Touching Darkness

by Jaime Rush

  “Is it showing off if he doesn’t know anyone’s watching?”

  Jerryl only grunted as he turned to leave. Her mouth twitched in a smile.

  She knew Nicholas was scheduled to start working at ten, and it was now nine. She went downstairs and used the kitchen phone to call his room. She hated to admit it, but her father was right; she felt a hitch in her breath when he answered.

  “Good morning, it’s Olivia. Could you meet me in the kitchen in about fifteen minutes?”

  After a pause, he said, “Sure. Be right there.”

  She felt that hitch again when he walked into the kitchen twelve minutes later, wearing a Polo-style shirt that stretched across his wide chest. His dark brown hair was damp and combed into submission. Usually, it looked delightfully mussed. With his soulful brown eyes and slight pout to his mouth, he reminded her of pictures she’d seen of Elvis in his youth. The smell of soap filled her senses.

  “Hey, what’s up?”

  She lifted a finger to indicate he wait and slipped behind the tall metal shelves. She lit two candles on the small pyramid of cake she’d managed to salvage and walked around the corner. “Happy birthday to you…” She didn’t go on because she couldn’t sing worth a damn and wasn’t going to embarrass herself or put him through the agony.

  A mixture of surprise and alarm froze his expression. In fact, his whole body stiffened, though a small tremor moved across the muscles of his arms.

  “Oh, jeez, you’re not a diabetic, are you?”

  When she neared, he lurched forward and blew out the candles with a burst of breath. “One of the candles looked like it was about to fall over,” he said with a wave of his hand in answer to her questioning look. He released a breath. “No, I’m not diabetic. How did you know it was my birthday?”

  “I manage the staff records.”

  He gave her a smile. “That was really sweet of you.”

  She set the dark blue cake on the small table the staff used to take their meals. She’d already placed two plates and forks there. “I thought we’d have a piece before you started work.” Okay, she didn’t want Gerard to see it.

  Nicholas sat down, and she handed him a knife to cut it. He did the honors and gave her a slice first. She waited for him to take a bite, and his smile filled her with something close to giddiness.

  “Wow. This is the moistest cake I’ve ever had. Did you make this from scratch?”

  She nodded, pride glowing inside her. “I love to bake. I’m a Food Network addict, especially the baking Challenge shows. I have this idea…” Was she really going to tell him that?

  “What?”

  She waved it away. “Nothing. It’s silly.”

  “Good.” And he waited.

  She loved that he was interested, giving her his whole attention, and she hated that she’d now have to tell him. “It’s just an idle daydream, you know, because I’m committed to an illustrious career with the CIA, working for my country and all that, but I muse about how fun it would be to have my own business.”

  He glanced at the cake. “A bakery?”

  A grin exploded on her face. “‘Dangerous Cakes.’ Not just ordinary, boring cakes but big, tall, cakes, with moving parts and pyrotechnics, and…” Her enthusiasm was running away on her. “See, silly.”

  “You don’t think so.” His smile wasn’t patronizing. The way he was looking at her, she’d swear he was absorbing her zest for the idea, or at least enjoying it.

  “Well, it is, because I already have a career.”

  “I don’t mean to degrade what you do, but how illustrious can being an assistant be? Even to a director?”

  “There are possibilities for advancement.” That’s what her father had been telling her. So far, she saw only the leash that kept her working with him.

  “I don’t see that spark when you’re talking about the CIA. I saw it when you talked about Dangerous Cakes. Livvie, life is short.” His expression shadowed on those words. “It can be over in an instant. Grab it now and suck every bit of juice out of it.”

  Those words shimmered through her in ways she couldn’t even decipher, but her body involuntarily moved closer to his. “I like that. Maybe I’ll write it down and tape it to my bathroom mirror. I like the sucking part best.”

  His eyebrow went up, clearly taking her words for something much more erotic than she’d meant. Or had she?

  She tilted her head. “Say it again, so I’ll remember it. Grab it now and suck the juice right out of it?”

  He cleared his throat, his fingers tight on his fork. “We’d better finish our cake before…”

  “Before?” Before he tore off her clothes? Kissed her? He was looking at her mouth, making it tingle so that she had to run her tongue over it.

  He wrenched his gaze away. “Before I have to report for work.”

  Work. Father. Rules. Damn.

  They ate in companionable silence, catching each other’s gaze and smiling. Okay, a little harmless flirting.

  He took a bite, sliding his fork out of his mouth and rolling his eyes. “This is outrageous. Where did you learn to bake a cake like this, those cooking shows?”

  His compliment filled her with champagne bubbles, not so much the words but the passion behind them. “I spent a summer in France in my junior year of high school. I was there to study the language, but I took a pastry cooking class and got hooked.”

  He took her in with those chocolate Grenache eyes. “‘Dangerous Cakes.’ Yes, very dangerous.”

  Did he mean the cake? She wanted to think he also meant her. She remembered what he’d said yesterday, about wanting to socialize with her. She wanted to “socialize” with him, too.

  She ran her finger through the cream icing and stuck it in her mouth. He watched the move, his throat convulsing in a hard swallow. Yeah, he could have meant her. The fact that she had an effect on him sent a supercharged thrill through her.

  Once again, it seemed an effort to pull his gaze from her and back to his cake.

  That’s when she realized he’d called her Livvie. She’d gotten totally distracted by the sucking part. “No one’s ever called me Livvie before.”

  “Really? You look much more like a Livvie than an Olivia. Does it offend you?”

  “I think I like it.” Livvie, fun, light, the kind of girl who flirted. Her smile faded. “Just don’t call me that in front of Darkwell.”

  He feigned a shocked look. “Heavens, no!”

  She laughed, loving the sound of her own laughter and the way it tickled through her. He chuckled, a soft, deep sound that did more than tickle. No one had plugged into her body the way Nicholas had, bringing it to life the way the family’s fake Christmas tree came to life once it was dragged out of deep, dark storage.

  He took a last bite and set his fork on the plate. She stood, leaning forward to take his plate just as he got to his feet. Their noses brushed, and she stepped back, nearly losing the plate she was holding. The fork, however, went flying to the floor.

  He started to reach for it, but she said, “I’ll get it.”

  When she stood, she was inches from him. She had to look up at him, since he was probably eight inches taller than she. His gaze flicked to her mouth, before returning to her eyes. She swallowed hard, fighting the urge to lean closer, knowing his mouth would taste like sugar and butter and everything else she’d put into that cake, including feelings she shouldn’t be having.

  If her father came in right then, he’d see that she’d gone against his wishes. Hell, he’d see much more than that. She felt all of that delicious excitement evaporate. Flirting with Nicholas was just a tease, but it wasn’t a harmless flirtation.

  “You’d better get upstairs,” she said on a rush of words, grabbing her plate and backing away. “You know how Darkwell gets.”

  She was in such a habit of referring to him as someone other than her father, she now called him Gerard or, to the others, Darkwell. When she set the plates in the sink, she turned to find Nicholas
standing next to her.

  “I hope I didn’t get you into trouble yesterday.”

  She shrugged. “I violated the rules.”

  He tilted his head. “Do you often do that? Break the rules?”

  “No. Never.” She met his gaze. “Well, not usually.”

  He leaned closer. “I don’t like rules. They’re too restrictive. Confining.”

  Fever flashed into her cheeks. “Rules are good.” She didn’t sound the least bit convincing. “They’re what set us apart from animals.”

  His voice grew soft, and his heated gaze swallowed her up. “Sometimes it’s not bad to be like animals. Their lives are pretty simple. Eat. Sleep. Survive.” And after a beat, “Procreate.”

  “But we need rules. We need…”

  His mouth touched hers, jumping her heartbeat right into her throat.

  Her lips were moving, trying to form the rest of the sentence she’d now forgotten. Then she was sliding against his mouth, and she couldn’t breathe, and she didn’t even care. He captured her mouth in his, and his hand curled around the back of her neck and pulled her closer.

  A sound of surrender escaped her throat. He took that as an invitation to deepen the kiss, teasing her lips apart and running his tongue across their surface. Her eyes drifted shut, swept into sensations that started at her mouth and spread through her entire body. Her hand involuntarily came up and connected with his arm. Her fingers curled around his biceps, tensing on the hard muscle beneath his shirt.

  “I need…” she whispered.

  “To follow the rules?”

  “For you to keep kissing me.”

  His tongue dipped into her mouth, once, twice, then invaded completely, and she fully engaged him back. How long had it been since she’d kissed someone like this and enjoyed it? I’m not just enjoying. I’m lost, sinking, senseless.

  He tasted even sweeter and better than just the cake. Her tongue came alive, as though it had a mind of its own, toying with his, tracing the edge of his teeth and the ridges on the roof of his mouth. His kiss was as deep and slow and sensual as he seemed to be, as he would be if he made love to her.

  He is making love to you.

  That thought filled her heart with sunshine. He finished the kiss, withdrawing his tongue but touching his lips to hers again and once more, as though he couldn’t bear to part.

  With his hand still around her neck, he leaned his forehead against hers. “You were saying…about the rules.”

  She opened her eyes, hazy and heavy. Her voice was weak. “Rules are good.”

  He laughed softly. “If you say so.” He stepped back, and she saw that his eyes were also filled with a sensual haze.

  “For you, too. If Darkwell caught us…” The thought cleared away the fuzz in her brain. “You could lose your contract.”

  “Would he fire you?”

  “Worse.” You said too much.

  He nodded, taking another step back, the haze clearing from his eyes. “I respect that you respect the rules.” He pinned her with his gaze. “But you’re not just worried about getting reprimanded. I see fear at the thought of being caught. What kind of hold does that man have over you?”

  She squeezed her eyes shut, not wanting to break another rule and not wanting Nicholas to think she was screwing her boss, either. “It’s not what you think. But I can’t say.”

  “He’s not your lover. That’s what you’re saying. Because that would be…”

  “Sick. I mean, inappropriate.” Damn, she had a hard time following the rules where Nicholas was concerned.

  “Why would it be sick? Because he’s older? No, he acts more like a father…” His eyes widened. “He is your father, isn’t he?” When her flushed face gave away her answer, he smiled in a relieved way. “That explains a lot. You don’t look like him, though.”

  “I look like my mother, at least that’s what I’m told.”

  “You’ve never seen her?”

  She shook her head. “She left us when I was a baby. He destroyed all of her pictures. Anyway…” She pushed past that. “Darkwell—my father—doesn’t want anyone to know. He wants to keep it professional.”

  He shook his head. “I understand now. But I’ll tell you this, Livvie: That rule about socializing isn’t so much to preserve the integrity of the program. It’s to keep you in line, to keep you from getting involved with the wrong kind of guy. And make no mistake, I am the wrong kind of guy for you.”

  She tilted her head. “And what makes you think that?”

  “Besides who your father is? Besides the rules and the fact that you follow them?”

  She was curious. “Yeah. Besides all that.”

  “When I finish what I’m doing here, I’m gone.”

  “Well, not forever.”

  That shadow filled his eyes again. “Yeah, forever.” He rubbed the back of his fingers against her cheek. “Thanks for the cake. That was special.” His voice lowered. “So was the kiss.” He headed out of the kitchen, and she called out, “Have a good birthday, Nicholas.”

  She quickly cleaned any evidence of the cake. Thank God her father hadn’t caught her.

  She put her fingers to her mouth. She wanted more of that. Of him. No matter that he wasn’t going to be around long. That he’d backed down out of respect for her obedience, well, that made him more appealing. If not for that, they’d still be in the kitchen kissing.

  Obedient little Olivia, and look where it’s gotten you: alone and in a job that doesn’t fulfill you. Nicholas had a point. How could fraternizing with the contractors compromise the program? She didn’t know anything. In fact, Nicholas knew more than she did.

  She felt pressure in her chest and reached for the pendant hidden beneath her shirt. Her fingers caressed the ridges of the Darkwell family crest, an eagle in profile. She had been required to wear this pendant every day since she was a young girl. Though her father was a man of logic, he’d told her it would protect her. She now took that to mean in a general way and not a superstitious way.

  Well, it sure hadn’t protected her from falling for Nicholas. She sighed, turning to leave the kitchen after one more inspection. She had fallen for him, hadn’t she? Once again falling for a guy who didn’t meet her father’s standards. The last time…

  She put her hand on her heart, feeling the ache even now. What am I going to do this time?

  CHAPTER 5

  Nicholas headed downstairs for lunch but paused at the sight of Olivia standing in front of one of the paintings of glowering men. He remained at the corner of the grand dining room, taking her in, remembering how sweet she was, how even more delicious her mouth was than the cake she’d made for him. Though he hadn’t made a sound, she turned, and her dour expression transformed to a smile as it usually did when she saw him.

  He stepped up beside her but looked at the portrait of a man decked out with all kinds of stars and ornamentation. In a near whisper, he said, “So, all these people are your family.”

  She did a quick glance to make sure no one was around. “That’s my grandfather.” She pointed to a portrait of another man, her face going pale, her mouth tightening. “And that is—was my uncle Leon. He died two and a half weeks ago of a heart attack.” Her face paled and her mouth tightened.

  “I’m sorry. You must have been close to him.”

  “No one in the family is close, not emotionally. Loyal, traditional, but not loving.” She looked at him in surprise. “I don’t know why I even said that. It’s sad, tragic, but I think his death was harder because he was only two years older than my father. I guess it made me think about…” She shook her head, unable to even voice words about her father’s death.

  She pointed to a crest emblazoned in brass with an eagle at the center. “That’s our family crest.” She twirled her finger: big deal. “This estate has been in the family for three generations. I never lived here, thank goodness, but we came here for special occasions. My grandfather recently moved into a smaller house closer to the city.
This place was empty, and on the market, until Darkwell realized we could move the program here. Now he can do his work at Langley but spend as much time here as he can.”

  She went on to describe some of the other men, majors, generals, senators, as though she’d memorized them from childhood. Heck, she probably had.

  Stuck in a dark alcove was another portrait. He stopped, this one more intriguing than the rest. “Who’s this guy? And what did he do to piss off the family?”

  She laughed, though it came out nervous. “That’s Uncle Gus, the middle brother. And you’re right, he did piss off the family. When he was nineteen, he married a woman much older than he was. She’d been married when they began their affair, an affair that broke up her marriage. But worse than that was that she was a buyer for a clothing store, and her job took her out of town a lot. Gus was so in love with her, he quit military school and traveled with her. My grandfather bribed, threatened, but nothing would dissuade Gus.”

  Her expression was solemn as she spoke. “They had a daughter a few years later and settled down. She was just a little older than I. We both went to a private school here in Potomac.” She glanced at him. “Very exclusive. They teach you how to be a snob on every level. Audrey wasn’t a snob, though, and we were very close, kind of two against the world. We both loved the equestrian program, until I fell off and sprained an ankle. My father wouldn’t let me participate after that.”

  “That seems unfair. It was only one accident.”

  She shrugged. “He wanted to protect me.” But she still didn’t look pleased about it. “Gus and his family weren’t invited to family gatherings…the shame of it all, you see. But he was so happy. You could see the glow in their faces when they were together. They were so in love.”

  She let out a soft sigh. “And then he died, a lung aneurysm. Like you said earlier, it was over in an instant. And his wife, Carol, was destitute. They’d been living in a house in the family trust, so she had no claim to it. I can remember the day she came to see my grandfather, begging him to let her and Audrey stay; she was his granddaughter, for God’s sake. But he didn’t see her as family. My grandfather and his two sons ordered them to leave.”