Hard to Hold by Incy Black

almost-defeated
     note behind his rasp.
    “One of the Fortress men assigned to guard Anna is dead. Garroted. Ballentyne’s pissed,
     and you know what that means.”
    …
    After more or less manhandling her to the sofa—Nick countered it was merely shepherding
     when she protested—and insisting she take a seat, his questions were demandingly exact,
     and he tore apart her muddled answers with surgeon-like precision. She was on her
     third run-through of everything that had happened to her since she’d become pregnant:
     the gifts, the attempts on her life, when he imperiously held up a finger to halt
     her flow.
    A gesture that damn near sent her blood pressure into orbit. She clamped her palms
     together and sought out Will’s sympathetic gaze.
    “The gifts suggest gratitude,” Nick continued. “He’s thanking you for something, rewarding
     you even. Which is squirrely enough when we can’t work out what for? But what flips
     him into wanting to hurt you? Stop you? Punish you? It doesn’t make any sense…” Clearly
     perplexed and irritated as a result, he paced the long space next to the bank of arched
     windows, hands deep in his pockets, his broad shoulders hunched to discourage any
     interruption of his thought process.
    Abruptly, he halted midprowl, turned, and jabbed a finger at her. “You’re doing something
     to fuel his twisted psychosis. But what? It can’t be the pregnancy. The gifts imply
     he’s rather pleased about that.”
    He had started pacing again, the clipped sound of his tread fraying her last nerve.
     Her bones might feel brittle, but if he didn’t settle down, she’d break a limb to
     throw something heavy at his head.
    “It’s almost like there’s two different people after Anna,” Will murmured.
    Again he pulled to a halt, only this time he spun to face Will. “Sonofabitch! The
     conflicting behavior makes sense if that’s true. Two perps, both with a hard-on for
     her, one all loved up, the other consumed with hate and fury.”
    She flexed her tongue and whistled shrilly—a skill Nick had taught her—to get his
     full attention back on her. “There you go again with your hateful assumptions. I’m
     willing to accept I might inadvertently have attracted the attention of one psycho but not two.”
    “I’m rarely wrong and never about you.” She’d gotten her wish; he’d turned and now
     gave her his full attention. “So let’s have it, Anna. Who’s the father, because I’m
     damn sure he’s the link in all this?”
    His eyes no longer held derision. Instead they chilled and fixed her in place, reminding
     her of the time he’d taken her to the Arctic for Christmas. A wonderful surprise she’d
     ruined when curiosity got the better of her, and she’d fastened her naked hand round
     a metal pole to see if the warning she’d stick fast was true. She had and, much to
     Nick’s frustration, the medics accompanying them got to spend more time touching her
     than he had.
    Her palms instantly grew clammy. She rubbed them up and down her thighs. Testing the
     truth and feeding her curiosity always seemed to lead to disaster, which is why, for
     once in her life, she’d resisted digging for the identify of her baby’s father.
    “I don’t know, Nick. That’s the point of an anonymous sperm donation.”
    “Uh-uh. You’d never settle for that, Anna. With your computer skills, you’d have hacked
     into the records for his identity.”
    “Except I didn’t, because I don’t want to know who the father is.”
    He was right. She had been tempted, but seeing the name in black and white would have
     been akin to acknowledging her baby had a flesh-and-blood father who might make a
     claim. Ignorance was bliss. It meant the child was hers and hers alone.
    “I. Don’t. Believe. You.”
    “Nick,” Will intervened quietly. “I’m not sure calling her a liar is the most effective
     way of getting the information you want.”
    Anna kept quiet while the two men