Harlequin Romantic Suspense July 2021 Box Set

by Carla Cassidy

  Bella had slept through the violence earlier that night. There couldn’t be any more coming after. No chance that precious little girl would grow up with that fear in her home.

  “Since you came with warnings, I guess I should, too,” she told Greg before she could second-guess herself.

  He grinned. “Shoot,” he said, his lids lowered in a way that called out to her. She liked him this way—all relaxed and laid-back.

  But had to say what she had to say.

  “I’m not looking for forever,” she said, making her intent as clear as possible. “Not now. Not ever.”

  “Ever’s a long time off,” he said, still with a hint of a smile—not so much on his lips, but in his eyes.

  She turned, frowning, and took his hand. “I mean it, Greg. I am not going to get married. Or even live with a partner ever again.”

  She’d had a hard past and scars that were not going to go away.

  “Because of the chance that you’d end up with an unhealthy partner.”

  She’d told him her dark secrets. Now he had to understand that she’d made some healthy choices and they weren’t going to change.

  “Partially, yes.”

  “You think that somewhere inside me lurks a temper that could turn violent.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “But that’s just it... I never think it. I mean, I know you aren’t a violent man. But I also know that I am predisposed to not be able to discern if you were. But it’s not even just that...”

  She was being pushed from the inside out, as though her life depended on speaking up.

  “We’re in the beginning stages right now,” she said. She was falling back on things she’d learned in counseling; they’d helped her to finally understand a lot of what motivated actions she’d never before been able to recognize, much less understand. “Everything’s new and feels so great. There’s an excitement unlike any other kind in finding someone who’s a mate for our soul.”

  She heard the words and wished she’d dialed back a bit. Expected him to balk at the emotional, drama-ridden bit. His gaze was focused, seemingly intent. As though she not only had his full visual attention, but his auditory concentration, as well.

  “However long that lasts—could be weeks or months, even years depending on how much time you spend together—things are good. Kind of like the honeymoon phase of a new marriage. But there are always parts of people that you don’t know until you live through unexpected circumstances with them. Like a tire blowing out on a deserted road. Or the death of someone close. And then there are the life choices—a career change. A sudden need for adventure or the desire to wander to new places. Midlife crises. Or goals left unmet. Maybe even an unexpected need to procreate. Add to that any financial challenges, decorating difference and squeezing the toothpaste from the middle or not...”

  Turning his hand over, she slowly laced their fingers together. One by one.

  “Or a brother being prosecuted,” he said.

  And she knew what he was telling her. Something she’d already pretty much figured out for herself. Just because Heidi had shown tonight that she wasn’t healed didn’t mean that Josh wasn’t also an abuser. There was nothing on earth that proclaimed that there couldn’t be two abusers in a home. Or that one took precedence over another.

  This wasn’t two spouses duking it out in divorce court. As far as the court suspected, or at least had to entertain, Heidi and Josh were equally abusive.

  If that was the case, they’d both have to pay.

  “I know his case isn’t just going to go away, if that’s what you’re worried about,” she said now. Greg nodded.

  “I also know that entering into another life-partner relationship is not healthy for me.” She brought them right back to where she’d started. “I’m always going to be looking, Greg. Fearing the unknown. And by doing so, creating my own reality. Bringing on the bad. They say that what you put your mind to, you get. Or something like that. And I can’t be in a live-in monogamous relationship without having those thoughts.”

  She knew how people could do things they’d never expect themselves to do or in a million years want to do. Desperate circumstances created desperate actions.

  Like pushing your brother so hard he had to get stitches.

  “So you could be in a live-in relationship if it wasn’t monogamous?”

  He wasn’t smiling. Was he asking for...

  “No,” she said. “I can’t be in a sexual relationship that isn’t monogamous, either.” Saying it out loud like that sounded so...uptight. She came with strict rules of all kinds, apparently.

  “So, if we were to...say...be friends who had a sexual relationship, I’d be the only one you were sharing that kind of friendship with?” He nodded as he spoke, like he could already see that happening.

  Even after she’d let him know, quite clearly, that their friendship would never be more than that.

  “Yes.” The word came out with a sound of intent. And maybe a bit of cheer.

  She hadn’t been describing their future, she’d been defining what it couldn’t be, but...

  “Good, then,” he said, leaning over to kiss her again. “Because I’m all for a monogamous friendship with you.”

  He was pushing her back down to the couch. Slowly. Gently. Giving her time to object. “And you understand that it goes no further than that,” she said, not objecting so much as stalling.

  “I do.” He was looking her right in the eye, all humor gone for the moment, as he said those two words.

  She kissed him then, pulling him down to her as much as being laid down. And then stopped once more. “And this is a given, but should be mentioned—I come as a package deal with Bella right now. And for however long it takes.”

  “Oh, lady, I’ve got that one,” he said, lying fully on top of her. “I believe I’ve just signed on for a long-term plan without having kids of my own, which I happen to like, by the way. I’m good with kids. They seem to like me, too, what little I’ve had to do with them. I just don’t have a lot of experience so wouldn’t want to say...raise one on my own, as Josh has been doing. But I’m open to learning. So...yeah, I’m fully prepared for whatever comes with Bella...”

  His mouth was on hers as his voice drifted off, and she couldn’t think after that.

  Not about violence, or court, or never having kids of her own. She couldn’t think about not having...anything...because in his arms, she felt like she had everything she’d ever need.

  CHAPTER 17

  She didn’t sleep with him that night. She came pretty darn close. About as close as you could come without completing the act. He was the one who’d stopped them. But she was glad he had. Even in the moment.

  Being with him felt...necessary. Rushing things just didn’t. They had time. She needed time.

  And yet, as the weekend transpired, she was burning with the need to have that final connection there between them. Burning on the back burner, as she gladly welcomed her brother and his caseworker, Marianne, who’d agreed to a longer weekend visitation with Bella. The little girl knew nothing about her mother’s visit the night before, the violence or her subsequent arrest, but Josh still needed to see her. To be close.

  They watched a couple of kiddie movies. Made chocolate chip cookies. And had hot dogs for dinner. Marianne sat in a corner of the dining room a good part of the afternoon, working on a laptop and going out on the deck to make calls.

  Josh was hoping that when William Brubaker got to the office Monday morning and heard about his victim’s arrest, he’d drop the charges.

  She hoped, too, but didn’t count on it. She did think, though, that Josh had a better chance of winning the case, that his attorney had a better shot at showing the court that Heidi was manipulating them, lying, than he’d had before.

  She didn’t tell Josh about Greg. And wasn’t sure why.
Maybe because of Wynne’s reaction. What if Josh, like her friend, warned her off? Reminded her of her relationship challenges? Told her he didn’t have a good feeling about him?

  Maybe she didn’t tell him just because she wanted to savor her new friendship privately for a bit. Or maybe she felt a bit off, finding this new happiness while her brother’s life was falling apart. Almost at his expense.

  Because his life was falling apart. But if it hadn’t been for Heidi filing charges, she’d never have met Greg. Maybe the thing to do was just as Greg had suggested the other night when he’d stopped their lovemaking. They should wait until after the case was done.

  Anything else just further complicated an already complicated situation.

  She couldn’t have Josh worrying that she was losing focus. Or that Greg was.

  For that reason, she decided that she shouldn’t have Greg around Bella much, either. At three, the little girl had a tendency to blurt out whatever was on her mind with no idea of nuances or potential consequences. She didn’t want Bella telling Josh that she’d had dinner with Greg. Or watched TV with him. Or that he’d been kissing Auntie JJ.

  And she most definitely was not going to put herself in a position that would require her to tell Bella not to tell her father. Not about Greg. Or anything else personal.

  So she contented herself with phone calls. A lengthier one on Sunday night even than Saturday.

  “It’s kind of good, you know,” she told him while lying in her bed in the dark. “Having this time. I know you’re there. That we’re here. And yet I’m going about my normal life, too.”

  “And is normal life giving you qualms about us...being here?”

  “None.” Which surprised her. A lot. “It’s kind of a sweet agony. Thinking about you. Wanting. Knowing I’m going to have you and yet...not having.”

  “Like looking at all the presents under the Christmas tree and knowing you’ll get to open them, but not until later,” he said, his voice a low, sleepy drawl. He’d told her he was in bed, too. In the dark.

  And nude.

  She was in her favorite nightgown. She had a child in the house and had already told him how she always slept with her door open. Wanted Bella to feel free and comfortable about crawling into bed with her if she wanted.

  “Yeah, like Christmas,” she said now, wishing he was there with her. “Except that at Christmastime, you only get to unwrap once and then the anticipation is over.”

  “You planning to unwrap over and over?”

  “Oh, yeah.” She chuckled. And then, thinking about the morning, sobered. “Josh thinks William’s going to reconsider the charges against him,” she said, treading a fine line. Greg couldn’t tell her what the prosecutor was going to do. Couldn’t tell her strategy. Not ethically.

  And she wouldn’t have him any other way.

  “I’d like to see him with Bella,” he came back, leaving her to read, or not read, more into the statement.

  “I could arrange a dinner here,” she said. “His next visitation is Wednesday night. You could join us.”

  “Let me think about it,” Greg said. “I’d need to be the one to set it up. And he’d have to agree. And frankly, I don’t see his lawyers allowing that. I wouldn’t. Your brother’s relationship with his daughter really has no bearing on this case.”

  Not on Greg’s side of it. She got that.

  “So why do you want to see them together?”

  “Because I want to see the man you see.”

  Scooting down further under the covers, she relaxed. Well and truly. For the first time since Josh had woken her up to tell her he was bringing his daughter to her. “You believe me now, don’t you? You see Heidi for who she is.”

  His silence could have been agreement. Or not. She didn’t ask. She didn’t need to. He believed her and was on their side.

  * * *

  Greg hung up the phone Sunday night, climbed out of bed and went in to lift weights. You see Heidi for who she is. Jasmine’s statement kept playing over and over in his mind.

  She was right. He did see. The things Heidi had told him about Jasmine and her relationships, that Jasmine was afraid of herself, of getting violent when things got intense, about her breaking up with her lovers when she did get that angry. Heidi had sounded so convincing because she’d been describing herself. He saw that now.

  And he wanted to believe, really wanted to believe that Josh Taylor was an innocent victim all the way. But he just couldn’t. The doctor’s report, the evidence that put Heidi at Josh’s house, not at the gym, at the time of the injury...and even the photo—it was the opposite wrist as Jasmine had said. When he’d asked Heidi about it, she’d produced another one of the other limb, saying that at first, Josh had grabbed both wrists. When he’d sprained her wrist, he’d only been holding the one.

  Not information he could or would share with Jasmine.

  So what if Heidi was lying about all of it? Not about being at Josh’s house—they had the neighbor’s security camera footage to prove that. But what if, on the way to the hospital, she’d paid someone to hold her wrists and then jerked herself away?

  Was he being ludicrous here? Thinking such thoughts?

  Or opening his mind to the truth as Jasmine had asked him to do? Open his mind to possibilities he’d never imagined.

  Like falling for a woman who, like Liv, had emotional residue from a tragic past to the point of not being able to have a committed traditional relationship? He wanted what his folks had, what they’d given him: a family. A happy home life. And maybe, just maybe he did want children of his own someday. Now that he was actually waking up to the fact that he didn’t want to go through life alone.

  He wanted to be biologically related to someone he knew.

  And here he was, nuts about a woman who wouldn’t give him any of those things.

  Life didn’t always fit the mold.

  But it usually fit. So...maybe Jasmine was right for him because she didn’t need what he didn’t have. She didn’t need someone right there in her world, her home, sharing everything with her in the moment, like Liv had needed. His lack of empathetic powers didn’t even seem to be an issue with her.

  And what about Josh and Heidi Taylor? Were they both abusive spouses? Or was he not looking in the right places for the truth?

  He worked out hard. Slept a little. And was already in the office when William arrived the next morning. Charges were pending against Heidi—another prosecutor would handle that case—and she was out of jail, having been warned to stay away from the Taylors or her bail could be revoked. Her visitation with her daughter would continue, in a playroom at Child Protective Services only. And for only one hour a week.

  William asked Greg to go talk to her. To find out if she’d be a credible enough witness to still take her case to court. He felt, as Greg did, that the evidence against Josh Taylor was too strong to ignore.

  “And what concerns me the most...” William started.

  “...is the fact that he continues to deny any culpability,” Greg finished for his friend and colleague. “If he admitted getting angry, grabbing her wrist to keep her from hitting him, we could maybe see a way to thinking that this was a onetime thing on his part and not an ongoing danger.”

  Not that the holding the wrist to avoid a blow theory was valid. The injury clearly showed that Heidi’s arm was down when she was grabbed.

  “My guess is he’s in denial, which is almost a guarantee of future violence, or he’s aware of his issues and hiding them,” William agreed, sipping from the coffee he’d brought in for the both of them. In a shirt and tie, and behind his desk, William looked impressive enough. But when he stood next to Greg in court, his five-foot-two frame next to Greg’s bulk, not so much.

  But anyone who underestimated William, or his ability to see right to the core of things, anyone who thought William didn�
��t have what it took to fight to the end no matter how bitter it got, would be making a huge mistake.

  “Either way, without accountability and counseling, he’s a danger out there.” Greg, who was sitting in his usual seat across from William, voiced a concern that had been gnawing at him with growing intensity.

  “Talk to Heidi,” William said. “Find out what’s going on with her. Try one more time to get her to admit there were other episodes with him.”

  “I witnessed something this weekend.” Greg had to speak up. Lives could be at risk. Jasmine and Bella’s lives. “An apathy to physical abuse, almost as though, as long as one came through it without major physical damage, it wasn’t a big deal. My take was that it comes from years of living with abuse as a way of life. Normalizing it. So maybe Josh has been exhibiting signs of abuse that no one paid attention to. Unexpected temper flares, for instance, that those close to him would be able to understand and explain away. Slamming a door hard enough to crack a door jamb, but maybe the jamb was old and loose anyway. Spinning the truth to suit him. Maybe, as this behavior has a tendency to do, his violence is escalating.”

  “Find out.”

  He nodded. And then continued, needing to check himself in with William. “One of the things the High-Risk Team looks for is a trigger for the escalation. Usually it’s financial worry, alcohol or drug addiction, a breakup. Josh Taylor has none of those.”

  He showed no patterns, from what Greg could see. And he’d seen a lot over the past couple of weeks, just by talking to Jasmine. And looking into Josh Taylor’s personal affairs. Everyone who knew the guy seemed to love him. Greg had been to Play for the Win headquarters. Had asked discreet questions around some of the gyms—posing as a man looking to place his son.

  He couldn’t help thinking that maybe Jasmine was right. That Josh was being set up by a woman who wasn’t getting what she wanted. Heidi didn’t have Josh. Or her daughter. And, though she’d gotten a settlement in her divorce, it hadn’t been as much as she’d might have won had she not been abusive to her ex-husband. To the contrary, Josh Taylor, of his own accord, had been more than generous with her, considering the circumstances.