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His agitation hurt her even more than his withdrawal. She had to relieve it. Had to cover herself first, get off him. Had to find her co-ordination and control. She finally did, stumbled up and to her bed, sank on it, aftershocks of release still rocking her, loss and confusion suffocating her.
He continued, his black-velvet voice hushed. “I can only plead that I must be suffering the same survival backlash…”
“You said you felt this way from the moment you saw me…” Please, let this at least be real.
His next words told her it wasn’t. “I guess, being in this region, in our line of work, we’re never not in post-traumatic stress. What we think, and what we think we feel, how we react—it’s all extreme reactions, unreal, just escape mechanisms.”
She was intimate with all that. The last fifteen years had been a string of coping maneuvers, sanity preservers. She’d mastered them all. And none of them applied here. With Dante, it was all new and real at last.
And it was one-sided.
Fine. She understood. It gutted her, but she did. And she accepted it. She would still have something else of him. He was part of GAO now. They were bound to give him an important post, keep him here. She’d join his team. It would be enough to see him, work with him. Anything at all with him was better than everything she’d ever had…
He finally moved, rose, came over to stand above her, every move an effort now. “Gulnar, please, say you forgive me. I feel like I’ve dishonored what we’ve shared, what we’ve been through. And after all you’ve done for me. I can’t let us part with this hanging between us.”
Part? Did he think he needed to put distance between them now? Would he ask for an assignment that would take him out of her reach? Refuse her access to his team?
No. No! She had to make him understand it wouldn’t change a thing, that she wouldn’t pursue or embarrass him. Their enforced intimacy was over and she’d keep to her place, be his assistant, or whatever he wanted her to be, and nothing more. She had to make him believe her.
“Dante—stop it, please. You’re making too much out of this. It isn’t the first time and it won’t be the last that two survivors seek physical comfort in each other’s arms.” A bi
tter giggle escaped her. She surely hadn’t given him comfort! “I can’t begin to see how you can think you’ve dishonored anything.”
The distress in his eyes faded, something even blacker, bleaker seeping into its place. Then his lids went down, obscuring a succession of expressions that stopped her heart. Cynicism. Disillusion. Disgust.
He walked back to the couch, sat down again. His head fell back on the headrest, his lips twisting. Her insides followed suit. Had she made things worse by making light of it? Was he, now that his blood had cooled, analyzing her actions, condemning her for her shamelessness, seeing her as Lorenzo—and Emilio—had once accused her of being, a promiscuous hazard to any team effort? No!
She tried again, an uncontrolled thread of desperate laughter weaving into her tones. “Dante—let it go. It was nothing important, really. A month from now we’ll look back on this and laugh.” Stop, stop. She was making it worse and worse. Distract him. Change the subject. “And do you realize you didn’t tell me what you wanted me to do for you? Do you need your back scratched?”
The eyes that opened, leveled on her, were a stranger’s.
So this was how it felt to lose something irreplaceable.
“Actually, I was going to ask you to shave me, especially my head. I don’t mind the beard as much, but a few millimeters’ growth on top makes me crazy.” Even his voice was unrecognizable.
Swallowing the jagged desperation, she jumped at the opportunity, and to her feet.
His alien voice froze her. “Never mind. I don’t think you’re in any condition to handle a razor now. What you really need is to get back to sleep. I’ll take one of the other nurses up on her offer.”
Other nurses? Oh.
That put her in her place. Ended their artificial intimacy and her importance to him.
But this was what she’d said she’d settle for! Keep it light. Impersonal. He wanted it that way.
Her heart wept but she tried on her most nonchalant smile. “Just to put your mind at ease, I’ll let someone else do it. But for future reference, I’ll have you know that I am an expert barber!”
His blank eyes rested on her, his smile even emptier. “I’m sure you are. But since I’m going back to the US just as soon as I can breathe without keeling over, I don’t think I’ll have the chance to take you up on your offer.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
“YOU just can’t leave!”
Dante sighed. GAO’s Azernian operation co-ordinator was a good man. One of the best. He just had the most aggravating nasal twang ever. As for his powers of repetition!
Dante inhaled deeper this time, the air rushing into his lungs a reminder of how lucky he’d been. Only two weeks after a bullet had penetrated his chest back to front, he was beyond lucky to be breathing at all, let alone with such ease.
No, it wasn’t luck. It was Gulnar…
