Rock Chick 03 Redemption (13 page)

“What’s wrong with ‘dude’?” I asked when he didn’t answer.

“We don’t have enough time to get into al that’s wrong with ‘dude’, especial y when we have more important shit to talk about. And if I stay here any longer, I’m gonna want my exercise in an entirely different way, a way that isn’t going to help Shamus keep fit.” He gave me a light kiss, which made my lips tingle even more pleasantly than my scalp.

“There’s coffee beans in the freezer, grinder in the cabinet over the coffee maker. Help yourself but I’m takin’ you to Dozens for breakfast so don’t eat anything that’l spoil your appetite.”

“Okay,” I said, staring at his lower lip, fascinated with watching it move while he talked.

“Roxie?”

“Hmm?” I was kind of not paying attention. What could I say? His lower lip was
fine
.

“You keep lookin’ at my mouth like that, after I’m through with you, and since I’ve been doin’ most of the work,
you’re
gonna have to take Shamus for a run.”

My eyes moved to his and then they narrowed.

“
You’ve
been doing most of the work?” He grinned but didn’t answer.

“Wel ! Do I have to remind you, Hank Nightingale, that you wouldn’t let me touch you the first time and the second time I
tried
to climb on top but
you
flipped me over –” He kissed me quiet.

“You don’t have to remind me,” he said softly when he was done kissing me. “I remember every second.” That shut me up, mainly because it took my breath away.

He went on, “I’l be back in forty five minutes, an hour at the most. Wait for me, we’l shower together.” I nodded my head. Although somewhere in my psyche it was registering that he was being supremely bossy, I didn’t care, not even a little bit.

“I think I might go back to sleep for a while,” I told him.

“Wake me up when you get home.”

At my words, his eyes got lazy and his arms tightened, bringing my body deeper into his. I got the feeling he was losing his motivation for the run. I looked to the side of the bed and saw Shamus sitting there, impatiently, tongue lol ing out, tail starting to wag when he caught my gaze. I looked back to Hank.

“Whisky, Shamus is waiting.”

Hank kept looking at me, just that, looking at me, his face close, his eyes staring into mine. I felt my breath turn shal ow as his lazy eyes got that intense look behind them.

“What?” I asked.

His hand ran up my side.

“Just thinking of you sleepin’ in my bed,” he said. “It’s a good thought.”

My throat closed and feelings of panic and happiness surged through me. It was strangely thril ing and frightening at the same time. I swal owed to open my throat, then I put my arms around him and pressed my face in his neck.

“Hank,” I whispered against his skin. “What I have to say at breakfast I know you aren’t going to like. Please, for me, or for the person you think I am right now, don’t –” He interrupted me.

“Are you tel in’ me you’re a different person?” I shook my head, pul ed away from his neck and looked into his eyes. “But once you hear what I have to say, you might think I am.”

He stared at me a beat, then, al of a sudden, he pul ed me completely out from under the covers and slid my naked body across his lap. He yanked the covers over me, wrapping them around me to keep me warm and then his hands went into my hair on either side of my head and held me, facing him.

“Sweetheart, I’m thirty-five years old and I’ve had a fuck of a lot more lovers than you counted on your one hand last night. I’ve come to the point, with women, that I know what I want when I see it and I haven’t seen anything in a long time that interests me as much as you.”

Holy cow.

I was trying to process that (and struggling with it) when he continued.

“Not only that, but I’ve seen a lot of shit in my job and I deal, day to day, with the filthy crust eating away at the edge of good civilization. I know good people, I know bad people, I know good people who do bad things and bad people who do good.”

I stared at him, wide-eyed, fascinated and speechless as his face dipped closer to mine.

“I know what kind of person you are and nothing you say over breakfast is gonna change the fact that, while I’m runnin’, I’m gonna think about your fucking fantastic body naked and asleep in my bed.”

A shiver slid through me.

“Wow,” I whispered.

“So you can stop worrying,” he finished.

I nodded.

He watched me for a beat and then his hands went from my head, to my shoulders and then around my back.

“One more thing, Roxanne.”

I nodded again, stil speechless, stil processing and, even though I nodded, I was not entirely sure I could take

“one more thing”.

“I meant what I said last night, about you and me. I know you’re scared –”

“I’m not scared,” I lied, automatical y and in self-defense.

His arms tightened. “Quiet,” he ordered.

I shut up.

“You think we’re going too fast.”

“
That
, I’l agree with,” I broke in again.

He shook his head and smiled. “What you need to get is that it’s done. The minute I slid inside you last night, it was done.”

That got a bel y quiver.

“You said that last night,” I reminded him.

“I have to know you get it.”

“Why?”

“‘Cause whatever it is you’re gonna tel me in a couple of hours is gonna make me involved.”

“I’m not sure it means that.”

“I am.”

“Whisky –”

“I’m already involved.”

“I don’t think so.”

He frowned. “You don’t get it.”

“You have to let me sort it out myself.”

“Been there, done that… I was a bystander the other times and it sure as fuck isn’t gonna happen with you and me.”

He was talking about Indy and Jet and al their problems.

“You’re being very nice but I have to take care of this my way.”

“I’m not being nice, I’m protecting what’s mine.” My body jerked in shock at his words, I blinked and my back straightened. “I’m not yours,” I said.

“You’re welcome to think that but it doesn’t change the fact that you are.”

This was familiar, too familiar, annoyingly familiar.

Men!

“I’m not yours!” I said and my voice was so much louder, Shamus gave a woof.

“I get it, Roxie, you’re tryin’ to be independent and strong

–”

Oh no, now he was patronizing me. I wasn’t a big fan of being patronized. “Don’t you dare patronize me, Hank Nightingale. I am independent,” I said, not claiming to be strong. I knew I wasn’t that. “And I’m sick to death of men who think they can…”

I stopped. I didn’t want to go too far, too soon.

“What?” Hank asked. When I didn’t answer he pushed.

“Men who think they can what?”

I scowled at him and burst out in a flurry of (loud) words,

“Possess me! Trap me! Make me be where I don’t want to be or go where I don’t want to go or feel what I don’t want to feel!”

After I was done talking, he twisted, my back hit the bed and before I knew it, he was on top of me, staring down at me, his eyes intense.

“Belonging to me doesn’t mean I’l make you do anything, it just means I consider you mine for as long as this lasts. It means I protect you, it means I take care of you.

For another man, it might mean something different.” His eyes changed, they went funny, the intensity strengthening to something that was mesmerizing.

Then he said, “Don’t confuse me with another man.” His words dealt my defenses a destructive blow.

Doggedly, I carried on, trying to be philosophical, trying to hold up the ragged remains of what was left of the shield I had around me, protecting me from Hank.

“They say, if you care about something, you have to set it free and if it comes back to you, it was meant to be.”

“They’re ful of shit.”

Obviously, I failed spectacularly at being philosophical.

I gave up on that and went for annoyed. “Hank!” I snapped.

He smiled, effectively breaking the moment, and gave me a light kiss.

“We’l talk about it over breakfast. I’l promise to listen to you and you have to promise to listen to me. We’l figure it out.”

If I could have put my hands on my hips, I would have.

“You’re as stubborn as Uncle Tex.”

The smile deepened.

“That means you’re in trouble,” he said.

“I already know that,” I grumbled.

He rol ed completely on top of me, his body pressing into mine, taking my breath away.

“The minute I saw you walk into Fortnum’s, I knew I’d do whatever it took to get you right where you are now. And I’m gonna do whatever it takes to keep you here for as long as both of us get something good out of it.”

I bit my lip. What could I say? He was getting to me.

No, if I was honest, he’d already gotten to me.

I couldn’t let him know it.

“And you think
I’m
crazy?” I asked.

“Yeah, I do, if you keep pretendin’ you don’t want to be here, you’re definitely crazy and you’re lyin’ to yourself,” He kissed my nose and grinned at me. “Don’t worry, I’m patient.”

Shit.

He got up, twisted me around until I was right in the bed and bent low to kiss my temple.

Then, without waiting for me to come up with an answer (which I was finding difficult) he was gone.

* * * * *

I mental y tugged at my protective shield but I knew it was useless.

Oh wel , whatever. So, I had to factor Hank into my plan.

It wouldn’t be hard, considering I had the feeling that Hank was probably just going to take over the plan and do it his way.

There were worse things, right?

Anyhoo.

I heard a knock on the door while I was burrowing into Hank’s pil ow and I smiled.

He’d come home, way early.

Poor Shamus. Maybe I’d take him out to play Frisbee later. I didn’t know if Shamus actual y played Frisbee but he seemed to be a super-smart dog, he’d learn.

I thought that Hank probably didn’t take his keys because he knew I’d be here.

I got up, found my panties and tugged them on and grabbed his turtleneck off the floor and pul ed that on too.

I left his bedroom and entered another room, a big room that ran the length of the house and had two couches running down the sides, a wood-burning stove sitting on a stone hearth at the end and a television. I walked through the side door, through the kitchen to the front door. Without looking to see who it was, I opened it, a smile stil playing on my mouth.

The minute I saw who was on the threshold, my smile died.

Bil y stood there.

That was the end of Hank and me.

Even though I thought it was the beginning, what happened next would keep Hank further away from me than any flimsy shield I could throw up.

* * * * *

I’d never hurt so much, my body hurts, my face hurts, my heart hurts.

Everything hurts.

I hurt but I wasn’t scared.

Bil y’s gone; the men took him away. I don’t know who they were, I don’t know where they were going and I don’t care. Someone would find me, the maid (if they had one in this fucking place) or the manager when we don’t check out. I just have to wait. I wasn’t going to die cuffed to a sink.

Though, it was debatable if something important, something deep inside me, something precious, hadn’t already died.

* * * * *

It wasn’t an easy kidnapping for him; I fought it.

It was violent, it was destructive and it was ugly.

After I opened the door and the smile died on my face, he surged into Hank’s living room, hands on me.

We went back… back… and then he slammed me into the wal . My skul cracked against it and I hit with such force, one of the New Belgium Brewery prints (the Fat Tire one) fel , crashing down, glass flying everywhere.

“Hank fucking Nightingale,” Bil y spat in my face, tel ing me how he found me. He’d looked up Hank.

Shit.

I couldn’t talk, Bil y’s hand was at my throat and it was squeezing.

“I saw him running with his fuckin’ dog. A fucking cop.

Detective
Hank fuckin’ Nightingale,” Bil y snarled.

I pushed hard, kicked harder and somehow got him off me.

We wrestled standing. I broke away, starting to run. Bil y caught me, whipping me around. More wrestling. a lamp fel , crashing to the floor, tables overturned. Bil y got me on the floor, rol ed on top of me, his angry face in mine.

“You fuck him?” he asked.

I didn’t answer, too scared to speak. I pushed against him, my heart racing, frightened out of my wits, hoping with everything that I was that Hank would come home and soon. I tried to think of how long he was gone. He’d said forty-five minutes, an hour. It had probably only been twenty minutes, twenty-five, tops.

“I said,
did you fuck him?
” Bil y shouted in my face when I didn’t answer and then he moved.

Then I heard the snap of a switchblade and he rol ed off me, and before I knew it, the blade went into Hank’s sweater, slicing through it. I pushed away, Bil y caught hold of me by the sweater and it tore more, hanging on me in tatters. I pul ed free, got up, tried to run but Bil y caught me by the ankle and I went flying, landing hard on my knees.

I twisted around as he yanked me toward him by my ankle and tried to fight him but he was too strong, he hit me in the face, one of his silver rings tearing my flesh open at my cheekbone. I saw stars and tried to shake my head clear when he got up, pul ing me with him and dragged me through the house, into Hank’s bedroom.