Chapter 4 #2
He saw her trembling hand and steadied it with his own. He removed the lettuce from her fingers, curled his big, rough hand around hers and brought her hand to his mouth.
His breath was a hot wash over her skin. Goose pimples broke out when he kissed her hand.
He understood exactly what was going on inside her. His dark eyes were so intelligent and so heat-filled she didn’t know where to look.
If he had had that annoyingly smug male look of someone who’d hooked a live one, this would have been easy. Put up a wall, eat the nice food, make light conversation, be distant when saying good night, avoid the kiss.
But he didn’t look smug. He looked serious, stern, as if wild sexual attraction were the most dangerous thing on earth.
And it was. A loaded grenade, in fact.
Oh God, she had to nip this in the bud, and fast.
“Look, I—” Nicole’s eyes widened in dismay. The words didn’t come out. This was terrifying. All that came out was a huff of air as her throat tightened. She had to stop and try again.
“Look.” Through sheer willpower she steadied her voice, tugging her hand from his. Trying to, anyway. His hold was painless but unbreakable. “There’s something I need to say to you, right up front, Sam. And I need you to listen to me carefully.”
He bowed his head, eyes always on hers. “Fine.” He tightened his warm grasp slightly. “But I want to be touching you while I listen.”
Well, hell. Him not touching her was part of what she wanted to say. But her hand felt…wonderful in his. Warm, surrounded by hard male flesh, somehow safe.
She took a deep breath because this wasn’t going to be easy.
For a moment she simply looked at him, at this very large, very strong, utterly male man who had most improbably woken up her dormant libido at exactly the wrong time in her life. She had an enormous pang of regret for what she had to say to him, but there was no evading it. It had to be done.
From the moment she’d gone to pick up her sick father in Dushanbe and had been told by the doctors what condition he was in, she’d known that her old life was over and that everything but caring for her father was going to have to be tossed overboard.
Her carefree single life in Geneva, friends, a love life.
Everything had to go. She’d seen it all in one moment of brutal clarity.
The only other thing she could allow into her life was work, and that was purely out of necessity.
She hadn’t been even remotely tempted to allow anything else into her life before now, but somehow Sam Reston made her yearn, yearn for the affair they might have had if things had been different.
But they weren’t.
“This…this thing between us—” she waved her free hand between them, “and you’ll notice I’m not denying that there’s something. But whatever it is, it has to stop here. Much as I’d like to explore it, I can’t.”
His face was utterly impassive and he held himself still. He didn’t even appear to be breathing. He was completely concentrated on her, all that male power, tightly focused on her.
She’d asked him to listen carefully because she thought he wouldn’t want to hear what she was saying. He didn’t show any trace of denial, though, as most men would have. Maybe that was a soldier’s gift—to see what was. If you couldn’t see reality, no matter how unpalatable, you were dead.
“Explain, please.” The deep voice sounded thoughtful, not angry or defensive.
“Okay. I need to tell you where my life is right now.” Deep breath.
Let it out in one controlled stream. Just like her yoga teacher had taught her.
“A little over a year ago I was living in Geneva, where I’d gone to university.
I was working for the UN as a translator.
I loved my job and I had a wide circle of friends and an active social life. ”
She looked out the window for a second, allowing herself the sharp pang of pain at what had been lost.
How incredibly happy she’d been. Young, single, earning well.
She’d loved translating, her colleagues, her friends, her life.
The UN paid very well, in Swiss francs and tax free.
Geneva was a dream city—pretty and green and safe, surrounded by gorgeous mountains with the best skiing in the world.
A short train ride away from southern France and northern Italy.
The world had been her oyster. She suppressed a sigh. Those days were gone, forever.
She looked back at Sam, watching her steadily. “Well,” she said briskly, “I imagine you know all that if you checked my website. Or at least you’d know the basics.”
“Yeah.” The deep voice was quiet. “I know you lived in Geneva and worked for the UN. Sounds interesting.”
A sharp little stab to the heart. “Yes, yes it was interesting. I loved it.” Nicole sat up straighter, stiffening her spine.
It had been good. It was now over. Deal.
“But now I have other priorities. I’ve always been close to my parents.
My mother died in a car accident when I was twenty and it was a huge blow to my father and me.
We just had each other. When I graduated and started my new job, he was appointed ambassador to Tajikistan, with special plenipotentiary powers.
He seemed as happy in his new life as I was in mine.
So I had no inkling of trouble when the call came.
Midnight, on the fourteenth of May, a little over a year ago.
The call was to say that Dad was in the hospital. ”
Nicole’s mouth tightened. She remembered the scene so vividly.
The call had come on a Friday evening. She’d been packing for a ski holiday on the glaciers, happily thinking of snow and schnaps and schnitzel.
Then her world fell apart. The caller was an embassy secretary, to say that her father was in the ICU.
An hour later, Nicole had been at the Geneva airport, waiting for the first of four connections for the 24-hour trip to get to her father’s side.
“The Embassy said that my—my father was very ill, in a coma. I left immediately and when I arrived in Dushanbe, Dad was just coming out of it. In carrying out a CAT scan to exclude a stroke, they discovered that—”
Oh God. This was so hard to say. Her hand in his started trembling and his hold tightened slightly.
Just say it.
“They discovered that he has brain cancer. Not one big tumor, which would be serious but perhaps treatable. His brain is riddled with them, almost too numerous to count, the doctors said. Inoperable. The only thing they could do for him was radiotherapy to extend his lifespan a little, and some chemotherapy. I was making arrangements to fly him back with me on a medevac flight to Geneva, when he started waking up. I knew I could cope in Geneva. I could find a larger house to rent; medical care there is excellent; the UN has a very generous health plan that includes relatives; I was phoning people, working it all out. When he was fully awake, Dad was told his condition. And—and he told me he’d served his country abroad all his adult life, and that now he wanted to go home, back to the States to—”
Nicole’s throat seized up, simply wouldn’t work. Her eyes prickled and she had to look away for a second. She swallowed. Sam didn’t show any impatience at all. He simply sat, looking at her, holding her hand. Quiet and still and focused.
A minute, two. She stared blindly out the window until she could get her voice back. She drew in a shuddering breath and looked back at him.
“To die. He wanted to come back home to die,” she finally whispered. A single tear spilled from her eye and plopped onto the table. And here she thought she had no tears left.
Sam dried the track it had left with his thumb. The skin of his finger was rough, like a cat’s tongue, the touch delicate.
“Sorry,” she said, bowing her head. A weeping dinner date was no fun.
“Sorry?” He frowned. “For what?”
She was sorry about everything. Sorry that she was soon going to lose her father, sorry about her reduced life, sorry that this attraction couldn’t go anywhere.
Okay, the next bit just had to be said.
“From that moment, from the moment I learned that my father was very ill and that he wanted to come home, my life changed on a dime. I quit my job and we moved here, to the house my grandmother left me.” Nicole tried to make her voice brisk.
“So, Sam. Like it or not, this is my life. My father is dying and we have no money. While closing up Dad’s affairs, I discovered that Dad had invested his life savings in a mutual fund run by Lawrence Karloff. ”
She nodded when he winced. The tangled lawsuits of the thousands of people who’d lost every cent of their savings in the giant Ponzi scheme run by the Wall Street legend were still making headlines.
“Yes, indeed. Dad lost every penny he’d ever put aside to that bastard Karloff.
He is essentially penniless. That SOB took everything.
And since Dad had to retire from the State Department early for reasons of health, he has a reduced pension.
Basically, the pension pays for the utilities, food, taxes and that’s about it.
The State Department covers hospitalization.
But the costs for his nursing care, our housekeeper, his physical rehab, the drugs…
they’re all astronomical and they’re all on me.
I don’t think we could have afforded to actually move back to the States if my grandmother hadn’t left me our house.
Luckily, we don’t have to pay rent or a mortgage.
Otherwise I don’t think it would have worked and Dad wouldn’t have gotten his—his wish.