“I don’t want—” She pulled away, ran her hands down arms that were suddenly ice cold.
“You don’t want what?” he parroted, the warmth in his tone cooling several degrees as his eyes narrowed dangerously. “You don’t want this? You sure picked a helluva time to change your mind.”
The flames in the iron-working stove had died down as he worked with his blowtorch, so that it gave off just a small amount of light. Enough that he could see her outline, but her face and eyes were shadowed.
“Serena, answer me. What’s going on here?” Impatience colored his words, making them cooler—and hotter—than they might have been otherwise.
Serena pressed trembling hands to her eyes, desperate to block out the darkness and the hint of temper Kevin couldn’t hide. Desperate to stop the memories bombarding her. Though her arousal was gone, killed by the sudden and imposing darkness, now she was shaky for entirely different reasons and she couldn’t stand this new and unexpected loss of control.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly. “I know it looks bad, but I never meant to do this to you.” And she hadn’t—once she made up her mind she rarely changed it and she always, always followed through with what she started, whether it was an assignment for work or a project she did for pleasure. Making love with Kevin definitely fell into the pleasure category, but she couldn’t do it. Not right now. Not while darkness closed in around her. Not while Sandra’s screams echoed in her head and the stench of long-dried blood assaulted her nostrils.
“I never said you had.” His tone was guarded, though warmer than it had been a few moments before.
“I don’t …” Her voice was harsh, husky with a fear she couldn’t banish as she forced the words past the sudden lump in her throat. “I don’t like the dark.”
“What?” Kevin asked, confusion evident in his tone.
A hint of her own temper entered her voice—she hated being vulnerable. “I’m afraid of the dark, okay?” The words were evenly spaced, her voice defiant as if daring him to make fun of her.
Feeling as if he’d missed a couple of steps, or an entire staircase for that matter, Kevin closed his eyes. Ran another hand through his hair. Clamped down on the desire still twisting his guts into knots. “You’re a photographer,” he finally said incredulously. “Half your life is spent in a darkroom!”
“It’s different.” Her voice shook, despite her best efforts to keep it steady.
“How?” But his voice was softer. He was too shocked at the difference in her—the complete transformation from cool and composed to trembly and terrified—to be annoyed. From the second he’d laid eyes on Serena he’d wanted to see her with her control shattered. But he’d never envisioned it happening like this. He reached out a hand and found hers in the darkness, astounded at how quickly she had turned cold and clammy.
“My choice,” she said in little more than a whisper. “I choose to go into that room, dark or no. And I have control of the light switch. Nobody else.” Her trembling suddenly increased and he couldn’t resist pulling her into his arms.
“Kevin,” she said, hands once again pushing against him. “I don’t want to do this right now. I can’t—”
“I’m not asking you to do anything. But you’re shaky, freezing. Let me hold you for a minute.”
Her spine suddenly stiffened and her voice dripped ice as she answered. “I’m not a child to be comforted. I simply would rather wait until the lights came back on before …” Her voice trailed off.
“Before what?” He pulled her back into his arms, ignoring her slight resistance, ignoring his own need to give in to her.
“You know what.” She held herself rigid against him, unable to take the comfort he so freely offered.
Settling himself against the wall, Kevin pulled her into his lap before she could protest. “Sssh.” One hand reached up to stroke her short hair, the other rubbed her slender back soothingly as he murmured nonsense to her.
Against her will, Serena relaxed into him. He felt safe, made her feel safe and secure. It had been so long since she’d felt this way that it took her a minute to recognize the feeling.
Seventeen. The thought echoed through her. She’d been seventeen the last time she’d felt this safe. At the time she’d thought she had everything she’d ever want—guaranteed entrance into one of the best photography programs in the country, a boyfriend she adored, and the best twin sister in the world. But that was before Damien, with his good looks and insane jealousies. Before she’d known what it felt like to have a blade sink deep into her flesh. Before she’d heard her sister die.
Stifling the whimper that wanted to escape, Serena cursed herself. It wasn’t like her to lose control like this, to curl up on a man’s lap and let him soothe her like a baby. She never needed comforting, had refused to need it for more than a decade. So why was she cowering on Kevin’s lap just because the lights were out?
She started to move, to push away again, but Kevin held her in place. And she let him without knowing why. She could have struggled, could have demanded her freedom. But it felt right sitting here, letting him hold her. When the lights came on, Serena knew she’d be embarrassed that he’d seen her this way. But for now, as fear stalked her and darkness fenced her in, she was content, if not happy, to stay exactly where she was.
Her heartbeat slowly returned to normal and her breathing leveled out, but Kevin continued to rock, continued to soothe without ever saying a word. Without thought, her arms crept around his waist, her cheek pressing against his bare chest as she listened to the slow and steady beat of his heart.
Despite the heat of the past few minutes there was nothing sexual in his touch, nothing passionate in hers. Yet, leaning against him in the dark, letting him support her, she recognized a small and sudden rekindling of the fire that had burned so brightly within her earlier. Who would have thought the fearsome, awe-inspiring Kevin Riley could be so … kind?
They sat in the darkness for a long time, holding each other and listening as torrents of rain continued to pelt the house. When Kevin finally spoke, it wasn’t the words she had dreaded hearing, wasn’t the demand for an explanation that he had every right to expect.
Instead, he heaved a long-suffering sigh. “So tell me about this book thing.” His voice hinted of beignets and chicory and long, lazy mornings in bed.
“Your book thing?” she answered carefully as his voice sent chills of pleasure up her spine. Her voice was shaky, but it held, a fact she was incredibly grateful for.
“Our book thing,” he growled. Lightning flashed outside, illuminating his beautiful face and troubled eyes for just a second. She didn’t know why, but she longed to touch his face, to let her fingertips slowly soothe the tension from his muscles.
“I thought you didn’t want to talk about it.”
“I don’t even want to think about it,” he answered. “But it seems to be happening whether I want it to or not.”
“You agreed to do it, you know.” She shifted in his lap, as if a change in vantage point would suddenly reveal his face again. “All you had to do was say no.”
“I did say no. At least fifty times. When I signed that contract, it wasn’t agreement. It was surrender due to total and complete desperation. Steve and Marsha got together and ran me to ground. I never stood a chance.”
“Against your agent and publicist? And you call yourself an artist? Don’t you know that it’s your duty to make their lives hell?” she teased. Her voice wasn’t as steady as she would have liked, but it held. She couldn’t ask for more.
“You know that and I know that, cher. But the two of them don’t seem to get the concept,” he commented drily. “They think I hired them to make my life hell.”
“So why don’t you explain it to them?” A powerful surge of thunder had her cuddling closer, had his arms tightening around her without either being aware of it. “You don’t exactly seem the type to take such abuse lying down.”
“I’m not. And I have explained it, many times, but they don’t listen. Instead, they hound me day and night. Phone calls at all hours, trips here or to my house in New Orleans when I take the damned thing off the hook.” She felt his very un-Kevin-like smile against the top of her head.
“And you put up with this?” She liked this new side of him, so different than anything she’d ever seen or heard about him. She knew he was distracting her, knew he’d chosen the topic to keep her mind occupied with something other than her fear. But that made him only more interesting—as a person and as a potential lover.
Her fingers itched for her camera, the need to record this unexpected side of him nearly overwhelming. But it was way too dark to photograph him, no matter how good her flash was. Not to mention that she’d have to leave the safety of his arms to do so, something she wasn’t yet ready to contemplate though she shied away from the knowledge.
Glancing around the still-dark studio, she shuddered before she could stop herself. She hated this stupid fear, hated that it still had the power to control her. It had been ten years since Sandra had died. And while the first few years were a jumble of fear and hate, confusion and loneliness, she’d slowly pulled out of the tailspin her sister’s murder had thrown her into.
Years passed and she began to go days, weeks, sometimes even months without feeling the crippling grief that literally brought her to her knees. But something always happened. A newspaper article, a movie preview, a blackout. And she would realize, once again, just how tenuous her grip on sanity really was.
Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. The pattern was her mantra at times like these. If she did it long enough, the shaking would stop. It always did.
Kevin tensed and felt his heart rate double. Serena was all but convulsing in his arms and she was doing it without a sound. But the quiet made her agony all the more frightening. She was breathing—slowly, methodically, as if every breath was a matter of life and death. He raised a hand to smooth her sweat-soaked hair from her face, astounded to realize that he wasn’t quite steady. He couldn’t stand this, couldn’t handle her pain or his total inability to make it better. Pressing her tightly to his chest, he locked his arms around her and waited for her to calm. But the shaking only got worse.
Finally, finally, her heart rate slowed and her breathing became less mechanical, more natural. He buried the questions racing through him, ignored his need for answers as he searched for something harmless to say. Painful seconds passed before he decided to return to their previous conversation.
“Why do I put up with an agent who manipulates me, you ask? Have you met Steve?” He kept his voice light with effort.
“I know he can be a little …” Her voice shook, but she latched on to his conversational lifeboat like a drowning victim.
“Neurotic? Insane? As vicious as a great white that’s scented blood?” He was grateful the shaking had stopped, unsure of how much longer he could have handled her terror without losing it himself.
“I was going to say persistent. But your descriptions fit too.” She forced a laugh, but it was strained. “You understand him so well. Perhaps because you don’t strike me as totally sane either.”
“I am in perfect mental health, cher.” His voice held outraged indignation, but he couldn’t hide the thread of laughter beneath.
“Which is why you keep a neurotic, insane, man-eating shark as an agent?”
He shrugged. “He’s the best in the business. Besides, would you want to fire him?”
“You know, I get a totally different story from Steve. He warned me to watch out for you. Something about you being grumpy, surly, and a people-hater with violent tendencies?”