Free Make Me Tremble by Beth Kery

that looked down on the gardens, and the sharp drop-off the dune to Lake Michigan. Because it was night, only their reflections and that of the chandelier’s glowed in the black glass. The room was nearly empty, only a few of his personal items remaining from his recent occupancy. He saw Alice’s neck convulse as she swallowed. “You and Sidney had suggested how the Durands prized Addie so much, always giving her the best. I just guessed it’d belonged to her. And to you. Alan Durand prized you, as well,” she added, once again meeting his stare.
    Slowly, she spun to face him. She wore only the fitted T-shirt she’d had on last night during the storm and a semi-transparent pair of white cotton panties. Instinctively, his gaze dropped over her, trailing along her elegantly sloping shoulders, the full, thrusting breasts that stood in such erotic contrast to her slender limbs and narrow waist and hips. His gaze lingered between her thighs. Alice dyed the hair on her head to an obscuring, near-black color, but her true shade was a dark red-gold, a combination of her father’s blond and her mother’s auburn. He was reminded of that yet again as he spied the triangle of light brownish-red pubic hair visible beneath her thin panties. Despite the tension of the moment, he felt his sex flicker in arousal. There was something about the contrast of Alice’s tough-girl strength and her potent vulnerability that lit a fire in him, something elemental and strong. The paradox was singularly powerful.
    He dragged his gaze to her face.
    “It must be strange for you, thinking of me living in Addie’s room. Here. In the Durand’s house,” he added, taking another step toward her. It struck him that he was often approaching Alice like he might a half-wild animal forced into some domestic confine, highly aware that she might bolt at any moment.
    He was determined to catch her, no matter what move she made.
    She shook her head. She wore not a trace of makeup. Without the heavy eyeliner and mascara she often wore to obfuscate or intimidate—or both—her dark blue eyes looked enormous in her delicate face. Jesus, what he’d experienced when she’d walked into that office last May, so awkward and yet so defiant in her inexpensive new interview suit. The truth had slammed home, jarring him, rattling him to the center of his bones, even though he’d taken great pains to hide it. He had seen those eyes before.
    But even if it
had
been the first time Dylan had ever seen her, he suspected he might have been nearly as shaken. No wonder she’d been drawn to the eye-goop. Her eyes would draw men with the noblest intentions.
    And the foulest.
    “No, it doesn’t seem strange to me at all. I can see you in this room.” Her chin tilted and her eyes sparked in that familiar defiant gesture. “You moved out of it because of me, didn’t you?”
    “I didn’t know what to expect. Sidney thought we should cautiously expose you to the surroundings,” he admitted. Sidney was familiar with Adelaide Durand’s history and had been friends with Alan and Lynn. He’d brought his psychological expertise to bear on Alice’s unique situation, once Dylan had finally tracked her down after nearly two decades of searching. It was Sidney who had suggested bringing her to the estate under the pretense of hiring her as a Durand Camp counselor. In that scenario, Dylan could keep an eye on what she recalled and how she would react, monitor her for signs of trauma. If not him personally, then the two Durand security employees Dylan had hired to watch her could do the job.
    “I was familiar with Addie Durand’s habits,” he began slowly. “There are a few rooms that I worried might be more likely to trigger something . . . undesirable. This one. Alan and Lynn’s suite. The den, the original living room . . . and the dining room. With few exceptions, the entry hall, the kitchen, the terrace gardens, and the media room have been extensively renovated,