An Eye for an Eye: Zach and Katie's Story (Redwood Falls) (23 page)

Nothing he ever did with Katie Turner was right. He'd never made one correct move in all the years he'd been chasing her. He'd fucked up, every time. He closed his eyes and shook his head at his own stupidity.

Why should tonight have been any different?

****

The next morning, Zach was suffering from a hangover that he knew he deserved. They had both slept late, and now Katie was moving around the kitchen, as silent as a wraith, preparing coffee and gathering a few of her personal items that had been strewn about.

He sat on a dining room chair and silently contemplated her, the more time he spent thinking about what he'd done and the way he'd treated her making him feel lower than the lowest slime. His hand shook as he popped open the ibuprofen bottle and swallowed down three pills, the chalky, medicinal taste blending with the coffee and making him grimace.

He was watching Katie with a knot in his stomach the size of a grapefruit as she folded a kitchen towel when his cell phone rang. He picked it up, but it was an unknown number to him. Unfortunately, that didn't mean he couldn't answer it. His business demanded that he answer all calls. "McIntyre," he announced into the phone.

"This is Josh Turner. I need to speak to you."

As the aggressive announcement resonated in his ears, Zach's stomach muscles tightened in reaction and an internal stream of obscenities vocalized in his brain.
Goddamnit, son-of-a-bitch, motherfucker, this couldn't be good.

The other man's voice was pissed, and Zach glanced at Katie before standing up and moving to the far side of the living room where she couldn't hear his rebuttals to the confrontation that he knew was coming. Zach recognized that this conversation was going to be about Katie, but he had to make sure and besides, he needed something to break the ice. "All right. Hannah okay?"

"She's fine. This doesn't concern
my wife."

Zach closed his eyes briefly, before opening them again and looking out over the Gulf of Mexico, but without seeing the blue water or white foam of the waves crashing against the shore. So, the other couple was married now. A week had passed since he'd seen his sister, and Zach needed to remember that the man he spoke to was now his brother-in-law. "How can I help you?"

"You need to listen up. I've given you the benefit of the doubt time and time again. And the last thing I want to do is to upset my wife. I just found out about the note you hold on our property. We've got the money to pay it off, which we'll do
this afternoon
, but that's beside the point. I want to know why you extended the loan. For that matter, I want to know what your motivation was for offering the loan in the first place."

Son-of-a-fucking-bitch
. This was deteriorating from bad to worse. From the questions he asked, Zach knew that Josh Turner had made him. The other man knew
exactly
what his motivation had been when he'd extended the loan. Zach glanced across the room and saw that Katie had taken a seat at the kitchen table and was surreptitiously watching him. He lowered his voice to make sure she couldn't hear. Zach took in a lungful of oxygen and prepared to try to set things right. "I've done a lot of things the wrong way in the past. It's too late for apologies, but I suppose you deserve a truthful answer. I did the things I did because of Katie--"

"
Goddamit!"

The explosion that cut off his words didn't surprise Zach. He deserved what he was getting and attempted to set it right. "You need to know--"

"Where the fuck is she?"

"She's with me," Zach admitted as neutrally as possible.

"She better be with you of her own free will,
motherfucker,
because if she's not, you're gonna have every goddamn law-enforcement officer within a ten-mile radius swarm your ass in the next few minutes--"

Zach understood in that moment that Josh Turner knew about everything that Katie had gone through in the past. The anger in the man's voice, the protectiveness he felt for his cousin told Zach that much. He cut in to try to calm the younger man down. "She's fine, man. We're coming home this weekend--"

"Home to Redwood Falls?"

There was no question that Josh wanted to see Katie for himself to make sure she was okay. Zach made the decision to take her to Redwood Falls first, even if she wanted to go to Dallas. "Yeah."

"I want to speak to her
now.
Put her on the damn phone." His new brother-in-law's voice bled hostility and Zach could in no way blame him for feeling the way he did.

He glanced over at Katie; she was picking at a piece of toast and darting him questioning looks every few seconds. Zach turned his back completely and spoke lower into the phone. "Okay. She's sitting right here. I'll hand her the phone okay? But, Turner, I need to tell you. You and I . . . we need to learn how to get along."

"Why's that?" the other man sneered. "Because my wife is your sister?"

Zach took two seconds to think about how he should respond to that question. Yeah, they needed to get along for the reason that Turner suggested. But he also needed to make the other man understand that what Zach felt for Katie wasn't casual . . . and it was no longer vengeful . . . it hadn't been vengeful in a long, long time. How in the hell would Zach feel if he thought that Hannah was being forced into a situation not of her own making? He'd go ballistic and he knew he owed Josh Turner something. Why the hell not the truth? Zach blew out a ragged breath. "Well there's that, yeah . . . but also because I'm in love with your cousin."

Zach gripped the phone to his ear as he heard only heavy silence coming from the other end. He walked across the room and handed Katie the phone. "Your cousin wants to speak to you."

Her eyes flared when she realized who he'd been talking to and he read a question there before she took the phone and put it to her ear. Her eyes held his as she said, "Josh?"

Zach couldn't take another second and walked upstairs to try to wash away his hangover with a cold shower.

****

Katie watched Zach's retreating back as she heard Josh's growl come over the line. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," she said distractedly.

"Are you sure?"

She tried to change the subject and take his mind away from why she was with Zach McIntyre. "Did y'all get married?" Katie hadn't texted either Josh or Hannah to confirm Zach's belief. If they were eloping, she hadn't wanted to be held responsible for not telling her mother.

"Yeah. We're married."

Katie heard the fierce satisfaction in his voice and it didn't surprise her a bit. "Congratulations," she said through a smile. "Are mom and dad okay with it?"

"Aunt Di's still a bit mad at the way we did it, but she's thrilled to death that Hannah and I are married."

"I am, too."

"Thanks, hon," he breathed out before his tone changed, any lightness leaving his voice to be replaced with a serious quality. "I have a question to ask you."

"Okay." Katie braced herself. Here it was; he was going to ask the sixty-four thousand dollar question about why she was with Zach.

"What's all this bullshit about McIntyre being in love with you?"

Katie felt a starburst explode in her head and land in her stomach. Shock cascaded through her bloodstream as she tried to get her brain to function. "He said that to you?"

"Yeah."

Katie sucked in oxygen. "No, he didn't."

"Yeah, Katie, he did."

"He told you that he's in love with me?" She tried to clarify. She couldn't wrap her head around it. Why would Zach say that to Josh?

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the line. "I thought it was pure bullshit he was feeding me." Another heartbeat of silence. "But I can tell from your reaction that it's true. When did all this happen? And why didn't you know?"

"I don't know . . . I didn't know."

"He said y'all are coming home?"

"Yeah, today."

"Then I'll see you later, sweetheart. Sounds like you have things to think about."

"Okay, love you."

"Love you, too."

Katie ended the call and carefully set the phone down. She glanced up the stairs where Zach had disappeared. She could hear the water running in his bathroom. Her brain felt fuzzy. She tried to think but couldn't. Why would Zach have said something like that if it weren't true? Katie's heart skipped a beat.

He wouldn
't have.

A warm, sweet ache built as her tummy flipped.

Zach loved her
.

****

Zach hustled her through the airport and into the cabin of the airplane where first class was located. Katie looked around at all the empty seats. They had this area of the plane virtually to themselves.

Before they'd left the house, Zach hadn't given her even a second to question him, although she had tried. He'd been uncommunicative on the drive to the airport, his expression forbidding, and Katie hadn't pressed him.

But now, as the plane ascended into the clouds, he was strapped in next to her and she could have his undivided attention, as long as he didn't pull out his laptop.

She jumped into speech before he could do that. "Josh told me what you said."

He busied himself by pulling his cell phone from his pocket and switching it off. He didn't look at her as he answered. "I'm not doing this right now."

"Zach--"

"No. I'm taking you home." His voice was firm, his resolve undisputable. "We're wiping the slate clean. I'm going to repair the biggest screw-up of my life even if it kills me. You're going home to your family. After you get there, if you still want to talk about this with me--" he turned to face her and their glances connected. "If you want to talk to me
of your own free will,
then nothing would please me more."

His eyes were dark brown pools of torment, and an unbidden image of all those roses he'd sent to her over the years came up and took over her brain. The notes he'd written. The times he'd argued with her and told her repeatedly that they weren't enemies.

A flush came up her neck and she felt it heat her cheekbones.
He wouldn't talk to her, but would he push her away?
Katie slid her hands over his shoulders and leaned into him, looking into his eyes. She felt the raw sizzle of need that was written on his expression, and before she could think about it or stop herself, she put her lips on his.

His shoulders immediately stiffened, and Katie knew he was about to deny her this kiss. He pulled his mouth from hers and glared into her eyes with an exasperated look of displeasure on his face. His hands came up and clenched her upper arms and his accusing scowl changed to one of aggressive challenge. A raw, feral look crossed his features and a dangerous sizzle filled the air between them as his volatile mood shifted in only a second flat. "You best be careful. You have no clue what you're doing."

"I'm not scared of you." Katie threw out the challenge even before she realized that it was the truth; she
wasn't
scared of him.

"I mean it, Katie. Don't push me. I've shit to work out, but the way I feel about you hasn't changed. I hate myself for the way I treated you, but understand me when I tell you that just because I know what happened, that doesn't mean that I don't want you.
Nothing's changed
. Get that through your head. I still want you like burning hell."

As his voice lashed her, Katie knew this was his way of spelling it out to her. But she still wasn't afraid. "You don't scare me. You'd never force me."

"I wouldn't force you, but you're giving me too much fucking credit. I'd coerce you, I'd try to persuade you, I'd try to seduce you, I'd try to intimidate you into a relationship with me."

"You wouldn't try to intimidate me."

An anguished growl came from low in his diaphragm.
"You don't get it."
His hands grasped her biceps in uncompromising restraint. "You fascinate me. You captivate me. I'm fucking obsessed with you
and always have been
. Don't kid yourself about what I want from you."

Katie took a moment to study him and to think about what he was trying to do. She said gently, "It's not working. I'm not afraid."

His grip tightened and he leaned down and put his mouth to her ear and spoke into it through gritted teeth. "I want you; every bit of you. I want you to belong to me of your own free will. You need to think real hard about whether or not you want that too."

His hot breath sent shivers down her spine and heat bloomed between her thighs. But she turned her head so she could see his eyes again. "Why are you doing this? Why are you purposely trying to frighten me? It's. Not. Working."

"You can't live in a fantasy world where you believe things could be sugary sweet between us. Don't turn your mind away from how it would be. Don't imagine us strolling on the beach holding hands forever.
I want a sexual relationship with you
. I want it raw, carnal." His eyes held hers. "I've
always
wanted that." He hesitated a second and then his voice gentled. "I can
try
to be tender and sweet, but Katie, baby. I can't promise that.
All I can promise is that I won't make you do anything you don't want to do."