you.”
Now that was bull. “You’re the man who should have touched me.” Long ago. It was late and the words were weak, but she continued, “I-I’m sorry about your parents. That must have been terrible for you. I can’t even imagine what it must have been like—”
His head snapped up. He stared at her with glittering eyes and a clenched jaw. The angry mask was back in full effect.
Her chin notched up, too. She clutched the sheet, tucked it under her arms, climbed out of the bed, and grabbed him. “I know I don’t understand how it felt, okay? But I am sorry you had to go through that. No one should ever see—”
“The bloody bodies of their parents?” His lips twisted. “I see bodies every day. It’s my job.”
“That wasn’t your job.”
“That’s why I do my job. That’s why I became a cop.”
Yes, she’d thought as much. The newspaper report had said…
“He was on drugs, Christie. My old man was so strung out he barely recognized his own family. My mom had kicked him out. She was trying to get a better life for us.”
A life that ended too soon. That fist was back, squeezing her heart too tightly. She didn’t let Jonas go. Christie kept her hands on him, her eyes on his.
“He broke in. By the looks of the place, I know he came looking for money. He trashed everything. My mom—she must have been trying to stop him when he—he—” His lips snapped closed. But she knew what came next.
Sixteen. He’d been through so much, so young.
“The cops told me it looked like he tried to help her. He even managed to make a 9-1-1 call. Hell, maybe the asshole finally realized what the hell he’d done. He called the ambulance for her, and then he killed himself. One shotgun blast to the head.”
But Jonas had arrived before the ambulance. He’d been the one to find the bodies.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and let the sheet drop. She held him as tight as she could. Her lips pressed against his neck.
“You should be telling me to get the hell out now.” His arms weren’t around her. His body was held stiffly, too tense and hard. “My dad was an addict who killed my mom. You know what kind of bloodline I’ve got, you don’t need to be—”
“Shut up, Jonas.” Now he was pissing her off. “You’re not your dad.” She lifted her head. “You’re a good man, a good cop. You just got a real crap hand dealt to you.”
His eyes widened a bit.
“Now get back in bed,” she ordered him, hoping her voice sounded tough and strong. Hoping he didn’t notice that her hands were shaking a bit. The new Christie she was trying to be—the wild girl who went after what she wanted—well, she wouldn’t let her man walk away. Not after the hell he’d had today. She wouldn’t wilt under that hot green stare. Wouldn’t flinch from the pain in his past. No, the new Christie would be tougher than that.
Jonas slowly climbed back into bed with her. Her breath eased out when his head touched the pillow. Good.
She hit the lights and plunged them back into darkness because she could only keep the veil of that new Christie up for so long.
Jonas’s arms came around her, pulling her against his body. A warm, strong body. A strong lover. One who was hers, for a brief time.
No commitments. It was just supposed to be about sex, right? And just sex meant no emotions.
So why the hell was she blinking away tears again and hoping that none of the drops fell onto his arms?
The cops told me it looked like he tried to help her.
The new Christie might be bluffing her way through the game, but underneath that fake cover, she was the same woman. A woman who cared too much. A woman who had one very big weakness.
A weakness who was holding her in his arms, close to his heart.
5
He was in trouble. Jonas stared at the small green box in his hand and wondered how the hell something as simple as no-strings sex could become so complicated.
Ah, but then, the answer was simple. Christie was involved—and the woman tended to complicate everything.
“Hey, man, you shouldn’t have!” A pale hand snatched the present out of Jonas’s grasp. He shot to attention—too late—and saw his partner, Scotty McKenzie, clutching the present. “I didn’t get nothin’ for you!” Scotty declared, his voice too loud.
Jonas shook his head. “Trust me, man, that’s not your size.”
Scotty blinked, then laughed, a deep, rumbling laugh that sounded like a train engine. “Then I’m guessing it belongs to the lady you were so hot to see last night. The one who had you smelling like a damn strawberry patch when you came to the crime scene.”
Yeah, her smell had been on him, and he’d liked it. It had helped to combat the stench of death all over the place.
“Didn’t even know you had a lady.” Scotty threw his body in the wobbly desk chair. “I mean, not one that you stayed with longer than a weekend.” He tossed the box back to Jonas.
Jonas caught it in one hand. He’d already stayed the weekend with Christie. And, at first, he’d done just what he promised. One hell of a good time.
The last thing he’d expected was to get a call about a scene like that, with her there.
He put the box on the desk top and ran a hand over his eyes. When he’d gone back to her place, his control had been shot. Rage had ridden him, the fury that he’d held close for so many years.
He’d been desperate to get back to Christie. He’d known she’d help him banish the past and forget the blood. He’d also known he was walking a real thin line, but he’d gone back anyway.
Call him a damn moth to the flame.
He’d been on her too fast, too hard. The sex had been rough and wild. But she’d opened her body to him. Held tight. Changed the fury to passion.
Good time? No, that didn’t even come close to describing last night.
Then she’d blown his world apart with her little confession. All these years she’d known.
“Hey, man!” Scotty rolled his chair forward. “You with me?”
Jonas blinked.
“What?” Scotty’s lips lifted in his usual crooked grin. “You realizing you already spent too much time with this one? Gotta be careful, she’ll think you’re attached.”
His gaze darted to the box.
“Tell you what”—the chair wheels squeaked as Scotty rolled closer—“I’ll do you a favor since it’s the holidays. You don’t want to leave some poor woman on her own
