Free Covert Christmas by Marilyn Pappano

be proud of.”
    â€œI would have run away with you at any time.”
    â€œI didn’t know that. I didn’t know…”
    A lot of things. That she was no better than the life he’d wanted to leave behind. That she was more a liar than he’d ever been. That she wasn’t someone he could be proud of.
    The hope and heat and pleasure generated by their kiss deflated, sinking heavily in her stomach. “And finding out changed everything.”
    He gazed past her for a time before giving her a raised-brows look that substituted for a shrug. “I make a lot of bad decisions, Nat.”
    The lump in her stomach turned to ice as she carefullydisengaged from him and sat back. Which was his latest bad decision? Kissing her? Admitting that he’d loved her? Tracking her down in the first place?
    He let her go, but not her hand. His fingers gripped hers firmly, holding it on his knee. His head turned away from her, staring out the window, he quietly asked, “Where were you before Chicago?” No need for such intimate whispers now.
    Speaking required a deep breath and more effort than she’d expected. “I ran away from home when I was fifteen and wound up in Jacksonville. I hadn’t had any contact with the family for years when I started getting letters from my youngest half sister. She had located me somehow, and she wanted to…to be sisters.”
    There’d been no possibility of that when she’d lived at home; Traci had encouraged both girls to treat Natalia the same way their parents did, and the older one had delighted in it. Allie had tried to be friendly, but after seeing Natalia punished for it, she’d taken to ignoring her completely.
    â€œOur father found out, and he threatened me. He never made idle threats, so I left town the next day. Chicago was as far as I could go on the money I had.”
    Josh looked at her. “And there you met Patrick. Then me. You ever notice how fate has a way of screwing with some people?”
    Her own look was dry enough to rattle. “Fate, destiny, fortune…my whole life has been a cluster—”
    â€œNat! Goody Two-shoes don’t say that word.”
    She primly closed her mouth, waited a beat, then murmured, “I’ve said it before.”
    â€œNot to me. And you never can—” he leaned closer and his voice dropped to a husky, make-her-blood-pump shiver “—unless we’re both naked and have a lot of time to pass.” He followed the words with a wink and an impossibly sexy grin before settling back to watch the scenery again.
    Both naked. Her heart was beating wildly again. He was entertaining the possibility that they could have wild, wicked sex at least once more. Just the idea made her throat dry and herstomach flip-flop. She had resigned herself to living the rest of her life the way she’d spent the past few years—celibate—but a few kisses, a few words and a wink, and she was ready to strip down then and there.
    Even if it was his latest bad decision.
    Even if it meant getting her heart broken all over again.
    Even if this time she might not recover.
    She scoffed. She hadn’t recovered the last time. She’d lived like a robot—doing the jobs the Mulroneys demanded of her, too defeated to run again, too hopeless to care. The closest she’d come to really living had been her weeks in Copper Lake, with Joe and, later, Liz. Even though, their biggest value to her had been the constant reminders of Josh. She’d just existed, and, after fleeing there to avoid arrest, she’d hardly done even that.
    From the last time she’d seen Josh in Chicago to the moment she’d recognized him in the yard last evening, she’d barely been getting by.
    There should be more to life than barely getting by.
    Traffic got lighter as they neared downtown. Most businesses had closed early for Christmas Eve, their employees gone to the malls for