by Janzen, Tara
Her unconscious body language reminded him of all the reasons he’d kept her with him for so long. She had the courage of a person twice her age, and the purity of conviction reserved solely for the young. But it also reminded him of all the reasons he had to let her go. With the candlelight turning her hair into molten silver and her face into a sweet mystery of shadows, she broke his heart with wanting.
“Can and will,” he said softly, forcing himself to hold her gaze. “The game’s over, Nikki. I reported you to the authorities. They’re sending an aide over in the morning to pick you up.”
From one breath to the next, and the next, he watched her emotions race from shock to disbelief and finally to confusion and pain. In less than a minute, he had destroyed a year’s worth of trust, a lifetime’s worth of friendship.
“J-Josh?” She spoke his name in a broken whisper, offering it like a talisman against the impossible, as if the one word could hold their lives together.
He wanted to say he was sorry, but the pitiful statement didn’t come close to describing his feelings. He hated the grief clouding her eyes, hated himself for putting it there, and had to look away. The next morning he would hand her over to some stuffed shirt from the embassy and then he’d get drunk and stay drunk until another story came along, or until he forgot how painfully innocent his young partner really was, how innocent she’d always been.
Nikki slowly rose from the table. His silence mocked her, the downward cast of his eyes making a sham of all they’d shared. Her body trembled, her heart beat fast and furiously, hurting, breaking, and aching all at the same time.
“Damn you,” she whispered. “Damn you.” Then she turned and fled into the lobby.
Josh finished his beer and another double shot of tequila, all the while keeping watch on the front desk. He knew she’d make a run for it, but he also knew she wouldn’t stick him with her room bill. The lady had an honest streak a mile wide. Thanks to Nikki, he had the cleanest set of books south of the border. It wasn’t her fault money ran like water through his fingers.
None of his thoughts made him feel better. In fact, they made him feel a helluva lot worse. Holding his head in his hand, he poured more tequila into the glass.
Women! he thought. Who could figure them? He tried to console himself with that generality, but Nikki wasn’t a generality. She wasn’t even a full-grown woman. She was teasing warmth and shining brightness, and having her by his side made him special. None of the bums hanging around the bar had Nikki Kydd showing them the truth behind the obvious. None of them had Nikki complaining about their cooking with a subtle wrinkling of her nose or a grumpily voiced critical review. None of them had her sharing a campsite with them at the end of day as the tropical sun slid into the sea.
And she only looked like a full-grown woman.
“Damn.” The muttered curse held merely a fraction of the frustration and anger welling inside him. He’d screwed up everything, from the minute he’d thrown the ticket at her until his last ultimate stupidity. It had all seemed so clear, so right, when he’d called the embassy. And now it all felt horrible, heart-wrenchingly horrible. His shoulders sagged in defeat.
Big boys don’t cry. He tried another hopeless cliché and hung his head down, sighing heavily. If he started to cry, he’d know he’d had too much to drink. But he didn’t feel drunk, not even close. The stricken look on her face would probably keep him stone-cold sober until he was ninety.
Raking a restless hand through his hair, he allowed himself to consider other options. He could go to her and explain. Go to her and apologize. Go to her and—and tell her that her leaving was for the best . . . how much he cared. . . . Tell her how many nights he’d lain awake thinking of her, of the two of them. . . . Tell her he loved her, and hold her and kiss her until she believed him—and he lost his mind.
His thoughts tangled around one another until he was back in his original, overheated frame of mind. He shook his head, as if physical motion could clear away the images, but the action was useless.
With a groan of disgust, he pushed his chair back and rose to his feet. After she left, maybe he would fly down to Costa Rica for some rest and relaxation, take a vacation away from chaos. Maybe he’d find out if time really was the great healer. What was the other thing people said? Absence makes the heart grow fonder—of someone else. There was a woman in Costa Rica, a dark-haired, sloe-eyed beauty who’d made her desire obvious. In more ways than one, Nikki had put a damper on his sex life. Maybe he’d go find Gabriella what’s-her-name and lose his hurt inside her.
Yeah, sure, he thought. Great idea. You’re full of them, Rios. His mouth slowly tightened in pain, and his eyes squeezed shut. The mere thought of loving someone else left him feeling emptier and more alone than before. What have you done, you stupid son of a bitch?
Guilt and sadness overwhelmed him and he was helpless against his longings. He knew what he’d done. He’d thrown away the best thing ever to happen to him, and he couldn’t let her leave feeling abandoned and betrayed. He couldn’t. The year they’d shared deserved better than the bitterness she’d find to hide her pain.
He opened his eyes and let his gaze drift to the second floor of the hotel. Light shone through the slats of the shutters on the far left window, Nikki’s window. Oblivious to the activity around him, he watched and waited, and soon her shadow passed into the light. Slight and fragile, her profile hung high above him in the night, hinting at her bowed head and the slender curves of her body. His fingers curled into a fist, a tight hard knot echoing the heaviness weighing down his heart.
Their time together was over. The good times, the bad times, the fighting and the running, the early morning strategy sessions, and the late night celebrations—all of them were gone. But if he reached out to her once more in friendship, maybe they could salvage the best of what they’d been.
He looked down at the tequila and reached for it, then hesitated, the sober part of him doubting his motives. Raking both hands through his hair, he held his head and struggled to put his crazy feelings in order. A wasted moment later he picked up the bottle and his glass. They’d finished a few bottles together when a story had gone bad or a source had washed out. One more bottle, shared in misery, would be a fitting end. Motives be damned. They were friends.
Walking toward the lobby, he felt a wry but weak smile curve his mouth. He’d nursed her through a few hangovers. She was a pushover when she could barely open her eyes and her head was pounding like a steel band. All in all, he’d be saving everybody, from the embassy jerk to the flight attendants, a lot of trouble if he cooled her jets before they tried to get her on the plane. Fresh, rested, and spitting mad, she might easily give them the slip—and the last thing he wanted on his conscience was Nikki Kydd roaming around the country without him. He would do a lot of things, noble or otherwise, to make sure that didn’t happen.
Feeling better than he had in a week, he strode across the oak-floored lobby and bounded up the stairs two at a time.
Four
Nikki slumped back against the shutters, her head down, her arms wrapped around her waist. The small balls of her fists dug into the overlarge white T-shirt hanging half off her shoulders. Tears, salty, sad, and angry, streamed down her cheeks and dampened her neck.
Why? The question without an answer lay heavy on her heart and mind. Why now? Why ever? They were good together. They were better than good: they were the best. Kydd and Rios had broken more stories than any of the other reporters in the whole of Central America. Kydd and Rios, not just Rios.
“Damn him,” she whispered, swiping at her tears. He wasn’t going to get away with his underhanded scheme, not by a long shot. She was the one who knew the countries, the politics, the culture, and she could speak Spanish around him until his head swam. She didn’t need him. She didn’t need him for anything.
The lie caught on the tender places of her heart, adding a razor’s edge to her pain and causing a fresh wave of tears to flow. He’d used
her. Josh Rios, with his dark angel face and driving ambition, had risen to the top on the sweat of her brow. And she, young and foolish, would have allowed him to go on using her. She’d given him the biggest stories of his life, and been willing to give him so much more. She’d seen how other women looked at him, with their eyes half closed and their mouths soft, and she’d known exactly what they were thinking. In her dreams, she looked at him the same way, wondering about him not as a friend but as a man.
A sob broke from her. Damn him. Damn him. Damn him. She pushed off the windowsill and crossed to the four-drawer dresser holding all her worldly belongings. One by one she emptied the drawers, throwing everything into the suitcase that lay open on the bed. Half the things went in; half landed on the chenille spread or on the faded rug covering the wooden floor. T-shirts and pants, all big and baggy, flew over her shoulder. Underwear and socks followed by the handful. With one clean sweep, she scooped up her shampoo, brush, sunscreen, and all the other sundries that constituted her grooming gear. She was getting the hell out of Dodge. Josh Rios could eat her dust, but he wasn’t going to turn her in.
Looking down at the pitiful supply of items clutched in her arms, she felt another sob catch in her throat. Maybe if she’d fixed herself up better, maybe if she’d tried harder to look feminine, maybe then he would have seen her as more than an expendable business partner. There had been a time when she’d worn makeup and pretty clothes, but that was a lifetime ago. She’d spent a year trying to fade into the background, and she’d succeeded to the point of becoming a wallflower, a drab, shapeless wallflower.
Her pride rebelled. No. Josh should have looked deeper. He should have known better. He should have respected her for what she was.
Sniffling and crying, and trying not to do either, she stumbled across the small room and dumped her stuff into the suitcase. It was a mess, just like her. She sorted and arranged the clothes, trying to put them into a semblance of order. A ratty old khaki shirt here, a threadbare pair of pants there. She picked her high-top tennis shoes off the floor and held them in her hands. The shoelaces were new and bright red, the only spot of color in her wardrobe. They had been a gift from Josh.
How could he do this to her? What possible reason had she given him to call the embassy?
None. The answer finally came. None that she could accept. It was down to survival now. She was on her own again, and from here on out, she worked alone. For a moment the thought buoyed her confidence and sparked her anger back to life, but the tears didn’t stop. They ran down her face, wet trails of sadness blurring her vision and catching in pools at the corners of her mouth.
Oh, Josh. How could you? She shoved a tennis shoe into a corner of the suitcase.
“Nikki?” Her head jerked up at the sound of his voice. He knocked and called again. “Nikki?”
“Go to hell,” she cried, pulling a shirt out of the suitcase and frantically wiping her face with it. He wasn’t going to catch her crying. Not her. Not Nikki Kydd.
“Nikki, please.” Josh tried the door, and the knob turned in his hand. Dammit, how many times had he told her to keep her door locked? “I’m coming in.”
“Go away!”
He winced as a shoe hit the wall an inch from his face. Well, no doubt about it. She was mad. He peeked around the door, then quickly ducked. Another tennis shoe careened off the jamb, shoelaces flying.
Silently he waited for the next barrage. When nothing happened, he asked, “Are you finished?”
Only more silence answered him.
Braving all, he stepped inside, and immediately dropped the tequila to fend off a sandal. The bottle rolled off the rug and into the wall. The sandal glanced off his arm. He caught the next sandal in mid-arc, dropped it and his glass, and kept on moving forward, confident now of his safety. The lady only owned two pairs of shoes.
Nikki threw a shirt, and watched it flutter ineffectually to the floor. Her notebook came next, missing him by a mile, but unerringly finding the lamp on the dresser. The cheap porcelain base rocked once, twice, then fell with a crash, throwing the room into darkness. Josh flinched, cursed, and kept on coming.
Her choking sobs echoed through the room, and the air remained filled with shirts, pants, socks, until she was stuffing them into his arms. “Get out of here. I don’t ever want to see you again. Not ever. I don’t need you. I never needed you. You needed me. You’ll see”—Her voice broke on a harsh whisper. “You’ll see.”
Moonshine and the glow from the outdoor lights slowly filled the room, making it impossible for her to hide her tears. She grabbed the last T-shirt out of her suitcase and found herself pressing it against the hard wall of his chest. “I—I swear, Josh Rios, you’ll see.”
Her fingers clenched around the thin material, pushing him away, but Josh wasn’t going anywhere. He’d expected a fight—they always fought—but not this fire storm of shoes and clothes and tears. He knew her. She would regret the lamp, all two bucks’ worth of it.
“I’ll pay for the lamp,” he said softly, feeling her hurt as deeply as his own.
“Damn right you will. Now get out of here.” She dropped her hands to her sides and let the T-shirt fall. Not once did she look up at him. She didn’t have the heart for looking at him.
Josh stared down at the silvery cap of her hair, the nape of her neck, the satiny sheen of her bare slender shoulder, and fell totally, helplessly in love. The breath went out of him on a ragged sigh, and he wondered what she’d say if she knew he felt like crying, too.
“Nikki, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” He lifted his hand to touch her, but she moved away without noticing. His fingers curled, empty and cold, into his palm.
“You’re worse than sorry,” she whispered. “Get out, Josh. Leave.”
Leave her? He watched her lean against the shutter over the tall window, weariness evident in the tilt of her head. Moonlight streamed in slanted lines down the length of her body, playing light and shadow along her breasts, her hips, and the silky length of her legs revealed by her shorts. He couldn’t leave her. Not like this.
Drawn by invisible ties, he followed her across the room. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to do, but when he stood so close behind her, he automatically reached for her. His hand drifted gently along the curve from her shoulder to her neck, and this time she didn’t move away. Her skin was like satin, warm and vibrant beneath his fingers and palm.
“Nikki, I want . . .” His voice trailed off, soft and husky and full of doubt.
She looked up at him, her eyes accusing and sad in the fluid band of light shining through the shutters. Tears spiked her gold-tipped lashes. Her mouth trembled, beckoning to him in all its soft sweetness. Another sigh swelled his chest.
She shouldn’t have looked, Nikki thought. Looking only made leaving him harder. Pain had etched harsh lines at the corners of his mouth and darkened the depths of his eyes. A heavy sweep of ebony hair curved around his ears and lay across the collar of his rumpled khaki shirt, needing a woman’s touch, a woman’s caress. She wanted to smooth the worried frown from his face, starting with the tight muscles of his jaw, then sliding her fingers up to ease the tension from his brow. She’d comb through his silky black hair and caress the strong column of his neck. With a growing and oddly desperate ache, she wanted to touch him like a woman, just once. For she was leaving him tonight.
Don’t, a warning voice cautioned, and Nikki obeyed, despite the barest pressure from his hand on her shoulder. The last thing she wanted was his pity. To save herself from doing anything foolish, she lifted her chin and whispered, “I hate you.”
Josh slowly shook his head. “No, you don’t,” he murmured, brushing her hair back from her face, it was far too late for leaving her. Months ago, his silver-haired waif had begun weaving her magic spell around him, drawing her web ever tighter, capturing him completely. His last crazy shot at freedom had backfired. For he was there with her now, in the warmth and the darkness of the tropical night, and he
wasn’t letting her go.
The doubts, the rights and wrongs, faded under his increasing need to have her. Tonight Nikki belonged to him. He’d waited so long.
With the slightest movement, he brought them closer, his body nudging hers, his other hand sliding around her waist, fingering the narrow leather belt holding up her shorts. “Ah, Nikki.” His breath blew softly across her cheek. “There’s so little time left. Let me stay with you tonight. Let me stay with you . . . like this.” He pressed their bodies together, rubbing against her, letting her feel his arousal. “Please.”
Nikki froze beneath his gentle aggression, her senses instantly alert to the new, strange pressure of his body next to hers. She knew, and didn’t know, what his hardness meant, doubted if what she thought she felt had anything to do with her. But his breath was warm on her skin, teasing a path to her ear.
“Please, Nikki,” he whispered seductively, then gently gnawed on her neck.
A thousand shooting stars burst inside her at the tender explorations of his teeth and tongue. They shimmered down to the tips of her fingers and settled into a heavy sweetness between her thighs. Shocked by what he asked, by the power he had over her, she started to back away, but his hand immediately tightened against the small of her back.
“Don’t,” he commanded huskily.
“Josh, I—”
“One kiss, Nikki.”
Even as he spoke, his mouth moved over hers, and his hand swept up her neck to cup her face. His lips brushed hers lightly, tentatively. He couldn’t force anything from her, but in his heart he knew he didn’t need force. He’d seen her eyes in unguarded moments when she looked at him with longing. Tonight he would teach her what she’d been longing to learn and, in the teaching, heal his soul.
Finding courage in her acceptance of his chaste kiss, he opened his mouth over hers. Finally, after all these many months, he put into action the dream that had haunted his nights and slid his tongue across her lips. She tasted sweeter, felt better, than anything he’d dared imagine. His body tightened; hers softened.
