He was pretty sure that she suspected ulterior motives for his being in Tahoe. She never voiced her suspicions, and it surprised him when she accepted his invitation to dinner. That first evening had been strained, but he had tried hard to make it as pleasant as possible. Today, their time together had been comfortable. That Mother Nature would provide the ultimate opportunity for him to be with her was more than he could have asked. As a result, he could assure himself, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she was safe, at least for now.
“I haven’t laughed that long and hard in years,” said Sin, burrowing down into the cozy comfort of the sofa. “It felt good.” And so did being with Nedra.
The rest of the evening was spent watching the weather report and playing board games. The winner of the spirited games seesawed from one to another, until, tied, four to four, they decided to retire for the night. Nedra took the bedroom. Sin took the sofa bed.
It was early the next morning when a loud yelp awakened him. Instantly alert, he sat up with a start and reached immediately for the revolver he had tucked under his pillow. He had worn it strapped to his leg during the day, undetectable to Nedra. Until now, he didn’t think he would have to use it. There had been no indication that she was in danger, but that sound brought him out of his bed and onto his feet. Every muscle in his body was tense. There was a second yelp. He realized that it was coming from the bathroom. His heartbeat slowed as he recognized the voice.
“Nedra? Are you all right?”
Her muffled reply came from behind the closed door. She sounded exasperated. “I guess.”
The door slowly opened. Sin quickly pushed the gun under the pillow just as she made her appearance. She was dressed in a pair of flannel pajamas. Her hair was tousled, her eyes were little more than slits. She didn’t look happy as she glared at him accusingly.
“Didn’t anybody teach you to put the toilet seat down after you use the bathroom?” Nedra turned around to reveal a wide wet spot covering her derriere. Sin tried not to laugh. She was angry enough already. He tried but failed and once again the small cabin was filled with his booming laughter.
Rolling her eyes as hard as she could, Nedra stomped back into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. Men!
The rest of the day went better. After showering and dressing, Nedra exited the bedroom to find Sin cooking a large country breakfast, complete with fried potatoes. It was scrumptious, and she devoured it appreciatively, offering a dry thank you, still annoyed by her brief swim in the toilet.
Trying to make amends, Sin insisted that he wash the dishes while she relaxed.
She accepted his offer, deciding to let him eat a little more crow before forgiving him for his transgression. By the time they went outside, all was forgiven.
The snow had reached the predicted three feet, and was still falling. Progress was slow as they worked on clearing a path to the walkway leading to the cabin, a distance of about fifty feet. By late that evening, they had made significant progress, despite breaks for snowball fights, snowman building, and making angel patterns in the snow.
Chilled and soaked, they took turns showering, with Nedra providing Sin with the shirt and pants left in the closet by Carla’s fiancé. Luckily, both men wore the same size.
They were exhausted, and after a dinner of soup and sandwiches, they decided to call it a day. Wearily, Nedra retired to the bedroom, leaving Sin stretched out on the sofa. He was asleep before she closed the bedroom door.
Snuggling under the covers, Nedra sighed, happily. Today had been fun. Romping in the snow, she had felt like a young girl again. Her plans for a quiet vacation had been turned upside down by the mysterious Sinclair Reasoner. With a sigh of satisfaction, she plumped up her pillow and drifted off to sleep.
****
Carla’s frantic call to Richard surprised him. He rarely talked to his sister on the telephone unless he happened to answer when she was calling Sharon. The sound of her voice startled him as she explained how she had tracked him down, through his office, to ask a favor. Nedra was at Carla’s cabin in Tahoe. She had left her cell phone in Oakland and there was no telephone in the cabin. It was predicted that Tahoe would be snowed in and she was worried.
Richard was in Truckee, California, on business, and Truckee was not far from Tahoe. She wanted to know if he would go to the cabin and see if Nedra was okay. Would he? Of course he would!
He chuckled to himself as he tucked his toothbrush into his Louie Vuitton bag, and zipped it. Carla had to be desperate asking him to check on her friend. Surely she must know that it was like sending the cat after the canary. But he wasn’t worried about Nedra. That was one woman who could take care of herself. She was resilient, which was one of the things that made her such a challenge.
Carla’s call had been made the day before yesterday, and it had taken an additional day for the highway to Tahoe to be cleared of snow and reopened. He was glad to be finally on his way. Truckee had been snowed in too, and he had been bored out of his head. There had been absolutely nothing to do in this one-horse town!
The door to the bathroom opened slowly, and a bleached blond appeared. Glazed blue eyes glanced his way. Richard sighed. Well, there was almost nothing to do.
With an wan smile, the blond walked to the dresser and retrieved the three folded bills lying on top of it.
“Was it as good for you as it was for me, honey?” The blond laughed at the cliché, ignoring Richard’s lack of appreciation at the attempt at humor.
Tucking the money into a pants pocket, the blond reached for the door, started to exit, then looked back at Richard with lascivious perusal. “All kidding aside, you was good, honey. I, for one, like the rough stuff. Hope you remember to call me if you come back here. What’s your name?”
Richard’s stare was hard. Silence echoed throughout the room. The blond hustled quickly into the hallway, hesitated, then peeked through the cracked doorway. “My name is Steve.” With that he closed the door behind him.
Within minutes Richard began his own exit. Checking the room one last time for misplaced objects, he grabbed his bag from the bed and placed his room key on the night stand. Satisfied that he was ready to depart, he shut the door behind him. His next stop was a cabin in Lake Tahoe.
CHAPTER 8
It was six in the morning, and still dark, when the wailing began. Nedra sat straight up as the familiar sound filled the cabin. She knew its source. Opening the bedroom door, she entered the living room and turned on the light. Sin lay thrashing wildly. The blanket that had been covering him had fallen to the floor. His long, brown body, clad in black briefs, glistened with sweat. Carefully, she approached him, remembering the last time she had interrupted his nightmare.
“Sinclair.” Her voice was low, soothing. His restlessness waned a little, but the moaning continued. Taking a deep breath to fortify her courage, Nedra moved forward, easing onto the edge of the sofa bed. Gently, she reached out and touched his shoulder, shaking him. “Sincl--”
Before the words left her mouth, she found herself lying on top of him, struggling for breath as she fought against his vice-like grip. She tried to scream, but the sound was a strangled gurgle.
Sin rose on his elbow, drawing her closer to his body. Instinctively, he slid his free hand under the pillow for the gun. Nedra’s muffled screams stopped him.
“What the hell?” Shaking his head to release himself from the last vestiges of sleep, his manhood hardened as Nedra wiggled on top of him, the heat from her soft body invading his senses. Relaxing his grip, he rose to a sitting position with Nedra still in his arms.
“Let go of me, you idiot!” Incensed, she pounded on his hard, chiseled chest, outraged at being manhandled, and embarrassed by her body’s reaction as she lay pressed against his half naked frame. Sin released her immediately. Struggling to her feet, Nedra fought to control her anger.
“Just what do you think you’re doing?” She looked as though she was ready to strike him at any moment.
&n
bsp; “What do you think you’re doing?” he countered. “You were the one I found in my bed!”
For a moment, Nedra faltered, the question catching her off guard. She forced herself to keep her eyes focused on his face. It wasn’t easy.
“I...I heard you moaning. You...you were having a nightmare.”
The defiant look on Sin’s face quickly faded, replaced by an expression of shock and surprise. The muscles in his face contracted as his dark eyes bored into hers. Wordlessly, he rose from the sofa bed, found his pants, and pulled them on.
Nedra tried not to watch his every movement, but her efforts failed. She was mesmerized. His body was a work of art—long, muscled thighs and legs, slim hips, a small waist, flat stomach, and muscled chest and arms. She felt cheated when he covered himself with the shirt she had loaned him.
As he moved into the kitchen area, Nedra shook herself out of her stupor. She expected him to say something about what she had revealed, but he kept his back to her. She realized that he was embarrassed. Quietly, she retreated to the bedroom.
After she was bathed and dressed, Nedra returned to the living room. The bed had been made, and the linen put away. A plate stacked with pancakes had been placed at her empty spot at the table. Sin sat sipping a cup of tea, his own plate untouched. He was waiting to eat with her. Nedra slipped into her seat, closed her eyes, and bowed her head.
“Thank you, Lord, for this meal, for this day, and for all of your earthly treasures.” She opened one eye and peered at Sin. She had said nothing about him not joining her in prayer at any of their meals together, but this time she increased the volume of her blessing to make a point. “And, Lord, please don’t bring your wrath down on our heads because this man won’t pray with me! Amen.”
She dug into her pancakes as Sin rocked with laughter.
“Woman, you are something else!”
“You’re so right.” She winked and slid a mouth watering pancake into her mouth.
They finished shoveling and were back in the cabin eating lunch before she approached Sin about his nightmares. This time she didn’t hesitate.
“Sinclair, this morning was the second time that you’ve had a problem sleeping. The first time was that night at the Simpson’s house. What is it that disturbs your dreams?”
Sin’s body tensed. His eyes hardened. Everything inside of him went cold. He had hoped that she would forget what she had heard. He was hoping that the memory would melt and go away, like the snow outside this cabin. Then they could both pretend that the dreams hadn’t happened. He could hide behind his humor, his attentiveness, and his growing affection for her.
Why did it have to happen here? Why did it have to happen now? He wanted her to admire his strength, not see his weakness. He had envisioned himself as Sir Lancelot coming to the rescue of the damsel in distress, even if she didn’t know that she was in distress.
These last few days with Nedra had been more than he could have ever imagined. He had discovered that there were layers to her personality that he would not have guessed. Not only was she pretty, smart, and caring, but she was funny, insightful and intuitive. Nedra was everything that any man could want. Everything he wanted, and his feelings for her had intensified far beyond the boyhood crush that he had harbored for so long. He did not want her to see him vulnerable, or wanting, or needing to share the pain he never revealed to anyone.
Abruptly, Sin stood and began to clear the table. Taking the dishes to the sink, he turned his back to Nedra with every intention of shutting her out again, except, this time he couldn’t.
Nedra noted the change in his demeanor. It was in the way his body shifted as he ran the water in the sink, added the dishwashing liquid, and began to wash the dishes. His defensive stance slowly began to wane. She knew the exact moment when he was ready to talk. Whatever it was that had him screaming in the night was about to be revealed.
Picking up the empty glasses off the table, she followed him into the tiny kitchen area and placed them in the soapy water. He washed. She dried. Neither of them spoke as she watched and waited.
When the dishes had been put away, Nedra returned to her seat at the kitchen table. Sin leaned against the sink facing her. Taking a deep breath, he closed his eyes and then opened them slowly, looking past her for a moment, before focusing on her face. Nedra’s heart constricted at the sadness in his eyes.
“My past is something that’s very hard to talk about. It was another world, one that’s hard to forget. One I really don’t want to remember and one I’m not sure you could even understand.”
“Try me.”
Running his hand over the sculptured waves in his hair, he massaged his neck, and then took another deep breath. “I’ve never told anyone this before.”
He stopped, trying to force the words that he wanted to say back into that place where they had nestled comfortably for so long, but they struggled, forcing themselves to the forefront determined to break free. He started again.
“I was a gang member.” He watched her expression, expecting to see revulsion. There was none. He continued. “Kids can be so stupid. I guess it comes with youth. It did with mine. The members of my gang spent most of our valuable young lives posturing, defending our manhood, and fighting over city streets that didn’t belong to us anyway. But, it was all so important then. The streets and the gang were all I knew. I pledged my love, my loyalty and my life to my gang, and I meant every word.”
Jamming his hands into his pockets, he started to pace. “I told you a little about my mother when we spoke at the church that time. Like I said, she was only twenty-five when she died. I guess she did the best she could to show me that she cared about me, but the system proved that it didn’t care about me at all, the gang showed me that they did. At least that’s what I thought at the time. I joined when I was ten, and the members of that gang were the closest thing to a family that I had. The younger boys were my friends, my brothers. The older ones were like uncles, fathers. We grew up together.”
Sin stopped pacing and joined Nedra at the table. She sat looking at him intently, her hands clasped on the table in front of her. He fought the urge to take those hands in his and caress them.
“I did things that I’m not proud of back then. Things that weren’t legal, things that hurt people, things that I’d rather not talk about.”
“You don’t have to.” Her voice was gentle, encouraging.
Sin flashed a half smile. He could tell that she was in her counselor mode. Good. It was needed. “Maybe someday I can talk about it.”
“Maybe.”
“If you know anything at all about gangs, you know that they have turf wars. Unfortunately, when I was sixteen, my gang was involved in a vicious one. People were landing in the hospital daily. Eventually, the inevitable happened, some gang members on both sides ended up in the morgue.”
Sin’s eyes strayed out the window to gaze at the snow-covered trees and the natural beauty that lay far beyond the concrete jungle in his nightmares. His voice sounded distant as he continued.
“A rival gang killed one of our boys. They gouged his eyes out.”
Nedra cringed. Sin didn’t notice.
“We sought our revenge. The plan was to surprise them, with guns in hand, and draw blood. We didn’t know they’d been warned and were waiting for us.” Sin ran his hands over his face, as if to wipe away the memory. “When the gun fire stopped, five of my gang brothers were dead. There had been six of us.”
He returned to the comfort of the cozy cabin, and the warmth of the hand that reached across the table and lay on top of his. He took her hand in his, stroking it gently. It felt like velvet, smooth and soft. Her long, oval nails were perfectly manicured, painted with clear polish. These hands had never been washed in blood. His had.
He closed his eyes in an effort to obliterate the vision that had become his nightmare. His voice was barely audible as he fought the emotion welling up inside of him.
“It was so quiet when I came to.
I’ll never forget the silence. I don’t know why I lived. All I had was a scratch above my temple where a bullet grazed me.”
Swallowing the lump in his throat, he opened his eyes and forced a smile. “I guess that man upstairs you believe in so strongly had another plan for me.”
Nedra acknowledged his words with a nod, silently urging him to continue.
He sighed. “Anyway, I walked through the blood and carnage, all the way to the bus station and caught the first one out of New York.” Sin let her hand slip from his. “I can still see the tracks that my sneakers left as I walked away. The soles of my shoes were red.”
He fell back in his chair, the power of that memory draining him. Pain marred his chiseled features.
Nedra knew that she should not have moved from her chair. She told herself that she was reacting to his anguish—that’s what she told herself. But, slowly, deliberately, she moved toward him until she was hankered down before him. His hands fell loosely between his legs. She took them into her own hands, rubbing their texture against her cheek.
For a moment their eyes locked, as they each waited for the other to deny the truth. Neither of them did. So, with all denials abandoned as lies, they let truth emerge as their lips met.
****
The going had been slow, the roads were slick and hazardous, but Richard had made it. He smiled as he pulled into the dark driveway leading up to the cabin in which Nedra was staying. He knew she would be shocked to see him, but she would welcome him with the graciousness she always displayed. He liked that about her. Nedra was a lady.
He had met her a decade ago, when his sister brought her home for a visit. From the moment he saw her he knew that she would be his. He approached her and quickly discovered that she was unlike the other women with whom he had been dealing—bimbos. She was a nice girl, pure in heart and spirit.
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