Somewhere in Florida

 

Wren could hear Cormac talking in the kitchen, could hear the panicky calm in his voice. He was trying to quiet someone who wasn’t wanting to be quieted. A woman, she thought, from the way his voice kept turning into melted chocolate. It was the fourth call he’d gotten since they came back to the house over two hours ago. The fourth he’d answered, anyway.

“Who is she?” she demanded when he came back into the room. “Is she the one who kidnapped me?”

Stress was written all over his face, creating lines that hadn’t been there before. He paced the massive living room, the fading light playing on his face, across his shoulders. She watched him, admired him. She thought about what Mr. Mitchell had said about her father, how he had a certain confidence that was almost admirable. Cormac had that, too, but it was currently dueling with whatever this was, whatever was the source of his disquiet.

“I worked with the psychological profilers for a time at the FBI. You know that, right?”

“Yes.”

“We were called in whenever there was a case in which it would benefit investigators to know a little more in depth about the perp to help solve the case. Sometimes our profiles are right on. Sometimes they aren’t.”

“I know how it works. I was a homicide detective.”

“Yeah, well, there was once this case, a serial rapist who was quickly escalating. He started by snatching a girl as she left her job, moved on to keeping a couple of girls for several days. He was going to kill—it was just a matter of time, and the cops knew it. So, they called us in, asked us to create a profile they hoped would help them narrow down their list of suspects.” He turned, crossing his arms over his chest as he looked at a spot just past her. “We had just arrived when this girl escaped from the rapist. He wasn’t done with her, but she’d managed to get free of her restraints and run. She was horribly traumatized, but she was a wealth of information the investigators could use, and she—for unknown reasons—attached herself to me.”

Wren nodded, remembering what she’d read about him. He’d been reassigned to Los Angeles two years ago because of an inappropriate relationship with a witness in a serial rapist case.

This woman.

“My superiors encouraged me to spend time with her, to speak to her. We needed information from her, but she was so deeply terrorized that she flipped out every time we asked her a question. She just…she couldn’t talk about her ordeal with us unless we walked around the subject and allowed her to come to it on her own.”

Cormac turned from her, running his hands over his head before tucking them into the pockets of his slacks. “Her name is Aria. Aria Parker.”

Wren waited, watching him as he stood near one of the tall windows, staring out at the waning day. She put aside the laptop she’d been using to attempt to find her mother’s family in Texas—there were still quite a few Thomases in the Round Rock area—and sat forward, resting her elbows on her knees. Her head hurt from the emotions she was trying to shove down, deep down inside of her, her body sore from the ordeal she’d been through this past week. A part of her wanted to crawl into bed and cover her head with a nice, soft blanket. She wanted to shut the world out and pretend none of this was happening. But then again, her desperate need to understand what had happened to her mother, her driving need to know who Cormac Delaney was, kept her glued to that chair.

“Aria is beautiful and kind and almost child-like. She reminds me of someone I once knew, someone I lost. And that connection…” He sighed heavily. “I knew I shouldn’t be the one working with her, but my superiors saw her attachment to me, and they knew it would be the fastest way to get the results they needed. They gave me no choice.”

He turned and looked at Wren, regret and pain and grief written in those perfect eyes. “I told her about my past, and that gave her the courage she needed to tell me about what had happened to her. And it was…there is nothing more horrific than hearing the things a victim has suffered coming directly from her lips, you know?”

Wren did know. She’d worked with multiple rape victims during her early years on the force. It wasn’t just the act itself, but the need some rapists had to humiliate their victims, the power they exhibited over them, the sense of security they stole. It was as much about the emotional side of it as it was the violence. It was like they’d striped their humanity away and stomped all over it, leaving them like a shell in what was once a strong, independent soul.

She knew.

“We grew close because of that. And when we caught the guy, when the case was over and I was sent back to Virginia, she fell apart. She couldn’t handle being alone. She started calling me all the time, writing me letters and emails. Then she showed up at my place. Claimed to anyone who’d listen that I was her fiancé, and that I’d made all these promises to her. None of it was true, but the FBI believed it. I was disciplined, sent to Los Angeles.”

“What happened to her?”

“I managed to get her into a facility.” He rolled his shoulders, turning back to the window. “For nearly a year and a half, I didn’t hear anything from her. I put it behind me, focused on fixing my career. But then she showed up again.” He was quiet for a long moment. “She’d been doing research on these cases, had somehow managed to get case files that should have been sealed. She was investigating murders similar to the one that I’d told her about, trying to locate the man who’d committed the crimes. She wanted to solve my problem for me the way I’d done for her.”

“She’s the one who put together those boards back at the other house?”

Cormac turned, almost completely in shadows now. He nodded, his shoulders hunched down low.

“And she’s the one who took me.”

“She saw you with those files back at the hotel, and she thought you were trying to hurt me. She misunderstood.”

“What was she doing there, Cormac?”

He shook his head. “She has this knack of showing up at the oddest times. I don’t even know how she knew I was there. When I got back to the hotel and found the files on my bed, and you were gone…it was just a guess, but I knew she had you.” He sat heavily on the couch. “I got to you as fast as I could, but if I’d just walked you out of there, she would have killed us both. I had to be careful.”

“She’s insane!”

“She’s broken. There’s a difference.”

Wren snorted. “She got you in trouble with your job, and she kidnapped me. What more does she have to—”

Something suddenly occurred to Wren. She tilted her head, staring at Cormac as she tried to tell herself it wasn’t possible. But it suddenly made too much sense for her to be wrong.

“She’s the one who shot you.”

“Wren—”

“She shot you! That’s why you came to me instead of going to the police! You didn’t want them to arrest her!”

He shook her head, but even his denial wasn’t that convincing. Wren got up and began to pace the room, not sure if she was more amused or angry.

“You’re harboring a damn insane criminal! If you’d told the police that she shot you, she never would have been in that hotel room, and she wouldn’t have kidnapped me!”

“I’m sorry she hurt you.”

“You’re sorry?” Wren snorted, not even sure he believed his own apology. “She could have killed me! She tased me God knows how many times, moving me from that hotel to wherever it was she took me. How far did she travel with me in the trunk of her car, huh, Cormac? What if she’d been in an accident? What if I hadn’t gotten enough oxygen? What if there’d been a leak in the exhaust system?” She swung her arms around, growing more and more agitated by the second. “And I helped you cover it up! How fucking ironic is that?”

He got off the couch and came toward her, but she moved away, slipping out of his reach just before he would have grabbed her. He stopped, staring at her, clearly defeated.

“It’s not enough that she kidnapped me. You’re protecting her! You’re covering the whole thing up to keep her out of jail. Again.”

“You don’t understand. What she went through—”

“What about what I went through?”

That shut him up.

Wren turned away, fighting a lump of tears in her throat. She hated sounding like a petulant child, but she couldn’t help herself. It was insane what he was doing, protecting a women who wasn’t his responsibility. Why would he do such a thing? Because she was helping him with these cold cases? Why was that so important?

“Wren…I never meant for you to get caught up in all this. Hell, I never even meant to see you more than once or twice. I wanted to know what you knew about your mother’s murder—that’s the only reason I met with you the first time. And after that…”

He fell quiet again. She turned, caught him watching her before his eyes fell to the floor. But then they came up again, and those smoldering blue eyes sent a shiver of need through her, making her ache in places she hadn’t ached in a very long time. How could a man she barely knew have such intense power over her?

“Why her, then? Why are you letting her do this to you? Why not send her back to whatever facility you left her in before?”

“I tried,” he said, a sort of defeat resounding in his voice. “She threatened to hurt herself.”

“But by believing her, you’re playing into her delusion. Don’t you see that? You’ve got to break free of her, you’ve got to stop surrounding yourself with this depressing example of humanity. Don’t you want to find a little happiness, Cormac? Don’t you want something good in your life?”

He made a sort of chuckling sound deep in his throat, but there was no humor on his face, no amusement. Only dark clouds that she wanted to wade through, to make them move aside and reveal the man she knew was hiding in there, somewhere. He wasn’t what he wanted her to think he was. He wasn’t a kidnapper. He wasn’t a man who’d willingly hurt her. He hadn’t tased her out of some sort of twisted pleasure, hadn’t drugged her for unimportant reasons. He’d done it all to protect her, and he wouldn’t have done that if he didn’t care about her.

He’d come to her when he was desperate, literally putting his life in her hands. Didn’t that say everything she wanted to know?

“I know you trust me,” she said softly, moving close to him, lifting his face with her palm against his jaw. “I know you keep coming back to me because there’s a part of you that wants what I can offer you.”

“Wren…”

He twisted his head, stepped back to avoid her touch.

“You rescued me. You could have taken me home and never come around again. You could have walked out of my life a dozen times—”

“I tried. You tracked me down to my house.”

“You didn’t try very hard. You invited me to Colorado with you.”

He shrugged, but there was something sheepish about his expression.

“You want an out from the craziness in your life.”

“I’ve tried normalcy,” he said, his eyes haunted now. “I had a career, friends, even a girlfriend who was content to wait for me at home every night. It was a good life, but I just…there are things in my past that I cannot let go of.”

“You think my past is easy to let go of? You think the fact that my mother was murdered doesn’t affect everything I do, every thought I have, every action I take? Do you think I don’t understand?”

She moved into his space again, pressing her body against his, touching his face before sliding her fingers into his hair. He groaned, with a slight moment of hesitation as he wrapped his arms around her body. But then there was no hesitation as he lifted her, allowing her to wrap her legs around his waist as he stole her lips.

They went from zero to passion in a split second. All it took was that first touch of his lips against hers, and they were back in the kitchen, back to the heat that had taken her from fear and confusion to a desire that went miles beyond anything she’d ever known before. She was far from inexperienced, never a prude, but something about him woke things inside of her she never knew were there. Inhibitions she’d thought she’d have to deal with for the rest of her life suddenly evaporated. Anything he wanted…

She wanted to know every inch of him. She wanted to touch every crevice, every line, every pore. She wanted to taste him. She wanted to know everything he was willing to share, things he didn’t even know he was sharing. She knew so little about him, yet she felt like she knew him better than anyone else in her life. They were connected, somehow, on a level she couldn’t begin to describe. But it was there. And she wanted this.

They stood in the center of the room for a long time, exploring each other with nothing but their lips. She ran her fingers through his hair, drew him as close as he could get. When his mouth moved down over her chin, down along her throat, she moaned as she tightened her thighs around his waist. His hands moved over her ass, drawing her closer to him. They couldn’t seem to get close enough even as she leaned back to give him more access to her.

He moved, crossing the room to lay her on the couch. She pulled him down with her, brushing her lips over his throat. She felt a rush when he moaned, loving the idea that her touch could do that, that she had the power to make him moan. He dropped to his knees in front of her, this big, powerful man, his muscles flexing against the thin material of his button-down shirt. It was humbling, that sight. But then he tugged at her hips, drawing her to the edge of the couch as his hands slipped under her skirt, snagging the edges of her panties. He watched her face as he pulled them down, her heart racing as the soft material brushed against her skin. He kissed her knees, turning them slightly to kiss the tender skin underneath.

“You’re beautiful,” he said, leaning in to steal another kiss.

His mouth moved over her throat again, his chin pressing into the front of her shirt, putting pressure on the small buttons. One popped open like they tended to do when what was underneath was too much to be contained. His fingers played with the others, carefully releasing them, exposing the thin lace of the bra she wore underneath. He nibbled at the mound of her breast while one hand snuck under her skirt, sliding along the suddenly sensitive flesh of her inner thigh. She shamelessly spread her legs, aching all over for the promise his touch was making, her own hands reaching for the front of his shirt, for the buttons that kept his skin from her.

Passion had turned into…she wasn’t really sure. Something gentle. More gentle than she’d expected. He was a man who plowed through life, pushing constantly to get what he wanted. But he seemed content now to take his time, to touch and explore, to drive her to the edge of insanity. She sat up slightly, tugging at his shirt, wanting to see more of him, more of those impressive muscles, more of his incredible body. She’d seen him nearly naked before, lying in her bed with a gunshot wound in his belly. But now she’d have the right to touch those marks, those tattoos, those hidden gems that had been out of her reach then.

Aware of what she wanted, he sat back on his heels and removed his shirt, tugging it over his head. There was that tattoo on his shoulder that appeared to be a date, numbers scrawled in an old English sort of print. She brushed her fingers over it before he snatched her wrist and pushed her back, pressing her against the couch before he buried his head against her chest once again. She slipped out of her shirt, dislodging him a few times, but he seemed pleased when she reached behind her to undo her bra. He helped, slipping the straps from her arms, a happy sigh slipping from his lips as her full breasts came into view.

His eyes came up to her, and…it was one of the most intimate moments she’d ever experienced in her life. It was this connection…she’d never felt so close to another human being in all her life.

And then they were kissing again, and his hands were sliding under her skirt, tugging her close to him again. She could feel the intensity of his arousal pressed against her, feel his need in his touch. She arched her back, drawing him into her, her hands sliding over his chest, his belly. She felt the small, gnarled pieces of flesh where his various scars lived, felt the tender flesh where his latest wound was still healing. What had this man been through in his life? Who’d caused him so much pain?

She knew the answers, at least some of them, and those answers made her ache in more ways than one for him. Did he know how much strength it’d taken for him to rise above the darkness in his life? Did he know he had a right to be happy, to find normalcy, to make a good life despite the horror he must have experienced as a child?

She wanted to show him that.

She pressed her mouth to his throat, sliding her lips down over his chest. She kissed that tattoo, brushing the tip of her tongue over his skin. She kissed the rough scars that marked one of his pecs, the scar that ran along the edge of his ribs, moving downward, pushing him back so that she could kiss every mark that had ever been made by human hands on his beautiful body. He held her head, his fingers dislodging her messy bun, forcing the clip to fall to the floor. He twisted her hair around his fingers, guiding her as another moan slipped from between his lips.

And then he was pulling her back, forcing her down against the couch again. She tried to touch his face, but he twisted away from her, a cloud burning in his eyes.

“Let me touch you,” she said softly.

He shook his head, dragging her hips to the edge of the couch again.

“Cormac…”

He wasn’t listening now. He was tugging at his belt, releasing the front of his slacks. Her heart skipped a beat as she realized what was coming next. She wanted him, wanted to feel him inside of her, but it felt like something had changed, like something was off. She reached for his hands, and he brushed her away. She sat up, wanting to help him, wanting to touch him, but he grabbed her hips and forced her back down, supine on the couch.

His touch was almost rough as he jerked her legs apart, resting her heels on his shoulders as he moved forward, guiding himself to that place hiding under her skirt, to the ache that had been waiting for this moment for longer than even she was willing to admit. She wanted him, but it was like he’d shut down, turned off the connection that had been burning between them. What had she done? Why was he doing this?

She lowered her legs and sat up, creating a storm of frustration on his face. She ran her hands along his chest, touching those same places she’d kissed a moment ago. He grabbed her wrists to stop her, but she just replaced her hands with her mouth.

“Stop,” he moaned, but without moving away.

“Let me touch you,” she said softly, looking up into his eyes. “Let me care about you.”

His eyes darkened, but she thought she saw just the slightest crack in that mask he’d pulled up.

“I want to care about you, Cormac.”

He shook his head, his grip on her wrists tightening. “Don’t call me that.”

She tugged her hands away from him and let them slide again down the length of his chest. He closed his eyes and sat very still as she touched him, her hands exploring not just his chest, but his hips and his well-defined abs and his tight ass, making him suffer as she got to know every angle of his hard, muscular body.

“You are so masculine,” she sighed with her lips against one particularly nasty scar. “So perfect.”

He grunted. “I’m broken.”

“Everyone’s broken.”

She continued to explore him, her lips sliding over his chest as her hands slipped low on the backs of his thighs and then up along the tight muscles in his back. And then his hands came around her, slipping over the soft skin of her back, exploring some of the same places on her body that she was exploring on his. That connection was coming back, and her body was aching undeniably, almost painfully.

“I want to make you feel good, Cormac. I want to make you feel things you’ve never felt before.”

“Daniel,” he moaned against her ear. “My name’s Daniel.”

Before she could react, before she could ask him what the hell he was talking about, he pulled her hips forward and thrust, suddenly—unexpectedly—filling her, lifting her off the couch and twisting, dropping her onto the floor as his body came down to crush her, taking her breath away with both the surprise and the suddenness of it. He held her hard against him, controlling everything—his movements, her movements, the depth and the intensity of it all—sending such a wave of pleasure through her body that her mind just went completely blank. How could she think with him touching her this way, with him loving her this way?

It was a ride that was so like everything she’d ever known, and yet elevated, taken to a new level, miles above everything she thought she knew and understood about her own body. The way he held her, the way he moved, the way he felt…there was no comparison.

All she could do was ride the wave.

When it was done, he picked her up and carried her upstairs, her body still limp from the pleasure of it all. And he took her on that ride again…

There was no time for words after that.