She didn’t want to think about how difficult the past year had been for him.
“So,” he continued, “they took Carter home with them and put him into summer session at that fancy school of his, so he could make up some of the classes he flunked in the spring. They put him back into his old life as if nothing had happened, and I knew it was a mistake.
“I tell myself I fought them as hard as I could without totally alienating them. I was afraid that if I made too big of a stink about them taking Carter home, the Barneses would pull me off Carter’s case. And I wouldn’t have minded that, if I could’ve been sure the Barneses would hire another psychiatrist and get Carter the help he needed. But I didn’t know if they’d do that. I was afraid they’d end his treatment altogether.
“That’s what I’d like to believe, Laura. I’ve tried to convince myself that was how it happened.”
“But you don’t believe it?”
“I don’t know anymore. It’s all such a jumble. I was working on dozens of cases at the time. There were tons of kids at the shelter who I thought were in much more desperate shape than Carter.
“Maybe I didn’t push his parents as hard as I should have when they took him out of the hospital. Maybe I didn’t work hard enough to convey to them how serious the situation was—I don’t know anymore. I’ve spent most of the past year trying to figure it out, and I just can’t.”
Laura picked her words carefully. “Did you ever think that you were being too hard on yourself?”
“A boy is dead,” he said, raw anguish in his words. “An innocent boy. How hard am I supposed to be on myself?”
Now Laura remembered what had happened. One day, not long after he was released from the hospital, Carter Barnes went to that expensive school of his with a revolver and started shooting. Before anyone could stop him, another boy, who just happened to get in Carter’s way that day, was dead.
The way the Barneses told the story, they had had no idea how ill their son was. They had trusted Nick to tell them, and he’d let them down. The Barneses told their story to anyone who would listen, all the while making Nick out to be the villain.
“I do recall it now,” Laura told him. “What happened to Carter?”
“He took a plea bargain. He’s in another hospital. He’ll probably be there for a long time, and that’s where he needs to be. But it shouldn’t have taken the death of another boy to get Carter into treatment.”
“What happened to you?” Laura asked softly, already knowing the basic answer.
Nick leaned forward, put his elbows on his knees, his head into his folded hands, and sighed. Finally, he looked up and told her, “I fell apart. Do you know why?”
She shook her head.
“I’d lost patients before, and it’s hell. But with them, I knew I’d done all I could to help them. I know psychiatrists can’t save everyone. I could accept that if I worked at it hard enough.
“But I’d never watched an innocent child shot down. I didn’t understand the risks at all. I never thought, in doing this job, that I’d make the kind of mistake that would cost an innocent child his life. And when I realized that, I couldn’t do the job anymore. The risks were just too high. Unfortunately, by then the job was my whole life.”
“And it was gone,” Laura said.
He nodded, a wry smile on his face. “But I can’t do it anymore.”
“So you’re going to lock yourself away in here until... what?”
He looked to the left where she sat. Over his folded hands, his eyes came up. Something flickered through them, some emotion she couldn’t name.
“Until you,” he said softly.
Inside her all her logic, all her caution, all her fears just melted away. She felt weak, a little dizzy, and this whole conversation became more important than ever before. He was more important to her than ever before.
These things she felt for him—the compassion, the concern, the admiration—had been nothing more than a front, a disguise, for the real emotion underneath.
Laura Sandoval was falling for this brokenhearted man. And it was up to her to mend his heart, because only then could she make his heart her own.
Fear came rushing back full force. This was much more than she’d bargained for. He meant more to her than her ex-fiancé ever had.
The implications were staggering. She leaned back into the cushions of the sofa and dared to look at him again.
“Surely you knew that already,” he said. “You and that little boy in there have changed me already. You’ve made it impossible for me to waste away inside these walls anymore. I don’t know if I can pick up the pieces of my life and go back to the work I used to do, but I can’t just sit here hiding from the world any longer.”
He waited. She didn’t say anything. Laura gazed at the hands clutched together in her lap and saw that they were trembling. Her heart, if it had been hooked up to a cardiac monitor, would have been dancing off the charts. And when she glanced around too quickly, she found that the room wasn’t quite steady.
His gaze was, and it seemed to bore right through her.
“You’re going to have to help me here,” he said.
She had to fight to clear her throat enough to be able to ask, “How?”
“How do you thank someone for saving your life?”
“I don’t...”
“Because that’s what you did.”
He was more certain of himself than she’d ever seen him.
“I couldn’t go on living the way I have these past months. I sank so low I didn’t think anyone could have pulled me out. I didn’t want to come out, Laura.”
“We...we just needed help, and you were there.”
“There’s a lot more to it than that. You wouldn’t take no for an answer.”
“It’s a bad habit of mine.” She found the strength to smile then.
“No, it’s not,” he said. “It’s not a bad habit at all.”
Laura thought that was one of the nicest things a man had ever said to her.
Nick took a strand of her hair between his fingertips and rubbed it around. She stiffened in surprise, and he pulled his hand away.
“So. tell me something. Do you think you could still stand to have me touch you? Now that you’ve heard the whole sordid story?”
“It wasn’t that,” she insisted. She was thinking of his very good friend, A.J., the other woman who refused to give up on him.
“Liar,” he said.
Laura decided her best bet was to go back to the subject at hand because she wasn’t ready to deal with this other woman in his life right now. Everything inside her was still too new, too raw in its intensity. “I don’t think it was your fault, Nick. Do you?”
He shook his head noncommittally. “The dead boy’s parents do.”
“I’m sure they got the Barneses’ version of the facts, not yours.”
“Hell, everybody in Chicago got the Barneses’ version of the facts. Nobody heard mine. Nobody cared. After the Barneses stood with a camera and a microphone in their faces for two months straight, never once closing their mouths, nobody cared what I had to say.”
Laura observed him. She didn’t see a neglectful man or a reckless one, and certainly not an unfeeling one.
“I care,” she said. Even if he was in love with another woman.
“Laura...” Once again he stroked her hair, teasing the ends, then taking it in his hands and holding on. “I don’t deserve that. I don’t deserve you.”
“You don’t deserve what happened to you last year.”
“I wish to God I believed that.”
“I think you do, deep down. If not now, you will someday soon.”
“I hope so.” He still held on to her hair, smoothing it down now. “If you and Rico hadn’t come along when you did, I don’t know what I would have done with myself. I don’t know what I’m going to do with you right now.”
She laid her cheek against the palm of his hand and had to remind herself to b
reathe. She thought of all the things that had happened today, of the incredibly small amount of time she’d known this man, of all that could happen in the next day or the one after it.
With the feel of his hand on her cheek, she thought of all the moments they had between now and the time the sun came up. She didn’t want to waste one. She didn’t want Nick to retreat inside that shell of his in the broad light of day and dismiss all that had happened on this night.
He would likely start rebuilding that wall of his in the morning. She knew how to tear it down before he ever got started. She wanted to spend the night with him, drawing him closer to her, pulling him back toward life until he couldn’t bear to withdraw from it or from her.
She couldn’t help herself anymore. She was a fighter, and she was going to battle for him.
Somehow she found her voice and asked, “What do you want to do?”
For a moment, he looked as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.
“If you could do anything you wanted,” she suggested, “right now, what would it be?”
“I want to forget everything that’s happened, for just a little while.”
His palm stayed against the side of her face, but his thumb was wandering across her lips, the touch almost like a kiss.
Almost, but not close enough.
Laura wanted more, much more. “What else?” she prompted.
“I don’t want to do anything but feel. I want my arms around you. I want your lips and your hands and your mouth on me, and I want to be a part of you. I want to be so far inside you that I can’t figure out where my body stops and yours begins.”
Her face flamed at the graphic images that came so quickly into her mind.
“What about you, Laura. What do you want?”
She closed her eyes, yet still saw his face, still pictured his body joined with hers. “I want the same thing. I want to forget about everything and everyone but you.”
“Just for tonight.” That was all he was offering her. “You have to understand that part of it. Because I don’t have anything else to offer you right now.”
“Just for tonight,” she agreed.
Everything became so awkward then. She waited, thinking he would kiss her, that the kiss would push every other thought out of her head. But he didn’t kiss her. He just stared at her, as if he had as many doubts as she did about taking this next step.
And that left her too much time for her own doubts to take root. Maybe he didn’t really want to be with her. Maybe he wanted A.J. Maybe he wasn’t that attracted to Laura. Maybe she would regret this come morning.
“I need...” she stammered, then tried again. “I want to check on Rico, to make sure he’s settled, so we won’t ... be disturbed.”
She bolted from the sofa and walked into the bedroom, only to have Nick follow her and stop in the doorway. The room was dark, the boy snoring softly under the covers. “I guess we don’t have to worry about him.”
She turned, not knowing what else to do with herself, not knowing how to begin to seduce a man.
“Look in the top drawer in the nightstand,” Nick said.
She did, finding a small box of condoms.
“Something left behind by the man I sublet the place from,” Nick explained.
She was rattled enough that she hadn’t thought that far ahead, but she was glad he had. She managed to get one out of the box, then walk across the room and give it to him.
He took hold of her hand and wouldn’t let go, though there was nothing threatening about his grasp. “We don’t have to do this. We don’t have to do anything, unless you want to.”
“I do. I’m just ... a little nervous.”
He squeezed her hand. “I don’t make a habit of this.”
“Neither do I.”
“I know that, Laura. Everything is going to be fine, for tonight at least. Trust me on that. After that... who’s to say. Now, come into the other room and tell me what’s really bothering you.”
They walked into the living room and closed the bedroom door behind them. Nick tugged on her hand, and she followed him into the kitchen, where he opened the bottle of wine they’d discovered earlier in their search of the cabinets. She said nothing as he poured a generous serving into one glass and handed it to her, then poured another for himself.
“Well?” he said. “It’s harder when you take the time to think about it, isn’t it? It would have been much easier if we’d finished what we started on the sofa. But I want you to think about it, Laura. I want you to be sure, because I’m certain right now that you have your share of doubts.”
She thought of a number of men who would never have shown a woman this kind of consideration, and she was happy that he had.
Still, now that he’d given them this time, she couldn’t help but wonder what she was going to do if he said he was in love with another woman.
Would she still go through with this? Would she be able to make him forget about A.J.? After all, he’d said himself that A.J. was very much in love with her husband; she was expecting his child. What could be left between Nick and A.J.?
What could there be between Nick and Laura?
Laura took a sip of the wine, then another. This wasn’t going to get any easier. “About you and A.J....”
“Yes.”
“You said you weren’t alone through this whole mess, and I’m glad you weren’t, but...”
“She’s married,” he said, his feelings a closely guarded secret at that moment. “And that’s the end of it, as far as I’m concerned.”
“But you still... have feelings for her?”
He looked down at the glass of wine in his hand, as if he could find some sort of answer there. He’d been careful to point out to her that this was simply one night. And she wasn’t quite sure she could go through with that now.
“I’m sorry,” she began. “You don’t have to explain, and I shouldn’t have asked.”
“I don’t mind telling you,” he said. “I just had to think for a minute. It’s a complicated situation, and our relationship worked on a lot of different levels. For a long time, I thought I was in love with her. And I do still love her. I’m very proud of her. I’m proud of the work she’s doing and all that she’s made of her life. I think there will always be a special bond between us, but that’s the end of it”
“Oh.” Laura could live with that. And she believed what he was saying. After all, there weren’t many men who would admit to loving a woman they couldn’t have, especially not in the midst of taking another woman to bed.
If indeed he was going to take her to bed.
Laura wasn’t sure what she did, what gave her away, but he seemed to know exactly what she was thinking. He took a sip of his wine, and reminded her once again of the devil himself. And he smiled at her. She sometimes thought the world was going to tip on its axis when he smiled.
“A.J. and I never had a sexual relationship,” he said.
“Oh.” That was certainly a relief.
“We were never more than very good friends,” he added.
Which left only one basic question. “And what are you and I?”
“I hope we’re going to be lovers, Laura. How would that be? As a start?”
With a trembling hand, she set the wineglass on the counter. “We could start there.”
They began with a slow dance and a kiss. Nick found a radio station playing some old jazz and lit a few candles that now burned throughout the apartment. He poured Laura another glass of wine, then pulled her into his arms.
It felt wonderful. Danger seemed so far away.
She felt a little reckless tonight, and at the same time, she felt perfectly safe in his arms.
Laura had expected him to rush her; men always seemed to be in a rush about these things. Relieved that he wasn’t, she enjoyed his body as it brushed tantalizingly against hers while they danced in the near darkness of the kitchen.
There was something incredibly seductive about a
greeing to make love to this man, then having all this time in anticipation. His hands were warm and slow, moving across her back, down through her hair, then to her hips. They moved more and more slowly to the music, each caress of her breasts against his chest or his thighs against hers making her only want him more.
She never knew it was possible to want a man this much. She swayed closer to him, tightened her grip on his waist, pressed her cheek against his chest, all the while aching for the feel of his lips on her flesh.
“Nick?” she said finally.
“Hmm?”
He nuzzled her ear, his warm breath sending shivers down her spine. The touch had the breath rushing out of her body on a long, low sigh. Goose bumps rose on her skin, leaving her tingling all over.
“No rush, right?”
He spoke the words into her ear, an instant before his mouth settled over this mass of nerves at the side of her neck. Her knees nearly buckled, and she tightened her grip on him as his mouth moved up and down along the side of her neck.
Laura didn’t know whether to pull him closer or beg him to stop. The sensations were so intense she didn’t think she could stand it. It seemed as if every nerve ending in her body began at that spot in her neck covered by his mouth and ended in the spot at the juncture of her thighs.
One of her hands was tangled in his hair, telling him in no uncertain terms that she liked what be was doing to her neck. They’d given up all pretense of the dance and now he simply rocked his hips against hers, the pressure leaving no doubt about how aroused he was.
“Touch me,” he begged, guiding her hand between their bodies.
And then it was his turn to gasp.
“Laura,” he warned, “I haven’t done this in a very long time.”
“Neither have I.” She held him through his clothes, cupping him in her hand, wanting him more with each passing second. And she intended to make him want her just as much. “Am I doing something wrong?”
“What do you think?”
“I think you’re a tease.”
In response, he left a string of slow, soft bites down the side of her neck and across her collarbone. When his mouth passed along the scooped-out neckline of the shirt she wore, finding the curve of her breasts, he started sucking softly against them, until he’d pushed the shirt off one shoulder. His hand came under the shirt, cupping her breast and holding it up, until his mouth could reach it above the neckline of the shirt.
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