chapter 22
Linda’s scream wasn’t one of anger, but sheer terror. She’d gone as white as the towel wrapped around her body.
Tony cursed. “Linda, it’s just me!” He held his arms out, palms upright, as if placating a child in the middle of a temper tantrum. “It’s just me,” he repeated.
Damn it, he’d only meant to clear his head. He hadn’t meant to frighten her.
A sob tore out of her chest. “Oh, God, I thought you were him...them.”
Them? “Who?”
“I don’t know. The men who shot at me. The cop you saw outside my house. Guapo’s men...I mean...” Her brow furrowed as she realized she was babbling.
Tony stepped closer. “Linda,” he murmured, “you’re safe. I’ll keep you safe.”
She shook her head. “Tony...” Abruptly, her knees buckled.
Damn. She was weak from shock and he was feeling dizzy, as well. The oxygen in the air seemed to evaporate. He swept her up, one arm under her knees, the other cradling her shoulders and head against his chest, and carried her into his room. Gently, with trembling arms, he placed her down on the bed.
“God, Linda. I’m so sorry I scared you.” He sat down next to her. She curled into the fetal position and wrapped her arms around her knees. For all her strong exterior, for all her determination in going after a judgeship, Linda was still a wounded woman. A victim. And he’d helped make her that way.
She’d been pounded into oblivion because she hadn’t divulged his name to the bastards who demanded she tell them the name of the informant. Him. And they hadn’t even talked about the incident. Not really.
Guilt ravaged him from the inside.
“Do you want me to leave you alone?” he asked, ashamed at how tinny and tight his voice sounded.
She hesitated for several seconds. Hell, a whole minute went by and he rose, certain her silence meant she wanted to be alone. But before he could leave...
“Stay,” she whispered.
He’d stay. He’d stay by her side until she could pull herself together, and then he’d take off. Get the hell away from Linda. Hitchhike back to Sacramento, if he needed to.
When he heard Linda release a relaxed breath, he looked down and was surprised to see his own hand stroking her hair.
“Where were you?”
“I just went for a drive. I needed to clear my head.”
“But you could barely pick yourself up off the floor. Why would you take the car? Where did you go? We had food. Water. You could have called your girlfriend on your cell at any time. Why would you leave without telling me first?”
He saw it in her eyes when she paused. When she swallowed. When she broke his gaze and stared out the window.
“Did you go somewhere to score drugs?” she asked, her voice hollow. “Was Neil right? Have you just been playing me this whole time? Was that man at my house really a dirty cop or someone you hired to break in so you could ‘save’ me?”
Oh, God, did she really believe that?
He couldn’t bear the ache in her voice.
The pain in her eyes.
How long could he keep up this charade? After all she’d sacrificed, didn’t Linda deserve to know the truth—at least some of it? His drug addiction had caused her the hell she’d lived through eighteen months ago. The hell she still lived through, given her response to being startled. He couldn’t give her everything, but he could give her this.
He took a deep breath and readied himself to speak, hoping the truth would take away some of her pain.
“I took a drive because I’d pushed myself too hard doing those push-ups. I hurt like hell again, and I was afraid if I didn’t leave, I’d take the codeine pills the doctor gave me.”
“I looked for them. Where—?”
“I stashed them under a loose floorboard under my bed. You were right about me being clean, Linda. And I want to stay that way. I drove a distance away and tossed them over a cliff.”
This close, he could see the beat of her heart as the artery in her neck pulsed.
Pulsed.
Pulsed. Her scent covered him, clung to him the way she clung to him when they made love. When their bodies craved and hungered and gave and spent.
“You’re really clean? For how long?”
“Like I told you before, since before we ever started dating. I mean, there were plenty of times I almost gave in...”
She nodded, as if it was what she’d expected. And that made sense given what he’d implied earlier. Even when he hadn’t meant to, he’d given her the clues she’d needed to believe in him. “I’m so proud of you,” she whispered, reaching out to stroke the line of his jaw.
He flinched back. “Please, don’t.”
She lowered her hand. “Don’t touch you?” she asked.
“Don’t touch me. Talk to me. Look at me. Just don’t.”
“Tony, what have you been doing since Mattie and Jordan and Dom left? This drug-lord image you’re projecting—it’s just an image. I know you’ve been lying to me about taking over Guapo’s operation. You’re working with the cops again, right? Serving as an informant again so you can find the supplier of the bath-salt drugs?”
“What the hell do you know about those drugs?”
“I heard Justine talking on the phone with someone named Nicco. She told him that you’d set up a meeting with a Rapture supplier. That you were on your way to taking over Guapo’s ring, she said. But that’s not the real reason, is it? You want to shut down the supplier because the drugs are so damn dangerous. Because they can drive users crazy...”
A few other things suddenly occurred to her.
The fact that Tony was clean but had only recently admitted to it, and even then, that he still tried to convince her he was “bad.” That he’d confessed to Guapo’s murder, even though Guapo had been stabbed by someone much shorter than Tony. Someone that was the size of...
“Justine!” she exclaimed. “She killed Guapo, didn’t she?”
Tony’s eyes widened and though he tried to hide it, she saw the truth in his eyes. He shook his head. “No. What are you—?”
“Justine takes drugs. She took drugs the first day I saw you in court. In the bathroom. I was there. Maybe she even took Rapture. Is that why she killed Guapo? Did she go crazy?”
Tony grabbed her arms. “Whoa. Stop it. You saw Justine taking drugs in the courthouse bathroom?”
“I didn’t see her. She was behind the stall. But she was sniffing something.”
“You’re sure that was the day I was arraigned? I didn’t see her there.”
“The courthouse was packed, remember? And she looked at me like she hated me. Like she wanted to kill me, Tony.”
“That’s ridiculous,” he said, but he didn’t sound so certain. “She knew nothing about you.”
“But an observant person would have seen how we reacted to seeing each other that day. Maybe she saw that we cared for each other and was jealous. It would explain—”
“I told you I’ve been clean off drugs. I haven’t told you I didn’t kill Guapo. I didn’t tell you I’m working undercover to stop a Rapture supplier.”
“You don’t have to tell me. I can see it written all over your face.”
“Damn it, Linda.”
She shook her head. “You can’t protect me from this, Tony. If that’s what you’re trying to do, you’ve already failed.”
“I haven’t failed at anything. You’re alive, aren’t you? You’re going to be a judge—”
“I’m alive. For now. But forget about me being a judge. I might not have a job in a few days.”
“What are you talking about?”
“A reporter has been snooping around. He’s connected the two of us. Is claiming I’m the reason you got out on bail.”
“How do you know this?”
“Neil called me when I was out for a walk. He told me. So you see, I need you to tell me the truth, Tony. And if there’s any way I can help you finish this job you’re doing, I need to help you do it. Because in helping you, I’ll be helping myself, too.”
He didn’t look up, not until she reached out and took his hand.
He told himself to pull away, but he couldn’t. He wrapped his fingers around hers, wanting so badly to lift them to his lips. To pull her against his chest and just hold her. Instead he forced himself to recall how she’d looked lying in a hospital bed, beaten and broken and fighting for her life.
And that slapped him out of his morbid thoughts faster than he could blink.
Being with her wasn’t an option. He had to accept it.
Tony suddenly felt like he couldn’t breathe. That he was going to drown in her nearness. He pulled his hand out of hers. “What is this, Linda? Do you get off stringing me along? You’re the one who broke off our relationship. You can’t have it both ways, so back off.”
He heard a sharp intake of breath and looked up, seeing the hurt there. But Jesus, what did she expect? She’d made her feelings about him clear when she’d kicked him out of her life. Today, last week, the past few freaking years without her, had been a nightmare.
And he hadn’t even fallen off the wagon, he thought again. He hadn’t slipped up. She’d just assumed he would.
As many times as he told himself she’d had reason to, that she’d been reasonable in protecting herself and her life, it pissed him off.
“You’re letting the past skew your thinking, Linda. You’re one of the good guys. A prosecutor. A soon-to-be judge. You’re getting everything you wanted and you were right to think you wouldn’t get it if you had anything to do with me. I’m worthless and would have done nothing but drag you down. Why shouldn’t you believe I’ve done exactly what I’ve said?”
Her stare was blank. Inscrutable. Time ticked by, marked by croaks of frogs outside the window. The pulse in her neck kept up its furious beat. He waited. He could wait forever.
“You want to know why I can’t believe it? Because I loved you, Tony. And I still do. And you know what? I think you still love me, too.”
Before he could respond, she kissed him.
* * *
As they kissed, Linda was immediately aware of two things.
First, Tony didn’t even try to fight their connection this time. Despite the way he’d pushed her away with his words, he refrained from doing it with his body. His mouth opened readily underneath hers, and his arms wrapped around her tightly.
Second, she wasn’t going to settle for anything less than both of them naked this time. Her hands tore at his clothes, refusing to be denied. Buttons flew. Fabric ripped. And he seemed just as frantic to get her naked, too.
Thank you, she thought, when she was completely bare to him. He cupped her breasts and tweaked her nipples. Heat speared between her legs, causing an ache that made her whimper with need.
When he released her breasts, she moaned with disappointment until he replaced his hands with his mouth. He sucked on her strongly, working one nipple until it was red and engorged before moving on to the next. The whole time, her hands roved over his body, relishing the bulge of his muscles and the way they tightened with his need for her.
That was a start, but not good enough. She wanted him trembling. Shaking. Begging for her touch.
This time she pulled away and he moaned in protest. But when she fell to her knees, he tangled his fingers in her hair and urged, “Yes, Linda. Please. Take me in your mouth. I’ve missed this. Missed you.”
He didn’t have to ask her again. She didn’t reacquaint herself with his length slowly. Instead she drew him into her mouth greedily, as if by doing so she was filling up every empty, lonely spot inside her. She pulled back to flick her tongue over the tip of him, then swallowed him even deeper than before, until he touched the back of her throat.
“I’m going to come if you keep that up,” he gritted out.
“That’s what I want,” she said.
“Me, too. But first...” With a grimace, he pulled away from her and urged her to her feet. “First I want to come inside you again. Here,” he said as he cupped her. “It felt so wonderful taking you without a condom. Can we— Will you take me that way again?”
She took a shaky breath and considered his request.
She’d started this knowing where it was going and also knowing they didn’t have a condom. She knew she was taking a chance, but hadn’t she already risked everything for Tony?
Three and a half years ago she hadn’t trusted him enough to stay with him. Did she really trust him enough now to give him this? To give him everything?
She nodded.
He smiled, a big genuine smile that made her feel like she’d hung the moon.
She threw her arms around his neck as he cupped her butt and lifted her onto him. She felt his hard flesh searching between her folds before he sank inside, slowly. Slowly. And so thoroughly that she felt stretched to bursting. His scent enveloped her, as did something else.
His love. She felt it everywhere he touched her. She saw it in his eyes.
He didn’t have to say it for her to know.
This man still loved her. She loved him.
But even as she skyrocketed to pleasure, she was sadly aware that loving each other had never been the problem. And it had never been enough.