A Match for Celia

The lights were still on in Celia’s bedroom. The bedclothes were still tangled and twisted. She swallowed hard, remembering that she and Reed had shared that bed only hours before. She didn’t know what time it was now—an hour or so before dawn, probably—but everything had changed during this eventful night.

It was hard to believe so much had happened in so short a time. That her perceptions of him had been altered so dramatically since he’d left her bed.

Suddenly shy, she avoided looking at him as she quickly opened a drawer and pulled out a clean T-shirt. “There’s an ice maker in the bar in the other room,” she said. “Why don’t you put an ice pack on your head while I change? I promise to hurry.”

“I don’t want an ice pack.”

She bit her lip, nodded and moved toward the bathroom to change.

Reed stopped her with a hand on her arm. “Stay in here where I can see you. You’re still too pale. I don’t want you passing out in there.”

Despite what had passed between them earlier, it bothered her to think of undressing in front of him now. In some ways, he wasn’t the same man she’d made love with before. “I’m not going to pass out,” she assured him, still without looking at him. “I just want to wash up a bit.”

“Celia.” His voice sounded strained, as if his patience had worn much too thin. “Change the damned shirt and let’s go. I want someone to look at your head. You could have a concussion.”

So could he, she thought in quick remorse. Reed must be feeling terrible. This wasn’t the time for inappropriate modesty on her part.

She tugged the soiled T-shirt over her head. She couldn’t bite back a faint groan when the neckline rubbed against the raw lump on her forehead, and her scraped palms stung in protest of the activity. She ached all over.

Reed’s hand fell quickly on her shoulder, her thin bra strap the only thing separating his palm from her bare skin. “Are you all right?”

“Yes.” She concentrated on finding the hem of the clean T-shirt.

“Celia.” He exerted enough pressure on her shoulder to turn her toward him. “Why aren’t you looking at me? Is your vision blurred? Are you seeing double?”

He tilted her face upward, anxiously searching her face, studying her eyes with clinical thoroughness.

To Celia’s chagrin, she felt her eyes brim with hot tears.

Reed reacted immediately. He tugged the shirt out of her hand, tossed it aside and pulled her into his arms. “It’s okay, Celia,” he murmured, one hand supporting the back of her head. “It’s all over now.”

She clung to him, burying her face in his shoulder. His shirt was crumpled, dirty, dampened with sweat and drops of blood. She didn’t care. She soaked up his warmth, his strength. And prayed that when he’d said it was all over now, he wasn’t talking about them.

He stroked her bare back, soothingly, slowly, murmuring something she couldn’t quite catch. After a moment, she lifted her head and looked at him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to fall apart.”

“You have every right to do so,” he said, still holding her close. “It’s been a hell of a night.”

He could say that again. She’d lost her virginity, stumbled onto an illicit arms deal, witnessed an attack on Reed, gotten herself captured and thrown into a room full of guns, escaped, discovered that Reed wasn’t at all what he’d pretended to be, been held at gunpoint, watched her friend get shot…

“Yes,” she said. “I guess you could say it’s been an eventful night.”

Reed smiled crookedly and rested his forehead against hers. “Poor Celia. You found more adventure than you bargained for when you left Percy, didn’t you?”

She’d found adventure, all right. And so much more. “Reed?” she asked in a very small voice.

He tenderly smoothed a strand of hair away from her injured forehead. “What?”

“Was it all an act?” She motioned toward the bed. “Everything?”

He stiffened. His eyes flashed. If she hadn’t already known he was a dangerous man by that time, she would have realized it then.

His voice was a low growl. “Are you asking if I made love to you as part of my job?”

She tilted her chin and answered bravely. “Yes. I guess that is what I’m asking.”

“Damn it, Celia, don’t you know I could have lost my job because of you? Hell, I still might, as badly as I screwed up this assignment.”

She searched his face, looking for any reason not to take him at his word. “You lied to me,” she said. “About your job, your reason for being here.”