"He wanted you safe."
"Well, maybe I didn't want to be safe. Maybe I wanted to be there, so when some fuckwit of a terrorist shot him in the head, I could have held his hand, heard his last dying breaths. But no, it was okay for Jess to risk her life, but little old me had to be tucked away safe in the hotel room."
A look of relief passed over Jake's face, and his lips curled in a slow smile.
"What?" she snarled.
"I like you better when you're angry."
"Well, good. I always aim to please. Not. Tell me something."
"Yes?" He sounded wary now.
"Would you keep something like this from Kim?"
"If you'd asked me three months ago, I would have said yes. Now, she'd kill me, and I respect her too much to keep her in the dark."
She raised her brows, and he sighed. "You're right. He should have told you. Are you going in there?"
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because if I go in there now, I'll punch him in the nose and that's probably not a good thing when he's just been shot."
"And are you ever going back?"
"I'm reenlisting tomorrow." And she stalked away.
Zach held his breath as the door opened, then released it as Jake's tall figure filled the opening. "Where is she?"
"Gone."
At that moment, the doctor finished bandaging Zach's arm and moved away. "There. You'll be fine," he said. "I'll get a prescription for some painkillers, but otherwise you're good to go."
Zach waited until he'd left the room. "What the fuck does 'gone' mean?"
Jake strolled across the floor, his face expressionless, and handed Zach a crumpled piece of paper.
"What's this?"
"A note. From Dani."
Zach smoothed the note, his eyes narrowing as he read.
Zach,
I was happy tonight. I planned to tell you I loved you, that I'd be whatever you wanted me to be.
Then I heard you'd been shot.
I thought you were dead and everything flashed in front of me. Sam. My parents. I can't do that again. But more than that, I don't want to do that again.
Then I planned to lie and tell you that I didn't love you, but that's not true and not fair. So I love you, but really that's irrelevant. I think we both knew this was never going to work. We're too different, and we're both terrified of commitment, and when you get back to your real life, you'll realize this is for the best.
I'm reenlisting tomorrow.
Good-bye
Dani
He screwed the letter up and threw it against the wall.
Chapter Eighteen
The anger had drained away by the time she reached Jess's apartment.
Jess opened the door, took one look at her face, and said nothing, just dosed her with enough whiskey to knock out an elephant and tucked her up in bed. No doubt, her best friend was feeling guilty about her part in tonight's fiasco, but Dani felt too wrung out to even consider recriminations.
She spent the night wondering if Zach was hurting, interspersed with flashbacks of that moment when she'd realized he'd been shot. At one point, she leaped out of bed, raced for the bathroom, and threw up the whiskey. Then she huddled under the blankets, shivering and missing Zach's arms around her. They hadn't spent a night apart since Scotland.
Zach loved her. And she loved him. So much it hurt-even when she didn't think he was dying.
What the hell did she do now?
She'd never thought of herself as a coward, but fear was paralyzing her, freezing her brain. And she hated that.
Love had never worked out for her. She'd thought it was something lacking in her personality. Now she wasn't so sure. Maybe all those years ago, she'd been too young, and too damaged, to see things clearly.
Maybe it was time to face her demons.
She rose at first light, dressed, grabbed her case, and left the apartment before Jess was even awake.
By the time the train pulled into town, she was still undecided whether to phone first or to go straight to the house. In the end, she decided to head on over there. She could always call at the last minute if she lost her nerve.
Her dad was an accountant and the area she found herself in was affluent, solid middle class. That had been part of the trouble; Dani had come from a troubled background and hadn't really fit in with their ordered existence. She'd tried hard, though, and would have succeeded eventually, if tragedy hadn't struck and all their worlds fallen apart.
She'd dressed carefully. She didn't really possess anything fancy except for her dress uniform, but she wore the dark pants suit she'd bought when she'd taken on the bodyguard job-standard wear Jess had told her for more formal occasions-and teamed it with a plain white shirt.
She pushed open the gate and stepped into the garden-her dad had always loved gardening, but had let theirs go to ruin after
Just do it.
Without giving herself any more time to think, she raised her hand and rang the bell, then instinctively took a step back, her gaze searching for somewhere to hide.
Oh God, she didn't want to do this.
Why the hell was she here?
The door opened and a strange woman stood there. Around her middle forties, still attractive, with warm blue eyes and honey blond hair, loose around her shoulders.
"Yes?"
Dani took a deep breath. "Is Mathew Sinclair here, please?"
A small frown formed between her brows. "And you are?"
Another deep breath. "I'm Dani. I'm " What the hell did she say? Because she hadn't felt like his daughter in a long, long time.
"You're his daughter." The woman took a step toward her, one hand lifting to press against her chest. "Danielle?"
So she was at the right place. This woman obviously knew who she was.
"I'm Matt's wife. We married three years ago." She shook her head. "You must come in. Matt's He's going to be "
Thrilled? Annoyed? Upset that I've come back, no doubt reminding him of a part of his life best forgotten?
"You know who I am?" she asked.
"Of course. Matt doesn't talk about you much-guilt, I think-but there are photos and your hair hasn't changed." She stepped to the side and gestured for Dani to enter. "Give me a second, and I'll go warn him."
Dani stood staring around her. There were photos on the wall of children, but they looked too old to be her father's. The place was bright, charming, and spotlessly clean. She'd tried her best to make a home for him after her mom left, but she'd done a poor job and he hadn't really noticed anyway.
She chewed on her fingernails. It was probably only two minutes before the door opened, but it felt like much longer.
"Dani?"
He looked the same. Blond and blue eyed, like Sam had been. They'd so obviously been father and son. She'd been the misfit. But he seemed like a stranger. She didn't know what she'd expected, some sense of recognition perhaps. Instead, he stood awkwardly as though he wasn't sure what to do.
"Beth is making coffee," he said. "Or do you prefer tea?"
Or how about a really large scotch? But she kept the words inside and followed him into the sitting room. "Coffee is fine."
He sat down, and Dani perched on the edge of the seat opposite. His face held a shell-shocked expression, and she was pretty sure hers did as well.
"You remarried?" she said.
Talk about stating the obvious.
He cleared his throat. "Yes. Three years now. Beth has been good for me."
"I can tell, and I'm glad."
Beth appeared at that moment, carrying a tray, and the awkward silence was filled by the clatter of cups while she handed the coffee around, then took the seat next to Dani.
"I'm glad you came. I've been telling Matt for years he should get in touch with you."
Matt's gaze darted from her to his wife as though searching for an escape route.
"Don't worry. I understand," Dani replied.
"I don't," Beth said.
Dani swallowed, then studied her father. He glanced away, and she realized something then. Her father was a weak man.
"Sometimes things are just too painful to face," she said. "Sometimes it's better to forget."
"But you're here now."
"I needed closure, I guess. I honestly thought I was over this"-she waved a hand toward her father-"and instead, really I just pushed it to the back of my mind."
"And what changed?" Beth asked when her father remained silent, sipping on his drink and staring at the floor, leaving the onus of the conversation to his wife.
"I was injured. In a bomb blast in Afghanistan, so I've been sort of on sick leave while I waited for a physical."
Her dad looked up from his contemplation of the carpet, and she could feel his eyes on her, checking her out, but it was Beth who answered, "You poor thing. Are you okay now?"
"Yes, I had the physical yesterday, and I'm fine. I can go back. But that's not it, really." She fiddled with her cup. "I met someone recently. I guess it made me realize how screwed up I am."
"You don't seem screwed up," Beth said.
"Thanks," Dani said dryly.
"So who is this someone?"
"His name's Zach. He's a writer."
Beth's smile widened. "You know your face softened when you thought about him. I'm guessing you like him a lot."
"Maybe. Maybe too much." She turned to her father. "Do you hear anything from Mom?"
"Nothing."
Short and sweet.
She sighed. He wasn't like a stranger. He was a stranger.
Beth made small talk after that, with Matt adding the odd comment when he was directly asked. Dani shifted in her seat. She wasn't uncomfortable; there were no bad feelings between them. Mainly because there was nothing between them at all. But she also realized that she didn't feel too bad about that. Maybe deep inside, she'd felt a lingering guilt that she hadn't tried harder. Now that dissipated, leaving a sense of lightness.