Murphy's Law (7 page)

“Where is your husband?” he asked.

Sara stared off into the trees, a
cynical twist to her lips. “He died six months ago. He and his mistress were
driving to their hotel of choice for the weekend and while she was…servicing
Kent, he got distracted and plowed into a parked car. The rate of speed he was
driving combined with no seatbelts and the elevated alcohol levels in his
bloodstream killed them both instantly. Even in death Kent managed to go out with
a bang. The Benchleys used their money and influence to keep it out of the
papers so no one knows how the prodigal son humiliated them. He died a martyr
and I was the widow who had to live the lie.”

Abby looked up at them. Sara smiled down
at her, her features softening. “Abby is the only good thing that came out of
my marriage. She’s the one thing Kent gave me I can’t hate him for.”

Tears shimmered in Sara’s eyes. Murphy
knew she had suffered dearly at the hands of her husband and his family. A
sudden, protective urge whipped through him. He disliked this family already.

Abby smiled at her mother and continued
to skip along between them.

Sara looked up and met his eyes. “I
don’t know why I’m telling you this. I told myself I wasn’t going to.”
Vulnerability and loneliness shone in her eyes.

“Your mother, is she still in the
nursing home?” he asked.

Sara’s eyes clouded and she looked away.
“No, she passed away two years ago. Kent insisted we move her into a more
upscale home and she died in her sleep two days later. Another mistake of mine.
I never should have taken her out of the home she loved.”

A lifetime of regrets would break down
even the strongest person. Murphy could see them layered on Sara’s shoulders.

“Who are you running from, if not your
husband?”

“I’ve said too much already.”

Sara suddenly swung Abby into her arms
and hugged the girl tight to her chest, burying her face in the curls peeking
out of her hat. Murphy watched the girl squeeze Sara tight and giggle, saw Sara
struggle to reign in her emotions, and knew he was in trouble. Sara Sheldon
represented his weakness. A weakness that had almost killed him once.

Their eyes met over the girl’s head and
he felt himself walking onto a loaded minefield. He doubted he would walk
across without detonation and sighed. For her, he would do it.

“Please take us back to the cabin,” Sara
said. “I think I’ve walked far enough.”

Murphy understood what she meant. She
had gone too far and she wasn’t going any further.

He nodded and turned around. He would
get the truth out of her another time, and then he would decide what to do
about it.

Chapter
7

Sara couldn’t sleep. She’d told Murphy
too much today and had come dangerously close to telling him everything.

Abby slept peacefully beside her with
her arms wrapped around her doll.

She longed for a friend, someone to talk
to and share her troubles with, someone to reassure her that things were going
to work out. Murphy wasn’t that kind of friend. He wouldn’t do any of those
things for her, so why risk telling him? He wasn’t a touchy, feely kind of
person and she doubted had a consoling bone in his body. Yet, she longed to
have him wrap her in his big, strong arms and hold her until her troubles faded
away. His broad shoulders would hold her burdens easily and keep her safe. And
he would scowl the entire time.

Sara smiled into the darkness. Being
held in his arms again sounded really good right now. She longed to lay her
burdens on someone else, if only for a moment so she could regroup.

Sighing, she slipped out of bed and from
the room. Warm milk wasn’t going to help her tonight. Thinking about Murphy
made her more restless. Every time she looked at him, butterflies took flight
inside her belly and electricity zinged down her spine. A response she had no
clue how to handle. Which frustrated her even more. She needed a drink. Not the
bitter, expensive wine the Benchleys always served, but a nice, solid glass of
bourbon. The kind that burned on the way down and warmed her from the inside
out. It would numb the edginess and hopefully make her forget about Murphy’s
strong arms.

Maybe Murphy had a stash somewhere in
the kitchen. Crossing her fingers, she tiptoed into the kitchen and stopped
short when she saw the light already on.

Murphy did have a secret stash.

He sat at the kitchen table, half in the
shadows created by the soft light glowing above the stove. A bottle of amber
liquid sat on the table in front of him, an empty glass in his hand. His hair
was tousled from sleep and to Sara’s dismay, he was naked to the waist. Her
gaze landed on his muscled shoulders and trailed across his tanned chest. So
much for getting him out of her mind. Now she had the real thing to dream
about. Looking at the dark hairs that veed down his chest and disappeared
behind the table, she decided he had been right. He was a dangerous man.

She tore her eyes away from temptation
and looked at the granite lines of his face. Beneath the hardness of his
expression, something haunting lingered. Drawn, she circled the table until she
stood at the opposite end.

Murphy met her eyes with coldness that
should have sent her running for the safety of her room, but she remained
standing in place. He wanted to chase her away. This time she wasn’t running.

“Mind if I join you?” she asked on her
way to the cupboard to grab a glass and return to stand over Murphy’s shoulder.
She reached for the bottle. The muscles in his shoulders flexed when she leaned
over him.

Murphy’s hand snaked out and wrapped
around hers, preventing her from pouring a drink.

“I mind,” he growled.

“Well, get over it. I need a drink.”

Scowling, he let go of her hand and
allowed her to pour a glass for herself. She refilled his glass next and set
the bottle on the table. Then she moved to the chair beside him and sat before
lifting her glass in a silent toast.

“Cheers.” She brought the glass to her
lips. His eyes on her as she drained the glass made her fight the urge to cough
as the fiery liquid burned its way down her throat. Seconds later she felt the
familiar warming sensation as it numbed her insides. Her eyes filled with
tears. She blinked them away as she reached for the bottle.

Murphy held it away from her. “What are
you doing?”

“Having a drink. I’m not in the mood for
warm milk tonight.”

His eyes darkened and narrowed. “You
don’t strike me as the drinking type.”

She wasn’t, but tonight it sounded good.
Maybe it would soothe away her problems and make her forget how screwed-up her
life was. Talking about Kent earlier had brought back painful memories. She
didn’t want to feel that misery anymore tonight.

“Maybe you don’t know my type,” she
said.

Murphy studied her closely for a moment
before rubbing a weary hand over his face. “Go back to bed, Sara. Sleep it
off.”

“I don’t want to sleep it off. I’m tired
of thinking about it.”

Maybe it was the whisky, or the sight of
Murphy’s naked chest, or the part of her that had been dormant for six years
coming back to life. More than anything she wanted to discover it with Murphy,
her strong, scarred hero.

She rose to her feet. Murphy watched
warily as she stepped in front of him and positioned herself between him and
the table. He leaned back in his chair and sent her a thunderous look.

“You and I are alike in many ways,
Murphy,” she said softly. “We both have lost pieces of ourselves we can’t ever
get back and it has forced us into a life of loneliness and solitude. I don’t
know about you, but I’m tired of being alone.”

Murphy pinned her with a hard glare.
“I’m not what you want. Go back to your room before I do something we’ll both
regret in the morning.”

His harshly spoken words sent little
electrical shocks through her body.

“I’m tired of people telling me what I
want,” she said.

Murphy grabbed her wrists and pulled her
down toward him. He wasn’t gentle about it. He leaned in close. “How many
lovers have you had?”

The taunt should have scared her off,
but not tonight.

“I haven’t been with anyone besides my
husband and that was over four years ago,” she answered with a defensive note.

He must not have expected such blunt
honesty, because he went very still and his eyes showed his surprise. Some of
the hostility left his expression. “Christ,” he muttered, letting her go and
reaching around her for the whisky. He didn’t bother with his glass and drank
straight from the bottle.

Sara watched his throat work and wanted
to sink her teeth into the strong cords of his neck. He was a virile man.
Strong and gruff and potent. And suffering. She recognized the signs because
she experienced the exact same ones.

“You had another nightmare,” she said
softly, leaning against the table.

Murphy’s expression darkened. His
fingers tightened around the neck of the bottle.

“I know about nightmares, Murphy. I know
how it feels to be haunted by the past and I know it hurts to be alone all the
time. Neither one of us has to be alone tonight.”

He set the bottle on the floor beside
his chair and slowly rose to his feet. She swallowed hard when she saw his
jeans rode low on his hips. Images of Murphy tossing her on the table and
ravaging her flashed through her head.

When Murphy stepped close and pressed
her onto the table, she thought he would do exactly that.

Her breath caught in her throat. Nerve
endings danced and her heart tripped in her chest.

He braced his hands on the table on
either side of her and eased her down. The sensation of his bare chest against
hers made her swallow hard and try to remember to breathe. His masculine scent
filled her lungs, and butterflies set flight low in her belly. He stopped their
descent with Sara half sitting, half lying, and she found it more erotic than
any dream she’d had of him. A mix of anticipation and excitement zinged through
her veins. She had never felt this kind of arousal before and she liked it,
wanted to find out what else Murphy could do to her.

Sara lifted her eyes to meet Murphy’s.
Heat smoldered in his. Her mouth went dry. Combined with the scar, he looked
rugged and untamed and her body answered the call. For a moment they stayed
like that, chests rising and falling in unison, just staring at each other. She
saw the battle he fought and hoped he lost, because she didn’t think she could
walk away from him tonight.

“I’m not the man you’re looking for.”
Murphy growled, gripped the nape of her neck with one hand and crushed his
mouth to hers. His lips were hard and demanding as they moved over hers, the
battle raging still.

Sara arched into the kiss, feeling a
heady sense of power that she was responsible for his torment. She responded to
the anger in his kiss with equal fervor. She didn’t want casual sex, but she
also didn’t want to be alone tonight. Deep down she knew this would be added to
her long list of mistakes, but she didn’t care. Murphy would be her greatest
mistake.

The kiss changed, softened, and turned
into a heated exploration of her mouth. How could she have lived this long
without being kissed so thoroughly and sensually? Her hands found their way to
his chest and with a tiny moan she splayed her palms over rock-hard muscle and
crisp hair. She wanted to explore every muscle, every scar.

Murphy lowered her to the table until
she lay beneath him. He fitted himself between her legs without breaking their
kiss. He tasted like whisky and male. So potent he overwhelmed her. She had
never known anyone as intense as Murphy. His power stirred a primal response
inside her she’d never known existed. Murphy’s hand grazed her hip beneath her
shorts. Uncertainty fled.

As quickly as he kissed her, he released
her and stepped away.

Sara opened her eyes and blinked to
focus.

Murphy stood a couple feet away, chest
rising and falling rapidly. His face was a tight mask of control, but a muscle
jumped in his cheek.

She had just lost the battle.

“Go to bed, Sara,” he ordered in a harsh
voice.

“Murphy--”

“No. I was out of line, it won’t happen
again. You have my word. Good night.”

Stung by his rejection, she sat up and
slid off the table onto shaky legs. He wanted this as much as she did, so why
deny them? Damn his honorable intentions.

“What are you afraid of?” she asked
quietly before walking away.

* * * *

You.

Murphy raked a hand through his hair and
glared at Sara’s closed door. He never should have let the kiss happen. Hell,
he never should have opened his door two nights ago. There weren’t many things
that scared him in this world. Sara Sheldon did. She threatened everything he’d
come here to avoid. She offered something she didn’t know anything about. She
was practically a damned virgin.

The thought added to his frustration.
He’d be a fool to take her to bed, and he wasn’t looking to be one of her
mistakes. There was no room in his life for a woman. He wasn’t ready to share
his past with anyone. If he made love to Sara, the question of protection would
arise. He wasn’t prepared to explain to her why they wouldn’t need to use any.

How the hell was he supposed to sleep
now? He had a hard enough time sleeping for more than a couple hours at a time
without the added burden of his attraction to Sara.

He wanted to know who’d forced her to go
to ground, and he wanted to protect her. The last time he protected a woman it
cost him his career and self-respect. By locking himself away from the world
he’d assumed he was safe. How wrong he’d been. How very, very wrong.

Keeping his distance from Sara Sheldon
would be difficult at best. But he had to do it. Making love to her would
create too many complications. Too many answers to questions he didn’t want
asked.

Starting now he would do everything in
his power to see he accomplished his task.

No matter what the cost.

* * * *

Sara rolled over in bed and reached for
Abby. A migraine stabbed at her temples. She had spent a long, miserable,
sleepless night thinking about Murphy and what she wished would have happened.

He was wrong. What she and Murphy shared
wasn’t ordinary or common. He could deny it all he wanted, but there was
something between them. It scared him enough to cause his retreat. Maybe it was
for the best, but she just couldn’t bring herself to believe that. Her body
certainly didn’t believe it. It still thrummed with unreleased energy.

Groaning, she patted Abby’s side of the
bed and bolted upright. She searched frantically around the room. When she
didn’t see her, she threw the quilt off and ran out of the room, heart pounding
in her chest. She checked the bathroom and found it empty. Panic settled like a
fist around her chest as she ran toward the kitchen. Two figures sat at the
table. Her bare feet slid to a stop on the cool wood floor. Tears of relief
filled her eyes.

Murphy sat at the head of the table, a
tall glass of milk in front of him and a small round cookie in his hand. A
package of Oreos lay on the table. Abby sat next to him, a shorter glass of
milk in front of her, and a cookie in her hand. She concentrated on Murphy and
didn’t see Sara standing there. Although Murphy didn’t look at her, he surely
knew she was there.

Murphy held up the cookie and waited for
Abby to do the same. When she held hers up, he showed her how to twist the top
of the cookie off. With a determined set to her mouth, Abby did exactly as he
showed her and twisted the cookie apart. She grinned when she finished and held
it out to Murphy, who nodded and licked the white creme filling off the
remaining piece of his. Sara’s breath caught in her throat as she watched his
tongue stroke the cookie. The night before came rushing back with a vengeance.