Summer Fire
Page 93
Which I did, to the mutual satisfaction of us both.
*
“So?” she prompted me a little later.
I was feeling relaxed and mellow. “So what?”
“So if we’re going to keep on seeing each other back in Boston, don’t you think it’s time you told me what you’re doing these days? You’re not still teaching?”
“Ah, right. You might not believe me when I tell you, though. Hell, I don’t believe it myself half the time.”
“Try me?”
“You promise you won’t laugh?”
She promptly laughed. I pretended to be offended and delivered another spank to her bare ass. She wriggled, grinned and then made an effort to look serious. “Okay. I promise.”
“It’ll be the ruler again for you if you break your promise. Okay. Here goes: I don’t know if anyone knew it when you were in high school, but I had all these typical English teacher dreams about writing the great American novel. I used to go home after class and work on it. Poetry, too. I wrote atrocious poetry.”
“I knew about the poetry. You ran a poetry slam once, remember. 1950s beatnik style. It was one of the things that made all us girls drool over you.”
“Shit, I’d forgotten that. Very Allen Ginsberg? Yeah, I was young…what can I say? I had literary aspirations.”
“And?” She prodded when I fell silent for a while.
“And after being unemployed for a few weeks with no hope getting another teaching job at that time of year, if ever, I began having pay-the-rent and buy-food aspirations. Self-publishing was in its infancy and indie authors were making bank. So I picked a really popular type of story and started writing.”
“Like—” She was clearly trying to figure out what type of popular fiction a guy like me would be inclined to write “—science fiction? Murder mysteries?”
“More popular.”
“Thrillers?”
“Nope. What’s the bestselling genre in publishing?”
“I don’t know. Fantasy?”
“You’re a chick and you don’t know this? Romance. As a genre, romance outsells everything else.”
“Wait. Bad Prince Harry is a romance novelist?”
I could tell she was desperately trying to keep her promise not to laugh. I readied my ruler, just in case.
“Hey, people buy it. It’s gotten super high profile over the past few years. As in, my books have been bestsellers, and not just in the U.S. I am making a very nice living, especially when I compare it to my teacher’s salary.”
She had gone past laughing—she was gaping at me. “You’re a bestselling novelist? How come I didn’t know that? I read a lot.” She reached over to the bedside table and grabbed her phone. What was she doing—calling her mother?
“Who’re you calling?”
“I want to check online to see if I’ve read any of your books. I’m looking up Harry MacCallum on Amazon. Or—” she smirked at me. “Do you call yourself Harriet?”
“Harry MacCallum will probably always be a shitty wannabe poet,” I growled. “But Charlotte Charles is a New York Times bestselling romance novelist.”
“Charlotte Charles?! I’ve heard of Charlotte Charles. I’ve even read a couple of her books. Wait.” Her face changed as the significance of my pen name sank in. “Charlotte Charles?”
“Yep. It was you who got me fired and thus launched on my new career. So I named her after you.”
The ruler did get used, after all.
But it was Charley who used it on me.
Chapter Twenty
Charley
On the day of our flight back to the U.S., we had to leave very early in the morning. Harry and I had said our goodbyes the night before, promising to connect with each other next week at home. Mom must have had a similar farewell session with Tom, because I didn’t see her at all until we were groping with our luggage in the pre-dawn darkness. We were trying to get ourselves to the airport in time to catch our plane.
Once there, everything happened fast. The aircraft was waiting for us on the tarmac and we boarded and settled into our seats. Coach class this time.
Without explaining herself, Mom got up and went forward. I assumed she was going to the bathroom, so I was surprised when returned to our row and pulled her stuff from the overhead bin.
“Whatcha doing, Mom?”
She looked a little flushed, which was really unusual for my mother. “You don’t mind if I change seats, do you? It’s just that Tom has decided to fly up to Boston on business and he has a seat for me in first class.”
I gaped at her, but I quickly controlled it. I’d been paying so much attention to my own summer romance that I hadn’t realized that hers with Tom had reached the “we can’t be separated, so come to Boston with me” stage.
“I don’t mind at all,” I assured her. “You’ll enjoy it—first class on this airline is great.”
She beamed and gave me a quick kiss, then she was off up to the aisle to the front of the plane.
Wow. Go, Mom! I wondered if she and Tom would be doing the mile-high thing. My brain shied away from the idea. She was my mom.
I settled back in my seat, thinking this wasn’t so bad. I now had two empty seats beside me. Plenty of room to spread out. I tucked my Kindle into the seat pocket in front of me. I’d downloaded a new Charlotte Charles romance that I intended to read on the plane. If it was really as erotic as Harry claimed, maybe it would ease my fear of flying.
Plus I’d have something to tease him about next time I saw him.
For the take-off, though, I pulled out my blindfold. I was just settling it over my eyes when I heard steps in the aisle and a voice at my side saying,
“Whew, that was close. Taxi driver got a flat and I almost missed my flight.”
I ripped off my blindfold. Harry was standing there grinning, hot and gorgeous as ever.
“I thought your flight was tomorrow!”
“It was. I changed it. I decided I didn’t want to stay on the island one more night without my girl.”
He sat down beside me and reached for my hand. “You’re not gonna need that blindfold, babe. Flight’s half empty. We got a whole empty row opposite us and no one behind us. I can think of better ways to spend this flight than worrying about crashing, can’t you?”
I could and we did.
The End
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Heat Lightning
Joan Reeves
HEAT LIGHTNING
by Joan Reeves
HEAT LIGHTNING © Joan Reeves 2015
Her husband found her, claimed her, rescued her. David’s touch makes Tessa throb. Desire flashes between them like heat lightning on a summer night. Her body knows David, but when she looks at him, he is a stranger to her. Not a flicker of memory is left of him or their life together since she awakened from a coma. All she has are questions. Who is she? Why does David seem to hate her even as he pulls her into his arms? What is he hiding? How can she trust him when her gut says, “Trust no one”?
Prologue
Drenching rain pummeled the roof of her old Porsche. She stared with tear-swollen eyes through the windshield and wondered where the hell she was. Not that it mattered. Nothing mattered any more. Not the wrong turn she’d taken many miles back. Not the summer storm that had ambushed her. Nothing.
She hadn’t seen another vehicle on this narrow blacktop road that cut through a densely forested area. Wind whipped the pines and oaks that lined both sides of the two-lane road. She was alone in the stormy night. All alone. Just like she’d be for the rest of her life now that she’d driven him away. Bitterness and hatred filled the crack in her heart. She gulped back a sob.
Bright light suddenly filled the interior of the small car. The light was so bright it seared her burning eyes. She jabbed at the rearview mirror to tilt it up and pressed down on the accelerator to put a little distance between her car and the driver behind who seemed intent on blinding her. The little car lurched, fishtailed on the wet pavement then straightened out. The headlights behind receded.
The trees thinned. A quarter of a mile later, she drove out of the woods. Fading daylight showed an old high-arching bridge ahead. Below the bridge, she could just make out the flood-swollen river boiling around wooden pilings.
Light behind again filled the car’s interior. She accelerated, but the lights drew closer rather than fell behind. Fear whispered up her spine, raising the tiny hairs on the back of her neck. She glanced into the rearview mirror, eyes narrowed against brilliant white light that drew near as she watched.
Fear didn’t just whisper now. It shouted. She knew who was behind her. She grabbed her cell phone from where she’d tossed it on the passenger seat after turning it off. With shaking fingers she tried to power it on.
Crash! Her head whiplashed back then forward, striking the top of the steering wheel. Pain slammed through her. The cell phone flew out of her hand, landing somewhere inside the car. The other vehicle struck the rear of her car again. She fought the steering wheel. The lights came at her again.
Fear sliced through the pain in her head. She tried to brace herself. Another bone-shaking crash, and she lost control of the car. Her car struck something metal. Her head hit the side window. She nearly blacked out.
Rain and wind blew into the car through the broken glass, spattering her face. The car was motionless. Silent. She touched her throbbing head and came away with blood. Her thoughts were confused. All was silent except for the rain and the groaning of wind-whipped tree branches.
The sound of a racing engine cut through her confusion. Panicked, she peered through the broken windows. Through the falling rain, she could see a big black truck.
Stark terror gripped her. The lights on the truck flashed on. She didn’t even have time to scream. The truck hit her car broadsided. Metal crushed. Glass shattered, cascading over her. Tossed from the driver’s seat as if she were a rag doll, she finally screamed when the stick shift rammed into her right side.
Tortured metal screamed against metal. She smelled burning rubber and heard the whine of tires spinning on pavement. Her car moved. Inch by inch, the pickup shoved the crumpled car toward the side of the road. Metal bent and popped.
Oh, God! She’d been a fool. She’d come prepared for the confrontation, for her vengeance, but she’d run like a scared little girl. She tried to open the glove box to get the pistol, but the catch wouldn’t yield. Tears of frustration and anger, pain and loss flowed down her face. If only she could have wiped away the past and truly created the new life she’d wanted so desperately.
Another vicious shove, and the car slammed against the barricade of upright wooden posts.
Her last thought was of him. She loved him. But she’d ruined his life. Now she’d never have a chance to explain.
Would he mourn her?
Wood was no match for metal. The powerful truck gave one last violent push. The timbers snapped as if they were twigs, and her car went over the edge of the road.
Then she and her car were falling.
Falling.
Falling.
Into the cold black water below.
Chapter One
For months, David Galloway had been in emotional freefall, swinging from despair to anger, back to despair, and finally to hatred. Now, looking at the woman who stood a few short feet from him, all the torment, all the rage that he’d suppressed came out in one word blasted into the quiet room. “Tessa!”
She turned from the bank of metal file cabinets, and his breath caught. He’d held his tongue while he and Frank Rhone, the doctor who’d been treating Tessa, had stood outside the door of the small hospital’s billing office. He’d listened to the doctor tell him again about Tessa’s condition when all he’d wanted to do was laugh in the man’s face. Rhone had reminded David that Tessa would look different from the photograph David’s private investigator had emailed him. Finally, Rhone had agreed to give David five minutes alone with Tessa for a private reunion.
For a brief moment, David entertained a vengeful fantasy about the damage he could do in five minutes to the woman who’d ruined his life. Like the civilized man he was, he swallowed back his anger and resentment, but he closed the distance between them, invading her personal space, intimidating her with his physical presence.
Her startling light blue eyes—not dark blue—widened in alarm. He smelled her perfume. Something with gardenia, her favorite scent, but not, he suspected, the expensive fragrance in the crystal bottle that still occupied space on their bathroom vanity. She looked like a different version of Tessa. A lot different. Tessa was all about conservative clothes. She’d never have worn the cheap pink-flowered cotton dress with a scoop neckline nor the white canvas sneakers.
When he’d last seen his wife, her hair had been pale blonde and perfectly styled in a sleek cut that framed her face and brushed the edge of her jaw line. Occasional telltale dark roots and the dark patch of hair between her legs had told him blond wasn’t her natural color. Still, the lustrous dark brown hair, with an auburn cast, surprised him. Her hair was longer, almost touching her shoulders. A thin, pink scar ran across her forehead near her hairline, marring her once perfect face. A slight smile lifted the corners of her full lips as she looked at him. His gaze locked on her lips, and pure lust rocketed through him, bringing with it full-blown anger that she still had this effect on him. His hands curled into tight fists.
“May I help—” She broke off. Her eyes widened and her smile vanished. She took a half-step back then stopped, squared her shoulders, and reclaimed that half-step of floor space. She met his gaze. In a resolute voice, she said, “If you’re here to talk about a patient’s bill, I’d suggest you get a grip on that attitude, bud.”
Taken aback by her assertive stance, David could only stare. More than her hair and her eye color had changed. The Tessa he’d known was non-confrontational. He said nothing, just gazed into her light blue
eyes, made more striking by the contrast of the dark hair. The doctor had diagnosed retrograde amnesia. He’d nearly snorted in derision when he’d heard that. It sounded like a cheesy Lifetime movie. Tessa was good at fooling people. Look how she’d fooled him. No matter how closely he studied her sky blue eyes, he saw no hint of recognition.
Hell. Amnesia? No way. He didn’t know what kind of game she was playing, but he’d play along. After all, he needed her compliant and cooperative, and he needed her that way within the hour. And he had to keep her that way for the next two weeks. She was the key to unraveling the knotty mess he was in.
David forced his fists to uncurl. He smiled and dug deep for the charm he’d once wielded so effortlessly even though it twisted his guts to do so. “Sorry. I’ve been accused of so many things since you disappeared that I’m in constant fight or flight mode.” He waited to see how that bit of honesty went over.
Tessa paled. “Oh, you must be, uh, the man Dr. Rhone told me was coming.”
This time when she smiled, it was more than politeness. It was open and carefree, totally unlike Tessa who was always so guarded.
Genuine warmth infused her voice even though she blushed prettily and seemed embarrassed. “You’re David Galloway? You’re my—my husband?”
David studied the blush that washed over her face. She was good. She should have headed straight to Hollywood after she’d left him. “Darling, you do remember me, don’t you?”
He didn’t give her a chance to reply. He reached for her, his hands closing over her upper arms. The touch of her skin beneath his palms jolted him. Sensual awareness radiated from where he touched her.
Tessa’s smile vanished, and the pupils of her pale blue eyes dilated. He was so close he heard the shuddering breath she sucked in. Her lips parted. He pulled her into his arms, partly because he was playing the besotted husband. But also because he wanted to crush her body to his and shatter that invisible barrier she’d always kept between herself and the rest of the world. He’d never been able to reach her. Not even when he’d been inside her.