No Magic Moment (Secrets of Stone Book 4) (15 page)

When we got to the secluded alcove along the shore, I spread out the blanket and kicked off my shoes. I sat down, grinned up at Michael then patted the spot next to me.

“How did you find this spot?”

“I’ve become a beach bum.” I giggled a little. “Actually, Kil told me he brings Claire here sometimes for romantic dates, and I wanted to snuggle with you a little bit.
Now
I think we both could use it.”

“I think I agree.” He smiled and kissed my temple as I scooted over, fitting my body against his. His warmth was perfect, sinking into me, filling the fissures in my soul, which had split so much wider the last two days.

I was so addicted to this man. I needed him like the air I breathed.

I swung my hair down over my shoulder so it didn’t hang in his face, and stared at him with intensity I’d been bottling up for days. This was exactly what I’d needed. One moment of looking into his eyes, as brilliant as flames through amber glass, and I knew his cracks had opened just as deep.

“I love you.” I ran a finger along his lip. “I will do whatever it takes to make sure I don’t lose you. I want you to know that, to believe that. You are the most important thing in my world, Michael Pearson. I can’t be without you. I simply can’t.”

He swallowed hard. Licked at my finger. “I love you too, princess. And I’m so damn happy to hear you say that. I acted like an ass on Saturday…but I can’t bear to lose you either, especially not to the clutches of my uncle.”

I giggled again. Couldn’t help it. “The ‘clutches’?”

“Don’t laugh this off, Margaux. I’ve seen what that man will do to a woman. It—it killed me as a kid, having to watch him beat on my mom. When he hit
me
, it was fine. I preferred it, even goaded him into doing it, because there was hope he wouldn’t go after Mom…but most of the time, I was wrong. He’d already warmed up on her and came to me next, or vice versa.” He averted his gaze upward, glaring at the rock formations in the ceiling. “When I was old enough to fight back, I tried fighting for both of us. It was pretty useless; sometimes just made shit worse. We’d nurse our bruises together.”

I brushed my hand up, struggling to smooth the tension from his brow. His words echoed with such sorrow and helplessness. “What kind of loser beats on a woman? And a little kid?”

“Domestic abuse happens more often than you think.”

As he spoke, I rolled over so we could spoon. Maybe his response to my next question would come easier if he didn’t have to look me in the eye. “Tell me now,
honestly
, what happened on Saturday—after security took you outside.” If he really had beat on Declan, I now fully understood where the rage came from. We’d deal with it
after
he told me the story himself.

He settled in a little closer, arm around my waist, before starting. His gruff snort tickled my ear. “Well, to no surprise, as soon as you were out of sight, those goons dropped me in the sand like the day’s trash. One of them took a shot at me, which was how I ended up looking like
I’d
gotten into it with Dec.”

I added a snort, too. “Not that the Acme Guard School asshole will ever cop to that.”

“Not even worth the effort, sweetheart.”

“What saved your bacon with Porky Pig?”

“They got another call and had to leave. By then, I just let it go and walked down the beach a little. Tried to cool down and get my shit together before coming back in to you. I wasn’t down far, just past an outcropping of rocks.”

He paused, whether to let me digest his account so far or to recall more, I wasn’t sure. I rubbed his forearm, urging him to go on.

“I heard some men approach. Took three seconds to recognize one of them as the bastard from my nightmares.”

“Declan.”

“I prefer Fucking Declan, but yes. He was out there on the beach, with a group of—shit, I don’t know what to call them—goons? Guards? Henchmen?”

“
Henchmen
?”

“Hello Al Capone, right? But that was what I thought. Modern-day mafia.
Esquire
meets the Corleones. Dressed in all black, grease ball smirks, slicked-back hair, and built like fucking brick houses, all of them. I wouldn’t think of taking
one
of them on myself, let alone the four they had me outnumbered at—five if I counted Dec. So I stayed in the shadows and listened.”

I turned over then sat up. He was right. This was getting serious. “What did they say?”

“I only heard Dec use one real name for anyone. Their leader’s name is Menger.”

“Their leader?” My heartbeat thudded in my throat. “What do you mean? Like, they were really some kind of a hit squad?”

“That’s exactly what I mean.” Michael scooped up one of my hands. “He owes them money.
Lots
of it.”

“Them…who?”

“A group called ‘the Principals.’ I don’t know exactly who they are but he’s into them deep. Best I can tell, it’s gambling debt. He always did like to play. Whether he racked it up locally at the rez casinos or out in Vegas, he has a weakness for it. And apparently, he’s in some trouble now, at least six figures. Those men came to collect.”

“Okay, so Uncle Dec is a loser to the third degree now. But what does that have to do with you?”

Michael let me go and scooted upright too—though the next moment, his head dropped between his bunched shoulders. As crazy as this ride had been so far, I sensed we were rolling to the worst part now. He growled, also broadcasting that he didn’t want to tell me the rest.

“Baby.” I dove a hand through his thick curls. “Just tell me. We’ve come this far; just get it out. There’s no point in keeping any part of it from me now, especially if it’s now going to involve me—which you’ve implied already.”

He gave in to my tug, raising his head again. Expelled a decisive breath. “You’re a damn smart woman, Margaux Asher.”

I raised my brows along with my grin. “Are you trying to flatter your way out of this?”

“No,” he sighed again. “Just stated it as the lead-in. These pieces are going to be easy for you to slide together.”

“Okay…” I drew it out, purposely leaving the end open.

“California is suffering a major drought, right?”

What the state’s water crisis had to do with Declan was a mystery but I nodded. “Right.”

“Who’s suffering the most from the drought? Farmers, right?”

“Yes.” The smart one was following so far. Good thing, since he took another huge breath and reset his shoulders before going on.

“The farm—my family’s land in Julian—sits on a massive, natural underground well. It’s big enough to provide water for us and all of Julian, and could likely be piped to San Diego as a substantial water source for the city.”

My eyes popped wide—before threatening to jump out of my head. “And Declan…”

“Knows about it, too.” He grunted. “For years, the ass wad’s been trying to pressure Mom and me into auctioning off the rights to the well to the highest bidder. Oil company, gas company, the City of San Diego, the fucking Republic of Mars…the bastard will talk to anyone offering the highest flow for the H2O.”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah. Holy shit.” His glower matched my fury. “Sometimes I can’t believe he comes from the same gene pool as my dad.”

I stared out at the waves, focusing on the liquid layers of gray and blue to calm my thoughts. “Okay, just as devil’s advocate and because I don’t completely understand the situation, why wouldn’t you simply deal with him by sharing the water?”

“Because our land would be destroyed. The methods of tapping into the well would devastate our farm, uprooting most of the orchard.”

“Wow.”

“Those trees have been growing for decades, some for close to a hundred years. Most of our employees would have to be let go. Families would be without incomes. Livelihoods would be decimated. The list of cons is a mile long. We use the water for everything in the orchard, making us one less worry for the San Diego Water District. We’ve been off their grid for close to thirty years, an even bigger draw for Dec’s interest.”

“But would that stop the city from claiming eminent domain now, and taking your land?” I sounded oppositional, but it seemed like Di and Michael had considered every reality. As long as he was sharing, I was asking.

“They don’t want to go there any more than we do. It would be a public relations nightmare, the ‘big bad politicians’ destroying the livelihood of local farmers. Right now, Mom and I couldn’t agree more. We want to remain self-sufficient and lay low, business as usual. Pearson’s has been a part of Julian since I was a kid, and if Julian is anything, it’s easy and uncomplicated—the way the locals demand it. We don’t want to be the ones dragging big city government problems to town, destroying the natural charm everyone’s worked for.”

I absorbed all of that through a contemplative pause. The rush of the waves and the murmur of the wind served as perfect filler.

“I hear everything you’re saying, and it all makes perfect sense—but I still don’t see where I figure into all this. Why are you so concerned about my safety? None of this feels ‘dangerous’ to me personally, Michael.”

He scrubbed a hand across his face then hit me with a wary stare. “The conversation I overheard with Dec and those guys, on the beach…there was more to it.”

“More?” My skin prickled. I didn’t like the harsh glint in his eyes. Not one bit.

“You thought I was mad when I came upon him talking to you in the ballroom. That I’d reached my limit. Right?”

I nodded. With the whole story in place, it didn’t surprise me how the man pressed every button Michael had.

“So this Menger asswipe started talking about how it’d be so convenient to make it look like I’d pounded on Declan instead of them. My own temper had just given him the perfect alibi.”

I squeezed my eyes shut. “Oh shit.”

“Damn right, oh shit,” he growled. “But it gets better.” He didn’t let up with the fear-filled stare. “They know who you are too, sugar—and Menger was making dirt ball comments about ‘comforting’ you if I was thrown in jail. It made me see red. I mean, a real red haze slammed over my eyes. I went on autopilot. Outnumbered or not, I didn’t care. I jumped at the bastards from the rocks, and was able to take out one of the goons before the others ran off—but before I realized what the hell was going on, the photographers swarmed in again, along with security. And you.”

“So you really never hit Declan?”

“Not once.”

“What did the photographers take pictures of?”

“Shit if I know. It was all a blur, especially after you got there. I was so furious that you didn’t believe me.” His jaw turned to steel again. “Do you have any idea what that felt like?”

“Michael—”

He waved me off. “It doesn’t matter now.”

“It does matter. Hear me out. And dammit, look at me.”

He stared at the blanket for another thirty seconds. Finally, slowly, lifted his gaze back up.

“Do you realize the difference between then and right now?” I demanded. “How much all of what you just said means? Do you understand that if I’d had all this information on Saturday night, I would’ve known, with every fiber of my instinct, that you were telling me the truth?”

His lips parted on the start of a retort but I stopped him with a sharp wave.

“Instead, I was totally crippled. Fighting blind. I was ordered into battle without a sword. I won’t have to now.
Thank you.
I’m grateful that you’ve finally opened up and given me the whole story. Your past with this awful man, unfortunately or fortunately depending on how you look at it, has contributed in a big way to the person you are right now. Our pasts shape our futures—and now that you’ve let me in on your past, we can build our future together. We’ve been working for this, Michael. Now, we just have some really bad people to clear out of the way first.”

His long, unblinking silence would have stretched into unnerving—if not for the soft smile on his lips and the golden fire in his gaze.

Finally he murmured, “How are you so amazing?”

I shrugged a little, smiling in return—and loving the fresh heat in my heart.

He reached over. Threaded a hand in my hair. Pulled me to him then pressed a long kiss to my lips. It felt like we hadn’t kissed in months, not just one day. His mouth was warm but tender, a physical plea for forgiveness.

I watched his face while he kissed me, something I didn’t often do. With his eyes closed, I could marvel at his long lashes, the exact honey color of his hair. He breathed air in through his nose, absorbing me through all of his senses. I wanted to do the same…to drown in him completely.

When his mouth parted to deepen our contact, I let my eyes fall closed, too…as my heart and my spirit opened. Finally, I enjoyed it for what it was: the end of a nasty fight, and the beginning of new steps into the future.

Together.

Michael

O
pen heat. Soft
surrender. Perfect passion. I could’ve added a thousand words to the string, all of them right and real, but none more fitting than the one resounding louder than all others.

Home
.

I’d never appreciated the word more.

Never felt it more for anyone in my life.

Never ached more strongly for the chance to show her.

I let a moan vibrate through myself then her, reveling in her immediate, intense response. She arched into me as if lit on fire, fisting my hair, pressing our bodies tighter. In that connection, she gave me the sweetest gift of all. The door to her soul was flung back open, and I knew her thoughts with the clarity of my own. I knew the depth beneath every tremulous shiver, every shuddering sigh, every harsh breath. I
knew
her again, in every recess of my exploding heart.

A cry escaped her, half breath and half plea, echoing everywhere in our little cove—and all the corners of my senses. “Michael!”

“Margaux.” I grated it into her neck with matching need. “Oh God, sweetheart.” I suckled her skin, trailing my tongue into the crevice between her neck and collarbone. When I added a tiny bite, she issued a full cry, her head falling back.

“Ahhh!” She drove a hand into my hair. “Mmmm…”