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Rio watched her pick up a dark green towel, thinking to tell her there was really no rush. The call could certainly wait until morning. But seeing her wipe her hands as she headed across the room and snatched up the phone hanging above the counter, he wasn’t so sure it would have made any difference. There was a stiffness to her usually graceful movements that spoke of intense preoccupation; an abruptness that made him think she was focusing only on what she was doing at that very moment and nothing more.
“Hi, Hal. It’s Eve,” he heard her say, her tone making him think she was surprised she’d reached him. “I’m sorry to bother you,” she went on, one arm holding her stomach as she faced a dish cabinet. “But Rio wants Mom’s day planner for this year. It’s not in the box you sent over. Do you know where it is?”
It wasn’t too hard for Rio to guess Hal’s reaction. Especially once she’d mentioned his name. Eve’s whole body went stiff as a plank.
“I know the police are working on it,” he heard her say. “But it can’t hurt to have…”
Hal must have interrupted her. Going silent, she closed her eyes, then proceeded to destroy the smooth line of her hair by shoving her fingers through it while she listened to her brother rant.
Wishing he’d stopped her from making the call, Rio started toward her. He was three feet away when she decided she’d had enough.
“Thank you very much, Hal,” she said, her tone clipped, and hung up.
Her back was still to him when she crossed her arms.
“He said he needs it so he can keep her appointments. It has Mom’s agenda for the rest of the year. He also said to tell you that the sheriff’s already seen it.” Turning, she found him standing behind her. Seeming puzzled to find him there, she scooted right back to the sink.
There wasn’t a doubt in Rio’s mind that Hal had said far more than what Eve had repeated. But she reminded him a little too much of an overwound spring at the moment, so he didn’t ask her what she’d left out. He could pretty much guess, anyway.
Eve hands were always busy, especially when she was nervous or uncertain. But she didn’t continue arranging her flowers as he’d thought she might. Or start fiddling with the towel or wiping an imaginary speck off some already pristine surface. She just stood with her arms wrapped around herself, staring at the night-blackened window.
As he watched her, the wide pane of mirrorlike glass reflected the light haloing her short and slightly disheveled hair, the partially filled vase of spiky crimson flowers, and his own guarded features. He would have felt a whole lot better about whatever was going on with her if she’d started fidgeting with something. The way she held herself so tightly made it look as if she feared she might fall apart if she let go.
“What do you want with the day planners?” she asked, meeting his glance in the window. “Is there something specific you’re looking for?”
He heard the hope in her voice, along with the brittle tension he’d seen in her the moment he walked through the door. When they parted after the luncheon, he’d thought then that she looked a little rocky. At the time, he’d figured that was to be expected, considering the emotional energy giving that speech would have required. She hadn’t bounced back as she usually did, though. That wasn’t like her at all.
Ignoring the self-protective voice that told him to stay where he was, he moved toward her. A lesser person would have broken down long before now. But he knew there was a backbone of solid steel beneath all that softness. The problem with that was that steel didn’t bend or bow with its burdens. When the load became too much, it simply snapped.
“I just want to reconstruct her schedule.” She was looking to him to ease some of the anxiety she carried over her mother’s murder. He hated that there was nothing of substance to tell her. “It’s a long shot, but maybe there’s something the sheriff missed. Some name that’s been overlooked.”
She pulled a steadying breath, seeming too numb to be disappointed. “There are some files in the boxes. Was there anything in them that might help?”
“According to the labels on them, they were for newspaper articles, but the files themselves were empty. I’d say either Hal or the police kept them.”
“Was there anything else in there? In the boxes, I mean?”
“You haven’t looked?”
She shook her head, the tips of her fingers turning nearly white as she tightened the grip on her arms.
She hadn’t been able to bring herself to do it. She didn’t have to say a word for Rio to know that encountering another aspect of her mother’s life would do nothing but bring fresh pain.
“Nothing that helps,” he had to tell her. “Pictures, vases, that kind of thing.”
His shadow fell on her as he curved his hand over her shoulder. In the window he saw her head jerk up. Beneath the soft fabric of her shirt, he felt her tension increase. Ignoring it, he turned her around to face him.
The sudden wariness in her eyes made him even more aware of the shadows beneath them. They made her look terribly, frighteningly, fragile.
“Are you all right?”
Eve closed her eyes, drew a breath. The man didn’t play fair. As tenuous a hold as she had on herself, his concern threatened what little composure she could claim.
“I will be.” Come morning, the awful feelings would have passed. It was just a matter of getting through the next nine or ten hours. Then, getting through them again the next time. “I just wish I could be like you,” she told him, slipping sideways to break his hold. “I wish I had your ability to keep things from getting to me.”
She made it about three feet before he snagged her arm. Blocking her retreat with his body, he scanned her face, concern for her etching his lean features. “I don’t know where you got the idea that nothing gets to me,” he informed her, sounding as if he already had an example to the contrary in mind. “But that couldn’t be further from the truth.”
“Oh, come on, Rio. You’re always in such…control. You always have been.”
“And you’re not?”
“Not here. Not since any of this started. And not like you. Never like you. I can’t…I feel…”
She shook her head, frustration piling onto everything else when the words seemed to fail her.
“You feel…what?” he encouraged, tugging her closer.
She tugged back. “Don’t, Rio. Please.”
“Just talk to me.” Though he eased his hold, he didn’t let go. “We could always talk. Remember?”
Relaxing her grip on her arms enough to restore the flow of blood to her fingers, Eve gave him a nod.
“Are you upset about what I told you today? That the police checked you out?”
“No. Maybe,” she amended, because denying it didn’t change the fact. “I understand that’s how these things work, but… Yes,” she finally admitted, because rationalizing didn’t help, either. “That’s probably part of it.”
“What about the rest? Is it your brother?”
“Not entirely, but he’s in there.”
“The investigation?”
“That, too.”
“What about having to sell this house?”
She gave him another nod, but he had the feeling there was still more.
He paused, his conscience kicking him squarely in the ribs. “Me?”
“Yes.”
She was looking down. Since the top of her head barely reached the base of his throat, he couldn’t see her face. It was probably just as well. Everything he’d mentioned was ganging up on her, but all he considered was the certainty in her last reply. It was one thing to suspect that he added to her burdens. Hearing it when she seemed so defenseless made him feel like a snake.
“And what does all of that make you feel?” he asked, smoothing her hair. “Impotent? Alone? Scared?”
His hand slipped to her nape. With his fingers resting against her slender neck, he felt her swallow.
“For starters,” she whispered.
In other words, what she felt was…overwhelmed.
The pressure of his hand increased, urging her forward. But she held her ground, refusing to move.
“I just want to hold you,” he told her, not sure it wasn’t his own need he sought to fill.
“I want that, too.” So badly she ached for it. “But I can’t let you.”
Sliding his thumb along her jaw, he stepped an inch closer and tipped up her chin. Her eyes looked haunted when they met his.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m not that strong. I don’t think I can handle whatever it is that’s going on between us right now. Or what isn’t. I don’t know if that makes any sense to you, but I don’t know how else to explain it.”
“You did about as good a job as I could. I don’t know if I can explain what’s going on with us, either. But I do know,” he continued, running his hands down her arms to pry her hands apart, “that when something can’t be explained, it’s a waste of energy to try. Stop being so stubborn and come here.”
It wasn’t stubbornness. It was survival. But she went, anyway, more because she couldn’t not go than because he drew her closer. Rio knew her so well, knew what she felt, what she needed. He always had.
His arms were already around her. And when he pressed her head to his chest, she felt the fight drain out as surely as if he’d pulled a plug. Not that she had much left. It was just that she couldn’t fight herself and him, too. Not when there was so much else demanding her energy.
That was the only thought she allowed herself as she sagged against his strong, solid body. Enveloped in his arms, she simply let herself rest against him while he stroked her hair, his palm cupping the back of her head as he skimmed from crown to nape. The motion was more soothing than she could have ever dreamed, the feel of him more welcome than she could have imagined. And, in the past few weeks, she’d imagined him holding her more times than she could count.
“That’s not so bad? Is it?”
She shook her head, the motion rubbing her cheek against his shirt. He smelled of soap and fresh air, and warm, musky male. Beneath the soft fabric, she could feel the strong, steady cadence of his heart. He was a rock, and she badly needed the support he offered. The way they’d been lately, with both of them staying away from each other as much as possible, he was the last person on earth she would ever have expected to offer it.
His arms tightened around her back, securing his hold. With a familiarity that shouldn’t have been there, his hand curved easily around her side, the heat of his palm seeping inside her.
“I’d forgotten how small you are,” he murmured, his voice as soothing as his touch. “At least now I know you won’t break. The first time I held you six years ago, I was afraid you might.”
Her whispered “You were?” was barely audible, muffled as it was by his shirt.
“Yeah. I was.”
The admission surprised her. She couldn’t picture Rio fearing anything. “But I didn’t.”
“No,” he agreed, his breath feathering her hair. “You didn’t. You’re a lot stronger than you look. And a lot stronger than you think you are.”
She looked up to find a faint smile curving his sculpted mouth. He was telling her that she was doing better than she thought she was, and she appreciated the encouragement more than he could possibly know. But she wasn’t strong when it came to him. She’d meant that when she said it.
She might have told him that, too. But his glance drifted to her mouth, pooling heat low in her stomach when the smile in his dark eyes faded. When he met her eyes again, a faint tension seemed to have entered his body. She could feel it in his arms, see it in the strong angles of his features. For long seconds, he searched her face, looking as if he didn’t know whether to pull her closer or let her go. Then he carefully tucked back the hair she’d mussed earlier.
“You’re going to be okay,” he told her, seeming to ignore the way his body hardened against hers. “A lot of it will just take time.”
He was right, of course. But she couldn’t think why. She couldn’t even remember what they were talking about. All she could think of was how safe she felt at that moment, how protected. Nothing could intrude when he held her. None of the uncertainties, or questions, or hurts. Even if the feelings were an illusion, for now she needed them desperately.
“Rio?” Her voice sounded thready, hushed. “Please don’t go home tonight.”
The motion of his hand stopped, his fingers still threaded through her hair. “If that’s what you want,” he finally said, sounding as if he found it understandable that she didn’t want to be alone, even if he hadn’t expected the request. “I’ll sleep on the sofa.”
She shook her head. “I mean stay with me. Holding me.”
“Eve. I can’t do that.”
She didn’t know which hit harder. The absolute certainty in his voice, or the look in his eyes that clearly said he thought she’d finally slipped over the edge. She ducked her head, embarrassed for having asked, feeling like a fool for confusing his concern with caring.
“Honey, don’t.” He refused to let her go, his expression as tormented as his words when he saw the hurt clouding her eyes. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“It’s okay.”
He swore, the whispered epithet harsh and unforgiving.
“No. It’s not okay.” Knowing her as he did, he knew she’d never have asked such a thing of him unless she’d been desperate. And all he’d done was make her feel worse than she already did. “I said I just wanted to hold you, but that’s not true.” It had been when he’d said it. When he’d reached for her, he’d meant only to offer comfort. But the moment he felt her sag against him, altruism had gone to battle with want, sensibility with need. “I’ve never stopped wanting you, Eve. Even after all these years, all I can think about when I’m with you is how you taste and feel and move. Don’t you know that?”
Her heart hammering in her throat, she slowly shook her head. “When we’re together, you never come anywhere near me.”
“There’s a reason for that.”
He didn’t trust himself around her. Eve got the message clearly enough when his eyes, dark and glittering, settled on her mouth. The knowledge did something very freeing to her spirit. As controlled as he so often appeared, inside he was a man doing battle. And she was a woman who very much needed that man.
“I’ll stay.” He would do that because he knew how long and lonely some nights could be, and heaven help him, he couldn’t stand the thought of her here by herself. “But you know what will happen if we’re in the same bed together.”
“I think so.” She touched his chest with her fingertips, her fingers trembling. “But it’s been so long, you’ll probably have to show me all over again.”
Her words were too honest to be deliberately provocative, but the images they evoked of the first time they’d made love played pure havoc with Rio’s brain. She’d told him then that he’d have to teach her what to do. And he had. Too impatiently, he was sure.
Clasping her hand in his, he drew it to his mouth and brushed a kiss to her wrist. Beneath his lips, her pulse leapt. “It’s like riding a bike,” he whispered, threading his fingers through hers and drawing her arm behind her back. “It’ll come back to you.”
His last words were murmured against her mouth, his breath hot against her cheek. When his tongue touched hers, Eve thought her legs would buckle, but he caught her to him, letting her use his body for support. Long moments later, her breathing altered, his just as erratic, he bent and picked her up in his arms.
“Get the lights,” he told her, swinging her toward the switch on the way out of the kitchen.
He turned off the front lights himself, using his forearm as they passed through the foyer. With the filtered lights from the porch and hall upstairs illuminating the way, he carried her up the stairs, pausing just outside Molly’s open door.
“Is she okay?”
Seeing the soundly sleeping child, Eve whispered that she was. Quiet as air, he turned to the room Eve had claimed for herself and used his foot to swing the door partway closed once they were inside.
The filmy curtains were open, moonlight streaming into the tiny, atticlike room. The daybed was against one wall. A chair and dresser against another. Eve watched the shadows move over his face as he slid her down his body to the floor, then reached past her to close the door the rest of the way. In those muted shades of gray, his noble features were taut with purpose and possession.
“I can still sleep on the sofa,” he told her, skimming his hand down her arm. He laced his fingers through hers, smoothing her hair back with his other hand.
She shook her head. At least, she thought she did. She was really only aware of his eyes, intent on her face, and the feel of his fingers drifting down her neck.
“I want you here,” she finally said, just so there’d be no doubt.
There was none. The possessiveness in his eyes moved to his touch as the mesmerizing movement of his hand reached the collar of her blouse. With the tip of his finger, he nudged the fabric aside and drew his finger along her collarbone, trailing a line of heat to the hollow of her throat. His touch lingered long enough for him to feel the quickened beat of her heart before he carried it between her breasts, then back up to trace her jaw.
