Read Online The Reveal by Julie Leto - Free Book Online Page B

he’d been half-conscious from his injuries and unable to appreciate her bedside manner.
    She dried him off then shoved a large log onto the fire until the fire roared again and heated the entire room. As she hung the tattered tartan by the fire beside her wet clothes, Sean forced himself to sit up.
    They’d had their fun. They’d had this moment. Dawn was a few short hours away. This fantasy he’d willfully allowed himself to indulge again would soon be over for good.
    “Brynn,” he whispered.
    His voice barely broke through the crackle and pop from the hearth.
    Brynn stood, as beautiful and breathtaking as a Renaissance statue, facing the fire. Her body was outlined by the glow as if her skin was marble. Her gaze, which he could see only in profile, was once again mesmerized by the flames. He had to fight the instinct to go to her, wrap her in his arms and bring her back to life with his warmth.
    He was an idiot. He’d had all that he deserved. In the morning, he had to move forward.
    Move on—without her.
    “We need to talk,” he continued.
    She spared him a glance over her shoulder. “Do we?”
    Two words, shot from the other side of the room, impacted against his resolve and reduced it to ash.
    Unlike him, Brynn wasn’t a fool. She had started their relationship. She knew as well as he did when and where it would end.
    He changed course. “Is the food still in the truck?”
    She spared him a tiny grin before turning back to the flames. “Mmm.”
    He’d take that as a yes.
    “I’ll just go get it then.”
    He dragged on his jeans and shirt but, before he left, draped his jacket across her naked shoulders, careful not to do more than brush his knuckles against her hair, now tumbling haphazardly around her. Even that miniscule contact flamed his skin, burning him to his core.
    On his way out the door, he caught her burying her nose in his lapel. Her cat-in-the-cream smile nearly cut out what was left of his soul.
    Vaguely, he remembered making a deal with himself, something along the lines of resisting the urge to make love with Brynn again. He pushed into the cold, wishing the frigid temperatures would cool his libido.
    Unfortunately, he needed more than brisk air to undo the magic Brynn had weaved into him. He’d been to war. He’d been to hell. He’d been to the line between sanity and insanity, and he’d managed to drag himself back into the real world with only a few visible scars.
    But loving Brynn?
    He’d never recover.

Nine
    Sean carried the groceries in from the truck and spread out their haul on the nearest flat surface, which happened to be the mattress. As if nothing had happened between them, Brynn snatched a handful of grapes, popped one in her mouth and announced that she wanted to see the photographs of the men who’d attacked her in San Sebastían again.
    Sean handed her the phone. He’d once thought he’d mastered the craft of compartmentalizing his professional life from his private one, but she made him look like a rank amateur.
    “If you didn’t recognize them before, what makes you think you’re going to now?”
    She slid through the photos, expanding the areas around the faces into close-ups. “You never know when a fresh perspective will change preconceived notions,” she said, her eyebrow arched knowingly before she went through the pictures one last time and then handed him back the device. “If I had a wireless connection, I could tap into a secure network and run facial recognition.”
    “Macy has signal blockers positioned around the perimeter of the property. No one gets internet out here except for her.”
    “I think I’m going to like this Macy Rush.”
    “Macy Burke,” he corrected. “She’s badass, but she took Dante’s name.”
    “Taking a man’s name doesn’t make a woman any more or less badass,” she said, but without conviction for debate. She was scrolling through the photos with one hand while mindlessly running her fingers over the scab