by Nora Roberts
“I’m stronger than you think,” she said aloud and listened to the furious tone of her own voice echo back. “Why don’t you come out, face-to-face, and find out? You bastard.” She grabbed a stick, thudded it against her palm. “You son of a bitch. You think you can scare me with a bunch of second-rate photographs?”
She whipped the stick against a tree, pleased by the way the shock wave sang up her arm. A woodpecker sprang from the trunk above her and bulleted away.
“Your composition sucked, your lighting was awful. What you know about capturing mood and texture wouldn’t fill a thimble. I’ve seen better work from a ten-year-old with a disposable Kodak.”
Her jaw set, she waited, eager to see someone, anyone, step out onto the path. She wanted him to charge. She wanted to make him pay. But there was nothing but the whisper of wind through the leaves, the clicking of palmetto fronds. The light shifted, dimming degree by degree.
“Now I’m talking to myself,” she murmured. “I’ll be as loony as Great-granny Lida before I’m thirty at this rate.” She tossed the stick, watched it fly end over end, arcing up, then landing with a quiet thump in the thick brush.
She didn’t see the worn sneaker inches from where it landed, or the frayed cuffs of faded jeans. When she walked deeper into the forest, she didn’t hear the strained sound of breathing struggling to even out, or the harsh whisper that shook with raw emotion.
“Not yet, Jo Ellen. Not yet. Not until I’m ready. But now I’m going to have to hurt you. Now I’m going to have to make you sorry.”
He straightened slowly, considered himself in full control. He didn’t even notice the blood that welled in his palms as he clenched his fists.
He thought he knew where she was going and, familiar with the forest, he cut through the trees to beat her there.
PART THREE
Love is strong as death;
jealousy is cruel as the grave.
—Song of Solomon
TWENTY
JO didn’t realize she’d made up her mind to go to Nathan’s until she was nearly there. Even as she stopped, considered changing direction, she heard the pad of footsteps. Adrenaline surged, her fists clenched, her muscles tensed. She whirled, more than ready to attack.
Dusk settled around her, dimming the light, thickening the air. Overhead a slice of twilight moon hung in a sky caught between light and dark. Water lapped slyly at the high grass along the banks of the river. With a rush of wind, a heron rose, soaring away from her and its post.
And Nathan stepped out of the shadows.
He broke stride when he saw her, then stopped a foot away. His shoes and the frayed hem of his jeans were damp from the water grasses, his hair tousled from the quickening breeze. Noting her balls-of-the-feet fighting stance, he raised an eyebrow.
“Looking for a fight?”
She ordered her fingers to uncurl, one by one. “I might be.”
He stepped forward, then tapped his fist lightly on her chin. “I say I could take you in two rounds. Want to go for it?”
“Maybe some other time.” The blood that was singing in her ears began to quiet. He had broad shoulders, she mused. A nice place to lay your head—if you were the leaning sort. “Brian kicked me out,” she said and tucked her hands in her pockets. “I was just out walking.”
“Me, too. I’m done walking for a while.” The hand he’d fisted uncurled, and the fingers of it brushed over her hair. “How about you?”
“I haven’t decided.”
“Why don’t you come inside . . .” He took her hand, toyed with her fingers. “Think about it.”
Her gaze shifted from their hands to his eyes, held steady there. “You don’t want me to come inside and think, Nathan.”
“Come in anyway. Had any dinner?”
“No.”
“I’ve still got those steaks.” He gripped her hand more firmly and led her toward the house. “Why did Brian kick you out?”
“Kitchen crisis. My fault.”
“Well, I guess I won’t ask you to help grill the steaks.” He stepped inside, switched on the lights to cut the gloom. “About all I have to go with them are some frozen fries and a white Bordeaux.”
“Sounds perfect to me. Can I use your phone? I should call, let them know I won’t be back for . . . a little bit.”
“Help yourself.” Nathan walked to the fridge, got the steaks out of the freezer. She was jumpy as a spring, he thought, taking the meat to the microwave to defrost it. Angry on top, unhappy underneath.
He wondered why he had such a relentless need to find the reason for all three. He listened to the murmur of her voice as he puzzled over the buttons on the microwave. He was about to make an executive decision and hope for the best when she hung up the phone and came over.
“This part I know,” she said and punched a series of buttons. “I’m an expert nuker.”
“I do better when the package comes with directions. I’ll start the grill. I’ve got some CDs over there if you want music.”
She wandered over to the stack of CDs beside the clever little compact stereo on the end table beside the sofa. It seemed he preferred straight, no-frills rock with a mix of those early rebels Mozart and Beethoven.
She couldn’t make up her mind, couldn’t seem to concentrate on the simple act of choosing between “Moonlight Sonata” and “Sympathy for the Devil.”
Romance or heat, she asked herself impatiently. What do you want? Make up your damn mind what it is you want and just take it.
“The fire shouldn’t take long,” Nathan began as he stepped back in, wiping his hands on his jeans. “If you—”
“I had a breakdown,” she blurted out.
He lowered his hands slowly. “Okay.”
“I figure you should know before this goes any farther than it already has. I was in the hospital back in Charlotte. I had a collapse, a mental collapse, before I came back here. I may be crazy.”
Her eyes were eloquent, her lips pressed tight together. Nathan decided he had about five seconds to choose how to handle it. “How crazy? Like running-down-the-street-naked-and-warning-people-torepent crazy? Or I-was-abducted-by-aliens crazy? Because I’m not entirely convinced all those abducted-by-aliens types are actually crazy.”
Her mouth didn’t exactly relax, but it did fall open. “Did you hear what I said?”
“Yeah, I heard you. I’m just asking for clarification. Do you want a drink?”
She closed her eyes. Maybe lunatics were attracted to lunatics. “I haven’t run naked in the streets yet.”
“That’s good. I’d have to think twice about this if you had.” Because she started to pace, he decided touching her wasn’t the best next move. He went back to the refrigerator to take out the wine and uncork it. “So, were you abducted by aliens, and if so, do they really look like Ross Perot?”
“I don’t understand you,” she muttered. “I don’t understand you at all. I spent two weeks under psychiatric evaluation. I wasn’t functioning.”
He poured two glasses. “You seem to be functioning all right now,” he said mildly and handed her the wine.
“A lot you know.” She gestured with the glass before drinking. “I came within an inch of having another breakdown today.”
“Are you bragging or complaining?”
“Then I went shopping.” She whirled away, stalking around the room. “It’s not a sign of stability to teeter on the brink of an emotional crisis, then go out and buy underwear.”
“What kind of underwear?”
Eyes narrowed, she glared at him. “I’m trying to explain myself to you.”
“I’m listening.” He took a chance, raising his hand to skim his fingers over her cheek. “Jo, did you really think I’d react to this by backing off and telling you to go away?”
“Maybe.” She let out the air clogging her lungs. “Yes.”
He pressed his lips to her brow and made her eyes sting. “Then you are crazy. Sit down and tell me what happened.”
“I can’t sit.”
“Okay.” He leaned back against the kitchen table. “We’ll stand. What happened to you?”
“I—it was ... a lot of things. Work-related stress. But that doesn’t really bother me. You can use stress. It keeps you motivated, focused. Pressures and deadlines, I’ve always used them. I like having my time designated, my routine set out and followed. I want to know when I’m getting up in the morning, what I’m doing first and second and last.”
“We’ll say spontaneity isn’t your strong suit, then.”
“One spontaneous act and everything else shifts. How can you get a handle on it?”
“One spontaneous act,” he commented, “and life’s a surprise, more complicated but often more interesting.”
“That may be true, but I haven’t been looking for an interesting life.” She turned away. “I just wanted a normal one. My world exploded once, and I’ve never been able to pick up the pieces. So I built another world. I had to.”
He tensed, straightened, and the wine that lingered on his tongue went sour. “Is this because of your mother?”
“I don’t know. Part of it must be. The shrinks certainly thought so. She was about my age when she left us. The doctors found that very interesting. She abandoned me. Was I repeating the cycle by abandoning myself?”
She shook her head and turned back to him. “But it wasn’t just that. I’ve lived with that most of my life. I coped, damn it. I made my choices and I went for it, straight line, no detours. I liked what I was doing, where I was going. It satisfied me.”
Knowing his hand wouldn’t be steady, Nathan set the glass aside. “Jo Ellen, what happened before, what other people did, no matter who they were to us, can’t destroy what we are. What we have. We can’t let that happen.”
She closed her eyes, relieved and soothed by his words. “That’s what I’m telling myself. Every day. I started having dreams. I’ve always had very vivid dreams, but these unnerved me. I wasn’t sleeping well, or eating well. I can’t even remember if that started before or after the first pictures came.”
“What pictures?”
“Someone started sending me photographs, of me. Just my eyes at first. Just my eyes.” She rubbed a hand over her arm to chase away the chill. “It was creepy. I tried to ignore it, but it didn’t stop. Then there was a whole package, dozens of photographs of me. At home, on assignment, at the market. Everywhere I went. He’d been there, watching me.” Her hand rubbed slowly, steadily over her speeding heart. “And I thought I saw ... more. I hallucinated, I panicked. And I broke.”
Rage whipped through him, one hard, vicious lash. “Some bastard was dogging you, stalking you, tormenting you, and you’re blaming yourself for crumbling?” His hands were steady now as he reached out for her, pulled her against him.
“I didn’t face it.”
“Stop it. How much is anyone supposed to face? The son of a bitch, putting you through that.” He stared over her shoulder, wishing viciously he had something to fight, something to pummel. “What’s the Charlotte PD doing about it?”
“I didn’t report it in Charlotte.” Her eyes went wide when he jerked her back. Widened still more when she saw the wild fury in his.
“What the hell do you mean, you didn’t report it? You’re just going to let him get away with it? Just do nothing?”
“I had to get away. I just wanted to get away from it. I couldn’t cope. I could barely function.”
When he became aware that his fingers were digging into her shoulders, he let her go. Snatching up his glass, he paced away from her. And he remembered how she’d looked when he first saw her on the island. Pale, exhausted, her eyes bruised and unhappy.
“You needed sanctuary.”
Her breath came out in three jerks. “Yes, I suppose I did. Today I learned I hadn’t found it. He’s been here.” Resolutely she swallowed the fresh panic in her throat. “He mailed photos of me from Savannah. Photos he’d taken here on the island.”
Fresh fury clawed at him with hot-tipped fingers. Drawing on all of his control, Nathan turned slowly. “Then we’ll find him. And we’ll stop him.”
“I don’t even know if he’s still on the island. If he’ll come back, if . . . I don’t know why, and that’s the worst of it. But I’m facing it now, and I’m going to deal with it.”
“You don’t have to deal with it alone. You matter to me, Jo Ellen. I won’t let you deal with it alone. You’re going to have to face that too.”
“Maybe that’s why I came here. Maybe that’s why I had to come here.”
He set his wine down again so he could take her face in both hands. “I won’t let anyone hurt you. Believe that.”
She did, a little too easily, a little too strongly, and tried to backpedal. “It’s good knowing you’re on my side, but I have to be able to handle this.”
“No.” He lowered his mouth gently to hers. “You don’t.”
Her heart began to flutter in a different kind of panic. “The police said—”
“You went to the police?”
“Today. I ...” She lost her train of thought for a moment as his mouth brushed hers again. “They said they’d look into it, but they don’t have a lot to look into. I haven’t been threatened.”
“You feel threatened.” He ran his hands down to her shoulders, over them. “That’s more than enough. We’re going to make that stop.” He skimmed his lips over her cheek, along her temple, into her hair. “I’m going to take care of you,” he murmured.
The words revolved in her spinning mind, refused to settle. “What?”
He doubted either one of them was ready to face what he’d suddenly realized. He needed to take care of her, to soothe away those troubles, to ease her heart. And he needed to be sure that whatever he did wouldn’t snap the thin threads of the relationship they were just beginning to weave.
“Put it aside for a little while. Take an evening to relax.” He ran his fingers up and down her spine once before drawing back to study her. “I’ve never seen anyone more in need of a rare steak and a glass of wine.”
He was giving her time, she realized. That was good. That was best. She managed to smile. “It does sound pretty good. It would be nice not to even think about all of this for an hour.”
“Then I’ll put the steaks on, you can dig out the fries. And I’ll bore you to tears talking about this new project I have in mind.”
“You can try, but I don’t cry easily.” She turned to the freezer, opened it, then closed it again. “I don’t like sex.”
He stopped one step away from the microwave. It was necessary to clear his throat before he could face her again. “Excuse me?”
“Obviously that’s part of the package we’re putting together here.” Jo linked her hands together. It was best to be up-front about it, she thought. Practical. Especially since the words were out and couldn’t be taken back.
He really had to stop putting his wine down, Nathan decided, and picking it up again, he took one long, slow sip. “You don’t like sex.”
“I don’t hate it,” she said, pulling her fingers apart to wave a hand. “Not like coconut.”
“Coconut.”
“I really hate coconut—even the smell puts me off. Sex is more like, I don’t know, flan.”
“Sex is like flan.”
“I’m ambivalent about it.”
“Uh-huh. Meaning, take it or leave it. If it’s there, fine, but why go out of your way?”
Her shoulders relaxed. “That’s about it. I thought I should tell you so you wouldn’t build up any big expectations if we go to bed.”
He ran his tongue over his teeth. “Maybe you haven’t had any really well-prepared flan ... in your experience.”
She laughed. “It’s all pretty much the same.”
“I don’t think so.” He finished off his wine, set the empty glass down. Her eyes went from amused to wary as he walked toward her. “And I’m compelled to debate the subject. Right n
ow.”