Chapter Two #2
It was a demand, nothing less. He came out of the shadows, a darker entity that almost appeared insubstantial until he got up next to her.
She opened her mouth to deny the tears when his voice registered.
A note. One off note. Someone else might not have caught it, but she had intimate knowledge of his voice.
She studied him carefully before reacting. Instead of Hawkin Wilder standing straight with his wide shoulders and killer body, Harlow could see he was hunched over, both arms wrapped around his middle. He was hurt. Seriously hurt. Everything flew from her but the need rising up to help him.
“Tell me what’s wrong, Wilder,” she demanded, approaching him slowly. One didn’t move fast at him. He had the instincts of a hunter, and he would react. She had seen him go from completely relaxed, sprawled lazily in a chair, to full-out attack mode, taking down his prey with ease.
“Tell me why you’re crying.”
She had to tilt her head to look up at him. Not far, but it was annoying when she was the nurse, the one in charge, and she was tall.
“We aren’t bargaining when you’re clearly injured,” she said. “Can you make it back to the house, or should I call for help?”
“I was on my way to you,” he admitted. “I can make it. But you may as well resign yourself to telling me why the tears and why you’re running at three in the morning.
Which is not a good thing, Harlow, and I think you know that.
It’s dangerous for any woman to be out here alone, but you, in particular, with everything that’s going on, shouldn’t be without bodyguards. ”
Of course he would know. Everyone knew. It was international news. The humiliation of having a man like Wilder know about the shameful things her father had done burned through her. And she refused to have bodyguards. She was over that life and had been for years.
Harlow cursed herself for being so emotional.
She’d been raised to be stoic, to never show her feelings, but lately, she fell apart the moment she was alone.
Now, Wilder had come at the worst possible time.
She’d given herself permission to fall apart, to cry, scream, rail against injustice, believing she would be alone at three in the morning on a trail in the middle of nowhere.
Still, she was a nurse, and a darned good one. The scandal didn’t matter, only the fact that this man was injured. She took a deep breath, forcing air into her lungs. She could handle this. More, it was Wilder, and he was injured.
“Let’s get you to the garage. I can take you to the hospital.” She managed to keep her voice steady. In charge. She should have known it wouldn’t work.
“Not going to the hospital, woman. If I wanted to go there, that’s where I’d be. I was coming to you so you could fix me up.”
She matched her pace to his. Normally, Wilder moved with easy, fluid steps, but he was awkward. Hunched. Arms still wrapped around his middle. One hand was pressed hard against his side. “Where is your car?” She hadn’t noticed one sitting in any of the parking places.
“Don’t have one.”
That didn’t make sense. “How did you get here? You’re injured.”
A faint grin sent her heart into overdrive. His smile was stunning yet terrifying in the way she reacted to it. She just didn’t—couldn’t—have such intense chemistry with any other person. But Wilder?
“Happy you finally noticed I could use a little assistance. It hurts like a son of a bitch.”
She kept walking, ensuring she didn’t move too fast. A fine sheen of sweat glistened on Wilder’s face. He hunched even more as they made their way slowly back toward her house.
“Ran into trouble on a mission. Parachuted in to you.” His low, velvet-toned voice was barely discernible. “Don’t want to take the chance of paperwork in the hospital that would lead straight back to me. If this is inconvenient…” He shrugged.
“As if I’d ever turn you away.” She wasn’t going to point out she was risking her license, depending on how bad it was. She could get in trouble if he’d been shot. That was something she would be obligated to report—not that she would, and she was usually by the book.
As if reading her mind, he took one hand and ran it down the back of her hair as they walked. “Things go wrong, you need anything at all, you reach out to Rainier. He has the pull to get you out of trouble.”
Her heart stuttered. “You stay here. I’ll go get the car.” Something was very wrong. She should have realized Wilder would never be sweating or stumbling the way he was if the injury wasn’t bad.
He kept walking. As he did, he slid one palm to her lower back and pressed gently to keep her moving. “Let’s just get there, babe.”
Under any other circumstances, she would have objected strenuously to being called babe by him. Now, she just wanted to get him safely to her home.
“Distract me. Talk. Tell me why you were out here when you know better and why you were crying.”
She heaved an exaggerated sigh. “I don’t understand how you can manage to be annoying even when you’re clearly seriously wounded.”
He flashed that faint grin of his that could melt the panties right off a woman. “It’s a gift.”
Harlow was slightly ashamed that she reacted to that little grin.
It seemed a little perverted that she was thinking of sex when he was most likely bleeding to death.
His skin had a grayish hue and was beaded with sweat.
He might act confident, but he was severely injured.
Ordinarily, she would have taken charge, but Wilder wasn’t a man she could manipulate or control, not even when it came to his health.
She kept walking, determined to get him to her house as soon as she could.
“Wilder, it’s clear you’re really injured. I should give Rainier a call. He can come help me.”
His palm crept up her back to settle around the nape of her neck as they walked. “I don’t want you to call Rainier unless you absolutely need to. I wasn’t working for him. He’ll be pissed as hell and feel responsible when he isn’t. I walked into an ambush. They were waiting for me.”
At his tone, she glanced up at his face.
He wore the expressionless mask that was normal for him, but his eyes were alive with something deadly.
A chill crept down her spine. Wilder wasn’t going to let this go, no matter what she said.
She kept her head down, looking at the ground as they covered the distance to her home.
More and more, he leaned his weight into her.
She was certain he wasn’t even aware of it.
That alarmed her. Wilder was always aware.
She was calling Rainier whether he liked it or not.
“This is my mess. I’ll clean it up.”
She narrowed her gaze and flashed him a frown, hoping it was intimidating. He didn’t look in the least bit as if it were. “Stop reading my mind.”
“Is that what you think I do? Woman, really? Your friend Vienna is the poker player. Definitely not you. You have this little storm that gathers in your eyes when you’re about to do something you know I won’t like.”
“That must happen all the time because you don’t like anything I do.
” It hurt even to say it, but it was the truth, and sometimes, throughout her life with her parents, telling herself the truth was the only thing that saved her pride.
She had a code, and she lived by it. It was very, very far from her parents’ code.
Wilder stumbled, and her heart nearly stopped. His fingers tightened on the nape of her neck as if she were his support, keeping him from falling over.
“Unfortunately for the two of us, I like everything you do. That storm building in your eyes is sexy as hell.” There was a trace of amusement in his voice.
She wasn’t touching that. He had to be so loopy from his wound that he didn’t have a clue what he was saying. She’d had many encounters with Wilder. Most of them weren’t that good. He rarely spoke, and when he looked at her, deep inside, fireworks went off—but for her, not him.
The house was in sight now. “We’re going to lay you down in the front bedroom. I’ll get my medical supplies, and you’ll need to remove your clothes.” She tried to sound matter-of-fact. “If it’s too difficult, I can cut them off you.”
Wilder’s fingers still firm around the nape of her neck. “Best not to put those images in my head when I can’t do anything about it.”
She heaved an exaggerated sigh. “You’re really injured, Wilder. I’m a nurse.”
“Believe me, I know you’re a nurse. Every mission I take, I spend an inordinate amount of time weaving fantasies around you in your cute little scrubs.”
“You’re definitely delirious.” She shoved open the door to her house, waving Misha inside.
“Damn it, Harlow. You didn’t lock the door. You know better than that.” For a moment, his fingers dug into her neck as if he might strangle her. “It’s a good thing I’ll be staying with you. You know with the crap going on with your family there have been death threats made.”
“Against my father.”
“Against you. Your father, your mother, and you. Even if there hadn’t been threats made, you lock your doors and don’t go running in the middle of the night.
” He sounded exasperated. “That’s just a safety rule for all women, but someone with your looks and…
” He trailed off, shaking his head as she aided him through the house to the nearest bedroom.
Harlow would have given him her room had it been the closest, but thankfully, she had a perfectly good guest room clean and ready near the front of the house.
He nearly fell onto the bed. It wasn’t just the way his legs gave out but the suppressed groan that galvanized her into action.
She raced to the hall closet where she kept her medical supplies, detouring to send Rainier an SOS and give him the details she had, which were practically none.
She told him if he had Wilder’s type blood to bring it and come prepared to operate.