by Elle Kennedy
“What happened?” he demanded.
She pulled back and met his eyes. “Someone broke in,” she answered in a tortured voice.
“Did you call the police?”
“No, I called you.”
Bewilderment skated through him. “We need to call the cops. Now.” He let go of her abruptly. “The intruder might still be in the—”
“There’s nobody here,” she interrupted. “I already checked.”
“You checked?” he echoed. “Jesus, Amelia, you should’ve run outside the second you saw the shape your door was in!”
The adrenaline in his blood spiked, mingling with the anger pulsing in his veins. The foolish woman had come home to find her doorknob smashed in and she’d stepped inside to investigate?
“Was anything stolen?” he asked, looking around the room.
An indecipherable expression flitted across her pretty face. “I don’t think so.”
Sucking in a breath, he tried to calm the frantic beating of his heart and fumbled in his coat pocket for his cell phone. “I’m calling the cops.”
“No.”
Her fearful interjection caught him off guard. “What do you mean no? Someone broke into your apartment, sweetheart. We need to report the break-in.”
“No.”
Derek resisted the urge to rip his hair out. What was wrong with her? Why was she—
He froze, noticing the wild look in her hazel eyes. The way her entire body trembled like a leaf being blown around by a gust of wind. The tears streaming down her cheeks.
And then she started babbling.
“I can’t call the police, Derek. I can’t. I’ll have to fill out a report and then there’ll be an official record and then Fe—whoever broke in will know for sure that I’m—” Her breath came out in rapid pants. “I fixed the door today! I thought it would be enough and then I realized it wasn’t enough and I…I…”
As she trailed off, her body went still, her expression taking on a blank stare.
Fingers of uneasiness clawed up Derek’s spine. Oh, Christ. Her hysteria, the odd behavior, the crazy talk. Her constant nervousness and secretive nature. He’d seen and heard it all before, and he couldn’t believe he hadn’t recognized the signs after spending ten years with a woman who suffered from a mental illness.
As he looked into Amelia’s expressionless eyes, he suddenly remembered all the “false alarms” Tess had put him through—calling him in a panic and claiming it was an emergency, and then when he rushed home, he’d find her sitting on the couch with that same deadened look Amelia wore now.
Softening his tone, Derek planted both hands on Amelia’s delicate shoulders and fixed her with a gentle look. “Maybe I should take you to the hospital.”
* * *
Chloe’s head jerked up. “What?” she said in shock.
“It’s clear that you’re shaken up,” Derek went on in a voice reserved for small children and skittish animals. “And I think it might be helpful to get checked out, maybe talk to a medical profess—”
“A shrink?” she interrupted, snapping out of the fear-induced trance she’d gone into when she’d come home from the bank and discovered yet another break-in. “I don’t need to see a shrink, Derek.”
But he clearly thought she did, and Chloe realized she couldn’t blame him for thinking her unstable. She’d been acting like a crazy person from the second he’d walked through the door. Of course he’d think she was nuts.
She dragged both hands through her hair, battling a rush of frustration, fighting the ripples of fear that continued to plague her body.
She had no doubt that Felix had been responsible for the break-in. Thankfully, she’d been out when he’d decided to pay her another visit. After quitting her job, she’d spent the day running errands. She’d purchased the supplies she needed to sustain her on the road. Emptied her bank account in town. Called her contact so he could get the ball rolling on a new identity. She’d planned on hitting the road tonight, but when she returned home and found Felix’s present, she’d panicked, plain and simple.
And her first instinct had been to call Derek.
“I am shaken up,” she relented, exhaling a calming breath. “But only because my apartment was just broken into. I’m scared and I freaked out, but I assure you, I’m not having some sort of breakdown right now.”
He still looked dubious. “Then why not call the police?”
“Because…” She scanned her brain for a logical excuse. “Because I know who broke in.”
His dark eyebrows rose. “You do?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Chloe hesitated. Somehow, in the past three weeks, she’d come to trust Derek Colton. She’d known without a shred of doubt that he would come to her aid when she called, and he hadn’t proved her wrong. But the way he was looking at her now, with those troubled brown eyes, told her that he was far too intelligent, far too perceptive, to buy any lies she sold him.
So tell him the truth.
Fear trickled through her. The truth? No. She couldn’t.
“Okay,” Derek said after her silence dragged on too long. “I think it’s time to get the police involved.”
Her pulse raced. “No. Please. I don’t want to do that.”
“Why the hell not? Damn it, Amelia, tell me what’s going on.”
The lethal edge in his voice made her flinch. She’d never seen Derek look so angry, and she instinctively backed away from him, an irrational part of her expecting him to strike her.
He must have seen the fear in her eyes because shock flooded his handsome face. “Don’t look at me like that,” he said in a firm voice. “I am not going to hurt you, sweetheart. I’m trying to help, damn it.”
Wow. Two damns in less than a minute. Derek hardly ever cursed. He must really be upset with her.
Tell him the truth, the little voice repeated.
Biting on her lower lip, Chloe stared into his frustrated eyes, wanting so badly to trust him. But how could she? How was she supposed to admit that she’d been lying to him from the moment they’d met?
“I can’t do this,” Derek mumbled, edging away from her. “I’m leaving, Amelia. I’ll call the police and wait downstairs until they show up.”
She watched in dismay as he headed for the doorway. “Derek—”
He kept walking.
“It was my husband!” she burst out.
That broad back stiffened.
Very slowly, he turned around and sought out her eyes. The surprise etched into his features was unmistakable. “What?”
“My husband,” she said in a dull voice. “That’s who broke in.”
He shook his head repeatedly, as if trying to make sense of that. “Your husband.”
She nodded, her shoulders sagging with defeat. “Yes.”
“You’re married.”
“Yes. Well, kind of.”
“Kind of?” A humorless laugh popped out of his mouth. “What the hell does that mean?”
“It means that it’s a very long story,” she answered, releasing a heavy sigh. “One that probably needs to be told over a drink. Or ten.” She took a step toward the kitchen. “Have a seat. I’ll get the whiskey.”
Chloe hurried out of the room before he could object, but she knew he wouldn’t go anywhere. The bomb she’d dropped in his lap was too big to ignore.
She found a bottle of Maker’s Mark in the cupboard over the sink, grabbed two plastic cups then stood in the middle of the small kitchen, breathing deeply. Could she really do this? Confide in Derek? Tell him all the pathetic, sordid details of her miserable life?
And once she did, what could Derek really do? Help her disappear? Get rid of Felix for her? That was unlikely on both counts.
&nbs
p; Yet even though she knew spilling her guts to Derek wouldn’t achieve a damn thing—except provoke his pity, perhaps—she felt compelled to tell him the truth. She might be leaving town, but Derek deserved to know the truth before she left. He’d been unbelievably kind to her these past three weeks and she couldn’t in good conscience disappear from his life without at least telling him why she was doing it.
* * *
Derek’s mind continued to reel as he waited for Amelia to return. Amelia was married?
Kind of, he amended, whatever the hell that meant. And why had this “kind of” husband broken into her apartment?
The situation had trouble written all over it, yet he couldn’t bring himself to leave. After weeks of trying to solve the puzzle that was Amelia Phillips, she was giving him the answers he craved, willingly providing him with the puzzle pieces he’d been unable to fit together.
As Amelia strode back into the living room, he instantly noticed the change in her demeanor—eyes devoid of tears, shoulders straight, head high. She looked as if she were walking into battle, armed with a bottle of whiskey, two cups and—was that a wedding dress?
His gaze snagged on the poofy white garment tucked under her left arm. “What’s that?”
With a resigned expression, she set the bottle and cups on the coffee table, then held up the dress for him to see. He recoiled when she turned the dress to give him a frontal view. Why the hell were the bodice and full skirt stained red? Not bright crimson, but a dark reddish-brown that resembled…blood.
She stepped closer, and his nostrils flared as a metallic scent wafted in his direction.
Derek’s gaze flew to hers. “Why is that dress covered with blood, Amelia?”
She gulped. “It was like this when I found it.”
“You found it,” he repeated.
“Hanging in the closet. And before you ask, I didn’t hang it there.” Her fingers trembled, causing the lacy material to crinkle. “I left this dress behind when I escaped six months ago.”
Escaped. Her choice of word didn’t go unnoticed. Wariness circled his stomach, deepening when he glimpsed the weary look in Amelia’s eyes.
“But now the dress is here, in my apartment, stained with blood.” She placed the dress on the armchair opposite the couch. “I doubt it’s human blood. Or if it is, it probably came from a blood bank and not some innocent person Felix murdered in order to send his sick message.”
“Felix.” Derek frowned. “That’s your husband?”
Nodding, she joined him on the sofa and leaned forward to untwist the cap of the whiskey bottle. She splashed the amber-colored liquid into each glass, then handed him one.
Derek brought the cup to his lips and took a small sip. He was on call, but one drink wouldn’t hurt. The whiskey burned a fiery path down to his gut, soothing his addled brain.
Next to him, Amelia threw her head back and downed the whiskey. She made a face, then poured herself another glass. She sucked that back, too, before turning to face him. “My name isn’t Amelia Phillips, Derek.”
He blinked in surprise.
“It’s Chloe Moreno,” she confessed, a note of sorrow in her voice. “Six months ago I faked my own suicide.”
His mouth fell open.
“It sounds crazy, but it’s true.” A desperate laugh flew out of her mouth. “I crashed our plane into the ocean.” Another burst of laughter. “Everyone I know thinks my body is at the bottom of the Pacific. They even threw me a memorial service and everything.”
It took a moment for Derek’s brain to start functioning again. He stared at Amelia—no, Chloe. He stared at Chloe in sheer disbelief. “You faked your death. Why?”
“Because if I didn’t, my husband would have killed me,” she said simply.
He kept staring, unable to decide whether he should believe her. Her story was…unbelievable. Absurd. Yet her face was dead serious, which either made her a phenomenal actress, or this tale of hers was absurd enough to be true.
“Felix is a dangerous man,” Chloe whispered. “He’s a sick man. Controlling, ruthless, violent.”
Derek slugged back the rest of his whiskey. “Jesus, Amel—Chloe, please don’t tell me you’re some gangster’s moll.”
“Try a plastic surgeon’s trophy wife,” she replied wryly.
He faltered. “No way.”
“It’s true. I married Felix when I was twenty-nine. Back then I thought he truly loved me, but it turned out all he loved was the idea of me. A pretty, wealthy socialite he could mold and manipulate. The perfect little Stepford Wife for his perfect little life. He kept up a good act for the first few years of our marriage, but after that…well, he stopped trying to hide who he was.”
“And who was he?” Derek asked roughly.
“A maniac.” Her pulse jumped in her throat. “And again, before you ask, there were a lot of reasons why I didn’t leave him.”
He hadn’t been going to ask, but he didn’t correct her. The second Amelia—Chloe—had uttered the word violent in her description of her husband, Derek had finally understood the reason behind the shadows that haunted her hazel eyes. The reason for her skittishness, her secretive nature, the way she shied away from unsolicited physical contact.
This woman had been abused. Repeatedly. And for years. It all made sense now, and as a physician, Derek knew better than to ask why Chloe hadn’t left her husband long before now. Abusive spouses had ways of maintaining their power and control over their victims. They used guilt, fear, shame, threats—anything they could to wear down their spouse and trap them in a situation that eventually seems impossible to escape.
“At first I blamed myself for Felix’s actions,” Chloe admitted, resting her glass on her knee and fingering the rim. “I don’t want to get into it, but we were going through a lot of issues, and as messed up as this sounds, I thought I deserved what was happening to me. I felt like I’d let him down in so many ways, and when he told me I was a failure, that I was defective, I believed him.”
Derek’s heart clenched. Despite himself, he set his glass on the table and reached for her hand. Her skin was cold, clammy, and he rubbed her knuckles, trying to warm her.
“That’s not uncommon,” he said gently. “There’s an astounding number of reasons why people remain in abusive situations. Often times the abused partner will rationalize the abuser’s actions, tell themselves that it’s their fault for upsetting their spouse.”
“I was an emotional basket case,” she confessed, sounding ashamed. “At the beginning Felix preferred verbal abuse to physical, but then one day he got angry about something and hit me. A backhand to the face. I was stunned, but I—” Her face collapsed. “I made excuses for it. Once the violence became more regular, I realized I couldn’t let it keep happening. I was already suffering from depression thanks to—” She halted “—to those issues I don’t want to get into. I started seeing a therapist and she made me see that the beatings weren’t my fault and that I didn’t deserve a single second of what was happening. Not long after, I found the courage to tell Felix that our marriage was over.”
Derek held his breath, knowing the story wouldn’t end there.
“He freaked out. A divorce would have ruined his perfect image, but I think it was more than that—he loved having power over me, having a little toy he could play with and toss around whenever he felt like it. He told me that he owned me and that he would never let me go. When I told him I’d file for divorce, anyway, he beat me so badly I could barely move for days—and then he threatened to kill my father.”
The breath came out in a sharp puff. “What?”
“I was telling the truth about my dad’s illness,” Chloe said, shooting him an imploring look. “He does live in a facility in St. Louis, he does suffer from dementia and he’s the only family I have.”
“Why d
idn’t you tell the police about the threat?”
“I did,” she said flatly. “I went to the station and filed a report. When the detective I spoke to brought Felix in, my husband did what he does best—manipulated the situation. When I tried to show them the bruises from the beating, he pulled out a bogus medical report saying I fell down the stairs and a signed statement from our housekeeper backing up the story. Then he gave the cops this whole speech about how mentally unbalanced I was. He had documents from my psychiatrist to back it up, showed them my antidepressant medication, pretty much made me look like a crazy person. Then he dragged me home and threatened to kill me if I ever tried something like that again.”
“What did you do?”
She let out a heavy breath. “I went home with him and tried to figure out my next move. First thing, I took my dad out of the Malibu facility he was in and moved him to a home in
St. Louis, which was where we lived before my parents moved us to Beverly Hills when I was five. I specifically arranged it so that I was his only approved visitor and the only one able to make decisions about his care.”
Bitterness dripped from her voice. “And Felix, of course, proved that no matter what I did, he’d be able to get to my dad. His first week at the new facility, Felix paid my father a visit, showed the staff a forged letter from me granting him access to his father-in-law, and what do you know, Dad had an ‘accident’ while walking with Felix on the grounds. He broke his leg and was bedridden for two months.”
Derek squeezed her hand tighter. His heart ached for her, and he knew from the tortured look in her eyes and raw pain in her voice that every word she spoke was the truth.
“So I resigned myself to my fate.” She sighed. “I continued my charity work, tried to stay out of Felix’s way, played the part of the perfect wife when we were in public together. He stopped beating me, but he was just as vicious verbally and just as controlling. And then…”