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“Of course not.” Dropping both pieces of luggage, he strode to the desk as if he’d walked through her home a thousand times. “We didn’t know when we were getting married until that day. So we just hightailed it down to the justice of the peace and did the dirty deed.” His eyes narrowed on her, as if he were challenging her to call his bluff.
“So it’s on record.”
“With the city of Seattle and King County,” he said, reaching around her and drawing her into the circle of his arms. Sighing, he brushed a lock of hair from her face and struggled with his temper. “Come on, Nik. Throw some things together and we’ll go to my place.”
“Is that what we planned?”
“I think it’s best.”
“We could stay here.”
“Nikki.” He rested his forehead on hers. Tenderness softened his features. “We’re both tired. Let’s not argue—just get your things together and—”
“Wait a minute.” She couldn’t let him sweet-talk her. As warm and inviting as his embrace was, she yanked herself free and tried to think clearly. She was running on adrenaline now and she was back in her own home. No one, especially not a man she couldn’t even remember, could order her around. “This isn’t Salvaje, Trent. You can’t use your caveman tactics on me.”
“And I thought I was being nice,” he said, rolling his eyes to the sloped ceiling.
“I want answers, answers you should have given me the first day I woke up.”
His jaw slid to one side. “When we get to my place.”
“How about right now?” She was on a roll and she wasn’t going to stop. “Why did you follow me?”
“What?”
“On the island,” she said, stepping farther from him, putting much needed distance between her body and his. When he held her, she found it impossible to think and remain level-headed. Right now, back in the United States, they had a helluva lot to straighten out. “You did follow me, didn’t you?”
“I was worried about you.”
“That’s not an answer.”
He muttered something and shoved his hands into his pockets. “I hired a man to keep his eye on you.”
“You what?”
“A private investigator.”
Her temper flamed white-hot. “You low-down, lying son of a—”
“Stop it!” he warned, his nostrils flaring slightly as his temper began to slip. “I wanted you to have a little freedom, but—”
“Not too much. You were just giving me a slightly longer leash, is that it? Why? So I could strangle myself?” She marched back to him and tipped her chin upward. Heat radiated from beneath her skin and she knew her eyes were throwing off sparks of fury. “You’re keeping something from me. No, I take it back—not something, but everything. You’ve been pointedly vague when I asked about your family, you’ve sidestepped a million questions about our romance, and you act as if we’re in some sort of dire jeopardy. Even now. When we’re home. You told me I wasn’t pushed over that ledge, and yet you’re nervous as a cat, acting like someone’s planning to do us—well, me, at least—in. What is it, Trent?”
“I told you I’d explain when we get home.”
“We are home.” She planted her hands on her hips and decided to force his hand. “Why don’t you tell me what all this…secrecy and cloak-and-dagger stuff has to do with Senator Crowley?”
His jaw hardened a little. “So you’re still onto that, are you?”
“Absolutely.” She skirted him, walked to her computer and snapped the power switch. The machine hummed to life. “I figure I’ll know everything I want to know and a lot of things I don’t want to know about good ol’ Diamond Jim when I find my notes in this thing.” She tapped the top of the monitor with her fingernail. “Maybe your name will come up, too.”
“We don’t have time—”
“Don’t we?” She whirled on him, her hair slapping her in her face. “What happened to ‘all the time in the world.’ Or ‘the rest of our lives’? On Salvaje you wanted me to think we could take everything slow and easy, but now we’re back in Seattle and it’s rush, rush, rush. Are you going to enlighten me, Trent?” she asked as the monitor glowed.
Exasperated, she plopped into her desk chair, pressed a series of buttons and scanned her files. “Let’s see, how about under ‘Crowley’ for starters?” Deftly, she typed the senator’s name, but the machine beeped at her and told her no such file existed. “Okay.” Her brow puckered and she tried to think. “How about ‘government’?” Only a half-finished story on a mayoral candidate. “Politics” was no better. “This can’t be,” she said, typing quickly, one file heading after another. She reread her work-in-progress menu again. No Crowley. No Diamond Jim. No political intrigue. Something was wrong. Biting her lip, she brought up other menus, from articles she’d finished. Not a clue.
“Why are you so damned certain that you were working on this story?” Trent asked, eyeing the screen skeptically, then sauntering to the fireplace and picking up pictures of her family. He fingered a color photo of her sister, Carole.
