Glory, Glory: Snowbound with the Bodyguard

by Linda Lael Miller

“Rarely,” she replied, moving to the sink. As she stood with her back to him he couldn’t help but notice again the tight fit of her worn jeans across her butt. She had a great butt. Besides the jeans she wore a pink sweater that hugged her slender curves and complemented her blond coloring.

  She fixed the bottle, then took Sammy from his arms and sat in the chair next to his, her hair falling softly around her shoulders. “If the streets are clear enough maybe it would be best if I found someplace else to go until the bus runs again.”

  She looked so small, so utterly vulnerable, and at that moment Sammy smiled at him around his bottle’s nipple, the gesture sending a stream of formula down the side of his mouth.

  “That isn’t necessary,” he replied. “Zack just told me the streets are practically clear, so I imagine that the bus will run tomorrow.”

  “Good.” She held his gaze. “About last night…”

  “You had a nightmare. I comforted you. That’s all there was to it.” He got up to pour himself another cup of coffee. “You want some breakfast? I was thinking maybe I’d make a stack of pancakes.”

  “You don’t have to go to all that trouble for me,” she protested.

  He grinned at her. “I’m more than willing to go to that kind of trouble for me.”

  She returned his smile. “Well, in that case pancakes sound wonderful.”

  Breakfast was pleasant. Sammy entertained with coos and grins as his mother and Dalton ate pancakes and talked. The conversation was marked with a new easiness that he suspected came from the fact that they both saw the end of their confinement together.

  She made him laugh as she shared with him funny stories about her grandmother. He noticed that in none of the stories did she mention the older sister she was supposedly on her way to visit, but he didn’t call her on it. Instead he simply enjoyed the way her eyes sparkled as she spoke of the old woman who had raised her.

  She might not have graduated high school, but she was smart as a whip. She argued politics with him and spoke easily of current affairs. He had a feeling she would do well no matter what path she chose in life.

  The rest of the day passed pleasantly. As Sammy took a late-afternoon nap, Dalton and Jane sat at the table and played poker with toothpicks as chips.

  “You’re one heck of a bluffer,” he said after she’d won her third pot.

  She laughed. “If you think I’m good, you should play with Nana. She’s the ultimate poker player in the family. In fact, she gets together once a week with some of the other ladies in the trailer park and they tell everyone they’re playing bridge, but they really play poker.”

  He laughed, but his laughter was cut short by a knock on his door. “Sit tight. I’ll get rid of whoever it is.” She cast him a grateful look as he got up from the table.

  It was probably one of his other brothers coming to check in on him. He’d have to play the sick card again. Hopefully he could bluff as well as Jane when it came to fooling his family members.

  He pulled open the door to see a burly, dark-haired man he’d never seen before standing there. He wore the khaki pants and coat of law enforcement. “Yes?”

  “Dalton West?”

  “Yeah, I’m Dalton.”

  “I’m Sheriff Brandon Sinclair from over in Sandstone. I hate to bother you, but I’m looking for a woman named Janette Black. She’s traveling with a baby and I have reason to believe she might have come here.” His gaze went over Dalton’s shoulder, as if trying to see inside the apartment.

  Dalton tensed but offered the man a frown of confusion. “There’s no woman or baby here,” he said. “What makes you think she’d come to me? I’ve never heard of this Janette Black before.” That part, at least, was true. But it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know that Jane was really Janette.

  “She stole money from the café where she worked and when we went to find her just before the storm hit we discovered more serious crimes. Her grandmother has been murdered and Janette is a person of interest. Your name and phone number were on a piece of paper next to the old woman’s bed, so we thought maybe she’d come here.”

  “Sorry, I’m afraid I can’t help you.” Dalton’s head whirled with the information Sheriff Sinclair had just given him. What in the hell was going on?

  Sinclair studied him for a long moment, then held out a card. “If you see her, or if she tries to make contact with you, give me a call. She’s dangerous, Mr. West. She needs to be behind bars.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind,” Dalton said. He murmured a goodbye, then closed his door. He waited until he heard the sound of the sheriff’s boots going back down the stairs, then he went into the kitchen.

  Janette sat at the table, her face devoid of all color. As she stared at him a deep, wrenching sob ripped from the back of her throat. “He killed Nana. First he raped me, and now he’s killed Nana,” she cried.

  She jumped up from the chair. “I’m—I’m going to be sick.” She ran for the bathroom as Sammy began to cry.

  Chapter 5

  Janette stood in the bathroom fighting not only an all-encompassing grief, but wave after wave of nausea, as well. Just hearing his deep voice had made her ill. Knowing he’d been on the other side of the door had sickened her.

  He’d found her.

  He’d said he found a notepad with Dalton’s name and number next to Nana’s bed. There was no way Nana would have willingly given him that information. Oh, God, she must have died trying to protect Janette and Sammy.

  Blinded by her tears, she leaned weakly against the wall and wondered if it were possible to die of grief. She felt as if she were dying. Her heart felt as if it might explode at any moment.

  Nana was dead.

  Nana was dead.

  Never again would Janette feel Nana’s arms around her, never again would she see the old woman’s eyes shining with love, her wrinkled face wreathed with laughter.

  And Janette was wanted for her murder. That’s how he would get Sammy. He’d see her tried for a murder she hadn’t committed. She’d spend the rest of her life in prison, and Brandon Sinclair would have her precious boy. And her nana, the woman who had meant the world to her, was dead.

  “Janette?” Dalton knocked on the door.

  She sucked in air, trying to stanch the deep sobs that ripped through her. She didn’t want to face him, was afraid that he might believe all the horrible things that Sinclair had said. And if he did believe Sinclair, there was nothing to stop him from contacting the lawman and letting him know she was here.

  “Janette, come on out. We need to talk.” His voice held a quiet command.

  She grabbed a handful of tissues and wiped at her eyes, at her nose, then tossed the tissues into the trash. But she was reluctant to open the door, afraid to face him. What if she told him the truth and he didn’t believe her? She didn’t think she could handle it.

  “Janette, you can’t stay in there all night.”

  He was right. She couldn’t stay in the bathroom. She opened the door. He no longer held Sammy, but as she stepped out of the bathroom Dalton opened his arms to her. She walked into them as tears of rich, raw grief began to flow again.

  His strong arms surrounded her, and they felt like shelter from a world that had been terrifying for a very long time. She cried into the front of his shirt, wondering how she was going to survive without Nana’s loving support.

  After several minutes, Dalton released her and led her to the sofa. Sammy was once again on his blanket on the floor, staring up at the ceiling as if fascinated by the patterns the late-afternoon sunshine made as it drifted through the window.

  Dalton sat next to her, his features inscrutable. “The truth, Janette. I need to know the whole truth,” he said softly. “You said he raped you. Were you talking about your old boyfriend?”

  She had two choices. Continue with the lies she’d told him, or tell the truth about everything. Her heart banged against her ribs. “No.” The word whispered out of her on a wave of despair. She knew it
was time to tell the truth. She had nothing to lose now and she wanted—needed—Dalton to know.

  She grabbed a strand of her hair and twisted it around her finger. “There is no ex-boyfriend. The man who raped me, the man who killed my grandmother, is Sheriff Brandon Sinclair.”

  Dalton’s eyes narrowed and he drew in a quick breath of surprise. “I think maybe you need to start at the beginning and tell me everything.”

  She leaned back against the plump sofa cushion and closed her eyes, fighting the overwhelming grief that still reached out to smother her in its clutches. She opened her eyes and gazed down at Sammy, who in the midst of her heartbreak had fallen asleep.

  Looking at Dalton, she fought against the tears and drew a deep, steadying breath. The beginning. “It happened one night when I was driving home from the classes I was taking to study for my GED. They took place at a community college about twenty-five miles from where I lived in Sandstone.”

  She rose from the sofa, unable to sit as she fought against the panic that remembering that night always brought. It was a panic that constricted her lungs, closed up the back of her throat and quickened her heartbeat. It was the fear of having to remember and the additional stress of wondering if Dalton would believe her.

  “Janette.” He reached out and took her hand. Holding it firmly he drew her back on the sofa next to him. “It’s okay, you’re safe for now.” He didn’t let go of her hand. It was as if he knew she needed support, something to cling to as she went back to that horrible night.

  She nodded and swallowed hard. “The highway between the community college and Sandstone is pretty deserted after dark. I was about halfway between the college and home when I saw the lights of a patrol car in my rearview mirror. I knew I was speeding so I pulled over to the side of the road, figuring I was about to get a ticket.”

  She paused and drew another deep breath, trying to still the frantic beat of her heart. Dalton squeezed her hand, as if to give her strength, and she desperately needed it. She needed all the strength he could give her to get through the rest of it.

  “I thought something was odd when he told me to turn off my headlights and get out of the car. He told me I had been speeding and asked if I was doing drugs. I’ve never touched drugs in my life,” she stated emphatically.

  Dalton nodded, his expression giving nothing away of his inner thoughts. “Had you had run-ins with him before that night?”

  “Never,” she replied. “I’d seen him around town, on the streets, but he’d never spoken to me before, never even noticed me that I knew of.”

  “What happened next?” he asked.

  A trembling began deep inside her. It was as if all the warmth of the room had been sucked out and an arctic chill had taken over the world. Tears blurred her vision once again and she blinked them away, angry that after all this time the memory of what happened still had the power to make her cry.

  “He told me he needed to frisk me and he warned me that he’d hate to have to shoot me for resisting.” She looked down at Dalton’s hand around hers, unable to look him in the eyes.

  “He raped me there on the side of the road.” The words didn’t begin to describe the horror, the violation of that night.

  Her nose filled with the sweaty, ugly scent of Sinclair. Her skin wanted to crawl off her body as she thought of the way he’d touched her, the sounds he’d made as he pushed himself against her. “I won’t bore you with all the ugly details.”

  She pulled her hand from Dalton’s, afraid he could feel the ugliness inside her. She couldn’t look at him, was afraid to see disbelief in his eyes. She’d fall completely to pieces if she saw doubt or condemnation there.

  “What happened after?” His voice was soft, as if he understood the emotions blackening her soul. Thank God he didn’t press her for any of the details of the rape itself, for she’d shoved those particular memories deep inside her in a place where she wouldn’t easily retrieve them.

  She looked up into those warm green eyes of his. “Nothing,” she said simply. She forced a smile of dark humor. “I guess I should be grateful that at least I didn’t get a speeding ticket.” The smile faltered and fell away as tears once again burned at her eyes.

  He raised a dark eyebrow. “You didn’t tell anyone?”

  She leaned back and stared at a point just over his shoulder. “Who was I going to tell? I couldn’t exactly report the crime to the sheriff.” There was more than a touch of bitterness in her voice.

  She shook her head. “I didn’t tell anyone. I didn’t want to tell Nana because I thought it might destroy her. It wasn’t until I realized I was pregnant that I finally told Nana and the man I’d been seeing at the time.” A shaft of pain stabbed through her. “He asked me what I’d been wearing that night, implying that it was somehow my fault. Needless to say that was the end of that relationship.”

  “And you’re sure Sheriff Sinclair is Sammy’s biological father?” There was a faint note of apology in his voice.

  She wanted to be offended by the question, but realized Dalton really didn’t know anything about her. It was a fair question, she supposed.

  “I’m positive. The guy I was seeing at the time…we hadn’t…you know, been intimate.” Her cheeks burned and she kept her gaze averted from his.

  “So, you realized you were pregnant. What happened then?”

  She looked at him once again. It was impossible to read him. She had no idea if he believed her or not, couldn’t get a sense of anything that might be flowing through his head.

  “The last thing I wanted was for Brandon Sinclair to know that I was pregnant. I managed to hide my condition from everyone until late in the pregnancy, then I told people who noticed that I’d had a fling with a salesman passing through town.” She gazed down at Sammy. “As far as I was concerned Brandon Sinclair had no right to know about my condition. From the very beginning Sammy was my baby and nobody else’s.”

  “So, he didn’t know anything about Sammy.”

  “I didn’t think he knew until three days ago when he walked into the café where I worked.” She told him about Sinclair and his deputies coming in and the sheriff asking her about her son.

  “There was something in his eyes, something in the things he was saying that let me know I had to take Sammy and run and so that’s what I did. I didn’t steal anything from the café, but the moment the sheriff left, I told Smiley, the owner, that I didn’t feel well. I also told him I wasn’t happy working there and I was quitting, then I went home.”

  She paused a moment to draw a deep breath then continued, “Nana agreed that I needed to take Sammy and leave town, get as far away as possible from Sheriff Sinclair. One of Nana’s friends drove me here to catch the bus. Our plan was that I’d get settled someplace far away from Oklahoma, then I’d send for Nana and we’d start building a new life together.” Grief once again rocked through her and new tears burned at her eyes as she thought of her grandmother.

  Dalton studied her, a tiny frown furrowing the area in the center of his forehead. “After that night of the rape, did he continue to bother you? To threaten you in any way?”

  She shook her head. “No. Of course, I went out of my way to avoid him. I kept my pregnancy pretty well hidden, too. The few times we did run into each other, it was as if nothing had ever happened. He’d look right through me, as if he had no memory of what he’d done.”

  She wrapped her arms around herself, fighting a new chill. A bitter laugh escaped her. “Who was I going to report it to?” she said more to herself than to him. “Who was I going to tell about the rape? The sheriff? His deputies? Brandon Sinclair owns Sandstone.”

  Leaning forward she stared at the wall just over Dalton’s shoulder. “Everyone is afraid of him. He’ll get Smiley, my boss at the café, to agree that I stole money. He’ll get anyone in town to say anything whether it’s true or not, because nobody wants to get on his bad side. Besides, when he was done with me he reminded me that I was nothing but trailer trash
and nobody would ever believe my word over his.”

  “I believe you.”

  Those three words, so simply spoken, wove a strand of warmth around her heart. She hadn’t realized how badly she’d wanted to hear somebody other than her nana say them. She began to cry again.

  *

  Dalton pulled her against his broad chest as her tears flowed once again. He believed her. Dalton, better than anyone, knew that a gold badge of law enforcement could hide a sick, twisted soul.

  There was no way she could fake the grief she felt for her grandmother and there was no way she could have manufactured the trauma she’d exhibited as she’d told him about the rape.

  He tightened his arms around her. There was a special place in hell for men who raped women, and a place beyond hell for men in authority who abused women.

  Janette’s tears finally ebbed and she raised her head and looked at him, the blue of her eyes dark with tortured sorrow. “I just can’t believe she’s gone,” she said, her voice hoarse with emotion. “I just talked to her yesterday morning.”

  “Yesterday morning?” Dalton frowned, the sheriff’s words replaying in his mind. “You spoke to your grandmother yesterday morning?”

  She nodded and moved out of his embrace. She wiped at her cheeks and tucked a strand of her shiny hair behind her ear. “I called her from here to let her know that I was stuck here because of the storm.”

  “But according to what Sheriff Sinclair told me, he found her dead before the storm moved in.”

  Janette blinked in confusion. “But that’s impossible.” Her tears disappeared as a tenuous hope shone from her eyes. “He lied. And if she wasn’t dead when he said she was, maybe she isn’t dead at all. Maybe he just said that to get you to turn me over to him.” She jumped up from the sofa and headed to the cordless phone on the end table.

  Dalton leaned forward and watched her. As she punched in numbers she looked small and fragile, and the thought of a man touching her, taking her with force filled him with a simmering rage.

  He watched her face as she gripped the phone receiver tightly against her ear. The hope that had momentarily lit her eyes faded.