CHAPTER SEVEN
“So, what do you want to do on your last day of freedom?”
Chloe smiled against Ethan’s chest. Hearing his deep voice rumble in her ear sent a shiver coursing through her in spite of her relaxed position. They had rarely left the bed since Friday night and, if Chloe had her way, they wouldn’t be leaving anytime soon. Unfortunately, tomorrow was Monday and that meant work. She’d have to leave him whether she wanted to or not. ‘Not’ being the operative word.
Her finger traced a pattern on his chest and her smile widened at his sharply indrawn breath. She’d known, of course, of his ‘love ‘em and leave ‘em’ approach to his past relationships. She’d seen him in action. But a year of wondering what being with him would be like had made the decision of going to bed with him an easy one. That, and the fact that she’d been in love with him for so long that not knowing what it felt like to be with him hadn’t been an option. She didn’t know how long this would last—maybe not past the next week or two—or at least until he was able to go back to his own apartment. Either way, she was going to enjoy the time she had with him.
“I’m really, really hungry.” Her hand trailed down his stomach.
“You’re killing me, woman,” Ethan groaned, his hand capturing hers before she could reach her target.
“Spoilsport,” Chloe pouted. Propping her elbow against the mattress, she looked down at the perfection that was her bedmate. She still found it hard to believe that she now had intimate knowledge of every muscle and sinew, including the tiny scar on his shoulder that he claimed came from falling out of his treehouse when he was nine, and the heart-shaped tattoo on his left buttock that he wouldn’t tell her about. It was the only time in the last thirty-six hours that she’d feared their interlude was over before it ever really began. When he’d kissed her passionately and whispered that he’d rather concentrate on them, she’d been only too happy to oblige. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder who the tattoo was for. And if that person was still a part of Ethan’s life.
“Just give me a minute, darlin’, and I’ll be more than happy to oblige.”
She grinned at his affected drawl. “Sounds good, cowboy, but I really do need food.” She threw back the covers, ducking away when he reached for her. “Uh-uh. I need sustenance now.”
“Wore you out, did I, sweetheart?”
Chloe couldn’t help but grin at his smug look. Slipping his tee shirt over her head, she sauntered to the door, looking back at him over her shoulder. “Oh, I’m not done with you, mister. A little protein and I’ll be up for more.” She threw him a saucy wink. “Hopefully you will be too.”
A groan slipped from Ethan’s throat as he watched her backside sway enticingly through the bedroom door before disappearing from his view. Instantly, he felt alone even though he could hear her in the small kitchen, opening the refrigerator door and taking some dishes from the cabinet. Not wanting to dwell on the fact that he usually preferred being alone, he threw back the light sheet and reached for his jeans. Slipping them on, he left the button undone and padded—well, limped—barefoot into the kitchen after Chloe. The pain shooting through his leg made him realize he might have overdone things, but he wouldn’t trade a single second of what he’d just experienced for a pain-free moment.
Chloe was standing at the counter, humming and making her usual PBJ. “Going to make me one of those?”
“Would that make you happy?”
Ethan considered her tilted head and lopsided grin. She looked damned adorable. “Yeah.”
“Good,” she nodded, laying the finished sandwich on a plate and scooting it toward him across the small space that separated them, “I like making you happy.”
The bite of sandwich that Ethan had taken stuck in his throat, nearly choking him. He couldn’t blame it on the peanut butter. He grabbed for the bottled water she handed him, screwed off the plastic cap in one vicious turn and drained half the bottle.
I like making you happy.
The words echoed in his mind as he stared at her. She concentrated on making another sandwich for herself and missed his intent look. His eyes traced her form, recalling with indescribable pleasure every peak and valley of her voluptuous body. There was enough distance between them that they weren’t touching, but he could still feel the heat of her body, the pull of her nearness. Hell, he’d been fighting the feelings for so long, he couldn’t remember when they hadn’t been a part of him. Now, he couldn’t forget the way she’d touched him, moved like the other part of him as he’d filled her.
I like making you happy.
“Why?” The word sounded alien in the quietness. He’d paused for a beat too long.
Her gaze swung to his, and he could see her nervousness as well as the determination that lifted her small chin. “Because I’m in love with you, Ethan. I have been for a long time.”
Ethan’s hand reached for the counter, seeking a hold on something firm as his world tilted. “Chloe, I…”
“Don’t worry,” her laugh sounded forced, “I’m not proposing marriage and I don’t expect you to, either. I just wanted you to know.”
Ethan knew he should move, but he was frozen where he stood, leaning against the counter, holding a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. He felt the bread squish and realized he’d squeezed the sandwich nearly in two. Laying the mangled pieces back onto the plate, he finally moved forward, breaching the small space that separated him from Chloe. He put a hand out to stop her nervous movements as she spooned jelly from the jar. She was embarrassed, he could tell, but also glad that she’d gotten out what she’d wanted to say.
“No one’s ever said those words to me before.”
Chloe looked up at his softly spoken statement as confusion pushed her embarrassment out of the way. “Really?” Her brow furrowed. “I would have thought women slung those words at you all the time.”
“Nope.” Ethan continued to hold the hand that held the jelly-filled spoon, his body reacting to the warmth of her soft skin regardless of the seriousness of the conversation. “I’m always upfront about where I stand on the subject of marriage and happily-ever-after.”
Chloe nodded, her stomach sinking even though she’d known what his response to her declaration would be. She’d had to tell him anyway. She’d told herself that knowing what his response would be wouldn’t matter because she only wanted him to know how she felt. She’d been wrong. It hurt. Still, she couldn’t blame him. He was what he was—a self-declared bachelor for life. “And do you tell them why you feel the way you do about marriage and happily-ever-after?”
He shook his head, wondering at the sudden urge to share the story with Chloe when he’d never been able to speak of it with anyone else. Besides Clay and Wyatt, only Tom knew his reasons and that was because he’d been there to witness the whole thing. He was the only member of the unit from Ethan’s early years that he still had contact with.
“Why not?”
“Because it hurts too much.”
The words echoed the sudden haunted look on his face and Chloe’s free hand reached automatically to touch him, resting lightly atop the muscular forearm of the hand holding hers. “I’m sorry, Ethan.”
He shrugged as though it didn’t matter even as the words he’d never shared with anyone else spilled from his mouth like water from a dam. “I was in love once, sure I’d found the girl of my dreams and the woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. She was perfect. Funny, smart, kind. And so beautiful.”
Chloe listened with her heart dying inside her chest.
“Everything was wonderful until I killed her.”
“No, Ethan, I don’t believe that.” Chloe immediately shook her head, laying the spoon aside and trying to step closer. He backed away and she stopped. She knew he wasn’t capable of killing someone. A tragic accident, perhaps.
“I may as well have.”
His eyes sought the small window over the sink; his expression telling her he was seeing something entirely different than the house across the street or the lone tree in front of the apartment building.
“I was a green agent, barely with the unit a year. We were working a sex trafficking ring. Someone was grabbing young women and selling them to organizations outside the United States to be used as sex slaves. My unit was trying to find out who was behind the operation here.”
“And you did.” It wasn’t a question. Chloe could see the answer in the pain on his face.
He nodded once more. “Turned out to be a former Wall Street executive that had made millions on the stock exchange. He had a thing for young girls and apparently a Brazilian associate casually mentioned that he could make a killing turning the women into prostitutes. Being a greedy son-of-a-bitch, he jumped in, using his various connections and his three yachts to acquire and ship his cargo.”
“Oh, Ethan,” Chloe gasped.
“It was just another way to make money to that bastard. You see, Brazil, like India and China, forms a part of the BRICS nation. Being a developing country, the gap between the urban and the rural and the rich and poor is very large. Human trafficking is an on-going problem there as well as in many other countries. It’s a very lucrative business.”
Although the thought sickened and saddened her, Chloe still didn’t understand how that had affected his relationship. Then a horrible thought struck her. Had Ethan’s girlfriend been kidnapped?
“I went undercover, acting as a bodyguard. I attended parties, hobnobbed with the rich. She got jealous when I came home smelling of another woman’s perfume. One night she followed me, snuck into one of the parties, acted as if she belonged there. No one questioned having another beautiful woman at a party. And I couldn’t say or do anything without blowing my cover. She started attending the parties regularly after that, star struck. I couldn’t explain to her what was going on in case it got back to the man I was pretending to work for. If he had found out I knew about his little side business, it would have blown months of investigation. And we didn’t have that type of time to start over. I begged her to stay home, tried to send her back to her family in Michigan. Even threatened to have her arrested, but nothing worked. Then one day—”
“Oh, no. He did kidnap her.”
“No,” Ethan’s laugh was mirthless, “he found her snooping through his bedroom. He thought she was an undercover officer.” His voice broke. “He…he beat her almost to death then shot her so that she’d slowly bleed out. I barely made it to the hospital before…” He took a deep gulp of air. “She died in my arms.”
“Oh God, Ethan, I am so sorry.” Moving to him, she closed her arms around him, holding him as his big body shook. “I am so sorry,” she whispered achingly.
Of all the things that she could have guessed made Ethan anti-marriage, this story would not have even made it into the fringes of her thinking. How horrible to lose someone you love in such a violent way. Minutes passed as they stood there, silently holding one another. She knew she had to say something. He might not listen to her, but she couldn’t let him continue to carry around that burden of guilt. She pulled back to look up at him. “It wasn’t your fault, Ethan. She was just young and naive.”
“She thought she was helping me.” His voice held a bitter edge. “And I couldn’t protect her.”
Chloe’s frowned. “You were both young. And so many things went terribly wrong. But it wasn’t your fault.”
“Tell that to Marie’s parents.”
*****
Chloe’s mind was still racing with unanswered questions when she opened the door to her office the next morning. After he’d shared his story, Ethan had retreated to the bedroom, forcing Chloe to spend an uncomfortable night on the couch. Uncomfortable since the last two nights had been spent in Ethan’s arms. She’d gotten up the next morning and cooked breakfast, as usual, hoping the hours apart would give them both some perspective on the past. A knock on her bedroom door had been met with no response. She’d grabbed some clean clothes from her laundry pile, showered quickly, dressed and left.
She reached for the light switch and let out a scream worthy of a horror queen when a quiet voice came from the darkness, sounding just like Anthony Hopkins in the Silence of the Lambs.
“Good morning, Chloe.”
Clay did a hell of an impersonation, complete with the slight clicking sound of his tongue that had made that scene so bone-chilling.
Chloe said a few choice words that would have gotten her mouth washed out with soap during her younger years and flipped on the light switch. She threw a searing glare at her boss, who sat on the edge of her desk, arms crossed, grinning like a fool. It was not the first time he’d pulled that particular joke on her.
“I’m so not in the mood, Clay.” She stomped over to her desk and threw down her purse, scattering papers atop the various stacks of files.
“Really?” Clay studied her, one dark brow raised in question. “You’re usually a better sport.” His head tilted to the side and a roguish smile curled his lips. “Let me guess, roommate troubles?”
Chloe hesitated to respond. Clay had proven himself to be a valuable friend as well as a great boss over the years, but Ethan was his best friend and…
Clay interrupted her inner struggle. “Let me make this easier for you, Chloe. I know you and Ethan have been tiptoeing around each other ever since you met, so I would surmise that after Amy and I left, you and he gave in to those impulses and did the nasty all weekend and now one or more of you is regretting it?” He gave her that quizzical and sympathetic look that she knew had made more than one guilty person confess their crimes to him.
“I’m not regretting it.”
“But he is?”
Chloe shrugged her shoulders and refused to answer. She walked around the desk and took her seat. With automatic moves, she turned on her computer and straightened the files. Those tasks complete, she heaved a sigh and folded her hands in her lap. Unable to sit still, she began turning the chair in small, semi-circles. “I really don’t know. Last night he told me about Marie.”
Clay let out a long, low whistle. “Really? He usually doesn’t talk about her—or that time in his life.”
“He doesn’t?” That tore another hole in Chloe’s heart—for Ethan. How could he have gone through something like that and not talk about it?
“No. Wyatt and I managed to get him to speak about it once—after about two bottles of whiskey.”
Chloe had met Wyatt Whitfield once when he’d come to the office to take Clay to lunch. The epitome of the old west cowboy, Wyatt would stand out in any crowd. Devastatingly handsome, the wickedly rich owner of the biggest ranch in Colorado had women throwing themselves at him. A lot of good it did, Clay had confided to her, Wyatt, an old college friend of both Clay and Ethan, was also a confirmed bachelor.
But it wasn’t Wyatt she wanted. It was Ethan. Ethan with his chocolate eyes that could make you beg for his touch and a charisma and sense of humor that could charm you and make you laugh all at the same time.
Clay’s next question drew her out of her thoughts.
“Does that bother you? That his job put her in danger and he wasn’t able to protect her?”
She jumped from her chair, her hands on her hips. “How can you even ask me that, Clay Montgomery? Her death had nothing to do with Ethan’s ability to protect her. It was a devastating act of fate that no one could have predicted.”
Clay smiled at her, his heart gladdened that this woman was now firmly in the corner of one of his best friends. Ethan needed a woman like Chloe in his life—had always needed her. He was damn glad they had given into the sexual tension that had surrounded the two of them since, like he’d told Chloe, the day they’d met. He’d known Ethan hadn’t acted upon his feelings because he knew the type of woman Chloe was—the kind you take home to your mother. The kind you make a solemn vow to love, cherish and protect. And, unfortunately, Clay also knew his friend well enough to realize that even now, after he’d given into his attraction, the last little word was going to still cause the two of them some heartache.
That was unless of course, they got a little help.
“I was just checking, sweetheart. He’s my friend, too.” He rose to his feet, taking Chloe’s face in his hands and placing a kiss in the middle of her forehead. “Now, let’s get to work, I have to be back in Denver by this evening. Closing arguments are tomorrow.”