Stepbrother Thief (21 page)

“I glanced out the back door to make sure you two weren't going to kill each other when I find you balls deep, Gill. I think I have the right to make a couple of well-placed quips.”

“Just don't let it go to your head. You have a job to do tonight,” Gill growls, the sound making me dizzy with desire.
Damn it.
I glance over my shoulder and find him staring at me again.

“A job that I've been doing perfectly well for weeks. Don't forget, I saved your girlfriend's life once.”

“I'm not his girlfriend,” I say, if only because I feel like somebody has to say it and Gill doesn't seem even remotely interested in balking the falsely descriptive noun.

“Right.” Aveline snaps her fingers together, standing up and tugging up her baggy gray sweatpants. “You're his
sister,
aren't you? Definitely looked like a sibling bonding moment out there earlier. You two are just lucky the neighbor didn't see. That bitch would happily host a sniper for Karl, take both of you assholes out.”

“Goodnight, Aveline,” Gill snarls, moving away and pausing by the front door while I grab my coat. If I'd have given him the chance, he would've gotten it for me and tried to help me into it. Can't deal with any niceties or favors from him right now.

“Where are you two off to?” Cliff asks from behind us. I turn as I slip my arms into the black and white wool coat, the one with the houndstooth pattern that I've been dying to wear since I bought it. Tonight's the first real opportunity I've had to get out of the house since that ill-fated breakfast with Gilleon. A double-breasted princess coat fits the occasion perfectly.

“Dinner,” I say before Gill can interject. “To talk,” I add, knowing Cliff will sympathize.

“Well, don't stay out too late,” he says, coming over to me with a coffee mug in hand, and kissing both my cheeks.
He doesn't know yet.
Thank God Aveline was the only person in the house to actually see the deed go down. “And stay safe.” He gives Gilleon a pointed look and turns away, heading back towards the kitchen and whatever novel's caught his fancy today. Gill, surprisingly, has a very large collection of classics and brand new bestsellers both. Go figure. Must run in the family.

“See you later, Papa,” I say, giving Gill the opportunity to open the front door and do a quick sweep of the yard and the car before I go out. I watch from the window as he greets a friend of his, some off duty cop who's sitting in his cruiser across the street. A police officer helping protect a jewelry thief from the guy he stole from. Interesting.

“And don't let him get to you,” Papa warns before he disappears around the corner and I hear a chair scrape across the floor.

“Definitely don't do that,” Aveline purrs, winking at me and turning away join to Cliff.

“I won't,” I call back at them and then wonder if I already have.
Am I letting Gilleon get to me with his big, blue eyes and his full lips? He says all the right things, does all the right things, but I can't trust him, not like that. Not ever again.

“All clear,” Gill tells me, gesturing for me to join him on the front porch. I step outside and close my eyes for a moment, listening to the quiet silence of the evening, breathing in the smell of wet leaves and autumn. There's a cold snap in the air that promises that winter is on its way. “I'm sorry about Aveline,” he says as we descend the front steps and … he pauses to open my door for me.
Damn it, Gill.
I know it doesn't seem like a big deal, but the more I let him in in little ways, the more he'll get to me in a big way. That's Gilleon. Love letters, black and white cards with silly sentiments, breakfasts in bed, quirky smiles, impromptu dance parties in the living room. It's what he does, and he does it well. Too well.

“Don't apologize for your friend,” I tell him as we climb into yet another vehicle—an SUV this time. Gill's car's now parked in the garage, and new rentals keep appearing. I don't know how that really helps if this Karl guy knows where Gilleon lives. Maybe it just makes it harder for the guy to find him when he goes out? “She's right anyway.”

“Right?” Gill asks, raising a dark brow and turning to look at me. The close confines of the vehicle are hard to deal with, especially after what just happened between us.
Start the damn car,
I think at him, but he just sits there staring at me. “Right about what?”

“What we did was stupid,” I say, and I refuse to let my stomach fill with butterflies when I think about it. A quickie was all it was, just a stupid, meaningless quickie. “Solène could've seen us.” I pause and purse my lips, looking out the window and not at his face. “Or Cliff.”

“You're right,” he says, and my stomach drops a little. I don't know why. I
want
him to agree with me, move past this so we can talk business. “We should've been more discreet with so many people around.” He leans over with a creak of the leather seat and presses his hot lips to the side of my neck before I can stop him, sending a wildfire burning through my body that I don't even begin to know how to stop.

I breathe out with an involuntary sigh, and my breath fogs the passenger side window.

“Gill,” I snap, turning towards him and putting a hand on his chest. He's already pulling away, lips twisting into a devilish smirk. “That wasn't the only thing that was wrong with what happened today. You know that?”

“We didn't discuss protection first?” he asks, finally starting the ignition and pulling out of the driveway. “At least you can rest assured that I'm clean.”

“Always use a condom with your girlfriends?” I ask and he shakes his head softly, giving me another smoldering look that makes me clench the seat with tight fingers. I really
am
letting him get to me, aren't I? A thirty-one year old woman acting like a teenager. Not particularly flattering. I need to get a rope around these hormones.

“I haven't had many girlfriends,” he admits with a small shrug. “None of them matched up to you.”

I snort and put my forehead against the palm of my hand.

“Would you please stop? This dinner is supposed to be about our
daughter,
” I say, glancing up in time to see him clench the wheel with tight fingers.

“It
is
about her. But it's also about us. I want us to be a family again, Regina.”

“Go fuck yourself,” I tell him, the words slipping out before I can stop them. Not very mature, I know, but wow. Really? The nerve of this asshole. A family? He
had
a family and he tossed it away like it didn't mean shit.

“Speaking of families,” he begins again, clearing his throat a little. “No condom?”

“I have an IUD,” I snap, rubbing my temples in little circles. “I don't plan on having another child, especially not by accident.”

“Not ever?” Gill asks innocently, and I swear, I'm about to reach over and break some of the fingers on his right hand. I'm not usually prone to violence, but really?

“Gilleon, I don't know what's happening here, but it isn't going to go the way you want it.”

“And how's that?” he asks me, his voice dropping a little, into a deeper, more primal sound. “How do you think I want it, Regina?”

“I think you want me back,” I say, and feel my heart start to pound. I look over at him, refusing to be intimidated, and find his eyes half-lidded and focused entirely on the road in front of us. He doesn't even glance my way. The blue lights from the dashboard cast shadows on his face, highlighting those strong cheekbones, that perfectly straight nose, the round fullness of his lower lip. The shading gives him this scary-pretty look, like the strength that's resting just beneath the surface of his skin could burst free at any moment and wreak some serious havoc.

“Aren't you going to say anything?” I ask, hating how nervous I am right now. Whatever he says, it doesn't matter, doesn't change anything about the past or the future. Gill and me, we don't have a future together anymore. We did, but that's all gone now, torn away by a split second decision and a handwritten letter.

“What does Solène know about … me and you?” he asks finally, choosing to pretend my statement isn't sitting in the SUV with us, the proverbial elephant in the room. I decide that I'm just as happy to drop the subject and lean back in my seat, my heartbeat slowing to something much closer to normal.

“She thinks Cliff is her dad,” I say, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I'm sorry, but life worked out the way it did, and explanations were needed, and Cliff and I did what we thought was best. After all, it was just me and him there at the time and Solène is a smart girl. She looks like me, like Gill, like Cliff. Obviously, there's blood there. She just believes that it's my mother's and Cliff's blood. “She thinks Elena is her mom, that she died right after she was born.”
Instead of the four years before that, shot to death right here in Seattle on a business trip away from Paris.
“When she says you're her brother, and I'm her sister, she really thinks it. I mean, she knows we're stepsiblings, but …” I pause and trail off before I keep talking and find that I can't stop.

“Did you ever think about telling her?” he asks, and although I want to tell him to mind his own damn business, the natural curiosity in his voice makes me think twice. He
is
her dad and I
didn't
tell him about her. True, it wouldn't have changed anything, but I think it's okay, good even, that he's interested.

“Dozens of times. Hundreds, maybe.” I shrug and then sigh, memories flooding my frontal lobe. There were opportunities, plenty of them, but I just couldn't do it. Maybe it was because telling her about me would mean I'd have to tell her about Gilleon, about how he abandoned us both. I didn't want her to feel like her dad didn't want her, and with Cliff right there and ready to help, I didn't have to risk that. “It feels like it's too late now. I'm afraid that if I tell her, it'll break her heart.”

“I wish I'd known,” Gill whispers, his voice laden with regret, heavy and wistful, like he can imagine a different future for us all. I could too, once upon a time. “Regina, I really am sorry. If I could've stayed, I would've.”

“Gill, please don't go there. I don't want to talk about it.”

“But I do. I want to explain things. I know you'll never be able to forgive me, but I feel like you should know what I was thinking and why.”

“That our life was too boring? That I wasn't enough? That you were bored, maybe? I mean, we were each other's first loves, first times. I always just assumed you needed more. The challenge of a new life, the thrill of a new girl, the excitement of sex with a stranger.”

“It was
none
of those things,” he snaps, running a hand through his raven dark hair. “I love you with a fierceness that scares me sometimes.”
Love.
Present tense. I suck in a deep breath. “It was never about the job or the sex or anything like that.”

“You're telling me you haven't had your fair share of girls over the years?” I ask, raising a brow and knowing the fourteen lovers I've had since he left—most of them one-night stands when I was trying to forget—have to be nothing compared to his count.

Gill's mouth twitches and I know that he finds my interest amusing. The bastard.

“Hate to disappoint you, Regina, but I've had less one-night stands than I have fingers on my right hand.”

“Fuck off,” I tell him, completely disbelieving that statement. What's the rule with guys? I thought when they told you about the number of people they've slept with, you're supposed to divide by two and subtract one. With women, it's multiply two and add one, right? Shit, I don't know. Screw gender stereotypes anyway. “You're telling me in ten years that you've slept with four people?”

“That's what I'm saying.”

I catch on to his word play and try to trick him into telling the truth.

“One-night stands. Okay. How many people have you dated?”

“Zero.”

“Bullshit,” I snap, my heart pounding and my hands getting all sweaty. Why is this conversation so exciting to me? I'm not a jealous person, and even if I was, I don't care what Gill's been doing. It's his body, his choice. “Four people. You're saying you've slept with five people your entire life?”

“That is exactly what I'm saying, Regina,” Gill tells me, his voice bubbling with amusement. “Why so shocked? Even if I had been looking, this job doesn't exactly allow for a lot of movement or mingling. I've spent weeks on the run, one step ahead of the authorities. I didn't have time for sex.” He pauses and his breath hitches a little, some of the amusement leaking away. “Besides, I've never given up the idea of you. Those one-night stands, I didn't even mean for those to happen. It was only when I was feeling hopeless, when I was certain I'd never get what I really wanted, that it happened at all.”

What I really wanted.

I swallow hard and tuck some hair back behind an ear, just so my shaking hands have something to do.

“Fourteen,” I tell him, watching as his face twists, heats with some of that raw anger and jealousy that I keep catching glimpses of. “I've had fourteen lovers. Four of them actual boyfriends. The rest were … they were nothing …” I say, wondering why Gill's pulling over on the side of the road, slipping into an empty parking lot and guiding the SUV into a space beneath a cluster of red alders. “What are you doing?”

He turns the ignition off and then leans over until his forehead is touching the steering wheel, hands resting on either side. At first, I think he's having a fit of some sort, like maybe I've set him off and that jealousy of his has morphed into something raging and terrible. And then I realize that he's laughing.

“What's so damn funny?” I ask, feeling suddenly warm in the closed in space of the SUV. The windows are already starting to fog up as I turn to Gill and cock my head to the side, studying him with no small amount of confusion. “Seriously, talk to me.”

“I have the strangest urge to track down and break the necks of each and every guy you've ever slept with.”

“That's funny to you?” I ask as Gill leans back and wrinkles his brow at me, those perfect lips twisted to the side in a bemused smile. He looks just like the Gill I always knew and loved right now, like we're sharing a private joke that nobody else is in on. “I think that qualifies more as dangerous stalking behavior than a joke.”