In Forbidden Territory

by Shawna Delacorte

  A hard jolt of shock charged through Ty followed immediately by an intense jab of fear. “Leave? Angie is leaving?” Everything inside him turned to a quivering mass of jelly. He couldn’t keep the emotion out of his voice as he tried unsuccessfully to wrap his mind around what Mac was saying. All he could manage was to repeat what he had already said, the words uttered in an unmistakably shaky voice. “Angie is leaving?”

  “Don’t play cute with me.”

  Ty could not shake away the bewilderment that swirled around inside him. Panic and a true sense of urgency filled his every word. “What are you talking about?”

  “How could you have led her on like that? Playing fast and loose with her emotions, treating her like she was just another of your party girls.”

  “Angie’s leaving?” Somehow he had to get his mind locked into what had happened. “Where is she going?” Panic welled inside him, expanding and growing with each successive minute.

  “I don’t know exactly. But because of you she’s taking the next ferry to Seattle and will be checking in at—”

  “No!” The reality of Mac’s words suddenly sank in, the meaning popping into crystal clarity. “I won’t allow it!”

  Ty charged out of the office, leaving a startled Mac staring after his retreating form. A combination of dread and alarm pushed him blindly toward the parking lot and his car. She had decided to go back to Portland with Caufield. There couldn’t be any other explanation for her leaving. She was headed toward Seattle to check in with him at his hotel.

  Had he truly lost her? His determination slammed into high gear. One thing was for sure—he wasn’t going to simply give up and let her go. He loved her. Without her his life was nothing and the future had no meaning. He had to find her and once he found her he would somehow have to find the right words to make her stay.

  Ty instinctively knew he was somehow responsible for her making that decision. Somehow responsible… that was a laugh. He didn’t need to think very hard to have the reality push through the wall he had built to protect his own vulnerability. It had to do with commitment—facing up to his feelings, to his fears, a true and lasting relationship and what the future held. It had to do with love, with giving her his unconditional and undying love.

  He drove directly to Mac’s house hoping to catch her before she left. As soon as he turned the corner onto Mac’s street he saw that her car was gone. A second wave of panic washed through him. He was too late. His heart pounded. So many times it had pounded when he was around her, but this time it was fear rather than passion. He drove straight to the ferry dock. He had to get on the same ferry. If she got to Seattle before him, he might never find her again—at least not in time.

  The bitter taste of adrenaline filled his mouth as he approached the car staging area. It was filled and the cars were already driving on board. He saw her car as she drove on. There was no way he would be able to make it on the ferry in his car. He frantically looked around, then made a sudden turn into the restaurant parking lot across the street—the one with the sign clearly stating that the parking lot was for restaurant patrons only and all others would have their vehicles towed away. A towing and impound charge would be a small price to pay if he could reach her in time.

  If—there was no if. He had to succeed. He could not allow any other outcome. There were no exceptions.

  He ran into the ferry building and down the hall toward the foot passenger boarding area.

  “Hey…don’t close that door.” He raced toward the entryway and squeezed through just in time. He allowed a moment to breathe a sigh of relief. Now all he had to do was locate Angie on a large ferry boat filled with hundreds of passengers, maybe even more than a thousand, and he only had thirty-five minutes before the boat arrived at the dock in downtown Seattle. It was a formidable task, but one he had to accomplish. There weren’t any options. There was no such thing as almost.

  She was his life and he had allowed her to go away. Allowed…that was absurd. A more accurate description would be that he had driven her away by stupidly indulging his fears and hiding from reality rather than telling her how much he loved her. Absolute and total panic churned in the pit of his stomach. A sick feeling tried to work its way up his throat. He tried to formulate an efficient plan for locating her, but his mind was so muddled he couldn’t think.

  He shook his head and set his jaw in determination. He had to get his fears under control. He needed to bring some calm logic to the problem so that he could resolve it.

  The vehicle deck. He would try that first in case she had decided to stay in her car. And even if she hadn’t, if he could locate her car he would know where to find her as the ferry docked. It was a bright red color, a shiny metallic red, and the car had Oregon license plates. He had seen which lane she was in when she drove aboard. At least he knew which side of the boat to search. He raced toward the vehicle deck and squeezed through row after row of parked cars. He finally spotted her car. He tried the doors. They were unlocked.

  Logic…he had to get his emotional upheaval under control and apply logic. Where would she have gone? He looked around and located the door closest to her car that led upstairs to the passenger decks. He took the stairs two at a time. His pulse raced and his heart pounded. He was desperate to find her before the ferry docked. Once she returned to her car he would only have a few brief minutes before she would be clear to drive away. He needed more time than that.

  He checked the line at the cafeteria and the surrounding tables where people were eating, but she wasn’t there. He stayed on the main deck, hoping his guess about her location was right. The panic welled inside him again and the fear coursed through his veins. He methodically made his way from the back of the ferry toward the front, carefully scanning the groups of passengers for any sight of her. He had never been so frightened in his life or so panicked. He had to find her. She was his life, the one single thing that mattered above and beyond everything else.

  Angie leaned against the railing at the front of the ferry, the breeze ruffling through her hair as she stared at the Seattle skyline in the distance. Several tears stained her cheeks. She quickly wiped them away with her fingers. Somewhere out there was a future for her—a place to live, a career. And maybe that special someone? She closed her eyes. A sob caught in her throat. No one would ever be able to replace Tyler Farrell in her heart.

  She opened her eyes and stared at the horizon. Ty was the past. She had to look to the future. She could not continue without a commitment and Ty had been unwilling to offer one. She preferred to end the relationship now rather than hear empty words that would make a breakup even more painful at a later date.

  She glanced at her watch. They would be docking in about twenty minutes. She would check into a motel, then find a job. It was a straightforward and simple plan of action. A place to live, a job and a new start on her life. She thought when she broke her engagement with Caufield that it was a clean start to a new life, but she had been wrong. She never dreamed she would become involved in a new relationship. Now she would start again, only this time she would stick to her goals. She wouldn’t allow—

  “Angie?”

  Her breath froze in her lungs and she stopped breathing for a few seconds. The voice came from behind her, a voice she knew so well. A shiver ran up her spine and rippled across her skin. Was the voice real or had she wanted to hear it so much that she imagined it? She hoped against hope she would see Ty standing behind her.

  She slowly turned around. Her heart skipped a beat. He looked so sexy, so strong, so sure of things. But his eyes held a level of panic she never would have associated with him. He had followed her on the ferry. But how did he know? Had he seen her leaving? Did he know about her plan?

  She didn’t have time for any more thoughts. He pulled her into his embrace and held her tightly against him. He folded her in his warmth. She felt so safe and secure in his arms. She loved him so much, but she had to know they had a future together. She couldn’t accept
a one-sided relationship. She couldn’t commit to that relationship if she was the only one making a commitment.

  She swallowed the lump in her throat as she tried to speak. “What…what are you doing here?”

  “That should be my question. Mac said you were leaving.” Total relief soared inside him. He had found her before they docked in Seattle. Then the dark cloud overshadowed his elation. Was it in time? And now that he had found her he needed to…

  He tried to get his thoughts straight, but could only blurt out the first thing that came to his mind. “You don’t need to go back to your ex-fiancé. I make a good living. You can stay here. I can take care of you.”

  He continued to hold her in his arms. He didn’t want to ever let go of her for fear she might disappear. Somehow he had to convince her to stay. He placed a loving kiss on her forehead as he gently caressed her shoulders. His words were a soft whisper, words he had already said but couldn’t stop himself from saying again. “I can take care of you. I want to take care of you.”

  Her moment of contentment disappeared. Had she heard him correctly? Take care of her? She had allowed herself to jump to the conclusion that he cared about her in the same way she cared about him and it had turned out not to be true. She would not make that mistake again. She would not misinterpret his words, make them mean what she wanted them to be—make assumptions.

  She pulled back from him and looked up into his face. “You can take care of me?” She stepped out of his embrace. As long as he held her in his arms she knew she wouldn’t be able to think straight.

  “Having someone take care of me is not what matters. It isn’t what I want out of life. I can take care of myself.”

  He reached out for her again, but she sidestepped his efforts. He furrowed his brow as the confusion swept across his face. “Then why are you going back to him? Back to Caufield?”

  A moment of stunned silence hung in the air before she could muster a response. Her surprise clung to her words. “What makes you think I’m going back to Caufield?”

  “Well…you told me he went to Seattle and checked into a hotel and that he had come here to take you back to Portland with him. When Mac said you were packing up and leaving, that you intended to catch the ferry to Seattle, I naturally assumed…well, what else was I to think?”

  Angie glanced toward the horizon, at the Seattle skyline and the ferry dock growing closer and closer. She took a steadying breath and plunged into what had been left unsaid when she and Ty were last together. There was no reason to hold back, no reason to hold out hope that he would willingly offer what she wanted most to hear.

  “Caufield offered me a commitment, a promise for the future. But what he wouldn’t do was allow me to be who I am, to pursue my career, to find fulfillment within myself and my capabilities. He wanted me up on some sort of ivory pedestal where my activities could be controlled by him which would include going to the country club, donating my time to his mother’s favorite charity and being a decoration on his arm when the occasion called for it. It was a suffocating prospect.”

  She paused for a moment as she shook her head and pursed her lips. “It’s not exactly what I’d call the basis for a lifetime partnership of equality or a happy marriage. I couldn’t live with that type of a relationship, with the restrictions…” she made eye contact with him “…any more than I could live with a relationship that didn’t include a commitment.”

  Ty swallowed hard. He wasn’t sure exactly what to say or how to respond to her words. “Then where are you going?”

  “I’m going to find a job and my own place to live. I have a couple of appointments tomorrow and I’ve circled several apartments for rent in the newspaper that I need to look at.”

  Again confusion clouded his thinking. “But what does that have to do with right now? Where are you going to stay tonight?”

  The announcement came over the loudspeaker system telling all drivers to return to their cars immediately.

  Angie looked toward the dock, then at Ty. A sense of urgency surrounded her words. “I need to return to my car. You need to get to your car, too. We’ll be docked in a couple of minutes.” She turned toward the door going from the outside deck to the inside area of the ferry.

  “Angie, wait. Where are you going? Where can I find you? Where will you be tonight?”

  She ran from the deck, past the cafeteria area, then headed for the stairs leading down to the vehicle level. She disappeared in the crowd of people attempting to return to their cars, but Ty knew where she had parked. He had to get to her car before she was able to drive off the ferry. If he missed her on the vehicle level…well, he didn’t want to think about it. It was not acceptable. He could not allow it.

  He shoved his way through the crowd toward the stairs. As soon as he reached the vehicle level he skirted his way around the parked cars, most of them with occupants and the motor running waiting for the car ahead of them to move forward. He reached her car, yanked open the door and slid into the passenger seat. The shock spread across her face at his sudden appearance.

  He gulped in a couple of deep breaths to calm his breathing. “I don’t care where you’re going, but wherever it is I’m going with you. We have to talk.”

  “What about your car? You can’t abandon it here where it will be blocking the other cars trying to leave.”

  “I had to leave my car in the restaurant parking lot across the street from the ferry dock on Bainbridge. There wasn’t time for me to get on with my car so I boarded as a foot passenger.”

  The car in front of them started moving forward. She put the car in gear and followed. Her mind raced to put together what was happening. Ty had followed her on the ferry, but for what specific purpose? To ask her not to leave? But without a commitment, it wouldn’t matter. She knew she had to stand firm on that point. It was very important to her.

  He interrupted her thoughts. “As soon as you get out of here, pull over on the first side street you come to. We have to talk right now. It can’t wait.”

  “Talk about what?”

  “About us…” He took a steadying breath in an attempt to calm his inner fears and shove aside his anxieties. “About the future.”

  “That’s what I’m doing here, Ty. I’m taking care of my future. I’ve explained it to Mac. He understands.” Her insides quivered and trepidation welled inside her. She felt trapped. At that moment, as much as she wanted a commitment from Ty, she needed to get away by herself and clear her head of the stifling confusion.

  “Well, I don’t understand. Maybe I’m just too dense. You’re going to have to explain it to me. I want to know where you’re going and exactly why. If you explained it to Mac, then you can explain it to me, too.”

  Her hackles stood on end. He sounded as if he was dictating to her, telling her what to do. How had everything gotten so out of control and gone so wrong? Every step she took put her in a bigger mess than she had been before. The last thing she wanted was a painful confrontation, but she didn’t seem to be able to escape it. Perhaps confronting him now would be better than later. Now would allow her to make a clean break of it. She knew she couldn’t handle a long drawn-out confrontation. She loved him too much.

  Leaving without talking to Ty, however, had been the coward’s way out. She had been suffering misgivings about the way she had handled the decision. She turned into a parking lot a couple of blocks down the street from the ferry dock.

  Angie turned in her seat until she faced Ty. “Okay. What do you think we have to talk about?”

  Ty tried to swallow his fears so that he could appear calm and in control. But as much as he wanted it to be so, he knew he had failed miserably. His fear of losing her, of her no longer being part of his life and his future, totally overshadowed his deeply held fear of making a commitment.

  He grasped her hand. He craved the physical contact, the warmth and security of her touch. He needed the courage it gave him, the courage to say what he should have said long before then. To
say what was in his heart.

  “Angie…” His throat went dry. He was about to say the most important words he had ever spoken, words that would have an impact on his entire future and the rest of his life. He had to say them and say them quickly before he lost his nerve again. He pressed the back of her hand to his lips.

  “Angie…I love you.” Once those most important and feared words were out of his mouth it was as if the dam had burst. Words tumbled out in an almost frenzied manner as if he couldn’t say them fast enough. “I love you very much. I’ll work very hard to make sure you’re never bored. You’ll never feel neglected or be taken for granted or patronized. I would never hold you back from being all that you can be, from accomplishing whatever you want.”

  Angie’s insides quivered so violently that she was sure her entire body must be visibly shaking. No words had ever sounded as marvelous as what Ty had just said. The jubilation rose inside her, shoving everything else aside. Tears of joy filled her eyes and threatened to overflow.

  “Are you sure, Ty? You’re not just saying that because it’s what I want to hear?”

  “I’m saying it because I mean it. I want us to spend the rest of our lives together. When Mac told me you were leaving I was so scared. I have never been as panicked before in my life. I knew I had to do everything in my power to stop you. I can’t imagine what the future would be like without you.”

  He leaned forward and kissed her. “I love you, Angie.” His voice dropped to a whisper, the words coming directly from his heart. “Come home with me. Be part of my life and let me be part of yours for all the years ahead.”

  Total elation bubbled inside her. “Oh, Ty…I love you so much. I’ve been so scared, so afraid that you didn’t love me. And when you wouldn’t make a commitment to us, to our relationship and our future, I felt I had to leave so I could make a clean break and get on with my life—a life I knew would always be empty without you.”