Edge of Midnight (McClouds & Friends #4)(31)

He couldn’t stop staring, though he could tell it made her uncomfortable. She pulled her robe tight, evidently unaware of how the sheer silk showcased her awesome body. Her white throat bobbed.

“So?” she demanded. “What did you conclude? How safe am I?”

“Not at all,” he said flatly. “If T-Rex is a tenth as good as me, he could be sitting right where I am now. I’m betting he is. Somebody should tell your folks this. That somebody probably should not be me.”

“Yes, they’re prejudiced,” she admitted. “But if you hadn’t stopped us from getting into the car, I’d be dead right now.”

“There is that,” Sean agreed. “Did that earn me some points?”

“With who?” She laughed nervously. “With my mother?”

“I don’t give a shit about your mother. I’m only interested in you.”

She fended him off with sarcasm. “I’m so honored,” she said. “But you were way, way down there into the negative numbers, point-wise.”

His mouth twisted in a humorless smile. “Am I up to zero yet?”

She dragged the comb through another tangled lock. “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know why you’re here, what you want, why you care. What does zero mean? A blank slate? Like nothing ever happened between us? I’m sorry, but I just can’t pretend that.”

He shook his head slowly. “I wouldn’t want you to.”

They stared at each other until Liv’s eyes dropped. She dug the comb into another thick snarl, her fingers trembling.

So she wasn’t immune. Angry, but not indifferent. Triumph leaped inside him, like flames. He wrenched his gaze away from her face. The wad of condoms was stiff in his jeans pocket, digging into his thigh. T-Rex. He had come here to talk to her about T-Rex.

“So you have no clue who this guy is?” he asked. “Most stalkers are known to their victims.”

“Yes, I know that,” she said shakily. “But I have no idea.”

“No jealous ex-boyfriends?”

She shook her head again. “Not a one.”

“I don’t see how an ex-boyfriend of yours could be anything but jealous, princess.”

The statement hung in the air. She lifted her chin. “Are you jealous, Sean?”

He clenched down on the hot flare of excitement. “What, you mean, I count as an ex-boyfriend? I rate the list? I’m honored.”

Her gaze was penetrating “Don’t wiggle out of the question.”

He took a deep breath, and threw it out there. “Is this a sneaky way of asking if it was me who burned your store and rigged a bomb in your car? Is that what those idiots have been telling you?”

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

“My brothers can vouch for me, if there’s any doubt,” he told her. “But even if I were so jealous I was sick with it, I would never hurt you, Liv. Not you, nor any other innocent person. Never. Is that clear?”

She stared into his eyes, and nodded. “That’s clear,” she said.

“You believe me?” He could hardly believe it.

“I believe you.”

He let out a jerky sigh as something inside him finally relaxed.

“I still want to know how you knew about the bomb,” she said.

Sean stared down at the pink hooked rug. “It’ll sound strange.”

“Try me.”

It took a while to puzzle out the best way to describe something so intangible. “I have…feelings. When I’m in a combat situation, I get warnings. Prickles on my neck, tingling in my balls. I was trained to act on it without thinking. It only works if you trust it blindly.”

Her clear white brow furrowed. “You mean, like, intuition?”

“You could call it that,” he said. “Maybe it comes from growing up with my dad, I imagine. You know about his illness, right?”

“Yes, I heard that he was—”

“A nutcase? Yeah. He saw danger everywhere. Every place was a potential minefield. Anything, a pen, a jar of nails, a carton of milk, could be a bomb in disguise. It was stressful, living with the guy.”

“Oh. Uh, wow,” she murmured. “I see how that might—”

“Skew your perspective, yeah,” he finished, matter-of-factly. “My brothers and I didn’t have any other point of reference. Dad’s bad guys were behind every tree.” He paused, reflecting. “It’s not that far from reality, now that I think about it. Look at T-Rex. You never know.”

She was shaken. “I’m so sorry.”

“I’m not trying to make you feel bad for me,” he said impatiently. “I’m just showing you my train of reasoning. The letter was part of it. You said T-Rex wanted to make you burn. He used the word ‘explosive.’ That made me think about Kev’s truck exploding, which reminded me of a dream I had. Kev was in it, and he was worried about your car.”

She was oddly gratified by that. “My car? Kev? Really?”

“Yeah. So I saw you and Madden walking towards your car, and it all came together. The note, the explosion, the dream.” He lifted his hands. “There it is. My convoluted mental processes laid bare.”

Her thoughtful eyes stayed on him, making him twitch. “This is the part where you tell me I’m a lunatic, right?”