She pushed her sleeves up slightly. It was then she noticed her anniversary bracelet was gone.
“What?” he demanded, noticing her hesitation.
“Nothing,” she replied quickly. The bracelet had been tucked up the sleeve of her sweatshirt, and she hadn’t even thought about it when he’d demanded her jewelry during the robbery. Now she wondered briefly where it could be.
“If you’ve got to go, it’s through that door right there,” he said.
Justine went into the small bathroom and looked around. She noticed that two or three of the floorboards moved with her steps and she was careful not to trip.
“Leave the door open,” he instructed.
She looked at him, as he stood in the doorway. “Do you plan to watch?” she asked evenly, feeling stronger now that she was out in the light and not suffocating in the dark.
“Do I have to?” he asked in reply.
Justine looked at the small bathroom window.
“The window’s painted shut,” he said.
She looked beyond him into the kitchen. She saw the stolen money scattered on the old table there, along with her wedding ring, a wallet, and other pieces of jewelry.
As if he read her mind, he said, “I’ll be right out there. You won’t be able to get past me, but you’re welcome to try if you want.”
With that, he turned and left. There was nothing she could do but what her body demanded. She didn’t plan to try and get past him. One, she couldn’t stand the thought of having his hands touch her, and she knew if he chased her down, that’s what he would do. Two, if she were going to develop any sort of trust with this man, she was going to have to start here and now. She was going to have to proceed as she’d done the night before, since she couldn’t sit and do nothing.
That didn’t mean she came out of the bathroom in any hurry. Her reflection in the small medicine cabinet mirror above the sink revealed a woman she’d never seen before. Her nose was swollen, and appeared too big for her face. No wonder it felt weird.
The dried blood on her chin and above her top lip was enough to send a shiver up her spine. She shook her hair to get out some of the dust, but there was nothing she could do about the dark circles under her eyes.
Carefully, Justine washed off the blood. The cool water from the tap felt good on her cheeks and washed away the dry, cracked feeling on her hands from working with the grout the day before. She did her best not to touch her nose. It wasn’t exactly a much-needed shower, but the water splashed on her face was better than nothing. And the water she drank from her cupped hands cooled her dry throat.
She heard him toss more logs on the fire. Slowly, she made her way back out to the kitchen.
“Can I have something to eat?” she asked. The table was between them and he stood at the hearth. Justine chose to keep it that way.
He ignored her as he stoked the fire.
“Please,” she said after a moment when it seemed like he would continue to ignore her. “I have a medical condition, and I need to eat or I’m afraid I might get really sick. You wouldn’t want that, would you?” She needed to eat to keep away the morning sickness.
He met her gaze. “So Dan married a woman with a ‘medical condition?’ I’m surprised he’d have anything less than perfect.”
Justine wished for nothing more than a bolt of lightning to strike him. But when it didn’t happen, she muttered, “Please.”
He drew closer, moving around the unconscious man on the floor. As he passed her, he stopped and looked at her sideways. “I’m not going to have to run out for insulin or anything like that, am I?”
“No.”
“Good.” He reached out as if to touch her face, and Justine stepped back, out of his reach. He grinned at her before moving into the small kitchen area of the cabin where he rummaged through a couple cabinets.
Justine watched him quietly, taking in the fact that the cabinets held little more than dust.
“Let’s see what’s on the menu. I have crackers with canned cheese. I have power bars. I have tuna and canned chicken. And bottled water. What can I get for you?” He mimicked a waiter.
“Crackers and cheese and a bottle of water, please.”
“Here,” he said a moment later, setting it out on the small table. He added a power bar and a chocolate bar, as if for good measure.
“Thank you.” Justine sat down at the small table and opened the box of crackers.
“You can stay out here as long as you don’t try anything stupid,” he said.
“Okay.” She crunched a cracker. She might have agreed, but her plan was to run if she saw an opportunity.
“But if you try to get away or anything,” he went on, “or give me any trouble, you’ll be back in the room tied up tighter than ever.”
“Okay.” She spread cheese on a cracker, planning to eat several, so she’d have the strength to run.
“Good.”
To her surprise, he sat down across from her. Then, as if they were sharing a snack together, he reached over and fixed himself a cracker with cheese before fitting the whole thing into his mouth.
“Don’t you even want to know my name?” he asked absently.
“I don’t want to know anything about you,” she said. She ate her cracker and felt it hit the bottom of her stomach. It wasn’t caviar, but she was starving, and it did wonders with helping her feel better. She stared down at the chocolate bar after she took a bite of it and tried to remember the last time she tasted anything so wonderful.
She remembered making a celebration dinner after they’d gotten a contract on the house they wanted, the house they now owned and renovated. Dan was late, obviously caught up in something at work. To make it up to her, he brought her chocolates and they’d fed them to one another by candlelight.
Her captor brought her back to the present. “Don’t lie to me and act like you don’t want to know anything. I know you. I’ve watched you for several months, even saw you in court. Questions are burning in your gut right now.” He stuffed another cracker into his mouth.
Justine took her time making another cracker, slowly spreading the cheese evenly without looking at him, not giving him the satisfaction of letting him know what he said was true. Yes, questions did burn her insides. What burned more was the idea of the creep stalking her.
“Deke Rynolds.”
He spoke as if his name should mean something to her. She hardly threw him a glance and studied her cracker before eating it. She had to fight not to shove the cracker in her mouth, she was so hungry. At the same time, she didn’t want any lengthy conversations with this man. She didn’t want to know his name. Her only comfort was that he’d have to state it in court when he was charged with kidnapping. What she did want was to gain his trust to give herself some leeway in a possible chance of escape. That was it.
At the same time, there was one question she could not ignore. She washed her cracker down with a sip of the bottled water. “What did you mean when you said my husband was wanted by the FBI?”
Chapter 18
Dan watched the gray of dawn break through the dark of night as he headed home from the Albrights. He hadn’t known he’d stayed so long with him. He wanted nothing more than to race to where he bet Deke held Justine, but he needed to plan, needed to gather supplies and be his best when he met his past adversary.
Deke would be waiting for him and had been given time to make a plan. Dan needed to do the same if he was going to beat Deke at this game.
At home, Dan made himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because he didn’t feel like cooking. That was why Justine had gone to the store to begin with. The last thing he wanted was something to eat, but it had been over twelve hours since lunch. If he was going to go after Deke Rynolds, he needed to be in top form.
But even the sweetness of the jelly and the stickiness of the peanut butter couldn’t move through the walls of emptiness that threatened to close in on him.
So he sat and slowly chewe
d, taking one deep breath after another as he waited, planning what was best to take with him. He needed firepower, but he needed a light load.
Why hadn’t Deke called yet?
Just what the hell was he planning?
Knowing Deke, it was a trap. That was why Dan needed to be ready for anything.
When Dan finished his sandwich, he fought down the empty, lost, and helpless feeling that threatened him. He didn’t have time for that shit.
“Dammit!” he said suddenly into the emptiness. With a force that stung, he slammed his hand against the table, sending a sound as loud as a gunshot through the still house. He didn’t have time to question whether or not he could live a life past his history with Deke.
He could.
He would.
For himself. For Justine. For the baby.
The thought of the baby stopped him cold as he stood in the bathroom about to put on a clean, camouflage shirt.
“A baby…” He forced himself to acknowledge that the child existed. But to acknowledge it also meant he had to face the fact that he might not be able to save the baby. It would be another innocent lost—his worst nightmare—and he wasn’t ready for that. Not yet.
He stopped and the house was completely silent. Oh, it was so hard not to let go of the few remaining strings that held his restraint together. He wanted to close his eyes to all of this and not look. He wanted to fall into a deep sleep with the hope that he wouldn’t awake until this nightmare was over.
No, what he really wanted was to go back in time and kill that bastard, Deke Rynolds.
He looked around the house. Their house. They’d made it home together for the past year. Dan thought back to the day they signed the papers. Justine had insisted they stay overnight in it and when he called out on a disturbance, he’d discovered her there with an air mattress, picnic basket and champagne. They’d christened the house that first night and built it a little more every day into what they both called home. He could not, would not, allow Deke to tear one piece of it apart.
In the quiet loneliness, it was too easy to let in horrible mental images of what might be happening to Justine. And he refused to let them in.
He absolutely could not think of his wife as being hurt, tortured or even dead, not at Deke’s hands, not at anyone’s hands.
Dan slipped his shirt on, mentally listing what he planned to take.
His insides shook. He thought he was just too close to falling apart. He forced himself to calm and tried to clear his mind, determined to get his wife back.
Just when he felt ready to head out and face Deke, he glanced down and something in the bottom of the small bathroom trash can caught his eye.
He stared down for a long moment before he reached in and fished out the object. It was small and narrow. He’d never seen one in actuality, but he knew immediately what it was.
It was a pregnancy test.
A positive pregnancy test.
“Oh, hell…” he breathed, unable to look away from what he held.
His words and his ragged breath and the rushing sounds of his own heart beat in his ears were all that broke the utter suffocating silence that surrounded him.
His legs weren’t strong enough to hold him up. He let himself sink to the floor in order to keep from falling flat on his face.
A baby. There really was a baby growing in Justine. Never mind the thought of diapers and new shoes every few months. Never mind that there might be Scouts, little league or ballet classes in the future. Never mind that he didn’t want it. Some little person was coming into this world in a few months. That little person was going to need a lot for a long time, probably forever.
Dan stared at the positive test in his hand for a long time. Strange, he didn’t feel any anger, not like he had when she first blurted out the news yesterday. Now he merely felt wonder. She’d obviously stopped taking her pill or missed a day.
He’d asked her what she planned to do about it. But the bigger question was what did he plan to do about it? Stick it out with her, raise this baby? Walk away? She thought he didn’t want it, and he’d let her think that. He’d never told her the truth. He’d never told her how important family was to him. Given the way he’d lost his parents when he was young, deep in his heart, this was all he’d ever really wanted. Mom, Dad, kids. It just hurt too much to know he could never have it, so he kept it hidden beneath the lie that he didn’t want it because he saw so many troubled kids.
“Hell,” he muttered again, as the realization flooded through him like an out-of-control river. In hopes of venting his frustration, he fired the positive pregnancy test back into the trash can as hard as he could throw it. He thought his frustration at not being able to help his wife was overwhelming. He thought it couldn’t get any worse.
He stared at the positive pregnancy test and knew that it just did.
Justine’s words had stunned him.
Seeing that positive pink line knocked the wind from his lungs.
How should he handle this?
His most dreaded nightmare?
Could he see it as a gift?
He thought of a child with Justine. It would be a child to love unconditionally, a child who would look up to him. Could he give the necessary guidance and teach this child in a way so that he never had to become one of those helpless parents?
Control. Dan had to get control of himself. He had to do something, but suddenly he couldn’t move. All he could do was force himself to breathe and think about his wife and the baby. He suddenly couldn’t help but wonder if it would be a boy, a boy who might remind him of one of Justine’s brothers, or a girl, as sassy and beautiful with dark eyes like her mother. All he could do was think about the two people who now meant everything in the world to him and how their lives were in the hands of a man with a gun, a man who in one swift move had turned his life to hell. The funny thing was, he’d thought he’d been in hell already until that moment. He just hadn’t known how much further into hell he could fall.
He pushed the thoughts of Deke from his mind and again thought of the baby, a baby who would someday call him Daddy.
He groaned out loud at the thought. How could he ever protect a tiny, helpless person, when he wasn’t able protect his wife, when he wasn’t able to keep himself from falling to pieces?
But he could and he would. He had no choice not to do so. It was a huge obstacle to overcome, but he could do it. For Justine. Because of how much he loved her.
He knew it might be a stupid thing, but he reached into the trash can again and pulled the test out, setting it on a tissue on the counter. Justine might want to keep it or look at it again. It was a stupid thought, but somehow this was a connection to her, and he wasn’t quite ready to trash it.
Then he covered his face with his hands. “Oh, Justine,” he said softly. “I love you. I’ve always loved you. I will always love you. Can you hear me? I hope you can hear me. I’m so sorry.” He took several deep breaths. His voice grew stronger. “Counselor, I’m coming for you.”
Chapter 19
Justine tried to tell herself this was no different than addressing a rough judge. But she couldn’t forget that this ‘trial’ was for her life. Her assailant was her judge and jury and executioner, and she was up against him without any help.
“Dan robbed a bank,” he replied to her.
She nearly burst out laughing. She practically choked on the cracker in her mouth. “Impossible,” she said.
“Not nearly as impossible as you think. Your wonderful husband, the same one who makes love to you at night and wakes up beside you in the morning was my get-away driver for a great bank heist. Not quite three million dollars. The only problem was he managed to get away with all the money.”
“I don’t believe you,” she said softly. At the same time, a cold little monster gnawed at her insides. There was a part of Dan that he always worked to keep hidden from her, a part of himself he never allowed anyone to see or get near.
But Dan
was good. Dan upheld the law. Dan took an oath to serve and protect.
After he drove a get-away car filled with three million dollars?
“Believe it or not, I don’t care,” Deke said. “But you can’t deny your wonderful hubby knew who I was yesterday despite my disguise. He must know me from somewhere.”
“You’re probably one of his many arrests,” she said.
“No, I can’t say I’ve got his name on my record anywhere,” he replied.
“If it’s true, and I’m only saying if, when did this take place?”
“Nine years ago, almost to the day.”
“And Dan’s supposedly had your three million dollars all this time?” Despite her wish to not waste her time talking to him, she couldn’t seem to stop the questions.
“Well, he better have, because I want my cut. And if he can’t get it to me, I’ll just have to take it from somewhere else—or perhaps from someone else.” He looked hard at her as he spoke.
“Why did you wait so long to collect?”
“Things got a bit hot for me. It seems the authorities got my fingerprints. It didn’t help that things went bad inside the bank and an off-duty cop was doing security that day. I kind of hurt him. I thought it best to skip town for a while. Actually, I skipped the country. I would have liked to come back sooner, but well,” he shrugged, as this was all nothing, “things happen.” He cocked his head slightly, explaining in an easy manner that sounded as if he were talking merely about how to set up a garden or something equally as trivial.
He didn’t elaborate on what things happened.
“Did you kill the security guard cop?”
“No, but I did hit him pretty hard, adding an assaulting a police officer charge to my armed robbery charge. I didn’t think it was a good idea to stick around to see how it all panned out. But now that things are a little more settled, I thought it would be safe to contact my old comrade in arms and collect my just rewards.”
A Twist of Betrayal Page 13