Close to Home Part 13

"I sent Patty to the bank, told her I'd walk you home when you were done here," Johnny said, without preamble.

"Okay." Tessa took a moment to stare at the man who was her husband. Maybe it was because she'd been thinking so much about the night they met, but there was a look about Johnny that reminded her of the boy he'd been. A little older than she was, more confident, sure of where he was going in life-but wounded, too. She hadn't been able to see it as clearly when she was barely more than a child herself, but now?

Johnny was hurting. And it made Tessa's own heart ache as if a rough hand had reached into her chest and squeezed it tight.

"Thanks. But I don't need an escort," she said gently. "I'm fine to walk home on my own. I've been doing it for more than a year now."

A muscle ticked in Johnny's jaw. "Things have changed."

"Why?" Tessa slammed the dough down a little harder than necessary. It felt good. "Because now you're here to see me do it? I'm sorry, Johnny, I know this is hard for you but that's not a good enough reason."

"The man driving that truck-"

"Was an a.s.s," Tessa said bluntly, without looking up from her knuckles buried in the soft dough. "A reckless driver who definitely ought to have his license revoked. But Johnny, come on! I can't hide in the bakery or Patty's house and never go out on the street again in case that guy happens to be driving by!"

She could practically hear Johnny's teeth grinding. "I think there's more to it than that. I can't prove anything, but I believe we were targeted. On purpose. And I want you to come with me to an ATF safe house right now, and stay there while I figure this out."

Shock shuddered down Tessa's spine, along with a healthy dose of dread. Turning slowly, she stared at her husband across the tidy kitchen.

"Johnny," she started, then paused, unsure what to say. "Do you hear yourself? I mean, do you get what this sounds like to me?"

There went that muscle in his jaw again, and oh, look, there was a throbbing vein at his temple now, too. "I know it sounds like the ravings of a paranoid lunatic," Johnny ground out. "I can't help that. You just have to trust me."

"I've trusted you with my life since the moment we met," Tessa said softly, watching his eyes close in relief. She almost hated to shatter the moment, but she had to. Or they were doomed to play out the same unequal, stilted pattern that had marked their entire relationship so far. "The problem isn't whether I trust you. It's the fact that you don't trust me. You never have."

Johnny's eyes flew open. "That's not true."

Even Tessa was surprised by the bitter edge to her laugh. She went back to her dough, deftly shaping the loaf into a mounded circle and setting it on the waiting parchment-papered pan. "Oh, I think it is. When was the last time you told me ... anything, really?"

"I couldn't tell you about my a.s.signment," he said instantly. "The details were cla.s.sified."

"That's not what I'm talking about. I understood about the a.s.signment, and about your missions for the army before that. But you shut me out in other ways, too."

Johnny made a frustrated sound and paced closer, as if he were contemplating throwing her over his shoulder and dragging her to the safe house by force. "We don't have time for this conversation, Tessa. We need to go."

"I'm not going anywhere. You're free to leave, obviously. But if you stay, we're having this conversation, because it's long overdue."

The sound of the next lump of dough hitting the countertop punctuated Johnny's low, vicious curse. Then he sighed and said, "Fine. Say what you need to say. But then you have to hear me out about this situation."

Tessa thought it over. "It's a deal. But I'm not promising to drop everything and scurry off to some undisclosed location."

"No," Johnny agreed dryly. "That would be entirely too easy."

Shrugging, Tessa punched down the dough and flipped it over, relishing the silky feel of the flour and the elasticity of the sourdough. "If you want easy, you don't want marriage."

"When did you get to be such a hard-a.s.s?"

Tessa shot him a glare, but there was a smile pulling up the corner of his mouth. She tilted her chin at the waiting piles of dough. "Can't afford to be soft when there's this much work to do."

"I could help. If you give me some tips."

Tessa thought it over. She remembered the way Dr. Voss worked things during their sessions out at Windy Corner so that there was always an activity, something physical to do with the horses while they talked. She thought about the way those sessions had shown her more about Johnny in a few weeks than she'd learned in years of marriage-and she thought about the way Johnny closed up tighter than a fist during one-on-one conversations, with both people just sitting and staring at one another.

"Go wash your hands," she instructed, jerking her head at the sink in the corner. "Then come back here and I'll show you what to do."

The impromptu bread-baking lesson only took a few minutes. Johnny was tense beside her, clearly humoring her and wishing they were putting Sanctuary Island in their rearview mirror, but he listened attentively. She wasn't surprised when he got the knack of kneading on the first try.

Johnny had always had good hands. Long, lean fingers, strong but sensitive. Tessa shivered, riding out the rush of heat that p.r.i.c.kled across her skin at his nearness. The close, solid, unmistakably male presence.

When they were both in the rhythm, pushing and pulling at the dough, Tessa forced her mind back to the topic at hand. "We were talking about trust. And the way you don't trust me, not just to take care of myself like a competent adult, but with any part of you."

"I don't think of you as incompetent, or a child," Johnny argued. "How could I, when you're clearly doing fine here without me. Better than fine. You're actually happy. G.o.d knows, that was something I never managed to do for you. You had to do it for yourself."

The regret in his tone tore at Tessa's defenses. "I was happy with you. Sometimes. But I always wanted more than you could give me, and that's not exactly a recipe for happiness."

To her relief, he didn't ask what she'd wanted that he didn't provide. The fact of her unrequited love sat on the table between them, as sad and misshapen as Johnny's first attempt at shaping a round loaf.

She stepped in to tidy up the boule, leaning in front of him to mold the dough into the desired, uniform shape. Behind her, close enough that his breath stirred the fine hairs at the back of her neck, Johnny said, "I wish I could give you ... everything. You deserve it."

Drawing back hastily, Tessa suppressed the tremor of longing and tried to stick to her guns. "You gave me a lot, and I don't mean to sound ungrateful. But I know you don't want my grat.i.tude, and the fact is, there were things you could've done, things you could've said, that would have made a difference. Even if you didn't ... even if you couldn't love me back the way I wanted."

Drowning a bit in the humiliation of that last sentence, Tessa started when Johnny grasped her shoulder and turned her to face him. His intent, dark eyes searched her face avidly. "What things? Tell me, whatever it is, and I'll do it."

A thrill sang down her spine. It was always heady to be the focus of Johnny's undivided attention. Add in the warmth of his hands on her shoulders and the new knowledge her body carried of the ways they could bring each other pleasure, and Tessa had a hard time thinking of anything she wanted more than Johnny's kiss.

But he was asking, really asking, and she couldn't waste this chance to fix what was wrong between them. Maybe even to start fixing whatever it was that haunted Johnny.

"I want to know you," she told him simply, reaching up to brush the floury back of her hand over his sharp cheekbone. "You know everything there is to know about me. My parents, my past, where I came from. I don't know anything about you except that you grew up on a farm, that you don't have any brothers or sisters, and that you're the kind of man who can't resist trying to save everyone around him."

The hands on her shoulders went tight for an instant as a shadow darker than pain crossed his rigid face. Tessa caught her breath at the sight of it and his grip instantly loosened, his hands dropping away to hang at his sides.

"That's not entirely true," he finally said, voice sharper than the serrated blade of Tessa's bread knife.

Her mouth dropped open in confusion. "What part?"

His jaw worked silently for a moment before he cranked it open and said, "The part about me being an only child. I grew up with ... I had a sister."

It had come to this. Johnny was about to rip himself open and spill his guts on the countertop to convince Tessa ... what? That she mattered? That he trusted her, so she should do the same and go with him to the safe house?

Urgency still beat through Johnny's bloodstream, pushing and shoving to get them moving, but it had dimmed somewhat in the face of Tessa's stolid refusal to believe there was any danger.

First Marcus, then Tessa-Johnny wasn't an idiot. He could see the way they looked at him, the caution mixed with pity as they tried to figure out how to tell him he was acting like a crazy person.

Well, maybe Johnny was messed up in the head. But as the saying went, it wasn't paranoia if people actually were coming after you.

But that wasn't going to be enough for Tessa. Nothing he could say would be. Johnny was under no delusions about that. Unless he could open his mouth and force out a lie about love, he and Tessa were through.

So maybe it was stupid of him to go through with this painful bloodletting, but Johnny didn't care. He owed it to the woman he'd married, but never really let in. She was right about that. And what did it matter now? One way or another, he wasn't going to be seeing much more of Tessa after tonight.

The pain of that realization was crushing enough that it almost overshadowed the deeper, older ache of his memories of Angie.

"Johnny?" Tessa bit her lip, obviously unaware of the way it dragged his attention to that spot. "You don't have to talk about this if you don't want to."

There she went, giving him the easy out. Johnny wasn't the only one with protective instincts. The thought warmed him and gave him courage.

"I don't want to talk about it," he admitted roughly. "But I think I need you to hear about it, if that makes any sense."

She leaned one hip against the counter, heedless of the flour and sticky bits of dough smearing her jeans. "I'm listening."

This was harder than Johnny expected. He swallowed hard and reached for another lump of dough, needing something to do with his hands. Prodding it restlessly, he said, "My little sister, Angie, was the kind of kid everyone instantly falls in love with. She had this way about her, a curiosity about the world and a smile that made you want to smile back. I was five when she was born. I guess my parents had been trying for a second child for a while, and I remember how thrilled they were. She was a miracle baby, and I was excited to be a big brother."

At his side, Tessa drew a shaky breath as though she had some inkling of what was coming.

Doggedly determined to get through it, Johnny ducked his head and pressed the dough down with his fists. "Angie followed me everywhere, and you'd think it would be annoying but it just ... wasn't. She was my best friend before she could walk or talk, and I was so proud of the way she looked up to me. She wanted to do everything I did, even though she was five years younger. By the time we were eleven and six, Mom trusted me to look after her while she worked the farm."

Heat p.r.i.c.kled behind his eyes, a spike of pain gathering at his temples where Johnny realized he had clenched his jaw hard enough to grind his molars. He made a conscious effort to relax, to stop his hands from shaking. But they wouldn't, so he hid them in the dough and pressed on.

"I don't know if you remember from that night you wandered onto our property, but we had a pond out back of the barn. It wasn't very big, but Dad had stocked it with trout and I liked to take the rowboat out and fish when the weather was nice. Ange was allowed to go with me, but she had to wear a life jacket. She was too little to handle the oars, which made her mad, but I didn't mind rowing us around."

The memory of those days on the pond were a poisoned apple, bitter and sweet all at once. If he closed his eyes, he could see the head of dark curls leaning out over the murky water, chattering loud enough to scare away the fish.

"One night while Mom was cooking dinner, I came downstairs from doing my homework and asked where Angie was. Mom said she thought she was with me, and we got worried when we realized neither of us had seen her in a while. She was going through this phase where she loved hide-and-seek, but she'd forget that she was supposed to let us know she was playing. We started combing the house, looking in all her favorite spots like behind the dining room curtains and under Mom's bed, but she wasn't there. Finally I checked the hall closet and saw her life jacket hanging there, and suddenly, I knew."

Johnny bent over the counter, hands flat and bracing him up as his stomach swooped down to his knees the way it had that awful night.

"Oh, Johnny." Tessa's voice was wrecked. "Oh, no."

He nodded once, chin to his chest, and forced out the rest of the story. "Like I said, she was curious and impatient to grow up and be big enough to do everything her big brother did. I tore down the stairs and out to the back porch. From there, I could make out part of the pond. It was still as gla.s.s, no wind to ripple the water. I stood there for a second trying to calm down and convince myself I was wrong-when the tip of the rowboat drifted into view from behind the edge of the barn. I nearly threw up. I don't remember running down to the pond, or falling down and getting back up, although I must have because later there was a hole in the knee of my jeans and my hands were badly sc.r.a.ped. I don't remember any of it. All I remember is coming to the end of the dock and seeing the rowboat floating in the middle of the pond, right where it got deepest ... completely empty."

He paused, chilled and clammy with the horror of the memory, only to tense when Tessa wrapped her arms around him from behind. She held on anyway, pressing her forehead between his shoulder blades. Johnny felt himself grow calmer, his body reclaimed and anch.o.r.ed in the present instead of caught in the waterlogged weeds of the past.

"I swam out to the boat," he said dully, "but Angie was gone. One of the oars was floating in the water beside the boat. Maybe she fell over the side trying to reach it. Maybe she got stuck drifting out there and couldn't work the oars to come back in, so she tried to swim for it. I don't know. I'll never know. They had to drag the pond to find her body, but my mother wouldn't let me see her. I know why, now, and I don't blame her, but at the time, it was like Angie simply vanished from the world. And all I could think was that if I'd been paying attention, if I'd been protecting her the way I was supposed to, she would still be with us."

The back of his shirt felt damp. Tessa was crying. He couldn't take that. Feeling creaky and old, Johnny reached back to pull her against his chest, where she immediately buried her face against his neck and sighed wetly. "Johnny, I'm so sorry. What a tragedy, to lose your sister so young-I can't even imagine the pain of it. Your poor parents."

"My dad was long gone by then. But Mom never really recovered. She tried to pull it together for me, but I didn't make it easy for her. I was a pretty angry kid, for a long time. Anger to cover up the guilt, I guess."

"You were angry because you were grieving, and anger is a part of it," Tessa pointed out, lifting her head to give his face a searching look. "But you had nothing to be guilty over, Johnny. I hope your mother made that clear."

Johnny shrugged, his shoulders as tight and sore as if he'd been hefting five-hundred-pound sacks of flour all day. "That's what she said, but it didn't change how I felt."

How I feel.

As if she'd heard the silent confession, Tessa's brows lowered. With her eyes red and swollen and her cheeks as pale as the dough rising behind her, she should have looked awful. Instead, Johnny thought he'd never seen anything more beautiful.

"It was a terrible accident," Tessa argued. "No one was at fault. Certainly not you-no matter how much your parents trusted you to watch over your sister, you were only a child yourself. And you had your own life, your own responsibilities, your school work..."

Johnny's chest ached. "None of that mattered, none of it was more important than keeping Angie safe. I would give everything I am, sacrifice everything I have, for one more day with her."

Pulling back and placing her palms gently against his chest, Tessa stared up into his eyes. "So you grew up and sacrificed your future for a girl you didn't even know. And you found a job where you would be asked to sacrifice your very ident.i.ty for a chance to make the world a safer place."

"This isn't one of our therapy sessions." Johnny glanced away, feeling the burn of Tessa's stare like fire against his cheek. "I didn't tell you this so you could psychoa.n.a.lyze me. You said I never let you in, well, this is it. You wanted in, you're in. This is all that's inside me. A gaping, black hole full of my failure to protect the people who depend on me."

Chapter 16.

The devastation in Johnny's beautiful, coffee-dark eyes tore a jagged wound in Tessa's heart. Part of her wished she hadn't pushed this, hadn't made Johnny dredge all of this up-but most of Tessa was aware that she and Johnny had never been closer than they were in this moment ... not even when he'd propelled her to ecstasy with his pa.s.sionate, intimate kiss.

"Not what you were hoping for, I know." Johnny's profile was stern and imposing, but Tessa could see the throb of his pulse in his strong, tanned throat.

She picked her words like she was picking tiny shards of eggsh.e.l.l out of a bowl of yolks. "I hate that your family went through that. I hate that you have to live with the loss of your sister. But I could never, ever be disappointed by the man you are inside, John Alexander. My husband."

That brought his eyes back to hers. A wry smile touched his lips. "For a little while longer, at least."

Tessa stared at him, her heart swelling until it crowded her lungs and made breathing a ch.o.r.e. He'd given her so much, shown her so much. Was it enough? Did she truly have the right to ask for more?

The moment held, like a strand of spun sugar pulled taut between their bodies, stretching thinner and thinner until it finally snapped. Johnny glanced down and wiped his hands on a damp kitchen towel before digging in his pocket for his phone. He thumbed it on and swore softly. "Come on, Brad. Call me back."

Tessa frowned. "What do you need to talk to your boss at the ATF about?"

"Something Marcus said," Johnny replied vaguely, slipping the phone back into his pocket. "Not important. But I'm going to head out tonight, drop into the office and see if I can't catch him there."

"You're leaving?" Tessa's swollen heart shrank, shriveling up hard and wrinkled like a raisin. "And you've given up on trying to get me to a safe house."

He pressed his lips together in a flat line. "Maybe I'm blowing things out of proportion. And maybe there's some slight connection between my tendency to get overprotective, and my past. Either way, you have the right to make decisions about your own safety, and if you don't want to leave Sanctuary Island, I won't force you."

Tessa tried for a smile even though she felt as if she'd never have a reason to smile again. "Good. There was a minute there where I was afraid you were planning to knock me out and kidnap me."

Embarra.s.sment shaded his cheekbones brick red. "Maybe Brad was a little right, too. I probably need a break from the job. I'm starting to see bad guys and evil plots everywhere I look."

Tessa caught her breath. It was a huge admission from Johnny, and a huge step toward him getting some help dealing with the incredible stress he'd lived with while undercover.

"Why not stay here and finish out the sessions at Windy Corner?" Tessa said, hating the slight pleading note in her own voice. "I mean, you do need a break. You deserve one. Do you really have to go back to the office?"

A strange expression tensed Johnny's handsome features. Stepping close, he cradled her face in his large palms, thumbs stroking her cheeks in the way that always sent shivers through Tessa's core. "Yes. Because I can't stay here with you any longer, knowing that I'll never have you."

Tessa's stomach clenched, emotion swamping her in a shocking flood. "You could have me. Just tell me you love me. Lie to me, I don't even care."

Tenderly, slowly, Johnny swiped at the tears that spilled from her eyes. "I'll never lie to you, Tessa. Not even to keep you."

She choked on a sob and grabbed at his hands when he went to pull away. Desperate and fevered, she cried out, "Wait! Don't go."