“Stacey...” The warning in his voice was diluted by its unmistakable huskiness.
She pulled back, but pressed his hand closer to her. He didn’t remove it. She looked up at his stubbled jaw, then at his mouth.
“Don’t look at me that way.”
Her lips curved. “Why?”
“You know why. I’m trying to be noble here.”
“Screw nobility.”
“Stacey...”
“Kiss me, Cord.”
“No. This isn’t appropriate behavior for your bodyguard. It’s dangerous.”
“Put your mouth on mine.”
“No. You’re just reacting out of stress.”
“I want to taste you.”
“You’re too young. I’m too jaded.”
“Please, Cord.” She inched her lower body close to his. When she felt his erection press against her, she smiled seductively. “You want to.”
His eyes closed briefly. “I never said I didn’t want to.”
Stacey reached up and encircled his neck with her hand. “I want to, too. I want to do things with you I’ve never wanted to do with any man before.”
He groaned. A deep, male, primal groan.
Then he lowered his head.
The kiss was not tender. Nor was it tentative. He took her mouth with a greed that bespoke weeks of wanting. He pressed hard against her lips, bathed them with his tongue. When she opened them to him, he slid it inside. Simultaneously, he laid her back onto the pillow, angled his body over her and pressed her into the mattress. All the while, his hand kneaded her breast. His tongue mated with hers and swept the inside of her mouth.
Then he pulled back. His arm braced beside her, he looked down into her eyes. “You are the most precious thing I’ve ever touched in my life.” His hand moved to work loose the three big buttons on her pajama top. Bared to him, the sight of her made his eyes glitter. “And the loveliest.” He returned his hand to her aching breast, grazing the nipple with his calluses, then rolling it between his thumb and finger. It hardened instantly and sent a rush of feminine response through her. Her moan echoed an invitation in the still semidarkness.
Lowering his head again, he brought his mouth to hers. His kiss was rapacious. He devoured her lips, bit them with gentle aggression, soothed them with his tongue. He kissed the corners of her mouth, worked his way to her jaw, then to the sensitive skin at her neck. She moaned again. “Ah, Stace, don’t make those sounds. They kill me. I’m so hard I’m ready to burst.”
“Make love to me,” she murmured.
The bald invitation sobered Cord. Already, he was on the brink of losing control. Taking a deep, desperate breath, he put some distance between them. Her chest was heaving as if she couldn’t get enough air, he noticed as he buttoned up her pajamas. Her lips were swollen from his passion; he smoothed his thumb over them. His beard had raised tiny red pinpricks on her cheek. She looked wanton and ready and more seductive than a harem girl. He wasn’t sure he could back away.
Except that she was Helene’s daughter. He hadn’t backed away from the mother eighteen years ago, and it had ruined lives. He couldn’t ruin any more by seducing Stacey.
“I can’t make love to you, Stace.”
“Why?”
“For all the reasons I’ve already given you.”
“They aren’t good enough.”
No, but the real one is . He should just tell her and get it over with. Now was the time, given how vulnerable he felt toward her, how his willpower was ready to snap like a frayed rope drawn too tightly. But the truth was, he was afraid she’d kick him out of her life for good, and he couldn’t risk that now. He couldn’t risk her safety in any way. So he opted for the most credible reason he could think of, hating how it would hurt her.
Reaching down, he grabbed her left hand. He tugged it up, then flicked her wrist so her eyes came flush with her engagement ring. “You belong to someone else.”
Color suffused her face. But it was the tears brimming—and what they meant—that nearly undid him. Infidelity of any kind was abhorrent to her. Cord knew how she felt and he’d taken full advantage of his insight into her. He despised his action but anything was better than making love to her and dealing with that hurt when she found out about him and Helene.
“I’m going to get up now, and go to my own room,” he said. “We can’t do this again, Stacey. Do you understand?” God, he sounded so arrogant—so rational, so in control. In reality, he was a breath away from ripping off her pajamas and burying himself inside her, regardless of the consequences. The kiss had released the desire that had been banked inside him for weeks.
“I understand,” she said gravely.
“Good.”
* * *
PEDALING FAST, STACEY breathed in deeply, trying to outrace the images that chased her like the ancient Furies.
You’re just like Helene, they told her. You would have let him make love to you. You’re engaged to someone else.
She pedaled faster. The blood rushed to her face and her calf muscles stung. She wiped the dripping sweat from her forehead but kept going.
“Training for the decathlon?” she heard from the double doors which led out to the pool.
“Hi, Daddy.”
“Hi.” Gifford crossed into the room and Stacey slowed down the bike. “Cord’s out on the patio. He just filled me in on all the details from last night.”
Not all the details, I’m sure.
“I’m sorry I was out of town. You must have been terrified.”
Stacey nodded, then felt the moisture gather in her eyes. She stopped pedaling and exhaled sharply, trying to regain some control.
“Come here, honey, let me give you a hug,” Gifford said.
In seconds, she was in the arms of her father—arms that had seen her through closet monsters and measles, boys and braces. “I’m so tired of all this, Daddy, I can hardly think straight.”
“I know.”
“Are the police going to do anything about last night?”
He hesitated, which meant no. “Well, Cord raised all kinds of hell with Valentino, but they checked out the elevator today, and they say it showed no signs of tampering. It was under repair, and just stuck. Same thing for the stairway door.”
Stacey drew back and looked at her father. “What happened with the stairway?”
“Didn’t Cord tell you?”
“Ah no. We didn’t talk much afterward, and I was busy all day at work.”
“Apparently, the ground-floor door was stuck along with the elevators.”
“Then how did Cord get to me?”
“He took the service elevator that goes directly to the top executive offices, then went down the stairs to the third floor. He went through the trapdoor in the ceiling, since the elevator was between floors.”
Stacey started to shiver, remembering her fear when she’d seen the door open above her. “How can the police think this is a coincidence after everything else that’s happened to me?”
“I don’t know, honey. It seems preplanned to me, too.”
Drawing away from her father and placing a quick peck on his cheek, Stacey flopped onto the couch. “It’s all too much. The stalking. The problems with Preston. Helene.”
Gifford cocked his head. “Helene?”
She stared at her father. “I’m being bombarded with memories, Daddy.”
“Like at the pool on Father’s Day?”
“Yes.”
“Honey, I meant what I said about talking about her. Maybe that would help.”
“Maybe.”
Gifford’s eyes strayed to the wall of storage closets. “I have a better idea. Come on—I want to show you some things.”
He crossed to the other side of the room and retrieved a key hidden in a potted plant. After he’d unlocked and opened the door of one storage closet, he switched on a light in the five-by-six-foot area. Inside, Stacey saw boxes piled to the ceiling, and stretched canvases stacked along the wall. She
recognized them as the work she’d done in high school.
“You kept my paintings?”
Gifford turned to her. “Of course, every single one of them.”
Stacey pulled out a canvas. When she turned it over, a geyser of emotion swept through her. The distinct odor of oils and turpentine recalled hours spent in the art room at school and in the spare room upstairs that she’d used as a studio. When she looked at the painting, she saw the swirling blues, greens and yellows that had dominated her work. She remembered her teachers in high school had praised her technique and encouraged her to keep painting.
Her father watched as she flipped through the canvases. “That was my favorite,” he said when she got to an outdoor scene of a babbling brook and surrounding trees.
She smiled wistfully. “It won first place in the Scholastic Art Show. I remember how proud you were.”
“It hung in the library for a year until you made me take it down.”
She shook her head at her youthful rebellion.
“Why did you do that, Stacey? What’s the real reason you quit art school?”
How could she tell him that when she was a freshman in college, she’d found out her mother had been an artist? Her father’s eyes were always so sad when he talked about Helene, Stacey hated to bring up her name. Although she’d always wondered why he’d been more sad than angry, since Helene had betrayed him so badly.
“Lots of reasons,” she hedged. Then she pointed to some cartons. “What’s in those boxes?”
Gifford studied her for a minute, then turned around. “They’re things of your mother’s that I didn’t give away or destroy.” He looked at her again. “Maybe I knew deep in my heart that this day would come.”
“What do you mean?”
Sighing, he ran a hand through his hair and sank onto one of the boxes. “Honey, you’ve grown up with a skewed view of your mother. She wasn’t what Ana led you to believe. What I allowed her to tell you.”
The familiar rage welled in Stacey. “She was unfaithful to you, wasn’t she?”
“Yes, she was. But I don’t think you have a clear picture of that, either.”
“In what way?”
“Stacey, I was gone a lot. More than a lot. I traveled several nights a week and entertained customers when I was in town. Your mother got lonely.”
“That’s no excuse.”
“No, but she was only human.”
As clearly as if he was standing next to her, not out on the patio, Stacey heard Cord say, Your mother was just human. Maybe she even had reasons you don’t know about. But that doesn’t matter. What matters is that you’re a good person. Maybe she was, too.
“Why are you telling me this, Daddy? It must kill you to talk about it.”
“Because it’s not fair that you think badly of her any longer. She loved you very much.”
At her questioning look, Gifford shook his head and turned back to the boxes. He riffled through a couple. “Here it is.” Picking up a large crate, he set it on top of the others and withdrew a sketchbook. From Stacey’s vantage point, she could see several others. Her skin tingled and a strange sensation trickled through her. Then she remembered... Helene sticking a book like this in her bag. Come on, love, I want to draw you out by the pool.
“They’re hers,” Stacey whispered.
Her father’s eyes were so filled with regret, Stacey wanted to grab the book and throw it away. Almost as much as she wanted to see what was inside. He handed it to her. She ran her fingers over the familiar red surface then lifted the cover.
The first charcoal sketch was of an infant. In the corner it said, One day old. The child nestled in a blanket and slept soundly. Tiny fingernails had been carefully drawn, and wisps of hair peeked out from a hospital cap.
She turned the page. One week old. The baby had grown. Awake now, huge eyes stared out at the world. Two strong masculine hands held the little bundle. Stacey knew those hands well.
Page after page of her infancy followed. From one to the next, she grew, her hair got longer, her features more distinct. She was a happy child. Her first smile was captured. One grinning mouth had two little teeth poking out.
The book ended with her birthday. A cake with one candle sat in front of her. Frosting covered her face, hands and clothes. She was laughing and Stacey could almost hear the tinkle of childish giggling.
The images began to waver with her tears, so she looked up. “They’re all of me.”
Her father nodded, his own eyes moist. Then he picked up four more sketchbooks. “She did one each year. Until she died.”
Stacey closed her eyes to keep back the tears, but they leaked out, anyway. She swiped at them, then took the books from her father. Sliding to the floor, her back to the wall, she turned the pages.
It took a long time, but Gifford sat where he was, on the crate, watching his daughter become acquainted with the childhood he had stolen from her. It was almost more than he could bear.
Stacey looked exhausted when she finished. “I never knew.”
“She loved you very much,’’ he repeated.
Raising soulful eyes to him, she said, “Why, Daddy? Why did you let me think... let me grow up believing she never loved us?”
His shoulders slumped like an old man’s. “It was never my intention to do that, honey, but things got out of hand with your grandmother. Before I knew it, she’d filled your mind with poison about Helene. But I take full responsibility. I was too cowardly to let you know the truth.”
“Cowardly? Why?”
“Because the truth would have shown you how unhappy I’d made your mother. If I’d been home more, if I’d listened more to what she was telling me, she’d be alive today.”
His daughter came off the floor to stand before him. He didn’t want to look at her, knowing he’d see well-deserved blame and accusation in her eyes. When he managed the courage to face her, his heart almost stopped. Instead of justifiable rage, he saw forgiveness. God, she was more like her mother than he’d realized.
She put her arms around him. “Oh, Daddy.”
They held each other and grieved for the woman who had loved them both.
“Stacey, there’s something else. Another part of this. I’m beginning to see. I haven’t viewed you as adult all these years, that I’ve tried to keep you a child.”
She pulled away to look at him. Wiping her eyes, she said, “Maybe I’ve encouraged that, Daddy. I’ve noticed I behave differently around you, I act more like a kid. I’d like that to change.”
“So would I.” Gifford smiled sadly, thinking of what a beautiful woman she’d become, both inside and out.
Stacey smiled, too. Then she waved her hand at the other boxes. “What’s in the rest of those?”
Shaking his head, Gifford turned to confront the myriad memories he hadn’t faced in years. “Some personal things that belonged to Helene. Jewelry, a few pieces of clothing, some books. Lots of pictures. Truthfully, I don’t remember what’s in all of them.”
Stacey smiled at him again—weakly, this time—and he wondered what it felt like to know your hero had feet of clay. But he was glad this was all out in the open.
All but McKay . He prayed to God she never found out about that. She’d never forgive either one of them.
His daughter dug into a box. She ferreted through some evening bags and shawls of Helene’s, then she pulled out another sketchbook. Gifford didn’t think he’d ever seen it.
“Another one?” she asked, her mouth turned up slightly.
“I guess. I don’t remember that one, but it was a long time ago.”
Stacey casually leafed open the book. Her forehead creased and she bit her lip. When she turned the page and her hand trembled, Gifford asked, “Stacey, what is it?”
She raised such incredibly sad eyes to him that he was alarmed. “Stacey?”
“Oh, Daddy.” She held out the sketchbook. He took it and stared down at the open picture.
On the eight-by-ten
page was a full-blown charcoal sketch of him, twenty-three years ago. He posed beneath a tree in his father’s backyard, gripping an overhead branch. His grin was cocky as he winked at the artist. He and Helene had both been Stacey’s age, on the brink of starting a life together. He looked happier than he ever remembered being.
He flipped the page. There he was in his tux. Eyes sparkling, trim, fit, his wedding ring gleamed on his finger.
Another page revealed him in a business suit, his hair shorter, more the executive now. It was the beginning of his career, the beginning of the change in him. Successive pages showed that transformation through Helene’s eyes; he looked older, more sophisticated... hurried...then tired. Once or twice, he was relaxed, holding Stacey or in the pool. When he came to a sketch of him in bed, obviously after they’d just made love—he was naked from the waist up, his lap covered with a sheet—Gifford had to close the book.
The lump in his throat threatened to overcome him. He wanted to scream, to cry, to smash the nearest breakable object. Years ago, he’d stopped feeling that searing, sickening pain at Helene’s accident—at the futility and uselessness of her death. But now he felt the grief so deep, it leveled him. He’d had so much, and thrown it all away for success that now meant so little to him, it made a mockery of his life. The tears he’d held at bay, to be strong for his daughter, escaped. He clutched at his heart, hoping to stop the agony.
“Daddy?”
Stacey’s image blurred before him. Trying to focus on the only good thing he had left in his life, he finally said, “This was...unexpected.”
Her voice raw, she said, “You’d never seen the sketches?”
“No, I packed up stuff I didn’t even look at. God knows why.”
“From what I saw in the pictures, I can tell she must have really loved you.”
“And you, honey.”
Stacey smiled and hugged him again.
Behind them, Gifford heard, “What’s going on in here?” The voice of another person Helene had loved. Cord McKay.
* * *
THE SITUATION BETWEEN Cord and Stacey simmered for four days, almost coming to a boiling point several times. It reached meltdown one night when Cord insisted they work on some new self-defense techniques. It was now well into July—Cord had been living at the Webbs’ for almost a month. Every day, they’d practiced the three or four maneuvers Cord had taught her, but he seemed determined to add more.
Bodyguards Boxed Set Page 34
