“Please let me in.”
She punched numbers into her alarm system. Disarmed. Slid open one bolt. Turned the second. Pushed back the chain. Opened the door.
They stared at each other. Will’s blue-gray eyes, the Pacific Ocean before a storm, stared at her.
He asked, “Can I come in?”
She stepped back without comment. He closed the door behind him. “Robin-”
She walked around him and bolted the door. She couldn’t leave it unlocked. She felt almost obsessive- compulsive, but in the seven years since Theodore Glenn had killed her friends she couldn’t help herself. She was terrified. Even in her own home.
She skirted Will and went into the kitchen, keeping the counter between her and the man she used to love.
“Who did he kill now?”
Will blinked. “No one. That we know about.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I’m worried about you.”
She held up her gun and gestured toward the door. “I’m fine. You can leave.”
“Dammit, Robin! You’re not fine.”
“I’ll be fine when he’s behind bars. Or dead. Better dead, I think.”
“He knows about us,” Will said quietly.
Her stomach flipped. “What do you mean?”
“He saw us. Together.”
“You mean
“Yes. Having sex. That night, in the bar.”
“Oh God.” She dry-heaved into the sink, her head spinning. She put her gun on the counter because she could no longer hold it, her hands shaking, reaching for the edge of the sink to hold herself up. The thought that Theodore Glenn had not only watched one of the most intimate moments of her life, but that he’d then gone across the street and killed her roommate, undid her rocky composure she’d been barely holding together since his escape.
Will was at her side, pulling her into his arms. She clung to him, dragging them both down to the hardwood floor. He gathered her into his lap and leaned against the wall.
What was happening? How could that coldhearted killer have watched her having sex? Killed Anna? Why had he spared her? Suffering as a survivor was almost worse than death. Maybe she should have died. Because she certainly hadn’t been living these past years.
She’d lost four friends. Then she’d lost Will. When she needed him most, he’d turned his back. She’d never grown close to anyone since, either a boyfriend or a girlfriend. It had been all business, no personal relationships, for seven years.
The words Will spoke back then clouded her mind as if he’d whispered them just now in her ear. She stifled a sob, Will’s arms around her tightened.
“Robin, I am so sorry. I know you don’t believe me, I broke your trust. I can’t tell you how I feel about that. My life has been on hold. When I saw you yesterday it was like time had stopped. There you were, even more beautiful than I remembered, than I’ve dreamed about. All I wanted to do was hold you. Make love to you. Never leave you. I blew it, Robin, big-time. And I don’t see how you can forgive me. Still, I need you to forgive me. I need you.”
“I needed you, Will.”
Will heard exactly what Robin said, and it hurt. “I know.”
She shook her head into his chest. “No. You don’t.”
“Please, Robin. Don’t-”
“I can’t. I can’t do it. Please don’t ask me to put my heart on the line again. I don’t have anything left to give.”
He wanted to scream. How could he convince her he wasn’t the man she’d first met?
He kissed her hair, her forehead. She let him hold her. Until he heard the phone conversation between Glenn and Robin, followed by Trinity’s revelation that Glenn had watched them having sex, Will hadn’t realized the depth of Glenn’s obsession with Robin. Seven years ago he’d known Robin was possibly a catalyst, that Glenn was fixated on her for some reason, to hurt people in her life but not her specifically.
Now, the truth started to fall in place. It had all been about Robin. They simply didn’t have enough information back then to see it. And now Glenn had had years to plot his revenge, to obsess on Robin. Will had feared for Robin’s life since he’d first heard of Glenn’s escape, now he knew she was the reason he’d returned to San Diego. Everyone else Glenn wanted to kill was extraneous to him, no one compared to Robin.
“I won’t let him get to you,” he whispered, rocking her in his lap.
“I’ll kill him, Will.”
The coldness in her voice disturbed him. He suspected for the first time that yes, in fact, Robin McKenna could kill Theodore Glenn. She’d had seven years to practice. Seven years to hate. He’d stolen so much from her-her security, her safety, her friends.
And Will. Had Glenn not planted those seeds of doubt-if Will hadn’t let him-he’d never have doubted Robin. Or would he have? Was he that shallow? Except that he was a cop first. He had to ask the hard questions. And based on Glenn’s M.O., he had to ask Robin if she’d had a sexual relationship with him.
Maybe he’d just been so close to her that he was scared of his own emotions. Pushed her away the only way he could. Accusing her of lying to him. Accusing her of sleeping with a killer.
He’d take it all back if he could. She wouldn’t listen to him, maybe she would let him touch her.
He kissed her. Firmly. Closely. Intimately. To show her that he loved her. Believed in her. Her lips opened. He tasted the salt of her tears on her tongue. She moaned and he held her head tightly, his hands tangled in her long, curly auburn hair. He kissed her again and again, almost disbelieving that she was kissing him back, her hands around his neck, her mouth seeking his as much as he sought hers.
She shook her head, turned her lips from his. “Will, no.”
“God, Robin, I love you.”
She shook her head over and over. “Don’t. Don’t do this to me. You can’t walk into my life like this because it won’t last. Without trust, love means nothing.”
“I was wrong. Dammit, Robin! I was wrong!”
“I know that. And you do, too. But what about next time? What about the way you looked at Mario Medina today?”
“The bodyguard?”
“Like I had walked out of my office after screwing him on the desk.”
“I didn’t. I-” He had been jealous. He’d taken one look at the good-looking, muscular bodyguard and instantly thought something had to be going on between him and Robin. Because she was a beautiful, sexy woman.
“You’re not like that anymore-” He bit his tongue. “I mean-”
“I’m not a stripper anymore. So when I was a stripper, you expected me to spread my legs for every halfway decent looking man who walked into RJ’s? I did it fast enough for you, didn’t I?” She pulled herself up.
“Don’t, Robin. You know it was never like that between us. I didn’t mean it the way it sounded-”
“Go away, Will. I’m not going to do this to myself. I can’t.”
He stood, held her arms. “Robin, I love you.”
She shook her head. “You only think you do. You don’t know what love is. And I don’t, either. I let my heart be broken twice, and I’m done.”
Will sat in his car outside Robin’s loft. He was sick about their conversation-that he’d hurt her so deeply she couldn’t trust him-but he planned to spend the rest of the night watching her loft. If Glenn was going after her, it would be when he thought she was asleep and unprotected. He’d put in a couple hours sleep once dawn broke.
His cell phone vibrated in his pocket. “What?”
“Good morning to you, too,” Carina said.
