by Sharon Sala
“Judd said nothing is broken, but she has a concussion, some cuts and bruises. They’re keeping her in the hospital for a couple of days.”
“I’m scared.”
“So am I—for you,” Bud said. “I need you to do something for me.”
Holly couldn’t quit shaking. She wanted to pack up everything she owned and get on the first plane back to Montana.
“What?” she mumbled.
“Don’t leave your room again until I get there.”
Holly’s heart leaped; then her eyes filled with tears. “You’re coming here?”
“My plane leaves Missoula at six o’clock tomorrow morning. I’ll be in St. Louis around 2:00 p.m. if there are no delays.”
“Thank you, Bud, thank you so much.”
“I don’t need thanks.”
Holly shivered. The gruff, raspy tone in his voice rattled her. Even as she asked the question, she knew what he was going to say.
“What do you need?”
“Just you, baby.”
“That scares me, too,” she whispered.
Bud pinched the bridge of his nose to quell a surge of panic. Was this where she told him that she didn’t feel the same way he did? He had to make it right. He couldn’t bear it if she suddenly became afraid or uneasy around him.
“It’s okay. I shouldn’t have ever said anything to—”
“No, you misunderstand me,” Holly said softly. “I’m not scared of you. I’ve loved you for years.”
Bud could have wept with relief. “Then it’s all good,” he said softly. “I just need you to stay safe until I can get to you. Can you promise to do that for me?”
“I didn’t leave the room all day,” Holly said. “I won’t budge until you get here, I promise.”
“Thank you, honey,” he said. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll get through this thing you’re dealing with, but we’ll do it together, so you won’t be in any danger, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I love you, Holly.”
The breath caught in Holly’s throat. “I love you, too.”
“Thank you, God,” Bud said, and hung up.
Holly dropped the phone, then covered her face. First Maria, now Savannah. What had they gotten themselves into?
Bill Riley had gone from a van and a motorcycle to a stakeout of Mackey’s residence. He’d set up shop in an empty house across the street, with a telescope on a tripod, a hookup for his laptop, a large everything-pizza from Pizza Hut and a liter of Mountain Dew. Even if Mackey was the man they were looking for, Riley had a feeling the killer in him had hung up those shoes years ago. With no new bodies showing up and a man who didn’t even have a speeding ticket to his name, whatever had triggered his killing spree had either resolved itself or Mackey was the slickest SOB he’d ever met when it came to covering his tracks.
He watched the lights going on and off in different parts of Mackey’s house until they all went off for good a little before 11:00 p.m., then went back to his laptop to finish typing up the route Mackey had taken today. Once he’d completed his notes, he emailed them to Detective Carver, then moved from email to some police-friendly search engines and began looking up everything he could find on Harold Mackey. It wasn’t part of his assignment, but Riley was an overachiever. And it helped pass the time.
Mackey knew the house across the street was empty. It had been for sale for months. So what the hell was that faint glow coming through the curtains? The possibility that someone had broken in and was vandalizing the place was the most logical answer, but Harold wasn’t the kind of man to get himself involved. He stayed in his recliner, watched his usual shows and, when it was bedtime, went through the house turning off lights. Then he stood in the dark, staring out the window at that strangely stationary glimmer of light.
It bugged him. Harold liked routine, and this was out of place. Again he thought about calling the police, then changed his mind, took off his slippers and put on his sneakers, and went out the back door, took the alley behind his house all the way down to the end of the block, crossed the street under cover of a broken streetlight, then made his way up the back alley leading behind the empty house.
He stopped, listening as he would if he’d been in the woods, aware of the sounds of his neighborhood. There were no dogs, which was helpful. He heard a door slam a few houses down and guessed it was the new father carrying out another garbage bag full of dirty diapers. He heard sirens, but that meant nothing. Cities were full of sirens. He heard the sounds of televisions and could tell from the two nearest houses what shows they were watching. But there was no sound coming from the empty house.
Once he’d committed himself, there was no stopping. He walked into the backyard, the sounds of his footsteps muffled by the growth of new grass that had yet to be mowed. The night air was chilly, with a brisk breeze that blew his ponytail across his left shoulder, but he paid it no mind. His focus was on getting around to the side of the house without being detected. Between the shades on the windows and his years in the woods, he had no problem accomplishing the feat.
He reached the side of the house and the living room windows. The venetian blinds hadn’t been pulled all the way down. When Harold peered in, he could see nearly everything.
He had expected to see someone, but he hadn’t expected the telescope on a tripod, or the man kicked back in a folding chair with a laptop on his knees. The glow of the screen was even brighter from where he was standing, but he was too far away to see anything but a blur.
What surprised him was that the man didn’t appear to be some homeless guy looking for a place to crash or a thief looking for something to steal. And there was that telescope. The son of a bitch had it aimed straight at his house.
The hair rose on the back of his neck as he backed away from the window and retraced his steps. By the time he got back to his house, he was shaking. What the hell did this mean? If it had been twenty years ago, he would have known, but now…?
He locked the door behind him and walked through the house in the dark, his mind racing. He got into bed without turning on the lights, but he couldn’t sleep. He needed to think.
What about his life was different now than it had been? Had he done anything different? He began thinking back over the past few days, trying to remember what, if anything, stood out. There was the phone call to his work, and then the young woman he’d tailed. What was her name? Oh, yeah, Holly Slade. He’d also followed her to the police department. He’d written that off as nothing concerning him, but it seemed now that he might have been wrong about that. The big freaking question was what the hell was going down?
Holly was sick with worry. She tried to call Savannah, but it went to voice mail over and over. Then she realized that Savannah’s phone was most likely at the bottom of the ocean with the car she’d been driving. She had to trust that her sister would call when she could. Until then, she had to wait.
When daylight finally came, she was exhausted. She hadn’t done more than doze. Her head was throbbing, and there was a knot in her stomach. They’d all been so happy before Andrew died, and now everything kept going from bad to worse.
She needed to get a grip on her emotions, but her thoughts just keep moving in the same hopeless loop. No matter how many times she tried to deny it, the truth was, she and her sisters were in serious danger because of their pasts.
When the maid knocked on the door asking to clean the room, Savannah let her in, then curled up in a chair to watch her work, thinking she used to do the very same tasks back at the ranch and take pleasure in a job well done. Within twenty minutes the sheets had been changed, the bathroom cleaned and the floor vacuumed.
“Is there anything else that you need?” the maid asked.
“No, thank you,” Holly said.
Once she was alone again, there was little to do but watch TV and the clock, counting down the minutes until that knock on her door. It was almost eleven before she realized she hadn’t eaten since last night.
She ordered extra sandwiches and chips, knowing that Bud would most likely be hungry when he arrived, but when the meal came, she couldn’t eat much for the knot in her stomach.
Finally she covered up the food, crawled up on the bed and, as always, reached for the journal. She was asleep before she read past the first page.
Bud had never been to St. Louis, but he recognized the Arch as the plane was circling to land. His anxiety was at an all-time high. All he could think about was seeing Holly’s face, holding her in his arms, as he prayed that this nightmare would soon be over.
After he picked up his luggage he opted for a cab instead of a shuttle, wanting to get to the hotel as soon as possible, but they kept running into traffic snarls. It seemed as if the universe was plotting to keep them apart.
When he finally reached the hotel, he was a bundle of nerves. He grabbed his bag and strode into the hotel lobby, paused for a moment to orient himself, then headed for the elevators. He knew she was in Room 663. All he needed now was to get to the sixth floor.
He got on the elevator, unaware of the attention he was drawing as a tall, good-looking cowboy wearing a leather jacket, a Stetson and his best pair of Justin boots.
When he reached the sixth floor, he hefted his suitcase and once again paused just long enough to determine his direction, then headed down the hall. The closer he got to Holly’s room, the longer his stride became.
Room 663 brought him to a halt. He knocked, knowing when this door opened it would mark the beginning of the rest of his life.
The rapid knocks were loud and sharp, waking Holly instantly. She leaped off the bed and ran toward the door, pausing only long enough to look through the security peephole, then swung the door inward.
“You’re here!”
Bud slid his suitcase inside the room, swung her up into his arms and kicked the door shut behind him.
“I have missed you so much,” he said softly, and buried his face in the curve of her neck.
Holly couldn’t quit smiling. Why had it taken them so long to get to this moment?
Bud fully intended to take this slow. But when he pulled back and looked down into her face, he was lost.
“Hey, honey,” he said softly.
“Hey,” Holly echoed, then pulled off his hat and tossed it onto the bed.
Bud grinned. He’d feared this moment might never come.
“My life is a serious mess,” she said. “Now’s your chance to take back everything you said. I won’t hold it against you.”
Bud shook his head as he cupped her face. “Never. For me, it’s always been you…only you.”
Holly shivered as Bud’s lips lightly brushed the surface of her mouth. Then they centered, claiming ground with a gentle coaxing push.
She slid her arms around his neck, lost in the magic of that first kiss. She could smell the leather of his coat, feel the steady thump of his heartbeat, and she knew that spending the rest of her life with him would be the best thing she would ever do.
Bud was shaking. He wanted her in every way a man could want a woman, but that would come later. He broke the kiss with a muffled groan, then ran his thumb across the dampness of her lower lip.
“One kiss at a time, honey. One kiss at a time.”
Holly felt as if she were flying. At that moment she could almost believe the hell that her life had turned into might turn out okay.
“I ordered some extra food a couple of hours ago. Are you hungry?” she asked.
He grinned as he took off his coat. “You’ve known me too long to ask that question. Are you hungry?”
“I am now,” she said and, just like that, slipped into the mode that made her happiest: taking care of the people she loved.
She began uncovering the food, filling the glasses from the ice bucket, then adding Pepsi. It was his favorite. By the time Bud came out of the bathroom, the food was waiting.
“Oh, man,” he said, eyeing the small feast. He kissed her quick and hard before picking up half a sandwich and settling into a chair. “That’s for always being you.”
Holly blushed, but she was smiling. She took the other half of the sandwich, crawled up onto the bed and began to eat.
The room was quiet for a couple of minutes as they ate, but it wasn’t long before Bud began talking.
“What’s the status on your situation?”
She shrugged as she tossed away the remnants of her food. “I’m assuming the newly-opened case is progressing. I haven’t been out of this room in two days. However, I don’t expect them to keep me updated. Unless I have more information for them, they don’t really need me.”
“The more you stay out of the public eye, the better off you’ll be,” Bud said, and then popped a chip in his mouth.
Holly nodded, then looked away.
Bud frowned. “I’ve seen that look on your face far too many times not to know what it means.”
“What look?” Holly asked.
“The one that tells me you’re keeping secrets.”
She sighed. How did he always know this stuff?
“Holly?”
“I might have failed to mention one thing to the police.”
“Like what?” Bud asked.
“Like the fact that before I talked to them, I went by the place where my father…where Mackey works.”
Bud nearly choked on his food. “What the hell did you do that for? Did he see you?”
Holly frowned. “What do you think? I wanted to see him, and no, he didn’t see me. I wanted to know if I’d recognize him. I was hoping that if I saw him it would trigger more memories for me.”
Bud laid down the sandwich. “‘More’ as in you have other memories?”
“Some.”
He frowned. “Like what?”
“Without going into the gory details, I’m pretty sure that, as a child, I stumbled onto my father’s trophy stash.”
Bud’s frown deepened. “Trophy stash? What kind of trophy stash?”
“I’ve been having a lot of dreams since I read the journal. The other night I was dreaming that I heard hammering. In the dream, the sounds led me to a small room off the basement. He was inside, at a worktable. There was stuff hanging on the walls.”
“What kind of stuff?” Bud asked.
“I think it was the scalps he’d been taking.”
Bud felt sick. “Is that all you remembered?”
“No. There was something else. He told me if I told anyone what I’d seen, he would make me sorry. He said I would never see my mother again.”
Ten
Bud shuddered. There were so many emotions going through him right then that he had to struggle to find words. What he did know was how strong she must have been, keeping twenty years of ugly, evil secrets. He set his food aside, and pulled her off the bed and into his arms.
“Not that I’m complaining, but what’s this for?” Holly asked.
“I’m giving that scared little girl the hugs she needed and didn’t get.”
Tears welled. Her heart was so full, but she refused to cry. She laid her head against his chest, savoring the strength of his embrace and the steady heartbeat against her ear. Bud had always been her anchor. That he loved her like this was a gift she hadn’t expected. She wanted to be with him—to know this man in a way only his woman could know him.
She stepped back. “Maria has always said she was holding out for her hero. In the middle of all this mess, she seems to have found him. Judd loves Savannah beyond reason, and she knows it, but she’s always kept him at arm’s length. Maybe what’s happening to her will change the way she feels. And then there’s me. The oddest thing about all this is that the older I got, the more I cared for you. I think this took so long to happen because you were already there, just waiting for me to wake up. So, Robert Tate, you’ve kissed me and hugged me, but there’s something missing, and we both know what it is.”
Bud’s heart began to hammer against his chest.
“There’s no need to rush this
, honey. You’ve got a hell of a mess on your hands. I don’t want you to feel pressured to take this further until you’re ready. It’s enough for me that I can finally claim you. You are my heart. You’re the reason I draw breath. If you hurt, I bleed. Understand?”
“I understand,” Holly said. “But if there’s one thing this situation my sisters and I are in has taught me, it’s that waiting for the perfect moment can be a mistake. Maria nearly got killed waiting for her hero. What if Savannah had died before she and Judd could make a life together? You’re here. I’m here. I don’t want candlelight and roses. I want you.”
The curtains were already drawn. Bud kicked off his boots, then turned around and, one by one, turned off the lamps, leaving the room bathed in dusky shadows.
Instead of panic or uneasiness, peace settled within Holly so quickly that she knew this was right. Without a hint of embarrassment, she started to pull off her sweatshirt, but Bud stopped her with a touch.
“Let me.”
He feathered a kiss across her lips, then slid his hands beneath the edges of her waistband and onto her skin.
Holly shivered as she braced herself, holding on to his shoulders as he pulled her sweatpants and panties down in one swoop. She stepped sideways, leaving them where they’d fallen, and reached for Bud’s shirt. The snaps popped as they opened one by one. She put the palms of her hands against his belly and pushed them upward. Then she looked down at his hand. The rawness of the healing cut was evident, and yet he never complained.
Bud shucked the shirt within seconds, leaving himself bare-chested and aching for what came next.
Holly reached for his belt buckle, running a forefinger between his belly and the denim of his jeans, but Bud wasn’t a man for games. He came out of the jeans almost as fast as he’d taken off the shirt, leaving him naked to the world with an erection that made Holly weak at the knees.
Seconds later he had her sweatshirt over her head and tossed her bra over the back of the chair.
“Ah…so beautiful,” he whispered, and cupped her breasts, then rolled the nipples between his fingers just hard enough to awaken a surge of longing deep within Holly’s core.