by Jill Shalvis
Was it because Jenny was holding something back, or because Annie suddenly had terrible doubts about the people in her life? Such as, could Stella really be trying to ruin her? Or God forbid, Jenny?
And where did Dennis fit into all of it?
No doubt, Annie was going to have to go back to New York, at least for a day or two, and that weighed heavily on her.
For one thing, she no longer felt comfortable leaving Aunt Gerdie alone. She could simply bring her along, but the truth was, Annie just didn’t want to go. New York was no longer home. After such a short time, Cooper’s Corner, and all the special people in it, had become home. Especially this renovated farmhouse, which had so much of her heart in it.
When she’d first moved here, she’d been so relaxed at leaving behind the stress she’d actually thought about selling Annie’s Garden and starting over. Jenny could buy her out or not, and Annie would be free. Free from obligation, free from the stress, free, free, free.
But as she’d considered selling, her heart had lurched.
As it had every time since.
No, as she’d told Jenny, selling wasn’t an option. It would be like cutting off a limb. She’d continued to run product research and development from here and been perfectly content.
She glanced down at her drawings. Even with her mind on other things, she still had the touch. She’d drawn a mock-up of an Oriental take-home box. She’d have it made out of silk, with silver handles. A case a woman could use as a purse on a night out, dancing with her lover… Lover. With little surprise, Ian came to mind. What was it about him that made her feel so vibrant, so sexy, so…alive?
She liked it, too much. She liked him.
And he liked her back. The memory of him proving it to her with mindless, bone-melting kisses had longing and yearning bursting through her. Making love with him would be heaven, she just knew it. It was a surprise how earthy, how sensual her thoughts had become lately, as she’d never really thought of herself as a sexual creature.
But she thought maybe, just maybe, with Ian she could be.
Would be.
Smiling a little dreamily, she looked up, looked out the window and gasped. The night was black, but she could clearly see a man standing there, watching her.
Then she realized that long, lean, tough outline belonged to Ian. Her longing and yearning tripled, and she moved to the door, opening it, spilling the light from the studio into the night. He wasn’t looking at her, but down at the ground beneath her window, and carefully, letting out an oath he didn’t try to hide, he went down on his knees.
“Ian?” Dropping her pencil, she ran outside.
“Stay out of the planter.” He threw out an arm across her thighs to hold her back. “Don’t cover the prints.”
Then she saw them, and involuntarily, her bones gave way, dropping her to her knees beside him.
“How big are Aunt Gerdie’s feet?” he asked hoarsely.
“Not that big.”
“Gardener?”
The large footprints were facing her window. She thought of all those nights she’d worked late, with her curtains thrown open to the gorgeous night sky.
And someone had been watching her. “No gardener at this time of year.”
Ian got to his feet a little unsteadily, then pulled her up. She turned toward him, not knowing exactly what she was going to do, but then he opened his arms and she stepped right into them as if she belonged there.
“I was in the studio last night, too, after our date,” she said, hearing her voice shake. “Working late. And the night before…”
His arms squeezed possessively on her. “You and Aunt Gerdie are coming to stay at the farm. Now. We need to call the police, and—”
“Your leg first. You’re gritting your teeth, your jaw is all bunched and—”
“That’s just stress.”
“Ian, you’re sweating as if it’s ninety degrees out instead of thirty. Now, damn it, don’t treat me like an idiot.”
“Okay, it hurts,” he admitted. “I rode Thomas’s motorcycle—” He pointed to the Harley in the driveway. “And maybe I rode a little too hard. No big deal.”
She let out a shaky breath and turned him toward the house. “It’s a big deal to me. I want to look at it.”
* * *
IAN FIGURED ANNIE HAD to be the most stubborn woman he’d ever met. Before he could come up with a good reason for her to ignore his bad leg, she’d taken him inside, past the living room, down the hall and into the bathroom.
She pushed him gently down to the closed commode, then dropped to her knees beside him, her hands on his leg. “Lose the pants.”
He nearly swallowed his tongue. “What? No.” He laughed. “I’m going to be fine.”
“I want to see what’s wrong with you.”
She had her hands on him, with lingering terror still in her eyes. And yet she wanted to take care of him. He’d never met anyone like her. But more disconcerting was that his leg was killing him. He wasn’t invincible, damn it, and for her, he really wanted to be. “Call the cops about the footprints. Call Hunter.”
“The prints aren’t going anywhere in the next few minutes. Your leg, Ian.”
When he just glared at her, she actually reached out for the top button on his Levi’s. “Fine, then I’ll just—”
“Annie.” Gripping her hands just in time, he let out another rough laugh. “You can’t just take off my pants.”
“Really? Then tell me what’s wrong with your leg. What did you do? Were you in a car accident?”
“No.”
“Did it happen at your work?”
At his silence, she got even more determined. “Okay, it’s work related,” she decided. “Tell me about it. And while you’re at it, tell me what you do when you’re not on your brother’s farm. Tell me about your job. Tell me—”
“We have more important stuff going on at the moment—”
“You know what I’ve learned about you, Ian? That there’s always something more important than talking about you and your life. Why is that?” Her chin set stubbornly, she pulled her hands free of his, shoved up his shirt a little and popped the top button of his Levi’s.
What she was doing shouldn’t have been anything other than infuriating, but she was on her knees before him, her hands hovering above the part of him that suddenly was awake and looking for action.
She went for the second button, her fingers brushing over the bare skin of his belly, and he let out a strangled sound that had her gaze jerking up to his.
He was quite certain the look he shot her was long and hot.
She had the good grace to blush, but it didn’t stop her, and her fingers grappled with his.
But there was no way in hell she was getting his pants off, not here, not now. When she got his pants off it would be because he was about to sink into her glorious body. It would be because her legs were wrapped around his hips, head tossed back, his name on her lips. Because he wanted to watch her explode for him, screaming as she did.
And he did want those things, but not now, not in the harsh light of the bathroom, where what he’d get would be her gasp of horror at the sight of the scar from the bullet that had ripped him open.
Purposely he upped the heat in his gaze, well past hot and on its way to scorching. Her breath quickened, and she bit her lower lip.
“What’s the matter?” he asked silkily. “You don’t want to finish?”
“I just wanted to see your leg.” She pulled her hands back, but tried to stare him down.
He stared right back.
“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” she whispered.
“What’s going on is you have yourself a stalker,” he said bluntly, then stood and rebuttoned his pants. “Call the police, Annie. We’ll talk later.”
“Promise?”
“Pack some stuff, tell Aunt Gerdie. After we talk to Hunter, you’re both coming back with me until this is over.”
“Promis
e you’ll talk to me.”
“Annie—”
“I mean it, Ian.”
He started to move past her, but she stopped him. Her arms slipped around his waist. “Why can’t you just admit it to me?”
“Admit what?”
“That sometimes you hurt.”
“Are we still talking about my leg?”
She smiled, a little wistfully. “Yes. And more. Lean on someone, Ian, even if only just once.”
“Look who’s talking.” But he rested his cheek on her head. “I’m leaning on you now, did you notice?”
He felt her smile against his chest. “And does it hurt to do so?”
She hurt his heart even as she filled it. “Hardly at all,” he whispered.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE THREE OF THEM SAT in Thomas’s kitchen. Annie and Ian and Thomas, pretending to drink coffee and eat brownies—which Aunt Gerdie had baked before going to bed—but no one was eating or drinking.
Annie was still unnerved by how fast Ian had manhandled her and Aunt Gerdie over here, where he expected them to stay until her so-called stalker vanished.
“This isn’t necessary,” she said, pushing away her mug. “It’s a huge imposition for the both of you.”
“This old place is plenty big enough for all of us.” Thomas gently pushed her mug in front of her again. “And you’re safer here.”
“About that…” Annie looked at Ian. “I agree someone is trying to scare me. But that’s all I think it is. That’s all,” she repeated softly when Ian opened his mouth. “Otherwise, something should have happened to me by now.”
“Something?” Ian looked at Thomas. “She thinks something should have happened by now. Jesus.” He stood and limped around the table to Annie. “Are you forgetting about your tires? Or the note that reads You’re next?” He pulled her up and against him. “Or that someone was watching you work, only feet away from you?”
“Exactly my point.” She wrapped her arms around his neck, wanting to soothe, wanting to ease the tension she’d caused. “They were only feet away from me, and nothing happened.” She put her forehead to his, slipped one hand to his chest and felt the steady beat of his heart drumming beneath her fingers. “Maybe it is Stella, and she’s got someone watching me. Maybe she’s threatened by Annie’s Garden, by something she thinks we’re going to do. But she isn’t going to hurt me.”
“What could you possibly do that would hurt her?”
“Maybe she’s worried we’re going to switch our products, and then, like her, use synthetics. That’s what Jenny wants to do.”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
“Because, if we did, then we’d produce a whole new line, a lower-priced line, and if we placed it in the department stores right alongside her products, we’d be even a bigger threat.”
“Exactly,” he said softly. “You’re a threat to her multimillion-dollar-a-year business. You are, Annie, and it’s possible she’s willing to go to extremes to stop you. And then there’s Jenny.”
Annie opened her mouth, but Ian put a finger to her lips.
“And Dennis. You keep pushing them, God only knows what’ll happen. I won’t have it.”
“You won’t have it? Ian.” She let out a little laugh. “You’re sounding like a cop again. Maybe, after ten days of knowing me, there’s something you’d like to tell me.”
He went utterly still, then tellingly, his eyes cut to Thomas.
Annie waited, but when he didn’t say a word, when he didn’t even look at her, she shook her head and took a step backward. “Okay, I get it. Back to you Tarzan, me Jane. I’m just supposed to blindly trust you, let you keep the little woman safe, and you don’t have to give me anything back, not even an inch of trust in return, which is all it would take to tell me what you do for a damn living! As if I can’t guess!”
She hadn’t yelled at anyone in years, if ever, but she had to admit, it felt good. Now all she needed was a grand exit. Chin in the air, she swept out of the room.
“Annie—”
Nope. She was done. She never even looked back.
* * *
BOTH THOMAS AND IAN STARED at the kitchen doors nearly swinging off their hinges with the force of Annie’s departure.
“Well. That went well,” Ian said into the deafening silence.
“You need to tell her about yourself.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because everything is not just a case. She’s not just a case.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
“So why are you acting like she is, holding so much of yourself back?”
Without an answer, Ian stared at the still swinging kitchen doors.
“So you blew it on the job,” Thomas said softly. “Don’t blow this, too.”
“I’m not blowing anything.”
“You sure about that?”
No. Truth was, he’d never been less sure of anything in his entire life. He was all caught up in his sense of failure as a DEA agent, stupid as that was.
“Look,” Thomas said. “There’s more to life than work. There’s more to life than the city and all you can find there.”
Before getting shot, Ian would never have agreed with that. But now…looking out into the broad, open, quiet space of Cooper’s Corner around him, thinking about Annie and how he felt when he was with her…he had to agree.
Maybe, just maybe, there was more to life than what he’d thought.
* * *
ONCE ANNIE GOT TO THOMAS’S living room, she stopped, huffed out a frustrated breath, and began to pace.
She had nowhere to go, not her own bedroom, her studio, nothing.
Temper bubbled on top of the frustration, but then she heard Ian coming through the swinging kitchen doors behind her. She pretended she’d had a destination in mind all along and kept moving, right up the stairs and into the spare bedroom they’d given her. When she saw the lock, she smiled grimly as she clicked it into place.
Then she plopped down on the bed and pulled out her cell phone. She was ending this right now, and dialed Stella’s office.
No one answered, of course no one answered, it was after hours. Damn. She called information for Stella’s home number, but, no big surprise, she wasn’t listed. She sat there, with the phone still to her ear, thinking.
“Annie.” This came from the other side of the locked door. “Open up.”
“I’m on the phone.”
This time he didn’t just rattle the handle, he unlocked it. He stood in the doorway waggling a key between his fingers, looking quite smug.
Annie shot him a long look and shifted on the bed so she couldn’t see him.
“Hang up,” Ian said softly from right behind her, clearly under the mistaken impression she’d actually gotten through to someone who cared.
He sat down next to her on the bed, so close she bounced into him. He slipped one hand around her waist to hold her close and reached for the phone with the other.
They silently had a tug-of-war over that for a moment, and then when Annie knew she couldn’t win, she stomped on his foot. When he whooshed out his breath and grabbed for his toes, she lurched up and moved to the far corner of the room.
He followed her, calmly and easily wrestled the phone from her, then went to disconnect it, staring at the thing in confusion when he realized she’d never dialed.
He exhaled a long breath. “I swear to God, Annie, I don’t even know where to start with you.”
“I’m not going to just sit this out and wait.”
“So you’re going to tip off your suspect instead? Or worse, make her think you’re crazy?”
She lifted a shoulder.
“Annie.” He looked so horrified and stressed she felt her anger at him fade. Not really understanding the need, she walked toward him, let herself sag against him just a little, just for a moment. Without hesitation, his arms surrounded her, and she sighed, burrowing in a little.
“What are
you thinking?” he asked.
“I’m thinking I could really use a really big, built, protective boyfriend. One with a really dry shirt so I can cry on it if I want.”
“I don’t know about the big or built part.” His voice was low and hoarse. “But since I feel protective as hell, that probably applies.” He slid his hands down her body and back up again. Shifting his body closer, he put his mouth to the spot just beneath her jaw. “And I have a dry shirt.”
Her eyes burning, she nodded.
“I don’t want anything to happen to you, Annie.” He opened his mouth on her throat.
“N-nothing will.”
“I should tell you…” This was said between hot, wet kisses he dragged along her throat. “You scare the hell out of me.”
“I—” She moaned when he took a little love bite on her shoulder, but since her heart skipped a beat at what he was saying, she lifted her head, her arms around his neck. “Oh, Ian. What are we going to do with each other?”
“I was hoping you’d know.”
“No.” She shook her head. “I don’t.”
“Maybe we don’t have to decide right this very minute.”
She didn’t understand the odd sense of disappointment at that, but she swallowed it and mustered a smile. “Of course not.”
* * *
ANNIE WOKE WITH A JERK the next morning to the sun shining in her face. Never a morning person, she tried to clear the cobwebs from her brain and decide how she felt about sleeping in the same house as Ian. Was he still asleep?
Did he sleep naked?
Laughing a little at that thought, she tossed back the covers and got out of the bed. She moved toward the adjoining bathroom and opened the door.
Her tongue nearly fell out of her head. There, in the bathroom that she just now remembered wasn’t attached only to her bedroom, but also the bedroom on the other side, stood Ian.
A very naked Ian.
In that single heartbeat she looked through the steam to where he stood with his back to her, facing the mirror. She took in his sinewy, wet, sleek spine. His long, powerful legs. And a set of bare tight, perfect buns. His arms were stretched up, rubbing a towel over his head.
Then he dropped that towel and, still facing the mirror, glanced up. Clearly startled, he whipped around, and in that instant before she slammed the door shut, nearly on her own nose, she saw… everything.
