by Janet Eaves
Chapter Twenty
“I’m not really comfortable with this, Mr. Stevens.”
Catcher Stevens grinned at Winnie. “Call me Cat. And don’t worry. My only interest is convincing your friend that I am nothing more to you than a massage therapist. Jump up on the table and lay face down. I hear his car approaching. I was hoping for a little time to look around before he came back, but we can use this time to establish my presence here.”
Winnie held the sheet tight to her naked body, wondering how she’d allowed Cat Stevens to talk her out of her clothes and into a sheet that he was going to loosen then put his hands under. She glanced from him to the table, then back. “You touch nothing but my upper back.”
Cat smiled easily. “Whatever you say.”
Winnie struggled to place herself on the table without exposing herself to the sheriff’s husband. Though she hadn’t ever experienced the emotion herself, Winnie wondered how the woman stood her younger, hot, hot, hot, surfer-looking husband touching other women, but figured anyone as beautiful as Polly Stevens didn’t have feelings of insecurity which would result in jealousy.
She jerked when his cool hands touched her. Then did so again when he tugged at the sheet, draping it down the sides of the table before tucking it in gently at her hips. Winnie suppressed the urge to whimper as she lowered her face into the oval hole provided.
The sound of liquid squirting, then the feel of slick warmth as he glided his hands across her back had her relaxing within seconds, deciding that maybe a massage wasn’t going to be so terrible after all. The whine of the screened storm door opening announced the arrival of Tom, and reminded her that she needed to buy silicone spray to quiet the squeaking hinges. She gave him a few seconds to make it to the parlor before lifting her head. “Hi.”
Clearly surprised, Tom stopped immediately upon entering the room. He glanced from her to Cat. His gaze returned to her. “What’s going on here?”
Surprised and a little amused at this obvious displeasure, Winnie relaxed back into the table. “I decided to get a massage. You want one?”
A deep jab between her shoulder blades nearly made her laugh. Apparently Cat didn’t like being loaned out on the spot. She lifted her head again, but Tom was gone. She glanced back at Cat who slid a glance from the empty doorway to her.
“Looks like he doesn’t like another man’s hands on you.”
Winnie frowned, shaking her head. “Tom doesn’t think of me like that.”
Cat shrugged, pushed her face back into the hole, and continued doing what he did. “As long as it doesn’t impede my investigation.”
Winnie exhaled, surprised to find she was enjoying the sensation of warm hands kneading her shoulder-blades and sliding with deep pressure across her back and down her sides.
“Your shoulder muscles are starting to loosen up. You are way too tight, lady.”
Winnie hummed her agreement, deciding not to remind him Tom had left the room and his ministrations were only for show. Nor did she mind that his hands were going lower down her back as visions of Tom’s hands touching her, molding her, replaced Cat’s.
“I think that is far enough.”
Winnie lifted her head, pushed up from the table slightly with her elbows, still lost in the vision of Tom touching her, only to find him scowling at them both. Cat’s hands had stilled at the base of her spine.
“What?” she asked dreamily, emerging from the fantasy of a gentle, sexy Tom to the stern, yet still sexy, Tom standing before her.
“You are naked!”
Startled, Winnie glanced down to see that she was exposing her breasts to Tom. She dropped back down as he turned on his heels and left the room again. She turned to Cat. “What was that about?”
Cat grinned, pinning her with a knowing look. “He likes you. And he doesn’t like me touching you. Is there something between you two Polly needs to know about?”
Winnie’s mouth dropped open. She struggled to pull the sheet back around her as she pulled herself into a sitting position. “No.” She glanced back at the door then to Cat. “What has Polly told you about me?”
“Pretty much everything since I’m the one looking into it for you. It goes no further unless I find something that needs to be handled.”
Winnie nodded. She was embarrassed but understood he’d need to know what he was looking for. She just wished it could all be over and done so she could move on with her life. Amazingly, she thought, confused by her reaction to Tom’s reactions, a life that might just involve a man. But only a very special man who was willing to earn her trust.
“Do you really think he thinks of me like that?”
Cat started putting his oils and towels in their case. “Yeah. I think he does. How long have you known him?”
Winnie felt herself smile at the thought that someone as gorgeous and nice as Tom might actually have an interest, beyond the farm, in her, and was surprised to find it didn’t seem as frightening as she’d expected. “Not too long. He’s here to decide if he wants to purchase the farm and he’s helping me out in the meantime. Why?”
Cat finished packing his supplies. “There is something about him…” He shook his head. “I don’t know. Never mind. I’m always suspicious of people I don’t know.” He grinned, obviously amused with himself. “It comes from working with the criminal element for too long.”
Winnie gave it a moment’s thought before speaking. “I don’t think you have to worry about him. Tom is a nice man. Decent.”
Cat stared at her for a moment before helping her down from the table he then folded in half. “Give me a call on my cell phone when he’s leaving for at least an hour over the coming week. I’ll come back and set things up again since we’ve now established who I am to you. That should give me enough time to drive over the farm and look around.”
Winnie nodded. “Okay.” She bit her bottom lip. “Since that really felt good, do you think you could actually work me in for a real message sometime?”
Cat laughed. “Sure. I’m in the middle of opening up a Spa in town. But I’ll work you in next time I come out. That way your Tom won’t suspect a thing.”
Winnie couldn’t stop the grin from blooming. Her Tom. What a novel concept.
Chapter Twenty-One
What the hell am I doing?!
Tom paced his room, furious–and furious that he was furious. He had no right to care that some hunky kid had his hands on Winnie’s naked body. No right at all. So what was the problem?
Sure, he could convince himself that it was concern that someone as innocent as she seemed to be didn’t know what young men had on their minds when their oil-slickened hands were all over a beautiful woman. Or he could pretend that another man in the house might have something to do with the investigation he was conducting. But the truth was that he was pissed off because jealousy had reared its head when he had absolutely no right to be jealous.
If anything, he should be glad that she was otherwise occupied. That way he could resume his investigation. He could try to forget that every second of every day was starting to be filled with a non-professional curiosity about a woman who should be nothing more to him than a “Person of Interest” to his boss, the Federal Government of the United States of America.
Damn! He liked her. Not just liked her, but liked her a lot. She was cute and funny, and made him remember what it was like to be young, though she was less than a decade younger than his own thirty-five years. She had a love of life and carefree nature that he’d forgotten existed. And he just couldn’t believe it was all an act.
At the sound of a vehicle starting, Tom strode to the bedroom’s window to look out, satisfied to see that the truck the hunky kid drove was headed down the driveway. Okay, he’d have to stop it. So Winnie had wanted a massage. No big deal. The women he knew got them all the time. And had their nails recreated with acrylic, had their hair length extended with other people’s hair, and got every imaginable inch of their bodies waxed.
H
e exhaled, frustrated with himself and irritated with her. As he turned to resume his pacing, a board squeaked loudly beneath his foot. Tom shifted his weight a couple of times before he squatted down and picked at it, then crossed the room to the case of tools he’d brought. Returning to the spot, he squatted again while he wedged the screwdriver between the boards, tapped it with a rubber mallet, and popped the board loose. Something flashed at him when the board flew up then fell back down, and adrenaline that he’d finally found something made his hands shake as he pulled the board back up.
He froze, unable to move, to breathe. A scattered mess of pictures, some old, some newer, laid face up. Winnie’s was among them. Several of her… naked, crying, bruised, and bloody, in various sexually explicit positions with a much older Jack Butler behind her. His hands held her in those positions–arms up as if she were a puppet on a string, her legs apart exposing her completely to the lens of the camera, pulling her head back, one hand at her throat while the other fingered her below.
He dropped the board and collapsed to his butt. He could do nothing more than stare at them as his mind absorbed what horror Winnie must have suffered at the pervert’s hands. He finally forced himself to gather the lot from their hiding place, and flip through them one after another until he’d viewed them all.
Tom had seen and experienced a lot in his time on the force, but not even getting shot just above his heart had affected him as much as what he was staring at. Winnie hadn’t been Jack Butler’s only victim. The poor, much older woman who’d married him before Winnie must had thought she’d landed in Hell once she’d realized what she’d married. Her torn and sagging naked body, bruised and bloodied eyes, nose, and lips, as she hung from the posts of the same bed as Winnie had, said it all. And wife number one was there as well, though the posts she hung from were from a different bed entirely. She was young. So young. The fear in her blackened eyes, even now, after all these years beyond her death, filled the room around him.
The bloody bastard had been cruel, sick, a maniac, but he hadn’t had any imagination. All the women foolish enough to marry him had suffered the same horrible fate. Only Winnie had survived. Somehow without having completely lost her mind.
Tom clumsily repaired the floorboard, wondering if he should just tear all the other ones out instead. He needed to get on the phone. People needed to be contacted. Bodies need to be exhumed. And he needed to pull himself together.
He forced himself to his feet, the photos clutched tightly in his hand. He knew he couldn’t confront Winnie about the photos until he got himself under control.
No wonder she had burnt all the upstairs furniture. No wonder she was giddily happy the man was dead. Knowing now what she’d suffered, he had no doubt but that she’d been a pawn in Jack Butler’s sick clutches, and had nothing to do with the charges he’d come to investigate.
He had to wonder, though, if she’d had anything to do with the monster’s untimely, unexplained death. In her place, he’d have cut off Jack Butler’s balls, stuffed them in his mouth, and watched him bleed to death.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“We’ve been invited to a formal dance at the Lodge in honor of Legend’s Founder’s Day.”
Standing next to Lilly, who was holding her infant daughter close, and Suzie, who bounced her toddler son up and down as he pulled on her large chunky jewelry, Winnie smiled up at Tom as he descended the stairs. She was tickled that he actually seemed upset that another man had touched her, even if that touch was as innocent as a massage.
She didn’t know what to think about her thoughts where he was concerned, but hoped they meant she had survived Jack Butler’s cruelty without everlasting effects. She’d been doing a lot of soul searching, and decided to give romance one more try. If Tom was actually even interested.
“What?”
Winnie bit her bottom lip, hoping her amusement didn’t show. Tom was really upset. He seemed at a loss. Was even being rude. “Tom, you remember Lilly Hood and Suzie Matthews,” she prompted.
Tom blinked, as if coming out of a trance. “Uh, yeah… Hi, ladies.”
A little exasperated, Winnie laughed and turned to the two women. “Please come on in. I have fresh squeezed lemonade and mint if you’d like.”
“Oh, I wish we could, but we have tons of people to visit. Brad said to just send out invitations, but the time is so short with Founders Day only a month away. This is all so last minute since we didn’t know if the ballroom renovations would be completed in time to even attempt this. Of course it will be in the paper, but we wanted to personally invite our closest friends,” Suzie said, and Lilly nodded in agreement.
Winnie was afraid she was going to cry. That these women would include her in their special circle made her feel richer than all Jack’s hidden money ever could. She leaned forward and gave each a hug, afraid her heart was in her shaking voice. “We’ll be there. Thank you so much.” She turned to Tom, hoping he’d agree, but he had disappeared.
Frowning, she turned back to her guests. “Promise you will both come by for dinner sometime. I know I can’t cook like you,” she said, smiling at Suzie, “but who can? I do happen to make a pretty mean pizza.”
Suzie laughed. “I just bet you do. Call me. We’ll make it a date.”
Lilly nodded. “Me too. I missed that class.”
Satisfied, she watched as her two new friends departed, happier that she’d ever been in her life.
“I need to talk to you.”
Lilly turned back, her smile still in place, until she noticed the pallor of Tom’s skin. She moved to him. “Are you all right?”
Indecision seemed to have a hold on him, so she waited in silence. Until she just couldn’t stand the silence any longer. “Tom?”
“In the parlor,” Tom said, turning and leaving her where she stood.
Winnie swallowed, a sick feeling of foreboding knotted her stomach. She followed more slowly, entering the parlor only to find Tom with his back against the fireplace, his feet braced apart, and his face as stern as she’d ever seen it.
“Please sit down.”
Winnie shook her head. The days of a man dictating to her were over, and after all she had endured, she knew she could face anything he had to throw at her on her feet. “What’s on your mind, Tom?”
“I would like you to sign papers to have your hus… Jack Butler’s body exhumed.”
Of all the possible things he could have said to her, that would have never occurred to her. “What?”
“There was never an autopsy.”
Winnie knew she paled before his eyes. She felt nauseated and dizzy. “Who are you?”
Tom approached her, but she held up her hand to stop him. She struggled to make it to a chair and sit, lowering her head between her knees. Finally the dizziness passed and she leaned back into the cushion, allowing it to support her. “Who are you?” she repeated.
Tom sat down opposite her. “I am Tom Green. Agent Tom Green of the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. We didn’t know this thing was going to get so deep I’d need an alias. I came here to investigate your husband, and once he was dead, you.”
Winnie couldn’t help the quick intake of breath or the sense of betrayal. She blinked away tears that wanted to form. She stared right back at him, hurt, and angry. “Why would you investigate me? What could I have possibly done to anyone?”
Tom had the grace to look embarrassed. “Nothing, I don’t think. Now.”
Winnie felt fury building in the tightening of her chest. “Now? Now? What are you talking about? I married a monster! A sick, son-of-a-bitch monster! How dare you walk in here and do this to me!” She jumped to her feet and turned on him.
“I survived, you asshole! You have no idea what I survived, but I did. And I was starting to be happy! Do you have any idea how incredibly hard that is once you have been to hell and back with someone? Do you?
“No, of course you don’t, because you are a man. A stinking man. You are
all a bunch of lying, cheating, sadistic sons-of-bitches! And no! Damn it! I don’t usually talk like this! Get the hell out of my house!”
Winnie ran from the room, up the stairs, and slammed herself into her room.
Her chest hurt as she fought for breath. Her throat hurt from holding back tears. Her head hurt because, as usual, she’d been played for a fool. Only this time she thought, just maybe, her heart hurt most of all.
She’d dared to dream…
Chapter Twenty-Three
Tom knew he was blundering by involving Winnie in the investigation. He could have easily had Butler’s body exhumed without alerting her, but he’d needed to see for himself what her reaction would be. He’d had to know if she needed protection from possible prosecution should it turn out she had indeed killed the man.
If she had, he couldn’t blame her, but the court system would. No matter the man’s crimes, she would have been labeled a criminal as well. Though he seriously doubted there was a jury in the country that would convict her. What had happened to her and those other women would be exposed though, and he felt he knew Winnie well enough to know she would feel victimized all over again with a jury of her peers looking at her brutally used, exposed body.
He just couldn’t do that to her.
Taking a deep breath, he climbed the stairs and stopped outside her room. Three gentle knocks on the door were met with silence. “Winnie?”
Silence.
“Winnie. I know what happened to you. I would never do anything to hurt you. Please. Let me talk to you.”
Several seconds went by before he saw her knob slowly turning. Incredibly sad, wet eyes stared up at him. “What do you know?”
Tom started to pull the photos from his pocket, then stopped himself. He wasn’t sure she would be able to stand seeing them. “I found evidence of Butler’s cruelty.” She struggled to maintain eye contact, and he felt incredible pride for her.
“You found the pictures?”