* * * *
Christian sat in the living room on the couch. Everyone, save Brayden, was scattered around the house somewhere and not present.
The cops were here and she was supposed to answer questions. Gabe Morris seemed more tense than normal, but then again, what did she know about tension. Let alone normalcy.
"All right," Emma Laurence said. "We got a bit into this last night before the phone call. We have no way of knowing where it came from, the conversation was too short. But since we already have a tape Gabe provided yesterday, we have one voiceprint and we know they’ll match. If they don’t, then you’ve got more than one person after you Miss Bills and that doesn’t seem very likely."
Her voice was straight and to the point, yet calm all the same.
"You mean," Christian asked, "if you find this guy, if you get him to talk, you can match that person to the person who called."
"The one who attacked you, yes."
Another nail in the bastard’s coffin. She had some of her own. But those might take time. For now, she would give what she could.
"All right, do you want to start at the beginning again, or would you rather pick up where we left off?"
Laurence asked.
"I want her start at the beginning," Lieutenant Morris interrupted. "She might have remembered something and doesn’t even realize it until she says it aloud."
Or she could screw up. What had she said last night? She couldn’t really remember. Then again, what she did remember was garbled and hazy at best.
Rubbing her forehead, she nodded and again started from when she came home.
As the events unfolded, Brayden stood and walked to the window. His arms crossed. From here, she could see the tightened cords in his neck shift and bunch, the jump of muscle in his jaw.
Laurence said, "So when you awoke you still didn’t see him?"
She shook her head. "No, my head hurt and I was trying to figure out what had happened, where I was." She remembered his voice, teasing, calm and daring. She rubbed her hands over her arms. "Then I-I heard him. He grabbed my hair and kissed me. I tried to pull away and that’s when...." She trailed off.
"That’s when what?" Laurence prompted.
Christian swallowed and looked down at the throw over her lap. "That’s when I realized I couldn’t move." Taking a deep breath, she went on. "I still didn’t see him. Things were blurry and out of focus, but he said I was beautiful. Then he said tit for tat."
"Tit for tat?" Gabe asked.
She nodded. "He kissed me again, but bit my lip."
The rest of the facts she relayed as she could. When she’d awoken this morning, she’d convinced herself she could get through this. She could. Just relay the bare facts with a few omissions. Not that hard.
But the fear and the helplessness of it all clawed at her like a tiger playing with its food.
"The phone kept-kept ringing. I remember wondering when I’d put the ringer back on, because I couldn’t remember. He’d just laugh when it rang."
Help is so close, yet unattainable.
She heard the click of Brayden’s shoes as he crossed to her. A shiver danced down her spine. The pain pill was wearing off. Brayden perched on the arm of the couch, his arm around her. She stiffened, knowing she wasn’t through with the story, but she didn’t want him to leave either. She held onto his hand, as though he somehow gave her strength to go on.
Silence netted around them.
"Okay, what happened when the phone rang?"
"He just laughed," she repeated. "Just laughed, teased me. I couldn’t see, but he told me the phone was so close."
"Bastard," Brayden muttered, but she heard him all the same.
"Then what happened?" Laurence asked.
She couldn’t do this, she couldn’t go into this with Brayden sitting right here beside her. Shame filled her, made her shake with humiliation and self-loathing. Anger sparked deep within her, but she buried it.
Buried it until later.
She closed her eyes, raised her hand to cover them.
Laurence cleared her throat. "Would you rather Mr. Kinncaid leave?"
She felt him shift, start to stand, but she tightened her hold on him, holding his hand with the both of hers.
She didn’t know what she wanted.
"He-he was wearing gloves," she whispered.
"What kind?" Laurence asked, just as softly.
"Leather."
Leather. She would never forget how that warm material almost felt like a heated hand trailing over her, touching her, violating her.
"I know this is difficult for you, but...." Again Laurence cleared her throat. "During the exam last evening you didn’t talk very much or answer many questions. With what happened, that’s understandable."
Christian closed her eyes. She could feel Brayden tense beside her. Maybe she should have let him leave, but she couldn’t. If he was here, no one would hurt her.
Laurence asked more questions, probing-probing for answers, for details.
What she’d already told them turned her stomach.
Bile rose hot in her throat.
"I’m going to be sick," she said quickly, trying to get off the couch.
Her ribs pierced through the nausea and had her gasping. Brayden helped her up and she all but raced to the nearest bathroom. She could hear his furious voice lashing out at the cops as she shut the door down the hall.
After the heaves stopped, she leaned into the counter and tried to catch her breath. Her cupped hands shook so bad most of the liquid escaped before she could rinse her mouth with water.
What was she doing? Was she making the same mistakes as she had before by keeping silent?
No. No. No.
She’d told others before and it got her nowhere. Nowhere, but pain. He won. He’d always won. And he’d pay her back, not only by punishing her, but by hurting those she cared about.
Danny’s body in that cold casket flashed through her memories. Susan and her mother helping her onto the train. Susan’s father as he rode with her. Papa as they’d lowered his coffin in the ground.
Her eyes slid closed and her bruised face faded from her sight in the mirror. She could survive what he did to her, but if he hurt any of the Kinncaids or her family, there was no way she’d ever forgive herself.
She’d rather him just kill her.
This was her home and her family.
The Kinncaid motto echoed through her: This I’ll defend.
It wasn’t just the Kinncaids. She still had a brother who would never expect the maliciousness Richard was capable of. Grandparents in Louisiana too old to be a match for this monster.
The first will be Brayden and his little girl.
Tori. Oh, God.
Her hands shook as she dried them off and opened the door.
Kaitlyn stood in the hallway. "Are you okay, sweetie? Do you need anything?"
Christian shook her head and tried to take a deep breath.
"You might want to get back in there. Brayden is threatening to throw them out and they’re adamant about talking to you about pictures."
Pictures?
She walked with dread back to the living room. Now everyone was in there, and on the coffee table were packets. Brown manila envelopes--she knew what the contents were.
Gabe only arched a brow at her. "Shall you do the honors or shall I? No one here seems to know what’s in them. But you do, don’t you? And I do."
Why was he angry?
Gabe ripped open the top one and dumped the contents across the small table. Glossy eight by tens slid out across and onto the floor.
He opened the next one.
Brayden and Aiden stooped to pick them up.
"What is this?" Brayden ask, first her then Gabe.
She stood to the side of the boys and across from the police.
"Well, now," Gabe said, "this, or rather, ‘these’ were found in her condo. Neatly labeled and dated, complete with his calling card." He flipped one up in a plastic bag. "My Angel."
She saw Brayden turn to her, but kept her eyes on Gabe’s darkly raging ones. "Look Christian, these good boys don’t seem to know what the hell’s going on."
The flutter of the photos swished through the air as someone flipped through them.
"I never told them," she admitted.
Gabe shook his head at her.
"Why? How long have you.... When did all this.... How the hell long has this been going on?" Brayden finally managed to ask.
She looked around to him, at everyone staring at her.
Taking a deep breath, she said, "Since about a week after I moved into the condo."
The skin across his face pulled taut, and his eyes narrowed on her. "Why, in the ever living hell didn’t you say something?" he asked quietly, too quietly.
She dropped her gaze from his and could only shake her head and shrug.
"Want my opinion?" Gabe asked.
No one answered him.
"I think this guy knows her, which means she probably knows him. I can’t help wondering if she’s not protecting this man. Then I ask myself who would she want to protect and more importantly why. Only people she has contact with are you guys. Maybe it’s one of you."
Christian could only stare at him. "I told you before, it was none of them."
"Why not?" he asked her. "The youngest has fair hair and green eyes. His build seems about right from what you’ve described."
"What?" She couldn’t believe this.
"Excuse me?" A male voice asked. Christian didn’t take the time to see who it was.
"Maybe you and young Quin here had something on the side and he’s pissed cause you chose his older brother. Not wanting to tear the family up, you keep silent and..."
"That’s enough!" A voice lashed out.
She turned and saw Jock glaring at the cops. All the men were lined together behind her, Kaitlyn just to the side of her.
"I will not have you insulting or implying something so horrible about a single member of this family," the patriarch said.
Gabe ignored him, and turned to look at Quinlan. "You have an alibi for last night?"
"It’s not him! It’s not! God!" she said, striding to Gabe, anger radiating out of her. Never would she allow anyone to defame this good family. "I told you before it wasn’t them, Gabriel, any of them. Why are you doing this?"
"I want the truth."
She didn’t understand his fury. "Are you pissed at them?" She pointed to her family behind her. "Or me?" Her voice wavered and caught.
His dark look was flat as a shark’s. "I want to know why you never told them someone was following you, photographing you, sending you sick and twisted gifts and calling you," he said just as straight as his unwavering stare. "Why you never told them you were being stalked."
"I don’t know!" she yelled. "I don’t know. I don’t know. Is this an ‘I told you so’, Gabriel? Do you think-think I don’t know I made a mistake?" She slapped her chest with her hand. "God, I’m slow, I’ll give you that. And with what happened, it’s probably a given I’m st-stupid."
Tears streamed down her face. "I should have told them. I know that. It doesn’t matter I was coming to file an official complaint yesterday with you, does it? No, I should have done that before. And it’s beside the point I’d planned on telling them last night."
The coffee table stood between them. Tears choked her, and her chest started to tighten with another attack. "I know I made a m-mistake. I think I realized it about the time the bastard slammed my face into a door. Or, no wait, I did get an inkling before that when he grabbed me in the kitchen."
Rage volcanoed out of her. "But it became blindingly clear to me, Lieutenant, when I was tied to a damn bed and couldn’t stop the sonofabitch from copping a feel or jabbing his fingers or hands where the hell ever he pleased. I made a mistake. A mistake. I can’t go back and change it! I wish I could, but I can’t. I can’t." A sob caught her off guard. "Oh, God."
Tears blurred her vision, and someone reached for her, but she shook her head and backed away. Her knees hit the edge of a chair and she crumpled, the emotions twisting her tighter and tighter until all she could do was release them.
"It’s past time for you to go," Brayden said right beside her. "And if you can’t find the damn door, I’m sure one of my brothers can find it for you."
She felt his arms go around her, stiffened within the embrace, then gave into the storm raging within her.
His scent engulfed her and she let herself lean, took from the shelter he unconditionally gave as sobs rocked her.
Venice, Italy
Brayden shut down his computer. He’d just finished chatting with Aiden after he’d opened an email from Rob Roy. Ian. At least he assumed the email was from Ian. The police admitted they found blood and hair that didn’t match Christian, they were doing DNA tests. That was hopeful. And in the background, Aiden was quietly pressing Mom and Dad about Christian’s past to see if they knew anything.
The feeling wouldn’t go away that she somehow knew this guy. Somehow, somewhere she had crossed his path.
As soon as the police had left their house the morning after the attack, Brayden arranged to take Christian away. Italy appealed to him, and he knew she liked Venice. So to Venice it was. They’d been here for almost a week and he’d tried to get her out to see the city. But, she wouldn’t leave the palazzo he’d rented near the Grand Canal.
Instead she was silent and withdrawn--understandable, but it was killing him. He’d removed the two phones installed in the palazzo. The only phone he used was his digital and he kept that on him. The first night here, she’d had a nightmare that the bastard was calling them. She had dozed off out on the couch.
He’d told her over and over there were no phones, but it had taken forever to convince her there wasn’t a phone ringing. He figured it was the pain medication she took.
Brayden stood and rubbed the back of his neck.
Maybe tomorrow he could get her out to see Saint Mark’s Basilica. Tomorrow would tell.
It was after midnight and he couldn’t sleep. The sitting room between their two bedrooms was silent, only marred by noises of the occasional vaporatto on the canal below. The palazzo was big enough to house his entire family, but he wanted to be close to her. So, he chose rooms that adjoined, for the most part.
He stretched, realizing he wanted a glass of wine. He started for the kitchen but stopped at the muffled sound.
Where?
There it came again.
He strode to Christian’s door and pressed his ear to it. If she was asleep he didn’t want to wake her up.
She was hardly sleeping at all.
Again the noise shifted from within. Another nightmare?
He knocked, "Christian?"
The door, unsurprisingly, was locked. She always locked it.
"Christian?" He rattled the knob.
A whimper from within, rose into a scream. Damn it. He reached over and lifted the plant on the side table. A key lay beneath.
"Christian?" Brayden unlocked the door, for the first time invading her privacy since coming here.
The room was lit from a lamp she’d left burning. His gaze landed on the bed. It was empty and his heart crashed in his chest.
"Christian! Answer me damn it!"
The whimper, just a whimper.
He hurried around the bed and almost stepped on her. Quick reflexes saved them both.
She was lying on the floor, tangled in a quilt. Had she fallen out of bed? Then he noticed the pile of blankets under her.
On the floor, she’d been sleeping on the damn floor.
"Ah, baby." Gently he squatted down and reached out. "Christian."
She tossed away from him.
"No, no. Stop," she pleaded, gasping for breath.
Brayden sat beside her and gathered her to him. "Shh. Shh. It’s just a dream. Only a dream. You’re okay, Christian."
She struggled within his hold, caught in whatever demons plagued her.
"Let me go! Let me go! You sonofabitch!" She pulled and strained in his arms. "I hate you. Hate you. I always have and I always will!"
Her voice was hoarse, barbed with malice.
"Christian." Softly, he kissed her forehead. "Come on, baby, wake up. Shhh. You’re safe. You’re safe here." He rocked her, anger and helplessness warring within him.
Finally, finally, she stilled. Brayden leaned back as she opened her eyes. Panic coated the smoky irises and she bolted in his arms even as her breath wheezed out. Another asthma attack.
He let go. "You were having a bad dream," he told her softly.
She stared at him with almost vacant eyes. Then, hugging herself, she rocked.
He looked around, didn’t see her inhaler. "Where’s your MDI?" he asked, looking for her metered dose inhaler.
She reached under her pillow and pulled it out, taking a deep breath of the medicine. Tears wet her cheeks and he reached up to wipe them off, but she shied away. On a sighing growl, he dropped his hand back and sat with her on the pallet. He was completely lost here. He had no idea if he was helping her or making things worse.
"So, felt like camping out, did you?" he asked.
What might have been a snort huffed out of her.
"This floor is hard. No wonder you don’t sleep." He glanced at her. Tears still shimmered in her eyes.
"Why the hell didn’t you sleep out on the couch if you didn’t want to lie in the bed?"
She didn’t look away, but shrugged. Her bottom lip trembled. "I-I didn’t want you to know."
Well, why didn’t she just hit him?
"Why?" he asked softly.
Again she shrugged. "I feel like such a-a-a coward," she finished.
Counting wasn’t going to help. "A coward?" He couldn’t believe this. "Why in the hell would you..." No, she didn’t need his anger. With more calm than he thought he had, he said, "Sorry. Why would you ever think something like that?"
Tears trailed down her cheeks and her eyes were hazy pools of pain. "Look at me Brayden! I’m a mess.
A mess." Her eyes were still glazed and he noticed her voice wasn’t normal, not quite slurred, but not ...
not ... well, normal.
"Are you hurt?" he asked her.
"Percocet," she mumbled.
Silence settled between them and this time he waited her out. "I don’t know what to do," she whispered.
"I don’t know what to do." Christian wiped her face on the knees of her pajamas. "I hate this. Hate this.
Maybe I can fix-fix it. But I just panic."
Again he waited, but this time, she didn’t continue. His feet were getting cold. Picking up the quilt he stood, wrapped it around him and sat, leaning against the bed and tucked Christian up beside him, the quilt engulfing them both. Her head rested on the crook of his shoulder. The scent of her shampoo drifted to tease him. He ignored, or tried to, the way she immediately stiffened. He could all but feel her forcing herself to relax. He absently wondered how much she would remember in the morning. She remembered some of the first night in Seneca but none of the plane ride and little of the first day here. But he didn’t care. He talked.
"First off," he started, "no more sleeping on this cold hard floor. You don’t want to sleep in the bed, fine.
The couch is out in the living room." He started to offer she could sleep with him if she got scared, he’d keep the demons away. But, that probably wasn’t the right thing to say. "Second, and let me make certain you understand this, I never, never want to hear you call yourself a coward again." My God, that she’d even think it. He tilted her chin up so that she was looking at him. "What you are, is a survivor.
Remember that."
Her eyes were haunted as she blinked. This close and at this angle of light, he noticed the size of her pupils, large and round, edging out the gray of her irises. She probably wouldn’t remember a bit of this tomorrow. He needed to remember to ask her about it and how the medicine affected her.
"I can’t get him out of my mind, Brayden. He’s there. He’s always there. Just waiting, just like before.
He won’t let me go, he--Ri--" She stopped and tucked in her chin.
Ri? What was that?
...always have. I always will...
...just like before...
His pulse leapt.
"What were you going to say?" he asked her softly even as she settled against his shoulder.
She shook her head. "Nothing, nothing. He’s just always right there. Right there," she mumbled.
Brayden digested that and didn’t believe it. Right--long ‘I’ sound. She’d started to say something else.
Something with a short ‘I’. A name maybe?
Tightening his hold on her, he said, "Don’t keep anything from me, Christian. Not even sleeping on the floor. I’m right here. You don’t have to do this alone."
For a long time she was silent, so still and quiet he thought she was asleep.
"Sometimes I have to," she whispered.
"No, you choose to. There’s a difference."
He felt her swallow, heard her ragged breathing and a drop as it fell on his hand.
"The-last... He was angry. So angry. Banging on the door. Grabbed my throat and ripped that stupid locket off. Hate the locket. Hate it. Know what he said?" she asked shakily.
Grinding his teeth at the pictures her jumbled words invoked, he answered softly, "No."
"He-he said-he said..." She was crying. More tears fell on his hand holding hers.
"Shh," he told her.
Her head shook on his shoulder. "Can’t tell anyone. No one. Not a word or the Kinncaids will die."
What? He started to push back, but she latched onto him like a lifeline. Her fingers clawed at his hand and chest as she burrowed against him. "First-first would be you and T-Tori." Tremors shook her.
Smart bastard. Very smart.
Pulling back, he turned so that he could cup her face.
"Look at me."
When her eyes rose to his, he said, "This I’ll defend. Do you think I wouldn’t defend you and Tori? I’ll admit I’ve done a shitty job so far, but never again, Christian. Do you hear me? Never again. You’re mine. Not his. I protect what’s mine. You’re a Kinncaid."
She nodded, then leaned her head against his chest.
Brayden held her, thinking about what she might know and simply be too scared to say. Too scared?
No, the bastard had her so utterly terrified she even covered up slips of the tongue in a drugged state.
That might explain it.
But explanation or no, no one used his family in any way.
"Relax," he whispered. "I’ll hold you. You won’t have any more nightmares tonight."
He’d make certain of it.