by Nina Bruhns
She and Alex were the only passengers. Wonderful.
After takeoff, the cute stew poured them glasses of French champagne and set out a delicious spread of cheese and crackers on the low walnut coffee table between their two seats.
Too bad Rebel was in no mood to enjoy any of it.
All she wanted to do was close her eyes, drink herself into oblivion, and forget about the man sitting across from her.
She proceeded to try.
But apparently he had different plans. Yep. The one time in the history of the planet when a man actually wanted to talk, and of course it just had to be this man. And only now, after the damage had already been done.
She so did not want to hear about his phone call to his ex-fiancée. Or anything else he had to say. Not after this morning.
However, as soon as the attendant disappeared up front with the pilot, he continued his announcement. “Helena wanted to know how we’re getting along,” he stated.
Sure, she did. So, how had the other woman found out they’d been together to begin with? And why would she care? Unless . . .
Rebel tapped a sharp tattoo on her champagne glass with a fingernail. “What did you tell her?”
He must have picked up on her inner cynicism. “Not that we’re fucking,” he ground out, “if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Her foot actually twitched.
“Language, Zane,” she gritted out before taking a big sip of champagne and saying, “Well, that’s good, because we’re not.”
“Not what?” he asked, feigning not to understand.
She gave him a death-ray glare. He didn’t flinch. Probably didn’t even notice. He was too busy examining the untouched Gouda.
“She also wanted to apologize for leaving me at the altar,” he added.
“Better late than never,” Rebel drawled.
He sighed. “Helena’s not a bad person. She just has . . . pressures.”
So generous of him to forgive her. “I’m sure you’ll be very happy together.”
“Angel, we’re not—”
“And enough with the angel stuff, Zane. You got what you wanted from me. Now please allow me the dignity of not continuing with that whole ‘you saved my life in captivity’ naked dream farce. I can’t believe I ever fell for that story.”
“It’s the truth,” he said, hurt that she’d think he lied about something so viscerally and elementally real. Or that he’d used those awful memories to . . . what? Seduce her? “And you obviously have no fucking idea what I want, Rebel. That’s a damn fact.”
“Oh?” She turned away from him. “And what could that possibly be?” she spat out. “Because I think you’ve made it very clear what you want. And it’s not me. Except to—” Her knuckles blanched white around the stem of her glass.
He snapped his mouth shut. Regrouped. “Listen, I know you’re angry with me—”
“Ya think?” she muttered, taking another gulp of champagne and setting down her glass with a loud clink. “No, actually, I’m mystified, Alex. Tell me. Why did you sleep with me, if you’re just going back to her? I really don’t understand.”
“I’m not going back to her,” he insisted.
Like she believed that. He still wouldn’t look at her.
“What. Ever.”
“Actually, she’s been trying to call and tell you something important, but you won’t answer, and you won’t call her back.” He drained his flute and set it aside. “Boy, does that sound familiar.”
She snorted. “Yeah, you’re the wounded parties here.”
He sighed again, leaned forward in his seat, and took her hand between his. She so wanted to pull it away, but he brushed his lips over her knuckles and she couldn’t make herself do it. The pain in her heart needed soothing too badly.
He studied her fingers intently. “I know you’re hurting. But please, let me explain. It’s not what you think.”
No, she was pretty sure it was. But did she really want to know? “Is this going to make things better or worse?” she asked. Already guessing the answer from his posture.
“Honestly? I have no idea,” he said, and kissed her hand again. He finally looked up, his gaze filled with misery. “But it’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you for years.”
Years? Her distrust slowly deflated as last night’s shocking revelation from him arced through her mind. She took a giant mental step back.
Okay. She wasn’t being fair. He had to be feeling vulnerable, too.
What could possibly make a man feel worse than not being able to have children? She was still too stunned herself to think rationally about all the implications. She could only imagine what he must have felt. Must still be feeling.
She really didn’t want to deal with anything else right now. Certainly not if it was just one more reason they couldn’t be together. But he seemed determined to tell her.
She braced herself for yet another blow. “All right. What is it?”
For a moment he gathered his thoughts. “It’s about Helena,” he said. “She finally gave me permission to share this with you. But you have to swear not to tell a soul. Especially not her parents.”
Rebel blinked. Okay. This was not what she’d expected. She’d expected something about his job. That he’d killed people. Or about the torture he’d endured. Maybe even some awful, fatal disease, God forbid. But . . . “Helena? What about her?”
“Swear you won’t tell.”
“Yes. I promise.”
He took a deep breath. Let it out. “Helena’s gay.”
Wait. What? Astonishment whooshed through her. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah. Your friend, my ex-fiancée, is a lesbian.”
As soon as he said it, a wave of relief flooded across his face. It seemed as though a huge weight had suddenly lifted from his broad shoulders.
Rebel just stared at him in disbelief. “Really?” Not that it would normally be any big deal. But . . .
“Really. And thank God it’s all out in the open now.
Well. Between the three of us, anyway. You can’t imagine how good it feels to finally tell you,” he said. “I’ve been pleading with her for years.”
“She’s gay?” she repeated, filled with bewildered in-comprehension. This was crazy.
“Technically, lesbian,” he confirmed with a nod.
A million questions burst through her mind. But one stood out clearly above all others. She cut to the chase. “Alex. If you’ve known that all this time, why on earth would you want to marry her?”
How would he even contemplate something like that? What could possibly be his explanation?
The whine of the jet engines pitched higher, filling several long moments. She could relate.
At length he said, “Baby, I get that this might be hard for you to understand.”
An understatement if ever she’d heard one. She fought not to feel even more hurt by this than she already felt about everything else this man had heaped on her over the past twenty-four hours. Make that the past several years.
“Believe me, at the time, it seemed like an ideal solution,” he said. “For both me and Helena. Me with my overly dangerous job, and my . . . physical inadequacies. Helena with her ridiculously conservative parents and their unbending social expectations for her. Marrying each other would let her keep her family . . . and it would keep me from wanting one.”
Taken aback, Rebel reeled as though he’d struck her physically.
His eyes softened, his expression filling with remorse. Then he said the one thing that turned her world completely upside down. “And it would also keep me out of your bed.”
GINA and Gregg checked into the Watergate Hotel. The property had a great view of the Potomac and was fairly close to the Pentagon. Despite a recent major renovation, the place felt familiar to Gina. And safe. She’d stayed there on the few occasions she’d come to D.C. for a conference or a government funding interview and her ex-fiancé, Wade, had been off on assignment or a
case. But she’d always been on an expense account before. Her eyes popped when she saw the nightly rate on the bill.
“Don’t worry about it,” Gregg said when she suggested staying somewhere cheaper. “I want to stay. I like the irony. Of the name,” he added when she shot him a startled look. She definitely hadn’t pegged Gregg as the political type.
She remembered learning about the infamous old scandal when President Nixon’s henchmen had broken into his opponent’s Watergate campaign headquarters disguised as maintenance men. “Okay,” she said with a chuckle. “But from which point of view? The victims or the plumbers?”
He just winked, requested a suite on the top floor, and signed in as Mr. and Mrs. G. Gordon Paisley. She rolled her eyes. Like they hadn’t seen that before.
The view from the private balcony was indeed magnificent, and opulent didn’t begin to describe the room itself. Marble floors, antique furniture, deep feather canopy bed, spa tub. It even had a fifteen-bottle wine cooler, fully stocked. Naturally.
She turned back from the French doors and let her gaze travel over the luxurious appointments to where Gregg was bending over the minibar checking imported beer labels. He was dressed in black, as was his habit. Snug black T-shirt, low-slung black leather pants, black boots. He’d taken off his black leather motorcycle jacket—the one with the silver chains looped artistically across the front—and slung it on the sofa. Therefore she couldn’t miss the black shoulder holster strapped across his broad back with his platinum SIG Sauer tucked under his arm.
He always wore the SIG. She’d seen him with it a hundred times before, if not in its holster then stuck into the front of his waistband where he could always reach it. But for some reason, a shiver now ran down her spine at the sight of the powerful weapon . . . which she knew could just as easily turn on her as protect her.
And suddenly once again she wondered, was she wrong about him? What if his remorse was false? What if all those feelings she was experiencing about him were just her needing someone, anyone, to protect her? What if the drowningly good sex between them had blinded her—for the second time—to his intent? If he were innocent, shouldn’t he have signed the Watergate register as a permutation of the good guys rather than the infamous plumbers? Had he made her trust him, spun lies about his childhood, only to lower her defenses and lure her here to another big, anonymous city, away from her home and her STORM bodyguards, far from where anyone was searching for her, in order to—
No. She had to stop thinking like this. He was on her side. They were after the same thing: to find the traitor who had betrayed them both, so they could get on with it and go back to their normal lives.
Whatever normal was.
“Gina?”
She started badly.
He was watching her closely. “Something wrong?”
She banished the chill from her heart. “No. I’m okay. I just . . .” She shook her head again. “No, it’s nothing. So. What do we do now?”
He glanced at his watch. “It’s one-thirty. I need to set up a few things, then I want to pay a call on our Pentagon guy.”>
“What about me?”
He came over and enfolded her in his arms. After a brief hesitation he said, “Damn, girl. You’re tense as an itchy trigger finger. Why don’t you order up some room service, light some candles, and take a nice relaxing bath?”
Right. Like she could ever relax again. “Why can’t I come with you?”
“We already talked about this, sweet thing. I need to know you’re safe. That means here. In this room. Talking to no one.”
She nibbled on her lip, and made herself ask the simple question that would tell her if she really should fear him, or if her unease was only the PTSD talking. “Gregg?”
“Yeah, babe.”
“What happens afterward?” Her heart thudded painfully against her chest. Did she really want to know? Did she really want to admit to herself that she had fallen in love with him completely? Let alone admit it to him . . . “What happens after it’s all over?”
His body stiffened almost imperceptibly. “How do you mean?”
“With us. You and me. After we catch the traitor.” Her pulse sped when he didn’t answer right away. She told herself it didn’t matter.
“Gina . . .” He slowly let out a taut breath. “You know what I am. What I do. There’s no way you want to be with a man like me. If that’s what you’re getting at.”
Her heart pounded erratically. “You don’t love me? Not at all?”
His fingers dug into her arms, then eased up. “Sweetheart, if I ever knew what love is, I’ve forgotten a long time ago. And I’ve got no interest in remembering. I’m sorry.”
Her chest squeezed. “So you don’t want me.”
“God, I didn’t say that.” He wrapped his hand around her jaw and lifted her face to his, drilling her with a look so intense it made her insides quiver. “Woman, I want you like crazy. And I hope like hell you want me, too, and that whenever I’m INCONUS you’ll let me come to you.”
It was the right answer . . . in the sense that she believed what he was saying. Her jittery recurring paranoia about him was just that. She was safe with him, just as he kept saying. Just as her heart knew.
So why was that same heart crying out that he’d given her exactly the wrong answer?
Why did she suddenly feel devastated inside?
Yes, she loved him. At least she thought she did. But surely, surely, she didn’t want him to love her back? This man, this macho, controlling, emotionally unavailable mess of a man who was everything any sane woman would avoid? Okay, she needed him right now, needed his warm, safe body next to her at night. Craved the blissful moments of forgetfulness she found in his arms. Even appreciated the fleeting seconds of terror when he became rough, only to remember and force himself to be gentle with her, so she was slowly learning once more to trust a man’s sexual aggression.
But what would happen when the bad guys were caught and she no longer needed his physical presence in the same way? Could she be with a man like Gregg for the long term, one who could take a life without blinking? How could she reconcile her deep-seated beliefs as a doctor with what he did for a living? And how could she ever look at him without being deluged with memories of the worst days of her life?
Would she still love him then? Or was he right, and once the danger had passed she would see him for what he truly was, and being with each other would just be a painful reminder . . . ?
There was only one way to know for sure.
“Okay,” she said, taking a cleansing breath. “INCONUS. That works for me.”
For now.
Gregg searched her eyes and his fingers tightened on her jaw for a millisecond.
“Good,” he said, then dropped his hand and stepped away. “I better go. Lock the door after me and don’t answer it for anyone.”
Gina swallowed. Tried not to let the panic take her. She’d be fine. It wasn’t like this was the first time she’d been left alone. And Gregg would be back soon. He would. He’d promised.
“What about that room service?” she asked him.
After a brief hesitation, he bent and pulled a small Beretta from his ankle holster. “Take this. Put your robe on and keep it hidden in the pocket. Aim it at the waiter the entire time he’s here and do not hesitate to shoot if he acts the least bit wonky.”
Her lips parted on a small quiver of fright. “I suddenly don’t think I’m hungry anymore.”
“You need to eat, Gina. It’s okay. No one knows we’re here in D.C. Just stay alert and keep that gun in your hand.”
Like an unruly weed, the quiver flared fast and out of control. She reached for him, scared. “Please don’t go.”
He gave her a reassuring squeeze. “I have to. But swear to me you won’t leave the room.”
“I won’t,” she said, breathing deeply to reign in the irrational panic. “I promise.”
He kissed her. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Then he
let her go and strode out the door. “Lock it,” he called sternly from the other side.
She jerked herself out of her immobility and slid the dead bolt home, putting the flats of her palms to the cold wooden panels as she listened for his receding footsteps. She heard nothing. But when she put her eye to the peephole, he was gone.
“Oh, God,” she whispered, turned, and leaned her back against the door for support. “Please help me be strong.”
She stood like that for a full minute before mustering herself and fetching the fluffy robe from the closet. She put it on and slipped the Beretta into the pocket as Gregg had instructed. Her stomach growled, reminding her she hadn’t eaten since early this morning.
She ordered lunch and when it came she held the gun tightly in her pocket while a bellman with a name tag that read “Raj” set the meal out on a small table and chatted away in a Bollywood accent, oblivious to her tension. He ended by holding up a bottle of champagne with a flourish.
“Compliments of the management,” Raj said with a bow.
If she hadn’t stayed there before, she would instantly have been suspicious, but she knew the gift was de rigueur. The hotel was generous with its top-floor guests. “Thank you,” she said, and managed to tip him without shooting either of them in the knee.
As soon as he was gone, she put the gun aside on the sideboard with a shiver. She’d carried a knife but that was different. Less . . . random. A knife was all about the person, where a gun was all about the killing. And despite recent evidence to the contrary, she knew her bloodthirsty craving for revenge was not who she really was. Before she was kidnapped, she’d never in a million years have thought about taking a life. She was a doctor. She saved lives. Wanting to kill her attacker the other day weighed heavily on her mind. That she’d very nearly done it . . . well, it was a side of herself that horrified her. The fact that she’d thought it was Gregg, that she’d deliberately set out to see him dead, horrified her even more. What if she’d actually succeeded? She’d have killed the very man trying to protect her. The thought was so horrendous she didn’t even want to contemplate it.
