Deadly Betrayal

by L A Dobbs

  In high school, Jan had been a lost soul after her father died and her mother remarried. She didn’t get along with her stepfather, and her mother had always taken her stepfather’s side for some reason. Jan’s home life had not been warm and loving. Just like his hadn’t been. That was one reason why they’d bonded together. But Dino had had the Rockfords to make up for it. Jan hadn’t had anyone except Stacy and, if his glimpse into her private life this past week was any indication, things hadn’t changed much for her in that department since.

  The Rockford family had been a godsend in his life, and he wanted the same for Jan, at least for tonight.

  The chatter around the table continued through dessert—a lovely chocolate cake concoction that Dino had two servings of just because it was so damned good. By the time he checked his watch again, it was ten o’clock, and Jan was yawning beside him. Time to go.

  “Ready?” he leaned over to whisper in her ear.

  “Ready,” she agreed.

  They made their good-byes and headed back out to his SUV, parked near the end of the drive. She looked ready to drop, and he’d eaten enough to put himself in a food coma. Still, she seemed so much more relaxed than when they’d arrived, and he couldn’t help feeling a bit of pride that he’d helped do that. “How are you feeling?”

  “Good. Exhausted, but good.”

  “Good.” He helped her in the vehicle then walked around to climb in behind the wheel of the Tahoe. “All right. We’ll be back at your place in minutes.”

  “Um.” She shifted in her seat to look at him. “Could I stay at your house tonight?”

  “My house? Why?”

  “I don’t know. Yours is closer, right? And we’re both so tired, and the stalker won’t look for me there, and…”

  Her voice trailed off, and his heart ached at the note of desperation in her voice. “What happened today really bothered you, didn’t it?”

  “Yeah, it did.” She kept her gaze lowered. “I really don’t want to be alone tonight.”

  “Okay.” He backed out of the driveway and headed toward his home in north Summerlin instead. “You can stay with me tonight. Just be warned. It’s a lot smaller than your mansion on the hill.”

  “I’m sure it’s great.”

  Minutes later, he pulled up to his modest two-story, and they walked up to his front door. “So, what do you think?” he asked as he opened the front door and led her inside. “I know it’s not much compared to yours but—”

  He never finished his sentence because her lips were on his, soft and incredibly tempting. Before he knew what was happening, Jan had kicked his front door shut behind them and twined her hands around his neck, her fingers tangling in the curls at the nape of his neck. She sighed deep in her throat. “Dino.”

  His name sounded like a benediction. He summoned his last ounce of resistance and pulled away. “Jan, sweetheart, we shouldn’t be doing this.”

  “I just wanted to thank you, for giving me tonight.”

  “Thank me?” She nodded and tried to step away, but he gripped her waist tightly to lock her in place. “For what?”

  “I felt so alone today, and now, I…” She stopped, and he waited for her to continue. “I don’t feel that way anymore. Please, don’t make me go back to that huge empty house by myself. Not after I’ve seen what the Rockfords have. I don’t think I can bear it.”

  “Aw, sweetheart.” He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close. “You should have said something earlier. I’m always here if you need me. You know that, right?”

  She leaned back and peered up at him. “You are?”

  “I am. Anything you need, just say the word.”

  “Well.” She lowered her head, but not before he caught the flush of pretty pink color flooding her cheeks. “There is something you can do for me tonight.”

  His throat felt tight and stuffed with cotton, but he managed to force words out anyway, gruff as they were. “What?”

  “Sleep with me.”

  “Jan.” He wanted her more than his next breath, but after all the trauma she’d suffered recently with her stalker and the pressure she was under at the studio, he didn’t want there to be any question of why they were getting involved again. For him, he needed to know it wasn’t just her body involved. This time he needed her heart, her whole heart, too. “Like I said, I don’t think…”

  “No.” She frowned up at him. “Not like that. I meant like we used to back in high school. You used to hold me close, and I’ve never felt so safe in my life.”

  “Oh.” His tense posture relaxed slightly. Sleeping together. Really sleeping. Just sleeping. Yeah, he could do that, he supposed. After all, they had done that before, lots of times. That wouldn’t be breaking any rules. Even if the thought of having her so close and yet so far away would probably kill him before the night was over. He took several deep breaths before replying. He could do this. He would do this. For Jan. “All right.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.” He locked the front door behind them and set his security system then shut off the downstairs lights and led Jan upstairs by the hand. “Let me see if I have something you can wear to sleep in.”

  “No.” She started unbuttoning her top, and he damned near went into cardiac arrest. “Like high school. Undies only. I need to feel skin-to-skin contact tonight. I need that connection.”

  Jan peeled off her shirt, and he swallowed hard.

  Just sleeping, just sleeping, just sleeping.

  Maybe if he repeated those words enough times, they might get through. He watched while she kicked off her pumps then stripped off her jeans and turned down the covers on his bed. “Are you just going to stand there staring at me all night, or are you going to join me?”

  Mouth dry and pulse pounding loud in his ears, Dino took off his leather jacket and slung it over the back of a chair in the corner of the room then toed off his boots and socks before pulling off his sweater and jeans. As he eased between the sheets then reached over to switch off the bedside light, he couldn’t help but remember all the nights like this they’d clung to each other in the dark all those years ago. Two desperate teenagers against the world.

  Tonight, they were older and hopefully wiser, but as he gathered Jan’s warm, soft body in his arms and spooned her tightly against him, it felt so good, so right, so intimate that he knew no matter what happened with her stalker or his future, he loved her. He stroked her soft skin and kissed the back of her neck, and soon her breath evened out into the patterns of sleep, even as he stayed wide awake and watchful, the gears in his mind churning, digging deep into his training, trying to figure out how to find the stalker before he did something worse than cut up magazines and leave suggestive gifts.

  Jan was his other half, his prodigal heart, missing for fifteen years and now returned. And he’d do anything, anything at all, to protect her.

  16

  Warm and infinitely comfortable, Jan opened her eyes in the dim early-morning light and snuggled farther beneath the covers. She’d slept better than she had in a long time and had that fuzzy-headed feeling that went along with it. It took her a moment to remember what day it was, let alone her own name. She stretched and yawned then attempted to move but was stopped by a heavy weight around her waist. She lifted her head slightly and peered at her surroundings.

  Not her room, not her bed.

  Her eyes widened, and she slid back down to the pillow.

  Dino.

  She was in bed with Dino, at Dino’s house, in Dino’s bed.

  Behind her, he murmured in his sleep and pulled her tighter against him. His warm breath tickled the nape of her neck.

  Eyes closed again, she took a deep breath and just soaked in the sensations of being this close to him. They’d not spent time like this, just holding each other through the night, since high school, and she’d forgotten just how much she enjoyed it. And how much she missed it.

  Memories flooded back of the night before, the lovely dinn
er at the Rockfords’, the closeness of their family, the emptiness of her own life. With everything else going on at the studio and the escalation with her stalker, Jan hadn’t been able to bear the thought of going back to her cold, lonely tomb of a mansion last night. If Dino had said no, if he’d not let her stay here, with him, she wasn’t sure what she would’ve done.

  But he hadn’t said no.

  Slowly, carefully, so as not to wake him, she turned toward him, wanting to see if he still looked the same in slumber as she remembered from all those years ago. If his features still relaxed, making him look like a gorgeous little boy. If his hair still got all rumpled. If his lashes were still so long and dark and thick that most women would kill for them. She rolled over and blinked across the few inches separating them now.

  Yep. He looked the same, still gorgeous, still rumpled. His lashes were just as long and thick and dark as they lay against his cheekbone. The only difference now was the slight hardness to his features, the hint of world-weariness that time and life had given him. A shadow of dark stubble covered his chiseled jaw, and her fingertips itched to stroke his skin, to see if it felt as soft and smooth as it looked.

  One touch couldn’t hurt anything.

  He wouldn’t even know, if she was quick enough.

  If…

  She stopped mid-reach as Dino gave a little moan and his blue eyes opened, all drowsy and soft and incredibly seductive. He stared at her for several seconds before one side of his full lips quirked into a small smile.

  “Good morning,” he said, his voice sleep roughened and sexy.

  Heat prickled her cheeks, and she dropped her hand back to the mattress. “Morning.”

  Dino shifted position, and his legs brushed against hers beneath the covers, his calf twining through hers as his arm around her waist pulled her closer still. “This feels nice.”

  Nice didn’t begin to describe how she felt at the moment.

  Safe, cared for.

  Terrified.

  The last one most of all.

  Not of her stalker or the public’s expectations or Lou’s temper.

  But of Dino and her feelings for him and what would happen between them if she stayed.

  She needed to get up, get out, get clear.

  Right now, before this mirage of safety drove her to do something that would surely be a mistake, something like grab him and kiss him and never let him go. She rolled onto her back and stared at the ceiling. “I have to get up. Lou wants me in the studio early today.”

  Dino rubbed his eyes then leaned up to glance past her shoulder at the alarm clock. “It’s only six thirty. We have plenty of time.”

  Her heart wanted nothing more than to take him up on his invitation to snuggle the morning away, but her analytical mind wouldn’t let her. He was far too dangerous to her well-ordered life. He made her want things that she’d left behind a long time ago, things that had nearly broken her before and she was certain would again if she let them.

  No.

  Jan sat up quickly, and his arm fell away from her waist. She missed its warm weight immediately. Chilled now, she wrapped the sheet around herself and stood, her toes curling on the cold hardwood floor as she sprinted toward the bathroom. “I need a shower.”

  “Clean towels are in the cabinet,” he called behind her. “While you get clean, I’ll make us some breakfast. Eggs okay again?”

  “Yeah.” She hazarded one final glance back at him once she’d reached the relative safety of the door. Yep. He looked sleepy and seductive and entirely too sensuous for her own good. Better to run away with her heart intact than risk the pain and suffering if things didn’t work out.

  She flipped on the shower and let it steam up the room before losing the sheet and resigning herself to her fate while she slipped out of her bra and panties then stepped under the hot water spray. Her and Dino’s relationship had to stay professional this time. Otherwise, she’d never survive.

  Twenty minutes later—scrubbed clean, teeth brushed and hair towel-dried—she cracked open the bathroom door to peer out into his now-empty bedroom. While she’d been in there, he’d made the bed and laid her clothes on the comforter for her.

  She smiled as she padded barefoot across the pine floor to get dressed. He’d always been thoughtful and kind, and it seemed today was no exception. As she tugged on her jeans then shrugged into her white shirt and began to button the front, the smell of frying eggs and bacon drifted in, and her stomach growled.

  After slipping her feet back into her black Manolo pumps, she fluffed her still-damp curls before the full-length mirror against the wall then headed downstairs. She found Dino in the kitchen, whistling while he cooked, clad only in a white tee-shirt and his faded jeans with an apron tied around his waist.

  The clack of her heels on the slate tile floor must’ve alerted him to her arrival, because he glanced back over his shoulder and gave her a sexy grin. “Breakfast is ready. Have a seat, and I’ll fix you a plate.”

  “Thanks.” Jan took a seat on a stool at the large island in the center of the room and fiddled with a stack of paper napkins before her.

  He piled up a mound of scrambled eggs, three slices of bacon, and two pieces of buttered toast then delivered them to her with a flourish. “Your meal, madam. What would you like to drink?”

  “Just some water, please.” She picked up the fork he’d laid beside her plate and took a small bite of eggs. Just as good as the omelets a few nights earlier. “You’re quite a wizard with eggs, huh?”

  “I’m a wizard with a lot of things.” He set a glass of ice water down next to her plate and gave her a provocative wink. “Eggs is just one of them.”

  She lowered her head and took a large bite of bacon to avoid the awkward conversation she didn’t want to have. Last night was last night, and today was today. No sense muddling the two together. She’d expected him to take a seat beside her at the island, but when he didn’t, she finally looked up again and found him across the room, his slim hips leaned against the counter while he watched her.

  “Aren’t you going to have some too?” she asked around a bite of toast.

  “I already ate.” He narrowed his gaze on her and opened his mouth as if to say something, then closed it again. After removing his apron and tossing aside the dish towel he’d slung over one shoulder, Dino headed for the door. “My turn in the shower.”

  She nodded and stared at her plate, not trusting herself to speak.

  Alone, she finished her meal while glancing through the morning paper Dino had left on the island. Once done, she rinsed her plate and glass then placed them in the dishwasher along with her silverware. Full and focused, she’d just wandered out of the kitchen to explore the rest of his house when he jogged downstairs again, dressed, his dark hair still damp and slicked back.

  “Ready to go?” he asked as he passed her to grab his keys off a side table.

  “Yep.” She picked up her bag on the way out the door, and they made the drive to Treble Studios in companionable, if somewhat awkward, silence. Neither of them seemed ready to talk about the night they’d spent in each other’s arms, innocent as it had been.

  That was fine with her. They might not have done anything sexual last night, but the evening in his bed had been far more intimate than any erotic act he could’ve performed. It felt as if sleeping beside him, skin to skin, heart to heart, had weaved a tiny golden thread between them and around her heart, and it didn’t matter if they never spoke of last night again. Her heart remembered. And with each remembrance, that tiny golden thread squeezed a little tighter, bringing her closer to him whether she wanted to be or not.

  Jan glanced to the side and found Dino watching her, a hint of the same confused longing she felt evident in his intense blue gaze. Was it possible he felt that connection between them, too?

  Fifteen minutes later, Dino parked his Tahoe in front of Treble and helped her down from the SUV. They walked in the studio together, and her tension level ratcheted to h
igh almost immediately.

  Lou waited for her by the reception desk, toe tapping and expression impatient. “A snippet of Lie With Me released to radio today nationwide. Not the whole thing, just the first verse and the chorus. With any luck, it’s going viral. You ready to work?”

  “Of course.” She exhaled slowly as he took her elbow and directed her toward the stairs. “Aren’t I always?”

  He didn’t reply, just gave her a visual once-over then glanced back at Dino before returning his gaze to her, frowning. “Aren’t those the same clothes you wore yesterday?”

  “No.” She scoffed, hoping to play off his too-damned-accurate statement. “I have lots of similar outfits.”

  “Right.” His dubious tone suggested he didn’t buy it for one second. “Well, the plan today is songwriting. I’ve rented you one of the private music rooms. You’ll have plenty of time and privacy to sit alone with your guitar and write me lots of happy, upbeat songs to fill the remaining slots on the new album, yes?”

  “But—” She started to protest as he pushed her into a small room equipped with her guitar, a chair, a table, paper and pencils, and a large bottle of water. Nothing else. No windows, no pictures on the walls, no distractions whatsoever. Her own private prison cell.

  “No buts. We’ve got six slots to fill, and I want this album to burst with a joyful vibe. Now, sit down, tune up, and compose. See you at lunchtime.”

  With that, he closed the door in her face. The sound of a lock snicking into place echoed in the tiny space. Fantastic. Jan tossed her bag down on the floor and flopped into the chair, her head in her hands. Writing music required inspiration and time and freedom. None of which Lou had provided.

  Shit.

  Shit, shit, shit.

  Her guitar mocked her from its stand, and she toed off her shoes, seriously considering stacking the chair atop the table to reach the tiled ceiling above. Maybe she could climb her way out of here. Escape out the back entrance and run away from her current life and all its complications.