Tangled Web

by Cathy Gillen Thacker

  Sensing this was becoming too painful for her, Chase covered her hands with his own. “Hope, you don’t have to go on if you don’t want to,” he said. Suddenly it wasn’t important to him that he knew every detail, just that she was there, just that she was willing to talk, to share.

  But Hope shook her head defiantly. “No,” she said softly, “I want to tell you. I need you to know this.” Only if he could accept it, accept her, could they be close.

  “Everything was okay until we got out of the city, but once we were on the country highway that led back to his parents’ ranch, he started—well, he wouldn’t leave me alone. He kept pulling at the hem of my dress, touching me.” Her face burned at the helplessness she had felt. “I tried to get him to quit but he wouldn’t listen and with my hands on the wheel…I thought about pulling the car over but I was afraid to do that because we were so far from help. I knew he was stronger than I was and he had this crazy look in his eyes.”

  Chase tightened his grip on her hands. What she was describing made him livid. Worse, it sounded exactly like something Russell Morris would do. Bullies like him never played fair. “You did the only thing you could,” he soothed, wishing he could make Hope feel better, yet fearing in his gut the worst was yet to be told.

  “I thought so, too,” Hope replied in a voice that was both numb and sad. Tears welled up in her eyes. “But he grabbed me again, harder this time. The next thing I knew, the car left the road and we ended up in a ditch. Luckily, neither of us were hurt, just shaken up a bit. I was scared and furious, but he just thought it was funny. We started to get out of the car, to go for help. We knew we were just a few miles from home by then. And that’s when he—he did what he’d been wanting to do all night. He dragged me down into the ditch and—” She choked up, unable to go on.

  And Chase found, she didn’t have to. The next he could imagine with no trouble at all. A killing rage started in him, lessened only by his need to comfort her.

  Running both hands through her hair, she related miserably, “Afterward, I got away and walked the rest of the way home. Once there, I tried to tell my parents what had happened, but they didn’t believe me. Russell told everyone that we’d both been drinking that night and that we’d been trying to make love while we drove and that was how the accident had happened. He’d explained the grass stains on my clothing by saying we’d been so drunk that we’d finished it in the ditch.” Tears flowed down her face. She couldn’t look at him. “I tried to go to the police anyway but they didn’t believe me, either. The doctors at the hospital knew I’d been violated but couldn’t guarantee that my bruises were from the rape and not the wreck.”

  The incompetence of the officials was infuriating. “Couldn’t they tell you’d been forced?” Chase asked.

  She shrugged as if it no longer mattered, and released a bone-weary sigh. “Russell freely admitted to the fact he’d been very rough.” She shut her eyes, gritting her teeth against the memory. “He told the police I—” she swallowed hard, looking ill again “—liked it that way.”

  Oh God, Chase thought. She’d been through so much, without even her parents to stand by her.

  Bitterly she continued, “The bartenders at the bar only remembered serving us both drinks and taking away empty glasses. I was so hysterical by the time I got to the emergency room hours later that no one thought to give me a blood test, so we had no proof later that I hadn’t been drinking.” She shook her head miserably, whispering, “It was such a mess, Chase, and it didn’t end with that night, either.” Her lower lip trembled. “His insurance company sued me for the loss of his car because I’d been driving. I lost my license. His parents, livid about the whole thing, threw my family off the tenant farm and then spread some money around, insuring that the case would never make it as far as the grand jury for indictment. They told everyone that I was trying to milk their family of money, that Russell was the victim of my drunk, irresponsible actions, not the other way around. And because we’d had those two dates, because I was poor and he was rich, everyone believed him.” Her voice broke. “Everyone thought the worst of me, including my parents.”

  “That’s why you got so mad at Mr. Bateman at the baseball game,” Chase said slowly, recalling her vehement reaction to a similar injustice.

  Looking pale and drawn, she clenched her fists. “Yes. I can’t stand it when people use their power and position and wealth to hurt others. It brings it all back.”

  “I’m sorry, Hope.” He put his arms around her, and gently turned her face to him. She saw only understanding in his face for what she’d been through. “And that’s why you broke with your family?”

  She nodded, admitting, “I couldn’t stay.”

  And, Chase thought sadly, they hadn’t wanted her. How had she been through so much, he wondered, and come through with her heart and soul intact?

  “I came to Houston and I got a job at Barrister’s.” She took a deep breath. Now came the really hard part. “It was only later I realized I was pregnant.” She teared up again, looking heartrendingly vulnerable. “For Joey’s sake, I wish I could say that it hadn’t bothered me how he had been conceived, but it did,” she said. “I couldn’t bear the thought of having Russell Morris’s child. I decided to have an abortion. And so I went to Atlanta to have an abortion.”

  Suddenly it all made sense to Chase. Edmond, in a blue funk himself about his own situation, had reached out to help someone else. And he’d been drawn in by Hope’s beauty and warmth and innate capacity for love. “And my father went with you,” he said.

  Composing herself slightly, Hope nodded. “Yes. Only once I got there I realized I couldn’t go through with that, either.” She sighed tiredly. “I realized I wanted the child because it was my child.” Tears ran down her face and she wiped them away. “And that’s when Edmond came up with the idea to marry me. It was only supposed to be for a little while,” she confided hoarsely. “He was just going to give the baby a name, but in those first few months we grew to love each other. Not passionately, but deeply.” She shrugged, not knowing if he would understand, but wishing desperately that he would. “I know we were years apart in age, but we had so much in common, Chase, our love of the store, of Joey. He was so good to me and I tried to be good to him.”

  She didn’t have to convince him. Chase knew she had done that and more. She had loved Edmond and he had loved her. “You knew about the consequences of his illness when you married him?” he asked kindly. He only felt a little jealous that Hope had been closer to his father than he had been at that point in his life.

  Hope nodded. “Yes, I knew he was incapable of making love with me, but it didn’t matter.” She gestured helplessly. “I was never a physical person prior to that and the rape left me with an aversion to even the idea of trying to make love.” It was an aversion she had kept until Chase held her in his arms. Then, something different, something magical, always seemed to happen. She had felt guilty at first, but now she accepted it. It had nothing to do with Edmond and everything to do with Chase.

  “He gave me everything I wanted, all the security, all the love. He was like a parent to me and a best friend and a father confessor. And I loved him with all my heart and soul.”

  “And you were happy,” Chase said softly, suddenly glad his father and Hope had been blessed with each other.

  “Yes,” Hope affirmed. “We were.”

  His feelings in turmoil, Chase thought about all she had told him. And the danger still ahead. “Does Russell know about Joey?”

  Her face drained of color and she clung to him. “He’s just recently figured it out.” Tilting her head back, so she could look deep into his eyes, she confessed honestly, “Chase, I’m scared. I’ve already paid him one hundred thousand dollars. That’s why I sold my jewelry. I was trying so hard to get rid of him, to get him out of my life and Joey’s once and for all.”

  Chase had figured as much. Still, it was a relief to hear her say it. She was finally telling him everythin
g; she trusted him, after all. “But he still wants more,” Chase ascertained grimly. He was thinking ahead to possible solutions.

  Hope nodded. “Yes.” Her eyes darkened and her mouth took on a brave, determined line. “I realized tonight I can’t pay him again. If I do, it’ll never end.” She hesitated, looking to him for the answers she didn’t have, needing him as never before. “What am I going to do?”

  He held her close, stroking her hair, glad he was able to be there for her. As he contemplated the future, his mood was both troubled and thoughtful. He had to find a way to help her out. He wouldn’t rest until he did. “We’ll figure something out, Hope,” he said, gently reassuring her. “I promise you we will.”

  RUSSELL WAS WAITING for Hope when she walked into Maxim’s. Seeing Chase by her side, his expression soured. His mouth compressed in a furious line, he looked at Hope for explanation.

  “I’ve told Chase everything,” Hope said simply.

  “And I’m here to tell you to back off, pal,” Chase continued. He turned a chair around, slipped into it backward and folded his hands across the top. “The Barrister name wields a lot of influence in this state. Extortion is against the law.”

  Russell looked at her, pressuring her to back up his claim. “Hope’s just been helping out an old friend,” he said.

  Telling Chase the truth had exorcised a lot of demons within her. Hope knew she didn’t have to be afraid anymore, not of the truth and not of Russell. She still didn’t want Joey to know, but if it came to that, she knew they would find a way to handle it. She smiled at Russell, her eyes carrying the same dangerous glint as Chase’s. “I’m calling in my loans,” she informed her nemesis quietly.

  Chase fumed like a volcano about to blow as he faced Russell. “We’ll give you twenty-four hours to come up with the cash she so kindly ‘loaned’ you,” he said. The smoothness in his voice didn’t lessen the threat in his eyes one iota. “Then we go to the police and talk extortion.”

  “You wouldn’t dare,” Russell said smugly. The dots of perspiration on his upper lip belied the put-on confidence in his voice.

  “Yes,” Hope said firmly, saying what she had known she should have said from the very first, “I would.” For the first time in weeks she could face Russell without the fear of a migraine coming on.

  They stared at one another. Equals now. No longer the defenseless poor girl and the overbearing rich stud.

  “Be at our attorney’s office tomorrow at ten sharp,” Chase said, passing Russell a piece of paper with the name and address written on it. “And be ready to sign some papers.” He gave him a crocodile grin. “We’re going to make sure this never happens again.”

  Russell looked outwardly unimpressed, though a muscle was ticking involuntarily in his jaw. “And if I don’t show up?” he asked. His low voice was laced with vindictive fury.

  “Then be ready to face blackmail and extortion charges,” Hope said flatly, refusing to let him intimidate her. “Because I will go to the police, Russell.”

  “And this time,” Chase finished smugly, “she’ll have the full power of the Barrister name and all our influence behind her and she will win.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Exhausted?” Chase asked as he drove Hope home shortly before noon the following day.

  “Very,” Hope said. The session with the lawyers had been grueling but productive. Russell Morris had not only returned the money Hope had given him, but he had agreed never to seek custody of Joey. She had, in turn, promised never to ask Russell Morris for any type of financial support, or to divulge to Joey or anyone else who his real father was.

  Finally, after all these weeks, Hope was free of the blackmail, the threats and the memories. She should have felt wonderful. And maybe she would’ve had she not been so on edge about the relationship between herself and Chase.

  She still didn’t know where she stood with him. She wasn’t sure he knew where they stood. She didn’t want to believe the passion he felt for her was fleeting, but she also knew he wasn’t a man who, apart from his one brief, failed engagement, had ever professed a need to be tied down to any one woman or any one place. She was still very tied to Houston and to Barrister’s. She also still had a son to raise. Even if she wanted to follow Chase to the ends of the earth, she couldn’t.

  “Why don’t you go up and lie down?” Chase asked as he let them in the front door. “I’ll go in and get Carmelita to make you some tea.”

  “Thanks. I think I will.”

  Once upstairs in her bedroom, Hope kicked off her shoes and lay down on the bed. She shut her eyes. As she did so, she was confronted with vivid images of Chase and herself in the guest house, in his bed. Her face burned as she recalled how passionate they had been, how uninhibited. She had never guessed lovemaking could be like that. Never. But with Chase it was.

  Chase walked in, tray in hands. “Tea for m’lady.”

  Perspiring slightly at the nature of her thoughts, she sat up. He reached behind her to prop up the pillows and noted the moisture on her brow. “Not getting another migraine, are you?”

  Hope smiled her relief, glad she was at last able to say, “No, I think they’re all gone.”

  “Good.” He straightened and looked around awkwardly.

  “Chase—” There was so much she wanted to say, but she didn’t know where to begin. Or even if now was the time. “You don’t have to stay with me,” she said softly.

  Gently he tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I know that. I want to.” Seeing all the questions in her eyes, he confessed in a low, intimate tone that let her know he really did understand her, “I know what it is to handle the hard stuff alone, Hope.”

  Hope took in the firm, very masculine line of his mouth. Remembering what it had been like to kiss it, and be kissed by that mouth, the warmth of desire flowed through her. Trying to distract herself into paying attention to the conversation, she asked, “What do you mean?”

  He shrugged. If he was entertaining the same type of licentious thoughts, he didn’t show it, Hope thought. He traced a pattern lightly on the back of her hand. “Growing up, it seemed my parents were always fighting and I had no one to turn to.” His hand clasped hers tenderly and his eyes met hers. “I don’t want that for you, not anymore,” he said, reminding her of all the storms she had previously had to weather alone in her life. “I don’t want that for me.”

  Hope looked up at him, her heart in her throat. They stared at each other. They both longed to make love again. Only neither was sure what it would mean. Hope wasn’t sure she wanted to risk what had been a very pleasant, very wonderful, very giving memory.

  Reading her fear, he slowly and deliberately stood, picked up a gift-wrapped box she had failed to notice and brought it forward. “I almost forgot,” he said with care, his hazel eyes calm and searching. “Here. This is for you.”

  Aware of his gaze on her, she opened it with trembling fingers. Inside was all her jewelry. Each piece conjured up a different memory, of life with his father, of life before Chase. Overcome with emotion, she didn’t know what to say.

  “I knew you didn’t want to part with it, so I bought it back for you,” he said.

  Only he had waited until now to give it to her. Earlier he hadn’t trusted her enough. Now that he did, he found he really didn’t want her to have it, not if it meant she became his father’s wife again. His unwilling stepmother.

  “You really do think of everything,” Hope observed in a shaking voice.

  He studied her reaction, finding her not nearly as happy as he would have expected her to be weeks ago, when he had borrowed against the principle on his trust, and arranged to buy the jewelry. “It upsets you to have it back?”

  Hope shook her head slowly. No, it upset her to know he was leaving. But knowing how he had hated having burdens put on him—how his father expected him to take over the store and his mother expected him to be a social butterfly—she didn’t see how she could put demands on him, too. Not afte
r all he had already done for her and for Joey.

  “It’s not the jewelry,” she said, finding it hard to speak around the tightness in her throat. She was so afraid they were going to lose everything they’d found, and she didn’t think she could bear it if they did.

  “What then?” Chase prodded patiently.

  With effort, she summoned up all her courage and tried to cope with her feelings. “It’s about that night in the guest house.” She didn’t want a marriage like she had had before, with him marrying her because he knew she needed someone and wanted to help out. She wanted him there because he wanted to be there. Because he loved her as a man should love a woman.

  Chase studied her, looking suddenly as afraid, as wary, as she felt. “Are you angry with me?” he asked simply. “Do you think I took advantage of you, the situation?”

  “No,” she said, aghast. She stretched her legs out in front of her, smoothing the crocheted white afghan from knee to waist, as if by making herself more physically comfortable it would be easier to admit something that was emotionally uncomfortable to her.

  “No, I wanted that to happen.” She had for a very long time.

  “So did I,” Chase said softly, watching as she dipped her fingers restlessly into the intricate white weave of the afghan.

  It’s now or never, Hope told herself firmly. Be brave and lay it all on the line or die wondering what might have been. She had to find the courage to talk openly and honestly to him today. Right now, right this minute, while their feelings were still fresh. “Where do we go from here?” She lifted her face to his, her eyes telling him she really cared.

  He studied her a moment longer, his eyes roving over her slightly mussed hair and unglossed lips. He flashed her a crooked grin and said with simple, heartfelt optimism, “How about forward?”