Hiding in Plain Sight (19 page)

Chapter Eighteen

He looked at himself in the mirror as he dragged the disposable razor through the shaving cream, exposing another line of smooth skin.  The smile hidden by the contortions of his face as he shaved was definitely reflected in his eyes.

All because of what his little draga had initiated last night.  He'd given her his memories and she'd given him comfort.  And in such a way that his body still echoed with it the following morning.

The morning they were to be married.

"Shit!" he heard loudly from the other room, and he took two steps to the doorway to see her standing at the end of the bed, the contents of her backpack spread out over the bed.

"Trouble, my Reese?"

She was in her bra and panties, that glorious ass rounded underneath the stretch lace that encased it, holding her sundress up to her chest.  "I can't get married like this!" she exclaimed and turned her eyes to his.

"Like what?"

"I have nothing to wear," came her groan and she twirled before plopping her ass on the end of the mattress, still clutching the first thing he'd seen her wear as a partial covering.  "I don't want to get married as a biker chick."

His eyes were heated as he took in her appearance.  "I will always remember what you looked like in that sundress and hat by the side of that lonely road in Kansas."

He watched as she closed her eyes at his words. 

"I remember that too," she murmured.  "The way you looked crossing that hot piece of asphalt, unsnapping your jacket and takin' off your helmet.  It was… it was like my first glimpse of heaven on legs."

Shocked, Brand's heart stuttered at her words, the awe he heard in her voice.  He tried to think of something to say, some way to respond, but his mind was stunned.  He reached for a towel to wipe the excess suds off his face and stepped back to where she still sat.

"We will get you a dress if that is what you want." 

She raised her brown eyes to his, and he saw her vulnerability nakedly exposed in her expression.

"Let's remember why we are doing this, my beauty."

"To protect me from Louie," she admitted with a sigh.  "He wants a virgin to give him a son."

"Correct."  Brand nodded and leaned, pressing his fists on either side of her hips as he pressed his forehead to hers.  "He cannot marry someone who is already married."

"How much does that make you his target instead of me?" she asked, lifting her chin and staring into his eyes.  He felt his cock begin to lengthen as they pierced his, and he dropped his gaze to her full mouth.

"A lot, perhaps," he admitted after a couple of beats, but his mind was not on whatever Deschames would come up with as his little piss-ant way of punishment.  "I can handle Deschames, my Reese."  He straightened and moved his hands to her shoulders, watching as her face followed him, her neck fully exposed and calling to him to lick and kiss it in a way that would make her moan so sweetly for him.  "What I cannot handle is you getting upset over clothing."

Her eyes shot to the side and he saw a flush move over her cheekbones.  He loved every shade of pink her skin held, whether it was with the blush that spread over her cheeks or her nipples, her…

"Guess I'm makin' a mountain out of a molehill, huh?" She sounded sheepish as she pressed her face into his bare belly.  His hands moved to hold her head in place before gliding through her hair.

He cupped her cheek and brought her face back up to his as he again leaned down.  "We will get you a dress if that is what you want," he assured her again before pressing his mouth to hers.  "And, tonight, we will be sleeping in our bed, in our cabin with all of this behind us."

"I like the sound of that," she said back, her lips moving against his as she spoke.

"Good," he announced with a smile, and he opened his eyes to see hers smiling back into his. 

As he made his way back to the bathroom, he wondered why she was worried about getting married in biker clothes if this was only the temporary arrangement she'd negotiated for the night before.

His reflection in the mirror was now smiling fully.

*.*.*.*.*

The feel of Reese's hands on his stomach was comforting as was the heavy feel of the band on the finger of his left hand.  He glanced at it again, his eyes drawn to the gleaming circle of silver, catching the light as they traveled towards Missoula.

Married.

The service had taken less than ten minutes in the judge's chamber.  In fact, having the older, white-haired official saying the words over them had taken less time than it had for Atin to provide a certified copy of Reese's birth certificate.  Something he hadn't known was needed until they'd applied for their marriage license.

A license to be married.

Which had, after Reese had gotten over her pique at having nothing to get married in, been the only complication to complete his plan.

His mind refused to remember the promises the two of them had made.  Of the pledges exchanged which had included words like love, honor and until death. Words which skidded across his heart and had branded themselves across the vulnerable parts.

"How are you doing, Mrs. Jovanovic?" he asked through the microphone in the helmet.

"Doing good, husband," came the immediate reply, and he felt her small hands flex on his jacket.  "How much further?"

"An hour, maybe more," he replied back.  The peaceful feeling was still there within him and he couldn't explain it, didn't want to examine it.  Maybe it was simply that he was getting close to home, or the place that felt like home to him, anyway.

Or perhaps it is the feel of her plastered against your back.  Snugged up against you that makes you feel so…right
, a corner of his mind corrected. 

For whatever reason, the morning had found his mind filled with thoughts of the girl holding him so tight instead of the gravesite pledge to a woman who was lost to him.  A person just as damaged as he was, who had completed the younger version of himself.  A woman who'd carried the beginnings of the family his heart craved so desperately and gave him hope for his future, their future.

He heard the words he'd used the night before to explain about Nadia and felt his face crease again into a scowl.  He wasn't lying but somehow the words he'd used didn't sound like the truth, the full truth.  In fact, now that he thought about it, what he had shared with Nadia hadn't sounded like two people becoming a romantic couple, although at the time it had felt like it.  Viewed from a much different place in his life, what he'd had with Nadia had held many more layers than what was growing with Reese. 

From the place they'd come from, all the death and destruction they'd known as children, romance had not been something either one of them seemed to need.  Other wants were more important: to value and be valued by, to protect and be protected, to allow themselves to enjoy and treasure one another without the fear of it being taken away.  Romance, in light of their heart's deeper requirements, wasn't necessary.  Their feelings for one another, even without that ardor, had been deep and connected enough to soothe the damaged portions of their hearts.

Looking back, Brand saw how serious he and Nadia had been even with the feelings that had between them.  They had spent hours discussing and planning their future together:  where they would live, how many children they would have, what kind of jobs they would have to support their family.  But the frivolous words of love, the gestures of passion had not played a part in their relationship.

He wondered now if that would've changed over their years together if she'd lived, if they'd been able to have the future they'd planned so carefully.  Would Nadia have ever accepted his need to give and receive physical affection?  Perhaps come to enjoy it for herself?

  She had been her father's diplomatic daughter.  Socially adept, willing to move through the mine fields of political situations, but as a love partner?  No.

 He hated to admit it if only to himself, but it was as if she tolerated him in the infrequent times they were alone. 

Brand took a moment to explore this thought as he compared it to the beauty that was pressed and holding him with her arms and thighs. As for the other…

He wondered why it hadn't occurred to him before that Nadia only allowed him to use her body and never found her own satisfaction in their infrequent joining.  She'd only withstood him and his clumsy pawings when his need, his arousal became too much for him to contain.

She'd simply endured the physical side of him and his need for closeness.

When they were dating, he'd been young enough to be hopeful that her feelings would change if he gave her enough time, space and empathy.  Especially when she had briefly referred to her year alone in the camp after her father had gone to America, and her mother had died from one of the viruses, which ran rife through her camp.  While she'd alluded to things, she never came right out and talked about what she'd gone through.  Claiming it was, 'no worse than others,' when he had questioned her about it.  But she had never gone into detail.  She'd never had an emotional breakdown when he'd tried to use his mouth or force her mouth on him. All Nadia had offered was a simple, unemotional, 'No', and then turned her head away.

"You became the love of each other's lives slowly, then?" Reese had pressed.

 He made a noise in his throat as his mind began to explore something he'd never acknowledged.   Nadia had never responded to him except in his fantasies when he was alone in the shower stroking himself.  But he had coveted and ached for her reaction that told him she wanted him.  To reciprocate in his caresses…

Now he was almost ashamed to realize that the romantic love words usually said between couples had never been uttered by him or Nadia.  Not when she'd told him of the pregnancy which they suspected was due to a broken condom.  Not even when he'd asked her father for permission to marry her or when Brand had proposed to her.

Brand knew he'd loved her with all he'd had at the time.  He'd valued Nadia, respected her, cared for her and held both her and her father in high esteem.  He'd been devastated by their loss and the loss of the new life he'd planted inside the woman who was to become his bride.   Had vowed never to allow himself to love again.

But in pledging something so unrealistic, had he made Nadia a martyr?  Held both himself and her memory captive, a wall that prevented him from ever feeling deeply again?  Did living his own life take away from the beauty of the connection he'd once shared with her?

He didn't have answers, none that he could find anyway.  But just asking the questions seemed to release some knot within him.  In fact, when he searched his heart the gaping hole within him was gone.  Its absence, the lack of emotion inside, was the only mark of its passing.  Brand realized at last, at long fucking last, he was letting Nadia go.

Perhaps the anger he'd held onto for so many years was due to the death of his young dreams and the loss of hope in his future.  As well as the guilt of living when she and his unborn child had not.

Godspeed, Nadia Stankovic
, his heart whispered in the old language. 
May heaven give you the joy you couldn't find here on earth
.

His eyes caught on the glint of dark blue caught in one of his side-view mirrors, forcing him away from memories and back to their journey.

"Reese?  I need for you to pull your hair out of the top of your jacket," he instructed through the helmet mike.  He felt her release an arm from his waist and soon saw a flash of one of the bright red locks of hair in a corner of the mirror.

"Are they here?" he heard her ask as she again settled herself against him.

"Just beyond the truck behind us.  Your visor is down, yes?"