Libby stared up at him, unable to believe he had managed to take her over like that. She was always in control. Always. She didn"t lose her mind over men. She wasn"t seduced by them and she certainly didn"t have such powerful s.e.xual reactions-not over an arrogant man who had absolutely no social skills, especially one who insulted her entire family. What was the matter with her? She wasn"t all the way better. That was the only explanation for her madness.
"What drug?"
She blinked. "What are you talking about? I"m smart, Ty, but why is it I never know what you"re talking about?" She let her hand glide over his sternum, rest there for just a moment before sliding it around to his ribs.
He tangled his fingers in her hair, rubbing the strands between his fingers and thumb. "You said you were drugged, that this isn"t real. I want to know what drug you"re taking."
"Aspirin. I had a headache."
"And aspirin causes you to become s.e.xually excited? Kissable? Totally alluring?"
"Obviously."
He nodded. "Make certain you take one before our dinner date."