“But nobody knows any more than that?”
“Nothing that anyone shared.”
“Maybe I’ll find something about it in the police file.”
“I don’t know. When I talked to Gage about the case in high school, he said they didn’t seem to have a thing.”
“Okay.” He was still amazed that she had tried to delve into the murder. That had to have taken a lot of courage, given that her mind had erased it all. So she had tried to open a Pandora’s box once before. Gutsy lady.
“Will they tell you more?”
“Since Gage is requesting the complete file, we might get every single thing Denver’s got.”
She nodded and began pacing again. “I know I’m taking huge leaps here. I have no proof for any of this. But say my mom left to escape being harassed by this guy. Maybe she was getting afraid. Regardless, two months later she was killed. Which leaves me. If he was afraid of me remembering him, he should have come after me a long time ago. Then there’s that last note.”
“‘Like mother, like daughter,ʼ” he repeated.
“Exactly. What if he’s a nut and has decided I must be like my mother. That I’m a lesbian. God knows, it could easily look like it. It would probably never occur to this demon that I avoid men because of
him.
” She swore quietly and finally sank back onto her chair. “Tell me I’m crazy.”
He couldn’t. The way she was adding it up was the only way it could begin to make sense. Whether or not her mother was a lesbian, whether or not this fruitcake thought Corey was, he plainly was after her for the same reason, like mother, like daughter.
She took his silence as her answer, evidently. She nodded slowly. “Okay, I’m not totally in left field.”
Time to walk carefully. He couldn’t imagine the emotions that must be coursing through her now, or what pitfalls might lie right ahead. “Maybe not,” he said.
“Well, I’m onto something.”
“I’d tend to agree. But there’s still a lot we don’t know. We can’t know.”
“Of course not. But his linking her to me in this way...” She trailed off. “Maybe it’s too tidy. But it fits. All I know is, I don’t want to imagine how this guy must have scared my mother to make her take off like that. It was so sudden, her decision to move. I know that for sure because both my grandmother and aunt commented on it. To them it seemed to come out of nowhere, and once it did, she packed and left. I get that she might have been thinking about it for some time, but not to say anything to her family?”
“It does seem odd, but the only family I know really well is my own.” He tried to lighten the moment because to him it looked as if she was edging into a bad place. Little by little she was battering at the past, and each thing she brought up was more scary. “In my family, a decision to move involves at least five people and weeks, if not months, of discussion.”
“I think I’d like your family.” But it sounded as if she was hardly attentive.
“You would,” he said confidently. “Mention you want a new place to live and you’ll have a bunch of people checking out housing for you. And when moving day comes, forget it. Every able-bodied person and every available truck will show up.”
“That must be nice.”
“It could be annoying, too, depending on your nature. It doesn’t happen without tons of advice.”
At least she managed a wan smile. But then, to his horror, a tear trickled down her cheek.
“Corey?”
“Can you imagine?” she asked, her voice wavering, “how afraid she must have been to leave that quickly? To take a child and move to a big city where she didn’t know anyone? She’d lived her entire life here, Austin. All of it. It must have been so hard to leave.”
He’d reached his limit. He couldn’t just sit there anymore and let her walk her past alone. Rising, he scooped her up and carried her to the living room where he sat with her on his lap and wrapped her in the tightest of hugs.
“You’re not alone,” he said quietly. “I won’t let that happen.”
He expected her to dissolve into tears, but she didn’t. A couple more large drops escaped her eyes, then she seemed to relax into his hug and accept the comfort he was offering. It didn’t seem like much, but it was all he had.
A long time passed. His hunger for her returned, but he couldn’t think of a worse possible time. Not when she was trying to handle a whole bunch of stuff that he figured had just shaken her whole world. Things she hadn’t thought about before, maybe had never guessed at, were front and center, and they needed tending more than he did.
Finally, she spoke, her head still resting on his shoulder, her eyes closed.
“We could go make love in the town square.”
He would have laughed if he hadn’t understood exactly what she meant. “I thought of that.”
“So what stopped you?”
Ah, hell, back to the bad stuff. “First, we don’t know why he’s after you. We’re assuming. He could have another reason. Second, how safe will you feel if we merely put him off? I couldn’t guarantee that he’d never get a wild idea again. If I thought it would make a difference, I’d marry you tomorrow.”
“Very generous of you.” She sighed and slowly opened her eyes. Even though she had barely cried, they were reddened.
“Basically, we have two options here. You decide which one you want to pursue.”
She sniffled once. “Okay.”
“We can carry on in public and shame the porn industry as far as you want in the hopes he’ll give up on you. In the hopes that we’re not wrong about his motivation. He moves on and leaves you alone.”
“Maybe,” she qualified.
“Maybe,” he agreed.
“And the other option?”
“We get ready and let him play his game out. Catch him and put him where he belongs. The only problem with that one is that we really don’t know what he wants here. Just to scare you? Maybe. He might not even be the guy who killed your mother.”
“True.” Lifting an arm, she wiped away the drying tears. “We really
are
blind here.”
“Pretty much.”
“That doesn’t help.”
“No.”
She lay quietly in his arms while minutes ticked by. Then she startled him. “I’m tired of hiding. Of being afraid. I’m over it. I’ve been missing a lot of life, a lot of good things, because I’ve been hiding from the past, hiding from fears I can’t even name. I guess I shouldn’t have been so eager to get out of therapy.”
“Oh, I can understand that. You were afraid your doc was going to take you places that terrified you.”
“And all I did by being so smart was create a cage of fear. I get it. You were sure right about that. Well, I’m tired of it. I don’t want to live with that anymore. So...we let this game play out, like you said. We hope we catch the guy and put him away. Even if he isn’t the man who killed my mother, he’s still tormenting me. A real sadist. So let him pull whatever it is he wants to pull. At least I can get rid of him.”
“This could be really risky. You could get hurt or worse. You’re sure?”
“I couldn’t be more positive.”
He felt so proud of her then. Despite the way she’d been living, he’d never figured her for a real coward. She’d moved on, she’d moved ahead, she’d run a successful business where just anyone could walk in the door. It took strength to do all that in the face of her fears.
No, she was no coward. She was a coper, and that was a huge difference. The thing was, coping skills developed in childhood weren’t always the right ones for adulthood, and she was facing that. Bravely, too.
His heart swelled and he hugged her even closer so that he could drop a kiss on her forehead. Yet he felt obliged to remind her once again. “This could be dangerous.”
“I know. But I’m tired of living half a life.”
Then she totally took his breath away. Slipping her arm up around his neck, she kissed him hard. “Make love to me, Austin. Please.”
He drew back a little to study her face. He didn’t want to be just a momentary escape. He wanted something more, a real pairing, a meaningful coupling. He didn’t want to be used like a drug.
But what he saw in her face, for the first time since early this morning, was passion. Real passion. No desperation. No fear. Just a complete and total look of desire.
She pushed his shoulder playfully. “Did you think you could hold me on your lap and not get a reaction?”
“Corey?”
She smiled faintly. “I’m not losing my mind, and I’m not running. I want you. The mess will still be there in the morning, but right now, all I want is you.”
He hoped like hell that she wasn’t fooling them both.
Chapter 11
F
irst Austin ran up the stairs to turn on lights and pretend he was settling in. This time he explained his reasoning to her and she nodded.
When he came back down, he found her totally naked on her bed, temptation personified as she lay on her side and smiled at him. “You’re gorgeous,” he said, his breath catching in his throat. “Exquisite. Beautiful.”
“So are you,” she answered. “Or at least you will be when you get rid of those clothes.”
Standing beside the bed, he stripped rapidly. Then, realizing she was drinking him in with her eyes, he waited a few moments, holding back his urge to pounce.
Then she saw something and frowned. He tensed immediately until she sat up and scooted over so she could touch his side. “They really did hurt you.”
“Let’s not think about that. I’m fine now.” The beating had left some external scars on his torso where skin had split because of the kicks. “I figure I’m lucky that they left my head alone.”
“I guess that’s one way to look at it. I’m sorry I didn’t notice last night.” While she was exploring him.
“I think we were preoccupied. I intend to get that preoccupied again right now.”
She looked up at him, a giggle escaped her and she lay down and rolled away. He hit the bed in one leap and grabbed her, causing her to shriek playfully. A second later he had her pinned beneath him, and was staring down into her laughing blue eyes.
“Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair,” he whispered.
“I think I already have.” An instant of shyness appeared to overtake her, then she gave herself up to him, wrapping her arms around his neck and her legs around his hips. Oh, damn, he was going to go off like a rocket.
“Just a sec,” he said hoarsely. “Protection. Expect no quarter this time,
querida.
”
“Give me none,” she murmured. She attempted to help with the condom, which only made him crazier. He didn’t know what was happening between them, and right then he wasn’t going to think about it. All he knew was that never in his life had he gotten this hot this fast. Well, okay, not since he was in his teens.
She made him feel that way again, young and hungry and so very impatient. He lifted himself on one arm and plunged his hand down between them, stroking her petals. A low moan escaped her and she arched toward his touch. Sliding a finger into her, he found her moist and ready. Nor did she wince.
That was his last coherent thought. He slid into her, claiming her with every inch of him, and pumped them toward the heavens. All he cared was that she take this ride with him, and everything in the way she moved, groaned and sighed said she was right there. His moans joined hers, sounds that only inflamed him more.
He was mindless by the time he reached the peak. He felt the shudders rip through her, heard her cry of completion, felt her buck up hard against him. Then he let go, jetting into her and feeling as if he turned inside out. He exploded into a ball of blinding light.
Collapsing on her, both of them sweaty and panting, he didn’t want to move. He could have stayed there forever. But reality wouldn’t allow it. Cussing silently, he climbed out of bed to take care of business, then returned.
She looked dazed, he thought as he pulled the covers over them and drew her close. Well, he felt stunned. In the usual way, he didn’t compare his lovers, but this one got to him in an unprecedented way.
Holding her, he could feel her fragility. She was fine-boned, delicate in her build, yet he’d seen her physical strength at the gym. She wouldn’t be a pushover even for a large man.
But those thoughts drifted away as he continued to hold her. She felt so relaxed against him, and he decided that’s why she felt so fragile. Protectiveness surged in him. At that moment he’d have gone to slay the dragon in her moat. He’d have taken up his sword and gone to battle wearing her scarf.
And he’d read too many fairy tales in his youth, he thought. A quiet laugh escaped him.
“What’s so funny?” Corey asked lazily.
“I’m feeling like St. George ready to battle a dragon on your behalf. Ready to carry your scarf into battle.”
She rose and pushed herself over until she was resting her head on his chest. “St. George, huh?”
“I can be silly.”
“Good. But I kind of like it. You’ve been slaying one dragon or another since you got here.”
He wished it were true. Reaching up, he ran his fingers through her hair. “Why do you wear you hair up almost all the time?”
“It gets in the way at work. Sometimes I think about cutting it.”
“But then it won’t get long enough for me to climb up into your tower room.”
Now it was her turn to laugh. “You do have a fanciful mind.”
“Does it bother you?”
“I like it. It’s playful and fun. So you see me as Rapunzel?”
“Sometimes. My first impression was a Viking princess.”
“Hmm, I think I like that better than being the lady locked in a tower.”
“What was your first impression of me?”
“After my initial discomfort of your being a strange man, you mean?”
“Yeah, once I was no longer a dragon.”
She rubbed her cheek against him. “Handsome. Exotic. Sorry, I wasn’t ready to see you as St. George.”
“I can understand that.” Especially since she hadn’t wanted him there at all.
“But what I liked most about you was the way you were so comfortable with me. It couldn’t have felt very good to know I didn’t want you here. But you just made yourself at home and you cooked your way in.”
He laughed again and squeezed her. “It was nice to be able to cook again. And you realize we haven’t eaten tonight. Most of our ice cream is sitting in a melted puddle right now. Although my mother would insist that’s not food.”
“It has calories, right?” But she laughed with him. “I think we’re still loaded with leftovers. If you keep cooking like this, I’ll have to get a freezer.”
His hand hesitated for a fraction of a second as he stroked her hair. Was she suggesting they had a future? He hoped not. There was too much uncertainty right now. She might turn to him for safety, and while he didn’t want to be needed only as a bodyguard, he didn’t know what he would do if it was more. Regardless, sooner or later, he’d have to return to work. What then? The cards weren’t looking good.
His uncle had warned him about one-night stands with virgins. Maybe she was investing too much of herself because they’d made love. On the other hand, he might be doing the same thing in his own way. He finally spoke hesitantly. “You know I have to go back to Washington, eventually.”
“I know. But right now I’m all into living for the moment. For all I know I could be dead tomorrow.”
That thought pierced him worse than it should have. He’d felt fear before, but nothing like he felt at that moment. “I won’t let it happen,” he vowed.
“We’ll see.” Surprising him, she sat up. “Do you know your stomach is growling? Let’s go find food.”
* * *
Her job kept her so busy, Corey thought, that it seemed as if they spent most of their time together cooking and eating. And now making love.
She really liked the lovemaking. Imagine having missed that all these years. Well, she liked the cooking and eating, too, but it was a limited life experience. They couldn’t go anywhere together now, if they were to follow the course she had chosen, so any chance of finding out what it was like to take a long walk with him, or see a movie, or laze around in the backyard on a sunny afternoon—all of those things were precluded.
And just as he had said, he had to go back to Washington eventually. Her life was here, his was elsewhere, and she suspected they were sharing a bubble of time when the fates had brought them together. Eventually they would go their own ways.
She could think clinically about it, but in her heart felt the foreshadowing of loss. She was really going to miss him, this man who had managed to get past her barriers and all the protections she had built around herself.
Maybe what she needed to do was raise all those barriers again, and quickly. Before she got really hurt.
Easy enough to say, she thought as she helped reheat the delicacies that Austin had cooked. The thing was, did she really want to back away from the most glorious experience of her life?
Hell, no, she thought. Everything had a price. She ought to know that well enough by now. But what she had shared with Austin over the past day or so? No, she didn’t want to end it prematurely by ducking back into her safe little cave.
When Austin had to leave, she’d deal with it and far better than she had dealt with every other loss in her life, all thanks to Austin. In fact, if she honestly thought about it, life seemed to be a series of losses. But Austin had shown her a whole new world, and she wasn’t going to give it up because she feared the future.
In her experience, fearing the future hadn’t gotten her anywhere at all, or saved her any pain. All it had done was lock her away from a lot of life.
Then life had found her, anyway. With Austin. With the stalker. Apparently living in a carefully constructed cocoon was no defense. Sooner or later you paid the price of living.
She thought about those notes and the conclusions they had reached while Austin rummaged about, cleaning up the ice-cream mess and laying out fresh plates and flatware. She’d made the right decision there, she decided. She couldn’t live the rest of her life wondering when this jerk would start bothering her again. Evidently he had some unfinished business with her. She couldn’t be absolutely certain what it was, but she was stubborn enough to do whatever it took to end this. She’d sacrificed too much of her life to nameless terrors. This was not going to become another one.
“You look very determined,” Austin said as they sat at the table.
“I am. I was thinking it would be nice to take a walk with you after we eat. Just a simple, ordinary walk. But we can’t do that right now. It makes me mad.”
“Good.” He gave her one of his great smiles. “Mad is better than a lot of other things.”
“I guess you’d know.”
“I think I said once before that anger can be a fuel. Very powerful if harnessed right.”
“Well, I’m harnessing it now. I want this nut unmasked. I want to know if he killed my mother. And I want him out of my life for good.”
“Check, check and check,” he said. “I don’t know if he’s your mother’s murderer, but we’ll get him and find out.”
“So sure of that?”
His face hardened. “I usually achieve my goals. One way or another, we’re going to get this guy.”
She wished she were as sure. He’d warned her it would be risky. If this man was the murderer, he probably wanted to kill her, too.
In that moment, she had a memory flash across her mind, a vivid, horrifying image. “A ghost killed Mommy.”
She barely heard herself speak because the world seemed to be spinning away.
* * *
Austin caught her just before she tipped onto the floor.
A ghost killed Mommy?
Oh, God, she was remembering, the one thing he had hoped wouldn’t come out of this. A child’s mind had been so seriously traumatized it had forgotten, utterly forgotten. In this he agreed with the therapist who had told her she didn’t need to remember.
He shifted his hold on her and carried her to the living room, where he laid her on the couch, then knelt beside her, waiting. He was sure she’d be fine soon. Fainting didn’t last long.
But his mind was now racing at top speed. She’d remembered something, and now she was going to have to deal with it unless her mind successfully locked it away again. Damn it all to hell, he wanted to get his hands around the throat of this guy. The impulse to violence wasn’t native to him, but he was feeling it now.
Her eyelids fluttered.
“Corey?”
“Austin?” For a few seconds she looked almost dreamy, then a frown knit her brow. “What happened?”
“You fainted.” He tensed, waiting to see if she still remembered or if the image had once again been locked away.
Then her eyes widened. She remembered.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered.
“You remembered something, didn’t you?”
“A ghost killed Mommy?” She repeated the words, then her entire face twisted into a grimace of pain. He started to reach for her, then hesitated. He didn’t want to frighten her more if she was locked in a memory.
“Oh, God,” she repeated, her voice taut with pain. “A man. He was all covered in white. He looked like a ghost. But a ghost couldn’t have killed her.”
A man in a Tyvek coverall could have, though. At last Austin dared to reach for her hand. He was relieved when she grasped him as if he were a lifeline, her grip almost painful.
“I’m here,” he said. Useless words, but intended to draw her out of the well and back into the present.
For a few moments she didn’t respond. Then she said quietly, “That’s it. That’s all I can remember.”
When she burst into tears he was ready. He leaned over her and slipped his arms around her, holding her tight. “It’ll be okay,
mi querida.
It’ll be okay.”
Empty promises, he thought almost bitterly. A well of hate opened in him, hate for her nameless, faceless tormentor. Was he amused to think she might be terrified? Did he get his jollies out of threatening young women? He’d met some contemptible people during his time undercover, and this guy was fitting squarely into the class of people the world would be better off without.
She shed too many tears to kiss them all away, although he tried. She cried until exhaustion claimed her, her sobs dying away into hiccups of shattered breath. Finally, even that trailed away. He figured she must feel utterly wrung out.
He went on holding her, willing her to come back, and felt immense relief when her arms at last stole around him. Her embrace was weak, but at least she was reaching for him. Her return had begun.
But her cry would remain with him forever. It had emerged from the maimed child still within her, in a child’s phrasing. For an instant, Corey had been seven again.
He hoped that would never happen again.
* * *
Austin lifted her from the couch and carried her back to bed. He pulled away her robe, ditched his jeans, then climbed in with her, tangling their limbs together. She felt him, felt his heat, strength and reality, but part of her still seemed far away. The part that remembered the man who had killed her mother, a snapshot in her mind, just a single frozen image.