The Rogue

by Lindsay McKenna

  Usually her work relaxed her, but this morning the silence between her and Killian was terribly strained, and she had no idea how to lessen it. She glanced over at Killian, who worked in a crouch, pulling weeds, his face set. Every once in a while, she could feel him surveying the area, his guarded watchfulness evident.

  Susannah took off her hat, wiped her damp brow with the back of her hand and walked toward the house. She wanted to speak to him, but she felt that cold wall around him warning her to leave him alone.

  Entering the kitchen, Susannah realized just how lonely was the world Killian lived in. It was sheer agony for him to talk. Each conversation was like pulling teeth—painful and nerve-racking. Tossing her straw hat on the table, Susannah poured two tall, icy glasses of lemonade.

  Killian entered silently, catching her off guard. Susannah's heart hammered briefly. His face was glistening with sweat, but his mouth was no longer pursed, she noted, and his eyes looked lighter—almost happy, if she was reading him accurately.

  "Come on, sit down. You've earned a rest," she said.

  The lemonade disappeared in a hurry as he gulped it down and nodded his thanks.

  "More?"

  "Please." Killian sat at the table, his hands folded on top of it, watching Susannah move with her incredible natural grace.

  With another nod of appreciation, he took the newly filled glass but this time didn't gulp it down. He glanced at his watch. "I hadn't realized two hours had gone by."

  Susannah smiled tentatively. Casting about for some safe topic, she waved at the colorful pictures on the kitchen walls. "My most recent class did these. Some of the kids are mentally retarded, others have had deformities since birth. They range in intellectual age from about six to twelve. I love drawing them out of their shells." And then, deliberately holding his gaze, she added, "They find happiness by making the most of what they have." Susannah pointed again to the tempera paintings that she'd had framed. "I keep these because they're before-and-after drawings," she confided warmly.

  "Oh?"

  "The paintings on this wall were done when the children first came to class in September. The paintings on the right were done just before school was out in June. Take a look."

  Killian rose and went over to the paintings, his glass of lemonade in hand. One child's first painting was dark and shadowy—the one done nine months later was bright and sunny in comparison. Another painting had a boy in a wheelchair looking glum. In the next, he was smiling and waving to the birds overhead. Killian glanced at Susannah over his shoulder. "Telling, aren't they?"

  "Very."

  He studied the others in silence. Finally he turned around, came back to the table and sat down. "You must have the patience of Job."

  With a little laugh, Susannah shook her head. "For me, it's a wonderful experience watching these kids open up and discover happiness—some of them for the first time in their lives." Her voice took on more feeling. "Just watching them blossom, learn to trust, to explore, means everything to me. It's a real privilege for me."

  "I guess some people pursue happiness and others create it. I envy those kids." Killian swallowed convulsively, feeling uncomfortably as if her sparkling eyes were melting his hardened heart—and his hardened view of the world. Her lower lip trembled under the intensity of his stare, and the overwhelming need to reach over, to pull Susannah to his chest and kiss her until she molded to him with desire, nearly unstrung his considerable control. If he stayed at the table, he'd touch her. He'd kiss the hell out of her.

  Susannah wanted Sean to get used to the idea that he, too, could have happiness. "You know, what we did out there this morning made you happy. I could see it in your eyes. Your face is relaxed. Isn't that something?"

  Leaving her side abruptly, Killian placed his empty glass on the counter, a little more loudly than necessary. "What's next? What do you want me to do?"

  Shocked, Susannah watched the hardness come back into Killian's features. She'd pushed him too far. "I. . . Well, the screen in my bedroom could be fixed. . . ." she said hesitantly.

  "Then what?" A kind of desperation ate at Killian. He didn't dare stay in such close proximity to Susannah. The more she revealed of herself, the more she trusted him with her intimate thoughts and feelings, the more she threatened his much-needed defenses. Dammit, she trusted too easily!

  "Then lunch. I was going to make us lunch, and then I thought we'd pick the early snow peas and freeze them this afternoon," she said.

  "Fine."

  Blinking, Susannah watched Killian stalk out of the kitchen. The tension was back in him; he was like a trap that begged to be sprung. Shakily she drew in a breath, all too clearly recognizing that the unbidden hunger in his eyes was aimed directly at her. Suddenly she felt like an animal in a hunter's sights.

  Chapter Six

  "Look out!" Killian's shriek careened around the darkened bedroom. He jerked himself upright, his hand automatically moving for the pistol. Cool metal met his hot, sweaty fingers. Shadows from the past danced around him. His breathing was ragged and chaotic. The roar of rifles and the blast of mortars flashed in front of his wide, glazed eyes as he sat rigidly in bed. A hoarse cry, almost a sob, tore from his contorted lips.

  He made a muffled sound of disgust. With the back of his hand, Killian wiped his eyes clear of tears. Where was he? What room? What country? Peru? Algeria? Laos? Where?

  His chest rising and falling rapidly, Killian narrowed his eyes as he swung his gaze around the quiet room. It took precious seconds for him to realize that he was here, in Kentucky. Cursing softly, he leaped out of bed, his pajama bottoms damp with sweat and clinging to his taut body. Shaking. He was shaking. It was nothing new. Often he would shake for a good hour after coming awake. More important, the nightmare hadn't insidiously kept control of him after waking. The flashbacks frightened him for Susannah's sake.

  Laying the pistol down, Killian rubbed his face savagely, trying to force the remnants of the nightmare away. What he needed to shock him back into the present was a brutally cold shower. That and a fortifying cup of coffee. Forcing himself to move on wobbly legs, he made it to the bathroom. Fumbling for the shower faucet, he found it and turned it on full-force.

  Later, he padded down the darkened hall in his damp, bare feet, a white towel draped low around his hips. His watch read 3:00 a.m.—the same time he usually had the nightmares. Shoving damp strands of hair off his brow, he rounded the corner. Shock riveted him to the spot.

  "I thought you might like some coffee," Susannah whispered unsteadily. She was standing near the counter in a long white cotton nightgown. Her hands were clasped in front of her. "That and some company?"

  Rubbing his mouth with the back of his hand, Killian stood tautly, his heightened senses reeling with impact. Moonlight lovingly caressed Susannah, the luminescence outlining her slender shape through her thin cotton gown. The lace around the gown's boat neck emphasized her collarbones and her slender neck. He gulped and allowed his hand to fall back to his side. Susannah's face looked sleepy, her eyes dreamy with a softness that aroused a longing in him to bury himself in her, hotly, deeply. She remained perfectly still as he devoured her with his starving gaze.

  There was fear in her eyes, mixed with desire and longing. Killian not only saw it in the nuances of her fleeting expression, but sensed it, as well. Like a wolf too long without a mate, he ached to claim her as his own. And then, abruptly he laughed at himself. Who was he kidding? She was all the things he was not. She had hope. She believed in a future filled with dreams. Hell, she gave handicapped children back the chance to dream.

  "It's not a good time to be around me," he rasped.

  Inhaling shakily, Susannah nodded. "It's a chance I'll take." Never had she seen a man of such power, intensity and beauty as Killian. He stood in the kitchen doorway, the towel draped casually across his lean hips, accentuating his near nakedness.

  Killian's shoulders were proudly thrown back, and his muscles were cleanly delineated. Hi
s chest was covered with hair that headed like an arrow down his long torso and flat belly. The dark line of hair disappeared beneath the stark whiteness of the towel, but still, little was left to the imagination. Susannah gulped convulsively.

  Susannah's skin tingled where his hungry gaze had swept across her. Trying to steady her desire for him, she noticed that her hands shook as she turned to put the coffee into the pot.

  It had taken everything for Susannah to tear her gaze from his overwhelming masculine image. "I—I heard you scream. At first I thought it was a nightmare I was having, and then I realized it wasn't me screaming. It was you."

  Killian remained frozen in the doorway. The husky softness of Susannah's voice began to dissolve some of the terror that seemed to twist within him like a living being.

  She shrugged. "I didn't know what to do."

  "You did the right thing," he said raggedly. He forced himself to move toward the table. Gripping the chair, he sat down, afraid he might fall down if he didn't. His knees were still weak from the virulent nightmare. He looked up at Susannah. "Didn't I tell you that I wasn't worth the risk? Look at you. You're shaking." And she was. He wanted desperately to reassure her somehow, but he couldn't.

  Rubbing her arms, Susannah nodded. "I'll be okay."

  Killian felt like hell. He'd scared her, triggered the fear she'd barely survived months ago, and he knew it. "I walk around in a living death every day of my life. You don't deserve to be around it—or me."

  The sweat glistening on Killian's taut muscles spoke to her of the hell he was still caught up in. Susannah forced herself to move through her fear and cross to his side. She reached out and gently laid her hands on his shoulders.

  Killian groaned. Her touch was so warm, so steadying.

  "Just sit there," she whispered in a strained tone. "Let me work the knots out of your shoulders. You're so tense."

  He opened his mouth to protest, but the kneading quality of her strong, slender hands as they worked his aching muscles stopped him. Instead of speaking, he closed his eyes and gradually began to relax. With each sliding, coaxing movement of her fingers along his skin, a little more of the fear he carried with him dissolved. Eventually he allowed himself to sag against the chair.

  "Lean on me," Susannah coaxed. She pressed her hand to his sweaty brow and guided his head against her.

  How easy it was to have his head cushioned against her as her hands moved with confidence on his shoulders and neck. A ragged sigh issued from him, and he- closed his eyes, trusting her completely.

  "Good," she crooned softly, watching his short, spiky lashes droop closed. Even his mouth, once a harsh line holding back a deluge of emotions, gradually relaxed.

  Susannah felt the steel-cable strength of his muscles beneath her hands. He was built like a cougar— lean and lithe. Her feelings were alive, bright and clamoring not only for acknowledgment, but for action. The thrill of touching Killian, of having him trust her this much, was dizzying and inviting. Susannah ached to lean forward and place a soft kiss on his furrowed brow. How much pain did this man carry within him?

  As she stood in the moonlit kitchen with him, massaging his terror and tension away, Susannah realized that Killian's life must have been one of unending violence.

  "Two years ago," she said unsteadily as she smoothed away the last of the rigidity from his now- supple muscles, "I had a little boy, Stevey, in my class.

  He was mentally retarded and had been taken from his home by Social Services. He was only eight years old, and he was like a frightened little animal. The social worker told me that his father was an alcoholic and his mother was on drugs. They both beat up on him."

  Killian's eyes snapped open.

  "I'm telling you this for a reason," Susannah whispered, her hands stilling on his shoulders. "At first, Stevey would only crawl into a corner and hide. Gradually I earned his trust, and then I got him to draw. The pictures told me so much about what he'd endured, what he'd suffered through, alone and unprotected. There wasn't a day that went by that I didn't cry for him.

  "Stevey taught me more about trust and love than any other person in my life ever has. Gradually, throughout the year that he was in my class, he came to life. He truly blossomed, and it was so breathtaking. He learned to smile, then to laugh. His new foster parents love him deeply, and that helped bring him out of the terror and humiliation he'd endured.

  "I saw this frightened, beaten child have enough blind faith in another human being to rally and reach out just once more. Stevey had a kind of courage that I feel is the rarest kind in the world, and the hardest to acquire." Susannah reached out and stroked Killian's damp hair. "Stevey knew only violence, broken trust and heartache. But something in him—his spirit, if you will—had the strength to work through all of that and embrace others who truly loved him and accepted him for who he was."

  Killian released a shaky breath, wildly aware of Susannah's trembling fingers lightly caressing his hair.

  Did she realize what she was doing? Did she know that if she kept it up he'd take her hard and fast, burying himself in her hot depths? Longing warred with control. He eased out of her hands and sat up.

  "Why don't you get us that coffee?" he said. His voice was none too steady, and it had a sandpaper rasp. Glancing up as Susannah walked past him, he saw her face. How could she look so damned angelic when all he felt was his blood pounding like a dam ready to burst?

  Miraculously, the nightmare and its contents had disappeared beneath Susannah's gentle, questing hands. Killian's eyes slitted as he studied her at the counter, where she was pouring the coffee. What was it about her? Grateful that she wasn't looking at him, Killian struggled to get his raging need back under control. Usually he had no problem disconnecting himself from his volcanic emotions, but Susannah aroused him to a white heat of desire.

  With trembling hands, Susannah set the coffee before Killian, sharply conscious of his perusal of her. His words, his warning, kept thrumming through her. She felt danger and intensity surrounding them. Did she have the courage to stay? To be there for Killian? Forcing herself to look up, she met and held his blue gaze, a gaze that was hooded with some unknown emotion that seemed to melt her inwardly.

  Gulping, she sat down at his elbow, determined not to allow him to scare her away. Right now, her heart counseled her, he needed a friend, someone he could talk with.

  Killian sat there thunderstruck. Susannah couldn't be this naive—she must realize how he wanted her. Yet she sat down next to him, her face filled with determination as she sipped her steaming coffee. Angry, and feeling at war within himself, he snapped irritably, "Why don't you go back to bed?"

  "Because you need me here."

  His eyes widened enormously.

  Prepared to risk everything, Susannah met and held his incredulous gaze. "You need a friend, Sean."

  His fingers gripped his cup, and he stared down at the black contents. "Talking is the last thing I want to do right now."

  She tried to absorb his brutal, angry words. "What, then?"

  He snapped a look at her. "Get away from me, Susannah, while you can. Stop trying to get close. I'm not Stevey. I'm a grown man, with a grown man's needs. You're in danger. Stay, and I can't answer for what I might do."

  There was such anguish in his raspy words, and she felt his raw need of her. She sat up, her fingers releasing the cup. "No, you aren't like Stevey," Susannah whispered unsteadily. "But you are wounded—and in need of a safe haven."

  With a hiss, Killian jerked to his feet, the chair nearly tipping over from the swiftness of his movement. "Wounded animals can bite those who try to help them!" Breathing harshly, he walked to the other end of the kitchen. "Dammit, Susannah, stay away from me. You've already been hurt by a man who nearly killed you." He struck his chest. "I can hurt you in so many different ways. Is that what you want? Do you want me to take you, to bury myself in you, to make night and day merge into one until you don't know anything except me, my arms, my body and—"


  With a muffled sound, Killian spun around, jerked open the screen door and disappeared into the night. If he didn't go, he was going to take Susannah right there on the hard wooden floor. The primal blood was racing through him, blotting out reason, disintegrating his control. As he stalked off the porch, he knew she was an innocent in this. She was the kind of woman he'd always dreamed of—but then, dreams never could stand the test of harsh daylight.

  Who was he kidding? Killian walked swiftly, his feet and ankles soon soaked from the trail he made through the dewygrass. Moonlight shifted across him in unending patterns as he continued his blind walk through the orchard. He had to protect Susannah from himself—at all costs. She didn't deserve to get tangled up with his kind. It could only end in disaster.

  Gradually he slowed his pace as his head began to clear. The night was cool, but not chilly. He realized with disgust that he'd left without his weapon, and that he'd left Susannah wide open to attack if someone was prowling around. As he halted and swiftly shifted his awareness to more external things, he acknowledged that, although unarmed, he was never defenseless. No, he'd been taught to kill a hundred different ways without need of any kind of weapon.

  He stood in the middle of the orchard, scowling. Bats dipped here and there, chasing after choice insects that he couldn't see. The old homestead was a quarter of a mile away, looking broken down and in dire need of paint, and also the love and care it would take to put it back in good repair. Killian laughed harshly. Wasn't he just like that old house? The only difference was that the scars he wore were mostly carried on the inside, where no one could see them. No one except Susannah. Why couldn't she be like everyone else and see only the tough exterior he presented to the world?

  Killian stood there a long time, mulling over the story she'd told him about the little boy named Stevey. The boy deserved Susannah's loving care. She was the right person to help coax him out of his dark shell of fear. Her words, soft and strained, floated back to him: "You are wounded—and need a safe haven."