Josiah pushed his chair back, slowly, and stood up. Willie glanced at him, and for a moment he saw a flash of fear in her dark eyes. “Don’t worry.” He sounded odd even to himself. “I’m not going to do anything stupid.”
“Again,” Hassan mumbled, and immediately took another huge mouthful of soup.
Josiah let it go. He left the table and trudged up the stairs, his footfalls silent. Stood outside the firmly shut bedroom door. Spread his fingers against the rough wood and imagined her behind it, maybe lying flat on the creaking single bed and silently weeping. God knew she wouldn’t let him see her in tears if she could help it.
What am I going to do? His fingers rested on the doorknob.
It was enough to make a man helpless, pulled forward like iron to the magnet. No use in struggling. He twisted the knob and walked in like a man heading for his own execution.
Chapter Fourteen
The door creaked a little, theatrically. “Anna?” Softly. As if he wasn’t quite sure what he’d find in the room.
That made two of them, she guessed.
Oh, God, can’t you leave me alone? She hunched her shoulders, her fingers running over the edges of manila folders. “Go away.” She couldn’t say it very loudly, and he came in, shut the door, and ghosted across the floorboards. He seemed to avoid each squeak and groan a normal person would wring out of lumber.
The bed creaked a little as he sat down next to her, though. She had pulled herself up, tucking her injured ankle and approximating a cross-legged position, a weight of paper in her lap. Thin moonlight fell through the windows under their cheerful clichéd red gingham, and she was suddenly shaken by the urge to scream. Did you have to make this place so fucking ugly? I could rip all the curtains down and make better ones from diseased flea market quilts. I know I could.
Homesickness tasted like bitter metal in her mouth. Anna pulled her lips tight, pushing the words down, away. The thin film of self-control was getting a workout, but at least she didn’t feel like she’d start screaming anytime soon.
Well, not very loudly, anyway.
Josiah pushed a strand of her hair back, tucking it behind her ear. He touched her swollen cheek, smoothing his finger down. “Ouch.” His tone took her by surprise—thoughtful, and gentle. “You bruise so easily. I used to think I should pad all the sharp corners for you.”
Her stomach turned over, hard. He sounded just like he always had. Calm. Quiet. Controlled.
God, how she’d loved that about him, the way he took everything in stride, from a flat tire to a bad cup of coffee. He’d always made her feel steadier and more reliable, too, instead of just the fruitcake little sister, the scattered artist.
She’d liked it, after being irresponsible all her life. You have two left feet and a brain stuck on glitter, Eric had yelled at her, once, when he tried to teach her the cha-cha.
He’d only been twelve, but still.
“I hate this.” She stared down at the file. “All this time, I haven’t even had a chance to look at it. Now I’m afraid to.”
His fingers curled around the messy stack of paper. There was a short struggle, not even deserving the name since she didn’t fight very hard, and he subtracted the whole bundle from her limp fingers. “Not right now.” He set it aside on the nightstand—an indifferently painted, chunky stripped-pine piece that had been further insulted by a shapeless seventies amber-glass lamp—and turned back to her. “I know you’re…really upset. The rug’s been pulled out from under you, and I’m sorry. But you’ve got to eat, Anna. And you’ve got to stop yanking my chain. I can’t do my job if you—”
Upset? I’m upset? A laugh, bitter and sharp, spilled out of her mouth as her temper snapped. “I thought that’s what you wanted. A good chain-yanking. A little roll in the hay, yanking the old ball and chain. Right? I’m useless for anything else.”
“Jesus.” He slipped his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close.
She wanted to hit him. She wanted to break the horrible amber lamp, wanted to smash the entire room, wanted to scream and scream and scream. Instead, she found herself breathing into the comforting space between his neck and his shoulder, shuddering. He had somehow pulled her into his lap, and was stroking her hair while she struggled to stop hyperventilating, to calm herself down. The entire cabin smelled like sap and unused air, the dusty, disused tang of a house closed up and left uninhabited for a while. Her ankle hurt, but she didn’t fight him, didn’t shift to a more comfortable position.
For the first time since seeing her brother’s body, Anna felt…well, completely safe.
He smelled like outside, like cold air and more pine sap and just plain Josiah. “I hate this,” she whispered into his sweater. “I hate it.” And I hate you, she was tempted to add, but that would have been childish.
“Shhh.” His breath was a warm spot on her scalp; he ran his fingers through her hair and rubbed her back in small circles, his expert fingers finding little spots of soreness and working at them gently. He murmured soothing little nonsensical words just as he had when her cat Caravaggio died. “I know. It’s all right. Shh.”
The shudders peaked, her teeth chattering, and eased slightly. Eased again. She was left with her face buried in his neck, damp tendrils of hair clinging to her forehead, listening to the sound of his breathing. Even, regular, as if she hadn’t upset him in the slightest.
Silence crouched over both of them. His fingers kept going, a gentle massage. Her head felt heavy, as if she’d cried herself out, but her eyes still burned with unspent tears. Stop it, Anna. Stop your whining. “Sorry.” It was a pale little word to contain what she felt.
“It’s all right.” He inhaled, a long, smooth movement. “It’s normal. I’d be worried if you didn’t hate this.” A short pause. “I’d be worried if you didn’t hate me a bit, too, right now.”
I wish I did. It was warm and dark, and she kept her eyes tightly closed. There seemed nothing else to say.
He seemed perfectly content to hold her, though she was probably giving him a cramp or two. Her neck started to hurt, and her lower back was unhappy. Her ankle twinged.
But he smelled so good she stayed where she was, and finally found something else to say. “I missed you.”
He made a small movement. “You have no idea how much I missed you.”
That made her smile, a sad, forlorn trickle of relief pulling the corner of her lips up. “How much?”
“I nearly got myself killed in Cairo, missing you. Wasn’t thinking clearly. Hassan had to bail me out. He saved my life.”
Well. I’m sorry I asked now. “Oh.”
His fingers curled into her hair. He kissed the top of her head. “You missed me?”
If you only knew. “I did.”
“Regret breaking up with me?”
Not really. I had to. “I wish you’d told me.”
“I couldn’t.”
This is so fucked up. The awareness of just how completely insane and absurd her life had become hit her, down low in the pit of her belly. “I know.”
“Anna?” He kissed the top of her head again. For a moment the intervening years fell away, and the only thing larger than the relief was the sickening thump in her chest when they came back.
“What?” She moved, restlessly, and he let her go. A moment’s worth of rearranging ended with her looking up at him as he knelt on the bed, the light from the lamp describing the stubbled line of his jaw, the curve of his cheek.
Her fingers itched for charcoal and paper. She did her best thinking while she sketched.
“You don’t have to pay me.” He levered himself off the bed in one swift graceful motion and pulled his sweater down a bit, a completely unconscious rearrangement. “I shouldn’t have said that. I shouldn’t have done that, either.”
Embarrassment scorched her cheeks—and other parts of her, as well. “I didn’t think you worked for free.”
“I don’t.” He turned on his heel and stalked for the door, his shoul
ders hunching slightly, as if he expected her to throw something at him. “But I’ll take what you give me, Anna. I always have. Try to rest.”
“Josiah—”
The door closed.
Well, that went as well as I’d expect after the last few days. Anna sighed. She stared at the unforgiving blank wood, wondering if she would hear him going down the hall unless he wanted her to.
It was eerie, how quietly he could move. She’d dropped a bowl, once, when he just seemed to appear out of thin air in her kitchen, and her short yelp of surprise had given them both the giggles.
What was she supposed to do now? Forgive him? Act like nothing that happened three years ago mattered? As if Eric wasn’t dead? Or as if Josiah hadn’t held her against the wall and whispered as many times as I want, and you’ll act like you like it?
Maybe as if she didn’t care? Was there a Miss Manners guide for this sort of situation? There should be.
She reached for the bedside table, touched the stack of paper.
There was nothing else to do. She scooped up the file and dumped it into her lap. Someone had killed Eric because of this, and Josiah suddenly didn’t seem really committed to hunting down her brother’s killer or exposing whatever story he’d been pursuing.
“Not that keeping me alive is a bad thing,” she muttered, and flipped the first folder open. “I’m not saying that at all.”
But something had to be done. If Josiah wouldn’t do it…it was up to her. For once in her life, her big brother needed something from her. The big brother who had always protected her as best he could.
Ever since grade school, Eric had been the one to look to for a solution. He’d always seemed to know what to do, never at a loss in the wide, drifting world like his almost-useless, dreamy, artsy younger sister. He knew how to fix a car or a broken lamp, and as scattered as his office was he was never late for an appointment. When their parents died two days after his nineteenth birthday, he’d moved from one task to the next, organizing the funeral, getting cards sent out, booking a chapel for the memorial service, signing the papers—and refusing to even listen when they wanted to send Anna into foster care.
I’m her brother, he said steadily. I’m over eighteen, and she stays with me. Do we need to get a lawyer to explain that to someone?
The thought of Eric not having a funeral of his own was a sharp spear through the middle of her chest. The monstrous, ugly idea of him stopped like a watch, unable to smile or laugh or play Scrabble anymore, was so hideously unfair it threatened to choke her.
It’s up to you now, Annie.
Anna reached over, turned the lamp up a notch, and began to read with burning eyes.
Chapter Fifteen
The room was dark, all the lights turned off and only the pale coldness of moonlight falling through a few windows, marred by the shadows of naked tree branches. Josiah settled into the couch, lifted the glass to his lips, and downed the fiery liquid.
It burned less than his conscience.
“You’re drunk.” Willie’s dark eyes glittered. With her hair loosened and a cashmere navy sweater blurring her outline, she was an angular, narrow-hipped shadow. Thick felted boots—she hated going barefoot, and would sleep in them—made soft familiar whispers.
Josiah poured himself another shot of whiskey, offered her the bottle. “I’d put the bar at mildly intoxicated.” He had a little trouble with the last word, it came out intoxshicated. “Want some?”
She took the bottle, set it on the table. “Mein Gott. She really gets to you, doesn’t she.” It wasn’t a question.
He saluted her with the shot, downed it. “Only one who ever has. Only one who ever will.”
“I believe that.” Willie perched on the arm of the couch with a sigh, sweeping her ponytail back with long fingers. “This means you’re not expecting an attack.”
“Not for another twelve hours at least.” Plenty of time to drink a little. He stared at the bottle, at the shot glass. He had to stop soon or he would be of no use to anyone.
But oh, the oblivion promised by the bottle looked really good.
“I suppose it wouldn’t do any good to tell you I approve.” Willie folded her broad, capable hands. “Even you need someone.”
Need. Bad word for it. Just like a goddamn junkie. “Don’t need anything.” His chin set stubbornly. He had no right to even touch Anna in the first place. Should he feel guilty he was all she had to depend on now?
“Even a hermit needs a world to isolate from.” She said it solemnly, her voice dipping from alto into light tenor for a moment, but her eyes were twinkling. “In any case, I think you’ve had quite enough.” Willie scooped the bottle up neatly, avoiding his halfhearted grab for it. “Drink some water. Your head will be unhappy tomorrow.”
For Christ’s sake. If I wanted a mother I would have hired one. “Unhappy’s the human condition. Give that back.” He’d already made up his mind not to press too hard for the bottle’s return.
“No. You’ve had enough.” She stood up and skipped back, avoiding his other feeble grab with regrettable ease. Liquid sloshed, and her teeth—all new, the crowns had cost quite a bit—showed in a rare, complete, very wide smile. “Go to sleep, mein Herr. You’ll need it.”
“Isn’t that the truth,” he mumbled, listening to her footsteps retreat toward the kitchen. Then toward the room she and Hassan had bunked down in. He should have a quiet talk with Hassan soon, so that the man understood Willie might say she didn’t want a ring, but…
On the other hand, that was probably an awful idea. When it came to women, Josiah was striking out with depressing regularity. He was used to two or three months, presents, easy uncomplicated sex, and a gradual letting-go as the girl found someone else. Right from the beginning he’d known Anna was different, in some significant, ineffable way. Instead of calling the shots, he was pretty much at the mercy of whatever small crumb she let him have.
That was distinctly uncomfortable. Control meant survival. Lack of it might cost him his life, cost his backup theirs.
Or, God forbid, cost Anna hers.
The world reeled out from under him. He found himself on his feet, the stairs not creaking as he ghosted habitually up, avoiding all the iffy spots. He was in stocking feet anyway, useless if there was another attack. Maybe he should take Willie up on her offer of felt boots; she had learned about them in the Baltic.
But he’d have warning, and plenty of it, from the rings of defenses and alarms he’d set up. There would be enough time to get shoes, and get her to safety if anything happened.
Or at least, he told himself so. He shouldn’t be drinking.
Goddammit, sometimes a man needed to. The situation was approaching the ridiculous, and he still didn’t want to think about fine crystalline ash glittering on a carpet. He needed all his wits to deal with this.
The trouble was, a man with a perpetual hard-on wasn’t the best candidate for rational, logical thought. Especially when that man was Josiah and she was right upstairs. Sleeping the sleep of the innocent.
The sleep of a woman from the normal world, his only remaining link to the man he could have been, if he hadn’t been so goddamn good at killing people. Moral adaptability, they’d called it. Along with physical durability and lack of emotional turbulence.
Like any man who was very, very good at what he did, he supposed he preferred to do what he was best at—and avoid the rest. It was too late for him to go back, and he wasn’t even sure he wanted to.
Even for her. Especially since going back would rob him of any chance to keep her, now.
You shouldn’t think about it that way, Josiah.
Too late.
The room at the end of the hall was a dark cave, a faint knife-thin bar of moonlight falling between the curtains. He could hear her breathing, if he stilled his own and listened until red spots danced through his vision. The door didn’t creak if you opened it the right way, slowly, with the pressure in the proper spot.
A met
aphor for life, Josiah reflected. If you went slow, with the pressure in the right place, all sorts of things would fall nicely into your lap.
Where was the right pressure to apply to Anna? Did he even know? If he knew, would he do it?
If he did, would she remind him so much of the man he could have been?
Josiah told himself sternly to quit second-guessing, just as the sound intruded through the peaceful quiet.
Skritch. Skritch-scratch.
His hand blurred, came up with the gun. His mouth tasted sour, and he blinked several times, everything inside him freezing into crystalline disbelief for a few endless moments.
A shadow bobbed up and down in the rectangle of moonlight lying on the floor, slightly distorted by the edge of a striped, frayed thrift store throw rug. It took a moment for the shape to make sense to his baffled brain—the silhouette of a head, of shoulders.
The window’s latch clicked, a soft deadly sound.
Anna sighed in her sleep; she turned over and buried her face in her pillow. Josiah saw the curve of her hip under the blankets, a long strand of dark hair visible against the white pillowcase.
He should have been in the bed next to her, keeping her warm. The thought circled his mind once, submerged into the clear, dark water of waiting for an enemy to show himself.
How did he get through the defenses, dammit? There shouldn’t be anything for acres I don’t know about. Am I slipping? What the fuck is this?
The window, incredibly, drifted up without a sound. Curtains fluttered on a soft, chilly breeze. The shadow in the moonlight swelled.
The bigger question, of course, was how in the fuck was this man climbing up into a second-floor window, one that had no direct line from the roof? The ground underneath was soft and there were no ladders; it was vanishingly likely that whoever this was could have brought his own. He should have tripped a wire and set something off.
I’m not that drunk, Josiah decided. The hair on the back of his neck stood straight up, an instinctive bristling he’d only felt once or twice before, when a job had gone sideways and precious little would halt the sliding.