Honor Unraveled (4 page)

All in all, not a convo he was looking forward to.

After breakfast, Mandy and Fiona took Casey out to the stables to get started on the chores and exercising the horses. With the guys busy getting Max’s WKB identity set up, the girls’ morning training practice had been canceled.
 

Kit walked into the den ahead of Ivy. He leaned against Blade’s desk and watched as she came into the room. “Close the door.”

She looked at him, visibly measuring her inclination to comply, then grudgingly did as he asked.

She was little changed since their high school days, Kit thought as he looked her over. Still petite and china-doll-like, with her white skin and big, dark-blue eyes. Her hair was so dark a brown, it might have been black. In the sunshine, it had red highlights. She’d tamed her wavy mane into a twist, which she held in place with a big clamp. Thin wisps had come loose, curling about her face and neck.
 

She’d worn Bohemian clothes in high school, a thing that set her apart from the other girls back then—the very thing that had caught his attention originally. In her own gentle way, she was as much a rebel as he was. Even now, she was wearing a light-blue tank top underneath an open-weave sweater that made wide webs from her waist to her elbows. Her shorts were cutoffs of an old pair of jeans. A few long strings hung from the frayed denim and streamed down her thighs like artistic splashes of color. Her legs were sleek, smooth, and pale. He remembered how god-awful soft they were. The flip-flops she wore showed off the multicolor paint on her toenails, completing her hippy look.

She was hot as fuck.
 

And she’d never again be his. Unless he could persuade her to let them have another chance. Which, given their relationship over the past six years, was about as likely as hell freezing over.
 

But they were in Wyoming, a place as much heaven as it was hell. And snow in summer had been known to happen….

Kit activated his mic. “Max, shut down the den. I’m going to have a chat with Ivy.”

“Copy that. Want a rescue call in ten?”

“Negative. I don’t want to be interrupted.”

“Good luck, man.”
Max clicked off.

Ivy didn’t move far from the door. Her silence, her posture, her position in the room screamed of a cornered animal—one determined not to go down without a fight.

He’d been wrong, he realized as he watched her. There was little of the girl he’d known so many years ago. She was all woman now, with eyes that said she knew her way around a man. He ground his teeth, wondering about the men who’d been in her life.

“So?” she prompted him, folding her arms in front of her. “You wanted to talk? How about we cover the rules of engagement in this war game you’re playing?”

“It’s not a game, Ivy, but it is war. With victors and losers. Real blood and real pain. Our enemies are deadly. They have no scruples, and nothing is off limits. Including women and children. You saw what happened here.” Ivy and Casey had been stowed in the bunker with the other dependents when the WKB had hit Blade’s house. “That was a pleasant outing for them. They wouldn’t hesitate to take you and Casey and use you to get to me. You’ve probably heard what happened when they kidnapped Mandy. Perhaps you’ve also heard what they did to Eden’s friends?” He held her gaze, watching her reaction to be certain she understood what he was saying. “You would not survive them.”

Her lips thinned. “So we’re stuck here.”

“You are.”

“For how long?”

Kit shook his head. “I wish I knew.”

Ivy sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “Why did I have to pick this town? Of all the places I could have chosen, why did I come here?”

A question he’d been wondering as well. “Why did you?”

She looked at him, tilting her head as she considered him. “Because I thought it was the one place you’d never come.”

Kit arched a brow. “That’s it? That was your plan? Avoid me?”

She nodded. Kit shifted his gaze to the wall behind her as the impact of her words leaked into his soul. He’d been unable to communicate with her when he first entered the service, except by letters, all of which were returned unopened. After boot camp, he had a long weekend before his orders took effect, so he’d hopped a bus and made the trip from Kentucky to Wyoming, only to find she was gone. Her family had moved to avoid the dishonor of her teenage pregnancy. Thanks to the help of his high school social studies teacher, who had a soft spot for them, he’d learned where they’d moved to in Michigan. He’d gone AWOL at that point, catching a bus out to see her instead of returning to his base. He’d failed in that mission—her dad wouldn’t let him see her. The bastard had put a restraining order on him. He’d had no choice but to let her go.
 

Maybe he had been something of a stalker. Jesus, he’d just wanted to lay eyes on her once. Just once. Hear from her own mouth that she wanted nothing to do with him.

He was away in Afghanistan with Blade and Rocco when the restraining order expired. By then, he’d put her out of his mind and had forced himself to move on with his life. She resurfaced—with Casey—when their daughter was six. Kit hadn’t known anything about what had happened to her—if she’d miscarried, as her dad had told him, kept the baby, or given it up for adoption. He didn’t even know the baby’s gender. It wasn’t until she’d reached out to Mandy that he learned she’d kept the baby. Kit had had his lawyer get in touch with her to make arrangements for supporting Casey—help she’d resisted at first, until it became clear that she didn’t have to work directly with Kit and he wasn’t going to fight for custody.
 

He’d often wondered if her feelings for him, all those years ago, had been real or if they’d just been some teenage infatuation, if she regretted being stuck with him forever because of their daughter. And wasn’t that another kick in the teeth?

He still adored her and she resented the hell out of him.
 

Not unlike everyone else in his family. His mother. His father. His grandparents. Shit, the whole fucking town hated him. But not Mandy. No, his sister had been his only relative who truly seemed to care about him.
 

And now, maybe Casey did as well. Maybe.
 

In the arrangements that his lawyer set up, Ivy was required to share Casey’s school performance records with him. He and Ivy had begun communicating by exchanging cordial emails quarterly when her grades came in. Then when Casey was sick, or the time she’d broken her arm, Ivy had written to him. She started sending pictures when special events happened. School performances. Smiles with missing teeth. Gradually, Ivy became open to suggestions, like signing Casey up for swimming and karate lessons.
 

He’d been involved with their lives for years now, but always from a safe distance. Thirty-thousand feet high. It was a coward’s way out. His heart was still wrapped up in Ivy, but she’d obviously moved on. She didn’t want him personally involved in their lives. He hadn’t seen her again until this summer. And now that he’d met his daughter, he’d be goddamned if he’d stay on the periphery of her life.

Ivy faced him, studying his expression. “What happens at the end of the summer when school starts?”

“We’ll bring in a tutor. Rocco needs one for Zavi.”

She frowned. “The educational needs of a preschooler aren’t the same as those of a seventh-grader.”

“If one tutor can’t handle it, we’ll hire two. Or she can make use of the online schools that are available now. Either way, the kids will be schooled here.”

“And if your work here ends before the school year is up? What happens then? Will you follow your team to the next site, the next terror event? Will you drop your interest in Casey, yank the tutor, and leave us to make our own way again?”

Anger raised its head, strong-arming the tenuous control he had on his emotions. He took a breath. “Have I yet done that? Since the very first that I learned of Casey?”

Her lips thinned as she silently regarded him. “I don’t understand this, Kit. I don’t know where we fit in your life.”

“I will always take care of you and our daughter, Ivy. Always. For now, it’s not safe for either of you to go out in public unguarded. Doing so puts you and those around you at risk.”

Ivy bent her head and rubbed her forehead. After a moment, she squared her shoulders and faced him. “So how does this work? What are the rules?”

“Greer will get your business software set up. I’ve ordered a desk that will be put in your room so you have a place to work. You and Casey have free rein inside the house. The bunker is off limits. You may go out back as far as the field below the retaining wall. Beyond that, one of us must accompany you. You have full use of the gym. Greer will give you an access code to the poolroom. Casey and Zavi are not to be in the poolroom without an adult.

“Most mornings, the girls have self-defense training with the guys. You’re welcome to join them. I think Casey is too young for that workout. Kelan and I will be taking over her karate lessons. When you need to go to the diner, one of us will go with you. You can’t be off the property unescorted.”

“What about Casey? She’s scheduled to go to summer camp for a month in a few days. Can she still do that?”

“No.” Kit straightened, prepared for the fight he sensed was coming.
 

Ivy sighed again. “We’ve already paid for it. It’s nonrefundable.”

“We only have one Casey. I’m not willing to risk her safety.”

Ivy threw a look toward the door. She was anxious to leave. He’d laid the groundwork for their interactions. There really wasn’t anything left to say. Except all the important stuff, like how was it possible that he could feel what he felt and she felt nothing? He’d kissed her twice since his return. Both times she’d responded to him, opening to him. Why was she holding back?

One way or another, by the end of their time here, they’d be together. Or forever, irrevocably apart. For their sake, he hoped the issues that Owen had brought them here to resolve took a long time to work through. She wasn’t something to conquer, a woman to claim. She was his Ivy, his very heart. No way in hell he’d let her go without a fight.
 

Deciding the chase was so fucking on, he snagged her gaze, holding it while he prowled toward her. Her chin lifted, her eyes meeting his challenge. She stood her ground, keeping her hands folded in front of her like a shield. As if she had any hope of holding her own against him. At the last minute, when their bodies would have collided, she stepped back. He claimed the ground she ceded. And having started her retreat, she didn’t stop until she was backed against the door.

Kit smiled. It was the start of their dance. She didn’t know the steps, and he was entirely reliant on instinct. He had one goal: his dominance and her submission.

He reached out, bracing his hands on either side of her head. He was at least a foot taller than she was. Height was another tool in his arsenal. She was nervous. He could feel it, smell it in the sweet waves of heat that rose from her body, see it in the way her gaze skittered over his chest and shoulders but never lifted to his face.
 

He bent near her, giving his lungs the luxury of filling with her scent. Sweet and summery. Lilacs, maybe. He longed to fill his hands with her curves, touch her body with his, feel her skin beneath his, but it was too early for that dance step.

Her nostrils flared. Was she scenting him, as he did her? “What are you doing?” she asked in a breathy voice that sent blood flooding to a critical part of his anatomy.

“Reacquainting myself with you.” He breathed deeply of the warm air by the curve of her neck and shoulder, as if he could take it for himself and leave nothing for any other man. Which he would. In time. When the dance ended.

He kissed the base of her neck. He hadn’t shaved this morning. Or for the past few days, either. Her skin was like velvet. Impossibly soft. He dragged his closed mouth up the center of her neck, moving in a line up to her ear. The stubble of his jaw dragged against her skin. She lifted her chin, and he accepted the movement as a gift, tracing his mouth over the center of her throat. Up, around her chin. He hovered over her lips, close but not touching, waiting until she lifted her gaze to him. When she did, her pupils were dilated, darkening her eyes. He could dive into those midnight-blue eyes.

“We’re not finished, you and I,” he growled. “What we had was real, in a way nothing since has ever been. Give yourself to me.”

She lowered her gaze, blocking him from reading anything in her eyes. Maybe he moved. Maybe she did. He felt her lips meet his. He couldn’t stop himself from pulling a long draw of air through his flared nostrils as the impact of that touch shivered through him. Her hands unfolded from their defensive posture to stroke over his chest, not to push him away but to learn him again by touch.
 

Her little pink tongue slipped between his lips and heat shot into his groin. His tongue welcomed hers, rubbing over, under, alongside hers. His hands moved from the wall to her hair. He released the clippy thing holding it up and tossed it to the floor, then buried his hands in her loosened mane, gripping fistfuls of it, thick and soft, as he ground his mouth against hers. Her hands rose higher, circling his shoulders. He turned his head to feel her mouth from another angle. He had to spread his legs to ease the pressure throbbing in his groin.