Kiss and Tell (7 page)

"So what are you saying?" Marnie asked, resisting telling him she wasn't playing games at all. "You won't seduce me unless I wear something slinky and pour on the French perfume and you're in a hospital bed? It can be arranged."

"Men don't get turned on by aggressive women."

"Hmmm." Marnie bit the inside of her lip. "Is that so?"

"Yes."

"Okay. I'll try to remember not to be so aggressive next time. Is that it?"

He came up to the other side of the counter, a large, threatening, intimidating male. He rested enormous hands on the Formica and leaned forward to glare at her.

"No. That's
not
it. I hardly see the point in enlightening you, but here it is. First, there won't
be
a next time. Second, we don't know each other. Third, you'll be gone soon. Get it? Good."

"Ah."

"What does
that
mean?"

She looked at him innocently, eyes wide, and shrugged.

He closed his eyes as if in pain. Her dad and brothers frequently wore the same expression. She kept her features guileless.

"Do you think I could have some coffee before you throw me out into the cold, rainy night?"

"It's morning."

Grouch
. She started to fill the basket with stale grounds and glanced at him over her shoulder. "And you don't need to go with me. I've been roaming this side of the mountain for years. I know the way to the other bridge perfectly well. There's no point in both of us getting cold and wet again, is there?"

His eyes were slits of annoyance. "I
said
I'd take you."

She poured water into the well, then set the carafe in its slot and turned the coffeemaker on. "No, thanks. I seem to do better when you're not around."

He scowled. The skin over his cheekbones stretched taut. "What does that mean?"

"I'm still hungry. Want some chili?"

"No." Frustration ate at him like a canker.

Her dog rose and ambled over to her side. The dog got its ears fondled. Jake bit back a nasty crack. He was jealous of her pet. Unfortunately he was now intimately acquainted with the feel of those slender fingers. On him. All over him. He wanted more. He wanted it all.

He was a fool.

It wasn't her fault she was desirable. It wasn't her concern he couldn't have her. Would never have her. He'd made the rules years ago. No more blondes.

For a few glorious, earth-shattering minutes, he'd forgotten and allowed his hunger for her to eclipse reason. She'd been perfect in his arms, everything he dreamed a woman could be.

His dream and his nightmare.

Almost too late he'd remembered Dolan's First Law of Survival.

He'd remembered about a second before he would have plunged himself into the hot wet center of her. He'd had to use considerable willpower and tooth-grinding control to refuse her offer.

Which was why he stayed the hell away from her type. Far away. He had a negative history with fluffy blondes. Six years ago one had put paid to that craving. The ingredients had been a South American jungle, an out-of-place blond "journalist," and a sharp knife. He'd found out too late that the fragile blonde belonged to the leader of the particular little band of terrorists Jake was attempting to round up.

She'd been sent to distract him.

She'd been good. Damn good.

He'd fallen for the bait like a rank amateur. The terrorists had covered their tracks and split while he nursed his bruised balls and sliced trachea. His best friend had died saving his life.

Jake had never stopped looking for the son of a bitch responsible. Every insertion, every operation, Jake kept his eyes and ears open for news of Dancer or information of a sighting.

He hadn't believed much in love before Soledad.

His belief in it after her was nonexistent.

The memory had put him off soft, delicate little blondes for life. It had done a number on his general trust indicator, too. To hell with logic – in his mind, blondes had become synonymous with pain, mayhem, and death.

And while Jake liked sex as much as the next man, he could control his urges until the appropriate time and place with the appropriate woman. Someone a hell of a lot less dangerous to his equilibrium than this deliciously scented time bomb.

"You sure?" Marnie asked, blue eyes heavy-lidded and sexy as sin. Her sweet little nipples peaked seductively under red fleece.

"Damn straight I'm sure," he bit out a second before he realized she was referring to the chili she'd offered, not listening in on his mental trip down memory lane. Her skin looked as soft as it felt. Petal soft and silky, scented with the aphrodisiac fragrance of her arousal. He could still smell it.

Sexual frustration clawed at his gut. He had several choices: use the booze to interrupt the circuit from his brain to his groin, take care of the problem himself, or get the hell away from her as fast as possible.

"I'm going out."

"Ookay."

Duchess danced around the counter, tail wagging. She sat before him, head cocked, eyes alert. She whined, seeming to be saying,
Poor sap
. Which was a fitting end to the last few miserable hours. Jake leaned down to snag his jacket from the floor. They'd pushed it off the counter when they'd been grappling.

He shook his head.
Dumb bastard.

"Make yourself at home," he said sourly, dragging on his damp jacket, trying not to trip over her dog. There wasn't anything Marnie could find while he was gone that he didn't want any stranger to discover. He was a careful and methodical man. There was no margin for error in his line of work.

Of any kind.

Skeptical eyes grazed the cottage. "Yeah, right." She poured coffee into another chipped cup, took a sip, and shuddered in distaste. Then she glanced back at him. "See ya."

Jake slammed the door behind him and strode into the deluge, her dog prancing at his heels.

Great. Just great.

Chapter Four

I
t was a good thing Marnie rarely got boxed. She set her sketch pad down beside her on the couch and stretched cramped muscles. There was nothing of interest in the cabin. She'd wandered around aimlessly after Jake stormed out. There was no point sleeping now.

How on earth anyone lived without creature comforts, even for an odd weekend, baffled her. Her little house in Sunnyvale was filled with
things
. Mementos of her life. Photos of her family, friends, and places she'd been. The stuff one collected without realizing it.

Jake Dolan's cabin was the clean slate of a man with no past and no future. Despite the dirt, everything about the cabin seemed sterile, scrubbed of character. Sanitized. It looked, Marnie decided, choreographed, like a stage set. Abandoned cabin in the woods. The play was obviously not a romance, she thought wryly, glancing at the narrow single bed against the far wall.

During his absence she'd done several intricate, detailed sketches of Jake. Most of them were conjured more from imagination than based on reality. She'd had to do some serious imagining to sketch Jake smiling, laughing, looking out of the pages with love, not just heat, in his eyes. She had a great imagination.

And while this attraction for a dangerous stranger hadn't exactly been in the cards, she wondered at the timing. Marnie pictured Grammy on a fluffy white cloud, chuckling as she manipulated her granddaughter's fate.

It didn't matter how unlikely and illogical her heated response to him had been. The fact of the matter was that she felt something. Something she'd never experienced before.

It was more than physical, although God help her, there had been that. Something greater than physical allure called to a part of herself she was still discovering. It was as though by seeing herself through his eyes, she would come to learn who the real Marnie Wright was.

The least the dratted man could have done was stand still and cooperate so she could fully explore the possibilities.

The rain had stopped an hour ago. Jake had been gone for almost three. She didn't need to be hit over the head with a two-by-four to know he didn't want her anywhere near him. And it made no difference that she knew her feelings were irrational. She'd known him for less than twenty-four hours. It was inconceivable she felt so strongly while he felt nothing in return. His lengthy absence made it pretty obvious he wouldn't return to the cabin until she'd left.

Was he out there somewhere, watching, waiting for her to leave? She stood in the middle of his dusty, inhospitable cabin and weighed her choices. Foolishly, her heart wanted her to stay and see what would happen in the next round. Eventually he'd have to come back.

Her brain told her to pack up, put on her coat, and go upriver in the hope the other bridge was passable.

But what about Duchess? Marnie suddenly smiled. Unless Jake planned on kidnapping her dog, he'd be back. They'd have to see each other at least once more.

Her coat had dried in front of the fire. She put it on, wrote a brief note on a page from her sketchbook, and left it propped up on the breakfast bar where he couldn't miss it.

*

A frigid breeze ruffled Marnie's hair and stung her cheeks. She dug into her pocket for her red knit cap, then pulled it on to cover her cold ears. Leaves and branches swayed and mingled their music with the sound of her Timberlines swooshing through leaves. There'd been no sign of Jake and Duchess along the way.

It didn't take long to walk down to her grandmother's cottage. Or what was left of it. A hard knot of sadness welled within her chest. She sat on a mossy rock nearby, chin cupped in her hands, and took in the devastation.

The tree didn't look nearly as large by daylight as it had in the dark. Nevertheless, it had crushed the little one-room house. Vision blurred, Marnie bit her lip.

Her grandmother's death in her sleep at the age of eighty-eight had hit her hard, forcing her to question her lifestyle and the choices she'd made.

Grammy's death had been a turning point.

There had been nothing the old woman had been afraid of. Nothing she hadn't dared. Nothing she hadn't ventured. And while Marnie had always considered them kindred spirits, after Grammy's death she'd suddenly had the rude awakening that they weren't alike at all.

She
didn't take chances.
She
never risked anything. Her life had fallen into a rut without her being aware of it. She'd always taken the path of least resistance because it was easy and trouble free.

She worked for her father because he'd wanted her close and she didn't want to hurt him. And although her love of drawing and painting fulfilled her, she'd always considered it a hobby.

It was painfully ironic that Grammy had to die before Marnie could at last hear what her grandmother had been trying to tell her.

Live life to the fullest.

The tightness in her chest threatened to double her over. She bent over her knees to press her fists tight against her chest. It hurt to breathe.

"I'm going to do it, Gram. I'm going to do it."

Marnie didn't know how, when, or even what. But God help her, she was going to make her life a life Grammy would have been proud of. Not just for her adored grandmother, but for herself. Because twenty-seven wasn't too old to change.

There was enough of Martha Washburn in her to know there was hope. She wanted life with a capital
L
. She wanted to paint and draw; she wanted to taste excitement and grab life with both hands.

She wanted to
live
, not just exist.

A sob ripped through her.

She wanted it all, everything she'd missed by allowing herself to follow the path of least resistance. By taking the easy way out. By allowing herself to believe other people's reality of who and what she was.

Another choked sob tore through her.

She missed her grandmother. She needed her grandmother. She
wanted
her grandmother.

She and Grammy had shared their love of the outdoors, family, and all things traditional. Maybe they shared the same dash of daring, too.

The landscape blurred as the tears came – heavy and painful, and from so deep the well seemed bottomless.

She didn't try to stop them.

Grammy had been mother and best friend to her all her life. Marnie couldn't imagine life without her. She swallowed a sob, then let them come, one after the other. The tears, falling unchecked, felt hot on her icy cheeks. This was the first time in five weeks she'd been able to cry. The loss had just been too great, too deep. She made up for it now.

She'd always cried easily. A sappy commercial, a baby, or a beautiful sunset could make her misty-eyed. But when she cried for real, it wasn't pretty. She sobbed and hiccuped and blubbered; her nose ran and her face got red and puffy. She was thankful only a squirrel was witness to her outpouring of grief.

She cried long enough to give herself a stuffy nose and swollen eyelids. Feeling slightly better when she finished, she rose and walked around the crushed walls, trailing her fingertips along the wood siding, remembering the laughter, the words of wisdom, the lessons she'd learned inside these four walls. It was almost impossible to continue being sad when the memories were so happy. She said her final goodbye – but just to the place. Grammy would be in her heart forever.

Feeling as though she'd been through some sort of rebirth, Marnie trudged back up the hill.

Returning to Jake's, she considered what her grandmother would have thought about him. Grammy had a soft spot for strays. She would have pulled him into the circle of their home and treated him like one of her boys. Grammy also had a connoisseur's eye for a good-looking male. She would have liked the way Jake's dark hair brushed his broad shoulders; she would have appreciated the wariness of his blue eyes and the length of his legs. She would have liked his gentleness and his strength. She, too, would have seen in his determination to be unfriendly the need to have a friend.

And what would Grammy have thought of me trying to jump his bones?
Marnie grimaced at her lack of finesse. Admittedly that had been a little bold for the first time out of the gate. But the physical attraction was there. Even he couldn't deny it.