“So you’re going to pass up on what we have together, because there’s a chance it might not work out? Jocelyn, you might be missing out on a happiness that could last forever.”
“I’m not a risk taker. I do what it takes to prevent dangerous things from happening.”
“That’s a fine philosophy for your work, but not for your life. If you don’t risk the bad, you’ll never experience the really great stuff. I’ve been alone my whole life, and you’re the first person I’ve ever felt close to. I can’t let you disappear. I need you.”
She turned her back on him again. “You’re just feeling this way because of the situation. You’re feeling vulnerable, and I make you feel safe. What you feel isn’t permanent, Donovan. When Cohen is caught, you won’t need me.”
“I will need you, and it has nothing to do with Cohen. Don’t you trust me? Don’t you believe that I care for you deeply, and that I want you? Hell, Jocelyn, I’m in love with you.”
She turned to look at him, her face pale with astonishment. She sat motionless, staring at him.
“I love you,” he repeated, sliding closer and pushing a lock of hair away from her face. “I’ve never said that to anyone before. Doesn’t that count for anything?”
“Tom said those words to me, too, and my father said them to my mother.”
“I’m not Tom or your father. I’m Donovan Knight, the man who loves you and wants to spend his life with you.”
Jocelyn got off the bed like it had caught fire. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying I want you to marry me. Marry me, Jocelyn.”
Her eyes grew wide like saucers. She grabbed her head in her hands and paced to the door. “This is too sudden! You’re not being sensible. We hardly know each other.”
He tried to follow her. “That’s not true. We know each other better than some people can know each other in a lifetime. We click.”
Her face winced. She looked like she was going to cry. “Please don’t do this, Donovan. You’re pulling me in.”
“That’s my intention.”
“But I don’t want to be pulled in! I want to stay safe and be in control, at least until I can feel more sure of things.”
“Love is not a security assignment, Jocelyn. There will never be guarantees.”
“That’s what scares me.”
“But if it works out, think of how great it will be.”
“If it works out? I can’t hang my hopes or my future happiness on anything that begins with the word if.” She reached for her clothes and pulled her T-shirt over her head. “I’m sorry, Donovan, I need to be alone for a while. I’ll be in my room.”
With that, she walked out.
What just happened? Jocelyn wondered frantically as she shut her bedroom door and leaned against it. How had a simple week of pleasure gotten so out of control? And who started the heavy ball rolling? Had she encouraged Donovan subconsciously somehow? Maybe she had been dreaming a little too much about happily ever after, and she’d communicated that to him.
Or was he right? Did they click like they’d never clicked with anyone else in their lives? Was this the once-in-a-lifetime fairy tale?
Jocelyn dropped her forehead into the heels of her hands and padded to the bed. If only she had more experience with this sort of thing. She’d shied away from dating ever since things went sour with Tom, and she was way out of her league here. For all she knew, maybe all infatuations felt like this at first—a burning fire that refused to be extinguished. Maybe it was just lust. Maybe it would pass for both of them as soon as they got home.
Or maybe it wouldn’t.
She lay down on the bed she hadn’t slept on since they’d arrived. What was she going to do?
Her cell phone rang in the kitchen, and she jumped. Jocelyn hurried out of her room to answer it. “Hello?”
“Jocelyn, it’s Tess. How’s everything going?”
Jocelyn contemplated how she should answer that question. “Oh, you know, everything’s fine.”
“Yeah? You’ve been having a good time?”
Jocelyn recognized Tess’s playful, prying tone, but she wasn’t about to give her the dirty details when she didn’t even understand them herself. Tess probably wouldn’t even believe it if she told her. Yes, I’ve been having a wonderful time, and Prince Charming just proposed marriage….
“What’s up?” Jocelyn asked.
Thankfully, Tess stuck to business. “I have news. The police picked up Ben Cohen this afternoon. He’s in custody and he confessed to everything.”
“You’re kidding me.” Jocelyn sank into a chair at the table. “That didn’t take long.”
“Yeah, it’s great, isn’t it? You can come home anytime. Oh, and I tentatively booked you on a new assignment. An animal rights activist has been getting threatening letters.”
Feeling numb all of the sudden, Jocelyn sat and watched the rain slide down the windows in fast-moving rivulets. It was over. They’d caught Cohen. It was time to go home.
“Jocelyn? Are you there?”
She snapped herself back to reality. “Yeah, Tess, I’m here. That’s great. Uh…we’ll pack up and leave tonight. I’m sure the police will want to speak to Donovan first thing in the morning.”
“Yes, they did ask about that.” There was a long silence on the other end of the line. “So what do you want me to do about the animal rights activist? Do you want to take that assignment? She’s pretty anxious.”
Jocelyn continued to stare at the rain-covered window. Lightning flashed somewhere in the distance. Her heart throbbed a few times in her chest, then she took a deep breath and stood up.
“Yes. Take it, and tell her I’ll start immediately. I’ll do the advance work tomorrow.”
She flipped her phone closed, and turned around. Donovan was standing at the bottom of the stairs, staring at her, his brows drawn together with anguish and disbelief.
Jocelyn’s stomach flared with nervous knots. “I didn’t realize you were listening.”
His voice was low and controlled. “I can see that.” He slowly strode toward her. “What’s going on, Jocelyn? And why do I get the feeling that if you have it your way, after tonight I’m never going to see you again?”
Eleven
Jocelyn strode to her room to pack her things. “It won’t be like that. We’ve gotten close, Donovan. We can keep in touch.”
He followed and stood in her doorway. “The old ‘we’ll still be friends’ routine? Come on, Jocelyn.”
She opened dresser drawers and pulled out her clothes, balling them up and tossing them into her suitcase.
Donovan strode to her and took her arm. “Stop packing for a second and talk to me.”
“We can talk in the car. I want to get going because it’s a long drive and I want to get you back to your penthouse by midnight.”
“You’re just gonna drop me off and keep going?”
She paused for a moment to gaze into his eyes. “There’s no more danger. Cohen is behind bars, and there’s no point in you being charged my fees for another day.”
“Oh, so you’re doing me a favor, is that it? Saving me a few dollars? I didn’t realize I was paying for your services at night.”
Jocelyn’s mouth fell open. She supposed she deserved that, for all the pain she was inflicting upon him. All because she was afraid to take a risk.
Feeling defeated, she sat down on the edge of the bed. “Donovan, I’m sorry about this. I know I’m being a jerk.” He stood a few feet away, listening. She gazed up at him imploringly. “Maybe we could see each other but take it slow. Cool our jets and just try to bring it back a notch.”
He considered that a moment, then shook his head, his expression grim. “I don’t think I can do that. It would be hell for me. It would be like trying to swim upstream in whitewater rapids. I’m in love with you, Jocelyn. Passionately. I don’t want to be away from you. I want to come home to you every night and wake up with you every morning. Life’s too short to do it any other way.�
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Jocelyn sighed heavily and stared down at the white T-shirt she was squeezing into a ball on her lap. “I can’t be that person, Donovan. I can’t be your doting wife, who gives all of her heart to you. It would never be real. I would always be holding back and you’d know it. You deserve better. You need something better, because you’ve never had it, and I can see how much you want it. Believing that I’m the one for you…it’s just wishful thinking. You’re in love with the person I was here, but this isn’t the real me, and frankly, it’s not the real you, either. We were pretending. Pretending that life was perfect and nothing could touch us. It won’t be like that when we go back.”
For a long time, he stared at her in the lamplight, then he nodded and began to back away. “All right. I’ll go pack my things.”
He left the room. Jocelyn was shocked. Shocked by everything she had just said, and shocked that he was gone.
She continued to sit on the bed, staring after him in silence. Her eyes filled with hot, stinging tears. Her insides were churning.
She hated hurting him like this! But wasn’t it better to do it now, when it was just an infatuation, before things got truly serious?
A tear trickled down her cheek and she wiped it away. God, when was the last time she’d cried? She couldn’t remember. She’d spent her whole life trying to be tough, pushing pain away. She’d never cried when Tom left her, or when her father left. Anger and resentment had smothered any possibility of tears.
Looking back on it, she supposed she had never truly felt that Tom’s heart was involved—or her father’s, either. They’d been callous men, more concerned with appearances and what the neighbors thought than what she or anyone else was feeling.
Donovan was the opposite. He felt everything deeply, which was why he was working on a grief center for kids, because his heart was still enduring the hole left behind when his parents drove over that cliff and perished in front of his eyes. It was why he was still single. He was not cavalier about love.
Yet she had been savage toward his tender heart. What did that make her? How could she have done that? Was she really the cold, tough, unfeeling person she pretended to be? In not wanting to be like her mother, had she become like her father?
Her chest throbbed with a painful, squeezing agony. She didn’t feel like her father on the inside. She felt more like a wounded bird, who couldn’t manage to find her wings.
Yet she had found them briefly these past few days with Donovan, when she’d clutched at him and cried out his name in the darkness, or when she’d laughed with him or told him secrets about her childhood.
Was it too late for her to find her wings? Too late to believe in a love that could last forever?
She gazed up at the ceiling and heard Donovan slamming things around upstairs. She didn’t know. She just didn’t know.
After a long, silent drive back to Chicago in the pouring rain and darkness, Jocelyn escorted Donovan up to his penthouse. She did a thorough search to make sure everything was okay, then stood in his marble vestibule, preparing to say goodbye.
“So this is it,” Donovan said flatly.
She flinched at his icy tone. “Donovan, I’m sorry. I’ve accepted another assignment and—”
“You don’t have to explain. You already did that at the cabin.”
They stared at each other for a few seconds, then Donovan stuck out his hand. “It was a pleasure working with you. If you need references, I’d be happy to give them. You did an excellent job with the security.”
Feeling numb and confused, Jocelyn gazed up at his beautiful face, listened to his detached tone, and shook his hand. “Donovan…”
She didn’t know what to say! She wasn’t any good at this. She’d never been in this situation before, and she’d spent half her life struggling to keep people at a distance. He was doing the same thing to her now, and it was killing her inside.
Rising up on her toes, she leaned toward him and kissed him on the cheek. “I had a great time with you. I’ll never forget it.”
“Neither will I.” His voice told her he was shaken by the kiss. So was she.
“I should go. It’s late and we both need to catch up on some sleep.”
Donovan nodded.
She walked to the elevator and pressed the down button. With her back to him, she listened for his door closing, but it didn’t. He was still standing there, watching her. Her stomach tightened into knots, her heart racing.
Something was tugging at her. Telling her to turn around and dash into his arms, kiss him and tell him how sorry she was. Tell him that she loved him and never wanted to let him go.
But her brain wouldn’t let her. What about tomorrow, she heard herself asking, and the day after that? She couldn’t make important decisions like this on a heart-splitting impulse. She had to think about the ramifications of her actions. She needed time….
The elevator dinged and the brass doors opened smoothly. She stepped inside.
She didn’t want to turn around. She couldn’t look at his face one more time, because she might change her mind. Yet she had to turn around to press the lobby button.
Jocelyn took a deep breath and faced the front. Whatever she was afraid of was a nonissue. Donovan’s door was just clicking shut.
“I can’t believe you got on that elevator,” Tess said from her desk, tearing the paper off the bottom of her blueberry muffin. “Prince Charming wants to marry you, and you walk away.”
Back in the familiar feel of her brown pantsuit, Jocelyn stood at the filing cabinet in the reception area of her office, looking for something in the top drawer. “Life isn’t a fairy tale. It all happened too fast. People can’t make important decisions like that based on a few romantic days with their bodyguard at a lakeside retreat, when their life’s in danger.”
“He did.”
She threw Tess an impatient glare. “That doesn’t make it sensible. He would have regretted it. I did him a favor last night. He’ll realize that as soon as he gets back into his regular routine. I give each of us three days tops to forget about this. Where’s the file on limo services?”
“How can you be so sure? And what about you? Did you do yourself a favor last night, turning down a marriage proposal to the most handsome man alive, who also happens to be a rich doctor and great in bed?”
Jocelyn held up a hand. “Don’t go there. I don’t want to think about that.”
“Why not? If you don’t think about it, you’re not facing it and you’ll be living in a bubble, out of touch with reality.”
“Tess, I don’t want to—”
The phone rang. Tess picked it up. “Mackenzie Security.”
Her gaze lifted and she started pointing frantically at the phone, mouthing the words, It’s him!
There could have been a power surge in Jocelyn’s veins. She stood at the filing cabinet, panic filling every corner of her being, while she watched Tess and waited for her to say something.
Tess kept her gaze down, nodding and saying, “Certainly,” in that professional tone she had down. A few seconds later, she hung up the phone and Jocelyn’s heart broke into a thousand pieces.
“What did he want?”
Tess grimaced. “He wants me to fax him the bill instead of mailing it, so he can drop his check off today.”
A lump the size of a grapefruit was forming in Jocelyn’s throat. She couldn’t talk.
“Maybe he wants to see you, and can’t wait,” Tess offered helpfully.
Jocelyn knew better. She shook her head and went back to what she was doing. Her fingers crawled over the tops of her files. “I don’t think so. He wants to put a tidy finish on things.”
“Maybe not. Maybe he’ll show up with flowers.”
Jaded as she was, Jocelyn sighed and shook her head again, fighting off the tiny fragment of hope that, despite her attempts to crush it, still lived inside her.
That tenacious little hope languished, however, later in the day, when a check arrived by courier.<
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Jocelyn had given herself three days to get over Donovan.
Three weeks had gone by.
After finishing her assignment with the animal rights activist, she sat in her apartment eating Cheerios and watching television at ten o’clock at night. She had no work lined up for tomorrow. She’d told Tess to give her a few days off. She’d never needed time off before, but she’d never felt tired before, either.
Tired. Lord, she just wanted to crawl into her bed and lie there for a week. Everything had gotten so…busy. There was nothing to smile about. The animal rights activist treated her like she was invisible—which was nothing new. She expected and even encouraged that from her principals. But since her week with Donovan, she’d come to realize that being invisible wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. Sure it was okay on the job, but what about outside of her work? Who was she?
With Donovan, she had felt alive. She’d felt like a woman. Someone with an identity, even though she was away from everything that was a part of who she was—her apartment, her car, her office. Donovan had made her feel like she mattered in the world, even when she was naked, swimming in the lake.
What she’d had with him was the least materialistic thing she’d ever known. Yet it was the most real.
And she had walked away from it! Worse than walked away. She’d hurt him in the process, when he’d been hurt far too much in his life.
Would he ever forgive her? she wondered, longing for the bliss and tranquillity she’d felt in his arms day after day when she had been in his employ. She had thought it would fade away by now, but the hurt was only getting worse. She missed him. God, how she missed him. What a coward she had been.
She rose from the sofa to put her empty bowl in the dishwasher, then poured soap in and pressed the start button. She went to her bedroom and gazed at her empty bed, then at her treadmill and free weights, thought about what she did for a living, all the dangerous situations she’d been in. Wasn’t she supposed to be tough and strong? What had happened to her? Where was her grit?
A vision of Donovan’s beautiful face appeared in her mind, along with the memory of his kindness and tender generosity. Three weeks had gone by and she was nowhere near to being over him.
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