by Rachel Lee
And ashamed. Deeply ashamed of her illness and her despair. Everything was wrong about her. Everything.
She heard Rafe following her, but she didn’t dare run up the stairs for fear of waking Emma and Gage. She walked as quickly as she could, but knew he was only a couple of steps behind. Why was he following her? Why couldn’t he just leave her alone?
She threw open the door to her room and stepped inside, trying to close it behind her, but he pushed his way in without apology.
She took a ragged breath, fighting the tears that were always so close to the surface these days. “What do you want?”
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“Okay, you’re sorry. I just want to be alone!”
He just stood there looking at her, and she had a sudden wild urge to hit him.
“Look,” he said finally, “I’ve never had a chronic illness, so I can’t imagine how it feels. But I do know that I didn’t mean anything critical by what I said. I guess I could have asked the question better.”
She didn’t answer, just folded her arms so she wouldn’t strike out, and stared at him from burning eyes. Her chest felt so tight she could hardly breathe.
“I do know,” he continued, “what it’s like to have death staring over your shoulder. Been there, done that But I’ve been lucky. I haven’t had to live that way every day of my life.”
She managed to drag in a gulp of air, and her chest loosened a little. “So?”
“So...I’m sorry if you thought I was making light of it I was just wondering if you felt this way all the time. I can’t imagine what kind of hell that would be.”
Sympathy was proving to be worse than what she had mistaken as cold logic. Where before she had been angry, now she was closer to crying than ever.
“I don’t think about it all the time,” she said finally, her voice thick.
“I don’t see how you could. You’d go crazy.”
She managed a nod and took another deep breath, trying to steady herself, trying to ease the painful tightness in her throat. “I’ll be okay. I’m just...down lately.” She wished he would go away so she could have a good bawl and get it all out of her system.
“It’s been rough lately, hasn’t it?”
His continued sympathy surprised her. This cold man who seemed to want to keep himself at arm’s length was surprising her. “Everyone hits rough patches,” she said stubbornly. “I’ll be fine.”
“Sure you will.” But he showed no sign of leaving.
“Look,” she said finally, “I’m blue, but I’m not suicidal. You don’t have to worry I’m going to do something stupid. What I’m going to do is wait twenty minutes, take my insulin right on time, and then go to bed.”
“Sounds like a plan.” But he didn’t move, and his eyes were scouring her face as if he were looking for something and not finding it.
“I’m okay, Rafe,” she said firmly, though she felt far from okay. “Thanks for caring.”
He nodded slowly. “It’s the caring part that kind of floors me.”
“What?”
His lips curved, but the faint smile didn’t reach his eyes. His smiles almost never reached his eyes, she realized. Why that should sadden her, she couldn’t imagine. “Never mind,” he said. “I don’t know if I could explain it to myself, let alone someone else.” He started to turn away, then sighed. “Oh, hell.”
“What’s wrong?”
He faced her again. “Me. You. Hell, I don’t know.” Then he reached out for her, wrapping her in his arms and snuggling her face against his shoulder.
She was astonished at how hard yet welcoming his body felt, and how surprisingly good it was to have her face nestled against a man’s shoulder while his strong arms hugged her. She was surprised, too, by how good he smelled, like soap, and man, a heady mixture she’d almost forgotten. That and the faint smell of baby....
“If you need someone to talk to, just wake me up,” he said roughly. “I know what it’s like. There’ve been plenty of nights when I could’ve used an ear.”
She tilted her face up, trying to see his expression, but all she succeeded in doing was bring her mouth to within inches of his. He took it as an invitation, and she was almost shocked to realize that she wanted him to.
The touch of his mouth wasn’t what she had expected. From someone who looked so hard, she expected a touch equally hard. Instead she got the butterfly brush of lips, a warm caress that made her knees go weak. When he lifted his mouth an inch away, she thought she might die from the loss of contact. God, she hadn’t realized just how hungry she’d become for human warmth.
“I’m not good at this,” he whispered unsteadily.
“At what?” She whispered, too, afraid of shattering the tenuous moment.
“At comforting. I’ve never comforted anyone before.”
That was probably the saddest thing she could imagine a human being saying. Forgetting her own problems, she reached up and touched his cheek gently. “You’re doing just fine.”
He closed his eyes tightly, as if her touch was causing a violent storm of emotion inside him. “Yeah?” he finally asked, a mere breath of sound. His arms tightened around her, and his mouth found hers again, a little harder this time, but still gentle, almost questing, as if he were seeking her approval.
She responded in kind, hoping that somehow, even in her miserable state, she could offer him some of the comfort he was giving her.
But as soon as she responded, he stiffened. Then he let go of her and stepped back.
His eyes were open now, dark windows on some dark place inside him. “This isn’t wise,” he said.
Then he turned sharply on his heel and walked out, closing the door quietly behind him.
Angela stood frozen, feeling as if her universe had been rocked to the core by a simple human touch. A maelstrom of feelings whipped through her, feelings she couldn’t even name, making her want to cry, making her feel more alone than she had ever felt in her life, except when she lost the baby and her fiancé.
And when they passed, she felt empty. Exhausted. Raw.
He was right, she thought. It wasn’t wise at all.
But how was she ever going to forget that it had happened?
Chapter 5
At four in the morning, feeding a hungry baby in a room dark except for a single lamp, and silent except for the soft little sucking sounds the baby made, Rafe found himself rediscovering loneliness.
It was something he hadn’t thought about in a long, long time. Not since he’d been taken from his mother and discovered that a foster home, no matter how kind, couldn’t replace the comfort of being near the one person who had held you and cared for you since birth.
Of course, Marva’s care hadn’t been the best in the world, but it had been care. Whatever her other failings, Rafe had never doubted that she loved him, not even when she was too drunk to wake up to tell him what to have for supper.
The state of Texas had taken that away from him, and he’d been lonely until he learned to bury the feeling forever.
Until tonight.
Maybe it was the kid, he thought. His son was tucked against his bare chest, little fingers curling and grasping, looking up at him with those amazingly serious and intent infant eyes. The touch of those little hands had an emotional intimacy that was getting to him despite all his barriers against feeling. He was getting seriously attached to the kid.
Which would be a bad thing. If he couldn’t keep the kid, would the baby spend the rest of his life missing what his father had missed ever since the state of Texas had intervened in his life? He hated the thought
What the hell had Raquel been thinking of? She could have signed the kid over for adoption even before it was born. Why had she wanted him to have this kid? She must have known that she didn’t mean anything to him.
Or maybe not. Something in his chest ached with a feeling he hadn’t had since he was ten years old. Sitting there feeding the baby, he found himself remembering Rocky
’s incredible vulnerability.
She hadn’t been at all what he expected, not when they got in bed. He’d thought her a passionate, fiery, hot-tempered Latina who knew what the score was. Instead, once they’d fallen into bed, he’d discovered that was all a front. The real Rocky had been lonely, and wide-open to hurt.
And he’d hurt her. He’d betrayed her. He’d jailed her brother. How could she possibly want to give him her child? Some stupid notion that he was the baby’s biological father and would care?
Or had she been getting even in the most devious female way possible?
It was certainly a possibility, he thought. And if that was what she had intended, she’d succeeded. He couldn’t look at his son without remembering how he’d betrayed her. Without feeling that he was going to spend the rest of his life trying to make up for being such a damned jerk.
A sigh escaped him. At the same moment, the peanut decided he’d had enough to eat. Rafe set the bottle aside, moved the kid to his shoulder and began to pace the room, rubbing the little back gently. The floor creaked beneath his feet, and he hoped his footfalls weren’t disturbing Gage and Emma.
Peanut made a little cooing sound, apparently enjoying his ride around the room. What went on in that little head? Rafe wondered. People might think infants were a blank slate, but when he watched this infant, he was convinced there was an entire world inside that small brain
As he paced, waiting for the gas bubbles to escape the baby’s tummy, his thoughts strayed back to Angela and what had passed between them.
That had been a serious mistake. And he could find no excuse for his behavior. He didn’t just grab women and kiss them like that. He didn’t reach out emotionally to anyone that way. Yet that was what he had done, for a few moments making himself more vulnerable than he’d ever been in his life. Worse, he’d let Angela know he was vulnerable.
Every instinct he had warned him against the danger in that. He tried to tell himself that Angela wasn’t a subject in a case, so how could it matter? But it did. And just as dangerous was the way her vulnerability was reaching out to him.
Just the way Raquel’s had during that one wild night. The difference was that the next day he’d gotten what he needed to nail Eduardo Molina and had never needed to see Raquel again. He was going to see Angela every day as long as he stayed in this house.
Maybe he should move back to the motel. But that wasn’t the best environment for the child. He thought about taking a risk and going back to Miami, but as long as Manuel Molina knew where he was, he was at risk and so was the baby. God knew how many people Manny might have told where Rafe lived. One word in the wrong ear and poof! Peanut would be an orphan.
So what options were left? Dumping the kid on Nate Tate and hightailing it back home himself?
That had been his original plan, but for some reason he couldn’t bring himself to seriously pursue it. Nate wouldn’t want the kid, anyway, he told himself. The man was a grandfather now. Why would he want to start another family?
But that was just an excuse, and he knew it He had the strongest feeling that if he asked, Nate would say yes without hesitation. But he couldn’t bring himself to ask.
God, what a mess!
Thoughts such as those kept him up long after Peanut went back to sleep, until the sun rose and he heard Angela stirring.
Until the baby awoke again, a little later than usual, and started demanding his morning feeding. Which meant that Rafe had to go downstairs to face whatever there was to face from Angela after last night. He figured she would probably be mad at him.
But the baby wasn’t going to wait. He changed the crying kid, tucked him against his shoulder, and went downstairs shirtless and shoeless, feeling as if he had grains of sand behind his eyelids.
Gage was just going out the door as Rafe came into the kitchen. Emma and Angela were sitting at the round oak table nursing cups of hot coffee, and Angela was eating scrambled eggs and toast.
“Mornin’,” he said, and headed straight toward the refrigerator.
“Let me get you some coffee, Rafe,” Emma said. “Would you like me to make you some breakfast?”
“I’m not hungry, but thanks.” He found a clean bottle and nipple, opened the Pedialyte, and set about preparing the kid’s breakfast with one expert hand.
“How is he doing?” Emma asked.
“No more diarrhea,” Rafe responded.
“That’s good.”
“Yep.” He thought about heading back upstairs, but Emma had put out a fresh cup of coffee for him, and the aroma drew him. Giving in, he sat at the table with the women, feeding and holding the baby one-handed while he sipped his coffee with the other.
“You’re good at that,” Emma said wistfully.
He shrugged a shoulder. “Desperation’s a great teacher. What I could really use is another arm.” He avoided looking at Angela.
No one had any more to say, and for that Rafe was grateful. He’d had about three hours of sleep, all told, and the sound of other voices was grating on his nerves. Angela was grating on his nerves, he realized. Sitting there, staring into her scrambled eggs as if she was terrified that a look from him would turn her to stone.
But what really grated on him was knowing he was responsible for it. He should never have touched her. The woman had some serious issues to deal with, and he didn’t have the time or inclination to get involved with them. He never had the time or inclination to get involved that way, so what the hell had he been thinking of last night?
The peanut was kneading his chest, and he looked down, meeting those senous dark eyes. Hell, it was getting bad when staring at a baby could absorb him this way. But he didn’t stop himself, just kept looking down into Peanut’s eyes as if nothing else in the world mattered.
And maybe it didn’t.
Emma rose eventually, excusing herself to get ready for work. That left Rafe and Angela together in a silence that was suddenly fraught with unspoken words.
Finally Angela spoke. “When...” Her voice cracked and she stopped, then tried again. “When do you put him back on formula?”
“Later today. I’ve got to get some distilled water to mix with his formula, thin it out and put him back on it slowly.”
“Oh. But isn’t distilled water unsanitary?”
“I have to boil it first.”
“Oh.”
Silence fell again. He kept his gaze pinned to the baby as firmly as if it was tacked there. He didn’t want to look at her, didn’t want to see her terrible vulnerability.
Angela rose and went to rinse her dishes and put them in the dishwasher. “I’ll watch the baby while you go out for water, if you want.”
He wanted to refuse, but for the kid’s sake, couldn’t. “Thanks,” he said reluctantly. “The doctor thinks all the bouncing around might have unsettled him.”
“I can see how it might. Well, I’ve got to go get ready for my run. Inflexible schedule, you know.”
She said it airily, as if it didn’t matter. But he knew it did, and knowing made him look up. Their eyes met for the first time that morning, and what he saw made him catch and hold his breath.
In his day he’d seen people in all kinds of pain, but he couldn’t remember ever seeing the kind of haunted hurt he saw in Angela’s gaze. Before he could think what to do or say, she’d left the room.
And with a sense of relief he went back to being a father. That was a role he knew how to play, a role that was becoming increasingly comfortable with practice With Angela, he didn’t know who to be, what to say, what to do.
She put him off balance, and he didn’t like that at all.
Up in her room, Angela changed from her robe and nightgown into her jogging sweats and shoes. The cold look was back in Rafe’s eyes, she thought. The look that had vanished last night when he’d tried to comfort her was back this morning like the stark gray walls of a fortress.
She’d been stupid to think anything had changed between them. Not that it mattered. Sh
e couldn’t afford to get any closer to him, because he was dangerous to her peace of mind.
Sitting there this morning, trying not to watch him feed the baby, trying not to notice his powerful bare chest, had only served to remind her of how dangerously susceptible she was right now. Her loneliness and current misery were making her too easy a touch for anyone who evinced the least concern for her.
And worse, she was rediscovering herself as a sexual being. Rafe was awakening yearnings she’d tried to cut off years ago, reminding her that she was a woman.
If she had to get the hots for someone, why did she have to choose a man with hard eyes and a cutting edge? Why couldn’t she have chosen someone safe and comfortable? Why did she have to get the hots at all, come to that? No man in his nght mind would want her, and she wasn’t built to have a casual affair. It just wasn’t in her.
It was a relief to step outside into the brisk morning air and start trotting down the street. The run would clear her head. It always did—as long as she didn’t give herself low blood sugar by pressing too hard.
She passed the sheriffs office on her way out and her way back every morning, but this morning, as she went past on her return lap, Nate Tate, wearing his khaki uniform and a blue jacket, fell in beside her, keeping pace.
“You’re not wearing running shoes,” she remarked, surprised by how nice it felt to have him join her.
“Combat boots. They’ll do. I’m assuming you can’t just break off your run and have coffee with me?”
“Sorry.” She shook her head. “I adjusted my insulin to compensate for this.”
“I thought so. I usually take my run in the evening.”
“I do, too, when I’m working. It’s a beautiful morning, though.”
“It sure is.”
They covered another block in companionable silence, but Angela was sure there was a point to Nate’s joining her. He had never struck her as a man who did pointless things.
“What do you think of Rafe?” he asked.
