LITMIR.BIZ

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there was a light tap on her door, followed by a deep voice she recognized. “Savannah? It’s Niall. Are you okay?”

      She dropped the phone back into its cradle and made a mad dash for the door. She threw it open without even checking the peephole, something for which she’d berate herself later, but at the moment seemed utterly unnecessary.

      A barefooted, shirtless Niall stood in her doorway, as if he’d somehow divined she was in trouble and had only bothered to pull on his jeans before coming to her rescue. “Are you okay?” he repeated, running his gaze over her from top to bottom as if he needed to reassure himself.

      “I’m fine.” Then her curiosity got the better of her. “How did you know I needed help?”

      He hesitated. “My room’s right next door. I heard something and came to investigate. I didn’t want to intrude, but better safe than sorry, my mother always says.”

      A tiny pang went through her at the familiar phrase. “My mom used to say that, too.” Only then did she realize blood was trickling from Niall’s forearm. “Oh my God, you’re hurt!” She dragged him by his uninjured arm into her room and closed the door behind him. Then turned him so she could examine the wounded area. “What happened?”

      She didn’t wait for an answer, just darted into the bathroom for a clean, dry washcloth and her toiletries case, which also contained her little emergency kit.

      “Sit,” she ordered, when she came back. Niall glanced at the foot of the bed, then pulled the desk chair out and swiveled it around before taking a seat. Savannah pressed the washcloth against what was little more than a six-inch scratch, which was a good thing. It wouldn’t need stitches, just disinfecting and a gauze bandage. “What happened?” she asked again as she efficiently applied first aid.

      “There were a couple of masked—I guess you could call them intruders—outside your door when I stepped into the hallway. Not sure exactly what they were after, but the masks were a dead giveaway they weren’t there for a legitimate reason. They took off like bats out of hell as soon as they saw me, but I gave chase. I had my hand around the arm of one of them when the other produced a knife and lunged for me.” He didn’t even wince when she applied the alcohol wipe against the cut.

      “I turned to avoid the thrust,” he continued, “and the blade grazed my forearm. But I had to let go of the other intruder, and that was all she wrote. They vanished through the fire door and did something to it so it wouldn’t open from this side. Which reminds me,” he said as an aside, “I need to call hotel security, have them clear the blockage just in case there’s a real fire and people need to escape that way.”

      “Good idea,” Savannah said, but her mind wasn’t really on what Niall was saying about the fire door. She was laser focused on patching him up. “There,” she said with satisfaction as she patted the last piece of adhesive tape into place. “Almost good as new.” She smiled down at Niall, but her smile soon faded as her gaze slid farther down and she noticed for the first time a devastating scar near his heart, a bullet wound if she hadn’t missed her guess, and the surgical scar bisecting his chest. “Oh, my God,” she breathed. “What...?”

      She automatically went to touch it, but he caught her hand in an iron grip and prevented her. “Sorry.” His voice was brusque. “I know it’s offensive, but I was in a hurry and didn’t take time to put on a shirt. I’ll go back to my—”

      He started to rise, but she pushed him back down. “Not until you tell me how it happened,” she insisted, quietly but firmly. “I’m not offended. And I’m not disgusted. What I am is appalled you think I would be.”

      When he didn’t say anything, she nodded to herself as understanding dawned. “Someone told you it was offensive. A woman. A woman you cared about. A woman you...loved?”

      Not by the flicker of an eyelid did he betray she’d guessed correctly, but she knew she was right. “Oh, Niall,” she whispered, her eyes filling with tears. “I’m so sorry.”

      This time she didn’t try to stop him when he rose. “Don’t pity me, for God’s sake,” he rasped. “That’s the last thing I want from you.”

      “Not pity. Empathy. Because human beings can be so cruel to one another. Intentionally cruel. And it’s those intentional cruelties by those we love that inflict the most damage because we have no defenses against them.” It had been twenty years, but she still remembered when someone had done that to her, and she breathed raggedly. “Please tell me what happened.”

      At first she thought he wasn’t going to. But then he admitted in a low voice, “I took a bullet meant for another man. That’s all.”

      “That’s all? That’s all?” Without even thinking about it, Savannah reverently pressed her lips against the scar, wishing with all her heart she could “kiss it and make it better” the way her mother used to do when Savannah scraped her knee or cut her finger. Wishing she could draw the poison from Niall’s soul that way, poison planted by the woman he’d once loved, the one who’d told him the scar on his otherwise beautiful body was disgusting.

      Then one muscled arm closed around her, dragging her against a body that had no give at all, and his free hand tilted her chin up. His mouth descended on hers, completely obliterating any memory she’d had of any other man’s kiss. The kiss went on and on, until surrender was the only possibility. Until every nerve ending in her body was inflamed. When he finally raised his head, she stared up at him, mutely pleading for more.

      His face hardened. “Don’t look at me like that.”

      “Like what?”

      “Like you want me.”

      “But I do.” Savannah had never—never—been this upfront with a man about what she wanted, what she needed. Which was quite possibly why her few sexual relationships could be summed up in one word: Meh. But she had no reservations about telling Niall. And she was sure right down to her bare toes that sex with Niall would be anything but meh.

      “Savannah...”

      The rejection in the way he said her name stung, but not as badly as it could have if it wasn’t patently obvious by the impressive bulge in his jeans that he wanted her, too. And despite the need that hummed through her body, she understood.

      “‘Not tonight, dear, I have a headache,’” she murmured in a teasing fashion, and was rewarded by his masculine chuckle.

      “No headache, just a hard-on I’d give anything to bury deep inside you.” She gasped at his forthright language, although she wasn’t offended. “But there are reasons I can’t share with you why that would be a very bad idea.”

      “Why can’t you share them?”

      He laughed again, defusing the sexual tension. “Trust me, you wouldn’t want to know. And besides, there’s another, even more important reason why not.”

      “And that is?”

      “Because my parents raised me to be a gentleman. And a gentleman doesn’t take advantage of a lady when she’s vulnerable.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “And you, Dr. Whitman, are definitely vulnerable. Not to mention one hell of a lady.”

      It wasn’t until Niall had returned to his own room and Savannah was snuggling under the covers alone that she suddenly wondered how he knew she held a doctorate. She cast her mind back over their conversations, but she couldn’t remember ever having mentioned it to him. And her name badge only said “Savannah Whitman,” not “Dr. Savannah Whitman,” or “Savannah Whitman, PhD.”

      That’s odd, she thought, meaning to ask Niall about it the next day. Then her brain shut down as she slid into sleep, and the question completely slipped her mind.

      * * *

      Niall picked up the phone the minute he was back in his hotel room. He called the operator, who transferred him to hotel security. He didn’t mention Savannah’s name or that masked intruders had tried to gain entrance to

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