Disruptor (9 page)

She had no business being around anybody.
Especially not an innocent person like Kevin. “I need to go.” She
got to her feet, took a single step before vertigo spun the room.
She closed her eyes and slumped against the wall.

“You had a nightmare. You’re not going
anywhere.”

“I shouldn’t be here. I never should have
gotten in the car with you.”

He touched her face. She opened her eyes to
see him standing before her, close enough that she could hurt him
again if she lost control.

“You had a nightmare and you’re shaken up,”
he said. “Don’t make too much of it.”

“I hurt you.” She gulped down a breath and a
sob then reached for his throat, dropping her hand before she could
touch him.

Kevin took her hand in his and brought it to
his throat. “I’m fine. No harm done.”

His pulse beat strong beneath her fingers,
his skin warm. She blinked away tears. “I shouldn’t be here. If I
don’t kill you by accident, the people looking for me will kill
you.”

He moved closer, his hands on her shoulders,
eyes boring into hers. “If you tell me you have someone else out
there who can help you, somewhere else you can go and be safe. If
you swear to me it’s the truth.” He brushed a tangle of hair from
her face. “Then I’ll help you pack.”

Dani wanted to lie.
Needed
to lie. For
his safety and her conscience. But her throat was clogged with
tears and some shameful, weak part of her was so damned tired of
being on her own. Tired of hiding. Tired of pretending.

“But if there’s no one else, you should stay
here. I want you to stay here with me, Dani.” He cupped her face.
“Do you hear me? Stay with me.”

Kevin must have been out of his mind, being
willing to be so close to her, touch her, after she’d nearly
strangled him. He should have been terrified to have her in his
home, but instead he wanted her to stay. No way would she do
it.

Pack a bag. Thank him for his help. Get back
on the streets and somehow find a way out of town. Do it your damn
self, you weak piece of shit.

He whispered her name and took her in his
arms. She could have easily pushed him away, even hurt him to make
a point. Instead she froze. He held her gently, murmuring wordless
sounds of comfort. How long they stood there, she had no idea.
Gradually, against her better judgment, she relaxed into his
embrace. When the tears finally broke free and she buckled under
their weight, he caught her and carried her to the bed. Held her in
arms that had their own natural strength. Cradled her against the
wall of his chest and rocked her until finally the only voice she
could hear was his.

The next time she woke up, the space next to
her in the bed was still warm from his presence. Sunlight streamed
around the edges of the blinds. Her eyes were puffy and raw from
crying and hunger gnawed at her stomach.

At least she wasn’t screaming this time. That
used to be common. Dani sat up and drew her knees to her chest,
wrapping her arms around her legs. Plenty of people on the streets
found safety in numbers, especially at night. They slept in
shelters or in abandoned buildings with others nearby. Dani had
never liked that. It didn’t make her feel safe, especially when her
nightmares provoked questions. She was a lot less afraid of risking
attack now, after the lab, than she had been when she was first on
the streets.

Now, shivering from the night’s aftershocks,
loneliness pushed her out of the bed. She wanted company, something
to ward off the darkness and the lingering echo of the voice from
her dreams. It never stayed quiet long, but then, she didn’t
deserve it’s silence.

She didn’t deserve the care and comfort
offered by the man who’d held her while she cried last night,
either. Blasted open emotionally, still suffering physically from
her time on the streets plus all the fights, Dani just wasn’t
strong enough yet to walk away like she needed to. She would let
herself recover here, accept some of Kevin’s help within reason,
and then leave as soon as she felt strong enough.

Torn between acute embarrassment over last
night’s breakdown and the overwhelming need for food, Dani put off
facing him by taking a shower and getting dressed. A faint whiff of
bacon reached her and she said to hell with it, wrapped a towel
around her wet hair, and went downstairs.

She came to a halt at the kitchen doorway.
Bright sunlight filled the room. Kevin adroitly juggled the cooking
of eggs on the stove and bacon in the microwave. A breakfast nook
in one corner held a carafe of orange juice, along with glasses and
silverware. The kitchen was just as upscale as everything else in
the apartment, but also both functional and lived-in. For the first
time she wondered about the lack of servants.

Mostly, though, she watched Kevin. A white
t-shirt was molded to his chest, showing every dip and curve of
muscle on his lean, cut physique. Jeans hugged his hips and thighs,
showing off his rear to great effect. She took a good long look at
the arms that had held her last night. Defined muscle, crisp golden
hair, beautifully formed hands with long, elegant fingers. A tattoo
peeked out beneath the sleeve on his right arm. She wanted to trace
its lines with a fingertip, push the cloth up to examine the
design.

Maybe she should have taken a cold shower.
Dani shook her head, shocked at the direction of her thoughts.

“Good morning.” Kevin pointed at the
breakfast nook then opened a cabinet and withdrew two plates. “Have
a seat, the food’s ready.”

So he’d known she was standing there. Ogling
him. No, there was no way he knew
that
. He might have been
alerted to her presence by some tiny sound, but he hadn’t turned
around and seen the look on her face, the interest that no doubt
had shown in her eyes.

She slipped into the nook and poured orange
juice in both glasses. He brought a plate laden with bacon and
eggs, placed it on the table in front of her, holding on to the
edge a beat too long. She looked up at him, a
thank you
on
her lips.

His mouth curved into a slow, sexy smile and
he winked.

Oh shit. So he had some kind of sixth sense
about when he was being ogled. Dani dropped her gaze to the food,
willing herself not to blush.

“What would you like on your toast?”

She risked a glance, relieved that his smile
had dimmed to something approaching normal. “Whatever. I’m not that
picky when it comes to food.”

He sipped his orange juice. “I’m really good
at breakfast and brunch. The other meals, not so much.”

Dani tucked into her food while he finished
up. When he finally sat he brought two plates, one his and the
other stacked with buttered toast. They ate in silence for several
minutes.

“I talked to my friend. She’ll be in touch
about the new identity. We need to provide her with a photo and the
name and details you want to use.”

Dani was only mildly surprised he had a
contact who could make that happen. “I don’t have a way to pay for
it,” she said hesitantly.

“You saved my life, remember? That’s payment
enough.”

“How long will it take?”

“She didn’t say. Not long.”

“I need to leave as soon as possible.”

He picked up a piece of toast and offered it
to her. She took it, frowning.

“I know,” he said. “Actually, there is
another way you could pay me back for all this.”

Dani tensed. Just because she’d ogled him
didn’t mean she’d agree to any kind of sexual payment. If he
suggested it…it would hurt, bad, and destroy her estimation of him.
Plus she’d probably break his handsome face.

His blue eyes took on an intensity she’d only
seem once or twice in him so far. “Tell me how.”

No explanation was necessary. He wanted to
know how she’d fought off his attackers, and survived taking on a
house full of Russian gangsters. In the months since her escape,
she’d never once been tempted to tell anyone the truth. It was
dangerous knowledge, not to mention damned near unbelievable.

But she found herself tempted to tell Kevin.
Despite the danger and the risk that he wouldn’t believe her, and
the fear that confiding in someone only appealed to her out of
weakness. The idea of someone else knowing the truth, not just the
truth of what was done to her but the truth of what it had made her
– it begged the question, could he accept it?

Could he accept her?

If he knew it all, would he still look at her
like she was a human being?

It wasn’t a risk she was willing to take.
“No.”

They’d moved to the living room. Kevin sank
into the couch, his busted ribs sore from Dani’s rough wake-up from
a nightmare last night. He didn’t want to tell her that, though.
She may have been physically strong, unnaturally so, but
emotionally she was fragile and he didn’t want to do anything that
might make it worse. He’d told her he wanted her to stay so she
could have time to heal after being in fights, and that was true.
Her spirit needed healing, too, though, and he didn’t know how to
help her with that.

Dani unwound the towel from her hair and left
it on a barstool. Even with damp, uncombed hair, no makeup, and
wearing a plain t-shirt and pants, she was still the most beautiful
woman he’d ever seen. Her tawny skin suggested a blended racial
heritage, as did the slight narrowing at the corners of her dark
topaz eyes. She ran her hands through her long mane of night black
hair in an effort to tame it. Kevin sucked in a breath, remembering
the silky feel of that hair last night when he’d held her. She’d
been so vulnerable, crying in his arms. All he’d wanted to do was
take care of her.
Not
take advantage of her. And he wouldn’t
do that now, either.

It was clear Dani needed a friend, not some
hound dog lusting after her. Even though he was pretty sure she’d
been checking him out earlier, and damn, hadn’t that felt good.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have made
it sound like I would only help if you told me your secrets. That
was shitty.”

“I didn’t think you meant it that way.” She
sat on the floor with her back to the wall, between a book case and
Blue in Green
, the painting she’d admired yesterday. “I do
think you understand that it’s better if you don’t know anything
about me.”

“I know a few things. You’ve been on the
streets for at least a few months. You’re on the run. You rush
headlong into danger when you hear someone scream for help.”

“That sounds dramatic.”

“Believe me, when you’re the one screaming
for help, it is fucking dramatic.”

She cast her gaze to the floor.

“You don’t want to tell me how. Okay. Will
you tell me why?”

Shadows darkened her brown eyes to black.

“There’s got to be a reason for why you risk
your life like that for total strangers. I’d just like to know what
it is.”

Dani met his gaze, an unexpected hardness
etched in her features. “Why? What difference does it make?”

Kevin raised his hands in frustration. She
didn’t owe him any explanations, he knew that. So why did he keep
pushing? It wasn’t like him. None of his reactions to her were
normal for him.

Okay, inviting a beautiful woman into his
home, that was totally like him. But this level of curiosity and
concern was new. It wasn’t that he was an insensitive jerk, not
exactly, but he was very good at finding temporary partners who
were also only looking for something short term. Women who weren’t
looking for a commitment any more than he was, who liked to have a
good time and leave it at that.

Not that he was looking for even that much
from Dani. He didn’t know what he wanted with her, why he wanted to
know her secrets. It wasn’t to expose her, that was for damn
sure.

Maybe it was as simple as having a crush on
the woman who’d saved his life.

“Forget it,” he said. “Just because I’m
curious doesn’t mean you owe me any explanations.”

“Yeah, and just because I helped you doesn’t
mean you should blow it out of proportion.”

“I’m hardly the only person you’ve
helped.”

She gave him a look that raised the hair on
the back of his neck. “What do you mean by that?”

If she was on the run, she wasn’t going to
take this well. But if she was really in danger, she needed to
know. “People in Cabrini have been talking about you. That a person
in dark clothes, a hoodie hiding their face, sometimes shows up to
help people. A scream for help, and then you’re there.”

Dani pulled her knees to her chest and
wrapped her arms around her legs. “You heard that working in the
shelter’s kitchen?”

“Yeah, but not just there.” Kevin sat up and
retrieved a tablet from the coffee table. “From local social
media.” He woke the tablet and tapped the icon for his Twitter app.
“You’re a hashtag, Dani.”

She screwed up her face in confusion. “The
hell does that mean?”

He thought about that for a moment. “You used
my phone to access the internet. Did you ever check Twitter or any
other social network?”

“No.” She looked away.

“But you know what they are, right?”

“Yeah. Sort of. I haven’t exactly had access
to that kind of thing.”

Kevin laughed. “What, have you been in a hole
in the ground for years?”

With an almost unnatural speed and grace,
Dani rose and stalked to the sofa. Brown eyes gone black with
anger, she snatched the tablet from his hands and glared at the
screen. Kevin sank back into the cushions, slightly unnerved by how
downright frightening she could be at times.

A column in the app was devoted to following
the hashtag #CabriniGhost. Dani scrolled through the tweets, her
anger transforming to horror. “This is…this is public? Anybody can
read this stuff?”