Bared to You(68)

Gideon set his glass down on the end table with a harsh thud.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, feeling like I might be sick. "I'd spare you the details, but you need to know what someone might dig up. The hospital reported the abuse to child services. It's all a matter of public record, which has been sealed, but there are people who know the story. When my mom married Stanton, he went back and tightened those seals, paid out in return for nondisclosure agreements...stuff like that. But you have a right to know that this could come out and embarrass you."

"Embarrass me?" he snapped, vibrating with rage. "Embarrassment isn't on the list of what I'd feel."

"Gideon - "

"I would destroy the career of any reporter who wrote about this, and then I'd dismantle the publication that ran the piece." He was so cold with fury, he was icy. "I'm going to find the monster who hurt you, Eva, wherever he is, and I'm going to make him wish he was dead."

A shiver moved through me, because I believed him. It was in his face. His voice. In the energy he exuded and his sharply honed focus. He wasn't just dark and dangerous in his looks. Gideon was a man who got what he wanted, whatever it took.

I pushed to my feet. "He's not worth the effort. Not worth your time."

"You are. You're worth it. Damn it. Goddamn it to hell."

I moved closer to the fireplace, needing the warmth. "There's also a money trail. Cops and reporters always follow the money. Someone may wonder why my mother left her first marriage with two million dollars, but her daughter from a previous relationship left with five."

Without looking, I felt his sudden stillness. "Of course," I went on, "that blood money's probably grown to considerably more than that now. I won't touch it, but Stanton manages the brokerage account I dumped it in and everyone knows he has the Midas touch. If you ever had any concern that I wanted your money - "

"Stop talking."

I turned to face him. I saw his face, his eyes. Saw the pity and horror. But it was what I didn't see that hurt the most.

It was my greatest nightmare realized. I'd feared that my past might negatively impact his attraction to me. I'd told Cary that Gideon might stay with me for all the wrong reasons. That he might stay by my side, but that I'd still - for all intents and purposes - lose him anyway.

And it seemed I had.

I tightened the belt on my robe. "I'm going to get dressed and go."

"What?" Gideon glared. "Go where?"

"Home," I said, weary to the bone. "I think you need to digest all this."

His arms crossed. "We can do that together."

"I don't think we can." My chin lifted, grief overwhelming my shame and heartrending disappointment. "Not while you're looking at me like you feel sorry for me."

"I'm not made of f*cking stone, Eva. I wouldn't be human if I didn't care."

The emotions I'd run through since lunch coalesced into a searing pain in my chest and a cleansing burst of anger. "I don't want your goddamn pity."

He shoved both hands through his hair. "What the hell do you want, then?"

"You! I want you."

"You have me. How many times do I have to tell you that?"

"Your words don't mean shit when you can't back them up. From the moment we met, you've been hot for me. You haven't been able to look at me without making it damn clear you want to f*ck my brains out. And that's gone, Gideon." My eyes burned. "That look...it's gone."

"You can't be serious." He stared at me as if I'd grown two heads.

"I don't think you know how your desire makes me feel." My arms wrapped around me, covering my breasts. I suddenly felt naked in the worst way. "It makes me feel beautiful. It makes me feel strong and alive. I - I can't bear to be with you if you don't feel that way about me anymore."

"Eva, I..." His voice faded into silence. He was hard-faced and distant, his fists clenched at his sides.

I loosened the sash of my robe and shrugged the whole garment off me. "Look at me, Gideon. Look at my body. It's the same one you couldn't get enough of last night. The same one you were so desperate to get into that you took me to that damn hotel room. If you don't want this anymore...if you don't get hard looking at it - "

"Is this hard enough for you?" He broke the drawstring of his pants pushing them down to expose the heavy, thickly-veined length of his erection.