“Smyth.”
“No.” Julie shook her head. “James Morrison. He and his wife, Leslie, were my parents’ closest friends. After my mother died, Leslie became like a second mother to me. James was a great help to Colin as he took over the firm.”
Hunter was more confused than ever. On edge. Sipping the wine he’d carried over with him. Feeling he was sinking deeper into a place he definitely didn’t belong. And yet he couldn’t not sit there. Holding her hand in his, resting their joined hands just above his knee.
Nothing made sense.
Including the way his heart was continuing to bleed for the woman next to him.
“There’s this High Risk team here in Santa Raquel. It’s made up of police, school and medical personnel and provides a means by which all these professionals come together with reports of possible domestic violence. Their hope is to prevent domestic violence deaths.”
He’d heard of the team through Brett Ackerman and would soon be working on a fund-raiser for a new computer program that would give minute-to-minute mobile updates to all the team members.
“Over the course of a couple of years, Leslie had been in the hospital for injuries that drew concern. Their son was struggling at school.”
Oh, God. Not Morrison, too. He was watching his donor list crumble. Not just Morrison and Smyth, but all of the people the two of them knew.
How could he take money from them, regardless of the charities and causes? How could he invite them to parties, knowing this?
How did Julie live with it all?
He looked over at her, saw the pain in her eyes. And...
Needed to give her the crest of a wave.
“I didn’t know what was going on, but I was absolutely sure that James would never hurt Leslie.”
Hallelujah. Hunter felt like dropping to his knees. A gesture that was far too dramatic for him. Unless he happened to be licking the floor to get a smile out of Joy.
“She wouldn’t talk to Chantel, but she talked to me. Her injuries were truly accidents, but self-inflicted ones. Her psyche’s way of punishing her for what she believed she should have prevented. She’d been raped by David Smyth, too.”
“She didn’t know about your...” He couldn’t finish the sentence.
Julie’s nod had his stomach lurching again. “She knew I’d been raped. But she didn’t know it was by him. Not until afterward, when he told her. She’d offered to give him a ride home when he was stranded, never thinking she’d be in danger with him.”
“And by then he was already married with kids.”
She shook her head. “He had just started college then. Leslie didn’t tell a soul. He told her what had happened with Colin and me when I tried to claim he’d raped me. That’s when she found out who my rapist was. The Smyths and the commissioner made a powerful team. The Morrisons are rich, but only because people like the Smyths and Reynolds keep their money in Morrison’s bank. She knew that if anyone found out what had happened, they’d be destitute. More than that, she knew her husband would end up in jail because he’d kill Smyth himself. She also knew that coming forward, blowing her family’s lives apart, wasn’t going to change anything. And she couldn’t face the humiliation of admitting she’d been raped by a college boy, the son of a friend of theirs. David would say it was consensual, just like he did with me. That she’d propositioned him. There’d be people who’d believe him...”
“So the two of you held on to your secrets?”
For the first time in a while, Julie’s eyes filled with tears. A small smile tilted her lips. Not with humor, but with...something.
“Chantel wouldn’t let us,” Julie said. “She was a junior officer and took on the police commissioner. She devised a plan to trap David into attempting to rape her. But she couldn’t do it without Leslie’s and my help.”
“You helped her catch him.”
“Yes.”
“All those years later.”
“I wanted to get out of my prison.”
He looked at the grounds, at the mansion beside them, and understood. She’d been held hostage by lies. And fear. For more than a decade.
“I also knew, as Chantel did, that there had to be more victims. That if David had done to Leslie what he’d done to me, then he hadn’t learned his lesson, despite what his father had promised us. There had to be others in between.”
“Were there?”
She nodded.
“And none of this made it to the papers?”
“One thing did. Commissioner Reynolds’s resignation. Chantel had a list of demands she made in order to keep her mouth shut. That was one of them. And David was charged with a laundry list of crimes. His father managed to convince him to take a plea deal so his family could be spared the publicity. Victims were paid off, and it all went quietly away.”
“I’m glad it was kept quiet.”
“Me, too,” Julie said. “The thought of everyone knowing what I’ve just told you...”
“The thought of you having to go through that...”
They were looking at each other. Their faces so close.
Hunter squeezed her hand. She squeezed his.
And let go.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
JULIE ALMOST DIDN’T make breakfast Monday morning. It would’ve been a first, but Colin and Chantel would have understood. She’d had a man at the pool.
Major life change.
She didn’t want to face their questions.
Or their concern.
But when she considered the alternative—avoiding them, hiding out in her studio—she went downstairs as usual. She made fruit crepes and fresh-squeezed orange juice and had the table set by the time they showed up in the breakfast room.
“This looks great.” Chantel was in the pants and jacket she wore to work now that she’d made detective. Her gun strapped at her waist used to make Julie uncomfortable. She was accustomed to it now.
Colin had his tablet on the table, open to a news source.
“You okay?” Chantel asked, just as Julie, staring at the tablet, noticed that her brother hadn’t scrolled down the screen since taking his seat.
“I think I am,” she said, and then to Colin, “You can relax. And...I love you.”
He looked at her. Assessing. Because he would always be her big brother, watching her back.
“Thank you,” she added.
He nodded. Ate his breakfast.
And not another word was said about Hunter Rafferty. Or her highly unusual night by the pool.
* * *
FOR THE FIRST TIME since his business opened Hunter was missing an important function. The Monday-night toy auction in Santa Barbara was a yearly event. In its third year with The Time of Your Life. Kyle was handling it for him. Happy to, actually.
His second-in-command had been champing at the bit to take on more responsibility. They could do twice as much business if there were two of them who could host. They’d have to hire another event manager to take Kyle’s place.
Hunter wasn’t ready for that. His business was built on his reputation, and his events all had the hallmark of his personality.
Or maybe he was a little too full of himself.
Or...afraid to find out that he wasn’t as necessary as he thought he was. Maybe he didn’t want to know if things went on just as well without him as they did when he was in attendance.
On his way to pick up Edward for a light picnic dinner at the beach with Julie and Lila and Joy, he thrummed a quick beat on the steering wheel.
Other than the fact that police had been able to determine a direction in which Shawn had dragged Cara, based on Joy’s account of seeing a shadow the morning her mother disappeared, there’d been no progress that day.
They’d disc
overed signs in the dirt of a struggle not far from where Joy would’ve seen her mother. But the sidewalk had been just past that, and the trail was lost. They’d called in dogs, but again, the trail was lost. Police were canvassing neighborhoods. Anyone who knew anything wasn’t saying.
Julie had had an art session with Joy that morning. He’d been hugely relieved to hear Edward’s report that Julie was carrying on as normal.
Although why he’d thought she might not be, he didn’t know.
The rape and all the ensuing misconduct, the wrongdoing, had been news to him. She’d lived with the crushing effects of it for more than a decade. For her, nothing had changed.
For him, the entire world seemed to have shifted. It wasn’t that he was an idealist. Or at all naive. He knew that where there was money, there was a good chance of corruption. Knew that American politics had its share. He worked with political campaigns, with candidates, with PACs. They were some of the clients who hired him.
He just hadn’t realized that the men and women in this small town, some of the people on his donor list, the ones he’d grown to trust, in a business sense, had harbored an actual criminal.
Other than Brett Ackerman, who was more of a recluse than not, Hunter didn’t have personal relationships with these people. They were a list of invitees. Period.
How many of them knew about the Smyths? Commissioner Reynolds? All of them, he’d bet. They could keep it out of the news, but their gossip, among themselves, was a beast of its own.
One that ate well.
According to Edward, art with Joy had not gone well that morning. Nothing bad had happened. From what he’d said, Joy had been happy to see Julie. She just hadn’t said another word. Or revealed any more clues that could help them find her mother.
Which was why they were having a picnic at the beach. After a discussion between Julie, Sara and Lila—at which Julie had made the suggestion, based on her conversation with Hunter—it was determined that a trip to the beach was their best bet.
They’d all seen Joy’s reaction to the mention of Edward’s house by the ocean. While going to the beach might not be immediately pleasant, it would be familiar. She’d be with people who made her feel safe, and if she was frightened, maybe she’d open up to Julie again.
Over the past week, they’d been giving Joy a sense of family.
Lila and Sara felt that they needed to tell her that Edward was her grandfather. To reinforce a sense of security. She needed to understand that she had someplace to go. Family to look after her.
They also needed to prevent her from forming too close an attachment to Julie.
Bottom line, they needed Julie to continue to give her all to the little girl. But to do that knowing she was expendable. That at some point, and the sooner the better, Joy would no longer need her.
Or be in her life.
They were asking a hell of a lot from Julie, in Hunter’s opinion. But if anyone could handle it, she could.
They were also attributing far too much importance to his offhand suggestion of a trip to the beach. Maybe the visit would be enough—through fear or familiarity—to trigger more information from Joy. Maybe it would just be about the sand and the water.
If their excursion sent the little girl further back into her shell, a possibility that had been discussed at length, he’d been told, he’d have more proof that he needed to stay out of the emotional arena.
A couple of blocks from Edward’s hotel, Hunter’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his pocket immediately. Julie might need to—
Mandy.
He let it go to voice mail. He’d texted her earlier that day to apologize for the night before. Told her he’d make it up to her.
And he would.
She’d know he had a function tonight if she looked at his website. Which she usually did when she wanted to hook up. He’d try her later.
He’d been waiting all day for Julie’s call. Thinking she’d want to check in after their time together the night before.
He was new to this...emotional...thing and had guessed wrong. He hadn’t heard from her.
Told himself that was good. That he had no reason to be disappointed.
He’d never even kissed the woman. So why did he feel as though they were intimately involved? As though he was in a relationship, a committed one, for the first time in his life.
He’d been to bed with women and not felt that way.
Uncomfortable with the certainty that he was going to let her down sooner or later, he knew he had to see her.
To set things straight.
He needed out.
She hadn’t called.
* * *
THEY WERE MEETING at The Lemonade Stand and would walk through the back of the property, through a locked gate to the private beach. It was down a fairly steep path, which was walled off from the property on either side of the Stand. Property also owned by Brett Ackerman. Most times the beach went unused. As a general rule, residents at the Stand preferred to stay close to the buildings, with security nearby. They held their water parties at the lovely pool on the premises, or in the Garden of Renewal. But they’d had a beach party or two.
While Joy was with her house mother, changing her sandals for tennis shoes that also went with the jeans and red short-sleeved shirt she’d chosen that morning, Julie had gone in to see Lila.
She’d been at the Stand for most of the day—minus a couple of hours for a lunch meeting to discuss final plans for Thursday night’s gala—but had been busy with Joy, or discussing Joy, most of that time.
She would’ve liked to change from the brown pants and tailored cream shirt she’d put on for her business luncheon—and to have something other than the matching leather loafers to wear down to the beach. But she hadn’t had a chance to run home and put on something else.
Her loafers would slip off easily. She’d been walking barefoot in the sand since she was a kid. It was too cool for shorts. And her only pair of jeans was in the wash.
Lila was in jeans, which Julie had never seen her wear before. They were fairly formfitting and looked...really good. They were gray—Lila always wore brown or gray—but she’d topped them with a lighter-colored short-sleeved cotton shirt. And tennis shoes. Stunned, Julie stared for a moment.
And then grinned. “You look great.”
“I look like I’m going to work in my garden,” the older woman said as they entered her office, and Lila locked the door behind them.
“I didn’t know you had a garden,” Julie said as they settled on the couch. They were meeting Hunter and Edward in the lobby out front, but had a few minutes. Sara would be bringing Joy to them shortly.
“At my condominium. It’s small. Tomatoes. Cucumbers. That’s it.”
Julie couldn’t imagine gardening. Or imagine Lila doing it, either. For a while she’d been feeling as if she and Lila had a lot in common. They were both accomplished, independent women. And they both lived single lives, dedicating themselves to charity work, with no immediate families of their own.
Lila had always seemed content. Complete. Peaceful.
Exactly what Julie wanted to be.
“I’d like to talk to you for a second,” she said now. They didn’t have much time, at least not for personal conversation. And she had to speak with Lila. Not Sara, or Bloom Larson, her therapist.
“What’s up?” The other woman’s immediate attention was a balm, but it made her nervous, too.
“I need your opinion on something.”
Lila nodded, her hands in her lap. “Fine.”
“Do you think that everything’s possible for every person? That traditional choices, societal norms, are the best way to happiness?” She held her breath. Not sure what answer she wanted. Just knowing that she couldn’t let hope be born where it didn’t bel
ong.
Lila studied her as if they had all day. They didn’t. They only had a few minutes and...
“I’m not clear on what you’re asking me,” she finally said.
“I’m talking about relationships. Personal partnerships. Do you think everyone has to have one to be happy?”
Lila didn’t have one. Julie needed to know if she was happy.
Because after the night before with Hunter...
She couldn’t afford to waste her limited ability to hope on something that wasn’t right for her.
“I’m confused...by some of the things I see and hear that don’t seem to go together. We talk about healing with our residents, talk about hope for the future and the happiness that awaits them. We talk about everyone having the right to find their own happiness. But...are we being fair? I mean, what if a partner relationship isn’t what’s best for someone, isn’t that person’s way to happiness?”
Lila’s expression was serious as she answered slowly. “Sometimes, things happen to people that change them. Or things they do that change them. Sometimes, because of things that have happened because of them or to them, even things done by them, people can’t be in partner relationships. It doesn’t mean, however, that they can’t be happy. It just means they have to find another path to that happiness.”
Julie swallowed. Because she knew Lila was right. She was describing Julie as well as if she was inside her mind. Her heart.
“But...” Her voice broke, but she pushed forward. “What about healing?”
That was where her confusion lay. Sara and Bloom Larson—Chantel’s psychiatrist friend to whom she’d referred Julie—talked about the next phases of her life. Everything that came after healing.
Bloom was a former victim. And she probably had the happiest, sexiest relationship in town to hear Chantel talk about it. Many of the Stand’s residents had moved on to find truly happy lives.
And there were some people, like Julie, whose psyches had been so damaged they weren’t equipped to be healthy partners in a relationship. Her own psyche had been broken not only by the rape, but by the death of her parents shortly before that, and then ten years of being a virtual prisoner because of the lie she lived and her constant fear of running into the man who’d raped her.
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