No Turning Back (11 page)

“I make it my business to know the people who are trying to destroy me, whether they weigh a buck-twenty and look like Red or are three-hundred-pound bald men.” Cal walked around the small space, touching the tools and brushing his hands over the dust and checking to see what lay beneath.

“Destroy?”

“That’s what I said.”

That punch of anxiety came roaring back. Declan tried to swallow it back, “That’s a big word. Since when are you so dramatic?”

Cal stopped on the opposite side of the table saw. “Since I uncovered the private investigator your hot girlfriend had digging around in my life.”

The news walloped Declan like a roundhouse kick to the stomach. His breath hiccupped. “Leah?”

Cal glanced up before resuming his review of his surroundings. “Yeah, the woman you’re screwing is determined to screw us. So,
destroy
might even be too weak a word. Pick another if you want, but get to the same conclusion and fast or she will take you down.”

“She’s never . . .” Declan was going to say Leah wasn’t like that but he knew he couldn’t sell it because it just wasn’t true.

“Blamed you, accused you, hurt you?” Cal shook his head. “I don’t buy it. She’s got Baron blood coursing through her and more stamina to see her revenge through than her dad ever had.”

The information made sense. It fit with her attitude when they first met and what Declan overheard in the diner. Matched the accusations she liked to hurl whenever the topic of Shadow Hill arose.

But the woman he kissed, all warm and inviting, didn’t fit in with the rest. There was no need for her to offer her body to get close to him for an attack. It wasn’t like he was playing hard to get. And, despite everything, she didn’t strike him as the type.

He hoped like hell that wasn’t his pounding erection doing his thinking for him. “How do you know all of this?”

“Her investigator.”

“He admitted it to you?”

Cal’s gave a harsh laugh. “Eventually.”

Declan’s mind wouldn’t process the information. He couldn’t take the woman he touched out of the equation, but Cal didn’t throw shit around. Declan mentally gathered the pieces and shoved them aside. He’d unpack them and try to put them together later.

Until then, he would unload some information of his own. “She might not be the only one looking to cause trouble.”

Cal stilled with his finger trailing through the dust. “Meaning?”

“Someone name Kristin Accord is looking for you.”

Cal’s reaction was instantaneous. His body tensed and his hand balled into a fist. “Where is she?”

“At the local motel.”

“That’s just fucking great.”

Declan tried to assess Cal’s body language. He generally hid his emotions. He stood right there without blinking and pretended not to know Leah’s name. He didn’t have a tell. But this Kristin person meant trouble and Declan didn’t need Beck’s law degree or his father’s people-reading skills to figure that out. “Who is she?”

“No idea.”

“You’re not acting like it.”

Cal bit down on his lower lip as if weighing how much to divulge. “This isn’t the first time she’s caught up with me. She showed up at a construction job I was working. Told people she was a relative so she could get access to the office and wait around for me to come in. Good thing a fellow employee tipped me off so I could slip out. But, damn, the woman won’t let up.”

“Sounds kind of sick.” Or brokenhearted. Declan remembered more than one woman having a similar reaction to the news Charlie was married and used fake engagements as a way of getting access to heirloom jewelry. “Do you two have a history?”

Cal’s eyebrow lifted. “I just said I don’t know her.”

Knowing all about her and having her under him were two different things. “I wasn’t talking about long-term dating.”

A smile broke across Cal’s mouth. “Are you asking if I’ve slept with her?’

“Seems like a good guess. She’s older, but maybe a disgruntled former-lover type of thing. She did say it was personal.”

“Nothing like that but she’s started calling and her messages get more dire each time. All this ‘we must meet before it’s too late’ stuff.”

“How does she have the number? You’re unlisted and even changed it a few months back.” It was the last time they’d talked and Declan remembered the short conversation.

Cal swore under his breath as he stared up at the holes in the ceiling above his head. “She’s the reason I changed it. I thought ignoring her and switching numbers would make her go away, but she found me again.”

Declan moved Kristin Accord onto the stalker side of their list of enemies. Many would call and threaten or write letters, but those who went to the time and expense to track them down were a whole different level of danger. “That’s a determined woman right there.”

“Tell me about it.”

“You sure she’s not a former—”

Cal shot Declan a shut-the-fuck-up look. “When I sleep with a woman, I remember. And they rarely get involved enough to hunt me down. Condoms and casual is my motto.”

Declan wasn’t sure what to say to that. “That’s a good thing, right?”

“It’s better than sleeping with the daughter of Charlie’s number-one enemy.”

And there it was. They’d circled right back to Leah. “We’re not sleeping together.”

“Yet. And if my timing were better you’d have to answer that one differently.” Cal scowled as he said it.

“Yeah, well. You owe me one.” And since Declan intended to fix the sexual near-miss soon, well, as soon as he got a response to the investigator question, he was willing to let his brother’s piss-poor timing pass.

“I’ll remember that when you need someone to save you from her.” Cal nodded his head toward the door and started walking.

Yet another person who wanted to rush in and save him. Declan’s back teeth slammed together at the thought. “I can handle myself.”

Cal slapped Declan on the back as he escorted him out. “Let’s go find Beck and see if he agrees about the dangers of sleeping with the enemy. I have a feeling I’ve missed some of the fun by being three days late.”

Chapter Ten

Leah dropped the takeout bag on one of the long tables set up in the middle of Mallory’s shop. This one was Leah’s favorite. The scarred wood spoke to its resilience. There were paint chips and puncture holes. Customers used it for crafting. Mallory held classes there and sometimes just sat on one of the benches there and talked with a customer over coffee.

She pretended to be anti-social and tried to send out that vibe through the mix of dark clothing and a judging frown. But Leah knew better. Mallory was bone-decent. Orphaned early and passed around from relative to relative, trailer park to trailer park, she developed a hard shell and tucked her emotions in tight. But when she trusted, like she did with Leah, it was a beautiful thing.

Mallory treated her customers like old friends from the start, willing to learn anything and picking it up in just minutes, and people had been flocking there ever since.

Even now with the sign turned to
CLOSED
for lunch, a woman wandered the store. Mallory wasn’t the type to kick anyone out. It was a good thing she lived right upstairs.

“What did you get?” Mallory straddled the bench across from Leah and opened the bag. The paper crinkled as she waved to the older woman hanging out in the journal aisle with a stack of notebooks in her arms.

Leah jumped right to the heart of the conversation. “I kissed him.”

Mallory’s hands dropped, smashing the sandwiches under the weight of her fist. “What?”

Leah winced less over the lost lunch than the stunned surprise in her friend’s voice. Since Mallory had been the first person Leah had shared her losing-her-virginity story with, all two minutes of fumbling backseat disappointment, Leah expected a calm reaction. Not the bug-eyed stare.

May as well just tell Mallory everything and hope she didn’t pass out. Leah held up two fingers. “Twice.” Then she thought about it. The answer was more like two times but many kisses. “Well, I’m not sure how you calculate it, but more than once. And then again yesterday.”

Mallory smacked her hand against the table. The thud had the older woman grabbing for her chest. Mallory waved her off. “Sorry Mrs. Parker.”

“Nice,” Leah whispered under her breath.

This time Mallory leaned in, both hands flat against the table and her eyes practically gleaming. “And to you I say, ha!”

“Go ahead and say the whole thing.” Not that Leah didn’t deserve it. But, really, Mallory’s reaction had been her lowest concern when Declan brushed his mouth over hers.

The man tasted as good as he looked. And his body? Damn. He was all hard muscles and exploring hands. His kisses ripped away her last of defense and turned her knees to jelly. She’d been on the verge of begging him to take her clothes off when his brother came in.

Callen Hanover. Older, harder, unreadable. The guy was six-feet-two of trouble. He’d hated her on sight and made that fact clear. The feeling was pretty much mutual. Where Declan possessed an underlying charm, Callen consisted only of rough edges. Declan groused but he could joke and open up. He devoted his military career to service and helping others. More than one award recognized his sacrifice for the men who served with him.

Callen’s reputation as a loner and the huge gaps in his history pointed to a much darker side. When Charlie left town all those years ago, he had come back and he’d taken Callen with him. Pre-teen or not, Charlie dragged his oldest into his grifter life. There was no question which hat Callen wore.

Mallory pulled a too-thin sandwich out of the bag. The wax paper stuck to it. “I think I’ll skip the fists-in-the-air gloating I’m tempted to unleash here, but I told you so. I knew there would be kissing with you two. Your chemistry is off the charts.”

“Kissing, touching and general confusion.” Leah said the words before she could think about how much they revealed.

“If you’re confused he must be doing it wrong.” Mallory screwed up her lips as she made a face. “That’s disappointing. He struck me as a man who knew his way around a woman.”

Around, over and Leah would guess, in. “His skills are fine.”

Mallory’s face morphed to the horrified kind. “Just
fine
?”

Since there was no need to hide the truth or ruin Declan’s reputation, Leah spilled the truth. “Okay, he was amazing. Like, knock-my-shoes-off amazing, but that’s not the point.”

“It should be.”

Leah dropped her head in her hands. “What am I going to do?”

“I’m unclear on one point. Have you slept with him?”

Leah peeked at Mallory through her fingers. “No.”

“Then your answer is easy. Go do that.”

The customer inched closer. She faced the bookshelves but her head bounced up and down in what Leah assumed was agreement on the sex thing.

She thought about banging her head against the table. Now the whole town would know she was in the middle of a sex/no sex debate. With any luck, her father would find out. He’d probably try to ground her. Or send her away. He tended to miss the part where she was an adult. In the past she’d forced a bit of breathing room between them to deliver the message but the heart attack robbed her of that tool.

“Could you possibly focus on something other than my sex life?” Leah clenched her jaw and forced her voice to remain steady.

“Do you have one?”

“We ran into my father. We were at the diner on Sunday and ran right into him.” Leah couldn’t think of the scene without wanting to scream. “Chief Darber basically threatened to arrest Declan just for walking on the sidewalk. It was ridiculous.”

Mallory made another attempt at food retrieval. She peeled the paper back, frowning as the tuna fish stuck to everything but the bread. “I thought you guys ate dinner at your house. Or wait, was it even dinner or just a business meeting?”

Leah answered the part she wanted to and skipped the rest. “We started at my house.”

Mallory’s head popped up and her eyes widened. “You’re missing a step in the explanation.”

“We were all over each other.” Ten more seconds at her house and the diner scene never would have happened, because she would have had Declan naked and spread out on her family room floor. At that point she’d have let him do anything, even knowing the investigation paperwork was strewn all over the next room. “I put a halt to it and we went out for dinner. Are you happy?”

“Are
you
? Because that sounds kind of messed up.”

It was well beyond that, as far as Leah was concerned. Only a complete nutcase would want to drag the pants off the guy she’d been convinced for years was a swindler. “I couldn’t exactly walk him into my bedroom.”

The customer cleared her voice. Leah thought she heard a tsk-tsk sound.

“Because of the whiteboard?”

“Yes.”

“What are you going to do?” Mallory shot Leah a smile bright enough to power a small city. “Other than him, I mean.”

“I don’t know. It’s all so screwed up. I was so sure he was a con man just like Charlie, but now I can’t see it. He seems so different.” Smarter and real. Honest and sexy.

“Maybe he is. Maybe not.”

For the hundredth time since she’d met Declan in person, Leah wondered if this was how the con worked. All those other women, including her mother, had been lured in by Charlie’s smile and quick wit. To a few he’d sold them with stories about a dead wife, something he didn’t have, and the need to find a woman who understood him. He’d charm them right out of their panties as he had them sign over their bank accounts and safe combinations then be gone while they planned a non-existent wedding.

Being with Declan, having all that power and intensity focused on her, had Leah ready to drop everything. He touched her and she wanted to rip her shirt off. Maybe those lure-a-female skills passed through the males in the Hanover clan, or maybe Declan had learned them on his own. She’d been so sure of the answer once and now she didn’t know, and that scared the hell out of her.

“Then there’s my dad and the town. All the money that was stolen and Shadow Hill.” The weight of all that responsibility settled on Leah’s shoulders, crushing her until she couldn’t breathe.

“Wow, dating is really complicated these days.”

Like that, the serious mood lifted. Leave it to Mallory to find a way to joke about something so exhausting. They both laughed and the customer shook her head and shifted to the far side of the store.

“Shut up.” Leah pinched the edge of the paper and pulled the mangled remains of the sandwich closer to her. “This looks gross.”

Mallory pulled it back. “Stay focused on your hottie. The first thing we need to do is break down that whiteboard and—”

“No.” Despite everything Leah wanted to believe, she knew that was the right answer. Until she understood who Declan was and what Callen planned, she had to be prepared. Then there was the problem of controlling her father’s crazy expectations and wrecking whatever contingency he’d come up with in case she failed to carry out his eye rolling orders.

“Leah, you’ve been through it all. You know the articles and files by heart, and still all of your assumptions might be wrong. Doesn’t that tell you anything?”

“That I need to dig deeper.”

Mallory’s shoulders fell on a sigh. “That is exactly the wrong answer.”

“There is one thing I need to check first. After that, I’ll think about everything you’ve said.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Kristin Accord.”

Mallory frowned. “Who or what is that? Declan’s old girlfriend or something?”

Wrong brother
. Leah remembered the challenge in Callen’s eyes as he held out his hand in introduction. “I don’t exactly know, but I plan on finding out.”

***

Leah pulled into her driveway that night after work and her hands clenched the steering wheel. She turned off the car and slowly opened the door to get out. She watched as Declan stood up from her front porch step and brushed off his jeans. A second later he came to meet her at the car door.

She leaned against the side of the car and glanced around, but no one walked down the street. Nothing but a stray car at the stop sign up at the end of the block. “What are you doing here?”

“Dinner.”

She didn’t like where this conversation headed. Actually, she did like it, which was the problem. “You’re eating it on my porch?”

“I’m inviting you to join me.” He leaned a hand against her closed driver’s door and dipped in closer to her.

Being this close, smelling the soap on his skin touched off a memory of those kisses and had her heart flipping around. The stupid, traitorous thing. “I don’t see a pizza on you. Is there a sandwich hiding around here somewhere?”

He shot her that panty-dropping smile. “There’s an Italian place about fifteen minutes from here.”

“How would you know that?” He’d been in town about a week and already had the food scene down. Men and their meals.

“There is this amazing new invention called the internet.”

Since he was standing there looking all adorable and offering food, she ignored the sarcasm. “Which restaurant?”

“Does your answer on coming with me depend on my choice of venue?”

Sad thing was he could probably suggest fast food and she’d jump at it. Her control had deflated that far. “Maybe.”

“Castellano’s.”

The man had taste. “Good choice.”

A car drove by and honked. Without thinking she waved. So did he.

“So is that a yes?” he asked.

It should be a no. A definite no. The last two times they were close they’d climbed all over each other. “You know this is a terrible idea, right? We should negotiate on a price for the house—”

“I’m not ready to talk sale, it could be days or weeks or never. I don’t know and I’m not making a decision.”

He didn’t say the word
ever
but she thought she heard it. “It’s the best answer.”

“I’m not sure that’s true. Not for me.”

“Declan, we could—”

“Arguing with me is not going to change my mind. No real estate talk. Just dinner.”

She inhaled long and deep, hoping her brain would restart and the word
no
would form on her tongue. None of that happened. “Food. No kissing.”

He raised both hands in the air in what she guessed was his version of a vow. “I promise to keep my lips off you, but you can feel free to put your hands all over me whenever you want.”

If she did that they’d never get in the car.

“I accept that challenge.” She handed him her car keys. “My car is right here. You drive.”

“So you can duck and hide as we pass people.”

“Maybe.” Though she really wasn’t sure she wanted to hide her attraction to him anymore.

“Some people will recognize the car.”

“I’ll take the risk,” And use the car ride to shore up her common sense. When it came to him, she tended not to have any.

He slipped around the car and opened the passenger door for her. She’d just settled in and convinced herself she could handle this when he leaned in.

“You know this is a date, right?”

“It’s dinner.”

“Yeah, you just keep denying.”

But on the inside she wasn’t. This was a date and the kick of guilt she expected did not hit her. She knew what that meant.