Mine (18 page)

Calmed some by his acceptance, she nodded and relaxed her stance. “All right.”

“I’ll call Tommy back and have him draw up the contract,” Cole intoned, subdued, and crossed to his desk. He eyed her, took in her tense stance.

“Why don’t you go for a swim or something? You put in a long morning by the sounds of it.”

“You’re sure you don’t mind if I knock off for a couple hours?” Alex came to stand on the opposite side of the desk. At Cole’s nod, she replied, “Okay, I guess I should probably head into the office to talk to Sam and make the necessary arrangements. I’ll make sure I’m back around six if that’s all right, I know you wanted to have a session…”

Cole’s hand froze as he reached for the phone, and the pictures raced through his mind again. His gaze shifted to the clock, and he only narrowly avoided openly grimacing when he considered the time. Thinking of the long hours of daylight left before sunset—of the long hours of discomfort ahead of him—he couldn’t believe the words that came out of his mouth. “Why don’t you let me tag along?”

“What?” Alex asked, eyeing him suspiciously.

“Why?”

Cole scrambled to come up with a plausible 196

excuse. The last thing he wanted to do was tell her about the Rogue, but having her running around out there—out w
here he couldn’t have security watching over her without a
reason…where he couldn’t protect her—was simply out of the question.

If he was smart, he could survive the afternoon relatively unscathed. There wouldn’t be any serious damage—and therefore any serious explaining—as long as he avoided prolonged exposure to direct sunlight. He’d gone out during the day before…when absolutely necessary. He’d just need a little extra blood and a little extra time to recoup.

“I wouldn’t mind getting out of here for a while,” he offered, letting the idea snowball as he spoke. “We could take in a movie, or find some nice quiet restaurant later if you want.” Yeah, someplace dark was good. “I don’t get out of here near often enough, and this would be the perfect excuse. We’ll take care of your errands, and then we could hang out…”

“What about the session?”

Shrugging, he pushed it off. “It can wait till tomorrow.”

She looked uncertain, and he pressed his advantage. “Come on, Alex. We’re gonna be working together. We might as well get comfortable with each other—get to know each other better. This is the perfect opportunity.” She frowned, but before she could respond, he turned a charming, innocent smile at her.

“Help me escape my gilded cage, Alex, just for a little while?”

Pursing her lips, she weighed his request.

“All right…” She narrowed her eyes in firm warning, adding, “If you promise to behave yourself.”

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Then, as only Cole could do, he sent her senses teetering on the edge of a nervous cliff by giving her a wicked glance and drawling, “Only as good as I have to be, honey.”

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In short order, they were racing away from Cole’s home and out onto open road. Alex laughed and leaned back against the soft leather seat. Closing her eyes, she savored the feel of the wind raking through her hair and slapping at her skin. Shooting a sly glance sideways beneath her lashes, she studied Cole as he expertly guided the Shelby through hairpin curves.

He grinned like a madman—like a kid hopped up on sugar and set loose in a toy store—and his delight was infectious. She couldn’t believe she’d let him wheedle her into allowing him to drive.

She’d never let anyone else drive her baby. Never.

With a slight shake of her head, she had to allow that she’d been doing quite a bit of that lately—

doing things she’d swore she’d never do. With a blissful, contented sigh, Alex settled back and let the wind, and Cole, sweep her away.

“Dressed like that, you look like a cat burglar driving a get-away car,” she told him with a winsome smile, eyeing the dark shades and the dark, concealing clothing.

His only reply was to tip his sunglasses down and gave her an audacious, wicked wink above the rims, grinning shamelessly.

All too soon, they were idling into the parking ramp attached to the high rise containing the offices of the
Globe
. Cole reluctantly parked the car and turned the motor off. Drawing the key from the ignition, he glanced over to Alex.

Handing her the keys, he pulled the glasses from 199

his face. “If I’m extra good, do I get to drive back too?”

Laughing, falling into the moment, she replied primly, “I don’t know. Two stints behind the wheel—that would take something pretty special.”

Cole lowered his suddenly smoldering,
intense
stare to her lips, and remarked suggestively, “Baby, I could be so good you’d never let anyone else behind your wheel, ever again…”

She sucked in a sharp breath, and his heady gaze lifted to hers once more. That breath froze in her lungs. Her lips parted, and she blinked, twice.

God, sometimes his eyes just seemed to…to glow.

Their eyes locked, and she caught herself leaning toward him.

Rearing back as if he’d slapped her, her eyes went wide and accusatory. “Cole…” He tossed his hands up between them as if to say,
backing off now
. Smiling roguishly, giving an unrepentant shrug, he murmured aloud, “Shall we?”

Drawing a frustrated, shaky breath, she reached blindly for the door handle and slipped from the car. Before she could close the door behind her, he was around the car and reaching for her elbow.

He prowled at her side through the dim parking garage, and together, companionably silently, they rode the elevator to the sixteenth floor. When the door slid open, the small cubicle was flooded with the muted, busy sounds of an office at the peak of business hours.

Stepping into the sunny lobby, Cole slipped his glasses back on and edged to the side to stand in the shadow of a slim section of wall that divided two windows, waiting while Alex walked 200

up to a large horseshoe-shaped desk and spoke quietly to the receptionist. A few moments later, she led him down a long hallway, ignoring the astonished stares aimed their way.

They turned at the end of the hall and entered the first office on the right. Just as Cole stepped through the doorway, Rita rose from behind the desk to greet Alex with warm surprise.

Whatever she’d been about to say remained locked in her throat, as she stared goggle-eyed at Cole.

“You’re, ah…” Rita stammered. “He’s, ah…

Whaa… Holy shit!”

Shocked by her assistant’s flustered state—

let alone her inappropriate choice of words—Alex snapped sternly, “Rita!”

Turning a brilliant shade of scarlet, Rita gasped, “I’m so sorry…”

Smirking, Cole waved her apologies aside and extended his hand. “Cole Gunnarrson…and you are?”

Wide-eyed, Rita placed her hand in Cole’s and allowed him to move hers up and down. “Hah…” Alex couldn’t remember if Rita had blinked since she’d clapped eyes on Cole. Trying her best not to laugh out loud, Alex finished the introductions. “Cole, this is my efficient and unfailingly professional assistant, Rita Gates.

Rita, Cole Gunnarrson.”

Rita nodded and sputtered, “Hhhh…”

“Rita,” Alex called, snapping her fingers impatiently an inch from Rita’s nose. Once her assistant’s attention returned to Alex, she continued on, “I need to see Sam. We’ll wait in my office. Don’t patch any calls through, if anyone asks—I’m still on vacation.”

Alex ushered Cole through the inner door, closing it softly behind him.

201

****

“Can I get you anything to drink?” “Sure—got a beer?” Cole smiled flippantly at her, and then replied, “Whatever you got is fine.” He caught the icy cold can she tossed to him, and popped the top on the soda. He took a tiny, obligatory sip, then set the can aside.
Gods, that
stuff was disgusting.
Settling himself onto the small, stiff sofa by the window, careful to keep to the far edge and well away from the burn of the sun, Cole set the can down on the edge of the coffee table and waited as Alex took a seat behind her desk.

She shuffled through the inbox on the corner of her desk, and he marveled at the change that had come over her since they’d stepped off the elevator. Right before his eyes, she’d transformed back into the prim, aloof businesswoman. The same woman who’d coolly dismissed the mechanic in his study that first day.

He couldn’t say as he liked the change, much preferring the Alex she’d come to be while working with the band—much preferring the Alex she was when she was in his arms.
His
Alex. All fire and desire. He let his gaze drift over the room, taking in the artwork, the furniture. It was feminine. It was efficient. It was tidy.

Impersonal, repressive and sterile, he thought with an inward snort of disgust. It wasn’t her…not her at all. And it puzzled him. He was about to make comment, when the small box on her desk buzzed.

“Ms. Sinclair,” Rita’s efficient voice chirped.

“Ms. Davies will see you now.” Alex rose and glanced to Cole. “Make yourself comfortable. I shouldn’t be long.” He nodded and, after she’d left the room, stood and looked around. Heaving a sigh, he 202

poured the contents of the soda can into the small potted plant perched on the top of a filing cabinet near the window and tossed the can in the receptacle at the end of her desk. He sat back down and riffled through the tidy stack of magazines on the spotless, glass coffee table, shaking out a recent issue of a glamour rag.

Restless, he settled back and leafed through the pages, all the while, his mind wandered.

Nearly half an hour later, Alex stepped back into her office, silent, unnaturally subdued. She spent a few more minutes at her desk, dropping files and a few personal effects into a box, then smiled wanly at Cole.

“I’m all finished here,” she informed him. “We can go now.”

Her home was the next stop on her agenda.

Cole immediately recognized the gray, cranberry trimmed house from the Rogue’s pictures. His wary gaze scanned the surrounding area, but he could find no one out and about. Ducking his head, he shielded his face from the setting sun as much as he could while he waited for her to open the door. Even so, the UV rays beat harshly on his face and hands, making his exposed skin burn as though he’d leaped into boiling water.

Stepping inside the cool shade of her entry was like pouring a soothing balm over an open wound. He shifted the cardboard box in his arms, setting it down on a small table just inside the door as she indicated. Reaching up, he removed his sunglasses and glanced curiously around as he followed her farther into the house.

“I’ll just be a few minutes,” she called over her shoulder. “Make yourself at home.” Alex disappeared through a door at the back of the house, and Cole began wandering aimlessly around the room. He stopped in front of a wall of 203

assorted-sized, framed photos. Each was a candid shot. Not a single professional photograph hung among the dozens that covered the wall. Alex was present in most every one of them, smiling and laughing. Living.

Surrounded by friends and family.

There were group photos of Alex with other men and women. Some were obvious office shots, while others had clearly been taken during a night on the town with friends. Then there were the more intimate photos, those taken with family members—physical resemblances were obvious.

He paused in front of one such picture. The man was decades older than a teenaged Alex, yet she perched on his knee like a toddler. Their eyes were the same. There was another photo with a much younger Alex, learning to ride a bike. The man who ran along at her side was a younger version of the man on whose knee she sat in the previous photo. Cole knew a brief spark of jealousy, of loneliness, when he thought of his own family—his own brothers and sisters, his parents—all long gone centuries past.

Then his eyes lit on a photo that gave him pause. In this picture, Alex sat near an older woman. Near, but carefully not touching. The woman looked to be an older version of Alex, both women petite, both similarly colored. Both appeared to be smiling uncomfortably—painfully so—as if they could barely tolerate being close to each other.

The photo troubled him for reasons he couldn’t name. Gritting his teeth, giving a mental shrug, he wandered across the room, taking in the eclectic tastes of the woman who so fascinated him. The priceless creation of a master hung beside the work of a street artist. An aged leather-bound edition of Shakespeare sat back to 204

back on a shelf beside a Lindsey. A Tiffany lamp rested on an antique Duncan Phyfe end table.

The end table sat beside an overstuffed Lazy-Boy recliner.

Smiling at her penchant for mixing classical and sophisticated with modern and comfortable, he moved on to peer inside a narrow, glass curio case, faintly surprised to see an odd assortment of relics. Among them, the remains of an iron knife and a spearhead rested beside an aged and cracked drinking horn. The centerpiece of the display was a small round brooch of bronze and ivory. The kind of brooch women of his time used to fasten tunics.

In a blink, he was lost, back in that otherworld, in that other lifetime.

Once trusting brown eyes stared up at him,
lifeless yet filled with horror, from a face turned
gray with the cold. Her sodden cloak twisted about
her dead body, no use now for her frozen body.

Strands of hair, limp with water and ice crystals,
straggled over his soaked arm. Her sweet lips
were blue, and so still now. Yet, her dying words
echoed inside his head, damning and just. “You’re
a monster. I’ll not let you turn me into what you
are. Stay away from me.”

Cole fisted his hands at his sides. His breath sawed in and out as the memory swept over him, fresh as if it had been only yesterday.

“Dagna,” he had cried as he’d frantically
edged closer, his eyes flying from her face to the
edge of the cliff snapping so close at her heels. The
frigid fjord below waited expectantly for her foot to
slip, eager for her balance to shift just enough.

“This doesn’t have to change anything. I love you.

We can still be together—”

“No!” She shook her head violently, her arms
flailing to the sides as she tilted precariously closer
205

to the edge. “This changes everything.”
A pebble slid beneath her heel, skittering free,
tumbling to the glacial waters below. He lunged
forward, reaching out to pull her to safety. Frantic
to escape him, she twisted away, tottering
drunkenly closer to the abyss.

“You’ll never change me, demon,” she’d
screamed at him, hysteria swam in her eyes.

Then she’d leaped.

With icy hands and pounding heart, he pulled himself free of the bitter memories. Turning away from the display, he glanced around the rest of the room. Regrets a millennia old dug a deep groove between his brows. Drawing a deep breath, he forced his attention back to the here and now.

The furniture was comfortable, inviting. A bit frilly for his taste, but definitely a step up from her office. The colors of the room were bold, yet he found the effect somehow calming. She emerged from her bedroom doorway, grinning as she hefted two large pieces of luggage. Gods, how long had he been staring at that brooch?

Eyeing the bags in her hands, he forced a grin. “I didn’t realize you intended to pack everything, or I would have started out here.” Tilting her nose in the air, she quipped, “This is just the tip of the iceberg, bucko, just you wait.”

He moved forward and took the luggage from her, setting it down by the front door. “Is there anything else you’d like to take?”

“No.” She ran a critical eye over the room. “I think that should do it. I’ll be back to check on things from time to time. If there’s anything I need, I can just grab it then.” For some reason, her answer bothered him.

The idea that she would maintain this bit of 206

independence, this bit of self that had absolutely nothing to do with him, left him vaguely disturbed. He knew he was being unreasonable, but looking at those pictures on the wall made him realize how badly he wanted to touch her life…not just her body or her talent—but
her
.

He allowed that he’d grown attached to her in a very short amount of time, then he snorted with self-disgust. He’d never been one to lie to himself, and he wasn’t about to start now. If he were being honest, he would admit he’d done a whole lot more than grown attached. He’d become obsessed. He now treaded a dangerous line, the line between fondness and falling in love…with a
Mortal
. He glanced uneasily at the brooch in her display case, and cringed inwardly. Until now, until
Alex
, he’d lived his life once burned twice shy. What was it about her that pulled him in? By all that was sacred, why couldn’t he stay away?

He stared hard at her as she moved about her home, checking window locks, watering plants, puttering, oblivious of his perusal. Two little words, so full of hope…and dread…echoed in his heart.
What if…

“Are you hungry?”

He blinked. “What?”

“Are you hungry?” Alex repeated. “I probably don’t have much in the fridge, but—”

“No, I’m good,” he interrupted. Then he thumbed at the intimate collection of photos.

“You have an impressive display there.” She glanced over. Emotions skated over her face as she scanned the wall. Slowly, as if drawn by an invisible string, she moved to stand before the pictures and gazed fondly at the man teaching her to ride a bike.

“That’s my grandpa,” she told Cole as she fondly tapped the glass over the picture. A sad, 207

faintly wistful note crept into her voice. Her words were soft when she added, “He passed away a few months back.”

Cole moved to stand behind her, slightly to the side. The unmistakable sound of her sorrow tugged at him, and he placed his hands gently on her shoulders, pleased when she didn’t pull away.

But her body was rigid beneath his hands, her jaw clenched tight.

“I’m sorry.” Cole squeezed her shoulders, urging her back until she leaned against him.

Human suffering had never bothered him before, not on this level. He didn’t like it, not one bit.

“He was sick for a long time,” she murmured, blowing out a long breath as one more loathsome word slipped passed her lips, “cancer.” No wonder she’d had such an aversion to going to the hospital after the Rogue attack, he mused. Cole said nothing, but his arms crept around her waist. She relaxed against him, the tension draining from her body.

“He was always so supportive of me…of my music,” she began quietly. “When my songs first charted, he took me out to celebrate.” Her voice broke, but she pushed on. “It damned near killed me, watching him waste away, watching him fade.”

He knew what it was to watch Humans he’d cared for wither and fade. Cole held her tenderly in his arms, surprised and honored that she would share this bit of her sorrow with him. He pressed his lips to her hair and silently willed her to go on.

As if sensing his encouragement, she drew a steadying breath. “My father died when I was very little. Grandpa stepped in, for a long time it was just he and I.”

“What about your mother?”

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She stiffened, and he immediately regretted asking the question that caused her to pull away.

She shifted, moving from the haven of his arms, muttering quietly, succinctly, “We aren’t close.”

“Alex…” Cole snagged her wrist when she made to walk away.

She lifted her chin and stared him straight in the eye, her expression carefully guarded. “She didn’t approve of the music, of the band—or of me.” She offered him a brittle smile. “When things…didn’t work out last time, she had no compunction in rubbing the old ‘I told you so’ in my face. Any painful way she could. We generally speak once every couple of weeks or so, whenever I’ve done something else to displease her. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a few more things to do before we go back.”

Cole released her wrist, and she walked away, her back rigid with quiet dignity. His heart bled for her, unable to fathom how anyone—let alone her own mother—couldn’t approve of her. How could
anyone
not be utterly proud of her and what she’d made of herself? He turned back to stare at the wall with new understanding.

Sensing she wanted to be alone, he waited for her to come back, fighting the urge to follow her—

fighting to control furious indignation over her mother’s callous treatment. When at last Alex returned, not a trace of her sorrow remained physically, her eyes were not red with tears…shed or unshed…and yet he could
feel
her quiet grief.

But there was more. Resolve. He could feel that too, as sure as his heart beat in his chest.