Page 6

Gunnar

I was gonna die. And I was going to hell. I had a naked woman in my arms. One who had been the sole focus of my existence for four weeks. The same woman I’d sworn to my only friend I’d give the protection of my property patch and make her my old lady. Everything in me was screaming to take care of her, not to objectify her or even look at her as anything other than a young woman who was hurting and vulnerable. Unfortunately, my dick didn’t get the Goddamned message.

“I’m so sorry!” Pippa clung to me, breathing hard. She kicked out, trying to get her feet under her, but I lifted her with my arm around her waist. She sucked in a breath, her eyes going wide. “Gunnar?” That breathless whimper was the only thing keeping me from seeing how far she let me take us. But there was no way she was able to consent to anything. And I wasn’t nearly ready my own damned self.

“Are you OK?” My voice was a husky groan as need punched through my body like a spear.

She nodded, looking up at me. I couldn’t tell if she was frightened or not, but instead of resting passively in my arms, she gripped my shoulders and pulled herself closer to me. Her breasts were mashed against my chest, and I couldn’t stop myself from shuddering.

“Words, honey.” I cleared my throat. “I need words.”

“Yes.”

I sat her on the vanity and snagged a towel from the shelf over the toilet. I wrapped the towel around her shoulders and snagged another one to wring her hair out. She tucked the terry cloth under her arms to hold it in place.

Pippa trembled slightly as I gently squeezed water from her long hair with the towel. Her eyes never left mine, wide and uncertain. I tried to focus on the task at hand and not on how soft her skin looked or how badly I wanted to touch her because no matter how much I wanted to, it simply wasn’t happening.

“Thank you,” she whispered. “I’m sorry for causing you so much trouble.” Her lower lip trembled even as she smiled. “And for getting you wet.”

I grinned back at her. “You could never cause any trouble, honey. And I’m the one who barged in here.” I winced. “Probably overreacted.”

“You were worried about me?”

“Yeah. I was.”

“Because you promised my dad you’d protect me.” Where before there might have been a budding desire in her eyes, now Pippa looked lost. Resigned even.

I shook my head slowly. “No. And no, I can’t talk about it right at the moment because I don’t know what to tell you. But it’s not because I’m obligated.” It was her turn to shiver. She sucked in a breath, and I knew she felt the pull between us too. She gave me a shy smile, lowering her gaze so her eyelashes lay like dark crescents under her eyes. “Do you think you can stand, honey?”

“Yeah.” Pippa nodded and slid off the vanity as I stepped back. I kept my hands on her hips to steady her. Good thing too, because she swayed slightly and I realized she was drooping with exhaustion.

“You gonna be able to eat? I think you’ll feel better with something in your stomach, even if it’s just a bite or two.”

“I’ll try. I’m hungry, but I’m dead on my feet.”

“Figured.”

“I’m going to have to cut my hair.” The sad look on her face told me her hair represented more than just hair to her.

“Maybe not. I bet we can save most of it.”

“Are you good with getting mats out of a woman’s hair?”

I shrugged, a smile tugging at my lips at a memory. “I used to be. When me and my sister were little, she had hair so long she had to be careful not to sit on it. She was all the time getting knots in it. No matter how hard she tried to keep it brushed, she would always end up crying and bringing me her brush to help her.”

“How old were you?”

I shrugged. “Maybe seven or eight. She said Mom was too rough. Just like Mom was always too rough cleaning our faces. Like every spot of spaghetti sauce was a personal affront to her.”

“I think that’s a mom thing. Mine was always too rough too.”

“Anyway, Hannah refused to cut her hair, and I hated listening to my sister struggle with taming the wild mass. So, I took care of her.”

“Just like when she defended herself and killed her attacker?”

I should have expected the question, but she slipped it in there as skillfully as any investigator. “Yeah, I guess so.” She didn’t flinch away from me at the reminder of my prison time. I thought I might see fear or something in her expression, but there was only a deep longing. “Did you ever have anyone help you with your hair?”

“No.” She looked away.

“No sisters? Surely your mom helped you.”

She shrugged. “My mom wasn’t what one would call overly demonstrative. If she ever helped me with anything, I don’t remember it.”

I reached for the clothes she’d set on a small make-up table so she didn’t have to walk on shaky legs. “That doesn’t sound very pleasant.”

“I guess it’s what happens when your mother gets pregnant by a prison inmate but has a husband on the outside.”

“Knuckles didn’t tell me that part.”

“That’s because I doubt Knuckles knows. If he does, he’s got Mom completely fooled. She seduced him, intentionally got pregnant by him, introduced us and suckered him into thinking of me as his daughter so he cares about me. At least, that’s what she believes she did.”

“You think your mother had anything to do with your kidnapping?”

“I can’t say for sure either way. And you have no idea how bad that hurts.”

I grunted. “To know the whole reason you were conceived was to hurt someone else.”

“Yeah. The only thing I know about my father is that Mom says he’s a killer and that if he suspects for a moment I’m playing him, he’ll kill me without hesitation.”

“Pippa, Knuckles would never hold you responsible for your mother’s actions. Even if you were guilty of tryin’ to take him out, he’d still give you every benefit of the doubt until he couldn’t.”

“But after that, he would kill me if he thought he had to.”

“Honey, I’m not going to lie and say that, no, he wouldn’t kill you if he thought he had to. But I can’t say he would kill you either. I’ve known him for fifteen years. The only time I ever seen the man show fear was right after he came back to his cell the afternoon he met you. He said the whole prison knew he now had a weakness.”

Pippa gave me a strange look. “I don’t like being a weakness. To anyone.”

“You’re only his weakness because he can’t have anything happen to you. Especially not because of him. Your dad has a lot of enemies, but he’s still as solid as they come. Ain’t gonna say he’s a good man, but he has a strict code he lives by.”

“You trust him?”

That startled me. I hadn’t expected the question. “Yes. Like I said. He’s solid. He might not do something for the reasons you think and he will always find a way to use any situation to his advantage, but he would never intentionally hurt an innocent.”

“Then I’m going to choose to believe Knuckles is better than my mom. Do you know if anyone has been looking for me? Did Mom file a police report or anything?”

Yeah. This girl was smart. And it was going to get her hurt. “You’re so tired your words are slurring, Pippa. We can talk about all this later. I’ll give you as many answers as I have once you’ve had a chance to rest. Get dressed and I’ll see if I can work through your hair while you eat something.”

“There’s no way I can eat while you attempt to detangle this rat’s nest. Notice I used the word ‘attempt.’”

As I’d hoped, I distracted her from the line of questioning she’d opened. Because the answer to her question was a resounding no . Her mother hadn’t fileda police report. She also knew full well her daughter was missing because I’d spoken with the woman three weeks before I finally found Pippa, then again just before we executed the rescue. Both times, the woman claimed to have seen her daughter just the day before.

“We makin’ bets?”

“I don’t have any money. Since I’ve been gone a month, I’m sure my bank account is overdrawn.” She tried to sound flippant, but I could tell she was doing her best to keep reality at bay. She needed to break down and have a good cry or primal scream or something. Instead, I watched as she bottled up all the pent-up fear, anger, and grief inside her and tried to bury it in dark humor. But this woman was hurting.

“How about, if you manage to accomplish anything on my hair without me calling you a son of a bitch while I’m eating, I’ll talk Knuckles into getting you out of babysitting duty.”

“You’re not getting out of this as easy as that, Pippa. I promised Knuckles and, now that I’ve met you and spent some time in your company, I’m not sure I’m ready to quit this job.”

She stared up at me and, in her eyes, I saw the same longing I felt. Then she closed her eyes tightly. When she opened them, her face was blank.

“Do not shut me out, Pippa.” I didn’t mean to snarl at her, but I did. She didn’t recoil, but her eyes widened and she sucked in a breath. “You tell me what you’re thinking, and I tell you what I’m thinking. If we do that, we can get to know each other faster. Now, what are you trying to keep from me?”

“Nothing. Just…” She took a deep breath. “Gunnar, will you kiss me?”