The Confession Read online

  Searching for a little summer dress and flip-flops, I went down the stairs to meet him. Each step closer made me feel lighter. Just being near him made me happy.

  He turned when he saw me approach, and when his gaze lowered to my legs, I did a quick spin to give him a better look.

  “Hey,” I said, and lifted on my tiptoes to give him a kiss.

  He didn’t kiss me back.

  He turned back to the water, and threw another rock, this time with enough force to rip a hole through the ozone.

  A weight descended on my shoulders.

  “Um . . . is everything all right?”

  “You’re a bed hog,” he said. “You’re four feet tall and you take up three-quarters of a queen-sized bed.”

  Four feet? Try five-four. I crossed my arms over my chest as he picked up another handful of rocks and began to toss them.

  “And you have an enormous amount of girl stuff crowding the bathroom counter.”

  Just a few products. And a blow-dryer. And okay, maybe some makeup and brushes. But in my defense it was a tiny bathroom. I thought it better not to mention that this was only about a third of the stuff I regularly used. The rest of it was still at my apartment.

  “And?” Clearly I’d done something to annoy him. He might as well let it all spill now.

  He threw another rock. A bead of sweat dripped down his temple, and he wiped it away on his shoulder.

  “And,” he said, really heaving the next one, “the thought of not seeing you every day is breaking my fucking heart.”

  He’d run out of rocks.

  I put my hand on his shoulder, feeling it rise and fall with each breath.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  He stared out over the water. “I’m not going to testify against Max.”

  My hand fell.

  The water splashed over my toes, and as the wave retreated I could feel the suction of the sand on my feet.

  “What are you talking about?”

  He wouldn’t look at me.

  “You have to testify,” I said. “If you don’t, you’ll go to jail.” That was the deal. He’d struck a bargain with the district attorney. If he testified, all charges against him would be dropped. He’d serve three months in the penitentiary, and play ball with the FBI, and this mess would eventually go away.

  The thought of not seeing you every day is breaking my heart.

  His moodiness over the past couple of days began to make sense.

  “Dinner last night, and you and me after . . .” The way he’d held me too tight, and gotten me a birthday cake, and made love to me like it was the last time. He’d known our time was ticking. “Was that just some elaborate good-bye?”

  “I love you, Anna.”

  I pulled my shoulders back to make more room to breathe.

  “No,” I said. “You’re giving your testimony. You’re sending Maxim Stein to prison, otherwise none of what we’ve been through matters.”

  “He’ll keep using you against me.”

  “Not if you send him away!” I pulled my feet from the sand and positioned myself in front of him. “If we win this trial, he’ll have nothing. No company, no money, no collateral. He won’t be able to pay people to hurt us. It’ll be over.”

  He met my eyes, the pain in them so deep I felt like someone had punched me in the gut.

  “I can’t take that risk,” he said.

  “You already have,” I said, gritting my teeth. “And we’ve shown him that we can survive anything he throws at us.”

  “He’ll release the pictures. They’ll be all over the news.”

  “I don’t care!” I planted my hands on his chest and pushed, but his feet were stuck in the sand, too, and he nearly stumbled before he caught himself. “They’re just pictures.”

  I did care, of course, but if it meant keeping Alec, I’d submit them to the papers myself.

  “Pictures he hurt you to get,” he said. “Next time it’ll be worse, Anna. This was the last warning.”

  His voice was so calm, so even. Like he’d already made up his mind.

  “You don’t get to make this decision without me,” I said, feeling a twinge of desperation.

  “It’s done.”

  I swallowed the sob. He lifted his hand, as if to touch my face, but I backed up.

  “I told my lawyer two days ago. Chances were slim I could put him away anyway. None of the names I gave corroborated my story—he’s already paid them all off. Jessica Rowe is gone, who knows what he did to her. And there’s nothing besides that car in Miami, and Janelle told me yesterday she can’t pull a number off the plate. There’s no reason to keep putting you in danger.”

  I was crying now. The wind whipped my hair in front of my face, and it stuck to my damp cheeks. I shoved it back.

  “That’s why Matt hasn’t come back.”

  He nodded grimly. “The FBI doesn’t have to protect me anymore. Your pal Marcos has agreed to keep an eye out. Even after I’m gone.”

  This wasn’t happening. This couldn’t happen. Not after I’d only tasted our future. But the look on his face was set.

  “You did this for me,” I said. “You went to the FBI for me. If you hadn’t . . .”

  I was the reason he was going to jail. Because he’d wanted to do the right thing to be worthy of me.

  “I’m doing this for you, too,” he said gently. “I’m sorry I didn’t do it sooner. I thought we could win.”

  I covered my eyes with the heels of my hands. All those things I’d seen, those things I’d finally let myself want, were slipping away.

  “You can’t give up,” I said. “I won’t let you give up.”

  He reached for me then, hands cupping my elbows. He kissed my forehead.

  “I have to turn myself in tomorrow. You should go home to Cincinnati with your dad until all this clears. I talked to him an hour ago. He’s already arranged for a protective detail.”

  It felt like the ground beneath my feet was giving way.

  “Cincinnati isn’t my home,” I said. “Where you are—that’s my home.”

  His head fell forward, his hair falling over his eyes.

  “Anna, I had you longer than I was meant to.”

  I stepped back.

  “Then you’re a coward.”

  She said I was a coward if I didn’t figure out a way to make it work. My father’s voice rang through my head.

  His eyes darkened.

  “Do you love me or not?” I asked.

  “You know I do.”

  “Then fight for me.”

  His gaze narrowed. “I am.”

  “Fight to be with me,” I said. “Fight to stay with me.”

  Another wave hit the back of my calves. The tide was rising, the water stronger than before.

  “Are you hearing me?” I asked. “Maybe I’m a bed hog, but you steal the covers. And you’re a terrible singer. And you are hands down the most stubborn man I’ve ever known, but I love you and I’m going to love you the rest of my life. And you can’t just do that to a person and then cut them loose.”

  “You think this is cutting you loose?” he snapped, his cool composure finally breaking. “I don’t know how many times I have to tell you, you’re it for me.”

  “Then don’t let me go.”

  All the pieces that had scattered suddenly aligned with surprising clarity. I saw it again, as I’d seen it last night. A table surrounded by our friends. Alec’s hand in mine. The way his hair would gray around the temples, like his father. Year after year of conversations, and arguments, and kids we would love together.

  “I’m going away,” he said, uncertainty thinning his voice. “And not just for three months. Years, Anna.”

  I felt like I was standing at the edge of a precipice. Alec facing prison
scared the hell out of me, not just because I’d be alone, but because of the danger he faced when he walked through those gates.

  “I know what we’re facing.” Goliath. And we barely had a slingshot. Maxim Stein’s lawyers were the best money could buy, and all we had were Alec’s truths.

  He tilted his head.

  “You’d wait for me.” It wasn’t a question; it was a baffled accusation, at best.

  I snorted. And then I giggled. And then I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt.

  “You’d marry me.” He looked like I’d just told him I was part mermaid.

  “That depends if you’re asking.”

  Again, I felt that shift between us. Something was changing. Something important, that would forever alter the course of our lives.

  And for once, I welcomed it.

  “I’ve literally got nothing to offer you. Even if we win and I get the company, it won’t be worth anything.”

  I laughed. Was this the Middle Ages? I didn’t need a dowry and three goats.

  “I’ll have you,” I said. “That’s all I want.”

  It took him a while to process this.

  “That’s all I want,” he said finally.

  “Well?”

  He scratched his head. “Look, if you’re fucking with me . . .”

  I jumped into his arms. “Yes. Yes, yes, yes.” I kissed his cheek. “I mean, no, I’m not fucking with you. Yes to the other thing.”

  He laughed, still confused. And then he lifted me higher and squeezed me so tightly I coughed because he was crushing my lungs.

  “Yes?” he asked.

  “On one condition.”

  “Anything you want.”

  “You testify. And we see how this plays out.”

  He froze, then set me down.

  “Anna.”

  “That’s my condition.”

  He shook his head, then bit his upper lip.

  “You know I can’t say no to you.”

  “Especially now.” I smiled.

  He gave a dry laugh. “I’m screwed, aren’t I?”

  “You’re so screwed.”

  He kissed me then, and there wasn’t even a hint of sadness within him. There was only pure, unfiltered joy, and when I wrapped my arms around his neck, he picked me up, and I thought, This moment right now. This is the best of all of them, and I will remember it for the rest of my life.

  And then we were laughing, and spinning, and he was chasing me as I ran back toward the stairs that led to the apartment above the restaurant. He caught me before we reached the top and kissed me until the world tilted sideways. I barely escaped before he took me right there under the cloudy sky.

  We almost didn’t make it inside. As soon as he kicked the door shut, my hands were yanking on his belt and his were pulling the sundress over my head. It caught halfway over my shoulder, and he tripped on his pants, and we crashed to the floor, drunk on each other, and our doomed future, and the love we would risk our lives for.

  He pushed into me slowly, and when he settled between my legs I smiled, and kissed him with the same tenderness he showed my body.

  “Ask me,” I whispered, as he found that pace I loved.

  He looked into my eyes. “Marry me, Anna.”

  “Yes,” I said. And as he moved deeper I said it again, and again, and again.

  Twenty-nine

  “Your phone is ringing,” I said, eyelids heavy. Whoever it was had called twice in the last five minutes. If they’d called before that, I hadn’t heard the ring over my own cries of pleasure.

  “I’ll call them later.” His head rested on my stomach, and I combed back his hair with my fingers. The brush of his eyelashes on my skin tickled, and when I squirmed, he wrapped one arm beneath my lower back.

  My dress was crumpled beneath my head as a pillow, but his pants still hung on one leg. I was still flushed, not just from what he’d done to me, but what we’d both promised.

  We were getting married.

  Maybe not today. Maybe not for a while. But we would have our happily ever after, even if we had to take on Maxim Stein’s army of lawyers to get it.

  “Mrs. Flynn,” I said when the phone stopped. “That’ll take some getting used to.”

  He kissed my belly button, drawing a new wave of heat to the surface.

  “Not for me,” he said.

  I rolled onto my side, and he continued kissing my waist, my ribs. Slowly and leisurely, as if he had all the time in the world.

  If he didn’t, I refused to be sad about it now. Soon, the course of our future would be revealed, but until then he was right here in my arms.

  “How long have you been thinking about this?” I asked.

  He chuckled. “A while.”

  He kissed the side of my bare breast, and though my vision went a little fuzzy, I forced myself to keep talking.

  “How long’s ‘a while’?”

  “Since you first spent the night.”

  “That’s not that long,” I said. “I’ve been here, what? A week?”

  “At my apartment downtown,” he added.

  “Oh. Oh.” That was months ago, before Alec had even gone to prison. Before Charlotte MacAfee had died, or her brother, Trevor Marshall aka William MacAfee, had tried to avenge her. I remembered it now, waking up from a nightmare. The way he’d held me and eventually, after I was settled, made love to me.

  He rose on his elbow and kissed around my side to the back of my ribs.

  “I already knew I was in deep.” He kissed the top of my shoulder, “But that night I knew there was no going back. I even told Mike the next day.”

  I turned, so that he was forced to look at me. “What did you tell him?”

  He kissed the top of my breast, making my breath hitch.

  “I told him I met a girl. The girl.”

  I smiled. “And what did he say?”

  Slowly, he drew my nipple into his mouth, swirling his tongue around the hard point. I arched into him, and his hands fanned out beneath my back, holding him to me.

  “He said it’s about goddamn time.”

  The laughter bubbled out. “Amy’s got it bad for him. They kissed, you know.”

  “I heard. It was so good she ran into a closet.”

  I winced. “He makes her nervous.”

  Alec grinned, nuzzling his face into my hair. “He likes making her nervous.”

  “He told you that?”

  I gasped as a warm, wet tongue tasted the soft skin beneath my ear.

  “He might have mentioned it.”

  “What else did he mention?”

  I was talking faster. It was just a matter of time before I lost the power of speech.

  “I can’t remember.” His hard length pressed against my thigh, and I surrendered. My legs parted for him. My fingers slid down his broad shoulders. I could touch him forever.

  And I would.

  The phone rang.

  Alec stilled, then groaned and muttered something about adding homicide to his rap sheet.

  “Maybe it’s Janelle,” I said. My heart leapt at the possibility that she’d learned more about the car that had taken me. If she could find a plate number, she could find out who rented it, and maybe we could tie them to Stein.

  “Don’t move,” Alec said, giving me a stern look. He pushed up, kicked his pants off the one ankle where they still clung, and snagged his phone off the kitchen counter. I stayed on my back on the floor, not a stitch of clothing to cover me, arms behind my head like I was sunning at the beach.

  He looked at me as if I was purposefully punishing him. Which I sort of was. I bent my knees, and then opened them just slightly to give him a peek.

  His gaze narrowed. He looked down at his phone, and scowled.

  “Ben, hey.” He cleared
his throat. “Hang on a second.”

  My dad? Ew. My knees snapped shut. I sat up, shook out the summer dress, and then slipped it over my head. Apparently Alec felt better talking to my father with clothes on, too, because he grabbed his jeans off the floor and pulled them up over his perfect, bare ass. Even now I was sorry to see it go.

  He took a deep breath.

  I grinned. “You’re going to tell him, aren’t you? Go get ’em, tiger.”

  He exhaled in a huff.

  “It didn’t go so well the first time.”

  “The first . . .”

  “Sorry about that,” Alec answered, effectively cutting me off. I was standing now, staring at him incredulously. He’d already told my father he wanted to marry me? Surely I’d misunderstood. But he did say he’d been thinking about it for months . . .

  “Listen,” he said. “There’s something I’d like to talk to you . . . Sure.” Alec hesitated. His scowl deepened.

  Uh-oh. I could almost hear my father cocking his shotgun.

  “Where is she?”

  She? Hang on.

  “Jesus,” he raked a hand through his hair. “Yeah. I’m coming.” He looked up at me. “We’re both coming. Whatever you do, don’t let her take off.”

  Alec clicked off his phone, but continued to stare down at it. I came to him immediately, placing my hands on his biceps.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Jessica Rowe,” he said. “Your dad found her.”

  * * *

  Five minutes later we were hurrying down the stairs to the SUV.

  “What about Janelle?” I asked. “Will she be sending more agents?”

  I pictured an entire SWAT team showing up to take Jessica Rowe into custody, which was more than a little concerning. If she’d been purposefully evading the authorities, subtlety seemed the best course of action. We would have to play this very carefully.

  “I’ll call her when we find Jessica,” said Alec, in a way that made me wonder if he and Janelle were on the best of terms. She probably wasn’t thrilled that he’d retracted his statements about Maxim Stein, a case she’d been working on for months.

  I jumped into the passenger side of the SUV. The engine was thrumming before I even shut the door.