Relentless Rhythm (Tempest #4) (13 page)

“Stop!” I shouted. “Stop.” A strand of hair escaped my ponytail as I shook my head, but I didn’t bother brushing it away. I couldn’t look away from him. Truthfully I didn’t try. Chocolate layers lying soft across his forehead, vanilla brushing his ears, earnest golden eyes, his wide shoulders in black leather, his long lean legs in jeans. The temptation to sin, to touch, to taste and experience it all was standing right there before me.

“I don’t want to stop.” His gaze dropped to my mouth where the strand of hair still lay. My lips felt as if they’d swelled under his gaze. They buzzed with sensation, the wisp of hair across them becoming a titillating tickle.

“Dizzy,” I whispered, intending to tell him to stop again, but when his gaze popped back up, his eyes a dark steamy concoction, I knew I’d made his name a plea instead. I wanted it so badly. A kiss. Just a single kiss might be enough. I couldn’t remember ever wanting anything more in my entire life.

Fuck it. Fuck James. Fuck my fucking life. I was going to get what I wanted for a change. Just this one little thing. “Kiss me. Please.” I tilted my head back, peering directly into his gleaming eyes through my lowered lids. “I wanna know if the rumors I’ve heard about you are true.”

“Ah, Kitten.” He touched my cheek softly, his warm breath spilling over me. “It’d be my pleasure to enlighten you.” The velvet in his voice was like silken ties that bound me to him.

“Yes.” I practically panted the word, reaching for him, twining my arms around his neck, brushing against the cool leather of his jacket, and sinking my fingers deep into the thick soft hair at his nape.

He tensed at my touch, but then groaned and grabbed my hips yanking me closer. His masculine rumble of approval and the hard length of his arousal made that corresponding part of me throb with need. Suddenly I was less certain that one kiss would suffice. “Tell me you’ve got one of those open marriages.”

“No.” I lifted my gaze from that pierced lip and the piercing that I so longed to meld with my own.

“That’s too bad.” His voice was husky. He carefully slid the strand of hair from my lips, the tips of his fingers rough as he gently tucked it behind my ear. “Then tell me you don’t love him.” He stared deeply into my eyes searching for the answers he wanted. “Tell me your marriage is on the rocks, and that you’re about to get a divorce.”

“I don’t love him, not anymore. He doesn’t love me either, but I can’t… I can never leave him.” I was barely able to string a sentence together. His caressing fingers made me ramble as they skimmed the arched column of my neck fanning my desire and coaxing secret truths from me that I shouldn’t have shared. My breath caught when I realized what I’d said. “Please, Dizzy I just need you to…” I trailed off feeling the sudden rush of cold air across my hot exposed skin.

He’d untied my scarf.

His fingers stilled on my shoulders. “What the fuck?” Dizzy exclaimed eyes wide as he saw the unmistakable evidence of James’ favorite game.

“It’s not what you think.” I stepped away from him, swallowing hard as the silken camouflage fluttered to the floor along with the desire that had bloomed so rapidly and irresistibly between us.

Before I could continue my excuses, the door to the storeroom burst open. We both jumped even further apart as Sager stepped inside. “Hope I haven’t interrupted something important.” His tone was heavy with innuendo, and his gaze glittered with accusation. “But I thought you might wanna know that Mel’s looking for both of you.”

The moment she walked out of her building. I felt a surge of relief. She didn’t appear to have suffered any further harm overnight. Had Sager not interrupted us, I’d have made damn sure she didn’t go home that night to the bastard who’d done that to her. But it wasn’t my choice. The whole thing was so screwed up.

Sager was pretty pissed at me. He thought I was stepping out on Mel with her best friend. I’d tried to explain the situation without giving anything away, but he wasn’t having any of it.

What he couldn’t know was that April, not Mel, was the one who truly needed protecting. She was in real danger. As far as I could tell Mel didn’t even know her big secret, and that meant it was all up to me to do something about it.

Raindrops pelted her relentlessly as she moved hurriedly down the sidewalk in my direction. She had the hood of her rain jacket pulled up over her head so I couldn’t see her face, but I’d remedy that in just a moment. The Mine bartender and I definitely had some unfinished business. She was going to look me in the eyes and tell me what the bloody hell had happened to her. I was pretty certain I already knew, and that was what had me so worked up. So much so that I’d been parked out on the street all night long, sitting in my car waiting for her like a fucking stalker.

“April,” I called when she got close enough, stepping out of my car to intercept her.

She kept going as if she hadn’t heard me. She had though. She had definitely stepped up her pace. I jogged behind her and grabbed her arm, swinging her around to face me.

“Dizzy, go away!” she hissed her expression apprehensive beneath the shadow of her hood. She turned and glanced over her shoulder nervously. “James is home. He’s awake. Our window faces this way. He’ll see us.”

Her fear of him revealed a lot. “I don’t bloody care,” I snapped. Anger toward him and agitation over what he’d been doing to her had me at the tipping point already. She tried to yank her arm free.

“We’re getting soaked.” The rain was coming down harder now. Everything but my jacket was saturated, clothes cold and wet and plastered to my skin, rivulets of water dripping from my hair and into my eyes. I gestured toward the Panamera. “Get in the damn car so we can talk!”

“No!” she protested.

“Yes!” I insisted, dragging her by the elbow to the passenger side and clicking open the lock.

“You can’t make me go with you, Diz.” That was the first time she’d used the shortened version of my name. I liked it, and I liked that spunk evident in her tone. She wasn’t afraid of me. What I didn’t like seeing were those red rimmed eyes. She’d been crying, a lot I think.

Shit.

“You wanna bet?” I wasn’t above a little blackmail at this point, so I laid it out for her. “You either get in the car with me or I’ll go up to your apartment and have a word with your husband myself. Which is it gonna be?”

She ducked her head and slid in. I let out a breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding and closed the door after her. Jogging around the rear of the Panamera, boots kicking up a big splash of water sheeting down the street, I folded into my side and closed the door.

“Please. Just drive.” She was tense as fuck, staring straight ahead, hands clenched into tight fists on her lap. “Get us away from here.”

“Alright.” My voice was gruff reflecting my own internal turmoil regarding this whole twisted up scene.

She let out a shaky breath as soon as I peeled around the corner and headed downhill toward the waterfront on Burrard. I looked at her. She was shivering, soaked to the bone. Droplets of water clung to her lashes as she returned my stare. “Let me out here. Pull over into that empty spot.” She gestured toward the curb.

“Not gonna happen, Kitten.” But I did pull over, just briefly, so I could shrug out of my jacket and drape it around her shoulders. I liked the way it looked on her. I could have stared at her just like that for hours, but she was still cold. I turned up the heat some more and reached over covering one of her fists with my hand, tapping down the intense hum of desire I was getting used to feeling whenever I touched her. “I’m gonna ask the questions and you’re gonna answer them. We can talk here in the car, but I’d prefer it if we go somewhere else. I have a feeling I’m not gonna like what you tell me, and I don’t want either of us to get hurt if I lose it and wreck my new car. Ok?”

She nodded once, sagged in her seat and squeezed her eyes shut, but she left her hand underneath mine. I could sense the fight had gone out of her and that made me sad. “I wish…” Her breath seemed to catch and when she restarted her voice was lower. “I wish you would just let it go. Forget what you saw.” She turned to look at me, the regret glistening in her eyes tying my gut up into tighter knots. “It really doesn’t concern you.”

“Bullshit!”

She flinched, more at the vehemence in my tone than vulgarity.

“I know the drill,” I said quieter, but firmly, staring straight ahead as I pulled back into traffic. “I’ve heard all the excuses, because I’ve used ‘em all myself.”

“I don’t understand.” She looked perplexed.

“My old lady was a crack head. On her good days, she was disinterested in Lace and me, but she didn’t have many of those. Mostly she was jonesing for her next fix and taking out her frustrations on us when she didn’t get it. I built up a tolerance for getting the shit beat out of me, and I also got real good at deflecting like you do when people ask too many questions.”

“How old were you?” she whispered, staring back at me her eyes swimming in empathy.

I looked back at the road. The sight of her distress on my behalf, even with all the shit she was dealing with herself, reached a part of me that I thought was long dead. But this was about getting her straight, not me and my issues. “The first time? Two or three probably. Hell, I don’t know. Could’ve been before that. I don’t really remember.”

“Oh my God! You were a
baby
! I’m so sorry.” She covered our joined hands with her other one and squeezed.

“Thanks,” I mumbled voice thick. “It was a long time ago. It’s in the past.”
A past I couldn’t escape.
I pinned her with a look. “I just told you so you’ll understand why I’m not letting this go. There’s no way in hell that’s gonna happen. So, where do you want to go to talk this out? You name the place, and I’ll drive us there.”

She sat up straighter, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, the interior of the car silent except for our soft breathing, the patter of rain, and the whir of the windshield wipers. “My mom’s expecting me out in Coquitlam.” She turned pleading eyes on me. “Can we talk after that? I could meet you someplace this afternoon.”

“Negative. This shit’s been churning in my gut all night. I’m not giving you an opportunity to regroup and brush me off again.” I could tell by the flash of guilt on her face that she’d been planning to do just that. “I’ll take you there myself.”

She shook her head. “I’ve got two rambunctious little brothers to watch. You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into.”

I
didn’t
know that. She never talked about her personal life at work, and she hadn’t mentioned anything about her family during the drive out to Whistler either. “How little?”

“John’s seven, Michael’s five.”

“They’re a
lot
younger than you.”

“Yeah, my dad died when I was really young. They’re from my mom’s second marriage. I’ve had a hand in raising them. I love them wicked bad.”

I guessed. “So you go out every Saturday to see them?”

She nodded. “And to give my mom a break with George, my step dad,” she clarified.

“How do you mean?”

“Traumatic brain injury.” Her voice turned dull. “His mind and body don’t work right anymore. He’s wheelchair bound. He’s just too much for my mom to handle alone.”

“I’m sorry.” It was my turn to offer condolences. At the same time, I was starting to understand the sources of the quiet resignation and the steely resolve of the woman beside me.

“You can still back out. It’s a lot to take in. Even for me, and you, well…”

“No,” I cut her off. “I think I’d like to meet this family of yours. And we’re gonna talk, Kitten. There’s no going back now.”