RENEGADE'S REDEMPTION

by Lindsey Longford

  And off they’d gone, exhilaration bolting through her with each duck and dodge across the parking lot, with each booming explosion of color and sound. The colors splashing across Royal’s shirt in the darkness were carnival mad. He held her around the waist, lifting her clear of the ground with each of his long, running strides. Cradled in his other arm, he carried Tommy. Eyes wide with excitement, Tommy clung to Royal’s neck.

  Now, hunched in the back of a police car, she was astounded by how alive she felt. “Thank you, Detective Bienvenue,” she offered to the back of the seat. “For helping me.” She wished he weren’t involved, but he was, and truly, some part of her was relieved in spite of herself. She’d done the best she could. What would be, would be. Que sera and all that. She smiled. She felt as if she were on the verge of a momentous adventure, of an incredible discovery. She hadn’t felt this way in— Had she ever felt this intoxicating mix of energy and excitement? “You’re taking us to your house, Detective?”

  “Just call me Beau, ma’am. I’d be more comfortable. Since this isn’t really an official outing, you understand?”

  She did. “I never saw you tonight, Beau.” Laughing, she added, “As far as I’m concerned, this car is on automatic pilot.”

  Tommy snickered.

  Tickling her ribs, Royal edged his palm across her abdomen. She gasped with pleasure. Grabbing at those exploring, teasing fingers, she covered them with the flat of her hand, stopping their provoking journey.

  “Spoilsport,” he whispered. With a tiny pull, he teased the lobe of her ear with his teeth, and shivers of delight rippled over her skin.

  Leaning back against him, she murmured, “I know what you’re doing.”

  “Yeah?” His lips moved against her neck in a smile. “And what’s that, sugar?”

  “Distracting me.”

  “That’s what I’m doing?” He turned his hand palm up and curled his fingers through hers, his fingers sliding along her palm in a secret, toe-curling caress. “Gosh, I’m so glad to have it explained.”

  Holding her hand in his, he blew softly at the nape of her neck. Strands of hair lifted, moved, left a vulnerable spot there, and all the while shivers ran over her, puckering and tightening her skin, her nipples. As her head fell forward helplessly, Royal dipped his mouth to that spot just above the neckline of her dress and nipped sharply. Hot shivers spurted down her spine, pooled underneath their joined hands.

  In another life, another place, she would have been uncomfortable, embarrassed to be so easily aroused, so oblivious to place and situation, but she’d traveled to the end of her world and stepped off, falling into this dazzling freedom of sensation.

  What was happening had nothing to do with her.

  In a few hours, everything would come roaring in on her once more. She understood that. This was a temporary freedom. Like everything else, an illusion.

  But illusion was all she was going to have.

  And illusions were better than loneliness, infinitely preferable to terror.

  Royal bent his knees, scooted forward and enclosed her in the cradle of his thighs and pelvis, his hard chest supporting her weight easily. Sighing, she let her head rest on his chest. Pressed against him, she heard the strong beat of his heart, its powerful rhythm drumming into her, through her, filling her, a steady, reassuring cadence in the darkness.

  The car bumped over a curb, slowed to a stop. “Okay, folks. I’m goin’ on inside. I’ll open the door on Elly’s side. Give me a few minutes to close the blinds. Then go on around to the back door. It’ll be unlocked. The interior lights of the car are still off. Far as I can tell, we weren’t followed. No reason to expect we would be, but I checked the whole way. Took a few extra turns on the way here to make sure. You’re safe. See you inside.” The driver’s-side door opened. There was a quiet click at the door near Elly. “And, Royal?”

  Royal’s “Hmm?” buzzed along the side of her neck.

  “Leesha said she’ll kill you if you don’t behave yourself.” Beau paused and then said slyly, “Are you behaving yourself, Royal?”

  “Always.” Royal pulled his hand free and gave Elly’s hip a friendly pat. His hand slipped under the hem of her dress, his fingers stroking the top of her thigh in slow, tantalizing movements that moved higher and higher. “I’m behaving. Right, Elly?” His index finger nudged under the plain band of her panties, circling, touching. Teasing.

  She couldn’t answer. Jerking forward, she inched her hips away from the muscled cradle of his legs. “Wicked, wicked,” she scolded.

  “What’s wicked?” Waking up, Tommy tried to turn toward her, but wedged in between legs and door and seats, he couldn’t.

  “Royal’s a wicked man, honey, that’s what.” She tugged at her dress and slapped away his helpful hand.

  “Why is he wicked? What did he do?” Squirming energetically, Tommy finally scrabbled to his knees and around to face her.

  “Nothing important.” Elly shook her hair back and freed her neck from the exquisite torture of Royal’s mouth over her skin. She’d lost her hat somewhere in the wild run to Beau’s car, and she missed it. But like almost everything else in her life now, she could survive without it. “He’s being a pest.”

  “Am I?” His whisper into her ear started the shivers all over again. “A pest?”

  “Definitely.” She scrambled forward and pushed open the door, scooping Tommy along with her, Royal right behind them. “Come on, honey. We’re going in.”

  They moved silently and swiftly through the pitch-blackness, stumbling against and edging around what Elly imagined to be a flower bed. The back door opened easily on oiled hinges.

  With his hand on the small of her back, Royal directed her to the living room at the front of the house. She liked that unconscious intimacy, the sense of connectedness.

  She would miss that most of all.

  “Hi, Ms. Malloy, Tommy.” Alicia Williams stood up and came toward her.

  “Call me Elly, please.”

  “Of course. And I’m Leesha. Or Alicia. Whichever you’re more comfortable with.”

  Elly steeled herself for a barrage of questions and explanations. She’d been so careful about not revealing any personal information to Alicia Williams that the woman had to have a hundred questions. She would want explanations. Royal had involved these people, but they were his friends, not hers. They owed her nothing. She straightened and took a deep breath, preparing for the ordeal.

  Giving her space, Alicia stopped a few feet away. “You must hate this, Elly. If I were in your shoes, I would. I’m not going to pry. It’s none of my business, none of theirs. But we’ll help you, no matter what’s happening.” She didn’t touch Elly, didn’t offer an arm around the shoulders, didn’t make any of the obvious, easy gestures of reassurance. Instead, her face serene and accepting, her dark eyes rich with understanding, Alicia Williams waited calmly for Elly to take the initiative.

  “Thank you.” Elly sank onto the couch. She couldn’t believe the generosity of this woman she’d admired for so long. How could Alicia offer help without wanting to know the consequences? It was too much. Elly bowed her head, overwhelmed.

  “Beau, why don’t you get Elly a cold drink? I’ll show Tommy where y’all are goin’ to sleep, okay?” Alicia’s voice rolled over Elly soothingly. “You sit there and catch your breath. Everything’s going to be all right. Beau and Royal could handle an army if they had to.”

  “That’s my woman,” Beau said with a wide smile.

  “Think so?” Alicia stared him down with a lift of one sculpted eyebrow. “Don’t go counting your chickens, Beauregard Bienvenue. Those eggs might not ever hatch if you don’t take care.”

  “I take care, Leesha.” Something more than teasing moved across the dark planes of his face as he came to her side.

  “Do you?” Alicia cast Beau a challenging glance as he laid his arm across her shoulders. Her scarlet, thigh-high skirt shimmered as she bumped him with her hip. Side by side, they were a
lmost the same height and extraordinarily striking in their sleek, long-limbed grace. “Don’t take anything for granted, Beau. You know I mean that.” Smoothly, she extricated herself from his light grasp. “I’m not an easy woman—”

  “Lord, nobody ever accused you of being easy, woman,” he groaned. “Least of all me. Leesha, you are the most complicated, stubborn, exasperating—”

  Alicia waved an elegant hand languidly. “The man adores me, Elly. He can’t help himself.” She stooped and faced Tommy, eye to eye. “Isn’t that right?”

  “Uh-huh.” Tommy rubbed his eyes. “Beau should marry Leesha.”

  “Exactly, my man. That’s what I’ve been telling her.” Beau’s teeth flashed in a blinding smile. “But the woman won’t give me the time of day.”

  “It’s not the time of day you’re after, Beauregard Bienvenue.” Alicia’s grin was knowing. “Is it?”

  “Huh?” Tommy yawned.

  Alicia gave her attention to Tommy. “Come on, Tommy. Let me show you where you can sleep. Your mom will be in with you in a little while. Okay?”

  “Yep.” He nodded and followed Alicia’s long-legged stride in a daze, turning his head and yawning “G’night” as Alicia led him through a door and down a long ball where a night-light gleamed in a welcoming glow.

  Beau handed Elly a clear glass filled with amber liquid.

  She looked up at him questioningly. Alcohol would knock her out at this point.

  “Drink it, sugar. It’s only sweet tea. Leesha keeps Beau stocked in it. Told him to think of her every time he takes a sip. You do that, too, don’t you, Beau?” Royal sank onto the sofa close to Elly and threw his arms along the back.

  “You kidding? Of course. I’m wooing the woman. I have to. She’s giving me enough trouble as it is.”

  “Can’t be a bee buzzing around all the flowers and expect the orchid to take you seriously.”

  “You got that right.”

  “What has Beau finally gotten right?” Alicia strolled up to him, and took the glass he handed her.

  “Not you,” he murmured, looking at her with a hunger that made Elly ache. “But I’m trying, Leesha. Give me credit for that.”

  “I give you all the credit you deserve.” But Alicia softened her words with a tantalizing smile. “Now, Elly, Royal, what’s the plan? What do you need?”

  Elly lifted her glass in Royal’s direction. “He hasn’t told me all the details. I imagine he’s saved a few—”

  “Not surprises, sugar. Because you don’t like them. A few … refinements, maybe.” He stood up abruptly. “We need a safe place for a few days, Beau, while we sort things out. And we need a place for Tommy to stay. He can’t go with us.”

  Stricken, Elly stood up. “I didn’t understand. You didn’t make that clear. I thought we were—” She rubbed her forehead fretfully. “How did I miss what you were suggesting? I never thought for a second you meant for me to leave him! You know I won’t agree to that, don’t you?”

  “We can’t maneuver like we’ll have to if he’s along. And hiding out for a few days will be too confining for a five-year-old. Too dangerous. Elly, you said you didn’t want Tommy to be caught in the middle. I assumed that settled the question.”

  “But I thought you meant we had to find out about these men, get away from them at the rodeo and then Tommy and I would go on our way.”

  “That’s not a … permanent solution, sugar. If you think about it, you know I’m right. That’s what I meant when I said you didn’t want Tommy around when those torpedoes came after us. We have to have a safe spot for him. Somewhere no one will find him. With people who will guard him with their lives. Leesha. Beau. Maggie and Sullivan. Then you and I will have room to maneuver. I think.”

  She clung to his arm. “Royal. I don’t think I can do this. The situation … I have to … I can’t.”

  “Elly, you have to. It’s the best way to protect him from—from whatever you’re afraid of. You know Leesha. I’ve been watching you. You like Beau. And when you meet Maggie and her husband, you’ll trust them with your son. You wouldn’t be able not to.” He pulled her to him and enclosed her tightly in the circle of his arms, his body, and she knew he was right and was furious with him because he was.

  “Let me go.” She struggled against the comfort he offered so freely, effortlessly, in this hour when he was asking her to do the impossible. To go into hiding without Tommy.

  “I can’t, Elly. These are determined men. And they have more experience at killing than you do of running.” Royal’s hand swept down her spine, back up. “They won’t give up. And one time, they’ll find you. And Tommy will be with you.”

  Behind her, she heard a low cough. “Excuse me, Elly, I know I’m intruding, but let me tell you what I’ve found out in the couple of hours Royal gave me.”

  Bewildered, she whirled out of Royal’s arms to face Beau. “What do you mean, ‘found out’?”

  “He means, sugar, that I asked him to locate whatever information he could about you.”

  “You had me investigated?” Disbelief crackled through her. “You checked me out?”

  Royal nodded.

  Foreboding shook her from head to toe. What was going on? Was she being arrested? Was all Royal’s sympathy and concern an elaborate con game? “You sent Beau snooping into my business because you didn’t have the decency to ask me what you wanted to know?”

  “I’m a cop—”

  “You were a cop. I thought you were my friend. I trusted you, and you went behind my back. Why would you do that? You owe me an explanation.”

  He went very still. There was a long pause, and she had the impression he was choosing his words too carefully. “Answer one question first, will you, Elly? Would you have given me the answers to all my questions?”

  She wouldn’t have, and the expression in his eyes dared her to admit the truth. “What does it matter now?” she asked tiredly. “I hate what you did. It was … deceitful.”

  “Do we want to talk about deception and deceit, sugar?” His voice sharpened.

  “No,” she admitted. How much had he been able to find out? And did it matter anymore if he knew the whole of it? She was too tired to make the decision, but the habits of the past months kept her lips sealed. She’d done as much as she was capable of doing when she’d gone along with his decision to ask his friends for help.

  But even now, even in Beau’s house, she couldn’t rid herself of these faint tremors of uneasiness, couldn’t quiet that small voice that said Royal was holding a hidden card. With his talk of card games and gambling, he had her thinking in his terms. “Maybe you did what you had to do, I don’t know. But your actions were despicable.”

  “You’re the linchpin, Elly. These men are connected to you.” His tone was frighteningly reasonable as he added, “How else was I to find out anything about them? I have no vehicle license number, no name, only a description. You’re the thread that connects them. Be fair, Elly.”

  “Why should I? I don’t want to be fair! This isn’t a game, with rules and points and a score sheet. There are no winners, only losers. So you can see fairness has no meaning to me right now. It’s only a word. This is my son’s future we’re talking about.” She glared at him. “I can’t take any chances, and you’re playing fast and loose with our lives. You think this a game of cops and robbers. Well, it isn’t.”

  “I know it’s not a game, Elly.”

  “No. You say you understand. Maybe you do. Here.” She tapped his forehead. “But not here.” She placed her hand over her heart. “Here where it counts, you don’t understand. You have nothing at stake.”

  “Like you, my life,” he reminded her mildly. “Whether either of us likes it, the cards have been dealt to both of us in this game.” He emphasized the word, as if she’d touched a sore spot. “I don’t have a pat hand, and I’d like to change the odds. If we can. I stand to lose, too.”

  “But not someone you love.” Wondering
if he could begin to see the situation the way it was for her, she lifted one shoulder helplessly. “That’s what’s at stake for me. Tommy. And he means more to me than my own life, than anything else in my life. Sure, I care what happens to me. I like living. But I’d give my life that fast—” she snapped her fingers “—for him. And as for you, Royal? I’m not sure how high a value you place on your life. So what kind of bet is that for a game of this magnitude? Tell me, will you? Can you ante up that stake?”

  He couldn’t. What he felt for her and Tommy was too formless for words, too vague. The impulse to shield her and her son ran through him so strongly that he couldn’t check it, couldn’t name it. That impulse forced him to protect her from Scanlon and whatever he had planned.

  Royal knew he couldn’t protect her if he told her everything about his involvement. She’d take off in fear and anger at this point. One way or another, he had to make her see that she had only one choice if they were to find their way through the maze they were in.

  “Nothing to say, Detective?” Under the sarcasm, he heard her fear, her need. Like Goldie, she was scratching and clawing and spitting in terror.

  Royal veered off in another direction. “While you’re deciding what we’re going to do about Tommy, would you like to know what Beau found out?” he said gently, staying out of her personal space, wanting her to think, to realize what he was saying was the truth. “Tell her, Beau.”

  “Ms. Malloy?” Taking sides, Beau waited for her permission to speak.

  Staring at both of them, Elly wavered. Plucking at her skirt, she looked at Royal with a lost expression.

  “That okay with you, Royal? If Ms. Malloy gives me her okay to reveal private stuff? You got any problems with that, Royal?” Withholding his support of what Royal had done, Beau sent him a measured look.

  Royal felt the chill of separation from his friend. They’d teased and joked, but he’d made the phone call, the phone call he’d sworn he would never make. He’d asked for help. He’d jeopardized Beau’s career. But without a single question. Beau had shown up at the rodeo. He’d been there, solid as a rock. A friend. A colleague. He deserved explanations, details. Under the circumstances, Beau had a right to be prickly.