by Jill Shalvis
“I’m just misunderstood,” Reilly said and Cheri laughed and hugged him.
Tessa remained mute but it wasn’t, he was sure, out of loyalty to him. Not after how he’d treated her this morning, but honest to God, all he wanted was to just move on from what had happened Friday night.
He couldn’t, however, not with her needing this job because of money. Four long days.
He was really getting tired of his father with his interfering ways, this belief that life was all about fun and laughter—often at his own son’s expense.
Tessa was still watching him with those eyes. And then there were the bruises on her delicate throat. They were killing him.
So, fine. She was going to be in his hair for a few days. At least she smelled good.
If only he didn’t remember that she tasted even better.
* * *
SOMEHOW REILLY MANAGED to put Tess out of his head and bury himself in work. Thankfully he’d picked an occupation he was well-suited to and was good at. Numbers didn’t argue, numbers didn’t manipulate. Numbers just let him be.
Overall, he supposed, things went well. They all stayed busy and Tessa actually did know her way around an accounting ledger.
At the end of the day, she appeared in the doorway of his office, her eyes shining, her mouth curved in a smile as she held out a stack of files he’d asked Cheri for.
He couldn’t help but notice that she had been enjoying herself since he’d convinced her to stay. But he had a feeling she always enjoyed herself, enjoyed life. Damned if that wasn’t unexpectedly attractive.
“I brought the Sarkins files up to date, all the way through to the general ledger,” she said. “And Cheri and I together handled the Anderson account as well.” She started to go, then stopped. “Oh, and your father’s on line two.”
He picked up the phone. “After what you’ve pulled,” he said to Eddie. “I am not going out with you and a pack of women to the game tonight.”
Eddie’s long-suffering sigh sounded in his ear. “I told you, no pack of women. Just a couple. And that’s not why I called.”
“You want me to thank you for the old, grumpy office help?”
“That’s no way to talk about your own mother.”
“You know damn well I’m referring to Tessa.”
“Who’s not old and grumpy.”
Reilly drew in a deep breath and looked at Tess, who was still standing there. “Which is my point.”
“She’s good, isn’t she?”
“You know she is. Look, I don’t know what you’re up to, but—”
“Son, I’d love to stick around and listen to you sound like an ass, but I have a bigger problem than even you at the moment.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The burglary…you remember the four guys the police hauled in?”
Yes, he was fairly certain he remembered.
“Well, apparently a few of them have prior records and when the cops held those up, dangling some sort of deal, they squealed like the three little pigs. They said the whole thing was set up by someone I knew. It turns out she’s…”
Reilly waited impatiently. “She’s what?”
Eddie sighed and said, “An ex of mine.”
“An ex. Shocking. Do they have any idea which one of the thousands it might be?”
“There weren’t thousands. Hundreds maybe, but—”
“Get to the point, Eddie.”
“It was Sheila Vanetti. Your mother always refers to her as the crazy one and it turns out, she’s right.”
“Where is she now?”
“Missing, funny enough, and the police haven’t been able to track her down. And they think…well, this is embarrassing, to tell you the truth.”
“They think what?”
“That she’s trying to scare me,” Eddie said laughing. “Funny, right?”
“Oh, yeah,” Reilly said. “A laugh riot.”
“They even think I need protection. Can you imagine such a thing? Me being stalked? How hysterical is that?”
“Hysterical.” Christ. “Did you hire a bodyguard?”
His mother appeared in the doorway. She’d always had a sort of sixth sense when it came to Eddie and, sure enough, she wore her worried frown.
“I thought,” Eddie said, “that given your last occupation, you could handle it for me.”
“I’ll be right over.”
“Thanks, son.”
When he’d hung up, Tessa said, “Is everything okay?”
He rubbed his eyes. “Not really.”
“What is it, Reilly?” This from Cheri, who looked far more worried than an ex should look. But he told them everything and, when he was finished, both of them watched him with that look that said they believed he could do anything.
Apparently Eddie thought so as well.
All these damn tugs at his heart. And he didn’t have a clue what to do about them.
CHAPTER 9
THE NEXT MORNING, Tessa turned the key of her VW Beetle, but for the second morning in a row, nothing happened. Yesterday she’d thought it was just a dead battery and she’d charged it overnight.
Apparently she’d been wrong. “Come on, baby,” she coaxed, and tapped the console lovingly. She tried again.
Nothing.
With a sigh, she leaned back. Her sister had already left for work, so she couldn’t get a ride from her. If she called Rafe, he’d probably get on the next plane.
She couldn’t call Eddie again.
So she got on the bus and decided not to worry about her car until she could do something about it. By the time she got onto the elevator in Reilly’s building, it was one minute after eight and her heart was pumping. She hated to be late and she ran off the elevator the moment the doors opened.
“I’m sorry,” she said breathlessly to Cheri, who stood there stripping off her sweater, clearly having also just arrived.
“No need to be sorry, you’re close enough.” Cheri smiled. “And since you’re holding a Krispy Kreme doughnut bag in your hand, you’re my new best friend.”
Tessa laughed. “It’s a shameless bribe for your son, but I brought enough for all of us. I’m determined to see him smile today.”
“Now that I’d like to see. He’s working out now; there’s a gym on the fourth floor he sometimes uses in the mornings. Between that and the doughnuts, it might just do the trick.” Cheri turned on the stereo to soft rock, opened the shades to the beautiful view and flipped on the lights to the hall that led to the offices.
Apparently there wasn’t a regular receptionist, because there wasn’t enough phone traffic to warrant one, which left the two of them taking turns answering phones. Knowing Reilly liked his messages first-thing, Tessa sat at the front desk to check his machine.
“He’s not easy to get to know,” Cheri said behind her. “And yet you already seem to have him pegged.”
“Yes, well, we got what you might call concentrated time together that night we spent locked up in Eddie’s house,” Tessa reminded her.
“It’s funny what the long nighttime hours will do to a person when they’re awake,” Cheri said. “How much more open you can be, how much more you’ll share.”
Tessa had to smile wryly at that. They might not have shared a lot of words, per se, but there’d been enough kissing and touching to make her feel extremely open. And vulnerable.
She wasn’t comfortable with that. Not one little bit.
“Is that what happened, Tessa?”
She sighed. “In a manner of speaking. And now, in the light of day, facing each other over accounting ledgers, it’s been a little…awkward. Sometimes a lot awkward.”
“Plus, Reilly has a way of making things as awkward as possible, doesn’t he?” Cheri said, smiling sympathetically. “I love him, I love him with my entire heart and soul and yet I want to just smack him sometimes for not letting people…I don’t know…see him. He’s so afraid he’s going to end up like his father. He’s a bi
t hung up on his privacy.”
“I noticed.”
“He doesn’t get that from me, I’ll tell you that. Actually, I don’t know where he gets it. Probably from working for the government as an operative doing…well, I’m not really sure, to tell you the truth. I’m just glad he’s not still doing it.”
Tessa stopped in the act of opening the bag of doughnuts. “You mean he was…CIA?”
“Was.” Cheri winced. “He didn’t tell you.”
“No. But it explains a lot. Why did he get out of it?”
Cheri took a moment to answer. “Let’s just say his last mission nearly killed him. Literally. It made him wary. And unhappy, I think. In any case, it took him a long time to recover and in some ways he’s still recovering.” She put her hand on Tessa’s wrist. “You’ll be patient with him, won’t you Tessa? Patient, and kind, and compassionate?”
“I’m sorry for what he went through, but I think you have the wrong idea—”
“You like him,” Cheri said. “You care about him. I can see that.”
“I barely know him.” And because she didn’t want to talk about it anymore, she busied herself with sharpening a pencil.
Cheri took the hint and left her alone. Tessa stared at the electric pencil sharpener, her mind far from the pencil and stuck on Reilly.
He’d been in the CIA. He’d been hurt.
He’d become wary because of it.
He needed patience. Kindness and compassion.
She had those things, but she wasn’t sure Cheri knew what she was asking. Reilly didn’t want anything from her but work.
A few moments later, Cheri handed her a stack of work and gave her a little smile. “Are you going to offer me a doughnut or are you just going to torture me with the scent of them all morning?”
Tessa set them out. She took the stack of work and a glazed doughnut and went to her desk to dig in. After a while, Cheri popped her head into the room and said she was going out to run some errands.
Alone, Tessa went into the small photocopy-fax room and started making a stack of copies she needed for one of Reilly’s clients. She got into a rhythm of lifting the top of the machine, replacing the sheet she needed copied, placing it back into the file. The sound of the copier was loud and hypnotic, so that when someone stepped up right behind her suddenly, she let out a little scream and jerked. Papers went flying as she whirled around, flattening herself back against the machine.
“Hey. Hey, it’s just me.” Reilly. He stood there, all in black, of course. Black athletic shoes, black running shorts, black T-shirt, which was plastered to him. The man sure was in some kind of amazing shape. She registered this in a distant way because he’d nearly given her heart failure and she couldn’t talk. He definitely looked the secret agent part, she’d give him that. Tall, edgy, dangerous….
“Tess?”
Get it together, she told herself, get it together before you annoy the hell out of him for acting like a baby. “I’m sorry. I’m fine.” She bent for the papers.
“Are you sure?” He hunkered down beside her and started helping her.
“No, I’ve got it.” She shoved the stack all back into the file, figuring she’d fix it when she was alone and could breathe again. “I’m just fine. Really.”
“All right.” He eyed her carefully. “I’m going to shower in the bathroom in my office.” He paused. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I just thought I was alone, that’s all. Cheri said you were working out.” He looked good all hot and sweaty and bothered. Extremely superhero-like.
Had she ever really seen a different side of him, a soft and gentle side, even for a moment? No. She had to have imagined that, because this man with his see-through eyes and rock-hard body and low, rough voice didn’t have a soft and gentle side—
He reached out, dispersing her thoughts like the wind. His hand settled on her shoulder and squeezed it lightly. “It’s okay, you know, it’s just delayed shock.” Standing, he pulled her up. “I…know what you’re going through.”
Oh, damn. He knew. He knew because something terrible had happened to him on his last mission, something much more terrible than being held up in Eddie’s house. He was big and tough and strong, and yet he understood, and wanted her to know that.
He needs kindness and compassion and patience, Cheri had told her and yet here he was offering it to her. She stared down at the papers, which suddenly went a little blurry, because here was that flash of beta guy again and it confused her.
With a sigh, he took the stack and set it all on the copier. He put his hands on her again, her hips this time.
“I’m really fine,” she whispered, wanting it to be so. Wanting it to be so quite badly.
“Yes.”
She shifted a little closer, needing the contact, needing…so much.
“Don’t.” His voice was low, gruff, and he tried to hold her off. “I’m all sweaty.”
“I don’t care.”
“Tess.” But he pulled her just a little closer, waiting until she tipped her head up to his.
“You know what?” she whispered. “I think I lied. I don’t think I’m so fine. It…” She closed her eyes and saw the gray room. Saw Reilly standing in Eddie’s kitchen with a gun. “It keeps coming back.”
“I’m sorry.” He looked her over, his jaw going all tight and bunched and sexy when he took in the bruises on her throat. “I’m really sorry.”
Something deep within her curled, warmed. Ached. “Maybe you should go back to snarling at me.”
“I don’t snarl at you,” he said, grimacing. “I never mean to, anyway. Not at you.”
Oh, no. He was making her melt again, melt into a boneless heap. The way he looked at her, as if she was something he needed to run from and run to at the same time… Without permission, her arms snaked upward around his neck and held on for dear life so that he couldn’t change his mind and back away. Her chest brushed his. So did her thighs. And everything in between.
Every single erogenous zone in her body stood up and took notice.
His fingers tightened on her hips for one moment, then he dropped his hands from her and stood back.
Which was a good thing. It reminded her why she was here. Work. Just work.
She didn’t want to feel this tug for him. She wanted him to go far, far away and leave her to that work before she forgot her entire humiliating experience with him at Eddie’s and did something stupid.
Like kiss him for a third time.
Oh, no. No, the next time they kissed, he was going to initiate it. He was going to want it. Because she already knew that if he did kiss her, she’d give in, she’d let him do it. She’d let him kiss them both senseless.
And then he’d walk away. Pretend it didn’t happen. She didn’t have to be ex-CIA to know that.
But he didn’t kiss her.
Not even once.
* * *
THE NEXT DAY Reilly was on his way into the office when Cheri called him on his cell phone.
“Oh, honey. Glad I caught you. I’m not working for you today.”
Reilly had already gone for his run that morning and was eating his way through a fast-food breakfast as he drove. He knew the two cancelled each other out, but he didn’t care. He ran because it felt good and he ate what he ate because it tasted good. “Are you sick?” he asked her.
“I’m never sick.”
Oka-a-ay. “Attitude adjustment day?”
“Why would I need that, I don’t have an attitude.”
“So it’s…a woman thing?” he asked warily, not really wanting to know.
“Reilly, I’m working for your father today. He’s behind, and—”
“What?”
“And I’ve got you all caught up, so—”
“But…” This was so far from what he expected, he couldn’t think. “You work for me.”
“Yes,” Cheri said with that calm reasonableness she had, that made his brain feel like she was scrambling it
. “But he needs me.”
“But…”
“Reilly, honey, honestly. Tessa could do my job blindfolded. You’ll be fine.”
He nearly missed his turnoff. “But Tessa isn’t my office manager. You are.”
“And I need a day off.”
“To work for Eddie.”
“That’s right.”
This made no sense. “You want to work for the man who deserted you when you were a pregnant teenager.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Cheri said, making an annoyed sound. “Look, it’s time you knew this. I’m the one who jumped his bones when I was sixteen. And I’m the one who—”
“Jeez!” He nearly rear-ended the car in front of him. “Over-share!”
“I knew the chance I was taking,” she said calmly. “We’ve long ago established how naive I was, but if you think I have regrets you’re the naive one.”
“Mom.” She was certifiable. “He has a hundred other women he could use for today.”
“Yes, but he wants me. And let’s face it, I’m the best.”
“What about whoever he took to Cabo?”
“Well, I doubt whoever she was knew accounting.”
True.
“Stop acting like an old man, Reilly. I’ll be back in a few days. Live a little while I’m gone, okay?”
“You sound just like him when you say that,” he said, broodingly.
“Have a good day, honey.”
He stared down at his cell after she hung up on him, then tossed it onto the passenger seat. Live a little. He’d lived plenty. He’d lived long and hard, and frankly, was happy with how things were going. Nice and quiet and even-keeled. No surprises. No being konked over the head by idiotic burglars. No being kissed stupid by a little hottie who had somehow—and he was still dizzy over this one—ended up working for him.
By the time he got into his office, he was ready to bury himself in numbers. Lots of numbers.
Tessa sat behind the front desk on the phone, her brown hair swinging as she turned to watch him walk in. Her big, bright-green eyes gave away her every thought, as usual.
She was thinking she would have been happier if he hadn’t shown up.
Join the club, baby.
She recovered nicely, even gave him a little wave accompanied by what seemed like a very genuine smile. So genuine he nearly waved right back.
