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Cam had no doubt.
“The woman needs to be locked up for her own safety,” Cam growled. “Son of a bitch, she knows they’ve targeted her and she still won’t let me help her. Stubborn-assed woman. ”
“You sound surprised. ” The mockery in Chase’s voice had him wincing. “Hell, Cam, you knew how stubborn she was when she was no more than a girl. What would make her any less so now?
”
“Common sense?”
“Oh. She had some of that, then? When?”
Cam had to chuckle. When it came to him, she had never shown good sense. From the time she was thirteen to now, they had gravitated to each other like bees to honey. And he had to admit, she had the sweetest honey he had ever tasted.
“She was a virgin,” he told his brother. The truth of that still filled him with a warmth that made no sense at all.
Silence met his statement. When he turned to look at his brother, it was to see the same primal arousal on his face that had filled Cam at the time.
“Damn,” he finally blew out roughly. “Damn. ”
Chase rubbed the back of his neck and turned away, shaking his head. Cam knew what his brother was feeling. That sense of male fascination, the knowledge that her sensuality was theirs to mold and teach. It was a heady feeling for a man to have a woman as passionate as Jaci, one whose sensual pleasures were awakening beneath his touch.
He loved it. The pleasure it brought him to see the fascination on her face, the dazed pleasure in her eyes, the shock and surprise, the adventure it brought to each touch, each kiss. It made him ache to show her more, to teach her all the ways of sensuality and desire that he knew.
“We have to get the Robertses taken care of. ” Chase’s voice was rough with arousal. “Getting her to trust us while you hide all those pesky secrets of yours isn’t going to be easy. ” There was an edge of disgust to his brother’s tone.
Cam had a feeling it wasn’t going to be possible at all. As he pulled up the files he’d transferred to the home computer throughout the investigation process, he concentrated on finding a weakness to exploit in the Robertses.
This situation had to be taken care of, had to be resolved now. He was tired of waiting, and by God, he was sick of that flicker of fear he caught in her eyes every now and then.
Jaci had to be safe. No matter what. He just prayed it didn’t mean revealing everything about himself to force her to reveal her truth.
A glass of wine and an old movie. Jaci sipped at the wine as she let the movie drone in the background. She was curled up on what she had claimed as her end of the long sectional couch, a frown pulling at her brow as she glanced again at the stairs leading to Chase’s apartment.
What the hell were they doing up there?
Cam didn’t bring work home in the evenings since she had moved in. And she’d gotten the impression it wasn’t something that was normal, either.
She swirled the wine in the glass, staring into the clear liquid as she tried to make sense of this relationship. The relationship and the man.
Cam had held her heart for so long, sometimes she wondered if there had ever been a time when he wasn’t a part of it.
Wait on me, Cam. I’ll grow up and I’ll take all the bad things away.
She had told him that the day she found him alone in the pickup, and something in his face had warned her that she was about to lose him forever. Even then, at thirteen, she had recognized that soul-deep sorrow inside him. A shame, a fury that devoured his soul.
Stay away from those Falladay boys, Jaci, her father had warned her as she grew up. The games they play aren’t for the likes of a decent girl. And that Cameron, he’s a danger to himself, let alone a little girl like you.
How many times had her father given her similar warnings? And then there had been Tim Bridges, the sheriff, a close friend of her father’s. She sipped at the wine, remembering the night the sheriff had come to her dad and they disappeared into her father’s workshop to talk. Jaci had heard Cam’s name mentioned and had been terrified. His name, and something else that hadn’t made sense to her at the time. Something about drugs and Cam’s pride.
Sheriff Bridges had mentioned Davinda Morris, Cam’s aunt, and his tone had been filled with disgust and anger toward the woman, but not toward Cam.
What had happened to him? She knew what she was beginning to suspect terrified her. Cam was a man with a mile-long streak of pride. Even then, so many years ago, he would have fought at the slightest slur to that pride.
Had Davinda abused him? How else would a woman like Davinda have been able to abuse or molest him, unless she drugged him? And that would have destroyed Cam. He would have never wanted anyone to know.
At fifteen, a young man’s pride was so fragile anyway, just being defined. He had just lost his parents, Chase was as wild as the wind and grieving in other ways, and Davinda Morris could have easily exploited his developing sexuality.
Why hadn’t she realized before now? She had suspected the darkness inside him had developed in the military; now she suspected it had developed long before that.
