For a split second he thought of going to her, pulling her into his arms and telling her that she didn’t have to do this, but deep down he knew she did. Regardless of the condition Simon was in now, he had once hurt her in the worst possible way and she needed to let him know how she felt, even if his stroke-stricken mind didn’t understand any of it.
“Tell him, Carrie. Tell him what you want him to know. Tell him how you feel,” he whispered softly.
She nodded, turned, and walked over to Simon. He watched as she stood there and stared at him, her expression a mixture of anger and revulsion. There wasn’t even an ounce of pity. “You bastard,” she said, trying to keep her voice low, calm. “You took something from me that you had no right to take. I hated you each time you did it and swore one day I would grow up and kill you. But it seems that you might as well already be dead. You deserve each and every day you sit alone and in misery. I hope you continue to suffer.”
Simon didn’t say anything. He merely stared at Carrie as if he’d never seen her before. Moments later, when Carrie realized that he really didn’t have a clue, she shook her head in disgust and walked off, her mouth trembling and tears streaming down her face.
Connor was there waiting. He held his arms out to her and she went into them, needing the comfort of strong arms. He pulled her into his chest, pressing her head against the soft material of his shirt. And then she cried uncontrollable tears. The heartwrenching sound of deep, remembered pain echoed in the room, bringing on even more tears that soaked through Connor’s shirt and seemed to scorch through to his chest.
And while Carrie continued to cry, Connor continued to hold her, knowing she needed this kind of cleansing. He glanced over at Simon. The man was staring into space, unaware of his surroundings or anyone in them.
A short while later, Carrie slowly pulled back out of Connor’s arms. She looked at him with tear-swollen eyes. “Can we leave now?”
Connor nodded as he looked down at her, feeling a degree of tenderness he’d never remembered having before. The intensity of it made his voice shake as he said, “Yes, let’s get out of here.”
Before leaving, they stopped at the front desk and he questioned Lila extensively, asking about anyone who paid Anderson visits, but she had stuck to the same information she had pro vided Miller. The man didn’t get visitors and there was no one listed in his records as being a family member.
“So what now?” Carrie asked quietly when they were seated in the car, still recovering from coming face to face with Simon. She knew Connor had asked her to trust him, to believe that he would figure out who was trying to get money out of her, but she was afraid to consider what might happen if he didn’t succeed. The thoughts of those pictures being posted on some Internet site and her brothers and father finding out about it was too much to think about. Although they would see her as a victim, she couldn’t face the humiliation.
“Now we go and check out Anderson’s house,” Connor said, interrupting her thoughts. “He might not get any visitors at the nursing home, but maybe if we looked around his place, it might give us some ideas of who his acquaintances might have been.”
A half hour later they pulled up in front of the place that Miller had given Connor as Anderson’s last known address. The refurbished-looking house was located in a recovering part of South Los Angeles.
“If anyone asks, I’m Anderson’s long-lost cousin from Florida, and you’re my wife.”
Connor’s comment interrupted her musings, and she merely nodded. Connor strode up to the front porch confidently, as if he had every right to be there, and she followed him.
The lawn looked unkempt, and weeds had taken over, killing out what appeared to have once been a flower bed. Connor tried the door, and not surprisingly, it was locked solid. “Stand next to me, close, to block my hand movement,” he whispered to her.
Trying hard to ignore the feel of his warm breath on her ear, Carrie lifted a brow. “Why?”
“I’m going to pick the lock,” he explained.
She watched as he took a paper clip from his wallet, bent it back, and inserted in within the lock. A few seconds later, she heard a click when the lock released.
“It’s good to know there’re certain things that I’m still good at.”
Carrie thought about a number of other things he was probably good at doing but refused to let her mind go there. Besides, she really didn’t have time to dwell on those things when Connor turned the knob and went inside the house. She quickly followed, closing the door behind them.
She glanced around. She distinctly remembered that no matter where they had lived, Simon had never been a good housekeeper, and it seemed nothing had changed. The place was cluttered at its best and untidy at its worse. Another thing she remembered was that her mother, when she wasn’t on drugs or hitting the bottle, had been the one to keep the place fairly clean and livable.
Quietly, she followed Connor to the living room. The furniture consisted of odds and ends one would pick up at a flea market or thrift store. Nothing lush, vintage, or fancy but definitely cheap. “What are we looking for?” she asked knowing he was the one used to playing Sherlock Holmes and not her.
He didn’t look at her when he answered, but continued to glance around. “Anything that will give us a hint about Anderson’s associates. He was dropped off at the ER at one of the hospitals and was later sent to that nursing home. He may not have family, but I find it hard to believe he doesn’t have friends or associates. I’m curious as to who is keeping up the rent on this place. Someone must have come upon those pictures and decided to use them for extortion.”
At that moment he did glance at her. “Come on. Let’s see what’s upstairs.”
He fell in step behind her as she began climbing the stairs. He couldn’t move his eyes off the lush backside in jeans in front of him. Whether he was viewing her from the back or the front, he liked what he saw—a little too much.
Suddenly, she almost lost her footing, and instinctively he reached out his hand to place around her, to help her keep her balance. “Be careful.”
Carrie fought to regain her equilibrium. She hadn’t realized Connor was following so close behind, and the feel of his arms around her waist was making goose bumps form all over her body.
Instead of saying anything, she resumed mounting the stairs at a quicker pace. When she reached the landing, she glanced around. The upstairs looked as untidy as it did downstairs. Although what Connor had said made sense, she wasn’t sure just what they were supposed to be looking for.
“Come on, let’s go in here,” Connor whispered in her ear, catching her arm before she went off in another direction. Again, his touch did crazy things to her insides, and she quickly dragged her arm free. She followed him into a bedroom.
Despite her best effort, she tried ignoring him while he began opening and closing drawers and looking under the bed. To regain her focus, she walked over to what appeared to be a bookcase, thinking the one thing she never remembered was Simon having a penchant for reading. Her eyes skimmed the spines of the books, and then she pulled out one to discover it wasn’t a book at all, but a video case.
“Umm, this is interesting.”
“What is?”
She motioned to what appeared to be a row of books. “Simon’s hidden video collection.” When she noticed they had been organized by year, panic began to crawl through her, and she began quivering at the thought of what the collection contained.
Knowing Anderson’s background, Connor had an idea and quickly grabbed them before Carrie did. When he pulled them out a piece of paper slipped to the floor.
Carrie picked it up. The paper had a list of names, dates, and phone numbers. “Hey, look at this,” she said holding up the paper. “It might be a list of his contacts.”
“Just stop right there and put those things back where you got them from. You have no right to be here and I’m calling the police.”
Carrie swung around the same exact time
Connor did and came face-to-face with an elderly man brandishing a baseball bat and staring hard at them. “I’ve had a lot of break-ins in the houses I own,” the man was saying, “and the police told me to call them if anyone trespass on our property. And don’t think I won’t use this if I have to,” he said, holding the bat up higher.
Connor said quickly. “You don’t have to involve the police. My wife and I are related to Simon Anderson and—”
“That’s not true. The only family he has is a sister, and she told us to watch out for people like you who’d come around, claiming to be relatives just to bother her brother’s belongings. I promised her that I would make sure that no one did.”
Connor looked surprised. “His sister?”
“Yeah, his sister.”
Carrie eased a little away from the bookcase and lifted her hands in apology. “Look, we’re distant relatives, so evidently Simon’s sister forgot about us. If she told you to protect his belongings, then you do what you have to do and we’ll just leave. There’s no need to involve the police, and we’re sorry if we’ve caused any problems.”
The man’s anger eased somewhat at Carrie’s apology. He lowered the bat halfway. “You didn’t cause any problems, but the two of you should leave. I gave her my word.”
Connor, following Carrie’s lead, reassured the man. “Okay, we’re going. Do you know by chance when his sister will be coming back around? I really would like to talk to her.”
The man shook his head, lowered the bat to his side. “No. She just shows up every so often to check on things. She says her brother isn’t doing well and asked me to make sure no one comes in here and steals his stuff. She’s good about keeping the rent paid every month, so that’s the least I can do.”
“And we do understand,” Connor said, crossing the room and taking Carrie’s hand in his. The last thing he needed was police involvement at this point. “It was nice meeting you.”
Without looking back he led Carrie down the stairs by the hand, feeling Carrie’s pulse leaping in her wrist. When they were sitting back in the car and pulling away, Connor gave a sigh of anger and relief.
“Damn, I wished we would have had time to grab those videos and the list of names and numbers. I’d come back later but the landlord is going to make sure he keeps his eyes and ears open. I’d like to know who this woman really is, since Anderson doesn’t have a sister.”
Carrie met his gaze when he stopped at a traffic light. “I’d like to know the same thing.” Then with a smirk on her face, she said, “And as far as the videos and that list of names are concerned ...”
She lifted her tote bag and emptied the contents on the space between them. “What the hell?” Somehow she had swiped a couple of the videos, as well as the list. “How did you manage to get these past that guy? I saw when you put everything back on the shelf.”
Carrie’s smirk deepened. “Let’s just say it’s a skill from the past.”
“I’m going to get with Stuart Miller and have the him check out a few things on this mysterious sister since we’re due to leave tomorrow,” Connor said as they walked back to their hotel suite an hour later. “But I plan on flying back next week.”
“But next week is Thanksgiving. Don’t you have plans with your family?” she asked as they entered the room.
“Just the usual, but they’ll understand. It won’t be the first time I’ve worked on a holiday. As a cop, I did it often enough.” He stretched his hands. “Give me those videos and that list. I want to check something out.”
She went into her tote and pulled out the items. “What?”
“I want to see what’s on them and what I can find out about these names.”
“I want to see what’s on those videos, too. The one thing I noticed before the landlord walked in on us was that they were grouped by date and year. The one with the year my mom and Simon were together was missing,” she said.
Somehow Connor wasn’t surprised. “You don’t need to see the video, Carrie, and knowing what might be on them, I prefer that you didn’t,” he said turning to leave.
When he reached the door, he turned around. He had expected her to disagree, to give him a lot a mouth, and was glad when she didn’t. “I’ll be back later. You should get some rest while I’m gone.”
“Will you tell me everything when you get back?”
“Yeah,” he said, “I’ll tell you everything.” He paused and looked back at her before walking out the door.
21
Asia
“So where’s your ring?”
Asia met her sister’s curious stare but didn’t answer.
“Asia?”
Asia expelled a frustrated sigh. She needed to talk to someone, and she and Claire had always been close . . . until David. And although during the past four years they worked hard to repair what had been damaged, there were certain aspects of her life she could not discuss with her sister. She knew how Claire felt about David’s family, including Sean.
“Sean and I are having issues,” Asia said softly, praying that for once her sister would have an open mind.
Claire reached across their mother’s kitchen table, took her hand, and clasped it tightly. “Talk to me, Asia. You used to be able to do that and I promise that I’ll listen and only offer my opinion if you want to hear it.”
“I don’t know where to start,” she whispered, her voice wavering and unsteady.
Claire’s hold on her hand tightened. “Start wherever you like. I have all day, and Mom won’t be back from choir practice for a while.”
For a few brief moments Asia didn’t say anything. “After David, I tried so hard to get my life together and keep it there. It wasn’t easy rebuilding the confidence I’d lost, but I did. Writing helped, and it felt good to know it was not only therapeutic for me but for women in similar situations who read my books.”
Her gaze drifted back out of the window when she said, “Sean asked me to marry him, and a part of me knew the problems I’d face with David but I also knew him to be the kind of man I needed in my life; someone I could trust and grow to love. I told him I would think about his proposal.”
She looked back at Claire. “While speaking in New York, I met Lance Montgomery and from the first there was this unholy attraction between us. But I refused to let another man use me the way David did. Lance’s reputation preceded him, so I knew what I was up against. . . but still, I was not prepared for his relentless pursuit. The man didn’t give up.” She drew in a quivering breath just thinking about all the ways Lance had worn down her resistance.
“Why do you think he refused to give up?” Claire asked, releasing her hand.
“For several reasons,” Asia said softly. “But the main one was that he saw me as a challenge. In one of my talks he heard me say I’d been abstinent for a year and decided that he would be the one to change that status. I was nothing but a game he was determined to win, and he focused his efforts on doing just that.”
Claire wished she could smooth the lines of pain that fanned from her sister’s eyes. “And did he win, Asia?”
Asia sighed, slumping her shoulders disgustedly. “No, but he could have. I was that much of a fool and—”
“Let me get this straight,” Claire said, interrupting her sister. “I’ve seen you and Lance Montgomery together. I felt the heat the two of you generate. I saw the way the man was looking at you, and I felt a sense of intimacy, something intensely sensual surrounding the two of you.” Claire leaned in closer. “Are you telling me that the two of you have never slept together?”
“Just like there are different levels of love, there are different levels of intimacy. Let’s just say when I walked out of Lance’s bedroom, I was still celibate. Technically.” Asia knew her sister would probably draw her own conclusions, but she refused to give her every little detail.
Claire stared at her, her eyes widening some. “You want me to believe that after that relentless pursuit Lance Montgomery didn’t go all the way wh
en he had the chance?”
Asia dropped her eyes, not able to handle her sister’s intense stare any longer. “Yes, that’s what I’m saying.”
“Asia,” Claire prompted. “Look at me for a second.”
When she did as her sister asked, Claire reached out and took Asia’s hands in hers. “Think about it. Playas don’t leave any job incomplete if they have the opportunity to finish it. Montgomery wrote that in his book himself.” At Asia’s arched brow she said, “And yes, I read the book. It wasn’t one of his top ten rules, but it was one of the implied ones. So if you left his place technically untouched, there was a reason for it. Maybe he cares for you more than you think.”
“A man like Lance doesn’t know how to care for anyone, and yes, there was a reason for it. I told him that I would never let a man use me for his pleasure again.”
Claire lifted a brow. “And?”
Asia felt awkward. “And he said that he wouldn’t use me for his pleasure but was willing to let me use him for mine . . . and he did.” When Asia thought about just how he had done so, the memory made her breath catch. A shadow of pain crossed her features when she remembered how that night had ended.
“There’s more, isn’t it?”
Asia stood and walked over to the window and looked out. “Yes. Later when I woke up, he threw in my face what he’d done, made me aware he could have done more but had chosen not to because he knew there would be another time. Then he got a visitor, another woman, and he asked me to leave.”
Claire heard the hurt in her sister’s voice, the humiliation. “Are you saying that he tossed you out of his place to sleep with another woman?”
Asia turned back to face her sister.
“Yes, although he now claims otherwise. Lance wants me to believe that he didn’t sleep with anyone else that night and the reason for his unforgivable actions that night was because he felt things for me that he’d never felt for a woman before and it scared him.”
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