At the Midnight Hour (12 page)

“And yet you plan on taking him riding, anyway?”

“I think it would be good for him,” she said honestly, wondering why he insisted on keeping his back to her. “I assure you, I’ll take all the necessary precautions such as insisting that he wear a riding helmet and the proper gear, but sooner or later Andy needs to learn that statistics aren’t real life, and that enjoyment is as much a deciding factor as anything.”

“Enjoyment, Liz?” He turned, and the dark glow she saw in his wintry eyes made her catch her breath. All of a sudden, he didn’t look cold at all. Instead, as his heated gaze swept over her curled form, she felt all the breath leave her body. “Do you know what I would enjoy right now, Liz?” he asked intensely.

She shook her head, her eyes never leaving his face as her mouth went dry.

“I would enjoy kissing you, Liz. I would enjoy tasting your lips once more. I would enjoy hearing you whisper my name while your arms wrapped around my neck.” He took five steps toward her, until he could peer down at her with glittering eyes. “Would you enjoy that, too, Liz?”

She shivered, feeling her throat work even as she fought the answer. She’d promised herself she would keep her distance after last night. He was too dangerous, this man leaning over her like a predator sighting its prey. And he knew more about kissing than any man had a right to know. She shivered again, and closed her eyes.

“What do you want?” she managed to say.

He leaned even closer, until she could feel the whisper of his breath against her lips. One inch more, and the rough burn of his whiskers could caress her soft cheek. She had to clench her fists to keep from closing that inch.

“Why do you close your eyes, Liz?” he quizzed softly. “Why do you turn away when we both know what’s going on here? Are you afraid of me?”

Barely, just barely, she shook her head.

“Do you find me cold?”

Once more, that near-imperceptible motion.

“Is it Blaine?”

Her eyes flew open with shock, then jolted as she became fully aware of just how close he stood. “No,” she whispered firmly. “This has nothing to do with Blaine.”

“Then what, sweet Liz. What?”

She floundered, not knowing what to say when he remained so close she could smell the scent of fresh soap and spicy after-shave on his cheeks. She wanted to feel that five o’clock shadow, rediscover the soft fullness of his knowing lips. She wanted her arms around his shoulders, her breasts flat against his chest.

“I don’t think,” she said, then licked her lips nervously, feeling the heat of his gaze following the motion. She took another breath and tried again. “I don’t think you really know me at all.”

“What does that have to do with anything?” he asked levelly.

She flinched at the words, looking down at her hands on her lap. She felt the sting of tears against her eyelids. She should have seen that coming. There were times when she liked to think there was someone real beneath his granite exterior, someone who
had
danced and romanced and delivered a single yellow rose every day. But that person seemed to be gone, and the Richard she knew was a dangerously attractive man who seemed just as hard on the inside as he appeared on the outside.

She was out of her league. And even knowing that, she still wanted to kiss him.

She drew herself up. “I don’t think this is such a good idea,” she said softly, forcing her midnight eyes to meet his own glittering gaze. He frowned at her words, and she could see the first glimmer of frustration in his eyes. Once more, he dropped his gaze to her lips, and once more, she felt herself hold her breath in anticipation.

“I take it back, then,” he said, low and sure as his gaze swept across her face. “If it makes such a difference, I do know you, even better than you think. I bet you believe in happily-ever-afters. I bet you believe in knights on white horses, and endless love like in
Wuthering Heights.
I bet you drink fresh-squeezed lemonade in the summer, and daydream in clover fields of discovering true love. You find the silver lining in every cloud, searching out more and more adventures because you honestly believe they will all end well. Am I right, Liz? Tell me that I don’t know you.”

His eyes burned into hers, daring her to deny his description. But if he thought she would surrender, or even be outraged, he was wrong. Instead, he found a deeply troubled face looking back at him, emotions flickering across her eyes faster than even the fire’s shadows.

“No,” she whispered. “No, you don’t know me at all.”

Her hands revealed her agitation, twisting the robe’s belt over and over again. He watched the motion, then glanced back up, trying to find her eyes.

She turned away sharply, but not before he had seen. The impact of the sight floored him, and he felt a sudden coldness in his chest. Twice before he’d seen that look, that sliver of deep pain and raw anguish.

“Did you love him that much?” he found himself asking, the words harsher than he’d intended. It had to be a man. Only something as cruel as love could strike someone that deep.

She looked at him slowly, nodding her head. He could tell she was trying to remain calm, but she certainly hadn’t had the practice he’d had. Her face was too young to hide its mysteries. Instead, the pain flickered through in open revelation.

He found, this time, he was the one that had to look away. He straightened, giving them both the distance they suddenly needed.

“He was my husband,” Liz volunteered finally. She took a deep breath, willing away the tightness. Her composure came back faster this time, practice in the Keaton household, she thought hazily, was bound to make the exercise a success.

“You’re divorced?” Richard asked sharply. He didn’t like this topic. She’d come here alone, and he liked to think of her that way: as belonging to only him and Andy.

Liz shook her head. “No. Nick died. There was a bank robbery a year ago, one Sunday when we were going to a matinee at the local movie theater. The police arrived and all this gunfire broke out.” She smiled a faint, wry smile. “It was just like some scene from a bad Western. Except Nick was the one caught in the crossfire.”

Sometimes the memory was so sharp it seemed like yesterday. She was down on the pavement again, all the sirens wailing in her ears. And Nick was sprawled on the ground, blood seeping everywhere. She was crying, but she couldn’t feel the tears streaming down her face. She just knew that she had to stop the bleeding, and so her hands raced across Nick’s neck and chest, trying desperately to stop the bleeding. But no matter what she did, it kept running right through her hands as if she was no better than a human sieve. And then he was dead.

She twisted the belt of her robe, wringing it with the useless hands that couldn’t save her husband’s life. Richard watched the motion, feeling the uneasiness grow inside of him. He’d been harsh on her, and now he’d learned she was a widow. Funny, that in some areas he could be so blind. Did he really think he held a monopoly on pain? The expression in her eyes that first day should have been warning enough. He should have handled her more gently, he shouldn’t have pushed her so hard.

And yesterday, just yesterday he’d mocked her for not pursuing their kiss. He winced, and hated this feeling of regret. Damn fool, he was a damn fool.

He wondered if he should offer her comfort, but he realized that after all these years, he simply didn’t know how.

“Were you married long?” he asked at last, his pale blue eyes expressionless against the firelight.

He could see her take a deep breath, steadying herself. Her hands slowed their agitated motion.

“I loved him all my life,” she told him quietly. “From the time we were kids and he would push me on the swings in the playground to the time we went to our high school prom. We were always together. It seemed we always would be.”

She said the words with such simple conviction. He hadn’t anticipated just how sharply they would pierce him. He could see her with this perfect man all too easily. And all at once, it made him feel empty.

“Then you grew up together?” he asked, his voice giving nothing away.

She nodded. “Maddensfield, North Carolina, isn’t that big, and our parents had been friends for a long time. You could say it was classic small-town America. But,” she said shrugging, “I liked it.”

He gave her an intense, shadowed look. “Then what are you doing here, Liz?” He gestured around the darkened library with its dull leather-bound books and deep walnut wood. “This is a long way from home.”

She nodded, and he could see her eyes glitter with suppressed tears. But she took another deep breath, and gave him a watery smile.

“I had to get away. I had to start over. So this is where I am.”

He gazed at her, not wanting to push even as the next words burned in his throat. He told himself it didn’t matter. He told himself to keep quiet, he didn’t care. But it seemed his body was determined to ignore him tonight because he found his lips moving without command.

“Do you like it here?” he whispered intently in the library. “Is it...not so bad, after all?”

She hesitated, and he felt the hesitation stab him straight in the chest. Of course she didn’t like it here. Who would like living in a mausoleum like this? And he was certainly no better for her. A dark foreboding man that lived in a dark foreboding house. The things he’d said, the way he’d treated her... Certainly he was a far cry from this perfect man she’d loved all her life and married. Not that he cared, he thought savagely.

“Andrew is a great kid,” Liz replied finally from the couch. She knew she ought to say more, but no more words would come out. She still didn’t know what she thought of this place, she realized suddenly. The child looked like an angel, and probably deep down truly was, but he’d put her through hell before he’d shown it. And the house was intimidating and overwhelming, not to mention downright terrifying at three in the morning when the power was out and branches scratched at bedroom windows. A woman had died here, something Liz was having a hard time forgetting.

Then there was this man beside her, with his wintry blue eyes that never gave anything away. Sometimes she thought he might be a lost soul, like Andy. Sometimes she wasn’t so sure he
had
a soul; he had so much control, even when he kissed her. And sometimes she wondered what a man with so much control was capable of....

“Alycia was murdered.”

“I doubt we’ll ever know who did it.”

All at once the library seemed too dark to her. She stole a glance at Richard.

He had turned once more toward the flames, the expression on his face intense, but once again unreadable. He looked like granite, each facet carefully chiseled out, from the high cheekbones to the pitch-black hair. His body echoed the solid strength, the overwhelming control.

In contrast, she thought abruptly, Nick looked young and boyish in her mind. His blue eyes had been open and laughing, not the winter chill of Richard’s. And his face, while handsome and strong, had still looked wholesome and untroubled by life. Richard’s face, on the other hand, appeared to have been carved from cobalt and was unrelentingly stern.

The two would appear to have little in common.

Except...

Richard attracted her, she thought bleakly. She was an idiot to keep denying it. He’d already kissed her twice, dark, dangerous kisses like nothing she’d ever experienced. They had been hard, demanding kisses of a man. Even now, her breath stopped at the thought.

Sitting in this dark and strange library, the past seemed so far away. There was just the haunting sensation of the love she’d once had and that now was gone. In contrast, the man beside her was intensely alive even with his brooding ways. When he looked at her, she felt it all the way to the pit of her stomach.

All this from a man who may have killed his wife.

Her nerves came back full force, and she found herself shifting restlessly on the sofa. Richard didn’t seem to notice, his eyes still captured by the flames. Whatever was going on in his mind, his face gave none of it away.

“What about,” she began, licking her dry lips, “what about you and your wife?”

He turned to her and, if possible, his face was even darker than before.

“What about her?” he asked coldly.

Her hands once more trembled, but she forced herself to continue. She worked with this man, lived with him. She wanted to know. She
needed
to know.

“Did...did you love her at all?”

His eyes returned to the flames. “Once upon a time, isn’t that what the storybooks say?” He leaned over to pick up his brandy glass from the table, swirling it.

“But there was no happily-ever-after?”

He nodded, drawing a burning sip of the amber fluid. “You still wonder if I killed her, don’t you?” he stated baldly, the words harsh but expressionless in the silence of the library.

She felt suddenly miserable. But she forced herself to keep her chin up. “You said most people suspected you,” she said stonily. “And I understand that your marriage wasn’t a happy one....” Her voice trailed off, and she found herself shrugging weakly.

“Seventy-five percent of marriages are unhappy ones,” Richard said tonelessly. “Fifty percent of marriages end in divorce. But I don’t think the remaining twenty-five percent end in murder. Most people just suffer in silence.”

From the couch, Liz nodded, but she couldn’t help thinking that he still hadn’t answered her question. No, he’d simply reverted to quoting safe statistics, so much like Andrew.

“So you didn’t kill her?” she found herself asking boldly, though the words were still hushed.

He turned to face her fully, his eyes a cold, pale blue as he looked at her with thinly veiled rage.

“You asked me that same question two nights ago,” he reminded her angrily. “Then, you told me you didn’t know me well enough to believe my answer. What about now, Liz? You’ve sat at the dinner table with me, held a midnight vigil, seen my lab.”

Kissed me twice.

He didn’t say those words out loud, but he didn’t have to. They hovered between them, the unspoken desire each was acutely aware of, stirring to life.