Intimate (22 page)

Kaz set her bag down on a table and then sat on the edge of the bed. Remembering was painful, but she felt as if she owed Jake the truth.

“Jilly must have recognized her—Dad kept pictures in Jilly's room so she'd know who her mother was, but we'd always told her that Mommy was dead. After so many years, she might have been, for all we knew. The fact Jilly recognized our mother is the only reason she would have gotten in the car with her. She knew better than to go with a stranger.”

“Do you think your mother planned it?”

Kaz shook her head. “She said she didn't, that she would sometimes drive by the house in the hopes of seeing one of us. She was just curious, you know, how we'd turned out, but she didn't really care to get involved with any of us again. She saw Jilly, knew it had to be her, and she stopped the car. It was an impulse, not a plan. Everything my mother ever did was an impulse. She has no self-control. She called to Jilly and told her she was her mother. Jilly recognized her from the pictures and went to her. She said she only wanted to take Jilly for an ice cream, but she was high. She ran a red light just a couple of blocks from our house, and a garbage truck plowed into the passenger side of the car. Jilly had a seatbelt on, but she was small enough to still need a booster seat. She shouldn't have been in the front seat, either, though the whole side of the car was crushed. I doubt anything would have saved her.”

“I'm sorry. Kaz, I'm so damned sorry.”

She grabbed a tissue and blew her nose, then realized her mascara had probably smeared all over her face. “I'll be back. I need to wash my face.”

And have a good cry while she was at it.

Her last night with Jake, and she'd ended up dumping a story on him that would have most men running for the hills. Closing the bathroom door behind her, she stared at her raccoon eyes for a minute.

This was going to take more than a washcloth.

Quickly stripping out of her clothes, she carefully removed the tiger eye jewelry she'd worn to dinner and replaced the pieces with her own simple silver rings and studs. Then Kaz turned the water in the shower on really hot, waited for the room to fill with steam, and got under the spray.

She hadn't cried over Jilly for a long time.

Tonight, though, why did she feel as if she wept as much for Jake as for the little sister she'd lost?

*   *   *

It was cool this evening, so he cranked up the gas on the fake fireplace and parked his butt in a chair in front of it. He was such an ass. He'd sat there listening to Kaz's heartbreaking story, holding on to secrets of his own that were so damned ugly. Kaz and Jilly had been victims.

The only thing he'd been a victim of was his own stupidity and a healthy case of hubris. So certain his admission of guilt to protect Ben would get him, at the most, a slap on the wrist from the court, but he'd been willing to do anything for Ben. Anything to regain his brother's love.

So what had his great sacrifice earned him?

Nothing but disappointment. Jake sighed. As much as he wanted to blame his brother, Jake knew he was every bit as guilty. In his own way, Ben had to be suffering, too. But Jake had been in that car; he'd been having a wonderful time until everything went terribly wrong.

The young mother and son who died that night had lost everything. During the trial, it was revealed she'd been a victim of abuse, that she was running from her husband after years of torment. Jake had killed her dreams every bit as thoroughly as he'd killed his own.

His Olympic dreams were dead. His already pathetic relationship with his parents, who blamed him for the wreck and their unexplained estrangement from Ben, had died as well. And Ben? Ben hadn't been home since he'd enlisted in the army before the trial had even ended, before Jake was turned over to the California Youth Authority for almost six years. Choosing multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan rather than return to his family was a good indication of Ben's mental health.

Two families totally screwed by one night of teenaged stupidity.

He heard the shower go on, pictured Kaz under the spray, and his body reacted, but not the way he expected. Yeah, he was hard and he wanted her, but this was different, and pretty unsettling.

He felt a sense of longing, and it was unlike anything he'd ever experienced, a feeling that what he faced losing here tonight was worse than the loss of his freedom. Worse than the destruction of his Olympic potential.

But how do you lose something you've never really had? Kaz was poised to see her career go through the roof. He'd known from the beginning that this—whatever this was they had—was going nowhere.

Because he couldn't tell her the truth. At least not the whole truth, but maybe, if he told her a little, the secret wouldn't weigh so heavily on his soul. Or in his heart.

*   *   *

She'd washed her hair, cleaned the makeup off her face, but she still wasn't ready to get out from under the streaming water. She'd cried a little, though not as much as she'd feared she would. Tears weren't going to bring Jilly back.

Tears certainly weren't going to keep Jake in her life, either. She was stronger than that, strong enough to enjoy this last night with a truly special man and then move forward.

She heard a knock at the door. “Kaz? You okay?”

It was nice that he worried about her. At least for now. “Yeah. I'll be out in a minute.”

“Do you mind if I come in?”

“It's not locked.” She stuck her head under the water to rinse the conditioner off her hair, but a blast of cold air had her spinning around so fast she almost fell.

Jake's strong arms came around her from behind, and he pulled her close, her back against his chest, her legs brushing his hair-roughened thighs. Nuzzling her throat with his scratchy chin and its five-o'clock shadow, he planted a kiss along the edge of her jaw.

“I've been worried about you. Are you okay?”

She turned in his arms and pressed her forehead against his shoulder. “I think it's just been an emotional week for me. Getting fired, meeting you.” She laughed, but it sounded more like a sob. “The sex?” Shrugging, she tried for humor. “It's been a long dry spell.” Then she sighed. “Too many highs and lows. I think my mother was the proverbial straw, ya know?”

He chuckled and nuzzled her wet hair. “I'm almost afraid to ask if I'm a high or a low.”

Raising her head, she shot him a cheeky grin. “Right now, you're a high.” She glanced down. He was beautifully erect. She ran her fingers over the sleek length of him. “Very high.”

“Turn around.” His voice was so rough and deep, it sent shivers along her spine.

“Bossy, aren't we?” She turned and planted her palms on the slick tiles. His fingers slipped between her legs, teasing her, barely entering and then withdrawing. Bracing herself, she glanced over her shoulder. He tugged at the tiny ring between her legs, then slipped his fingers inside her again. When he withdrew them, she watched him sheathe himself, felt the broad head of his penis separating her folds, sliding slowly, deeply inside.

He filled her so perfectly that she groaned and pressed her bottom against his groin. He found both her nipple rings and tugged them, just the right amount of pressure that had Kaz clenching her inner muscles around his thick shaft, holding him when he tried to withdraw, tightening even more when he surged forward.

The water pounded on her back. Steam rose all around, and Jake whispered in her ear, things he wanted to do to her, with her, things that made her blush, made her hot and hotter still, while the steady in and out slide and glide of the hard and hot length of him filling her sensitive sheath left her panting.

“Now, Jake. Now!” She thrashed within his grasp, so close to the edge, so ready for the fall.

“Not yet.” He palmed her breast with his right hand, tugging almost painfully on the silver ring. His left hand slipped low, cupped her pubes, and flicked the ring in the hood of her clit, flicked it, tugged it, twisted, oh, so gently, and that was all it took.

She arched her back and cried out against the heavy pulse deep inside. Jake flew with her, the two of them going together in a climax that left her seeing stars.

Hanging there, her hands pressed against the tile, her body shivering from the aftermath of orgasm and the cooling shower as their hot water finally ran low, Kaz felt the tears hovering close again.

This was their last night. Tomorrow, he'd take her back to the city, back to a new job, and their idyllic break from reality would end.

*   *   *

Wrapped in a thick white towel, Kaz walked back into the bedroom a few minutes after Jake. He'd put on a pair of black sweatpants but no shirt, and sat by the fireplace, staring at the flames.

It reminded Kaz of how her dad would stare at the fire at home—a wood fire, when she was a kid—and look as if he were a million miles away. As an adult, she understood some of the things that might have been going through his mind, but as a kid she just thought he looked lonely, and she'd crawl into his lap and hug him, so he wouldn't feel so sad.

She felt like she should do that with Jake, but instead she sat on the floor beside his feet and leaned back against the overstuffed chair, feeling replete and somewhat sheepish.

Staring at the burning log, she sighed. She really had to say something, if only to feel less fragile, more in control of her emotions. “I'm sorry I fell apart earlier. I'm usually a little more together.” She sighed again. “It hit me really hard tonight, and all at once.”

His fingers tangled in her damp hair. “You don't owe me an apology. I've been sitting here, trying to figure out how I can apologize to you, but I'm not as brave as you are. You face the things that hurt. I bury them.”

She tilted her head back and looked at him. Even upside down, he was gorgeous. Gorgeous and horribly sad looking. And lonely, too.

“What's hurt you, Jake? Whatever you say won't leave this room. I can promise you that. I can offer a nonjudgmental ear to listen.”

He tilted his head back, sucked in a deep breath, and then exhaled. “That's probably more than I deserve. I've been wanting to tell you but wasn't sure how. I spent almost six years in the CYA. From the time I was sixteen until I turned twenty-one.”

She frowned, still looking at him upside down, but what he said made no sense, so she turned around and faced him. “CYA? All that means to me is ‘cover your ass.'”

He laughed. A great burst of laughter that sounded as if he really needed it. Then he leaned over and picked her up, towel and all, and settled her in his lap. That always amazed her, how easily he could lift her. She was over six feet tall, but he was so strong. So comfortable with his size and strength.

“Sorry. That was not the answer from you I was expecting. The CYA is the California Youth Authority. It's a hellhole of a detention center for kids who screw up bad enough that they need to be locked away. I was locked away.”

It took longer than it should have for that to register, to make any sense at all. Jake? But he was one of the smartest, nicest, gentlest men she'd ever met. She shook her head and touched the side of his face. “I don't get it. What for?”

He sighed and glanced away. “Sort of a long, convoluted story, but basically it happened because I idolized my older brother. Ben was like a god to me, but we had issues. We'd been really close, and then we weren't. I was into hero worship and he saw me as a pain in the ass punk kid. One night he got drunk and stole a car. He never would have done anything like that sober. At least, I don't think he would. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world when he asked me to hang out with him. Long story short, we had an accident and got caught. Ben convinced me to tell the cops I was the one driving. Since I was a kid, we figured I'd get off with a warning. He was nineteen and could have gone to prison, so I went along with it.”

“But you didn't get off, did you?”

He shook his head. “No. There was a new DA and he threw the book at me. I was sentenced to the California Youth Authority where I stayed until I turned twenty-one.”

“But your brother? He never fessed up, never told anyone you were innocent?”

Jake shook his head. “But I wasn't, really. I was in a stolen car. Even though I didn't know it was stolen, I should have. It was wrong. So damned stupid, but it cost me everything. My parents blamed me for messing up Ben's life. I haven't heard from them since the bailiff led me out of the courtroom. Ben joined the Army before the trial even ended, long before I was sentenced. He hasn't been home since. He's dealing with his guilt his way, I guess. Back to back tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, from what I've heard. The point is, what we did was wrong. I paid in my way, Ben in his. Our parents apparently wrote us both off.”

“Parents don't do that. At least, the good ones don't.” She had a hard time believing what he was telling her. It made no sense. None at all.

He shrugged and stared at the fire. “Mine did. They live in Marin, not twenty miles from me. I haven't seen them since I was sixteen.”

“They never came to see you when you were locked up?”

“Nope. But then I never contacted them after I got out, either.”

“I don't blame you. I think if I ever saw them, I'd end up making a scene. Good parents don't ignore their kids, especially when those kids need them.”

“Obviously, they missed that day in parent class. They weren't horrible parents, but they weren't the best, either. At least I hope I won't make their mistakes, should I ever end up having any kids. Doubt that will happen, though.”

“Why not?” She felt so warm and comfortable, snuggled in his lap, her head on his shoulder, but his answer was more jarring than it should have been.

“Because I'll never marry, and I don't believe in purposefully bringing kids into the world without two parents. Besides, with the training I've had, I'd probably make a horrible father.”