Safe by His Side

by Debra Webb

  Kate clung to him, her arms around his neck, her legs locked around his as he started to move. She lifted her hips to meet each thrust and Raine slid his arms beneath her to protect her from the cold ground. Harder and harder he pounded into Kate, driving closer and closer to release. He couldn’t slow the pace, couldn’t draw out the pleasure for her. Giving was out of the question, he could only take. He would make this up to her if it was the last thing he did.

  Heat and sensation crashed down on him, propelling him over the edge. Raine pressed his forehead to hers and thrust one last time, shuddering with the force of it. He slowed, emptying himself into her heat.

  Kate groaned her protest when he would have slumped to a stop. She quivered against him and her feminine muscles clutched urgently around his shaft. Unable to form coherent thought, instinct took control. Raine clenched his jaw and drove fully into her again and again, bringing her to the completion he hadn’t expected. She buried her nails in his back, a sweet pleasure-pain, as she convulsed around him.

  Exhausted and sated, they lay together without speaking, their frantic breathing and the wind shifting in the trees the only sounds around them. Kate shivered. Raine realized then how cold she must be, lying in his arms against the frigid ground.

  “We should go inside,” he murmured, and brushed a strand of windblown hair from her cheek.

  She silently searched his gaze. Raine hoped she couldn’t see how deeply this desperate act had affected him. For the first time in his life, he couldn’t push away how he felt. It threatened to burst out of him in ways and words he couldn’t yet acknowledge.

  He looked away, disengaged from Kate and shifted to a kneeling position. He shouldn’t be feeling any of this. He was a fool. He righted his clothes, then offered her his hand. She accepted it, and they stood together. Raine swallowed tightly as he quickly analyzed what had just happened between them. He’d never let anything get this far out of bounds before. He always maintained control of a situation—any situation.

  What the hell was wrong with him? People were trying to kill them, for Christ’s sake. And what was he doing? Having sex like a horny teenager with no consideration to their safety or the consequences of the unprotected act.

  His gaze swept over Kate as she tugged the now-buttonless shirt around herself. He had sworn that he wouldn’t do this to her. It was bad enough that he had endangered her life, he didn’t want to hurt her emotionally as well. She might not be totally innocent in all this, but her amnesia had left her vulnerable. And he had taken advantage of that vulnerability. She needed his protection, not his barbaric abuse.

  Holding the sides of the shirt together with one hand, Kate flipped her long hair over one shoulder and leveled her gaze on his. “Just so you know,” she said with more challenge than he would have expected. “This doesn’t change anything. I’m still not going to let you tell me what to do.”

  Before Raine could respond, she gave him her back and walked away.

  Chapter Ten

  Kate watched Raine pace the length of the living room once more. She shifted in her chair and waited for the inquisition to begin again. Impatient with dread, she crossed her legs, clasped her hands around her knee and tried her level best not to appear nervous. She swallowed tightly when she considered that only an hour ago she and Raine had made love outside, on the ground. The only evidence of that temporary lapse in sanity were the grass stains on the knees of his jeans. Kate resisted the urge to grimace at the memory of the primitive act. One minute he had been on top of her, lost to the desires of their heated bodies, the next he had grabbed back control and tucked all emotion into an iron fist of restraint.

  The transition hadn’t been so easy for Kate. It had taken a shower, clean clothes and several minutes of self-chastisement to shake the intensity of the emotions she had experienced. Coming back downstairs to face him had surely been one of the hardest things she had ever done. No matter how much her heart wanted to, she could not allow herself to make more of their encounter than was warranted. Sex, that’s all it had been. Desperate people in desperate situations did desperate things. As if to deny that reasoning, Kate shivered when the memory of his touch flooded her being once more.

  And now he wanted some answers. Answers, for the most part, she couldn’t give.

  “You don’t remember anything else?”

  Kate avoided his penetrating gaze. She wasn’t nearly so good as he at masking her emotions. “No,” she lied.

  Raine scrubbed his hand over his jaw as he slowly turned to retrace his steps. When he stopped he ran his fingers through his blond hair and seemed to consider long and hard Kate’s response. She knew he didn’t quite believe her, and certainly didn’t trust her. She could only hope that what she had told him would be enough. The dreams she’d had didn’t make a lot of sense, but there were parts that instinct told her were accurate.

  Though Kate still couldn’t recall having a father, she knew she did and that he was a cop. She’d had a brother too. A brother who had been a cop and had died in the line of duty. This information she shared with Raine, but nothing more. Kate felt the need to protect the rest of the mysterious snatches of memory. The really scary part was the bad feeling she had that her instinct to conceal this information had something to do with who Raine was and all this insanity going on around them.

  “Look,” Raine said, breaking into her unsettling thoughts. He sat down on the edge of the coffee table in front of Kate, his forearms braced on his thighs, his widespread knees on either side of hers. Those clear blue eyes settled onto Kate’s, sending a spear of heat through her. “It’s becoming more and more apparent that your turning up at my doorstep was no accident—”

  “But you said that I had wrecked my car near your driveway,” she interjected quickly. She knew exactly where this was headed and somehow she had to keep him from going there.

  “That’s the way it appeared.”

  “The way it appeared?” Indignation surged through her veins. “Do you think I hit the ditch and risked killing myself on purpose? That I’m walking around here with no clue to my past because I enjoy the mystery of it?” Realization washed over Kate, leaving her weak with disbelief. Though she had her own doubts as to exactly why she showed up in Gatlinburg, the amnesia was all too real. “You think I’m faking the amnesia.” She breathed that sudden awareness aloud.

  It wasn’t a question, she already knew the answer. Kate saw the quick flash of indecision in his eyes. The possibility had crossed his mind.

  He exhaled and looked away. There was no uncertainty in his gaze when it focused again on hers. “I don’t think you’re faking,” he said finally. His tone was reassuring but measured. “The accident and the head injury were real. The amnesia is real. I’m just not convinced that your being on that particular stretch of road was coincidental.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Kate felt her heart flutter. She frowned, trying to remember if she had taken her medication. Yes, she had. Raine had asked her that same question right after…after they’d come back into the house. Kate willed herself to relax, to pay attention to what he had to say next.

  “I think maybe someone sent you there to find me,” he said carefully. He watched her closely, poised to analyze any reaction, no matter how remote.

  Kate shot to her feet and stepped away from him. She couldn’t be sure that she could adequately shield her emotions if he probed too deeply. There were too many unanswered questions floating around in her head. Too many pieces of the puzzle that didn’t quite fit together. And a whole slew of gut feelings that skirted too close to the conclusion he had verbalized. She crossed the room and stared out the window at the clear, warm day.

  “My father is the cop, not me.” Kate folded her arms across her middle and looked over her shoulder at him. His expression gave away nothing of what he might be thinking. “I have a bum ticker, remember?” She injected a healthy dose of sarcasm into the repetition of his own words.

  Raine sto
od, his height alone immensely intimidating. Those long fingers sifted through his thick blond hair once more. His body language revealed as much about his own uneasiness as her eyes likely revealed about hers, Kate decided. He seemed uncomfortable with accusing her, or, distressed by the reminder of her heart condition. Kate felt certain that, whichever was true, sentiment of that nature was way out of character for a man like Jack Raine.

  “I remember.” He took several steps in her direction. “But that might not keep someone from using you to get to me,” he said softly, as if trying to lessen the ugly meaning behind his words. He stood right beside her now, crowding her with his nearness.

  …you’re our best shot at getting close to this guy. The now-familiar voice mocked, the words reverberating in Kate’s skull. She shuddered and shoved that foreboding intrusion away. If Raine was right, then whoever sent her could be just one step behind them, or waiting for Kate to make a move. She was still convinced that the phone call she had made had given away their location, bringing Dillon to their door. But she couldn’t be working for Ballatore…could she?

  And to bring him in either way.

  Kate’s breath caught, she blinked, then examined the absolute finality of the mental prompting some dark recess of her mind had just given. There was no question. Raine had hit the nail square on the head. She had been sent to find him and to bring him in despite what he had or had not done. He needs protection, Ballatore wants him dead, the voice reminded. If she were trying to protect him from Ballatore, she couldn’t be working for him.

  “You’re sure you didn’t know me before—” Kate swallowed the constricting lump rising in her throat “—before I showed up at your door?”

  Raine shook his head, then allowed one of those rare, breath-stealing smiles. “I would definitely remember if I had ever met you.”

  Kate braced herself against the assorted flutters and shivers his nearness evoked. She couldn’t allow those feelings right now. Like him, she needed answers. “Why would anyone be after you? What did you do?” She had really wanted to ask why someone would want him dead, but hadn’t been able to manage that much courage.

  Raine shifted to stare out the window. “It’s not what I did, it’s what I didn’t do.”

  “What didn’t you do?” Anticipation pounded through her veins as she waited for his response. The answer to this one question was somehow pivotal, Kate felt it with every fiber of her being.

  That disconcerting, analyzing gaze landed on hers once more. “I didn’t see it coming. That’s what I didn’t do.” He let go a heavy breath, then swallowed hard. The play of muscle beneath tanned skin momentarily distracted Kate from the question his words would have naturally prompted.

  “I should have anticipated Dillon’s move,” he answered without her asking. Raine shook his head. “He killed Michael Ballatore right in front of me and I didn’t have a clue what he was up to until it was too late.”

  “That’s why Ballatore wants you dead,” Kate realized out loud, talking more to herself than to Raine. “He thinks you killed his son.” Somehow she had known that, too.

  “That about sums it up,” he agreed dispassionately.

  “What are you going to do about it?” she prodded, suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to develop a plan to clear him. “You can’t just keep running forever. He won’t stop sending men after you. Even if you kill Dillon, Ballatore will just send someone else.” Fear snaked around Kate’s heart. She knew without a doubt that her summation was accurate. Sal Ballatore was not the kind of man who ever gave up. Raine needed a plan—she needed a plan.

  “I have to set the record straight,” he said in that cold, emotionless voice that sent a different kind of shiver dancing up Kate’s spine. She didn’t like that side of Raine. He’s spent the last twelve years of his life living on the edge…

  “How do you propose to do that?” she asked, shaking her head to clear it of the now too-familiar voice. She didn’t want to remember anything else. Raine’s plan wasn’t exactly the kind of plan she had in mind. “It’s not like you can call up his secretary and make an appointment.”

  One corner of his sensuous mouth kicked up into a wicked tilt. “I don’t plan to make an appointment.”

  Kate’s mouth dropped open, and she quickly snapped it shut, then made a sound of skepticism, half sigh, half chuckle. “You said yourself that Ballatore has an army of trained killers like Dillon on his side; just what do you have?”

  Raine cocked his head and allowed that one-sided tilt to widen into a grin. “I have the element of surprise.”

  “I CAN’T BELIEVE you’re doing this,” Kate hissed. She glared at Raine through the darkness of the car’s interior. A shaft of dim light from a nearby street lamp highlighted the angles of his handsome profile. She shouldn’t let him do it. But how could she stop him?

  “It’s the only way, Kate,” he told her again. The words weren’t any more convincing this time than they had been the other two times he’d repeated them. A muscle twitched in his tense jaw. She knew he’d become impatient with her resistance to his strategy, but she just couldn’t help protesting what could only be called suicidal. No more than she could help the way she felt…

  She cared too much. And she knew deep in her heart that when this was all over—when she had her memory back—things would never be the same. He would hate her for lying to him. Trust was a matter Raine took deadly serious. Of course, none of that would matter if the damn fool got himself killed tonight.

  “What I can’t believe is that I let you talk me into allowing you to come along,” he said incredulously.

  “Like you could have stopped me,” Kate retorted.

  Raine tossed her a look that spoke louder than words. The real decision had been his and she knew it.

  Kate exhaled a burst of helpless frustration that had been hampering her ability to take a deep breath for the last ten hours. Raine had driven nine of those hours with only one stop for refueling before they entered the city of New York. Now they sat in his black Range Rover less than a block from Sal Ballatore’s East Side estate. And there was nothing, short of shooting Raine herself, that she could do to stop what was about to take place.

  “Dillon was right.” Kate breathed the words into the tense stillness. “You are a dead man walking. You believe you have nothing to lose, so you don’t think twice about taking a risk like this.” Ice-cold fingers of dread nudged at Kate. Raine had a death wish and he was about to make it a reality.

  Raine shifted to face her, leather squeaked beneath faded denim. That glimmer of light spread across his full lips and intense blue eyes now. “The old man won’t kill me until he hears what I have to say.”

  “And if he doesn’t believe you?” Kate couldn’t mask the fear in her voice. She didn’t want Raine to die. Damn him! He’d made her have…all these feelings, and she wasn’t prepared to let him go just yet—even if they had no future together.

  “Kate—”

  “What if Dillon is here?” she demanded, cutting off whatever he would have said.

  “Dillon won’t be here,” Raine assured her. His voice had taken on a placating tone she’d heard only once before—when they had made love on the cold ground beneath the sun’s warm kiss.

  “Dillon and I were the only two people in the room when Michael died. He’s as guilty as I am in Ballatore’s eyes. That’s why he was ordered to find me. Failure would be a death sentence. He won’t come back until he eliminates the possibility that Ballatore might hear my side of the story. This is the last place Dillon will expect me to show up.”

  Kate searched his eyes, hoping against hope that she might actually be able to read his true feelings. But Raine was too good at hiding things. “Is there any chance Ballatore will believe you?”

  Raine lifted one shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. “Maybe.”

  “Maybe?” Kate shook her head. “How can you walk in there knowing that you’ll probably never walk out again?”

  “I d
on’t have a choice.” Raine fixed her with a gaze that chilled Kate to the bone. “If Ballatore backs off, then it’ll be just Dillon and me. Dillon has information I need.”

  “Information? About the money?” As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Kate recognized the stupidity of them. None of this was about the money.

  When he didn’t respond immediately, she said, “Who are you, Raine?” That was the missing link. Raine was the key. The realization hit Kate with sudden, amazing clarity. She needed him alive for more than one reason. She needed him to complete her assignment. “You can’t go in there,” she managed to say despite the sensations and voices whirling inside her head.

  “If I’m not back in one hour, drive until you find a pay phone and call Lucas.” Raine pressed a folded piece of paper into her trembling hand. “He’s your only shot at getting out of this mess alive.”

  Lucas Camp. Kate stared first at the small white square, then back at the man who had placed it in her hand. “Do you trust Lucas?” There’s only one person I trust, Kate, and that’s me. Raine’s words joined the medley of others inside her head.

  He exhaled and cast a glance in the direction of Ballatore’s dark house. “If Lucas can’t be trusted, there’s no one else.”

  Raine didn’t give her a chance to ask anything else, he slid his hand around her nape and pulled her mouth to his. Kate didn’t fight him, instead she melted into his kiss. His taste filled her, sent heat straight to her center where it bloomed and spread throughout her body. She couldn’t deny her need for him any more than she could deny the truth that was unfolding inside her and around them. Though the facts were still vague, Kate knew he was right—they were enemies, or, at the very least, on opposing sides in all this insanity. But none of that mattered when he kissed her.

  Raine pulled back all too soon. Before Kate could protest, he had opened the driver’s-side door, gotten out and was disappearing into the darkness on the other side of the street. She strained to make out his form moving toward the iron gate that guarded the entrance to Ballatore’s property. She watched for several minutes, but there was no further sign of Raine.