You Really Got Me (15 page)

The pendant light cast a circle of illumination over the table, the rest of the lights in the kitchen out. The fireplace at the far end of the room gave off a flickery glow in the darkness and warmed the chilly evening air. Kendall sighed.

Now that she was alone she could eat animal crackers. She jumped to her feet and crossed to the cupboard, then pulled out the lone box and thrust her hand to the bottom to find the last cookies. She shook her head at her own silliness, her reluctance to share her cookies with anyone. Mr. and Mrs. Debarros would probably look askance at her if she offered them animal crackers.
Here, have a giraffe. It will make you feel so much better.

The bottom of the box held only broken cookies and she frowned. They were better than nothing, but she much preferred a whole, fresh cookie. She sighed, and popped a piece into her mouth.

She thought about Jason asking her to go to his place. Or had he been telling her? She gave a little huff. She thought about how angry she’d been that they were doing the polygraph test. But really, that would only help things, right? If Kevin told the truth, they would know he wasn’t involved. There really wasn’t anything to worry about.

Yeah, and tomorrow it would snow in the Santa Ynez Valley.

She shoved the box back into the cupboard, grabbed her purse and car keys and quietly left the house.

Jason opened the door to see Kendall, her beautiful face strained, those big dark eyes shadowed, her full lips and her shiny hair gleaming beneath the lights of his kitchen. He shut the door and they stood looking at each other. And then she was in his arms.

“Thanks for coming, babe,” he murmured against her hair. “I know you were upset about the polygraph test. Just want you to know…I understand how you feel about your brother. I do. I know you want to protect him.”

“Oh, Jason.” Her arms circled his neck and her body pressed against his. Something soft and warm expanded in his chest, rising up into his throat and nearly choking him. He closed his eyes and hugged her tightly.

“I care about you, Kendall. I know this is hard. But I’m doing my job. I can’t tell you everything that’s going on. You have to trust me.” He rubbed a hand up and down her back, feeling the bumps of her spine, the tightness of the muscles on either side. “Come on. Let’s go sit down. Uh…want a beer?”

She smiled at him, a genuine smile of amusement, and he loved how it softened her features and relaxed her mouth, how pretty it made her look. “Sure.”

They sat on his couch in his dim living room, only a tall floor lamp in the corner and the television casting any illumination, and he picked up the remote and turned the TV off.

Silence dropped over the room and settled around them. Kendall shifted on the couch to face him, and he looked at her, looked away, then back at her.

If he wanted to earn her trust, he had to start by being honest with her. He’d held back last night when she’d asked why he’d wanted to move away and start over. But he needed to tell her that, to tell her the truth. He drew in a breath. “Last night I told you I moved here because I needed to start over.”

She turned her eyes on him. “Yes.”

“You asked why, and I didn’t want to talk about it. But I want to tell you.”

“Okay.” Those eyes regarded him steadily.

“My sister died.”

“Oh. Oh no. I’m so sorry, Jason.” She reached out and laid a hand over one of his. “What happened?”

“Her boyfriend killed her.”

“Oh sweet mother of hell.”

He looked across the room at nothing. Her soft fingers touched his cheek and turned his head toward her. In the dim room her face was a pale oval with big dark eyes.

“Oh, Jason.”

“It’s a long ugly story,” he said. But the words came tumbling out of his mouth and he had no idea why. “He was an abusive control freak, but he was subtle about it. I never liked him. Tried to tell her that, tried to make her see how unhealthy their relationship was, but even I never thought he’d go off the deep end like he did.”

“She didn’t listen to you.”

Huh. She got that pretty quick. “No. In fact, things got pretty tense between us.” His body tightened and he willed it to relax again. Her hand stroked over his and the soft warmth eased his tension minutely. He took a breath.

“Did she die with things still bad between you?”

Ah Christ. His throat clogged up. “Yeah.” He met her eyes with difficulty. “I told you that my parents had been gone for a while. It was just Stephanie and me.”

“Like me and Kevin.”

“Yeah.”

“So you do understand.”

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat. “I do understand what it’s like to be responsible for your younger sibling. She was ten years younger than me. I was more than just a big brother. After our mom died, I tried to be like a dad, I guess. I tried to look after her. A couple of years ago she started going out with this guy. He was an asshole.”

She gave a small smile.

“Really, he was. It wasn’t just me being overprotective. I knew in my gut that Linc was bad news. There were lots of signs—things that started out small, like telling her what to wear, and if she didn’t wear what he thought she should, he’d insult her. Hurt her feelings. But for some reason she was in love with him.”

Kendall held his gaze steadily. It was his own that faltered as he told the story he’d never told anyone. Larry, his deputy police chief, and Denny knew some of it, but not all.

“He got more and more controlling and abusive. And then he hit her.”

Her eye widened and her lips parted as she listened intently. He turned his hand so their palms met, watching as his big dark fingers curled around her paler ones.

Talking about this was a struggle for more than the obvious reason. It was difficult to reconcile his dominant tendencies with his revulsion for how Linc treated Steph. His sister’s relationship had made him question his own life and what he was doing, and he was still grappling with that.

“I told her to get out. To leave him. She got sucked into that typical abusive relationship. He apologized, swore he loved her, said he’d never do it again, begged her not to leave him. I know she was torn, but she couldn’t do it.”

He rubbed his thumb back and forth over her knuckles.

“I could see it coming. Knew it was coming. Her life was going to hell and I couldn’t stop it. When I tried to drag her out of there—they lived together at that point—she was furious. Now I was the one begging. I was terrified for her, and I felt…helpless. She kept telling me it was okay, he was changing, but I knew he wasn’t. I’d seen this so many times in my career. I was so fucking scared for her.”

“Oh, Jason.” Her voice drifted over his senses.

“Then one day, I guess things got really bad. Bad enough to scare her into getting the fuck out. She packed her things and she was going to leave.” He closed his eyes at the memory of how close she’d come to getting away. “Linc came home earlier than she expected and found her with her suitcases packed and ready to go. He freaked out on her.”

Kendall made a small, strangled noise. Her other hand came up to cover his.

“She managed to call the police, but when they got there, he wouldn’t let them in. He had a gun and he was holding her hostage.”

She stared at him, now wide-eyed, putting things together. “You…were a hostage negotiator.”

“Yeah.” His throat felt dry and scratchy, but he continued. “Yeah, I was. I was going to her place to try to talk her into leaving, but LAPD was there. I freaked out, knowing that guy had my baby sister inside the apartment at gunpoint. They’d called the D Platoon, who handle hostage situations, but they weren’t there yet. Fuck.” He bent his head, memories swirling darkly around him. “So I stepped up and I tried to talk to Linc, but…”

Now his throat closed right up. Kendall scooted closer on the couch and put her arms around him, laid her forehead against his, her nose alongside his. They stayed like that for long moments while he tried to get his emotions under control. Finally the words came out in a harsh rasp.

“I wasn’t in control of the situation. Linc didn’t want to talk to me and I was forgetting all the rules, all the training. I was good at my job.” He raised his gaze to hers. “I was.”

“I believe you. Without a doubt.” She smoothed a hand over his hair.

“But it was going south and they pulled me off, got someone else from LAPD in to try to make a connection with Linc. It didn’t work. He shot her. Then himself.”

She made an anguished noise and shifted even closer to him, hugging him to her. He took her comfort, drew it inside himself, and for the first time since that whole fucking disaster, he could say it didn’t hurt like a hundred knives stabbing into his guts.

“It wasn’t your fault,” she whispered.

“Yeah. It was.”

“No, Jason. God no. That’s like saying it’s your fault that Natalia is missing.”

And then she went very still in his arms.

“Jason. Is that what you think happened to Natalia? Do you think Kevin is like Linc, that he’d do something like that to her?”

Kendall ached with the hurt Jason must have felt, must still be feeling, but as her mind processed what he told her and made the connections, she knew before he answered her question that he suspected Kevin of doing something to Natalia.

She had to convince him Kevin wasn’t like that—but how?

There was no way Kevin was like that man—Linc. Kevin wasn’t controlling. If anything, he was too laid back about things.
She
was the one who had control issues, for God’s sake.

“It’s not like that,” she said, after a long moment when he didn’t respond. “It really isn’t, Jason.” She hesitated. “Kevin was never like that with Natalia. I know Kevin’s not like that, even when he’s been drinking.”

Jason nodded but she could tell he didn’t fully believe her.

“I know the signs,” she continued. “There’s a girl who works for me. Dedra.”

Jason went still. “Dedra who?”

“Dedra Burke. I worry about her.”

He was silent for a moment, then asked, “What are you worried about?”

She looked down at her hands. “I think her fiancé
is
abusive. He’s very controlling. He has a temper. One time…she came to work and she had bruises on her arms. She denied that he’d done anything, but…”

“You asked her?”

“I didn’t accuse him of hurting her, but I asked how she got the bruises.” She lifted her gaze to his face, and he stared at her with focused intensity. “She lied. I mean, I don’t know for sure, but…you know…” She pressed a fist to her chest. “Deep inside, in my gut, I know. But I’ve never, ever thought that about Kevin with Natalia. Never. Believe me, Jason.”

He nodded, looking thoughtful, and then she leaned into his strength, his warmth, his fortitude. She couldn’t speak, tried to swallow through a constricted, aching throat, held onto him as tightly as she could, like he was going to hold her up and keep her from drowning under the weight of her guilt and sorrow and responsibility.

She wanted to stay like that forever, safe in his arms, held against his broad chest with his hands on her body, comforting, soothing. But that wasn’t real life. In real life, she had to do this on her own. She sucked in a long, shuddering breath.

Her body yearned for him, for his touch, for his comfort, for his strength. She longed for him to make her feel as good as he had last night, to make her forget everything but the pleasure, to make her let go. His eyes darkened as he realized she was looking at his mouth and her own lips had parted too. Their gazes collided with an electric jolt and Kendall’s tummy did a flip of excitement that turned into liquid heat.

“Kendall,” he murmured, reaching out to touch her hair, to smooth back a damp strand stuck to her face. She leaned into his touch, and he cupped her cheek. “I know what you need.”

Their eyes met. “I don’t want to need you,” she whispered.

“I know.” His hand slid down her neck and gently cupped her throat, gentle yet dominant, protective yet dangerous.

He was the person she needed the most. The one who knew how to get rid of the pain from the past by giving her the kind of pain that brought her pleasure. Despite her fears, she knew that to his core he was solid and responsible, a man who thought it was important to do the right thing. Even though he might push her past her comfort zone, she knew he would never hurt her in a way she didn’t want to be hurt, who would look after her in every way she needed.

And that terrified her.

He groaned and leaned toward her to cover her mouth with his in a hot, fierce kiss. His breath warmed her lips. His tongue teased. “Let me show you,” he said against her mouth.

Chapter Eleven

She let him pull her to her feet and lead her up the stairs without a protest. In his bedroom, now familiar to her, they turned to each other and melted into each other’s arms, mouths fused in a long, heated kiss that grew hotter, more desperate. Heat sizzled over Kendall’s skin and she pressed into him needfully, longingly. Her pussy ached, her breasts throbbed and she pushed them against his hard chest, arms twined around his neck. His tongue filled her mouth, stroked over hers, and she moaned. It was crazy, so crazy, so bad, but she couldn’t stop, her common sense apparently having burned up in the lust fever.