A door slammed and Elise looked up to see Eric leave the house. Her breath caught in her throat.
“Eric, what are you doing out here?” Diane asked sharply. “Where’s Petra?”
“On the phone,” he said, standing stock-still, giving her a belligerent expression.
Her mother had told Elise that Diane had recently hired a nanny for Eric. This Petra, no doubt.
“Did Petra tell you that you could come outside?”
“No.”
Diane sighed and held out her hand in invitation. “Well, all right, come here for a moment.”
Eric came, though reluctantly.
“He’s shy with strangers,” Diane said. “Eric, I want you to meet our new neighbor, Mrs. Smith.”
Elise boldly stepped through the narrow break in the bushes—one she’d used in the past to visit Miss Henrietta—hunkered down to her son’s level and stared into his familiar blue eyes. “Hi, Eric, you can call me Nicole.”
Eric put his little hand in hers and smiled, and Elise’s heart melted. She had to hold herself back from taking him in her arms and covering him with kisses.
All in due time, she told herself. Soon!
Then Diane was circling the boy with her arms, scooping him away from Elise. “You know the rules about outside, sweetheart. You’re not to wander out here whenever you please. Someone needs to know where you are at all times. Petra should be with you. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Aunt Diane.”
“Then, go back in the house and tell Petra I wish to speak with her. I shall be in shortly.”
Watching him run back to the door, his short little legs pumping, Elise swallowed hard. She’d missed so much in the past three years.
“So he’s your nephew?” she asked conversationally.
“Until the adoption goes through.” Diane wore a haughty smile. “Then he’ll be my son.”
Elise wanted to shout at Diane, to tell her that she couldn’t adopt Eric, that he already had a mother…but Elise Mitchell was supposed to be dead. That didn’t make her hurt any less potent, didn’t make her arms feel any less empty.
Getting her anger under control, she tried to take comfort in the fact Eric had seemed pleased to meet her. That would make things easier when she came to get him. She had to find an opportunity to get even closer.
“Diane, perhaps you would be kind enough to give me some referrals, after all,” Elise said, turning her sister-in-law’s attention away from the child, who was pulling the back door shut behind him.
“As in?”
“I like to be involved with my community. Perhaps a charity of some sort…”
“As a matter of fact, I’m currently finalizing plans for a fund-raiser for Harbor from the Storm, a shelter for battered women and their children, which I founded over in the next town west of here.”
In the next town. Of course. From what she knew of Diane, the woman would never locate a shelter in North Bluff itself.
“Why that sounds like just the thing to get me started,” Elise said.
“Wonderful! This particular event is scheduled for next weekend. And my silent auction chair was called out of town on a family emergency.”
“Well, then, you can use my help.”
“I can. I’ve taken on her job as well as mine, and it’s too much. I need someone to do the running, to pick up the auction items and bring them back here.”
Perfect, Elise thought. “I’m fleet of foot,” she joked.
Diane smiled. “You’re heaven-sent. The chairwomen meet tomorrow afternoon. At my place, of course.” She made a sweeping arc with her arm to indicate the house. “If you have the time, that is.”
Her place? Mitchell House belonged to Eric, who’d inherited it at his father’s death.
As long as Eric was alive, a little voice whispered.
Forcing a smile to her lips, Elise murmured, “I’ll make the time.”
“Good. Come by at three tomorrow, then. No need for formalities. You can just cut through the yard and use the back door. It will take you right into the conservatory, where we’ll be meeting.”
“I shall look forward to it.”
Concentrating on what she had gained rather than on her resentment, Elise moved back to the Parkinson house and realized that Logan was standing in the window, his steady gaze on her. Immediately growing self-conscious, she slowed her step, but she couldn’t contain her satisfaction at her successes. She was no longer a stranger to her son. And she had a way into her old home. Not bad work for the first day.
Glancing back, she saw Diane halfway to the back door of Mitchell House, her rose-filled basket draped over one arm. Her sister-in-law was staring after her, her gaze as intent as Logan’s. Elise gave her a nervous wave and then her back, the best way of hiding any emotions she didn’t want the other woman to see.
When Logan opened the door for her, she smiled and threw her arms around him in excitement, an outward expression of her triumph.
Logan’s arms slid around her so fast she didn’t have time to react. His sleek silver gaze locked with hers and, for a moment, she forgot to breathe. Then he closed the gap between them, making her draw in a sharp breath even as his mouth covered hers.
At the first touch of his lips, she panicked, stiffening in his arms and clenching her jaw. But that didn’t stop him from using hands to coax her body to relax, from using his mouth to coax hers open slightly.
He suckled her lips, but he didn’t invade her. The kiss was seductively sweet…questioning, almost as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to go further…or he wasn’t sure that she did.
Heart thudding, blood rushing through her veins like liquid fire, Elise flattened her hands on his chest and pushed. Immediately he let her go.
Somehow finding her voice, she whispered, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Trying to convince the neighbors we’re newlyweds,” he murmured.
But when she glanced back once more, Diane was gone.
“I DON’T KNOW if I can do this,” Elise told Cass as she tried on a fitted suit in a jewel-tone blue that complemented her new hair color. “Pretend to be Logan’s wife.”
“Why not? What did he do now? If he’s harassing you, I’ll give him a piece of my mind. That suit is perfect on you, by the way.”
“You’ve said that about everything I’ve tried on.”
“Can I help it if you look great in everything?”
“Well, we can’t buy everything.” Elise turned and admired the more conservative her in the floor-length mirror. “But we will buy this one.”
Quickly, she slipped out of the suit and into a dress. The black sheath clung to her like a second skin and left her back exposed down to her waist, where crystals sparkled in a thick row. More crystals decorated the front neckline, which hugged her slender throat.
“Perfect for a night at the country club.”
“Or a fund-raiser.” Elise was already thinking ahead. “Okay, party dress, business suit, sports jacket with vest, two pairs of pants and a skirt, two blouses and a cotton pullover. That should do. I hope Gideon doesn’t choke on the bill.”
“Leave Gideon to me,” Cass murmured, waving over a saleswoman, handing her a credit card and indicating the clothes set to one side of the dressing room. “We’ll take all of these.”
It wasn’t until the saleswoman was rushing up to her counter, arms full, and Cass forced Elise to consider secondhand designer shoes that she went back to the thing that had been preying on her mind.
“Logan didn’t harass me, Cass. He kissed me. And I liked it.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh. These fit,” she said of a pair of black sling-backs trimmed in crystal, perfect for the cocktail dress.
But Cass wasn’t about to be distracted this time. “Well, that’s not a bad thing, right?”
“It’s very bad.” She slipped into plain nude nubuck pumps that she could wear with either the suit or the skirt and jacket. “Brian—”
<
br /> “Is dead, Elise,” Cass said softly. “He has been for three years.”
“Not in my mind.” Elise tried to make her friend understand. “I didn’t see him buried, you know, and I never had the heart to go to the cemetery when I was out on bail. So in my mind, I had a life with them— Brian and Eric. A fantasy, but a very real one. It’s what got me through those three years in lockup.”
“Which is understandable. And it would also be understandable that after three years of being truly alone, you might be attracted to another man,” Cass assured her. “Wanting a pair of comforting arms around you is nothing to feel guilty about.”
“So, then, why do I?” Elise traded the pumps for a pair of mahogany loafers.
“Because you haven’t properly said goodbye. Three years, Elise. That’s a long time to hang on to a ghost.”
“Maybe I’m not ready to go on.”
“Then, maybe you ought to figure out why.”
“Maybe,” Elise repeated with a sigh, adding the three pairs of shoes to the clothing.
Again at Cass’s urging, she picked out a few necessary accessories. A smart handbag, a silk scarf, a watch that was probably a knockoff rather than gently used at the oh-so-reasonable price. The store also carried inexpensive new underwear and panty hose and socks. Everything to complete her wardrobe.
Once the purchases had been rung up and packaged nicely, they left the shop, each carrying a dress bag in one hand, a shopping bag in the other.
“I thought it was you who cautioned me against getting involved with Logan,” Elise said as she followed Cass into a neighboring sandwich shop.
“Sometimes you simply have to trust your own instincts.”
Her instincts told Elise to run far away from the man as fast as she could. Not that she would. Her reality was that she was stuck with Logan Smith until she found a way out for herself and Eric.
The very thought of his breathing down her neck until then was enough to make her mouth go dry and her heart beat a little faster.
She didn’t know if that was from excitement or fear—and realized she could be in bigger trouble than she’d thought.
Chapter Six
Elise had dreaded walking into the club loaded down with purchases made on Gideon’s credit. But if he was perturbed by the seeming quantity or by the receipt Cass handed him along with his credit card, he didn’t show it.
Instead, he led them to a small storage room where her purchases would stay safely locked up for the night.
Cass went off to make a pot of coffee in the employee lounge, while Elise stayed behind with their boss.
“I want you to know how grateful I am for your help,” she told Gideon.
“It’s no big deal.”
“It is to me.”
“You’re welcome, then.”
“If there’s anything I can do to return the favor…”
She knew that sounded stupid. What in the world could she do for him, especially considering she’d be gone at the first opportunity?
“Just keep that boy of yours safe,” he said. “And yourself. It was bad enough that Eric had to lose a father to such violence.”
His expression had turned grim, and Elise got the odd feeling that Gideon had something else on his mind—something far more personal than her situation—but she wasn’t about to pry.
“I guess I’d better report for work. Blade wants me to branch out into martini territory tonight.”
“That can wait,” Gideon insisted. “I have something for you. In the office.”
Puzzled, Elise followed him. More clothing? She couldn’t envision it. And, indeed, what he handed her was smaller and far more precious: a wallet filled with various cards identifying her as Nicole Hudson. Then she noted the duplicates, but with yet another name, another false identity.
She stared at a photo of a stranger wearing a cheesy smile on an Illinois driver’s license—then realized it was one Logan had taken the night before. She simply hadn’t gotten used to her perfect disguise.
“How did you do this?” she asked.
“You’ll need identification to get work wherever you go,” he said, hedging her question.
“Gideon, I…I don’t know how to thank you.”
She didn’t know why he was doing this. Falsifying her identity was illegal. Before she could broach the subject of his deepening involvement, there was a knock at the door and Logan entered.
Eyes of steel pinned her where she stood.
Growing warm, Elise immediately backed off.
“I’d better lock this away with my other stuff,” she mumbled, waving the wallet in the air and speeding out of the office, head down.
After setting the wallet with its precious documents in one of the shopping bags, Elise closed the storage closet door and relocked it, only to feel a hot breath sear the back of her neck.
She froze. Logan, of course.
Without turning around, she asked, “What do you want now?”
“We need to talk.”
Again? “About?”
“What happened this morning.”
She turned to face him, taking care that they didn’t actually touch.
Back pressed against the door, she said, “You already explained it.”
“Obviously not to your satisfaction.”
“Can’t we just drop this?”
“We tried dropping it earlier. Then you mostly avoided me at the house.” Logan moved closer without actually touching her. If that were possible. “And now you practically ran out of Gideon’s office to get away from me.”
Her pulse was accelerating exponentially with the closeness. “You really are full of yourself.” She was bluffing, because, of course, he was correct.
“We’re playing a dangerous game. I thought you were up to it.”
“This game is mine,” she said. “But you’re obviously a control freak. I don’t like having the rules changed midstream.”
“Changed? You don’t think newlyweds would be affectionate with one another?”
“And there’s another example. This newlywed thing—I had no say to begin with.”
“You could have said no and found another way.”
“You took away my choices when you let Carol into the house and introduced me as your wife!”
“So is that the problem? That the scenario isn’t your idea?” Logan set a hand against the door above her head and leaned in, so that if she moved so much as a centimeter, they would touch. “Look,” he said, his low voice sending a thrill down to her toes, “if I promise never to kiss you again, never to touch you again without your permission, would that make you feel better?”
An odd sort of disappointment warred with relief at the suggestion. She would take a closer look at those feeling later, when she was alone, safe from him.
“How do I know I can trust you?” she asked.
A slow smile curled his lips, as though he knew why he had her so flustered. “I guess you need to take it on faith.”
A chill that had nothing to do with him washed over her.
“Faith?” Placing a hand on his chest, she pushed him away from her. “I lost my ability to have faith in anything after finding the husband I loved murdered, and naively believing that no one could possibly think I did it when I was innocent!”
Anger having broken the spell he had over her, she stormed off toward the club entrance. He knew how to push her buttons, all right, but this time he’d picked the wrong one.
ALL NIGHT, whenever given a chance, Logan watched Elise at work behind the bar. He didn’t know what he was looking for or what he thought he might see. But he was drawn to her, and the reason went beyond the simmering attraction between them. Yeah, he knew she was finding herself getting in as deep with him as he was with her. But she was fighting it, which was good. They didn’t need complications.
So what was it about her that was sucking him in, anyway?
He couldn’t figure it and it wouldn’t let him alone.
<
br /> Not at the club, not during the silent ride back to North Bluff, not when she hurried upstairs and he was left to sit alone in the dark with a drink and his thoughts.
Her devotion to the kid—that was it!—so like his devotion to his sister. Whereas it was too late to save Ginny, it wasn’t too late for Elise’s son. Logan had to concentrate. To keep his focus. To bring Kyle Mitchell down. And no matter how much his gut screamed that it wasn’t fair to her, Elise was going to help him do it.
He poured himself a second drink. And a third. He sat looking out into the dark, listening to the waves break on the lake below. Exhaustion and three drinks got to him. He told himself to get up to his bed, but he couldn’t move. Didn’t want to go anywhere. The chair would do.
He let his eyes close and his mind drift….
A noise startled him upright. Through a fog, he tuned back in until he pinpointed soft footfalls on the stairs.
They were coming down to him.
For a moment, fantasy took over and he imagined Elise, floating in silk, coming to find him, to kiss him, to straddle him and guide him up inside her….
But the footsteps were whispering away from him. And then he heard the side door open.
Where the hell was she going?
Waiting until she’d slipped out of the house and had pulled the door shut behind her, Logan rose from the chair and gave his body a few seconds to play catch-up. Feeling quickly flooded his limbs, and he made for the windows and stared out toward Mitchell House.
He cursed when he saw nothing moving.
Then a slight motion to his right caught his attention. He refocused his gaze to the east. There she was! Dressed in jeans and a dark top, Elise was jogging toward the lake.
When she cut around the hedges onto her late husband’s estate and started down the stairs, he knew exactly where she was headed.
The boathouse.
Wondering what she thought she was going to do there, he decided to see for himself.
PEOPLE THIS FAR ALONG the North Shore were bundles of contradictions, Elise thought. They might have their houses wired for security, but often they left their doors unlocked. The Mitchells were no exception.
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