Her memories of last night weren’t particularly clear. All she knew was that they’d argued again—she and Rich—as they so often did, and it had ended the way it always did. He had punished her, and in that sick, dark place inside her, she had enjoyed it. She had wanted it. She’d gotten off on it.
Freeing her hands from the sheet, she slowly sat up and shoved her hair out of her face. In the mirror across the room she caught a glimpse of what an unappealing picture she made this morning and resolutely turned away from it. She’d had a rough night. Hell, she’d had a rough life. She deserved to look it once in a while.
Leaning across to the nightstand, she opened the drawer and rummaged inside for a pack of cigarettes. Besides the cigarettes and a red throwaway lighter, there was an odd assortment of items in the drawer. They wouldn’t mean anything to most people, but for D.J. they held plenty of significance. There was the length of nylon rope that Rich used when he tied her to the bed. There was the belt, brown leather, an inch wide, that he used when he was really angry. There was the bandanna and a roll of duct tape for when he gagged her. Sometimes he liked to hear her cries. Sometimes he liked to make her scream. And sometimes he wanted to hear nothing from her, not even a whimper.
Those were the times, she thought as she held the lighter’s flame to the cigarette and inhaled deeply, when he pretended she was just another object—like the rope and the belt—intended for his sexual pleasure.
Or when he pretended she was somebody else, one of her friends. Or Teryl.
He never bothered to deny his interest in Teryl. She told herself he wanted her to believe it, even though it wasn’t true, because he was a mean son of a bitch. He understood her conflicting feelings toward Teryl better than anyone else—better, even, than she understood them herself. Their parents thought they were the same best friends they’d been twenty years ago when D.J. had become a part of the Weaver family. Their brothers and sisters believed it, too. Hell, even Teryl believed she’d never had a better friend.
But Rich knew better. He knew that Teryl was everything D.J. wasn’t, that Teryl had everything she’d been denied. He knew that her fondest dream, her most cherished fantasy, was to go back more than twenty years ago, back to a time before she’d known the Weavers existed, before the Weavers had known Teryl existed. Then D.J. would somehow slip herself into her friend’s place. She would be the Weavers’ first daughter. She would be the one who held a special place in their hearts. She would be a real Weaver instead of always being on the outside, part of the group but not a real part of the family, not a legal part.
She would be the one all the other kids looked up to, the one they all envied, the one they all wanted to be like. She had spent much of her life trying to emulate Teryl, trying to make herself over into Miss Straight-A-student, Abide-by the-rules, Never-step-out-of-line, Sweet-generous-and-kind-to-animals, A-virgin-until-she-was-twenty-one-fucking-years-old Goody-two-shoes. She had wanted to be Teryl… but at the same time she had felt contempt for what Teryl was. She had hated herself for being so bad, and she’d resented Teryl for being so good. She had craved the respect, acceptance, and love Teryl had always been given so freely, but she had wanted the sex, rebellion, and the inevitable punishment even more.
She had been warped ever since her parents had gotten their hands on her—too warped to ever become Miss Perfect. Like perfectly normal, perfectly average, perfectly well adjusted Teryl.
It had taken Rich about five minutes after they’d met to see and understand those things about her. It had been Teryl who’d brought him into D.J.’s life nine long years ago. It had been Teryl he’d wanted then. Encounters with her in the class he’d taught had made a major impression on him, but Teryl hadn’t returned his interest. D.J. had found it amusing to watch him make a fool of himself over someone who clearly would never want him, and, when the time was right, she had offered herself in Teryl’s place.
And so love—perverse, sick, depraved—had been born.
At least, it was the closest thing to love she had ever known. In nine years she had learned to hate him, to fear him, to loathe the things he did to her, the things she begged him to do. She was miserable with him and even more miserable without him. Like an alcoholic’s craving for booze or an addict’s hunger for drugs, she needed him—needed the sex, the disdain, the derision, the pain. The few times she had tried to walk away, she had always come crawling back. The few times she had found some pride, some dignity, she had brought it to him to destroy with his sharp tongue and his capable fists.
Her biggest hope was that someday she would escape this unholy, unhealthy hold he had on her.
Her biggest prayer was that someday never come.
Rising from the bed, she found her clothes on the floor where he’d thrown them and quickly got dressed. She would bring an overnight bag with clean clothes, a toothbrush, and other toiletries if he wouldn’t mind, so she wouldn’t have to go home in worn, wrinkled, and sometimes tattered clothing, but he wouldn’t let her. He didn’t want her to get the idea she was welcome here. This was his home. He would screw her here. He would debase her here. He would hurt her here.
But he would not welcome her.
He could live without her.
While she would die without him.
Once her hair was combed and she looked at least presentable, she left the bedroom and went searching for him. She found him in the kitchen, seated at the kitchen table, a bowl of cereal and the newspaper in front of him. Stopping behind his chair, she laid her hands on his shoulders, intending to massage away the stiffness that so often settled there, but he shrugged her away. With a suppressed sigh, she drew back. “Good morning.”
He didn’t look up from the newspaper as he responded to her greeting with a distracted grunt.
“How long have you been up?”
“A couple hours.”
“You should have awakened me. I would have fixed breakfast for you.” She wasn’t of much use in the kitchen, but she had mastered his favorite foods—eggs over easy, canned biscuits, and cream gravy. It had been one pathetic attempt to make herself useful, one more reason for him to keep her around.
“Cereal’s fine.”
She circled around to the closest empty chair and sat down. “Want me to make a pot of coffee?”
“No.”
For all the attention he was paying her, she might as well not even be there. Of course, that was what he wanted. When he had no further use of her, he wanted her gone. That was the way of their sad, sick romance.
She sat there a moment, considering leaving without another word, but studied him instead. He was handsome, though it had never been his looks that attracted her to him. She had never cared how thick and silky his hair was or what a deep, cocoa brown his eyes were. He’d had a beard when she’d met him, but that had neither attracted nor repelled her. Neither had his body—long and lean, sometimes, when he became absorbed in something, to the point of thinness.
No, what she had first liked about him was the fact that he’d wanted something—Teryl—that he couldn’t have. She had liked the fact that he’d taken that desire seriously. She had liked the intensity of it.
And she had particularly liked the fact that he was a kindred spirit. Just as he had so quickly recognized the ambivalence she felt toward Teryl, she had recognized herself in him. She didn’t know then—and still didn’t now—what had made him the way he was. She didn’t know whether someone in his childhood had mistreated him the way her parents had mistreated her or if it was a genetic defect or if he was just plain mean, just plain driven. For a long time, although she had never dared ask, she had cared, just as she had cared why Teryl had turned out as good as she had and why she had turned out so bad.
Now she didn’t wonder, didn’t care. He was beyond saving. And so, she feared, was she.
Finishing the cereal, he dropped the spoon in the bowl with a clatter, set it aside, then pushed his glasses up on his nose. The thick lenses made his eyes appea
r hazy and somewhat unfocused, but they weren’t. He saw life with a clarity that she envied. He saw everything around him and its effect on him. He saw the problems. He saw the solutions. Unfortunately, his solutions weren’t always the right ones. They weren’t always logical ones.
And sometimes they scared the hell out of her.
As she rose from the chair, she picked up his dishes, taking them to the sink and rinsing them. When they had first met, he’d been as sloppy and messy as any typical young man, but lately he’d changed that. Lately he’d gotten very finicky. He might make messes—might scatter dishes around, might spread newspapers out, or throw clothing to the floor—but he wanted them set right as soon as possible. This old farmhouse had never been so clean as it had been the last week.
Too bad he wouldn’t come to her apartment and get a little finicky there.
“I guess I’d better be going,” she said, standing halfway between him and the hall door, half hoping he would say, Nah, why don’t you stay? even though he never had before, not once in nine years.
This morning was no different.
“Should I come back this evening?”
At last he looked at her. “No. I’ll be working.”
“I won’t bother you.”
“No.”
“Come on, Rich,” she cajoled. “I’ll stay in the bedroom until you’re finished. I’ll be quiet. I won’t distract you.”
The look he gave her was cold and derisive. “You couldn’t distract me. You’re not smart enough, you’re not good enough, you’re not interesting enough. I’ll let you know when I want to see you again.”
“Please, Rich…” Calling on her deepest reserves of strength, she bit off the plea. He liked to make her beg in the bedroom. They both derived a certain pleasure from it there. Outside that room, though, it just made him angry.
It got demeaning.
“I’ll see you later,” she muttered, turning toward the door. All the way down the long hall, out the front door, and across the porch, she hoped he would follow, hoped he would stop her, hoped he would call out, Yeah, come back tonight.
Of course he didn’t. He never did. He never would.
But she always hoped.
It felt good being home again, Teryl thought as she sat at the kitchen table, a microwaved bagel and a Diet Coke in front of her. Sitting in her favorite chair instead of in the truck or on a lumpy bed, smelling potpourri and roses instead of must and mildew or gasoline and exhaust, moving about freely without being constantly watched. Sleeping in her own bed, bathing in her own bathroom, drying off with thick towels, wearing clean clothes… Those were all little luxuries she had taken for granted, but not anymore.
The only thing that would make it better, the only thing that would make her truly comfortable, was if she were here alone. If John wasn’t here. If he wasn’t giving her doubts about the Simon Tremont she knew. If she were as blissfully ignorant of his claims as she’d been the last time she’d sat here at this table.
Thanks to John, she might never wear that floral dress again. Or stay in a motel. Or speak to a strange man. She might never venture out of Richmond again. She just might not ever venture out of her house again.
Not that staying locked up at home would keep her safe. After all, the strangest man she’d met in a long time—or, at least, a candidate for that title—was temporarily living with her.
When he had come upstairs yesterday carrying their luggage, she had shown him to the guest room down the hall and around the corner from her own. It was a tiny room, big enough for a double bed, two night tables, and nothing else. Some previous resident had sacrificed a portion of the small closet space to build in shelves since there was no room for even the smallest of bureaus. There was no window, but plenty of light entered through the glass-paned doors that opened onto the balcony.
That damned balcony. From her door to his, more than half the length and about half the width of the house separated them. By way of the balcony, it was just a few yards from French door to French door.
Not that she had felt unsafe last night. They had slept only a few feet apart for three nights, and he’d done nothing. Now that they were in separate rooms, he wasn’t going to force his way in. She was much safer now than she’d been the last four days.
Still, there had been something terribly disconcerting about waking up this morning, snug in her own room, lying on her own pillow, tucked beneath her own covers, and looking out one of the three sets of doors that lined her wall only to see him standing out there on the balcony. He had been wearing jeans, no shirt, and no shoes, leaning against the railing, smoking a cigarette, and staring down at the garden.
When he had finished that cigarette, he’d lit another one, then had turned directly toward her doors. She’d known he couldn’t see her, had known the shadows were too deep. Still, she had burrowed a little deeper into the pillow, had snuggled a little farther into the cover, and in so doing she succeeded in reviving an ache that she’d hoped wouldn’t come back, at least, for the time being.
That was what she got for sleeping naked. For watching him when he didn’t know he was being watched. For letting him touch her face and her breast yesterday, for listening to him say the things he’d said. For bringing him to her house in the first place.
He had been right yesterday. Her breasts had been swollen and tender, her nipples had been hard, and, yes, she’d been wet between her thighs. That was why she’d stopped him from touching her there, so he wouldn’t feel the moisture and the heat. So he wouldn’t know how quickly and how intensely he could arouse her. So he wouldn’t know how easily he could seduce her.
She would have been so damned easy… if he’d given it any effort.
But he hadn’t. Her only satisfaction last night had been self-induced under the cover of the pounding water in the shower. D.J. would say the shower was the only place Teryl could have done it because it was the only place and the only time when it was not only all right but necessary for a good little girl to touch herself there and Teryl, her friend always teased, was such a good little girl.
She always had been.
But last night and this morning—and, hell, even right now, alone here in the kitchen—she wanted very much to be bad again.
Even if being bad was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place.
Her sigh was heavy and loud, but not quite loud enough to disguise the sound of footsteps in the hall. In another moment, another second, he was going to walk through the door into the kitchen and tell her that he was ready, that it was time to leave. Time to go to the office. Time to go through Simon Tremont’s file and test him on his knowledge of the contents.
The whole idea made her uncomfortable. There was something so sneaky and underhanded in the plan. She would be betraying Rebecca, who had treated her more than fairly, and the real Simon, who had a right to expect confidentiality from all employees of the agency. She wished he would give her a chance to sit down with Rebecca and tell her about his claims. She wished he wouldn’t insist on being so covert about it. But he’d been right yesterday. Rebecca wouldn’t help him. She might refer him to her lawyer or maybe pass him off to Morgan-Wilkes. She would definitely warn Simon, and she might even call the police. But she wouldn’t open the files to him. She wouldn’t seriously listen to him. She wouldn’t give his tale even the slightest consideration.
Not only would she not help him, she would make it very difficult for him to prove anything.
If he really was Simon Tremont, he deserved their help. He deserved her help.
He came into the room and sat down across from her. He’d just gotten out of the shower, and his hair was still damp. After silently sliding the untouched half of her bagel across to him, she studied him for a moment. Over the last thirty years, pop culture had elevated California girls to legend status, but there had been few references that she could recall to California boys. Based purely on physical attributes, this California boy—this man—could cer
tainly qualify for at least minor legend status. Golden-tanned, blue-eyed, sandy blond, over six feet tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-waisted, lean-hipped, long-legged, he could certainly have the same effect on the female libido that all those Beach Boys-type, curvy, leggy, busty blond girls in bikinis had on the male counterpart.
God knew, he had a hell of an effect on her.
He ate the bagel before speaking. “Does anyone ever come in to the agency on Sunday?”
“No.”
“It probably wouldn’t hurt to have an excuse ready if someone does happen to come by.”
She nodded. “I’ll think of something…” A sound outside drew her attention to the windows, and she muttered an oath that made him look out, too. He stiffened, just as she did, and rose from the table.
“Who is that?”
“D.J.”
“What is she doing here? She shouldn’t even know you’re back.”
Teryl also stood up. “Of course she knows. I called last night and left a message on her machine.” She bristled at the annoyed look he gave her. “She’s been waiting all week for me to call and tell her when I’m coming home so she could pick me up at the airport. Besides, I would never come back from a trip and just not call her. We talk all the time. We usually spend Sunday afternoons talking.”
“Who else did you call?” he asked with a scowl.
“My mother.” The slight defiance in her voice faded into defensiveness as she continued. “And I left a message on Rebecca’s machine.”
“Damn it, Teryl—”
“I had to. You’re going to take care of your business, then go back to wherever you came from, but I’ll still be here, John. I need my job.” She drew a calming breath. “I didn’t tell her anything, I swear. I apologized for not coming back when I was supposed to, I promised to make it up to her, and I told her that I would be in Monday. That’s all I said. I never mentioned you.”
After another hard look, he turned his gaze back out to the courtyard, where D.J. had parked beside his truck. Teryl watched him watch D.J. get out of the car, and in his expression she saw the immediate appreciation of a healthy man for a disarmingly beautiful woman. It was nothing new. Every man she’d ever been involved with had been at least slightly smitten with her best friend, but Teryl had never really minded. This time, though, it brought with it an unpleasant twinge of jealousy. This time she wished D.J. was so much less—less flashy, less gorgeous, less sexy. She wished D.J.’s hair was less vibrant in color, less wild, less untended. She wished her friend’s complexion was pallid and marred with freckles, like so many redheads, instead of rich, creamy gold. She wished D.J.’s clothes were less provocative, her body less shapely, her voice less sultry.
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