Know When to Hold Him (9 page)

Chapter Thirteen

Liam raised an arm in greeting Stuart, standing guard at Spencer’s building.

“She expecting you?” Stuart asked, reaching for the door.

Liam shook his head. “Nah. I just left something here last night.”

Stuart winked. “Classic move.”

“Yeah? Not too obvious?”

“Well, yeah.” Stuart lifted his hands. “But we’re men. We’re pretty simple.” Thunder and a sharp crack rang out above their heads. “You’d better get in,” Stuart advised, opening the door. “Tornado watch tonight.”

Liam cast a doubtful eye at the darkened, roiling sky. It was ominous and the wind had kicked up considerably during his drive to Turtle Creek, but the ground was dry. Not a drop had fallen.

The elevator door closed. Liam second-guessed himself as he headed up to Spencer’s twenty-second floor condo. He needed his coat, that’s all this was. He had a meeting the next day with the Mavericks’ management. He had to look sharp. And Spencer had his best suit jacket.

Once he had that, he’d be gone. Simple.

Liam had walked through the plan enough times today. When he couldn’t get Spencer out of his mind, her lips, her body, he’d tried to focus on more immediately attainable outcomes. For instance, his coat. His coat, he could get. It was tangible. It was a thing. It wasn’t…a connection. It wasn’t…permission.

Because Spencer had been clear the night before. Well, as clear as a woman could be. She had said no. And he’d gotten it. Loud and clear. Mostly.

They worked together-he refused to call it “against each other.” This whole thing would blow over soon. Troy had rejected a paternity test, Liam agreed, and Spencer and her client would just have to accept it.

And if she couldn’t, well, she would just be another in a long list of beautiful women he couldn’t have, right behind Angelina Jolie and Gisele Bundchen. Damn Tom Brady. He’d always hated that guy.

Liam knocked on Spencer’s door determined to retrieve his coat. He’d collect the damn thing, then he would leave. Really. He would.

But then she answered the door. In that tank top and shorts and a glass of wine, her hair pulled up in a knot type of thing on the top of her head. “Hello?” Spencer tilted her head, studied him.

“Hey.” She made a motion of invitation, and he stepped in. Her apartment smelled like lemon and herbs. Natural and clean. Something about it appealed to him. Or maybe it was the woman standing in front of him, looking like she knew every ridiculous daydream he’d had about her in the past twenty-four hours.

“Stuart said I could come up,” Liam said, explaining his presence.

“Ah. Stuart,” she repeated. “Stuart’s a good man. He doesn’t usually let psychos enter the building.”

“You worried I’m a psycho?” He teased.

“Worried? No, not worried. I can take care of myself.”

“Did you take a self-defense class? That’s good,” Liam nodded. “I told my sister to take one of those, before she moved to New York.”

Spencer sipped her wine. How would that cold white wine taste on her lips?
No, your coat, remember?

“No. A Glock. Welcome to Texas.”

As if in response, an ear-splitting crack sliced the atmosphere around them. The lights flickered then they were plunged into darkness, except for the tiny lights far in the distance through Spencer’s large window, twinkling like Christmas in April.

“I think the building was hit,” Liam said. “Lightning,” he added.

They stood in silence for a moment, as most do in the twenty-first century, waiting for the world to correct itself, sure that electricity would return and, with it, all the ordinary conveniences and luxuries.

It didn’t. The silence grew. The ambient sounds that people take for granted—the hum of appliances, the clicks and clatters of air conditioning and ceiling fans—had all stopped.

The only sounds came from them, only interrupted by a police siren or fire truck. He couldn’t be sure.

“Shit,” Spencer swore, moving toward the large, plate glass window.

“No!” Liam jumped forward, reaching for her, the siren’s purpose finally registering. It was a siren, all right. One for tornadoes. He pulled her toward the front door, intending to take her into the hall.

Spencer pulled back. “The elevators will be out.”

Liam grabbed her hand and tugged again. “We’re going to the hall.”

She pulled her hand back. “I’m not getting stuck in the hall. My things are in the bathroom.”

Liam rolled his eyes, pretty sure that she wouldn’t see his expression of total exasperation. “We need to be away from the giant window when the tornado rips through.”

A roar of wind and water hit the glass, shaking the window and momentarily drowning out the sound of the tornado siren.

“Bathroom. Now,” Liam commanded, grabbing the bend of her arm and racing toward the door he’d seen when he came in.

In three steps, they were in the small half bath. Liam shut the door against the sound of the fury now beating itself against Spencer’s living room window.

He’d seen enough disaster movies to have a pretty good idea of what a tornado could do to a nearly all-glass wall, twenty-two stories up in the sky.

It wasn’t pretty.

The bath was no more than eight feet square, and most of it was filled with a toilet and small vanity. And now, with two tall people, one of which used to play pro-ball.

Yeah, all things considered, the interior hall was sounding pretty safe and luxurious right now.

To drive the point home, Spencer cleared her throat. Liam dragged his attention back in her direction. The bathroom was pitch black. He could barely make out her form and only knew she was there because, well, two people in a small bathroom. It was obvious.

“I need to get around you,” she said.

“You’re not going back out there.”

“Let me get under the sink.” Her voice was strangled. “I keep candles and matches under there. At least we can have light.”

Liam backed up to the door, trying to flatten himself as much as was humanly possible as she opened the cabinet door under the sink. The door pressed up against his shins, and so did her fingers as she closed it. There was the sound of a match box, a scrape, and then a small flame perched on top of a single white candle.

It was amazing that such a small light could illuminate the whole room. The mirror behind the sink reflected the flame, causing the whole room to glow pale yellow.

Spencer included.

A strange ache grew behind his ribcage at the sight of her, pale skin and blond hair shimmering in the candlelight. She sat on the toilet seat, pulling her knees up and hugging them tight.

Liam settled himself on the floor, his back flat against the door, hoping to be able to spread his legs out.

“Do you have your phone?” she asked abruptly.

“Yes. And no, you can’t have it.”

“Why?” Her voice was shocked.

“You’ll run the battery down, and we’ll need it… in case…” He didn’t finish the thought. She didn’t need the reminder of the worst that could happen in a storm. “You don’t have yours?” It was shocking.

“No…” Spencer let out a breath, cheeks puffing out and stared at the door in speculation.

“No.” He cut her off. She wasn’t leaving this room to get a damn phone with the tornado sirens blaring throughout the city. He’d physically restrain the workaholic before she did that. They had to take cover. Now. A silence fell between them, until he noticed that Spencer’s breaths came in fits and starts, jagged inhales and incomplete exhalations.

“Spencer?”

“I’m okay,” she said with a wheeze.

She was anything but. Even in the glow of the candlelight she seemed pale, her face drawn. “What’s wrong?”

She scrunched up her face. “I hate storms.” Just saying the words sent her reaching for another shaky breath.

Liam put his hands on her shoulder, rubbing his thumbs along her skin. “It’s fine, we’re perfectly safe.”

BANG. BANG. BANG.
It sounded like Godzilla had just knocked on her living room window.

A whimper escaped Spencer’s mouth. Then she clambered onto the floor, nearly into his lap, given the small space available. Not that he minded. He debated for half a second before he draped an arm around her shoulder. It wasn’t a move, he told himself. Spencer was legitimately upset about the raging storm.

“Can I get you anything?” he asked for lack of anything better to say, and then wondered what the hell he could get her, locked in a bathroom.

“Water.” The request was close to a whimper.

Liam eyed the sink and the toilet. There was no cup on the counter, so he opened the cabinet under the sink. Maybe she kept a spare glass for guests. But no, he should have known, that wasn’t Spencer Hightower’s style.

Liam lifted the candle and held it under the cabinet. Dear God. Now he understood what she’d meant when she’d complained she wouldn’t have her stuff in the hall. A family of five could survive for weeks on the supplies in her guest bathroom alone. Rows of plastic water bottles lined up along one side of the cabinet next to a box of protein bars. A first aid kit, spare batteries, flashlights, emergency radio… Liam touched something crinkly and shiny. A mylar emergency blanket? This bordered on excessive. There, Liam grabbed a bottle of water and handed it to Spencer.

“Have you trained the Red Cross in disaster preparedness?”

Even when she was terrified, she gave him attitude. “I like to be ready for anything.”

“I see that. Like the zombie apocalypse.”

“Don’t make jokes, please.” Her voice trailed off, tired.

“Sorry. I’m actually scared of a lot of things, too.”

Her face was doubtful.

“Like spiders.”

Spencer scoffed. “You could smoosh them with a shoe.”

“I don’t care for snakes.”

Another dismissive noise. “Chop their head off with a garden hoe.”

“Zombies.”

“That’s what a flame thrower’s for.”

Liam drew his head back an inch. “Did anyone ever tell you you’re a little scary?”

Spencer raised a brow. “Guess so.”

Her breathing troubles had eased. Maybe it was the water or maybe it was the talking. Liam went for the latter and kept talking.

“I bet all your boyfriends love this, when they can come over and snuggle during a storm.”

Spencer’s brows scrunched together. “What? Don’t tell me…”

A dark expression was on her face. “No one’s ever been there for you, have they?” He purposefully kept his voice gentle and low. She didn’t need anything else upsetting her.

“I don’t…” She faltered. “I’m fine. I didn’t ask you to come over.” She lifted her chin and gestured toward the mini food pantry under the sink. “I take care of myself.”

Spencer tried pulling away from him but could only go so far. Her shoulder muscles were hard as a rock and he absentmindedly rubbed them. “With a shoe or a flame thrower.”

“Whatever works,” she said, smothering a contented moan, enjoying his massaging fingers.

“I won’t tell anyone,” he promised.

“What?”

“Your secret.”

Spencer turned towards him then, her face partially hidden in shadow, but the question plain as day.

“What secret?”

“That you’re not superwoman.”

Her pretty mouth stretched into a hesitant smile. “Please don’t. It would ruin my reputation.” She cocked her head at him. “What about you?”

Liam shook his head. “I’m not superman, either. Just takes hard work to get this good.”

“That’s something we have in common.” Spencer’s eyes drifted toward the stockpile of emergency supplies again. “Do you ever worry it won’t be enough?”

Liam was pretty sure she wasn’t asking about tornado preparation. Something about the tentative, quiet way she asked made him want to tell the truth.

“Yeah, all the time.” He constantly worried about being better, smarter, faster. If he let a ball drop, it could not only be the end of his career, but the end of a colleague’s, a teammate’s, and a client’s. It had been that way since he first stepped on a football field in high school—the constant pressure to not only be the best, but not to let anyone down.

Her response, a fraction above a whisper. “Me, too.”

In the brief time he’d known Spencer, she’d rarely let petty, human emotions like doubt or fear show. But she showed them to him now. And that made something in his chest tighten and ache.

It wasn’t an emotion he could examine too closely. Not here, not now, not with a hyperventilating woman and those sirens wailing across the city.

So he decided to change the subject.

“Did you see the movie
Twister
?” Spencer asked.

So much for changing the topic. “Yeah.”

“Do you think cows can be sucked up by tornadoes?”

The whine of the tornado siren echoed low in his ear. They weren’t out of the woods. Not yet. But the mental image of a cow flying by the window was amusing. “No,” he lied, “no, of course not.”

You’re hopeless, Connelly. Way to calm her down.

“Let’s talk about something else.” He racked his brain for a topic that wasn’t work-related, sports-related, weather-related…sex-related.

But Spencer still had storms on her mind. “The scariest thing is, there’s literally nothing you can do to stop them. They’re barely predictable. You just hang tight and hope you survive the shrapnel.”

What was she really talking about? Liam guessed it wasn’t storms.

In the candlelight, alone with her, he noticed the way her face softened when she was scared, the way her teeth worried her bottom lip as she focused on staying calm. When her mouth opened slightly and her breath caught, like a little tug on the air around him. In fact, it was so quiet…

“The siren stopped,” Liam announced as an afterthought.

And in a flash, Spencer was different. Pulled together, pulling back. Not quiet and nervous, but intense and alert. Before he knew it, her fingers were reaching into his pocket.

Nice
.

She paused and then withdrew his cell phone. Had the pause been all his imagination?

Sure enough, the phone’s radar screen showed angry red and orange blotches that had passed over them. As decisive as ever, Spencer uncurled from his arm, stepped over his legs, and headed for the door.