Rush: A MacKenzie Family Novella (The MacKenzie Family) (12 page)

She’d never be done. That much she knew.

“Katrina is back at home. You’ve got to get back to your mountain. I have things to do.”

It was pathetic but she waited, watching him closely to see if she saw anything in his expression that would tell her to stay. He stared back at her. Silent and stoic as always. Giving nothing away and she had nothing more to give. He had it all.

He just didn’t want it.

She rubbed her hands on her pants, looking around to locate her purse. She spied it on the floor and reached down to scoop it up, placing it over her shoulder. Olivia slid her feet into her heels, the boost making her stand up taller and uncover the strength to give him a smile.

She walked over to the side of his bed again, reaching for the damp cloth, surprised when he let her wipe gently along his collarbone. The blood came off easily but she got his hair wet in the process, so she pushed it back and finished the job. Her fingers got tangled in the strands of his hair and she enjoyed the slight wave of silk in her hands.

“For the record, I like the hair. The marauding dark Viking is a look you can pull off. Brant is just jealous.” The joke fell flat even to her own ears and she pressed her lips together to keep from saying something worse.

He reached up as she pulled away, his fingers wrapped around her wrist. “I feel like there’s something I should be saying. I just don’t know what it is.”

She pondered that for a moment, wondering if this was the opening she needed. But she couldn’t feed him the words she wanted to hear. He’d never told her he loved her and that was a hard limit for her. The bottom line was that she needed him to say them because he couldn’t go another minute without saying them, not because she gave him verbal prompts. They couldn’t build anything on the real-life equivalent of mad libs.

But she knew what
she
wanted to say.

“We were never easy, Atticus. Not really. Sex was the only time we made sense and no matter how hard we like to pretend, that’s not enough. I’m still me and you’re still you and there is no natural place where we are going to meet in the middle.” She took a steadying breath and continued, knowing that this would be her only chance to vent. “I think we had our moment to try and find a place to build a bridge and it passed many years ago. But I’m glad we got this time. I’m glad the way we ended before isn’t our last memory of each other.”

Three little words were poised on the edge of her tongue but she would not let them fall into the space between them. Olivia had said them before for nothing. Her utter humiliation at begging for him to take her back was burnt on her heart, and she wouldn’t do it again.  They were not the magic talisman as portrayed in books or movies, not the key to unlock the secret to happiness.

So she leaned forward and kissed his mouth. It was brief, light but also heavy with its finality. It was a good-bye kiss, after all. It should have some weight.

“Livvy, I…” Atticus rasped out the whispered words, his voice faltering with the words he couldn’t, wouldn't, or didn't want to say. The regret was hard to miss but it wasn’t what she needed to hear. She didn’t want him to miss her; she wanted him to need her.

“Me too,” she answered, leaving the rest unsaid as she turned to walk out of his room without a backward glance and shut the door.

The hospital corridor was as empty as she would expect at almost midnight. She nodded at the nurses behind the desk and tried to keep down the noise created by the tap of her high heels on the hard tile.

Olivia stopped at the elevator and pushed the down button for the main lobby. She’d grab a cab back to the Batcave, gather her bags and head straight to the airport. The sooner she got back to her regularly scheduled life, the sooner she’d tie up and shut down the feelings that had escaped their cell in the basement of her heart the last couple of days.

Chapter Fifteen

He did a double take when he saw who was standing on his front stoop.

The video monitor was filled with the face of Katrina Hickman, her huge eyes blinking in the bright sunlight, a bandage on her right temple. A big dude in a black suit and the stereotypical dark aviator sunglasses stood just behind her. He pressed the intercom.

“Yeah?”

“Let me up, Rush.” She held up two wrapped gifts. “I have something for you.”

Oh hell. She got him a gift? She looked up at the monitor, the smile on her face widening as she waved the boxes wildly back and forth.

Oh hell.

“Come on up.”

He could hear the pounding of her feet on the stairs and opened the door just as she hit the landing. She stopped when she saw him, her eyes widening when she saw the bulky bandages under his T-shirt and the dark bruises on his face.

“Oh, Rush,” she said and then flung herself at him, catching him around the waist with her thin arms.

He could hear her sniffling, imagine the tears running down her cheeks, and it took everything in him not to ditch her and run. But what he did surprised him. Reaching down, he grasped her around the waist and pulled her up until her arms could wrap around his neck and he squeezed her tight, letting her know that he was here until she worked this shit out.

Eventually her sobs died down and he braved a peek at her. Cheeks red and eyes slightly puffy, she looked done. Thank God.

“Oh, Rush.” Her lower lip wobbled again and he unlatched her from his neck and slowly lowered her to the ground.

“Nope. No more of that. I’m fine,” he said, nodding toward her bodyguard as he closed the door behind them. “Do your parents know you’re here?”

“Yes.” She rolled her eyes in tandem with the sarcastic answer and he looked at the bodyguard for the confirmation nod. When he got it, he motioned for her to continue inside. She wiped her cheeks and looked around the space, nodding in approval. “This is cool.”

“Thanks.” Rush almost mentioned that Livvy had helped him choose and decorate it but he bit it back. Just because his mind always strayed to her didn’t mean his mouth had to follow.

It had been a long week since she’d left him in the hospital, and once the debriefs and post-mission crap were wrapped up with Brent, he’d had a lot of time to dwell on what would never happen. Too much time. So much that he’d sent out feelers on the network that he was available for jobs.

He returned his focus to Katrina. “How are you doing?”

“I’m good. Seeing a shrink and I have nightmares.” Her honesty shocked him but she didn’t notice and kept talking. “They say they’ll get better.”

“They do,” he said, debating how honest to be with a young girl. After what she’d been through it would help for her to know what the deal really was. “They don't go away but they do get better, less frequent. You learn to deal with them.”

Katrina nodded. “Thanks for being honest with me. All of the adults are telling me that I just need to sleep it off and then whispering behind my back. It helps not to hear the same old bullshit.”

He considered correcting her cursing but he wasn’t her dad. Instead he went with what he could do, but it shocked him to hear the words that came out of his mouth. “You’ve got my number. Call me if you need to talk.”

“Anytime?” She waggled her eyebrows and he had to laugh.

“Stalker.” She smiled and he let out a breath that he hadn’t freaked her out. He didn’t know shit about dealing with kids. “Do you want something to drink?”

“Can I have a soda?”

“Are you allowed to drink soda?”

“No.”

He knew her mother was a health nut. Fuck it. This was his house. “Grape or orange?”

“Orange,” she said, her smile wide and bright. He hid his own grin behind the open door of the fridge when he leaned in and grabbed a soda for her and a beer for himself. Handing them off, he motioned for them to head out onto the deck.

Katrina popped the top and slurped at the soda, skipping across the patio to look over the edge and across the view. He lowered himself into one of the lounge chairs and watched her. She was a good kid and he was glad to see her okay.

“Do you want your present?” she asked, turning to face him. In the bright light he could see bruises on her neck and wrists and he tamped down the rage at her markings. She was fine now.

This wasn’t about him being pissed or the likelihood that her dad might be going down for corruption if Paulo tattled like the little bitch he was. Brant had made sure that the right people got the info on the stolen hard drive. Rush hoped she didn't hate him when it all went down.

Katrina sat down on the lounge next to him and held out the box. “I hope you like it.”

“Do I lie if I hate it?”

“Of course,” she said, nudging the box even closer. He took it, turning it over and over in his hands. She sighed and rolled her eyes. “It’s not a bomb. Open it.”

“Brat,” he grumbled, ripping back the paper and exposing the gift. It was a frame and when he turned it over his breath caught in his throat. A drawing, a really great one. It was her. Smiling. Holding a dog. A yellow lab. That’s what all the happy suburban families had these days. They fit in the back of their environmentally friendly SUVs. A big “thank you” was scrawled across the bottom. “You’re a great artist, Kat. I’ll hang it on my wall. Thank you.”

It wasn’t a lie. He could tell how much she’d improved over the last few years. He had no idea what all the lines and shading things were called but she had a talent. It was good. He nudged her with his elbow, biting back the wince when he strained the stitches in his shoulder.

“Is that mine too?” He nodded toward the other gift.

She shook her head. “It’s for Olivia. I heard you would have never found me without her.”

Okay, that surprised him. He schooled his expression to not show how much he hated that Livvy was gone. “Really? I thought she was your nemesis.”

Katrina rolled her eyes. “I hate to tell you this but I’ve moved on. I have a boyfriend.”

He forced himself not to laugh. You didn't laugh at girls when they were putting you in your place. He knew that much. He’d rarely gotten it right with Livvy but apparently this old dog could learn a new trick.

“Good to know.” He placed the unopened present on the side table and picked up the beer. “I’ll make sure she gets it.”

Katrina turned on her chair and looked around the deck as if she expected Livvy to materialize in front of them like magic. If she could then he would have conjured her a million times already. But if wishes were horses…beggers would ride.

“She isn’t here?”

“Nope,” he lifted the bottle to his mouth and took a healthy swallow. “She left a week ago. I don’t know where she went.”

“Why isn’t she here? You two were working together to save me. I thought…”

Apparently everyone had thought the same thing. Brant had chewed him a new asshole when he found out that he’d let Livvy leave. It didn’t matter that Rush had had no way to make her stay.

“No, Kat. That’s not how it works.”

“Then explain it to me. I’m a kid.”

A kid, my ass. He gave her the hairy eyeball. “If I was any good at it, I’d explain. But I’m not…good at this. I suck at it actually.”

“You don’t love her?” He took another sip from the bottle to avoid answering the question. Katrina was persistent. “I thought you
loved
her.”

“We’re divorced, Kat. That ends all that…love stuff.” He’d never even told her how he felt. Words were not his thing. He’d done his best to show her but when it had mattered, he’d been an ass.

And then too chicken-shit to follow her and make it right.

It was like Katrina could read his mind. She whispered, her eyes locked on his own, “I didn’t think you were afraid of anything.”

He went completely still, staring at her. A little girl on the edge of growing up with a big-ass bandage on her face and bruises from being kidnapped by a psycho bunch of killers and she was looking at him with such overwhelming…disappointment.

Fuck. That stung.

“She’s better off without me. We just make each other crazy.”

“Then you figure out how to get along anyway. Crazy has to be better than the grumpy and miserable thing you are right now.”

“I’m not…” He shut his mouth, the lies dying on his tongue. He was too tired to lie to anyone, including himself.

“You need to go get her back. She’s your forever person and you need to make it right.”

“My what?” Rush squirmed in his seat as her words hit a little too close to the truth.

“I see it on your face. You’re not that good at hiding anything when it comes to Olivia. I knew that she was special the first time you mentioned her in a letter. All it said was, ‘I went to a baseball game with Olivia’ and I knew I was out of the picture.”

He couldn't stop the snort at that one. Figures a twelve-year-old would be the one to hand him his ass. “You knew, huh?”

“Yeah and when I saw you two together that time? When you came back from Iraq?”

“When you froze us both out and acted like a brat?”

She nodded. “It was because you two looked like a couple. A real, in-love couple, and I was jealous.” She poked him in the side and then grabbed a handful of his T-shirt, making sure he looked her in the eye. “You were happy. You didn’t walk around with a big, stupid smile on your face but you were happy. The deep down kind that just makes your whole face look different. I’ve only ever seen that when you were with her. Don't you want that back?
Everybody
wants that. Don’t you?”

Did he? Yes. Right down to his marrow.

He thought about what she said and he knew she was right. He’d been happy with Livvy and that had terrified him because it meant she had the power to hurt him. Life had convinced him that it was foolish to try and keep people in your life but had left him unprepared for the moment when someone wanted to keep
him
. That had been…everything and he’d fallen in love with her because of it. He still loved her for seeing something in him worth keeping.

Rush took another drink from his beer, hoping Katrina didn't see his hands shaking. “It’s over now.”

It was lame but it was all he could think of to say at this moment. He wasn’t going to spill his guts to a twelve-year-old girl. Even one as smart as the one glaring at him with preteen indignation.