A Facade to Shatter

Chapter ELEVEN

ZACH DIDN’T KNOW what he was doing. It was a difficult thought to grow accustomed to. He was always sure of his choices, always in charge of his actions. Even when he didn’t want to do a thing, like stand in front of a crowd and make a patriotic speech about his time in the service, he did it. And he did it because he’d made a choice. There was an end goal.

Always.

What was his end goal now?

He ran a hand over his face and tried to focus on the computer in front of him. Less than twenty-four hours ago, he’d been at the Lattimores’ cocktail party, mingling and schmoozing the guests for contributions to his causes.

Now he was on a jet to Hawaii, having taken a side trip to Las Vegas where he’d stood in a seedy little chapel and pledged to love, honor and cherish Lia Corretti until death do them part.

Which, of course, was a lie.

They would not be together until death.

There was a purpose for this match, a reason they had to join forces. He was protecting her from her family’s wrath, first of all. Second, he was avoiding a media scandal that would be troublesome and inconvenient were it to erupt.

Except those reasons no longer felt like the whole truth.

Zach closed the computer with a snap. He couldn’t concentrate on business right now. All he could think about was Lia, asleep in the bedroom, her body curled sweetly beneath the sheets, her hair spread out in an auburn curtain he wanted to slide his fingers into.

This need for her was like a quiet, swelling tide. The more he denied it, the stronger and more insistent it grew.

And now he was taking her to a remote location, where the distractions would be minimal. How would he keep his hands off her?

Did he even need to? She’d certainly kissed him back yesterday in the garden. Until that moment when she’d pushed him away, she’d been as into the kiss as he had. He’d forgotten where they were, why he couldn’t have her the way he wanted then and there. He’d been ready to lift her skirt and push her back on the grass if it gave him the release he needed.

But she’d been the one to say no. The one to remind him this wasn’t normal between them.

Zach snorted. Hell, what was normal anymore? He’d left normal in the rearview the moment his plane disintegrated beneath him and he’d hit the eject button. Nothing since had been the same.

But, for a few minutes yesterday, he’d felt like it had. And, he had to admit, for those blissful few hours in Palermo, too. When he’d been with Lia, he hadn’t forgotten—but he’d felt as if he could accept what had happened, what his life had become, and move on.

Why did she do that to him? Why did she make him hope for more?

Lia Corretti—Lia Scott—was a dangerous woman. Dangerous for him. It had taken time, but he’d learned how to live with himself in the aftermath of his rescue.

She threatened to explode it all in his face. To force him to face the things he kept buried. If he told her, would she understand? Or would she recoil in horror?

He got to his feet and paced the length of the main cabin. A flight attendant appeared as if by magic.

“Did you need anything, sir?”

“Thanks, but no,” he said, waving her off again. She disappeared into the galley and he was alone once more.

He was restless, prowling, his mind racing through the facts, through the possibilities. Since he’d met Lia, nothing had been the same. And now they were married, and he was feeling shell-shocked—and hungry.

Hungry for her. He’d thought he could keep it at bay, that this arrangement between them would be tidy. But he’d been wrong. So very wrong.

Soon, he had to do something about this hunger—or go mad denying it.

Maui was bright and beautiful, with a rolling blue surf—which changed from deep sapphire to the purest lapis, depending on the depth—impossibly blue sky and green palm trees that stood in tall clusters, their lush foliage fanning out from the top like a funky hairdo.

Except there were other kinds of palm trees, too, Lia noticed, palms that were short and looked like giant pineapples jutting out of the ground. The tropical flowers were colorful, exotic and so sweetly scented that she fell in love with the island’s perfumed air immediately.

A car was waiting at the airport when their private jet landed, and a dark-haired woman in a brightly patterned dress greeted them with leis. Lia’s was made of fragrant tuberose and plumeria, while Zach’s was open on the end and made from kukui nuts and green ti leaves and tiny puka shells.

They got into the back of a Hummer limo and drove across an island that was flat in the middle and ringed by mountains. On one side was Haleakala, the tall volcanic mountain that could boast more than one climate. At the bottom, the weather was warm and tropical, but at the top, Zach informed her, it was often windy, rainy and cloudy. It was also bare and cratered, like the surface of the moon. But, before you got that high, there was an Alpine region, with chalets and misty cool air.

It was the oddest thought when all she could see were tall jagged peaks, fields of sugarcane and ocean.

Soon, however, they were on the coast again and driving up a road that led to a stretch of beach dotted with sprawling homes. Eventually, they arrived at one and were met by a man who came and got their bags and took them into the house. Zach lead her into the house and over to the stunning floor-to-ceiling windows that were actually sliding-glass doors. Once the doors were completely open, the house gave way to a sweeping lanai, which was tiered so that part of it sat in the infinity pool. Beyond was the beach, so white and sugary and inviting.

Lia could only stare at how beautiful it was. She came from an island, but one that was completely different from this island. They were both stunning, but Maui was a new experience.

“It’s gorgeous,” she said when Zach came up beside her again and stood there in silence.

She glanced up at him, and her heart flipped. They were married. Dio, she had a husband. She could hardly credit it. Even though he’d told her only a few days ago they would marry, she’d never quite gotten accustomed to the idea it would really happen. She’d been waiting, she could admit now, for that moment when he would decide he didn’t want her, after all. When he would send her back to Sicily and the wrath of the Correttis.

Her family might be angry with her when they learned the truth, but at least they would be satisfied she’d gotten married and wouldn’t be bringing scandalous shame onto the family by having a baby without a husband.

She wondered if Alessandro knew about the marriage by now. She’d sent a quick email to Rosa when they’d left Las Vegas, and then she’d sent another one to her grandmother. Nonna wasn’t online for endless hours, like so many people, but she was technologically proficient and would get the missive soon enough. And she would surely tell the head of the family the news.

Lia decided not to worry about it. What was done was done.

“We won’t be bothered here,” Zach said. “It’s too far out of the way for your typical paparazzi. They’ll find easier quarry to harass.” He stood with his hands in his pockets—he was wearing khakis and a muted aloha shirt—and looked gravely down at her. “How are you feeling? Do you need to rest?”

He was still hung up on the fact the doctor had said she needed more rest and less stress in her life. Everything had been fine with the baby, as she’d predicted. But the doctor had given him something new to worry about.

“I slept on the plane. I’m fine.”

“Then you should eat,” he said. “I’ll go see what we have.” He started to turn away, but she put a hand on his arm to stop him. Sparks sizzled into her nerve endings, as always, when she touched him.

She wanted to melt into him, like butter in a hot pan. He looked down at where her hand rested on his arm, and she remembered that she’d meant to say something. That it was odd and awkward if she did not.

“You work so hard to avoid me,” she said. “It’s not necessary.”

That wasn’t what she’d intended to say, but it was too late to take the words back. They hung in the air between them, hovering like candle smoke.

His eyes were dark, fathomless, as he looked at her. Studied her like something he’d never encountered before. Her pulse skittered along merrily, and she forced herself to drop her hand away from the bare skin of his arm.

“You noticed,” he said softly. “And here I thought I was so subtle.”

Her head snapped up as pain sliced into her. Yes, she’d known he was avoiding her—but to hear him admit it dragged on the same nerve that had made her question her worth since she was a little girl. It should not hurt so much, but it always did.

She knew her worth was not determined by others, and yet she could never quite appease that lonely little girl inside who was still looking for acceptance.

“I noticed.” She dropped her gaze, swallowing against the ridiculous lump in her throat, and his fingers came up to slide along her cheek. His touch made heat leap and tangle in her veins. If this heat were a light inside her, it would glow wherever he touched her.

“You pushed me away, cara. I was respecting your wish.”

“I—I don’t know what my wish is,” she said truthfully. “I just know that you confuse me.”

His gaze sharpened. “Why are you confused, Lia? I think you know what I want.”

It took her a minute to answer. “I do,” she finally said. “But I don’t know why.”

He blinked. And then he laughed. The sound burst from him, loud and rich and unexpected. Lia stared at him, her cheeks heating. A tiny thread of irritation began to dance through her. She crossed her arms and stared him down.

He stopped laughing at her, but he was still smiling. “Damn, I needed that.” He put his hands on her upper arms. He didn’t pull her in close like she thought he might. Like she hoped he might.

Yesterday, she’d pushed him away. Today, she wanted to pull him to her. Maybe it made no sense, but now that they were married, she felt more … secure. And her need for him had amplified since the moment he’d pushed a diamond—a large, family heirloom, it turned out—on her finger and said, “I do.”

His fingers dug into her arms. Not painfully, but possessively. “Hell, Lia, you really don’t know why I want you? Are you that blind?”

“I am not blind,” she said defensively.

“You must be if you can’t figure out what’s going on here. You’re beautiful, lush and perfect, and I ache with the need to touch you the way I did in Palermo.”

His words made her soften, melt. Want. She wanted what they’d had in Palermo—except for the part where she woke up and he was gone.

“I …” She swallowed as her heart beat a tattoo against her rib cage. Her throat was as dry as baked sand. It was a frightening thing to say what she wanted. But he was looking at her as if he was dying to touch her, and so she took a chance. “I think I want that, too.”

He made a noise of relief. Then he slid his hands down her arms and around her back, cupping her buttocks as he pulled her fully into his embrace.

“Grazie a Dio,” he said then in a throaty purr, and a liquid shiver danced down her spine. Her hands went up to clutch his shirt as his head descended.

Their mouths touched and a shudder went through Lia. All those feelings she’d felt in the maze yesterday came rushing to the fore. They were almost too much, too overwhelming.

But she wouldn’t push him away again. She couldn’t.

He was big and hard and strong, and she pressed herself against him, her hands running over the hard muscles of his chest and shoulders. Her body was on fire as liquid heat gathered in her core. She could feel the dampness in her panties, the instant response that she couldn’t have prevented even if she’d wanted to.

This thing between them was hot and bright and uncontrollable. It was a need that had to be assuaged, or she would be as restless as a spirit condemned to roam the earth for all eternity.

“Wait,” he said, pushing her back, breaking that delicious contact.

Lia’s stomach fell. If he was rejecting her now …

“Not yet,” he said, his voice sounding tortured enough that she relaxed infinitesimally. “We just arrived, and you need to rest first.”

“I told you I slept on the plane… .”

He slid a hand into her hair, cupped her head while he traced a path over her collarbone with the fingers of his other hand. “I know, but it was a long trip and the doctor said—”

Lia cursed. “I wish you would allow me to make my own decisions without all this argument! We’re going to get off to a very bad start, Zachariah Scott, if you constantly tell me what I should be doing.”

He looked at her for a long minute. One corner of his mouth turned up in a grin.

“What’s so funny?” she asked crossly.

“You. Such a temper from a little thing.”

Heat suffused her. “I am not a little thing and you know it. I’m too tall and I’m only going to get fatter—”

He put a finger over her lips, silencing her. “You are not fat, Lia. You’re lush and gorgeous and you make me hard.”

The tops of her ears were on fire. She didn’t consider herself to be a prude by any stretch—she’d read plenty of books where people had sex, sometimes even raunchy sex—but the idea she affected him that way, and that he had no problem saying it, both embarrassed and thrilled her.

“Allora,” she said, resisting the urge to fan herself with both hands. “The things you say.”

“Makes you hot, doesn’t it?”

Lia put a hand over her eyes. “Dio,” she said.

Zach laughed and drew her hand away from her face. Then he took both her hands in his and held them in front of his body. “I like that you’re still so innocent,” he told her. “I like the idea of corrupting you.”

A shiver washed over her as she imagined all the ways in which he might corrupt her. She’d had a taste of it, certainly, for two blissful days—but she knew there was more, knew they hadn’t even scratched the surface of their need for each other.

“There’s no time like the present,” she replied, and then felt herself blushing harder than before if that were possible.

He led her through the gorgeous house with the soaring ceilings, the koa wood floors and overstuffed couches and huge open sliding doors, to a bedroom with a king-size bed and a breathtaking view of the ocean, with its white sand beaches, jagged black volcanic rocks and rolling surf.

The bed was on a platform, clothed in pristine white, and there was a television mounted on the opposite wall. She wondered who would ever want to watch television in a house like this, but then Zach stopped and tugged her into his arms again.

He kissed her softly, sweetly—too softly and sweetly to mean he was actually planning to make love to her, she realized, and then he stepped away.

“Take a bath, Lia. Have a nap. We’ll have dinner on the lanai and watch the sunset. After that—” he shrugged “—anything goes.”

Anything goes.

Lia couldn’t get that thought out of her mind as she bathed and dressed. In spite of her insistence she’d slept on the plane, she had managed to fall into that giant king bed and drift off to sleep after she’d stared at the ocean for several minutes. It had surprised her to wake sometime later, when the sun was sliding down the bowl of the sky.

The doors to the outside were still open, and the ocean rolled rhythmically against the shore. A gentle trade wind blew through the room, bringing with it the scent of plumeria trees.

Now, Lia gazed at the ocean again as she stood in the open doors and gathered her courage before she went to meet Zach. Why, when she’d been ready earlier, did she suddenly feel as if a thousand hummingbirds were beating their wings in her belly?

Finally, she turned and strode from the bedroom, down the stairs and into the main living area. Zach wasn’t on the lanai, and he wasn’t in the living room. She continued to the kitchen, a huge room with koa wood cabinets and stainless-steel appliances. Zach was standing at the kitchen island, slicing fruit.

Lia blinked. It was such a domestic picture, and a surprising one. He looked up and smiled, and her body melted.

“You are fixing dinner?” she asked.

“It’s nothing terribly exciting,” he told her. “My repertoire is limited. But I can broil a fish, and I can make salad and cut up some fruit for dessert.”

“You are a man of many talents,” she said.

One eyebrow lifted. “I am indeed. I look forward to showing you some of those talents in detail.”

Lia blushed and a grin spread over Zach’s face. “You like embarrassing me,” she said.

He walked over with a piece of pineapple and handed it to her. She popped it in her mouth, nearly moaning at the juicy sweetness.

“Not at all,” he said as he went back over to the island. “I find it charming that you blush over such things.”

“Charming,” she repeated, as if it were a foreign word. Her family had never found her charming. They’d never thought she was anything but a nuisance. Except for Nonna, of course.

He picked up the platter. “Come out to the lanai and I’ll bring everything,” he told her.

“I can take the fruit.”

He handed it to her and then went back for the salad. When they reached the table on the lanai—a table set with simple dishes and silverware—he set the salad down and took the fruit from her. Then he tugged her into his arms and kissed her.

“Yes, charming,” he said. “I’ve never known anyone as innocent about such things as you are.”

He let her go and pulled out her chair for her. As she sat, she looked up at him, her chest tightening at the emotions filling her. Emotions she really didn’t want to spend much time analyzing. She already knew she cared too much. Did she need to know more than that?

“I don’t like blushing like a nun in a locker room,” she said. “It’s ridiculous.”

He laughed. “Like I said, charming.”

He went and retrieved the rest of the food, and then they sat on the lanai with a view of the blue, blue ocean, and a big orange ball sinking into it. They ate fresh fish and talked about many things, none of them singularly important, but all important in the bigger picture of getting to know each other.

Lia learned that Zach liked to read biographies and military treatises, and that he’d defied his father by going to the Air Force Academy rather than Harvard. She also learned that he managed his family’s charitable foundation, and that he’d met Taylor Carmichael in his work supporting veterans’ causes.

“Why did you drop the medal?” she asked, and then wanted to kick herself when he stiffened slightly.

But he took a sip of his wine and relaxed. “It’s something the military does automatically, writing you up for medals when you’ve been in combat. But I didn’t want it. I didn’t want any of them.”

Her heart pinched at the darkness in his tone. “But why?”

He kept his gaze on the ocean for a long time, and her pulse thrummed hot. She berated herself for pushing him, and yet she felt like she would never know him if she didn’t ask these things. He was her husband, the father of her child, and she wanted to know who he was inside.

He turned to her, his dark eyes glittering hot. “Because six marines died saving me, Lia. Because I was drugged and I didn’t do anything but lay there while they fought and died. They worked so damn hard to save me, and I couldn’t help them. They died because of me.”

Lia swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. “I’m sorry, Zach,” she said. She reached for his hand, squeezed it. She was encouraged when he didn’t snatch it away. “But I think they died because they were doing their job, not because of you.”

“You aren’t the first to say that to me,” he said, rubbing his thumb against her palm. “Yet I still have trouble believing it. I’m treated like a hero, and yet I haven’t earned the right to be one. They were the heroes.”

She hurt for him. He looked stoic, sitting there and staring out at the ocean beyond, and she wanted to wrap her arms around him and hold him tight. She fought herself, fought her natural inclination not to reach for him because of her fear of being rejected. In the end, the fear won.

“I doubt anyone thinks they weren’t heroes,” she said hotly, because she was angry with herself and angry with him, too. “They had jobs to do, and they did them. But they died because the enemy killed them. No other reason.”

His expression was almost amused when he turned it on her. Except there was too much pain behind that gaze to ever be mistaken for amusement. “How fierce you are, cara. One wonders—do you have a limit? Would you, for instance, stop defending me if I crossed the line?”