Shadows At Sunset - Anne Stuart [60]
He was wearing a loose white T-shirt. She stood and yanked the back up before he could stop her. Not that he would have. The tattoo was on his shoulder blade, faded slightly with the years. A heart, split by a lightning bolt with her name etched into it. Into his skin.
She let the T-shirt drop, suddenly chilled. He didn’t move, just sat there looking at her.
“Richard,” she said in a hoarse voice.
“Rico,” he corrected her gently. He held out his hand, his beautiful hand that had touched her all too well in the past. “Rachel-Ann…”
But she backed away, stumbling into the doorway that led to the rest of the apartment. “You lied to me.”
“I didn’t.”
“You didn’t tell me who you were….”
“I told you my name. I should have realized you wouldn’t know it. I was Richard the Cook’s son, the Mexican son of the chauffeur. I didn’t need a last name.” He didn’t even sound bitter about it, just accepting.
“You were stalking me.”
“No. You walked into a meeting and I knew you immediately. Unlike you, I hadn’t forgotten.”
“For God’s sake, I haven’t seen you in more than fifteen years,” she said. “How the hell was I supposed to recognize you?”
“You weren’t,” he said calmly. “Don’t be so upset about it, chica. There’s no reason you should have known who I was, and I didn’t want to spook you by mentioning it. As you said, it was a long time ago. It’s not important. I’m not the first man you slept with and I wasn’t the last.”
“Nicely put,” she said in a cool voice.
“You know what I mean. You’ve been married twice since then….”
“You’re behind the times. I just divorced my third husband. No, you weren’t the first and you most certainly weren’t the last. I can hardly keep track of my husbands, much less my adolescent fucks….”
“Don’t,” he said softly.
“Don’t what? Say fuck? That’s what we did, isn’t it? Everywhere, every time, every way we could think of. That’s what you do when you’re seventeen. Sorry you’ve lost interest in it recently, but I still enjoy myself every chance I get.”
He was supposed to be hurt, offended by her hostile words. Instead he just smiled at her with great sweetness. “You have such a happy life, Rachel-Ann?”
“Go to hell,” she muttered, pushing her way out of the kitchen. Her sandals were by the sofa with the brightly colored afghan draped over it. Consuelo must have made that afghan. Somewhere, packed away in her bedroom, was a similar one she’d made for Rachel-Ann for her sixteenth birthday.
He didn’t try to stop her, though he stood in the doorway of the kitchen, watching her. He was leaner than he’d been as a teenager, more wiry. He’d been strong and young and gorgeous as a teenager. He was devastating as an adult.
She shoved her feet into the sandals, grabbed her car keys from the table, accidentally knocking over the stack of condoms. She looked at them littering the floor. “I suppose I should take those with me,” she said lightly. “I imagine I won’t have much trouble finding someone who wants to use them.”
She’d finally managed to get to him, break through his gentle calm. He took a step toward her, then halted, visibly getting himself back under control. “You have a talent for pushing buttons, Rachel-Ann,” he said lightly. “Leave the condoms. We’ll use them next time.”
“Fuck you,” she said deliberately.
“Next time.”
She slammed the door on her way out, racing down the narrow flight of stairs to the street with complete disregard to her safety. In daylight the neighborhood looked worse, and there were three teenagers leaning on her BMW, peering inside. They looked up as she approached, keys in hand, and it took all her self-control not to hesitate, just to keep walking.
She’d just reached the car when one of the boys removed himself from it to stand in front of her. He was taller than she was, beefy, wearing gang colors. He had three teardrops tattooed on his cheek, and he couldn’t have been more than sixteen years old. Or been more frightening.
Then a voice rang out, and he turned, all danger dropping away from