Robert knew it was a stupid moment, but he couldn’t help but smile back. She was standing so close he could see the water beading on her eyelashes. He could smell the subtle scent of her shampoo coming off her wet hair. Her eyes were luminescent in the light of the beam. He was aware of Jack sleeping soundly between them, that Lily was close enough to touch, and an odd sense of rightness settled over him.
The moment shouldn’t have meant anything—they were cold and tired and hungry with a band of hostile soldiers hot on their trail—but the moment did mean something. It meant a lot. More than he could put into words. A hell of a lot more than he wanted it to.
As he stood there looking into her beautiful eyes, the realization of just how lucky he was to have found them, regardless of the circumstances, hit him like the business end of a cane. Lily stared back, her eyes wide, her lips trembling with cold. A single drop of water hung from her earlobe. Robert wondered what it would be like to lean down and catch that tiny droplet with his mouth. If she would allow it. If it would taste like her.
Before he realized that he was going to touch her, he reached out and caught the drop with his thumb. She flinched, then opened her mouth as if to speak, but no sound came out. Lord, he wanted to kiss her. Wanted to devour that mouth. Pull her to him. Finish what they had begun the night before. Damn it, he wanted to know if there was a future for them.
“Now might be a good time to pull that door closed,” he said gruffly.
“That’ll make it awfully dark in here.”
“You’re not afraid of the dark, are you?”
“No, I just…don’t like it.”
He thought about what it would be like to be in a dark room with her, decided it was something he’d be better off not thinking about at the moment. “Leave it open a few inches. I’m going to build a fire. We’ll use it as the chimney.”
Lily turned quickly away and pulled at the door.
Robert let out a long breath and wiped the rain from his forehead, wondering how the hell he was going to get through the rest of the night without doing something he was going to regret.
Chapter 10
Lily sat on the small tarp Robert had laid on the floor trying not to shiver, trying even harder not to think about how she was going to get through the night when she was cold to her bones and her life had just taken a hard left turn straight into disaster. She couldn’t believe DeBruzkya had put a price on her head. One hundred thousand dollars was an outrageous sum of money in Rebelia. A lot of people would do a lot of things to earn it.
The possibilities made her shudder.
She looked at Jack snuggled in Robert’s jacket next to her, and another layer of fear lanced through her. Robert was right; she’d put her child at risk. The thought struck her like a punch. He was the most precious thing to her in the world. A sweet, innocent baby—and she’d put him in danger. Not only Jack, she realized, but Robert, too, and guilt wrapped gnarly fingers around her and squeezed.
For several long minutes she sat next to Jack and watched him sleep. He’d wakened for a few minutes when she’d changed him; he’d even taken a little bit of the goat’s milk, then quickly fallen back to sleep. Lily wished sleep would come to her as easily. Wished she wasn’t wet and cold and still shaking from their brush with DeBruzkya’s soldiers.
A few feet from the mine entrance, Robert fed ancient wood planks to the small fire he’d built. Lily watched him, a new trepidation creeping over her. She’d never been particularly claustrophobic, but for the first time since they’d set foot inside the mine some twenty minutes ago, she felt hemmed in. Trapped. Not only by the dangers lurking outside, but by her feelings for Robert.
No matter how badly she wanted to deny it, there was something powerful and undeniably profound between them. A tangible connection that pain and grief and distance hadn’t erased.
“The fire should warm it up in here a little.”
She started at the sound of Robert’s voice and looked up to find him silhouetted against the fire, facing her. His wet hair looked black in the flickering light. He’d slicked it back, revealing sharp cheekbones and angular planes that lent him a menacing countenance. His face was in shadow, but she knew he was watching her. She could feel his eyes sweeping over her as surely as she could feel the welcome heat from the flames.
“It’s going to be a long night,” he said. “This might be a good time to see what we can do about drying our clothes.”
“I’m fine.” She knew the instant she said the words how silly they sounded.
“Wet clothes are fine if you’re a fish. But you’re not, and I don’t have to tell you about the dangers of hypothermia,” he said. “Do I?”
When she didn’t respond, he frowned and walked over to the fire. She knew what he was going to do next—take off his sweater. And while she knew that was the practical thing to do, the side of her that wasn’t feeling quite so practical jumped into panic mode.
“What are you doing?” she snapped.