AFTERSHOCK Read online

  She searched his gaze, clearly wondering if he was still teasing her.

  "Just looking at you makes me think of hot kisses and stolen touches."

  She blushed. Blushed. So, the cool woman could be shaken. "Oh, I'm sorry," he said, anything but. "I'm being inappropriate again, aren't I?"

  "You know you are." Tough facade back in place, she walked the room, passed the piles of work on his desk, passed the additional piles that had simply overflowed to the floor. He'd vacuumed before setting Taylor down, so the vacuum cleaner was still in the corner. His coat, which had fallen from the rack, lay crumpled in a heap. His boots were sprawled on the floor, discarded after his last inspection. So was the bag his lunch had come in, from his favorite hamburger joint.

  "You're a pig," she said lightly, scooping up his jacket and placing it on a hook.

  He wondered at the gesture. Was it because she cared, or because she cared that Taylor was in such a messy room? "Talk to your daughter. She's been a busy girl today."

  A small smile crossed her lips. But Dax could see past the exterior, past that cool defense she wore like a coat. Deep in thought, he stared at her.

  "What?" she asked when he came close. She didn't fidget like normal women, so she didn't pat her hair or look herself over for flaws. But her eyes chilled in response to his silent study. "What are you staring at?"

  Dax knew how to soothe a woman, but he had the feeling the usual compliments and flirtations wouldn't work with Amber. She was different. Very different. Her dark, gorgeous eyes looked bruised, rimmed with light purple. Her mouth, carefully painted, was tight, pinched. And those shoulders, the ones that seemed to be strong enough to carry the burdens of the entire world, were strained, as if the weight had become too heavy.

  "Stop looking at me like that," she demanded.

  "Like what?"

  "Like … you're hungry, or something."

  Oh yeah, he was hungry. For her. How long, he wondered, would it take a man to dig under those walls? To find the real Amber, the one who'd had the guts to have a child by herself, the one he knew would protect that child with everything she had?

  "Why are you still staring at me?"

  Because she looked exhausted. Because she was a puzzle he couldn't put together. Because he couldn't seem to help himself. Backing her to a chair, he applied pressure on her arm until she sat.

  "I don't have time to sit." Her voice was weary. "I still have to run to the grocery store, pick up the drycleaning and then when I get home, I have a report—" Carefully, she closed her mouth and in a rare gesture of emotion, ran her hands over her eyes. "I have no idea why I'm telling you all of this."

  "Because you're too tired. If you weren't, you wouldn't say a word, you'd handle it all. Alone, most likely. But we're a unit now, Amber. You should be able to vent."

  "And that means you'll vent, too, I suppose."

  "If I need to, yes."

  She looked so genuinely unsettled that he wondered what her definition of vent was. "How about I keep Taylor while you do your errands? She's fine here, the guys come in every two seconds just to look at her anyway. She'll be entertained. I'll bring her home to you later."

  "I can't take advantage that way."

  "Amber." He came from a family of touchers. It seemed perfectly natural for him to lift a hand and touch her cheek. And if he enjoyed the feel of her soft skin so much that he left his fingers there for an instant longer than he'd planned, what did it matter? He was just trying to comfort.

  Okay, maybe it was more complicated than that, but he wasn't ready to go there.

  And besides, she backed away.

  "Why do you do that?" he wondered. "Shy away from touch?"

  "I don't like to be touched."

  "You did once."

  A delicious shade of red colored her face. "I should make it clear to you," she said in that prim voice he was perversely beginning to enjoy. "I'm not being coy here. I acted … wild with you then. I'm not going to do it again."

  "Are you thinking wild is a bad thing?"

  She looked at him steadily.

  "Or that I don't respect you?"

  Still, just that look. Damn, she brought new meaning to the word stubborn. "What happened between us was spontaneous, yes," he agreed. "Hot, most definitely. Even wild. But Amber, it was as necessary at that moment as breathing, you have to remember that much."

  "It wasn't necessary."

  He'd have liked to prove her wrong, right there on the floor of his office. He had no doubt he could do it. She had passion and heat simmering just beneath her surface, all he had to do was set fire to it. The way they kissed, it should only take two seconds.

  But he wouldn't, because he didn't like how easily he'd come to forgive her, and he sure as hell didn't like the way he yearned for her, even now. "Even before I knew about Taylor, I wanted to see you again."

  "Of course you did. I slept with you after only knowing you an hour."

  "Are you talking about when we made love?"

  "Sex," she said calmly enough, but the words came out her teeth. "We had sex."

  "That's not how I remember it." He smiled wickedly, figuring her imagination could taunt her with exactly what he was remembering. It would serve her right, since he'd been doing nothing but remembering.

  "I acted cheaply. I don't like thinking about it."

  "Cheap?" he asked incredulously, oddly hurt. "That's the last thing that comes to my mind when I think of that day." She turned away but he took her arms, forcing her to look at him. "God, Amber, we were terrified. We thought we were going to die. We needed to feel hope. We needed to feel alive, and we did, in each other's arms. How could you have forgotten all that?"

  She might have pushed away, but he held her still. "No, listen to me." Somehow it had become critical to him that she not regret what they'd shared. "You didn't betray yourself that day, it just happened. And it was … right. Very right, dammit."

  Her tortured look faded somewhat. "It gave me Taylor," she said quietly.

  "It gave us Taylor," he corrected. "And I'll never forget it."

  They stared at each other, so close that he could have leaned forward a fraction and kissed her soft, very kissable lips, but he didn't. Much as his body ached for hers, she'd burned him before, and he wasn't interested in getting burned again. "And as for tonight. You're not taking advantage, I offered. I'll even bring dinner."

  "Why?"

  "You know, all that mistrust is getting really old."

  "I'm not mistrustful."

  He laughed. "Granted, it's well hidden behind that sophisticated, sleek business front, but it's there."

  "Why are you bringing me dinner?"

  "See? Right there. Mistrust."

  She rolled her eyes.

  "I'm bringing dinner because I'll be hungry."

  "Oh." She thought about it and started to give him a suspicious look, which she quickly squelched. "I suppose that would be all right."

  "Good." He'd have shown up whether she liked it or not. If he knew his little daughter, and he was beginning to know her quite well, he figured Amber hadn't had a hot meal or a decent night's sleep in over three months. That was going to change.

  "Go on," he said, pulling her up, nudging her to the door. "We'll see you later." Then he ushered her out before she could gather her wits to resist, which he knew she would have done if she hadn't been dead on her feet.

  When she was gone, Dax turned to Taylor, hands on hips, a mock frown on his face. "You've been tiring out your parents," he said, picking her up and holding her close.

  Taylor gummed a wet smile.

  "It's got to stop. You hear me?"

  She let out a sweet little giggle.

  Dax kissed her noisily, making her wriggle with delight, which in turn warmed his heart in ways he'd never imagined.

  He couldn't fathom being without her.

  He was beginning to understand he felt the same way about her mother.

  * * *