Intimate (31 page)

Jake was bleeding, too. Blood ran down his left arm and dripped from his fingertips, but he knelt beside her, and there was only one of him, thank goodness. One of him bleeding. She touched the back of his hand.

“You've been shot.”

“I'm okay. Stings like a son of a bitch, but I think he just grazed my shoulder. God, Kaz.” Gently, he gathered her up in his arms and held her close against his chest. The tenderness in his touch, the pain in his eyes, the blood covering his arm undid everything holding her together. She couldn't stop the tears. She cried softly, clutching his sides, twisting her fingers in his shirt, holding on to him for all she was worth.

He'd come for her.

Even when she'd been so awful, when she hadn't trusted his promise, he'd found her.

Except he'd lied, hadn't he? What was the truth? Had he really killed this man's wife and child? No. She wouldn't make guesses. She'd ask him later, but for now he was here, and because he was here, she was still alive. Kaz pressed her bruised and battered face against his beautiful black silk shirt, now wet and sticky with his blood, and sobbed.

She always cried ugly, but now? Now she really didn't care.

 

CHAPTER 19

Jake sat in the straw and leaned against the side of the stall with Kaz in his arms. His shoulder seemed to have stopped bleeding, but it still hurt. He held Kaz close against his chest while she cried, and he thought his heart would break. This was all on him. His fault. He kissed the top of her head and rested his cheek against her crown. “I don't even know where to start, sweetheart. This is all my fault. I did this, Kaz. God, I'm so sorry. So damn sorry. I should have told you everything from the beginning, but I was a fucking coward. This should never have happened.”

But sorry wasn't enough. It would never be enough. He'd done this to her. His cowardice had done this to her.

“Jake?”

He pulled Kaz close to hide her nudity against his chest before he glanced up. Nate stood beside them. Norwich was hog-tied in the middle of the tasting room. Jake was sorry he hadn't killed him. “Yeah?”

“Your lady okay?”

Kaz nodded before Jake could answer. Hell, he had no idea if she was okay or not.

She sniffed, and he grabbed a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped her eyes. She took it from him and carefully wiped the blood away from her nose and mouth. “Nothing's broken. He beat me up pretty bad, but he said he was more interested in leaving marks and lots of blood than killing me. At least until you got here.” She stared into Jake's eyes. Her left eye was no more than a slit. “How did you find me? How did you know?”

“Honestly? I was so stunned when you threw that envelope in my face and ran that it took me a minute before I looked at the pictures. I knew immediately they weren't mine. If you'd gone through all of them, you would have seen a picture of the two of us making love in the vineyard and known I couldn't possibly have taken it. But the note…” He shook his head.

“I know. I saw the note first, but didn't see a picture of the two of us. I couldn't look at them. They were so ugly, so wrong, but I read the note and didn't think. I'm sorry. If I'd really thought about it, I would have known they weren't yours. Your pictures are art. Those are ugly.”

Jake gently brushed her hair back from her eyes. Her face was a mess, and yet she was still the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen. “You have nothing to be sorry about. This was all my fault. As soon as I saw them, I knew I had to find you, tell you they weren't mine. I promised you, Kaz. I will never share those pictures with anyone.” He sighed. “But I guess you really didn't have any reason to believe me. I was still lying to you, even then, about my past.

“The day I met you, I'd started getting anonymous text messages from someone who remembered me as RJ. Nothing specific at first, but I figured he was stalking me, not you. Then he made references to things that were happening to both of us, but I was too thick to make the connection. When you told me about the attempts on your life, I figured it had to be the same guy. By then I'd gotten enough texts, I knew he'd been in Healdsburg, possibly driving the car. This afternoon I called and left a message on your phone that I needed to talk to you. I went by your house, finally gave up, and figured I'd see you tonight at the launch, tell you what was going on. Then you showed me the pictures. I tried calling and even went to the coffee shop, trying to find you. I finally went to your house, and Lola and Mandy were furious with me. I showed them the picture, the one of us together, and they finally believed me. That and the fact it was delivered to Top End. They know that I know you don't work there.”

“But how did you find me?”

He brushed her hair back from her eyes and kissed her forehead. It was just about the only place without a bruise. “Mandy remembered your tablet with the app for finding your phone. That's how I traced you here, but until Norwich called me and I heard his voice, I didn't make the connection between the attacks and him. It's been almost twenty years since I saw him, and he's changed. He doesn't look anything like the man I remember.”

He turned and stared at Norwich, lying all trussed up in the middle of the tasting room floor. What if he hadn't made it in time? What if the bastard had just decided to kill Kaz? He rested his cheek against the top of her head. “I'm so sorry, Kaz. Damn, just so fucking sorry.”

Her fingers tightened their grasp on his shirt, and he held her tightly.

Nate walked across the room to check on Norwich. He was still tightly bound, though beginning to regain consciousness. “Sirens are getting close,” Nate said. “You guys okay? I need to let the sheriff's deputies in. Your car's blocking the gate.”

Jake fished his keys out of his pocket and tossed them to Nate. “Here. Go ahead and move it.”

Nate caught them and walked out to meet the deputies.

“Let's get you covered up before they get here. Sorry about the blood.” Jake shrugged out of his shirt, and Kaz helped him peel the sticky silk away from his left arm.

“Sheesh, Jake. It might just be a graze, but it's left a divot at least a quarter inch deep. It's still bleeding.” She used the handkerchief to apply some pressure against the wound while Jake helped her slip into the shirt. The black silk he'd worn for the event tonight was a bloody mess, but at least it hung all the way to her thighs. By the time the deputies stormed into the barn, she was decently covered.

Nate's wife, Cassie, came out to the barn when the deputies arrived. Jake had met her during last fall's crush when she and Nate were still engaged. She hadn't been pregnant yet. He'd thought she was beautiful then, but now she absolutely glowed.

She went straight to Kaz and introduced herself.

“I'm so sorry for what that man did to you. Promise me you'll go to the doctor. There's a good little hospital in town; let them take a look at you.”

Kaz glanced away, almost as if she was embarrassed, but about that time the deputy walked over to talk to her. Jake sat behind her on the blanket. He didn't want these men looking at her all beaten and bloody. Didn't want them to see her wearing nothing but his shirt, but the deputy was both professional and kind.

“Ms. Kazanov, this wasn't a domestic, was it? You're not related to the man who's tied up?”

Kaz shook her head. “No. He's a stranger to me, though Jake—Mr. Lowell—knows who he is. But he's made four other attempts on my life. He tried to run us both down about two weeks ago when we were in Healdsburg. Then he hired a kid to run a truck into me in San Francisco, but the boy missed. He told me tonight he was also the one who pushed me in front of a Muni train at the station in front of AT&T Park a couple of days ago, and this morning he took two shots at me in front of a coffee shop near where I live. You can get information for the three attacks in San Francisco from Officer José Macias.”

She waited while the deputy wrote down the information.

“There are police reports on all the incidents in San Francisco, and I'm sure there's some sort of record of what happened here in Healdsburg. The police were there, but Jake and I didn't realize it was anything but an out-of-control driver. Tonight, he kidnapped me, beat me up, and told me he wanted to kill me with Jake watching.”

Her voice remained steady, her delivery sounded detached, almost professional. Jake felt sick.

When it was his turn, he told the police the entire story, about the accident when he was sixteen, the fact the woman who died had been badly beaten before the car ran into her, that he'd been arrested as the driver and spent almost six years incarcerated in the California Youth Authority system for the crime. He didn't mention that Ben was driving, nor did he bring up the fact that he was RJ Cameron, Olympic medal winner and media star, when it happened.

That would probably come out soon enough.

It was time.

*   *   *

There was too much for her to process. Kaz hurt everywhere. She kept telling herself she was lucky he hadn't raped her, but Russell Norwich had done a job on her just the same. Jake found her handbag and cell phone in Norwich's car, and that gave her something to hang on to. The deputies finally got their information, read Norwich his rights, and took him away. She declined an ambulance, and Jake helped Kaz to his car. Her outfit and shoes were in shreds—Norwich had actually cut the crop top and harem pants off of her, and then he'd gone on cutting up her wedge sandals.

The man was totally crazy, and she was damned lucky to be alive. Cassie had brought a clean T-shirt for Jake and a cotton maxi dress for Kaz that would at least cover her better than Jake's silk shirt, though she was loath to give up the shirt. It smelled like Jake. It was warm from his body, it was his … and wasn't that pathetic?

Still, she decided to keep the bloody shirt on and save the dress for something clean to change into after the hospital visit.

They called Mandy and Lola, and Kaz cried when she talked to them, and they cried, too, and she just felt so damned fragile. She wasn't fragile. She'd always been strong, but this past couple of weeks had totally screwed her over. She loved a man with more issues than dogs had fleas, and she wanted what she didn't need and possibly something he couldn't give her—she wanted him to love her back.

Her dad called her while she was in the ER waiting for the doctor to take a look at her injuries. Mandy had told him about what had happened, and she cried again, but it was okay because she was alive, and he wouldn't have to bury another daughter. It had been too close. Way too close.

Finally, after Jake's arm was stitched and wrapped, her ribs were x-rayed, a scan showed she didn't have a concussion, and her other cuts and abrasions were cleaned and bandaged, it was time to leave. She didn't question Jake. Instead, she let him lead her to his car and take her back to the same hotel on the plaza in town. Jake had called the hotel while she was getting x-rayed and scanned, and once again managed to find an available room.

She was dressed in hospital scrubs and still an absolute mess, and the young man at the desk couldn't help but stare at her when they checked in. Finally, he glanced at Jake and then again at Kaz and said, “Are you all right?”

She nodded. “I am now, thank you.” She glanced at Jake, met his dark brown eyes, and softly said, “He saved my life.”

*   *   *

Kaz sighed as he helped her to the elevator, and they went up to the second floor. She wasn't sure how to feel about tonight—either she was really lucky, or the unluckiest woman alive. She still couldn't believe Jake had found her in time. She'd expected to die, and then he was there. Norwich was in jail, and she was going to be okay, eventually. But she'd been in danger because of something out of Jake's past. Something he'd been unwilling to share with her. Not that knowing about his past would have changed anything.

Or maybe it would have changed everything.

They stepped into the room. Kaz noted the single king-sized bed and then headed straight for the bathroom. “I need a shower. I have to wash the feel of his hands off me, along with your blood and mine. This has been a rather messy evening.” She left Jake standing in the room behind her and closed the bathroom door.

She was exhausted and hurting, but she wanted to know the truth. He owed her that much.

No. He didn't owe her anything. She had to stop thinking like that. He couldn't help it if she loved him any more than he could change who he was, what he had done. But she was still planning to ask him.

She stared at herself in the mirror. She looked more naked without her jewelry. One of the gold chains was missing, the one that had hung from her right breast. At least the diamond stud was intact. The chain from her earlobe to her nostril had broken, but the nurse had removed all of them at the hospital. Jake had the chains and the various diamond studs in a plastic bag in his pocket. She wished she had her plain silver rings. She felt naked without her jewelry. The only piece of her own that she'd worn was the tiny silver ring in the hood of her clit.

She heard Jake on the phone, but she didn't want to pry, so she turned on the shower and slipped out of the scrubs the nurse at the hospital had given to her. Everything still seemed to be moving in slow motion, but the steam rising from the shower called to her, and she got in and stood under the spray, letting it beat against her face and then her back and shoulders.

A few minutes later, she heard the bathroom door open, felt the change in temperature as cooler air drifted in, and then Jake was at the shower door. He was still dressed, obviously not assuming anything. Sex was the last thing on her mind, but she wanted him close. Wanted to know he was okay.

“Kaz? Are you all right?”

“I could use some help.”