Seducing Liselle (9 page)

He lifted a shoulder, discomfort flitting
across his face. “I didn’t expect to have a nightmare tonight.”

She sighed and tucked her face into his
neck. The fire was dying down finally and she was getting cold. “You can’t
predict them. Sometimes I’ll get a nightmare every night for a week, and then
months will go by with none.”

He kissed her head. “I didn’t know you had
nightmares.”

She rubbed her face against his skin as if
she could scrub away the horror of her childhood. “Yeah, well, let’s just say
that my brother learned from a master. Growing up with my dad was …
unpleasant.”

John kissed her again,
then
swung her into his arms.

She squeaked. “What are you doing?”

“I’m taking you to a real bed.” He stood
up easily, cradling her like she was precious.

“What about your shoulder?” She poked at
him, not wanting to hurt himself. “I can walk.”

He laughed. “I’ve got you on my left side,
don’t worry. And I’ve carried you before, through the snow. This is nothing.”

She shook her head at him as he went up
the stairs. Even in the dark she could see his bed was rumpled. There were
clothes on the floor. John’s cat looked up sleepily from the pile, then yawned
and tucked his face back into his tail. A set of dog tags hung from one of the
corners of his wooden headboard. He was definitely a bachelor.

He smiled sheepishly. “I wasn’t expecting
company.”

She chuckled and tucked her face in his
neck. “I can see that.”

He tucked her in without another word,
pulling the sheets and comforter up around them both. “Sleep now,” he said,
curling around her.

Liselle
let the warmth of his body sink into her bones.
He’d seemed
okay, after the sex
, she thought. She hoped he didn’t regret the sex in the
morning. She hoped she didn’t regret it, too.

****

John opened his eyes. Morning sun slanted
across his bed and he stretched, feeling better rested than he’d been in years.
He reached out a hand and encountered … nothing. He sat up.
Liselle
was gone.

“Shit,” he said aloud, running a hand over
his face. “
Liselle
?” he called, pitching his voice
louder. Maybe she’d gone downstairs for a drink. No one responded. He looked at
the clock. Crap, it was after twelve. When was the last time he’d slept this
long? He rubbed his face again. He didn’t remember. He slung back the covers
and padded over to the balcony railing, looking down over the living area. The
fleece blanket had been folded neatly over the back of the couch. A piece of
his yellow notebook paper was balanced precariously on top.
Pitbull
looked up at him, yawning lazily.

“Shit,” he said again, a sinking feeling
in the pit of his stomach. She was gone. The cabin felt emptier than it had in
a long time.

When he made it downstairs, after throwing
on a pair of ratty boxers and a t-shirt he’d picked up from the floor, he went
straight to the note.

Dear John,

He had to snort at that. He’d just
received his first
Dear John
letter and he wasn’t even in the Air Force
any more. He looked down again, making note of her careful penmanship. She formed
all her words very carefully: the l’s curved at the same precise angle, all her
t’s
crossed. He wondered what part of her life made
her crave control so badly she had to take it wherever she could, even in the
small things, like writing with an unfamiliar pencil on someone else’s paper.

Dear
John,

I
want to thank you for giving me the gift of last night. I don’t date anymore. I
don’t get close to anyone, but you got under my skin somehow, probably because
you turned out to be so unexpectedly kind. I’m not used to that.

Anyway,
thank you. I’m leaving now and I won’t bother you or Beth again. My life isn’t
safe, and I don’t want either of you to get tangled up in it.

Please
take care of yourself. I would like to remember you the way you looked this
morning: relaxed, smiling, so handsome you took my breath away.

Fondly,
Liselle

John crumpled the paper and threw it at
the sofa. He clenched his fists for a moment, forcing himself to just breathe.
Then he walked over to the paper, picked it up and smoothed it out. He walked
over to his office area, took down the book his father had given him right
before he died, and stuffed the paper next to the messy, looping swirls of his
father’s signature.

It took him two weeks to realize she’d
taken one of his dog tags with her, too.

Chapter Six

Liselle
panted as she hurriedly tied the bandage over her leg.
God damn
him
, she thought, not for the first time.
God damn him to hell
. Her father was insane, and fixated, and for
some reason he felt he had the right to hunt her down no matter where she went.
She’d given up relying on the restraining orders she’d arranged. He ignored
them and she didn’t have the money to press charges that would stick anyway.
He’d been arrested so many times she couldn’t even keep track anymore, but he
was always free within a few months, the bastard. It made her sick to think
that she shared DNA with the fucker. She still hadn’t figured out how he always
found her again. Stupid modern life with its stupid paper trails…

She spared a moment to give thanks that
her brother was finally dead and she didn’t have to worry about him, too. It’d
been worse when he was alive—the two of them took special delight in tormenting
her together and since Matt was older than her, the last few years before she’d
run away had been especially unpleasant. She supposed she should be grateful
none of the abuse had been sexual.

“Fuck,” she hissed as pain shot through
her wrist. Tightening the bandage on her thigh stopped the bleeding, but it did
nothing for the bruising on her arm. Her father had thrown an iron fry pan at
her and she’d blocked it instinctively. She winced. She was lucky it wasn’t
broken. She looked around the cheap motel room and sighed. This time she’d only
managed to grab her emergency duffel. She’d have to start all over again and
she was stuck in the middle of nowhere USA. At least it was warm again outside.
It was always easier to pack up and go in the summer.

The scent of ripe wheat and a hint of
diesel wafted in the window. She looked at her leg critically. Did it need
stitches this time? The bandage was still white, so maybe she could get away
with ignoring it now that she’d cleaned it and smothered antibiotic ointment on
it. If she went to a hospital, they’d enter her name in the system, even if she
paid with cash. She let herself slump against the wall, watching the parking
lot. She didn’t think he’d follow her here. She’d taken a bus this time, paying
with cash and using a fake name. Usually she rented a car.

She winced, thinking about the rental that
had broken down in the middle of a blizzard just a few short months ago. Making
love with John felt like a dream, now. She closed her eyes and remembered
waking up in his loft, early morning sun just peeking into the cabin. He’d
looked so beautiful, lying there in bed. Relaxed and innocent, though she knew
he had his own demons. Even so, she couldn’t drag him into the mess that was
her life. Her father always tracked her down. This time, he’d managed to hook
up with her last boyfriend through some twisted fucking karma she couldn’t
understand.
The boyfriend one who liked to throw pieces of
furniture at her.
He’d given her father her latest cell phone number
because she’d been too tired and too stupid to get a new one.

She sighed, and let the cheap curtain fall
shut. Ohio in July was incredibly dull, but she could use a little dull right
now. She wished she could’ve stayed in
Pennsylvania,
get to know her niece, Beth. Go out to dinner with John, like a normal person.
Spend a week not looking over her shoulder. She snorted. Yeah, like that was
ever going to happen. She’d spent most of her life running and until the old
man dropped dead, she had to keep going.

She walked over to the bed and fell down
on it, hoping the chair she’d wedged under the door would hold if he found her.
She fingered the string around her neck, pulling it up until she could see the
single dog tag she’d taken that early morning several months ago. Her fingers
traced along the name inscribed in the metal, smoothed over the rubber silencers.
She fell asleep with it in her hand, thinking about the way John had touched
her, as if she was worth something. As if she was precious.

“I think you should look her up,”
Jenn
was saying over her sandwich.

John sighed. “She made it clear that she
didn’t want us to.
Didn’t want
me
to.”

“Beth really liked her.”
Jenn
took a bite of her pickle and chewed noisily. John
wisely didn’t mention her appalling lack of table manners. Older sisters could
be vicious when you pointed out things like that. Plus, she had a piece of
pickle on her cheek and it was more fun trying to calculate when it would fall
off than it would be letting her know she was a slob.

“She wrote me a
Dear John
letter,
Jenn
.
Seriously.”
Even as he said
it he knew the explanation would be wasted on her.

“That’s ridiculous,” his sister said,
taking a sip of her iced tea. “You’re not in the military anymore. And you
never dated her. You can’t get a breakup letter from her.”

He rolled his eyes. Just one night with
Liselle
had felt like five years with any other woman. “My
name’s John. She left me a note that said,
‘Thanks,
don’t look me up.’ That’s a Dear John letter if you ask me.”

“This is why we don’t ask you,” Jean said
as she walked into the kitchen, sitting down. She slapped a postcard on the table
in front of him then extracted two more from her pocket. “See those? They’re
from three different states. Every time Beth gets one in the mail she gets all
sad.”

He poked at the scraps of paper. All of
them bore battered photos of state landmarks, the kind of postcard you’d buy
when you were at a gas station or motel.

“So? She moves around a lot. Some people
travel for their jobs,” he said. He wasn’t going to make more of this than he
had to. He took a huge bite of his sandwich, trying to chew fast. It was a
mistake coming here for lunch and the sooner he finished eating and could
escape his sisters the better.

Jean huffed. “You know what kind of
brother she had.”

John sighed. “Matt’s dead, remember?” He
rolled his head, cracking his neck. His dog tag chain caught on his hair and he
moved a finger beneath it to readjust it before it pinched. He had to get a
haircut.

“When did you start wearing that again?”
Jenn
asked him, frowning over her glass.

John took another bite of his sandwich and
chewed slowly this time, hoping she would forget she’d asked if he took long
enough. He didn’t look at the postcards on the table.

She lifted a brow at him impatiently.

He sighed and swallowed.
“A few months ago.”
He took another bite, following it with
a gulp of water.

Jean glared at him. “You don’t need them
anymore.”

John pushed his plate away, appetite gone.
He’d only eaten half of his lunch. “I need to get back to work.”

“You only just got here,”
Jenn
said, clearly disappointed.

Too bad, sis.
Maybe next time you won’t interrogate me and we can all enjoy our
lunch
, he thought, standing up. He grabbed his cell
phone. “Yeah, well, I’ve got stuff to do this afternoon.” He downed the rest of
his water. “Tell Beth I said hi.” He turned and walked through the hall and out
the front door before his sisters could protest. They could deal with his
half-eaten sandwich and their self-righteous opinions on their own. He didn’t
need to listen to it. He had enough regrets about that night without them
piling more on him.

Outside, he paused next to his truck and
ran a hand down the shiny black paint. It was a nice pickup, had all the
amenities, but he missed his grandfather’s truck. He’d never got it working
again after
Liselle
had left. It’d felt like a sign,
as if the universe was telling him:
give it up, already. She’s not coming
back.

He pinched the bridge of his nose, willing
himself to stop the self-pity.
Stop thinking about her, you idiot.
Enough.
The sun was shining, there was a lovely breeze
blowing through the trees, and he had plenty of work to keep him occupied. So
what if he couldn’t focus? He remembered the way she’d looked that night:
vulnerable, sweet, and passionate. Her blue eyes seemed to hold the answer to
everything he’d ever wanted to know, and then she was gone like it had been
nothing more than a good dream. One night with her and he was ruined for life.