by Lisa Childs
He was protecting her.
She wanted to rush to him and profess her love. But because he’d gone to such great lengths to protect her, she couldn’t foil his plan. Like Xavier, the killer might not have bought it either.
She shouldn’t have had Cole’s mother help her get rid of Manny. Of course there was at least one guard outside this door. She was safe because Xavier was safe. She needed to make sure that Cole knew she was safe, too. He was probably incredibly worried and upset with Manny and with his mother. She needed to get word to him right away.
But when she opened the door, it wasn’t a guard standing outside it. Cole’s stepfather stood there, and he had a curious expression on his face.
Usually he seemed happy and harmless. But the look on his face now had goose bumps rising on Shawna’s arms.
“Excuse me,” she said as she tried to maneuver around him. But he clasped her arm tightly in his hand, pinching her flesh.
“You and I can either go back in the old bastard’s room and finish this up with both of you,” he said, “or we can step out onto the balcony.”
She drew in a deep gulp. If she went back into Xavier’s room, Jeff would kill them both. If she went onto the balcony with him, she might have a chance to escape. But as he pulled her through the balcony door, she remembered how high up they were—with the brick patio beneath.
If she jumped…
She was certain to get hurt.
But she knew Jeff intended to do more than hurt her as she turned and stared into the barrel of a gun. “Why?” she asked.
He had seemed like such a nice man—so mild mannered, like Emery. Why would he resort to murder? She shuddered, realizing he was the one; he’d set the bomb that had killed her husband, her friend.
“Is all of this just about the money?” she asked. She knew money motivated most people, especially Cole’s family. But she couldn’t understand it pushing someone to murder. She didn’t want to die just for money. She didn’t want to die at all. She loved her daughter too much to leave her. And she loved Cole, too.
She had to figure out a way to disarm this killer before he killed again.
*
A sense of peace washed over Jeffrey. There was no way now—no way for Cole to thwart his plan. First, he would kill Shawna, then he would kill that cagey old bastard. Then it wouldn’t matter that Xavier had changed his will.
Hell, it didn’t matter now.
“No,” he replied. “This isn’t about money.”
“What’s it about then?” Shawna asked.
“Love.”
Her brow furrowed. “I don’t understand.”
“Of course you don’t!” he exclaimed. “The only one who might is Cole…” He sighed. “He loves you. But you never really loved him.”
“That’s not true,” she protested.
“You married another man,” he reminded her. “You kept his child from him. And after all that pain you caused him, he’s still trying to protect you.”
She glanced around as if Cole had appeared. But Jeff would make sure Cole didn’t rescue her this time. Not that he would hurt him—because that would hurt Tiffani.
He hadn’t realized until recently that she actually loved her son. So it was good that he’d missed Cole when he’d shot at him, although he’d regretted not ending it then. But now that he knew she loved the boy, he couldn’t kill him. That would only bring Tiffani more pain. And he didn’t want to do that. Not really.
He was only trying to prove his love for her. Why didn’t she understand that?
Why had she never seen just how much he loved her?
This would prove it; he would get her the inheritance she’d been denied when Coleman had died. A smile curved his lips as he thought of that.
Killing Coleman Bentler had been immensely satisfying. During the AA meetings where they’d met, Tiffani had talked about her husband, about how he’d killed a woman and gone unpunished just because he was rich. She’d known the woman. Natalie Montoya had been her idol and mentor on the beauty pageant circuit. That was why Tiffani had sought out the man who’d killed her. She’d wanted to punish him.
Instead Coleman had punished her. He had deserved to die for killing Natalie and for hurting Tiffani.
Killing Shawna wouldn’t feel quite as satisfying. Unlike Coleman Bentler, she had done nothing to deserve death. But still she had to die, so that Tiffani could get the money she’d wanted for so long. So she could get the happiness she deserved.
And maybe, when she realized what lengths Jeff had gone to in order to make her happy, she would love him like he loved her. And if she didn’t…
If she couldn’t…
Then he didn’t care to live without her love anymore.
Chapter 23
Cole should have realized right away where Shawna would go—to Xavier. She was probably as furious with him for his manipulations as Cole was. It wasn’t as if she actually wanted to marry him. She had just lost her husband, after all.
But had Emery Little ever really been her husband? Cole had questions about that relationship. He had a lot of questions for Shawna. But first he had to find her.
He hurried toward the wing of the house where his grandfather’s bedroom was. But as he turned the corner in the hall, he saw a body slumped against the wall. Blood spattered the brocade wallpaper over Lars’s head and soaked into his hair, turning the pale blond a rusty red.
His hand on his gun, Cole rushed forward, but the hallway was empty except for Lars. He leaned down and felt for a pulse, and he breathed a ragged sigh of relief when he found one. Lars was alive, but he needed help.
He probably wasn’t the only one. Cole jumped up and hurried around the corner and pushed open the door to Xavier’s room. The old man gasped and pressed a hand to his heart.
“What the hell’s going on?” Xavier demanded. “You nearly scared me into having another heart attack.”
“Are you alone?” Cole asked. He glanced around the expansive master suite. The blankets were tossed back on the bed, and the old man had dressed.
“Yes,” his grandfather replied. “Shawna just left, though.”
Panic gripped Cole, pressing so hard on his chest he could barely draw a breath. “When?”
“Just a couple of minutes ago,” Xavier said. “You didn’t see her in the hallway?”
No. And he should have, if she’d gone into the hall. “Did you hear anyone outside the door?” Cole asked.
Xavier shook his head, and the color began to drain from his face. “What’s wrong? What’s happened?”
Cole tossed his cell phone at his grandfather. “Call Cooper for help. Someone knocked out Lars in the hall and must have taken Shawna.”
The old man’s hand trembled as he grabbed the phone and began to scroll through the contacts. But when Cole opened his door again, his grandfather stopped and called out, “Wait! Don’t go off alone.”
“I can’t wait,” Cole said and closed the door between them. He might already be too late.
Right outside the door was a sitting area and on the other side of the sitting area was a door to the second-story balcony. Even before he noticed the shadow beyond the drapes, he knew that was where they were. Shawna and the killer.
Cole moved quickly and quietly toward the door. He carefully turned the handle and popped it open just enough that he could hear.
“I—I don’t understand why you’re doing this,” Shawna murmured, her voice quavering with fear, “if it’s not about the money.”
“I told you,” the man said, his voice sharp with frustration and anger and madness. Cole barely recognized that it was his stepfather talking—his stepfather holding a gun on the woman Cole loved. “It’s about love.”
“How can murder ever be about love?” Shawna asked.
“She doesn’t know—she doesn’t appreciate how much I love her,” Jeff said. “How I’ll do anything to make sure she gets what she deserves.”
“So it is about the mo
ney,” Shawna insisted. “It’s about her not inheriting Coleman’s estate, so you’re going after Xavier’s.”
Jeff snorted. “I didn’t kill Coleman Bentler just so she would inherit his money. I killed him to free her from that murdering bastard.”
“What?” The question slipped unbidden through Cole’s lips.
Jeff whirled toward him with the gun, firing wildly. Cole ducked, and a bullet splintered the jamb just above his head. Another bullet shattered the glass in the balcony door.
Shawna’s scream shattered the quiet afternoon, making Jeff whirl back toward her. But before he could fire again, Cole fired.
He had to make sure his bullets didn’t stray and strike Shawna on the other side of his stepfather. He had to make sure Jeff didn’t get the chance to squeeze the trigger of his gun again and kill the woman Cole loved, whom he had always loved.
He couldn’t lose Shawna forever.
He fired quickly but carefully. Gunshots echoed after his, and he knew Jeff had fired. The man staggered and fell—right on top of Shawna who’d dropped to the floor of the balcony.
And Cole feared he hadn’t acted fast enough. That he hadn’t been accurate enough.
That he had lost her.
*
Shawna wiped the blood from her face. It wasn’t hers. Like Cole, she’d ducked just in time to avoid getting her head blown off. Jeff had not been so lucky. She shuddered as she remembered the horror of that moment, of Cole taking a life to save hers.
“Are you okay?” he asked her.
He’d picked her up and carried her away from the balcony, away from Jeff’s body. She was in the bathroom off her bedroom now, cleaning up.
“I didn’t get hit,” she assured him. Again. That had been his first concern when he’d pulled Jeff’s body off her.
His gaze met hers in the mirror. “That’s not what I’m talking about.”
She sighed. “That wasn’t the worst thing I’ve seen.” That had been the explosion.
Cole must have remembered she’d witnessed that because he apologized.
“Why would he kill Emery? Why would he hurt anyone?” she asked. “I still don’t understand.”
She might never know the reason. Jeff might have taken them to his grave.
“I know,” a soft voice murmured.
Shawna and Cole turned to see his mother, who stood in the bathroom doorway. For the first time since Shawna had met her, the woman looked her age. Deep lines marred her forehead and her face, with dark circles rimming her eyes.
“Are you all right?” Tiffani asked her.
Shawna nodded and asked, “Are you?” The woman had just lost her husband at the hands of her son. Would she be okay?
“I’m sorry,” Tiffani replied, looking at both of them.
“Were you part of it?” Cole asked, his voice gruff with emotion. “Did you put him up to all of this?”
His mother gasped with shock and pain. “Of course not. I had no idea.”
“He killed my father,” Cole said. “I didn’t even think you knew Jeff yet when that happened.”
“I didn’t,” she murmured. “Not really. I’d only seen him a few times in our AA meetings.”
“The meetings,” Cole murmured. “I remember that was where you’d met him.”
“I wasn’t there to meet anyone,” Tiffani said. “I knew I needed to quit drinking and get strong enough to leave your father.”
Shawna couldn’t blame her. The man had never treated her well.
“But you didn’t leave,” Cole said. “So Jeff took care of my father for you.”
“I didn’t know,” she said. “I just thought he was driving too fast—like always.”
“Like he had the night Natalie died,” Cole said.
“Natalie?” Shawna asked the question then.
“The woman Cole’s father loved and lost in high school,” Tiffani said.
Cole was staring at his mother with his eyes narrowed with suspicion. “How did you know about her? He never mentioned her to me.”
She laughed bitterly. “He never mentioned her to me either. I knew her.” She uttered a wistful sigh. “I idolized her. She was so beautiful. So sweet. She didn’t deserve to die. And he wasn’t charged with anything for killing her.”
“Is that why you did it?” Cole asked. “Why you got pregnant? To punish him?” He looked queasy, as if the thought of being a punishment was sickening.
It was. Shawna squeezed his arm in sympathy.
“I realize now that he was punishing himself,” Tiffani said. “That was why he worked so hard. Not for the success or the money. He did it out of guilt. I set out to punish him and actually wound up feeling sorry for him at the end.” Tears filled her eyes again, but she blinked them back. “All these years I thought he’d driven off that cliff on purpose. I had no idea Jeff…”
Cole still looked suspicious. “You really had no idea what Jeff was up to? That he was a killer?”
She shivered and shook her head. “I still can’t believe it.”
Shawna couldn’t either and he had nearly killed her more than once.
“He was so sweet to me,” Tiffani told her son. “After how your father treated me, I appreciated the way Jeff lavished attention on me. He loved me.”
“That’s why he did it,” Shawna said. “That’s what he said… It was because he loved you.”
She shook her head. “I tried to tell him that I didn’t need the money. I didn’t need anything but love.”
“But not his love,” Cole said. “You loved someone else.”
She nodded. Then she turned toward Shawna. But she couldn’t meet her gaze. And Shawna knew.
Suddenly she knew who her friend had loved and thought he could never have—until recently—until he’d gotten hopeful again. “Emery?”
Tiffani nodded. “I loved him so much…but I couldn’t hurt Jeff. He worshiped me. I couldn’t treat him the way Coleman had treated me. So Emery and I, we sneaked around.”
Cole looked from one to the other of them, as if he expected to see jealousy or resentment. Shawna smiled and slipped her arms around the other woman, pulling her close. “He loved you—so much.”
“I don’t understand,” Cole said. “Why did he marry you then?”
“He was my friend,” Shawna said. “He was only ever my friend.” She remembered that she’d been the one to introduce him to the woman she’d thought would one day be her mother-in-law. That had been before Cole had broken their engagement and her heart.
Tiffani pulled out of Shawna’s embrace. “I couldn’t believe he was really interested in me. He was so much younger—so good-looking.” Coleman had obviously destroyed her self-esteem. That must have been why she’d married Jeff. She’d felt secure with him.
And instead she’d married a killer.
“He loved you,” Shawna assured her again.
“I know,” Tiffani agreed, and emotion cracked her voice. “I finally accepted that. I was going to leave Jeff. I told him that I didn’t love him like he deserved to be loved. But he didn’t understand. He kept thinking he had to prove his love.”
Cole cursed. “That’s why he did all of this.”
His mother nodded. “I’m so sorry,” she murmured again before she ran from the room.
Cole stared after her. “I should go,” he said. “I should talk to her—make sure she’s okay.”
Shawna nodded in agreement even though she didn’t want him to leave her. She needed to feel his arms around her, needed to hear that what he’d told his family had just been part of a plan to protect her.
But she didn’t stop him. She just watched him leave. She couldn’t help but wonder if he would come back. His assignment was over now. She no longer needed protection. But she still needed him.
She wished she’d told him so. But maybe he had been telling the truth when he made that announcement to his family. Maybe he would never be able to forgive her for marrying another man and for keeping his daughter from h
im.
Like Emery, she might never get her chance at her happily ever after.
*
Cooper was damn glad this assignment was over, although his client seemed to be struggling with accepting that fact.
“The case is closed,” he told Xavier. “The police closed it, too.” They’d just left the house after taking reports from everyone involved. The coroner had taken away Jeffrey Inman’s body. “There is no longer any threat.”
He doubted Cole’s mom had any involvement in her husband’s misdeeds. She’d been too distraught. But her husband apparently wasn’t the man she was mourning.
What a mess.
And he’d thought his family was colorful. The Paynes had nothing on the Bentlers. No wonder Cole hadn’t wanted anything to do with this bunch.
Maybe that was why Xavier pleaded with Cooper, “Stay on just a little while longer.”
Cooper shook his head. He wanted to get back to his family. He had never appreciated them more.
“I’ll make it worth your while,” Xavier said as he pulled out his checkbook.
He had just written a sizable one. Cooper didn’t need or want another. “My brother’s team has already left for the airport.”
Parker had another assignment for them, one the new chief of the River City Police Department had personally asked him to handle. The chief was also their new stepfather, so Parker was doubly anxious to get his team back to tackle the job.
“And my team’s packing to leave,” Cooper went on. “You don’t need a bodyguard any longer.”
Xavier snorted derisively. “You’ve met my family, right? You don’t think Jeffrey Inman was really the only one who wants me dead?”
“I don’t think any of your other relatives have plans to off you right now,” Cooper said. But he wasn’t one hundred percent confident.
“You never know with this bunch,” Xavier said. “I could use at least one bodyguard for around-the-clock protection.”
Cooper grinned. “And do you have any particular bodyguard in mind for this assignment?”
Xavier grinned, as well. “Well, I think your sister is kind of cute.”