Roman's Heart

by Sharon Sala

  “Damn it, Billy, it’s too late to chicken out on me now.”

  “I don’t care. I never signed on for murder. ”

  Gordon Mallory sneered “And it wouldn’t have happened if you’d done what you were told to do.”

  “But I did what you said.”

  Gordon slapped his brother up the side of his head in frustration.

  “Yeah, after the fact. This would have been an easy heist. Carl Julian had been skimming from the daily take at the casino for over six months. He had a million dollars of his boss’s money in his safe. The last thing he would have done was report a robbery. What would he have said? ‘Oh...by the way, the money I stole has been stolen from me.’” He hit Billy again, only harder. “If you’d done your job, Julian wouldn’t have surprised us in the act.”

  “He wasn’t gonna talk. You had no business killing him,” Billy mumbled.

  “I don’t leave witnesses.”

  Holly froze. Her heart was in her throat. All she could think was that she had to get to the police. In her haste, the strap of her purse caught on the portable stairway. She gave it a yank, and everything inside went flying down the steps. Horrified, she looked up at the open doorway.

  It was just as she’d feared. Gordon appeared in the doorway with his brother, Billy, right behind him.

  Gordon took one look at her face and knew that she’d heard When she began to run, he started down the steps after her, catching her by the arm before she’d reached the ground.

  “Sweetheart, where do you think you’re going?”

  Play it cool, she kept telling herself, but her mind had gone blank. Where was a good lie when you needed one? Then she remembered the cab and tried a smile.

  “I didn’t have change for the cab,” she said. “Then as I started up the steps, my purse caught on this stupid old railing and look what happened.”

  Gordon frowned. She was good. He’d give her that. But he could feel her pulse racing through her system and wasn’t buying a word of what she’d just said. Spilling the contents of one’s purse did not cause this kind of reaction.

  Gordon pointed toward the cab. “Billy, pay the man while I get my sweet Holly out of this sun.”

  Oh, God, now what do I do? She took a deep breath and then pressed a hand to her forehead.

  “No, Billy, wait,” she said, trying to regain some control. “I was coming to tell Gordon that I’d changed my mind I’m not really in the mood for Nassau after all.”

  A dark smile broke the scowl on Gordon’s face as he began dragging her back up the steps. “Oh, but Holly, I’ll put you in the mood.”

  “But my things, ” she said, pointing back toward her scattered belongings.

  “Where you’re going, you won’t be needing them,” he whispered.

  “What are you going to do with her?” Billy asked.

  The smile on Gordon’s face darkened even more. “She doesn’t want to go. I thought I’d give her about an hour to change her mind. Then—” he tightened his grip on Holly’s arm “—if she still wants out... why, far be it from me to force a woman into anything she doesn’t want to do. If she wants out, then out she goes.”

  Holly’s heart dropped.

  “But, Gordon, in an hour, we’ll be in the air,” Billy argued

  “Exactly,” Gordon said, and then shoved Holly into the plane before she could scream for help.

  Daisy’s head rolled from side to side on her pillow as she struggled to breathe. Now she was caught in the darkness behind a dirty blindfold and the rubberlike scent of duct tape beneath her nose.

  They’d been in the air for forty-five minutes, and in that time, Billy Mallory had hardly taken his eyes off of the woman Gordon had dumped on the floor between them.

  “Damn it, Gordon, I still don’t like this. Why can’t we just drug her or something? It would be hours before she came to and we could be out of the country. ”

  “You know me,” Gordon said. “I don’t leave witnesses.”

  But Billy stood his ground, desperately pleading his case. “Think what you’re doing. Think who she is. Her old man has more money than Midas. If something happens to her, he’ll tear up heaven and earth to find out who hurt her. lf she dies, we’ll never stop running.”

  Billy wasn’t prepared for the blow, or the anger that came with it. When the fist connected with his jaw, he fell backward onto Holly’s legs before dragging himself upright.

  “You’re going to be sorry,” he said, wiping the blood from his lip.

  Gordon cursed beneath his breath. “I already am. I should have known better than to let you get involved in something this big.”

  Billy spit blood as Gordon entered the cockpit, closing the door behind him. He could hear Holly Benton crying. If he hadn’t looked down at her, he might have chosen a different path. But he did, and when he saw twin tracks of tears flowing out from beneath the blindfold he snapped. Without giving himself time to rethink his actions, he yanked off her blindfold and tore off the tape before dragging her upright He clapped his hand over her mouth and whispered near her ear.

  “Keep quiet or we’re both dead.”

  Her eyes were round with fear, but she did as she was told, watching in growing panic as he pulled a parachute from a nearby cupboard. The realization of what he intended seemed impossible to consider.

  “What are you going to—?”

  “You ready to die?”

  She swallowed harshly, then shook her head.

  “That’s what I thought,” he muttered, strapping her into the chute and giving her a quick, thumbnail sketch of what to do.

  “After you jump, count to ten and then pull this. ”

  Jump? She looked nervously over her shoulder and then ran her hands across the front of the straps, feeling for the handle he’d just mentioned.

  Billy glanced over his shoulder as the enormity of his betrayal sank in. His hands were shaking as he grabbed a nearby duffel bag and hung it around her neck.

  “There, now, ” he said, adjusting the straps so the bag wouldn’t interfere with the deploying chute when she jumped.

  “What’s in this?” she asked.

  “The reason we’re in this mess. I have no more stomach for crime. You can tell the authorities whatever you want, but when we land, I swear to God I’m going straight. I’ve pulled my last con, and that’s a fact. ”

  The roar of rage that came from behind startled them both. Gordon had come back, and God help them, she was still in the plane.

  Billy threw his weight against the door, anxiously twisting the lever. The door popped, like a cork out of a bottle. Instantly, the cabin was engulfed in a blast of chilling cold. In the wild rush of wind that followed, the inside of the cabin became a maelstrom of everything that wasn’t tied down.

  A piece of newspaper hit Holly in the face as the pressure inside the cabin dropped. Between the weight of the parachute and the bag Billy had hung around her neck, she was helpless to stop the inevitable from happening. Along with everything else that wasn’t tied down, she tumbled out of the plane and into the sky, falling head over heels like a broken doll. Hurtling toward earth, the bag around her neck was alternately choking her or pulling her down. Once as she rolled on her back, she looked up at where she’d just been. Things were flying out of the plane right behind her, fluttering like so much confetti that had been tossed to follow her down.

  And then the rush of wind in her ears and the sight of the earth coming up to meet her brought her to her senses. She closed her eyes, counted to ten, and then pulled the handle on the chute just as that damnable bag hit the side of her face. Blood was filling her mouth as the parachute deployed.

  Daisy rolled off the sofa and onto the floor just as the parachute ballooned, stopping the woman’s descent with a jerk. The memory was gone the moment she opened eyes, but the instinct to run was still with her. Without knowing why, she crawled to her feet and ran out of the door and into the storm.

  The brutal cold was like a
slap in the face. Reality surfaced just as she fell off the porch and into a snowdrift that was over her head. She opened her mouth to scream and got a mouth full of snow instead. Choking and gasping for air, she inadvertently sucked snow up her nose, as well. The harder she struggled, the deeper she fell into the drift. Further disoriented by the engulfing darkness, she tried to dig her way out, unaware that she was upside down and digging the wrong way. When her hands hit solid earth, she panicked. Something was wrong! Fear cut deep, like the blistering cold surrounding her. There was nothing before her but blackness, and nothing to hear but the muffled sound of the wind.

  The scream came at him in stereo, echoing within the cabin and then up into the loft. He came off of the bed within seconds, and was halfway down the stairs when she ran out the door. Even though he saw it happening, he couldn’t believe his eyes. She’d gone out into that blizzard in her bare feet, wearing nothing but a sweatshirt that barely covered her knees.

  “Daisy! No!” he shouted, but she kept on going and, moments later, disappeared from his sight.

  In the seconds it took him to get down the stairs and across the room to the door, his heart had stopped and started twice over. If she got lost out there, she’d be dead before he could find her.

  He paused in the doorway, shouting her name aloud. But the wind threw it back down his throat. He reached back inside the house and hit the light switch, instantly flooding the porch with a weak but welcome glow.

  And then he saw it, a dark indentation in the snow just off the porch. His heart dropped. She’d fallen into the drift! Without thinking of his own bare belly and feet, he stepped off the porch, only to find himself chest high in snow, and with more still falling.

  With great effort, he began to move. Moments later, he stumbled upon something solid. To the best of his knowledge, there’d been nothing in this area but grass. What he was feeling had to be Daisy.

  Thrusting deep, he began digging wildly, desperate to find her. The wind made the falling snow into a natural weapon, cutting his cheeks and stinging his eyes from the blast. And he was cold...so cold. Instinct told him to go back after some clothes, but he stayed. It was all he could do to keep digging.

  When he felt fabric, then flesh, his heart skipped a beat. God help me, he thought, and went in after her, head first. When a hand suddenly closed around his wrist, he knew a moment of relief. At least she was conscious. In one motion, he scooped. When he stood, she was in his arms.

  Staggering out of the snow and back onto the porch, he stumbled into the house. Clutching her close to his chest, he moved toward the sofa and the fire still burning in the fireplace.

  “Daisy, can you hear me?”

  When she didn’t answer, his heart sank. Although her body was trembling, her eyes were closed. Snow clung to her skin, and her hair, and her clothing.

  His hands were shaking as he laid her down. There was a panic in his voice that was relayed to his legs as they finally gave way. He knelt, and for a heartbeat, closed his eyes and leaned forward, resting his forehead on the sofa cushion and thanking God that she hadn’t gone too far.

  Daisy felt the heat first, then a pressure against her arm. When she opened her eyes, she saw him kneeling at her side.

  Everything was mixed up in her mind. The dream that had sent her out on the run was gone. There was nothing left but the reality of a bone-chilling cold and the man at her side.

  “What happened?”

  Roman inhaled slowly, then looked up. “You went out for a little midnight stroll.”

  Her eyes widened. Only then did she notice the fact that they were both soaked to the skin.

  “Dear God.” She wiped a shaking hand across her face. “I must be going out of my mind.”

  She looked so small, so bedraggled, his heart went out to her. “I know what you mean. For a moment there, I thought I was going to lose mine.”

  Daisy reached for him, touching the wet black hair plastered to his forehead and then grasping his wrist. His pulse was rock steady, just like the look in his eyes.

  “I owe you my life.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t believe in those kind of debts. Now, let’s get into some dry clothes before we both catch pneumonia.”

  She started to get up.

  “Stay by the fire,” he ordered. “I’m going to run a hot bath. You need to get warm as quickly as possible.”

  “But what about you?” she asked, eyeing his bare feet and chest.

  “I’ll be fine,” he said shortly. “I’ve been worse and survived. I will again.”

  Shuddering, she watched him walking away and knew how fortunate she was to have stumbled into his life. There was something about this man that demanded respect.

  She rolled over and sat up, leaning toward the heat of the fire as melting snow puddled around her feet. And as she waited for him to come back, she kept thinking of the money hidden upstairs beneath his bed. He was taking good care of her now—but what would he think and how would he behave if he knew?

  Leaning forward, she rested her elbows on her knees and covered her face with her hands as an old saying kept circling through her mind. “Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive.” All she’d done since they’d met was hide. And she was still hiding something from him—the truth as she knew it.

  The fire was blazing. Daisy’s underwear was dry and had been moved to make room for the wet clothes steaming on the hearth. By morning, the clothes would be dry. But to Daisy, the incident would never truly be over. She would never forget the panic of feeling buried alive, and then the overwhelming relief of his hand upon her thigh.

  Cradling her cup of coffee between her hands, she stared into the fire, mesmerized by the flames slowing eating their way into the wood. It was thirty minutes past four in the morning. Sleep was over for her. The last thing she wanted to do was relive whatever it was that had driven her out into the storm.

  Something banged in the hallway behind her. She didn’t have to look over her shoulder to know it would be Roman, and not the wind. His voice cut through the silence in which she’d been sitting, sending her pulse into a swifter rhythm.

  “Are you still cold?”

  She shook her head, watching as he circled the sofa and then sat at the end, near her feet. She had a swift image of him stretching out beside her instead, and looked away before he could see it in her eyes. When he tucked at a loose edge of her covers, she took a quick sip of coffee, so as not to give herself away. The more she was around him, the more she wanted to be with him...in the true sense of the word.

  Three days ago, she hadn’t known he existed. And now, he’d become the most important thing in her life. She tried to tell herself it was all due to the predicament in which she’d landed. She didn’t know who or where she was and she needed him for shelter and sustenance. And when the snow melted, she would need him to get her down off the mountain.

  More than once, she’d seen the hard, unyielding side of him. But it was his gentleness and consideration that kept coming through, time and time again. That, and that slow, devastating smile. When she left, would he forget her? The thought hurt. She would never forget him.

  Roman wanted to hold her. The feeling had been in the back of his mind for some time now. At least a day, maybe longer. Maybe as far back as the moment he’d seen daisies shining through the seat of her pants.

  There was a knot in his throat that had nowhere to go. He’d done the unthinkable and let himself care for a woman he didn’t even know. He tried not to think of the stupidity of the act, but it was almost pointless. There was nowhere he could go to escape her presence. Even when she wasn’t in the room, the scent of her seemed to linger, like a fresh breath of the spring.

  He kept reminding himself that she could be someone’s wife—someone’s mother. She could have a lover who was desperate to know of her fate. There was a selfish part of him that almost wished she would never remember—that her life would begin from the moment they met
. At that point, his thoughts kept fading. What comes afterward? What happens when the snow melts? What do I do when the time comes for her to walk away? In his mind, he knew it was imminent. In his heart, the notion was abhorrent.

  When Daisy stirred, he looked up. Their gazes met, then locked. A silence grew between them.

  He kept looking at her eyes, then her mouth and the healing cut at the edge of her lip.

  There was a muscle jerking at the side of his jaw. Daisy wondered if his belly was in knots. Hers certainly was. He inhaled slowly. When his gaze drifted down toward her mouth, she saw his nostrils flare. It wasn’t much of a signal, but it was enough to let her know something of his mood. Unaware she was holding her breath, she waited for him to make the next move.

  Roman’s gut clenched. There was an unmistakable look in her eyes, and he knew why it was there. More than once during the past couple of days, she’d come close to dying. When that happened to people, quite often they would turn to something to remind them how precious life really was. And what better way to do that than to lie in someone’s arms, to feel the thunder of your own heartbeat rolling through your ears, to savor the feel of body-to-body contact in a never-ending embrace. With the right person, it could be heaven. But with the wrong person, it could be the biggest mistake of your life. He gritted his teeth and tried to shift the mood.

  “Don’t you want to try and get some more sleep?”

  Her eyes never left his face. “I’m afraid to sleep.”

  He swallowed and tried to look away, but there was an energy between them he couldn’t ignore.

  “If you’re afraid of a repeat performance, we could trade beds,” he offered.

  She shook her head, and there was a tone in her voice he’d never heard before.