Donovans 01 - Amber Beach

said after a moment. “You trust me that much.”
    “A moron’s trust. How gratifying for you.”
    The cool acid in Honor’s voice told Jake that five minutes wouldn’t be nearly enough to make her understand.
    “If I had come to you,” he said roughly, “and told you that the Donovan clan was trying to frame me for what your beloved brother Kyle did and I needed you to prove that I was innocent, you would have slammed the door in my face.”
    “Delightful thought.”
    “Not for me. My company has been booted out of the Baltics and shit-listed in Russia. Unlike the Donovan brothers, I don’t have a vast family fortune to cushion my fall. I fight or I go under and stay there. I’m not going under.”
    Honor looked at the grim lines of Jake’s face and didn’t doubt a word he said.
    “I’d like to meet the man who gave you those scars,” she said. “I’d hire him on the spot.”
    “They don’t post want ads in hell.”
    There was nothing warm and reassuring about Jake’s eyes at the moment. They were winter cold and as unforgiving as the hell he had just mentioned. She swallowed and wondered for the first time if she shouldn’t be afraid of him.
    She wanted to be. It would make everything so much easier. But she wasn’t.
    Rather distantly she wondered what the IQ of a moron really was. Probably close to absolute zero, if her own so-called brain was any guide—she was the one who had been babbling about love to a man who hated her brother. Her only, bitter, comfort was that Jake had been too busy screwing her to listen.
    “What would you have done in my place?” he demanded.
    “My options would have been limited. I’m not as strong as you are. And I’m not a world-class liar.”
    His hand tightened on Honor’s thigh. “I haven’t lied to you. Not in the way you mean.”
    “Really? What way do I mean?”
    “I didn’t make love to you in order to get to your brother,” Jake said bluntly.
    “I believe you.”
    He let out a long breath. “Thank God.”
    “You didn’t make love to me, period,” she continued with a thin smile.
    “What would you call it?”
    “Sex.”
    “Whatever. As long as you know it didn’t have anything to do with the Kyle mess.”
    Honor stared at Jake and wondered which one of them was crazy. One of them had to be.
    “Let me get this straight,” she said. “You came to me under false pretenses—”
    “You hired me under false—”
    “—and then you—”
    “—pretenses,” he said, talking over her. “You didn’t want to learn how to—”
    “—take advantage of my fear to crawl in bed and—” she continued relentlessly.
    “—fish and you’re afraid of—”
    “—then you have the balls to suggest that the sex and the Kyle mess have nothing—”
    “—small boats and—”
    “Stop yelling!”
    “I’m not yelling.” Jake’s breath came out in a rush that was also a disgusted curse. “This isn’t getting us anywhere.”
    “On that we agree. Let go of me.”
    “You’d rather finish this conversation on the floor?”
    “There’s nothing to finish. It was finished when Archer told me who you were.”
    “Just what did your brother tell you?”
    “That I was a little fool and you could be Kyle’s killer.”
    A stillness came over Jake.
    For the first time, fear breathed a chill over Honor’s skin.
    “Is that what you believe?” he asked softly.
    She made a trapped, frustrated gesture. “I don’t believe Kyle is dead, so I could hardly believe you killed him, could I?”
    “Talk about damned by faint praise.”
    “It’s more than you deserve and less than a smart woman would give you,” Honor said, her voice flat. “But then, you’ve already proved just how stupid I am, haven’t you?”
    “No. I proved how passionate you were. That’s a different thing entirely.”
    Honor closed her eyes and wished with all her soul to be somewhere else. Anywhere else. And with no memory of the past few days.
    The pain and humiliation beneath her anger made Jake wince. His hand on her thigh became less confining, more caressing. “Honor, sweetheart, I’m sorry you had to find out this way, but I’m not sorry about last night.”
    “Don’t. Touch. Me.”
    The softness of her voice made the hair on Jake’s neck stir in primal reflex. If he pushed her any harder, she would go for his throat like the cornered animal she was. Very gently he lifted his hand. She let out a shuddering breath and opened her eyes. He didn’t like