Mac stood and pulled some money out of his pocket, holding it out to Jessie. She looked at it, then back at him and shook her head. “You’re such a dick sometimes. I’ve got it covered.”
He laughed and leaned across the table to kiss her cheek. She winked and strolled away.
The table went silent. Mac blew out a breath, wondering if he should ask her if she wanted to talk, then changed his mind, figuring Lily was exhausted. And he didn’t want to fight with her. She really did look wiped. “You ready to get some sleep?”
She shrugged. “I guess so.”
He led her to the tent. She climbed in without a word and lay on her side. Turned away from him, of course. He pulled the blanket over her, then lay on his back, staring up at the dark canvas of the tent ceiling.
The noise of the band played on, the sounds of the crowd still going strong. They’d go all night, some of them anyway.
“You can go out there with them, you know.”
Mac turned his head toward Lily. “Huh?”
“You can go out there and party with your friends. I’m fine here.”
He shifted to his side. “I don’t want to be out there.”
“Trust me. You don’t want to be in here, either.”
“Lily, you’ve known me a long time. You know I do exactly what I want, when I want.” He touched a curling end of hair from her ponytail. Like silk. “If I wanted to be out there, I would be.”
She went quiet then. But he knew she wasn’t sleeping.
“Just let me go, Mac. I can’t stay here with you. And I won’t give you up to the police. You have to know that.”
He did know it. “I can’t.”
She turned around to face him. “Why?”
He started to reply, but hell, what could he say that hadn’t already been said? Or not said. It was the same conversation over and over again. The conversation they couldn’t have. He really hated this. But no one could know about the Wild Riders.
“There are things I can’t tell you.”
“Will you ever be able to talk to me?”
He hoped she could read his face in the semi-darkness.
“Honestly? I really hope I can. Someday.”
But even as he said the words, he knew he was lying to her. And it actually hurt him, like a physical pain to know he couldn’t. This was bullshit. Something was going to have to change.
Lily sat up, drawing her knees to her chest and wrapping her arms around them. Moonlight lit up the tent enough that she could see what she didn’t want to see.
Frustration ate at her, the sensation of feeling closed in and unable to breathe.
She knew Mac so well she could read the lie on his lips.
He’d never tell her the truth. How could she care about him, make love to him, when she had no idea what he was going to do with a deadly virus?
How could she reconcile her feelings, this draw she felt toward him, with the possibility that he could be unleashing a disaster of epic proportions on the world?
She tossed him a glance over her shoulder. “That virus could potentially kill millions of people.”
“I know.”
“Children, too.”
“Yes.”
She blinked back tears again and looked away from him. How had she gotten involved in this? Wrong place, wrong time.
Wrong man. But what if she had called the police and they had recovered the artifact? What then? Whose hands would it have fallen into? There was no doubt a plot was in place to move the artifact from city to city. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that part out. But who was moving it and why? For what purpose?
And why couldn’t Mac see they could do so much better at working on this together than apart?
Men were so stupid sometimes. Fine. If he wouldn’t let her in, if he wouldn’t divulge information, she’d just figure it out on her own.
“Lily.”
He had moved behind her, drawing her hair to the side so his breath washed across her neck. She shivered, tried to brush him off, but he held firm to her shoulders. She hated that she could be so pissed off at him and yet he could still affect her physically. He made her feel weak, and no one had ever made her weak.
“Lily, I might be a lot of things, I might have made a lot of mistakes in my past, but I could never hurt millions of innocent people, least of all children. You gotta know that about me.”
She did know that about him. She’d seen him angry when he was younger. Violently angry and frustrated, so hot with fury that she felt the tension in him without even touching him. But he’d never lashed out, had never deliberately hurt anyone. He’d always held his anger in check.
“I know you couldn’t.” She had to tell him that, had to let him know she didn’t believe he could deliver that virus to anyone who would hurt children, destroy families. This was just so damn frustrating. She wanted to know, had to know what he was going to do with it.
But she couldn’t force him to tell her.
He kissed the back of her neck, his murmurs against her skin sending shivers of wicked delight down her spine.
“I know trusting me is a huge issue for you. I know there are things you want me to reveal. Believe me when I tell you there are so many things I want you to know about me.
About where I’ve been the past ten years and what I’ve done with my life.” He turned her so she half faced him, desire and serious intent mixing across his moonlit face. “If and when the time comes that I can reveal it all, I promise to tell you everything. I want you to know.”
There were things she wanted him to know about her, too. At least about how she stood on things. “I won’t stop trying to figure it out.”
His lips curved. “I know.”
“And I’ll continue to try and take the virus away from you.”
“I wouldn’t expect any less than your absolute best attempt.”
Her lips quirked. He leaned in and kissed her neck again, dissolving the last shred of her anger and frustration. She needed to relax. Nothing was going to be solved tonight. She was still with him and he didn’t seem to be in any hurry to get rid of her, which meant that he still held the virus. Because she knew damn well that as soon as he’d delivered the vial, he would let her go. He was only holding onto her so she wouldn’t give him up. She was no fool.
But for now, that was good enough. In the meantime, she’d work on her own theories. By herself.