Beachcomber (31 page)

But maybe he’d changed his mind. After all, she was next door to naked, too, and he had to be as aware of her body as she was of his. Probably the warmth of her, the feel of her soft breasts pressing into his side, the slide of her leg against his, the location of her hand, was driving him nuts. Probably he was getting so turned on that any minute now he would bend his head and kiss her. Just remembering how hot his kisses were sent an anticipatory tingle shooting all the way down to her toes.

“Now isn’t this better than you being way over there all by your lonesome fighting me for the blanket?” he asked in a low, growly voice.

Oh yeah.

“I’ve got to admit, this is better,” she said, practically purring.

“Damn right it’s better.” There was no mistaking the satisfaction in his voice. His arms tightened fractionally around her. “Now if you’re all settled, maybe we can finally get some sleep.”

21

“H
MM
. R
IGHT
.”

Not
what she’d wanted to hear. Not what she’d expected to hear, either. But probably a smart idea. While she was trying to convince herself that being shot down for the second time in one night was actually a good thing, she unexpectedly fell asleep.

Something—a sound, a movement—woke her with a start what could have been minutes or hours later. Eyes wide, heart pounding, she stared into the darkness, not quite sure of where she was. There was an odd roaring in her ears. She was lying on something soft and she was wrapped in someone’s arms—Michael?

No, not Michael. These arms were definitely more muscular. The body attached to them was longer and more muscular, too. And it was almost naked and had a triangle of short, coarse hair in the middle of its chest and radiated heat like a stove—Luke. At the realization she felt a ridiculous kind of warm glow. Then everything came back to her in a tidal wave of memory, and the warm glow vanished as she froze, listening intently. What had awakened her?

She didn’t know.

But just considering the possibilities made her heart pound.

Don’t panic. It was probably nothing.

Methodically she took inventory of her surroundings. There were only a few stars visible in the night sky. Luke was asleep. His breathing was deep and relaxed, and his chest rose and fell steadily beneath her head, which was pillowed on it, and her arm, which was stretched across it. The roaring in her ears was the tide coming in.

Christy listened for what felt like quite some time, but beyond that heard nothing except a single muffled
thud,
perhaps caused by a falling branch or some nocturnal animal in the nearby forest or maybe even a wandering turtle. She refused to allow herself to even consider the possibility that the sound might have been made by her attacker, or to wonder if he might be close by.

As Luke had pointed out, what were the chances that he could have followed them so far, through darkness and a forest straight out of
Green Mansions?
What were the chances that he would find
them,
instead of, say, the turtle watchers up the beach? And in any case, she did not have the feeling of dread, the prickly sense of lurking evil, that so far had pretty reliably signaled when he was near.

She must have been awakened by another nightmare—big surprise. Her whole life had devolved into one long bad dream, so it shouldn’t be all that surprising if her sleep was no different.

Relax already, she told herself.

Unfortunately, focusing on how much she needed to sleep to build her endurance up for the trials and tribulations of the coming day proved to have the opposite effect. More wide awake than ever, she tried another tack: focusing on the man in whose arms she lay.

Being snuggled up against Luke was the next best thing to being clean and dry and safe back in her own bed, she decided. They were both as close to naked as they could get and still be minimally decent, and she was wrapped around him like yarn around a spindle. Everywhere they touched he felt warm and solid, and his skin was rough in interesting places with hair. His body was long and strong, his chest was wide and resilient, and the arms around her were corded with muscle. He smelled of salt—so, she was sure, did she—and essence of man, and she could hear the steady beat of his heart beneath her ear.

Okay, she was still awake.

Sharpening her focus, she concentrated on the contrast between the thicket of short hairs curling around her fingers and the satiny warmth of the skin beneath. The muscles underlying the skin were really impressively developed, and given the sedentary nature of his profession provided
de facto
evidence of what must be some pretty grueling workouts. His waist and hips were hard and narrow—with her stomach pressed tight up against his hipbone she knew this for sure—and his legs, which she tested by flexing her knee and moving her thigh along the one nearest her, were powerful, confirming her impression that he must be a pretty dedicated weekend warrior, at the very least.

Sliding her hand upward in what she assured herself was a purely reflexive gesture, she absorbed the firm nature of his pecs and the hard flatness of his nipple, and gave herself a little electric thrill in the process.

Fortunately, the thrill served as a wake-up call. Practically molesting the man in his sleep was not something she needed to be doing, she told herself sternly.
Sleeping
was what she needed to be doing.

Clenching her fist, she pulled her hand back close to her side, stilled her leg, closed her eyes, and waited for exhaustion to do its thing and overwhelm any lingering inappropriate thoughts. When exhaustion proved slow on the uptake, she set about trying to lull herself back to sleep.

She listened to the surf; she counted sheep; she deliberately isolated each muscle and relaxed it, starting at her feet and working her way up. By the time she reached her shoulders, rolling them discreetly around to ease the stiffness in her neck, she could feel the tension slowly draining from her body.

“Having trouble sleeping?” The husky murmur in her ear made her jump.

“Did I wake you up? I’m sorry,” she said, although she wasn’t. Since he was awake already, and she didn’t have to worry about disturbing him any longer, she snuggled a little closer, although she was careful to keep her hands to herself. Warmth and human companionship were undoubtedly what she really needed in order to relax enough to go back to sleep.

“I wasn’t asleep.”

Christy went still with surprise. “You were.”

She sensed rather than saw his smile. “Uh-uh.”

She didn’t know whether to believe him or not, but in case he was telling the truth she searched for a conversational gambit that would effectively distract him from any totally wrong thoughts he might be thinking.

“You know, you never did tell me,” she said, remembering their earlier abortive conversation, “how you wound up in my trunk.”

A beat passed.

“It’s a long story,” he said. “Probably we should save it for tomorrow.”

“So give me the short version.”

“Did I mention that I’m trying to sleep here?”

“If you tell me how you ended up in the trunk, I promise I won’t say another word. Or move. Or anything.”

Another beat.

“Fine,” he said. “Here you go. The short version. After I left you, I went out to get kitty litter for Marvin. On the way back from the store, I saw your car. I wondered where you were going, and I worried that something might be wrong for you to be leaving your cottage so late, so I turned around and followed you. I didn’t see the accident itself—I was too far back and it was raining, remember—but I saw your car smashed up when I drove past. I stopped, ran over to the wreck to see if you were okay, and got cracked over the head with something for my pains. Next thing I knew, I woke up with you beside me in the trunk.”

Christy didn’t say anything for a moment as guilt built up inside her. The hard truth was that Luke had
ended up in that trunk solely because of her. That he’d been targeted by the killer solely because of her. That his life was in danger right now solely because of her.

That he was an innocent victim in all this.

“Oh my God,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I got you involved in this.”

The arms around her tightened. “It’s not exactly what I would call your fault.”

Little did he know.

“Listen,” she said earnestly, shifting position so that she could look at him, although of course she couldn’t see much more than the faint gleam of his eyes. “When we’re safe out of this, when I’m back in my cottage and you’re back in yours, I want you to stay away from me. This isn’t anything to do with you, really, and there’s no point in you putting yourself in danger over it. If you’re not with me, you’ll be perfectly safe.”

A beat passed.

“Christy,” he said. “Are you by any chance
worried
about me?”

Her eyes narrowed. “Of course I’m worried about you. What’s happening here isn’t anything to do with you. If you get killed, it’ll be all my fault.”

“That’s cute,” he said. “No, that’s sweet.”

Cute? Sweet?

“What are you talking about? Did you listen to anything I just said? You need to stay away from me. The only reason you’re in danger is because of me.”

“Why don’t you let me worry about me?”

“Because you don’t understand.” Urgency filled her voice.

“Then why don’t you explain it to me?”

“Explain what? That there’s somebody out there who keeps trying to kill me but who doesn’t seem to be really picky about who else he kills if they get in his way?”

“A serial killer, right?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe?”

Christy bit her lip. His tone told her that her slip of the tongue had registered with him big-time. Now she’d made him wonder. The temptation to confide the whole terrifying story to him was almost overwhelming. She needed somebody to talk to, somebody to trust, somebody who might be able to bring a fresh perspective to the situation as well as offer a few suggestions on how she might survive.

She couldn’t think of anybody better than Luke.

But if she told him the truth, then staying away from her wouldn’t keep him out of danger. They’d be after him, too.

“There’s something you’re not telling me, isn’t there? I’ve thought so from the beginning,” he said.

Oh God, she’d been quiet for too long. Her silence had taken him a step beyond wonder to suspicion.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

It only occurred to her that she sounded way too wooden when his arms tightened and he rolled with her so that all of a sudden she was lying flat on her back with him leaning over her. She could feel the heat of him, the weight of one of his legs pinning hers down, the hard strength of the arm draped across her chest.

“You can trust me, you know.” His voice was quiet. A
hand brushed her cheekbone, smoothed the hair back from her face. “And anyway, I’m already caught up in this. Now that this guy has gone to the trouble of knocking me unconscious and stuffing me in your trunk, I’d say that it’s a good bet that he’s not going to just forget about me.”

“If you stay away from me …” Christy began desperately.

“Not gonna happen.”

She could feel his hand against the side of her neck now, caressing, gentling.

“Luke… .”

“Christy.” His thumb feathered across the soft hollow beneath her ear. “Don’t you think that since you got me into this you owe it to me to tell me the truth? It would be a lot easier to protect myself—and help you—if I knew what was really going on. Something tells me that you’re not entirely convinced that this guy is a serial killer, are you?”

Christy took a deep, shaken breath. His points were valid, but she was afraid—for herself, and for him.

“I—don’t—know.” She drew the words out slowly, in an agony of indecision about what to do. She wanted to tell him so badly… .

“Tell me, honey. Tell me the truth.”

“You don’t know anything about me,” she whispered wretchedly. “You don’t have any idea what you’re asking. Believe me, this is something you’d really rather not know.”

“Is it something to do with your ex-boyfriend?”

Christy drew in a sharp breath. She was breathing
hard, and her eyes were wide in the dark. “What makes you think that?”

“What you’ve said about him. What you haven’t said about him. Your reaction just now.”

“Oh God.” She’d given herself away.

“Whatever it is, we’re in it together now. Whether you tell me the truth or not, I’m putting you on notice that I’m not going to be walking away.”

“I want you to walk away.
Please
walk away.”

“Not till you can walk away with me.” She could make out the slow negative shake of his head. “Tell me about your ex-boyfriend, Christy. How is he connected with this? What is he, some kind of big man in the mob?”

“How could you know that?” Christy gasped, then heard, too late, the semi-jocular tone in which the question had been put and closed her eyes. He hadn’t really been serious, but she’d answered his question in the affirmative anyway without even meaning to. Her words were an admission, and she knew it. He was so close with his guesses—how was it that he was so close with his guesses?