by Diana Palmer
* * *
SHE WAS SITTING in the passenger seat with her seat belt fastened when he climbed in beside her.
“I’ve never driven a Mercedes. Are they nice?” she asked, to make conversation.
“They’re immortal and almost never break down. Where are we going?” he added abruptly.
“Sorry. Aspen Street, just past the bakery.”
He nodded, cranked the big car and pulled out of the parking lot.
She held her bulky purse in her lap and dug her nails into it. He couldn’t know how difficult it was for her to sit with a man who was more or less a stranger. He disliked her and made no secret of it. Jerking out of his arms and running at that party they’d attended separately had just made things worse.
She stared out the window as he drove, not even trying to make conversation.
She directed him to the parking lot of a group of orthopedic surgeons. He didn’t comment, but she was young, or seemed to be. He associated orthopedics with elderly people.
“Thanks for the ride,” she said quietly.
“You’ll need a ride home,” he replied. “Give me your cell phone.”
He spoke with such authority that she handed it over without thinking.
He took it and pulled up her contact list. It was blank. He looked at her with a faint scowl.
She swallowed, hard. “Why do you need my phone?”
He pulled up a screen and put his own contact information into it. He handed it back. “That’s my cell phone number. Call me when you’re through here and I’ll drive you back to your car.”
“I can get a cab...”
He just looked at her.
She bit her lower lip. “It will be an imposition.”
She was fascinating him. The image of her he’d built up seemed nothing like the reality. She was uncomfortable with him, shy, withdrawn. He’d only seen her being vivacious, the life of the party. Was it a mask?
“I have to check in at my feed store and look over some accounts with the manager. It won’t be an inconvenience.”
“Well...okay, then. Thank you.”
He shrugged. He turned off the engine, went around and opened the door for her. She actually flushed.
“Is that not allowed in our modern, too-liberal society? Opening doors for women?”
“I like nice manners, and I don’t care if it’s acceptable or not,” she stammered.
He cocked his head and looked down at her with open curiosity.
“Thanks again. I’ll be late,” she added, glancing at the plain watch on her wrist. She turned and walked slowly toward the building.
It wasn’t really blatant, but he could see that she limped a little when she walked. Odd. An old injury? he wondered. A fall or something? Not his business. But he was curious about her. Far more curious than he wanted to be.
* * *
IDA SAT IN the waiting room for her turn to see Dr. Menzer and tried to understand why Jake McGuire, who obviously disliked her, had been so kind to her. She didn’t expect kindness from men. She pretended to be a wild woman, just to make men leave her alone. She exaggerated her reputation, let it be rumored that she had high standards for her bedroom and talked about fictional men she’d had affairs with to give the idea that she’d gossip about a man who didn’t measure up to her expectations. As she’d expected, it kept her free of complications in her private life. Not many men had the ego to even approach her.
Cort Grier had, but she found an unexpected friend in the jaded cattle baron who’d had his own issues with women who wanted his wealth, not himself. They’d formed a friendship. She’d opened up to him as she hadn’t been able to open up with any other man.
She was happy for him. He loved Mina and his son, and that was wonderful. But he’d been the only friend she had. When he married, she’d removed his contact information from her phone. She didn’t want it to appear that she was after him even when he married. That left the screen completely blank. She had no contacts, because she only used the phone for emergencies and surfing the internet. Her attorneys had her home phone number, which had an answering machine. She had no idea how to set up voice mail on the cell phone, so it was better not to have people call the number. That was why her contact screen was blank, and Jake had noticed. She’d have bet that his own phone contact list was overflowing.
Well, she couldn’t want a man that way, not anymore. And she had her own problems. Her ex-husband, Bailey Trent, was just recently out of prison and in hock to his gambling associates. How he’d gotten out was a mystery. She’d had him sent up for violent assault and battery. Shortly after his arrival, he’d lost his temper and killed another inmate, almost guaranteeing that he’d never get out. But he had gotten out.
He’d been calling her on her home phone, leaving threatening messages. She’d phoned her attorneys in Denver, but she wasn’t even sure what they could do about him. He left no contact number. She didn’t even know where he was. She tried a reverse lookup on her phone, but the number was blocked. What if he came after her again, the way he had the last time she’d refused to give him money, before he even went to prison?
Her hand went idly to her hip and she grimaced. She’d had a fractured pelvis and damage to her femur, injuries that had been catastrophic, to her mind. The orthopedic surgeon, a genius in his own right, had put her hip and femur back together like a jigsaw puzzle. Two surgeries, a partial hip replacement and a metal plate along her thigh with metal screws to hold it in place had alleviated most of her problem, but the pain continued and the visits to her orthopedic surgeon had increased in recent months. Oncoming cold weather usually brought its own set of complications. Secondary arthritis had set in to the damaged pelvis. She needed another prescription for the powerful anti-inflammatory medications she had to take, hence the visit.
She tried not to think about the injury her second husband had caused. He’d seemed like such a kind, sweet man. She hadn’t realized that it was an act, all of it, to lure her in and get her to marry him so that he’d have access to her inherited fortune.
She shivered, remembering. It hadn’t been a long fall, just over the side of a one-story parking garage. She’d landed on hard ground, not, thank God, on concrete. The pain had been something out of her experience. By the time the ambulance arrived, of course, Bailey was pretending hysterics and wailing that his poor wife had fallen despite his efforts to save her. It would have been her word against his, how it happened. Even in the hospital, he’d been the soul of remorse. No one realized that he’d caused the injuries, and she was too shocked and in so much pain that most of her hospital stay had been a blur. Rehab had kept her out of his hands for a while. But inevitably she had to go home. It was only a month later that he assaulted her in view of a witness, a severe beating that got him sent to prison.
She’d hoped he’d never get out. That was unrealistic. He could always talk people into things. He had a pipeline into drug trafficking and somehow he’d managed early release, probably by helping someone get access to controlled substances. The nightmare had begun all over again the day he was released from prison.
He was adamant about his confinement and her part in it. He was furious that she’d given up his name after the divorce and gone back to the surname of her first husband, Merridan. He was furious that he couldn’t make her send him money for the pain and suffering she’d caused him. She owed him and he planned to collect. She had all that nice money and he was destitute. She could pay up or unpleasant things might happen, he suggested just before she hung up in his face and blocked his number. She remembered some of the unpleasant things that had already happened and she felt sick inside.
Cody Banks, the local sheriff, had been a sympathetic listener. He was one of the few people in Catelow who knew the woman behind the mask. He’d been kind to her. He promised that Bailey Trent wouldn’t get near her. He encouraged her to tak
e out a restraining order. She had, although the clerk had told her that they were very rarely worth the paper they were printed on. She phoned her attorneys in Denver and had them send an investigator out to keep an eye on Bailey. She could afford the expense, which might save her life. Bailey used drugs. He was dangerous even when he didn’t.
She couldn’t believe how naive she’d been about him. Coming from a marriage with a man who was a closet homosexual, she’d had no faith at all in her ability to attract a man. It wasn’t until her husband took his own life and left her the note that she’d even known about his sexual orientation. She’d thought that she simply wasn’t woman enough to appeal to him.
He’d been a kind, sweet man, always taking care of her, doing anything he could to make her life happy and easy. His loss was painful.
Then there was Bailey Trent. He was rugged, authoritative, a real he-man, at least to Ida’s naive eyes. They’d dated and he’d been passionate with her, but he hadn’t insisted on intimacy until they were married. That, too, she thought miserably, had been calculated. She’d been desperate to have him, in thrall to her senses for the first time in her life. He’d taken advantage of feelings she couldn’t help to rush her to the altar.
And then had come her wedding night. Nothing in her young life had prepared her for the depravity some men reveled in. She had nightmares about what he’d done to her, that night and others, when she was too bruised and frightened to fight back anymore. That first week they’d been married was when he’d lost his temper and thrown her over the side of the parking garage. After her wedding night, it hadn’t been much of a surprise, although the pain had been something far beyond what she’d already endured.
She’d tried to run away once, after she got out of the hospital. But he’d found her and convinced her protectors that she’d overreacted to what was basically just a sad accident. He loved her desperately. He couldn’t live without her. He told everybody.
Ida knew better. He couldn’t live without her money. But she was encouraged to forgive him and make her marriage work. Her sweet friends who’d taken her in had been happily married for twenty-five years. They had no idea what her life was like. And she was too ashamed to tell them.
“Mrs. Merridan?”
She lifted her head and came out of the reverie quickly. She smiled at the nurse as she got painstakingly to her feet and followed the younger woman back to the treatment room.
* * *
DR. MENZER EXAMINED her and grimaced.
“What did you do?” he asked.
She flushed. “It’s autumn,” she began.
“You can hire big strong hefty men to lift those heavy flowerpots from the patio into your sunroom,” he said shortly and watched her flush. She did the same thing every year, just before frost warnings went out, getting her precious herbs and flowering plants inside. “You’ve no business trying to do it yourself.”
She made a face. “I can’t let my flowers die. And I love fresh herbs.”
“Buy some at the store.”
“It’s not the same,” she pointed out.
He drew in a breath. “Ida, there are things you just can’t do anymore. Heavy labor tops the list. You have to be sensible.”
“Sensible.” She sighed. “He’s out of prison, you know,” she added, her blue eyes poignant. “He wants money. He says if I don’t give it to him, I can expect even worse than I had before he was convicted.”
“Talk to Cody Banks.”
“I have,” she replied. “I took out a restraining order, as well. But if somebody wants to kill you, he can,” she added.
“If he wants money, killing you isn’t in his best interest, now, is it?” he returned.
“I guess not. I had a new will drawn up when he went to prison, guaranteeing that if I die, he inherits nothing.” She drew in a long breath. “The nightmares came back, when he called me.”
“You should be in the care of a psychologist.”
She shrugged. “I tried. It didn’t work.” She looked over at him. “My first husband was gay, but he was a better, more loving husband to me than Bailey Trent could ever be.”
He just smiled. “We all make mistakes.”
“Yes, but most of us don’t end up in intensive care when we make them,” she replied with a faint smile.
“You survived, at least,” he replied. “That’s something.”
“I guess.”
“I’m going to have Melanie call in a prescription for stronger anti-inflammatories,” he said, typing on his computer. “You’ll take them for five days only, then ten days off. That way you’ll be able to keep your liver and save your kidneys.”
“Powerful stuff,” she commented.
“Very. And don’t take them and try to drive,” he admonished.
“I won’t. Thanks,” she added. “For the meds. And for listening.”
“Who else have you got?” he asked reasonably.
“Sad but true.”
“You should come to supper one night,” he told her as he got to his feet. “Sandy would love to make you that terrific meat loaf she does, along with some homemade bread.”
“Your wife is a wonderful cook. And I appreciate the offer. But...”
He raised an eyebrow. “But?”
“Carl,” she said, “anybody I associate with could be in the crosshairs when Bailey comes after me. I’m not putting you and Sandy there.”
“Now, listen,” he began.
“No,” she interrupted. “But thank you. And tell Sandy one day I want her to try and teach me to do breads.”
“I’ll tell her,” he replied. “Keep in touch with Cody,” he added. “He’ll watch out for you.”
She nodded.
He hesitated. “For the record, Sandy and I are both sorry that we encouraged you to go back to Bailey. We didn’t know about him then.”
“You didn’t,” she agreed. “And I was too ashamed to tell you. That’s all in the past. No worries.”
“You take care of yourself.”
She smiled. “I’ll do my best.”
“Some gentle exercise would help strengthen those muscles,” he added.
“So you keep telling me. I bought a Tai Chi DVD,” she added. “It’s made for people with arthritis. So far, I’ve managed one whole form without falling over the coffee table.”
He chuckled. “Keep it up.”
She grinned. “I will.”
* * *
SHE WENT TO the counter and got her next appointment set, then walked outside. She pulled out her phone and hesitated. She really shouldn’t start anything with McGuire, she told herself. He didn’t like her, even though he’d been kind today. And she hesitated to put him in the line of fire. She should just call a cab.
She pulled up the internet on her smartphone and started looking for the number of the only local cab company. Before she could copy the number, a red Mercedes pulled into the parking lot and stopped beside her.
CHAPTER TWO
IDA PAUSED WITH the phone in her hand and her mouth slightly open as she stared at the man sitting in the big car beside her.
He powered down the window. “Calling somebody?” he asked. “A cab, perhaps?”
She felt a shiver inside. How had he known?
“Get in.”
She was too unsettled to argue. She climbed in beside him and fastened her seat belt. “How could you possibly know?” she asked.
He shrugged. “I get these wild notions sometimes. I don’t know where they come from. Well, that’s not quite true. An ancestor of mine ran afoul of the authorities in Salem, Massachusetts, in the sixteen hundreds.”
She pursed her lips and whistled softly.
“So I come by it honestly. I knew my parents were going to die. I dreamed it.”
“That must have been a hard gift to live wi
th.”
“It still is. Do you have a prescription to pick up?”
She nodded. “I’ll check and see if it’s ready. You’re sure you don’t mind?” she added worriedly.
Silver eyes met hers and slid away. “If I minded, I wouldn’t be here.”
“Okay, then. Thanks.”
She phoned the pharmacy and spoke to Carol, a clerk she knew well. She asked about the prescription, smiled and thanked her.
She put the phone away. “She said they’re already working on it. They have the drug in stock.”
“What sort of drug?”
“Ibuprofen,” she replied and told him the milligrams.
“Good God, you’ll destroy your liver,” he muttered.
“Five days on, ten off,” she replied. “And you take it with meals three times a day.” She drew in a long breath. “It isn’t my first walk around the block with this drug, although it’s been a couple of years since I’ve needed such a dose. We tried other meds, but they weren’t working.”
He scowled. He knew that such a massive dose would indicate an equally massive problem. “Broken bone?” he asked.
She nodded. There had been several fractures, but he didn’t need to know that.
He glanced at her, curious. Away from people, she was a different woman. He was curious about the change in her.
“You don’t talk much,” he commented.
She was staring out the window. “I’m not used to people,” she confessed. “I keep to myself.”
“When you’re not hosting orgies.”
She tautened all over and couldn’t force herself to look at him. It wasn’t true, but she didn’t know him and she didn’t trust him. She turned her purse over in her lap and looked out the window.
He noticed her lack of response and put it down to acceptance. After all, she could hardly deny what she was. Everybody knew. He couldn’t understand why he was ferrying her around in his car, looking after her. It wasn’t like him to get mixed up with a promiscuous woman. God knew there had been enough of them when he was younger. But as he grew older, he grew more jaded, more disgusted. What sort of woman sold herself for trinkets?