One Last Breath

by Lisa Jackson

  The sad answer was “nowhere.” She didn’t even have a cat waiting for her in her walk-up. Even so, she’d meant to turn him down. She really had. But the kicky April breeze was turning into an all-out gale, and she didn’t really have anywhere to be, other than her empty apartment. She offered him a cool smile. “A place called Rendezvous wouldn’t be my first choice to go with a complete stranger, but okay.”

  He thrust out his hand. “Liam Bastian. Not a stranger anymore.”

  “Rory Abernathy,” she replied cautiously, shaking his hand. His grip was strong, but not crushing, his eyes warm.

  And that was the beginning of their whirlwind romance, one that still had the ability to turn her throat dry and make her heart beat a little faster. He’d swept an arm toward Rendezvous’s front door and Rory had led him inside the bistro.

  Chapter 7

  Heather stared out the window of the bedroom she was sharing with Charlotte, watching the sway of black leaves against a sky which was only a few shades lighter. Rendezvous. From the onset of her relationship with Liam she’d told herself she was making a mistake—hadn’t she learned anything from running out on Cal?—but she hadn’t really listened. Looking around the restaurant, she chose a place in the rear, a recently vacated booth with high backs that was near a hooded fireplace and a comfortable fire. She and Liam waited as a busboy swept away the glasses from the previous occupants, then wiped the table clean. There were people on either side of them, the conversation was a continual hum, the waitstaff slipping in and out among the tables. The place was anything but a secluded, intimate rendezvous.

  Good, she’d thought at the time.

  She sat across from him as they’d glanced over the menus and then ordered coffee drinks, hers a mix of coconut and cream with a shot of Baileys for good measure, and his black. As they sipped, her insides warmed with the drink. She told herself not to be fascinated by his blade-thin lips or just the hint of a dimple on one side of his face. When he ordered her a second drink, she wanted to argue, but had glanced out at the slanting rain and decided sitting near the fire and talking to a handsome man wasn’t all that bad. He was bright and witty and never once pulled out his cell phone again. Nor did she. As the gas flames licked the logs and she sipped the rich drink, she learned that he was in construction and worked for his father’s Portland company. He was visiting Washington with his brother, Derek, and while Liam was attending a conference in the heart of Seattle, Derek was scouting out real estate for potential expansion into the area. Derek was heading back to Portland that evening, Liam staying on a few more days.

  She found out he was single, a lifelong Portland resident, liked the great outdoors of the Pacific Northwest, and worked for the family business that had been in Oregon for over a quarter of a century. He hiked and biked, fished, and even windsurfed along the windy beaches of the northern Oregon coast. He mentioned getting a pilot’s license and seemed comfortable in his own skin. She had to admit, she liked his self-confidence, and she began to thaw in spite of herself.

  But when the conversation turned toward her, she became uncomfortable. She always kept talk of her own family to a minimum, the fewer answers the better, she reasoned. And as this was only a quickie coffee date, really some kind of penance for knocking her down on the street, there was no reason to divulge too much.

  “You’ve lived here all your life, then,” he said as the waitress refilled his cup.

  “Around here. Not in the city, really.” She wasn’t about to explain that her small family had never settled anywhere for more than six or eight months at a time. She’d been enrolled in six different elementary schools. She’d never made any friends that had lasted more than a year, two at the max. And then there were the problems with her older stepbrothers.

  At eighteen, she’d struck out on her own, working during the day, taking classes at night. She’d put up with a series of flaky roommates, two of whom had skipped out on the rent, just like her own mother and stepfather had done on more than one occasion, hauling the kids out of bed in the middle of the night, hustling them into a rattletrap car and driving to an unknown destination. That always meant a brand-new school for Rory, along with a different curriculum, a stranger for a teacher, and a classroom of kids who stared at her for what seemed like weeks until she’d settled into a desk and eventually made friends with a small group of girls whom she never brought home.

  She’d been told her stepfather’s hunt for a job was what had uprooted the small family from one battered apartment to the next, but eventually she realized that Harold was always keeping one step ahead of the law.

  But on their “date,” she didn’t confide any of this to Liam Bastian, who, she’d gathered, had been born to money. He hadn’t said as much, not outright, but she could tell by the cut of his clothes, the way he spoke and held his head, his body language. Liam Bastian knew his place in the world.

  Finally, she set the glass mug on the table and said, “Thank you. But I have to run.” She stood up, her knee aching a little.

  “Too bad.” He said it as if he meant it and pulled out his credit card to pay. The waiter scooped it up as he added, “I thought you might show me the city.”

  “Seattle?” she said, her eyebrows rising. “Even though you live in Portland, a couple of hours away, you want a tour of Seattle?”

  “More than a couple,” he clarified. “With traffic—”

  “Come on. Haven’t you ever taken the train up here for a Mariners or Seahawks game?”

  “Well, maybe . . .”

  “So I’m guessing you know the city.”

  He grinned. “Okay, ya got me. I just wanted to spend a little more time with you.”

  She shook her head, tempted but firm. “I don’t do ‘tours.’”

  “What does that mean?” He smiled as the waiter put the bill down and he signed it in a fast scrawl.

  “Just what it sounds like.” She smiled back as she shrugged into her coat. The man was way too attractive.

  “Make an exception.”

  She shook her head as she walked around other tables to the door, Liam following behind. Why not take him up on his offer? she argued with herself. He was smart and interesting and certainly good-looking. Why not spend a day with him? But she added a lie instead. “And I’ve got plans.”

  “Cancel them.”

  “Pretty bold, the way you keep ordering me around,” she said.

  “Not ordering. Suggesting,” he said easily. “These plans . . . are they life-or-death?”

  “Not really.”

  “So . . . they’re maybe changeable?”

  “I don’t know you.” She flipped up the hood of her coat and glanced up at him through a fringe of faux fur.

  “How do you think you ever will if you don’t spend more time with me?” His eyes glinted. “Come on, Rory, take a chance. You seem like a risk-taker.” They were walking toward the waterfront now and the sidewalk was more crowded with pedestrians, while traffic was clogging the streets. Cars, SUVs, trucks, and buses jammed together.

  She smiled back at him, cautiously. “You don’t know anything about me.”

  “Yet,” he said as the wind battered her face, raindrops peppering the ground. “You said you were single, so I’m guessing no serious boyfriend’s in the picture.”

  That much was true. She’d broken it off with Cal two months earlier, the last straw coming when she’d learned he was supplementing his wages as a waiter by stealing food from the kitchen of the upscale restaurant and reselling it. She’d begun to think she only attracted the wrong kind of man.

  She let Liam walk her to the bus stop, where a bus that would take her to the University District was just pulling up. “Gotta run,” she said and picked up her pace. “That’s mine.”

  “I could drive you.”

  She almost hesitated. Almost, but instead, turning her head to call over her shoulder, she said, “Thanks for the coffee!” She waved and, following a lumbering man in a tweed overcoat s
traight out of the 1940s, she climbed aboard. As she was wedging herself into a seat, she glanced out the window and saw Liam standing at the stop, his phone already in his hand, as if he was picking up from the very call he’d dropped over two hours earlier when he’d bumped into her.

  That should have been the end of it. And she’d expected to never see him again.

  But she’d been wrong.

  The next day at work she found out she was still hanging on to her job, though Ned warned her, leaning over her desk in the accounting department, his nose pressed so close to hers she could view his pores, “Another outburst like yesterday’s, Abernathy, and you’ll find yourself looking for work.”

  “And if you don’t quit leaning over my desk and staring at me, I’ll file a formal complaint with HR.”

  “I know people in Human Resources.”

  “So do I, and I’ve got some of your little jokes recorded on my cell phone,” she’d blustered, lying through her teeth but satisfied to see him pale beneath his fake tan.

  “You’re lying.”

  She pulled out her phone then, and scanned the small screen.

  “You’re a stone-cold bitch, Abernathy, and trust me, you’re gonna pay for this.”

  “Compliments won’t work,” she said tightly, and as he sent her another murderous glare, added, “Have a nice day.”

  Ned nearly ran into one of the office gofers, a young woman with a killer figure who was carrying a white bag with markings from a local bakery and a cup of Java Jive coffee. “Whew,” she said as she brought her bounty to her desk.

  “Don’t let him ever get to you,” Rory warned. “He’s a bully. Always stand up to him.”

  “Maybe he has a small penis,” she suggested.

  “Maybe.” Rory smiled.

  She thought about just leaving work. Getting the hell out. Not giving any notice, just never showing up again.

  But then you’d be running again. Like you always do. Like your whole damned family does—fleeing in the middle of the night. And this time you wouldn’t get a reference to get another job.

  Gritting her teeth, she stuck out the rest of the day, avoided Castrell, and walked out of the building at five p.m., where she’d spotted Liam Bastian, big as life. In jeans, an open-collared shirt and his ubiquitous jacket, he was waiting under a portico from the building that housed the central offices of Java Jive.

  Having spent the afternoon ignoring the hard-edged stare of Castrell, she was in no mood for anything other than a long, hot bath, glass of wine, and a good book. She’d planned on grabbing takeout Thai food on the way home, but it looked like her plans for eating chicken panang curry out of the carton were about to be scrapped.

  Liam was phone-free, at least for the moment, one shoulder propped against a concrete pillar holding up the portico. She walked straight up to him. “What?”

  “I had some time to kill, so I thought I’d wait around till you got off work.”

  “You a stalker, Mr. Bastian?”

  “It’s Liam. And I’ve never been a stalker before, but I don’t know. Maybe it’s a new affliction.”

  “I should’ve never told you where I work.”

  He nodded. “That might’ve been a mistake.” He was staring at her with those slightly bemused eyes, the irises of which were a light brown color, almost gold.

  She couldn’t help but smile. She wanted to go with him, but she couldn’t trust her instincts. They’d let her down too many times before. And really, Liam Bastian, damn him, seemed to be too good to be true. Which she also didn’t trust. She’d learned that lesson the hard way. Over and over.

  “I could take you to dinner,” he suggested.

  “Or I could go home and put my feet up.”

  His crooked smile touched his eyes. “I could go with you. Takeout, or in this case, take-in pizza? We could pick up a bottle of wine.”

  The thought was enticing. But dangerous. She knew little about him other than what he’d told her, though she had Googled him and confirmed the facts: thirty-four, unmarried, graduate of Oregon State University, currently working for the company his father had founded, Bastian-Flavel Construction in Portland, Oregon.

  “I don’t think that would be a good idea,” she said, even though she’d come up with much the same plan earlier, with one big exception, of course. In her envisioned evening there had been no Liam.

  She started walking down the hill to the bus stop, to the spot where she’d run into him the previous day, and once more she felt as if she was being followed, though of course she wasn’t, not that she could see.

  “Then let’s grab something together,” he said. “You pick the place. You’re the native.”

  She probably should have said a firm no, but she hadn’t, and they’d spent the night on the town with dinner at a funky Italian dive off the waterfront and drinks at an Irish bar a few doors down. She’d let him walk her to the bus, and as she’d turned to catch the big, rumbling vehicle, he’d grabbed her elbow. “Let me drive you,” he’d insisted as rain fell from the night sky and the lights and noise of the city had surrounded them. She’d been about to argue, but he’d leaned forward quickly and kissed her upturned face. His lips were warm in the cool evening and she felt them mold over hers as raindrops fell onto her cheeks and starred her lashes.

  Though she fought her emotions, she leaned toward him, like a plant bending toward the sun. She longed for someone, something, that had completely escaped her all her life. She gave herself up to the thrill and warmth that invaded her body as his arms were surrounding her. Human touch. She was desperate for it, and she became oblivious to the hustle of the city surrounding them. Only when she heard, “Get a room!” did she pull back, surprised at her reaction, and made her way on weakened legs to the bus.

  “Rory, I can drive you,” she heard Liam call after her as she climbed aboard, but she shook her head. She stumbled to one of the last seats available. As the bus chugged away from the stop, she craned her neck, looking out the window, feeling a little buzz from the drinks and a surge of lingering excitement from his kiss. She watched him walk away. Oh. Lord. One kiss and she’d nearly melted against him. What was wrong with her?

  Still basking from the glow of that one kiss, she touched the glass and looked out the window to a side street, where she was certain she caught a glimpse of a dark figure staring at her.

  Her throat tightened and she blinked, but the bus rolled past, the image disappeared, and she exhaled and told herself she was imagining things, the ghosts of her past chasing through her mind, forcing her to feel things that weren’t there. She was away from her family now, the horror that she’d lived through for those years was over. No need to worry.

  Nerves jangled, she took a sweeping gaze of the other passengers and decided she was safe. She settled back into the seat. Thoughts of Liam came rushing back, crushing her worries. The hours with him had been magical and exciting, but their night together was at an end, though she replayed it over and over again as she made her way to her apartment, one of the cheapest ones in the U District, which she’d sublet, probably illegally, from a student who had dropped out of college before the term was over. She slept on the pull-out couch, the bedroom belonging to a roommate she’d barely seen, a girl who spent all of her time at her boyfriend’s place. Rory and Ashley were passing ships, only seeing each other in their shared bathroom and kitchen and then only sparingly. Ashley was set to be married in the summer, and then Rory would have to move.

  Again.

  Crawling into her couch-turned-bed, she wondered what it would be like to put down deep roots, to find a home that she could call her own for more than a few months at a stretch, to feel as if she belonged. As she stared at the blue luminescent face of her digital clock, she replayed the scenes of the past few days in her mind, how she’d wanted to run away from her lousy job and Ned Castrell, how she’d hoped to spend a quiet, boring evening at home, and how Liam Bastian had changed all that.

  He was staying
at a hotel downtown and had told her the name and room number as some kind of not-so-subtle invitation, but she’d declined either visiting him there or inviting him here. Now she wondered if it had been a mistake, especially after her reaction to him.

  She did believe he was interested in her. But what would happen when he found out about her family, how they were all just one step away from the law? Worse yet, what happened when they found out she was dating a wealthy man, someone who would be immediately perceived as a mark? She shuddered inwardly at the thought. No, better to let things be. She sensed Liam might just be the kind of man she could fall for—big-time, and that would be a mistake of colossal proportions. She needed to get her own life on track before she complicated it with anyone else.

  Oh. God. What was she thinking? Was she seriously contemplating a relationship with him?

  That would never happen.

  And yet, that’s exactly what happened.

  The following Friday, he met her after work and spent the weekend with her, blowing off the last of his conferences and walking through Pike Place Market, which was teeming with customers browsing the fresh fish, homemade wares, and art, then down to the waterfront where seagulls wheeled through the gray skies and ferries churned through the water. They headed to Pioneer Square for the underground tour, where there were remains of the city as it once had been. And then, to cap off the “total tourist experience,” he insisted on dinner at the Space Needle, where, despite the rain, they viewed the shimmering lights of the city.

  As they were leaving, he took her arm and said, “I’m not taking no for an answer. I’m driving you home.”

  The wind was stiff, buffeting their bodies, the rain a fine mist. She thought about returning to her empty apartment, as her roommate was again a ghost, so she considered. What would it hurt? She didn’t have to invite him in, or if she did, she could insist he leave when she wanted him to, if she wanted him to. But in the end she didn’t give in. She was too unsure. Instead, she caught a bus that would drop her off only blocks from her apartment.