“Nothing. Thank you.” He looked up at her, his gray eyes glinting like frost on pavement. The glow from the lamp beside him threw shadows across his face, and his harsh expression unnerved her.
She crossed the room in front of him and sat down on the edge of the armchair. “I am not, nor have I ever been, involved with Mike Stevens,” she said quietly.
“Is that why you lied to me? A meeting with Annie’s teachers, you told me. Instead you were planning to run off to Canada. Why Canada, for pity’s sake? Does that sound like the actions of a person with nothing to hide?”
She sighed. “No, it doesn’t. You’re right. I didn’t tell you the truth. For a very good reason. I was running away. Canada seemed like a good place to disappear for a while.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Running away? From Stevens?”
She shook her head, wondering how he could be so damn indifferent. “Of course not. I was running away from you.”
She’d shaken him. She could see it in the way he blinked, as if he wasn’t quite sure what had hit him. “Why in the hell would you run away from me?” He paused, his expression suddenly sharpening. “Unless you figured out I was a cop and would stop you from meeting Stevens?”
She fought back her resentment. She had to keep a clear mind and stay in control. “For the last time, Blake, I was not going to meet Mike. I thought he had sent you to find me. I thought he’d hired you to...hurt Heather.”
There was a long silence, broken only by Blake’s harsh breathing. Finally he made a sound of disgust in the back of his throat. “Why, in God’s name, would you think that? How could you possibly think that I would hurt Heather? Dammit, Gail, you’re not making sense.”
She couldn’t answer him for a moment. He’d called her by her real name, for the first time. If only it had been said the way she wanted to hear it—from his lips softly and caressingly.
She drew in a trembling breath. “Why is it that you are all so ready to take the word of a criminal against mine? I’m telling the truth, Blake. Mike threatened to send someone to kill Heather. I wasn’t the only one who lied. You lied to me, too. I knew you weren’t a real-estate agent from Seattle. Even before I caught you out, I think I knew. I thought Mike had sent you. How was I to know you were an undercover cop?”
“You could have leveled with me. You could have told me the truth about your past, instead of making up lies. That’s what an innocent person would have done.”
“Blake, please, listen to me and try to understand what I’m saying. When Mike was sent to prison, he swore he would find a way to get even with me. He tried to blame me for Frank’s death. He said I’d driven him to it. Apparently Frank had flown into one of his jealous rages and accused Mike of having an affair with me. They fought, and Mike pulled a gun on him. I don’t know if he meant to shoot him or not. I only know the gun went off and Frank died.”
She shuddered, thinking of that terrible moment when she’d walked into Frank’s office and had seen his broken, bleeding body on the floor. “After the police had left,” she said unsteadily, “Mike came to me and told me he’d gotten rid of my jealous husband. He said I owed him my life, and that now I should repay him.
“I was horrified at what he’d done, and terrified of what he might do to me and Heather. I managed to talk him into leaving, telling him it wouldn’t look good if the police saw him with me so soon after Frank’s death. As soon as he was out of the house I called the police.”
Blake nodded, his expression hard and unrelenting. “Yeah, I heard. Your testimony’s on record. For what it’s worth.”
Resentment burned hot for a moment, and she waited for the reaction to pass. “It happens to be the truth. When Mike was arrested he knew I’d told the police that he’d killed Frank. He accused me of leading him on, and then rejecting him. He swore to get back at me for betraying him. He said he would...destroy the one thing that meant anything to me—my daughter....” Without warning her voice had wobbled, and she fought to regain her composure.
“Take it easy,” Blake said gruffly.
It was the first faint indication that he was affected by her story, and her pulse leaped with hope. She took a steadying breath. “Mike swore to the police that I’d planned the whole thing with him. They believed him. Everyone believed him.”
Again her voice broke, but intent on finishing now, she struggled on. “Frank was insanely jealous and possessive. He was convinced that every man who came into the store had come for the sole purpose of coming on to me. Even though I told him over and over that I hated the way Mike acted around me, he still believed that I encouraged him. I guess he made everyone else believe it, too.”
She hunted in the pocket of her jeans for a tissue. “I hadn’t any close friends, Frank had seen to that, but I thought that among the people I knew, at least one or two would know me well enough to believe me about what happened. Instead they betrayed me, telling the police about the fights I’d had with Frank over Mike’s sickening behavior when he was around me.”
“Well, I hand it to the guy, he’s persistent.”
She felt cold when she saw Blake’s grim expression. Nothing she’d said had made the slightest difference to him. He’d made up his mind she was guilty and that was that.
All at once she’d had enough. There was no more fight left in her. She got up from the chair and walked over to the door. “I can see that you’re determined not to believe me,” she said bitterly. “Whatever happened to justice and the concept that someone is innocent until proved guilty?”
She pulled the door open and looked back at him. She’d done her best. She wasn’t about to beg. “I’m tired,” she muttered. “I’d like you to leave now.”
He stood slowly, as if he found it painful to move. Her heart skipped a beat when he studied her for several seconds without speaking. Then he said softly, “You don’t understand. I’m not going anywhere. Your lover boy escaped from jail last week. He’s on his way here to meet you. Or maybe he’s waiting for you in Canada?”
So her worst fears were realized. It was a moment before she could speak. “How did he know where to find me?”
“He had you watched. Someone tailed you from the minute you left Portland. Mike Stevens has a lot of connections. He pulled in a couple of favors. His contact hung around here long enough to make sure you were putting down roots, then he reported back to Stevens.”
So her fears hadn’t been all that paranoid. Her sense of being followed when she’d first arrived in Mellow Springs had been genuine. As for the past few days, she knew now that it was Blake who had given her that same feeling. He must have been behind her all the time, without her ever seeing him.
Her fear spread, almost choking her. “How did you know where to find me?”
Blake shrugged, and dug his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “When Mike went over the fence he was supposed to take his cellmate with him. He must have decided he’d be better off on his own. So his cellmate got ticked and snitched on him. Apparently in a rash moment Stevens had told him he was going to meet up with you in Mellow Springs.”
“He didn’t happen to say what he intended to do with me when he caught up with me, I suppose?” She held out her hands in a gesture of appeal. “Can’t you see, Blake? He’s coming here to make good his threat. He’s going to try and get at Heather, and he’ll almost certainly hurt me. The man is crazy. He’s determined to make me pay for turning him in.”
She stood there while the seconds ticked by, willing him to believe her. He looked so cynical, so damned superior. She just couldn’t stand it anymore. Hurt beyond belief at his distrust of her, she finally let go of her temper.
“Damn you,” she muttered fiercely. “Every word I’ve spoken is the truth. But you’re just too arrogant to even consider that you could be wrong. You and all your damn colleagues. Well, I can’t make you believe what you don’t want to believe. But I’ll tell you right now, I’m not waiting around here for Mike to come after my daughter while the
cops stand around twiddling their thumbs and feeding their egos.”
She slammed the door shut on the last word and rushed across the room. To her utter dismay, Blake calmly stretched out an arm and blocked her way.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
“I’m getting my daughter and myself the hell out of here.” She shoved on his arm, struggling to get free. “I don’t give a damn if you believe me or not, but you’re not stopping me from taking my daughter somewhere where she’ll be safe.”
He shifted his grip and grasped both her arms. “Gail—”
Incensed beyond measure, she shoved against his chest. “Let go of me, dammit. You can’t keep me here. I’m not under arrest. So go to hell, Mr. U.S. Marshal. Leave me alone!”
She glared up at him, and saw an answering spark of anger in his eyes. She saw something else—the unmistakable heat of passion. For a moment she wasn’t sure if he would yell at her or thrust her away from him.
He did neither.
Before she could draw a full breath he jerked her hard against his chest and smothered her startled cry with his warm, hard mouth. “I do believe you,” he muttered thickly, punctuating his words with short, urgent kisses. “You’re damn well not going anywhere without me.” He opened his mouth, and she was powerless to prevent her own lips from parting.
Her mind warned her to pull away from him, but her body wasn’t listening. Crushed against the hard wall of his chest, she clung to his shoulders and gave herself up to the sheer pleasure of being in his arms.
The power that she had sensed in him was transmitted now as a searing, urgent need. She had thought that nothing could move this man and break down his formidable armor. She’d been wrong.
Lost in the heat of his kiss, her body caught fire as his hands moved roughly over her hips, pulling her closer to him. She dug her fingers into his back and met his passion with a fiery need of her own. She wanted this man as she’d never wanted anything in her life. Her body ached with it.
Feverishly she sought his tongue, and felt his shudder in response. She forgot about the fear of the past few hours. She forgot about Mike and the possibility of him turning up in Mellow Springs. All she could think about was Blake’s body, hard against hers, his hands triggering spasms of pleasure everywhere they touched, and his mouth, urgent and hot on hers.
She almost forgot about Heather, too, until somewhere in the fog that clouded her mind a tiny warning sounded. She couldn’t do this. Not now. Not with Heather sleeping down the hallway. It was sheer agony to pull herself out of his arms.
The second she resisted, he let her go. Dropping his arms to his sides, he dragged in his breath. His voice sounded a little hoarse when he finally spoke. “I’m sorry. That shouldn’t have happened. I guess I got carried away.”
All her pent-up emotion seemed to drain out of her. He didn’t have to make it quite so plain that he regretted his weak moment.
“Forget it,” she said tightly. “We’re both tired. I think we should both get some sleep.” She crossed the room to the door and pulled it open. “I’ll call you first thing in the morning.”
“Gail, I have to stay here tonight. If what you say is true, and Stevens is out for revenge, both you and Heather are in danger. I can’t leave you alone now.”
She looked at him, torn between wanting him out of the house so that she could forget what had happened, and needing him there because she was afraid to be alone.
“What I say is the truth,” she said wearily. “I’ll make up a bed for you on the couch.”
“Just give me a blanket. I’ll manage with that.”
She found him a pillow and a couple of blankets, and laid them on the couch. Ignoring his insistence that he wasn’t hungry, she heated a frozen pizza and opened a beer for him.
Watching him attack the food made her glad she’d offered it. Surprisingly, she was hungry enough to join him. “Where do you think Mike is now?” she asked him, as they both sat at her coffee table munching on the pizza. “I suppose the local police are watching out for him?”
“We’ve got an APB out on him, but in this neck of the woods he’d be tough to spot. There just aren’t enough cops to go around to keep watch on all the roads.”
She couldn’t look at him without remembering how she’d felt, crushed against his body. “You were planning on arresting him single-handedly?”
His casual shrug didn’t quite match the tension in his face. “It’s my job.”
She shook her head at the trite remark. It didn’t begin to cover what was involved. “So what happens now? Now that you don’t have me to lead you to him, I mean.”
“I guess I just sit tight here and wait for him to show up.”
“I hope you realize just how dangerous Mike can be. I have no doubt that he would kill all three of us just to get back at me.”
His glance flicked over her face, as indifferent now as if the kiss between them had been nothing but a fantasy. “I’m well prepared for that. I have to admit, though, it will make things easier knowing I don’t have to fight off a vicious girlfriend.”
She raised her eyebrows at that. “You thought I was vicious?”
There was no humor in his eyes when he looked at her. “From what I’d been told, you’d helped your lover blow away your husband. That put you in the ‘vicious’ category.”
She thought about that for a minute. “What changed your mind about me?”
This time he avoided her gaze. “After twenty years on the force, I’m a pretty good judge of character.”
“But right up until tonight, you still suspected me of planning to meet Mike.”
“That was before I heard your side of it. Besides, there’s always been a doubt in my mind.”
“Why? What made you think I could be telling the truth when no one else believed me?”
He picked up his beer and twirled it, making a miniature whirlpool in the glass. “I asked myself why you would turn Mike Stevens in if you’d helped him murder his brother. You certainly couldn’t have expected him to keep quiet about your part in it.”
“I asked the policeman who arrested me the same question.” She uttered a bitter laugh. “Apparently, the police believed that I led Mike on long enough to persuade him to kill Frank, and then I turned him in to be rid of him.”
“That occurred to me, too.” He tilted his head back and drained his glass, while she fought the resentment still smoldering deep inside her. How could she blame him, when everyone else thought the same?
“But then,” Blake said, setting down his glass, “I had to ask myself another question. If you hated the guy enough to send him down for murder, why were you planning to meet him now that he was on the run? It didn’t make sense.”
She felt a warm rush of gratitude. “Thank you,” she said unsteadily. “You have no idea what that means to me.”
“Don’t thank me. I’m a cop. I’m supposed to question everything.”
Was it her imagination, or was he being deliberately remote? She was tired, she told herself, and letting her imagination get the best of her again. She had his trust once more, and that was all she could ask—for now.
Later, when she could think more clearly, she would decide what that kiss had meant. One thing she did know—he hadn’t been unaffected by it, either physically or emotionally. He’d left her in no doubt of that.
A little shiver of excitement coursed down her back. Blake Foster was very good at masking his thoughts and feelings. But in those few moments when she’d been locked in his arms, he’d abandoned all pretense of indifference.
The prospect of all that power and pent-up need being fully released in an explosive display of raw passion melted her insides. Making love with Blake Foster would have to be an awesome experience. Just the thought of it made her weak with anticipation.
She’d found something with him that she hadn’t believed existed. For the first time in her life she knew what it was to fall in love. It was terrifying and excitin
g, all at the same time. It was like flying down the bunny slopes on a disk—the ride was daunting, and there was always the chance of getting hurt, but you couldn’t wait to get up and try it again.
Half smiling at her metaphor, she got to her feet. “I’m really tired. I think I’d better go to bed.”
He nodded, his gaze fixed firmly on his empty glass.
“Help yourself to anything you want,” she added.
When he didn’t answer she hesitated, longing for him to say something, anything, that would give her an indication of what was going on in his mind. “I’m...glad you’re staying,” she said awkwardly. “I feel much safer knowing you’ll be here. I have to admit, I’m scared, knowing that Mike is out there somewhere.”
“You should be. He’s a nasty piece of work.”
“Can’t you send for reinforcements?”
He shook his head. “This is one I get to handle all on my own. Unless things get ugly, and then I’ll call in the local boys.”
She shivered. “Well, let’s hope he doesn’t turn up here tonight.”
The look he sent her was hard to read. “As far as I’m concerned, the sooner the better.”
Not quite sure why that sounded so ominous, Gail told him good-night and went to bed.
Long after she’d gone, Blake continued to sit on the couch, twisting the empty glass around and around in his hands. He had committed the unforgivable sin. He’d let his emotions get the better of him.
Dammit, he’d wanted her. He’d never wanted a woman quite so badly. He still wanted her. His body hurt with a raw craving that wouldn’t subside. Just knowing she was lying in bed, only a few yards away, tied his gut in knots.
She would have made it easy for him, too. He knew that.
He’d felt her responding—her hips grinding against his, her breasts thrusting into his chest, her warm, soft mouth eagerly. exploring his. He’d been surprised at her eagerness—surprised and utterly aroused.
God, what he would give to set her down on a soft bed and cover her naked body with his own. She fitted against him just right; he could imagine how it would be to lie naked with her while he used all his skill to bring out the primitive passion that boiled just below the surface.
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