chapter seven
“Simple, huh?” Rachel backed away from him and headed into the house. She needed a beer. Maybe two. “As simple as living in the same town?”
Jack followed her. “As simple as keeping things the way they have been until last night.”
She wondered if he heard how gruff he sounded, how defensive.
Reaching the fridge, she pulled out two beers and set one down in front of him. They faced each other across her kitchen counter with equally wary and examining glances.
“You don’t get to make that decision by yourself, Jack.” She twisted off the top of her beer and took a swig.
His gaze narrowed. He had his game face on, dangerous and inscrutable. “I’ll make the decision if it keeps you safe.”
“I think the person you’re trying to save is yourself.” She pointed at him with the neck of her bottle. “I scare you.”
“Thinking of something happening to you scares me.” He opened his beer and drank, watching her as he swallowed.
“So, you ride off into the sunset, and I’m here safe and sound . . . until I get carjacked at the gas station. Or robbed at the store.”
“Not the same thing,” he argued. “The level of inherent risk with me is much higher.”
“Shouldn’t I be more worried about you not coming home than the reverse?”
“I know what I’m getting into when I go to work. You didn’t sign up for this.” Jack ran his hand through his hair. “The last thing I want to do is bring more traumas to your life. You and Riley need someone who comes home every day. Someone who leaves their work at the office. Someone—”
“Like Steve?” she interjected. “A guy who never had a moving violation in his life. No speeding tickets. A guy who never drove without his seat belt on. Who would have thought he’d die in a car wreck? No one. Terrible things happen to unsuspecting people every day. It’s part of living, Jack. There’s no way to go through life risk-free.”
“I’m not bringing the shit from my job to your doorstep. Period.”
Rachel’s foot tapped on the tile floor. “You think I didn’t know what I was taking on when I seduced you? I’m a grown woman with a child who depends on me. I don’t jump without looking. You seem to be forgetting how well and how long I’ve known you.”
“Steve didn’t know the gritty details of what I do. If he had, he never would have wanted you anywhere near me on a permanent basis.”
Her gaze moved to the photo of Steve and Jack on the mantel in the next room. She could barely make out the details from where she stood, but the image was indelibly etched on her mind; she could see it with her eyes closed. Both men were dark-haired and brown-eyed. Both were tall and fit. But that was where the similarities ended. Steve’s handsome Asian features reflected his fun and easy charm, while Jack’s gaze was shadowed and his smile guarded. Steve had been content with the simple things in life—like her. Extroverted and spontaneous, he was known and liked by damn near everyone; Jack was hard to know and harder to understand.
Yet she loved them both madly.
Rachel looked at him. “You were the brother Steve never had. He trusted you with his life. But I don’t make my decisions based on conjecture about what my deceased husband would think of them.”
“Don’t you?” he challenged softly, his eyes so dark they looked black. “Tell me Steve isn’t the reason you came over last night.”
“Steve isn’t the reason I came over last night.” She lifted her chin. “I loved my husband. I couldn’t have loved him more. He was everything to me and if he were alive right now, what happened last night would never have happened. But he died, and I came to terms with that. I changed. My needs and wants changed. And now, when I look at you, I don’t think about him. I don’t think about you in relation to him. Half the time, I don’t think at all, because I’m too busy appreciating the view. If you gave me some kind of best friend pity fuck last night, that’s on you. Don’t try and say that’s where I was coming from.”
Jack was oddly still . . . except for the rapid tempo of his breathing and the fevered brightness of his eyes, both of which betrayed far more volatile emotions.
Rachel frowned, catching on to the fact that she was missing something. She didn’t believe he’d made love to her for any other reason than that he’d wanted to, but she was beginning to think he hadn’t attributed the same motivation to her. “What’s going through your head?”
“It doesn’t matter. I was wrong.” He looked down at his bottle, which he twisted and turned atop the counter. There was a softness to his features that tightened her chest.
“Most especially in thinking you could put on the breaks and slide into reverse.” She bent down and leaned to the side, catching his lowered gaze. “There’s only forward, Jack. I stopped looking back a while ago.”
JACK stared at the vibrant woman looking at him in a way he’d never allowed himself to even dream about and knew he was done. He was never going to be able to say no to her. Not now. Not in the future. He wanted to give her everything, make her happy, keep her safe.
As if she knew what he was thinking, she said, “The safest place I can be is right next to you.”
“Not when I’m the reason you’re endangered to begin with.”
“So you spend some of your off-duty days teaching me how to shoot a gun until I’m dangerous. You help me pick out an outrageously expensive and comprehensive alarm system for the house.”