Chapter 29

Finally.

The instant Wyatt’s mouth crashed down onto hers, Melanie realized everything she’d done—the hair, the makeup, the dress and shoes—had been geared toward this exact moment. She’d thought she just wanted a good fight. To stomp and shout and fling insults that would bounce off of Wyatt the way they always had.

But what she’d really wanted was this. Not just anybody. This body, hard and unyielding as his hand twisted into her hair and a powerful arm looped around her waist, pinning her to him as he devoured her. Only Wyatt could handle her when she was like this—wild, ravenous, teetering on a fine line between desire and rage.

Rowdy had made himself a convenient tool to nudge Wyatt over the edge, but not with anything as simple or petty as jealousy. She’d had to make this the lesser of evils. Wyatt was too damn honorable to take advantage of her when she was on shaky emotional ground, but he could be needled into making the sacrifice if he was convinced he was saving her from worse.

Then drown her in wave after wave of sensation.

His mouth possessed her so thoroughly she had to assume he was trying to erase every man who’d ever kissed her before—and he was doing a damn fine job of it. She was dimly aware of car lights passing on the street, a horn honking. Wyatt released her hair to reach for the apartment door, opening it and hauling her through. Their combined weight slammed it closed with enough force to knock dust loose from the ceiling high above.

When he reached up to turn the dead bolt, she knew he wasn’t going to change his mind this time.

He wedged his knees between hers and pinned her in place with his hips, his body an iron wall of heat and power. Her breath caught at a sudden awareness of his sheer physical presence and her vulnerability. All that strength was on a very short leash.

But this was Wyatt. He would never allow himself to do her harm.

His hand wrapped around her bare thigh, sending a firestorm of need raging through her as he slid his palm down—knee, calf, then ankle. But he stopped her from wrapping her leg around his waist, reaching instead for her shoe and stripping it off. He tossed it over his shoulder to thunk against the wall. The second followed.

“I hate those shoes,” he muttered, his breath hot enough to burn the words into her skin.

You were supposed to. But she was quickly losing the ability to think at all, let alone dissect her own intentions.

He ripped his mouth from hers to inflict a series of bites along her jaw and into the curve of her neck, an exquisite trail of tiny pains intensified by the rasp of his beard.

“This shirt’s gotta go, blue eyes.” She hooked her thumbs inside the front edges and yanked, hard enough to send buttons pinging off the tile floor. He dropped his arms and let her shove it down past his wrists as he caught a spaghetti strap between his teeth and dragged it off one shoulder. He spun them around so he leaned against the door and had access to her zipper. She barely noticed, busy tasting, testing his reactions, her teeth first nipping then skimming his flesh, drawing a deep, rumbling sound from his chest when she found his nipple.

He shoved the dress down over her hips to drop around her bare feet. And then they were flesh to flesh, breasts to chest, her fingers buried in hard muscle as she all but tried to climb him. He peeled her off with a pained groan. “Not here. We’re gonna hurt each other if we don’t find a padded surface.”

“No crutches?” she asked, momentarily surfacing as he dragged her toward the stairs.

“I won’t be needing them for this.” He flashed her a pirate’s smile, glinting with fierce intent in his unshaven face, and again her breath hitched. There was a wildness in him tonight, and it sent a ripple of unease through her. She had expected, even craved, a reflection of her own rage—Wyatt angry for her—but when she’d kicked the ever-present embers, they had flared into a wildfire fueled as much by his pent-up anger as by hers.

She had pushed him beyond his limit, tapped into some hidden core of molten fury…and it was both terrifying and thrilling.

He dragged her to the top of the stairs, scooped her purse from the floor and hooked the strap over his shoulder, his bare torso turned to marble by the silvery-gray illumination from the skylight. Clean, hard lines, the curves and angles as sharply defined as if they’d been cut into stone.

But stone wouldn’t sear her flesh as he spun her around and took her mouth again, cool plaster at her back and hot male sliding against her front. He cupped her butt and lifted her a few inches, her legs around his waist. His hips pulsed, the hard ridge beneath the fly of his jeans deliciously abrasive through silk and lace. Long, talented fingers slid beneath the elastic, finding, stroking, circling but not quite penetrating. She arched, seeking the perfect alignment as she rocked again and again. If he would just touch her there…there…oh God, there.

And she came undone, the climax blasting through her. Before she even stopped shuddering, he pushed open the unlocked door to the boudoir and carried her the few strides into the room to dump her onto the bed. She blinked, trying to focus in the nearly dark room as he dropped her purse beside her, kicked off his shoes, then his jeans, cursing when he had to pause to work one leg over his ankle brace.

Then his hands were on her again, peeling off her underwear and tossing them aside before his mouth found her breasts. She didn’t have time to float all the way down before he drove her up again, nipping and sucking, tongue and teeth and the rasp of his stubble bringing every millimeter of her skin to excruciating life.

She twisted away, scrambling to the head of the massive bed, the silk coverlet slick beneath her knees. Wyatt caught her, hitching an arm around her hips and dragging her back against him. His teeth closed on the back of her neck as he slid, hard, hot, between her thighs. She reared up and tipped him onto his side. With a swift twist, she spun around to grab his shoulders and push him onto his back.

He laughed, low and rough, and hitched himself up to lean against the padded headboard as he reached for her purse. “Mind if I help myself?”

To…shit. How did he know about the condoms? Then her gaze moved from his face and down over that lean, breathtaking body, and she forgot to care. As he dug out a condom and ripped it open, she feasted on the sight and the feel of his body, her fingers ruffling the silky patch of hair on his sternum, circling his flat nipples, riding over the subtle ridges of his abs. Muscle and bone as finely tuned as the engine in the Camaro, maximum performance in a heart-stopping package.

He groaned when she skimmed her fingernails lightly down the inside of one thigh and back up the other, then paused to cup and squeeze, watching him twitch in reaction.

His gaze locked with hers as she took the condom, and held as she rolled it into place, then swung her leg over to straddle his thighs. She moved over him, slowly, deliberately, watching his body tighten and his neck bow as she just barely took him, an inch, then two, then up again as his breath hissed through gritted teeth. Again. And again. Drawing the anticipation and ache out until it sang through them both like the hum of a high voltage wire.

Then she drove her hips down, swift and hard, gasping at the shock of him inside her. And suddenly she was a wild thing again, all claws and teeth and hammering need. His hips rose to meet her, their bodies slamming together with punishing force. Her fingers dug into his shoulders, his into her hips, and still they strained harder. Harder. Pounding away at thought and reason until there was nothing left but this moment. This man. This—

She shattered, her body a bright arc of fire and light. He rocked hard into her again, and again, and then made a deep guttural noise as he pulsed hot inside her.

Like every storm, this one left a momentary stillness in its wake as they reeled in the shock of its passing. At first she heard nothing but the thud of her heartbeat in her ears and the harsh rasp of their breathing. Then she became aware of the thump of music from the bar below. The bellow of a train whistle only a few blocks away, where the tracks angled through downtown. The salty dampness of Wyatt’s skin where her cheek was pressed into the curve of his neck.

Oh. God. What she’d just done…and with Wyatt. She had never felt so raw. Defenseless. As if a storm had raged through the room and left her stripped bare of far more than her clothes. She made a noise, embarrassingly close to a whimper, and his arms came around her. For one breath, then two, she teetered on the verge of burrowing into his chest like a lost kitten.

But this was Wyatt. And he would see…everything.

She pushed free of his embrace, rolling onto her side to hug her arms around a chest that felt overstuffed, in danger of flying apart. Wyatt touched her shoulder, gently, tentatively, in such stark contrast to the ferocity of their lovemaking that she nearly crumbled. If she just leaned back, let him spoon all of that heat and strength around her…

But that was another, much more dangerous line, and she knew without question that once she crossed it, there would be no stepping back.

So instead, she retreated. Swinging her legs over the side of the bed, she sat up. “I’m gonna take a shower. I seem to have worked up a lather.”

He didn’t make a move, not a sound, as she ducked into the bathroom…and locked the door behind her. She braced for a knock as she cranked the taps and drew the curtain around the standing frame with trembling hands. Her legs felt equally unreliable when she stepped into the tub, so she sat down, drew her knees up and latched her arms around them, but it wasn’t enough. The trembling seemed to start in her bones, as if she’d been socking away the pain and uncertainty, and now it was all escaping in a series of fine tremors. As she turned her face into the stinging spray, she gave in and let the tears fall.

* * *

Melanie stood under the shower until the water ran ice cold. Then, shivering, she wrapped herself in a towel and spent another twenty minutes drying the hair she’d just had done only hours before. When she couldn’t find any more reason to hide in the bathroom, she finally opened the door.

Wyatt was gone.

He’d left a single, pink-shaded lamp burning beside the bed, which he’d made. When she stepped closer, she saw that the sheets had been changed, the covers turned down…and her phone left on the pillow like a hotel mint. She picked up the sheet of paper beside it, torn from her new notebook, and unfolded it to read the block-style print.

CHECK YOUR EMAIL.

She sank onto the edge of the bed, tucked the towel more securely around her, and did as instructed. The most recent message—with an encryption key to ensure privacy—had been forwarded by Wyatt, originating from the same attorney who’d sicced the process server on her this morning.

Dear Ms. Brookman,

I am writing to inform you that you may disregard our request for your testimony. Upon examination of the attached video and signed statements provided to us by Mr. Darrington, we are confident that the plaintiff will choose not to pursue his case…

What video? And what testimony? She skipped past a few more lines of legalese and opened the document file. There, in Wyatt’s careful, flowing handwriting, was a transcript of the telephone conversation between her and Michael at the Waffle House, minus the part where both she and Wyatt had threatened to make his life hell. It had been signed by five strangers, who were identified as either employees or customers.

Her hands dropped to her lap, numbly cradling the phone. She didn’t need to watch the video. She’d been there for the performance. And that, she realized, was exactly what it had been. A show put on for the benefit of their fellow diners. Her chest constricted again as she replayed the scene. Wyatt turning on her speakerphone. Cranking up the volume so the others could hear every word Michael said. Not to embarrass her, as she’d so wrongly assumed.

To guarantee there would be witnesses who could corroborate her version of events.

A strangled laugh escaped past the tight band in her throat. Geezus. Leave it to Wyatt. Who else would even think…would be so cool-headed and cold-blooded…

And have her back so thoroughly?

She lifted the phone, her thumb hovering over the reply button, then tossed it across the room onto the fainting couch. After tonight, after everything, she had no idea how to respond. Didn’t trust anything she might say. Was she angry? Relieved? Grateful? Mortified?

Something…else?

The emotions balled up inside her in an impenetrable knot, and at that precise moment, she had neither the energy nor the fortitude to pick it apart. Instead, she let the towel drop to the floor, crawled between the cool, crisp sheets, and turned off the light.

She squeezed her eyes shut, hugging one pillow to her aching chest and burying her face in the other, trying to ignore the sharp twist in her gut when she found no trace of Wyatt’s scent on either.

* * *

Wyatt sat on the hood of the Camaro at the scenic pullout on Cabbage Hill, nursing the one beer he’d allowed himself. From there, he could track the progress of the eighteen-wheelers that made up ninety percent of the traffic in the wee hours of morning, from the first rattle of jake brakes as they crested the summit, passing behind him to glide around the swooping curves of the mountain flanks, accelerate across the flat, then disappear momentarily into the Umatilla River valley at the southwest corner of Pendleton before crawling up the steep incline on the opposite side and fading away into the distance.

He could guess at which of the lights scattered on North Hill was the security light at his condo. He didn’t need to see Main Street or the Bull Dancer to imagine Melanie lying alone in that bed. Sleeping? Crying?

Cursing his name?

The phone beside him had remained dark and silent long past the time when she would have read his email. No return message. No text. No call.

By now, he shouldn’t be surprised. There might have been a time when her temper had ruled her actions, but it was long past. Her silence told him nothing except that she’d retreated into the emotional space she’d created for the express purpose of absorbing, contemplating…and plotting. An extended version of taking a deep breath and counting to ten. It was, he had decided, the most predictable thing about her.

What she would do when she stepped back out again was anybody’s guess.

Call him chicken, but Wyatt didn’t intend to be within easy reach when that happened. He couldn’t absorb any more of her hurt or anger when his own was already spilling over. Last night had pushed him perilously close to the end of his control, but he’d managed to just barely hang on. God only knew what might happen if he lost his grip. Something bad. Irreversible.

Something like shouting that yes, dammit, he loved her.

He always had.

He rolled up his jacket and propped it behind his neck, using the windshield as a backrest while the trucks continued to rumble past, one after another after another, until the sky began to lighten. Then he got in his car and drove to the airport.

He took flight just as the sun broke the horizon.