Honor Unraveled (32 page)

He bent and scooped up her leopard bra and panties. “What are you doing with those?” she asked.

“Tossing them.”

“What?” She scrambled out of bed. “That’s my favorite set.” She reached for them, but he swiped his hands behind his back, blocking her.

“You wore them for
him
.”

“No. I wore them for me. They make me feel pretty.”

He shook his head. The humor was gone from his eyes. “You selected your sexiest set of underwear for a date with what’s-his-name. Every time I see you in these, I’ll think of that.”

“Kit Bolanger, you are not throwing those out. Hand them to me.” She held her palm out.

“No.” He tossed them in the trash.
 

“Kit!” she shouted, then tried to move past him to retrieve her unmentionables from the waste can. He bent and snagged his shoulder against her belly, hoisting her over his back. Turning, he caught sight of her naked bottom in the mirror. He couldn’t stifle the hiss that broke free.
 

She pushed herself up, looking over her shoulder to the mirror. Her dark hair slipped across her bare back. They both watched as his hand eased up her thigh, then slipped between her legs. He palmed one of her butt cheeks, holding her steady as his fingers found her slick, hot center. He slipped one finger in and out, then two. She was trying to brace herself against his back. He felt every movement of her hips. Her ass was next to his face. He kissed one cheek, then ran his teeth over her flesh. “Jesus, Iv. I need you again. Please.”

“Yes. Hurry, Kit.”

He set her on her feet on the bed. “Bend down. Yeah.” He loosened his zipper, letting himself out, then slipped right into her. She arched her back, pushing into him. He banged into her, over and over, the motion pushing her up on the bed, slamming the headboard against the wall. She peaked hard, crying out, pulling his release with hers, bucking against him. He held her hips as hot streams of semen shot from him deep inside her.
 

“Aw, fuck, Ivy. I wasn’t covered.” He bent over her and buried his face in her shoulder.

Ivy pulled free of him and turned over, staying beneath the cage of his arms. “I know.”

“That’s how all this trouble started.”

She smoothed the worry from his forehead. “No, it isn’t. The trouble started that day at school you stood by the windows and smiled at me.”

He studied her a long moment, awed and humbled by her soft smile. “I’m going for our sandwiches. When I get back, we’re gonna have a long talk.”

“Okay. I’ll be here.”

* * *

Kit walked into the kitchen. He retrieved the fixings to make a few sandwiches. He’d gotten the first one assembled when Kathy came in.

“Oh, Kit, there you are! You didn’t come down to dinner. I set aside a tray for you and one for Ivy. Shall I warm up yours, or both yours and Ivy’s?”

Kit grinned, not at all snowed by her not-so-subtle digging for information. “Warm them both, if you would. I’ll be in the den for a minute.”

The den’s door had been closed when he passed it on his way to the kitchen. He wondered what was going on. He took his sandwich and stepped into the den without knocking. The whole team, sans Max, was assembled, their faces somber.
 

He looked at Owen. “You called a meeting and didn’t get me?”

“You’re off the clock tonight,” Owen answered.

“Coming up for air?” Val asked, grinning.

Kit held up his sandwich. “Food break. What’s up?” He took a bite and chewed it.

“Nothing that you can’t deal with in the morning. Go back to what you were doing,” Owen ordered in a terse voice.

“How about you let me make that determination?” He watched Greer look at Owen, who was still giving Kit his freeze-ray stare. “Fucking spill it, Greer. What’s up?”

Owen nodded to Greer. “Tonight was a set-up,” Greer told him. “We’d cleared Roy, but we hadn’t looked into his family. I ran his plates out of curiosity and discovered he was using his father’s car. His dad was one of the twelve being blackmailed by Blade’s dad. They were trying to get to Ivy. I think he had an abrupt change of plans when he saw all of us tonight.”

“She said she met him before we came out here.”

“Obviously, they were aware of her relationship to you,” Blade said. “It’s good she’s here, ’cause she’s a direct conduit to you. They take her, they got you.”

Kit took another bite of his sandwich. “Okay. So what do you want to do with this info?”

“Nothing yet,” Owen said. “Kelan’s going down to put a GPS on his dad’s vehicle. We’ll watch where he goes for the next few days while he’s home on recess.”

“Who is he?”

“He’s a US senator. George Whiddon.”

“He’s in the videos?” Kit asked Blade.

“Yeah.”

“So let’s take him down.”

“No. Not yet. These twelve are connected to the WKB in ways we don’t yet understand. I want to figure that out before we deliver justice. They’re a cancer. If we don’t take all of it out at the same time, it’ll just grow back.”

Kit looked at Blade. “You okay with that?” He took the last bite of his sandwich.

Blade shrugged. “I can’t undo what they did to me. If we can get them for something more, like, say, treason, I’m all for letting the bastards fry.”

“Which is why we didn’t need you tonight,” Owen told him. “Ivy’s safe. Get back to her.”

A knock at the door sounded just then. Kit opened it to find Kathy holding their dinner tray.

“Sorry to disturb you. Did you want me to take this down to Ivy?”

Kit took the tray. “Nope. I’ll do it—thanks.” He sent a dark look back toward the guys sitting and standing around the room. “You know where I am if you need me.”

Ivy wiggled under the covers. The sheets slipped across her bare skin, a cool, otherworldly caress. She caught sight of her bra strap hanging over the lip of the trash. That had been her favorite set. Kit had had such a strong reaction to them tonight that she wondered if she’d ever be able to wear—and enjoy—them again without worrying that he was remembering Roy. Throwing off the covers, she crossed the room to grab the ensemble out of the trash.
 

She stared at the pieces, then tossed them back into the trash. It didn’t matter what Kit thought, she wouldn’t enjoy wearing that set again.
 

And then she realized it was happening again—she was losing herself in Kit. She wanted what he wanted. She found joy in what pleased him, found displeasure in what displeased him.
 

Was she such a nonentity that she couldn’t make up her own mind about things?

The last time she’d gone down this road, she’d lost everything—Kit, her family, her home, her future. And she’d had a baby to care for while she was at the bottom of that barrel. God, she couldn’t do this again. She sat on the edge of the bed, feeling panic chill her.
 

Why couldn’t she be happy with someone who was steady, respectable, boring, kind? Why was it always Kit who set fire to her soul and made her feel alive?

She grabbed her clothes, dressing quickly. She was buttoning her shirt when Kit returned with a big tray of dishes. He stopped in the doorway. His blue gaze made a slow pass over her.
 

“What’s goin’ on, Ivy?”

“I can’t do this.”

“You were doing fine before we took a break.”

“You don’t understand.”

“No, I don’t.”

She shook her head, struggling to find words that would make sense to him. Heck, it didn’t even make sense to her. He was everything she wanted. And being with him terrified her. She would have to surrender everything that she was to be with him, and that was a very, very dangerous choice.

Kit put the dinner tray down on the dresser. He moved toward her, studying her face as he closed the distance between them. He touched his big hand to the side of her neck, using his thumb beneath her jaw to lift her face.

“You’re a block of ice.” She crossed her arms. He sighed. “Talk to me, Ivy.”

Ivy sat on the foot of the bed. “You threw my best underwear away.”

Kit frowned at her. He snagged the undergarments out of the can and held them out to her. “I did. I’m sorry. I overreacted.”

She pushed them aside. “This isn’t about your reaction. I can’t wear them now.”

He sat next to her. Opening his hands, he considered her silky underwear. “They can be washed.”

“No. It’s not that.”

“I’m trying, Iv. I don’t get it, but I’m trying.”

Ivy sighed. “When we were kids, I lost myself in you. And then I lost you and I had no me.” His gaze was level and direct, as if he was waiting for her to quit speaking in tongues. “It’s happening again. You’re disgusted with those.” She motioned to the underwear he was holding. “And now I won’t be able to enjoy wearing them again. You see?”

“No.”

“I’m terrified of going back to a place where I have no me. I think about you all the time. I worry about you all the time. I want what you want. I change myself to make you happy.”

“Whoa. Hold on there. I don’t need you to change. I think you’re perfect as you are. And the rest of it is just because you’re in love. I want what you want. I think about and worry about you all the time, too.”

“Does that scare you? What you feel for me?”

“No. It gives me joy.”

Ivy slowly smiled. Briefly, the face of the boy she’d known overlaid that of the man sitting next to her. “You always had that fierce self-determinism. It’s what attracted me to you in the very beginning.”

He grinned. “That’s one point in my favor.”

“You have all the points in your favor. It’s me who’s tipping the scale the other way.”

“Yeah? So why are you holding back?”

“I wish I could explain it. Thinking of being with you gives me a panicked feeling that terrifies me. What if I need you too much? What if I come to depend on you and you leave? What if I get used to making shared decisions, then lose you? I will have lost my self-reliance. And you. And everything. I can’t get past what happened before.”

He sighed and stared down at the ground. They were both quiet for a minute, then he asked, “You ever see a prickly pear flower?” She shook her head. “They’re beautiful. Yellow, pink, orange. They live atop thorny cacti in the most inhospitable terrain. Its thorns make it safe. That it can blossom on such a plant, in that hard country, makes the flower extraordinary.
 

“What happened before, with us, after us, that’s your thorns. We both know it’s your time to bloom, but first you have to accept the past. You have to accept your thorns. They’re part of what makes you you.” He stood up and shoved his hands into his pockets as he watched her. “I want a present and future with you, but I can’t magically make you unafraid. I can’t make you forget. I wouldn’t even if I could.” He kissed her cheek, then grabbed his discarded clothes and looked back at her. “I promise you, though, that I’ll be here when you work through this. I’ll guard you while you heal, and if your thorns make you bleed, I’ll patch you up.”

* * *

Casey walked to the dance floor with one of Davy’s friends. He’d brought several guys to the table where Casey and Zoe sat. It was thoughtful. Casey wondered if Zoe had asked him to do that or if the other boys had wanted to come too. Not that it mattered. She’d gotten to dance several times—even a couple of slow dances. The evening had been magical. The late barbecue had been for everyone of both camps, but the little kids had left afterward for a special story time around the fire. The older kids were allowed to stay for the dance portion of the evening. This was the first year she’d been in that group. Casey hoped the counselors let them stay a little late. She didn’t want the evening to end.
 

As she thought that, Zoe squeezed her hand and got up from the picnic table. She grinned at Casey, who smiled back, then quickly looked away so no one would notice the two sneaking off. One of the boys asked her to dance. It was another slow dance. Lots of the other kids came up to the floor in couples. The girls without partners came up and danced, too.
 

Casey focused on the boy in front of her. He was about her height. He was looking around them more than paying attention to her. It didn’t matter. These were her first boy-girl dances and she treasured every one. Even if he was a little damp from sweat. Boys smelled so much different than girls. They moved differently. And talked differently. And were, all in all, utterly fascinating.

When the dance shifted to a fast song, her partner stepped away as two other boys came up to dance with her. She didn’t recognize them, but she was the only girl dancing with two boys. She laughed with the sheer joy of it. After a few minutes, another boy came up to the dance floor and headed straight for her. Her heart started beating. She couldn’t dance with three guys!

“Don’t stop dancing,” he whispered in her ear, “but I think something’s wrong with your friends. They haven’t come back.”

Despite the boy’s directive, Casey did stop dancing. She flashed a quick look over to the picnic table. Zoe was not there. She looked at the kid. Who was he? Why hadn’t she seen him earlier in the season when the boys’ side got together with the girls’ for activities? Was he even from camp? “What should we do?”