Nic moaned.
Griff kissed her hand.
Her eyelids flickered.
He leaned down and kissed her forehead.
She opened her eyes.
“Hello, beautiful.”
“Griff ?”
“Yeah, honey, it’s me.”
“What happened?”
Griff swallowed. “Don’t worry about anything. Just rest. We have time later to—”
“My baby!” She clutched Griff’s arm and struggled to lift herself into a sitting position. “Where’s my baby?”
“Nic, calm down.” Griff grasped her shoulders gently and eased her down onto her back.
Her eyes wide with fear, she asked, “Is our baby dead?”
Tears pooled in Griff’s eyes. “No, he’s not dead. By some miracle our son survived. The doctors performed a C-section. He’s tiny. Not quite three pounds.”
“It’s a boy?” Nic smiled. “We have a son?”
“We do.”
“Where is he? I want to see him.”
“He’s not here,” Griff said. How could he tell Nic that the doctors gave their child less than a fifty/fifty chance of survival? “He needs special care and we’re making sure he gets it. He was transported in an incubator to one of the top-ranked pediatric hospitals for neonatology in the country.”
“Where?”
“Palo Alto,” Griff told her. “The Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford.”
“You should have gone with him.”
“A specially trained doctor, nurse, and respiratory therapist went with him. And you and I will go to Palo Alto together just as soon as you’re well enough.”
“But he’s all alone. I want you to go—”
“I’m not leaving here without you. Besides, he’s not alone.” Griff debated whether or not he should tell Nic that Yvette had gone with their son. He had no idea if Yvette’s empathic abilities would work on a newborn infant, but if there was any chance ... He decided that telling Nic could wait. “He won’t be alone once Maleah and Derek and Barbara Jean get there. They left Knoxville a few hours ago and are going straight to Palo Alto.”
“How soon can I get out of here?” Nic asked.
“If you behave yourself and follow doctor’s orders, maybe a week. But when you leave here, you’ll have a nurse with you around the clock. Understood?”
“I don’t care if you hire a staff of doctors and nurses to watch over me twenty-four-seven, as long as I can be with our son.” She lifted her hand to Griff’s unshaven cheek. “Tell me about him. Everything. Did you count his fingers and toes? Are his lungs developed? What are the odds that we might still lose him?”
“He’s got all the essential parts. Arms, legs, fingers, toes, eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. And screw the odds. Our boy’s a fighter, tough as they come. He’s going to make it. Look what he survived before he was even born.”
Rafe Byrne watched Yvette through the nursery window of the neonatal unit at the Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital. Griff and Nic’s infant son rested in an incubator, a large Plexiglas box with a mattress inside. The baby was tiny, helpless, born too soon, and struggling for life. Yvette stood guard over the child, apparently having been given special permission to visit him in the unit.
Rafe wasn’t sure why he was here. When he’d left the Big Valley Hunting Lodge, well in advance of the local law enforcement’s invasion, he had intended to return to Europe, either London or Paris. But instead, he had booked a flight to Palo Alto and come by taxi to the hospital. He had wanted to see Yvette, to say a final farewell.
But now that he was here ...
What was she thinking as she looked so lovingly at Griffin Powell’s son? Was she thinking about her own child, the one Malcolm York had stolen from her? Was she wondering if she had a son, a boy almost seventeen, out there somewhere in the world? Was she thinking that perhaps this little boy wasn’t Griff’s only son?
Rafe knew, had always known, that Yvette wanted Griff to be her child’s father. But what if he wasn’t? What if ... ?
During the months of Yvette’s pregnancy, Rafe had hoped the child was his, the living, breathing proof of their love. God, he’d been such a fool. Yvette had never loved him.
But that fact did not change the possibility that he could have fathered the child she had given birth to on Amara.
For the past sixteen years, Rafe’s goal, his singular reason for living, had been to kill York’s closest friends and business associates, the men who had visited Amara frequently and enjoyed the entertainment their host provided. Now they were all dead—Tanaka, Di Santis, Klausner, Sternberg, Mayorga, Yves Bouchard, and Harlan Benecroft. And Griff had, for the second time in his life, killed a monster named Malcolm York.
Rafe had thought that once he had exacted his revenge and they were all dead, he would feel something. If not joy, at least satisfaction or perhaps relief that the job was done. But oddly enough, he felt nothing. He was empty inside, void of human emotion.
That’s not true. You still feel something for Yvette. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.
He didn’t love her. He was no longer capable of love. But seeing her again had stirred up old memories, memories he had believed long forgotten. A naïve young man’s passionate love. His foolish hope that a child born of that love existed.
Was it possible that Yvette’s child was still alive, that York hadn’t killed the infant? If so, what had he done with the baby? Where was Yvette’s son or daughter? And was he her child’s father?
Rafe took one last look at Yvette and said a silent good-bye before walking away without speaking to her.
Jonas Sanders Powell weighed four pounds and six ounces. His parents had named him after Damar Sanders, the man who had saved Griff’s life on Amara, and Jonas MacColl, the man who had died to save Nic and her baby. At two months, his perfect little head was covered with dark hair and when Nic held him in her arms, he looked up at her with beautiful blue-gray eyes, identical to his father’s.
Griff and Nic haunted the neonatal unit at the hospital, spending as much time with their son as the staff allowed. They spent their nights together in a suite at the Stanford Park Hotel in Menlo Park, the Peninsula’s only five-star Diamond hotel. Griffin Powell went first-class, no matter what the circumstances. He had showered Nic with love and attention, and kept a nurse on duty around the clock the first month after her surgery.
A homecoming was planned for the day after Joe Powell weighed in at a hefty five pounds. It would be a return to Griffin’s Rest for his parents and a royal welcome party for the young prince.
Unable to choose from a list of three godmother candidates, Nic had asked Aunt Maleah, Aunt Barbara Jean, and Aunt Yvette to share the honor. Uncle Damar and Uncle Derek shared godfather duties with Nic’s brother, Uncle Charles David.
Alone in their suite each evening, Nic wrapped in Griff’s arms, the two of them more in love than ever, they had talked about the months they were apart, and about Griff’s past on Amara, his relationship with Yvette, her experiences being held by York, and her relationship with Jonas. When, once again, Griff had taken all the blame for Nic’s kidnapping, she, once again, had reminded him that she had played a part in what had happened.
“I shouldn’t have left you. I should have stayed at Griffin’s Rest and worked things out with you. I should have tried to understand about Yvette. I do now.”
“Because of Jonas MacColl?”
“Yes, because of Jonas. I wasn’t in love with Jonas, just as you weren’t in love with Yvette, but I cared about him, and if he had lived...”
“He would have been your friend and you would have wanted him to be a part of your life.”
“Yes.”
“We’re going to have a good life from here on out, you and me and Joe.”
“And maybe before I get too old, we might give Joe a baby sister.”
“If that’s what you want, then I’ll do my best to accommodate you, Mrs. Powell.”
“You bet.”
“No more secrets,” Nic had said. “Promise?”
“I promise. And no more lies or even half-truths.”
“Agreed. But in the future, if I ever ask you whether or not a certain pair of jeans makes me look fat, remember that the only acceptable answer is no, even if it is a lie.”
Laughing, thankful for his many blessings, Griff had pulled his wife into his arms. “Nic, darling, I don’t care if you get so fat you have to wear a tow sack. I’ll still think you’re beautiful.”
“Good answer, Mr. Powell, very good answer.”
Nic and Griff brought Joe home on New Year’s Day. Every room in the house at Griffin’s Rest remained decked out for Christmas, even the nursery that Nic had overseen long distance, with Maleah and Barbara Jean handling the day-to-day details with the interior designer. Countless presents, most with Joe’s name on them, were piled beneath a twelve-foot spruce by the fireplace in the living room.
The house was filled with family and friends, everyone there to celebrate a belated Christmas, Joe’s homecoming, and the renewal of Nic and Griff’s marriage.
Maleah and Derek had set a wedding date in April.
“Nothing elaborate. That’s not my style. But I do want you to be my matron of honor,” Maleah had told Nic.
Sanders and Barbara Jean were working on resolving their problems, but they had decided to sleep apart until they were certain of their future together.
“I don’t expect him to ever forget Elora or to stop loving her, but I deserve more than he’s given me,” Barbara Jean had said.
Nic wasn’t sure how things would work out for them, but she believed that Sanders was much too smart to risk losing the best thing that had ever happened to him.
Upon their arrival, Yvette had met Nic with a smile, the two women having set aside past difference. And later Yvette had admitted how much she envied Nic.
“You have everything. A wonderful husband who loves you and a beautiful child you will bring up together.”
Without hesitation, Nic took Yvette’s hand. She didn’t care if the woman read her mind, sensed her feelings, or absorbed some of her happiness. “You are a beautiful woman and an exceptional human being. You deserve to be happy, to find love, to share your life with someone. That’s my wish for you.”
“You are very kind, Nicole, but I do not believe it is meant to be.”
“Never say never.”
Later that evening, as Nic stood over her son’s crib, Griff came up behind her and wrapped her in his arms. They stayed there in the nursery for a long time, simply watching their son breathe, his little chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm. They had come so close not only to losing each other, but the child who had been conceived in their love, the child they now thought of as their precious miracle.
The past lay behind them, the misery and unhappiness, the horror and torment. Neither would ever forget, but they would never again allow the past to overshadow the present, each having learned valuable lessons about understanding, forgiveness, acceptance, and the power of love.
CLOSE ENOUGH TO TOUCH . . .
He’s their secret admirer, wooing them with phone calls, love letters, and special gifts. From a distance, he admires them. Desires them. Despises them. And when he gets close enough, he kills them all.
CLOSE ENOUGH TO KISS . . .
Adams County, Alabama, is a small, friendly place where everyone knows each other—but not well enough, it seems, because Sheriff Bernie Granger has a serial killer on her hands, a total psycho who first romances, then stalks, kidnaps, and kills his victims. It’s Bernie’s first big case, a chance for her to prove herself to her new partner, Memphis police detective Jim Norton, but it won’t be easy. This killer is uncannily smart. It’s as if he knows what Bernie is thinking. And his next move is more than shocking—it’s chillingly personal.
. . . CLOSE ENOUGH TO KILL.
A terrifying game is underway. A desperate hunt has begun. Bernie is determined to stop a twisted serial killer at all costs. But is she getting nearer to catching him—or being drawn ever deeper into his deadly web?
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Chapter 1
Please, dear God, let him kill me.
Stephanie Preston lay on the narrow cot, listening to the rapid beat of her heart. Staring up at the ceiling in the small, dark room, she tried to pretend she was somewhere else. At home, with Kyle. Or at work, surrounded by people she knew and trusted. Perhaps at church, where she sang in the choir. Anywhere but here. With anyone but him.
As hard as she tried to mentally remove herself from the reality of this moment, from where she was and what was happening to her, she could not fully escape into her mind.
Try harder. Think about last Christmas. About how surprised you were when Kyle proposed, on bended knee, right there in front of your parents and your sisters.
Just as the image of her smiling parents flashed through her mind, the man on top of her rammed into her again, harder this time. With more fury. And his fingers dug into her hips as he forced her body upward to meet his savage thrust. As he accelerated the harshness and speed of his deep lunges, he voiced his need, as he did every time he raped her.
“Tell me.” He growled the words. “Say it. You know what I want to hear.”
No, I won’t. Not this time. I can’t. I can’t.
She lay beneath him, silent and unmoving, longing for death, knowing what was going to happen next.
He slowed, then stopped and lifted himself enough to gaze down into her face. She closed her eyes, not wanting to look at him. Not wanting to see the face of terror.
He grabbed her, clutching her chin between his index finger and thumb, pressing painfully into her cheeks. “Open your eyes, bitch. Open your eyes and look at me.”
Her eyelids flickered. Don’t obey him. Not this time. Be strong.
“Why are you being so stubborn?” he asked, a tone of genuine puzzlement in his voice. “You know that I can force you to do whatever I want. Why make it so hard on yourself? You know that, in the end, you’ll obey me.”
“Please . . .” She opened her eyes and looked at him through a mist of tears.
“Please, what?”
Tears pooled in her eyes despite her determination not to cry. He liked it when she cried. “Just finish it.”
“If you want me to finish with you, then tell me what I want to hear. Otherwise, I’ll punish you. I’ll make it last a long time.” Lowering his head to her breast, he opened his mouth and bared his teeth. Before she could respond, he clamped down on her nipple and bit.
She cried out in pain. He thrust into her several times. Harder each time.
When he moved his mouth to the other breast, she gasped, then cried out hurriedly, “I love you. I want you more than I’ve ever wanted anyone. Please, darling, make love to me.”
He smiled. God, how she hated his smile.
“That’s a good girl. Since you asked so nicely, I’ll give you what you want.”
She lay there beneath him and endured the rape, hating every moment, despising him and loathing herself for having given in to him yet again.
This can’t go on forever. Sooner or later, he’ll kill me.
I hope it’s soon. I hope it’s very soon.
He stood across the street, on the corner, and watched her get out of her car and walk up the sidewalk to her front porch. She was lovely. He would enjoy sketching her, but before he could begin, he would need to see her up close. When he created the pictures of her, he wanted to get every detail correct. The slant of her eyes. The curve of her nose. The fullness of her lips. Her neck was long and slender; her body nicely rounded, neither skinny nor fat. Just right.
The first thi
ng he would do was call her. Just to say hello. To make contact. He would be able to tell by the sound of her voice if she would be receptive to his overtures. He wouldn’t listen to what she said. Women so often lied—unless you forced them to tell the truth. But he could always tell when a woman was interested just by the way she spoke to him.
“Thomasina, Thomasina. Such a lovely name for a lovely lady.”
The thought of their courtship excited him. He reveled in the days leading up to the moment before a woman became his completely. It was the prelude to the mating dance that intensified the pleasure, those incredibly delicious events that prepared them for the inevitable.
However, he couldn’t begin pursuing Thomasina in earnest until he ended his current relationship. He’d been keeping tabs on her, learning everything he could about her—but from afar. He wasn’t the kind of man who would betray one woman with another. It wasn’t his style. It wouldn’t be easy ending things with his current lover. She was very much in love with him. He had been wild about her in the beginning, when she had posed a challenge to him, when she had led him on a merry chase. And the first time they’d made love had been good, although not all he had hoped it would be. He was certain that she knew their relationship was coming to an end, that they both needed to be free. And soon.
Perhaps tonight he’d tell her.
She would cry, of course. She cried a great deal. And she would beg him, plead with him, offer to do anything he wanted her to do.
Poor darling. It was simply going to kill her when he told her that their love affair was over.
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