by Erika Wilde
It took every ounce of control he possessed to resist her very tempting offer to spend the day in bed with her and forget about the real world. He straightened and thrust his fingers into the front pockets of his jeans to keep from touching her warm, supple skin and luscious curves. “Since I’m out of eggs and bacon, how about I go and get us some pastries and lattes for breakfast?”
“Mmm,” she said, the one word a provocative, come-hither purr in her throat. “I could handle that.”
“Great.” He took a step back, then another, fighting his body’s desires with the need to make things right with her before he pinned her to the bed and fucked her again. “I’ll be back in about half an hour,” he promised, and then he was gone.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Natalie lay in bed, listening to the sound of Noah’s light footsteps heading down the stairs to the foyer. She heard him stop there to set the silent house alarm before leaving to pick up breakfast. A small smile touched her lips at his protective nature, though now that she knew why he was taking extra precautions with her safety, she appreciated his attentiveness.
She heard his car back out of the driveway, then an overwhelming silence settled over the house, along with the realization that she didn’t like being alone. After a week of constantly being surrounded by people, she felt a bit uneasy being companionless. Which was ridiculous, she knew, since she clearly couldn’t spend the rest of her life with a bodyguard attached to her side.
Yet it seemed by Noah’s reserved behavior this morning and his restless desire to get out of the house that he needed a reprieve, even if it was a brief one. In a way, she understood. Last night had been so emotionally intense, a surrender of hearts and souls in a way that felt like the very first time for her. She’d been thrown by the depth of her feelings for Noah and hadn’t been able to hold back the declaration that had felt so perfectly right.
Yet for as much as he’d returned her sentiment, there had been a few times she’d sensed uncertainties within him, as if something deep and personal was going on in his mind that he wasn’t ready or willing to divulge just yet. Then again, there was always the possibility that she might be reading too much into her own insecurities.
With a sigh, she got out of bed and padded to the bathroom. After taking care of personal business, she brushed her teeth and changed into her drawstring pants and a loose, comfy T-shirt. Just as she finished combing out the tangles in her hair, the sound of shattering glass downstairs made her jump, and her heart accelerated to a hard, pounding beat.
Startled, and certain Noah had returned and accidentally broken something, she dropped the brush on the vanity and started out of the bedroom and down the stairs.
“Noah?” she called, and came to an abrupt halt when she saw that the glass from one of the windows flanking the front door was scattered on the floor in the entryway. The door was ajar, and the morning breeze wafted indoors. The cool air caused goose bumps to rise on her flesh, contradicting the hot prickle of unease invading her entire body.
Her gaze shot to the security system on the wall. The red light on the alarm panel flashed, indicating the silent alarm had been set off. Noah wasn’t home, and someone had obviously broken into the house.
The phone in the kitchen rang, breaking through the silence and Natalie’s paralyzed nerves. Praying it was the security company, she leaped over the shattered glass on the floor and ran into the kitchen. Before she could reach the phone, a familiar male figure appeared, blocking her path and leaving her with a feeling of dread.
She screamed in fright and stumbled back a few steps. Terror gripped her as she stared at the man who’d been stalking her—her ex-boyfriend, according to Noah. A man who obviously had no qualms about breaking and entering to get what he wanted.
And what he wanted was her.
Oh, God.
An arrogant smile lifted his lips. “Hello, Natalie,” he said, and though he didn’t make any move toward her his presence emanated an underlying animosity she felt to her bones.
Shaking from the inside out, she curled her fingers into tight fists at her sides as the phone continued to ring. “Ch-Ch-Chad,” she stammered, surprised that her vocal chords worked.
He lifted a blond brow, looking immensely pleased at her recollection. “You finally remember me. I was beginning to think that your amnesia, and Noah’s influence on you, had permanently erased me from your memory.”
His voice was low and tinged with malevolence. Disjointed memories flashed in her mind, of Chad’s face twisted with fury and a temper to match. And then the recollection crystallized. She’d been the victim of that rage before—it was what had caused her to leave Chad and start a new life here in Oakland.
She was stunned by the memory and terrified by Chad’s irrational frame of mind and what he was capable of doing to her. “Get out, now,” she ordered adamantly, just as the phone went silent.
“We’ll be leaving together this time,” he said, too calmly. “Do you know how long I’ve been waiting to catch you alone? It hasn’t been easy with your watchdog by your side at all times.”
Refusing to turn her back on him, she took a step back, then another, edging closer to her only means of escape—a framed threshold leading to the formal dining room and the stairs that headed up to the second level of the house. She thought of Noah’s revolver in the bedroom upstairs and knew that it was her best source of defense against this deranged man.
But she had to get to the weapon first.
“You’ll always be mine, Natalie,” Chad said possessively, drawing her full attention back to him.
Her chest tightened as his familiar words sank in. They were the same as the words she’d read on the card that had accompanied the bouquet she’d received at the hospital.
Noah hadn’t sent her those flowers, she realized. Chad had.
“You never should have left me,” he chided as he moved around the counter, his steps deceptively slow and unhurried, his gaze dark and direct. “Did you really think that I wouldn’t be able to find you? And I can’t believe that your lover thought that I couldn’t get to you, just because you were locked in his house with an alarm. You’re mine, and this time I’m not letting you go.”
He was too close, too dangerous, and she’d had enough. Taking advantage of the only weapon and distraction she had available to her, she grasped her textbook off the counter and flung it at Chad’s head. The book hit its mark, striking him in the temple. He grabbed his head and howled in pain, and she turned and ran through the opposite doorway and up the stairs, desperate to get to Noah’s gun.
Once she’d made it to the master bedroom, she shut and locked the door. She bolted over to the dresser and rummaged through the drawer where he kept his revolver, her heart beating in time with the heavy, angry footsteps of Chad coming up the stairs.
She tossed Noah’s cotton undershirts onto the floor in her frantic search, and a sob of despair caught in her throat when she realized that the gun was gone. He must have put it on this morning, though for the life of her she couldn’t remember him wearing his holster, which didn’t mean much. She’d grown so used to the weapon being a part of him that she hardly noticed it anymore.
But the fact remained that the gun was gone, and she was trapped upstairs with a crazed man after her.
The bedroom door rattled as Chad tried to kick in the sturdy wooden panel, spurring Natalie to find another means of defense. She’d gone through two other drawers for something sharp or blunt to use when the door cracked and splintered from the force of Chad’s repeated blows, then crashed open.
She jumped back with a gasp, while he stood there in the doorway, the cut near his temple oozing blood down the side of his face. His features were filled with violent rage.
Fear swelled within her. “I’m expecting Noah back any minute,” she blurted out, hoping and praying it was true. Or at least that the alarm company had dispatched the police since she hasn’t answered the phone. “I suggest you leave before he returns.”
She shook her head in confusion as she backed toward the far side of the room to keep distance between them. Knowing conversation was her best stall tactic until she could figure out an escape, she asked, “What lie?”
“The two of you aren’t engaged.” He waved an impatient hand in the air. “I’ve been watching you long enough to know that the two of you weren’t ever an item, at least not before the night of your accident.”
His comment rippled through her mind, and denial rose fast and furiously. Of course, she and Noah were engaged! They lived together. She’d given him her body, her soul. She loved him.
But along with that denial came snippets of conversations she’d had with Noah, of him skirting the issue of their engagement, no ring on her finger, no wedding date set, and no straightforward answers to the many questions she’d asked about them as a couple.
More vague images appeared in her head…Noah at the bar, talking and flirting with her, walking out with her the night of the accident, and her playfully fending off his flirtatious advances. They’d been friends, acquaintances, nothing more. The memories were fresh and real and gave her no choice but to believe Chad’s words.
She and Noah weren’t engaged.
The truth crashed over her in waves, shaking the very foundation of her relationship with Noah, which in essence had been nothing more than an affair. No wonder so much hadn’t made sense to her.
“I thought you’d finally changed,” Chad went on bitterly, touching her personal items on the dresser, taking a whiff from her perfume bottle before continuing toward her. “But being the slut that you are, you moved in with him, slept with him and now you’re his whore.”
Whore. She winced, remembering Chad cursing her with that exact word the night he’d attacked her after work in Reno.
He’d claimed she was a tramp for using her body as a showgirl, and he didn’t like other men looking at her, lusting after her. Memories of her tumultuous past with Chad deluged her mind, overwhelming her—memories she would have been happy to keep suppressed but this confrontation triggered a release of recollections she couldn’t stop or escape.
Swallowing the whimper of panic rising to the surface, she kept inching backward, until her spine pressed up against the wall and she found herself cornered by Chad and the king-size bed to her left.
Knowing she was trapped, Chad continued to approach her like a savage animal anticipating pouncing on his prey. “I’ve had enough of watching you with him. Now I’m going to take back what’s mine.”
Her chance of escape was slim, but she wasn’t going to let Chad bully her anymore. She refused to be a victim any longer, refused to allow this man any power over her mind or body—as he’d had in her past.
Resolute and more determined than she’d ever been before, she sprinted to the left and dove for the bed so she could scramble across the mattress. She made it halfway across before she felt a large hand clamp around her ankle and yank her back. She flipped over just as Chad started to move on top of her, his intent clear.
He was going to assault her.
And she was going to fight for her life, without remorse or hesitation. Just as he let go of her ankle, she kicked, hard, and aimed high. Her foot connected with his jaw with a loud crack, and his head snapped back from the impact. Her other foot landed in the middle of his chest, knocking him off balance and giving her the reprieve she needed to get the hell away from him.
“Goddamn whore!” he bellowed furiously, the agony of her dual attack radiating in his eyes.
She rolled away from him and off the bed. As soon as her feet hit the floor she was running out the door and down the stairs. He was seconds behind her, cursing her and promising retribution every step of the way. Before she could reach the foyer and front door, shards of glass be damned, he grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her to an abrupt stop.
She yelped in pain but didn’t stop moving, her arms swinging, hands punching, and legs and feet striking any body part she came in contact with. They stumbled into the living room, and she kicked him in the shin, expecting his instant reflexes to cause him to let her go.
No such luck. Another explicit curse filled the air and he shoved her down onto the floor between the couch and coffee table, pinning her there with the weight of his body. He straddled her thighs, taking away any chance she might have had to knee him in the groin.
She wanted to scream in frustration but didn’t waste her energy on something that would be of no help to her predicament.
He stared down at her, his nostrils flaring with each labored breath he took. “I’m going to take what’s mine. Right here. Right now.”
“Go to hell,” she said through gritted teeth. “You’re nothing but a hypocrite! You call me a whore, yet you have no qualms about using my body to slake your lust!”
He clenched his swollen jaw and narrowed his gaze to tiny slits. “It doesn’t matter. You’re used goods, anyway.”
Grabbing the neckline of her shirt, he ripped it right down the middle, exposing her breasts encased in a thin cotton bra. She fought to fend him off, then ceased her struggles when she caught sight of the bronze statue on the coffee table next to her. As much as it revolted her, she let his hands grope her and didn’t issue a protest when his mouth touched down on the upper slope of one breast.
Swallowing the nausea rolling in her belly, she sank her fingers into his hair in the pretense of enjoying his kisses, feigned a sigh of surrender and reached for the bronze statue. As soon as her fingers curled around the cool metal she jerked Chad’s head back and bashed the statue against the side of his head. The first hit merely dazed him. The second strike, backed with more force, rendered him unconscious.
He slumped on top of her, and with a deep sob she immediately shoved him off and crawled away from his lifeless form, the statue still clutched in her hand. She pressed her back up against the wall just as she heard the sounds of a siren and a vehicle skidded to a stop in the driveway. Seconds later, two uniformed police officers charged into the house, guns drawn—no doubt sent by the security company when she hadn’t answered the phone.
They took one look at her ripped shirt and devastated expression, coupled with the man crumpled on the floor, and came to all the right conclusions. They made sure she was physically unharmed, then proceeded to take care of Chad, locking him in cuffs and rendering him immobile so he’d be no threat when he gained consciousness.
As they called for backup and an ambulance for Chad, Natalie buried her face in her hands. She finally broke down, allowing her emotions and tears to flow freely and releasing the fear, anxiety and pain she’d kept bottled up inside of her for too long.
But mostly, she wept for the empty future without Noah that awaited her after today. She understood now that their relationship had been based on a lie, a fabrication she’d fallen for, deeply and irrevocably, when in reality she’d been merely a responsibility for Noah. He’d taken her into his home to protect her from Chad since she couldn’t recall her past, and she’d fallen for the protective ruse. But Noah had never truly been hers.
Their relationship, his family, the sense of belonging she’d experienced…it had all been a false sense of security that had now been shattered by the return of her memory.
Despite his tale that they were engaged, she couldn’t blame Noah for the affair they’d had, since she’d been the one to allow her own suppressed needs and desires to blossom and take flight. She’d tempted and teased him, instigating those first few erotic encounters and ultimately seducing him into making love to her.
She’d just had no idea how intimately involved her heart, body and soul would become with Noah—in a way she’d never given to another man. And while she harbored no regrets for loving him, neither did she expect him to make her promises of forever. As she now
remembered, he’d been a confirmed bachelor before her memory loss, a man who enjoyed his freedom and carefree, uncomplicated lifestyle.
And she was a woman who’d never let a man as close as she’d allowed Noah, for fear of losing her sense of self, as she almost had with Chad. The amnesia had loosened her inhibitions and left her much too vulnerable to love. To Noah.
She swiped at the moisture beneath her eyes and on her cheeks and shored up her resolve. With her memory back and the crisis of being stalked over, it was time for her to move on and start out fresh—no matter how much she dreaded a life without Noah.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The moment Noah pulled into his driveway and saw a patrol car and ambulance parked in front of his house, fear nearly strangled him. He jumped out of his vehicle and ran.
The broken window next to the front door and the shards of glass crunching beneath his sneakered feet as he bolted into the foyer sickened him, adding to his anxiety and dread that Chad had finally gotten to Natalie.
In his living room, he came across the paramedics strapping Chad to a cot, and Noah’s stomach lurched when he caught sight of the blood on the other man’s face, and his lifeless form. His gaze frantically swept the general area for Natalie, and his chest tightened with apprehension when he didn’t find her.
Where in the hell was she? Had they already taken her away in a separate ambulance? Or, God forbid, had she been fatally hurt?
Desperate to know something before he went insane with worry, he grabbed the arm of a passing EMT, and the young man looked up at him in startled surprise. Now that Noah had the technician’s attention, he released him.
“Where’s the woman?” he asked, his voice hoarse.
The man hooked a finger toward the adjoining room. “She’s in the kitchen with the police.”
“Thank you,” he muttered, and strode into the kitchen, instantly finding her sitting at the table in the corner nook with two police officers taking her statement. Relief at seeing her alive mingled with a stabbing pain in the vicinity of Noah’s heart as he took in her disheveled hair, puffy eyes, and the dried tears streaking her cheeks. Her shirt was torn, and she was holding it together with one hand.
