As if he owned the place, Badger trotted toward a hallway leading to the one-story portion of the house. The hallway itself was lined with windows on the east side, making it a virtual sunroom. He gave her a doggie smile and stretched out in a sunbeam. Give him three minutes and he’d be snoring blissfully.
Tessa let him sun himself and moved on in her search for Jonah. The first door she came to opened into a mudroom the size of Rhode Island. It connected to a four-car garage, and a flip of the light switch revealed that Jonah hadn’t denied himself a few nice toys—his Tesla, several other vehicles, half a dozen mountain bikes, and two ATVs.
Back inside, she found a game room guys of any age would kill for. A pool table, air hockey, foosball, and more classic video games than she could count. Pacman, Galaga, Donkey Kong.
Was Jonah Steele a man or a perpetual fourteen-year-old boy? Based on the things he made her feel, she’d have to come down on the side of full-grown man.
She eased open the second door off the hallway to find another large space, but this one looked like NASA Mission Control. Massive curved screens on the walls, long tables with blinking equipment, and racks filled with other bits of metal and wire. The low-level humming from the electronics was strangely calming.
But the man sitting in the middle of it all, surrounded by a wraparound workstation and cradled in some kind of high-tech recliner, did not make Tessa feel the least bit calm.
In fact, he made her restless and needy.
Jonah wore headphones that had to be noise-canceling, because he never glanced her way. His face was a study of concentration as his fingers flew around the keyboard suspended in front of him with the click, click, click of a tap dancer on fast forward.
His facial scruff was a little scruffier than normal and his brown hair stood out in little tufts here and there. The only strands under control were those mashed down by the headphones. His mouth was a solid line, and shadows lingered under his eyes. The fact that he still wore yesterday’s clothes was the final bit of evidence she needed to conclude that he hadn’t slept.
“Hey,” she said quietly.
His focus didn’t waver. He was still glaring at the monitors surrounding him.
So Tessa strolled into the room and stood between him and his view of the massive screens. She figured if it worked when she was trying to get her dad’s attention during football season, it would be effective here, too.
Jonah’s warp-speed typing came to an abrupt halt, and he jerked at his headphones, letting them drop around his neck. “What’re you doing up? You should get some sleep.”
“I got plenty, thanks.”
“You couldn’t have slept more than…” He glanced around the windowless room as if it could give him some indication of the time of day. Tessa lightly tapped on a screen that showed the current time in the upper right-hand corner.
“Seven fifty-four.”
“In the what?”
She couldn’t help but smile. When she’d been at Steele Trap, she’d noticed that he often kept unusual hours, working long into the night and coming in at three in the afternoon. “In the morning.”
“Monday?”
“Yes. Why? Have you skipped days before?”
“Yeah, I think once it was forty-two hours.” He rubbed both palms over his face, making a raspy sound that gave her a girlie ping between the legs. She pressed her thighs together, but the feeling was like an itch that shouldn’t be scratched in a public place.
And thinking about an itch like that only made you want to scratch it that much more.
Problem was, she needed Jonah for that.
His words from last night came back to her. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to keep you safe. But wanting to keep her safe and wanting her were two different things.
“You sat in a chair working on your computer for almost two days straight? How is that even humanly possible?”
“I have an exceptional ability to focus.”
“Still, it can’t be healthy.”
Suddenly, Jonah swung out of his chair. “Excuse me for a sec.” Then he loped toward a door near the back of the room. Several minutes later, Tessa heard the muted flush of a toilet and the sink water running.
When he emerged again, he was rubbing his stomach. It let out a sound that would’ve scared small children.
“You haven’t eaten either?”
“I don’t like crumbs on my keyboard.”
“C’mon.” She motioned for him to follow her. In the sunny hallway, Badger ran over to Jonah and scratched at his leg to be picked up.
Apparently, her dog had no loyalty to the kibble provider.
Without breaking stride, Jonah scooped up Badger as they headed back down the hallway to the kitchen. “I never would’ve taken you for a dog person.”
“Why not?”
“They’re…messy. And you’re so…neat.” He scratched Badger’s chest, and her dog somehow wiggled his way onto his back so Jonah was cradling him like a baby. His brown eyes were begging Jonah for a belly rub.
Pet me. Stroke me. Love me.
Geez. She and her dog both had the same man-crush. “He came to me from a dachshund rescue group, but I’m pretty sure Badger’s the one who rescued me. Sure, he sheds and poops, but when he snuggles, there’s nothing else like it in the world.” It was like having her own mini canine therapist. She couldn’t count the number of nights she wouldn’t have made it through without him. “He’s a great listener, too.” With a commanding finger, she pointed Jonah to a stool. “Sit and I’ll fix you something to eat.”
A smile touching his lips, he obeyed and let Badger hop to the ground. “My mama would like you. She’s a general, too. Little bitty thing, but she can bring her kids to their knees. In Reid’s case, that’s like chopping down an oak.”
If he was the brother she’d seen in town, she’d describe him more as a redwood.
And Jonah’s mother sounded like a woman Tessa would very much like to know. Jonah had never shared much about his family during the time they’d both been at Steele Trap, but she knew they were all successful in their own right.
With efficient movements, she moved around the kitchen—fixing coffee, checking the fridge and pantry, and pulling out everything she needed to make breakfast.
Within fifteen minutes, she was sliding a plate piled with a ham and cheese omelet, home fries, and fresh fruit in front of Jonah. He stared at it as if he’d never before been introduced to the concept of breakfast.
“What?”
“Where did you learn to cook like that? Hell, how did you learn how to chop like that? You looked like one of those ninja chefs.”
“It’s not any different from how fast you can work a keyboard. My mom taught me how to prep fast and clean as I go.” As a child, Tessa had rolled her eyes. But after the rapes, the chopping, dicing, and slicing had become a kind of therapy for her. She could control the size of the onion, bell pepper, and carrots. She could control the thickness of a slice of ham.
She couldn’t control what had happened to her.
She fixed herself a bowl of fruit and sat on the stool next to Jonah. But she wasn’t hungry for food. She wanted answers. “Tell me about Sarah’s Smile.”
“There’s not much to tell.”
“You built it and that rec center, didn’t you?”
He cut and chewed. Cut and chewed. “Tessa, we really need to talk about last night. About why someone is targeting you.”
“We will.” And they would, but he was avoiding answering her question. Why would he want to hide his involvement in the shelter? “After yesterday, you owe me some answers about the shelter.”
“What’s there to know?” He stabbed at a potato. “Those kind of places need money, and I have money, so I give it to them. Simple.”
“Why a women’s shelter?”
His attention didn’t waver from his plate. “Because they and their children are…”
“Easily victimized?” she said quietly, the
rightness of her guess settling inside her. “Are you involved with others?”
“Does it matter?”
Oh, it mattered. So much. He was standing up for and doing for those who couldn’t always stand and do for themselves.
But she didn’t want to be lumped in with those he thought couldn’t do for themselves. Yes, she needed his help now, but she didn’t like the idea that he might believe she needed his protection.
Mulling it over, Tessa absently dipped her fork into her bowl and caught Jonah staring down intently. Following his trajectory, she found that her robe had parted and was revealing a long expanse of her thigh. Her skin rippled with awareness and tiny goose bumps popped up.
She crossed her legs, which hiked her robe up to the tie belt and inched her short nightgown farther up her legs. If she revealed any more real estate, she’d be flashing him her panties.
Jonah swallowed hard and stabbed at his food without hitting a bite of it. He wanted her, but he didn’t want to want her.
Their entire problem was that too much haze and too many half-truths had always stood between them. And she’d never pushed him for more because she’d been afraid of his rejection. But she wanted a relationship with him, and if she continued to wait, it could take him millennia to come around.
Over the years, she’d been very, very careful about who she warmed up to. But no man had ever made her hot like Jonah Steele did. So she was taking off the gloves. And hopefully all her other clothes, too.
She rolled her shoulders so that her robe slipped down one arm, revealing the thin strap of her gown and the champagne-colored lace that barely covered her left breast and dipped into a deep vee. Behind the fabric, her nipple hardened to a tight point.
Jonah rubbed his hands over his cheeks, and again, the sound set off an ache between her thighs. What would he do if she told him she wanted to feel the rasp of his facial hair across her skin? Along the insides of her thighs? Against her—
Jonah grabbed the neckline of her robe and yanked it up to her shoulder, covering her exposed breast. “It’s cold,” he said gruffly and dug back into his food.
What was she going to have to do—strip naked and jump up on his breakfast bar? This feeling building inside her was a combination of impatience and frustration and anxiety. Dangerous, because it made her feel reckless and impulsive.
The fruit in her bowl no longer appealing, she used her fork to pursue a strawberry with a slice of mandarin orange. Somewhere along the way, other fruits became involved in the high-speed chase and a plump grape and a blueberry flew over the barrier, bounced off the counter, and made a break for the floor.
“I got it,” Jonah said, but she beat him to it and slid off her stool.
Fruit in hand, she was straightening from her crouch when Jonah swiveled on his stool and she came face to face with the zipper on his jeans.
The distended zipper on his jeans.
He either really liked her cooking or he’d gotten hard from looking at her thigh and breast.
She couldn’t help herself. She stayed there in a strange crouch staring at Jonah’s crotch until he drawled, “Wanna give me that fruit? A few more seconds and you’re gonna have a smoothie.”
His words shocked her out of her fascination with his erection, and she felt pulp and juice squishing through her fingers. “I need sex, Jonah.”
Silence.
“With you.”
More silence.
Extended silence. And he’d suddenly become fascinated with the one piece of ham left on his plate.
Damned man. To keep from either kissing or choking him, she reached for a napkin to clean the fruit from her fingers. Shaking with anger and need and a sliver of embarrassment, she marched around the bar, swiped the mess into the trash, and cranked on the faucet to wash her hands.
When she turned, Jonah was standing there, so close she could feel his breath on her skin. His hands rose and fell. “I don’t know what to do with you, Tessa.”
She could give him a list, starting with a long, hard kiss and possibly ending with him lifting her to the countertop and screwing her blind. Why couldn’t he see what was between them? What could be between them?
“Why do you always turn away from me?” she asked, waving a vague hand near his hip. “Because unless your reaction really was to the omelet and not me, then I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.”
“You’re not doing anything wrong.”
“Based on our history, I’ve been making the assumption that you are attracted to me. Did I miss a turn somewhere? Am I just imagining it?”
“No.”
“Then why do you avoid touching me? The times you have, you’ve been ashamed and beaten yourself up afterward, haven’t you?”
“Can we drop this? We need to focus on your break-in and the hacking incident.”
“Is helping me something you feel like you have to do? Because if you can’t look at me without that strange combination of guilt and need, I’m not sure this is smart. You’re obviously uncomfortable with any role you play in my life—lifesaver, reluctant friend, even more reluctant lover. And I am tired of wanting a man who won’t allow himself to want me back.”
He squeezed his eyes closed. “I keep my hands off you because…”
“Because when you look at me, you see her, the helpless Tessa, don’t you?”
Jonah’s phone rang, and he grappled for it like a drowning man might reach for a life preserver. “Hello…yeah, this is a fine time. C’mon over.”
When he hung up, Tessa touched his arm, a light stroke of fingertips. “Jonah, talk to me.”
“We can’t do this right now.” He removed her hand from his arm and pressed it against her side. “Not when someone is threatening you.”
“Then we’re done here. Take me into town to pick up my car.”
“Not happening,” he said. “Maggie is on her way so we can talk about that son of a bitch who painted on your wall.”
11
Tessa snapped her fingers for Badger and made for the stairs.
Jonah only indulged himself by watching her ass swing from side to side for three steps before going after her and catching her by the elbow. She, her bouncing breasts, and her stellar ass were going to kill him.
D-E-A-D. Dead.
She swung around and the anger flashing in her eyes only made him hotter. “What?”
Near the windows, her pocket-sized dog was giving him the stink-eye as if thinking: Man up, dude, or I’ll fuck you over.
“Stay,” he said. “Please.”
If she walked out right now, she’d be facing whatever this threat was alone. And the thought of that made his body and brain rebel. Safe. He wanted her safe and happy.
This morning, she was neither.
“I know we have some…” he rolled his hand as if that might make the words flow more easily, “…unresolved history.”
Her snort made it clear she thought he was Captain Obvious.
“If I promise you that we will talk about what’s between us, can we table it for now?”
“It’s been tabled for years already.”
“I know. You’re right.” He intertwined their fingers, admired the contrast of their skin. Maybe it was time for him to try to untangle his mixed feelings about Tessa. Could he do that and survive? “But that’s damn hard to do while I’m worried about your safety. We—I—need to figure out who was in your files, because that’ll tell us who broke into your place.”
“Is that what you were doing all night last night, trying to track down my hacker?” Tessa asked him.
“Yes, and I came up empty-handed.” And it was making him fucking crazy. Just like Tessa was. He couldn’t hide the truth much longer—that he wanted her so ferociously that it scared the shit out of him.
A knock on the door announced Maggie’s arrival.
Tessa said, “You’re right. We need to focus on this for now.”
He pulled open the door. “Come on in,” he said to Maggie
and led her to the kitchen. “You want some coffee?”
Her eyebrows went up at his offer of hospitality. “Sure.”
Badger trotted over to her and reared up on his hind legs to sniff at her uniform. “Hey there, little guy.” She reached down to pet him and shot Jonah a questioning look. “When did you get a dog?”
“Maggie, meet Badger. He’s Tessa’s bodyguard.”
Maggie turned her attention on Tessa and held out her hand to shake. “Hi, Tessa. I’m Maggie Kingston.”
“I’m impressed that Haywood County elected such a young sheriff.” Tessa’s smile was genuine, but her eyes were shadowed, leading Jonah to believe her mind was still on their earlier conversation. Why couldn’t she see what was inside him? See the need that bordered on obsession and understand how dangerous that was for her?
“And a female to boot,” Maggie said. “We’re not as backward out here as a lot of people think.”
Jonah made a one-shot cup of coffee for his cousin and slid it in front of her. “So what’s the news from Asheville?” His patience and hospitality only went so far. He wanted answers.
“Just talked with my contact in the Asheville PD this morning. They went door-to-door on Tessa’s floor of the building and talked with the staff. But…”
Maggie’s hesitation told Jonah he wasn’t going to like what she had to say a damn bit.
“…in a pricy place like that, the neighbors make it a point to stay out of other people’s business. None of them saw or heard anything.”
“What about the idiot building manager? Did he give someone else a key?”
"He swore he didn’t. Said the only reason he handed one over to you was because Tessa was with you.”
“And the other staff?”
“One of the maintenance guys remembered seeing a dude in a navy hoodie. But hell, it’s December. That didn’t strike him as suspicious. He figured it was a resident going out for a jog.”
“What about security footage?” he demanded.
“They asked for it, but apparently the state-of-the-art system the building owner promised residents has yet to to be installed.”
Stripping Bare (Steele Ridge Book 7) Page 10
