Something inside her was screaming, and could not stop.
That was how Connor’s two brothers and his friend Seth found them. They glided like silent shadows into the room and looked around, speechless at the carnage. They pried Connor’s arms away from her and draped her in a man’s leather jacket, still radiating heat. Connor pulled her into his arms again. She huddled there with her eyes shut.
The lights came on, the room filled with people, noise, a hum of activity. She could’ve cared less. Connor carried her out of the place.
She was turning inward, coiling up tight in total silence. Bright lights, the sting of a needle. A wailing siren. Then nothing.
Chapter
26
Connor parked the car, killed the engine, and sat there aching for a cigarette. There was no good reason not to just go buy himself some tobacco and some rolling papers. He’d given them up to please Erin, but he wasn’t her boyfriend or her husband, or even her bodyguard, so what the hell? He wasn’t her anything. Damn. That called for a smoke.
But he couldn’t, as if that promise were the last tenuous bond he had left with her. Lighting up a cigarette would be admitting that he was never going to have her. He couldn’t face that. Not quite yet.
Erin hadn’t made a move toward him since the bloodbath, over a week ago. She’d dumped him very definitively before that, so he figured the ball was in her court. But he wasn’t going to be able to wait much longer. Carrying an engagement ring around was wearing down his nerves. He felt like he had a bomb ticking in his pants pocket.
He got out of the car, rubbing the muscle in his thigh that cramped whenever he was stressed, which was pretty much all the time these days. He gazed up at the grim bulk of the state prison. The place made him tense, in much the same way that hospitals did. He guessed that was probably the whole point.
It was a long, tedious wait. He’d stuck a few scraps of paper into his pocket to fold into origami animals, a vain effort to keep his mind too busy to dwell on the dumb-ass thing he was doing. How much false, useless hope he might be pinning on it.
Finally his name was called. He had a sickly, nervous feeling in his stomach, almost like he was going to see a doctor or a dentist.
He met Ed Riggs’s dark eyes through the heavy panes of glass. He was limping more than usual. He forced himself to walk more smoothly.
Erin had gotten her wide-set brown eyes from him. Weird, to see those eyes, so similar and yet so different on Ed’s stone-hard face. Riggs picked up his phone and waited.
Connor picked up on his side. “Hi, Riggs.”
Riggs’s gaze was grim. “McCloud.”
There were many ways to approach it. All of them sounded stupid.
Riggs grunted impatiently. “They don’t give you much time, so if you’ve got something to say to me, spit it out.”
He took a deep breath. “I’m going to ask Erin to marry me.”
Riggs’s eyes went blank. He stared through the glass at the younger man. “Why are you telling me this?” he asked slowly.
There it was. The million-dollar question. He’d been trying to answer it for himself for days, ever since the marching orders to go talk to Riggs had come over him. “I’m not sure,” he admitted. “To clear the air, I guess. You’re her father. I wanted you to hear it from me.”
Riggs let out a bark of bitter laughter. “Man to man, huh? Are you here to ask for my permission?”
Anger twisted and burned, the sour, familiar pain of betrayal corroding his gut. He breathed it out and let it go. “I don’t need your goddamn permission,” he said. “And neither does she.”
Riggs shook his head. “You self-righteous son of a bitch. You always did piss me off.”
Connor shrugged. “There’s a limited amount of pissing off that I can do to you through a telephone and bullet-proof glass. Look on the bright side. You’re never going to have to drink beer and talk football with me over the barbecue.”
Riggs’s mouth twitched. “Fuck you, McCloud.”
“Fuck you, too, Riggs,” he replied.
They were silent, eyes locked. Seconds ticked by. Riggs’s eyes flicked away. His shoulders slumped. “Barbara was in here last week. She told me what happened. What you did for Erin and Cindy.”
Connor waited. Riggs leaned his face in his hands. When he looked up, the frustration of a trapped animal burned in his eyes. “Damn it, McCloud, what do you want? You want me to thank you? You want an apology? Forget it. This place is punishment enough.”
“No, I don’t want that,” Connor said.
“I couldn’t protect them, but you can, is that what you’re here to tell me? You want to puff out your chest and gloat? Go ahead. Yay for you, asshole. You did good. You win. You get the grand prize.”
“That’s what I’m hoping for,” he said.
Riggs’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, yeah? You think you deserve her, because of this? You think you’ve earned her? You think—”
“No,” he cut in. “Erin decides. What I deserve or don’t deserve doesn’t mean shit.”
“Then what the fuck are you doing here?” Riggs hissed.
Connor looked away from him. “I was hoping you would wish me luck,” he said quietly.
He braced himself for a vicious retort. Silence greeted his words.
When he raised his eyes again, the flush of anger was gone from Riggs’s face. It was bleak and gray under the fluorescent light. “You are so fucking strange,” he said heavily. “I always thought so.”
Connor lifted his shoulders. “I know. But what can you do.”
“You ask a lot.”
“You owe me a lot,” Connor said. “And I really want this.”
Riggs’s mouth flattened, like he was tasting something bitter. “Oh, what the hell,” he muttered. “Good luck, then. For what it’s worth.”
Connor let out a long, shaky breath. “Uh…thanks.”
“Don’t thank me yet,” Riggs warned. “Consider the source. Good luck from me might be a curse.”
“I’ll risk it,” Connor said.
“Time’s up,” said a disembodied voice over a ceiling intercom.
He nodded at Riggs and put down his phone. Riggs gestured for him to pick it up again. Connor put it back to his ear. “What?”
“You keep protecting her, McCloud,” Riggs said. “You take good care of her.”
“Hell, yes. If she’ll let me,” he promised. “I was born for it.”
Riggs let the phone drop. He got up, turned, and marched away.
The apartment looked even more forlorn now that the pictures and hangings she’d used to cover the stains in the wall were packed away. Miles ducked into the door and headed for the standing mirror.
“Be careful, please,” she begged. “It’s extremely old.”
“I’m always careful,” he assured her. He wiped the sweat off his forehead, grabbed the mirror, and galumphed out the door.
Her mother bustled in. “That’s all that will fit in the van for now, hon. A couple more armfuls of clothes, and you’re out of this place.”
Erin tried to smile. “Cindy’s still guarding the van?”
“Yes. Let’s take down this load, and then we’ll go grab a bite.”
“I’m not hungry, Mom. I’ll just do some last-minute cleaning.”
“Cleaning? This place is cleaner than it deserves to be, honey! If you clean it any more, it’ll disintegrate into grit!”
“I just need some quiet time,” Erin insisted. “Don’t worry.”
Her mother saw the steely look on Erin’s face, and pressed her lips together. “Whatever.” She yanked an armful of plastic-wrapped clothes out of the closet and marched out the door, her back stiff.
Erin stood in the middle of the apartment. Her legs trembled from all those trips up and down the six flights of stairs. The elevator, of course, was still broken. Soon that would no longer be her problem.
Her real problem was that something inside her felt broken, too.
She sank down onto the floor in the middle of the room and hugged herself, shivering. It was a warm day, she was sweating, but she still felt cold when she thought of what had happened. Even though Connor had saved her. Disaster had been averted. She hadn’t been hurt, and yet she was bleeding inside.
And Connor had not called.
God. What did she expect? What did she want from the guy, anyway? He’d tried so hard to protect her. She had fought him, and undermined him, and finally turned against him, along with the rest of the world. She wouldn’t blame him if he never wanted to see her again. He must be disgusted with her. She was disgusted with herself.
And yet, he’d risked his life for her. He had carried her out of that charnel house in his arms. And then he had melted away like fog.
The first few days after Mom brought her home from the hospital, she’d barely cared if she lived or died. She was frozen stiff. She had no feelings at all. She just lay in her bed and stared at the wallpaper until Cindy and her mother were frantic. She didn’t care. It was their turn to chew their nails, to tear out their hair, to be the grown-ups. Let them sweat.
Then one day, she’d been lying on her stomach, hand dangling to the floor, and her fingers had brushed over a scrap of folded paper.
Connor’s origami unicorn.
Feelings had roared through the ruined landscape of her heart, and she’d remembered. She had realized what had been taken from her. That magical night of perfect trust and love. Her gallant knight errant, tender and passionate and brave. It had cracked her wide open.
She pressed her hand against her belly and stared at the scarred linoleum. The memory of that night with him still stabbed like a knife.
It hadn’t gotten any better in a week of endless days and sleepless nights, but every time she picked up the phone to call him, she stopped. She had so little to offer him. Just herself, and she felt so small right now. Such a sorry prize. And if he rejected her, that would be it. She would shrivel up like a dead flower and crumble into dust.
Not knowing was preferable to dreadful certainty. Every day, she dropped the phone back into the cradle, and she thought, tomorrow. Tomorrow I’ll have more nerve.
Well, there were no tomorrows left. She had to call him today. Her contingency plan was ready. If he said no, she would leave tomorrow. Her friend Sasha lived in a group house in Portland that had a free bedroom. Just like her college days. It would be a step backwards in time, but it was all she could afford, and the noise and bustle of a house full of busy young women would be good for her. She could temp in Portland while she sent out resumes. There was nothing holding her in the Northwest now, if…if the answer to the big question was no. Mom was working, and loving it. Miles was tutoring Cindy through summer school. They didn’t need her to take care of them, and lucky for them, because she was all tapped out. She would be lucky if she managed to take care of herself.
“Honey? I decided to get one last load. Let’s go down together.”
Erin smiled up at her mother’s anxious face and scrambled to her feet. She grabbed the final armful of clothes from the closet and followed Barbara down the stairs. She kicked the lobby door open.
She stopped, as if she’d been turned to stone.
Connor was lounging against his car. His long, rangy body was dressed in battered khaki cargo pants and an olive drab T-shirt. His hair was loose, blowing around his shoulders. His face was grim. Wary.
Plastic-wrapped clothing slid out of her arms and scattered every which way over the steps.
“Well!” Mom said. “You took your own sweet time showing up!”
Cindy gave her mother a horrified look and scrambled to gather up Erin’s fallen clothes. “Mom! Don’t make it worse!”
“Worse? How could it possibly be worse? Stabbing villains to death? Gouts of blood? Threats of rape, torture, and murder? She can’t sleep, she won’t eat! Don’t talk to me about worse!”
Connor’s face softened. He almost smiled. “Nice to see you again, too, Barbara.”
“Don’t you get smart with me, Connor McCloud. I am very annoyed with you, and I’ve had a bad week.”
“Me, too,” he admitted. He turned his gaze up to Erin.
Her mother flung the clothes into the van. Erin was still transfixed. The silence dragged on. It reached deafening proportions.
“Hi, Erin,” he said gently.
The simple, innocuous words released a tide of emotion. It swept over her, made her body quake and shudder. “Hi,” she whispered.
Connor glanced over at Barbara, Miles, and Cindy. “I was hoping to get Erin to go for a ride with me,” he said. “You all mind?”
“Ask her, not us.” Barbara jerked her chin in Erin’s direction. “She’s the one who’s been holding her breath for a week.”
“Mom!” Cindy moaned. “Stop! You’ll ruin it!”
Connor looked at Erin. “Erin? Will you come for a ride with me?”
Somehow, she unlocked her muscles enough to nod.
“We’ll get out of your hair, then,” Mom said. “I’m sure you have a lot to talk about. Connor, she hasn’t eaten yet. See to it that she does.”
Cindy shot her a hopeful thumbs-up as she slid the van door shut. Miles folded his impossibly long self into the passenger seat. Barbara yanked the driver’s side door open, and hesitated.
She stalked over to Connor, grabbed him around the waist, and gave him a fierce, stiff hug. Then she took a step back and swatted him on the chest, hard enough to make him wince and leap back.
“Ouch!” He rubbed the spot, indignant. “What the hell?”
She made a frustrated sound.
Connor leaped between her and his car and held out his arms protectively. “Don’t you dare touch my car, Barbara. I love this car.”
“Idiot,” she muttered. She glanced at Erin as she hurried to the van. “Call me,” she said. “Don’t make me worry, whatever you end up doing. I just can’t handle it right now.”
“OK,” Erin said faintly.
They waited until the van turned the corner and was lost to sight.
Connor rubbed his chest. “I’m going to have a bruise. Christ. That woman is dangerous.”
“Mom’s dealing with a lot of conflicted emotions right now.”
“Huh. Aren’t we all,” he grumbled. “As long as she doesn’t come to terms with them using a tire iron, we’ll be fine.”
It was time to move her legs, but if she bent them, the starch might just go right out of her, and she would fall flat on her face.
Which, now that she thought of it, was exactly where she’d been for the past week. She unlocked her knees, a smidgen at a time. She took a step, then another. She made it to the car without falling.
He held open the car door for her like a perfect gentleman. Not sweeping her into his arms or covering her with kisses or anything great and reassuring like that. No, he politely opened the door for her as if she were his eighty-year-old maiden aunt.
She slid into the car with a murmur of thanks.
Connor drove the car, and she searched through the database of her mind for one of the zillion prepared speeches she had made. They were nowhere to be found. She could only stare at his chiseled profile, at the beautiful line of his jaw. Scratches and bruises were still fading on his face. She wanted to kiss every last one of them.
“Looks like you were moving,” he said.
His voice was so neutral. She could deduce nothing from it. “Yes,” she said. “I’m putting most of my stuff in Mom’s attic. Just taking a couple of suitcases with me.”
“Where are you headed?”
She echoed his casual tone. “Portland, to start with. A friend of mine lives in a group house there. I figured I’d temp while I send my resume around, see who bites. Just for a change of air. It’ll be fun to live with girlfriends again.”
“A change of air,” he repeated.
“Yeah, it’s time,” she faltered. “I have to get going on my career. Cindy and Mom are going to be fine no
w, so I’m free to…to—”
“Free to go,” he finished. “Good thing I came by when I did. I might have missed you completely.”
“Oh, no,” she said hastily. “I meant to call you before I left.”
“Just to say good-bye.” His voice was hard.
He parked the car in front of a white two-story house with a deep, wraparound porch surrounded by rosebushes and hydrangeas.
“Where are we?” she asked.
He looked at her silently for a long moment. “This is my house.”
Her gaze skittered away from his. “Oh. It’s, ah, very nice.”
“Come on up,” he said.
She followed him up the walk through a green, lush lawn and peeked around herself as she followed him in.
The place was simple and tidy. Starkly furnished, but with warm colors. Parquet floors, a rust-colored rug in front of a navy blue couch. A fireplace. State-of-the-art speakers and sound system. A few carefully placed pictures on the walls, mostly charcoal landscapes.
“Come on into the kitchen,” he invited her. “Your mom said you hadn’t eaten. Can I fix you some lunch?”
“No, thank you,” she said.
“A drink, then? I’ve got cold beer in the fridge. Or iced tea.”
“A beer would be fine,” she said.
Connor pulled two long-necked bottles out of the refrigerator. He popped them open with his key chain, grabbed her a glass from the drain board. He pulled out a chair for her. For the first time, she saw past her own anxiety and noticed that his face looked strained.
He sat down across from her. “Why didn’t you call me, Erin?”
The question lay between them, heavy and important. She poured out a glassful of beer, stared into it, and told him the simple truth. “I felt too awful,” she said. “About not believing you.”
“Don’t feel bad about that,” he said. “I wouldn’t have believed me either. No one would have. It was so bizarre, I barely believed myself.”
Standing in the Shadows Page 44
