Нора Робертс - Hideaway

“Another bloodsucker,” Maggie decided. “Who is she? I want to Google her.”

“Jessica A. Rowe.”

Sparks groomed himself for his visit with his lawyer/biographer. He worked some product into his hair, still thick, to add a sheen (subtle) of silver to the gray. He practiced his sad but adoring looks in the mirror.

He still had it.

Then again, Jessica proved to be one of the easiest marks in his long career. At forty-six, stout, saggy, plain as a plank of wood, she’d been ripe for a little illicit romance. Desperate for love.

He’d started her out with the repentant routine, shared details—some real, some fabricated—that hadn’t gotten into the public trough as yet. Shyly, he’d confessed he’d tried to write his story himself, as a kind of penance, but he couldn’t find the words to express himself.

He expressed himself with her, maneuvered her into using her very rusty law degree to represent him so they could talk confidentially.

Over weeks, then months, he’d primed her, reeled her in, wooed her.

Through the years, he’d had letters from, visits from, women drawn to men in prison. He’d considered many as liaisons to the outside. Rejected many as either straight-out crazy or simply unreliable.

But Jessie, oh, Jessie was another type altogether.

The rule follower fascinated with rule breakers. Because, his instincts told him, she wanted to be one.

The lonely middle-aged woman who believed herself—rightfully, in his opinion—unattractive, undesirable. The naive-to-the-point-of-stupid mark who thought of herself as insightful.

The first time he’d taken her hand, held it, looked into her eyes as he kissed her fingers in gratitude, he knew he could, and would, play her like a violin.

Now, after months of preparation, after stolen kisses, fraught embraces, after promises and plans to marry upon his release, came the true test.

If she failed it, he’d wasted his time. But she’d passed all the small ones. Reporting back to him on everyone he intended to pay back. He had other sources, and every bit of information she gave him matched. Right down the line.

And since she worked hard on getting him that early release—and might pull it off—it was time to act while he still had an ironclad (literally) alibi.

She was waiting when the guard took him into the conference room. They no longer shackled him. They would subject him to a search after—unless he bribed the handpicked guard.

But no need on this visit.

She’d changed her hair from the first time they’d met. Shortening it, coloring out the gray, trying to add some style. She used makeup now, though never lipstick. If they managed to kiss, there would be no telltale smear.

He knew she worked on exercise and diet, though her body, in his opinion, would never be anything but stubby.

Still, he gave himself full credit for her efforts, for the more stylish suit she wore—so much better than the brown bag she’d had on during that initial meeting.

“I’ve missed you. Jessie, I’ve missed you so much. All the years before you, I could deal with them. I deserved them. But now? It’s torture just waiting until I can see you again.”

“I’d come every day if I could.” She opened her briefcase, took out a file, as if they had something legal to discuss. “But you were right. Too often and they’d wonder. I feel like I’m in prison, too, Grant.”

“If only I’d met you all those years ago. Before I let Denby and Charlotte use me, manipulate me. We’d have made a life, Jessie. Had a home. We’d have had children. I feel … they stole all of that from us.”

“We’ll make a home and a life, Grant. When you’re free, we’ll be together.”

“I think of the kids we’d have had. Especially a girl, with your eyes, your smile. It breaks my heart. I want to make them pay for what they took from us. For that little girl who’ll never be.”

She reached across the table for his hand. “They need to pay. They will pay.”

“I shouldn’t ask you to get involved in this. I—”

“Grant. I’m with you. You’ve given me more in these few months than anyone has in my whole life. I’m with you.”

“Can you take this next step? Can you call the number I give you, say the words I tell you to say? Even knowing what it means? If you can’t, I won’t blame you. It won’t change how I feel.”

“I’d do anything for you, don’t you know that? What they took from you, they took from me. A little boy, with your eyes, with your smile.”

“Be sure, my darling Jessie.”

Tears sparkled in her eyes. “For what they did to you, what they took from us, I’m sure. I love you.”

“I love you.” He kissed her hand, looked into her eyes. Gave her the number, gave her the words to say.

Twelve hours later, a guard found Denby’s body, the shank still in his belly, in the showers.

When Sparks got the word, he smiled at the ceiling of his cell and thought: One down.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

After making a delivery—eggs, butter, cheese—to the main house, Dillon walked down to Cate’s. Maybe returning her bread cloth equaled excuse, but it was her cloth. Besides, he had a little time, and wanted to see her again.

Nothing wrong with that.

Plus, he’d waited nearly a week—and he’d had to deliver the dairy anyway.

He glanced down at his dogs. “Right? Am I right?”

They appeared to agree.

The November wind brought a bite with it, and a light, steady rain. He didn’t mind that. Not when it made everything on the peninsula look like a storybook.

The sort where witches lived in enchanted cottages and gnomes lurked among the denuded, twisted trees. And maybe mermaids with sinuous bodies—and sharp teeth—lurked under the waves crashing at the cliffs.

The ranch might be only a few miles away, but this was a different world. He liked visiting different worlds now and then.

And in the gray gloom, with the wisps of fog, smoke trailing up from the chimney, and flowers—still bright—in the window boxes, the guesthouse did look like an enchanted cottage.

It made you wonder, if you played around with the theme, if the woman inside was a good witch or a bad witch.

Then he heard her scream.

He bolted the rest of the way, the dogs racing with him, growls low in their throats.

When he burst through the front door, ready to fight, to defend, he saw her standing at the kitchen island, her hair scooped up, her eyes wide and shocked.

And bread dough in her hands.

He said, “What the fuck?”

“Back at you. You may have heard of this traditional gesture called knocking.”

“You were screaming.”

“Rehearsing.”

Funny, he thought, his heart hadn’t started hammering until after he’d run in and seen her. Before that it was just fight mode.

“Rehearsing what?”

“Screaming, obviously. Can’t pet you,” she told the dogs. “Hands full. Close the door, would you? It’s cold out.”

“Sorry.” He closed it, changed his mind. “Not sorry. When I hear somebody let out a bloodcurdling scream, I react.”

She kept kneading dough. “Did it hit bloodcurdling?”

He could only stare at her.

“Is that my cloth? You can put it down there. If you want coffee, you’ll have to make it yourself. I’m a screamer,” she added.

“I heard that. Loud and clear.”

“Not all actors can scream realistically or pull off the type of scream the scene and character call for.”

“There are types of screams?”

“Sure. You’ve got your heartbroken scream, your I’ve-just-stumbled-over-a-dead-body shriek—which could also be a caught-in-the-throat type—there’s your I-just-won-the-billion-dollar-lottery scream, and the wet scream—filled with tears and vibrating—among scores of others. I need a bloodcurdling.”