Recovery by Alexandrea Weis

woman’s name. “The car spun out of control and rolled over three times. Carol died instantly.”
    I silently chastised myself for asking about his scars. “I’m sorry,” I said.
    Dallas took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I left the bureau after that. Couldn’t quite look at the job the same way after Carol’s death.”
    “Were you close with this Carol?”
    He kept his eyes focused on the ceiling above us. “We had been seeing each other for some time, unbeknownst to the department heads. I had just asked her to marry me that day.”
    I bolted up in the bed. “You were engaged?” I found it surprising to believe the elusive man next to me had at one time actually had feelings for another human being.
    He rolled over and looked at me. “It was a long time ago.”
    His arctic eyes were empty and the rest of his face was like stone. I often found myself trying to figure out what he was thinking, what he was feeling. But I never could.
    I let my body fall back against the bed.
    “You’re very jumpy,” he observed. “You were wound up so tight tonight I thought you were going to explode in front of your family. You’re not being very convincing, Nicci.” He sat up in the bed.
    “Well, I convinced everybody in New York.”
    “That was New York, where no one knew you.” He paused as he got up out of the bed. “We need to try something different.”
    I sighed with frustration. “What do you suggest?”
    He came over to my side of the bed and put his hand out to me. I frowned, unsure of his intentions, but I decided I should probably go along and avoid any further interrogation. I took his hand and let him pull me up out of the bed. Before I knew it, he had his arms around me. I could feel the heat from his skin as my hands rested against his bare chest. His lips stood poised inches from mine.
    I tried to squirm free, but he was too strong for me. “Let me go, Dallas,” I said, wriggling even harder.
    “A convincing cover has to be real. I suggest we practice being a couple.” He paused for a moment. “Kiss me,” he insisted.
    “What?” I tried to allay the discomfort his embrace was creating inside of me by thinking this was some sort of joke.
    He moved his face closer to mine and whispered, “Kiss me once, like you mean it.”
    I really struggled to free myself. “You’re not joking, are you?”
    He tightened his hold on me. “Kiss me, Nicci!” he commanded.
    I hesitated for a few seconds, weighing other options such as a knee to his groin. But after further reflection, I concluded a simple kiss would be safer. Slowly I leaned forward, touched my lips to his, and prayed there would be nothing more. The taste of his lips and the way his firm body felt next to mine brought an unsettling kind of heat up from somewhere deep inside of me. With David’s kisses, there had been passion, urgency, and complete surrender. With this man, I sensed the thrill of danger. Handing myself over to the tingle of excitement rising within me, I slid my hands around the back of his neck and pressed my body to his. Suddenly I had forgotten about our cover, David’s killer, and the reason the man was kissing me in the first place. All I could hear was the pounding of the blood in my veins as my heart thudded away in my chest. It had been so long since I had felt so alive.
    He pulled away first, flushed and out of breath. “That’s what I mean.”
    Dazed, I looked up into his eyes. “What?”
    “Kiss me like that and no one will think we are anything but lovers.”
    He immediately let me go, and I felt a little wobbly on my feet for a moment. Then the knowledge of what he had just done hit me. I reached up to slap him, but he grabbed my arm and pinned it behind me, holding me close against his body.
    “I knew it was there inside of you waiting to get out,” he whispered as his breath burned against the nape of my neck. “I could feel you stirring beneath my lips. Keep that passion, and we’ll have