“I see,” I said, matching my tone to his, detached and impersonal. “If that’s the case, why push me to take it?”
“Apparently, it’s mainly because I’m a selfish bastard—I’m paraphrasing here, you understand,” he said.
He took a pace backwards and leaned his shoulder on the wall opposite, folding his arms so his fingers were tucked under his, armpits. He tilted his head back, staring past me at a point of nowhere as if he had to put effort into remembering words I knew would be acid-etched into his brain.
“He told me you’d already been through more than most people ever have to face in a lifetime. That you’d been broken in every way that mattered—mentally, physically, emotionally. And, in his opinion, the blame for most of it can be laid squarely at my door.”
“That’s rich,” I said, rough with a dangerous cocktail of emotions, “coming from him.”
Sean shrugged. “But, the trouble is, he’s probably right,” he said, and the casual acceptance in his own voice sent a greasy fear sliding through my gut. “So, first thing tomorrow I’ll call Parker and get him to send up Joe McGregor to take over from me. He’ll help you keep them safe until this bloody mess can be sorted out.”
I’d always thought that phrase about your heart sinking was purely metaphorical, but I felt the sudden lurching contraction in my chest. I wanted to say a hundred things, but when I opened my mouth all I actually managed was, “What about you?”
“I’ll go back to New York, see if I can help Parker untangle things at that end.” He sounded matter-of-fact, as though he had nothing to gain or lose by the action.
For a moment I couldn’t react, couldn’t break the paralysis his announcement caused. When he could bear my shocked gaze no longer, Sean lifted himself abruptly away from the wall and moved further into the room, almost restless as he pulled off his tie.
I found my voice, used it to say, “I don’t want McGregor,” and hated the plaintive note.
“Why?” Sean turned back, impatient now, hands on his hips. He carried the Glock high on the right side of his belt, with a slight forward cant. “He’s young but he’s good, and his experience is solid.”
“But he’s not you,” I said, small and subdued. “I want you.”
He let his head snick down and left, biting off whatever retort was forming on his lips, closed his eyes and took a breath.
“You don’t know what you want, Charlie,” he said wearily. He glanced up and the defeat in his eyes terrified me. “I thought, last summer when we were in Ireland, that you knew, that you’d made up your mind. But it only takes a few days in the delightful company of your parents before your resolve all goes to shit.”
He sucked in a breath, let it out slowly as though willing the fragile hold on his temper to last just a little longer. “I’m tired,” he said, flat. “Tired of not being sure how you feel about me. Tired of being shunted out of sight when it suits you, like some dirty little secret—okay to fuck in private, but God forbid you should ever have to acknowledge that fact in public.”
“That’s not fair,” I said, grinding out the words over my distress. “You know damn well we can’t make a show of being a couple, not in the job we do. Even Parker doesn’t quite trust us not to let it get in the way!”
He shrugged, like it wasn’t worth arguing about anymore, and started to turn away, unfastening the cuffs of his shirt.
Fury blazed. I shoved away from the wall and reached him in two fast strides, grabbing his arm, flipping him to face me.
If I’d been expecting to catch him off form, off balance, I should have known better. Sean twisted out of my grip with the kind of fluid, practiced ease that had always made him so deadly at hand-to-hand. He sidestepped, graceful as a fencer, and sent me sprawling onto the bed like he was brushing away an unwanted fly. Now I wasn’t even worth the trouble of fighting properly.
He’d been carelessly gentle but, even so, I had acquired a lot of new bruises lately and the thump as I landed reminded me of every one of them. I elbowed up and stared at him, my vision starting to shimmer.
“Is that all I am to you, Sean?” I demanded, using anger to drive the shake out of my voice. “A quick fuck?”
He went very still and stared down at me, the only movement in his face a muscle jumping at the side of his jawline.
Nothing good will come of provoking him, my mother had warned.
Maybe if that cautionary note had been sounded by anyone else but her, I might have paid more attention. As it was I cast aside all sanity and threw another stupid, reckless challenge his way. “Only, I’ve been fucked before, and I didn’t think what we had together was quite in that category.”
For a moment he didn’t react. Then, with an almost feral growl deep in his throat, Sean pivoted and swept the ornate lamp off the desk behind him with a single backhanded blow. It yanked the plug out of the socket and spun the glass base against the bathroom wall, shattering it into fragments. The explosion of violence was stark and shocking.
Appalled, I threw myself sideways off the bed, dropped onto my feet on the far side of it, scrambling to meet his eyes. They were burning, ferocious, in the face of a stranger. The fear caused a massive spike like an electrical short. I’d always sensed the beast in Sean ran very close to the surface but he’d never fully uncaged it before. Never with me. Until now.
He advanced, head down, utterly focused, kicking aside a chair. I backed up, my heart thundering against my breastbone, the blood roaring in my ears as the adrenaline rampaged shrieking through my system.
He reached me, reached for me, ramming me backwards until the wall brought us up short. I told myself I could have stopped him, could have evaded him, but I wanted—no, I needed—to know how far he would take this. How far he would hurt me.
Because then I’d have my final answer.
His fingers clamped around my wrists, jerking my arms up and out, pinning me against the wall. He crowded me with his body, forcing an awareness of the height and the breadth and the weight of him.
The memories triggered by that deliberate act ripped through me, caving my chest until I could barely breathe. He leaned his face close to mine and watched with a cold hard gaze as every scrap of color bleached out of my face and I struggled to hide the sudden bloom of panic in my eyes.
“Sean!” The words were torn from me, weak and watered. “Please …”
I’d pleaded that night, too—begged and pleaded. For all the good it had done me then.
Donalson, Hackett, Morton and Clay.
“I’m not them, Charlie,” he said, almost a whisper that I struggled to hear above the rasp of air in my clogged throat. “I’ve never been them—except inside your head. And every time you flinch away from me—yes, just like you’re doing now—you’re blaming me for what they did to you.”
“I don’t blame you.” Was that pathetic little voice really mine?
“Yes, you do,” he said, certain as stone. His eyes flicked down to my mouth and back up again. Eyes so dark they were almost black, with the tiniest flecks of gunmetal and gold around the pupil. “Just as your bloody parents blame me, for not teaching you better, for not protecting you.”
“Sean, you weren’t even there!” I protested, still reedy but stronger than before. “You didn’t know—”
“I blame me,” he said, and the quiet admission undid me. He let go of my wrists and stepped back, a flicker of selfloathing in his face as he saw the reddened marks his grip had left on my skin.