The Runaway

by Lisa Childs

  It was as he’d turned to leave that the other sister had spoken again. “Don’t go,” she’d murmured.

  He’d turned back, startled that she’d spoken to him. “I’m sorry?”

  “Don’t go,” she said, her eyes glazed with fear. Or maybe they’d always looked that way. “Don’t go.”

  Her sister had tugged her back from the doorway and tried to close the door. But the other woman had persisted. “Don’t go. It’s cursed.”

  Then the door had slammed in his face.

  “Your name?” the disembodied voice asked with an impatience that suggested she might have asked before.

  He’d been too damn distracted lately—because of Rosemary, because of his fears for her. Fears the sisters obviously shared.

  Even if he’d heard the voice the first time, he would have hesitated over giving his name. Not that it was a scandal to visit an employee of a treatment center.

  “Whittaker Lawrence.”

  “You’re not on the list,” the woman replied.

  “List? What?”

  “You’re not on the list of visitors.”

  “Rosemary isn’t a resident,” he said. “She’s a counselor. I just want to talk to her.”

  “You’re not on the list, sir.”

  “What the hell—” A shadow fell across the drive on the other side of the gates, and he stepped forward. Somebody—or—something had been let inside the damn place.

  Just not him . . .

  “Hello?” he called out. Branches rustled on one of the pine trees, knocking snow to the already snow-covered driveway. “Is somebody there?” He curled his hands around the wrought iron to peer through it, and the cold metal seared his skin as if it were burning. He jerked his hands away and cursed.

  On the other side of the gates, more branches rustled, sending another dusting of snow to the ground. Then the wind kicked up again, blasting him in the face. Sucking in a breath, he whirled away—toward the street.

  A car idled on the street behind his vehicle. It wasn’t pointed toward the gates, wasn’t trying to get inside like he was. Instead it appeared as if the driver had noticed him and stopped. When he looked through the driver’s window, his gaze caught hers, and his breath left his lungs again. She was so damn beautiful.

  The driver’s window lowered, and she leaned out. “Are you checking in?” she asked him.

  “They won’t let me in,” he said. “My name isn’t on some damn list.”

  She laughed, and the sound had him gasping for breath again. It was as beautiful as her face. “And unless you’ve made a reservation, you’re not getting in for months.”

  “I don’t want to get in now,” he said. “I just wanted to see you.”

  “Why?”

  “To make sure you’re okay.”

  “Since you knew where to find me, you must have talked to Evelyn and Bonita.”

  He nodded. “You should listen to them and stay away from here. It just might be cursed. The name of the island alone suggests that the whole place might be.”

  Her mouth turned up into a slight smile. “I don’t believe in curses.”

  “Maybe you should, after that crash.” Anger gripped him again over someone cutting her brake line, trapping her inside the wreckage of her overturned vehicle. He’d just recently learned something else about the island, about the sheriff, that had brought him back to Bane. Rosemary really couldn’t trust anyone here, especially not the sheriff.

  “It’s cold,” she said. “You should get back inside your car.”

  “I should,” he agreed, but he remained standing next to hers, staring through that open driver’s window at her beautiful face. He asked, “Where are you going? Back to the boardinghouse?”

  She sighed. “I should. They worry . . .”

  “With good cause,” he said.

  “They barely know me,” she said.

  “They know this place,” he pointed out. He didn’t know if that was just because they lived on the island or if they had a more personal connection to it—like Rosemary did. “Did you find your daughter?”

  She shook her head.

  “Then why are you still here?” he asked. “Why don’t you go home?”

  “Not without Genevieve,” she said. “Why don’t you go home? You’ve talked to me. You see that I’m fine.”

  “You’re not fine,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ll follow you back to the boardinghouse.”

  She tilted her head, studying his face for a long moment.

  “You can trust me,” he said. “I swear I didn’t hurt you, that I would never hurt you.” But would he ever be able to make her believe that? “I don’t know how to prove it to you—until Genevieve is found, until we can do that DNA test.”

  “Help me find her,” she implored him.

  He nodded. “I’m already working on it.” When he’d been DA, he’d worked with some great investigators, but he’d found one even better than them, though. “Edie Stone is helping.”

  Rosemary snorted. “Sure she is.”

  “Oh, she wants the story,” he admitted. But at least he wasn’t the focus of the story anymore. The hall was. “She’s good. In fact she’s already found out something about Sheriff—”

  “I know,” she said.

  “Did he tell you?” he wondered. The sheriff had been quite protective of her, almost possessive.

  “No,” she admitted. “But there’s no proof, just speculation.”

  “He still should have told you,” Whit said.

  “Why?”

  “You’re not involved with him?”

  “I barely know him,” she said.

  He expelled a ragged breath. “Good.”

  “Why?” she asked.

  “I wouldn’t want you to trust someone who wasn’t worthy of your trust,” he said.

  “Again?” she asked.

  “I didn’t betray your trust,” he said. Someone else had, though. “You really don’t remember any more about that night?”

  She shook her head. “I’m not sure I want to.”

  A horn honked as a car passed Rosemary’s on the right. The tires sent a spray of snow and gravel from the shoulder onto the road and onto the passenger side of her car.

  “I need to get out of here,” she said.

  “Am I still invited to follow you back to the boardinghouse?” he asked.

  She nodded. “If you dare . . .”

  “The Pierce sisters don’t scare me,” he said. But he couldn’t deny that the older women were very eccentric.

  “It’s not them you should be afraid of,” she said, her lips curving into a teasing smile.

  His heart pounded faster and harder. And he knew she was right. He needed to be afraid of her. Very afraid ...

  * * *

  Snow sneaked between his hat and the collar of his coat, sliding down his neck. He shook, but not with cold. He shook with rage as he peered through the pine boughs at the couple on the other side of the gates. She was outside now. But she would be back.

  Rosemary Tulle would keep coming back to the estate that should have been his or at least partially his. Bainesworth blood ran through his veins. Maybe the curse did, too, since he couldn’t seem to get rid of her no matter how hard he’d tried.

  He belonged here. She didn’t.

  But she would keep coming, keep badgering everyone for answers about Genevieve. She wasn’t going to give up.

  Until she was dead ...

  Chapter Eighteen

  For the first time since she’d given birth to Genevieve and given her up, Rosemary didn’t feel alone. The hollow ache of loneliness had finally been filled—with Whit. He hadn’t just followed her back to the boardinghouse.

  He’d stayed.

  And somehow he’d charmed the Pierce sisters. They stopped regarding him with suspicion and interacted with him with the same consideration and care with which they interacted with Rosemary.

  Even Bonita . . .

  In fact, from th
e way she’d brought him an extra slice of apple pie after dinner, it was clear that the older Pierce sister had a crush on him. Rosemary couldn’t blame her.

  He was so good-looking—even more so now that he was older. All those interesting angles and dimples were even more pronounced, sexier, than they’d been when he was younger. And the lines that had been added to his face only spoke of his experience and wisdom.

  When she’d first googled him and learned he was a judge, she’d been shocked, but now she could see it, could see how he would look sitting on the bench. Tough but fair ... was how some of the articles had referred to him. Others had called him harsh, at least when it came to rapists; she’d thought that was hypocritical then. Now she wondered ... what had really happened that night, because she believed him.

  “It’s too late for you to go across the bridge now,” Evelyn told him as she cleared the plates from the table. “Bonita will make up a bed for you.”

  “The green room,” Bonita murmured, and she was already rushing out of the dining room. She turned before heading up the stairs, though, and added, “It’ll match his eyes.”

  Rosemary smiled. She had always loved his eyes, too. Even in the nightmare . . . when he stared down at her.

  She hadn’t been afraid then. It was later ... in the darkness. . . when she could see nothing but just feel the pain, the degradation . . .

  “Are you all right?” he asked her, laying his hand over hers on the tablecloth. His hand was so big it completely covered hers.

  Surprised that she didn’t mind his touch, she nodded.

  “She won’t be all right until she finds her daughter,” Evelyn said.

  Appreciative of her landlady’s understanding, Rosemary smiled at her.

  “Are you going to stay to help her?” Evelyn asked Whit.

  “He just came to check on me,” Rosemary said, and she hadn’t expected even that from him. She believed he wasn’t Genevieve’s father.

  “I also want to help,” he said. “I have no trial currently in session, so I can stay.”

  Evelyn, her arms full of plates, just nodded and said, “Good.”

  Rosemary waited until the swinging door to the kitchen closed behind Evelyn before asking him, “Why?”

  “Why what?” he asked.

  “Why would you help look for Genevieve?” she asked. “She’s not yours.”

  A ragged breath escaped his lips. “Good. I’m glad you know that.”

  “Then why stay?”

  “I know what it’s like to lose a child,” he said. “A daughter . . .”

  She’d discovered that, too, when she’d googled him—that he’d experienced personal tragedy. She turned her hand over beneath his and entwined their fingers. Squeezing, she murmured, “I’m sorry. How old was she?”

  He shook his head. “Just hours. That was all she lasted before she passed after her mother.”

  Pain clutched her heart. “You lost them both at the same time?”

  He nodded.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said.

  “I’m the one who’s sorry,” he said, and his broad shoulders slumped with guilt and loss.

  “How long ago?” she asked.

  “It’s been a while now, nearly eight years,” he said. “But the media back home like to keep dredging it up.”

  “I don’t live there,” she said. Where she’d grown up had ceased to be home once her dad had died. “I live in Michigan.” Lived. She wondered now if she would ever go back. “And I never kept track of you . . . after that night . . .” She’d wanted to forget all about him.

  She realized now that had never been possible.

  There was no forgetting Whittaker Lawrence.

  His handsome face twisted into a grimace of pain, probably over reliving his loss. Instead he said, “I hate that you thought I could have hurt you.”

  “I don’t remember much of that night,” she admitted. “And when I never saw you afterward . . .”

  “Your mother threatened me and told me to stay away,” he told her, as he had the other day.

  Frustration nagged at Rosemary. “I don’t remember her being there that night. I don’t remember so damn much. . . .”

  “You said earlier that you’re not sure you want to remember,” he said. “But do you think it might help?”

  “With the nightmares?” She shrugged. “I don’t know if it would help or make them worse.”

  “You have nightmares—even all these years later?”

  She nodded.

  He squeezed her hand. “I’m so sorry. I thought you would be safe since your parents had come home. I had no idea something might happen to you after I left. If I had, I would have stayed no matter what your mom threatened to do to me,” he said, his voice gruff with regret.

  “It’s not your fault.”

  It was hers. She’d been so besotted with him, desperate to spend time with him and show him that she was mature enough for him that she’d thrown that stupid party.

  Instead of moving their relationship to the next level, as she’d wanted, that night had ended it. It had ended so many things in her life. Her relationship with her mother. And her relationship with her daughter as a daughter ...

  What would Genevieve say when she learned the truth? Or had she, was that why she wouldn’t return any of Rosemary’s calls?

  Was she furious with her?

  His fingers skimmed along her jaw. “You spent all these years hating me.”

  “I don’t hate you anymore,” she assured him.

  Or maybe she just didn’t want to be alone again, to feel that hollow ache of loneliness inside her. She rose from the table, and using their entwined hands, tugged him up with her. “Let me show you to your room,” she said.

  “I could go back to the mainland,” he offered, as if worried that she was still scared of him. “It’s not that late.”

  She shook her head. “It’s too late now. Unless ... do you have someone who wants you home tonight? Your wife died a long time ago. . . .” So he must have moved on.

  He shook his head. “Nobody’s waiting for me.”

  He must have loved her very much if he’d never recovered from his loss. But what a loss it had been....

  Her heart ached for him.

  “What about you . . . ?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “Nobody.”

  He flinched. “You said that quickly. Has there ever been anyone? Anyone important?”

  She shook her head again. “No . . . I wouldn’t let myself get close to anyone, to trust anyone . . .”

  “I’m sorry,” he said again, his voice gruff with guilt. “I thought you’d be okay after I left that night.”

  “I know.” And she should have been safe. What the hell had happened?

  They passed Bonita on the stairs, heading back down. “The room’s all ready,” she told them with a bright smile. “Do you want me to show it to you?”

  “I’ll show him,” Rosemary said. “I know where it is.” At the top of the stairs, she first pointed out the bathroom before heading down the hall. She pushed open the door that was just before hers. “This is the green room.”

  He glanced around at the deep green walls that were just a shade darker than the green velvet drapes pulled closed over the windows. He stepped over the threshold and peered around the room. Bonita had turned down the velvet comforter on the four-poster bed.

  The room actually looked more comfortable than her rose room. But she said, “You don’t have to stay here ... if you don’t want to . . .”

  His long body tensed. “Did you change your mind? Don’t you want me here now?”

  She shook her head. “No. But if you want to leave, I understand. With your plans to run for governor, you don’t need to get caught up in my drama.”

  He gently tugged her inside with him and closed the door. “This time I know you’re in danger,” he said. “So I don’t want to leave you.”

  “I don’t want you to leave,” she admitt
ed, but she knew she was fragile right now, worrying about her daughter, about her past, about ...

  “Then I’ll stay here,” he said, “I know that you still don’t trust me.”

  “I shouldn’t,” she agreed.

  “But you can,” he said. “And if you can, you can stay here—with me—and all I’ll do is hold you.”

  Temptation tugged at her. She’d been alone so long.

  He kicked off his shoes and shrugged off his suit jacket. When he reached for his tie, she sucked in a breath. But it was all he removed. Still in his shirt and pants, he pulled back the blankets and crawled into bed.

  Her pulse racing, she hesitated a long moment ... before kicking off her shoes and crawling into that bed with him. She settled against his side, her head on his shoulder. When he curled his arm around her, she tensed.

  “It’s okay,” he murmured. “I’m not going to hurt you. I’m just going to hold you.” He was true to his word, keeping just that arm wrapped loosely around her as he drifted off to sleep.

  Rosemary hadn’t slept much since she’d played that voicemail Genevieve had left for her. But the warmth of his body, the steadiness of his breathing, made her feel safe for the first time since she was sixteen. And Rosemary found herself drifting off to sleep as well.

  * * *

  Whit awoke to a scream. The terror in that scream sent a jolt of fear rushing through him.

  What happened?

  Where was he?

  Disoriented and dazed, he had no time to react before a fist struck him, hands and feet flailing around in the dark. “What? What’s wrong?” he murmured.

  Then he remembered: the nightmares . . .

  “Rosemary, it’s me,” he said. “It’s Whit.”

  Maybe that was what had frightened her so much, though, realizing that she’d spent the night in his bed. And it had been most of the night as faint light filtered through the heavy drapes pulled across the bedroom window.

  “Whit?” she whispered in the dark.

  He didn’t know whether confirming it would upset her more, but he said, “Yes, it’s me. You’re safe. I won’t hurt you.” His heart wrenched with pain over her thinking for so long that he had hurt her.