Secret Seduction (17 page)

“You don’t have to say anything. It’s okay.”

“No,” she said. “I want to say it. I want to tell you. I want to trust you, Tanner.”

“Vanessa,” he whispered, wrapped his arms around her and pressed his lips to her soapy temple.

She felt something crack open inside her. A glacier calving. A fortress collapsing.

“Then one night,” she started again, her voice clearer, stronger. “I saw Carlo lose it in the alley behind the club. He was high on drugs and he beat one of his henchmen to death with his bare hands because the guy had shortchanged him on a cocaine deal.”

“You don’t have to talk about this.” Tanner clamped a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“You’re wrong. I have to talk about this if I want to get past it. I need to tell you. You were right. If I can share my body with you, then I should be able to share my darkest secrets.”

“I don’t want to put you through that.”

Vanessa could feel Tanner’s gaze on her face, but she couldn’t look at him. She was so ashamed. “I tried to hide behind the Dumpster, but he saw me cowering and came after me.”

Tanner fisted his hand around the washcloth. She heard his breathing quicken and grow shallow. It matched her own erratic rhythm.

She bent her head to her knees in the cooling water. She didn’t want to cry in front of him, didn’t want to be that vulnerable, but it was too late. She flashed back to the most terrifying moment of her life, saw the man bloodied and dying in the alley. Relived the horrifying moment when Vega whirled, his eyes wild, spotting her behind the Dumpster. Grunting and cursing, he’d come after her with his raised, bloody fist. She’d been snatched into the jaws of a nightmare, except it had been all too real.

Remembering that terrifying, life-altering event caused her heart to race and her mouth to grow dry. For fourteen years she’d suppressed the memory, but it had never gone away. It had been festering inside her, eating away at her, keeping her from being the person she was truly meant to be.

“Go ahead and let it out,” Tanner said. “You’re safe with me.”

Safety seemed so remote, especially after what had happened tonight, but he made it sound so possible. She wanted to believe he could tame this desperation inside her. That he could soothe her savage longings with his body. That he could traverse the barriers she’d erected for so long. What a relief it would be to let him into her life, into her heart.

“Carlo came at me,” she murmured. “I was certain I was dead. He grabbed me around the waist, put his filthy hand over my mouth, and I bit him.”

She shuddered, paused.

Tanner didn’t press. He let her tell the story the way she needed to tell it.

“I’d taken to carrying a knife, a switchblade, for protection. I tucked it in the go-go boots I wore when I was dancing on stage.”

He made a noise low in his throat that sounded like half sympathy for her, half rage at Vega. Why couldn’t Tanner have been there for her then? She would have given anything to have a man like him back then.

He’s here now.

Tears burned the back of her eyes, and she blinked them away.

“Carlo pulled me from behind the Dumpster, punched me hard. He was swearing and I was screaming, or at least I thought I was screaming. I might not have been because I think his hand was still over my mouth. Somehow I really can’t remember this part, but I managed to get hold of the switchblade.”

“Vanessa, it’s okay, shh, shh.” Tanner cradled her head against him, but she just kept talking.

“I fought him off, cut him.” She shook her. “That part was a blur, too.”

Tanner held her, rocked her in the tepid bathwater.

She stared straight ahead, kept up her narrative. Once the dam had been broken, the river started to flow. “He howled and let go of me. I ran as fast as I could, staggered into the street, screamed for help. He chased after me. People were standing around watching. I remember seeing faces I knew, but no one from the club was going to get involved. They were all on his payroll, or they were customers with too much to lose by getting involved or they were just plain terrified the bastard would do the same thing to them. If a car hadn’t stopped on the street…” She let her words trail off again.

Tanner rested his forehead against hers.

“I testified against Carlo even though his goons threatened to kill me. The jury convicted him, and he went away for fourteen years on first-degree manslaughter charges. As they were dragging him out of the courtroom, he vowed to get even with me.”

She cleared her throat and stared glassy-eyed at the shiny chrome bathroom faucet fixtures. “The defense brought in my mother and Earl as character witnesses against me. They said I was a liar. A runaway. A thief. My own mother. Luckily the jury believed me and not them.”

“That must have been terrifying.” Tanner’s voice was calm, but loaded with an undercurrent of anger. “I wish I could have been there. I wish I could have protected you.”

“The trial wasn’t as terrifying as working for Vega. I was glad he wasn’t going to be able to hurt anyone else. The media made a big deal of it. I was hailed as a hero, but I just saw myself as a survivor. And then something unbelievably wonderful happened because of everything I’d gone through.”

“What was that?”

“An anonymous benefactor came forward. In a news interview I’d said I wanted to be a doctor. The benefactor paid for my way through college and medical school. I was pretty proud, and at first I didn’t want to accept the money—I wasn’t a charity case. I had proven I could take care of myself. I’d taken down a powerful criminal with my testimony. I could have made it without this person’s money. But then I realized it was my one chance to be a doctor, and I wanted that more than anything else on earth. I wanted, needed to help people. So I took the money, I changed my name and buried Trudy Valdez. I was reborn Vanessa Rodriquez and I devoted myself to achieving my goals. I refused to let anything distract me.”

“You were dedicated.”

“I wasn’t going to let Vega steal my soul or ruin my spirit. I was going to triumph and I made it.” The tears were back and she couldn’t blink them away this time.

Tenderness misted his own eyes. He kissed her lightly on the cheeks, the forehead, her eyelids. “Sweetheart, you are such an amazing woman,” Tanner said. “More than I ever guessed.”

The tears trickled down her face.

Gently, Tanner drew her up out of the water and turned on the shower. He held her while he rinsed the soap from her hair. He shut off the water and toweled her dry, his hands skimming over her body. When he was finished and her hair was wrapped in a towel, he put his arms around her again.

For fourteen long years she’d hidden her sorry truth from the world. But now she’d let down her guard. She’d trusted him. Tanner could not think of a greater gift.

He had only one regret—that he hadn’t known her then. That he hadn’t been able to protect her. No one had protected her. Not her mother, not her real father, whoever he was. She’d lost her innocence at such a young age. She’d gone it alone and in an incredible act of bravery, she’d saved herself and countless other women by putting Vega behind bars. But in the process, so much trust and hope had been hammered out of her. Tanner wanted to give those things back to her, but he didn’t know how.

“You have nothing to be ashamed of, Vanessa,” he whispered. “Never be ashamed of who you are.”

She looked at him, her brown eyes glittering with tears, and then she laughed hoarsely and kissed him. Tanner could see she was frantic with relief. She finally set down her burden.

He stroked her face with his fingers and his lips. Tasting her, feeling her, absorbing her into his system. He picked her up and carried her into his bedroom.

The towel fell from her hair, exposing the wet strands that were now jet-black with dampness. He settled her onto the new mattress he’d bought when he moved in, then removed his own clothes and lay down beside her.

She touched him between his thighs with her fingertips and he hardened instantly.

Breathlessly he planted kisses all over her body and she did the same to him. Gone was all the wildness of their previous mating. This was calm and quiet, steady and secure.

They lay naked together, hands and mouths exploring, learning things about each other they hadn’t known before. They were trembling, both of them, caught up in this helpless newness of their fresh knowledge of each other.

At times it was awkward, the blinding intensity of these feelings. They made their way through it together, signaling with touch, whispers and feather-soft caresses. Enrapt in a timeless place as hot and emotional as a restless summer night filled with lightning.

Her deep brown eyes darkened to midnight as his gaze met hers. “I’ve been waiting for you my entire life,” she murmured. “And I never even knew it until now.”

No other words could have lifted him higher. Tanner’s heart, broken so long, soared on the hope of wholeness and repair. He had suffered; she had suffered. But it was all over now. They merged together in a sweet cocoon of love.

VANESSA FELT like a new person in the same old skin. She woke happy and giddy to be alive and not even the thought of her vandalized condo could shake the joy strumming through her blood.

They spooned together in the pearly soft light of dawn streaming in through his bedroom window. Tanner lay curled against her back, his right arm tucked under her head like a pillow, his left arm thrown across her waist, her fingers laced through his.

He stretched against her and she flexed back. She could feel his erection pressing against her buttocks. His bare chest was hard against her bare back. He inhaled, loosened his fingers from hers, ran his hand along her belly.

The taste of him was in her mouth. The scent of him on her skin.

“I’ve been lying here listening to you sleep. You have the sweetest snore.”

“I don’t snore,” she denied.

“How do you know?” He chuckled. “You’re sleeping when you do it.”

“I don’t snore.”

“It’s not a real snore,” he said. “Not loud. Just this raspy little sound that lets me know you’re breathing.”

She rolled against him, into him. “I wish we didn’t have to get up. I wish we could stay in bed forever.”

“We can’t. We have to go to work.”

“I know.”

He kissed her forehead. “Come on, sleepyhead, I’ll make you breakfast.”

Tanner grinned at her and her heart filled up with happiness. And as she watched him get up to strut buck-naked across the room she found herself thinking, So this is what it feels like to be in love.

WHEN TANNER GOT TO WORK, he found a message waiting for him on his answering machine from his P.I. friend in El Paso. “Got the lowdown on Vanessa Rodriquez. Call me.”

After closing his office door, Tanner called his friend back on his cell phone. “Phil,” he said. “Tanner. Whatcha got for me?”

“Something very interesting.”

“Yeah?” He tried to sound cool, professional, but his gut squeezed tight.

“For one thing, your lady wasn’t always known as Vanessa Rodriquez.”

“I know, I just found out she had it legally changed from Trudy Valdez.”

“Rats, you take all the fun out of it. I suppose you know about her real father, as well.”

Tanner’s hand tightened on the phone. “No, who is he?”

“It’s a scorcher.”

“Someone well-known?”

“He’s from your neck of the woods.”

“Don’t drag this out, Phil. We’re not playing poker. Gimme what you’ve got,” Tanner growled.

“You know Senator Garcia?”

“Yes?”

“He’s her daddy.”

The information turned his head around and he eased down into his chair. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope.”

It made perfect sense. No wonder Robert was so concerned about Vanessa’s well-being. He was her biological father.

“Where’d you find this information?” Tanner asked, the implications bouncing around in his brain. How was he going to break the news to Vanessa?

“It wasn’t easy. Her birth certificate listed her father as unknown, so I went over to the barrio where she was born. Had a visit with some of her mother’s relatives. Most of them wouldn’t talk to me, but there was a chatty old cousin who remembered Robert when he lived in the neighborhood and dated Vanessa’s mother.”

“Wow. That’s a bombshell. Are you absolutely positive?”

“Only a paternity test will tell that story,” Phil said. “But that’s not the biggest shocker.”

Tanner drummed his pen against the desk. “What else could there be?”

“That threatening e-mail sent to your lady doctor?”

“Yeah?”

“Hold on to your hat.”

“You want me to come through this phone and choke the info out of you?” Tanner growled.

Phil laughed. “I love getting you riled. I figure this Vanessa means something to you on a personal level.”

“How do you know?”

“It’s in your voice, man,” he said. “Plus you’ve never threatened to choke me before.”

“What about the e-mail?” Tanner asked, barely able to keep his patience. “Where did it come from?”