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“A pity hug from you. I am pathetic.” But she didn’t pull away—she sniffled into his shoulder, and it was such a strange sensation. Holding and comforting someone he barely knew. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done this for someone he did know.
“How long has he been like that?”
She stiffened. A question she didn’t want to answer, and inevitably the question that got her to pull herself together and step away.
Because the impulse to touch her face, wipe away the tears there, was shockingly strong, he shoved his hands into his pockets. There was something all wrong about this whole exchange, and it wasn’t her crying or pulling away. It was him. His reaction to it. The wanting to understand and fix wasn’t unique; he felt that a lot.
But he never felt compelled to act. Never acted against the voice in his head telling him to put up a barrier or step away. He had learned his lesson from childhood, damn it.
“Look, um, thanks. Really.” She wiped her face with her palms, let out a shaky breath as she looked around. “Can’t say I’ve ever broken down in a hallway before.”
“Where do you usually do your breaking down?”
“Alone.”
Christ.
“But those big broad football shoulders are good for crying on.” She ran her fingertips down his chest, and this was a completely inappropriate time to think of anything sexual, but he could not force himself to be appropriate.
She pulled her hand away and the way she looked at him, he had to wonder if she felt it, too. The little zing of heat and inappropriate attraction.
She took a full step back, eyebrows drawing together. “Anyway. Hopefully you won’t be put in that position again. It isn’t...normal.”
“It isn’t?”
The vulnerable bafflement on her face immediately changed, blanked. “Enjoy your day off tomorrow, Marc. You earned it.”
“I only did my job.”
She cocked her head. “You did a little more than that, Captain Quiet.”
Before he could argue with the obnoxious moniker again, she stepped inside her apartment and shut the door.
He found himself here far too often, wanting to understand more, with a door shut in his face. When he should feel nothing but relief, he felt the exact opposite.
CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_87328933-5797-5d58-941c-22aa8272ebf8)
TESS SCOOTED FARTHER down into the cooling bathwater. It was her day off and she didn’t want to face it. So much so, she’d taken a bath, something she almost never did. Infrequently enough she didn’t even have bubbles. She’d squirted some shower gel in there and now she was lounging in tepid, bubbleless water.
It seemed terribly appropriate.
At least she didn’t have to face Marc. Small mercies. Her embarrassment wasn’t likely to fade anytime soon, but maybe she could get a better handle on it with a day in between sitting in a car with him for eight hours.
Eight long hours knowing he’d seen through her so easily. All the bravado, all the work she’d done to create this persona, and it’d only taken her father threatening someone with a butter knife and her asking Marc to keep people from pressing charges.
Marc saw her for what she was. A scared little girl with daddy issues so wide no submarine could cross.
She thought about the way she’d cried all over his shoulder then commented on the broadness of said shoulders. It was so out of character. At the very least when she flirted with a guy she didn’t do it in the middle of a good cry.
And she did not flirt with cops. Attraction didn’t matter. She’d seen enough to know if she got together with one cop, all the hard work she’d put into building her reputation would be for nothing. It was rare these days someone rolled their eyes at her simply for her gender.
She wasn’t undoing all that work for an impressive chest. Except she’d already done it with tears and Dad.
It was an impressive chest. What was the harm in a little fantasy when he wasn’t here, and she was in the bath, and—
Nope. Whole lotta harm. Because she had to share a damn patrol car with the guy for weeks upon unending weeks, and she did not need actual fantasies in her head.
Which was enough impetus to get her out of the bathtub. The only problem was—now what? She should go see Dad, check his place for signs of drugs, figure out what was going on.
She should. She should. What else might he do if she didn’t?
I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care.
She was over the crying and the hurting. So she’d do the only thing that ever helped that—run her ass off.
She pulled on her running gear and slipped her apartment key in her shoe. She purposefully left her phone on the kitchen counter, strapped her MP3 player to her arm and stepped into the hallway.
There was Marc.
Well, hell.
She mustered her best I-did-not-wipe-snot-on-your-shirt-last-night smile.
“Morning.”
“Um, morning.” He cleared his throat, looking around the hallway at everything but her. “I was, um, going for a run.”
She could see that. Despite the cool March temperatures, he was in shorts. Showing off legs. Long, muscular, powerful, strong legs. A whole lotta adjectives for legs.
She had to stop looking at his legs. “I was, too.” Run till her brain exploded. Hopefully her libido, as well. But not in the fun way.
“Ah.” He nodded, looking at some point behind her on the wall.
“Yeah.” She scratched her head, pointed awkwardly at the stairs. “Um, after you.”
He gave one of those little Marc nods. She could not think of anyone else who could pull off that terse, distanced demeanor and still be something of a marshmallow on the inside.
Marc Santino had hugged her while she’d cried last night even after she’d given him a total out. No getting around that marshmallow move. Which was not something she had a lot of experience with. Which meant she should be wary, not interested.
“I should...get to it.”
Tess nodded. Not interested. Not interested. Not interested. Her eyeballs weren’t getting the message, because they were homed in on his butt as he walked down the stairs in front of her. Granted, in the loose athletic shorts she couldn’t get a good butt vantage point, but she’d seen it plenty in his uniform pants.
And had apparently unwittingly committed to brain space that it seemed very tight and firm and—yikes.
He paused at the bottom of the stairs. “Do you know any good...running routes?” He was so stiff and uncomfortable, not making any eye contact.
Tess gave up. “Pretending last night didn’t happen is way more awkward than acknowledging it.”
“I wouldn’t bet on it,” he muttered.
“Well, maybe it’s just as awkward, but you’re being too weird. I can’t take it.”
“How am I being weird?”
“You’re staring at a light fixture.”
His frown deepened and he purposefully moved his gaze to her. And, zowie, she needed to stop dwelling in Attraction Land. But his eyes were all light brown and mesmerizing and...
Briefly, his gaze dropped, not to the floor, but more like boobs, floor, then quickly back to her face. Wait. Had he just checked her out?
Oh, they were in some trouble.
Focus on the running thing. Now. “I usually run down the waterfront then up the bluff. There’s a path, pretty secluded without being creepy and a nice view.”
“That’s got to be at least four miles.”
“Run until your legs fall off.” She forced a sassy smirk. “Surely you can handle it?” Because there was no doubt about Marc being in fantastic shape. His T-shirt was loose enough in the stomach area, but around those arms? And the shoulders, perfect for snot crying?
Yeah, she had ample view of his shapes.
She seriously, seriously needed to cool the heck off. “You’re welcome to follow along if you want. Unless four miles is too many for you.”
Again he did the little boob-floor-back-to-face look, and if she wasn’t totally warped, she could swear his cheeks were a pinch pink. As if he was blushing.
Anyone else, she might adjust her sports bra right there and give him something to really blush about. But no cops. Especially not ones with marshmallow centers.
“All right,” he finally said, gesturing toward the door. “After you.”
She forced a sunny smile and sauntered out the door. No, she wasn’t sauntering. She was walking. Like a normal human being.
Swaying those hips like you want him to stare at your ass.
Okay, that, too. She kicked her leg out behind her, pulled her toes up to her butt. “Do you stretch beforehand?”
When she glanced over her shoulder, she saw him still standing in the doorway. Until the door smacked him because he hadn’t been paying attention. You will not bend over and touch your toes. You. Will. Not.
But, oh, it was tempting. A hell of a lot more fun than trying to run her conflicted thoughts about Dad away.
But also way more dangerous. She wasn’t into danger. She was into finding a way to build some kind of stability in her life.
Ha. Ha.
Marc stood to her side, where she couldn’t really watch him stretch. Which was probably by design.
They stretched in silence, and it was hard work to maintain the silence. Just like she couldn’t stand his weird awkwardness, she was no good with his distancing silence.
She was no good with all of it. Maybe you’re just no good.
“Ready?” she asked, eager to run that asshole voice in her head to the ground.
* * *
TESS’S PONYTAIL BOUNCED. She bounced. Every spandex-clad inch of her. This was some circle of hell. Run with the hot woman in spandex who is your FTO and also going through emotional shit you want nothing to do with. Circle five? Had to be higher than that.
Once he’d tried to get ahead of her, but she’d taken it as a challenge and never let him pass.
So he had to run behind her on the narrow path and try to focus on trees and shit. They’d run down the waterfront and up the bluff, and Marc slowed as a familiar house came into view.
“Don’t tell me you’re running out of steam.”
He looked at the big fancy house along the bluff. He’d only been here once, and it had been a weird visit. Christmastime. Mom harassing Leah and him stepping in. One of those rare moments with Leah when he couldn’t hold on to his usual detachment. “That’s where my sister works.”
“Oh, yeah?” She stopped her running, bending to one side and then the other. Spandex. Ass. Breasts. Spandex. Fucking damn it.
“Are you going to stop by and say hi?” she asked, completely unfazed that he was dying.
Saying hi to Leah was the absolute last thing he wanted to do. Scratch that, the last thing he wanted to do was keep jogging with an erection because Tess’s ass in those spandex running pants was not fair.
Life was not fair.
“Yeah, um...” How did he phrase this so he made it clear that even if he did go say hi to Leah, he didn’t want Tess tagging along? Doing it alone was bad enough—adding this woman to the mix had disaster written all over it.
“I’ll go up to the top of the street, turn around. If you’re not done by then, I’m sure you’ll catch up or I’ll just see you later.”
“Yeah. Great.”
She bent backward, fingertips splayed across her back, then bent farther, giving him an ample look down her shirt.
Abruptly, he turned toward MC Restoration’s office. He wouldn’t go to the big house—not all sweaty and...other things he was denying.
He’d knock on Leah’s little workshop door, hope to God she wasn’t there, and be on his merry way. Far away from the sight of Tess in spandex.
He refused to look back at Tess as he strode through the backyard of MC. He was focused on his destination. On safety. He knocked, held his breath and hoped no one answered.
“Marc?” Leah’s eyes were wide as she opened the door. “Hey, is everything o—”
“Yeah, yeah, good. I was just out...running.” He gestured toward the ring of sweat around his shirt collar. “Passed by and thought I should say hi, I guess.”
Leah blinked at him, but then she smiled.
Which was conflicting. A part of him felt as though he should be making bigger strides in the big brother department. Trying to figure out some relationship they could have or maneuver that wouldn’t be all heavy with what came before.
But Leah had spent too long as the driving factor of his life. Spending days on end in hospital waiting rooms, scrimping so Mom and Dad could pay off her medical bills, listening to bickering and arguments, trying to tread the waters of his parents’ separation.
Then, when they got back together, doing everything in his power to be whatever they needed.
Most of that wasn’t Leah’s fault. Her health had been beyond her control, though her rebellious streak had landed her in the hospital more than necessary after her heart transplant. Which had also been the source of Mom and Dad’s discontent and...
