Page 10 of Point Blank

She stopped scrubbing and turned to face him. “Milo, it’s not my blood.” Her bottom lip trembled, and she dropped her forehead to his chest.

“I—I killed someone.”

He locked his arms around her. The need to comfort her, to erase whatever the hell had happened, scorched his body with the force of a flash fire. If she’d killed someone, it hadn’t been in cold blood. Serena was headstrong, not coldhearted.

“Who?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know,” she whispered. He rubbed his hands over the clip of her bra and down to the waistband of her skirt. Even in heels, she was so much smaller than him. Hell, how had he forgotten the mold of her body? His muscles had no problem laminating to her slight frame as easily as they had more than a decade ago. But his brain had forgotten this. How her shoulders fit perfectly against his ribcage, her cheek against his sternum, and her belly against his cock. Christ, if he didn’t get a handle on his lust soon, he’d be of no use to her. She needed warmth, food, and clean clothes. Not sex.

“You can tell me everything after. Let’s get you cleaned up and fed first, all right?”

She nodded, and he took one last inhale of her intoxicating floral scent. Every ounce of resistance that had taken up residence in his heart on seeing her vanished. She needed him. And this time, he wouldn’t cower. As soon as he got her calm, he’d find out what the fuck had happened.

And then he’d kill the sonofabitch if she hadn’t already.

Chapter

Three

The faint scent of cologne tickled her nose. Not the familiar scent of pepper and citrus he used to wear but something lighter and woodsy. After gathering her wits in the bathroom, she’d urged him out and changed into her gym clothes—too bad her gym shoes were still on the seat of her car. The leather of the chair in front of the desk crinkled as she curled her legs tighter under her. She dipped her chin again and inhaled the fabric of the black pullover sweater he’d given her.

The office door opened and she dropped the material from her nose.

“Food will be ready in ten minutes.” He shut the door behind him and strode to the desk, lifting his hip to rest on the edge. “Talk,” he commanded. It would be so much easier to talk if he were closer to her. Back in the day, just his touch had been enough to melt away all her troubles.

No. She couldn’t get attached to him again.

He’d pushed her out of his life twice before. Being here should be putting a huge ding in her pride, but instead it was filling her with longing. Not just for his hot body, but for him. And for the good old days of kissing under the stars, nineties music bumping in the night, and his roaming hands all over her.

Milo had cared about her and protected her. Until her uncle—the useless, scheming prick—had ratted out Milo’s dad, putting him behind bars.

Bitterness crept in but she pushed it away. Regardless of what had happened in the past, Milo wouldn’t let anyone hurt her.

He raised his dark eyebrows. She tucked her ankles under her and toyed with the drawstring that dangled from one side of the hood. “I was driving home from a potential client’s house and someone smashed into me. I . . . I thought it was an accident, but he accelerated when I was in the middle of the intersection.”

Milo frowned. “Did you see the driver?”

“He opened my door and pointed a gun at my face, but he wore a mask.” Her voice wavered. The memory of the mouth of the weapon was branded in her consciousness. She wound and unwound the string around her finger, over and over.

She’d stabbed someone. He might have been planning to kill her, but she’d done it first. She held her focus on the desk beyond Milo’s thighs. Her nose burned with the need to let loose the dam of welled-up tears, but she couldn’t—wouldn’t—cry again.

“Hey, it’s okay, you can talk to me.” He lowered himself to his knees in front of her and pressed his warm palms on the tops of her thighs. He gripped her hands and wrapped them in his much larger ones. Heat blossomed in that cocoon, melting the tension in her fingers. Pain flowed through her heart, and it had nothing to do with the man she’d stabbed and everything to do with the man she missed. Milo had always been her rock. Moving on with her life without him had been a double blow. The loss of him had also been the loss of her friend. Her mouth was resisting her brain’s desire to talk to him. Why?

Because if she did, letting go again would be that much harder.

She pulled one hand away and pressed the heel of her palm to her forehead. She shouldn’t have come here.

His thumb stroked the back of her hand. “Serena, please.”

She lowered her palm to her thigh. The skin around his eyes crinkled. An ache opened in her chest. She wanted to trust him. God, why did it have to be so hard? Why did he have to screw everything up?

“Babe,” he growled, more insistently.

The endearment sent ripples of pleasure through her. Memories of him drawling out that four-letter word assaulted her. Jeez, he was teleporting her into the past with one damn word. She lifted her shoulders. “I grabbed the switchblade you gave me and stabbed him in the neck.”

His eyes sharpened and his head pulled back an inch.

Oh, crap.