Worth Dying For (12 page)

“Oh, Dante, I’m so sorry. I wish, for your sake that—”

He kissed her. It happened so quickly, so unexpectedly that she had no time to prepare herself. His wide mouth was soft and moist, but the kiss was hard and demanding. As a trickle of fear crept up her spine, she stiffened in his arms. Then suddenly the kiss changed from aggressive to tender, as if he instinctively understood her reaction and tempered his passion with gentleness. Giving herself over to the delicious sensations bombarding her body, Tessa returned his kiss, opening her mouth, inviting him in. His tongue licked a quick path over her lips, then delved between her teeth and raked over the roof of her mouth. Tessa sighed. Her tongue darted out shyly, wanting to participate, but not sure exactly how. As Dante deepened the kiss, took it to another level of intimacy, primeval feminine instinct took over and Tessa’s inhibitions dissolved in the heat of her passion.

The kiss exploded into raging hunger that Tessa could not control. She grasped Dante’s shoulders, her nails biting into the fabric of his jacket. Throbbing, moistening in preparation, her femininity clenched and unclenched. All rational thought ceased.

And then without warning, Dante ended the kiss, grabbed her by the shoulders and held her away from him. His breathing was harsh and labored; hers was the same. They stood there staring at each other, the chemistry between them electrified.

“Dante?”

“It’s all right, honey. We just got a little carried away. It was all my fault. I shouldn’t have let things get so out of hand.”

She shook her head. “I wanted it…needed it.”

“Ah, babe…”

He stared at her with such longing, the hunger in his
eyes so raw, that it hurt her to look at him. “Were you kissing me or were you kissing Amy?”

He released her abruptly. “You want the truth?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know. I honest to God don’t know who I was kissing.”

Tessa told herself that she would not react in any way to his admission. After all, she’d already known what he would say, hadn’t she?

“Maybe you’re right. Maybe another Dundee agent should take over the investigation. I can’t seem to handle things in an objective manner.”

He gave her one last look, his gaze saying how sorry he was, before he walked away. Out of the parlor. Leaving her alone.

His name echoed inside her head.
Dante. Dante
. She wanted to cry out, to call him back, to beg him not to leave her. Did it really matter that he was still in love with his teenage sweetheart? Amy Smith was dead, wasn’t she? How could Tessa possibly be jealous of a dead woman?

But she was jealous of Amy. And it did matter that Dante still loved her, or at least the memory of her.
Let him go
, Tessa told herself.
Let him go before he breaks your heart
.

“W
HAT’S THE MATTER
, Dr. Barrett?” Leslie Anne glared at the therapist. “I thought you were the wise one, the great psychiatrist who helped my mother recover from being raped and savagely beaten by my father, and yet you don’t seem to have any words of wisdom for me.”

She hated the way the doctor looked at her, with such pity in his eyes. What was he thinking—that Leslie Anne Westbrook would make a fine case study, perhaps be the ideal subject for a book on inherited deviant behavior?

“Do you really think of Eddie Jay Nealy as your father?” Dr. Barrett asked.

Leslie Anne shrugged.

The truth of the matter was that she didn’t think of her mother’s rapist as her father. But she also didn’t think of some fictitious guy named John Allen as her father, either. Even though she’d been curious about her paternity for years and had suspected her mother and grandfather were lying to her about John Allen, she had clung to the childish hope that whoever her father was, he and her mother had loved each other. Boy, what a dummy she’d been. Nothing could be further from the truth.

“You can’t expect to digest all the information you received today in a matter of hours or even weeks,” the
doctor told her. “It took your mother years to work through her fears and doubts, to be able to move forward and live a normal life.”

“Is that what she has—a normal life? She isn’t married. She doesn’t date. Her whole life revolves around three things—her job with Westbrook, Inc., Granddaddy and me. If you’d actually cured her, don’t you think she’d at least have a boyfriend?”

“Is that what you want, Leslie Anne? Would you like to see your mother married?”

“I didn’t say that. I just said I don’t think you fixed her a hundred percent and you’re not going to be able to fix me, either. I’m like Humpty Dumpty, all broken into a bunch of pieces and not you or anybody else can put me back together.”

Dr. Barrett paused in their stroll along the path that led through the well-maintained gardens on the estate. He crossed his arms over his chest and looked into her eyes. “If your mother got married, you’d have a stepfather, someone you might be able to think of as a father. Is that the reason you’d—”

“Ha!” Leslie Anne smiled, spreading her arms wide in a phony pose. “Of course, that’s it.” She snapped her fingers. “Instant cure. Find me a stepdaddy with whom I can bond. That’s all I’ll need to forget the fact that some psychopath’s blood flows through my veins, that I could possibly have inherited his demonic need to kill.” She walked up to the doctor, stood on tiptoe and got right in his face. “Maybe I’ll start by killing you. Doesn’t that worry you?”

His ruddy face paled. Despite the fact that she was crying inside, screaming with pain and humiliation, she
laughed. Dr. Barrett wasn’t as unaffected by her threat as he tried to pretend, even though he managed to maintain his composure.

“I can’t help you if you don’t want to be helped,” he told her in a calm voice. “Your mother desperately wanted help. Apparently you’re not ready. Not yet.”

“I’m ready for you to leave me the hell alone.” With her chin tilted, her gaze defiant, she stood her ground.

“If that’s what you want.”

“It’s what I want.”

“Very well. Why don’t I walk you back to the house and we can tell your mother how you feel about therapy? That you’re not ready to begin sessions with me. Not yet.”

“Why don’t you tell her yourself? And while you’re at it—tell her I want everybody to leave me alone. And I mean everybody!” Feeling an overwhelming need to escape, Leslie Anne turned and fled.

“Leslie Anne!”

Dr. Barrett kept calling her name, but she didn’t pause in her flight, didn’t look back. She kept running down the path, hurrying away from the doctor and from her home and family, running from a truth too horrible to bear. But where was she going? What was her destination? She didn’t know, didn’t care.

By the time she realized which pathway she’d taken, she had reached the river. Winded and perspiring, she skidded to a halt near the edge of the embankment that overlooked the dark, lazily flowing waters of the mighty Mississippi. Gazing down, over the tops of the brush that clung tenaciously to the jagged, sloping earth, she suddenly wondered why she shouldn’t jump. If she threw herself over the edge, into the river, all her problems would be
solved. She wouldn’t have to deal with the knowledge that Eddie Jay Nealy was her father. Not now. Not ever.

“Are you thinking about jumping?” a familiar male voice asked.

Leslie Anne gasped, then whirled around to face Tad Sizemore. “What’s it to you?”

“Nothing really,” he replied, a silly grin on his much-too-pretty face. “Jump if you’d like. But you should know that if you do jump, there’s a very good chance you’ll break your fool neck.”

“Is that so? Well, maybe I want to break my fool neck. Did you ever think of that?”

“Now, tell me, princess-of-all-she-surveys, why would you want to kill yourself?”

“I didn’t say I wanted to kill myself.”

“Sugar, if you break your neck, it’ll more than likely kill you.”

She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. “Why don’t you go away and leave me alone? What are you doing out here anyway?”

“Mother and I are having lunch with G.W. today,” Tad said. “I’m early because I stopped by the airstrip to pick up your aunt Sharon and give her a ride home. Mother will arrive shortly, so there’s no point in my leaving and returning later. But I did feel that I might be in the way up at the house, so I decided to take a leisurely walk and not butt in while your aunt informs the family she’s returned.”

“How considerate of you.”

“Hmm. They’re probably talking about you, you know. You certainly upset the household when you ran off the way you did. I’m curious. Whatever possessed you to run away? You’ve got the world by the tail, little girl. Old G.W.
dotes on you. He’d cut off his right arm for you. And you seem to be the beginning and end of your mommy dearest’s whole world.”

“You don’t like me very much, do you, Tad?” Well, she didn’t care if he hated her. She certainly despised him and his butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-her-mouth mother.

“Other than the fact that you’re G.W.’s heir, you really aren’t even a blip on my radar screen. But you and your mother are definitely thorns in Mother’s side. She’s bent over backward to make you two like her and yet—”

“Your mother doesn’t care anything about Granddaddy. All she’s interested in is his money.”

“Words straight out of Tessa Westbrook’s mouth. But then you are your mother’s daughter, aren’t you? A spoiled little rich girl who snaps her fingers and gets whatever she wants.”

“And you’re your mother’s son,” Leslie Anne retaliated. “Blood-sucking leeches, the both of you.”

Tad’s face reddened and for just a moment, Leslie Anne thought he might hit her. Instead, he laughed.

“Heredity is a bitch, isn’t it, kid? We don’t get to choose our mommies and daddies, but we have to spend our entire lives trying to overcome their influence.”

What did he mean by that? Did he know about Eddie Jay Nealy? Had Tad learned about who her biological father was from somebody in the family? Had Granddaddy told Olivia?

“Who told you?” she demanded.

“Who told me what?”

“Don’t play dumb with me. You know about my father, don’t you? Did Granddaddy tell Olivia and then she told you? Did you two get a big laugh at my expense? G.W.’s precious little princess is the devil’s daughter. Bet you found that funny.”

She hated Tad. She hated Olivia. And she hated Granddaddy, too!

“The devil’s daughter?” Tad laughed.

Leslie Anne reached out and slapped him, then gasped and jerked her hand away. What had she done? Rage boiled inside her. Murderous rage?

“Why you little minx.” Tad rubbed his cheek. “You’ve got quite a temper, don’t you? I’d say you need the same thing I needed growing up—a father who’d put you over his knee and give you a good walloping.”

Horrified as much by the fact that she’d hit him, that she had reacted violently, as by his comment about her needing a father to beat her, Leslie Anne ran past Tad, back up the path toward the garden area. With tears blinding her, she couldn’t see where she was going. But she didn’t care. God, she wished the ground would open up and swallow her.

T
ESSA STOOD
in the shadows of the arbor and watched her father and Olivia in the gazebo. That woman had no shame. She’d chased G.W. unmercifully, calling him five times a day, dropping by the house unexpectedly several times a week, arranging to be invited to every social occasion where she knew he would be. She’d worn him down, little by little, and all with Aunt Myrle’s help. Didn’t her mother’s sister see Olivia Sizemore for the gold digger she was? The woman had been married four times. She’d buried two husbands and divorced two. And she seemed damned and determined to make G.W. number five.

Over my dead body,
Tessa thought.

It wasn’t that she objected to her father dating. He’d kept company with several very suitable ladies since her mother
had died over thirteen years ago. If he wanted to remarry, why hadn’t he chosen someone halfway worthy of him? Olivia might have been Aunt Myrle’s sorority sister, but she certainly wasn’t the same type of woman. She wore too much makeup, dyed her hair that hideous red to cover the gray, laughed too loud and talked like a magpie.

Tessa crept closer, wanting to hear what Olivia was saying to her father. She didn’t trust that money-hungry floozy any further than she could throw her. If she didn’t protect her father from the woman, then who would?

“Oh, G.W., I do wish you wouldn’t fret so about that child.” Olivia forked her fingers up the back of G.W.’s neck in a playful, petting gesture. “Children will act up from time to time. They all do. Even my darling Tad sowed a few wild oats.”

“You don’t understand,” G.W. said.

“Then tell me, sugar. Explain what’s going on. Maybe I can help.” She nuzzled his neck as she laced her arm through his and cuddled against him. “You know little old me would do just about anything for you.”

Oh, God, Daddy, don’t tell her!
Tessa said silently, praying her father had better sense than to divulge a family secret to Olivia.

G.W. wrapped his arm around Olivia’s tiny waist. “I appreciate your concern, but it’s a family matter.”

“I’m practically family, aren’t I?” The woman cooed the words.

Tessa thought she might throw up.

“Now, Olivia, honey, we’ve discussed this before and—”

“I don’t know why Tessa and Leslie Anne don’t like me,” Olivia whined. “I just adore both of them and I’ve done everything I know to do to make them like me. Thank
goodness my Tad thinks the world of you. Why he said to me only this morning how he surely did wish G. W. Westbrook was his daddy.”

G.W. chuckled. “Did he now?”

Oh, get real. Daddy, you’ve got to know what a lie that is
. Tessa inched closer and closer to the gazebo, hiding behind a massive live oak tree and staying just out of sight from the gazebo’s two occupants.

“A man like you should have had a son,” Olivia said. “Someone to carry on the Westbrook name and take over the reins of Westbrook, Inc.” Using the tip of her finger, she caressed G.W.’s lips, then pulled his bottom lip down and stuck her finger in his mouth. “If we got married, I know Tad would gladly let you adopt him and legally change his name to Westbrook.”

“I’m sure he would,” G.W. said, then bit down on Olivia’s finger.

She yelped and jerked her finger away. “You naughty boy you.”

He grasped her shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. “I’m not ready for marriage. Not to you or anyone else. And although I appreciate the fact that Tad would very much like to be my son, he’s not. As for carrying on the Westbrook name—I have a daughter and a granddaughter who carry that name. And as for Westbrook, Inc., Tessa has already proven she’s more than capable of taking over when I’m gone.”

Good for you, Daddy. That’s telling her!
Tessa felt like jumping for joy.

“Eavesdropping?” Sharon Westbrook whispered as she sneaked up behind Tessa.

Tessa gasped. “My God, Aunt Sharon, you scared me
half to death.” Tessa turned around, grabbed her aunt and hugged her. “When did you get home?”

“Just a little while ago. Olivia’s darling boy, Tad, picked me up at the airstrip and brought me home. When did she arrive?”

“About five minutes ago. She’s a couple of hours early for lunch.” Tessa gave her aunt a condemning look. “Tad’s bad news. He’s just like his mother, out for whatever he can get.”

“Give me some credit, Tessa. I know what that beautiful boy is all about.” She nodded toward the gazebo. “And G.W.’s got Olivia’s number. He just enjoys screwing her. He’s not going to marry her.”

“Aunt Sharon, you’re outrageous.”

G.W. cocked his head to one side and looked out toward the big live oak. “Is somebody out there?”

“We’ve been caught,” Sharon said.

“It’s just us, Daddy,” Tessa called to him. “Aunt Sharon’s home.”

“Well, come on up and say hello to Olivia.”

Sharon laced her arm through Tessa’s. “Come on, kiddo, let’s go face the enemy.”

Tessa laughed.

When they entered the gazebo, Olivia reached out and hugged Sharon first and then Tessa, before Tessa could sidestep her grasp.

“How’s our little Leslie Anne?” Olivia asked. “She will be joining us for lunch, won’t she?

“Leslie Anne’s fine,” G.W. replied.

“I’m not sure she’ll be joining us,” Tessa said. “She’s rather tired after her…er, her adventure.”

Lowering her voice and putting a concerned look on her face, Olivia asked, “Did she ever tell y’all why she ran away?”

Silence. Loud, profound silence.

How could they answer such a direct question? Tessa wondered. Why Leslie Anne ran away was none of this nosy woman’s business.

“She did it on a dare,” Sharon said, in a matter-of-fact way that brooked no doubt.

“On a dare?” Olivia’s hazel eyes widened quizzically.

“You know how teenagers are.” Sharon offered the woman her most sincere smile. “One of her friends dared her to run away from home and our bold Leslie Anne accepted the challenge.”