Chapter 53 #2
I look over at Kane. Despite the fact that his shoulders are still shaking with suppressed laughter, his eyes remain on mine, waiting to see how I’ll react. The fading flash of blue on his teeth catches my attention. Mel’s words echo in my head.
With effort, I summon up a smile, a part of me acknowledging I do feel strangely privileged to be included in the camaraderie of their unusual club.
When Kane responds with a slow smile and an approving tilt of his head, the warmth that floods me is troubling.
Ross strolls over, fighting a grin. “You’re not alone in falling for that one, Amy.” He wraps an affectionate arm around Mel’s waist. “Mel was also one of Nugget’s victims.”
Mel bumps him with her hip. “If I remember rightly, I was as mad as Amy is right now.”
“You got over it quickly enough.”
I flick a glance at Ross. “I look forward to paying you back one day.”
“Actually, Amy’s already made a start on paying you back,” Kane says, stroking a dusty Nugget.
Ross’s eyes narrow. “What are you talking about?”
Kane looks ready to run. “You know the problem you’ve been having with the oil under the Jeep?”
Ross lunges for him. “You’ve got to be kidding!”
Kane moves quickly so an oblivious Nugget stands between them. “Keep in mind it was Amy’s idea.”
I prop my hands on my hips at the unapologetic cheek of the man. “Who poured oil under the car every morning?”
“I can’t believe I fell for that old trick!” Ross says in disgust as he and Kane circle Nugget. “Three mornings I’ve wasted tinkering under that car. I was ready to take it in today.”
“Kane, really, what a cruel joke,” Mel says, looking ready to trip him up if he dared run past her.
Kane stares at her in disbelief. “And blue teeth is kind?”
“But that wasn’t Z’s idea.”
“He helped you, I’m sure.”
“Yes, he did,” Mel admits happily.
The momentary diversion of Kane’s attention, however, is enough for Ross to dive at him and catch him in a headlock. Ross winks at Mel and she smiles in triumph.
Watching Kane and Ross wrestle like school boys, my chest tightens on a sudden surge of emotion.
If at the end of all this I turn Kane in to the police, what will happen to Ross and Mel?
Will they face charges of accessories to kidnapping?
I don’t want that. If I’m honest with myself, I don’t even want Kane behind bars.
Just picturing him in a prison cell locked up for years and years causes dismay to rise up inside me.
Abruptly, an image of Nolene taking pictures of me while I was paralyzed flashes through my head. I won’t be upset if she spends a couple of months in jail to teach her a lesson.
Then I remember it was Kane who injected me. From there, a list of all the other wrongs he did to me tumbles through my head. Confusion overwhelms me.
I’m pulled from the spiraling descent of my thoughts when Nugget nudges me expectantly with his nose.
“Forget it,” I tell him. I glance up to find Kane regarding me with a watchful expression, as if he picked up on my change of mood. Snorting, Nugget pushes me again and I push him back. “Cut it out.”
Smiling, Mel strokes the horse’s neck. “Don’t worry, old boy. My turn now.”
As Kane and Ross drift away and I rest in the shade to watch Mel brush Nugget, I remind myself these people aren’t monsters. They’re ordinary people who crossed a lot of legal lines fighting for what they think is right. And I’m caught in the middle.
#
Later that afternoon, I grab a nap in my room. I don’t ask for permission and refuse to feel guilty when everyone else carries on with their chores. They chose this life. If they want to run themselves ragged, that’s their choice.
It’s a lifestyle I can’t even begin to understand.
I learned yesterday that Ross and Mel have made huge financial and personal sacrifices for the sanctuary.
Not even their evenings are free. Mel spends most of her nights tackling piles of paperwork, while Ross is on the phone sourcing funding for the sanctuary and writing animal welfare articles.
A tap on my door wakes me up. I sit up in bed just as Kane enters my room. Troubling heat floods my belly at the sight of his broad shoulders, muscular body, and irritatingly handsome face.
“How are you feeling?” he asks.
I take a sip of the water on my bedside table. “I’m aching in places I never thought possible.”
“Hard work will do that to you.”
Annoyance rises up. “Here we go again. The noble kidnapper lecturing the spoiled princess.”
He frowns. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
I stand and face him, my heart beating too fast. I’ve had enough of him claiming the moral high ground. “I think that’s exactly how you meant it.”
Kane eyes me warily. “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed.”
“Says the person on the wrong side of the law.”
But my snappy retort is spoiled because my gaze keeps drifting to his mouth. Of course, he notices. He’s a man who notices everything.
For a breathless moment, we stare at one another.
Then he says, “I think I better leave.”
“Yes, run away,” I mock, the words knocking aside all my carefully constructed barriers of caution in their rush to touch something in him. “That’s what you do best.”
Judging by the tightening of his jaw and the energy radiating off him, I’m getting to him. The problem is, he’s getting to me as well.
The air between us thrums with tension.
He steps closer. I remain rooted to the spot.
“What are you pushing for?” he asks in a low voice.
“What do you think?” I whisper, my breath quickening.
For four, maybe five, heartbeats, he stands there, the conflict playing out on his face. Then he closes the distance between us and says roughly, “Remember, you asked for this.”
He takes my face in his hands and his mouth comes down on mine. My senses flare with the taste of him, the dry scrape of his stubble against my skin, the warmth of his mouth. Heat pours through me. I dig my nails into his shoulders and his hands slide across my back, crushing me against him.
And I wish... I wish with a painful, hopeless kind of desperation that Kane was a businessman I met at a cocktail party, with a tuxedo taming that powerful body, ladies covertly eyeing his rugged attractiveness, but his gaze fixed only on me.
The kiss slows and deepens. Kane’s hands move up my spine, his fingers tangling in my hair. My joints become loose and soft, and I press closer to him. A moan slips from my throat.
Instantly, he pulls back, setting me away from him. His cheekbones are flushed, his eyes blazing with desire.
I stare at him in a daze, still staggering from the impact of the kiss and the suddenness of his withdrawal.
We stare at one another in silence, our breathing labored and uneven.
Finally, Kane breaks the silence with a hard laugh, his lips twisted with self-loathing.
“You represent everything I’m fighting against,” he forces out, his hands clenching and unclenching, as if it’s my throat in his grip.
“I look at you, at your life, and I can’t stand you.
” His voice drops to a rough whisper. “Yet I still want you. I can’t get you out of my head and it’s driving me crazy. ”
I draw in a shaky breath. My eyes burn. I pushed him to this and now I’m paying the price.
“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” he says, his expression tortured. “It seems all I’m doing is hurting you and apologizing afterward.”
I can’t speak. I wish I could put him in his place with a snappy retort—as if someone like you could ever hurt me—but even that wouldn’t be true because right now I am hurting. A great weight presses on my chest. All I can do is stand here and hope I won’t break down in front of him.
How odd that the comment made by Darren, my disastrous whitewater rafting date, comes back now to haunt me. One day you’ll meet someone who won’t be cowed by your looks or your father.
Well, I finally met that someone.
“Let’s get through this,” Kane says now, his face tightly shuttered. “Then we’ll never have to see one another again. We can forget this ever happened.”