No Law Against Love 2

by Zoë Archer

  “Not your business, brother.” Tucker’s inner turmoil turned to anger. He didn’t have the energy to explain everything to Jimmy. He needed all his strength to face Clarissa and end his engagement. He’d been trying to get in touch with his fiancée every fifteen minutes since he left the shelter, but she hadn’t answered any of his calls.

  Jimmy rubbed his hand over his face. “And when did you plan to tell Phoebe? The very nice woman you let fall in love with you. And she does love you. I saw that in her eyes when you left the park. Well, I’m going to do something.” He raced out of the room. Tucker heard him running down the stairs shouting for the one person he didn’t want to talk to—his mother.

  ~~~

  Phoebe brushed lint off her serving uniform—black pants and the vest she wore over a white shirt. She pinned her long hair securely at the nape of her neck.

  “Should I call in extra security tonight while you’re gone,” Ella asked.

  “I don’t think so. It’s only a pre-wedding party. Won’t be all night. Rick is bringing some leftovers at five. I’ll hide in the van and leave with them. No one will know I’m gone.”

  Rick Romano remained one of the shelter’s best supporters. It had kept him and his mother safe from his brutal father more than a decade ago. Rick constantly repaid Ella for his good life with money and food.

  “Leftovers?” Ella raised an eyebrow. “Remember last time. Two-hundred pounds of unclaimed wedding cake.”

  “No, I checked. Cheese, fruit, Swedish meatballs and mini-quiche. Retirement party. Only half the people showed up.”

  Romano’s van arrived at the back door and Phoebe helped unload. They stowed all the catering service’s edible excess in the giant refrigerator he had also donated for the shelter’s use.

  “Where are we going tonight?” Phoebe asked Rick.

  “Marble Grande banquet room.” Rick’s eyes lit up and he rubbed his hands together in mock enthusiasm. “Prelim for a big society wedding next week. Money marries more money.”

  Phoebe laughed. “Did you marry for love or money?”

  “Got the best of both.” Rick draped a friendly arm around her shoulder. A bit of a reach since he was a good six inches shorter than her. “I married the girl I loved, she helped me work hard, we made money—and kids.”

  Phoebe smiled. Could it be that way for Tucker and her? How could she, a shelter child turned bodyguard, help a man like him? She closed her eyes and remembered his mouth on hers and his promise. Children? Maybe. She’d like that.

  She climbed in the van, but they didn’t have to go far. The Marble Grande Banquet Hall was only half a mile from the shelter. A short ride around the park and they parked behind the building along with Romano’s other vans.

  ~~~

  “Clarissa, I need to talk to you.” Tucker wrapped an arm around her and swiftly drew her away from the family and guests milling around the limo parked in front of the Marble Grande.

  “Certainly, darling.” Clarissa gave him a vacant smile. She didn’t pull away, but her body tensed to a thin, rigid pole.

  Tucker swallowed hard. “I can’t marry you.”

  She stared up at him, eyes wide with surprise. “Why not?”

  He plunged on. “I don’t love you. You don’t love me.”

  Clarissa’s eyes narrowed and she crossed anorexic arms under perfect surgeon-shaped breasts. “What’s love got to do with us getting married? You know why we’re doing this. Did Daddy put you up to something?”

  Tucker’s mouth dropped open. “No. I’m in love with someone else.”

  “So am I,” Clarissa snarled between her teeth. “But if I don’t marry you, Daddy will ruin the man I love financially, or worse, hurt him. Daddy scares me sometimes.” She suddenly grinned, as if the rarest of things, an idea, crossed her mind. “Oh, oh.” Her eyes brightened and cheeks flushed. “But, if you break up with me, I can blame you.”

  “Whatever you want,” Tucker agreed. “Blame me. But this guy you love…”

  “He’s French, Catholic, and has parents who immigrated to France from North Africa. Daddy’s terrified of coffee-colored grandchildren. But as soon as Arnoux is finished with his work here, we’re going to run away to Paris. I figured I could buy a little time by marrying you. Get Daddy off the track. And get my money.”

  Tucker stood frozen in shock for a moment, then asked, “Is that all marrying me meant to you? I’m just a place holder until you can leave with the man you want?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Tucker. How incredibly hypocritical. What did you expect? You were going to marry me to bail your father out of bankruptcy.”

  Tucker knew she was right. “I guess we both got lucky then. Come on. We have to tell everyone.”

  Clarissa shook her head. “Oh, no. Not now. My mom’s not here tonight. She’ll want to see the look on Daddy’s face when it happens. Little Miss bitch Tiffany planned this party.” Clarissa despised Tiffany the swimsuit model, her father’s third trophy wife.

  Tucker didn’t want to go on, but he felt he owed Clarissa something. He’d been prepared to use her, even as she was prepared to use him. “Okay. Let’s get this farce over with.”

  “What about your mother and father?” Clarissa asked.

  “Jimmy told Mom. She didn’t know about my father’s little financial deal. I expect he’ll be too busy soothing her to be angry at me.”

  Tucker’s mother had been mortified when Jimmy told her what had happened. She’d married for love and expected her sons to do the same. She’d known about the precarious financial situation, but cared for her son’s happiness more than money.

  Tucker sighed with relief and followed a smiling Clarissa into the banquet hall. He’d sit beside her and enjoy what would certainly be a gourmet meal. He could call Phoebe tomorrow.

  ~~~

  Phoebe carried the serving trays across sealed concrete floors and placed them on stainless steel counters. She shivered. Rick set the thermostat down to fifty to be sure the perishable food went from refrigerated van to refrigerated kitchen without a problem. One case of food poisoning could ruin him.

  On the other side of three sets of swinging doors, the scene couldn’t be more different. Pink and gold marble floors, brocade wall panels, tables with snow-white cloths where large arrangements of fresh flowers covered every inch that wasn’t dedicated to dining. It all glowed under subdued golden lighting. The future bride and groom would dine with their families at a long table sitting on a raised platform. Rick darted around the kitchen checking temperatures, tasting, yelling at staff. He’d be on high alert until the last guest left the building.

  “Phoebe,” he shouted across the room, “you and Carlos serve the wine at the bride and groom’s table.”

  Phoebe held the door while Carlos rolled the wine cart into the banquet room. They’d entered behind the long table seating the bride and groom. Carlos would start with the bride and she would serve the groom. She did a quick survey of the assembled crowd. Not a completely formal party, but a well-dressed bunch. She recognized a few, those closest to the bridal party table. The mayor, his wife, other assorted dignitaries who’d made a big show of their occasional contributions to the shelter. The rise and fall of laughter and conversation filled the room where Rick’s other serving people moved among tables also pouring wine and filling water glasses.

  Phoebe draped a white towel over one arm, picked up an open bottle of wine, and approached the groom. People like these looked right through servants as though they weren’t even human beings as long as they filled, refilled, and removed everything when empty.

  The bride and groom laughed, sharing some secret joke. She approached the groom from behind and carefully reached around him to get his wine glass. He turned to face her.

  Phoebe froze. Only a second, but a lifetime of emotion, every piece of agony she’d ever known found her and cut through her like razors. The one man she’d ever really believed she could trust sat beside his future bride.

  ~~~


  Tucker drew a sharp breath. God, no! This couldn’t be happening.

  “Phoebe!” He caught her wrist. The look of horror on her face—how could he stand it? She jerked hard and his hand tightened by reflex. The bottle of wine flipped out of her other hand, hit the table, and flooded red liquid across the flowers and tablecloth like a bleeding heart.

  Phoebe jerked again. “Let me go, bastard.” She snarled the words through her teeth. This time her substantive strength lifted him from his chair.

  “Phoebe, you don’t understand.”

  “Oh, I understand all right.” Phoebe stopped pulling and jumped toward him. Her shoulder caught him in the chest and the room turned upside down when he landed on his back with a bone-jarring thump. The old clichés, ‘knocked the breath out of me’ and ‘seeing stars,’ became literal. He lay staring at the ceiling and the shocked faces of people around him.

  Jimmy stood near his feet, grinning like a kid on Christmas morning. “Way to go, Phoebe,” he shouted.

  Clarissa knelt beside him. “Tucker? Are you okay?” She held her hand over her mouth, covering a smile. Jimmy’s joy at his brother’s predicament had apparently infected her, too.

  “Phoebe,” Tucker gasped. “Have to get to…” He struggled to rise and had to fight a number of hands wanting to hold him down while someone called an ambulance. When he made it to his feet, chaos ruled the area around him. People milled around the room, talking and staring. Jimmy and Clarissa had their heads together in a guarded conversation, and his mother had his father backing away from her while she shook a finger at him. Tucker had rarely seen her so angry. They could all deal with that, but Clarissa’s father, Alden, was shouting at the caterer. Tucker stepped between them.

  “This is my fault,” he said to Clarissa’s father, “not his.” He turned to the caterer. “Where is she?”

  The caterer fixed him with a cold stare. “Don’t know what this is about, but I’m on Phoebe’s side.”

  “I am, too. Please, I’ve got to get her to forgive me.”

  The caterer relaxed a bit. “She ran out the back door. Probably went home. It’s not far.”

  “Look here, Ferrell.” Clarissa’s father was suddenly in his face. “If you expect my daughter to marry you, you better—”

  “I’m not going to marry Clarissa. Blame it all on me.” Tucker spoke louder than he intended. He suddenly realized the room had fallen silent and everyone had heard him. Oh, shit. He needed to extricate himself from this situation fast. He needed to find Phoebe.

  Tucker headed for the door and Jimmy followed him as he rushed outside. “Come on,” Jimmy said. “We’ll catch her.” They ran to the parking lot, climbed in the Escalade and raced off in pursuit.

  ~~~

  Phoebe left the building and ran down the sidewalk toward the shelter. She’d cut across the park and be there in a few minutes. Poor Rick. She’d screwed up his party. Maybe he wouldn’t get sued.

  The city had skimped on the lights lining the park’s sidewalks and they created pools of illumination between long stretches of darkness. She stopped running and slowed to a walk. She rubbed her eyes. At least she’d managed not to cry—yet. She could do that later. Stupid, so stupid. But he’d been in her arms, touched her, this man who made her feel so alive. How could she have been so wrong? She’d lived by her instincts since her parents died, cautious about relationships, until Tucker dropped into her life. She’d hurt for a long time on this one.

  Phoebe moved slowly across the park toward the shelter. What would she tell Ella? Ella had told her to trust her heart and her heart had led her down a terrible path.

  She trudged on, still wrapped in misery, until she reached the fountain. They’d replaced the light she’d broken and the colored glass created a rainbow in the water’s hissing plumes. It sprayed from the top of a rough, five-foot concrete pineapple stuck on a thin pedestal like a bizarre crown.

  Laughter suddenly interrupted her single-minded obsession with herself. Four men emerged from the shadows and surrounded her.

  ~~~

  Jimmy drove slowly down the street while Tucker watched for Phoebe. No luck. They’d driven all the way around the park and past the shelter twice.

  “Maybe she went somewhere else,” Jimmy said.

  “Go around to the shelter again,” Tucker ordered. When they arrived, he jumped out and ran to the door. Ella had recognized him through the peephole and opened the door, but Phoebe wasn’t there. Alarm was clearly painted on Ella’s face. Phoebe lived a dangerous life as she stood between women and children and violent men. He raced back to the Escalade.

  “Little worried here,” Jimmy said. “Something is wrong. Where could she be? It’s been almost thirty minutes since we left and—”

  Tucker rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know, I…” He knew where to find her. “The park. She probably cut across the park.”

  Jimmy turned the Escalade and the mammoth vehicle barely shook as it jumped the curb, straddled the sidewalk, and plowed headlong across the grass.

  ~~~

  Phoebe’s best option was to cut and run—if she could. Two of them she knew, Wallace and a dirty bruiser nicknamed Grim. The pair had probably recruited the other two at the local bar a block from the shelter. She’d taught Wallace and Grim to avoid dangerous contact with her hands and feet. They’d use the two idiots picked up at the bar as shock troops. Then they’d move in and take her down.

  “Gotcha now, bitch,” Wallace snarled. He sounded sober.

  “Yeah, bitch! You’re meat this time.” Bad news. Grim sounded sober, too.

  Phoebe let her mind and body drop into that vigilant state where all conscious thought and emotion ceased and the body reacted solely to instinct. She shoved fear aside and concentrated on the moment.

  As she suspected, Wallace and Grim hung back, allowing the two novices to charge in and take the first blows. The first rushed at her with little finesse. One at a time? Not a problem. Phoebe aligned her body straight and balanced, then made a half step toward him. The heel of her hand caught him hard under the chin. A good solid strike, bone on bone. His head popped back with an audible snap. His arms flew out, and he landed on his back. He didn’t move.

  The second novice jumped in. A smaller man than the first, so she caught his arm, ducked under him, straightened her legs and tossed him at the fountain. He hit the concrete pineapple with a thump, then dropped into the water. The pineapple swayed, then toppled over, hit the fountain base with a gunshot crack, and broke into pieces.

  Wallace and Grim were on her then, using brute force to drag her down to the sidewalk. Wallace knocked the breath from her as he jammed a knee into her stomach. Grim moved a bare arm too close and she clamped her teeth on it. He howled and snatched it back, leaving foul skin and flesh in her mouth. She spit.

  Wallace still pinned her down, but when Grim leaned away holding his bleeding forearm, she drew her leg back and slammed a foot in his face. Wallace released her and jumped to his feet. She rolled away, desperate to rise, but couldn’t make it. He kicked her in the head. White light filled her eyes, but she felt nothing as the light faded into blessed midnight where there was no pain.

  ~~~

  Tucker held on tight as Jimmy steered the vehicle around a tree and rammed it through flowerbeds and bushes like a giant runaway lawn mower. When he turned toward the fountain at the park’s center, the headlights suddenly flashed on a scene from hell. A man lay unconscious on the sidewalk and another draped over the fountain’s edge, struggling to rise. A third man crawled across the grass, blood dripping from his face.

  Phoebe lay on the ground. The brute standing over her kicked her in the head. His foot came back again and slammed into her ribs. Her body jerked and rolled at the violence of the blow.

  Tucker jumped out of the Escalade before it stopped rolling. The man who’d kicked Phoebe stared into the brilliant headlights, turned slightly as if to run, but Tucker was on him.

  Tucker had de
fended himself bare fisted in the saloons of Montana and Texas. This time his rage hurtled him far beyond a mere bar fight as he mercilessly pounded the man who’d hurt Phoebe. The brute went down. Tucker straddled him and continued his attack. Only when Jimmy screamed in his ear and beat his own fists on Tucker’s back did he stop. He’d made a bloody mess of the now unconscious man’s face.

  “See about Phoebe,” Jimmy said. “Don’t move her.”

  Tucker pushed himself to his feet and went to kneel by a still, silent Phoebe. He desperately wanted to kiss her pale face, to hold her and somehow let her know how much he loved her. His Amazon.

  “Yes, the middle of the park!” Jimmy kept yelling into the phone as if he could hurry an ambulance along with his voice alone.

  ~~~

  Phoebe woke to acute pain. She gasped. Fight it, get up, and run—but she couldn’t move. Memory crashed in. She was alive. In a bed, probably a hospital. She drew deep breaths trying to clear her mind. It only amplified the throbbing pain in her head and chest. Consciousness slipped away. She woke again, this time with enough clarity to assess her situation. Pain? Tolerable. She opened one eye to a blur of light. Swollen shut, the other eye refused to obey her command. She moved her hands, gently flexing bloated fingers and sliding the tips across the sheet.

  Someone noticed, because various people moved in the space around her, gave her a sip of water when she croaked out the single word, but refused to let her sit up. She learned she had cracked ribs and a concussion that had kept her in a coma for two days. Indeterminable time passed while they kept her drugged. Finally, she told them to ease off on the meds. She could tolerate the pain easier than a foggy mind. One eye remained swollen, but she could see with the other.

  Later, though how much later she didn’t know, Ella appeared at her bedside.

  “Who’s on guard?” Phoebe asked. She could speak above a whisper now.

  “Tucker hired security people so I could come. You are seriously misjudging that young man.”