Darkness Before the Dawn (Maggie Bennett 2)

Maggie’s smile widened. “Caleb McAllister.”

“Good.”

“Good?” That wasn’t quite the reaction she’d been hoping for. But what had she been hoping for? she demanded of herself. “Why ‘good’?”

“Because if he’s busy here, I can go search his office.”

“Guess again, Randall. We can go search his office. What are we searching for?”

He stared down his long, elegant nose at her, disapproval radiating through him. “We’re looking for anything pertaining to Francis’s last project. You know, you’d be a great deal more helpful if you stayed here.”

“Why don’t you stay here, and I’ll go search his office?” Maggie countered brightly. “And if you don’t take your goddamned hand off my arm, I’ll kick you so hard you won’t be going anywhere.”

He didn’t even blink. “You’re welcome to try anytime, Maggie. I haven’t slowed down in the last five years.”

“Six,” she said, and could have shot herself.

He nodded, expressionless. “You’re right. It has been six years.” He released her. “I thought we weren’t going to waste our energy fighting each other.”

“I’m not fighting you, Randall. I’m just going to help you search Caleb’s office.”

He sighed, a put-upon sound that didn’t quite match the deep intensity of his stormy eyes. “What did I do to deserve you?” he murmured.

“You want me to remind you?” Her voice was still and cold.

Randall looked at her, suddenly wary, and she could see there was no need for reminders. He hadn’t forgotten a thing. “We only have a few minutes, Maggie. Do you want to spend it on nostalgia or on finding out who framed your sister?”

Her smile was ice cold. “The nostalgia can wait, Randall. Show me Caleb’s office.”

Their affair had been a mistake from the first. Maggie had known that, just as she’d also known it was inevitable. From the moment Randall had shown up at the cemetery—No, from the moment she’d walked into Mike Jackson’s office and seen him—she’d recognized the inevitability of it all.

But that was no excuse. She should have fought, and kept on fighting, and never let him close enough to touch her. It wasn’t the physical touching that had done her in, though that was powerful enough. It was the psychic reaching, deep inside her soul, something that cried out to her from some part of Randall that was carefully locked away.

Damn, she’d been a fool to believe such things. The only thing Randall Carter had locked away inside him was a stone-cold, flint-hard heart the size of a walnut. She’d had more than enough proof of that.

She’d learned to forgive herself for her stupid mistakes. She had been alone and frightened and out of her element in that grimy little industrial town of Gemansk. She’d had no sleep, had spent the last day and a half desperately trying to keep a man alive—a man who’d taken his own life the moment she’d left him.

Randall had been in control and had been unmoved by the impossible situation they found themselves in. He had been a tower of strength, and she’d succumbed to the temptation of giving in to that strength, of lying back and waiting for someone else to make everything all right.

It reminded her of her mother. Passive and nondemanding, she’d let him do everything, from getting their provisions to meeting with Vasili to arranging their escape. She’d been content to stay in that dismal apartment and wait for his return. On her back, she taunted herself. And Randall had even taken care of that, demanding nothing of her but the shimmering, instant response he was so good at eliciting.

He had been sitting at the table when she awoke one morning after they’d been there a little over a week. The room had been filled with the depressing blue-gray light of a grimy industrial dawn, and Maggie wanted to bury her head beneath the scratchy sheet and hide. Hide from the bleakness of the day, hide from the bleakness in Randall’s blue-gray eyes. Their lovemaking the night before had been tinged with desperation that left Maggie exhausted and frightened. They hadn’t slept more than a few hours, and she felt an unbearable sense of doom hovering over them. The remote expression on Randall’s face offered no reassurance.

Not even the smell of freshly made coffee could warm the atmosphere. Maggie sat up in bed and pulled the covers over her breasts in a wasted protective gesture.

He looked up from the paper he had been reading. It was as if the mutual passion of last night had never happened. He’d turned to her time and time again in the darkness, insatiable, driven, wearing them both out with his demands. Sometime during the night, their relationship had changed from one of student and teacher, master and apprentice, to something approaching a dangerous equality. Randall had given her a small part of his soul last night, and he didn’t like it one tiny bit.

Tough, she thought, scooting down in the bed and giving him her best smile. Which was a neat trick, considering that her mouth was bruised and swollen from his kisses. It was going to work out, despite his ironclad reserve and the unmistakable existence of a wife. She was going to make him love her.

“We’re getting out,” he said, and his eyes returned to the paper.

She took in that news with mixed emotions. She was desperate to get away from the squalid little apartment, out into the sunshine again. But here, Randall belonged only to her; here, she had the advantage. Out in the real world things might change far too swiftly. “When?” she said.

“Vasili came by this morning, before you woke up,” he said, not answering. “There’s a man in the visa office who can be bribed.”

“When?” she repeated patiently.

“He’s trustworthy,” Randall continued, still refusing to answer. “He’ll keep his end of the bargain if we keep ours. Vasili took him our new passports.”