The Street Where She Lives

CHAPTER FOUR

BEN PRETENDED that he could actually breathe in this too big, too terrifyingly normal house that he wasn’t welcome in, and managed a smile as Emily showed him around.

He couldn’t quite wrap his mind around the fact that he was here. That he’d stepped foot inside South Village and hadn’t imploded on impact. That he’d seen Rachel, and had felt…something. She’d felt it, too, but given the attitude and daggers she’d shot him, she hadn’t liked it any more than he had.

The refurbished firehouse was interesting, if one was into huge, open, elegant spaces. The rooms had high ceilings and windows everywhere that showed off the interesting view of the city that never seemed to sleep. There was a firefighter pole right down the center of the place, and a spiral staircase of wrought iron. Braided rugs adorned the shiny hardwood floors, and artwork from around the world decorated the brick walls. So did photographs.

None of his, Ben couldn’t help but notice. No skin off his nose. He’d come into this house with a mental wall twelve feet thick just to keep Rachel out of his head, and no doubt, she’d done the same for him. She was good at building walls. Hell, she was the master at building walls.

The furniture was new, tasteful and very Rachel. In other words, expensive. And yet, he could see Emily racing through these rooms, sliding down the pole from one floor to another, perfectly at home.

“You’re really going to stay home for a while?” she asked him.

Ben’s insides knotted at the small, hopeful tone, even more so than at the word home. He’d spent most of his childhood here in South Village trying to get out and all of his adulthood trying to forget.

Now he was back, indefinitely.

Dropping his things on the bed in the room that was to be his for the duration, he turned to her. “Yep.” Because she was looking unsure, he opened his arms, relieved when she leaped into them, hugging him tight.

“I know you said you would.” Her head didn’t come up to his shoulder. Against his chest, she smiled. “And you haven’t ever broken a promise, I just wanted to hear you say it again.”

God, she was young. She was so smart that sometimes he forgot how young she was. Honest relief flooded him that he was able to give her something, anything, other than his usual phone call. “I’ll stay as long as it takes,” he promised, thinking of Asada. He’d gone to see Agent Brewer on the way here, but there’d been no news.

So he concentrated on the here and now, how Rachel had looked downstairs, how she’d stopped his heart with just her eyes and how incredible it felt holding his kid-God, his kid. He wondered at the sharp ache in his heart. Why did it hurt so much to love her? “How does that sound, my staying as long as it takes?”

A grin split her face, a glorious answer, and his strange hurt faded.

Face flushed with happiness, she wriggled away. She danced and whirled to the door, all gangly arms and legs, and for a moment, Ben was lost in time, seeing Rachel as she’d looked thirteen years prior.

She’d been all arms and legs, too, he remembered. And the pang came back, sharper than before. What a miserable time in his life that had been, struggling to survive when he’d been little more than a kid. And Rachel had been his bright spot.

His hope.

Just as Emily was now.

“I’m gonna cook tonight,” she announced proudly. “A celebration dinner. Mac and cheese.”

“Celebration?” He doubted Rachel would be up for that. Her once creamy skin had seemed nearly transparent and bruised with exhaustion. She’d barely been able to hold her head up as she’d flashed those huge, angry, hurting eyes on him. If he hadn’t still been so unnerved at being here, so tensed and battle-ready, it might have broken his heart. “I don’t think tonight is a good night-”

“It’s a perfect night,” Emily assured him. “Mom’s where she wants to be and I have both my parents in the same place.”

Uh-oh. Ben might claim not to know a lot about the intricate workings of a female mind, but he knew warning signals when they blared in his brain.

And man, were they ever blaring now. “You know my being here is because you managed, God knows how, to pull a fast one on your mom.” And because a madman wants to destroy me. “Not because she and I are back together.”

Emily sobered. “Are you mad at me?”

With Asada on the loose he’d have had to come regardless. “No,” he said honestly.

“Mom’s mad.”

“Good guess. Em…tell me you know this is just temporary.”

“You just wait.” She twirled again and executed some sort of ballet movement that had his eyes crossing as he tried to follow her. “You’re going to love being here so much,” she said, breathless now, “that you won’t want to ever leave us.”

Damn. “Emmie-”

“Gotta get the dinner started. Catch ya in a few!”

And she was gone, leaving Ben blinking in her dust.

He was doing the right thing, he assured himself as he sank to the bed. Though he felt like he was suffocating here, he was doing the right thing.

He would not do as he’d been doing for years. He would not run and lose himself in some jungle. Or in some guerilla skirmish. Or in some forsaken desert somewhere. His camera and his need to capture the good photo, the story would have to wait this time.

He slipped his hand into his pocket, bringing out a copy of the second letter he’d received from Asada, which had been farther down in his stack of mail back in the South American jungle.

The authorities had the original, another fastidiously clean piece of stationary with precise folds and meticulous handwriting. In contrast to the pristine paper, the text was enough to make him feel sick: “Dear Ben, Just as you have ruined my life, I will ruin yours. Your most faithful enemy, Manuel Asada.”

The South American authorities were on Ben’s side completely. Asada had escaped, and this wasn’t only an embarrassment, but a huge threat. If they didn’t find him, it was only a matter of time before he’d set up another charity scam or kill without conscience to protect his business.

Or come here to exact revenge…if he hadn’t already. Ben felt a terrible, agonizing certainty Asada had somehow caused Rachel’s accident.

It wouldn’t happen again. Yes, eventually, Ben would have to explain the regular police drive-bys to Rachel and Emily, but now that he’d seen Rachel and the extent of her injuries, he was more convinced than ever she shouldn’t know until she was stronger.

Besides, how did one explain to his daughter and the woman who hated him that he’d inadvertently put their lives on the line? That there was a madman out to get them? It would make Rachel all the more dependent on him, something she’d hate with every fiber of her being.

Right or wrong, he had to wait. And if in the meantime, it put more pressure on him to protect them, to be something he’d never been able to be in Rachel’s eyes, then so be it. It was nothing less than he deserved for bringing them this danger in the first place.

BEN FOUND RACHEL right where he’d left her, sitting in her chair in the spacious living room, facing the huge set of windows. That damn ugly cap was still in place, hiding her hair from him. Her right arm and leg were in air casts. He knew that her ribs were cracked and that sitting there for so long must be torture. But he knew also that it had to be painful to shift positions.

She should have looked ridiculous. Miserable. At the very least, pathetic.

Instead, she looked as beautiful as ever. Maybe more so. Despite the fading bruises, her face was aristocratic, her skin smooth. Her body, what little he could see of it, was still long and sleek, and still made him yearn.

He could vividly remember a long-ago night when they’d sat in a hidden-away spot in the botanical gardens behind city hall. Rachel’s long blond hair rippling over his arm, that lithe, soft body spread beneath his in the grass, her huge, melting eyes filled with heat and fear and hope as she gave herself for the first time, to him. His first time, too, and in spite of the fact their birth control had failed them-the condom broke-that night still stood unrivaled to anything he’d experienced since.

She didn’t acknowledge him as he moved into the living room, and he wanted her to. “What happened to the person who hit you?” he asked.

“They never found him.”

He sucked in a breath. Oh yeah, Asada had done it.

Emily could be next.

Ben’s stomach quivered as he mentally added this to the long list of things he’d screwed up. Are you good for anything, Benny boy? No. No, he wasn’t.

Unaware of his personal hell, Rachel stared down at her hands, her words coming out slowly. “I’d almost rather it be a hit-and-run than someone who’d just made a terrible mistake. This…this torture of mine wouldn’t be erased by destroying someone else’s life as well.”

That Rachel had once nearly destroyed his life didn’t escape him. By the time she’d finished with him, Ben had felt every bit as battered and bruised as she looked now, except his injuries had been invisible.

Did she really look at him and feel nothing? And why did he care? Did he feel something when he looked at her?

Yes, he could admit, he did. Mostly anger and humiliation. She’d been taught to not express herself, but somehow he’d gotten Rachel to open up to him. It’d been like watching a flower bloom, beautiful and arousing. They’d been two lost souls made into one, yet she’d thrown it away with an ease that chilled him even now.

Good, there was more of that anger he needed in order to keep his distance. He’d just see her comfortable, then go make some calls regarding her accident and then stay away from her until he could leave. But when he stepped closer, took in her grim expression, her pale face, the way her good hand clasped her casted one, he was filled with alarm to see her trembling with the effort to remain upright. “Hey, let’s get you get into bed.”

She didn’t respond, which made him feel like an unwelcome slug. Not a new feeling for him, but it bugged him nevertheless. He put himself in her line of vision and reached out for the cap that shaded her eyes from him.

“Don’t.” Coming to life, she struggled to lift her arm, holding the ugly thing in place.

“I want to see your eyes.” Liar. You wanted to see if her hair was as glorious and thick and curly as it used to be.

“Why?” She flashed those eyes up at him now, wide and furious and full of pride as she stubbornly held on to the cap.

At least the temper was a hell of an improvement over the sadness and vulnerability. Not that he really cared. She’d fixed that for him a long time ago. He was simply here to make sure he didn’t bring his personal hell down on her.

“L-leave the cap.”

“I want to see the real you, what you’re thinking.”

“I’m thinking I wish you could leave.”

He couldn’t help it; he laughed. It was that, or lose it entirely. Go away, Benny. Go away, Ben. Go away… “I just remembered one of the things I used to admire most about you,” he muttered. “Stubborn as a bull.” He rose, moved behind her and grabbed her chair. “Nothing’s changed. Let’s go.”

When he would have shifted her chair forward, she set her good hand on the wheel. “No.”

Afraid to hurt her fingers, Ben stilled. “I’m taking you to your room where you’ll lie down and rest, damn it. You’re so tired you’re shaking. You have black circles under your eyes, you haven’t been eating near enough and-”

“You’re my nurse, not my mother.”

He looked down at the top of her head. “Well, since we both know what a peachy job your mother did, let’s leave her out of this.”

“How dare you throw my past in my face! You, of all people.”

Oh, he dared, and she’d riled him good now. Their past was exactly what had brought them here together. Their past often kept him up at night with flashes of remembered heat and passion.

Their past was one of the emotional highlights in his life, pathetic as that was to admit.

Torn between being infuriated and turned on at the same time, he let loose. “And as your nurse, I say take off the stupid hat.” Before she could react, he whisked it off her head.

And froze.

Her soft, flowing hair was…gone, leaving a short, choppy cut of maybe an inch or so. Then there was the three-inch long jagged surgery scar behind her left ear that made him want to throw up. “Rachel. My God,” he whispered, horrified at the extent of what she’d been through. Clasping the ridiculous hat to his chest, he turned the chair so he could look into her face, prepared to hate himself for reducing her to tears.

But he’d forgotten, Rachel would never allow him to do such thing to her. Crying in public would be unacceptable. Crying in front of him would be tantamount to a disaster.

Instead, regal as ever, she remained utterly calm, her head high. Eyes bright, she sent him a fiery look. “I h-hate you.”

Oh, yeah, he believed it. He even deserved it, more than she knew. Gently, he put the cap back on her head, his fingers brushing over the warm, smooth skin of her neck. “I’m sorry.”

“Go away.”

“Rachel-”

“No! Don’t even look at me.”

Her fair skin had reddened furiously, and he realized they absolutely were not on the same plane, that she apparently thought the sight of her had sickened him. “No, wait. God. Rachel-” He dragged in a deep, ragged breath. “Look, my horror is for what you’ve been through, not for what you look like. You look…”

Stunning was all he could think, staring into her wide, lovely eyes. Brave and lovely and desirable. But she’d never believe that. “Alive. Rachel, you look alive. Isn’t that all that matters?”

She didn’t say a word, but her chest rose and fell with her agitated breathing, and being nothing less than a very weak man, his eyes caught there, mesmerized by the surprisingly lush twin mounds of her breasts.

“You mean ugly,” she whispered.

A sound escaped his throat before he could control it. “No. That’s most definitely not what I mean.” He drew another deep breath and shook his head to clear it. “You’re wrong, very wrong.”

“Just go away.”

As those were hauntingly familiar words, he swore softly beneath his breath, fought with the demons that urged him to do just that, then placed his hands on her chair. “We’re out of here.”

“To where?” she asked, panic laced in her voice.

“To where I should have taken you when I first got here. Bed.”

FROM EMILY’S PERCH on the open loft, lying flat on her belly next to the top of the spiral staircase, with only her eyes peering over the side, she watched her parents and bit her lip. This was not quite the joyful reunion she’d imagined. But she was no longer a child. She knew life sometimes sucked. And yet…she could fix this. She could. If her mom and dad weren’t happy to see each other, she’d just make them happy. How hard could it be?

All her life she’d been told how brilliant she was, how extraordinary. She loved that word, extraordinary. Mostly because when she looked in the mirror she saw nothing but frizzy hair that gel didn’t fix, too many freckles and a geeky smile. Where was her extraordinariness? Maybe it would come when she got boobs, but what if she never got any and, just like her Aunt Mel, had to buy them?

Her mom had said her extraordinariness came from her brain, which worked like a well-honed machine. Well, she’d made good use of it then, regardless of the tangled web she’d woven by gathering them both here. She wouldn’t waste the effort.

All she had to do was get them to fall in love. Unfortunately, she knew little about that particular emotion. Desperate, she’d just gotten off the phone with Mel, figuring since her aunt had a new boyfriend every other day, she’d have lots of ideas. Emily had explained she was asking for a friend, but Mel had laughed and said she and her friends were too young for love.

Thanks, Aunt Mel.

Far below her in the living room, her father pushed her mother’s wheelchair. His face, now that he thought no one was looking at him, had lost some of that easygoing, laid-back attitude that was so innately him, replaced by a tenseness that shook her.

What was the matter? Well, besides everything?

Her mother’s expression, tight and angry, didn’t surprise her in the least. Emily had some serious kissing up to do. Probably dishes for a month, maybe more. She’d probably lost TV privileges too. Losing her beloved reality shows and MTV seemed like a small price to pay if they fell in love again.

When they were gone from view, she slid down the fireman’s pole and dropped to the middle of the living room, trying to ignore that tingling of guilt in the pit of her belly. Because, darn it, if she was as special as everyone said, then she knew what was best for her parents. And what was best for them was to be together, on the same continent for a change. That’s why she’d done it, blabbed about her mother’s situation to her father. Told Aunt Mel that they’d hired a nurse. Let her mother think Mel had gotten them that nurse.

Because now that everyone had done what she’d wanted, things could fall into place. All she had to do was make it happen.

MANUEL ASADA crawled through the Brazilian jungle for days upon days, and finally came out at his compound. Exhaustion and unaccustomed lack of even the most basic luxury had him weaving with weakness. He’d been on the move for too long, and could barely think, but the sight of his old fortress gave him a surge of energy.

It’d been searched and pillaged, of course, because thanks to Ben Asher, the authorities were hunting him down like an animal. Damn them all, his home was now barely a shell of what it had once been. Windows gone, inside gutted, dirtied…trashed. Disgusting. They’d pay for that, too.

That he’d gotten here at all was a miracle. He’d made it by the skin of his teeth, bribing when he’d had to, pulling from his dwindling stash of cash as it had been necessary. And it had been, several times. The entire experience-jail, the escape, being on the run-had sent him reeling with memories of his penniless, loveless, thankless childhood.

He could kill for that alone, that he’d relived being a professional beggar by the time he was four…but first things first.

His compound, once hopping with activity, mocked him with silence in the growing night, making him shudder. God, he really hated silent and dark.

Most of his minions had fled or been taken to jail, which left slim pickings. Two were still in the States, quaking in their boots, awaiting his further instructions after screwing up the murder of Rachel Wellers. He’d had some time to think about that now. By all accounts via his laptop, which he’d plugged in at various villages when he could, the woman had suffered greatly and continued to do so. Asada liked that; he liked that a lot. He intended for them all to suffer even more. Soon as he got himself reorganized. “Carlos, the place is filthy.”

“Yes, but you’ve been gone a long time.” The man’s voice wobbled with fear.

As it should. Everyone knew how Asada felt about dirt, how crazy it made him. Being treated like a parasite in a filthy jail cell hadn’t helped. Nor had being on the run ever since.

They couldn’t go inside; there’d be men around, looking for him to do that very thing. But beneath the compound lay a secret underground bunker. They’d once used it as a supply container but now it would become his home.

Carlos raced ahead of him as they made their way toward the hidden door that would lead to a set of stairs. Manuel waited while the trembling Carlos used his own shirt on the dusty door handle. They stepped inside but didn’t turn on the light-they couldn’t, not while he was still being hunted like a dog, and besides, there was no electricity. It was unthinkable that after all these years of building his empire, amassing fortune upon fortune, that this could happen. But it had.

He had been brought back to zero. Back to the old days, when he’d begged for money, sold himself, whatever it took. With a deep breath, he strode inside the dark, damp cellar and lit a single small oil lantern. Then he very carefully pulled out his small laptop from his pack, blew a speck of dust off the top. He didn’t turn it on, not yet. He wanted to conserve the gas in the generator. But he’d go online later, to check on the progress of what was happening in the States.

Once upon a time, just above him had been the center of his universe. Now, on top of this Brazilian mountain, hunkered beneath his multimillion dollar compound that gave him his multimillion dollar view, and he didn’t even dare go up there to survey his domain.

The fact that he couldn’t so much as show his face anywhere without possible retribution filled him with an unholy fury for which he had no outlet. He stalked over to a box of office supplies and pulled out a sheet of stationery. “You’re going to hike back into the city-preferably without getting yourself killed-and get this mailed,” he told Carlos.

“Sir, the others and I, we were wondering when we were going to get paid-”

The others were a handful of equally pathetic, worthless minions who deserved to be hung for letting this happen to him, their savior. “Go away until I’m ready for you.”

“Yes, but-”

“Go away and don’t come back until the entire cellar is spotless, not one speck of dust left.”

“Sí.”

Alone again, Manuel begun to write. “Dear Ben…”