The Sparks Broker, page 20
part #2 of S.A.S.S. Series
A man in his fifties dressed in a gray suit led them to a private room, where the concierge checked them in. Seated at a delicate desk, the concierge stood to greet them. He had a slight build, a belly, a round face with glasses and a jovial smile. Unsure exactly why, Kate liked him.
“I am Abdul,” he said. “Your rooms are ready.” He motioned to an elderly man near the door who came over and retrieved the keys to their rooms. “We were informed that your personal belongings had been stolen so we took the liberty of providing you with some things you’ll need until you have sufficient time to replace them. If we’ve missed anything, please just let us know.” He nodded at the man with the keys. “This is Sattar. If you’re ready now, he’ll show you to your rooms.”
“Thank you.” Kate moved to follow Sattar. Walking a few steps behind him, she got an uneasy feeling. Normally, she was shuttled to a third-rate hotel that might or might not have air-conditioning and running water, where someone shoved her a key and she found her room on her own. If her personal items were not with her, she went without them. Period. This was strange, and, while it was pleasant, she wasn’t sure if she should like it. She looked over at Nathan. “Why are we getting this kind of treatment?”
“I suspect General Shaw had something to do with it.” He winked at her. “We’ve had a rough few days.”
Sattar moved slowly, and Kate didn’t rush him. They took the elevator to the fourth floor, then walked about halfway down the east hallway.
He stopped and turned to Kate. “Your room is here. No money, please.”
When she nodded, he opened the door, and Kate took the key. “Thank you.”
“My privilege.”
Privilege? She looked at Nathan. “Where will you be?”
“The corridor light caught on his wedding ring and its gleam mocked her. As much as things had changed between them, he hadn’t yet finished dealing with Emily. That was essential before the relationship between them progressed, wasn’t it? It felt essential, reasonable. Logical.
Love isn’t logical, Kate.
“Major Forester’s room is next door.” Sattar moved to open Nathan’s door. Then he walked back and passed Nathan his key.
“Thank you.” Nathan took it. When Sattar returned to the elevator, Nathan turned to Kate. “What’s wrong, Kate?”
Her heart beat hard and fast. Emily aside, them staying together would be a stupid thing to do, personally and professionally. Sad in a way she probably shouldn’t be, she walked inside her room. “I’m totally exhausted,” she told him. “I need a shower and a nap, then I’ll be fine.” She said it, and prayed it was true.
Nathan frowned, clearly doubting her. “I’ll be next door if you need anything.”
Kate nodded and closed the door. She stripped off her top and let the cold air cool down her body. The desert was a wicked place to be in summer. She checked the room for listening devices and found none. But she did find three sets of fresh clothing. All were made of high-quality silk, bold colors and styles that flowed. In a dressing room next to the bath, she found everything she could possibly want in the way of cosmetics and toiletries, including an exotic blend of patchouli oil. The footed tub was large enough to swim in, and she debated between a shower and a long soak in the bath. They both won.
She showered first, washing off the salt and sand and dust caked on her skin, shampooed her hair and knotted a towel around her head, then she rinsed the tub and filled it with steamy hot water. She dripped in some of the scented oil, inhaled deeply and sank into the tub.
The rich scent relaxed her, and exhaustion overtook her. Her eyelids grew heavy, then heavier still.
The water cooled and before she fell from a light doze into a deep sleep, she forced herself to get out and dry off. Wrapping a towel around her body, she finger-combed her hair back from her face. Her limbs felt so heavy she doubted she could stay upright any longer than it would take her to get to the bed.
She dragged back the soft, green-brocade spread and crawled in, then pulled the sheet up over her. Her head sank deep into the cushy pillow and she closed her eyes. “Ah, bliss.”
The last image that filled her mind was of Nathan looking at her with that tenderness in his eyes.
“Kate?” Someone smoothed her hair. “Kate?”
Nathan. It was Nathan. She tried to open her eyelids, but they were in full rebellion. Finally one cracked open a slit. “Mmm?” It was all she could manage.
“Are you all right?” He leaned over her, the look in his eyes not tender but worried.
She nodded. “Yes, what’s wrong?”
“You didn’t answer your door. I knocked and knocked, but you didn’t answer.” He shrugged. “It worried me.”
“I was in the tub.” He’d changed clothes. Navy slacks and a subtle print shirt that looked wonderful with his eyes. And the dusty bandages had been replaced with smaller, clean ones.
“You were in the tub for nine hours?”
Frowning, she insisted that her eyes open. “Nine hours?”
“It’s nine at night, Kate.” He swiped his face with his left hand and she saw a telltale circle of white skin where his wedding band had been.
He’d taken it off.
Her heart skipped a little beat and, silently thankful, she scooted over on the mattress. “Then it’s a reasonable bedtime.” She tossed back the sheet and patted the empty place with her hand. “Come to bed, Nathan.”
“Kate, I don’t think... You don’t know what you’re—”
Alert now, she looked him right in the eye. “Sometimes you think too much, and I know exactly what I’m doing, Nathan.”
He frowned at her, shoved his hands into his slacks’ pockets. “Do you want me here because of some fear of ending up alone?”
“I’ve been alone all my life. It’s what I know. I don’t fear it.” She lowered her arm. The sheet fell slack over her hip. This wasn’t about her at all. He’d taken off the ring, but this was still about Emily. “Do you love me, Nathan?”
“Yes, I do.” He looked anything but happy about it. “I told you I did.”
“I know what you told me, but then you thought you were going to die. You’re alive now and, at least for the moment, odds look pretty good that you’ll be alive for the foreseeable future.” She sat up. “Do you love me now?”
“Yes, but—”
Of course there was a “but.” Wasn’t there always a but? “But I’m not Emily,” Kate finished for him.
“No.” He looked genuinely surprised. “You’re not Emily, Kate, but you’re not supposed to be. You’re supposed to be you.” He let his head loll back. “You’ve got this wrong.”
She scrunched up her pillow. “Then give it to me right.” He caught his lower lip with his teeth, his left eye twitching. “I haven’t been with a woman since Emily died. That’s what this is about.”
She couldn’t believe it. He was too virile, too everything. “You’re telling me that you’ve been celibate for five years?”
“Yeah.” He nodded, reinforcing his claim. “I don’t know the rules in this kind of relationship. I don’t like being on unsure ground.”
This, she understood. “You’re afraid of me.”
“Yes.” His expression turned frank. “I’ve only dared to love one woman in my life. She died. Now I’m in love again, I have no idea how you feel about me, and I’m afraid you’re going to break my heart.” He sighed so deeply it heaved his shoulders. “There, I finally said it.”
He expected her to ridicule him; she sensed it. It was hard not to reassure him, but he wouldn’t believe her anyway. This was one of those firsthand lessons that he’d have to work through himself, and the only proof that would be of use to him would be time. He’d have to live it to recognize the truth. “I’d never deliberately hurt you, Nathan.”
He walked a short path beside her bed. “When Emily died, I thought I’d died, too. I thought that part of my life was over.”
“What part?” she asked, settling back on her pillow. Obviously, Nathan needed to talk. “You loving a woman?”
“Yes.” He looked her straight in the eyes. “You scare me, Kate. You have since I first heard your voice on the radio.”
She hadn’t talked to him on the radio. “When did you hear my voice?”
“During the first compound raid.” He grimaced.
“When I flirted with Douglas?” Now, she was finally getting a grip on this.
Nathan nodded.
“I scared you then?” This, she didn’t get. “But I didn’t even know you.”
“I know.” He lifted a hand. “But something inside me sure knew you. I was so jealous of Douglas, I wanted to rip his throat out.”
“What did he do?”
“Nothing.” Nathan rolled his eyes back in his head. “I wanted you to flirt with me. I didn’t want you to flirt with him, and I sure didn’t want him flirting back with you.”
“Ah.”
“Yes, ah.” He snorted, started pacing again.
“So why didn’t you contact me afterward?”
“What?” He stopped. “I’m supposed to call and tell you I was listening in, and the sound of your voice made me a lunatic?”
“I see your point.” Infinitely pleased, she rose up onto her knees at the edge of the bed and placed her hands on his chest. “I don’t think you’re a lunatic, Nathan.” She stroked him shoulder to waist. “And you’re not the only one afraid of ending up with a broken heart.”
“Why are you afraid?” he asked, stunned. “You know I love you.”
“I’m not merely afraid,” she confessed. “I’m terrified.”
“I know.” His eyebrows knit together. “Of being alone, right?”
“No, I told you before, I’m used to being alone. It’s normal for me.” She looked down at the floor, then forced herself to meet his gaze. “I’m terrified of loving you for the rest of my fife and never again seeing you look at me the way you looked at Emily’s picture.”
“Kate, no.” He stroked her hair, reassuring her. “Oh, honey, no. There’s no competition, Kate. Love doesn’t work that way.”
“See, that’s the problem. How would I know how love works?” She sucked in a sharp breath, looked up at him and circled his neck with her arms. “I think I’ve done something really stupid, Nathan.”
“Kate, nothing can be that bad.”
“This can.”
“What is it?”
She steeled herself and said the words she’d never before in her fife uttered out loud except once when she was five, to her favorite teddy bear, Baxter. “I’m totally and completely in love with you.” She shook her head then shrugged. “I can’t explain it, Nathan. I wish I could, but I’m not a hundred percent sure what this is I’m feeling. I’ve never been in love. I’ve never felt love from anyone else. How would I know it if it fell on me?”
He hesitated and then his expression closed. “I think I understand the problem. I saved your life, Kate. You’re grateful to me. That’s all. You feel gratitude and that’s confusing the issue, making you think it’s love. But it’s not.” He backed up a step, putting more distance between them.
Her arms went slack on his forearms and she tilted her head to look at him. “How do you know what it is or isn’t?”
“It’s a logical deduction, sweetheart.”
“But everyone says love isn’t logical.” He feared she had confused gratitude and considered it love. And he thought that was logical? Sounded illogical to her. “No, I’m not buying it, Nathan.”
“Why not?”
“Because over the years, many men have saved my life and I’ve never felt like this about any of them. I’ve only been in this position once. Now, with you.” She dipped her chin to her chest, weighed her feelings, seeking the truth, and when it settled, she looked up at him. “I am grateful to you for saving my life. I would’ve drowned, and I know that. But the things I feel for you...” She faltered, failing to find just the right words, fell back and regrouped, then tried again. “Gratitude isn’t enough. I’ve felt gratitude and attraction, but neither of those things is like...like this.”
The fear left his face. His expression softened, the tenderness she craved lighted his eyes and he cupped her face in his hands then stroked her jaw with a gentle pass of his thumbs. “I think the truth is, we’re cowards, Kate.”
This, she should find endearing? “What?”
“Cowards,” he repeated. “We fight demons like Kunz and Sandross but we run from the ones inside us. I’m afraid of loving and losing again. You’re afraid of loving at all. We’re cowards.”
She frowned and tried to pull away.
He wouldn’t let her. “No, listen to me. Just listen.”
“Okay, but I have to warn you, Forester, I have issues with cowardice.”
He smiled. “Losing Emily was the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life, Kate. The idea of going through that again—” His voice cracked and he paused. Swallowing hard, he then went on. “Your job in S.A.S.S. really increases the odds.”
“I know you’re not going to suggest I leave my job, Nathan.” Her tone made it clear that would be an outrageous request.
“No, I’m not. I’d never do that to you.” He sucked in a breath that heaved his chest. “But I am going to be grateful for you every moment and every day.” His hands trembled on her face and his eyes shone bright. “Here’s my bottom line. I’d rather have five minutes with you than a lifetime without you.” Resolve filled his voice. “I’m not running anymore, Kate. I don’t want to run, and I don’t want you to run from me.”
“I don’t want to run from you.” She covered his hands on her face. “Together maybe we can do what we haven’t been able to do alone.”
“What’s that?”
“Stop being cowards.” Facing men who might kill you was one thing. Openly trusting someone who could break your heart was far more dangerous.
He smiled. “Yeah, I think we can.”
In taking that small leap of faith, Kate discovered her strength.
The woman she had been was no longer.
A new woman was born.
A woman both loved and in love.
A rustle awakened Kate.
Sprawled in bed, her face buried at the pillow, she pushed back her hair and looked toward the sound. Nathan was standing at the window, staring out into the night. “Nathan?”
“Nathan, what are you doing here?”
“Did I wake you?” He didn’t look back. “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s okay.” She slid out of bed, wrapped her robe around her and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” he said softly. “Go back to sleep. You’re exhausted.”
Distant and edgy. Very unlike himself. “Nathan, I asked you a question and I expect you to be honest with me.” He looked over his shoulder at her. “Nothing you can fix.”
Kate muddled over that remark. Something significant brought him to her room. They’d had a lovely dinner with great conversation and a magical goodnight kiss, then he’d gone to his room and she’s stayed in her own. It’d been a perfect date. Perfect.
Only two things could get him this rattled. She crossed her arms and moved closer to stand beside him at the window. “Is it your men or Emily?”
He swiveled his gaze from the city lights to her. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I know that, Nathan.” She stroked his face. “You’re worried about your men, but you feel guilty for loving me, right? As if you’re betraying Emily?”
“Worse.” Agony shone in his eyes. “I don’t. I should, but I don’t.”
Emily. “I see.” Thank God. That, she could help him sort out. She stepped back to the bed and sat on its edge. “Granted, I’m a newcomer to this love business, but as inexperienced as I am, I know vows are until death. It’s been five years more. I get it, but looking at this from Emily’s perspective, I know if something happened to me, I would want you to live. I would want to know you’re loved. That would comfort me.” Kate waited, but he still didn’t look at her. “I see all the good in you, Nathan. You have so much give. I would die praying you found someone special to love again.”
He turned to look at her, his eyes wide and unblinking.
“It’s the truth.”
“But you can’t be sure.” He shrugged. “You didn’t know her, Kate.”
“No, but I know you. And I know from you that she loved you.” Kate tucked a loose lock of hair behind her ear. “Women are complex creatures, I’ll give you that. But love isn’t complex. I didn’t realize that until you. Love just is, Nathan, and when you feel love for someone, you want that person to be embraced by it. I can’t explain it logically—I don’t know if that’s even possible. Love is too new to me to be sure of much. But I know that I would want you loved. I know it as surely as I know I love you.”
He swallowed hard, blinked three times in rapid succession. “In my head, and even in here—” he tapped his chest “—I know you’re right. It’s been five years, but to tell you the truth, Kate, you hit me like a sledgehammer. I think I just need a little time to get used to it.” He walked over to sit in the chair beside her bed. “I fell in love with you without ever seeing you. When you were getting ready to attack Kunz’s compound in Iran and you were flirting with Douglas on the radio, I knew it then. I told myself I was crazy, that I thought it was love because I’d been alone so long. But I knew I’d been lying to myself the moment I first saw you. I’ve known it every moment since. I’ve resigned myself to that.”
“Jeez, Nathan, your enthusiasm for loving me has my knees shaking. Back off a little on the charm.”
“No, quit being sarcastic. I mean, I had accepted that I loved you and I would love you for the rest of my life,” he explained. “What I hadn’t considered was the possibility that you would ever love me.”
“Oh.” She smiled softly, stroked his knee. “Of course. I get it now.” Knee to knee, she touched his arm. “You feel guilty because you’re alive and being loved and Emily is dead.”
