He looked at her for a long moment, then let out a long breath. “Okay, fine. Apparently some word of my…indiscretions has leaked out.”
She crossed her arms. “And?”
“And it’s distinctly frowned on for a professor to sleep with his TA.”
“Imagine that.”
“Hey,” he said stiffly. “It’s not like I’m sleeping with my actual students. They’re TAs. And they come on to me.”
“Uh-huh. And now your reputation’s on the line.”
He opened his mouth but was interrupted by a knock at the door. She made a move to go get it, but Derek stepped into her, blocking her between him and the counter. “Let it go,” he said. “We’re not done.”
“Oh, we’re done.” Holly tried to shove past him, but he held her trapped.
“I need you, Holly.”
“No, you need someone to put the illusion back together so you can fix your precious reputation. That’s not going to be me, Derek. Surely you know that.”
“It has to be you.” He tightened his grip on her. “I told the review board that we were reconciling.”
This momentarily shocked her into immobility. “Oh my God. You have a case? You’re in that much trouble?”
“You have to fix this for me,” he said, the façade dropped, replaced with sheer desperation.
The knock came again. Again, she moved to go but Derek pushed her against the countertop, which bit into her back. “Holly—”
“Get your hands off me,” she said tightly. “Now.”
Instead, he dipped his head, nuzzling at her neck. “We can make this work if we want it enough.”
This was true—anything could work if it was wanted enough. Look at her dad and Deanna. Or Kate, going after her own happiness. Even Adam knew how to make things work for him, and she’d been wrong to push for more just because that was what she wanted. “You’re right Derek, but I don’t want it, not with you.”
“Holly—”
“No, Derek. I don’t love you. You can’t make someone love you the way you want to be loved, no matter how badly you want it to be so. Trust me, I know.”
He stared at her. “There’s someone else. You love someone else.”
“Yes, I love someone else. And to be honest, I always have.” Again, she shoved at him, but he couldn’t be budged. His fingers were digging into her arms hard enough to leave bruises and the counter was hurting her, and for the first time, she began to get scared. “Let me go, Derek.”
“No. You’re mine.”
Wrong. So wrong. Furious at him, at the situation, she simply reacted—with her knee to his crotch, dropping him to the ground like a sack of wet concrete. Holly whirled to run out of the kitchen and gasped.
Adam stood in the doorway, soaked to the skin, eyes hard and cold, body tense. Milo was at his side, alert, his fur standing straight up at his neck, eyes on Derek.
But it was what was in Adam’s hands that caught Holly’s attention—a bouquet of wildflowers. They were dripping water like he was, a wonderfully brilliant rainbow of colors that were so beautiful it only further infuriated her because it mocked romance. It mocked her divorce. It mocked everything she was feeling in that moment, which explained her juvenile reaction. She snatched the bouquet from Adam’s hands and whirled on Derek. “Are you kidding me? More stupid flowers? What is this, a bad romantic comedy?” She threw the bouquet at Derek’s feet and stomped on them.
“I…didn’t send those,” Derek said through clenched teeth, still cupping his family jewels.
Oh God. Holly turned back to Adam.
“You okay?” he asked, voice low and calm enough to get past the adrenaline rushing her system.
Was she okay? Her answer depended entirely on how long he’d been standing there and what he’d heard. Her mind raced backward, trying to remember exactly what she’d said. You can’t make someone love you the way you want to be loved…Trust me, I know…I love someone else. And to be honest, I always have…
Oh God. She had to figure by the light of barely banked anger in Adam’s eyes that he’d heard it all, every bit of her dirty little secret. Embarrassed, horrified, she kept moving, grabbing her purse, leaving both men in the kitchen as she made for the door.
She ran out into the night, into the rain. It didn’t seem so bad now. Or maybe that was just compared to the storm brewing inside the kitchen. She thought she heard Adam call her name, but she kept going. She jumped into her Jeep, slamming and locking the door as she pulled out of the driveway. She was on the street before it occurred to her that leaving Derek and Adam alone might not be such a smart idea.
She didn’t care. She turned her concentration to the road because the night was pitch-black. No city lights, no streetlights, nothing but the slick roads.
And the wind beating at her Jeep.
The rain seemed to amp up now, viciously slashing at the windshield, and she began to doubt her sanity for leaving the relative safety of her house. She debated turning around, but at this point Kate’s place was just as close. If she was home…Since the last thing Holly wanted to do was be the stupid chick who drove off the road trying to get to her phone, she pulled over to fumble through her purse. When her fingers closed around it, she made a sound of relief that was short-lived.
Low battery.
Damn stupid smartphone, with only enough battery to get her three-quarters through a normal day. What the hell was wrong with technology? “Please work,” she said, and hit Kate’s number, sagging with relief when she answered. “Hey, you’re home.”
“Yeah, got a sick brother acting like a baby.”
“How does an ice-cream pity party sound?”
“Perfect,” Kate said. “On a night like this, we need something hot to go with it. I’ll heat the fudge. Be care—”
The phone died. Holly tossed it aside and carefully pulled back onto the road. The isolated road, with no other cars in sight.
Driving straight into a storm.
Seemed she was the stupid chick, after all.
The road was slick, the water flowing across it in sheets now, past the rails on her right, down the embankment to the river rushing below. She slowed down, way down, not wanting to be a statistic. It happened out here all the time. The people of Sunshine were a hardy bunch, but they also thought they were invincible.
She did not think she was invincible. She had a healthy sense of preservation and a will to live for that ice-cream pity party with Kate, so she slowed down even more. She crossed the bridge—the one that washed out every few years at flood time—and gulped in relief when she got over it. Another gust of wind hit and she fought the steering wheel as she headed into the next hairpin turn. In spite of her low speed, the Jeep slid, and both right tires rolled off the edge of the asphalt. She jerked on the wheel but her tires didn’t respond. Adam’s words flashed in her head.
Steer into the slide…
She could hear him plain as day in that low, authoritative voice. But before she could do that, there was a loud POP—her tire, she thought—and her Jeep hit the railing. The railing broke. She screamed as she went airborne off the ice-slicked surface and over the embankment.
Twenty-five
Adam heard the front door slam signifying Holly’s departure, and it galvanized him into action. He strode across the kitchen floor and squatted before the man curled in a ball on the tile floor, still clutching his gonads. “Derek?”
The guy wheezed and nodded.
“You all right?” Adam asked.
Derek let out a shuddery breath. “I think so.”
“That’s too bad.”
Derek’s eyes flew to Adam’s face. “Who the f**k are you?”
Adam was tempted to say “your worst f**king nightmare,” but he didn’t want to sound like a bad movie line. “You touch her?”
“She’s my wife.”
Adam grabbed Derek by the front of his shirt and pulled him up, possibly banging the back of his head on the cabinet just a little bit.
“Hey, man, watch it.”
Adam did it again, harder.
“Ow, Jesus! What’s your problem?”
“You,” Adam said. “You’re my problem. You’re still worked up over the divorce?”
“Yes.”
“Wrong answer.”
“You threatening me?” Derek asked.
Adam got a little closer, and this time when Derek’s head banged into the cabinet, it was his own doing as he tried to move back.
“You’re the guy,” Derek said slowly. “The one she loves.”
Against all odds and disbelief, yeah. He was. He’d never been worthy of that love, but he was going to work on that.
“Did you know she was coming off a long-term relationship when you took up with her?” Derek asked.
Adam purposely took his hands off Derek so he wouldn’t be tempted to strangle him. “You want to talk? Let’s talk about what a college professor was doing hooking up with a vulnerable nineteen-year-old.”
Derek swallowed but didn’t look away.
“Drop the appeal,” Adam said. He rose and headed for the door.
The storm had intensified, but he was already drenched, anyway. He started toward his truck.
Holly was long gone already. Not surprising. He’d seen her expression when she’d turned to him. Embarrassment, and hurt, which killed him. He pulled out his cell and called her, but he went right to voice mail.
He had no idea where to look for her. He called Dell. “Where would a really pissed-off woman go?”
“You’re asking me?”
“You’re with Jade, and I figure you piss her off daily, so yeah, I’m asking you.”
Dell let out a breath. “Jade wouldn’t go anywhere—she’d stay and kick my ass.”
“Not helping.”
“Holly, right?”
“No, the Tooth Fairy.”
Dell laughed softly. “Okay, so you pissed her off and she stormed out. Give her some space. Then grovel. She’s a hell of a good woman, and she’s worth a little time on your knees.”
Adam hung up. Fuck space. He’d given her enough space over the years. He was done with space.
But most of all, he was done holding back how he felt about her. He’d long ago learned to shelve his emotions, long before he met her, in fact. No amount of training could have prepared him for her, and no one could have told him that he would be brought to his knees by a woman.
But that’s what she’d done, brought him straight to his knees.
He’d always told himself that there was a better man for her, and that man wasn’t him. Even though deep down inside he’d wanted to believe that he was the only man for her.
She’d believed it all along, and he finally believed it, too.
All he had to do was find her and tell her he’d caught up. He told himself this, knowing it wasn’t going to be that simple, nothing with her ever was. He drove out into the storm, figuring he’d take the only road into town and wing it once he got there.
One hundred yards later he was thinking he was insane to be out in this. And so was Holly. The road was an exercise in concentration, and a disaster waiting to happen. Deeply concerned for Holly, he crossed the bridge, then hydroplaned on the next curve, swearing viciously when he saw the broken rail.
It hadn’t been broken on his way here, which meant that it had just happened.
A car had gone over.
He called 911 and then pulled to the side of the road. Grabbing his Maglite, he hit the ground running, the storm beating at him. At the broken rail, he flicked the light below, trying to take in what he was seeing. The riverbanks had flooded, and Jesus Christ, there was a car at the bottom of the embankment, nose in, the water rising toward the doors. An old memory nearly knocked him to his knees. That long-ago night, drag racing, watching the cop car skid out and go over the embankment…
Fuck.
He didn’t see anyone moving around, but he needed to get down there for what would hopefully be a rescue and not a recovery. It would take emergency responders at least twenty minutes to get here. But whoever was in that car didn’t have twenty minutes.
He ran back to his truck for rope, tying one end around a sturdy tree at the top of the embankment, the other around his waist. Two cars had driven by him and not even slowed. He was on his own. No Kel, no Milo, no anyone but his own wits, which were weak at best.
He rappelled down the bank. Normally the river would be at his knees, but tonight it was raging and about to take the vehicle into its greedy grasp. Closer now, he shined the light on it and his heart stopped.
Holly.
Holly opened her eyes and panicked. She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t move, couldn’t see. Disoriented, confused, she couldn’t even tell which way was up or down. She was reaching out, trying to feel around when she saw a shadow move outside her Jeep. She flinched with instinctive fear, but that was quickly replaced with knee-melting relief because it was a man, and he had a flashlight. He flicked the light inside her vehicle and she realized her Jeep was nose down, her seat belt holding her suspended between the seat and steering wheel. Water was swirling around her, filling up the interior of the Jeep.
“You okay?” the man yelled through the wind and slashing rain.
Holly jerked in stunned disbelief because either she was hallucinating or it was the one man she didn’t want to see right now. “Adam?”
He knocked on the window. “Unlock your door.”
She blinked and took better stock. She was still having trouble breathing, no doubt because she was hanging from her seat belt, the nylon cutting into her chest. Water was filling the Jeep at an alarming rate as she fumbled for the door lock control—but it was underwater and she couldn’t find it. Straining forward, she ran her hands beneath the surface of the water over the slippery controls on the door and accidentally dunked herself. “I can’t—” She choked on fear. “It won’t unlock!”