All of her clothes were gone.
“Looking for something?” Edmund Sinclair’s taunting voice made Jared whirl around. Carrie’s brother was standing in the doorway, watching him, a sneer on his aristocratic face. “Or someone?”
“Where is she?” Jared’s voice was harsh.
“She’s gone,” Edmund said. “My father thought it best if she went to visit some relatives for a while. Funny, I can’t recall whether she went to Vermont or Connecticut. Or maybe it was Maine.”
Jared spun to glare at Jax. “You son of a bitch,” he spat. Two large strides brought him toward Edmund, and he hauled off and punched his former friend in the face. Without another word, Jared disappeared out the window.
Jax grinned and kept writing. Yeah, it was time for Edmund to get knocked down. He’d keep that in.
Jax parked his sports car on the street outside of Kelly’s apartment. Looking up, he could see the lights on in her windows. He got out of the car, grabbing the handles of the bag that held the food he’d picked up at the Chinese restaurant down the street.
If Kelly wouldn’t come to dinner, dinner would come to Kelly.
She lived on the second floor of a three-family house on a quiet residential street in the Boston suburbs. Jax climbed onto the front porch and pushed the middle of three doorbells.
The evening was warm, and Jax sat back on the porch railing, watching a couple kids ride their bicycles around and around in a driveway across the street. But then the porch light came on, the door creaked open and Kelly was standing behind the screen, looking out at him.
She was wearing cut-off jeans and a ratty T-shirt, and her hair was loose around her shoulders, cascading down her back in a long, dark sheet.
He smiled at her, and she returned the smile rather ruefully, pushing open the screen door to come out onto the porch. Her feet were bare, and Jax let his eyes travel up the long lengths of her legs, feeling a still somewhat odd surge of desire. But it shouldn’t be odd, he told himself. She wasn’t a child anymore. She was a beautiful woman.
He could still remember the first moment he’d realized his feelings for Kevin’s little sister weren’t brotherly any longer. It hadn’t taken him much time to shake off the feelings of oddness that night.
She sat down on the top step, hugging her knees in to her chest and looking up at him. “Now, why am I not surprised to see you?”
“You were expecting me?” he said with a quirk of one eyebrow. “I’m honored that you dressed for the occasion.”
“Tell me you don’t wish you had shorts on,” Kelly said.
“You win.” He smiled, just looking at her. Her dark hair was so long. He wanted to touch it, run his fingers through its silkiness, but instead he gripped the railing. “How many years did it take you to grow your hair that long?”
She swept her hair off her neck, twisting it and pulling it in front of her and frowned down at the ends. “I’m going to get it cut. I haven’t done more than trim it in almost four years. I’m thinking of going radically short for the summer.”
“Radically?” he asked. “You mean, like Vin Diesel?”
Kelly laughed, and Jax was momentarily transported back in time seven years, to the night of her junior prom, to the night he’d danced with her in his arms, holding her for the very first time. It seemed as if they’d spent the entire evening laughing. Almost the entire evening…
“That’s maybe a little too radical,” she said. “But I am thinking of getting it buzzed in the back.”
She pushed her hair up as if to demonstrate just how short she wanted it cut, and Jax’s eyes were drawn to her slender neck. He liked her long hair the way it was, but she would look unbelievably sexy with it short. Her hair would curl slightly around her ears, frame her beautiful face and accentuate her long, graceful neck.
“I think it would look great.”
“You do?” She looked up at him, surprise in her voice.
“Yeah.”
She stood. “I’ve got to get back to work,” she said, edging toward the door.
Jax was confused. They’d been having a normal conversation, everything was very comfortable and…He was coming on too strong, he realized suddenly. He’d been distracted, thinking about how much he wanted to kiss her neck, and he’d started mentally undressing her. She knew what he was thinking from the look on his face, and now she was running away again.
He looked down at the uneven floorboards of the porch. It was the only way he could hide the desire he knew was in his eyes. “I brought over Chinese food,” he said.
She shook her head no. “Thanks, but I already ate,” she said. “Good night, T.”
“Kelly, don’t shut me out.”
His quiet words made her slowly turn around to face him. “Jackson, I can’t handle seeing you right now. I need some time. I need my life to be simple for a while. And face it, our relationship has never been simple.”
“We can make it simple.” His voice sounded calm, matter-of-fact, betraying none of his desperation.
He took a step toward her, and Kelly took a step back, panic flaring in her stomach. If he touched her, she wasn’t sure she could resist him. It was bad enough seeing him, talking to him. It was frightening the way her memories of the way she used to feel for him could consume her. It was almost as if they weren’t memories at all.
But there was no way she could still be in love with him, not after seven years. No way.
“I have to get back to work,” she said again. “I’m sorry.”
She went into the house, closing the door tightly behind her. She leaned against it for a moment before climbing up the stairs to her apartment.
Dear Kelly,
Still no word from the American consulate.
The thought of serving ten years in this hellhole scares me to death. It’s unbelievable that this farce could have come this far. I’ve been framed. It’s as clear as the daylight that I know is shining outside, despite the fact that it barely penetrates the thick walls of this stinking cell. I’m being punished for failing to cooperate with this country’s current government, failing to reveal the location of the rebel forces, failing to reveal the names of the people who led me to my meeting with the rebel leader.
What’s really ridiculous is that I don’t approve of many of the rebels’ methods in their fight for freedom. But if I betrayed them, it would mean the death of many people, most of them women and children.
So I sit here. Wherever the hell “here” is. Somewhere in Central America. I might as well be on the moon, a million miles away from the land of the free and the home of the brave, a million miles away from your sweet smile, writing letters to you in my mind, letters that have no hope of reaching you until I am free to deliver them myself.
With luck, that will be soon. Your eighteenth birthday is coming, and I intend to be there.
I love you.
Love, T.
Kelly sat at her computer, staring at the empty screen.
Well, it wasn’t quite empty. It said “Chapter Ten” about a quarter of the way down, and there were two carriage return symbols after that, along with a tab symbol. The cursor flashed five spaces in, ready to start the first paragraph.
But all she could think about was T. Jackson Winchester the Second, and the best and worst night she’d ever had in her life. It was the best because it had been an amazing Cinderella-like fantasy, with T. Jackson playing the part of Prince Charming. And it was the worst, because after it was over, after all the dust had settled, he had walked out of her life for good, and her world turned into a pumpkin.
Until now.
Seven years later.
Kelly closed her eyes, remembering that May night. Prom night. It had been a night like this one, hot and humid, more like summer than spring.
That afternoon, she’d modeled her prom dress for Kevin and T. Jackson. Kevin had just finished his first year of law school, and T. had finally graduated from college, having had a year off between his s
ophomore and junior years. T. was hanging out with the O’Briens, kicking back for a few weeks, taking a vacation before facing the realities of the working world….
“Tonight I’m going to wear my hair up,” she’d said to them, twirling around the living room to show off the sweeping skirt of her long gown.
“Sweet Lord,” Kevin said, staring at her. “When did you turn into a girl?”
She made a face at him. “Try opening your eyes sometimes, dweeb. I’ve been a girl for sixteen years.”
She risked a glance at T. He was looking at her, a small, funny smile on his face. She smiled back at him, her heart doing a fast somersault. He knew that she was a girl.
“Sure could’ve fooled me.” Kevin grinned. “I thought when you said you were going to get dressed up for the prom, you meant you’d wear your jeans without the holes in the knees and a new pair of cowboy boots.”
“Ha ha,” Kelly said.
“Just please don’t tell me Mom bought that dress with the grocery money.” Kevin made a face. “You look great, Kel, but I don’t think a prom dress is worth having to eat hot dogs for the rest of the summer.”
“This dress used to be Grandma’s. It didn’t cost a cent. Your stomach is safe.”
The gown was outrageously retro, right out of the late 1930s, and it fit Kelly as if it had been made for her from some kind of shimmery, slippery cornflower-blue fabric that matched her eyes.
Kelly turned to find T. still watching her long after Kevin had gone into the kitchen to forage for a snack.
It hadn’t been too much later when the telephone rang. Kevin answered it, and bellowed up the stairs for Kelly. She came clattering into the kitchen where T. and her brother were looking at the newspaper, trying to decide which movie to take Kevin’s girlfriend, Beth, and one of her friends to that night.
“It’s your boyfriend,” Kevin said in a purposely obnoxious high voice, and Kelly snatched the phone away, glaring dangerously at him.
She covered the mouthpiece. “Frank’s not my boyfriend. He’s a friend who happens to be a boy, and we’re going to the prom together. So don’t be a jerk.”
On the phone, Frank sounded terrible. He had some kind of stomach virus, he told her. There was no way on earth he was going to make it to the prom.
Kelly slowly hung up the phone.
“What did Frankie want?” Kevin asked. “Can’t decide between the sky-blue or the chartreuse tux?”
She wheeled, turning on him angrily. “When are you going to grow up? You’re in graduate school, you’re supposed to be an adult now, so why don’t you act like one? Frank’s sick, so I’m not going to the prom, all right? Does that satisfy your juvenile curiosity? Or is there something else you want to know?”
“I’m sorry.” Kevin was instantly contrite. “I didn’t mean to be—”
“I’ll take you,” T. said.
“What?” Kevin and Kelly turned to him at the same time.
He was looking at Kelly, and he smiled his easy smile when their eyes met. “I mean, I’d like to take you.”
Kevin stared at his friend in exasperation. “We’re double-dating tonight. What, are you just going to blow off this friend of Beth’s?”
“No.” T. crossed his arms in front of him, and leaned casually back in his chair. “I’ll call her and tell her I can’t make it.”
“Because you want to take my little sister to some stupid high school dance?” Kevin laughed. “She’s going to love that—”
“It’s not a stupid dance,” Kelly protested.
“Kev, it’s her prom….”
Kevin sighed, looking from Kelly to Jax and back again. “Then I suppose I should take her.”
“Gee, thanks,” Kelly said. “A night out with Mr. Enthusiasm. I’d rather stay home.”
But T. laughed, shaking his head. “No, Kev, you don’t get it, do you? I want to take her. I want to take her. I would love to take her….”
Kelly swallowed. What was T. Jackson saying? She heard the words, but the implications were too intense.
T. turned and looked at her, his green eyes lit with an odd fire. “Kelly, will you let me take you to your prom?”
“Whoa, wait a minute,” Kevin said before she could answer. He stared at his friend with growing realization, his voice tinged with disbelief. “Winchester, do you have, like, the hots for my little sister?”
But it was as if T. hadn’t heard Kevin. He was just sitting there, his chair tipped back against the wall, smiling up at Kelly, waiting for her to answer him.
“Yeah.” She’d smiled into his eyes as she’d nodded. “T., I’d really like that…”
Looking back now, Kelly knew that was the very moment she’d admitted to herself that she was in love with Tyrone Jackson Winchester the Second. And once she’d admitted it, she realized that she’d been in love with him for years. It wasn’t puppy love. It wasn’t a crush or an infatuation. It was solid, total, powerful love.
As she sat staring at her blank computer screen nearly seven years later, Kelly had to wonder.
What if T. had really been in love with her, too? What if they’d stayed together the way he’d promised, if he’d been the man she’d married when she was nineteen years old instead of Brad? Would her feelings have lasted?
Jax woke up drenched in sweat.
It was the nightmare again. The same old nightmare. He was back at that joke they’d called a trial.
He’d taken a flight from London a week earlier because the magazine he worked for had secured him a rare personal interview with the leader of the rebel forces in the tiny Central American country. The interview had gone smoothly and he had returned to his hotel room to type up his notes on his laptop computer.
Later that night he was roughly awakened by government soldiers and dragged to an official building where he was questioned about the location of the rebel forces. He’d been scared to death, but he refused to reveal even what little he knew about where he had been and who his contacts were.
Finally, after more than twenty-four hours of relentless questioning, he’d been released.
Back at the hotel, he’d considered calling the American consulate, telling them what had just happened, but there was a flight to Miami leaving almost immediately, and he barely had time to get to the airport, let alone make a phone call.
And he wanted to get out of there. Fast. He would have taken the next flight to Hades if he’d had to.
It was then, on his way to the plane, that the government’s military police stopped his taxi. A quick search of his overnight bag led to the discovery of several large sacks of cocaine tucked neatly next to his underwear.
It was such an obvious frame-up that Jackson had laughed.
But as he sat in the ridiculous excuse for a courtroom the next day, listening to the announcement of the guilty verdict and the resulting ten-year jail sentence, he stopped laughing.
He’d managed to get in touch with the American consulate, but they could do nothing for him. Drug charges were out of their jurisdiction.
He was furious. It was so obvious. He was a reporter, he had information the government wanted. It was such a blatant setup. The drugs had been planted in his bag. What about his rights? He was an American—
But Jax had no rights, the consulate finally told him. He wasn’t a hostage. He wasn’t a political prisoner. He’d been convicted of possession of drugs, and there was nothing anyone could do to help him.
So he went to jail. He did not pass go, and he sure as hell didn’t collect two hundred dollars.
Be good, the warden told him, and maybe you’ll get out in five or six years.
It had been hell.
Jax had been put, alone, in a dark, damp cell with only a tiny slit of a window. He was let out only for an occasional meal or a walk around the compound. He might’ve gone crazy, and maybe he even did a little bit, because he started imagining Kelly. He started seeing her there with him, keeping him company, giving him strength. He had no paper
, no pencil, but he still wrote hundreds of letters to Kelly. He wrote letters in his mind, letters that would never be sent, words he vowed he’d one day put onto paper.
And somehow he’d survived for twenty horrific months.
For years after, he’d had terrible nightmares, but finally they’d stopped.
So why was he dreaming about it again?
Chapter 3
After tipping the room-service waiter, Jax brought the breakfast tray to the table and set it down next to his computer. He poured himself a cup of steaming coffee and took a sip of the dark, pungent brew as he pulled his current story up on the computer screen.
Yesterday, when he’d finished writing, he’d left Jared in his horrible little room at the boardinghouse, fuming about the way Jax had spirited Carrie away from him.
Now. To get Jared on that boat for Europe.
Thinking hard, Jax took another sip of his coffee. He hadn’t realized shipping Jared off to Europe was going to be this difficult. Jared was right—there was no way he would voluntarily leave Carrie, the way Jax had left Kelly all those years ago.
The two situations weren’t exactly parallel, Jax reminded himself. Although Carrie and Kelly were both sixteen, back in Carrie’s day, women frequently married at that age. And Jared wasn’t Jax. Jared was a hero, while Jax was…only Jax.
He flipped through his notebook. In Jax’s original outline, Jared had left Boston and gone to Europe, vowing to make his fortune and return a rich man, rich enough to wed the beautiful Carrie. But Jax had written that outline before he’d fleshed out the characters, before he knew just how bold and dauntless and damned self-confident Jared was going to be.
So now he was stuck with Carrie hidden away with some distant relatives, and Jared crossing his arms and refusing to leave until he found her.
How do you make a man do something he doesn’t want to do?
Love.
No, it was because of love that Jared wanted to stick around.
Blackmail.
“Don’t start with that dark family secret thing again,” Jared said warningly.
Letters to Kelly Page 3