by Sheryl Lynn
Speaking soft and low, Laura asked Abby again about her day. The little girl happily told her all about the camp counselors and a nature hike and learning a song about a little clay pot. She even shared her riddle. What’s red, blue, green and flies? Answer, Superfrog!
Hiding in bed wouldn’t cut it anymore. Forcing Abby to tiptoe around one parent or the other and worry that she’d done something bad was the depth of cruelty. Laura and Ryder had a responsibility as grown-ups to work out their problems. For better or worse.
Abby’s chatter faded to a mumble and then stopped. Laura lifted her head enough to see Abby’s face. Eyes closed, cupid-lips parted, she slept. Laura stroked her tender cheek with a fingertip, marveling at the silky texture and angelic curve.
The past was a horror show. All the wishful thinking and false memories in the world couldn’t do a thing to change what she had done. But the future was a clean slate.
Her choice was clear. Spend the rest of her life hiding from her husband and hoping it did no harm to her daughter. Or she had to figure out a way to make amends, to make this house a real home—even if it meant accepting that Ryder would never love her.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK, boss?” Tom Sorry crouched, resting on his heels. He had cocked back his hat as far as it would go.
Ryder touched the faint mark of a shoe heel in the damp, sandy dirt. They’d had several good rains in the past few days, which meant this track was fresh. Shoe prints crisscrossed the dirt between the boulders. A candy-bar wrapper was wedged in a crack.
“I think we found ourselves a hunting blind, Tom.” He’d spotted the tracks while taking his afternoon horseback ride. He’d noticed them first on the dirt track that cut across a pasture from the road.
He put himself in the mystery man’s shoes—city shoes, with a broad heel and rounded toe. He could look straight between the barn and his studio for a clear view of the back of the house. He imagined with a pair of binoculars a watcher could see whomever walked up or down the main staircase, see into Laura’s sitting room if the draperies were open, and watch anyone who went in or out of the pool house.
Tom pointed northeast. “You say they go all the way to Packerd Creek? So what do you reckon, boss? A burglar? Art thief? Rustler?”
Ryder wished he could think in such mundane terms. But the discovery of these tracks followed too close on the heels of Donny Weis’s visit. He’d always figured Weis as a lowlife con man who’d do anything for a buck. Including making veiled and not-so-veiled threats about starting a battle for Abby’s custody. Ryder had been tempted on many occasions to buy the man off. But that wouldn’t work. Once he gave Weis a taste for easy money, the man would bleed him dry.
“Might have been Donny Weis.”
Tom shifted a suspicious glare between the tracks and Ryder’s face. “You really think so?”
Ryder shrugged. Wets had probably never done more than an hour’s worth of manual labor in his life. He was more inclined to live off women, and didn’t have the decency to see anything wrong with it. He didn’t appear to be the type of man who had the patience or the physical stamina to watch Laura and Abby.
A sickening thought drew Ryder’s gaze to the house. Suppose Donny Weis’s visit had knocked loose Laura’s memory for good? She’d been hiding from Ryder for days now, refusing to leave her room or speak to him. She might have gotten around to remembering how much she hated him. Worse, remembering how much power she held over him.
What if she allowed Donny Weis to snatch Abby? With Abby held hostage, she could figure out how to handle Ryder.
“So what do we do?” Tom asked.
Ryder rose and stretched, kicking the stiffness from his knees. “Keep an eye out.”
“Are you going to report this to the sheriff?”
Ryder picked up the candy-bar wrapper. This had been no casual look-see at the house. “Report what? Sneaking a peek at the house isn’t much of a crime.”
“Trespassing.”
Ryder thought of Becky Solerno, who still saw him as a suspect in the shooting of Laura. “Who’s going to bother investigating a trespassing? We’ll take care of this ourselves.”
“WHERE’S ABBY?” Ryder asked. He hung his hat on the peg inside the kitchen door.
Mrs. Weatherbee glanced at the kitchen staircase. “Up in her room, I believe.” She lifted her brooch watch and scowled. “Lord, where’d the time go? I haven’t heard a peep out of her since she got home from camp.”
Alarmed, Ryder took the stairs two at a time. A quick search of Abby’s bedroom produced only her backpack. He checked his bedroom where she sometimes watched television. His bedroom was empty, as well. Trying to not feel the insistent fear clawing at his diaphragm, he hurried to the main staircase.
He noticed Laura’s open bedroom door. The door to her sitting room was closed, as usual, so it was odd that her bedroom door would be open. He walked quickly but quietly to the door and peeked inside the room.
A television played with the volume on low. Laura and Abby sat on the bed, with the covers over their legs. Laura had an arm around the girl. Abby held a book open on her lap.
In her bright, high voice, Abby laboriously sounded out, “Buh-buh-buh.”
“Very good. Buh for B,” Laura said. “What’s this letter?”
“A! A for Abby.”
“Excellent. Now what does A sound like with the B?”
Ryder’s heart caught in his throat. The two of them, their dark heads bent together, snuggled like a pair of kittens on the big bed, were so beautiful that his mouth went dry and his eyes ached. All the yearning for Laura, which he’d been bottling like shook-up soda, burst free.
That silk-covered bed contained everything he’d ever wanted from life. A lovely wife with a sweet smile and gentle hands. A beautiful kid full of sugar and spunk.
Laura glanced his way. Her eyes widened and her smile faded.
Abby noticed him, too. She flashed him a milewide smile and hoisted the book in triumph. “I can read, Daddy! Listen.” She scrambled off the bed. Her cowboy boots hit the floor with a thud.
Well, if Laura remembered how much she hated him, she hadn’t remembered that little girls were supposed to wear prissy dresses and Mary Janes, or that one never, ever for any reason put shoes on a bed. Laura had a fear of dirt and disorder that bordered on a phobia—used to have. The head injuries appeared to have knocked that quirk out of her, too.
“Listen, Daddy,” Abby said insistently. She wrapped one arm around his leg. The cardboard pages of her book flopped like wings. “Buh a—”
“Ah,” Laura prompted. She drew up her knees and hugged them to her chest. She glowered at the television. “A in that word sounds like ah.”
“Buh-ah...uhl.” Abby frowned in concentration. She suddenly gasped. “Ball! It spells ball, Daddy. Look! I can read, Daddy. Ball.”
“That’s brilliant, sugar bear.” He couldn’t help a little puff of pride. “I always knew you were a wizard.”
“What’s a wizard?”
“Somebody who’s very smart, like you,” Laura said. “You need to go wash up for supper, baby. I imagine that’s why your father’s here.”
“Guess what, Daddy?” Abby twisted around on his leg, grinning up at him like a little monkey. “Mama likes ‘Sesame Street.’ We watched. She knows all the songs.”
Since when... “Good for you. Now go get washed up.”
“I’m eating supper here with Mama. She needs company. She’s sad.”
Laura blushed. “I’ll come downstairs, Abby.”
Leaning far to the side, Abby eyed the television with longing. “Can we watch TV while we eat? Downstairs?”
“Don’t press your luck, kiddo.”
After Abby skipped away, Ryder stepped into the bedroom. Laura rested her chin on her knees and stubbornly watched the television set.
“So you decided to join the living,” he said. As soon as he spoke, he was sorry. He was wrong, Laura didn’t remember hating him. If she did, she’d r
emember hating Abby, too, and it was clear as day to him that she loved the girl. Which meant if Donny Weis was lurking around, then he was troublemaking on his own.
“I don’t see what difference it makes to you,” she said coolly. “You made it perfectly clear that you don’t care whether I’m a part of your life or not.”
“I never said that.”
“Oh? Then I must have misunderstood your threat to institutionalize me.” She flung back the covers and swung her legs off the bed. Her knee-length nightie rode up her thighs. She immediately tugged down the hem.
He moved in to help her rise, but she jerked her arm from his touch. His temper rose. “You can sulk all you want, darlin’, but don’t be putting words in my mouth.”
“You are quite right, darling. I believe the word you used was nuthouse. ”
She stood for a moment, the cords standing out on her neck and her eyes closed. When the spell passed, she limped away. Without so much as a how do you do, she entered the bathroom and closed the door. The lock clicked loudly.
His daddy had always told him to be careful what he said—some words sure tasted nasty the second time around.
SUPPER WITH RYDER and Abby had been like some kind of twisted art film with swirling undercurrents and subtitles. Abby had been chirpy, chatting away like a little bird. Ryder had been so stiff-backed he’d looked sculpted from stone; his gaze had never once left his plate. Fearing the slightest verbal error, Laura hadn’t spoken beyond necessity.
Now Abby was tucked into bed, and Laura was in her room alone. Again.
Anger was one thing—acting stupid was entirely another. She pulled on a fleecy robe, stalked out of her room and across the hall to Ryder’s door. She drew several long, deep, steadying breaths and knocked.
Ryder opened the door. He wore pajama bottoms and held a loaded toothbrush. He looked her up and down. “Yes, ma’am?”
Shaken by his near nakedness, she struggled to remember her mission. His bare chest was hard-cut and deep with muscle. A line of dark hair bisected his flat belly, pointing like an arrow below his navel. He made an impatient noise. She focused on a spot near his left ear. “We have to talk,” she said firmly.
“I’m tired.”
It had taken her hours to work up the nerve to confront him; a little grumpiness wasn’t going to dissuade her. “This shouldn’t take long.”
He stepped out of the doorway. “Come in.”
His back was almost as interesting as his front. It amazed her that he seemed somehow bigger without clothing. His sun-browned, tough-looking skin begged for a touch. Aching for what might never be, she made herself look elsewhere.
His bedroom walls were dark, and the furniture was large and weighty. Just as Abby’s room had been a girl’s room, this looked like a lord of the manor’s room. A sneaking little suspicion made her think that this room wasn’t a temporary measure for Ryder.
Water rushed. She edged closer to the bathroom door and saw him bent over the sink, brushing his teeth. The vulnerability of his posture filled her with longing, and she absorbed the sight of brown curls brushing his neck. His arm muscles flexed and relaxed in an intriguing display.
“How long have we had separate bedrooms?”
He glanced at her, but said nothing until he finished and rinsed his mouth. He wiped his face with a towel. “Always,” he said. “My getting up at four every morning disturbs your beauty rest.”
She wasn’t going to cry, she thought fiercely. She focused on a framed photograph of a horse. He strode past her to the bed and slid under the covers. Propped on pillows, he hooked his arms behind his neck. His posture emanated cold resistance. He wasn’t going to throw her out, but he wasn’t going to make her welcome, either.
She sat delicately on the end of the bed. The mattress was so high, her feet barely touched the floor. “What are we going to do, Ryder?”
“About what?”
“About us. I can’t live like this. I don’t see how you can, either.” What she wanted to do was throw herself on him, beg his forgiveness and plead for his love. Tatters of remaining pride held her in place.
“What do you want to do?”
His harsh tone failed to conceal a plaintive note. Did he dare feel hope? She guessed he might wish for a solution to their problems, too, perhaps as much as she did..
Clasping her trembling hands, she said, “Do you mean what you said about locking me away?”
He lowered his arms and his face.
“I’ll never take Abby away from you. You’re a wonderful father. She needs you. Please believe me.” Hesitantly, fearful of him drawing away, but craving the feel of him, she placed a hand over his leg. He twitched under the covers. “And it isn’t because you threatened me. Abby needs me, too. She needs both of us. It’s not right for a little girl to have to worry so much about her parents.”
“I protect her. She’s my whole world.”
“You can’t protect her from watching and noticing. Or feeling. She’s worried because both of us are sad. It’s true. At least, it is for me. I’m miserable.”
Melancholy filled his eyes.
“I want us to make our marriage work,” she continued. “To make our family work. I’ve hurt you badly in the past. I know that now and I am so sorry. If I could change any of it, I would. I don’t know if you can get beyond that. If you can trust me.” She bit back the urge to ask if he could love her. That much she didn’t, couldn’t dare.
The mattress shifted and he touched her arm. “Look at me.”
Willing herself to not blow this by crying, she lifted her head.
“Do you mean it?”
“I’m not beautiful anymore. I’m not certain what I did before to make myself useful, and I don’t know if I can do it again. I don’t know what I have to offer, Ryder... except my solemn promise that I will never, ever hurt you again.”
He raised a hand slowly and touched her cheek with his knuckle. His eyes held the most peculiar expression.
“But you have to be honest with me.” His touch turned into a caress, and she leaned into the pleasure of his warm, rough-textured palm against her cheek. “I can’t keep discovering all these horrid things about myself. A part of me dies every time I learn something new and terrible.”
“Ah, darlin’, I wanted to protect you.”
“It’s impossible.” She placed her hand over his and folded her fingers. “Is it too late?”
“I don’t know.”
She closed her eyes. “We have to do something. I can’t take this anymore.” Determined not to distress him with her tears, she coughed away the growing lump in her throat. “I want to be good to you. I really do.” She made herself look at him “I don’t know why I didn’t love you before. You’re a wonderful man. You deserve the best. I’ll do anything for you, anything to make this work.”
The corner of his mouth lifted as if he wanted to smile but didn’t quite trust himself to do it.
She’d started it, and if she demanded honesty from him then she had to be honest with him. “I love you. I want our marriage to work. I want our family to work.”
His eyes darted to hers, then searched her face. “You mean it.”
“I’ve been dying inside, trying to figure out what to do. I can’t even properly apologize for what I’ve done because I don’t remember. All I can do is go forward. All I can do is beg you to show me how to love you.”
He cupped her chin, gently tugging her toward him. “You mean it.”
“I do ” He was so close to her now she could smell the toothpaste on his breath. She could read the aching hope in his eyes. Out of words, she pressed a gentle kiss to his lips.
“You love me,” he whispered.
“I must have been crazy before if I didn’t love you. I want to be your wife. I want our family to be a real family.” She kissed him again.
He responded by wrapping a powerful arm around her waist and falling in slow motion against the pillows, pulling her on top of him. He kiss
ed her, hard and eager and delicious. She caught the sides of his face, reveling in the light stubble on his cheeks and the sun-toughened texture of his skin. She worked her fingers through his thick hair, parting the curls. His busy tongue teased and tantalized, erotically slick. She wanted to kiss and kiss and kiss forever, lost in the warmth of arms.
When she lifted her head to catch her breath, she whispered, “How could I forget making love to you?”
He tugged at the belt holding her robe. After loosening the knot, be pulled the belt from around her waist and dropped it on the floor He pushed the heavy robe off her shoulder and lifted his head to press a hot kiss to her bare flesh.
“You’re still beautiful, Laura. Different, but... I think you’re more beautiful than before.”
“Oh.” She laid a finger against his lips. “Don’t say nice things to me. You’ll make me cry.”
He laughed and rolled her toward the middle of the bed. “You are beautiful.” With achingly slow tenderness, he spread her robe open over her shoulders. Underneath she wore a light cotton gown. He rubbed the flat of his palm in a slow circle over a sensitive nipple.
A shudder gripped her and worked its way from her knees, up her spine and back down, settling deep in her belly. A fluttery groan escaped her lips.
He breathed through parted lips, his expression one of eager anxiety. “I want you, darlin’. I want you with me.”
Clumsily, her hands feeling as if they belonged to someone else, she pushed and pulled at the robe until she worked it off her arms. As she sat up and gazed down upon him, she recognized the glowing approval in his eyes and the desire in the heat of his skin, and she felt beautiful.
He slid a hand under the hem of her gown and inched it up her thigh. She traced the hard lines of his face, examining up close the crinkly crow’s-feet at the corners of his eyes and the strong jut of his nose.
He reached the top of her leg, and her breath turned liquid and heavy in her chest. Working on instinct, she shifted and tugged the gown from beneath her. Watching him watching her, she pulled it over her bead.
He made a fluttery noise of his own.