“Excuse me,” he said, catching up to the cop. “Bryn was driving my car when she had the accident. Can you tell me how I can find out where it is?” He didn’t care if it was totaled. Bryn was alive and she was going to be all right. Nothing else mattered.
Martin Bouvier stopped. His level cop’s eyes squared on Cole as he turned. “We’re holding the vehicle in evidence,” he said.
Cole did a double take. “Why?”
“Miss Louvel was conscious at the scene,” Bouvier said. “She was able to tell the responding officer that the brakes failed. We had it checked out. The brake lines were cut.”
Chapter 13
The glaring Louisiana sun highlighted the hollowness of Bryn’s eyes as she walked out of the hospital to the medium-sized sedan Cole had rented. She moved stiffly, and he could see she was still hurting. He shut the car door after Bryn eased into the passenger seat of the sedan. He’d had the car running in the soupy heat outside the emergency entrance to get the interior cooled off for her.
The blow of the air conditioner filled the silence after he sat down on the driver’s side and closed his door. He made no move to pull away from the curb.
Just looking at her made him feel as though he wanted to do something he couldn’t remember doing since his father had been killed. He wanted to cry.
She could have died, and it would have been his fault. Since he’d found out about the cut brake lines, he’d been so angry he felt as if he might self-combust. This crash had been meant for him, only Bryn had been hurt instead. She looked like hell now. Her head rested back against the seat as if it was almost too heavy for her to support.
And she was lucky—lucky!—it hadn’t been worse. If she’d been driving faster, if there hadn’t been an airbag…
He felt a violent impulse to take revenge for what had happened, and yet with it came the chilling helplessness that he had no idea who was responsible.
“I knew you’d be here,” she said quietly, staring out the window at the hospital.
“Why didn’t you call someone?” She had to have a dozen friends she could have phoned. Drake Cavanaugh. Even Emile or Mathilde.
She turned her lovely, hurting eyes to him. “I don’t know who to trust. I’m scared.”
And she’d turned to him.
He knew a possessive, marrow-deep need to put his arms around her, as if that would keep her safe. He clenched his fists to keep himself from reaching for her. He had no right to hold Bryn in his arms, especially now. He was the one who had put her in this danger.
“This was my fault, Bryn. Someone cut my brake lines. It wasn’t intended for you—it was meant for me.”
“No, it’s not your fault,” she said, her voice low and angry through the bone-weariness. “I didn’t know what to think all this time. Randol Ormond disappeared. I was so confused. And there were all those pranks. But this isn’t a prank. Someone tried to kill you.” Her eyes shone with an awful clarity. “Aimee’s killer is still out there. Why else would someone have cut your brake lines?”
He shook his head. “I can’t think of one other reason.”
“No telling what happened to Randol Ormond,” she whispered.
Guilt didn’t even come close to describing how he felt. “I never meant for anyone to be hurt, Bryn. I just wanted to clear my father’s name.” For the first time he wondered if it was worth it. But at the same time, if he’d ever had a doubt about Aimee’s murder, it had disappeared when Martin Bouvier had told him the Cobra’s brake lines had been cut.
Someone wanted him dead. Someone was afraid of the questions he was asking, the doubts he was raising.
“We can’t stop,” Bryn said, and her voice broke. “We have to find the truth now.”
“Not we, Bryn,” he said immediately. “Me. You can’t be part of this. Not anymore. That crash was meant for me.”
“Aimee was my sister,” she cried, then paused to draw a shaky breath. “I’ve already asked Martin to speak to the police chief for me, set up a meeting for tomorrow. I’m going to ask him to re-open the investigation into Aimee’s death. And I’ve been thinking—we could contact the media. Get somebody interested, somebody from the Baton Rouge press, or even one of those national cable networks that showcase unsolved crimes. We could show them the forensic report. It’s worth a try.”
Cole felt a sick burning in his gut. She couldn’t know what she was saying. “Bryn, I know we need help. I’ve got a private investigator on the case already. But if you put this in the hands of the police or the media right now, it’s going to be out of your control and you don’t know what will come of it. Who knows what else might come out?”
Already there was the possibility that Aimee had been pregnant.
“I don’t care what comes out. Not anymore.” Her hoarse voice was desperate, but he knew that deadly resolve in her anguished eyes. It was the same resolve that had brought him to Azalea Bend. “Somebody killed Aimee and they’ve been walking free for fifteen years. I can’t live with that. I’m going to tell the police tomorrow that I want Aimee’s body exhumed.”
The sick burn crawled up his throat. “Bryn—”
“I’m going to close Bellefleur,” she cut in, and the horrible catch in her voice tore at his heart. “I can’t let guests stay there when—” She blinked back tears and looked away for an aching beat.
Someone had come onto the plantation in the night and cut his brake lines. The killer had been that close. There was no way she could keep the bed and breakfast open under those circumstances.
And all he could think was that she was putting herself straight in the bull’s eye. No matter how much he wanted to clear his father’s name, putting Bryn’s life at risk had never been part of the equation. He’d known sheer terror such as he’d never known before when that call had come in from the hospital.
“I want you safe, Bryn. I want you out of this investigation.”
She leveled her tormented gaze on him again. “You’re not calling the shots, Cole.”
He drove her back to Bellefleur. Bryn felt as if she could drop where she stood when she got out of the car, but her pain and exhaustion wasn’t stopping her. She cancelled the few bookings she had coming up for the bed and breakfast, and Cole put a sign on the door suspending mansion tours. She called Melodie and let her know she wouldn’t need to come into work, and punched in the number for Emile and Mathilde’s cottage. Bellefleur was closed for business.
Fear licked her stomach with every passing moment, but her will to find the truth kept her going. She couldn’t stop thinking about Aimee. The dark crush of knowing that her sister’s killer had been walking free for fifteen years was beyond bearing. That, along with the fact that she now believed her father had killed Cole’s for something he’d never done, was tearing her apart.
It was her father who’d been a murderer, not Wade Dempsey. The awful morass of that night got worse all the time and her emotions felt pulled on a thin, agonizing thread that could snap at any time.
“Brouchard.”
“Mr. Brouchard, this is Bryn.” Briefly, she told him about the accident. She didn’t mention that the brake lines had been cut. No sense worrying him more than necessary.
“Are you all right?” Concern threaded his gruff voice.
“I’m fine. I’m home.” She explained that the mansion was going to be closed, and rushed on before he could give her another lecture about the gris-gris or Cole or anything else. She was so tired. “Is Mathilde there? Will you let her know?”
“She’s gone to cousin Georgitte’s in Monroe,” he said. “She’ll be relieved to know you don’t need her. Georgitte broke her hip. She might have to stay a while. She was real fretful about having to leave you.”
Now she knew what Mathilde had wanted to discuss with her. She’d completely forgotten she’d told Mathilde to meet her at the house. “Tell her it’s okay. I don’t think I’ll be opening Bellefleur any time soon.”
She put down the phone after she’d t
old Emile goodbye. Her head felt thick and heavy, as if it might fall off, and a nauseated lightness reminded her she hadn’t eaten all day.
“Bryn, you’ve got to lie down,” Cole said, coming into the office. He looked sick with worry. She wanted nothing more than for him to come over and put his arms around her, no matter how dangerous that would be. In her world gone mad, Cole had suddenly become safe. How crazy was that?
She straightened in her chair and winced from the bruising her body had taken when she’d been hit by the airbag in the crash.
“I’m going to lie down in a minute. I was just going to phone Emmie, check on my mom.”
“What you need to do is call someone who can come stay with you,” he said, and a strain entered his voice. “I’m not leaving you here alone.”
She’d kicked him out. She’d forgotten that, too.
She started to shake her head, but nausea swam through her at the too-sudden movement. Her eyelids squeezed briefly against the sharp spear of pain. She was aware of Cole coming around the desk.
“God, Bryn, you’re white as a sheet.” His powerful arms enveloped her. “You’re one sick puppy whether you want to admit it or not. You can call from upstairs.” He helped her up and supported her up the steps. Her legs felt positively rubbery, but the way her pulse was tripping, it was more than the accident that was responsible for her reaction.
Cole was right about one thing, she was one sick puppy. As in demented with this need for him that no amount of common sense could assuage. When they reached her room, he pulled the sheets down on her bed while she changed into light pajamas in the bathroom, then he tucked her in like a two-year-old, and all the while her traitorous body yearned for him to lie down beside her and touch her as though she was anything but two years old.
He brought the phone in from the office in her suite and plugged it in to a closer outlet so she could have it by the bed.
He sat beside her. “I’ve already made arrangements to check in at the Bayou Star Inn on Route 43,” he said grimly. “And you have my cell number if you need me. But you can’t stay here alone. It’s not safe. Either you call someone else, Cavanaugh even, or I’m staying.”
A haunting quiet stretched between them. Shadows angled across Cole’s hard features. He hadn’t said a word damning her or her father since he’d picked her up at the hospital. He wasn’t blaming her and his kindness was almost harder to bear than the anger with which he’d arrived at Bellefleur that first night.
But in that kindness, she saw again the tender boy of his youth. And all she wanted tonight was to hang on to that one tender thing left in her life.
“I don’t want to call Drake,” she said. “He’s a friend, a good one, but I don’t want a friend tonight.”
Pausing, she took a deep breath.
“I want you to stay.”
Somehow, he’d managed not to lie down on that bed with her. Somehow, he’d managed not to hold her and kiss her and oh, about a thousand other things he’d wanted to do.
Cole brought her a tray with a sandwich he’d fixed in the kitchen. No way was he leaving her alone, no matter how hard it was to stay. She was right—he wasn’t her friend, and that she wanted more than a friend right now was killing him because that’s what he wanted to be. Way more than a friend. But she was hurt, and he was trying his damnedest to do the right thing.
He hated to see the anguish shimmering in her eyes, hated even more knowing he’d set her down this terrifying, shattering path by his decision to come to Azalea Bend. He doubted she’d completely come to grips with it yet, but by accepting that Wade Dempsey hadn’t killed Aimee, she’d accepted that her own father had murdered Cole’s. He knew she wasn’t ready to talk about it. The reality had to be too raw and awful.
And Cole was the one who’d brought all this grief and danger home to her. The truth about Aimee was coming with a terrible price tag already.
She’d insisted on taking a shower while he’d been getting her meal, despite the fact that she looked fragile as a strand of Spanish moss. She was way too stubborn for her own good. And for his. He’d found her coming out of the bathroom when he’d walked back into her room.
The image of her haunted him, the way she’d stood there wrapped only in a towel, the cotton sweeping low and barely covering her breasts. Her hair, dripping and tangled, and her big violet-smudged eyes made her look like a tragic nymph. He was all too human, and the soulful yearning uncloaked in that hurting gaze of hers in that unexpected moment had been almost more than he could take. He wanted her in this hot, blinding way that he didn’t even understand, had given up understanding.
All his reasoning vanished every time he looked at her. He’d just stood there, every sense strangely heightened, and somehow he’d made his feet walk away.
He had to protect her from danger. Including the very real peril of him.
She slept the rest of the day while he made phone calls and paced and wanted to go outside and fight the phantom who’d cut those brake lines. In late afternoon, Emile Brouchard came out of one of the old barns riding a small tractor. Cole watched him from his window as he set about tearing up one of the overgrown gardens. Apparently, whether or not Bryn had the mansion open for business, Brouchard intended to continue keeping the grounds.
The sound of the machinery buzzed into the house, but it didn’t wake Bryn. It was nearly dark when he heard her come out of her room and pad down the stairs.
A wiser man would have stayed put, but he’d left wise behind a long time ago.
He followed her through the house, to the kitchen, where he found her standing in front of the refrigerator. The small fridge light illuminated her in its ghostly spill. The rest of the kitchen lay in the thin gloam of dusk.
She looked better, not so sick and frail as she had right after the accident. Her beautiful body was wrapped up in a thick robe, her feet bare. Her eyes were still vulnerable and hurting, and she just stared at him without saying a word.
Something inside his chest twisted when he thought of what could have happened to her in that crash, that she could be dead now instead of standing here so alive.
He went to her and cupped her face in his tender hands. “I haven’t told you how glad I am that you’re alive,” he whispered hoarsely, and then there was no denying what he wanted to do. He kissed her.
Chapter 14
She kissed him back, sweetly, needily, and an instant rush of wonderful, hot sensations filled him. He felt his senses shred. This was everything that mattered. Bryn. In his arms. Alive. He had lost so many people in his life, and he couldn’t bear to lose her. With a groan, he pulled her even closer, kissing her with all the aching, haunting passion inside he’d tried so hard to bury. He’d tried to convince himself this was just sexual attraction, pure need, but it wasn’t true. It was the farthest thing from the truth.
The faint sound of the refrigerator door closing behind them brought him back to reality. He pulled away from her just enough to see her face in the dusky light that crept in through the kitchen window. Her eyes were huge, her lips wet, her skin opalescent. The violet smudges under her eyes remained.
He forced himself to let her go. She was exhausted, hurt. He couldn’t claim her like the caveman she made him want to be.
“If you’re hungry, I’ll fix you something to eat,” he said roughly. “You should go back to bed.”
She shook her head. “I’ve had enough sleep. And I’m not really hungry. I’m restless, I guess.” And yet she stood there, watching him with those soulful eyes. “Thank you for staying.”
“I couldn’t not stay, Bryn. I can’t leave you alone.”
“You make me feel safe,” she said softly.
“I don’t know if I can keep you safe,” he told her, his chest crushed with the weight of his fear for her. “I’m sorry you’re involved in this now. I’m sorry I ever came to Bellefleur and put you in this danger.”
“I’m not sorry,” she told him, and he could see the emotion sh
ining in her damp eyes suddenly. “All this time, I never fought for Aimee. I believed everything I was told. I was wrong, and because of you, I have a chance to make it right.”
“I don’t want you to be hurt anymore.” He couldn’t bear the thought of anything else happening to Bryn.
“I don’t care what happens,” she said in a broken whisper. “As long as we find out what happened to Aimee, it’s worth anything.”
“It’s not worth your life, Bryn.” He couldn’t help it, he reached for her again, traced the pale line of her jaw. “I can’t stand for anything else to happen to you. I nearly died inside when that call came in from the hospital.” His voice shook.
“I should have believed you all along,” she said, and her voice trembled, too. “I should have believed you fifteen years ago.”
“You had no reason to believe me then,” he said. “I pushed you too hard. I asked you to do something that would have hurt your family.” He’d asked her to tell the police the truth about why his father had been fired. “It was too much to ask and it wouldn’t have solved anything.” He’d pushed her too hard since he’d come back, too.
“I was scared,” she said in a small voice. “Maybe if I’d told the truth then, people would have asked more questions. Maybe the police would have looked harder into Aimee’s death. Maybe—”
“Maybe doesn’t matter now, Bryn.” He couldn’t stand to see her blame herself. After all these years, years in which he’d blamed Bryn, too, he knew it hadn’t been her fault. He’d been hurt, bitter, and he’d blamed everyone. But he never should have blamed Bryn. He knew now how much she’d gone through, all the pain and grief that had seared these years for her. How her family had been destroyed as much as his own. “All that matters now is that you’re not hurt again.”
“I won’t be. You’re here.”
Cole’s heart clenched. He’d do anything for her. Anything. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you,” he swore darkly. “If this madman, this killer, comes after you, he’s going to have to get to you over my dead body. I’ll sleep outside your door tonight if I have to.”
Cole Dempsey’s Back in Town Page 12