Read Online Protect Me by Selma Wolfe - Free Book Online Page B

into the ground, but catlike quiet had
been trained into her over the years and she couldn’t lose it now just because
she felt like it.
    “It
is,” Rick said after a long pause, in way that suggested he’d already answered
the question and doesn’t understand why he needed to repeat himself. Hope
suspected he wouldn’t have answered Trinity that way, or his yacht friends at
all. It was the little things that made you feel loved, she thought, and
wondered if she was hysterical.
    “This
is… I’ve never seen anything like this,” she said honestly. “I don’t understand
why you’re hiding it. Do you want to - what, keep it only for yourself? Auction
it off to the highest bidder?”
    A flash
of something very like hurt showed in Rick’s eyes before he tilted his head and
rolled his eyes, totally disdainful and apparently impervious.
    “Of
course not. What would I do with the money? But it’s not cleared yet by the
FDA, and the government still hasn’t decided what to do with it, exactly. You
see, there are some… issues.”
    This
was starting to sound like familiar territory. Hope gave in to impropriety and
propped her elbows up on the test table. She pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Oh God.”
    “Rather,”
Rick said, disturbingly cheerful. “See, the government is worried that there
may be a risk of, shall we say… undesirable elements attempting to reverse
engineer my little invention. I’m thinking of naming the stuff Skin-It, by the
way, what do you think?”
    “I
think that will make every single buyer feel like they’re getting the genuine
serial killer experience,” Hope said absently. “What do you mean, reverse
engineer it? Make their own? Does that really matter so much?” She trailed off,
uncertain. It wasn’t really her place to judge how jealously Rick guarded his
secrets (the ones she didn’t need to know).
    His
gaze slipped away, toward the floor. Hair in need of a trimming fell forward to
shadow his face and Rick shifted his weight. He grabbed a pen out of his coat
pocket and clicked it a half dozen times.
    “I
might have. Um.” He sounded uncertain again, which Hope was rapidly learning
was rarely a good sign. Some people you always wanted to have off balance. But
Rick wasn’t like that; if he wasn’t standing by her side then things were
probably more likely to be the worse for it. “Accidentally proved you could do
it? The government’s squirrelly about stuff like that.”
    For the
life of her, Hope couldn’t understand why the US government would give a damn
about people reducing a miracle cure to its component parts. Rick looked so
uncomfortable, and she was tired. This was a lot to take in, all of it.
    So she
just nodded and let it go.
    “Alright,”
she said. The adrenaline was wearing off properly now, leaving her feeling
raw-edged and ragged. She resisted the urge to fidget and pulled her spine
straight instead. Rick watched her with careful eyes. “That’s… alright. Okay.
Anything else you want to tell me?”
    She was
already turning away when Rick reached out and grabbed her arm.
    It took
all of Hope’s self-control to whirl around without breaking the hold. She knew
that if she yanked away it would turn this moment into an ugly thing, something
darker than it was. Already she didn’t know if this was something they could
come back from.
    So she
turned sharply to face Rick but took care not to jerk away. It brought them
close together, their faces scant inches apart. She searched out the light
flecks in his dark eyes as he looked at her, cautious but still honest, not
hiding his misgivings.
    Hope
had no such qualms. She saw her face reflected in his eyes, calm as an
untouched pool of water. There were times that she felt that way on the inside,
too. But she was starting to forget that feeling. She hadn’t felt that way
since she’d stepped onto that boat and come face to face with Rick Stone.
    “What
is it?” she asked, her voice deliberately even. His