Longest Night (13 page)

But as the sky darkened and Marguerite hinted at leaving, Cecily's protective side reared its head. Leaving them to talk, Cecily snuck off to the bedroom, where she unbuckled her belt and removed her holstered .45. She'd need to change to a weapon with more firepower, just in case they did meet up with a bear. She knelt down and unlocked the safe.

Ian stepped through the doorway. “Something going on?”

“Taking Marguerite back. She found signs of a bear on the way up here. It's probably safe, but I'd rather not take any chances.” She looked back, letting her eyes rove over Ian's body. God, he was gorgeous in his suit—and out of it. She'd been looking forward to undoing every single button, one at a time. “You should stay here.”

“Don't be ridiculous,” Ian countered. He closed the bedroom door and shrugged out of his jacket, then tossed it onto the foot of the bed.

“It's safer,” Cecily insisted, turning back to the selection of guns. She had a Kimber 8400 classic bolt-action rifle for big game hunting. Loaded with 160 grain .270 Winchester rounds, it would be sufficient to take down a bear. She loaded three rounds and pocketed another three. Then she set the rifle on the bed, muzzle safely facing away from Ian.

When she glanced up at him just in time to see him step out of his slacks, she couldn't help but stare. He wore nothing but black silk boxers that made Cecily want to forget about everything but petting him, contrasting the feel of silk with skin.

“You're too damned distracting,” she accused, finally forcing herself to turn back around.

Ian's laugh was low and knowing, and it took all of Cecily's self-control to ignore it. She took out the old .44 Magnum revolver and gave it a quick check, even though she knew all of her weapons in the safe were clean and ready to go. She hated the Magnum's recoil but had fired it enough to be confident that she could hit a close-up target, which was all that mattered tonight. She wasn't hunting a bear; she was just trying to keep everyone safe.

“Really, Ian, you can stay. I know the quad hurts your back,” she said as she found a box of bullets for the Magnum.

“I'm not an invalid,” he snapped with abrupt heat in his voice.

Startled, she looked up to see him frowning down at her, wearing only blue jeans. She couldn't help but let her eyes roam over sleek, tight muscles. “I know,” she said truthfully. “But you're always taking those pills—”

“They're over-the-counter.” He turned his back, showing faint, careful surgical scars, such a contrast to the ragged, unattractive marks of war on Cecily's body. She turned her attention back to the safe, not wanting to have this conversation. He was constantly taking ibuprofen, and over-the-counter or not it couldn't be healthy. But it also wasn't her business. Instead, she concentrated on loading high-power bullets into the Magnum before she slipped it into a holster. She stood up to thread it into her belt; the weight difference was immediately apparent. She drew it a couple of times to remind her muscles of the change from her usual .45.

“Marguerite could stay here tonight,” Ian said gently. It sounded like a peace offering or an apology, and Cecily seized on it, wanting to get past the awkward moment.

“We'll be fine,” she said, looking over at him. While her back had been turned, he'd put on a hoodie, hopefully over thermals and not just a T-shirt. She picked up the rifle.

“I take it this isn't excessive?” he asked, eyeing the firearms.

“Anything less will get it angry. As I said, it's probably safe, but best not to take chances.” She headed for the bedroom door.

Ian intercepted her with a smile, hands catching her around the waist. “Are you always this protective?”

She looked up at him and nodded honestly. “For as long as I can remember,” she admitted. “I'm sorry—”

“Don't,” he interrupted and leaned down to brush his lips across hers, a light touch that made her lips tingle. “I think it's wonderful. She's lucky to have a friend like you.”

Cecily felt her cheeks go hot. She looked down and shrugged, embarrassed.

Then Ian touched her chin to tip her face back up. When their eyes met, he said quietly, “And so am I.”

October 28

“Well, that was a complete waste of three hours,” Ian said acidly as he dismounted gracelessly from the quad Cecily pulled right up to the front of the cabin.

“You didn't have to come,” she growled back, fumbling the key out of the ignition. She left the quad where it was, too cold and irritated to give a damn about stowing it safely away. She'd deal with it tomorrow, assuming the storm didn't bury it, in which case she'd just shovel the damned thing out in the spring and scrap it.

Ian actually had the audacity to accuse, “There was no bear.” He banged the cabin door open and went right for the fireplace.

As if Cecily could make a bear appear on demand? She followed Ian inside, stamping snow off her boots. The cabin was almost as freezing as the outside air. As always, she had banked the fires on the way out. She left the rifle by the door—it would need to be dried and oiled before she put it away.

She went to the hearth, saying, “I'll do that.”

“I have it!” he snapped back. “I know how to build a damned fire!”

Cecily resisted the urge to smack the back of his head and remind him that he was the one who'd wanted to spend three hours on the back of a bouncing quad in the freezing-cold snow. Instead, she dragged herself to the kitchen. The woodstove heated more efficiently than the fireplaces, so the kitchen would warm up quickly, and she wanted to get a hot drink into both of them. A few years ago, she'd picked up a box of herbal tea meant to fight insomnia. It tasted like shit and had done nothing to help with her sleeping problems (which were far from ordinary insomnia), but it might calm Ian's temper.

As soon as she had the fire built and the kettle heating, she went into the bathroom and started the shower. “Ian! Get in here!” she shouted. Because the pipe from the water heater was only a couple of yards long, the bathroom almost immediately began filling with steam. She breathed deeply, letting it burn through the ice clogging her lungs.

Stubbornly remaining in the living room, he shouted, “I'm perfectly capable of—”

“I know!” Cecily interrupted sharply, leaning against the sink. She pressed her hands to her eyes, thinking this was a fine time for Ian to become a complete asshole.
Lawyers
. “Just get in here.”

He stormed in a moment later, tall and furious, sharp eyes glaring, pale cheeks flagged with color. It would have been imposing if not for the snow-damp hair that hung in his eyes, waterlogged from light gold to brown. His glare softened into suspicion when he glanced at the tiny shower stall.

“Get in there before you actually do die and I'm stuck with your corpse for the winter,” Cecily told him. “Pinelake doesn't have a mortician.”

Ian frowned as though puzzled. “You should shower first. Your shoulder's too stiff for over-the-counter painkillers to help much.”

Startled by the consideration, Cecily resisted the urge to touch the old scar. It
was
aching, but she thought she'd hid it well. “I'm fine,” she lied, gesturing toward the shower. “Just don't use up all the hot water.”

“You need it more than I do.”

“Which is why you should get your ass in there and stop wasting it. God, are you
always
this stubborn?” Cecily muttered, trying to push past Ian so she could go build up the bedroom fire.

He caught her arm, making her tense warily, but all he did was study her face intently. Slowly, Ian's fingers uncurled, releasing her. He turned away, apparently satisfied with whatever he saw.

“The Tuckers.”

Baffled, Cecily asked, “What?”

“Taxidermists. Almost the same skill set as morticians.”

She stared at the pale line of skin at the back of Ian's neck. Droplets of melting snow were slithering down his nape, disappearing into the collar of his shirt. The last of her irritation vanished under the desire to taste those drops as his words finally registered in her brain.

She snorted out a laugh and forced herself to turn away. “There's a gruesome thought.”

“Impractical, too. Though you're welcome to keep my skull. Didn't they do that sort of thing in the Victorian era?”

Cecily laughed. “Gruesome, but romantic,” she said, charmed despite herself.

Ian's laugh sounded pleasantly surprised.

***

Ian pulled his knees to his chest and wrapped himself in the blanket taken from Cecily's bed. He should have felt ridiculous in all his unwieldy layers of clothes, including three pairs of socks, but he still felt cold, and that
never
happened to him. Before the surgery and addiction, he'd been able to ignore cold or fatigue or hunger or any other discomfort his body imposed on him. Now, he'd apparently lost the knack. Despite the hot shower and the fire and the way he'd pushed the sofa right up to the hearth, he was still freezing.

And the cold had apparently reduced his inhibitions to nothing. What the hell was he thinking, suggesting something so grisly, so
serial
killer
as he had?

But Cecily's response was equally as puzzling. She'd
laughed
. She hadn't reacted with disgust or disdain or even a hint of fear at what was, in retrospect, a blatantly sociopathic statement. Then again, police, like soldiers, tended to develop certain defense mechanisms, gallows humor being the most common. She should have adapted her behavior back to civilian standards when she'd reintegrated, but she hadn't. Ian was glad of that. “Normal” was even more boring than nearly freezing to death—as he knew all too well, having experienced both.

Cecily's showers normally lasted just under four minutes. This one took six, and it was another five before she came out to the living room.

“Still cold?” she asked.

Ian nodded, turning to look at Cecily. “I hate Canada.”

Instead of taking offense, she smiled at him. “I assume you didn't make coffee or tea. Which would you prefer?”

“Tea,” he said a bit plaintively.

Cecily left him to his misery, returning a few minutes later with tea that smelled like decomposing plant matter. “We're now out of milk,” she said as she climbed over the arm of the sofa and sat down opposite Ian. Leaning over, she set both cups of tea on the hearth and tugged her fleece blanket off the back of the sofa so she could wrap up warmly. Like him, she was dressed in layers, though perhaps not so extremely.

After a few minutes of staring at the fire, Cecily said, “I'm sorry. I should have been more clear about going out in this kind of weather.”

Ian huffed in irritation. “You didn't even anticipate it. You were no more prepared than I was.”

“Well, no,” Cecily said, frowning, “but it's more than just wearing snow—”

“Or
did
you
?” Ian asked as new connections sparked deep in his brain. “You take precautions, but minimally. Your whole lifestyle is centered around
personal
risk
. You brought a rifle and backup handgun to deal with the possibility of a bear attack—to keep Marguerite safe—but you didn't bother to dress for what you surely recognized as the possibility of a snowstorm. And now you're apologizing to me because your risk didn't involve only you.”

Taken aback, Cecily went silent. Her face, usually so open and expressive, became a blank mask.

Ian twisted on the sofa, tucking one leg under the other, and leaned forward, studying Cecily's face. Firelight and shadow changed the shape of her cheeks and eyes and jaw, darkening her green eyes to a shade closer to emerald.

“Tell me something,” he said quietly. His thoughts were soaring now the way they did in court, when he picked apart his opponent's argument point by point. He was high on the exhilaration of watching the pieces of a mystery come together, giving him another facet of the puzzle that was Cecily Knight. But this time, his high was tempered with the realization of a truth she was probably hiding from herself.

“What?” Cecily asked tightly, still staring at the fire.

“If you had been alone, would you have carried your usual handgun instead?”

***

The last day of December. Seven years ago. Cecily could still remember that first day, the first year, how often she'd forgotten something critical. Food supplies. Firewood. Clean, warm socks. She'd risked injury and nearly died a hundred times that winter, and every time, she'd faced her trial with a stoic sense of calm. She'd never thought about it or psychoanalyzed it, because she'd been too busy trying not to get herself killed.

She didn't want to think about what Ian was saying. She didn't want to follow his thoughts to their ultimate conclusion. She wasn't a complete idiot; she could see where this was all leading.

“I'm not suicidal, if that's what you're implying,” she said, as coldly as she could manage, and she threw in a glare for good measure. Then she picked up her mug, cupping her hands around the warmth, though she didn't take a sip.

Rather than looking properly apologetic, Ian smirked. “No. You just face ever-escalating risks and don't care if the price of failure is your life.”

“Stop.” Cecily snapped out the command and turned away, unable to meet his eyes. “Just stop it, Ian. I'm not being cross-examined by you. You have no right to go digging around in how I think.”

“Someone has to. Seven years, Cecily.
Seven
years
,” Ian said relentlessly. “You're still hiding in the middle of nowhere, turning meaningless danger into a game and challenging death to win because you know that one day, it must.”

“So?” The word came out as a shout. Cecily put her mug down on the stone hearth so she wouldn't give in to the temptation to throw it. Anger raged through her, burning along her veins in an irrational blaze that she had to control.

She breathed deeply, eyes closed, and listened to her heart pounding in her ears. Refusing to think about Ian's words, she focused instead on her body: the crude support of the old sofa cushion over the hard wooden frame, the contrast between the cold air at the back of her neck and the fire's warmth on her face and fingers, the smell of the smoke and the clean snap of wood.

Slowly, she calmed down. Ian had been speaking, but Cecily hadn't heard a single word. She took another breath, falling through the last, lingering anger to the other side, where everything inside her was cold and deathly still. “Are you staying up?”

Ian's frown turned puzzled. “Yes.”

“Fine.” Cecily untangled herself from the blanket and rose, climbing back over the arm of the sofa. She threw the blanket over her shoulder and went into the bedroom, closing the door to keep in the heat. It took two minutes to bank the fire for warmth and darkness. She put the gun on her nightstand, took off her belt and holster, and dropped them on the floor beside the bed. Then she climbed onto the mattress and dragged the blanket over herself. She didn't want the damned herbal tea anyway.

***

Ian leaned back, staring at the wall over the fireplace. At first, he couldn't decipher Cecily's reaction. He was correct about her motives—of course he was—and he was accustomed to hostile reactions, usually from witnesses. But Cecily had gone from anger to hostility to…something else, something he couldn't readily identify. And then she'd left, going to the bed where he had been sleeping for the past week. Was that an invitation or simply a practical reaction to Ian remaining on the sofa?

He rearranged the blanket more comfortably and looked down at the fire, mentally replaying every word and nuance of their conversation. On the surface, her actions seemed reasonable, but not when scrutinized. Tonight, the easy solution would have been to invite Marguerite to stay at the cabin. Then they could have escorted her home tomorrow, in daylight. Instead, Cecily had risked an accident and the weather, as well as a potential encounter with a bear. If she were genuinely interested in
avoiding
the risk, she simply would have stayed at home.

Ian closed his eyes, thinking of the criminal world of Manhattan, of how he often had to venture into the city's underbelly to ferret out truths about his clients, both guilty and innocent. That was part of his appeal as a lawyer; he still did much of his own investigative work, which was how he'd ended up getting attacked and injured in the first place.

A normal girlfriend would tell Ian he was insane for living the life he did. But Cecily was hardly “normal.” Now, he just had to figure out if he had a chance of convincing her to go from friend to girlfriend.

***

Even before Cecily was fully awake, she rolled off the bed, dropped to one knee, and braced the surprisingly heavy weapon on the mattress, muzzle aimed directly at the open door. Her trigger finger trembled as she was caught between the conflicting urges to identify her target first or shoot blindly, and for painfully long seconds she had no idea where she was. The darkness and fire and smell of smoke disoriented her more than her sudden awakening did.

“I'd rather you not shoot me.”

Silky baritone, full of dry wit. Cecily exhaled and dropped her face to the bed as her fingers relaxed, letting the gun rest safely on the blankets. “Fuck,” she muttered, trembling with the jolt of adrenaline coursing through her veins. She didn't think she could stand, so she sat down on the floor, resting her right arm on the bed. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

“You didn't shoot,” Ian said, as if the end result was all that mattered. Cecily heard him cross the room and felt the other side of the mattress dip under his weight. Fabric rustled loudly—one of the blankets. Air moved in a soft breeze against her arm and face as Ian shook out the blanket.

“Right. Want the bed back?” she asked, leaning on the mattress for balance as she stood.

“Stay.”

“No.” Cecily moved her gun out from under the second blanket, hands still shaking.