The Departed (18 page)

FOR so many years,
cold
had been a part of Dez’s life. The departed felt cold. The long empty nights she spent following leads were often cold. She went home to a cold, empty bed and she awoke to a cold, empty house.

She was more used to cold than warmth.

So it was something of a shock when she drifted awake and found herself surrounded by warmth. She stiffened, the breath locking in her throat as she stared at the wall straight in front of her, unable to move, hardly able to think.

A hand rested on her hip and in that moment, as her mind tried to figure out just what in the
hell
was going on, it started to move, stroking upward. She shivered, feeling an odd tickling sensation in the wake of his hand.

“It was a mistake insisting on the three months,” Taylor said quietly, his voice muffled against her neck.

She lay still, not moving, hardly daring to breathe. Even when his hand rested on the curve of her nape, she didn’t move. “I knew it then, even if I couldn’t have made myself say it. I can say it now. It was a mistake…and I’m sorry.”

Dez closed her eyes. Swallowing, she asked, “Why are you in my bed, Jones?”

For the longest time, he was quiet. Then, finally, he pressed a kiss to her nape and replied, “Because I seemed to have a lot of trouble walking away from you last night. I needed to tell you that, needed to tell you I was sorry.”

“Okay. You told me. You’re still in my bed.”

He let go and she felt something fall across her neck. Reflexively, she caught it, but she didn’t look down because he’d caught her hip and started to tug, slowly. A gentle, unyielding pressure.

She could have resisted it, but that would have felt more than a little childish. She settled for keeping her eyes closed—that was only a
little
childish, right? Even as she lay there clutching whatever it was in her hand, she kept her eyes closed. Even as Taylor guided her to her back and pressed a hand to her belly and even as her heart skittered and danced in her chest.

She couldn’t look at him. She didn’t dare.

“I have the hardest damn time putting you out of my head.” Taylor brushed his lips over her cheek.

She had to bite her tongue to keep from hissing out a surprised gasp.
Don’t listen to him. Whatever new game this is—

Then his lips covered hers. Thought stopped. As his tongue stroked along the seam of her lips, Dez opened for him with a startled moan.
What in the…

He rolled on top of her, his weight pinning her against the bed. His hands cupped her face, tilting her head back. “I missed you—fuck, why can’t I stop thinking about you?” he muttered, his voice low and harsh, demanding.

Dez’s head was spinning. This—shit. This wasn’t happening. Her heart raced, pounding against her ribs so hard she could barely breathe. Tearing her mouth from his, she opened her eyes and glared at him as she shoved him back.

“What the hell, Taylor?” she demanded, disgusted to realize she wanted to cry. Damn it all. She blinked back tears and glared at him. “What in the hell is this? First you push me away, then you refuse to even discuss anything remotely personal, and then you spend the night
uninvited
and now you’re pawing me. What the fuck is this?”

A dull red flush spread across his cheekbones and if she hadn’t been so upset, so fucking aroused and confused, she just might have thought it was adorable—he was blushing.

But she was aroused, she was confused, and she didn’t know what in the hell was going on. The tears clogged her throat and, staring up at him, she whispered, “What is this, Taylor?”

He sighed, stroking one thumb over her cheek. “Would you believe it’s a wake-up call?” His gaze dropped to her lips again and then he groaned, pulling away from her and sitting on the bed with his back braced against the post. “You walked away last night, and I had the strangest damn feeling it was the last time—that if I didn’t do something, figure out some way to talk to you…I wouldn’t get any other chance. And I finally figured out that I needed it—needed…”

He closed his eyes and averted his face.

Dez felt her heart leap up into her throat. Easing upright in the bed, she stared at him, not daring to breathe, not daring to speak, to think. The tears were back, this time threatening to blind her and rob her of speech, but damn it, she wouldn’t let them. She started to wipe them away and that was when she looked down…and saw what she held in her hand. What he’d been holding when she woke up.

Her necklace.

This time, she couldn’t stop the sob, couldn’t stop the tears. She had nothing of her past, save for this necklace. It had come from her grandmother—a woman who’d died when Dez had been almost too young to remember her. But she knew the woman had loved her. The
one
person who
had
loved her.

All this time, she’d thought it was lost—destroyed or tossed aside in the rush to save her life, maybe, the night she’d been hurt.

Through her tears, she looked up and stared at Taylor. “Where…where did you find this?”

“I’ve had it since that night.” He stared at the bit of gold swinging from her fist, his gaze rapt, like he couldn’t look away. “I…I kept telling myself I’d mail it to you. Then maybe I’d convince myself I’d bring it to you, and apologize. Make sure you were doing okay. But I couldn’t let it go.”

“Couldn’t let it go?” She shook her head. “What is this? Damn it, what is going on?”

“I finally let myself admit something,” he said, his voice raw and harsh. “I figured something out. Figured out what I need, Dez.”

“Yeah?” She swallowed the tears clogging her throat. Hope tried to dance in her chest, but she didn’t want to believe in it. Didn’t dare. “What do you need, Jones? Do you even know how to let yourself need something?”

“Not a what, not a thing,” Taylor said quietly. He looked back at her. “Who.
You
, damn it. And you’ve known it all along. Better than I did. I need you and I knew if I just let you walk last night, that was it. It was done.”

“I
did
walk,” she pointed out, lowering her gaze to the necklace for a moment before looking back up at him.

He gave her a faint grin. “But you didn’t get away. You’ve been stuck with me all night, even now.”

She snorted. She managed a casual shrug as she inspected the chain of her necklace. It was damaged, but that was okay. The chain wasn’t the important part. She’d replaced it four or five times over the years. The cross was what mattered to her. “Circumstances, Jones. You can’t claim credit for circumstances.”

Taylor reached up, scratching at the light golden stubble on his chin. “Actually…there were no circumstances. I had no reason to take you back to the kid’s house—I was just trying to stall and figure out how to make my brain and mouth cooperate.”

Dez stared at him. “No circumstances. That’s bullshit. We found a trail.”

“Dumb luck.” Taylor shrugged. “I wasn’t entirely surprised when you picked something up, but I wasn’t exactly expecting it to happen, either—like you said, you’re not one of my bloodhounds. It was just a last-ditch effort to keep you from holing up in here away from me.”

“Ahhh. Hmmm.” She licked her lips and then, before she did anything else, she set the necklace down. Carefully. She couldn’t lose it again. That he’d cared for it all these months made it that much more precious, she realized. Even if she wouldn’t let herself acknowledge it. That done, she drew her knees to her chest and made herself think about what he’d just said.

He’d lied to her. Hell, he’d also kept something she treasured for over a year. Yeah. She should be pissed off. He’d lied, after all, right? But somewhere inside, instead of fury, she felt something that just might have been hope. Or even glee.

Pressing her face to her knees, she took a deep breath. She needed to think and focus. Think. Focus. And get the hell away from him. Yeah. That was a good plan. She should get out of the bed and walk away. Without looking at him. Because if she looked at him, she was lost. So lost, so screwed. She swallowed and tried to send the command to her body.

Said body wasn’t in the mood to cooperate.

Okay. So she’d tell him to leave. That would work, too, right?

Sucking in a deep breath, she opened her mouth.

But what came out
wasn’t
an order to leave. Instead, she blurted out, “What the hell does it matter if I hole up away from you
now
? When did things change all of a sudden?”

And she made the mistake of looking at him. Her gaze locked with his and she fell into that steely blue—usually so cold, so flat and emotionless. But now…not cold. And while she couldn’t entirely understand the emotions she saw there, there
was
emotion—a whole hell of a lot of it.

“Change?” He laughed, but there was no humor in the sound. “Oh, nothing
changed
exactly. Except for that wake-up call I mentioned.”

Her breath caught in her throat as he rolled onto his knees and crawled across the bed. It should have looked awkward. Seriously, who could
crawl
and
not
look awkward? Obviously Taylor Jones. Caught in the blue of his eyes, she felt like she was being stalked and she couldn’t have moved for the life of her.

He stopped only scant inches away and lifted a hand, stroking it down her cheek. “The past year has seriously sucked, Dez. I don’t know if I can do any sort of relationship and chances are I’m going to fuck it up something awful. I’m probably going to end up hurting you. But if there’s any chance at all that you and I 
might
have something between us, I want it.”

Shit
. Her heart slammed against her ribs; her breath was trapped inside her lungs. This was happening—this was real. Staring at him, she swallowed back the dazed, delighted giggle that wanted to break free. No. She wasn’t going to fall for this so easily. Hell, no.

“For how long?” she asked, clenching her hands into fists to keep from reaching for him. “While we’re both here? Until you go back to D.C.? How long, Jones? If it’s just until you’re bored with it, then just get the fuck away from me.”

With a featherlight touch, he stroked a finger over the scar on her neck. His eyes held hers. “Dez…I could live a thousand years and never be bored with you. And I don’t know how long. Probably until you’re fed up with me and boot me out on my ass.” He slid his hand back to curve around her nape, his thumb rubbing back and forth over her skin. “But I don’t have hard-and-fast answers. If you’re looking for them…well, I’m no genius at relationships, but I don’t think they
come
with hard-and-fast answers. We just do our best and see what happens.”

Relationship
. As his fingers slid up to tangle in her hair, Dez closed her eyes. She was sitting here, in bed, talking about a
relationship
with Taylor Jones.

Hell had frozen over. That was the only logical explanation for this weirdness.

His lips brushed over her forehead and she tipped her head back, looking at him. “You know how insane this is?” she asked, her voice soft. “I shouldn’t even want to see you, talk to you. I’ve spent the past year trying not to think about you at all.”

“Same here.” A faint smile curled his lips. “Did you have better luck than I did?”

Dez made a face. “Every time I slowed down more than five minutes, I’d find myself thinking about you. Thinking about you, cursing the ground you walked on in one breath, and missing you in the next.”

“I just missed you.” His mouth brushed across her cheeks, first one, then the other. “Missed you, then I’d curse the ground I walked on. I’ve spent a lot of time wishing I could kick my own ass. Dez?”

“Yeah?”

“If you’re going to kick me out, do it now, because if you don’t, I plan on having you naked in the next two minutes.”

Her heart skipped a beat and her breathing hitched. Pulling back, she stared at him, while inside her head a war raged. Kicking him out was exactly what she
should
do. She knew that.

But she wasn’t going to.

“Two minutes, huh? Do I have time to brush my teeth?”

“It’s closer to ninety seconds now.”

She grinned at him. “You’re counting—”

Before she could finish, he had her mouth under his. She shuddered and opened for him, wrapping her arms around his neck. He hauled her against him and twisted, rolling across the bed until he had her flat on her back and under him.

His hands flew over her clothes and although she wasn’t counting, he had her clothes off pretty damn fast—it just might have been two minutes. As the last of her clothes went flying, she worked her hands between them and pushed him back when he would have covered her body with his.

“Now you,” she demanded, grabbing the hem of his shirt in her hand and tugging on it. “I want you naked, too.”

He scowled but pushed away, dealing with his clothes with the same speed and efficiency he’d used on hers. He came back to her, his body hard, strong, and warm, chasing away the cold that always seemed to linger. She groaned, all but wrapping herself around him.