The Love Shack

Chapter SIXTEEN


AFTER MARA AND ANTHONY left the cove, and all of Gage’s relations returned to their respective homes, Skye made dinner for him at her house. They’d been spending their evenings at No. 9, but tonight she was considering sending him back by himself and sleeping at her home...alone.

Yes, she’d experienced that spurt of optimism, but good sense counseled it wasn’t smart to get too accustomed to company.

Gage prowled the kitchen while she cleaned up after the meal. He poured her more wine and grabbed a new beer from her fridge for himself. “Close the door from which the wind blows and relax,” he said, tapping the lip of his bottle against the rim of her glass.

“If I thought you knew, I’d ask you what that means,” she told him, wishing he’d at least heed the admonition to loosen up. He was more restless than she’d ever seen him and his constant movement put her on edge, too.

Or maybe that was because she was contemplating her lone bed, with no one in it to share the nightmare hours.

He was flipping through the catchall basket that sat on the counter where she dumped grocery receipts, pizza coupons and other offhand items that a tidier woman would relegate to the trash can on a more regular basis. She was considering wondering aloud if his actions weren’t an invasion of privacy when he went still.

Frowning, she craned her neck to get a look at what had garnered his sudden interest. She hoped to God she hadn’t left about any scraps on which she’d doodled ridiculous junior-high-style sentiments like Skye + Gage 4 Ever.

“How well do you know him?” he said.

“Who?”

“Dagwood.” Gage flipped the rectangle of paper in his hand toward her. It was a photo taken at a semiformal event sponsored by a business association. She’d been Dalton’s date and they’d been snapped by the professional who’d taken everyone’s picture on their way inside.

“You know what his name really is,” she said, frowning a little. “I don’t know why you pretend you don’t.”

“Because he looks like a Dagwood,” Gage said. “How well do you know him?”

Drying her hands on a dish towel, she gave him a wary glance. “I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”

“Could he have been the guy who tied you up?”

Shocked by the question, Skye stared at him. “No!”

“Think, honey, don’t just react. Could it have been him or maybe some pervy buddy of his?”

“No.” Agitated, she ran her hands through her hair, then tucked them in the pockets of her shorts. “I don’t know why you’d suggest such a thing.”

“Because I’d like to solve the mystery.”

“You think I wouldn’t? But the police believe it’s a random event. There weren’t any similar crimes in the area before, haven’t been any since, and the men walked out of the house with just the cash from my wallet—which wasn’t much. So there’s no incentive for them even to return.”

Unless the creepy one, him, came back to fulfill the sexual threat he’d promised.

Just like that, memory attacked. She could feel the awful prick of the knife across her chest. How her naked flesh felt only more vulnerable surrounded by shredded clothes. The blindfold’s pressure on her eyes. A stranger’s hoarse, disgusting voice. I’ll come back one day and finish what I started.

The contents of her stomach revolted, and she felt herself go clammy. “Oh, God,” she muttered, then rushed for the bathroom.

Gage was on her heels. She slammed the door in his face and took great gulps of air, trying to calm the pitching and tossing seas in her belly.

“Honey, are you all right?” His concern came through the paneled wood.

“I’m fine.” Her fingers clutched the porcelain rim of the sink as the sense of certain upchuck slowly faded.

“What can I do?”

She splashed cold water on her face, took a few more deep breaths, then pulled on the knob to face him. “You could not bring up that night again, okay?” Her palm pressed to her belly as if it could contain another bout of panic. The afternoon with Mara had definitely unsettled her, she decided.

“It wasn’t Dalton,” she told Gage. “It wasn’t anyone I know. I’m sure of it.”

“Okay, okay.” He grimaced. “I’m a little off today. Sorry.”

The afternoon with Mara—and thinking of Charlie—had unsettled Gage, too. “All right.”

He rubbed his knuckles against the top of her head, a fond noogie that made him even more forgivable. “C’mon, let’s go outside for some fresh air.”

On the porch of her house sat two wide-bottomed, thick-cushioned chairs. He took one, but when she tried to take the other, he snagged her arm and pulled her into his lap. His strength surrounded her, and she let herself relax against him for a moment, his warmth and the rhythmic sound of the surf dispelling the last of her queasiness.

Still sleeping alone tonight, she reminded herself.

“Are you going to see him again?” Gage said in her ear.

She turned her head so they were nose to nose, astonished that he’d ask. “You mean Dalton?”

“When I’m gone, are you going to start dating him again?”

It wasn’t any of Gage’s business. As he said, he was leaving. But she was too tired to point out either of those things and settled back on his shoulder. “No.”

He sifted his fingers through her hair. “So...what did he want the other day when he was over?”

“To make clear I understood he was dumping me.”

Gage’s movements stilled. “I thought you’d already broken up with him.”

She shrugged. “He conveniently forgot that part, I guess.”

“What a Dagwood,” Gage said, his tone disgusted.

Skye laughed.

They sat together in silence, the whispering hiss of water on sand the only sound besides some faint music floating down the beach from Captain Crow’s. The stars were bright in the dark velvet of the sky and she could make out the haze of the Milky Way. It drifted across the constellations like a bridal veil.

When Gage left, they’d never share another night like this, she thought, not even under separate skies. As she’d learned, when it was night here, it was day in that other part of the world.

If she asked, would he light a morning candle for her?

“Gage.” Thinking of his return to that dangerous part of the world raised another concern. “Mara told me about the precautions and protocols the foreign press adhere to when they’re overseas. You do that, right? Make sure you’re as safe as you can be?”

She felt him stiffen a moment; then he scooted lower in the cushions, his arm across her waist to hold her more securely. “Those precautions and protocols didn’t save Charlie, did they?” he said.

“No, but you do leave notice of where you’ll be going and when you expect to return, right?”

“Exactly what Charlie did.”

“Gage—”

“Let’s not talk about it anymore, okay?” Shifting her so she was sideways on his thighs, he leaned close. “Isn’t this better?” he said against her mouth.

It was, even as she knew he’d set out to distract her. The kiss consumed her with heat and greedy need, and all niggling worries and maudlin thoughts fled. She threaded her fingers in his hair and opened her mouth to the aggressive thrust of his tongue. He slid his hand beneath her shirt at the small of her back, and the slight roughness of his palm brought out goose bumps that climbed her spine and then spread up the nape of her neck and over her scalp.

He groaned and found the back clasp of her bra, unhooking it with ease, then sliding his hand around her ribs to cup the weight of her breast. His mouth trailed over her cheek to her ear as he toyed with her nipple, pinching at the ruching flesh until she squirmed on his lap. He was thick beneath her bottom, hard and eager.

“Let’s go to bed,” he whispered, his warm breath tickling the whorls of her ear. He nipped the rim and she shuddered.

“Gage...” He was muddling her mind. There was that promise she’d made to herself, remember? She had to...she had to...

The specifics evaporated as he urged her to her feet, then kissed her again, her upturned face cupped in his hands. His forehead pressed hers. “I want you naked.”

She wanted that, too, and hauled in a deep breath to tell him so. But oxygen brought clarity. Hadn’t she decided to sleep alone tonight? “Maybe it—”

Her protest was cut off by another luscious, delicious, demanding kiss. Without thinking, she had her hands on his skin beneath his T-shirt, her palms absorbing the heat and play of muscles along his spine. A grunt sounded from deep in his throat, and her response was instinctive: she tilted her hips to press against the bulge of his arousal.

His hand palmed her bottom, keeping her close, making her squirm. He broke this kiss. “God, Skye—”

A wolf whistle pierced the darkness. A passel of kids jostled each other on the beach, wading in the shallows at the surf line. “Get a room,” one yelled.

Skye buried her face in his chest, half-embarrassed, half-amused.

“Shit,” Gage said. “Let’s get inside.” Without waiting for her answer, he tugged her through the doorway.

In the entry, though, she resisted farther forward movement, her head and her hormones going to war again: Don’t get used to this! But he’s a limited-time offer!

Gage glanced at her over his shoulder, his expression puzzled.

“I think I should sleep alone,” she blurted out.

Still holding her hand, he turned to study her face. “All right,” he said after a long moment. “If that’s what you really want.”

It wasn’t what she really wanted! It was never what she really wanted! “I... No, never mind.” She stepped forward and wrapped her arms around his waist and butted her head against his shoulder. “It’s been a long day.”

His sigh blew against her hair. “Yeah. Yeah, it has.” He rubbed a comforting hand down her back.

Skye leaned into him, drawing his exotic-spice scent deep into her lungs. Closing her eyes, she reveled in the moment of closeness and warmth. Weeks ago she hadn’t wanted a man to look at her, but this particular one had slipped through her barricades and earned her trust. Why would she put him at arm’s length?

He tucked his fingers beneath her chin, bringing her gaze back to his. “Would you rather we both go back to No. 9? Spend the night there?”

Skye hesitated.

His hand took another soothing pass down her spine. “We haven’t been to bed here. Is that what’s bothering you? Me and you in this particular house?”

It was today that continued to bother her, Skye knew. It was the time she’d spent with Mara. As much as she liked and empathized with the other woman, those afternoon hours had reminded her of the danger looming in Gage’s future. He’d be on his way to more risk soon, while every moment she spent with him risked her heart.

Insist on sleeping by yourself, her common sense whispered again. Make a move. Start putting distance between you.

“It’s not the house,” Skye told him, and she massaged her right temple where an ice pick was suddenly trying to gouge through her skull to get to her brain.

He made a soft, sympathetic noise. “You have a headache.” His fingers closed around her wrist and drew her hand away. “I can fix that,” he said, then started towing her, his touch gentle.

To her surprise, he turned into the bathroom that had two doors, one that opened into the hall and the other into her bedroom. It was a large space, tiled in old-fashioned white and pale yellow, and included two pedestal sinks, as well as a walk-in shower with nozzles on opposite walls.

“Wha—” she started.

“Shh,” he said, disappearing for a moment to turn on a bedroom lamp. When he reappeared, he flipped off the overhead so that the only light was what spilled from the other room. She found the dimness soothing and, bemused, allowed him to press her down onto the closed lid of the commode.

He reached inside the tiled enclosure and flipped on both fixtures. Water pattered down like rain from the circular showerheads. Then he crossed to her and knelt to tug the sandals from her feet.

“I can do that,” she protested, but he hushed her again.

“Let Dr. Lowell do his work,” he said.

In moments she was naked and so was he, and they were under the soft, warm spray. “Close your eyes,” Gage whispered, tilting back her head to drench it thoroughly. Next she smelled her shampoo, and he had his hands on her again, his fingers massaging her scalp, creating light suds.

The headache was barely a whimper now, and seemed to wash down the drain when he drew her back under the water to rinse her hair. “Good,” she said, feeling lethargic now that the pain had abated.

“Good,” he confirmed, kissing her lightly. Then he went to work with soap and cloth, washing her with slow, hypnotic strokes. No flesh went untended; he started at her forehead and ended at her feet, always unhurried, always with deliberate movements that were caring but not sexual in nature.

The attention loosened her joints and liquefied her muscles until she had to lean against him to stay upright. His chuckle was soft in her ear, and she kissed his bare shoulder as he shuffled her back under the spray. “I think I could fold you into a Jell-O mold about now.”

“Mmm,” she said, feeling like a spoiled lap cat.

“Better?” he asked.

“So much better,” she said. “Today...”

“Today?”

“It hit me hard. Mara’s pain—”

“I know,” he said, and held her against him, with the water raining down and his heartbeat a comfort in her ear. He was semiaroused, but he didn’t seem impatient to stoke her fire. “Let’s go to sleep, Skye.”

She blinked up at him, her lashes sticky with wetness. “Sleep?”

His smile was fond. “Just sleep. We have all the time in the world for the other.”

But they didn’t! They didn’t have time! Skye was loath to be the one to point that out, however, and said nothing as he wrapped a towel around his waist then dried her off with more tenderness.

In the bedroom, he reversed the process with the lights, turning on the one in the bathroom, then flipping the switch on the lamp so that the room was near dark. “Nightgown?” he asked, and she nodded, crossing to the bureau herself.

The sleeveless, thin cotton garment floated over her damp body and when she crawled between the cool sheets, she shivered. Gage gathered her close, his nakedness already warm, and she burrowed her back to his front and let herself drift away, floating on an ocean of sweet forgetfulness.

Later, she woke, instantly aware of Gage’s heavy arm across her waist and a need to use the facilities. She slipped free of his hold, took care of business, then flipped off the bathroom light. Tiptoeing across her floor, she heard him make a little sound.

Dreaming, she thought, with a smile.

Then another sound came from his throat. More guttural. Urgent.

“Gotta get out of the dark,” he suddenly muttered. “The dark is gonna kill me.”

“Gage,” Skye said, alarmed at the rough rasp of his voice. He sounded as if he’d been screaming for a week straight. She hurried to his side of the bed, sat on the edge.

“I can’t read the letters in the dark.” His groan sounded as if it was tortured out of him.

Skye’s stomach tightened. “Hey.” Her fingertips brushed his shoulder.

He sat bolt upright. Even in the shadowed room, she could see his eyes were open, though he moved his head about as if he was blind.

“Gage.” Her palm cupped his whiskered cheek.

At her touch, he jerked, then reached out to grasp her upper arms. His fingers curled, digging tight. “Give me light, you f*ckers,” he yelled in that ruined voice. His eyes were on her face, but unseeing. “Give me goddamn light!”

Shocked, she could only stare at him.

Then he shook her, hard enough to rattle her teeth. She bit her tongue, the sharp pain causing her to cry out. Only then did Gage freeze. He blinked several times, clearly orienting himself to the real time and place.

“Oh, God,” he said. “Skye.” He released his hold on her and lurched across the mattress toward the bedside lamp on the other side. Fumbling to turn it on, he almost knocked it to the floor.

When light flooded the room he inhaled deeply, over and over, as if the yellow glow were oxygen. His back was to her, and she could see the shudders that racked his large body.

Something was definitely wrong. Something big. The issue that his twin had been sensing? “Gage—”

“The lights were off. I can’t have all the lights off.”

“Why?” she asked, keeping her voice soft.

He waved a hand, the movement jerky. “A little phobia.” His voice sounded breathless.

Without another word, she got off the bed and padded into the bathroom. She brought back a glass of cold water, handing it over as she stood in the lamplight.

He drank it down in thirsty gulps. “More?” she asked, taking the empty cup from him.

Shaking his head, he glanced up at her and went rigid. “Oh, God,” he whispered. “Oh, baby.” His hand shook as it reached toward her upper arm.

She looked down, saw the ring of incipient bruises above her biceps. There was a matching band on the other side. His fingertips grazed the mottled flesh; then he met her eyes, his expression hardening to a mask. “I hurt you.”

Before she could respond, he hurtled out of the bed. He shut himself in the bathroom, and she detected the sound of water, the rustle of clothes. Clearly, he was planning to escape.

Determined not to let that happen, she wrapped her fuzzy robe around herself, taking a seat on the mattress. A second thought had her scurrying to the kitchen, and then she was back on the bed, hands folded in her lap as she prepared to drag the truth out of him.

The bathroom door popped open and he came into the room, pausing when he saw her expectant pose.

“You’re going to tell me what that was about,” she said.

His expression still unreadable, he shook his head. “No.” He slid his hands in his pockets as his gaze roamed the room. “Have you seen my keys?”

Lifting one hand, she let them dangle.

He zeroed in on their merry jangle, then strode toward her.

Skye shoved them deep in the patch pocket of her robe. “Tell me what happened first. I’ll give them to you after.”

His expression darkened as he halted a few feet away from her. “Don’t play games.”

“I’m serious.”

Shaking his head, he started forward again. Skye instinctively shrank back, and he stopped, pushing the heels of his hands into his eyes. “Shit!” he said. “Now I’m scaring you. Give me the keys and let me get the hell out of here.”

Skye straightened her spine. “Not until you talk to me.”

“You don’t know what you’re asking for,” he said, the stony mask falling from his face. Temper vibrated his body and throbbed in the air. “You’ll wish you never knew.”

It made her belly jump, but she didn’t let that or his menacing stare move her. Crossing her arms over her chest, she pinned him with her gaze. “Tell me anyhow.”

And when he did, Skye realized she’d never have to worry about sleeping alone.

Because she’d probably never sleep again.





January 20



Dear Gage,



After a week of low skies and drizzle, we’re enjoying a string of halcyon days—you know the kind, when we hope they’re not televising a golf tournament from Pebble Beach or a surf competition in San Diego. When that happens, and the forecast is 77 and sunny on the SoCal sand...well, you can hear the stakes pulling up all over the rest of country and we brace for more freeway traffic.



The ocean is winter-green and white, its surface choppy, the waves throwing themselves on the shore like temperamental teenagers taking to their beds. But warmth radiates from the golden sand, and the jade plants are flowering, the scent from their pink, star-shaped flowers sweet and alluring. My mother used to tell my sister and me it was the perfume of the fairies, lingering in the air after their nights of mischief and magic.



Best, Skye





Skye:



Please send more word warmth! Our high yesterday was 2 degrees Celsius (that’s 35 to those Fahrenheit-inclined). After reading your letter, I shivered my way to the bazaar and found a shemagh (desert scarf) in the cove colors of sun and skye (sic). I told the shopkeeper it’s because I’m from California and he wanted to know which of the L.A. Lakers live next door to me. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I can’t claim actual neighbors because I haven’t had a permanent address in years. When I think of home, however, my mind increasingly turns to Crescent Cove. Perhaps the fairies’ magic at work?



Gage





Fuming at Skye’s stubbornness, Gage stalked about the room. The nightmare was still clanking inside his skull like a tossed salad of nuts and bolts, bruising his synapses and scrambling his mental processes. He should come up with a cover story, blame some innocuous trigger like indigestion or allergies, but his head felt heavy, making it too clumsy to concoct believable untruths.

And then there was Skye herself. Thoughts of her had been the only dependable illumination for two terrifying weeks in the darkness. Her letters the good-luck charms that had gotten him through. When she looked at him the way she was and when he thought of how she’d trusted so much of herself to him, he couldn’t lie to her.

Still, it made him angry as hell, because he’d never intended to tell anyone. “I was kidnapped,” he stated baldly. Because what was the sugarcoat?

Her sharp intake of breath was a second delayed—as if her mind needed a moment to catch up—but it sounded loud and shocked in the quiet, shadowed room. “H-how?”

“I wrote you about that new contact I’d made, remember?”

She swallowed. “Yes.”

“He was supposed to take me to a new Taliban training camp in the border region.” Jahandar had been too smiley, too obsequious, Gage thought now. Except that wasn’t true. The young man had seemed sincere, and the money he wanted to act as guide was within the norms of what Gage had given to others.

“But instead?”

“Every time you get a new opportunity, you’ve got to make a decision,” he told her. “You weigh what you know, what could go wrong, what you hope to accomplish.”

“You take a gamble with your life.”

“No.” His temper was rising again, making his voice harsh. “Well, yes. But it’s not a death wish like you’re implying.”

She raised a brow.

“Somebody’s got to get the information, Skye.” He dropped into an upholstered chair positioned in the corner of the room. “I’m good at what I do. I’m good at seeing things in a way that clarifies what’s going on out there.”

“And you thrive on the danger.”

She didn’t get it, he thought, shaking his head. “If I consider myself in actual, impending peril, I don’t take the chance. Yes, I’m aware I could get hit by a stray bullet or have the bad luck of running over an IED, but that’s different than thinking I’m an actual target.”

Gage felt his hands tightened into fists. “That day I was set up,” he said. “Instead of taking me to the Taliban, Jahandar drove to the site of his family’s lucrative business. A ransom farm.”

She flinched.

“It’s exactly what it sounds like. The family specialized in kidnapping wealthy businessmen, mostly, but they were willing to branch out to journalists, too. Anyone who they suspected had family in America from whom they could extort cash.”

“Were you...were you held at an actual farm?” Skye asked.

His sharp laugh tore at his throat on its way out. “I was put in a hole in the ground.”

She went still. “I think you better give me the details before the ones I make up are worse than reality.”

“Reality likely isn’t much better.” But he explained that after being driven to Nowheresville, he’d expected to be met and vetted by the Taliban leader. Instead, he’d been confronted by three young men with Kalashnikov assault rifles. Adrenaline had flooded Gage’s system, though he’d tried to keep calm as they ordered him away from the car and up a dirt track. There, they’d slid away a piece of plywood the size of a manhole cover.

“That was home, sweet home,” he told Skye now. “They didn’t bother trying to coax me into the shaft, they just picked me up and dropped me down, about eight feet. One of my new friends followed me in, shooing me forward into a tunnel by prodding me with the nuzzle of a pistol.”

Shoving his hand through his hair, he tried to forget the smell of the earth, the tannic and ash taste of it on his tongue. “Then we got to a square-sized ‘chamber,’ that was six feet long, three feet wide, four feet high and braced with pieces of half-rotted wood. Inside was a dirty blanket, a dirtier pillow and a single lightbulb hooked up by wires to a corroded car battery.

“Once I was shown my new digs, my captor backed out and put another piece of wood over the opening that led to the shaft. I tried moving it, of course, but it wouldn’t budge.”

Skye stared at him. “How did you breathe?”

“There was a pipe that poked up to the surface. Oh, and I had a waste bucket, a watering can filled with rust-flavored H-two-O, and a backpack stuffed with boxes of mango juice and packaged cheese cracker sandwiches.”

All the temper was drained out of him now, leaving only the dark, oily stain of the memories.

“You were there for how long?”

“I was in that hole for two weeks.”

Skye shuddered. “How did you manage?”

“You...” He hesitated, sliding his palms down the denim of his jeans. “You got me through.”

“Me?” Her eyes went round.

“Your letters. I happened to have them with me.” She didn’t need to know he’d carried the thin packet whenever he left the place he rented in Kabul—he was that afraid they might get lost if someone robbed his rooms while he was out. “I’d read them, imagining you and the cove. Almost better than TV.”

She tried to put on a smile, but it quickly failed. “You didn’t always have light, though.”

His fingers tightened on his knees. “How...?”

One of her shoulders lifted. “When you were dreaming, you were demanding it.”

Begging, probably, Gage thought, feeling heat crawl over his neck. For a guy used to action, to movement, independence, autonomy, when the bulb sputtered out he’d believed he was being smothered. If he couldn’t see himself, there was no self. If he couldn’t read Skye’s letters—even though after a few days he could whisper aloud each word by heart—then there was no sunlight or ocean or Crescent Cove where he might someday return.

He tried on his own smile. “Let me just say I have a new appreciation for fresh car batteries.”

Frowning, Skye eyed him as she drew the edges of her robe more tightly around her. It was the color of a duckling and looked just as soft. “How did you get free?”

“I have a colleague, an Afghani photojournalist. They asked for a cell phone number and I gave his. We have an...agreement of sorts. To make a two-week-long story short, he has a contact in the national police. They ultimately arrested the patriarch of my kidnapping crime family. Then a deal was struck—he was freed upon the release of the farm’s current hostages.”

Skye blinked. Dawn was delivering its gray-fingered light into the room, mingling with the glow from the lamp. It created an odd visual field around her, obscuring the edges of her body. Squeezing his knees, Gage stayed where he was, ignoring a sudden and urgent craving to touch her, to make sure she was solid and real.

“You’re going back to that place, aren’t you?” she asked. “You’re going back to see if that family is at it again.”

His jaw dropped.

“I overheard you discussing your next assignment with Rex one afternoon,” she said. “And I can’t believe you’d walk into the lion’s den like that.”

He frowned at her. “Look, they are no more lions than I’m a lamb. And from what I’ve learned, that particular group has scattered.”

“Then why—”

His temper took hold of his tongue again. “Because I have to. Because I have to go back and photograph those holes in the ground. Those empty holes in the ground, to prove that I didn’t leave anything of myself behind.”

She opened her mouth, but he pointed a finger at her before a word came out. “You of all people should understand that, Skye,” he said. “You should get that I can’t allow anyone to keep a piece of me.”

The room was light enough now that he could see the flush on her face. “I...” She subsided. “But...” She subsided again, then sent him a truculent glance from under lowered brows.

Point made. He relaxed back on the chair cushions. Crisis passed.

Then she opened her mouth again. “How come Griffin doesn’t know about this?”

Gage froze. “I...”

“Why wasn’t he the one you had the kidnappers contact? Or why didn’t your Afghani colleague call your twin? Isn’t the protocol to leave information on where you’re going and when you’re expected back and what to do if you don’t return?”

The nuts and bolts were jumping around again in his mental hopper. He pushed the heel of his hand against his forehead, trying to keep them still. “I couldn’t... I don’t...”

“Oh, my God,” Skye said, sounding shocked. Her hand crept toward her throat. “You ignore the protocol.”

Once again, he couldn’t lie. “I do,” he agreed, sighing. “You know what happened when Charlie was taken. You know the position that put Mara in. So I’m protecting Griffin, my folks, all of them. I don’t want my family to ever blame themselves like she does now.”

Skye was staring at him. “So...so it’s acceptable to you that you’ll go off and they won’t be alerted that you’re in danger and need help? Gage, you could die and they might never know it.”

“Skye—”

“I...” She swallowed, but her voice remained tight. “I might never know it.”

His chest took each word like a blow. “Honey,” he said softly, aching from his heart outward. “That’s not something to think about.”

Her voice rose. “Of course it’s something to think about.”

“Skye.” Gage got to his feet, approaching with the single idea of offering comfort. To both of them.

She scrambled back on the mattress, her face pale. “Stay away from me.”

He halted, staring at her. “What?”

“I want you to go.” Her palms went up, warding him off.

“Skye,” he chided, holding out his arms. “Come here, baby.”

“Don’t ‘come here, baby,’ me.” She leaped off the bed.

“Just take it easy,” he suggested.

With a furious sound, she turned, drew his keys out of her pocket and threw them at him.

“Shit!” Only a last-minute knee tuck saved him from a blow of sharp metal to precious jewels. “What’s gotten into you?”

Instead of an answer, she sent him a fulminating look, then slammed into the bathroom. He heard the click of locks on both sets of doors.

The whole house seemed to pulse with her temper. Well, he was mad, too, Goddamn it. Hadn’t he tried to protect her, protect everyone from this? “I told you,” he yelled through the door. “I said you’d wish you never knew.”

She yelled back, “I don’t want to know you.”

Seething, he shot eye daggers through the wood. He had the distinct sense she was doing the same from the other side. Damn it. Goddamn it! Where the hell had sweet, shy, reserved Skye Alexander gone?

Feeling put upon and more than a little put out that the siren of the cove was suddenly showing her true—cruel—colors, Gage stalked out of her place. Maybe Beach House No. 9 would have the magic to let him forget any of this had ever happened.