Loved You First Read online

  “I don’t need an ambulance.” Reading the argument in his eyes, she shook her head. “I don’t.” She glanced down to see that her blouse was gaping open. It was ruined, of course, she thought in disgust. That and her suede skirt were spotted with blood. “His blood, not mine,” she pointed out.

  “You broke his slimy low-life nose,” Alex snapped.

  “I’m glad my self-defense class wasn’t wasted.” When he began to swear, she caught his hand. “Alexi,” she began, her voice low, intense. “Do you know what it is for me to accept that you risk your life every day, every night? Do you know I accept only because I love you so much?”

  “Don’t turn this around on me,” he said furiously. “That bastard nearly killed you. He was so far gone it took three of us to drag him off.”

  She didn’t want to think about that just yet. She couldn’t. “I played it wrong.”

  “You—”

  “I did,” she insisted. “But the point is, we can’t change what we are. I won’t change, not even for you. Now cancel the ambulance and do something for me.”

  He called her a name, a rude one, in their native language. It made her smile. “I’m no more of a horse’s ass than you. I need to contact my office and explain. I won’t be able to represent Lomez under the circumstances.”

  “Damn right you won’t.” It was small satisfaction, but he could hope for little more. Gently he touched his fingers to the bruise on her cheekbone. “He’s going down, Rachel. I’ll make damn sure he goes down for this, if nothing else. There’s nothing you or anyone else can do.”

  “That’s for the courts to decide.” She got shakily to her feet. “And you will not call Mama and Papa.” When he said nothing, she lifted a brow. “If you do, I’ll have to tell them about your last undercover assignment. The one where you went through the second-story window.”

  “Go home,” he said, giving up. “Get some rest.” He turned away from her to study Zack. His opinion of him had changed a bit, since Zack had been one of the three who’d hauled Lomez off Rachel. Alex had been a cop long enough to recognize murder in a man’s eyes, and it had shone darkly in Zack’s. He assumed, correctly, that Zack would have dealt with Lomez himself, regardless of cops, if he hadn’t been so busy cradling Rachel in his arms. “You’ll get her there.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Count on it.” He said nothing else as Alex left them.

  Unsteady, and far from sure of herself, Rachel tried to smile. “Some date, huh?”

  A muscle jumped in his jaw as he studied her spattered blouse. “Can you walk?”

  “Of course I can walk.” She hoped. The little seed of annoyance his terse question planted helped her get across the room. “Look, I’m sorry things got messed up this way. You don’t have to—”

  “Do me a favor,” he said as he took her arm and led her through the squad room. “Just shut up.”

  She obliged him, though she was sorely tempted to tell him how foolish it was to indulge in a cab for the few blocks to her building. It was better if she didn’t talk, she realized. Not only did it hurt, but she was also afraid her voice would begin to shake as much as her body wanted to.

  She’d be alone in a few minutes, she reminded herself. Then she’d be able to indulge in a nice bout of trembling and weeping if she wanted to. But not in front of Zack. Not in front of anybody.

  With a drunk’s exaggerated care, she stepped out of the cab and onto the sidewalk. Mild shock, she deduced. It would pass. She’d make it pass.

  “Thanks,” she began. “I’m sorry…”

  “I’m taking you up.”

  “Look, I’ve already ruined your morning. It isn’t necessary to—” But he was already half carrying her to the door.

  “Didn’t I tell you to shut up?” He pulled open her briefcase to look for her keys himself. White-hot rage had his fingers fumbling. Didn’t she know how pale she was? Couldn’t she understand what it did to him inside to hear the way her voice rasped?

  He pulled her through the door, into the elevator, and jabbed his finger on the button.

  “I don’t know what you’re so mad about,” she muttered, wincing a little as she swallowed. “You lost a couple of hours, sure, but do you know what I paid for this suit? And I’ve only worn it twice.” Tears sprang to her eyes, and she blinked them back furiously as he dragged her down the hall to her apartment. “A PD’s salary isn’t exactly princely.” She rubbed ice-cold hands together as he unlocked her door. “I had to eat yogurt for a month to afford it, even on sale. And I don’t even like yogurt.”

  The first tear spilled out. She dashed it away as she walked inside. “Even if I could get it cleaned, I wouldn’t be able to wear it after—” She broke off and made an enormous effort to pull herself back. She was babbling about a suit, for God’s sake. Maybe she was losing her mind.

  “Okay.” She let out what she thought was a slow, careful breath. It hitched as it came out. “You got me home. I appreciate it. Now go away.”

  He merely tossed her briefcase aside, then tugged the coat from her shoulders. “Sit down, Rachel.”

  “I don’t want to sit down.” Another tear. It was too late to stop it. “What I want is to be alone.” When her voice broke, she pressed her hands to her face. “Oh, God, leave me alone.”

  He picked her up, moving to the couch to hold her in his lap. Stroking her back through the tremors, feeling her tears hot and damp on his neck. He forced his hands to be gentle, even as the rage and fear worked inside him. As she curled up against him, he closed his eyes and murmured the useless words that always seemed to comfort.

  She cried hard, he realized. But she didn’t cry long. She trembled violently, but the trembling was soon controlled. She didn’t try to push away. If she had, he wouldn’t have allowed it. Perhaps he was comforting her. But holding her, knowing she was safe, and with him, brought him tremendous comfort.

  “Damn it.” When the worst was over, she let her head lie weakly on his shoulder. “I told you to go away.”

  “We had a deal, remember? You’re spending the day with me.” His hands tightened once, convulsively, before he managed to gentle them again. “You scared me, big-time.”

  “Me, too.”

  “And if I go away, I’m going to have to go back down there, find a way to get to that son of a bitch, and break him in half.”

  It was odd how a threat delivered so matter-of-factly could seem twice as deadly as a shout. “Then I guess you’d better hang around until the impulse fades. I’m really all right,” she told him, but she left her head cuddled against his shoulder. “This was just reaction.”

  There was still an ice floe of fury in his gut. That was his reaction, and he’d deal with it later. “It may be his blood, Rachel, but they’re your bruises.”

  Frowning, she touched fingers gingerly to her cheek. “How bad does it look?”

  Despite himself, he chuckled. “Lord, I didn’t know you were that vain.”

  She bristled, pulling back far enough to scowl at him. “It has nothing to do with vanity. I have a meeting in the morning, and I don’t need all the questions.”

  He cupped her chin, tilted her head to the side. “Take it from someone who’s had his share of bruises, sugar. You’re going to get the questions. Now forget about tomorrow.” He touched his lips, very gently, to the bruise, and made her heart stutter. “Have you got any tea bags? Any honey?”

  “Probably. Why?”

  “Since you won’t go to the hospital, you’ll have to put up with Muldoon first aid.” He shifted her from his lap and propped her against the pillows. Their vivid colors only made her appear paler. “Stay.”

  Since the bout of weeping had tired her, she didn’t argue. When Zack came out of the kitchen five minutes later, tea steaming in the cup in his hands, she was out like a light.

  She awakened groggy, her throat on fire. The room was dim and utterly quiet, disorienting her. Pushing herself up on her elbows, she saw that the curtains had been drawn.
The bright afghan her mother had crocheted years before had been tucked around her.

  Groaning only a little, she tossed it aside and stood up. Steady, she thought with some satisfaction. You couldn’t keep a Stanislaski down.

  But this one needed about a gallon of water to ease the flames in her throat. Rubbing her eyes, she padded into the kitchen, then let out a shriek that seared her abused throat when she spotted Zack bending over the stove.

  “What the hell are you doing? I thought you were gone.”

  “Nope.” He stirred the contents of the pot on the stove before turning to study her. Her color was back, and the glazed look had faded from her eyes. It would take a great deal longer for the bruises to disappear. “I had Rio send over some soup. Do you think you can eat now?”

  “I guess.” She pressed a hand to her stomach. She was starving, but she wasn’t sure how she was going to manage getting anything down her throbbing throat. “What time is it?”

  “About three.”

  She’d slept nearly two hours, she realized, and found the idea of her dozing on the couch while Zack puttered in the kitchen both embarrassing and touching. “You didn’t have to hang around.”

  “You know, your throat would feel better sooner if you didn’t talk so much. Go in and sit down.”

  Since the scent of the soup was making her mouth water, she obliged him. After tugging the curtains open, she sat at the little gateleg table by the window. With some disgust, she shrugged out of her stained jacket and tossed it aside. As soon as she’d indulged herself with some of Rio’s soup, she would shower and change.

  Obviously Zack had found his way around her kitchen, Rachel mused as he came in carrying bowls and mugs on a tray.

  “Thanks.” She saw his gaze light briefly on the jacket, heat, then flatten.

  “I pawed through some of your records while you were out.” It pleased him that he could speak casually when he wanted to break something. Someone. “Mind if I put one on?”

  “No, go ahead.”

  Watching the steam, she stirred her soup while he put an old B.B. King album on her stereo. “And they said we had nothing in common.”

  Relieved that he wasn’t going to bring the incident up, she smiled. “I stole it from Mikhail. He has very eclectic taste in music.” Once Zack was seated across from her, she spooned up soup and swallowed gingerly. Sighed. It soothed her fevered throat the way a mother soothes a fretful child.

  “Wonderful. What’s in it?”

  “I never ask. Rio never tells.”

  With a murmur of acknowledgment, she continued to eat. “I’ll have to figure out how to bribe him. My mother would love the recipe for this.” She switched to tea. After the first sip, her eyes opened wide.

  “You didn’t have honey,” Zack said mildly. “But you had brandy.”

  She took another, more cautious sip. “It ought to dull the nerve endings.”

  “That’s the idea.” Reaching across the table, he took her hand. “Feel any better?”

  “Lots. I really am sorry you had your Sunday wrecked.”

  “Don’t make me tell you to shut up again.”

  She only smiled. “I’m starting to think you’re not such a bad guy, Muldoon.”

  “Maybe I should have brought you soup before.”

  “The soup helped.” She spooned up some more. “But not making me feel like an idiot when I was crying all over you did the trick.”

  “You had pretty good cause. Being tough’s not always the answer.”

  “It usually works.” She sipped more of the brandy-laced tea. “I didn’t want to let go in front of Alex. He worries enough.” Her lips curved. “You know how it is to have a younger sibling who refuses to see things the way you do.”

  “You mean so you’d like to rap their head against the wall? Yeah, I know.”

  “Well, whether Alex likes to believe it or not, I can handle my own life. Nick will, too, when the time comes.”

  “He’s not like that creep today,” Zack said softly. “He never could be.”

  “Of course not.” Concerned, she pushed her bowl aside. This time she took his hand. “You mustn’t even think like that. Listen to me. For two years I’ve seen them come in and go out. Some are twisted beyond redemption, like Lomez. Others are desperate and confused, either battered by the streets or part of the streets. Working with them, it gets to the point that if you don’t burn out or just scab over, you learn to recognize the nuances. Nick’s been hurt, and his self-esteem is next to zero. He turned to a gang because he needed to be part of something, anything. Now he has you. No matter how much he might try to shake you loose, he wants you. He needs you.”

  “Maybe. If he ever starts to trust me, he might be able to turn a corner.” He hadn’t realized how much it was weighing on him. “He won’t talk to me about my father, about what it was like when I was gone.”

  “He will, when he’s ready.”

  “The old man wasn’t so bad, Rachel. He’d never have made father of the year, but—hell.” He let out a breath in disgust. “He was a hard-nosed, hard-drinking Irish son of a bitch who should never have given up the sea. He ran our lives like we were green crewmen on a sinking ship. All shouts and bluster and the back of his hand. We never agreed on a damn thing.”

  “Families often don’t.”

  “He never got over my mother. He was in the South Pacific when she died.”

  Which meant Zack would have been alone. A child, alone. Her fingers tightened on his.

  “He came back, mad as hell. He was going to make a man out of me. Then Nadine and Nick came along, and I was old enough to go my own way. You could say I abandoned ship. So he tried to make a man—his kind of man—out of Nick.”

  “You’re beating yourself up again over something you can’t change. And couldn’t have changed.”

  “I guess I keep remembering how it was that first year I came back. The old man was so fragile. He couldn’t remember things, kept wandering out and getting lost. Damn it, I knew Nick was running wild, but I didn’t have my legs under me. Having to put the old man in a home, watching him die there, trying to keep the bar going. Nick got lost in the shuffle.”

  “You found him again.”

  He started to speak again, then sat back with a sigh. “Hell of a time to be dumping this on you.”

  “It’s all right. I want to help.”

  “You’ve already helped. Do you want more soup?”

  Subject closed, Rachel realized. She could press, or she could give him room. One favor deserved another, she decided, and smiled. “No, thanks. It really did the job.”

  He wanted to say more, a whole lot more. He wanted to hold her again, and feel her head resting on his shoulder. He wanted to sit and watch her sleep on the couch again. And if he did any one of those things, he wouldn’t make it to the door.

  “I’ll clear it up and get out of your hair. I imagine you’d like some time alone.”

  She frowned after him as he walked into the kitchen. She had wanted time alone, hadn’t she? So why was she trying to think of ways to stall him, keep him from walking out the door.

  “Hey, look.” She pushed away from the table to wander in after him. He was already pouring the remaining soup in a container. “It’s still early. We might be able to salvage some of the day.”

  “You need rest.”

  “I had rest.” Feeling awkward, she ran water over the bowls he’d stacked in the sink. “We could probably make at least one museum, or catch a matinee. I don’t want to think you spent your whole day off mopping up after me.”

  “Will you quit worrying about my day off?” Zack slapped the container on a shelf in the refrigerator. “I’m the boss, remember? I can take another.”

  “Fine.” She slammed the water off. “See you around.”

  “Man, you’ve got a short fuse.” Amused, he put his hands on her shoulders and rubbed. “Don’t get yourself worked up, sugar. All in all, I had a very eventful day.”


  She closed her eyes, feeling those rough fingers through the silk of her blouse. “Any time, Muldoon.”

  He could smell her hair, and he had to fight the urge to bury his face in it. It wouldn’t be possible to stop there. “You going to be all right alone? I could call the cop to come stay with you.”

  “No. I’m fine.” Gripping the edge of the counter, she stared hard at the wall. “Thanks for the first aid.”

  “My pleasure.” Damn it, he was stalling when he should be out the door. Away from her. “Maybe we can have an early dinner one night this week.”

  She pressed her lips together. The way his hands were rubbing up and down her arms made her want to whimper. “Sure. I’ll check my schedule.”

  He turned her around. He couldn’t be sure if she moved into his arms or if he’d pulled her there, but he was holding her. Her lips were parting for his. “I’ll call you.”

  “Okay.” Her eyes fluttered closed as the kiss deepened.

  “Soon.” He felt the breath backing up in his lungs as she molded against him.

  “Um-hmm…” As his tongue danced over hers, she gave a quick sigh that caught in the middle.

  He tore his mouth away to nibble along her jaw. “One more thing.”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m not leaving.”

  “I know.” Her arms curled around his neck as he lifted her. “It’s just chemistry.”

  “Right.” Struggling to remember her bruises, he rained soft kisses over her face.

  “Nothing serious.” She shuddered, nipping at his neck. “I can’t afford to get involved. I have plans.”

  “Nothing serious,” he agreed, blood pounding in his head, in his loins. He jerked open a door and found himself facing a closet. “Where’s the damn bedroom?”

  “What?” She focused, realized he’d carried her out of the kitchen. “This is it. The couch…” She nipped his ear. “It pulls out. I can…”

  “Never mind,” he managed, and settled for the rug.

  CHAPTER 7