by Lyn Stone
Jensen was a large man, shorter but stockier than Damien. A jock type with dark hair and eyes, and a kick-butt attitude. He would have been handsome if not for the permanent I-can-take-you-anytime smirk he wore. Damien didn’t think it was a result of Jack’s time behind bars. It looked inborn.
“You’re a Brit,” Jensen said.
“You’re observant,” Damien replied.
Jensen ignored him and turned his attention back to Molly. “Not working today?”
Molly glared. “You know I’m not. And you know why.”
“Oh, that’s right,” Jensen said, drawing out the last word. “Too bad about the job, but it wasn’t much, anyway. Wasting your talents there, honey.” He made a face, like a grimace of sympathy.
“Go away, Jack,” she said, her voice gruff with irritation, “before I have you arrested. You’re not supposed to communicate, remember?”
“Uh-oh, I bet we haven’t had our morning coffee yet, have we?” he remarked. “I’ve never known you to leave home without a cup. And eating out this morning, too! Guess home cooking’s lost its appeal?”
The cretin was actually taunting Molly with a veiled reminder of the poison. Damien stepped in to diffuse her temper. It would be preferable if Jensen lost his.
“We were just about to order. Are you planning to join us or just stand there and try to ruin her breakfast?” Damien smiled for effect, glanced pointedly at Molly and then regarded Jensen again. “I can promise you, nothing you can say—or do—is going to affect my…appetite.”
Jensen’s expression grew dark at the obvious sexual connotation Damien gave the word, but he managed to recover. “Just visiting the States?” he demanded, barely concealing the note of outright hostility. He wasn’t trying all that efficiently to hide it, but he was still in command of himself. One more shot might do it.
“Oh, no, I live here now,” Damien assured him. Then he cast Molly a provocative look. “I adore this city. Beautiful, don’t you think?” He raised a brow at Jensen, grinned and winked. “And so…accommodating, as well.”
The man ground his teeth. You could actually hear it. His hands were fisted and his face was turning red. A vein on his forehead pulsed. However, after a couple of seconds of that, Damien realized Jensen was not going to give them the display he’d hoped for. Might as well retire to their corners until the next round.
“Well, it has been quite an experience meeting you,” Damien said with false cheer. “One I hope to repeat under…more opportune circumstances, shall we say?” He stuck out his hand, giving Jensen no choice but to shake it.
Jensen’s palm was dry and the handshake bruising. Challenging. Damien squeezed back. Harder. Damien was quite confident of the outcome. Apparently Jensen soon realized it, too, and let go.
Like the bully he was, Jensen backed away from Damien and turned on Molly. “You take care now, Moll,” he said softly, menacingly. “You take real good care.”
To her credit, Molly put on a supremely confident smile of warning and replied, “You’d better do the same, Jackie Boy.”
Damien wanted to hug her for the brave front. Not once had she revealed her fear when he knew it must be considerable. “Ciao, Jack,” he added pointedly. “That’s Italian for goodbye or face arrest.”
Jensen said nothing. He merely shot Damien a get-stuffed look, turned away and left. Neither of them spoke until Jensen had slapped down his check and a few bills by the cash register and left the building.
Molly heaved a sigh of relief and closed her eyes for a moment. “Well, what do you think now that you’ve met him?”
Damien shrugged and sat, picking up his menu. “I doubt he’ll invite me to lunch.”
“Not unless he’s got some of that rat poison in his pocket,” she replied with a droll laugh. Then she grew all too serious. “He was just livid, Damien. I really hate to think what he’ll do now.”
“Whatever it is, we’ll be ready,” he reassured her, beckoning to the waitress who was circulating with the coffeepot.
Hours later, Molly felt ready to give up on the city tour. How in the world had she ever thought she could entertain a man like Damien? Oh, he acted interested enough, but she knew he must be bored silly.
After their ride out to visit The Hermitage, Andrew Jackson’s home, she’d realized the place must seem relatively new to him, given the ancient castles near where he’d grown up. Heck, his own home had probably been older than the White House. Dumb move on her part.
The art museum here at Creekwood must seem tame when he compared it to, say, the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square. Of course, she’d never seen it except in photos, but she could just imagine how great it was, how majestic and chock-full of centuries’ old artworks.
But he marched on, pretending eagerness, all but dragging her into the Pineapple Room Restaurant adjacent to the museum for sandwiches. They sat there now, finishing their iced tea while Damien shuffled through the brochures they had picked up of other Nashville attractions. Molly almost groaned.
“Here!” he said, tossing one beside her plate. “We can’t miss this.”
“The toy museum?” she asked with a huff of disbelief. “All right, that’s enough. Let’s go home and watch a video or something. You’re off the hook.”
“No, no!” he argued, laughing and snatching up the pamphlet. “I mean it. C’mon, I love trains. Indulge me.”
She shook her head and set down her tea glass. “You’re being nice, Damien, but give it up. I know your eyes must be glazing over by now.”
He lay his hand on her arm and smiled that wonderful, gracious smile of his. “Molly, I can’t tell you when I’ve had more fun.”
“Right. You can’t tell me because the truth would hurt my feelings! I love Nashville with all my heart, but you—”
“Love it, too,” he assured her. Then he pinched her wrist playfully. “But I’d love it even more if I could see those trains. Be a sport?”
Gone was all his savoir faire. He sounded like a little boy, which, she realized, he still might be in one respect. Had he ever had many toys around? Boarding schools probably didn’t allow much room for those. And he’d spent so little time at the home that wasn’t a home.
She slung her purse strap over her shoulder and got up. “Trains it is, then. C’mon, kid, let’s make tracks.”
He groaned at the pun and pulled her free arm through his to escort her out. Molly almost groaned, too. His touch made her a little dizzy.
In the next couple of hours she met a whole new Damien. While she stood by in amazement, he carried on about track widths and steam versus electric locomotives until she wanted to scream. The man was in heaven.
They examined every exhibit at least twice, and then checked out the gift shop. He came out of there with a boxed set he swore was appropriate for a child Sydney’s age. Molly knew better. Syd would never get her chubby little hands on that prize, she thought with a grin.
As the day wore on Damien periodically assured her that they were not being followed. He had turned off the tracker before they’d left the restaurant and kept close watch everywhere they went.
She supposed it didn’t matter all that much whether Jack followed them during the day. He wouldn’t approach them again the way he had at breakfast. She had a feeling his next move would not be out in the open at all. Damien agreed.
She was surprised when he wanted to see where Jack lived, but she gave him directions to the Jensens’ house after they left the toy shop.
“Pretentious, huh?” she asked as they drove by the gates to the high brick wall surrounding the mansion and property.
“Gives him the illusion of safety,” Damien remarked cryptically.
“I think you’d better leave him that illusion,” Molly warned. “If you have any wild ideas, you ought to know there are two Dobermans prowling that fence who might like the taste of you.”
Damien laughed. After their day on the town, Molly thought he seemed to have loosened up somehow. She knew he
had to be tired. He hadn’t had much sleep last night, if any. Maybe he was punchy from exhaustion.
At the moment he reminded her of Ford. Not in looks—they were as different as night and day there—but Damien wore the same expectancy, the same eager-for-trouble expression her brother was famous for. Could be an agent thing, she supposed.
“Dogs love me. What else ought I to know?” he asked, nodding toward the Jensen property.
“Are you just idly questioning, or about to get busted for trespassing?”
“Oh, Molly, darling, I am never idle,” he said with an engaging grin. “And I have never, ever been busted for anything.”
Chapter 7
Damien toyed with the idea of checking out the Jensens on their home ground, but figured he could glean all the pertinent information about them from Molly. The main thing he was interested in was getting a better handle on Jack, a profile.
Harassing Molly with phone calls and embarrassing her in public were bad enough, but obtaining a key to her house and placing that poison was something else again. So was buying a tracking device and tailing her everywhere she went. Those things indicated a great deal of thought and preplanning. Actions a true stalker, not just an irate ex-husband, might take.
He watched Molly dish up the take-out steak dinners they had picked up on the way home. The way she had groused about throwing out all the food that Jensen might have tainted with the rat poison, Damien wondered just how tight her funds really were.
“Does Jensen pay you child support or alimony?” he asked, handing her a couple of glasses from the dishwasher.
She shook her head and concentrated on filling the glasses with ice.
“Nothing?” he asked.
“I never wanted anything from him,” she explained. “Jack insisted Sydney was not his. His mom and dad believe him, I guess. They’ve never even asked to see Syd. Like it would convince them if they did! Syd doesn’t have a single Jensen trait, looks or otherwise. And I’m glad of that. It’s fine with me if he thinks she’s not his. Can you see me granting him visitation rights?”
“Good point,” he granted.
When she handed him his glass of tea, he saw the anger in her eyes. “They think Jack got himself saddled with lowlife, poor white trash. That I tricked him.”
Damien snorted at the description. “You are joking?”
She smiled wryly, her natural good humor taking over. “Nope. You see before you a disadvantaged, junior college dropout. I’m sure they imagine Jack finding me in some rundown dump with a sofa on the front porch and a junker in my yard up on cement blocks. I was out to trap my sorry self a guy with money.”
“Trap? You weren’t pregnant when you married him,” Damien stated.
Molly laughed as she set his plate of food in front of him and then sat. “No, actually they think I used my lush and wicked body. That’s a laugh, huh? Like, I’m so-o-o enticing.”
She was, Damien thought. Enticing as hell, but she didn’t seem to know it.
“He must have loved you to go against his parents’ wishes and marry you, anyway,” Damien said. “He probably still does love you, but it’s turned pathological. The hate he feels is just as strong. Did he suffer abuse as a boy, do you think?”
“Possibly,” she answered, and then qualified it. “Or maybe he just observed it. Mildred can be irritating, no doubt about it. And when the old man’s not around, she acts haughty as hell, but I think she’s probably more scared of John than I ever was of Jack.”
“You believe he mistreats her?” Damien asked, taking a bite of the tasteless beef.
“I can’t say for sure. I never saw it happen or noticed any bruises, but it makes sense, doesn’t it? Learned behavior? Like father, like son?”
“Could be.” He nodded, satisfied that he’d gained at least one piece of the puzzle. Jack had probably been battered, too, not that that was any excuse for what he’d done to Molly.
Damien certainly had seen and endured his share of beatings growing up and it wasn’t as though he went around pounding on schoolteachers because of it.
Question was, how deep did Jensen’s rage go? Would he kill? He certainly thought he had when Molly had fallen and hit her head.
“He feels jealousy, even now,” Damien told her. “That was obvious in the restaurant. Yet he wants to hurt you, either psychologically or physically. The man is definitely sick.”
“Well, thank you, Dr. Perry,” she said with an engaging grin. “That is so profound! Will you be billing me for that diagnosis?”
He laughed with her. “Never mind me. I’m just thinking out loud.”
“Uneducated as I am, I had figured all that out by myself. At least the part about Jack. I know he loved me once, and I thought I loved him, too.”
Damien said nothing. Of course, she had loved the man. A woman like Molly would never marry where she didn’t love. Jensen had betrayed her in the very worst way. For that alone, he ought to be shot.
She pointed at him with her fork. “But his parents could be right about one thing. His wealth might have played some part in my selection process.” She shrugged. “Could be, that’s another reason I didn’t ask for any support. Maybe I felt a little guilty.”
“You would never have married for money, Molly,” Damien argued.
“Spoken like a man who has never lived without it,” she countered with a wry smile. “How do you know what I would or wouldn’t do?”
Damien knew, but he wondered if she really doubted herself that much.
“If I promised you a fortune, told you that you and Sydney would have everything your hearts desired, you wouldn’t marry me, would you?”
She giggled, wrinkling her beautiful nose with its sprinkle of freckles. “Hey, you call the preacher, honey! I’ll bake the cake.”
He laughed, too, but at himself. Why the devil had he asked her such a thing? Obvious answer, if he was honest enough to face it. The thought of marriage to someone such as Molly had somehow taken root in his mind these past two days. Maybe that’s why he’d put the example to her, to diffuse what should have sounded like a ridiculous idea, though it seemed to have the opposite effect on him to say it out loud.
It wasn’t as though he could love a woman he’d only known for a few days, could he? He doubted he knew how to love if he’d known her for a lifetime. But the notion of someone loving him certainly had appeal.
Now he had no clue what to say, so he said nothing.
She was still chuckling softly and making whirls in her mashed potatoes with her fork. She looked up at him. “Do you like chocolate?”
“What?”
“Chocolate. I truly need a fix. Let’s go to Dixie Freeze and get a shake.” Then she snapped her fingers. “No, wait! We don’t have to. I’ve got a bag of candy bars in the van.”
He shoved back his chair to get up. “I’ll get it for you.” Damien was relieved she had remembered the candy. Just thinking about going out again exhausted him even more than he already was. If he didn’t get a few hours’ sleep, he’d soon be of no use to her whatsoever.
She waved him back down and hopped up. “It’s okay. I know right where they are.”
With a practiced motion, she deactivated the security alarm and flipped on the light in the garage.
Unwilling to let her go out there alone, Damien followed her and stood in the doorway. She was already at the van, so he waited there, propped against the door frame.
“What in the world is this?” he heard Molly mutter to herself.
Over the van he could see her move toward a white box sitting on the workbench. His first thought was bomb. “Molly! No!”
She screamed. Before he could reach her, she’d scrambled backward and huddled into the far corner of the garage, her hands over her head.
Bees swarmed everywhere, filling the garage with a loud angry hum.
“Freeze, Molly! Don’t move!” he shouted.
Several stung him on the arms as he dashed for the garage door and shov
ed it open. Damien carefully stood out of the way until most of the swarm had flown outside. Some remained, angrily circling the white box. A few hit the walls of the garage as they sought escape.
As soon as the hum subsided and the air became fairly clear, he went to collect Molly from the corner so he could get her inside. She hadn’t moved.
“Most of them are gone,” he said. “The rest are finding their way back to the hive where the queen is. It’s all right now.”
She uttered a keening sound of pure terror as he tried to pull her stiffened body out of its crouched position. He spoke softly to her. “Molly! Listen to me, darling, it’s fine now. They’re gone. Come on, uncover your head and look around. See? Were you stung? Let me see.”
Jerkily, she held up her arms. “Help me,” she cried, her voice high-pitched terror. One hand was already swelling and not just at the site of the sting. Her arm, as well. Damien glanced at her face and saw her struggling for breath.
“Oh, my God!” He grabbed her up and ran out to the Lexus, setting her down only long enough to fish out his keys and unlock the door. He shoved her inside and ran around to the driver’s side.
Damien remembered passing the hospital on their afternoon tour and judged it would take about ten minutes to get there. He meant to make it in five. The worst thoughts imaginable ran through his mind.
Lack of oxygen could cause brain damage if she couldn’t breathe. What if he didn’t get her there in time? She might stop breathing altogether. They might not save her at all if he didn’t hurry.
Damien pressed the accelerator to the floorboard and flew, running red lights, horn blaring. He cursed when an ambulance blocked the access to the emergency doors. Screeching to a halt, half on the sidewalk, he leaped out and ran around to get her out of the car.
By the time he got her in his arms, she could barely draw a breath and her eyes were swollen shut.
“Hang on, Molly. Almost there!” She was totally stiff in his arms. And shaking. He struggled through the automatic doors, trying not to bang her head or feet, and carried her toward the desk at a run.
“Anaphylactic shock!” he shouted. “Hurry! Do something! She can’t breathe!”