“Hey, there’s good news for you, Delaney.” He passed the paper over. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d read a newspaper made of paper. Some poor sap hadn’t grabbed his change out of the vending machine and so the Cerca News was his because you snooze you lose, sucker! Was this how hunters felt when they bagged a lion or something? Triumphant and a tiny bit ashamed?
“What’s that supposed to mean? Why good news for me?” She took in his startled expression and leaned back, rubbing her eyes. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to snap. I’m tired.”
No doubt. She’d sleepwalked again last night (sleptwalked?). And though it had been a few days, she hadn’t brought up the DNA test again.
To be fair, neither had he. The day they met, he’d been all about reclaiming his life and his money, not even in that order. But then things got weird(er). And now there was Lillith. The truth was, if he found out he wasn’t Lillith’s dad, the adventure was over. Delaney and her family and Lillith would be out of his life. Forever.
Definitely Stockholm syndrome.
Speaking of Lillith, she hadn’t had much to say lately, either. And the man who’d tried to snatch her hadn’t been seen since. Neither had his partner, whom they referred to as “the Other Jerk” for the sake of convenience. It should have been good news. But since there was far more going on than Rake had been told, it just made him uneasy.
To hide this, he insulted his host again. “You spend too much time crunching numbers. You’re always hunched over your laptop. You’re gonna look like the witch when she gave Snow White the apple.”
“It’s what I have to do,” she said shortly. “And I’ve got better posture than you do. One of my foster mothers was a fanatic about that stuff.”
Well. That took the wind out of his sails. Jeez, how many homes was she bounced around in? “Uh, sorry.”
She shrugged it off and squinted at the paper. “What’s the good news for me?”
“Says right here.”
She let out a long-suffering sigh. “Rake, you’ve got a gift, no question. The girls say you speak Italian like a native, which is a good trick for someone who’s never lived here. You’re fluent in French, Spanish, Russian, and German, too, right?”
He blushed at the compliment and groaned in embarrassment, two things he had never done at the same time. “Was there anything I didn’t tell you that night? The time I threw up on the girl I had a crush on in fourth grade? Where I lost my virginity and got pinkeye the same night?”
“In the parking lot of the MGM grand!” Delaney couldn’t even get to the end of the sentence without cracking up.
“Ha! Wrong!” He jabbed a finger at her face in triumph. “That’s where Blake jettisoned his virginity. He wouldn’t go near the Restaurant Guy Savoy parking lot because they only had two Michelin stars.”
That just made her laugh harder. “I’m starting to think you’re on to something with that whole ‘Blake’s the worst’ thing.”
“Right?” Never had he been fonder of someone he hadn’t slept with. The woman was genius-level perceptive! “Anyway, I lost mine to Tammy Terrin in my mom’s walk-in closet.” Vermouth must be avoided at all costs; among other things I reminisce about my twin losing his virginity. Not Freudian or weird AT ALL. “How about you?”
“It’s boring,” she warned.
“Doubt it.”
“I was twenty-two—”
“What?”
“—and it was in a hotel room with an actual bed and everything. Very vanilla. Lights off. Missionary. Wham-bam-etc.”
“Perv! Sickest thing I ever heard.”
“There weren’t any good parking lots around,” she said with a straight face. “So we had to make do with a Days Inn.”
“But Delaney, you’re supercute, I bet lots of boys would have loved to have been your first. Why’d you wait so long?”
Her smile, which had broadened at “supercute,” became fixed, and in an instant, the fun was done. It was as if all the muscles in her face froze at once. “Oh, you know,” she said with a vague gesture. “A few times I almost did, when I was younger. It—it wasn’t exactly my idea, those times. To lose my virginity. I learned how to keep them off me, but—”
“You don’t have to finish,” he said quickly. “I’m sorry to be asking. It’s none of my business.” He realized his hands had locked into fists and made a conscious effort to unclench. Names, I need names, goddammit. Also addresses. Blood types, too, maybe. They’ll all need hospitals.
“There’s nothing to tell—I told you they tried, not that they succeeded.” She actually patted his hand, because they lived in a fucked-up universe where she’d endured a brutal childhood and now was trying to make him feel better. “And to be honest I was kind of scared to lose it—to find out what all the fuss was about. What was it about sex that could make people so completely, dangerously irrational? To take risks they’d never, ever take in their right mind? Something not to be fucked with, no pun intended. So I put it off for a while.”
“Okay. I can see that.” Dangerous and irrational, yes. Of course. But tender and exciting and wonderful and sweet and sweaty and amazing, all those things, too. And it was even better when you were in love with the person, or so he’d been told. “Makes sense.”
“And then I finally met someone nice and we did the deed after his graduation at U of M. And it was … you know.” She smiled. “Fast. Which was fine with me.”
I don’t know where I am.
Oh God. Oh my God. Is that what she was talking about? Trying to walk away from? Is that why she feels trapped? For a long moment Rake thought he was going to faint. No, manly men don’t faint, he’d pass out, he wouldn’t faint and oh fuck, who did it and where could he find them and would Delaney lend him money for a baseball bat? And some body bags?
No one will come in? Unless I let them?
“I’m sorry.” It sounded beyond inadequate. “Delaney, I’m so sorry that you were scared to—that you felt you needed to put it off. But good for you. I mean, it was your choice at the Days Inn, right? You had sex on your terms. That’s— Some people don’t even get that, you know?”
A shrug. He’d never known anyone who could be so eloquent with her shoulders. “It was a long time ago.”
A long time ago? She wasn’t thirty yet.
“Does this go back to that whole eventful childhood thing?”
Her gray gaze was on him, watching his face for—pity? Wondering if he’d crack a joke? God, please, please don’t let her think I would joke about this. “Yeah,” she said eventually. “It was.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe I told you that. I mean—I really can’t believe it. You’re an entitled pain in my ass, Tarbell, but you’re sure easy to talk to. It must be the oh my God you’re blushing.”
“I am not!”
“You’re blushing even harder now!” she cried, delighted.
As annoying as that was, it was pretty great that his lack of control over the blood vessels in his face had cheered her up. “Yeah, well,” he mumbled. “It happens sometimes.”
“It’s sooooo cute.”
“Please shut up now.”
“Downright adorable, in fact.”
“I hate you and everything you stand for.”
That made her laugh. “That’s probably true. But getting back to my point—” She gestured at the newspaper. “My point is, I can barely order a meal in Italian.”
“Yeah, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that. You think you’re ordering milk, but you’re actually ordering coffee and milk. Which is why they keep bringing you coffee and milk. Then you force it down and glare through the rest of dinner.”
“That’s because it’s not so much Minnesota Nice as it’s Minnesota Passive-Aggressive. I’ll roll right up on a CEO who changes his mind about a charity pledge, but I’ve never sent a restaurant meal back in my life, and I’ve had some stinkers. And for the last time, whatever is in the paper you want to show me, just tell me already.”
“Here. Right here.” He pointed to the headline below the fold. “That jewelry/handbag shop near the Rialto Bridge. It says they had pledged a donation and then reneged, and then reneged on their reneging.” He thought of what Delaney would do to anyone who promised charity and then didn’t deliver, and shivered. Decapitation, probably. Followed by one hell of a long shouting match. “This is just the kind of thing you hate, right?”
“Yep.” She reached out and touched the paper, looking puzzled. “That made the news?”
“Guess it was a big deal. The owner had made a show of how profits weren’t letting him keep up his end, called a press conference and everything. So I guess it was big news when he did another one-eighty not even a week later.” He waited, but Delaney just sat there.
Huh. Where was a delighted smile? Not that he’d been trying for one. Just trying to keep Delaney up on current events. With a paper newspaper no less.
“Isn’t it great that they found the money after all?” he prodded.
“Yes, it’s great that they promised money they’d never miss, broke their word, then changed their mind about breaking their word.”
“I know you’ve heard this before—”
“Then don’t, for cripe’s sake.”
“—but anything sounds bad when you say it like that.”
“You can stop reading the newspaper now.”
Much later, when he found out exactly what Delaney was doing to people who renounced their pledges, he thought decapitation would have been kinder.