Sea Haven 01 - Water Bound

headboard, allowing the rain to soothe her when her heart ached for him. “I think you’re better off here, Lev. Stay here awhile and just let yourself live. There aren’t any strings. I’m not asking anything of you. Just find who you want to be, who you really are underneath it all. Whoever that person is, will be welcome here.”
    The burning behind his eyes hurt. He just lay there, holding her, afraid if he moved, he’d shatter, just break into a million pieces. He also knew it wouldn’t matter to her if he did—she wouldn’t view him as less than a man.
    She would simply accept him.
    He took a breath and allowed himself to feel very real love for another human being. He told her the stark truth. The emotion was strong, swamping him, invading every part of his mind, his heart and his body. He shook with 190

    it. He let it consume him, filling up every empty space. Several heartbeats went by before he could speak.
    “I want to spend my life with you, Rikki, not just a few moments, not a few nights. If you take me on, we’ll work together, no matter what comes up, and we’ll find a way to make it all work.”
    Her heart jumped. He felt it, but he didn’t look up.
    “I don’t want to go back to living in the shadows, lyubimaya. If we do this, it has to be all the way, because I don’t know how to be any other way than what they trained me to be. Here, with you, I’m different. If I leave you, I’m back in a black void. Maybe I belong there,” he nuzzled her thigh with his chin, “but I’ve had a taste of something else. You’re magic to me, Rikki.
    I don’t know why, but I know without you, I don’t have a chance of living a normal life.”
    She made a strangled sound in her throat. “Lev. By any stretch of the imagination, I’m not the norm. Maybe you’re not seeing me as I am. I can’t even let you use my bathroom. You’ve somehow managed to get into the bed, but I still wince when you’re in the kitchen and I can’t watch you cook.
    Is that the kind of life you envisioned for yourself?”
    “My life is killing, Rikki. I stalk my target, immerse myself in their life, kill them and disappear without a trace. There’s nothing left of me because I’m not real.”
    “You’re real.”
    He rolled onto his back to look up at her face. “I’m not real to anyone else. I’m a ghost to most people, a weapon the government lets loose on the world when they need it. When they get to the point where I’m too scary for them to handle, a contract will be issued and then it will be a matter of time before someone just like me shows up to eliminate me.”
    “But you’ve been loyal and you’ve carried out whatever task they’ve asked of you, no matter how abhorrent to you, right?” Rikki protested. “Why would anyone you’ve served want you dead?”
    “I have too much information running around in my head and I’m dangerous. They would presume that eventually, if I’m not working for them, I’ll work against them.”
    She frowned and he couldn’t help himself, he reached up and traced her soft lips.
    “Then it’s a good thing that everyone thinks you’re dead, Lev.”
    He sighed. “That man on the platform that day. You called him Ralph.
    He saw me.”
    “Not your face. I said you were visiting. And why would he remember?”
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    “You honestly don’t know, do you?” He was a bit shocked at her naïveté. “He was trying to flirt with you and you didn’t give him the time of day.”
    “That’s just silly. He’s friendly to all the divers. And you had a concussion and were imagining things.”
    “It’s my job to catch every little nuance, Rikki. It’s the difference between life and death. Believe me, the man was flirting. He finds you intriguing. And it’s probably the first time he’s ever seen you with a man.”
    Now her frown reached her eyebrows and he had to trace them as well because he just couldn’t resist. “He noticed me, all right. And when they come looking—and they will—he’ll mention that you were out on the sea that day and I was with you. That will lead some very bad people straight to you.” He wasn’t certain if he was warning her, asking permission to kill Ralph or needing to see her reaction to knowing Ralph had been interested.
    “You might be just a little paranoid, Lev. Why in the world would he talk to perfect strangers about seeing either of us?”
    “Because my government will send their best cleaner and he knows how to get