Texas Ransom

by Amanda Stevens

  She hesitated. “It’s getting cold out here. Let’s go back to the house. I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

  They walked back in silence, and it seemed to Nikki that Graham was careful to keep enough distance between them so that there would be no accidental contact. When she glanced at him, he wouldn’t even look at her.

  She rubbed the back of her hand across her face. How was she going to fix this? How could she possibly make things right? Even if she could somehow make him understand, he would never be able to forgive her. He would never trust her again. And she had no one to blame but herself.

  She opened the door of the bungalow and he followed her inside. She turned on a lamp and the soft light cast shadows over his face as he stood looking around.

  His appearance stunned her. His eyes were bloodshot and he hadn’t shaved in days. He looked exhausted and worn out, but not worn down. There was something oddly feral about the way he took a quick assessment of his surroundings.

  Leo Kittering had been right, she thought in despair. Whatever Graham had done to get her back had changed him. The man she’d known was gone forever.

  His hard gaze met hers and she shivered.

  “Were you in love with Kittering?”

  The question shocked her. “No! I despised him.”

  Something flickered in Graham’s eyes. “Why did you leave your job at the consulate to work for Leo Kittering?”

  “Because I wanted to make L.J. pay for what he’d done to my sister.”

  “Your sister?”

  “She met L.J. on spring break one year. She was just a kid, and he was rich, handsome, sophisticated. He swept her off her feet. When everyone else went back to school after that week, she stayed behind to be with him. She even called and told me that he wanted to marry her. She was ecstatic. I’d never seen her like that. We had a pretty miserable childhood…an alcoholic mother, an abusive stepfather. I’ll spare you the details. I was just so happy that she’d finally found the kind of love she deserved.

  “But after a while, things changed. L.J. tired of her, and when she finally showed up back home, I hardly recognized her. He’d beaten her down, gotten her hooked on drugs and then he’d kicked her out. A few months after she came back home, she overdosed on heroin. I found her on the bathroom floor one night with the needle still in her arm.”

  Graham’s gaze was still on her, but he didn’t say a word. Nikki didn’t know whether to take that as a good sign or not.

  “I decided I was going to make him pay for what he’d done to my sister. I didn’t know how or when, but I knew that I couldn’t let him get away with it. I couldn’t let him do to anyone else what he’d done to Melanie. And maybe a part of me wanted a reason to get away from my own crappy life. So I moved to Mexico, got a job with the consulate and started showing up at the places he liked to hang out. We had a lot of mutual acquaintances and I eventually landed a job with his father. That’s where I met Kendall.”

  Graham stiffened and glanced away.

  “We became friends, mostly because of our backgrounds, I suppose. We were both American, both single, both seemed to have a lot of skeletons in our closet. She told me about you.” His back was still to Nikki and she hesitated. “I couldn’t imagine even then why she’d look twice at someone like L. J. Kittering when she had you back home.”

  He said over his shoulder, “Don’t.”

  “But it’s true.” She tucked a strand of hair behind one ear with a trembling hand. “What we had was real. I never lied about my feelings for you.”

  “What happened with Kittering?” he said without emotion.

  “He beat her, too. I saw her with black eyes on two different occasions, but when I pressed her for the truth, she always protected him. Just like Melanie did. Then one night Kendall showed up at my apartment. She had more than a black eye that time. He’d really worked her over, nearly killed her. I tried to get her to go to the hospital, but she didn’t want to. She said she had to get out of the country because she was afraid he was going to come find her and finish the job. She had her passport, some money, and she wanted me to drive her across the border.

  “But before we could leave, L.J. showed up. He’d followed her to my apartment. He was drunk and in a rage, and I thought he was going to kill us both. I grabbed a knife from the kitchen, told him to leave, but he wouldn’t. He just kept coming at me until…” She trailed off and drew a shaky breath. “I killed him.”

  Graham turned. “And then you ran.”

  She nodded. “I was in shock and I panicked. I knew what Leo would do if he found out. So I got Kendall out of the apartment and into her car. I think I had some vague notion of driving us both across the border. Except I didn’t have my passport. No identification of any kind. Kendall’s passport was found on the side of the cliff only a few feet from where I went through the windshield.”

  “Were you forced off the road?”

  She shook her head. “No. The accident was all my fault. I was driving too fast and I lost control of the car. It went over the cliff and exploded on impact. The bottom of the cliff was at least a hundred feet down and nearly impossible to get to. So once they found the passport, they assumed I was Kendall Hollister, and that I’d been alone in the car.”

  “And you let everyone, including me, believe it.”

  “Because I knew that L.J.’s body must have been found in my apartment by then. And it was only a matter of time before Leo came after me.”

  “When I brought you back to the States…why didn’t you tell me the truth then? I could have protected you.”

  “I wanted to,” she said. “More than anything. I kept telling myself that once I knew I was safe, I would tell you everything. I kept putting it off because I was in love with you. And then you fell in love with me and I couldn’t walk away from that. No one had ever loved me the way you did. It was the first time in my life I’d ever been truly happy. I didn’t want to lose it. I didn’t want to lose you.”

  “But it was all based on a lie,” he said. “It wasn’t real.”

  “It wasn’t a lie. Nothing about us was a lie. Graham, you have to believe that. If nothing else, you have to believe what I felt for you—and what you felt for me—was real. Why does anything else have to matter?”

  He shook his head sadly. “I don’t know. But it does matter. And I can’t help that.”

  “I know.”

  He glanced around aimlessly, as if unsure what he should do next. “What about Michael? Did he know who you were?”

  “He figured it out. He and Kendall had been…close. I had no idea because she never talked about him. When I didn’t respond to him the way he thought I should, he eventually put two and two together.”

  “The FBI thinks he’s the one who told Kittering about you.”

  “I think so, too. I don’t know how else he could have found out. But I don’t suppose it matters anymore. Maybe he thought he was doing you a favor by getting rid of me.”

  “Somehow I don’t think his motives were quite so altruistic,” Graham said bitterly.

  Nikki sighed. “No, probably not.” She bit her lip. “So where do we go from here?”

  “I’m flying back to Austin tonight,” Graham said. “Clarkson has arranged for you to have this place for a few more days. That’ll give me time to find an apartment. When you get back, you can stay on in the house until you decide what you want to do.”

  “So this is it, then?” For the first time, Nikki felt a surge of anger. “You’re just going to walk away from what we had?”

  “We didn’t have anything. I was married to Kendall. You and I…”

  “What?” Nikki prompted.

  “Look.” He ran a hand through his hair and glanced away. “I came down here to say goodbye. Let’s not drag it out any longer than necessary.”

  “If that’s the way you want it.” She folded her arms and lifted her chin, but she could feel her lips tremble. “Goodbye, Graham.”

  HE
WAS halfway back to the airport when the full impact of what he’d done struck him. He’d just said goodbye to the only woman he’d ever loved.

  Kendall had been his legal wife, but she’d never loved him the way Nikki had. She would never have been content with the life the two of them had shared these past five years.

  Graham had been to hell and back these past few days, and if he’d learned anything, it was that happiness could be snatched away in the blink of an eye. So why was he throwing it away so willingly?

  Before he could change his mind, he turned the Jeep around and headed back to the beach house. When Nikki drew open the door, she stared at him for a moment, her eyes wary and sad and yet somehow hopeful.

  He took a step toward her. “I don’t know if this is going to work. I don’t know anything except…I don’t want to leave without you.”

  Her face crumpled. She put a hand to her mouth. “Are you sure?”

  He closed his eyes briefly. “Just answer one question.”

  “Anything,” she breathed.

  “Do you love me?”

  “More than anything. More than life itself.”

  “Then come home with me.”

  She lifted his hand to her scarred face and nodded. “There’s nowhere in the world I’d rather be.”

  ISBN: 978-1-4268-1153-1

  TEXAS RANSOM

  Copyright © 2008 by Marilyn Medlock Amann

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