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Dana Bright sat in her car at the end of Cecil Green Park Road and stared out the open window. The sky over Cleaves Mills was salted with stars and glowed a dull ice-blue low on the horizon. The weather was unusually cool for mid-July. A stiff southern breeze tore through the line of ancient trees that edged the opposite side of the street. The clatter of leaves insulated Dana from the sounds of the neighborhood: barking dogs, playing children and the animated conversations of an adult population still reeling from the death of Rashid Mahmud.

Dana loved her job. She absorbed every nuance of a story and spat it back out in a form that was hopefully relatable, if not comfortable, for an eager audience. Whether the reaction was good or bad made no difference, so long as people were paying attention, Dana was satisfied. The events surrounding the Cotton family, Josh Blake and Mahmud had been emotionally exhausting. For the first time in many years, Dana felt the pain of perpetrators and victims.

Unlocking those mental doors had left her vulnerable to unexpected feelings of warm and regret regarding John Smith as well.

“If you ever want to lighten the load, you know where to reach me.”

The invitation was sincere but Dana had begun to question the wisdom of it the second the door closed behind her.

Headlights splashed over the dashboard and crawled up the windshield as a car approached the intersection. Dana winced at the sharp squeak of brakes. “Put your foot down on the accelerator!” she growled.

The car backfired as it rumbled slowly past, belching a foul smelling cloud through Dana’s open window. She waved away the fumes. My fault, I should have left when I had the chance.

After her final report from outside the Sheriff’s station, Dana had resolved to do just that. Bring back John’s keys and say good-bye. Drive out to 1-95 and be in Boston before midnight—short and sweet. Unfortunately, closing the door had never been that simple for either John or her.

The ring-tone of Dana’s cell phone sliced neatly through the sigh of the wind. “Jesus, go the hell away!” The sound persisted. Dana sighed and reached blindly for the phone resting in a tray below the CD player. “So help me if this is you Gary…” Acrid thoughts of her producer and his anal retentive nature vanished when she read the caller I.D.

‘Johnny Smith’

You’ve got to be kidding.

Dana stared at the tiny screen. The instrument had stopped chirping, indicating that the caller had been sent to voicemail. She could still answer but something held her fast.

Anger?

Dana pushed a hand through her hair and leaned her elbow on the doorframe. Despite her dismissal of John’s harsh words at the sheriff’s station, a part of her was still fuming. Justified or not, Dana could not help feeling that John owed her an explanation for his terse, distant manner.

Curiosity?

She glanced at the phone and noted the tiny flashing symbol in the lower right hand corner. John had left a message. Why now? Was there more to the gentle kiss they had shared? A spark of hope carefully sheltered from time? Dana shook her head. No, the reason for hesitating was something quite different but familiar: fear.

A sigh seeped between Dana’s dark lips.

John Smith was an enigma wrapped in a plain, brown wrapper. He was, in many respects, the most frightening and complex man Dana had ever met. Demonized, canonized, imprisoned and released by an ability he did not want or fully comprehend. That juxtaposition of reality, coupled with Dana’s innate curiosity, had compelled her to learn more. She tendered her ‘application’ for the job of looking out for John Smith without reservation. One torrid night that ended in a nearly fatal encounter with Max Cassidy sewed the first seeds of doubt. Still, the fascination persisted and she pursued the possibility of a relationship with John for several months.

Dana knew ‘something’ had happened between John and Sarah Bannerman after the fire at Cathy’s Steakhouse. She struggled to live with it. After all, she had been the instigator of similar situations at the behest of successful and manipulative men. Sarah Bannerman’s ineffectual declaration of friendship for John during the aborted Intervention at the Faith Heritage retreat proved to be the final straw. Whether John was truly capable of letting go of the past became immaterial. Dana Bright was not going to wait for any man to make up his mind. At the time the decision had felt like independence. Time cast the light of cowardice. She left Cleaves Mills in search of new professional horizons. It was the truth but held the same weighty undertones as John’s recent statement: “Not bad, considering.”

Dana looked at the phone in her hand.

Walk away. Run away. Don’t look back!

The inner voice was loud and clear. Dana forcefully ignored it, pressed the buttons to replay the message and brought the phone to her ear.

“Dana…” John cleared his throat. “I just wanted to say…” He sighed softly. “I thought I knew what I wanted when I dialed your number. I can’t believe I still remember. Then again,” he chuckled. “You remembered how I take my coffee so…” The laugh seemed to stick in his throat. John sighed again and whispered. “I’ve missed you, Dana.” The connection ended with a sharp click.

The message said very little, the delivery more than Dana wanted to hear. She dropped the phone onto the seat and slowly shook her head. No, no, no. I can’t, I shouldn’t. Why can’t I close this chapter and move on?

“Damnmit, Gary! Why did you send me back here? What the hell was I thinking when I took this assignment?” Dana swore vehemently beneath her breath and started the car. She forced the implications of the message into the deepest corner of her mind and jammed the lever into drive, peeling away from the curb in a chirp of grit and rubber.

The light was on above the front door when she drove in and parked behind John’s Rover. Had he turned it on after calling in the faint hope that she was coming back? Dana bit her lip and yanked the key out of the ignition. Oh please! Don’t think much of ourselves, do we?

“Is this what it feels like to be schizophrenic?” Shaking her head, Dana grabbed her purse and slid out of the car.

She walked up the steps and took a deep breath before pressing the doorbell. The chimes echoed through the mammoth house. Dana shivered, reminded again of the size and weight of the Smith legacy. More than structures or bank accounts, John’s family exuded an almost freakish wealth of spirits, good and bad.

The bell went unanswered and flashes of doubt singed Dana’s nerves. She pushed a second time and folded her arms, feigning confidence.

The deadbolt slid back with a sharp click and the door swung inward on silent hinges. John’s eyes were dark and unnaturally soft as they traveled slowly up from the slate step to Dana’s face. “You got my message?”

The question was tinged with uncertainty and seeing John this way made Dana uneasy. His inner strength was tangible, ever-present, with the single exception of their eventful first date. Even then, he had come out the stronger of the two of them. Picking himself up from her past tragedies and his without openly acknowledging the impact either had on his psyche. John had changed since they parted ways. She sensed it from the moment they hugged in the Faith Heritage auditorium. The weight was heavier, the feeling of responsibility more overt than before. Dana flushed at the almost maternal urge that swept over her at the realization. “Yes, I did.”

John stepped aside, inviting her in with a slight gesture of his hand.

As Dana walked past, she observed the dark smudges beneath his eyes and the still inflamed bruises on his pallid cheeks. It was obvious that he had not really slept since the discovery of Rashid Mahmud’s body. She felt a stab of guilt for not noticing during their earlier parting.

John trailed her into the living room without speaking. He indicated one end of the couch with a nod and sat on the opposite end without waiting for her to do the same. Perplexed, Dana perched on the edge of the cushions.

All the lights in the living room had been turned off. Illumination crept in from the overhead fixture in the dining room and the refracted glow of the yard lights through the filigree of the curtains. Dana’s eyes slid over the shadowed furnishings and fixtures. They were familiar yet surreal due to the distance of years.

“It’s late,” John murmured.

Dana blinked and pivoted to face him. John’s head was propped against one hand, his gaze unfocused as he stared towards the opposite window.

This is hard… Dana bit back a cynical laugh. By calling, John had made the first move. There was now an enormous sense of pressure to say something, anything. Dana licked her lips, troubled by the familiar feelings of inadequacy and resentment that had always arisen when she contemplated their relationship.

“You shouldn’t drive back to Boston tonight.”

Was this an invitation to stay in a guest room? Share coffee and croissant in the morning like two old friends? Or was it something more substantial from an old flame not quite extinguished? Dana bit back an impatient sigh, wondering if he were really unaware of the confusion his comments was inciting. “I was planning to.”

“You left an hour ago,” John pointed out in the same flat tone.

“I did?”

The ghost of a smile lifted his lips.

It was the first trace of emotion he had shown since answering the door. The John Smith Dana knew was a passionate man driven by the need to help and a substantial fear of a future he had never shared with her. The man sitting on the couch was the antithesis of that familiar figure. Startling blue eyes dark and empty, sunken into a face lined with worry. There was no light and Dana suspected that the recent events had dashed cold water on an already weak flame.

“We still share each others lives even though she has a home and a family now and I have memories and visions. And if they sometimes seem more real to me than they are it’s because I wish they were.”

Dana blew out a shaky sigh as the memory of their first evening slid away. It was months before she understood the real reason why she got her answer. It was in John’s nature to speak his mind, acknowledge what hurt even if the revealing was more painful than the problem itself. The candlelight had picked up the glint of tears in his eyes that night and Dana remembered the sharp stab of self-loathing. She pitied him and hated Sarah Bannerman for throwing away such a tender soul. Later—after the dancing, the sex, the pathetic attempt to fashion a relationship from the ashes of their past—Dana knew differently. She understood Sarah’s motivations and accepted the tryst that she could never prove. Their conversation in the kitchen of the retreat, while outwardly damning, was inwardly resolute. No one had ever asked her to forgive Sarah Bannerman and, by rights, no one should. Dana had done so in the privacy of thought because she could do no less and still live with herself.

Four years later, John was completely removed from that man who sat through dinner staring balefully at his plate. He seemed incapable of explaining whatever had occurred in the interim between their last meeting and now. Yet, he obviously needed to do so without fear of judgment or reprisal for his decisions.

“Where did you park?”

Dana blushed self-consciously. “At the end of the street.”

John nodded into his palm.

Dana reached for his opposite hand. The flesh was cool and firm in her grasp. He flinched but did not pull away as she nudged the clenched fingers open and stroked his palm. “Johnny…”

He turned and pulled her close, cupping her chin with his free hand as his mouth covered hers.

Their kiss in the foyer had been hesitant and chaste, a good-bye neither was sure of. This time his lips were fever warm. His tongue pushed into her mouth, sliding luxuriantly over her teeth and teasing the hard flesh of her palate. Dana hesitantly parried his explorations with sharp thrusts of her own. John pulled his hand free of her loosening grip and moved it to the back of her head, gently guiding her to a better position. His tongue slipped down into the softness underneath hers and a low moan sounded deep in his throat.

No, this isn’t want I want! Or is it?

She wanted to resist, to sit and talk for a while, but John’s need was like a shadow. It stole quietly out from the corners of the room and draped over them in layers of regret and fear. The weight of it drove thought and reason down into a place Dana understood all too well. A place she had introduced John to over the course of their first night together. In the last three years she had learned to live without the irreverence of casual sex. Dana hated the hollowness left behind and did not want a similar pain for John. She worried that she could commit to an actual relationship and that he seemed so needful of anything less.

John increased the pressure and tempo of their kiss. His fingers tangled in her hair and dropped down to her shoulder. He cupped the bone, smoothing the fabric over the skin with jerky strokes as he probed her mouth.

God, it felt good! Selfish, forbidden, unworthy but…

Dana leaned into his awkward embrace and rested a hand on his thigh. John trembled and nipped the tip of her tongue, prompting Dana to trace light fingers down the inside of his leg. The muscles were leaner, tighter than before, the softness of the academician a memory. Dana pressed the hard flesh beneath the tight, black pants. She appreciated the change but wondered what had triggered it.

John nibbled her lower lip and kissed the corner of her mouth. He started to shift beneath her and Dana’s hand slid forward. She cupped his genitals, eliciting a startled gasp as she gently massaged. Slowly her fingers eased up and caressed his length, up to the tip and down again. Curling, cradling and splaying out to tease his thighs.

The breath rattled in John’s throat as he kissed his way to her temple. Dana suddenly shifted her attention to his belt and smiled secretly at his petulant groan. The leather was supple and did not resist as she undid the clasp one handed and slid her hand beneath the loosened waistband. Her fingers skimmed over his hip and grasped one cheek. John shivered. His hand dropped from her shoulder to her thigh, kneading the tender skin until it burned. His lips traveled down along her jaw line and across her throat.

A sigh shuddered through Dana. She arched her neck, reveling in the pressure of his eager mouth. John suckled the ridge of her collarbone and licked the milky skin above the neckline of her camisole. Dana brought both hands up to rest in his damp hair. John nudged sharply at the juncture between her neck and shoulder. His teeth grazed the skin as he kissed his way to her ear and teased the lobe with his tongue.

Dana hands threaded through John’s hair and down across his back. The muscles beneath the black shirt were wire tight. They rippled as his hands traveled up her arms and urged the blazer off of her shoulders. Dana shimmied out of the constrictive garment and sat back, catching John’s eye for the first time since the kiss.

His dark gaze was a mass of furies and fears. John could not ask for support and he had no right to demand it after all of this time. Dana swallowed hard against an instinctive urge to flee. She held John’s eyes and willed reassurance as she reached for his hands. Boston felt like the other side of the world. Three years was long enough. She would not run and hide.

John’s limp fingers curled around hers and tightened. Dana did not flinch at the pressure or the momentary flash of relief that brightened his features. He nodded fractionally and settled her hands on his waist. The long fingers lingered for a moment. Their hold was gentle but firm and she responded with a mischievous smile. Permission had been granted and Dana Bright never had to be asked twice.

They stood up together and Dana slowly unbuttoned John’s shirt as their pants dropped to the floor. Her gazed traveled over his hardened nipples and down to his navel as her fingers tentatively parted the fine, blond hair on his chest. John’s hands lowered to her waist. His fingers were feather-light as they pushed up the hem of the camisole and glided over Dana’s ribs. He lingered on the outside of her breasts. Touching, teasing the flesh until she shivered and stretched to kiss the tender spot beneath his jaw. John drew his large hands together until the thumbs met in her cleavage. He caressed the soft skin, his eyes unfocused and his mouth fixed in a pensive frown.

Dana forced herself to breathe evenly. She concentrated on nudging the shirt from his shoulders and kissing a trail the length of his jaw to a spot just below his ear. The expression on John’s face was familiar, aggravating and expected. The ghosts of Dana’s past had left their footprints on every part of her body. John was bound to encounter them and now, as before, it was her responsibility to bring them both into the present.

Dana nipped his earlobe and kissed the sharp point of his jaw. She smoothed back the fine short hair on his temples and then dropped her hands to his upper arms. The lean muscles seemed to melt like butter at a touch. John’s features softened into a pale smile. He shrugged off the shirt and pulled her close. Cradling her shoulder blades as he bent to nuzzle her neck and blow warm air over the tingling skin.

Dana dragged her hands down John’s back to his waist, delighting in the gooseflesh that popped across the skin. She forced his boxers over the firm curve of his buttocks and grasped both cheeks. John startled and she squeezed harder. A stutter of laughter trickled down and he bent enough to suck hard and long on her neck. Dana flinched away from the blossoming hickey. She laughed beneath her breath and pressed her body fully and firmly against his. Slowly she descended, massaging his cock with her stomach, cradling it in the hollow of her breasts and finally enveloping it with moist lips.

John shuddered and swayed with her rhythm. His breathing became stilted and his hands moved in jerky strokes through her hair. Dana pulled back to the tip and then plunged forward, drinking his length until the tight, blond curls tickled her nostrils. She tasted his arousal, inhaled the scent and felt her panties grow damp with wanting. The world dimmed and brightened in the shadows of their movement. John’s fingers brushed her cheeks and he coughed harshly, trying to catch his breath as her tongue swirled over the engorged glans. Dana took all of him in and then dragged her teeth back towards the tip, compressing the hot, quivering skin between her lips.

John’s hands fell to her shoulders as she released him with a last, languid stroke. He urged her up and onto the couch, his mouth descending on hers without warning. The kiss was bruising and fierce, his tongue plunging in and around hers until the need to breathe forced them apart.

Dana tried to catch his eye but John refused. He eased her back against the cushions and placed one knee on the edge of the couch. Using one hand to brace his weight against the back, he dropped the other to her crotch. Dana gasped aloud as his fingers urged the thin barrier of her silk underwear to one side and entered her moist slit.

John caressed the hard nub within. Slowly at first, then increasing pace as Dana moaned deep in her throat. She twisted, encouraging his ministrations with a thrust of her hips. A thin, satisfied smile flitted across John’s face. He bent and kissed her temple. Dana took the opportunity to capture his left nipple. She teased and sucked, enjoying his ragged gasps. The pressure and speed of his stroking increased and she swallowed a slightly hysterical giggle. Tiny shocks fanned out across her abdomen and down her thighs. She writhed at the exquisite pain.

Keeping his fingers in place, John shifted position. His now free hand eased Dana’s panties over one cheek and then switched places with its mate, seemingly without losing rhythm. The garment was removed in one smooth motion.

A part of Dana’s spinning brain marveled at John’s dexterity. He was a self-admitted late bloomer and she wondered if the skills he now exhibited were learned in reality or in another person’s mind. As John settled over her and entered, Dana ceased to care.

She was close to climax and when John began to move the world around her narrowed to his expressive face. One side was cast in shadow. The white of the eye a thin slit beneath dusky lashes. The opposite side seemed to glow in the dim light falling from the dining room fixture. The burnished gold of the cheek only slightly marred by the dark bruise on his lower jaw. John’s full lips were slightly parted, his breathing coming in short, sharp rasps as they rocked.

Dana arched, pulling him deeper. “John…” his name whispered free as the tiny shocks gathered into a wave that rippled out from her core to her twitching fingertips.

John buried his face in her neck, gasping into the damp, curling hair. Dana wrapped her arms around his shoulders, feeling muscle and flesh grow rigid and suddenly soften in release. He kissed her feverishly and silently as the spasms subsided. Dana shivered, unsure if the dampness on his cheeks was sweat or tears and unwilling to ask.

Eventually, John sat up and cleared his throat. One hand brushed self-consciously across his eyes and fell to stroking her thigh. “That was…”

“Good,” Dana completed with an impish smile.

He blushed. ‘I’m a little out of practice.”

“It doesn’t show.” She reached up and traced an idle finger over his lips. “Really.”

“Thanks.” John kissed her finger. “Is this what you meant earlier?”

“About lightening the load?”

He grinned as he helped her to her feet and started walking towards the stairs. “Yes.”

Dana stopped abruptly and pulled him around to face her. John kept his gaze focused on the floor between them. She sighed heavily. Damnmit, let me in! He squeezed her fingers and bent to kiss her neck. Dana shied away. “Look at me,” she demanded sharply.

John stilled. His eyes were dark, steel gray in the shadowed room. They roamed over her naked body, drinking it in the manner of a parched man viewing an oasis. Not feral but desperate and achingly sad when they finally met hers.

“You can talk to me,” Dana assured in a softer voice.

“I know.”

“Will you?”

John stroked the hair back from her cheek with trembling fingers.

Dana kissed him gently. The taste of salt and fear was sharp on his lips, bitter in her mouth. “Let me help you,” she whispered.

John swallowed audibly and embraced her. The tremors that passed between them seemed to come from his very soul. Dana held him tightly and hoped it was enough.

*THE*END*