Not Without Risk (14 page)

The squeal of brakes as a panel truck pulled to the side of the road spun her on her
heels. Filled with a heightened sense of extreme caution, she watched, throat dry,
as the driver swung his door wide and dropped to the curb before her. Eyes to the
sun, she couldn’t make out his features, even with her dark-tinted sunglasses.

“Ms. Conroy?”

What the man lacked in height, he more than made up for in width. He had the build
of a fireplug; round and solidly muscled. Ill-ease skittered along her spine, weakened
her knees. In his hands he held a clipboard, the pages of which rustled when the wind
picked up.

“Are you Paige Conroy? I got an order here to replace your front window.”

Her gaze left him to lock onto the name on the side of the truck. She read and re-read
it. Was that the place she’d called? Uncertainty crawled over her. With her state
of mind over the past few days, she couldn’t recall.

“Lady?”

His hand tucked into his pocket, reaching toward something just out of her sight.
Her breath backed up in her lungs. Her muscles bunched and tightened.

The creak of hinges in need of oil echoed through her mind and drew her gaze back
to the truck. A second man stepped onto the street. Nausea cramped her stomach painfully.
Fear left a cold, metallic taste in her mouth.

“Marv, we got the right place or what?” the second man asked.

A click to her right brought her head around faster than was intelligent in her weakened
state. Paige’s world spun once and then blessedly stilled. She expected to find a
pistol aimed at her middle, a knife, anything but a silver ballpoint pen.

She blinked with surprise.

“Lady? Is your name Paige Conroy or not?”

Mortification threatened to drown her. Taking a deep breath, she willed her heart
to slow. “Y-yes.”

“Thanks be for small favors,” the man mumbled under his breath. He raised his voice,
aimed his words at the man still beside the truck. “This is the right place.”

As the second man began to unload the truck, the first shoved the pen in her direction.
“Sign here,” he instructed gruffly.

Tears of humiliation threatened. For a minute there, she’d been so afraid, she thought
she could actually choke on the feeling. Paige took the pen he offered, relieved when
he held the clipboard in place for her. The state she was in, just signing her name
to the authorization form felt like more than she could handle. Her hand shook. Her
teeth began to chatter.

The knowledge that she was going to break down pushed her to close the distance between
her and her side door. It took three tries before the key slid into the lock. By the
time she stumbled into her building, the first tears wet her cheeks. She barely made
it to the top of the stairs before her knees gave out and she crumpled to the floor
in a heap.

* * * * *

He found her sprawled at the top of the stairs. Literally at his feet. Had the unlocked
side door not triggered caution in Justin, he likely would have tripped over her prone
form.

“Paige?”

Throat tight, her name escaped as no more than a whisper of sound in the too-silent
room. He visually searched for a wound, for a breath he was unable to discern from
his height. He drew his weapon.

“Paige?”

The absence of walls left him with an unobstructed view of what lay about him. Or,
more importantly, what wasn’t about him. A laundry basket lounged in the recliner
to his left, towels folded neatly and stacked to its rim. A half-full coffee mug and
black cordless telephone sat propped upon the center cushion of the couch, a pale
green afghan pooled on the floor before it. Bright sunlight illuminated it all, leaving
no shadows, no monsters, no threat to Paige’s physical being at all. Just Paige, lying
inert at his boots.

Satisfied that no threat hovered, Justin squatted at her side. With only the slightest
hesitation, he used his free hand to push aside the collar of her blazer and press
reassuring fingers to her carotid artery. Her pulse beat strong and steady. Relief
cut like a knife.

He draped his forearms across his knees, Glock hanging loosely in his right hand.
It took a moment to catch his breath.

She was asleep. Not wounded or dead, just drained. The knowledge that she had run
out of steam didn’t surprise. The fact that she appeared to have barely made it up
her stairs before sleep claimed her, did.

Her face angled toward him, a few strands of her hair stuck in the black tips of her
stitches. Her right arm cushioned her head, her left arced away from her body, keys
inches from her slackened hand. Justin trailed his fingers across her brow, brushing
the hair away from her eye. He traced the line of her jaw. Her lips parted and her
breath brushed across his knuckle as he followed the shape of her mouth with his thumb.

Good God, she was beautiful. And strong, stubborn, driven—things that he never imagined
he could find so alluring. Still teasing himself with the feel of her beneath his
fingertips, he trailed his hand down her throat toward the gentle swell of her breast
above the neckline of her blazer. His palm itched to continue on, to cup her. He wanted
his hands on her, wanted his mouth on her.

He fought back the urge by reminding himself that Paige had wants of her own. She
wanted her life back. The life she had before St. John’s murder, before the threats
and the fear. The life she’d had before him. It would do for him to remember that.

Instead, he chose to recall the taste of her. Her throaty moan of approval as his
mouth had taken hers. The way her body had strained against his, seeking release,
a release she craved as badly as he. Emotion pulled at him, threatened to drown him.
Scared the hell out of him the way those photos had just a few hours ago.

He hadn’t known a man could want like he did. He wanted her even though she made him
wish for things he’d never even considered, things he wasn’t certain he even believed
existed. He wanted to risk, to reach for that ever-elusive something that snaked through
him whenever she set those green eyes on him.

Damn, but just admitting that to himself made him wonder if he’d lost his senses completely.
He’d been trained not to risk. In his line of work, risk could get him killed. Yet
ever since that fateful evening some six months before, the feeling that he was missing
out on something in life ate at him.

Her eyelids eased open. He went from staring into her sleep-softened face to staring
into the endless green of her gaze. A smile curved her lips, lit her up from the inside
out.

“Justin.”

He didn’t know which he liked more, the way she said his name, or her smile. His pulse
kicked into high gear. Desire sucker-punched him in the gut. “Were you expecting someone
else?”

She sat up slowly, her fingers moving to his jaw. Her gaze slid to his mouth as she
traced his smile, dipped her thumb into his dimple. “Hmm…your smile is incredible.”

“Is it?” He held perfectly still, worked to draw oxygen into his suddenly deprived
lungs as she eased her body closer and closer. Her thigh pressed against his, her
breasts brushed his chest.

“So is your mouth,” she murmured, her voice like a caress across his flesh. Leaning
into him, she used her teeth to nip at his lips, following the sharp bite with a swipe
of her tongue.

Leave her alone
, the voice of reason whispered, but he ruthlessly shoved the thought aside. Blood
pounding, mind reeling, he settled his left hand at her waist, slid it up to cup her
breast through her jacket and captured her moan with his mouth.

She met him stroke for stroke, her mouth eager. Desperate. Hungry. Her fingers slipped
through his hair, then raked down his back, sending a sharp arrow of lust through
his gut. She grasped his hips and molded her body to his, straining against him until
time and place lost all importance and Justin could think of nothing past peeling
her clothes from her body and driving his flesh into hers. Again and again.

When she arched back, pressing her pebbled nipple into his palm, he caught it between
his thumb and forefinger and pinched lightly. A moan slipped from the back of her
throat and she pressed even harder against him. He kissed her longer, deeper, settling
his body atop hers as she melted to the floor beneath him. Her mound cupped his erection,
her heat searing him through the barrier of their clothing. He pulsed in response.

Anticipation filled him, sharp, biting and blissfully painful. The sensation of her
skin against his was one he couldn’t deny himself the pleasure of experiencing any
longer. Yet, when he shifted his right hand toward the buttons of her blazer, he realized
he still clutched his Glock in that hand.

Shock slammed through him with brutal force, brought him to his feet. Damn it, he
was supposed to protect Paige, not devour her. He prided himself on control, yet one
touch, one stroke of her fingers across his flesh crushed his restraint. His job was
to keep her safe. Instead, he’d nearly taken her like an animal, like a horny teenage
boy lacking the finesse to coax her to her bed.

He bit back a curse. Pulse hammering, he turned away from Paige and re-holstered his
weapon as he fought to control his ragged breathing, and the knife-sharp edge of self-contempt.

After a few moments, sanity returned and he could breathe again. Justin slid his hands
into his pockets and faced her, ready to do the only thing he could do.

Paige pulled her knees to her chest and did her best to ignore the heat that still
infused every cell of her body. She drew a shaky breath into her lungs and fought
against a surge of embarrassment as the realization of what had just happened hit
her full force.

Caught in that blissful place between sleep and wakefulness, it had seemed only natural
to reach for Justin as his handsome face slowly came into focus before her. He seemed
to have stepped from her sleep-induced thoughts into her reality and she was helpless
to keep from testing to see if his lips were as sweet as she remembered, his body
as warm.

Her memory couldn’t compete with reality.

Paige buried her face in her knees and groaned aloud. Mortification balled in her
stomach at the knowledge that she’d nearly had sex with him on her floor. Thank heavens
one of them had regained their senses before they’d made a big mistake. For surely
their joining would have been a mistake. Cataclysmic, but a mistake nonetheless.

“Paige, I’m sorry. I—”

She held up her hand, thankful when his words halted. Uncertain she could handle words
just yet, she didn’t want to hear his apology.

He believed her to be strong. She knew otherwise. A strong woman would hold to her
promise to keep her head where he was concerned. A strong woman would face him, not
hide. Her body still flushed, nerve endings screaming at the thought of how close
she’d come to discovering the magic those calloused hands of his could work upon her
naked flesh.

Oh, God! Something hot and liquid pooled in her stomach.

She squeezed her knees tighter to her chest. Grief drove her. Grief, along with a
healthy dose of fear. It had to be. She’d read somewhere that sexual intimacy was
the most popular way of reaffirming life. Surely that’s all she sought now, all that
drove her into his arms. She couldn’t be falling for him, couldn’t trust her heart
on a cop again. She was still trying to glue the pieces of her life back together
after the last time.

Never again would she settle for a relationship where she was anything but an equal
partner. No more secrets kept under the pretense of protecting her fragile sensibilities.
No more giving all of herself to someone who wouldn’t give all of himself back. Better
to be weak, to feel drawn to a man simply because he allayed her fear, than to take
an active role in setting herself up for pain.

Feeling as though she had a handle on her emotions, Paige lifted her face from her
knees. She focused on Justin, standing a good ten feet away from her, his mouth curled
in a tentative smile. Beneath the shoulder holster molded against his ribs, his white
shirt hung a bit crooked, his tails untucked. When her fingers began to itch with
the remembered feel of his warm skin beneath her palms, she knew, quite certainly,
that she didn’t have a handle on anything.

Instead, her emotions had a handle on her.

She felt off balance, her unease growing higher and higher with every passing hour
she remained with him. No matter how strong her will, she knew going home with him
would change things between them. She struggled enough against her intense attraction
to him, once under the same roof, it would be impossible to resist. “I think I’m going
to stay here.”

His smile faded. “Running away? I wouldn’t have thought that was your style.”

“Actually, it’s exactly my style.” At least it used to be. Running away from her problems
is what brought her to San Diego in the first place.

Gathering her courage, Paige moved to her feet. She pressed her hand against her stomach
where a hard ball of need remained. “I’m not sorry I kissed you. I’m also not sorry
that you had the intelligence to end it.”

“About that—”

“It was a smart move. That kiss was…a mistake,” she managed over a suddenly dry throat.

“A mistake.”

“Yes.” She reached up and pulled the pins from her hair. The long length fell free
about her shoulders, the loss of its weight helping to ease the tension in her neck.
“A mistake I can’t afford to make right now.”

His mouth thinned to a grim line. “I see.”

“I’m not ready for this.”

“This?”

“You. I’m not ready for you, for a relationship with you.” She cherished honesty,
gave it to him now. “I don’t know that I will ever be comfortable with your job. Not
after living through the worst of it. I won’t go through that again.”

“I never said I wanted a relationship.”

“Then what?” What else did they have if not the beginnings of a relationship? “What
are you looking for? What is this between us?”

“Sex,” he replied simply.

Numb with shock, a moment passed before she could speak. “Right. Of course.”

“Paige—”

“No, you’re right.” She straightened her shoulders, and tried not to let his words
hurt. Hadn’t she just told him she couldn’t handle a relationship with him? Why should
it matter that he hadn’t been looking for one?

Swallowing past the tightness in her throat, she forced herself to hold his gaze.
“Then it’s a good thing you ended things when you did. I’m not very good at sex without
something more.”

“You’re an all-or-nothing sort of woman,” he said matter-of-factly.

“That I am. That’s why I think I should stay home.”

Slowly, he closed the distance between them. “You don’t think we can keep our hands
off each other while under the same roof?”

She could still feel the weight of his body atop hers, the press of his arousal against
her center, and was painfully aware that her body wanted more. It took everything
she had not to lift her hand and settle it in the center of his chest, savoring his
warmth beneath her fingertips.

“You do?” The thickness to her voice startled her. “You think we can keep our hands
off each other?”

Her throat tightened as all hint to what he felt left his face. Had she not witnessed
it herself, she never would have guessed that moments ago, hunger had deepened his
intense brown eyes to near black.

“I’m prepared to do whatever I have to do to keep you safe,” he said with quiet emphasis.
“You are not staying here. You and I both know it is not a good idea.”

She did know. Just as she knew spending long hours in his company would be a mistake
that would lead to certain disaster. Everything inside her screamed to walk away,
but there was no way to do that. As easily as someone had gotten into her home the
night before, she wasn’t safe staying. It was only a matter of time before her mysterious
someone returned, and the next time, he may not be happy just taking pictures.

Just the thought of being alone when that happened froze the blood in her veins. Wrapping
her arms around herself, she scrubbed her hands over her upper arms, trying to ward
off the chill that had been with her for hours. “Maybe I should check into a hotel.”

“He’d find you. The same way he found St. John.”

“I’ll use a false name, pay with cash.”

“I won’t leave you on your own. If you prefer we stay in a hotel, fine.”

Paige closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her pounding temple. “You’d
stay with me?”

“Yes.”

Resistance gave way to compliance. “All right, I’ll stay with you at your place. I
just need to get some things together.”

Pausing to kick off the high heels that somehow managed to still be on her feet, she
snatched them up and strode toward her bath and the large walk-in closet it housed.
With each step, the sense that something about her home seemed a bit ‘off,’ grew.
Halfway to her destination the feeling grew so great that she stopped and skimmed
her gaze around the living area, searching for anything out of place, anything that
would explain the sudden prickling of her skin.

Nothing stood out.

But the eerie sensation remained. The small hairs at the back of her neck lifted and
she reached out to smooth them. Her heartbeat quickened into a gallop. She wondered
if she would ever again feel comfortable in her own home?

Irritated, she shifted her heels to her other hand, and scanned the room a second
time. Froze, then took an instinctive step back as she focused on a spot on the floor,
not three feet in front of her.

Her ring.
The ring she kept stuffed in the back of her panty drawer, in a shoe box filled with
memories she didn’t wish to revisit but couldn’t seem to part with.

In her mind, Paige relived her hurried dash across the room the night before. Her
muffled cry of pain as she stepped on something unseen in the dark and twisted her
injured knee. That something was her ring.

Only, she hadn’t left her ring in the center of her room. She hadn’t left it on the
desk at her left or the bedside table. Not anywhere near its final resting place.
She hadn’t even seen the ring since she’d tucked it into that box in her drawer.

Two years ago.

A cold knot formed in her stomach. Bile crawled up the back of her throat. Her feeling
of violation increased tenfold as she watched the sun reflect off the diamond she’d
always felt too pretentious. Someone had been in her home last night. And he hadn’t
been satisfied with just standing over her bed, taking her picture after all.

“Justin.” She couldn’t stop shaking. She hugged herself tighter, backed away from
the ring and in the direction she’d come. The urge to race to the bathroom and lock
herself inside swelled. To hide from the reality of what her world had become.

“Justin.”

“What’s the matter?” he asked quietly, his voice directly behind her.

She spun so quickly she collided into his chest. Her heels slid from her hand, landed
with a thud on the oak floor.

His fingers tightened around her elbow as she teetered. “What’s the matter, Paige?”

“Last night…” She forced her voice to remain calm even while anxiety tore her up inside.
“He did more than take my picture last night.”

He slid quickly, seamlessly into cop mode. A hard intensity descended over his face.
His shoulders stiffened. “How do you know that?”

“There.”

“Where? I don’t see what you’re pointing at.”

Taking hold of his upper arm, she walked the few steps and pointed at the floor. “There.
Do you see it? It shouldn’t be there.”

He crouched down to get a better look, but she noticed he didn’t touch it. “This is
yours?”

“Yes.”

“I’m guessing this isn’t where you normally keep it?”

“You’d be right,” she replied as his eyes came back to her. “I keep it in a shoe box,
shoved in the back of a drawer.”

He quirked an eyebrow. “You don’t keep it in a jewelry box?”

“No. I don’t wear it.” Her heartbeat quickened to a gallop as she looked past him
and focused on the ring on the floor. “The only way it got out of that box is if someone
besides me took it out.”

“Your intruder?”

“I stepped on it last night. I didn’t know what it was at the time. I didn’t care,
I just…” She took a deep breath to steady herself. “I locked myself in the bathroom
after hearing someone in my studio. On the way there, I stepped on something.”

“This ring.”

“Apparently, yes”

He straightened. “That would mean your intruder did more than take your picture, he
also searched your place.”

A headache started just behind her eyes. Her throat went bone-dry.

“Have you noticed anything else out of place?”

She dragged an unsteady hand across her forehead. “No.”

“Paige?” Justin leaned toward her, his gaze intense. “Is the ring significant in some
way?”

“It’s the engagement ring Rick gave to me.”

* * * * *

One hour later, Paige sat in the passenger seat of Justin’s GTO, wishing she could
enjoy the ride. Under normal circumstances, she found the rumble of a powerful engine
calming, its throaty purr reassuring. On a different occasion, she would appreciate
the car’s classic lines. Heck, she might even encourage him to open it up and show
her what
The Judge
had. But tonight, thoughts of her own safety kept her mind too busy to enjoy anything
of her drive across town. She was on the verge of a breakdown and the police traffic
softly crackling from the radio hidden beneath the dash only sharpened her anxiety.

Taking a deep breath, she blew it out slowly and tried to ease the knots still sliding
through the pit of her stomach. She didn’t want to think about the man after her,
but couldn’t seem to stop. How could this have happened? What did it say about her
that she slept through someone searching her house? It had been bad enough knowing
he’d been close enough to take her picture, but this? Someone had gone through her
belongings. Slowly, meticulously, all while she slept just a few feet away, blissfully
unaware.

Her eyes stung with the threat of tears. She was a grown woman who lived alone. While
her security system provided a relative amount of solace, she was not naturally a
heavy sleeper. She couldn’t wrap her mind around how now, when she was most vulnerable,
she could have dropped her guard so completely.

Perhaps Justin and Allan were right and she had ingested something that kept her from
waking? That would mean her intruder had been in her home on multiple occasions. Once,
to drug her food or water, and a second time to search. She didn’t want to believe
it, refused to believe. But at the same time she had to wonder if even her exhaustion
was great enough to overtake her fear and cause her to fall into a deep, healing sleep.

Which coincidentally gave her intruder the perfect opportunity to search her home.

Thankfully the whine of the engine as the RPMs spiked kept Paige from circling back
over that train of thought. Her eyes focused on the scenery outside her window as
Justin downshifted and turned into a residential neighborhood. Immediately the smell
of freshly cut grass and damp earth swarmed her senses. Unable to resist the temptation,
she rolled the window down further and drew deep breaths into her lungs.