Chapter 15
15
RAE
“ H ome sweet home.” Alec shoved the tall wooden door open. With a wide palm pressed to the center, he held it open and gestured for me to enter. “Ladies first.”
I bit back a smile and stepped into the… home? No, this place wasn’t a home.
“This is an estate, not a home, Alec. The driveway was the longest part of the trip.” Slight exaggeration, but it was the longest gravel driveway ever.
He softly shut the door behind us and dropped both our bags on the polished dark hardwood. “I like my privacy. Which reminds me, I have security cameras placed all around the property’s perimeter and in the house. Plus security alarms, glass-break sensors, and motion alarms. We’re safe here.”
“Fort Knox,” I muttered under my breath. But it was a relief. This place, the faraway location, was a relief. I inhaled deep, feeling like a free woman. “It’s beautiful, Alec.” I continued to inspect every inch of the entryway and the two adjoining rooms. To our right was a large living room full of leather furniture and a stone fireplace, to my left a personal library.
I held in my squeak of excitement at the stuffed shelves. My fingers twitched at my side to brush along the spines.
“You were right,” I said, turning to him. “I needed this. I already feel better, like the weight of the world has lifted from my shoulders. I know I fought you at first”—I shot him an annoyed look at his smirk—“but I’m glad you kidnapped me.”
A shy grin, one I’d never seen before, made his features soften, giving him a younger, less authoritative appearance.
“Come on.” He grabbed my hand and interlaced our fingers. “I’ll give you a quick tour, and then I need a nap.” He covered a yawn with his free hand. “I haven’t slept in twenty-four hours.”
A yawn of my own had my mouth opening. “Yeah, I’m exhausted.” Which I was, and I had a feeling being here, with him and the security, I’d sleep harder than I had in a long time. I chased that deep sleep with wine all the time but could never fully allow myself to be that vulnerable. But not here, not with him.
We passed a gym and a bedroom before the hallway gave way to a massive open space. The kitchen, a cozier living room, and the dining room all flowed together with a wall of windows on the other side. I removed my hand from his and moved to that bright wall to get a better look outside. To the left was a pool with a cabana, seating area, outdoor kitchen, and pergola. Opposite that was nothing but beautiful Texas landscape.
To the non-Texan, all they’d see was rocks, dirt, and piles of dust. But not to me, and apparently not to Alec, if he made these windows to stare out all day.
“Wow.” I glanced over my shoulder, smiling. “It’s beautiful.”
He nodded, his face unreadable as he watched me. “Come to the kitchen.” He held a hand out for me. “We skipped breakfast, and it’s almost lunchtime. I need food.”
I placed my hand in his. “Tired and hungry. That can’t be a good combo. I’m starving too.”
“A woman who likes to eat. I like her already.”
I turned toward the feminine voice. An older woman with the sweetest smile strode across the room, wiping her hands on the front of the pressed blue floral apron that hung from her waist.
I shook my hand out of Alec’s and swiped the sweat from my palm onto the sweatshirt before jutting it out between me and the woman. “Hi, I’m—” My grunt cut off the next words when she bypassed my hand and wrapped her arms around my shoulders in a tight bear hug. I stood stiff, not knowing how to respond, but the longer she held me the more relaxed I became in her arms.
How long had it been since another woman, a friend or motherly figure, had wrapped me in a loving hug? Tears threatened at the sadness and joy that swirled from this simple kind gesture.
“You must be Rae.” She finally released me but still held on to my shoulders at arm’s length. “I’m Sherry.” We both turned at the sound of the fridge opening. “You two must be exhausted from the trip and”—she fluttered a hand in front of her face—“everything you’ve been through. I’ll make you both a heavy snack and bring it to your rooms. I’m sure you’ll want to shower before crawling into bed.”
“You’re a gem, Sher Sher,” Alec drawled and shut the fridge. “If I could sleep-eat right now, I would. Damn, I’m exhausted.”
I nodded in agreement. Him mentioning it was like a trigger to my exhaustion. I could barely keep my eyes open.
“I’ll get Rae settled into one of the guest rooms.” Alec’s lips pursed unhappily about that revelation. Quite frankly, so was I. “Then I’ll bring you something to eat in your bedroom. It’ll be there before you’re out of the shower.”
Before I could agree or disagree, Sherry herded me toward another long hall. Before we slipped out of sight, I checked over my shoulder for Alec. He stood with his hip pressed against the counter, smiling as if everything was right in his world. I smiled back, loving that for the first time since he found me in the jail cell, he appeared genuinely happy.
The sun was high in the sky, its bright rays burning through the large window, when I awoke hours later. Groggy from sleep, I sat up and rubbed my eyes. I surveyed the room I was too tired to appreciate before sliding into the softest sheets and instantly falling asleep.
Soft blues and yellows sprinkled around the room on pillows, the fluffy duvet, and accented with a few pictures perfectly hung on the wall. It was cute, quaint. There was no way Alec decorated this. The front living room that was 100 percent masculine, yes, but not this room. This spoke to a female’s touch. Sherry’s maybe?
The urge to use the restroom forced me out of the comfortable bed before I was ready. Padding to the door, I pulled it open and checked up and down the hall before hurrying to the bathroom across from my room.
I winced at my reflection and did my best to tame my wild mane. I knew better than to go to sleep with it wet. Thankfully I found a stack of unused hair ties in the drawer, saving me from looking like a hot mess.
Minutes later, I stepped out of the bathroom refreshed and feeling more like myself, only to draw up short when I found Sherry going through my drawers. No, not going through them—filling them. The suitcase I had hastily packed earlier sat open on the bench at the end of the bed, half empty.
“Hi,” I said shyly.
Sherry whipped around with a smile. “Hope you don’t mind. I just wanted you to feel settled. Alec mentioned you two would stick around for a few days.”
My ears perked at the mention of him. “Is he up too?”
She nodded. “Out by the pool, waiting for you when you’re ready.”
I turned my attention to the suitcase and frowned. I hadn’t packed a bathing suit, mostly because I didn’t own one.
“You can borrow one of my suits. We’re about the same size, and I have a brand-new one I haven’t used.”
My frown deepened as I studied her frame. “Um, I don’t think?—”
“Nonsense. Of course you can use it. I’d be delighted. I’ll go get it and be right back so you can change.”
I held up a hand to stop her, but she was gone. With a reluctant sigh, I sat on the edge of the bed. Only a minute passed of me staring at my hands before she returned, a beautiful black one piece in her hand.
The material was smooth as I rubbed it between two fingers. Trepidation built in my chest as I turned it to look at the size. My brows furrowed at the double-digit number. I glanced up at Sherry through my lashes.
“I don’t understand. How did you know my size?”
“I didn’t.” Sherry shook her head, confusion clear in her fluctuating tone. “I bought that for me.”
“But you’re, well, to be blunt smaller than me.”
Understanding brightened her eyes. “I think you’re mistaken. Try it on. I’ll grab you a cover-up and be right back.”
I stared at the swimsuit, only knowing she left the room when the door clicked closed.
Ten minutes later, I was dressed in a matching sheer black cover-up, flip-flops, and wide brim straw hat. None of it my own, yet it all fit perfectly. That still made little sense. I thought it over as I made my way down the slate walkway, the borrowed flip-flops smacking against my heels with each step.
The sun blazed overhead, instantly making sweat bead along my spine and forehead, but thankfully the hat kept the harmful rays from hitting the fair skin of my face. The rest of my body was just as fair, but hopefully since it was late afternoon, I wouldn’t burn without sunscreen.
I rounded the full outdoor kitchen, and the pool came into view. Oversized with a diving board on one end, its clear water sparkled and glinted. A dark form speared through the water, bubbles and waves emerging in its wake. Alec’s dark hair breached the surface first as he came up for air. Water cascaded along his tan skin, sprinkles raining from his strands when he shook his head and rubbed at his eyes.
A wide smile broke across his face when he found me staring from beneath the shade of the pergola. Treading water, he hitched his chin.
“The water feels great.”
“Looks great,” I muttered beneath my breath. Clutching the cover-up tighter, I shook my head. “Sherry said she’d bring out some snacks.” And wine. The wine was what I needed the most for liquid courage. Anyone like me half naked around this Adonis would need it too.
His arms cut through the water as he swam toward the ladder. Hands gripping the rails, he hauled himself out. Water slicked down his taut pecs and weaved through his ripped ab muscles.
I licked my lips and all but fell into a chair, my knees literally giving out at the sexiest sight I’d ever seen.
“I was beginning to think you’d sleep forever,” he joked, shooting a wink my way. A tall wire shelf stood just off the pool, adorned with stacks and stacks of thick white towels. He grabbed one and pressed it against one eye, then the other.
“You been up long?” He shook his head, sending water to sprinkle my bare legs. He smiled at the sight and did it again. I shifted with a squeal. “Such a kid.” While he dried off, I took in the expansive pool area. “This place is amazing. From the house to this, I’m a little intimidated, to be honest.”
He cocked his head to the side. “Why?” The genuine confusion in his tone made me chuckle. He had no idea how all this could make a commoner, someone like me, feel. Add his sexy self to it all and I felt way out of my league.
“Because you’re you.” I waved a hand up and down his chiseled body. “With all this.” I gestured toward the house and pool. “And I’m me, with a one-bedroom cottage that’s falling apart.” I avoided him, choosing to watch the pool water lazily lap against the tiled edge.
“Rae, look at me.” Reluctantly I leaned back in the chair so I could look up. “None of that matters. Don’t allow this stuff to intimidate you.”
“How can I not? You have a live-in housekeeper, Alec. That’s not normal.”
He shrugged off my comment. “What is normal?” Metal screeched against the stained concrete as he tugged his own chair away from the matching metal table and plopped down. “My mom’s family was wealthy, so when she… died….” He struggled around that word, making me wonder what really happened. “Her trust was split between me and my sister.”
“I barely remember your sister,” I mused. She was older than us and never really did much around school. A sinking feeling turned my stomach sour. “Did your father treat her the way he treated you?” I didn’t want to use the word abused in case it sent him into defensive mode. Talking through all this was fresh for him; it would make sense if he had triggers that would shut him down.
I would know, had seen it many times before in the haunted eyes and reluctant tendencies of abused women. I wrapped my hand around my charm bracelet tightly.
Alec pitched forward and pressed both elbows to the tops of his thighs, clasped hands dangling between them.
“I took the brunt of it.” Water dripped from his hair onto the concrete he suddenly found riveting. “She never needed as much discipline as my mom and me. I was the one who needed to toughen up, to be a man.” The knuckles on both hands went white as he tightened his hold. “She left to study at Oxford and never came back. We still keep in contact, talk once or twice a year. We never talk about what happened during our childhood.”
“Sounds healthy,” I joked, the lightness in my voice forced, trying to ease the growing tension from his raised shoulders.
“You’re the only person who knows what went down that last day, what he said.” Slowly, he lifted his face, those gray eyes locked with mine. “I told no one what he said. Sherry knows the basics.” He grimaced like he hated that minor fact. “She’s been the one to slap sense into me when I lose myself to the memories.”
“And you never hurt her.” It was a statement—I knew he would never—but he needed to see that. My faith in him couldn’t carry him through the healing he desperately needed. He had to believe in himself too.
“Of course I never hurt her,” he huffed.
“So if she saw you at your worst and survived without a bump or bruise, then why do you think it would be different with me? Why are you determined to push me away when the evidence of your control over your actions and emotions lives here with you? And I can tell she cares about you, deeply.”
He glanced away, dismissing me.
“Why can’t you see yourself the way we do? The truth?”
His gaze slowly traveled back to me. With a brow arched, he leaned back in the chair and rested an arm on each armrest. “I could ask you the same thing.”
I paused, not expecting that response. “That’s different,” I breathed. “Totally different.”
“No, it’s not. You keep believing some false narrative about your body, about what you offer, refusing to believe others find you beautiful.” Rolling his lower lip between his teeth, he tilted his head. “Do you think Sherry is too heavy to be beautiful?”
“Well no, but that’s not?—”
“It is the same. You’re wearing her bathing suit right now, are you not?”
I narrowed my eyes at him. How the hell does he know that? I sealed my lips, refusing to answer. This conversation was over.
“The same bathing suit that looks damn good on you.”
Okay, maybe it wasn’t. The gurgle of the pool and buzz of the overhead fan inched up my anticipation wondering what he would say next. “We’ve both believed certain lies about ourselves for over three decades. None of that, how we view ourselves, will change in a day.”
I mulled that over and nodded. “Agreed.”
“I will add this to the conversation, because it would be wrong of me to not bring it up.” I swallowed and inched to the edge of the metal chair, my full attention on Alec and his next revelation. “As attracted as I am to you physically, it’s who you are that entrapped me from the start. You were always so damn happy.” A wistful look washed over his features. “Did you know I was jealous of you, of your life?”
“Mine?” I huffed.
“You had it all. You were—” He smirked as though he found his next words funny. “—sunshine personified. Kind to everyone, even those bitches at school. You believed everyone deserved a friend, a smile, and I was hell on wheels. Everything in my life revolved around rules and punishments and pain.” Vulnerability flashed in his eyes, making me itch to go to him, but I stayed rooted in my seat. “You were the only good in my life. I looked forward to seeing you at school, for that beautiful distraction you offered with your smiles and laughs. I wanted what we planned together that night,” he admitted hoarsely. “And I’m sorry I promised you the world and then walked away.”
“Wow,” I said in a long breath.
The shuffle of footsteps stopped me for asking for more, digging into his reason for leaving and finding out where he went, where he’d been all those years. A round plastic platter hovered in front of my face before settling down onto the table. A bucket filled with ice and a bottle of white wine rested beside it.
Without me asking, she poured half a plastic stemless glass.
“Thanks, Sher Sher,” he said with a lopsided grin. He licked his lips as he stared at the platter stuffed with cheeses, meats, fruit, and crackers. “I’m starving.”
I’d barely gotten out my own thank-you before she left, saying something about getting things started for dinner. Without bothering with the serving utensil, Alec began picking meats off the platter and shoving them into his mouth. He caught my amused smirk.
“What?”
“Where in the hell do you put all that?” I said around a laugh. Leaning forward, I plucked a strawberry off the platter. The juices slipped past my lips and rolled down my chin as I sank my teeth into the perfectly ripe fruit.
“I work out a lot,” he said absentmindedly, watching the juice slide down my chin before I could wipe it away. “I picked up boxing in the military.”
“How did you end up in the military?” I grabbed a cracker and nibbled on the edge. “I read where you spent time in the army before going to the Dallas police force, then became a state trooper, but I never read how it all happened. Figured you would’ve gone into business like your dad, but now I know why you didn’t.”
That damn teasing smirk popped his adorable dimple. “You read my Ranger bio?”
Well, shit.
“Maybe?” I shoved the rest of the cracker into my mouth and gave him a tight-lipped smile. “I just wanted to know what happened to you, where you’d gone. I always wondered.”
Alec finished chewing a few grapes and swallowed. “I never forgot about you either. Wondered how you were, what you were doing. Who you were with.” A flash of anger hardened his features.
“Really? I figured you forgot about me the day you left. Since you never came back, I just assumed I didn’t matter.” Inhaling deep, I studied the half-eaten platter of food. “I used to dream you would come back for me, would save me from what my life had turned into. Honestly, I’m not sure how much of what I held on to was young love or desperation to cling to the last time I remembered being happy. But you never came for me, and I guess year after year, each time something bad happened, then my self-inflicted isolation, you became the only dream I had left. That sounds so pathetic, but I could imagine, could dream of what could’ve been, a fantasy of a better life with you.” I peeked up through my lashes. “And seeing you like this”—I flicked a hand toward his hard bare chest—“does not help with the minor obsession I developed over the years.”
“Obsession?” His tone indicated he liked the sound of that.
“That’s what you heard?” I tossed a green grape at his head. “Whatever. Enough about me being a freak and hopelessly infatuated with a man I once knew. You were saying something about boxing and the military.”
He nodded. “It helps get my aggression out. Some days are harder than others to forget and move on. Punching the shit out of something helps on the bad days.” His lips parted, ready to say something else when his phone vibrated along the table. He flipped it over and checked the screen. “Charlie,” he said to me.
My stomach sank.
What now?