Aside from standing, Troy hadn’t budged from his spot near the sofa. “That sounds good,” he said. He must have sensed the emotion radiating from Zach because he moved toward the door. “Zach.”
Zach looked up and saw him coming. He took a few steps forward and wrapped his arms around Troy in a hard hug.
That about sealed it for Julie. Quietly, she moved into the hallway and into the bedroom where her own tears escaped silently down her cheeks. Seeing the possibilities for those two men made her feel hopeful and happy. They had a future.
Now it was her turn.
* * *
Troy found Julie in the bedroom. He’d seen the look in her eyes before she’d snuck out, leaving him and his uncle—father—alone. Any remnants of tears were long gone as she turned from the bay window. The setting sun lit her in a soft pink glow and her smile leveled him.
“Hey, there,” she said softly. “Your...” She faltered. “Zach seemed like a pretty happy guy knowing he has a son.” She watched him and her mood sobered. “How’re you holding up?”
The woman always asked the questions he wasn’t sure he had answers to. His world had shifted in a total turnaround. Trying to keep up was taking everything he had, but having her with him now made his life complete. With her by his side he could handle anything that came his way. “I’m good.” He stopped in front of her, wrapped his arms around her waist at the same time she draped hers around his neck.
Her eyes sparkled into his. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man more relieved in my life than when Zach hugged you. You’re like this amazing gift.”
That observation seemed over the top—by about a thousand feet—but Troy felt his cheeks heat up anyway and Julie chuckled.
“It’s true,” she said. “And I’m not speaking just in terms of Zach.” Her serious gaze had his pulse rate doubling. “You’ve been a gift to me too.” She licked her lips. “Look, I need to tell you something.” She swallowed and took a deep breath. “I don’t know about you, but this whole thing...us...feels really good. I don’t know exactly what you think about it. I mean, I know you like me well enough... as far as...” She gestured to the bed. “But I just want you to know how I feel. What I feel. I don’t expect you to return the sentiment, I mean, it would be nice if you did, but we haven’t known each other that long and I don’t want to...” She sighed and dropped her forehead against his chest. “I suck at this.” She mumbled into his shirt, but a second later, she pulled back. “Here’s the deal.” She looked him right in the eyes. “I love you. Yes, I said it. I know it’s fast. Way too fast, but you have a way of getting under a girl’s skin. There you have it.” Her double blink signaled the end of her speech and they stared at each other. For many long seconds.
Troy was surprised he hadn’t fallen over yet. She loved him? Him? No woman had stuck around long enough to feel that emotion or say those words. He was too closed off, too introverted. Too used to being alone.
Her brows furrowed. “Are you going to say anything or have I completely ruined a great thing?”
What the hell could he say? Yeah, sure, he’d seen the signs. He observed people for a living, but hearing her say the words tilted his world completely off its axis. He shook his head, still totally at a loss. He had a new father who happened to be a man he truly loved and respected and now he had this? Was he dreaming and this whole thing would slip away with the ring of an alarm clock?
“Troy. You’re scaring me.”
Her earnest eyes gazed into his. He pushed some hair off her cheek and shook his head again. “You love me?” he asked. He laughed, a burst of joy that erupted from his gut and spread through every cell. “I knew I really liked you around the second season of
The
Only
Way
, but I also realized I didn’t know you.”
Her hopeful expression faded.
“Because you can’t know someone watching them play a television or movie character. You can’t be in love with a fictional person or someone you don’t know. But when you introduced yourself to me on the red carpet, minutes away from dying... That’s when I fell in love with you.” His meaning hit home and her eyes widened. A wobbly smile touched her lips.
“I think you’re the most amazing woman I’ve ever met. I think you’re beautiful and talented and funny as hell and I don’t know what I did to deserve your love, but I’m sure as hell glad I got it.” He kissed her gently. “I would do anything for you. Anything. You’ve given me all the things that have been missing in my life for more years than I want to count.”
A tear slid down her temple and Troy gently wiped it away with his thumb. “You’d do anything?” she asked, her voice barely a whisper.
He nodded. “Anything.”
“Will you make love to me?”
Like she had to ask... “I’ve got news for you. That’s a given.”
Her infectious grin widened. “Oh really?” She wrinkled her nose in that way she had and Troy went down for the count. “Is that headline news or just gossip column stuff?”
“CNN all the way.” He brushed his lips across hers and the kiss turned slow, deep and heartfelt. After long minutes of the steamy wet connection, Julie held his face and pulled back from his mouth. “Seriously?” she asked. “You love me?”
That she had to ask amazed him. What man wouldn’t fall head over heels in love with her? “Yeah,” he said, nuzzling her cheek. “I love you. Always will.” Now was the time to tell her he was a private investigator, but she reached up and kissed him so sweetly, so softly that he couldn’t pull away. Didn’t want to stop the incredible feeling of having her in his arms, at his fingertips. Troy angled his mouth along hers and kissed her deeper. He cupped her head and held her steady as he devoured her mouth in another long, slow kiss that stole every thought from his brain. Julie rubbed against him and the semi-erection that had sparked as soon as he walked in the room and seen her smiling turned into a full-blown hard-on.
Shifting her, Troy walked her backward toward the bed. He continued to move his lips across hers slowly, continued to taste the warm sweetness of her mouth in a deep kiss. He wanted to show her how he felt and this seemed the best way.
Julie melted into his arms. She submitted to his roaming hands and hungry mouth. One article at a time, their clothes methodically landed on the floor and Troy eased her down to the bed. He stroked his hands over every inch of smooth skin and kissed all the erogenous zones he’d discovered in the last few days. He tickled the spot behind her ear with his tongue. He caressed the underside of her breast that made her arch into his mouth as he sucked on her hard nipple. Every moan, every restless move made him harder for her.
She loved him. The thought alone nearly made him come and he refused to cut this session short. He rolled onto his back and took her with him so that she straddled him. Her fingers ran through his hair as he grabbed each ass cheek and rubbed her against him.
This time, she moaned.
There was nothing more beautiful than watching her ride him, the way she moved her hips and took him so deep. It was the rapture on her face that leveled him. Her parted lips and nearly closed eyes. Goddamn, it was too good, so he pulled her down so she covered every inch of his chest. Her mouth fell hungrily to his, but the ferocious kiss slowly turned sensual, sexy and full of more heart and soul than he deserved. Feeling the way she slid along his chest and made contact with every inch of skin on his front, he held back his climax. He loved the play of muscles on her back as she flexed over him. His pulse pounded harder as he fought for control. She slowed her pace even more then froze as her inner muscles clenched and spasmed around him. As she held on tight and her slick skin glided under his hands, Troy came with an orgasm so intense, he saw spots behind his lids.
Together they lay, their skin hot and slick, and Troy thanked the higher power above that Julie let him love her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Julie woke up but didn’t bother opening her heavy lids. The heat of another sunny afternoon warmed her skin from the open window. She’d been in bed for almost twenty-four hours. A sleepy, satisfied smile curved her lips. She’d lost count of her orgasms and her energy had tapped out hours ago. She pushed a little closer to Troy’s big warm body. What was it about confessing feelings that turned great sex into passionate lovemaking?
Troy may not have been a big talker, but he spoke plenty with his actions, with his smoldering looks, his talented hands and his hot mouth...
Julie sighed. It didn’t get much better than this.
Troy must have sensed she was awake because his warm hand traveled from her waist to cup her breast at the same time his lips caressed her neck. She couldn’t believe he could go another round again. She sure as hell couldn’t. She was sore, the best kind of sore. Her grin widened.
“What’s got the birthday girl in such a good mood?” As if he didn’t know. His words rumbled in her ear, all sexy and soft and low.
She’d been surprised at midnight when he’d stopped kissing her to tell her happy birthday.
She
hadn’t even remembered, but she blamed the amazing sex. Turning in his arms, she looked into his dark eyes and smoothed her palm across the stubble on his cheek. “I tend to smile when I’m happy and this has been the best birthday
ever
.”
“Ah.” He nodded. “And here I thought it was all the orgasms.”
She snorted a laugh. He wasn’t much for long speeches—at least he hadn’t been until yesterday—but she loved his dry comments. She loved how he bided his time before tossing in a zinger. He was such a contradiction with his serious eyes and quiet nature, yet he still had a sense of humor that lurked beneath the surface. She was bound and determined to dig a hole deep enough to free the part of him that seemed afraid to let loose.
His half grin faded and his eyes remained darkly intent. “Look, there’s something I need to tell you.”
He sounded serious. The kind of serious that she’d learned to be leery of. The kind of serious that said,
I
may
have
failed
to
mention
I
have
a
wife
and
three
kids
back
in
California
and
even
though
I
said
I
love
you
,
I
can’t
leave
my
family
. Ack. She watched too much television. “Okay. What?”
His cell phone rang on the night table. “Shit,” he said softly. He sat up and checked the number. “It’s Zach.”
“Take it,” Julie said. They weren’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Troy punched the screen and flipped the covers off as he got out of bed. “Hey, Zach.” Julie watched as he paced the room, listening to his father. “Let me check with Julie, but it’s probably fine.” A few minutes later, he disconnected the call and tossed the phone at the foot of the bed. “Zach wants us to have dinner with him tonight.” He headed toward the bathroom. “I told him I’d get back to him.”
“Sure. That’s fine. He’s got a lot of years to make up for, Troy. He wants to know you. I don’t blame him.” She heard him flip the toilet seat up as his phone rang again. Probably Zach. She picked it up and the caller ID surprised her.
Sophia Nepali.
Interesting. She hadn’t even realized Troy had met Sophia, since she spent most of her time in London. The phone continued to ring as the toilet flushed and the faucet went on. Troy came out and Julie handed it to him.
“Why is Sophia Nepali calling you?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” He didn’t make any move to answer it.
“Are you dodging her?” She smiled because it seemed so out of character for the man who ran in front of bullets to be leery of a phone call from Ari’s wife. But the serious expression on Troy’s face had her wondering about the phone call. “I didn’t realize you’d ever met her.”
Troy wiped a hand down his face and stepped farther into the room. “Look, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you for a few days now...”
Julie hated the tone of his voice, noticed the underlying edge of nerves as he paced in front of her. He snatched his shorts from the end of the bed and put them on. Apparently this conversation needed clothes. She threw on her T-shirt that she’d lost under the sheets.
Troy paced in front of her and every bit of spit in her mouth ran dry. Not a good sign.
“I wasn’t actually working for Ari all that time.”
Julie waited, nodded. She refused to say a word.
“I was working for Sophia.”
“Is there much of a difference?” she asked. The money came from the same household, so what did it matter?
Troy canted his head. “Well, yeah, it matters because Ari didn’t know I was working for her. He thought I was on his payroll.”
Shrugging her shoulders, Julie said, “I don’t understand.”
Troy ran a hand through his hair, and a prickly feeling raced down Julie’s spine.
“Sophia hired me to...to watch Ari.”
“Right. I figured that. That’s what bodyguards do.”
“I’m not a bodyguard. I’m a private investigator. Sophia thought...thinks that Ari is having an affair with someone.”
Julie snorted. “She’s probably right. He can barely keep his pants zip—”
Private
investigator
. The words slammed around in her skull. She put a hand out, finger up, trying to put the pieces together. “Wait a minute. You were hired to watch Ari and find out who he was screwing, is that it?”
Troy nodded. “Yeah, but I hated it and quit when I told you I quit.”
The pieces slowly connected and Julie struggled to make sense of everything. “You quit the morning of the car bomb.” The morning after they’d spent the night together. A cold chill zinged down her spine and she covered her face with her hand as she backed out of the bed. No, no, no, this was not happening. “Are you telling me that I was the one you thought Ari was having an affair with? And you slept with me before you quit the job?” Her stomach turned over as a few more pieces clicked into place. The night they’d slept together he’d knocked on her door a minute after she’d hung up with him because he’d been in front of her house waiting for Ari to show up. Holy shit. Ari had been there and kissed her in the doorway. She’d called Troy and she’d looked out the window to see the coyotes on her front lawn. Her stomach flipped again and she did her own pacing on the other side of the bed. A nervous laugh escaped her chest. “This is beautiful. Just beautiful. You were watching me the whole time, weren’t you?”
“I was watching Ari,” he said.
“Bullshit.” She spoke very quietly, very succinctly. “You were in front of my house on at least two nights. Don’t deny it.”
His stiff body language was the picture of guilt and her stomach lurched. She wanted the truth. Her gaze never wavered.
“Yes,” he said. “I was.”
“Okay.” She nodded. Now what? Get the hell out. She needed space. Time. Needed to be away from him to sort this whole thing out, because right now she couldn’t stand the sight of him. She opened up her suitcase perched on a chair in the corner of the room, then scooped up all the clothes inside the top dresser drawer and tossed them into her luggage. She was out of there.
* * *
“Whoa. Wait a minute. What are you doing?” Troy asked, rounding the corner of the bed.
“You’re the P.I. Figure it out. Do not touch me,” she said, jumping back as he reached for her. She uttered the words quietly with the most deadly intent he’d ever heard. He kept his distance.
“Then stop whatever the hell you think you’re doing and let me explain.”
“You know what?” She nailed him with a hard blue gaze. “I don’t want an explanation. I don’t want to know why you’ve been lying to me for so long. For
weeks
. Especially the last two weeks!” Yeah, she spit those last words out like they were poison on her tongue. She scooped her clothes out of the second drawer and tossed them into her bag.
“Dammit, wait,” Troy said, blocking her path.
She stopped in front of him, her eyes blazing like fire, her skin flushed and every muscle taut. Lifting one hand, she ticked off a finger. “You could have told me in the hospital at the very beginning.” She still sounded deadly calm. “Oh, but wait, why bother since you left without saying goodbye, because you clearly planned to spy on me more. But then someone shot at me on the balcony so you were stuck on top of me for—what—forty-five minutes until SWAT got there. Maybe a few minutes more. But, no, you couldn’t tell me then because you still planned on watching to see if I was fucking Ari.” She swerved around him and got another load of clothes from the drawer. “Of course, then I made it easy for you. I called you. That’s right, like the biggest naïve fool that I am, I thought, ‘Hey, here’s a nice guy, he’s saved my life twice. Why don’t I give him a call to help me with security?’” She dumped her new load into the suitcase.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he asked.
“What does it look like?” She slid open the closet door with a bang and got out her other suitcase.
“You aren’t leaving,” Troy said with as much calm as he could muster.
Julie turned on him. The eyes that had been full of fire now fairly spit molten lava. “Oh really?” She all but whispered the words. The effect was ten times worse than if she’d raised her voice. “Do you plan on kidnapping me then? Was Cal right? I shouldn’t have come on this trip with a man I barely know?” She didn’t look in any way scared of him, not that Troy wanted that, but he did want her to see reality.
“No, I’m not—and I didn’t—kidnap you. I got you out of California to keep you safe. Alive.”
She snorted and tossed her second bag onto the bed. “Right. Excuse me while I finish packing.”
“Julie, dammit, hear me out.” He slapped the top of her suitcase down and forced her to look at him.
“That night when you showed up at my door in...like a minute...” She laughed, but it lacked any humor. “Stupid me, I thought you were watching me because you were worried about someone getting into my house, but all you wanted to know was if Ari was getting into my bed.” She flipped up the lid of her suitcase. “When am I going to learn?”
The anger in her voice cut Troy deep. “This is what I was trying to avoid,” he said “Everything changed after that night.”
“Really?” She spun on him. “Yet you didn’t see the point in telling me? Maybe you
never
planned to tell me, is that it?”
“No! That’s not it!” He blocked her path to the closet. “I wanted to tell you. More than anything. Why do you think I nearly walked out that first night we were together?”
“Yeah, there’s the operative word.
Nearly
. Maybe you should take up acting since you had me fooled this whole time.”
“I was going to tell you right then. That’s why I stayed. I was going to tell you, but I saw your face and it about killed me. I didn’t want to make you cry. I don’t ever want to make you upset. I care about you too much. I love you, dammit. That wasn’t bullshit. I love you.”
Since she couldn’t pass him to get to the closet she grabbed a pair of jeans on the bed and yanked them on, commando style. “Yeah, great way to go about not making me upset.” She zipped up and marched to the bathroom where she gathered her toiletries and marched back to her suitcase.
“Stop packing,” he shouted. “Would you stop fucking packing? You’re not leaving.”
“One of us is definitely leaving.”
Troy ran his hands through his hair. Unfuckingbelievable. “Fine. Then I’ll go. You stay.” He grabbed his duffel bag from the closet and started tossing his shit inside. “Yes, I should’ve told you, okay. I know that. There was never a good time. I was afraid if I told you during the car ride you’d have gotten out in Middle America. And once we got here, Zach came into the picture and I sure as hell hadn’t planned on that.”
“Well, we have that in common. Neither one of us planned on a few things.” She faced him, lifted her hands in the air, then dropped them on her head. “I can’t believe... I’ve got nothing. No words. I am beyond words.” She threw her underwear and pajamas into the suitcase.
“Stop packing, dammit. I told you I’d go. Just stay here and cool off, okay?”
“Cool off?” Her succinct words had the precision of a bullet to his heart. “Did you just tell me to ‘cool off’?” She got in his face. “I’ve got two words for you. Fuck off. How’s that?”
He’d never seen her like this. “Look, I know you’re pissed. You have every right to be. But I quit with Ari after that night with you. Then I called Sophia and quit with her.” He snagged a T-shirt from the bottom of the bed and whipped it on.
Her eyes widened. “Oh my God! Ari doesn’t even know who you are. He thinks you’re a bodyguard.” She went to her first suitcase and zipped it up. “Beautiful. Just beautiful. I should feel better knowing you lie to everyone, not only me.”
“Stop packing your damn suitcases. I’m leaving, okay?”
She faced him, her arms crossed over her chest, her eyes like blue steel. “Fine.” She ran a hand through her hair.
Troy shook his head, frustration eating at him like a virus, but he gathered more of his things and tossed them into his bag. “I know you never slept with Ari. I know you never wanted to or planned to. I told Sophia I quit because I met you. The real Julie Fraser. And you know me. You know more about me than anyone. I’ve never talked to anyone the way I talked to you. Yeah, okay. I should’ve told you sooner. I’m sorry. I am so fucking sorry, because I wanted to avoid this very thing. I want to keep you safe and not having you with me means you’re open to someone getting at you without my protection. I can’t stand that.”
“Guess you should’ve thought of that before you started keeping secrets.”
Whomp
. It was like a hit to the chest. Deep and hard. With no mercy, no remorse.