That left one person: Gray.
Forcefully she rejected that thought. No, not Gray. She remembered his face as it had been when he had come to the shack that morning, and as he had been that awful night. She remembered his fury, his implacable hatred. Gray had thought his father had run away with her mother, and he’d been in a rage.
But Gray had had the most to gain from his father’s death. With Guy gone, he had taken over the reins to the Rouillard fortune, and made himself even wealthier, from what the librarian had said. He had been groomed from the day of his
birth to one day step into his father’s shoes; had he gotten tired of waiting, and put Guy out of the way?
Faith’s thoughts darted around like a squirrel in a cage, banging against the bars. The door rattled under the force of several heavy blows and she jumped, startled and not a little alarmed. Why would anyone be at her door? No one knew where she was, so there couldn’t be a message from her office. She got up and went to the door, but didn’t open it. There wasn’t a peephole, either, she noticed. "Who is it?"
"Gray Rouillard."
Her heart almost stopped beating. It had been twelve years since she had heard that deep, smoky voice, but she went weak at the sound of it, excitement mingled with fear. He had hurt her worse than anyone else in her life, but still he had the power to electrify every cell in her body with nothing but his voice. Just hearing him again made her feel like the child she had been at fourteen, all shivery and agitated at his nearness. And always, always, was that ugly counterweight pulling her in the opposite direction, the stark memory of him saying,
You’re trash.
She had never been able to find any balance where Gray was concerned, had never been able to forget him, dream and nightmare combined.
The timing of his arrival made her skin prickle. Had she conjured him up with her thoughts? She stood there for so long that the door rattled again under the impact of his fist.
"Open up." In his tone was the iron authority of someone who expected to be obeyed, immediately, and intended to see that he was.
Cautiously she unchained the door and opened it, and looked up at the man she hadn’t seen for a dozen years. It didn’t matter. No matter how long it had been, she would have recognized him. He stood there in the doorway, disdaining to come in, and the impact of his physical presence took her breath.
He was bigger than she remembered, but then six four always seemed taller when you were looking up at it. His waist and hips were still lean, but he was heavier through the chest and shoulders, having achieved the hard solidity of manhood. And he was definitely a man, all hint of boyhood
long gone. His face was leaner, stronger, more harsh, with grooves bracketing his mouth and lines of maturity at the corners of his eyes. She stared up into the face of a pirate, and knew why Carlene DuBois had gotten the shivers at the mere mention of his name. His black hair was longer than she had ever seen it before, pulled back from his face and secured at the nape of his neck. A tiny diamond winked in his left earlobe. At twenty-two, he had been impressive. At thirty-four, he was dangerous, a pirate in nature as well as appearance. Looking at him made her feel hot and shivery all at once, her heart suddenly pounding so hard, she wondered that he couldn’t hear it. She recognized the symptoms, and hated her sickness. God, was she doomed to spend her entire life going weak at the sight or sound of Gray Rouillard? Why couldn’t she get beyond that leftover childhood reaction?
Above the thin blade of his nose, his sinfully dark eyes were still cold and implacable.
The sensual line of his mouth twisted as he looked down at her. "Faith Devlin," he said. "Reuben was right; you look just like your mother."
But if he had changed, so had she. Faith had won her confidence the hard way. She gave him a cool little smile and said, "Thank you."
"It wasn’t a compliment. I don’t know why you’re here, and it doesn’t matter. This motel belongs to me. You aren’t welcome. You have half an hour to get packed and get out." He gave her a wolfish smile that wasn’t really a smile. "Or do I have to call the sheriff again to get rid of you?"
The memory of that night lay between them, so strong that it was almost tangible. For a moment she saw again the lights, felt the confused terror, but she refused to let him throw her into a state of panic. Instead she gave a graceful shrug and turned away from him, strolling into the small dressing area, where she efficiently swept her few toiletries into her overnight case and took her single change of clothes from the rack. Acutely aware of those dark eyes boring a hole through her, Faith folded the clothes over her arm, slipped on her shoes, picked up her purse, and sauntered past him without ever changing her calm expression.
As she drove away from the motel, on her way back to Baton Rouge, he was still standing in the open door staring after her.
Faith Devlin! How about that for a blast from the past? Gray stood watching her taillights until they disappeared from view. When Reuben had called to tell him that a woman who was the spitting image of Renee Devlin had checked into the motel, and that she had registered as Faith D. Hardy, he’d had no doubt about her identity. So one of the Devlin spawn had finally worked up the nerve to come back to Prescott! He wasn’t surprised that it was Faith. She had always had more backbone than the rest of the bunch put together. Which didn’t mean he’d been inclined to let her stay.
He turned back into the lighted room that she had abandoned with so little fuss. Without any fuss, damn it. If he’d wanted a fight, she hadn’t obliged him. She hadn’t even asked for a refund on her credit card. Without so much as a flicker of an eyelash, she had gathered up her stuff and left. It hadn’t taken a minute; hell, he doubted it had taken her thirty seconds.
She was gone, and except for the wrinkled bedspread, the room was as pristine as if she’d never been there, but her presence still lingered. There was a sweet, faintly spicy scent in the air that overrode the staleness endemic to all motel rooms, and his blood stirred in instinctive reaction to it. It was the smell of woman, universal in some ways, exclusive to her in others. He stepped farther into the room, drawn by that elusive scent, his nostrils flaring like a stallion’s.
F.aith Devlin. Just hearing her name had brought back that night and he had seen her again in his mind, silent and willowy, with that dark-fire hair tumbling over her shoulders and her slender body silhouetted inside her thin nightgown, weaving a sensual spell over the deputies and himself. She had been only a kid then, for God’s sake, but she had had her mother’s sultry aura even then.
When she had opened the door to this room and he had seen her again, he had been stunned. She looked so much like Renee that he’d wanted to throttle her, but at the same
time there was no mistaking her for her mother. Faith was a little taller, still more slender than voluptuous, though she had filled out nicely in the twelve years since he’d last seen her. Her coloring was the same as Renee’s: the dark red mane, the slumberous gold-flecked green eyes, the translucent skin. What had infuriated him, though, was her eifort-less sensuality, and his own unwilling reaction to it. It wasn’t anything she had said or done, or even what she’d been wearing, which had been a stylish business suit. A Devlin wearing a suit, by God! No, it had been something intrinsic in her nature, something Renee had also possessed. The older daughter – he couldn’t remember her name – hadn’t had that potent allure. She had been easy and cheap, not sexy. Faith was sexy. Not overtly so, as Renee had been, but just as potent. He had looked into those cat eyes and thought of the bed just behind her, thought of tangled sheets and hot flesh, of having her naked beneath him and feeling her thighs clasp his hips just as he found the soft opening between her legs and pushed deep inside…
Gray broke out in a sweat and swore aloud in the empty room. Damn, he was as bad as his father! Give him a whiff, and he was ready to forget everything else in his rush to screw a Devlin woman. No, not every Devlin woman, he mentally amended. Thank God for that, at least. He had seen Renee’s potent appeal but found it resistible, and the idea of sharing a woman with his father repellent. Nothing about the older girl had been attractive to him. Faith, though… If she were anyone but a Devlin, he wouldn’t rest until he had her in bed and settled down to a long, hard
ride.
But she was a Devlin, and just the mention of that name made him furious. His family had been wrecked because of Renee, and he could never forgive or forget that. Forgetting was impossible, when he lived every day with the results of Guy’s desertion. His mother had withdrawn until she was just a shell of her former self. She hadn’t left her bedroom for over two years, and even now refused to venture from the house except for doctors’ appointments in New Orleans, on those rare occasions when she was ill. Gray had lost his
father, and to all intents and purposes had also lost his mother.
Noelle was a silent, sad ghost of a woman who spent most of her time in her room. Only Alex Chelette could coax her into a little smile and bring a hint of life to her blue eyes. Gray had realized some time ago that Alex had fallen in love with his mother, but it was a hopeless cause. Not only was Noelle oblivious to his devotion, she wouldn’t have done anything about it if she had been aware of it. She was married to Guy Rouillard, and that was that. Divorce was unthinkable. Gray sometimes wondered if Noelle was still clinging to the hope that Guy would come back. He himself had long ago accepted that he would never see his father again. If Guy had intended to come back, he wouldn’t have sent that letter of proxy which Gray had received two days after his disappearence. It had been mailed in Baton Rouge the day he left; the language had been terse and to the point, with nothing personal included. He hadn’t even signed it "Love, Dad," but limited himself to a businesslike "Sincerely, Guy A. Rouillard." When he had read that, Gray had known that Guy was gone from his life forever, and his eyes had burned with tears for the first and only time.
He didn’t know what he would have done without Alex those first desperate months when he had been scrambling to solidify his position with the stockholders and various boards of directors. Alex had guided him through the rocky shoals, fought with him for every advantage, done whatever he could to help with Noelle and Monica. Alex had grieved, too, for the loss of his best friend. Guy and Alex had grown up together, been as close as brothers. He had been stunned that Guy would actually turn his back on his family for the sake of Renee Devlin, and had left without even saying good-bye.
In some ways, Monica was stronger now than she had been before. She wasn’t as emotionally needy, so dependent on others. She had quietly apologized to Gray for her suicide attempt, and assured him that she would never do something that stupid again. But if she was stronger, she was also more remote, as if that paroxysm of pain and grief had
burned out her excess of emotion, leaving her calm but also distant. She had interested herself in his work and gradually became an excellent assistant, one on whom he could rely with every faith in her judgment and ability, but she was almost as reclusive as Noelle. Monica did go out into the community; she was particular about her appearance and got her hair styled regularly, and made an effort to dress well. She hadn’t dated for years, though. At first Gray thought she was embarrassed by her suicide attempt, and would relax as the scars faded. She hadn’t, though, and eventually he had realized that it wasn’t embarrassment that had kept her at home. Monica simply wasn’t interested in socializing with anyone. She would do it at a business function, but on a personal level she refused all invitations, and steadfastly turned aside his suggestions that she reenter the dating scene. All he could do to bolster her confidence was show her how he trusted her in their work, and pay her a good salary so she would have a tangible proof of her worth, and a sense of independence.
Last year, though, the new sheriff, Michael McFane, had somehow talked her into going out with him. Monica had been seeing him fairly regularly since then. Gray had been so relieved, he could have cried. Maybe, just maybe, Monica had a shot at a normal life, after all.
No, he would never forget what the Devlins had done to his family. And with luck, he would never see Faith Devlin again.
Thank you.
Those had been the only words she’d uttered, other than to ask who was at the door. She had been cool and enigmatic, watching him as if faintly amused, her poise unshaken by his threat. It hadn’t been a threat, though, but a promise. He would have had her escorted out of the parish for a second time if she hadn’t left on her own. And he would have had to call the sheriff, because if he had touched her himself, he would have lost control, and he had known it.
She was a woman now, not the kid he remembered. She had always been different from the rest of the Devlins, a fey woodland creature who had grown up to be as much of a temptation as her mother. Some poor fool had evidently
thought so, because the fact that her last name was now Hardy meant that she was married, though she hadn’t been wearing a wedding ring. He had noticed her hands, slim, elegant, well kept, and been cynically amused by the absence of a wedding band. Renee hadn’t worn one, either; it had cramped her style. Evidently her daughter felt the same way, at least when she was traveling sans the unknown Mr. Hardy.
She had looked prosperous, so, like a cat, she had landed on her feet. Gray wasn’t surprised. It had always been a particular talent of the Devlin women that they could always find someone to support them. Her husband must be a good provider, the poor sap. He wondered how often she left her husband at home while she rambled.