Chapter Eleven
After a mostly sleepless night, Darcy sat at the desk by the window with her voice recorder in hand, as she’d been for hours. The sun had barely crawled over the horizon, licking orange light up the log walls. No sound carried through the house, not even when she’d sneaked out to the kitchen and helped herself to a bowl of cereal.
Every time she tried to speak out her thoughts about last night, her mind drifted back to all the parts she shouldn’t have been thinking about. How he’d looked in the pool, wet and slick and beautiful. How he’d gained her complete surrender in an instant with a single kiss. His smile. His laugh. The love and respect he had for his mother. It warmed Darcy to know he’d been loved at least once.
What did that say about her character, that she could think about sex after what he’d told her? Completely inappropriate, thoughtless, insensitive. He might have wanted a roll in the hay, but it was her compassion he needed.
Finally, she pressed record on her voice recorder. “A boy with a blade scarred Micah, driven by a sadistic father who was probably trying to create a prodigy. How sick is that? His own child, and all of the prisoners had to watch the abuse of that child, all the while waiting in agony to know who the boy would pick as his victim. My story about Gramps losing his baby girl affected Micah more than he probably wanted me to see. I’m thinking he volunteered for that particular torture as much to help the boy as the other prisoners, because some sort of connection, like soldiers on a battlefield, formed between them in that moment. Whatever made this personal for him involves Fernando.”
Blurting out her epiphanies had almost been disastrous last night. He’d scared her with the kiss, and she’d lashed out at him. It could have gone much worse. If he hadn’t touched her scar and wrenched her back to reality, there was no telling what they might have done. Mere hours with him, and she’d almost blown it. Was he coming on so strong to keep her confused instead of digging into his life? If his secrets were scaring him that much, unearthing them would be nearly impossible.
How could she get close to the heart of him without letting him get close to her body? The situation was a labyrinth she wasn’t sure how to navigate professionally. She needed to be calmer in the future, to concentrate more on the foundation and less on him. He’d tell her what he could, when he could. She had to be patient.
Stalling for more time before facing him again, she glanced through the contents of the closet. Why had Cynthia needed an army of suitcases if she left so much here? So many pretty things like Darcy used to wear, like sundresses and form-fitting shirts. Sure, they were more risqué with plunging necklines, but pretty all the same. Unlike everything Darcy had brought with her, because she’d culled all the items like them out of her wardrobe after her ex-fiancé, Dickface, had left her broken.
Gritting her teeth, she went back to her own suitcase and picked out a pair of cut-off jean shorts and a Big Bang Theory T-shirt. Wearing anything else would suggest she wanted to impress—or possibly entice—Micah, and that wasn’t her intention. Only his mind interested her.
And his fingers. And his mouth.
“Would you stop it!” she told herself. It was time to find the man and finish deciphering him.
Silence remained in the cottage as she emerged from her room. A lack of scents suggested he’d eaten a cold breakfast. He wasn’t in his bedroom, the open door offering a glimpse of a bed with rumpled navy cotton sheets, telling of the rough night he’d had, too.
Not in the kitchen, the office, or bathroom. Had he left? No, he wouldn’t do that, considering Cynthia had taken the boat, and it would have been a long swim. Still, her stomach fluttered as she stepped through the patio door and gazed out at the lake through the pines. It was eerily calm and flat, like glass, half obscured by wispy tendrils of mist curling up from the surface. A loon’s trill echoed over the water. The haunting sound emphasized her loneliness that had become a silent ache in her, which most of the time she wasn’t cognizant of.
Why did he have to bring her here? So many childhood memories churned up her mind, increasing her vulnerability to dangerous levels. Only six and a half more days to go, and she could get back to the city. Back to the doldrums of her celibate life and her new office on the top shelf, where she’d do her part to change the world for the better.
An expulsion of breath and a grunt drew her toward the edge of the log cabin and the stairs that led down to the pool.
There he was on the deck beside it, moving with lethal grace and wearing only the black pants from a karate gi. He’d tied his hair back. Sweat ran in ribbons down his naked upper half, wetting the edges of his hairline. It appeared as if he were doing martial art formations with precision and what could have been pure, undiluted rage given the power in his strikes.
Wow.
He contrasted spectacularly with the calm of the lake, the only creature stirring anywhere. Darcy had frozen in place, struck by the scene before her.
After watching him for a while, she found herself at the bottom of the steps before registering a conscious decision to move, as if drawn to him by a tether.
His hands sliced through the air, one forward knee bent, and his back leg straight. His sculpted muscles were flexed, his biceps larger than she first thought. There he stayed, peering at her through strands of his hair that had broken free of the elastic, giving him a wild, predatory look. Imagining his captors in front of him or pissed at the interruption?
“Is that karate?” she asked. Had he always practiced martial arts? Or was that new, since he’d been abducted? When he continued to watch her in silence, she shrugged. “I’ll just leave you to it, then.”
“Did you sleep well?” A quick shift of his feet had them together, his face wiped clean of whatever hot emotion had been driving him. He picked up a towel from the back of a chair and scrubbed it over the back of his neck. “I thought I heard you inside earlier, but when I went looking for you, your door was still closed.”
He’d been looking for her? She ignored the zings circling her veins and said, “I thought you were still sleeping and helped myself to some cereal. I hope you don’t mind.”
“All I have is yours.” His smile turned suggestive.
As if accepting his silent invitation on its own, her gaze traveled down his sweat-glistened body, down to his bare feet and back up his black pants to his chest. More scars crisscrossed the front of him, and she had an insane urge to kiss her way down them.
“So, what’s on the agenda for today?” Her laugh sounded awkward and nervous. He needed to get some more clothes on, pronto.
“Let’s get some breakfast, because after the way you made love to your meal last night, a measly bowl of cereal can’t have satisfied you. Then, I thought I’d take you kayaking before the mist burns off, and after that, a tour of the island?”
Liquid heat filled her belly, her mind somehow translating his innocuous suggestions into a fantasy of triple X proportions. “Yes,” she said, the huskiness of her voice degrading to a sultry burn. “I mean, yeah, sounds good.”
Kayaking, huh? She’d never done it, but it couldn’t be that hard. Besides, having him trapped in a boat next to her on the water would provide an ideal situation for which to ask what she needed to know, what the rest of the world wanted to know. Maybe if she wrote a story he’d approve before the week ended, he’d let her go early.
The sooner the better.
A half hour later, with her belly full of fresh fruit, a bagel with cream cheese, and freshly squeezed orange juice he’d made for her, Darcy wobbled into a bright yellow kayak. It was on a different dock than the one she’d arrived on, located on the east side of the island, complete with a small utility shed where he’d retrieved the paddles and life jackets from.
Once Micah seemed satisfied that she wasn’t about to topple out the other side, appearing ready to dive in after her, he handed her a double-ended paddle and slipped into a blue kayak on the other side of the dock. Far more gracefully, of course.
“Just paddle on one side and then the other.” He demonstrated using his own paddle. “It won’t take long for that clever mind of yours to catch on. I’ll race you out to that green marker.” One deep stroke had him free on the water.
She followed, soon adapting to the craft and how it worked. They glided along, mostly in comfortable silence that only broke when he pointed out landmarks and houses fit for royalty. The air should have been strained between them, but it was the opposite. Darcy wondered where her usual compulsion to fill the silence had gone, and why it seemed so peaceful both outside her body and within.
Sol would have had a conniption if he could have seen her now, wasting time with sight-seeing instead of grilling the man for details. But Sol wasn’t writing this story, and the one she wanted to write wouldn’t be based on cold facts. Still, his threat hung in the background of her thoughts like a blinking exit sign. The career she wanted to in journalism hinged on this one interview.
Keeping to her plan, she focused on the foundation. “How do you choose the cases the foundation takes?” she asked lightly, hoping he’d snap out an answer before thinking about it. Those were always the most truthful.
The finger he’d extended toward the construction site of a fancy new resort his friend was building returned to his paddle. He stared at her for a while, his head cocked to the side. He was thinking about it. Dammit.
“Agree to tell me about your scars,” he said, “and I’ll tell you about the foundation.”
The bottom dropped out of her stomach. “God, this again? I really hoped we could just talk like we did last night in the pool. That was so great, almost like we’re two regular people sharing a vacation house.”
“You made a deal, and I have a feeling you won’t tell me anything juicy unless I pry it out of you.”
“My life is a total snore compared to yours. Why do you even want to know?” Sweat broke out across the back of her neck at the thought of reliving that night. She shivered despite the warm touch of the morning sun on her face.
“Your word, or we go back to seeing the sights.” A victorious grin stretched his lips wide.
Gripping her paddle close so she wouldn’t clobber him with it, she weighed her personal comfort against returning to Sol’s office empty-handed. Goddammit, she knew before coming that Micah would ask for stuff that made her uncomfortable, and she wasn’t going to wuss out now. “Oh, fine, you have my word.”
“Of course I do. The simple answer to your question is that I take any cases not large enough for Amnesty International to bother with, and that my people have a chance of solving.”
Nothing about him was simple. “All the ones talked about in the media involved children.” She left that lure hanging out in the water between them.
“That’s only a coincidence.” The drop of his gaze suggested otherwise. “If there’s someone falsely accused in a foreign prison or in the hands of militant kidnappers, and we have a hope of making a difference—child or adult—I’ll take the case and see it through until the end.”
“Okay.”
“Why do you say it like that?” Suspicion narrowed his eyes. “My decisions have nothing to do with my own experience.”
Liar, liar, pants on fire. “The logistics of dealing with foreign police and embassies must be overwhelming. And how do you even deal with the militant groups? It isn’t like you can actually exchange one prisoner for another or possibly have the kind of money some of them are asking for ransom. How do you do it? Your success rate is becoming legendary.” The reason for that was becoming painfully clear. Once he set his mind to something, he put all of his resources into finishing it—even if those resources happened to include his sex drive, and what he wanted was a seven-day affair.
“My liaisons, private investigators, strategists, and lawyers are the best in the world. They’re not even the key in some cases. Sometimes the best weapon against evil is to dredge up a few devils from that world and make them work for our side. My people work the magic; I only give them the task. Our victories belong to them.”
Gone from caring about nobody and nothing to giving all of himself to bring the lost home. The man crawled another inch into the one place within her that, since her last relationship ended, held a “no trespassing” sign.
“You give yourself too little credit,” she said. “None of it would be happening without your vision and passion, whatever your reason was for starting this. You’re the heart of the foundation, and I don’t need anyone to tell me that.”
“Your turn,” he said with no inflection.
This guy was a tough nut to crack. He was so carefully controlled; she couldn’t read anything from his body language. She thought about pressing him again as to why he didn’t want any credit, but his stern expression changed her mind.
Maybe if she shared every detail of the worst night of her life, he’d be more inclined to share his. It was worth a shot, despite the sickness filling her bones at the thought of dredging up the memory of her accident. Once she opened the door to it, though, the sights and sounds came back all at once.
It was dark the night that seemed so long ago. Thunder had crashed outside the window of Gran’s house. The sound rattled her teeth, the memory of it causing an ache in them even now.
Lightning had blotted out the world with blinding flashes, leaving white scars on her vision. Rain pounded the tin roof of the stables and the old brick farmhouse. Screams filled her ears from her own mouth as pain ate her alive.
She fumbled the paddle, leaning hard to catch it, disoriented and breathless. The kayak tipped. Cold water swallowed her up, filled her lungs as she gasped in shock. She wasn’t sure which direction was up, and her body felt heavy and awkward. A strong hand gripped her arm and yanked her head above the surface.
Darcy coughed up water as she clung to the side of Micah’s kayak, his warm arm wrapped around her shoulders like a lifeline. She’d once spent a seemingly endless night wishing for arms like his to save her, but she hadn’t needed him then, and she didn’t need him now. “Let go of me.”
“Are you all right?” He lifted his hand from her as if she’d burned him.
“I’m fine.” The violent edge to her voice didn’t lend weight to her words. Pushing off from his kayak, she swam toward hers, which had floated close to the shore, as if even it didn’t want anything to do with her craziness.
Micah retrieved her paddle and remained silent as she made several curse-filled attempts to mount the kayak again without success.
Refusing to ask for help, she towed her ride to the rocks and climbed out of the damn water. She tugged the kayak up onto the shore so it wouldn’t abandon her again. Suddenly exhausted—more from the emotional turbulence than from the swim—she plunked her ass on the wet stone and gripped her knees.
Micah hopped out of his kayak, secured it and the two paddles, and sat down beside her. “If I’d known you were going to try to drown yourself, I’d have waited until we were on solid land before asking that question.”
“You’re not funny, and for the record, I didn’t need your help.”
His mouth opened and shut twice before he actually spoke. “You’re shivering. We should go back.”
“Don’t tell me the hardcore Micah Laine is getting soft on one of the vultures. No, a deal’s a deal.” She pushed at her wet hair and straightened her back when he tossed up his hands in surrender.
If he found the courage to tell her about his scars, then she had to do the same, or he’d never trust her word again.
Her voice came out flat with her attempts to keep emotion out of the story. “It happened the day after my gran died, almost three years ago. Dad and I were at her place to feel closer to her and Gramps, who died a few months before she did. I guess you can die of a broken heart, because there was nothing else wrong with her. I was so angry that I hadn’t found more time to see them in those last years while I went to the university, started my career, and got involved with the biggest jerk of the century.”
“Darcy, I—”
“No, you want the truth, so here it is. Dad and I had been arguing about absolutely nothing, and we never argued. I think we both felt guilty and had no idea how to communicate our grief. After he left to take a drive and burn off some steam, a storm blew in. It was around one in the morning and dark, so perfectly dark. The wind was violent, and it blew open the door to the barn where Gran kept her three horses. She adored them almost as much as Gramps.” Her sudden burst of laughter broke off abruptly. “They came out and were totally freaking in the yard. I couldn’t bear to let anything happen to them, so I went out in that storm to help them.”
Best and worst decision of her life. Although it had been painful, having her eyes opened to the unclouded truth had been worth it.
Micah said nothing, only watched her. No pity apparent in his dark eyes, which gave her the nerve to keep going.
“Two of the horses went back in on their own, but the third was still throwing a fit. So stubborn, kind of like you.” She paused, caught in his crooked smile for a moment before focusing on the water splashing against the rocks. “I got a hold of his halter and managed to get him all the way to the door while the wind knocked me around. Before I could get him inside, lightning struck a tree on the far side of the house. All the lights went out. I just remember this blinding flash and the horse rearing up, screaming a whinny. The next thing I knew, it kicked, and I was on my back.
“I’d fallen on this old piece of machinery Gramps kept for nostalgia’s sake, with these wicked knives along the front for cutting crops. The horse ran off, but I couldn’t move to go after him. Then it was like time had been stopped and someone had flipped a switch, because there was no pain up until then, and all of a sudden, it roared through me.”
“Jesus.” Micah reached for her, dropping his hand when she glared at him. “Why couldn’t you move?”
“One of my legs was broken from the fall, but that wasn’t the biggest problem. I was hopelessly snared on that machinery because of the force from the kick. It was a good thing I couldn’t move, because the doctor said if I’d been able to get free, the removal of the metal teeth would have caused me to bleed out.”
“You were trapped.” His eyes crimped shut, and his jaw flexed.
“While I laid there in the rain and wind and dark, I remember feeling thankful Gran might be waiting out there for me to come and join her, and that Gramps had already died, so he wouldn’t know it was lightning that had ultimately killed me. After what a lightning strike and resulting fire did to his family, he’d become convinced God was punishing him for something. Storms always set him on edge.”
Micah turned toward her, studying her face, probably looking for lies. “Your father found you, then?”
“Not until a few hours later, when the sun came up. He came back to Gran’s after the power went out that night, and because all the rooms were dark, he assumed I’d gone to bed. I heard the car roll up and screamed for him, but he couldn’t hear me over the storm. The aftermath of that night eventually shattered all of my delusions about life, and I’ll always be grateful for that. I was long past due to pull my head out of my silly childhood dreams.”
“Dreams are never silly, Darcy.” He raised his hand to her cheek, lifting a tear she wasn’t aware she’d shed. “I’d have kissed it away, but I didn’t want you to hit me.”
The sound of her name from his lips did something strange to her chest, something good.
“And I would have.” She pushed him away, though more playfully than she meant to. Talking to him was like an intense therapy session, and her rage seemed to have escaped with her story.
“What happened after your accident that led to your shattered so-called delusions about life? When I was kissing you last night, you were enjoying it until I touched your scar. Someone hurt you more than that horse did.”
Now that the dam had been broken, words kept spilling out of her unchecked. “The strangest things went through my mind that night. I’d never see the butterflies flock around Gran’s hollyhocks again, or hear her play ‘The Music Box Dancer’ on the piano, even though she was already dead and that was a given, anyway. I was angry that I hadn’t tasted mangoes yet or gone to Hawaii or Australia, or had an orgasm other than by my own hand.
“Jesus, I did not just say that.” Bitter laughter cut through the morning air like glass as she stared inward. “What got me through to the dawn was that I already had my nightingale, the man I was planning to spend my life with. It was so stupid, too, because when I look back on our relationship, it was entirely one-sided. I think he loved football and his cell phone more than me. He’d come to see me at the hospital, at least. Sure, he was happy I’d survived and had hugged me gently. As my healing progressed, though, all he wanted to do was start having sex again. When I finally gave in, even though I was still sore and my legs were weak, the instant his hand accidentally brushed my back, he lost interest in an epic way.
“He made some lame excuse about needing to get up early and left me there in the bed, too stunned to say a word. A few days later, a friend of mine called to ask why she’d seen him with his tongue halfway down some woman’s throat at a club. I’d never felt so stupid in all my life. Never even said good-bye. He changed me, and I hate that I let him. But I’m over it. I channel all of my energy into my writing now, so I can make a difference.”
Damn her stupid, flappy mouth.