The Street Where She Lives

CHAPTER SIX

THE PHONE WOKE Melanie Wellers at what felt like the crack of dawn. Opening her eyes, she stretched lazily…and came in contact with a warm, hard, undeniably male body.

Oh, yeah, nice way to wake up.

Those male arms tightened on her, and a low growl sounded in her ear. “Mmm, you feel good.”

Yes, yes she did. She always felt good with a nice warm body to strain against.

Jason, no, Justin…yes, Justin, she remembered with a fond sigh, had so gallantly offered her a ride home from the bar last night where she’d gone after work in need of a stiff drink.

Her boss had been a son of a bitch all day, she had bills coming out the wazoo and she hadn’t gotten the raise she’d counted on. And yet Jason-damn it, Justin-had promised to make it all go away for a night.

Lord almighty, he’d kept his word.

The phone kept ringing, and it started to grate on her nerves. “Gotta get that, sugar,” she said, slapping his bare ass playfully as she stretched across him for the cordless on the nightstand.

Then she caught sight of the time. Ah, shit! Late for work, again.

Can you see me now, Dad? With a sardonic twist of her mouth, she glanced heavenward. Or maybe she should be looking down toward hell, as that was a far more likely place for her father to have ended up. Late for work, Dad, and proud of it. Roll in your grave over that one.

Hoping it wasn’t her boss, she grabbed the phone.

“Aunt Mel?”

A smile broke out onto her face, and only part of it was relief. “Hiya, Emmie, baby.”

“Are you busy?”

Mel glanced at the extremely gorgeous, extremely naked man in her bed. He rolled over and shot her a come-get-me smile, making her laugh. “A little. What’s up? How’s your mom?”

“That’s what I wanted to tell you, she’s good. She’s great. So great you don’t need to take any time off this weekend to come down here, we’ll be fine.”

Mel’s relief became tinged with something a little sour. She was the older sister and, stupid as it was, she had this bone deep need to be needed by Rachel.

Rarely happened.

Still, for weeks she hadn’t taken a spare breath, going back and forth from Santa Barbara to South Village, and not only had it crimped her social life, she really needed to rack up some extra hours at work. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. Mom says do what you have to do, we’re fine.”

“You got a nurse, right?”

“Things are really, really fine. So, uh, we’ll just see you next weekend. Or the weekend after.”

“Next weekend for sure…” Melanie narrowed her eyes and paused. As the Queen of Liars, Cheaters and Manipulators, she could smell a con a thousand miles away. “You didn’t say, Em. Did you hire a nurse?”

“Yeah, it’s, um, working out just great. Really great.”

Apparently tired of waiting, Justin ran two hands up Mel’s legs, slow and lazylike, toying with what he found between them.

Melanie’s eyes crossed with lust. Did she really want to grill her niece when she had this gorgeous man ready and willing to worship her body?

Then that gorgeous man slid a finger into her. “Okay, then,” she managed to say. “I’ll call you in a few days to check up on you. Bye, sweetie-”

Justin disconnected for her and tackled her flat to her back, holding her still while he smiled wickedly into her face.

“What are you going to do with me now?” she asked a little breathlessly.

“This.” Then he put his mouth where his fingers had been, scattering her thoughts like the wind.

B EN HAD GOTTEN her pregnant. Seventeen years old, the world finally, finally, at his fingertips, and he’d really screwed up this time. He reached for Rachel’s hand and found her fingers icy. “It’s going to be okay.”

Choking out a laugh, she pulled her hand free. “Really? How is that Ben? I’m having a baby, for God’s sake.”

Yeah. A baby. His stomach rolled, but that could have been hunger given he hadn’t eaten since breakfast. Nothing new in that. He’d planned never to be hungry again on the other side of the planet.

With Rachel at his side.

Looking at her in the moonlight, with her long hair and haunting eyes, his heart constricted. God, he loved her. Ridiculously so. Who’d have thought the no-good, black-hearted nobody had it in him to feel this way, as though he couldn’t breathe, couldn’t do anything if she wasn’t in his world?

And they’d made a baby. By accident not design, they’d come together and created a life, a perfect little life, and suddenly his panic turned to something much lighter, something much closer to…joy. “Marry me.”

“Ben-”

“Look, I love you, that’ll never change. And we’d have gotten married eventually, we’ll just move the plans up a bit.”

“But…where will we live?”

“Well, we’ll start out in South America, but-”

“Ben.”

“We’ll have to hit Africa in the fall, and then-”

“Ben.”

He was losing her, he could hear it in her voice, so he kept talking, fast as he could. “And then we’ll go to Ireland, because-”

She grabbed his hands, brought them to her heart. Her eyes were huge and wet, her voice so low he had to lean close to hear her. “Ben, listen to me. You love me, and that’s my own miracle, believe me, but I can’t. I can’t become Mrs. Asher.”

“So don’t change your name,” he said deliberately misunderstanding her. “I don’t care, Rach, I just want you.”

She let out another choked sound, this one a sob. “I can’t…I can’t give you what you want. We’re too different.”

“Different doesn’t matter.” He was going to have to talk her into wanting him. His stomach rolled and pitched again. No one had ever just wanted him, no questions asked. “Look, I’m going. You’re coming with me. We love each other-”

“No! God, you don’t get it!” Her face twisted. “I…don’t love you. Okay? I don’t love you.”

He couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

“I’m sorry.” Drawing in a deep breath, she stood. Her eyes were still wet but inscrutable now, hiding herself from him. She was good at that. “I won’t see you again before you go.”

With the words I don’t love you echoing in his head like a bad refrain, he could just stare at her.

“Goodbye, Ben.”

“Rach-”

“Go. Please,” she whispered brokenly. “Just go.”

It was a hauntingly familiar request for him. She didn’t love him and she wanted him to go. Fine. He wouldn’t beg. “Goodbye, Rachel,” he said, but she’d already walked away, vanishing into the night.

In hell with the memories, Ben woke up with a gasp. He lay in a white bed with white fluffy pillows, sweat streaking his body, air chopping in and out of his lungs as if he’d been running a marathon.

Nope, not hell, but close enough. The walls seemed to close in on him, strangle him.

How fast could he get out of town? Out of the country? Asia should be far enough for today. Surely he could get to Asia. With a vicious oath, he scrubbed his hands over his face, just as someone leaped onto the mattress at his side. Battle-ready, he whipped around.

Emily sat at his hip, with a wide cheeky grin. “Morning, Daddy.”

And just like that, his heart sighed. Sagging back against the mountain of fluffy pillows, he let out a shaky breath. Asada. Rachel.

Emily.

Revise. He was in hell. “Morning, sweetness.”

She wore cargo pants low on her hips, a tank top in neon yellow that made his eyes vibrate with the brightness, and held her laptop in her arms. She bounced a few times for good measure.

“Didn’t you sleep well?” she wanted to know.

“Fine.” Not fine, not really. Late last night he’d gotten a call on his cell phone from one of his editors. They’d received a letter at the magazine’s head office, forwarded from his last job. It’d been handwritten on fancy, stiff, olive-colored paper. “I’m still going to make you pay,” it had said.

Obviously Asada, but that it’d come to Ben in South America gave him hope-Asada still didn’t know where he was.

Or whom he was guarding.

When Ben had finally gotten into bed there’d been the nightmares of Asada finding this precious woman-child right in front of him, of losing Rachel and Emily now, in the present, as he’d lost Rachel so long ago.

Bounce, bounce. “You looked tired, Dad.” Bounce, bounce. “Maybe you should sleep some more.”

Bounce, bounce.

“Em, you’re scrambling my brain.”

“Sorry.” She stilled-a momentary miracle, he was certain. “Mom’s still sleeping. Wanna go out to breakfast and get artery chokers before I have to go to jail?”

“School isn’t jail, Em.”

“This school is.”

“No luck getting your mom to home school you yet, huh?”

“None,” she said on a dramatic sigh.

“What are artery chokers?”

“Scrambled eggs, a mountain of bacon and the best hash browns you’ve ever tasted. It’s at Joe’s, a sidewalk café right around the corner. Mom hates the place, but she doesn’t know how to enjoy herself.” Hopeful smile. Bounce, bounce. “Oops.” She stopped bouncing. Again. “Sorry.”

Cracking a glance at the clock, he managed to contain his groan when he saw three fives all lined up. “It’s not even six.” In his body’s time zone-God knows which one that was exactly-it felt like the middle of the night.

“Duh. That’s why Mom’s still sleeping. Come on, she’ll never know.” Leaping off the bed, she grabbed his arm and tugged. “We can get a milk shake to go with it, double chocolate. They’re huge.”

Ben rarely ate before noon unless it was a hunk of bread or cheese on the run. And it’d been so long since he’d been in the States, much less in a civilized country with sidewalk cafés that served huge chocolate milk shakes and “artery chokers,” he supposed he couldn’t blame his stomach for quivering hopefully. “Give me five minutes to shower-”

“Shower later.” She pulled him out of bed, making him grateful he’d pulled on a pair of knit boxer shorts before tumbling into bed the night before. The jeans she tossed him hit him in the chest, his shirt in the face.

“Hurry.” She bounced again, from foot to foot this time. “I’m starved.”

“Okay, forget the shower, but I still need two minutes.”

“Da-a-ad!”

“Two minutes,” he repeated, putting his hand over her face and gently pushing her out of the bedroom, shutting the door on her.

Her sigh came through the wood. “I’ll wait on the porch. Two minutes. One hundred twenty seconds, okay? Not like Mom’s two minutes, which are really twenty.”

“Em, no. Not the porch.” He didn’t want her outside, unsupervised, ripe for a kidnapping. “Wait inside.”

“Yeah, yeah. Two minutes, right?”

“Inside.”

“Gotcha.”

He used half his two minutes to call for his messages, hoping Agent Brewer had checked in. After this latest letter, they’d promised to double their efforts, but there was nothing new this morning.

Ben brushed his teeth and ran his fingers through his hair. One glance in the mirror assured him he wasn’t quite ready for a public appearance stateside. His hair was long and he needed a shave. His face seemed leaner than he remembered, and he had new lines fanning out from his eyes. Not laugh lines, given his life and what he’d done, but hard-living lines. Artery cloggers…yeah, he supposed he could use a few weeks of high-fat, over-processed food. Scrambled eggs, bacon and hash browns with his daughter seemed like a good start.

Risking his last few seconds before Emily came looking for him, he left the bedroom and because he was an idiot, a glutton for punishment, his hand touched the handle of Rachel’s door, twisted it. Pushed. The huge bed was still, covered in pillows and comforters, with an unmoving lump beneath them.

He moved closer. Nothing of Rachel showed, so he gently pulled the covers away from her face.

Her head was covered by a handkerchief, her face creased in a frown, but after a beat, she relaxed back into the deep sleep of the exhausted, flat on her back.

Maybe she wasn’t quite on her deathbed as Emily had led him to believe, but she was hurting, he could see it in the tight lines of her mouth, the delicate purple bruises beneath her eyes. All the painful injuries made her seem so vulnerable, which was hard to take because Ben remembered her well, and one thing she’d never been was fragile. A pillar of strength, most definitely. Full of immense courage and pride, yes. Stunningly intelligent and mouthwateringly gorgeous, yes. Fragile, no.

It made him feel fragile in return, just looking at her.

Letting out a soft exhale, she turned to her good side, winced, then went still again. Her creamy shoulders were in view, as were the straps of that amazingly sexy pj’s set he’d put her in yesterday.

He let out a slow, slow breath. He hadn’t allowed himself to think while he’d had his hands all over her body, but he was thinking now. She’d been hauntingly beautiful at seventeen, but at thirty, her beauty had only ripened, deepened. She had the little birthmark on her right inner thigh. He’d noticed that yesterday. He’d loved that birthmark, had loved to put his mouth to it and-

And those thoughts were going to lead to nothing but trouble. As if he didn’t have enough. He took one more long look, feeling like he was dying of thirst and she was a long, tall drink of water.

Once upon a time he’d been ashamed of how much he’d needed her, a woman who’d prided herself on never needing another soul.

And yet she needed him now. She needed him now and didn’t even know it.

She let out a little murmur, a half whimper, and broke his heart. “You’re okay,” he whispered, and lightly stroked a hand over her shoulder. She’d always had the softest, sweetest-smelling skin, and that hadn’t changed, either. He let his fingers linger, as suddenly and rather desperately, he wanted his mouth there. Everywhere. “Just sleep.”

Beneath his touch, her response was instant and shockingly gratifying. She relaxed. Just because he’d spoken.

The curve of her breast pushed at the top of the camisole, and he had to take his hand off her and stuff it into his pocket. Feeling like a pervert for wanting to touch her, he covered her back up, and reminded himself why he was in South Village.

Why he couldn’t hop on the next plane out of it.

Turning away, he caught sight of a stack of mail on her dresser. At the mac and cheese celebratory dinner last night, right in this room, Ben had met Garrett, Rachel’s neighbor. Apparently he always brought in the mail for them. Ben had wondered darkly what else he brought Rachel, but decided he was a fool for caring.

He started to walk out of the room, but jerked to a stop when he caught a glimpse of an envelope sticking out of the stack of mail. The sight of the fancy, stiff olive-colored paper backed the air into his throat. With a quick glance back at the still sleeping Rachel, he slid the envelope out from the stack.

It was addressed to him, in the carefully scripted handwriting he was beginning to recognize all too well. The return address said simply Asada, South America, postmarked a few days prior.

A new letter. Recent contact. With the envelope burning his fingers, he moved into the hallway and ripped it open, his hand shaking as he skimmed the words: “Ben, Worried yet? Frightened yet? Good, because we’re still not even…”

“TOOK YOU FIVE minutes,” Emily muttered when Ben finally came down the spiral steps. She sat cross-legged in the foyer, a long phone cord trailing across the floor to her laptop, which according to Rachel, she used to chat with her only friends-and cyber friends at that. She unplugged it and stood up. “Next time take the pole down, it’s faster.”

He’d taken the extra minute to call this latest letter in to his FBI contact. “Right. The pole.”

“Ready?”

He forced a smile. “Yep.”

They stepped outside. Ben checked and rechecked the front door lock as they stepped outside, then looked around with an eagle’s eye. There was a male jogger, a newspaper delivery guy on a bike weighted down by bags of newspapers and a woman in a sports bra and tiny shorts on in-line skates.

Nothing out of the ordinary for South Village, but the urge to wrap Emily up and tuck her away someplace safe for the rest of her life was strong.

Then there was Rachel. How he felt about protecting her was far more complicated. She’d once turned her back on him with ease.

And yet he found himself utterly incapable of doing the same.

Garrett sat on his front step reading a newspaper and drinking coffee, looking big and muscled and capable of taking down anyone he chose.

Ben sighed with resignation. “You going to be there for a little while?”

Garrett eyed him over the top of the paper. “Yep.”

Ben hitched a shoulder toward Rachel’s front door. “You’ll keep an eye out for a few?”

Garrett looked at the house, then back at Ben. “You expecting trouble?”

“I always expect trouble.”

Garrett nodded. “I’ll keep an eye out.”

Since neither Asada nor the bogeyman jumped out and announced themselves, he and Emily left the small front gate for the street.

Though it was still spring, this was Southern California, where there were two seasons-hot and hotter. Even at the crack of dawn Ben could tell the day would be on the fiery side of hell by noon.

“Phat day, huh?” his daughter said, and led him down the sidewalk.

“Phat,” he repeated, and made her laugh.

They passed a dinner theater and a do-it-yourself ceramic studio. And a shocking amount of people for just after 6:00 a.m.

“Early commuters,” Emily announced cheerfully. “Did you know on the weekends we’re up to twenty thousand people walking through here?”

That was 19,999 too many if you asked him.

They passed an ice-cream shop, which was also open. And also packed. “Don’t you love it here?” Emily asked. “You can buy ice cream 24/7.”

Love it? The crowds, the noise, the hustle and bustle, sucked the soul right out of him. What he’d love would be to leave right now, put ten thousand miles between him and this place. He didn’t belong here, on the very streets that had made him miserable. Hollow.

He should be used to that hollow feeling-he’d been raised on it. Then he looked into Emily’s happy, expectant eyes, and pushed away that feeling.

At least for now, he was going nowhere but crazy any time soon.

“This is it.” Around the corner, Emily gestured to a small outdoor café that had heavenly scents making his nose and stomach come to life. The tables were wrought iron and close enough that Ben could catch snippets of everyone’s conversation around them. Already seated were an eclectic mixture of urbanites, construction workers and shoppers. Ben sat and opened the menu that had more choices for coffee than for food.

“When summer comes,” Emily told him, carefully setting down the laptop she never seemed to be without, “I’m going to ask the owner if I can work here.”

“When you’re twelve, summer isn’t for working.”

She frowned. “What is it for?”

He’d never been a normal twelve-year-old, so hell if he knew. “For hanging out with friends?”

Some of the sunshine went out of her eyes. “I’d rather work.”

Ben remembered his preteen years pretty much sucking, too, but Emily came from a different universe. “What’s the matter with friends?”

“Nothing.”

“Em.”

“The other kids are all weird.”

“Weird, how?”

“The girls are into boys and the boys are into skate-boarding.”

“Well, then things haven’t changed much.”

She lifted her menu in front of her face, blocking him off. “I’m hungry.”

Okaaay. Leaning forward, he hooked a finger in her menu and lowered it. “Just let me say one thing.”

“Do you have to?”

“As your dad, yes.”

With a dramatic sigh, she set aside her menu, looking more than a little wary.

“Worrying about you sorta comes with the territory of being your dad. I can’t help myself.”

“Do you want to help yourself?”

“Huh?”

Her eyes were shuttered now. “Would you rather you didn’t have the territory at all?”

How was it he forgot how smart she was? “No, I want the territory. Emmie.” He touched her hand when she looked away. “I want to be a dad. Your dad. I love that.”

She bit her lower lip. “Sure?”

“I’m very sure, sweetness, but thanks for checking.”

She grinned.

He grinned back. “So…”

“So, I’m fine.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

Short of alienating her by pressing, he had no choice but to drop it. They ordered enough food to keep their arteries clogged for the year, and Ben spent the entire meal trying to spot Asada, or someone sent by him, in every face.

He hated that. He hated the helplessness, the vulnerability. With Asada in hiding, the cat-and-mouse game was on, with everyone Ben cared about as the mouse.

After breakfast, they started walking back. “Turn here,” Emily said, pointing to an alley between a lingerie shop and a gallery. “Shortcut.”

In his world, an alley was a death trap. “Let’s walk around the building and-”

“Hear that? Oh my God, look!”

Before he could stop her, she’d run into the alley, set her laptop on the ground and scooped something up into her arms.

By the time he reached her, Emily was jumping up and down with the bundle still in her arms. “Can we keep it, can we, can we?”

The “it” in question was the smallest, ugliest puppy on the face of the earth. Drab brown, flat face, hanging ears…the thing couldn’t have weighed more than three pounds soaking wet. In Emily’s arms, it seemed to sink in upon itself, ribs sticking out, eyes huge and pathetic and right on them. When Ben came close, it shrunk back with a whimper, then licked Emily’s hand.

“He’s a stray.” Emily hugged it tighter. “No collar. Oh, look…he’s half-starved.” Emily blinked up at him. “He’s an orphan, Daddy.”

Ah, hell. “No.”

“But we can’t just leave him here.”

“Yes, you can. You just put him down and walk away.”

Her face creased into a disapproving frown. “Mom said you’re a hero. That you save people. How can you say such a thing?”

Rachel had called him a hero? He couldn’t fathom that conversation. “Em…we can’t just bring a dog home.”

“But I’ve always wanted one…always.” Her lower lip began a slow thrust outward. “Especially because I’m so lonely…”

Ah, man… “Em…”

“Oh, Daddy, isn’t he adorable? We have to take him home and feed him.”

The puppy, sensing victory, seemed to perk up.

Ben closed his eyes but it didn’t matter. He could still see that grungy, mangy, pathetic face.

“Please, Daddy? Please?”

He strained for a valid reason that would get him off easy. “Your mother-”

“We’ve been meaning to get a dog, I swear! Just before Mom’s accident we’d decided to rescue one from the pound, but I can rescue this one instead.”

The puppy licked Emily’s cheek now. Blinked chocolate-brown eyes at Ben. Then whined softly, as if too hungry to put any real energy into it.

Damn it, he couldn’t stand when someone-or something-was hungry.

“And look, his ears are darker than the rest of him, they’re so cute.”

And dirty.

Emily rubbed her face against the dog, looking so happy it was almost painful to look at her. “We can call him Patches,” she said.

Patches sighed in bliss, and exposed a sunken-in belly for rubbing.

Ben sighed too, and found himself rubbing that soft belly. “Only one problem, Em.”

“No. No problem.”

“Yep.” Besides his zillion others. He stroked the soft belly again and gave Em a wry smile. “Patches isn’t a him.”