Josh got Amanda to her feet and lifted her in his big arms. “Let’s get you taken care of, sprite,” he said softly. His face was still pale, but he was smiling.
“Wow,” Jenny was whispering to Lisa as she spotted Josh. “Who’s the hunk?”
“Your boss,” Josh said with a teasing glance in her direction. “But I’m already spoken for. And flattery will not keep you at your desk. Get a camera, for God’s sake, and start asking questions! Where
’s your sense of exclusivity?”
“Yes, sir!” Jenny said, giving him a mock salute. “You can count on me, sir!”
He turned to Tim. “Can you take over the job press temporarily?”
“Yes, sir!” Tim grinned.
“It’s my newspaper,” Amanda grumbled as he turned and carried her to the paramedics. “My job press, too!”
“I’m only making suggestions, as your partner,” he said soothingly. “Any decisions you don’t like, you can countermand later. We have to keep the doors open, darling,” he whispered, and bent to brush his mouth over her pert nose, “until I decide what to do about a replacement for Johnson.”
“How about me?” she teased.
She tingled at the tone and the touch. But when she moved to put her arms around his neck, she winced.
“How did this happen?” he asked as he turned toward the paramedics.
“He hit me with the gun,” she said reluctantly.
He didn’t look at her. But his tall body shuddered with feeling, and the paramedic he was looking at came running.
“Yes, sir, can I help?” the man asked.
“She’s hurt,” he said, putting Amanda down gently. “Her arm might be broken.”
“I’ll check. Not to worry, I’ve had hours of extra training.” He frowned as he felt her arm. “Badly bruised, but I don’t feel any breaks. We’d better get an X-ray, though. Never know about hairline cracks that might come back to haunt you.”
“I’ll run her down to the hospital,” Josh said. “Come on, little one.”
He picked her up again, despite her protests, and carried her to the limousine.
“You either have to let me be protective or watch me follow that boy to jail and beat him half to death,” he said through his teeth. “Take your pick.”
She relented. She laid her head back on his shoulder
and looked up at him with soft wonder. “In that case, it’s all right if you want to be protective. I’ll lie here and try to look properly helpless.”
His eyes slid down to meet hers, dark with feeling. “There’s only one place I want you totally helpless. I think you already know where it is.”
“That isn’t enough anymore, Josh,” she said sadly. She averted her eyes to his hard mouth. “I’m sorry.”
His arms contracted. “I’m sorry, too. Sorry that I hurt you before you left Opal Cay, and sorry that I’ve been so damned pigheaded and stupid. I should have kept my mouth shut.”
“The truth is always best.”
“You don’t know the truth, yet,” he said, his dark eyes sweeping her face hungrily. “But once I have you properly looked after, I’m going to give it to you. All of it. Then,” he added, easing her into the limousine while the driver held the door open, “we’ll make decisions.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-TWO
D
ora
stayed beside Ward while he fielded journalists and policemen and paramedics. But when they were finally in his car, she went to pieces. “It will be all over town,” she whispered. “Edgar will hear it on the news before he hears it from me.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, miserable. “Dora, honey, I’m so sorry.”
“He’ll take my boys away from me.”
“Maybe not.” He pressed her hand. “Listen, suppose you get a divorce and marry me. Then we’ll ask a judge for visitation rights. You won’t lose your sons, I promise you.”
“You’ve lost yours,” she said sadly. “All because of me.”
“It’s been building for years, Dora. You only helped me pr
ecipitate matters. It will work
out. If Lawson fires me, I’ll find mother job. I can always go back to reporting if I have to. Trust me. I feel like a new man. I can do anything, if I’ve got you. How about it?” he asked, glancing warmly at her. “Will you take a chance on me?”
It was only then that Dora fully realized all she’d given up. Ward was nice to her in bed. He was a kind man. But she’d sacrificed respectability, a secure future, and her children. There was no way she could ever get them back again. She had Ward. But now that she had him, she wasn’t going to be allowed to give him back. His wife was dead. His son was probably going to prison. And she was the catalyst. She would have to live with his failures all her life and know that she’d caused them.
“Of course I’ll take a chance on you, Ward,” she said dully. She forced a smile for him. “But you’d better drive me home now. I owe Edgar an explanation when he and the boys get home.”
He was reluctant, but in the end he let her go alone. When she walked in the door, she noticed an unusual stillness. There was no one in the house at all. A note was propped on the immaculate dining room table. It had her name on it. She picked it up, hating the clean feel of it, and ripped open the envelope.
Dora, I’m sorry you didn’t feel you could be honest with me about your affair. I’ve taken the boys to stay with my mother, where, hopefully, the press won’t harass them. They’re very upset. I thought you were happy with us. I wish you could have said something before it was too late. Edgar.
She sat down on the sofa and clutched the paper in her hand. After a minute she began to cry. When at last Ward called her she had a bag packed, and she asked him to come and pick her up. It was all she could do. She’d given up everything she had. So had Ward. They might not be ecstatically happy together, but there was no going
back. She’d wanted Ward, and an ironic fate had given him to her. Now she had to make the best of what she’d salvaged of her life. It would be all right, she told herself. All the same, her last look at her old home was a bitter one when she drove away in the car next to Ward.
A
manda’s arm was only bruised, but the doctor told her to take Tylenol for the discomfort and get a good night’s rest. He gave her a couple of tablets to take that would make her sleep.
“You won’t need that,” Josh murmured as he stuck the sedative in his pocket. His dark eyes slid over her face with warm possession. “I’ve got a much better way to make you sleep.”
“Have you?” she asked with building excitement.
“Oh, yes.” He pulled her close as the limousine wound its way to his house through the night traffic of San Antonio. “Have you heard from Brad?”
“I had a letter yesterday. He says he’s doing well.” She looked up at him. “He thought he was in love with me, but he’s decided that it was mostly a case of a wounded ego. He’s very sorry for all the trouble he caused.”
“I’ll forgive him if you will.”
“We have to. He’s not a bad man, really. He couldn’t be. He’s related to you.”
“I like that,” he mused. He leaned back against the seat with a long sigh and held her close. “My God, what a day. When I came to find you, I had no idea in hell what I was going to walk into. Are you really all right?”
“Really. Had you been outside long?”
“Long enough to go crazy,” he said. “I was afraid he’d killed you when I heard the shot. I don’t know how I kept on breathing.”
She smiled and snuggled closer to him, laying her weary head against his broad chest. “I thought that I might not see you again. It made me sad.”
His arm contracted jerkily. He stared out the tinted window with eyes that barely registered the city traffic. “I’ve damned near made a tragic mistake, Amanda. I didn’t realize until today that all my noble sacrifices might not have meant anything if you died. If I lost you.”
Her heart leaped. “You yourself said it was only sex,” she reminded him.
“You knew better,” he said. “You knew I was lying through my teeth the whole time.”
“Well, yes,” she mused. “But it hurt, just the s
ame.”
He looked down at her. “
There won’t be any miracles, you know,” he said. “No accidentally botched tests or switched test results. I’ve had six specialists on the case. They all agree that I’ll nev
er be able to give you a child.
” He hesitated. “Well, the natural way.” He touched her cheek. “There’s a small chance with in vitro fertilization—what they call test tube babies. If you want to try it, later.”
“All I ever wanted was you,” she said simply. “You’re very wrong if you think my interest in you is limited to your fertility.”
He glanced away from her with faint embarrassment. “The thought occurred once or twice. Women want babies, don’t they?”
She searched his averted face. “I wanted
you.
Just you, for so many reasons, Josh. I enjoy being with you,
talking to you, sharing bad times and good ones. We think alike on all the important issues. The rest will give us a lot of
arguments to make up after.”
He chuckled. “You sound like a lady with commitment on her mind.”
She lifted her face to his. “Oh, yes,” she said softly. “Years and years of it. Any way you like. No strings—”
“No, you don’t,” he said, stopping her words with his mouth. He kissed her with lazy affection. “You’re not getting away from me again. And I don’t believe in long engagements. If we work fast, we can be married in three days.”
“Married!”
“Don’t look so shocked,” he told her. “You might scare me off. You can have a small, intimate wedding.”
Her head was spinning. Perhaps the ordeal had affected her. She said so.
“No, darling,” he replied gently. “Not the ordeal. Me.”
“And what about that busy love life you threatened to rekindle?” she asked, her eyes flashing.
He smiled ruefully. “That was a last ditch attempt to save you from me. I haven’t slept since you left, or done much of anything except grieve for you,” he said after a minute. His face sobered. “And I came very close to doing that for real today.” He touched her hair tenderly, smoothing it away from her face. The look in his eyes was humbling. “Amanda, do you love me enough to take a chance on happiness?”
“You already knew the answer to that question before you ever asked it,” she replied.
He searched her eyes slowly and nodded. “I’ve always
known. That’s why I had the tests in the first place. I wanted you more than anything on earth, except your own happiness. That came first.”
“And then you tried to take away the one thing that
was
my happiness: you.”
He drew her bruising]y close, careful of her arm, and rocked her against his strength. “I’ll cherish you until they lower me down in the dark,” he said roughly. “And the last thought I have
…
will be of you.”
She felt the sting of tears in her eyes at the love and tenderness in that deep, quiet voice at her ear. She clung to him hungrily and gave him back the words. When his mouth searched for hers, it didn’t have far to go. She met him halfway, as she always would now, for the rest of her life.
T
hat night, lying close and contented in his arms in bed, Amanda drifted off to sleep. Their loving had been slow and tender and profound, a sharing of wonder and awed beauty and pleasure that transcended anything that had come before.
Afterward they’d talked a little about the newspaper and Ward Johnson’s replacement. But they were hungry for each other, and in between whispers and endearments they’d sought fulfillment again and again.
While she slept Josh lay awake, watching her with unconcealed possession in his dark eyes. He hadn’t felt so complete in all his life. His fondest, most secret dream lay beside him. Amanda had come full circle, from frightened child to responsible, competent woman. She could take anything life threw at her now, and he knew it. He felt a sense of accomplishment as he realized his part in
her development. If there had been no obstacles, and he’d given in to his hunger for her earlier, he’d have stunted her growth. As it was, she had a life and a mind of her own, apart from him. If she ever had to rely on herself in the future, for any reason, he knew she could do it. He lay back and closed his eyes, smiling at his incredible good fortune. Sometimes, he thought, life was merciful.
A
manda’s changes were implemented without further complications. Ward Johnson married Dora and eventually, when Scotty was released from jail, she became more of a mother to him than Gladys had ever been. Dora gained visitation rights with her own sons, frequently including them in outings.
A veteran reporter was hired to manage the newspaper while Amanda took over the job press, which grew into a major competitor for much larger enterprises in San Antonio. Years later her shop would absorb two others and become the biggest in the city.
Josh and Amanda were married the day the
Gazette
ra
n
the exclusive story about the hostage situation that had resulted in Scotty Johnson’s arrest. It was a kind story, as weekly newspaper stories often are. The tabloid stories that followed were not. But everyone weathered them, and eventually they became old news.
Having fulfilled the conditions of Harrison Todd’s will by marrying Amanda, Josh signed over complete control of the
Todd Gazette
and job press to Amanda. He remarked dryly that he was afraid to ask which of the momentous events made h
er happiest. He didn’t really
have to. Amanda’s answer was in her eyes.