Obsession (12 page)

Why had she confessed that? Jessica flinched, realizing she’d lowered her barriers. Raphael gently gripped her chin between his thumb and forefinger. The contact made her shiver with awareness.

“You are not a stain. You are Lupine, proud, strong and perhaps far too intelligent for your own good.”

Releasing her chin, he walked to the table and pulled out a chair. “Sit.”

Jessica stared at the folders filled with dread. “Oh no…”

“File those. My assistant is on vacation for the next two weeks.” Judging from the gleam in his eyes, he knew how much she loathed paperwork.

As he sat at the larger desk, she sighed, opened a folder and shuffled through it. Mundane paperwork. Utility bills, receipts for trail rides, sales of organic honey the ranch sold.

Jessica began to organize the papers, darting glances at Raphael, who worked on his laptop. “Most businesses don’t have archaic systems. Everything is digital and backed up by a cloud.”

“The Double B Ranch is not only a business. It is run by a billionaire Lupine who needs to protect his privacy. J.J. does not trust clouds.”

He went to the iPod player sitting on a bookshelf, pushed a button. Music blared through the speakers. It was Jessica’s turn to look surprised.

“Foo Fighters? You look more like the classical music type. Urbane. Silk suits with the cowboy boots. Cigar smoking. Brandy swigging.”

He shrugged. “I downloaded the album for one song.”

Curiosity bit. It made her wonder what particular song he liked. Instinct told her Raphael wouldn’t tell. He looked wistful, as if pondering old regrets.

“Then again, you do have that kind of Dave Grohl look. Except your hair isn’t as long.” She tapped a finger against her upper lip. “And your mustache is a little wilted.”

Raphael sputtered. “I assure you, little Red, nothing on my body is
wilted.
”

Favoring him with a searching look, she smiled. “I have to agree.”

He shook his head, and muttered below his breath, but at least his melancholy look had vanished.

Digging through the files, she started sorting through the mess of papers. After a while, the strains of
Friend of Friend
drifted through the speakers. Such a sad song.

The sounds of typing on the laptop ceased.

She looked up. Raphael stared into space, his expression sorrowful. It hurt to look at him. Then, as if he sensed she watched, he glanced over. As her gaze dropped to the file folders, the sounds of typing returned.

After two hours, Raphael still typed away on the laptop. She’d organized all the papers and filed most of them. Jessica itched to get her hands on that keyboard and search for her brother. But he pushed away from the desk and looked up. “Lunchtime. I need to feed you.”

Absorbed with the idea of sneaking in time with his laptop, she shook her head. “I’ll stay here and finish. I’m almost done and I’m not hungry.”

“You haven’t been hungry since your arrival. I need to feed you.”

Sighing, she closed the file folder and accompanied him downstairs. Jessica glanced around the gleaming kitchen. “Where do I start?”

He blinked. “Start what?”

“Lunch. You’re hungry, you want me to make you something to eat. What do you like?” She opened the fridge and glanced at the contents. “Bachelor wolf. Nothing much in here. No matter.”

“I do not expect you to…”

Jessica looked at him, really looked at him. Fatigue smudged his dark eyes, and bracketed his wide mouth. She felt a sudden pull of sympathy.

Taking his hand, she guided him to the kitchen table and pulled out a chair. “Sit. I’ll make us lunch. I’m a pro at this. Is there anything you don’t like?”

Raphael tilted his head, as if he couldn’t figure her out. “I never waste food. I eat everything.”

“That’ll work.”

In the pantry she found a large can of mushroom soup, packaged chicken and a small bag of white rice. Jessica bustled around the kitchen, talking about her family and her foster siblings as she cooked. When she told him about the time when little Russ wanted to help bake a little cake for her and put toothpaste on it instead of icing.

“And you threw it out,” he guessed.

She found two bottles of green iced tea, opened them and set one before Raphael. “I ate it. The little guy went to all that trouble, I couldn’t hurt his feelings. It was just a small cake. At least it was mint toothpaste.”

His gaze softened. “You have a kind heart.”

Embarrassed at the praise, she scooped up the chicken, covered it with the gravy she’d made and dished out servings of rice and set both plates on the table with silverware.

Raphael picked up his fork and cut his chicken into neat, precise pieces. He ate one and sighed with pleasure. “Delicious.”

Judging from the luxurious furnishings in his home, the Lupine had plenty of money and could hire a cook to make gourmet meals. Jessica shook her head. “It’s just a simple meal I make for the kids when my foster mother asks me to cook.”

“Sometimes the simple meals are the best.”

She dug into the chicken with zest. Raphael was right. She liked this kind of impromptu meal.

Watching him eat, she wondered about this Lupine. He had the dominance and power of an alpha, yet served as J.J.’s beta. He knew a lot about computers and appeared extremely organized, as if he’d run his own business.

“How did you learn about computers?” she asked.

He took a deep swallow of tea. “I’ve always had an affinity for technical matters, and writing software programs.”

Interesting. “You worked as a programmer before you came here to the ranch?”

His mouth quirked upward. “Enough of me, Jessica. Tell me something. My background checks indicate you’ve hacked at least twice into your alpha’s system. Why do you do it?”

She lifted her shoulders.

Leaning back, he lifted a finger. “Once, you hacked once into your alpha’s system to change the time on an important pack meeting. Quite benign.” Raphael held up a second finger. “The next time, you did it for a friend. You tried to find out if I was Jeremiah Jackson Taylor, the one Alexa had sold her virginity to. Had you dug deeper, you would have discovered I am J.J.’s business manager, not J.J. himself.”

Feeling a flush heat her face, Jessica lifted her shoulders. “I was trying to help out my girl. I didn’t have much time to investigate you further, because my alpha keeps an eye on me.”

“Why do you hack?” he repeated. “You have a solid job, for a college graduate. And yet you have the skills of an experienced hacker. You haven’t done it for profit or personal gain.”

She ate more chicken, ruminating over the answer. How could Raphael understand how powerless she felt at home, at her job, with everyone telling her what to do and when to do it? No free time, no freedom.

“Is it a matter of control?”

Startled, she glanced upward, but his expression was kind. Maybe he did understand.

“I suppose. It
does
make me feel in control. At my job, even at home, everyone takes me for granted. I work hard and yet I’m invisible. No one notices me. It’s very demoralizing, having skills that go unused, and being ordered around. I’d leave except I owe Dennis for my student loan. So I hack into his system…”

Stabbing her fork into the air, she dragged in a deep breath. “Once. Twice. More than that, and you failed to find those little details. I’ve done it time and again.”

“You could cause much damage.”

Jessica shook her head. “That’s not me. I wouldn’t hurt anyone or endanger my packmates, but I enjoy annoying Dennis, doing things to make him frustrated, like the time I changed his online order for a case of Diet Coke to prune juice.”

Amusement danced in Raphael’s dark eyes.

“Nothing really serious. Just little things that are easily fixed,” she assured him.

“Why bother?”

“I’m like a graffiti artist. No one knows it’s me doing the work, and it is brilliant work because Dennis hires the best and brightest to toss up firewalls I simply take down. I get this secret satisfaction of bypassing his safeguards.”

Raphael’s mouth quirked. “As a means to say, ‘Screw you’ to your alpha. You have no remorse?”

“Only if I get caught.” Jessica pushed a piece of chicken around the plate. “You’re the only one who’s ever succeeded.”

He smiled, but it was a smile filled with satisfaction, as if she were a fox acknowledging the wolf as the greater predator.

Curious to know more of his personal life, Jessica asked about the ranch and Raphael’s house, but he kept the conversation neutral, not revealing anything about himself. As she scraped the last rice kernel off the plate, he wiped his mouth with a paper napkin.

“Thank you for cooking for me.”

Jessica started to take the plates, but he shook his head. “Sit, finish your tea. I’ll clean up.”

Raphael rinsed and stacked the plates in the dishwasher. “I saw that you are nearly finished with the filing. As my thanks for lunch, I’ll help you search the Lupine database for your family.”

Jessica thought it over. Having Raphael assist her was better than nothing. And she needed access to that database.

Upstairs in his office, he told her to sit at his desk and pushed his laptop aside. Then he pulled out a hidden sliding drawer with a keyboard and a mouse. Raphael picked up the remote and the HD screen powered on.

“Whoa. Nice system.” Jessica clicked on the Google Chrome icon.

“That’s how I roll.” Raphael leaned next to her. “No, get off the internet. Click on the wolf’s head icon. That accesses the private Lupine files only alphas can access.”

When she did, a box popped up asking for a user name and password. Raphael reached around her and typed words into the box, then swiped his finger over a box on the keyboard.

“Don’t bother memorizing the passcode. It requires a fingerprint swipe, too.”

Too late. She’d already memorized it. Fingerprint swipe? Easy enough to fool the system.

He handed her back the mouse. Mouth watering, Jessica stared at the screen and the listing of files. Data really turned her on.

So did the male standing next to her, smelling of oranges and cinnamon and something very male and musky.

“Any suggestions where to start?”

Instead of taking the mouse, he placed his palm over hers, guiding the pointer and clicking on a file. His hand was warm and his touch assured, making her heart race and her mouth go dry. Raphael scrambled her brain cells and made every female hormone sit up and howl.

“Maybe you should sit here. You look a little tense with me doing this.” She pushed back the chair.

“I’m fine. You are the one who is nervous.” He pushed a lock of her hair behind her ear. “I can hear your heart beat.”

“Good. Guess that means I’m still alive.”

He looked down with a grin that was all teeth. “You have quite the sense of humor, Jessica.”

Then he turned all business as he guided her hand over a filed labeled “Family bloodlines.”

Raphael surfed through a series of boxes and then landed on one called “Orphans.”

Jessica’s heart thudded fast as he opened the file, revealing a series of boxes with faces. He scrolled down through the boxes, each one labeled with a name, date and location.

“Who are they?”

“These are all the orphan Lupines. Their parents were either killed before their first Change or abandoned them at birth.”

“Look at all of them,” she said softly, her throat closing. “Sweet Danu, so many lost little ones.”

He reached across, typed a series of commands and suddenly a box appeared with her face in it.

Jessica’s chest tightened. It was her, when she was only five. Staring at the camera, her mouth flattened in a scowl, her brows drawn together, her red curls unruly and wild. How well she remembered that day. The genealogist had been at the Tyrell’s to record all their data for a census and she had been excluded. Then he’d put her against the wall and had taken her photo. She had frowned in a desperate attempt to hold back the tears. Even at five years old, she’d felt like an outcast.

“Such a sweet face. So alone. No parents, no family,” he murmured.

Jessica grabbed the mouse and clicked off her image, going back to the rows of forlorn Lupine young. “Screw you, Raphael.”

“A sore spot. I am sorry. But you must know this, little Red. Family isn’t everything. Sometimes blood can turn poisonous, and you’re better off with friends.”

“I’d still give anything to taste that particular poison.”

Shadows filled his eyes. “It is a poison I would never wish upon you, Jessica. Families are important, but blood can turn to venom and I advise you, if you are searching for your brother because you think blood will solve all your problems, you are howling at the wrong moon.”

Jessica stared at him. Gone was the smirk and sarcasm. He looked deadly serious. “Sounds like you’re talking from experience. What about your family? Don’t you have one? Don’t you love anyone?”

“Love?” He snorted. “Love makes the heartiest Lupines weak and foolish.”