The Renegade Steals A Lady

“This time.” She angled her chin defiantly, but the tremor in her chest ruined the effect.

“There won’t be a next time.” He bent to scoop the ice he’d dropped back into the plastic bag.

“Why don’t you just get it over with then, and get out of here?”

“Get what over with?”

“Are you having trouble building up the courage, or are you just dragging it out because you’re enjoying torturing me first?”

He stared at her, trying to figure out what the hell she was talking about. Understanding gradually dawned. His throat tightened. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“You shot at me,” she said.

“If I’d shot at you, you’d be dead.”

She had to know that. He was the Port Kingston Emergency Response Team’s best marksman. At least he had been, once. But that seemed like a lifetime ago.

“You couldn’t afford to kill me. You needed me to get out of the park,” she said.

The cords in his neck pulled so tight he thought they might snap. A headache beat at the back of his skull. “And now I don’t need you so I’m going to kill you?”

A heartbeat passed. Enough time, even for Marco’s watery eyes, to read the confusion etched onto her features. To feel the genuine fear radiating from her. For it to twist through him like a corkscrew in the heart.

His jaw turned to granite. “You know me better than that.”

She turned her limpid gaze up to him. “I don’t know you at all. Not anymore.”

“That’s a lie.”

Mesmerized by the melted-honey swirl of confusion in her eyes, he stepped forward. When he reached out to cup her chin, she flinched—the final blow to his tattered pride—but he wouldn’t let her turn away. He brushed a wayward curl off her cheek, let the myriad feelings inside him boil close to the surface.

“You know me,” he said, reveling in the way her pulse kicked up where he stroked the soft underside of her jaw. “You know every inch of me.”

A tide of color flooded her cheeks. Suddenly disgusted with himself, he dropped his hand.

The water in the tub had nearly run over. Fixing his gaze anywhere but on hers, he pushed past her and twisted the faucets off. Mentally he shut down the flow of his emotions, as well. He couldn’t afford to feel anything toward her. Not anger, not lust and certainly not sympathy.

“If you didn’t shoot me, then…” Her voice trailed off as if she forgot what she was going to say. Her eyelids sagged as if she didn’t have the strength to hold them open. “Then who…?” She swayed left, then right on the toilet seat.

Marco crossed the room in one long stride, cupped the back of her neck and pushed her head between her knees.

“Breathe slow,” he said, squatting down next to her. “Deep.”

Damn. He didn’t think she was concussed, but he didn’t like this dizziness.

After a few moments, she raised her head slowly. Some of her color had returned, but not much. “Oberas? The other prisoner? Was he the one who shot at me?”

“Get in the tub,” he said in place of confirmation or denial.

“Why?”

“How should I know why someone would want to shoot you?” he said, more harshly than he’d meant to.

She looked at him strangely. “I meant why do you want me to get in the tub?”

He sighed, propping his hands on the tank behind her and looking her straight in the eye. “The warm water will keep you from stiffening up after that fall, and some of those cuts and scrapes are deep. You need to clean them out.” He handed her the bag of ice. “You can prop your foot up on the side and put this on your ankle.”

“Every cop in the state is after you, and you’re worried about my ankle? What do you really want from me?”

“For now, all I want is for you to get in that bath.”

Liar. He knew what he wanted. Just once he wanted her to look at him like he was something other than a drug-stealing scumbag. He wanted her to look at him like she had looked at him the last time he’d been in her apartment, the night they’d made love.

Dragging his hand through his hair, he lurched to his feet. He couldn’t think straight when he was that close to her.

She stood, balancing on her good foot by holding on to the towel bar, and motioning for him to turn around with her other hand. He complied. He could leave her that much dignity, at least.

One by one he heard the pieces of her uniform swish to the floor.

“I won’t help you again,” she said.

He resisted the urge to look over his shoulder, but he couldn’t stop himself from cutting his eyes to the mirror beside him. The steam put a soft haze over the image, but didn’t completely obliterate the pale curve of her shoulder, the tantalizing taper of her waist or the swell of her hip.

Despite the humidity in the room, Marco’s throat dried up. “I’m not asking you to help me.”

She glanced back at him, angling her naked body toward the mirror. He locked his eyes onto hers in the last clear spot on the glass. Only her eyes. Admirable restraint, he told himself. Not to mention self-preservation.

“I’m just asking you to take a bath.”

Marco closed the door behind him and leaned his head against the wood, waiting. When he heard water sloshing, he retreated to the kitchen. He needed to get away from the bathroom. Away from the thought of Paige’s lithe body sliding into a warm, wet bath, and the memory of his body sliding into a warm, wet Paige.

Every time she’d opened her mouth in there he’d turned a hundred and eighty degrees, from cursing her to wanting to kiss her, and back again.

Not that what he wanted mattered. He was all too aware she didn’t want him. Never would.

Hardening his heart to the loss of something he’d never really had, he mentally listed the things he would need from the apartment. In the hall closet, he found Paige’s extra ammo, along with another prize—a man-size sweatshirt and jeans.

An unwelcome pang of jealousy shot through his gut until he unfolded the sweatshirt and saw the Port Kingston PD logo. From the multicolored spatters on both the shirt and jeans, he’d guess Paige’s brother, Matt, had helped her do some painting.

After a quick change, Marco collected food in a cardboard box, along with towels and soap, blankets, a flashlight and matches. On his way out to stash the goods in the trunk of her car, he spotted a book on the couch. Sue Grafton’s novel O is for Outlaw.

Prophetic, he thought. And kind of sad.

He tossed the novel in the box with the other goodies. Maybe it would entertain her over the next few days.

Realizing what he’d just decided, he stared at the book as if it had bit him. Until that point, he hadn’t let himself think about where he would go from here. What he would do. He’d just concentrated on getting himself and Paige out of the woods alive.

Now his course seemed clear.