Page 27 of Jacques

Danny drove the less than five minutes to the boarding house on the edge of town. The parking lot held a variety of vehicles, including a couple of minivans, a big, shiny truck and three sedans.

She found an empty space, grabbed her gym bag and purse and got out of her truck.

Jacques joined her, carrying her fire-proof box. “I forgot to remind you that the spare rooms in the boarding house are occupied by displaced families.”

Danny frowned. “Is there an empty room for me?”

Jacques shook his head. “No, but my room is big enough for both of us.”

Before he finished speaking, Danny was shaking her head. “That won’t work. We might as well stay at my place.”

“My room is a suite with a sitting room, a bedroom and a bathroom. The sofa in my sitting room is long enough to sleep on. I know, because I’ve fallen asleep on it a number of times. The sofa in your place is massively heavy, but not quite long enough for a full-grown man.”

“Maybe we can find a couple of rooms in a hotel,” she suggested, fighting back her rising panic.

“Most hotels anywhere nearby are full of displaced families,” Jacques said. “We can go back to your place if you feel that strongly about not wanting to stay here. I can sleep on the floor there.”

“Or I can go back, and you can stay here,” she said.

Jacques sighed. “Do you really want to spend the night in your apartment after someone broke in just to steal your medical record? What about when he realizes we’re not going to stop the investigation? Making your medical record disappear won’t be enough. He might want to make you disappear.”

He was right. She couldn’t stay on her own.

His voice softened. “You can have the bedroom. The door has a lock on it. I’ll take the couch. I promise I won’t touch you unless you want me to.”

Danny stared at the boarding house for a long moment, willing her pulse to return to normal. Finally, she said, “We’ll stay here.”

Jacques led the way into the building, dodging a toddler chasing a small dog through the common living area.

A woman cut between Jacques and Danny. “Sorry. Excuse us,” she said with a grimace. Then she shouted, “Jimmy, quit chasing the dog. You’re scaring him.”

Danny’s gaze followed the retreating figures, feeling for the displaced families. They wouldn’t be at the boarding house if their homes hadn’t been so badly damaged they couldn’t live in them. Some people were only waiting for the power to be restored. They were lucky the Brotherhood Protectors had offered them a place to live until they could move back into their homes.

Jacques’s suite was on the second floor, in the building's southwest corner. He’d been right that it was larger than her apartment, with a medium-sized refrigerator and a small kitchenette—enough for a bachelor.

“The kitchen is sufficient for preparing easy meals. When we want something more substantial, we use the kitchen downstairs. We’re in luck tonight. I stocked up on frozen dinners three days ago.” Jacques set her fire-proof box on the floor and grinned. “We have choices. It’s too late to go out to eat. Mimi’s is closed.”

“And the Crawdad Hole stops serving real food this late.” Danny nodded and set her gym bag on the sofa, which was big enough to accommodate even a tall man like Jacques.

“You can have the shower first,” Jacques said. “I’ll rustle up some grub.” He opened the freezer and pulled out two frozen dinners. “What sounds good to you—Salsbury steak and mashed potatoes or meat and cheese burritos?”

“Either,” she said. “After living on MREs, I’ve learned I can eat just about anything.”

“Then I’ll heat both, and we can share.”

She gathered a pair of leggings, an oversized T-shirt, panties and her toiletries, then headed to the bathroom, a room off the bedroom.

As she passed through, she glanced toward the bed, surprised to find it neatly made, the covers pulled tight, the corners perfectly angled. She bet she could bounce a quarter off the blanket like her drill sergeant had off hers in basic combat training.

The discipline he’d learned in basic had followed him through his career into his civilian life.

She found that comforting in a chaotic world. It was nice to find a man who made the bed, much less with precision. At the same time, she had the sudden desire to fling herself onto it and twist the blankets and sheets into a lovely mess, like it would look after making wild, passionate love.

Danny ducked into the bathroom before she gave in to that urge. Before she crossed to the bed and sniffed it for Jacques’s scent.

Was she finally coming out of the dry spell where she was not only against sex with a man but actively avoiding them? Would she be more open to a man’s touch now?

Or was she still going to find the one who’d brutalized her when she was at her most vulnerable?