Chapter 9
The next morning she woke up feeling better.
The first thing she had to do today was get settled that she could stay with Caleb for the near future. Hopefully he would suggest it again so she could act like she was caving and finally agree.
She couldn’t trust him to bring it up on his own though. Even if he wanted to continue having sex with her, he might not want her to make herself at home at his place indefinitely. But she needed to stay here—as close to him as she could get—and he needed to think it was his idea.
Overnight, she’d come up with an idea, so she got up early, put a bathrobe on over the T-shirt she was still wearing, and quietly walked downstairs.
Caleb should be leaving for work in a little while. She needed to find somewhere he was likely to see her but didn’t look like she was trying to be seen.
She got a cup of coffee as an excuse for being downstairs, thanking Breah and making sure the housekeeper saw where she was heading from there.
She settled in a small, pleasant sunroom and immediately pulled out her phone.
She started to write an email to herself, repeating the same sentence over and over.
Several minutes passed without any sign of Caleb, and she was starting to resign herself to another failed idea when a voice from the doorway made her jump. “You’re up early.”
Remembering what she was supposed to do, she ducked the phone quickly out of sight into the pocket of her robe. “Yeah,” she said with a smile. “Couldn’t sleep.”
Caleb was dressed in another suit, looking so sexy and sophisticated that she was momentarily breathless. And more breathless when he walked over with a possessive heat in his eyes.
She let him pull her to her feet.
“You look irresistibly rumpled this morning,” he murmured, tilting his head down toward her. “Like someone finally gave you the fuck you needed.”
Her mind was a hot blur of conflicted responses, and before she could sort them out, Caleb slipped a hand into the pocket where she’d put her phone and smoothly pulled it out.
He was actually bringing up the screen display when she snatched it back out of his hand.
“What the hell?” She didn’t have to fake her indignation. The bastard thought he had the right to invade her privacy, to look at her phone. “That’s not yours.”
She stuffed the phone back into the pocket, glaring at him, feeling a tremor of fear at the idea of his seeing the email she’d just been writing, which was made up of What the fuck am I doing? repeated about a hundred times.
Her phone was locked, but it didn’t make the fear of his seeing it any less real.
The corner of his lips tilted up. “I wanted to see what you were doing. You looked so intense and secretive.”
“Well, next time, ask like a normal person instead of behaving like a presumptuous ass.”
His expression changed again, and he slid a hand down the line of her spine until it was resting on the small of her back. Tilting his head closer to her, he murmured warmly, huskily, “Wouldn’t you like to tell me?”
Torn between more anger and involuntary amusement, she pulled away from him. His instinctive entitlement was absolutely outrageous. “That’s not how a normal person asks either.”
“I bet it would work though.”
It probably would. He could likely charm or seduce the secrets out of anyone he set his mind to, and she’d have to be very careful to not let it work on her too.
He wasn’t even making a serious attempt right now. He was having fun with her. She could see the glint of humor in his eyes, and something inside her wanted to respond to it.
She smothered that weak little part of herself, though, and remembered why she was there in the first place. “If you want to know something, ask.”
“What were you doing just now when I came in?”
She sighed as if resigning herself to answer him—even though she’d come down here on purpose to tell him this very thing. “I was emailing someone I know. Trying to get some more information on?—”
She trailed off strategically.
He obviously knew who she was referring to. Her fictional ex-lover who’d sent the thugs after her. “Any news?”
She shook her head, letting her shoulders and head slump.
“You know, I could help, if you’d let me.” His voice was different now, nothing playful or teasing about it. It was quiet, thoughtful.
“I already told you that it’s my problem and I’m going to deal with it.”
“But that’s irrational, and I’m not in the habit of accepting irrationality from people who know better.”
The words were blunt, almost rude, but she realized they were also almost a compliment. He must have a certain amount of respect for her if he expected her to make rational choices.
She wasn’t here to be sensible though. At all. “It’s not your problem, Caleb. Stop pushing.”
“I’m not going to stop pushing until you tell me what I want to know.”
In a way, his matter-of-fact stubbornness right now was just as outrageously entitled as grabbing her phone earlier. And, without the teasing veneer, it was even more likely to work.
She made a frustrated noise as if in resignation, and rubbed her face briefly with both hands. “Okay, fine. I got involved with the wrong guy. He won’t take no for an answer.”
“Is this the guy who texted in the park, who wouldn’t take no for an answer?”
She thought about using the text he’d seen her receive from Jesse to solidify the lie, but she was afraid her expression back then hadn’t been quite right to pull that off now. “No. That was just a random guy. This other guy is… different.”
“He’s turned dangerous.”
“Yeah.”
“Who is he?”
“I’m not going to tell you that.”
“Why—”
“Because I don’t want you involved. I’m not coming to you for help. I told you that before. I don’t want you dragged in. Things got out of control. I can get it together again though.”
“How exactly?” He looked like he believed her. Not particularly sympathetic but curious, like there was a puzzle to solve. “Have you gone to the police?”
“I did at the beginning, but it just made things worse.”
“But that was a direct attack on Sunday night. The police would have to?—”
“No police. He’s… he’s connected, and I can’t trust the police.” She’d developed a whole backstory where she could feed him pieces of information that wouldn’t get him anywhere but would give the impression of her being in real danger. She saw Caleb’s expression change as he processed the words.
“Connected.”
“Yeah.”
“You really did get involved with the wrong guy,” he murmured.
Talk about a hypocritical asshole. What right did he have to judge anyone else’s connections to organized crime?
“Tell me about it.” That was all she could tell him right now. Any more would give him too much to work with, and she needed to string him along for at least a couple of weeks.
He stood in front of her, absently rubbing the back of his neck with his hand, thinking through what she’d told him.
“So you see why I don’t want anyone else dragged into this.”
“Sure, but I also see why you need my help.” He’d evidently made up his mind. “When you go back to your apartment, what’s going to stop him from coming after you again?”
She looked away from him and gave a helpless little shrug, hoped it was convincing.
“So stay here. For a while. My security is top of the line. You’ll be safer here than anywhere else.”
It was exactly what she’d been hoping to hear.
“I can’t stay here indefinitely, Caleb.”
“Why not? It won’t be forever. Just until you can figure out something to do.” His tone was light, persuasive, and there was that glint of clever humor in his eyes again.
She knew what he was thinking. He was thinking that soon she’d cave and tell him all her secrets so he could get the answers to this new mystery that had intrigued him. He was pleased with himself for finding a way to snare a woman who refused to let herself get caught.
She had to let him think that even though it was wrong.
There was no way in hell she would ever tell this man her secrets.
“Okay,” she said after a long hesitation. “Fine. I’ll stay for now, but it’s not going to be for long.”
“Good.” He glanced at his watch. “I’ve got to get to work, but I’ll be back earlier today.”
“Okay. I’m really sorry about dragging?—”
“Don’t apologize again. I pressured you into coming here in the first place, didn’t I?”
“Well, yeah.”
“And I pressured you to stay. So I dragged myself into this. I might be able to help you if you let me.”
She checked his expression and saw he still wasn’t soft or tender. He did seem to want to help, but it was more like a challenge. A chance to prove that he was more powerful than this nameless criminal.
Men never really outgrew being boys.
She spent the day taking it easy, pretending to recover, and making plans.
She even said hello to Ralph, the German shepherd.
She asked if someone could take her over to her apartment so she could get some of her stuff, and—after phoning Caleb for permission—one of the security team drove her over.
At six, she was in the window seat in her room, pretending to read.
She was mostly just watching for Caleb’s car to return.
For the first time in a long time, she felt something akin to hope. There was no happy ending in this for her. She wasn’t deceived about that. The most she could hope for was a dark sort of victory.
Just an answer. A way to move on from a path in the woods with blood soaking into the dirt.
But, at this point, she’d be happy for even that.
Caleb normally stayed in his apartment in the city during the week, but he’d been driving out to his house in the evenings instead—she assumed because of her. At twenty after six, she saw his Mercedes pull in through the gates, and she put down her book.
She knew what she was going to do.