“Well…” I smiled sadly “…I got it, all right. Mission accomplished. I now know you will go to extreme lengths to push me away. We have such a frightening ability to get under each other’s skin in the worst, most terrible way. I think I’m finally done with you.”
I didn’t necessarily speak the truth, but my wounded pride wouldn’t let me yield to my heart’s desire.
He stepped forward, his heat radiating through me. I took a step back toward the bannisters.
“Why do I have a feeling you are playing me, Aisling?” he asked.
Low. Calmly. Deadly.
I swallowed, stepping backward for the millionth time. “Who said I wasn’t?”
“Your doe-like, please-don’t-eat-me eyes. But I’m starting to see there’s much more to you than I initially thought.”
“Your opinion of me wasn’t very high in the first place, so that’s not saying much.”
I retreated again. He advanced toward me. This terrible tango of wills.
“I checked your IRS file. You don’t have an income. Whatever you do is either voluntary or paid under the table. With your family going through audits every single year, I doubt you are stupid enough to meddle with money.”
“What?” I gasped, scandalized. “How dare you—”
“Easily. That’s how. Now it’s your turn to answer a question. What is it that you do in this clinic, Nix?”
I felt my back hitting the edge of the bannister, the stone digging into my spine.
I lost my balance and tipped over, my arms thrashing in the air. My torso flew right over the balcony, but Sam grabbed me by the waist, the only thing to keep me suspended in the air, six floors above ground, from sure death.
A thin crust of ice covered the stone, making it even more slippery.
My heart lurched, beating wildly and hysterically.
“Pull me back!” I cried out, my hands desperately trying to clutch onto his tux. “Please!”
He dodged my attempts, pinning my waist harder against the stone but not letting me touch any part of him.
“I don’t think so, sweetheart. First, you owe me a few truths. You’ll start by telling me what you did outside my apartment a week ago. Because looking back, you couldn’t have come there just because you needed a shoulder to cry on.”
“I did!” I gasped, swallowing air. “I—”
“You took one of my bullets,” he snapped, loosening his grip on my waist. My body dangled between life and death, hanging on the balance between his fingers fluttering against my middle.
He did this on purpose.
The realization hit me more violently than any slap would.
He cornered me, made me walk backward to try to get away from him, and got me right where he wanted me. At his mercy. Now he was threatening to kill me if I didn’t tell him the truth.
The worst part was he could get away with it, too. It was going to look like a sure accident. I had more than a few drinks throughout the night, and Sam could easily slip out of here undetected.
“Let me go!” I wheezed.
“You sure about that?” I heard his grave chuckle. I couldn’t see anything other than the black velvet sky above me, the stars shimmering like fairy dust, watching intently to see how my night played out. “Why did you take the bullet, Nix?”
“Sam, please—”
“Answer me.”
“I’m scared,” I whispered, my voice cold and low.
“Tell me the truth and you’ll have no reason to be.”
“Because I knew it was from the man you killed at the carnival!” I screamed, getting it out of my system. “My obsession with you started right after that damned carnival. I checked the news to see who was killed there, guessing correctly that they’d found the body. I found his name—Mason Kipling—and read that he was a human trafficker who had been wanted by the FBI. I put two and two together. Realized you had some beef with the guy. When I saw the bullet, M.K., I couldn’t help myself. I took it. Happy?”
He was quiet for a few seconds. I was scared he’d get tired of holding my waist and would let go. A shiver ran through my body from head to toe. My tears flew downward, trickling from my forehead, as they landed somewhere under the ballroom. Probably in the empty hotel pool.
“Now tell me why you came to my apartment.” His voice was silk and leather, traveling over my skin like a whip, promising both pain and pleasure.
“No.”
“Tell me what you do in that clinic.”
“No.”
“Aisling …” He began to loosen his grip on my waist even more, and I sucked in a sharp breath, telling myself that he couldn’t—wouldn’t—let me die. Not because he had a conscience but because I meant something to him.
That was why he couldn’t touch other women and not for lack of trying.
That was why we kept coming back to each other over and over again, drawn together like magnets.