by Gayle Wilson
That was the first time she’d seen him, and despite the wealth of interesting personalities Griff had gathered around him, her eyes had immediately been drawn to the man who had been introduced as Rafe Sinclair. They still would be, she admitted.
“Enlighten you about what I’ve learned?” he clarified.
“I’d be interested,” she said, removing a pot from the line of those hanging on the rack above the state-of-the-art stove.
“Why?”
Because I’ve always been interested in everything about you.
“Because we were friends,” she said aloud. “Because it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you. A long time since we’ve had a chance to talk.”
She walked over to fill the boiler with water at the sink and then carried it back to the stove. It took her a second or two to figure out which button controlled which burner. When she had, she looked up to find he was watching her.
“Don’t start something you aren’t willing to finish,” he said softly.
Clearly a warning to stay away from the personal. The fact that he felt compelled to warn her off both angered and embarrassed her. She could feel heated blood stain her neck.
“What is that supposed to mean?” she asked bitingly.
“That we’re going to be stuck in each other’s company for God knows how long until I get this figured out. And right now, I don’t have a clue what’s going on. I don’t have a clue who set off that blast in your office or why. I’m not completely sure anymore that it wasn’t intended to kill you.”
His voice was low and intense, just as it had been years ago when he’d talked about the responsibilities of the duty they had accepted by joining the team.
“I’m not going to let that happen, I promise you,” he went on, “but I’ll promise you this as well. Neither one of us is going to be pleased with what will happen if you start trying to catch up on old times.”
She could feel the blush spreading upward into her cheeks. What he had said was nothing less than the truth. That he had so quickly recognized what she was doing was humiliation enough. That he had called her on it was much worse.
“You’re an arrogant son of a bitch,” she said.
“That was never exactly a deterrent.”
“Rest assured, it will be now.”
“Then at least we understand each other,” he said. He held her eyes for long heartbeat before he turned on his heel and recrossed the room.
You arrogant son of a bitch, she thought again.
And he was even right about that. It never had been a deterrent.
Chapter Seven
She glanced at her watch as she set the second wineglass on the table. It had taken her a little longer than the prescribed twenty minutes to put the meal together.
Not that it was much of a meal, she conceded. She had searched the refrigerator for something to make a salad out of, but Rafe was right. Apparently it had been a while since anyone had stayed here. There was no fruit or produce in the house, other than the canned variety.
She had found rolls in the freezer, which were now browning in the oven. And she had unashamedly raided Griff’s wine rack for a nice merlot.
A jug of wine, a loaf of bread—and thou… There was still a part of that poetic equation missing. She resisted the urge to look at her watch again. She listened instead.
At some point in the dinner preparations she had become aware of the sound of the shower running upstairs. Now there was only silence. Of course, she could always do what Rafe had done yesterday and go up to check on him.
Not in this lifetime.
She stepped back to look at the place settings laid out on the small breakfast table, which sat beside one of the wide windows. As she worked, she had been aware of the breathtaking view spread out beneath it.
The beach at dusk was incredibly beautiful. As the waves rolled to shore, they displayed a dozen variations of greens and blues and browns until they foamed whitely over the dark rocks below. Almost as romantic as the poem she’d just remembered.
Don’t start something you aren’t willing to finish.
She stepped toward the table and began to gather up items. She crossed to the kitchen’s central island to put the plate, silverware, and napkin down before one of the bar stools. Then she returned to the table to pick up the other place setting.
Her eyes again found the scene below. By the time Rafe came downstairs and they finally sat down to eat, it would be fully dark. Nothing outside these windows would be visible. Surely he couldn’t question her motives then.
And what if he did? She couldn’t believe she was spending all this time worrying about where to put the damned dishes because she was afraid Rafe might think she was trying to initiate something. As if she had no more pride than to do that when he’d made it perfectly clear he wasn’t interested.
Except he hadn’t really said he wasn’t interested. He had said she shouldn’t start something she wasn’t willing to finish.
And because of that, she was acting like a sixteen-year-old virgin who’s never been alone with a man. Maybe that was the problem. She had been alone with this one. And they’d never left anything unfinished.
Nothing except the relationship, she reminded herself. This was the guy who hadn’t even bothered to phone in his goodbyes before he’d disappeared.
“Separate tables?”
She turned to find Rafe leaning against the island, an elbow propped casually beside the place setting she’d moved there. She hadn’t heard him come in. When her eyes followed the length of long, muscled legs, clad in a pair of fresh jeans, she discovered he wasn’t wearing shoes.
There was something unbelievably sexy about a man’s bare feet, she thought. Something almost vulnerable. Definitely intimate. She forced her eyes up to meet his.
“I thought that was the whole idea.”
One dark brow arched. “Whose idea about what?”
“You know. Yours about not starting anything.”
Without waiting for his response, she walked over to the stove and turned off the heat under the pasta. She lifted the pot and carried it to the sink, where she’d already placed the colander. She poured the contents of the boiler into it, breathing in the fragrant steam.
“What can I do to help?”
Not exactly the response she’d been hoping for.
“Pour the wine,” she suggested without turning.
She pretended to concentrate on the pasta, but she was aware of every move he made. Every breath he took.
And any minute now I’ll break into song.
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
Typical male question.
They had once known every inch of one another’s bodies. Every pore. Every heartbeat.
They had been both friends and lovers. Best friends and better lovers. And then…
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Typical female question.
She hated hearing it come out of her mouth, but dear God, she needed to know. Maybe then she could get on with it. Just get on with her life.
The silence lasted long enough that she finally turned to face him. Wine bottle in one hand and the corkscrew she had laid out beside it in the other, Rafe was simply standing there. Watching her.
“I deserved to know,” she said.
“Yes, you did.”
She waited, but he offered nothing more.
“And?” she prodded.
“You deserved to know, and I didn’t call you. Mea culpa.”
“That’s it? That’s all you’re going to say?”
“What could I possibly say, Elizabeth, that would matter to you after six years?”
“I don’t know,” she said, feeling her anger build.
Most of it was self-directed, but she didn’t want to examine the reality of that too closely. After all, she had plenty of anger to go around. Six long years’ worth.
“Whatever it is,” she said, “I’d still like to hear it.”
> “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for leaving or sorry because you aren’t going to tell me why you did?”
His mouth tightened. “Sorry for both, I suppose. Is that what you want to hear?”
“What I want to hear is a reason. I know it had something to do with what happened in Amsterdam. Maybe even with what you did afterward. I understood you were going to have to hunt down Jorgensen. You did that, and then—”
She was forced to stop because she had never known what came next. Rafe had recovered from his injuries. He had found and killed the man responsible for the bombing. And then he hadn’t come back. Not to the team and not to her.
Maybe he had done what she had eventually. Gone on with his life, pretending he was living. Or maybe, and this would be a much harder thing to learn, maybe he hadn’t had to pretend.
“This won’t help,” he said, his tone compassionate.
“It might,” she argued. “You said it yourself. We’re going to be stuck together for God knows how long.”
The blue eyes remained on hers for a silent eternity. The breath he took before he spoke lifted his shoulders.
With resignation? she wondered.
“I knew that nothing between us could ever be the same.”
Nothing between us could ever be the same…
“After Amsterdam?” she asked. “Because of Amsterdam?”
He nodded, his face like a mask.
“Why?”
“Because I wasn’t the same.”
She had known that. She had known that the bombing changed him. It had robbed him of his profession. It had sent him on a mission of vengeance that had occupied more than a year of his life. And it had cost him what they had once had together.
She wanted to believe that had mattered to him. That it was the loss he regretted most.
“People change,” she said. “Life changes them. Relationships adjust.”
“Or they don’t.”
“Or they don’t,” she agreed. “You never gave me a chance.”
“I didn’t mean you.”
Which meant…
“Your feelings for me changed,” she said, interpreting that the only way she could.
There was a small silence.
“I changed,” he said finally.
“Was there someone else?”
Another female question. One she hadn’t had any idea she was going to ask until the words were there, naked and exposed.
His mouth moved, the corners tilting minutely. Sickness crawled into her throat as she watched them. Then he turned and set the bottle and corkscrew down on the island.
“Enjoy your dinner.”
“You’re leaving?” she asked, her voice rising. She hated the sound of it, but that didn’t prevent her from adding, “You’re just going to walk away?”
“Again.” He added the word she hadn’t said.
“You damn coward,” she said bitterly.
He had taken the first step toward the door, but it stopped him, as she had intended it would. He looked at her over his shoulder, eyes hard and cold.
“That’s a weapon you would never have thought about using six years ago. Apparently I’m not the only one who’s changed.”
He held her eyes, giving her an opportunity for rebuttal. There was nothing she could say, of course, because he was right. The woman she had been then would never have thought about making that accusation.
“I’m sorry.”
She was. Sorry she had started this. Sorry she had revealed how much he had hurt her and how long and carefully she had nursed that pain.
He nodded again, and then he turned and crossed the room, disappearing into the darkness beyond the open doorway.
SHE HAD GONE through the motions of eating dinner after he left. She had put pasta on her plate and covered it with sauce. She had remembered to take the rolls out of the oven, although they were too hard and dark by then to be appetizing. She had even opened the wine and filled one of the glasses.
Then she had sat on the stool at the island and prodded the food on her plate with her fork. She couldn’t remember eating any of it.
All she could remember were the things they had said to one another. Things they would never have said six years ago. Things she would never have said, she amended.
She was the one who had stepped over the line. She had accused him of leaving because he was afraid. The truth was he had sought to escape questions she had no right to ask.
She lifted the wineglass whose stem her fingers had been idly playing with and found it empty. She couldn’t remember drinking from it. Not the second glass she’d poured, at any rate. Or maybe she’d never poured that second glass.
And maybe you’re too drunk to remember.
She pushed the glass away. She climbed off the stool and stood. The room swam a little before it settled into focus.
Too little food. Too little sleep. A glass of wine on an empty stomach. If she weren’t careful, she’d make a fool of herself. As if she hadn’t already.
It could have been much worse, she decided, picking up her plate and carrying it over to the sink. The rest of the pasta was still there, cold and congealed in the colander.
Screw it, she thought, setting the plate down on the counter. She’d clean up in the morning. Or if this offended Rafe’s sensibilities, he could clean up. Screw him, too.
An unfortunate choice of words, she admitted.
She turned away from the sink and surveyed the room to make sure there was nothing she needed to do down here before she climbed the stairs. As she did, she was aware of a subtle sense of disorientation.
Disbelief that she would be sleeping in the same house with Rafe Sinclair. Disbelief that it was Griff Cabot’s house they were sharing. Disbelief that they were hiding from a madman.
And surrounded with the reality of those things, all she could talk about was why he’d deserted her. That’s exactly what it had felt like, she realized. Desertion.
Except there had never been any vows or promises between them. Neither of them had felt they were free to make any. Not given the dangers inherent in what they did for the CIA.
It would almost have been easier if he had died in Amsterdam, she thought, hating herself for that admission. At least then she could have grieved. She could have believed she had mattered to him. This way…
In this way lies madness.
At some point during that terrible first year she had realized that. She had gone back to law school, taken the bar, and gotten on with her life. She had done those things because she had had no choice. Nothing had changed now. She still had no choice.
Or maybe she did. Don’t start something you aren’t willing to finish. What if she decided she was willing to finish it? She supposed that would depend on how big a glutton for punishment she really was.
She pushed away from the counter and walked across the room, turning off the overhead light when she reached the doorway. Then she stood there a moment, giving her eyes time to adjust to the sudden darkness.
As they did, she realized that she wasn’t alone. Rafe was leaning against the wall of the hallway that led from the kitchen to the front part of the house.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Waiting for you to finish up down here and come upstairs.”
Her heart rate had already begun to accelerate before she realized the reason he was waiting for her might have nothing to do with the sudden flare of hope those words had created.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because I don’t intend to let anything happen to you.”
“And you think something might happen to me here?” The tone of the question was almost derisive.
“I didn’t like leaving you alone.”
“Afraid I’ll do something rash? Don’t worry. If I were going to do that, I would have done it years ago.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Good,” she said.
She stepped through
the doorway and walked toward him. Since this had been the servants’ domain when the old house was built, the passage was narrow enough that they would be very close when she reached the spot where he was standing.
As she approached it, he straightened, she assumed to give her room to pass. Instead, his hand reached out to fasten around her upper arm.
She was so shocked by the unexpected contact that she made no attempt to pull free. Her forward progress halted as she turned her head to look at him.
“It had nothing to do with you,” he said.
His leaving. Nothing to do with you…
“I wanted you to know that,” he went on. “I changed, and because of that, nothing between us could ever be the same. I didn’t want what we had to become…something less. Not for me. And whether you believe it or not, especially not for you.”
“You just decided all that for both of us.”
She had called him an arrogant bastard. If what he’d just said was true, it was verification of exactly how arrogant.
“I wasn’t sure you’d make the right decision.”
For the first time there was a trace of amusement in his voice. She waited, his hand still around her arm, but apparently he had said all he intended.
“I wouldn’t have made that one. Not without giving it a chance. Not without giving me a chance.”
“Elizabeth—”
“Do you remember what it was like? Do you?”
“More clearly than you can imagine.”
“I don’t know. My imagination is pretty good. Of course, I don’t have to use it for that because my memory is even better. I’ve had lots of nights since you left to remember.”
What the hell is wrong with me? she thought as the silence stretched unbearably after that confession. Why can’t I just leave it alone? Leave him alone? He’s made it clear that’s what he wants, no matter how much he’s now trying to soften that rejection.
“I did warn you, you know,” he said softly.
The words made no sense in context. Before she could begin to figure out what he might mean by them, his fingers tightened around her arm, drawing her toward him.
