The Other Man

  He looked like he was about to snap, to lose it completely.

  I was afraid of him, that’s how much he was losing his ever-present composure.

  I’d always known he was dangerous. But my instincts, which I’d trusted before Heath, had always told me that, while he was dangerous, he was not at all dangerous to me.

  I did not feel that way now.

  Something dark and vile had overtaken him. He’d barely moved, but I still knew, deep in my gut, that he was incensed to a degree that I’d never seen before.

  To the point of violence.

  I was shaking. This was not Heath and his usual combination of mean and magnificent. This was not Heath angry = Me turned on.

  This was something unmanageable. I knew it.

  “She contacted you directly?” His face was fraudulently collected, but his voice hid nothing. He sounded murderous.

  “She came to my house. She had all kinds of interesting things she wanted to tell me about you.”

  I couldn’t speak of her without revealing my feelings, though I tried to hide it.

  My jealousy was very thinly veiled, but as I studied him I realized that that didn’t matter. He’d never notice it, because he simply wasn’t looking for it.

  He was much too wrapped up in his own volatile emotions then to notice mine.

  “She came here? To your house?”

  I didn’t answer, didn’t bother to repeat myself, just staring at him.

  He cursed, fluently and savagely. “Did she lay a hand on you? Hurt you?”

  I couldn’t manage an answer for several pounding heartbeats, because the way he asked it made me realize something.

  This fury, this unadulterated rage he was going through was not directed at me.

  It was for her. I was both relieved and as baffled as ever.

  “No,” I finally got out.

  That seemed to take some of the steam out of him, which was good. I could breathe again when he didn’t look so close to the brink.

  “She just came here . . . to talk?” he finally managed to get out.

  “Yes. She told me everything, Heath. I know everything.”

  His brows drew together menacingly. “She told you everything? I don’t fucking think so. She doesn’t know everything, and I’ve worked with her for a long time, so I can guess what she did tell you. A convincing combination of lies and truth. But I see it got to you.”

  “Are you saying you’ve never lied to me?”

  “Not like you seem to think. Have I been completely upfront with you? No. Have I lied? Yes. But not more than I had to.”

  “I know that you only approached me because of whatever was going on with your sister and Dair.”

  He cursed, and it was as good as an admission of guilt. “Yes, that’s why I approached you then. But it has fuck all to do with me being here now.”

  I recoiled. It was an awful thing to hear, because it made me think that— “So you only slept with me because of—”

  “No! Fucking no. Stop it. I checked you out for my sister. I searched your house. I got a feel for your patterns, trying to figure out if you were seeing Dair. But, like I said, that had fuck all to do with us having sex.”

  “Then why—”

  “I fucked you because I couldn’t fucking help myself, okay? It was never part of the plan. It was always against the goddamn plan, okay? I’ll admit that I invaded your privacy way more than was fair. I, shit, Lourdes, I started watching you and I liked what I saw. More than liked.”

  He took a very deep breath. “Listen, to understand why I became so obsessed with you so quickly, you need some background on me. I’ve done a lot of things. Terrible things. Things a man can’t come back from. You never come back. Instead, you end up owning those things, and they just become a part of who you are.

  “For better or worse, I own a lot of bloody baggage that I can’t ever walk away from. I’ve survived a lot of things I can’t come back from, and hell, I know there are some still to come.”

  He studied me for a moment, trying to gage my reaction, then continued, “I carry all of my burdens as best I can, but I know better than anyone that I can never lead a normal life. Even if all of my problems were solved, and my sister was safe, my life will never be peaceful.

  “I wouldn’t even know where to begin to be peaceful. I am not acclimated to the rules of normal society.

  “When you’re that fucked in the head, deceit becomes a way of life. Lies become a pattern.

  “I don’t lie because I like it. I’ve never enjoyed the burn at the back of my throat when I open my mouth and deadpan endless falsehoods, big ones, small ones, omissive ones, day after day.

  “I lie because the bottom line is: the truth is death for me, no matter how I might crave it.

  “But God, I do crave the truth.

  “Imagine damaged me with all of that inside of me, abhorring deceit, craving elusive honesty.

  “Running into a woman like you.

  “There wasn’t a thing about you I couldn’t read. Even if it was hidden a bit, no matter. You’re a piece of glass I could hold in my palm. So what if it clouded a bit, got a bit of sand on it? All I had to do was turn it this way, brush it off, and poof, shiny and transparent as ever.

  “But really, I didn’t even have to do that. The beauty of you, this gorgeous creature that for some fucking reason let me have her, over and over, was that if I wanted the truth from you, all I had to do was ask, and you’d tell me. You play no games. You’re incapable of deceit.

  “You’re the truth, Lourdes. So what if I couldn’t, shouldn’t have you? I craved you, and so I kept coming back.

  “I’m not dead inside. Not all of me. Something remains, something that doesn’t only live for vengeance.

  “That’s what you taught me.”

  He’d left me speechless, breathless, without a leg to stand on.

  He did care about me. I was positive of that now, at least. So many other questions remained, but that was the one that had bothered me the most.

  I was such a girl.

  I moved to him, laying my cheek against his chest.

  He wrapped his arms around me.

  We stayed like that for a long time, pressed together as I wondered what the hell I was supposed to do. Had this changed anything? It felt like it had. But feelings and reality were two different things.

  “She said she was your lover,” I finally broke the silence. I’d tried to keep that in, but I just couldn’t.

  He sighed and stroked a hand over my hair. “She’s a good liar. It’s what makes her great at her job. We’re not sleeping together.”

  “Since when?” Another thing I couldn’t keep in.

  “Since I was fifteen, and only then to mark her as mine to keep her safe from the other people we were working with. They were scared of me, and her being mine made her off-limits.”

  “So why is she so interested in me?”

  “Hell if I know. If I had to guess, I’d say it’s some leftover jealousy from the past. But I’ll tell you one thing—she won’t bother you again.”

  I took a deep breath, trying to hold in yet another question. Tried and failed. “Have you been with . . . anyone else, since you’ve been with me?”

  He stiffened up, but didn’t hesitate. “No.” Long pause. “I won’t be asking you the same question.” His voice was pained. “I don’t want to know.”

  I was gearing up to answer him, to set him straight when he continued, “Once I was tortured by a particularly sick motherfucker. He sliced me to ribbons with a rusty, dull knife. When I heard about you and your other man, heard he’d spent the night here, it hurt worse than that. Just so you know.”

  I started trembling. “Heath,” my voice caught on his name. “He didn’t—we haven’t, err, I didn’t have sex with him. He spent the night, but he slept on the couch, okay? I haven’t done more than kiss him.”

  “I don’t understand. So why did he spend the night?”

  ??
?Hell if I know. He wanted to. But he never even made a move. We were taking it slow.”

  I barely got the last word out before he was kissing me.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-NINE

  I woke alone in my bed.

  I sat up.

  He’d left?

  I was instantly angry.

  Not angry. Furious at him, for so many complicated reasons, but one of them, the most important one, was terribly simple.

  He’d left. I’d wanted him to stay, and regardless of why, he had not stayed. He had left. It was that uncomplicated and that devastating.

  And I had not a clue where we stood. He’d finally let me sleep after that last round of sex, and I’d passed out cold, but what we’d needed to do was talk.

  How could he do that?

  Back for only half a night, but he’d done his fair share of damage.

  Messing up my head.

  Messing up my heart.

  Then leaving without a goodbye?

  I couldn’t have it. I couldn’t do this again. Not for sex or for love.

  But what did I think we could’ve settled?

  He couldn’t offer me anything. I’d gathered enough about the current job he was on to understand that much, at least.

  Not even an occasional something, which sadly I’d have taken.

  All he could give me was a big fat maybe, just maybe someday, and I needed more than that, plain and simple.

  I had myself worked up into a temper when I heard the front door opening.

  I threw on my robe and charged through the house.

  And there was Heath, locking the door behind him with one hand, a bouquet of pink lilies in the other.

  My temper left me in one long, dreamy sigh.

  “I forgot last night,” he explained, holding up the flowers. “But then I remembered this morning. I noticed that your boys brought you different kinds, so I thought I’d surprise you.”

  I smiled, moving to take them from him. “It’s true, I like variety.”

  “Hopefully you’re only talking about flowers when you say that.”

  I laughed, shooting him a look over my shoulder. “You tell jokes now? Surely that’s a sign of the apocalypse?”

  I was rewarded with his version of a fond smile.

  I put the lilies in a vase and was just setting them on my entryway table when his voice made my breath catch in my chest.

  “If you tell me to stay away, I’ll do it. Otherwise . . . I’ll never leave you alone, never let you move on.

  I shut my eyes tight. “Stay away.”

  “Do you mean it?”

  I stood my ground, barely.

  I let out a deep, stuttering breath and gave him a very soft, tremulous, “Yes. I need to move on, and I’ll never move on if we keep doing this. Not if you can’t give me something real, something lasting.”

  “I’ve always given you something real. This is real. And for what it’s worth, it’ll last as long as I live.”

  Powerful emotion made my voice thick. I couldn’t quite believe what he was saying to me. “Then why have we never so much as talked about the future?”

  “I don’t have a future, Lourdes. But if I did . . . if I did, it would be yours. I’d give it you in a heartbeat. I wish I could give you everything you deserve.”

  “Will you explain that to me? Why don’t you have a future?”

  “They’re not my secrets to tell.”

  “This is our entire problem. If you could just stop being cryptic for one second and tell me what is going on.”

  His fists clenched. “I’m doing my level-best here,” he enunciated slowly.

  “Well, I need you to do better. If you’re asking me to do what I think you are, to wait for you, for some indeterminate amount of time, then I need at least some answers.”

  His eyes closed, jaw clenched in defeat, and I thought we were dead in the water.

  But then he proved me wrong about him, yet again. “Ask me a question, and I’ll try my best to answer it, okay?

  I didn’t know whether I was relieved or appalled. What would I be willing to do for a Heath that was actually upfront with me about his life?

  It boggled the mind.

  I started with the most important question. “Why don’t you have a future?

  “I’m on an assignment right now that is very dangerous. I’ve already taken six bullets for it over two different occasions and lost several men. I’m protecting a witness, a very important one, one that is in a great deal of danger. I can’t discuss the details of the case, but it is high stakes, and there is no other option but for me to see it through to the end.”

  “Can’t you just go into hiding for a while?”

  “We have, and we do, but this witness has powerful enemies working in the government, and my team’s already been compromised twice. And besides that, at some point my witness will be taking the stand in a very public trial. We can’t hide for that part.”

  “I got the impression your sister is right in the middle of this mess. How is she involved?”

  His mouth turned down into a frown that made me want to burst into tears, it was so full of pain. “She’s the witness.”

  Oh God. There really was no way out for him.

  “I’ll fight to the end to protect her, to stay alive myself,” he continued. “But our odds are shit poor. Impossible to sugar coat it. And even if somehow we succeed, and I keep Iris alive long enough to do the job she has to do, I still have years of work ahead of me before I can ever sleep easy at night.”

  “So,” I said slowly, “if we’re optimistic and things work out in your favor, we’re talking years you’re asking me to wait?”

  “It’s a very good possibility. I’m sorry. I wish I could give you a better answer.”

  I wished he could too.

  “Tell me something sweet, Heath,” I uttered softly.

  “I know I’m not being fair to you here. I know I should let you move on. But I can’t. I’ll do anything to be with you for as much time as I can. Anything you ask.”

  I soaked that up. I don’t know how he did it, but he always managed to say the thing that made it worth me sticking around, no matter how little he had to offer.

  “Okay,” I finally said, even while my mind still raked over all of the things I’d learned. “I’ll wait for you. As long as you’re faithful. And as long as you try your damned hardest to get back to me as soon, and as often, as you can.”

  He closed the few feet of ground that separated us, his hands going into my hair. He leaned down, touching our foreheads.

  “Thank you. Now I need you to do something for me.”

  “Hmm?” I asked, eyes closed, soaking up his tender touch.

  “Dump that fucker you’ve been seeing. Call him right now and tell him it’s over. And also, we both know I’m paranoid, but deal with him carefully in the future. Don’t be alone with him again. My people couldn’t find out much about him, aside from the basics, and they got nothing solid on his history. I don’t like that. I’ve never met a man with no past at all.”

  “Okay, I’ll do it right after you leave.” I told him, feeling a little disappointed in myself that it didn’t make me more sad to just be letting Kevin go that easy.

  Had he meant nothing to me at all? Had I just been using him as a rebound?

  The answer made me feel guilty. I’d expected better from myself.

  “Just make sure he knows it’s fucking final. Hammer every nail into that fucking coffin.”

  He was jealous, and I didn’t blame him. I’d have been just as jealous.

  “I will. I won’t leave him hanging. It wouldn’t be fair.”

  Somewhere in the house, my cell started ringing.

  I tracked it to the bedroom.

  Eduard was calling.

  What the fuck? Could I not get a break?

  Heath was right behind, and he saw the name on the screen when I did.

  He plucked the phone from my hand and ans
wered it with an oh so charming, “What the fuck do you want?”

  I perched on the edge of my bed and watched him, arms folded across my chest. Hell, maybe he could talk some sense into my idiot ex. I’d sure as hell never been able to.

  I couldn’t hear what Eduard said on his end, but I could see from Heath’s reaction that he didn’t like it.

  “Her fucking man, that’s who,” he thundered into the phone. “There’s nobody else. Just me from here on out, motherfucker.”

  I tried and failed to keep from smiling.

  “Suing? You have the nerve to talk about suing her? Are you fucking crazy? You threaten her again, and I’ll make you sorry.” Pause. “How? I’ll hurt you, slowly, you piece of shit.”

  Okaaaay, I thought to myself.

  That was about enough of that.

  I plucked my cell from his hand and hung it up, giving him an exasperated look. “I can handle him. Trust me.”

  He opened his mouth and I held up my hand. “Trust me,” I repeated. “You have enough on your plate. I can deal with my pain in the ass ex all by myself. Okay?”

  He nodded, but he sure as hell didn’t look like he liked it.

  And then, because I couldn’t prolong it forever, I asked the question I’d been dreading. “How long can you stay?”

  He cursed, and I knew I wouldn’t like the answer.

  And I didn’t.

  He was gone within the hour.

  I did what any woman would do when she’d just had a night of absolute bliss in the arms of an ex.

  I called a girlfriend.

  Danika knew the most about my current fucked up dating situation, so she got the honors.

  “I had sex with him five times last night.”

  Danika paused for a few beats on the other end. From the background noise, I could tell she was at work, in the gallery at the Cavendish resort.

  “Him who?” she asked.

  I winced. It was a fair question. Thus the wince.

  “Heath.”

  “Dayum. So it’s not really over between you?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “It always is,” she said wryly. “But five times does not sound like it’s over.”

  “It’s not. We’re back on; it’s just, you know, he’ll be gone a lot. It’s a long story, but the short version is I have to make a very unpleasant phone call to Kevin now.”