Allison Brennan - Killing Fear

“Sara,” he said.

Her eyes opened, confused. “Who-” She blinked, her eyes adjusting to the dark. “Teddy.”

Sara was the only one he allowed to call him by a nickname. It seemed to be important to her, though he never allowed anyone else to use anything but his full legal name.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and for a moment he felt strange. At a loss as to what to say or do.

“I was so worried about you,” she said, hugging him tightly.

“Everything is fine.” He swallowed heavily.

“You must be hungry. Tired.”

“I’m hungry for you, Sara.”

She pulled back, stared at him. “Oh.” She started unbuttoning the prim little nightgown she wore.

“Stop,” he said. “Let me.”

Instead, he kissed her. She responded fully, as if they had kissed before when the most they had done was touch fingers through the bars of the prison.

That Sara was so eager for him, neither flinching nor complaining when he touched her, turned him on. It had been a long time since he had a woman, and a rush filled him. He didn’t expect it to last-sex was predictable, especially with the same woman-but this was a first for him with Sara. He pulled off her nightgown, but hid her face.

“Tell me you want it,” he whispered in his ear. “Tell me you want me.”

“I want you, Teddy. I want you so bad. I’ve been waiting for this night for years.”

Sara had a nice body. Not long and lithe with big tits like Robin, but nice and tight and firm.

He pictured Robin beneath him, Robin wanting him. Robin asking him to screw her, Robin begging him for more.

He slammed into Sara and closed his eyes. His dick swelled and he exploded.

“Yes!” Sara cried, and Theodore didn’t care if she was faking. All he heard was one woman screaming for him.

Robin.

The knocking on the door persisted.

Theodore Glenn wouldn’t knock, Robin thought. He’d break down your door, come through the window, grab you in the parking lot.

She hadn’t been sleeping well, but before she was fully awake, her gun was in her hand. She didn’t need to check to see if there was a round chambered; she knew there was. It was nearly two in the morning. She’d slept for all of forty minutes.

She crossed her open loft. Before she looked through the peephole she heard the man on the other side.

“Robin, please let me in. I have to talk to you.”

Will.

She looked through the peephole. Will’s head was low, his hands on both sides of her door. He looked rumpled in his slacks and button-down shirt. He wore no jacket, his shoulder holster exposed.

He pounded on the side of the door. “Robin!”

She didn’t want to talk to him. She didn’t want to see him. Today at her club it had been all she could do not to give in to his kiss. Not to let herself be held. Be loved.

Love hurts.

“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 together ?”

“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.

“You see why I don’t believe you?”

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.”

Needed.

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.