Darkness Before the Dawn (Maggie Bennett 2)

He dropped Miroslav into the dust and grabbed her, planted his mouth on hers, and kissed her with a youthful completeness she hadn’t experienced since … since his brother. When he finally released her, he had a pleased grin on his face.

“Vasili told me how beautiful you were, lady,” he said, hauling the body over his shoulder again, “and he didn’t lie. Now I’d better get out fast. Your man is looking like he’d like to do to me what he did to Miroslav. Good-bye, my friends.” And he disappeared into the shadows with his burden.

Maggie turned to face Randall. Whatever expression had amused Leopold was gone now, leaving the blank, shuttered look she was so damned used to. There were no words. She looked at him for a long, confused moment.

“Let’s go,” he said finally, his voice even and polite as if the last half-hour of violence and savagery had never happened. “We’ll need all the sleep we can get. It’s close to midnight, and dawn is sometime around five.”

She held her ground for a moment. “Are you all right?”

“What do you mean?” His answering question was wary.

“Did he hurt you? Did you hurt yourself … uh—”

“Did I hurt myself beating the shit out of him?” Randall finished the question smoothly. “No. And he didn’t manage to lay a hand on me. I’m fine.”

“You’re very good, aren’t you?” she said, wonder and distrust in her voice. And something else, something she didn’t even recognize.

He looked as if he didn’t know what answer she wanted. He gave the only answer he knew, the honest one. “Yes.” He held out his hand to her, an instinctive gesture, and when he realized what he’d done, he dropped it.

She crossed the few feet to his side, afraid to touch him. “I was afraid you were going to kill him,” she said suddenly.

“I wanted to. But I’d promised Leopold.” He was watching her with a combination of patience and curiosity. “Are you coming with me, or are you going to spend the night out here?”

It was a thought. Going back into that run-down hovel with Randall suddenly seemed comparable to climbing into the lion’s cage with a ferocious man-eater. She eyed him warily, wondering what she would do if he pounced. And even worse, what she would do if he didn’t.

“I’m coming with you.”

The shack seemed smaller. The moon was setting, the shadows were deepening, and Randall seemed suddenly much larger than before, filling the spaces around her. He shut the door behind them, quietly, carefully, but she wasn’t fooled. All through the silent walk across the field, she could feel the tension thrumming through him, feel the violence still simmering beneath the surface, feel the anger and intensity that she could never understand.

“You take the bed,” he said, unbuttoning the remaining buttons on his shirt with deceptive calm.

She stood very still. It was a very small bed, more a sagging cot than anything else, but courtesy and something else dictated that she make the offer. “Where will you sleep? On the floor?”

“I could hardly hover in midair, now could I?” he replied, his thinly veiled temper slipping through.

“Don’t be an idiot, Randall,” she snapped. “We can share the bed.”

He moved then, swiftly, silently, and once more she was reminded of his deadly intent down by the bridge. It wasn’t death she had to fear from him, she knew that—unless it was the death of her soul, from loving the wrong man. “It’s a small bed, Maggie.”

She managed a casual shrug that convinced neither of them. “We can sleep back to back. I’m not worried, Randall. I’m sure you’re not about to ravish me. I’m not one to overestimate my charms, and you’re very good at resisting what you want to resist.”

“Maggie,” he said, his voice implacable and frightening in the darkness, “there are times when even you are a fool.” Then his hands were on her arms, and she knew the waiting was over, the choice was made, and there was no turning back.

The roughness of his mouth on hers reopened the cut on her lip, and she could taste the blood as she moved into his arms. With a small, deliberate decision, she turned her brain off, turned her mind and memory and doubts away, so that there was only the two of them, entwined in the darkness, his hungry mouth on hers, devouring, demanding, denying the existence of a past or future.

His mouth left hers, and his hands held her still, moving her inches away from his hot, tense body. “Maggie,” he said, his voice rough in the darkness.

He was frustratingly out of reach. His voice was the voice of reason, but she fought against it, fought against him, reaching for him. He gave her a small shake. “Maggie,” he said again, “do you know what you’re doing?”

She started to close in on herself again. “If you don’t want me, Randall,” she said, “all you have to do is say so.”

“How many men have you slept with since Pulaski died?”

She winced at the question, flayed by the memory of Mack. “None of your damned business,” she said.

“No one, right? Don’t you think I’m a hell of a choice? Do you really want to make it with someone you hate?” His words were biting, intrusive, and she wanted to hide from them. But his hands held her steady, the long fingers biting into her arms.

“Message received, Randall,” she snapped. “Get your hands off me, and I’ll sleep on the floor.”