His B-movie dialogue was as absurd as his idea that she was out to get him, and it sent a nervous laugh up her throat. She covered her mouth and turned it into a cough.
After watching her with narrowed eyes for several seconds, he asked, “Do you need a glass of water?”
She shook her head.
“Then I’ll say good-bye,” he said.
She took a deep breath and conjured up an image of Satchmo lying on the straw of his stall as he slipped toward the edge of death. That killed the last of her desire to giggle.
“Good-bye, Ward,” she said. As a peace offering, she stood on her toes and kissed the air beside his cheek, catching a whiff of his cloying cologne.
He lifted a hand as though to stroke her hair and then dropped it. “I wish I could turn back the clock.” He turned and walked to the door, hesitating a split second before he twisted the knob to open it. He paused there again.
Did he expect her to run after him and say she wanted to be friends after all?
Courtesy urged her to wish him a safe flight, a good sleep, something to bridge the charged silence. She pressed her lips together and waited until he stepped outside and closed the door. As soon as the latch clicked, she flew to the door and threw the deadbolt.
She hoped he heard it snick into place.
Chapter 19
HEFTING THE LOADED cooler, Adam rang Hannah’s doorbell and waited, the frozen clouds of his breath glowing amber under the porch light. The temperature had taken a sudden plunge downward, and there was snow in the next few days’ forecast. That always complicated the restaurant’s food deliveries because everything came in fresh.
A spate of barking acknowledged his presence before he heard Hannah’s voice issue a firm but unintelligible command. The dogs fell silent. He dropped his business worries and smiled at her relationship with her dogs. She loved them, but she’d taught them good manners. She’d make a great mother.
The thought killed his smile as it pulled him back to his dilemma with Matt, one he had yet to resolve. He wished he could discuss it with Hannah, but he didn’t want her to know what a coward he was. He wasn’t ready to have her turn away from him in disgust.
The door swung open to reveal her surrounded by furry creatures, her pale hair floating around her head like skeins of golden thread. There was welcome in her face, but a subtle unhappiness threw a shadow over it.
Her gaze settled on the cooler. “That’s a lot of caviar.”
“There are a few other ingredients.” He stepped in the foyer and set the cooler down, so he could wrap his hands around her slim shoulders and watch her expression. “Is something wrong?”
She slipped her hands around his neck and stood on tiptoe to press a kiss on his lips. The pressure of her breasts on his chest and the brush of her thighs against his sent a bolt of heat straight to his cock. He tightened his hold on her as he deepened the kiss. She shuddered and melted into him, freeing him to send his hands roving down to the delicious curves of her bottom. When he flexed his fingers, she moaned.
Images of stripping off her jeans and panties and sinking himself inside her flashed through his mind, but he banished them as he eased his grip. He needed to chase the sadness from her eyes before he could make love to her without guilt.
Lifting his head, he shifted his grip to her hands. “Come sit with me,” he said, turning her toward the sofa.
“What about dinner?” she said, glancing at the cooler, which was the object of her dogs’ rapt attention.
Adam twined his fingers into hers. “I’d rather hear about what’s got you upset.”
“I’m not upset. Just…confused.”
“Tell me.” He guided her down onto the cushions, seating himself beside her.
“I had a visitor from Chicago today,” she said, twisting her hands together in her lap.
“An unwelcome one?”
“Very.”
He waited. He felt her suck in a breath and let it out.
“My ex-fiancé,” she said. “Ward Miller. Have you heard of him?”
Her question sounded casual but he sensed a purpose in it, so he thought carefully. “Maybe. A rising politician?”
“That’s the one.” She lifted her eyes. “Do you know anything else about him?”
She seemed to think he should, but he shook his head. “I don’t follow politics all that closely. It makes it easier to be cordial to my guests at the restaurant.”
She gave him a slight smile but her gaze remained serious. “He says someone’s raising questions about the incident that made me leave Chicago. And he’s not happy about it.”
“Was he involved?” This was news to Adam.
“He’s Senator Sawyer’s protégé and former campaign manager, so he’s very involved.”
The pieces fell together in his mind. He’d known there was more to her story than unfavorable press over euthanizing a sick, elderly dog. “Is that why you left?”
“He told me I wasn’t cut out to be a politician’s wife.”
Anger flared as he considered how her ex-fiancé had deserted her when she most needed him. He unclenched a fist to brush a finger along her cheek. “I’d take that as a compliment.”
“It knocked my world sideways.”
He wrapped his arm around her and brought her against his side. “You’ve righted your world.”
“Seeing him again gave it a whack, though. It’s amazing how strong old feelings can be.”
So she wanted to use him to wipe away those old feelings. He could live with that. “Do you regret what you did back then?”
She stiffened, as he had expected her to. “For Sophie? Not a bit. All I regret is that I didn’t manage to persuade Mrs. Sawyer to put her to sleep before they left on vacation.”
“Did you ask Ward for help contacting Sawyer? He must have had the senator’s cell number.”
A moment of silence. “No. We’d had a fight about the fact that Mrs. Sawyer wouldn’t agree to euthanize Sophie. He said I wasn’t considering the children’s feelings. I asked him why they were more important than the dog’s suffering. It was ugly.”
He kissed the top of her head and held her, waiting for the rest of her guilt to spill out.
“I didn’t want him to tell me I couldn’t put Sophie to sleep until the Sawyers got back from vacation. So I didn’t call him, although I knew he could contact the senator. I went through the regular channels,” she said with a bitter edge to her voice. “Except Sawyer had blocked those.”
His anger swelled again. He reined it in so as to not crush her with his grip. “Would Ward have given you Sawyer’s cell phone number?”
“I’ve asked myself that a thousand times,” she said. “I didn’t give him the chance.”
“Because you knew the answer,” he said. “He would have told you not to bother the Sawyers, to keep Sophie alive.”
“How can you be sure of that?”
“He let go of something far more important in his life in order to protect Sawyer. You.”
She stirred and pushed away from him, rising to pace over to the dead fireplace. When she turned back to him, there were tear-streaks on her face, but she looked relieved. “I needed you to say it for me to believe it.”
He wanted to pummel her ex with a stainless-steel ladle. No, with his bare fists. More satisfying that way. “He doesn’t understand what you did for him. You knew you had to release Sophie from her suffering and you did it alone, for his sake.”
“No one else understood that.” She waved her hand in a gesture of apology. “I’m sorry. You always seem to get the worst of me.”
“No, the best,” he said. “The real honesty of you.” It was his fault Ward had intruded on her in Sanctuary, and Adam decided he needed to own up. “I’m the one who should apologize.”
“You?”
/> “I brought Ward down on you.” He forced himself to continue. “After you told me the story of Sophie, I went to see Paul Taggart. I persuaded him to look into the situation with an eye to clearing your name.”
She looked flabbergasted. “You went to Paul? But I already told him not to bother about it.”
“I know. He put up a good fight, but—”
“But he wanted to do it as much as you did,” Hannah said, shaking her head.
“It’s none of our business, but we were both pissed off on your behalf.”
She gave him a strange, unreadable look.
“Go ahead and tell me to butt out,” he said.
“Would you?”
He nodded. “I’ve done enough damage.”
“I’m not used to this,” she said, her voice tight.
“To people sticking their noses in your business?”
“To people caring enough to take up the fight when I’ve given up.” She came back to the sofa and sat down beside him, putting her hand on his where they were clenched together between his knees.
Her generosity astounded him. He’d be furious if someone had stirred up his past without his permission.
“I’m glad Ward came down here,” she said. “It clarified something for me.”
He turned his hands up to envelope her small one. “I’ll tell Paul to call off the dogs.”
“I’m not sure I want you to,” she said, using her free hand to trace over his knuckles. “Two very smart men think I should clear my name.” She looked up at him with a slight smile. “Maybe they’re right. Maybe I owe it to Tim.”
“Tim doesn’t—”
She held up her hand to stop him. “Ward and the scandal over Sophie were so tangled up in my mind that I left Chicago not knowing which I was running from.”
“Ward,” he guessed.
“And now I’ve faced him.” She wrapped her hand around his. “So let Paul work his magic.”
The tension in her shoulders and her convulsive hold on his hands told him this wasn’t an easy decision for her. “Don’t do this for anyone but yourself.”
She looked him in the eye. “That’s exactly who I’m doing it for.”
Chapter 20
AT ONE O’CLOCK the next day, Hannah sat in her car in front of Paul Taggart’s white frame law office. He’d scheduled her in at lunchtime without any questions, telling her he’d order sandwiches for both of them.
She felt wrung out, both physically and emotionally, from the night before. After she’d spilled her guts about Ward, she and Adam had eaten his delicious inventions featuring caviar. Somehow he’d even made it work with a dark chocolate mousse, the salty taste of the fish eggs contrasting with the richness of the cacao.
Weight gain might have been a concern, except they’d made love twice after eating. She’d deliberately seduced Adam because she wanted to forget all about Ward and the ugliness he’d dragged into her house. Not that Adam was reluctant, but guilt still twined with the heat flickering through her at the memories.
Shaking off those thoughts, she stared down at the crumpled copy of Sophie’s intake form, which she’d dug out of her junk drawer that morning. She placed it on her knee, trying to smooth the wrinkles out before she gave it to Paul. Fortunately, the slash through the line requesting an emergency contact number was still clearly legible, as was Robert Sawyer’s signature. Folding the paper, she slipped it into her handbag before taking a deep breath and opening her car door.
She strode across the porch and through the front door, not allowing herself to hesitate and fall prey to second thoughts. An older woman with the thickest mascara she’d ever seen was seated at a heavy, oak desk, keyboarding at superhuman speed. Without slowing, she smiled at Hannah. “Dr. Linden? Mr. Taggart’s expecting you. Go right on in.” She tilted her hairspray-lacquered head in the direction of an open door beyond her desk.
Hannah said thanks and walked through the doorway, finding Paul at his desk with a telephone headset hooked over his ear. He flashed a smile at her, held his index finger up in a request to give him a minute, and waved her toward a green, leather sofa. On the coffee table in front of it were platters of quartered sandwiches, pickles, Cole slaw, sweet potato fries, and bottled water. She shrugged out of her jacket and draped it over the sofa’s arm.
Paul finished his call and crossed to where she sat. “My apologies, but I made the mistake of taking that call from Bill Lassiter. He could talk the ear off an elephant.” He folded himself into an armchair before passing her an empty plate.
As she served herself, he sat back. “Adam told me your ex-fiancé paid you a visit yesterday. I guess I wasn’t as subtle in my inquiries as I thought. Adam and I both regret any distress it caused you. Say the word and I’ll stop all further investigation.” His tone was remorseful.
“No.” Hannah put her plate down with a clatter and dug into her handbag. “I want you to keep going.” She pulled out the form and handed it to Paul, who had straightened up in surprise. Evidently Adam hadn’t mentioned her change of heart. “This should help.”
He unfolded the paper and scanned down it, his lips stretching into a feral smile. When he looked up, she got a glimpse of what he must be like in the courtroom. “Gotcha, Senator Sawyer,” he said.
“Three of the vet techs are prepared to testify about Sophie’s condition on my behalf,” Hannah said, “but I’d prefer not to involve them. It might affect their jobs.”
“This won’t ever get to court,” Paul said, his pale-gray eyes lit with satisfaction. “Sawyer won’t let it. We just have to decide what you want from him.”
“What do you mean?”
“A public apology in the media. Compensation for the economic damage to your career.” He held up the paper. “This and a little back-door pressure will get you both of those.”
“I wouldn’t touch a penny of his money,” Hannah said. “I just want my name cleared in a way that will silence Mrs. Shanks and her sort.”
“How much crow do you want Sawyer to eat?”
Hannah remembered the suffering that Sawyer’s selfishness had put Sophie through and was tempted to make him grovel for that cruelty. Then she had a better idea. “As long as the blot is removed from my work record, he can blame it on one of his aides or absentmindedness or whatever he wants to do to save face. However, he must make a large donation to the local animal welfare society. I’ll get their contact information for you. He can even spin it as a gesture he’s making of his own free will in Sophie’s memory.”
“I like it,” Paul said. “You demonstrate your power by letting him present it his way, knowing all the while you can reveal the raw truth whenever you choose.”
“I’m not sure how you’re going to do all this without legal action,” Hannah said.
“Trust me, the senator will accept your terms without a word of protest.” Paul snagged a sandwich from the platter. “He wouldn’t have sent Ward down here if he wasn’t already worried.”
She raised her bottle of water in a mock toast. “To Sophie’s memorial fund.”
Chapter 21
TELLING THE CABBIE he’d pay him to wait, Adam jogged up the cement steps to the front door of a modest frame house in a suburb of Boston. The yard was small, the grass a frost-killed brown, but the short, concrete sidewalk was bordered with winter cabbages. While the house was a simple square box with little charm, its green paint peeling in a few places, the front door was a cheerful, glossy rust color, and the brass of the Irish-harp-shaped knocker gleamed.
He hesitated on the porch, remembering Matt’s tense, unhappy face as he said good-bye to him this morning. No matter how much he hated seeing his son looking miserable, he couldn’t lie to him outright, so he’d offered no words of reassurance. Just a quick hug that had been shrugged off with an edge of resentment.
He’d sp
ent the two flights it had taken to travel here from Sanctuary reading the newly expanded file on the O’Briens, trying to find the flaw that would make them unsuitable to adopt Matt. He’d asked Gaspari to dig deep. There were a few parking tickets, one minor automobile accident, and one contempt of court citation for failing to show up for jury duty twenty years ago. No serious medical conditions came to light, nor did there appear to be any issues with alcohol, drugs, or gambling.
Instead he read of Ellen’s job recruiting and coordinating tutors for at-risk children, and Pat’s years of service as a librarian.
Hoping to discover a bitter marriage or a filthy house, Adam gave the bottom of his leather jacket a downward tug and rang the doorbell.
The yapping of a small dog came from inside. “Oh hell, they even like animals.”
He heard a woman’s voice admonishing the dog to hush. The door opened. “Mr. Bosch?” the red-haired woman asked with a tentative smile.
He made himself smile back as he held out his hand. “Mrs. O’Brien, please call me Adam.”
Her face relaxed into genuine welcome and she took his hand between hers. “And I’m Ellen.”
A man joined her. “Adam, good to meet you. I’m Pat,” he said, giving Adam a firm handshake. “Come in.”
A muffled yip sounded from behind a closed door. Pat said, “That’s Hattie. We don’t want her begging while we eat.”
Adam nodded as he followed them through the small hallway into a living room filled with dark, polished wood furniture and china knickknacks. Faux Tiffany lamps cast a pale glow in the dimness of the winter afternoon. The scent of hot tea and fresh baking wafted to his nostrils.
On the oval coffee table sat a tray laden with a delicate china tea service and a plate of scones with clotted cream and jam. The gourmand in him appreciated the classicism of the offering, while a more basic reaction to the aroma set his mouth watering. He’d eaten nothing but a bag of pretzels on the journey.
Ellen waved him to the couch while she sat on one overstuffed armchair and her husband took the other one. “We like to have a real Irish tea,” she said, picking up the pot and pouring the steaming liquid into a cup. “I know you’re a grand chef and all, so I hope you won’t mind my scones. Pat swears they’re the best in Boston.” She cast her husband a laughing, sidelong glance that made her blue eyes gleam, and Adam felt the first twist of pain. No ugly nagging here.
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