hell are you doing here—besides scaring me half to death?”
“Hey, you’re the one who nearly knocked me out,” Ben said. “I’m here because Sebastian asked me to come down.”
“Is he all right?” she asked, glancing around her ex to search for her brother. However, the office was empty except for that gruesome flower arrangement.
“He’s fine,” Ben said. “He’s already taken off.”
“What about the blood out there on the dance floor? Is that his?”
Ben shook his head. “No. It wasn’t his.”
“What happened out there? Who got hurt?”
His broad shoulders lifted in a weary shrug. “I don’t know. One of the cleaning crew must have cut himself. Sebastian didn’t say anything about it.”
“You didn’t notice the blood?”
He shook his head again. “After all the years I’ve spent in an O.R., I guess I’m desensitized to it.”
If only she could get desensitized to him…. Because where his fingers still gripped her wrist, her skin tingled and heat streaked throughout her body. She lifted her gaze to his face, and while his eyes darkened with desire, lines of fatigue radiated from them. And a dark shadow clung to his jaw.
“Why did you come back down here?” she asked. “You look like you need your sleep.” But in all the time she’d known him, he’d never gotten enough rest. The man did not know how to take it easy.
His mouth shifted into a sideways grin, as if he was too tired to curve his lips into a complete smile. “Is that a nice way of saying I look like hell?”
She laughed. “Don’t pretend I’ve wounded your pride. I’m sure there are plenty of females down at the hospital—staff and patients—who stroke your ego quite enough.”
“Now you’re calling me conceited.”
“Conceited?” She paused as if considering and then shook her head. “Arrogant, yes.” But not without damn good reason. The man had all kinds of talents. Thinking about the one he’d shown her in her office just hours before had heat flushing her skin.
He chuckled, as if he’d read her mind. Why hadn’t he been able to do that when they’d been married?
Embarrassed and frustrated at her weakness, she glanced away from him. Her gaze landed on the door at the end of the hall.
“You’ve done it again,” she said.
“What?”
“Avoided answering my question.” Maybe the divorce had been more his fault than hers. “Why did you come back down here, Ben?”
Anger replaced the flare of desire in his eyes. “Sebastian wanted me to see that opening-night gift you got.”
Damn him. And damn Ben for coming. “And here I thought you’d developed such a drinking problem that you can’t get enough.”
“I can’t seem to get enough of something, but it isn’t alcohol,” he admitted, his fingers stroking over her skin before he released her wrist. But he took the bottle, turning his attention to the label. “The hard stuff, huh?”
“If you’re going to bean someone over the head, you better use the hard stuff.” She stepped away from him, just resisting the urge to rub her wrist where his touch still burned her skin.
“You didn’t think I was a desperate drunk,” he scoffed at her claim, “you thought I was whoever left those flowers in your office.”
“And the stake,” she reminded him as she walked over to her desk where the hideous arrangement remained, despite Sebastian’s offer to get rid of it. Heck, he’d done more than offer; he’d insisted. She was surprised he’d listened to her when she’d explained that she wanted to hang on to it. “You know…all those years as a lawyer and the first time I’m called a vampire is after I’m no longer practicing law.”
“You’ll always be a lawyer, Paige,” Ben insisted. “It’s being a bar owner that you should probably rethink.”
“Why are you so against my owning this place?” she asked, remembering that earlier he had seemed to have a problem with it.
His lips curved into that half grin again. “And see, more questions. You’re a lawyer through and through, Paige. I don’t understand why you would give that up now….”
“When I hadn’t before when you wanted me to?” Regret and resentment overwhelmed her. She couldn’t deal with him…or the flowers…not without losing it.
Paige pushed past him and ran out in the hall. This time Ben didn’t just watch as she walked away; he hurried after her. “I never wanted you to quit, Paige. I only wanted you to take it easy…to take care of yourself.”
She’d had to take care of herself because he’d been too busy taking care of everyone—and everything—else. As he followed her into the bar area, he glanced at the blood on the dance floor and the wall.
That patient was a member of the secret society. His girlfriend, also a society member, had gotten a little too passionate and nicked his carotid. While he wouldn’t have died, necessarily, the blood loss had weakened him to the point of helplessness. Stitching the wound and administering a transfusion had brought back his strength—so much so that Sebastian had already taken him home and left Ben to clean up the mess.
Along with the blood, he’d been supposed to dispose of the flowers before Paige saw them again and followed through on her inclination to call the police. Hell, maybe she should; Ben hadn’t protected her before. He didn’t trust himself to protect her this time, either.
“I take care of myself,” Paige insisted. “What happened…it was…”
Something they’d never talked about before. Even now, he couldn’t find the words to express his regret and loss and pain. Instead he glanced down at the bottle he still held—the one with which she’d nearly clocked him. As softly and gently as he liked to caress Paige’s naked skin, he ran his fingers over the label on the Dewar’s bottle. Hello, old friend…
Scotch had brought him comfort many a night after Paige had left him. Too many nights.
If he’d had a little less control, he might have become dependent on alcohol. But he’d had too many people—both living and undead—depending on him. So he had fought off the temptation then, and he would do so now because Paige needed him. He had to stick close to her, to protect her without her realizing what he was doing.
God, sticking close to Paige…
His body hardened at the thought of being close to her again—as close as they’d been earlier in her office, him buried inside her. So that he didn’t reach for her, he stepped behind the bar to place the bottle next to all the
