your fault.”
“I keep going over it in my head, over and over. I just don’t know what I could have done differently. Do you know what it did to me when the coroner said he would have survived if he’d gotten medical attention? He laid out in the cold and froze to death, alone. Probably scared to death. He was just a kid!”
She reached out and touched his forearm, which was just as tense as the rest of him. He sat down heavily on the sofa. Amber lowered herself next to him and without hesitation wrapped her arms around him. He resisted at first, then made a soft sound and buried his face in her neck. She held him against her, his breathing ragged, wishing she could ease his pain.
He had to handle his grief the way he needed to handle it. No matter how much she wanted to soothe him, she could only offer the comfort of her words and her embrace.
Chapter Nine
Amber stirred and opened her eyes, taking a moment to orient herself. She was still on the sofa. It was still dark in the house. No lights, but the warmth of Tristan’s big body was gone. She blinked in the semidarkness, the ambient light from the cold full moon shining its light through the front window.
She was so in tune with Tristan’s presence that she felt him before she saw him. Being in his dark house with him just standing at the window seemed so intimate. It was as if her skin was electrified, and her heart pounded hard. Struggling to hang on to her equilibrium, to maintain some balance, she swallowed hard, then rose.
Tristan didn’t turn. “You should go to bed, Amber,” he said, his voice very low and gruff.
Amber wanted to stay, go to him and offer whatever comfort she could. Clasping her hands into fists, she eased in an unsteady breath. “Good night, Tristan.”
She heard him follow and he said, “Good night, Amber.”
Unexpectedly close to tears, she headed for her upstairs room. Then she stood in the hall watching as he went into his room and closed the door.
She slipped into her room and shut the door behind her. Her expression taut, she toed off her socks, then stripped her clothes off, donning a pair of thermal underwear with hearts all over them and a pink tank top. She climbed blindly into bed. Draping her arm across her eyes, she tried to will away the ache, tried to collect a modicum of common sense. This was just chemistry, she tried to tell herself. Attraction and just two lonely people, she mentally argued. You’re kidding yourself, was all her conscience had to say.
She pulled up Tristan’s file on her computer. Her finger hovered over the open button. She’d had the file for some time. Beau had sent it to her a while back, but she’d been reluctant to open it. She had initially requested it because she wanted to go over everyone and everything related to this case. But if she opened that file now, she would be doing it because it was personal. She’d be violating his privacy. Still, she had a deep-seated need to find out more about him.
She pushed open and started reading. Fifteen minutes later, she was twisted up inside and her heart was breaking for him. She closed the file.
Feeling heavy compassion for Tristan, she wrestled with the fact that she was probably going to be gone by tomorrow night. There was no more time to explore any kind of situation with Tristan. He didn’t want it and she was out of time.
Turning on her stomach, Amber pulled the pillow under her and groaned. She didn’t think she could stand that awful unsatisfied ache throbbing through her whole body. Even the weight of the bedding was torture against her sensitized skin.
Feeling as if she were going slowly crazy, Amber got up and went to stand by the window, hoping the view and the cooler air would bring her some peace.
Trying to breathe around the thick emotion in her chest, she fought for some control, closing her eyes, willing whatever amount of calm she could muster into her body.
But the squeak of the door to Tristan’s room snapped her eyes open, and her pulse began to hammer all over again. And she knew, as sure as she was standing there, that he was downstairs, also unable to sleep. Just like her. And she wondered if he was still beating himself up