Page 30 of The Heat is On

He swallowed, turned away. She still couldn’t defend herself against a rapist like March. And Rio knew in his gut, in the way March kept looking at Skye, something dark and cruel in his eyes, that Rio couldn’t let him near her. Not again.

“Well, whatever you’re in for…you’re nothim.” She glanced at March, now yelling at Darryl.

Rio wanted to smile at that. She was trying, but oh, she didn’t have a clue. He looked away, shaking his head. “Actually, Iwashim. Desperate, angry, doing stupid things.”

Sirens. “I’m sorry to tell you, ma’am—”

Skye touched his arm, jerking him out of the memory. “Everybody makes a mistake.”

He glanced at her, and now his mouth rocked up on one side. “Oh, I knew what I was doing, Skye. I knewexactlywhat I was doing when I killed the man who murdered my sister.”

Her eyes widened and she pulled her hand away. Oh, he shouldn’t have said it like that. But he didn’t want her suddenly thinking she shouldevercome back for him again. That he was somehow redeemable. Worth risking her life for.

Still, she swallowed as if slapped, and he felt like a jerk, so, “In my defense, I was seventeen, my dad had just suffered a stroke, and my life was falling apart before my eyes.”

And he really shouldn’t have saidthatbecause her expression softened. She touched his arm again. Found his eyes, and he could wince with the compassion in them. “I’m sorry.”

“Thanks.” He stared at her hand on his arm. Funny, he’d held her hand all day, but this touch sank heat into his skin, found his bones. Like last night’s fleeting finger brush.

“She was sixteen and went out with friends to a rave. Hooked up with a guy and left with him. They found her body a day later, raped and strangled.” He closed his eyes against a sudden burn, probably fatigue, but he leaned his head against the house, so bone exhausted, he just wanted to curl into a ball.

Instead, he heard the sirens again, the ring of the doorbell in memory. “The police came to the door, stood on the porch, and told my parents that their only daughter had been murdered. Didn’t even come in. The cops thought she was some runaway at first—asked my parents how long she’d been living on the streets.”

He opened his eyes. The sun had started to weep red and orange across the sky, long shadows darkening the woods around the house. If the marshals were out there, this might be exactly the right time to invade and capture.

“We found out later that whoever killed her had drugged her up good. She was probably high when she was killed.”

Her hand slid down into his. He didn’t grip it, didn’t move, but his gaze fell on her fingers, curling around his thumb. Yeah, this was a bad idea, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself.

“I should have let the cops handle it, but I was…they were so…they acted like my sister was a…” He shook his head. “A prostitute. And I just knew that they weren’t going to find the killer. Or if they did…well, maybe I just wasn’t satisfied with the idea of some guy serving petty time for destroying my family.”

Skye’s thumb ran over his hand, and Rio couldn’t stop himself from closing his hand around hers. Something about holding onto her made the words run easier. “I had murder on my mind when I tracked down the guy who left with her. He told me he’d gotten her high and hooked her up with a couple guys. I think they were going to traffic her, but…well, she fought them. Which was why they beat her, strangled her.” He swallowed. “Raped her.”

Silence, and he thought he saw movement by the woodpile, stared hard in the direction of the gathering shadows, but nothing materialized.

“You found them.”

“I did.” He sighed. “And I was young and stupid and angry, and there were three of them. I had a baseball bat, but… Well, the short of it was that I ended up in the hospital, fighting for my life. But one of the guys I’d hit died, so after I lived, they shipped me off to juvie. I had a lenient judge who took in my mental state, but I did a year there.”

He met her eyes then, waiting for judgment, but hers had turned glossy.

Shoot. This was why he didn’t let the past out to roam because…well, it made him feel human and breakable and sometimes even…well, that he might deserve a woman like Skye in his life.

And of course, she said exactly the wrong thing. “I’m so sorry, Rio.”

He tightened his jaw, nodded.

“But you’re still not him.” She gestured to March, relentlessly pacing in front of the Bronco. “And desperation causes us to do stupid things. I told you my dad was in prison, right?”

He nodded, his gaze half on her, half on March by the Bronco. Something—

“He was actually an FBI informant for a drug smuggling ring out of this bar he visited, but…he got caught up in the sting and went to prison anyway.”

Rio’s gaze landed on her then. “What—?”

“Yeah. There were a lot of broken promises. And mistakes. He trusted the wrong people.”

Skye, you can trust me—the words were gathering when out of the corner of his eye he spotted a flash of light, maybe the glint of a gun barrel.