Sinful Temptation (9 page)

“Didn’t sleep that well?” His gaze sharpened down to a needle’s point. “What’s wrong? Don’t you like your room?”

“What’s not to like? Staying in your house is like staying with Donald Trump, without all the tacky gilt.”

The interrogation continued, gaining strength. “Is the mattress too hard?”

Her brain flashed back to that cottony slice of heaven. “No.”

Tony stared at her and, honest to God, those amazing eyes—long lashed, warmly brown and sparked with gold—were like heat-seeking missiles because they gave her nowhere to hide.

“Then what kept you from sleeping?”

Thinking of you, down the hall.
“Nothing. I mean…you know, it was just…new place and all that. New job.”

“Right.”

Was that it with the questions, then?

“So,” she said.

“So.”

The most uncomfortable seconds of her life passed.

“Well.” Her voice was now hoarse, so she cleared it. “Cheers.”

“Cheers.”

Looking down at the plate on her lap, she discovered that she’d loaded it with three times as much food as she needed. Perfect. Now, she’d inevitably not finish it, which he’d point to as further evidence that she was under the weather.

Oh, would you get over yourself?
she told herself sternly, reaching for a cracker.

They ate. Overhead, gulls flew. Waves splashed. Chesley ran down a crab, caught it in her mouth, and crushed it with great canine gusto. The sun shone. She and Tony chewed.

After several minutes, Tony spoke out of the side of his mouth.

“Wow. My lunches aren’t usually this excruciating. I blame you.”

That made her grin, and some of the tension between them eased back to a manageable level. “I beg your pardon. You pick a topic, and I will conversate intelligently with you.”

“Conversate? Is that a word?”

“It is now.”

“Okay. Here’s my topic—are you excited about the mural?”

The mere mention of the project made her grin like a hyena. Undignified, maybe, but she couldn’t help herself. “I’m thrilled. I can’t wait to get started.”

His gaze flickered between her eyes and her smile. “See?” he asked softly. “This is why I knew you’d be perfect.”

“Don’t get too excited. You may want to reserve judgment until you see my version of Odysseus. Maybe I’ll give him green skin and blue hair.”

Tony’s smile flashed, boyish and white. “Like yours, you mean?”

“Bluer.”

“Works for me.”

He glanced up at the top of her head, where her purple swim cap was currently roasting her head like a baked potato in the oven, and her heart sank. Another pulse of self-consciousness hit her, and she smoothed the edges of the cap over her nape. Funny, wasn’t it? Other women wore bathing suits to the beach and spent the whole time worrying about how their butts looked from behind.

With her, it was all about the hair.

To her relief, though, Tony didn’t mention it.

“Okay,” he said. “I have another question for you.”

“No fair,” she complained around a bite of cookie. “You’re double-dipping.”

He ignored this. “You said you wanted to travel more, right? Why’s that?”

Startled, she paused to grab a napkin and dab at her mouth. Out of the frying pan and into the fire, apparently. She shrugged, trying not to make a big deal out of a simple question.

“The usual reasons, I suppose. Life’s short. I work too hard. I should make more time for fun things.”

He raised a brow and shot her another one of those skeptical sidelong glances. “I had the feeling there was more to it than that. You sounded like you were really making it a priority.”

She studied her plate, ignoring the increasing burn in her cheeks. “Well, how do things ever get done if you don’t make them a priority?”

“Good point.”

“Anyway, you should travel, too.”

His mouth twisted with so much bitterness it was a wonder she couldn’t taste it. “I’ve spent enough time away for a while. I need to be home. Actually, I need to figure out how to be home. That would be a good start.”

“Give it time,” she said gently. “You’re not Superman.”

He looked back at the waves, his jaw hardening. “I got that lesson beat into me by the Taliban, thanks.”

This was the first time he’d mentioned the suffering he must have endured, and she wasn’t ready for it. Fear congealed in her chest, weighing her down. Was she pathetic or what? He’d been the POW, and she was too terrified to even hear about what he’d gone through.

“Tony—”

She reached for his arm, meaning to comfort him, but his skin was hot to the touch. She jerked her hand away, burned by the thrumming urgency in his tight muscles, and then he looked at her again, right in the eyes.

Oh, God.

“You have to help me out here, Talia.” His voice was a low rasp that connected more to her heart than it did to her ears. “Am I supposed to pretend you never wrote to me? Or that I don’t remember what you said? Is that what you want?”

She’d never been much of a liar, but now would’ve been a great time to start.

Unfortunately, she couldn’t manage it. “No.”

His breath eased a little. “When you told me ‘not today, Death’—that helped. It really helped.”

Now, suddenly,
she
couldn’t breathe—again—and it had nothing to do with overdoing it, not sleeping last night, or anything other than Tony’s extraordinary effect on her.

“Did it?”

“More than you know.”

“I’m glad.”

“Are you?”

“More than you know.”

They stared at each other, their gazes locked in place, and the magnitude of her mistake hit Talia all at once: she should never have come here to his home, where he was.

It seemed unlikely that she could spend any time with him—any time at all—without falling desperately in love.

Chapter 6

T
he sudden tension, which was pregnant and heavy, prickled across Talia’s arms and up her nape, into her scalp. A breaking point hit them both simultaneously, and they blinked, turning away from each other. God knew what he was thinking; she couldn’t think at all. She had another one of those painful moments of wondering why her fidgeting body couldn’t sit still and what to do with her twitchy hands.

Tony, on the other hand, didn’t move.

“So,” she said after a beat or two, when the awfulness of the silence became more unbearable than the intimacy of that last topic, “maybe after lunch you can show me how to paddleboard before I drown myself—”

“The thing is,” he said, keeping his face resolutely turned in the other direction, “if you have any more advice for me, now would be a good time to share it.”

Was this a safer topic? It didn’t feel safer, especially with his voice still in that husky range that twisted her up inside.

Lightening the mood with a joke or two probably wouldn’t work, but what other defense mechanisms did she have available to stop this man from burrowing his way straight to her heart?

“Advice? I’m happy to offer an opinion on anything from your shoe selection to animal husbandry.”

“Great. Then tell me how to get past the last several months.”

“‘Get past’?” she echoed faintly.

Just as she was beginning to feel grateful that he couldn’t see her face while she wrestled with her unruly thoughts, he looked at her again, nailing her with an expression so lost and bleak that he might have been the sole survivor of the apocalypse.

“Yeah. I’d like to do some forgetting. I’d like to stop being afraid. I’d like to stop feeling like death is all around me, just waiting to pounce on me or someone who’s important to me. What’s your advice on that, Talia? How do I do it? How do I live a regular life? What if I never can?”

Never before had she felt like such an abject failure. Even her good friend sarcasm couldn’t get her out of this one. “I don’t know, Tony,” she said helplessly.

“Give me something, Talia.”

God. If only he knew what he was asking of her.

“Right now, all I can think of is this quote by Publilius Syrus—”

“The Roman writer?”

“Well, he was from Assyria originally, but yeah. He said, ‘I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.’ So I should probably keep my mouth shut.”

Tony snorted and shook his head. “Has he got anything else?”

“Yeah. ‘Many receive advice, few profit by it.’”

His lips thinned. “This guy is batting zero with me, frankly.”

“I warned you. I wanted to keep quiet, but no.”

She hesitated, buying time and thinking hard. If he had any idea how uniquely unqualified she was to offer advice on the subject of living a normal and fear-free life, he’d probably bust a gut laughing.

Well, if she was in for a penny, she was in for a pound, right?

“He also said, ‘The fear of death is more to be dreaded than death itself.’”

“Yeah,” he muttered, “but I’m betting he was alive when he said it, so how the hell would he know? Maybe we should switch philosophers.”

“Fine. I have one from that great sage, Charles M. Schultz.”

“The writer of the Charlie Brown comic strip? Hit me.”

“He said, ‘I have a new philosophy. I’m only going to dread one day at a time.’ But for you, I’d modify that to one hour at a time. How’s that?”

Tony’s brow contracted. His unfocused gaze drifted off again, toward the waves, and he mouthed
one hour at a time
to himself. Then he rested his elbows on his knees, and she got a quick glimpse of his scrunched face before he slowly lowered it into his hands. She watched, heart sinking, as his shoulders heaved.

Oh, no.

“Tony,” she said, squeezing his forearm in a lame offer of support.

His head came up. To her surprise, there was a new light in his eyes now, and she went so far as to think he looked…relieved. Hopeful, even.

“One hour at a time,”
he repeated. “I can do that. I can get through one hour at a time.”

“I know you can, Tony. I have complete faith in you.”

“I don’t know why you would, but…thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I don’t know why I got on that topic. I just needed to tell you how much your letters meant to me, I guess.”

Her mouth opened, and out came another of the mixed messages he’d accused her of sending his way. “They meant a lot to me, too.”

It happened again. The air between them shifted and swirled, changing the mood during the time between heartbeats. In that fleeting second, they went from being friends to something dangerously and deliciously other.

She couldn’t take her hand off his arm.

The intensity of the moment, like everything else in her life, scared her.

Their connection was more powerful than just the physical, but the physical weight of her hand on his muscular arm was so thrilling that she couldn’t resist running her thumb over his skin.

His breath hissed—or was that hers?

“You know,” he murmured, “you have a real knack for making things better and worse, all at the same time.”

“I don’t mean to,” she said.

Even so, she damn sure couldn’t stop touching him right now.

“Tell me.”
He leaned closer, bringing that heat and masculine urgency with him. “There’s something important you’re not telling me.”

“No.” That didn’t sound convincing, so she tried again.
“No.”

“What are you hiding—”

Suddenly something invisible happened to him, and he stopped dead, flinching.

His eyes widened and fixed on a point behind her; his shoulders hunched in on themselves. Beneath her fingers, meanwhile, she felt the sudden stiffening of the muscles in his arm.

“Tony?”

Frozen to the spot, he didn’t answer.

Alarm shot through her veins. Was he in pain? Having a heart attack? She glanced all around, looking for an explanation and someone who could call for help, because she’d stupidly forgotten her cell phone. But there was no one in sight and the coast guard chopper off the coastline was the only—

Inside her panicked brain, neurons began to fire.

Wait—was that it? The chopper?

“Tony,”
she cried.

His rigid body had begun to vibrate. If a marble statue could shake, she thought desperately, it would feel exactly like this. Following his line of sight, she saw what he saw: a clunky red coast guard helicopter sweeping the shoreline, buzzing close but not close enough to kick up the sand.

Tony was dripping sweat now. His black pupils were so dilated she could hardly tell where they ended and his brown irises began.

Oh, God. Was this the fear he’d been talking about? Was this what life was like for him—everyday occurrences triggering debilitating panic attacks?

Well, she wasn’t going to just sit here and—

“Tony.” When he didn’t answer, she clamped her palms on his jaws—delivering something like a quick slap.
“Tony!”

His entire body jerked, including his gaze, which latched on to her face.

Was that progress? It sure didn’t feel like it, not with his big frame still trembling from head to foot. She had a wild image of the industrial paint shaker at the hardware store. Had someone slipped one of those inside this poor man’s body?

“Tony,” she said again.

He blinked.

She smacked his cheeks again. Screw it. She could apologize later. She gave him another hard shake.

“Tony.” Working really hard to keep her voice calm and her own growing panic at bay, she stared into his eyes. “Where are you?”

He blinked again then unstuck that throbbing jaw of his and opened and closed his mouth.

“You’re scaring me, Antonios. You answer me, goddammit.
Answer me.
”

“At—at home,” he said, his body now straining with the effort of drawing breath. “And I told you…not to call me…Antonios.”

Something made her choke. She was either laughing or stifling a sob—she couldn’t tell which. “Where is home?” she demanded.

“Sagaponack.”

The helicopter, which had to be the slowest moving aircraft since the Wright Brothers flew their plane, made its meandering way out of sight, its rotors still audible for what seemed like ten minutes after it was gone.

But Tony was doing better. Maybe.

“Who am I?”

Another blink, and it was as though he slammed back into his body.

One second he was checked out, probably on some horrible road in Afghanistan under fire from the Taliban and receiving air support from U.S. helicopters, and the next he was present, focused and, judging from the color now flooding his cheeks, embarrassed.

“Talia,” he said, wrenching free.

By the time she thought to tell him to sit still and recover for a minute, he’d already lurched to his unsteady feet. He staggered, which probably wasn’t good for his humiliation factor.

“Jesus,” he muttered, grabbing the umbrella pole for support.

“Here.” She got up, too, reaching for him. “Let me—”

That was the wrong thing to do. He flung his arms wide, breaking free. “I don’t need your help,” he roared, his features contorted and unrecognizable with fury. “You think I want your pity? Huh? You think I want you to see me like this?”

God. This man was ripping her heart out.

“It doesn’t matter, Tony—”

“Doesn’t matter?”
Some ugly sound came out of his mouth. A laugh, maybe, or a verbal sneer. “I’m crazy, and it doesn’t matter?”

“You’re not—”

He stalked several feet toward the boardwalk, thought better of it and wheeled back around. “Is that why you don’t want any part of me? Because you know how screwed up I am up here?” For emphasis, he jabbed two fingers at his temple.

God.

This man was going to shred her heart into mincemeat before this was all over.

“I don’t think you’re screwed up.”

His lips peeled back, revealing teeth that seemed sharper than usual, almost feral. “You should,” he said grimly.

“Tony—”

“So much for your advice, eh? I thought I could get through an hour at a time. Maybe I should break it down a little more. Maybe second to second is more my speed. I think that’s about all I can handle. Don’t you?”

“No, Tony—”

He stalked off, leaving only Chesley and the seagulls to hear her calling after him.

That night, Talia startled awake, knowing something was wrong long before she could pinpoint what it was. She sat up and blinked into the darkness, trying to get her bearings.

Her alarm clock’s digital display read 3:21. Her room, like the house, was utterly silent, but for the distant white noise of the surf. Since she kept her drapes open to enjoy the spectacular view, there was enough moonlight dappled from the waves to show that nothing was out of place in her room. There were no looming shadows behind the chair in the reading corner, for example, and no figures darting out from behind the entertainment armoire.

And yet something—maybe everything—was wrong.

Had she had a nightmare?

Rubbing her eyes, she tried to shake off the anxiety—

Wait. What was Chesley doing?

The dog was sitting by the closed door, looking over her shoulder at Talia. When she caught Talia’s eye, she whined and pawed at the knob.

Silly dog. Why couldn’t she do her peeing at a decent hour, like everyone else did?

Muttering, Talia tugged a long-sleeved T-shirt on over her tank top and shorts, found her flip-flops, tightened her silky sleeping scarf around her head and was on her way to the door when she heard a muffled sound that made her spine melt.

It was the long, eerie wail of someone in pain.

Sudden fear rooted her feet to the floor. She’d never heard a sound like that, and whatever caused it wasn’t good. The keening rose up again, drowning out the roar of blood in her ears, and the last of her sleep-induced confusion dissipated.

Tony. That was
Tony
in trouble.

Over at the door, meanwhile, Chesley was running out of patience. Wriggling with agitation, she gave a sharp bark easily translated into English:
hurry up, dummy!

Talia snapped into action, throwing the door open and heading down the hallway at a dead run. Guided only by a small console lamp and Chesley’s haunches as she raced past, Talia sprinted around a corner and into another wing that she’d never visited, and then—

Oh, no.

This new corridor had a hundred freaking doors marching up and down its length, all of them shut. Which one was—

Chesley went straight to a door midway down, sat and barked at her.

Oh, thank God for this wonderful dog.