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“Talking doesn’t work,” Sabella muttered.
“I think she likes it,” Sienna accused with a laugh. “She hasn’t been gone more than three or four hours and already she’s back after he got another taste of her. She’s hiding from him.”
Sabella bit her lip and looked back at Sienna.
“I heard Rick had to respond to a call of harassment because of him?” Kira said then. “Was he harassing you?” She leaned forward and stared back at Sabella curiously. “I talked to Ian after you left. He seems to think he’s a very odd man. Maybe you should fire him.”
Sabella looked from Kira to Sienna with a frown.
“He’s not odd,” she finally muttered as Kira sat down slowly, filled Sabella’s wine glass, and pushed it to her with a faintly apologetic look.
Kira stared at the two women. As Ian’s wife, and an operative herself, she knew the truth. She would have been amused if she didn’t feel so damned sorry for the widow who wasn’t a widow. She didn’t like the fact that Nathan Malone hadn’t come clean with his wife. She sure as hell didn’t like the fact that the girl looked so bewildered and lost. And the friendship they had developed over the years had only increased Kira’s worry. Sabella had never let go of her husband, and now he was back again, tormenting her in another way.
“Ian’s worried about you after this morning,” she told Sabella, giving her a quiet, almost gentle smile. “He loved Nathan like a brother.” And he still did. Though Kira would have preferred to kick the other man’s ass.
“I know he did.” Sabella sighed then took a healthy drink of the wine and Kira watched as her jaw clenched in anger.
Kira wasn’t having any part of being pushed out of this particular conversation.
Sabella had been faithful to her dead husband for over six years. The memory of the love she felt for him had tormented her. And for half that time, Nathan could have eased her pain.
Sabella licked her lips. She pressed her knees together and seemed to be trying to hold in emotions that were only festering inside her.
“He’s making me crazy,” she muttered. “He just takes over everything, as though it’s his right.”
“But you still want him.”
Silence descended.
“She doesn’t need him,” Sienna finally stated. “He’s not the staying kind and she knows it.”
“That’s not what it is. I know the expression of a woman steeped in guilt and fear because she’s finally met a man threatening her husband’s place in her heart,” Kira stated gently. “This has nothing to do with whether or not he’s the staying kind. It has to do with Sabella letting Nathan go.”
Kira was nothing if not forward. Sabella had learned herself, long ago, that the worst thing a woman can do is hide from herself.
“Yeah, well, that doesn’t mean I have to do anything about it.” Sabella frowned.
Kira leaned back in her chair and watched Sabella for long, sober moments. “No, it doesn’t.” She shook her head. “Ian loved Nathan like a brother.” She stared back at Sabella then. “When they told him Nathan was dead, he took it very hard, he told me. We’ve become good friends, Sabella. I’ve watched you the last few years. You laugh, you go out with friends, sometimes you date. But you haven’t had a lover since Nathan died. Have you?”
“I’ve been fine.” Sabella shook her head. “I’d be better if men would stop getting in my way and acting as though I need someone to tell me what to do.”
“Get a little drunk,” Kira advised her, her brow wrinkling at the pain she could see in Sabella’s eyes. “Get pissed off. Tell us what an asshole Nathan was because he left you.”
“Kira!” Sienna snapped, anger brightening her green eyes then. “That’s enough.”
“And each time she’s stepped away from Nathan’s memory you’ve reminded her of the man she lost, rather than the fact that there are other men out there, haven’t you, Sienna?” Kira said softly. “I’ve known the two of you for years now, and I’ve seen it. I’m just a neutral bystander with too much gossip under my belt and married to the man who was the asshole’s best friend.”
“Nathan wasn’t an asshole,” Sabella snapped.
“He was a SEAL, sweetheart. I’m married to one. They’re so dominant, fierce, and certain of their own abilities and opinions that they can’t help themselves,” she stated, amused. “So in the kindest vein, yes, that’s exactly what Nathan was. But he’s gone. He doesn’t exist any longer, but here you are, years later, from all accounts incredibly attracted to another man and fighting that attraction because of your guilt about your husband’s memory.”
“I don’t have to just jump into bed with every man I meet,” Sabella snapped.
“But neither were you buried when they told you your husband was dead.”
Sabella stared back at her, seeing in the other woman’s eyes sympathy, without the history she had with Sienna. Without the memories of Nathan she and her friend shared.
And she was right. Sabella didn’t have to like it, but she did have to acknowledge it.
