Passion (13 page)

This
was what she needed.

Damn
.

Sitting stiffly on the bed, Teryl stared at the worn box springs on the other bed and directed angry, silent curses all around.
Damn D.J. for not being able to get her mind off sex long enough to hear her plea. Damn John for taking her prisoner in the
first place, for scaring her enough that she hadn’t tried harder to make D.J. listen, for sprawling over there on that mattress
that blocked her only means of escape.

And damn
you
, she thought blackly, addressing herself, for being such a fool. For being sucked in by a pair of intense blue eyes and a
rare, sweet smile. For being naïve and trusting and such an incredible idiot. For being too afraid to blurt out a cry for
help that D.J., even while playing sultry, sexy, and naughty, couldn’t misunderstand.

Damn, damn,
damn!

Across the room—that sounded so much better, so much safer, than saying five feet away—John was half-sitting, half-lying on
the mattress. There wasn’t enough room between the bed, the dresser, and the door for the mattress to lie flat, so one side
was level and the other curved up to block the dresser drawers; one end was flat, and the other leaned against the door. The
only way he was going to be able to stretch out comfortably was to lie at a diagonal—not that she gave a damn if he was comfortable.
She wanted him to share her misery. She wanted him to be just as exhausted, hungry, and despondent as she was.

Judging from the brooding expression he wore and the
weariness that etched his face, at least that wish had come true.

Craving distance, privacy, and an escape from the blue gaze she’d found so flattering last night, she rose from the bed and
went to the sink, yanking the plastic wrap off one of the cups there, filling it with tepid water, and taking a long drink.
Her scowl deepened as her gaze connected with his in the mirror. So much for distance.

That left only the bathroom. She made a hasty retreat, closing the door behind her. She knew from her earlier visit that there
was no lock on the door, but he had been decent enough so far. Surely he wouldn’t begrudge her a little time alone. It wasn’t
as if she could go anywhere or could do anything.

Lowering the toilet lid, she sat down and rested her elbows on her knees. The bathroom was no cheerier, no cleaner or nicer
than the rest of the place. A bare light bulb, maybe forty watts, sixty at most, burned overhead, its fixture dangling by
a wire from an irregular hole in the ceiling. The walls were ugly powder blue tile, with an alternating border at eye level
of pale pink. The tub was old, small, and set against the back wall. A peek behind the shower curtain revealed bits of plaster
fallen from the ceiling overhead, a yellow-red stain extending from the faucet down to the drain and two cockroaches, one
dead, the other very much alive.

And lo and behold, there was a God up in heaven… and a window above the tub. It was set into crumbling tile, square, awfully
small, but she could wiggle through it. She knew she could.

With a new sense of purpose—with new hope—she returned to the bedroom and lifted her suitcase onto the bed. “I’m going to
take a shower,” she announced, opening the bag and rummaging through it until she located the zippered vinyl bag that held
her toiletries.

John made no response. He just lay there, his head tilted back at an awkward angle to rest against the door, his eyes closed,
his breathing shallow but steady.

Back in the bathroom, she closed the door once more, wishing she had thought to grab a shoe from her suitcase to
slide underneath it and act as a wedge. But it was too late now, and the shoes she was wearing, chosen for their thick soles
so she could do a lot of walking, were too big to be of any use.

Setting the bag on the floor, she chased away the live cockroach, turned the water on full force, then climbed onto the narrow
side of the tub. There was scum—mildew, dirt, slime she didn’t care to identify—on the lock and around the edges of the window.
Grabbing a threadbare washcloth, she covered the lock and began pushing.

After a moment of fruitless work, she sighed. The window obviously hadn’t been opened in ages; the scum grew in a continuous
spread all along the frame and seemed to cement the lock in place. Changing positions, one foot on each side of the tub, she
braced herself against the wall for better leverage and gave the small, slippery lock her best effort.

The metal had just started to budge when an arm closed around her waist, startling her, pulling her off-balance. She struggled
instinctively, shrieking as her feet slipped from the tub rim, one landing in the water that had pooled in the bottom of the
tub, the other on John’s foot. Muttering a curse in her ear, he lifted her with his arm around her waist, then settled her
against his hip like a sack of grain, carried her around the corner, and, with more force than necessary, dumped her right
in the middle of the bed.

Scowling, she scrambled into a sitting position. “You bastard.”

He ignored her and picked up the phone from the night table. As she warily watched, he disconnected the cord from the back,
then laid the phone aside on the other bed. So much for the possibility of calling for help, she thought darkly, not that
she’d given it much thought. Whom could she call and what could she say? That she was being held prisoner in a motel without
a name in a town whose name she didn’t know by a man whose name was commonplace enough to be a joke? And did she know this
man? No, not at all… well, except for getting pretty damned indecent with him on a French Quarter sidewalk. Oh, and behaving
shamelessly with him in
a taxicab. And, oh, yes, having sex with him three times only hours after meeting him.

Any rational person would think she was crazy and hang up on her. Even D.J.—
if
she could get hold of her again—wouldn’t buy this tale.

When he bent down, searching between the beds, then straightened a moment later with the phone cord in hand, hostility quickly
gave way to fear. She watched as he formed a loop with the thin wire, then bent again to fasten it around the metal foot of
the bed. Dread coursing through her, she began scooting away, scrambling across the bed, trying desperately to avoid him but
simply managing to back herself into the corner.

She was trapped.

And he was reaching for her.

“P-please,” she whispered, her voice trembling. “Please don’t tie me up.”

Looking grim and relentless, he grasped her right wrist and began drawing her across the bed. She pulled against him, but
the sheet was old and worn thin; her feet couldn’t find traction, and the slick, synthetic blend of her shorts and vest slid
right across the bed.

The cord wasn’t very long, so he pulled her to the edge of the mattress, then forced her wrists together and began wrapping
the length around them. When she struggled, he didn’t say a word but merely moved so that he was lying heavily against her,
his weight forcing her to subside.

She couldn’t bear this, Teryl thought. Her heart was thudding, and she felt an all-too-violent churning in her stomach. If
he didn’t change his mind, if he didn’t loosen the cord and free her, she was going to go into a full-fledged panic attack.
She was going to start screaming, and she wouldn’t stop until everyone in this entire little town had heard her.

Then she felt his erection.

His gaze met hers, and she saw his startled look. His desire had come swiftly. In no more than the space of a moment, he’d
gone from sex-was-the-last-thing-on-his-mind to hard enough to hurt where his penis pressed against her hip. Twenty-four hours
ago she had been flattered by his desire,
but right now she felt only fear—fear and, in some shameful place deep inside, a tiny little rush of heat.

Oh, God, she was as sick as he was. How could she care at a time like this that the sex between them had been good? He had
kidnapped
her, for God’s sake! He had taken her prisoner and was planning to tie her to the bed and was getting turned on by it! How
could she feel anything less than total revulsion? How could her body betray her this way?

He shifted positions slightly, rubbing against her, and then, holding both of her hands in one of his, he raised the other
to lightly touch her face. “Teryl…” His voice was hoarse, soft, a needy plea.

Humiliation given life by her own need made her turn her head away, and her response made him stiffen. He slid off of her,
sat on the edge of the bed, and began rewrapping the cord around her wrists, working quickly, mechanically. She lay still
until he began to tie the ends together; then she twisted her fingers, managing to wrap them tightly around his. “Please,
John…”

He brushed her away and fastened the ends into a knot, checking to make sure it wasn’t too tight—or too loose.

“John, please don’t do this.” Panic made her voice thin, insubstantial. “I can’t… Oh, God, I can’t stand this. Please, I’ll
be good. I won’t try to escape. I won’t cause any trouble.”

He ignored her pleading, stood up, and walked away, crossing the room to the television, turning it on, turning the volume
as loud as it would go. If she screamed, some rational part of her knew in spite of her fear, it wasn’t likely anyone would
hear, and if anyone did hear, it wasn’t likely they would care. They would probably assume it was just part of the cop movie
on TV. Still, that didn’t stop her from making one last, whispered, tearful plea. “I’ll be good, John. I swear I will.”

John went into the bathroom, closed the door, rested his arms against it, and buried his head in his arms. She was crying;
in spite of the television, he could hear it through the
thin wall. The soft little sobs pricked at his already raw nerves until
he
wanted to cry.

Christ, what was he doing here in a shabby motel in Podunk, Mississippi, with a crying hostage tied to a bed? What in hell
could possibly be so important that it could bring him to this?

Simon Tremont. That smug, condescending bastard claiming to be Tremont.

His books.
Resurrection
.

His life
.

Without Simon Tremont and the books, he
had
no life. He might as well be dead. And although he had lived half his life thinking dead was the best way to be, he’d be
damned if he would die a total failure. He didn’t have friends or family to miss him, didn’t have a woman who loved him or
kids who would mourn him, but he had twelve much-loved books, and he would reclaim them before he died. He would prove to
Teryl that he
was
Tremont. He would prove to her that he wasn’t crazy.

He would prove it to himself.

The sound of water still running in the tub penetrated his thoughts, reminding him that he hadn’t had time for a shower this
morning. He’d had too many plans to make—to obsess over. He had gotten to bed late and had been up early to watch for the
impostor in the hotel lobby, and now he felt dirty.

Of course, the dirtiness he felt wasn’t the sort a person could wash away with soap and water. It came from the inside out,
and there was nothing in the world with enough power to make him completely clean again. Still, a shower might help relax
some of his tense muscles. It might help alleviate some of his unwanted desire. It would certainly help block out the sounds
from the next room.

Closing the vinyl curtain, he switched the shower on, then stripped out of his clothing and stepped under the water’s spray.
Although the handle was turned to hot, the water was only lukewarm and quickly edging toward cool. Teryl had used all the
hot water in the cover-up of her failed escape. He didn’t mind the cool temperature, though. It washed away
the outer layers of his exhaustion, made him feel not quite so weary, not quite so ragged.

Besides, cold showers were supposed to be good for over-active libidos, and after years of lying more or less dormant, his
was certainly making up for lost time. Practically every time he looked at Teryl, he got aroused. Every time he thought about
last night, every time he closed his eyes and remembered…

That was exactly what he’d been doing earlier when she was in the bathroom. He had been more than half-asleep when she had
informed him that she was going to take a shower. He had heard and understood her words, though; the images his brain had
immediately conjured up were proof of that—images of her naked, her sleek brown hair wet against her head, her hands stroking
her soap-slick breasts,
his
hands buried in a lather of brown curls between her thighs. They were images guaranteed to lead to the vaguely unsatisfying
climax of a wet dream, but before he reached that point, something had jerked him wide-awake. Maybe it had been a sound. Maybe
it had been a subconscious unwillingness to come while thinking about her when he would much prefer to do it while making
love to her. Maybe it had just been instinct.

Whatever the cause, he had awakened hard and horny and suspicious, and she had given him reason to be. If she had escaped,
he would have wound up in jail—or, worse, the nearest psychiatric facility.

He smiled bleakly. Maybe they would have kept him too sedated to know who he or anyone else was. Maybe they would have kept
him too medicated to remember. Maybe, for the first time in his adult life, he would have found peace.

He finished his shower quickly, not because the temperature of the water now was sending chills through him but because Teryl
deserved that much consideration. Because the sooner he was done, the sooner he could untie her and the sooner she could calm
down. They could both calm down and get some badly needed sleep.

After drying off with a paper-thin towel, he pulled his jeans on and wadded the rest of his clothing into a ball. As
soon as he opened the door, the soft, teary sounds coming from around the corner stopped. He tossed his dirty clothes toward
his suitcase, shut off the television, then went to kneel beside the bed. There he freed the telephone cord, loosening it
from her wrists and from the foot of the bedframe, winding it in neat loops around the fingers of his right hand. When that
was done, he finally found the courage to look at her.