TRAGIC: Rook and Ronin, #1 (11 page)

I walk towards her and she holds her hands up and shrinks back into the corner. She's laughing so I know it's all in fun, but the defensive positioning bothers me for some reason. Like she's used to being stalked. Like she's used to guys coming at her with fists.

She starts to shift, uncomfortable with my silence and staring.

"Would you like to come upstairs with me?"

"What's upstairs?" she asks, trying to play innocent.

"My apartment. I could make you lunch." I look at the clock on the wall and it's almost dinner time, then nod towards it. "Or dunch, since it's late now."

"Dunch?"

"Yeah, you know, lunch and dinner. It's like brunch, but it's dunch."

"You cook?"

"No," I laugh. "Not really. But I can buy food and bring it back and put it on a plate and pretend I made you dunch." I walk a few paces towards her and she takes a deep breath but holds her ground. Yes, someone definitely hurt this girl in the past and that makes me angry. She catches my change in mood and I smile to ease her back down. She's perceptive.

"What else would we do?" she asks as I take her hand and pull her out of the corner.

"Watch a movie?" I offer. This piques her interest and she brightens as I bring her towards me and push her wet hair off her shoulders. It leaves drops of water behind on her bare skin.

"Which movie?" she breathes as I pull her into my chest. I can feel her heart hammering against my body and I take her face in my hands.

"Any movie you want. We have a database of pretty much everything." I lean down and caress her lips with mine and then groan when a tiny moan escapes her mouth.

She pulls back, her hand firmly against my chest to keep me at bay. "Why are you kissing me?"

"Because I can't stop myself. And because I'm the only one who knows you, and you're just Rook, the girl who appeared out of nowhere. But tomorrow, you'll be Rook, the face of TRAGIC. And I don't think you're tragic at all, Rook. I think you're Gidget. But what I think doesn't matter, because things will move forward once you sign that contract and we'll just have to wait and see where it all ends up."

"You don't want me to sign the contract?" She scowls at me, like I'm trying to steal her future away or something.

"No, that's not it. I want you to have your chance at that dream you have, but there's a reason this campaign is called TRAGIC and not GIDGET and I'm guessing you already know that, because you look like a smart girl to me. So, just for tonight, I'd like to treat you like Gidget and have you over for dinner and a movie."

She swallows down a sad look and then paints on a smile. "OK, dinner and movie. I'd like that."

I lean down again and brush against her ear with my lips as I whisper, "But no matter what happens—you will never shrink back into a corner from me again. Because I will never hurt you."

She stiffens a little as I hold her close, but I wait for her to relax before I let her go. And then I take her hand and lead her towards the stairs.

Chapter Eighteen - ROOK

Oh shit. I'm not sure what I'm doing here. Ronin is all over the place with me this weekend. Last night he had me standing in front of him naked so he could take a picture and hint that he'll take care of me. He leaves to go take care of someone else apparently, then lets himself back into my apartment and sleeps on my couch. He gives me a boat-load of free designer clothes, tests the waters with some not-so-veiled flirting, and then kisses me and invites me up to his apartment.

And I'm going!

Even though my head is screaming
stop
, my feet keep going. My hand is grasping his just as hard as he is clutching mine. My heart is pounding and if he wanted to take me to bed right now, I'd probably let him.

And on top of all that, he's got some well-formed opinions on what might have happened in my other life.

He stops at the top of the stairs and I try to rein in my wild emotions.

"Everything OK?"

I swallow and nod and this makes him frown. "What?"

"You look scared out of your freaking mind, Rook. You don't have to come up here, you know. We can go eat at Cookie's if you want."

I take a deep breath. "No, no, I want to watch a movie with you." That's not a lie either, the thought of picking a movie to watch with him actually sounds fun. "But I'm not interested in anything else." I look away, embarrassed.

"I don't want anything else, Rook. Just dinner and a movie."

I nod and snap back to reality, noting the hallway we've ended up in at the top of the stairs. Ronin notices my new interest in the place and points to the massive wooden double doors down off to the right. "That's Elise and Antoine's apartment. I'm this way." He redirects my attention to the left, where the hallway goes on for several yards and ends at an equally massive single door.

He keys in his security code and the door beeps and then clicks when the mechanism unlocks. Ronin opens the door and waves me in. I take a tentative step forward and then move out of the way so he can get past me. "Come on, I'll show you the movies."

He lets go of my hand and I scramble to take it back. He smiles over his shoulder and tugs me farther into the room. "Here's the remote," he says, motioning at me to sit on the couch. "Push that turquoise button to get to the movie database."

I push it and a search screen comes up along with a menu for different genres. "What kind of movies do you like?" I ask.

"Your pick tonight, I'll get dinner, and," he stresses, "I get to pick your food. And you can pick the movie."

"What's with you and the choosing food thing? I don't get that. Wouldn't you rather I get something I like?"

"Did you hate the burger I got you?"

"No, but—"

"But nothing. Give me a chance. I promise, I'm good at this."

"Yeah, but it's weird."

"What's weird about ordering you food?"

"It's not the ordering, it's the control."

"Oh, I get it. You're one of those."

"Those what?"

"Control freaks. You have to be in control all the time, right?"

"What? That's so far from the truth it's bizarre."

"What else could be then? I mean, if I pick what you like, then why do you care if I order you food?"

And I'm trapped. I can only shrug because to tell him the truth will spill all my secrets and to deny it will just keep the conversation going. Luckily he's one of those graceful winners and shoots me a wink.

"I'll be back in like twenty, OK?"

I nod and relax back into the overstuffed couch as Ronin wanders down the hallway and comes back with a clean shirt, then heads out. My gaze wanders around the room and I take it all in. It's definitely a guy's apartment because the color scheme is nothing but shades of brown with some black thrown in for variety. He has the biggest TV screen I've ever seen hanging on the wall and I get a little chill of delight as I think about watching movies on that thing. He's got surround sound speakers placed strategically around the room and through the sheer curtains I can see the city lights across what seems to be a pretty significant terrace.

Man, these people definitely have money.

I take my attention back to the database and enter the movie I want to watch. I've been thinking about this movie since I met him actually, because of his name. It's a movie both of us can enjoy—a touching love story with beautiful scenery—cherry blossoms even. And it's a war movie with lots of blood and gore.

I think he'll love it. This make me warm because if I'm honest, I want him to love it. Because I love it.

I really don't have a lot of experience with men but I can say with absolute certainty that no man has ever looked at me the way Ronin Flynn did when I came out of that closet wearing the blue nightie. His eyes swept down my body in hungry desire and then they climbed back up so slowly my heart started pounding with the anticipation of what his expression would say when he finally found my face.

If I spoke the language of his eyes I'd know for certain, but I'm at a loss with this guy. I'm fumbling around in the dark trying not to look or act like a complete child and I hope I'm not wrong about my guess, but those eyes looked like they wanted to touch every part of my body.

In the few seconds we twined our gaze together I heard myself ask him to kiss me a million ways in my thoughts, and if I spoke the language of my own desire then I'd know for certain that I almost begged him to do it with the look on my face.

Touch me
, I should've whispered.
Kiss me
. Because my whole body is humming with the realization that this is how a man makes you feel when you actually like him. This is what girls mean when they claim a man makes them feel weak. They don't picture fists hovering over them as they cower in the corner, hoping and praying that those hands never connect with their cheekbone.

I press play on the screen and then pause the movie and go over to the terrace to wait for Ronin. It's not warm out, but it's tolerable for a spring evening so I slip out and leave the door open behind me. It's a pretty large square terrace filled with patio furniture and a grill off to the side.

I walk over to the railing, bend down a little, and rest my chin on my hands. The view of downtown Denver is stunning—the tall buildings are lit up and everything seems to twinkle. I have no idea what any of the buildings are, but I don't care either. They're pretty. It's amazing, when I think about it, how fast things can change. Three months ago I was an abused girlfriend, beaten to within an inch of her life. Three days ago I was a scared girl with very little money in a strange city and living in a homeless shelter.

And tonight, even though I'm still scared and I still have very little money, it's all flipped around. I'm in a fantastic apartment with a beautiful man. I'm wearing some pretty nice clothes that I'll probably regret asking for when I see how much they cost. And I might even have a job as a model for a photographer who is important enough to own an entire building and pay girls a hundred dollars an hour to sit for him.

I hear the soft footsteps but I don't turn.

"Find a movie you like?" he asks as he comes up behind me. He puts his hands on either side of the railing, my body between them, and then takes a chance and leans in to close the distance between us.

"Yes," I reply as his mouth dips down to my neck, sending a tingle all the way up my body.

"What're you thinking about, if you don't mind me asking?"

I sigh. "Just how funny life can be. How things can change in a moment and how you never know when that moment will come. It's occurred to me over the past few days that I'm not really in control of very much. I mean, I can make a decision to get on a bus and move to a new city completely alone. And I can make the decision to walk out of a job where I was being falsely accused of stealing. And I can make the decision to spend my last ten dollars on a coffee where a bunch of models fling a little white card at my face and I end up with an invitation to sit in front of Antoine Chaput."

I turn my body so I'm facing him. I wonder what he thinks of that little revelation? That I wasn't invited, but stole an opportunity to test for Antoine from another girl. He eases up to let me turn, but as soon as I'm settled he presses against me again, only this time his chest is touching my breasts instead of my back, and his hands slip under my hair and begin to caress my neck. If he has an opinion on the invitation, he holds it back.

"But everything after that was luck," I continue. "I can't control other people. I couldn't make Elise take me into the studio, or Antoine like the way I look, or get offered a fake job shampooing hair just so I'd stick around."

He grins at that last remark.

"And I have no control over how you feel about me or why you want to let me stay here." I stare into his eyes and shrug. "I'm totally at the mercy of the universe for these parts. And it's a little bit scary not to be in control, don't you think?"

He pulls my face closer to his and my heart pounds with the thought of another kiss. But he doesn't kiss me, at least not where I expect him to. He brings his lips to my forehead and crushes himself to me, breathing in deeply. And his hands play with my hair, still stringy and damp from my shampoo.

"It's very scary," he whispers as his mouth travels down to my ear. "And I don't know the whole story with you but if you really did all that then I'm in awe of your courage, Rook."

"I think you overestimate me, Ronin. It wasn't courage, it was desperation and fear."

He pulls me all the way into him then, pressing me up against his chest, his hands wrapped tightly around my head and neck in a protective embrace. "Even so. You came up with a plan, and that is courage. Because if this guy you're running from did the things I think he did, then I know first-hand how scary that is."

I push back and stare up at him. "How?" I ask.

He smiles but it's sad. "Because my father used to beat the shit out of my mom back when Elise and I were kids. And one day he hit her with a baseball bat and she never got back up. Elise was eighteen and I was ten when they took my dad to prison. He's still there, I think. I have no idea really. When Antoine showed up and wanted to date Elise and take me in, we stopped being those tragic kids and just went back to being us again. It was scary as fuck those first few years, having to trust that Antoine was good and that he'd stick around. He and Elise never married and this bothered me for a very long time. I always felt that my new life was a rug that was about to be pulled out from under me at any moment. But then, slowly, things started to change. Antoine is a good guy, he loves Elise, and yeah, I'd like him to marry her and give her more security—but if what they have is good enough for Elise, then I just have to accept it."