Нора Робертс - Hideaway

She wrote a grisly short story about a woman’s revenge on a faithless lover, and celebrated alone when a mystery magazine published it under the name J. A. Blackstone.

She wrote two more while she slaved at a very average law firm for very average pay without any hope of advancement.

All of her life she lived by the rules she dreamed of breaking. She arrived at work early, left late. She lived frugally, drank moderately, dressed modestly.

Some of that changed when her grandfather died and left her, his only grandchild, three-quarters of a million dollars.

Her parents advised—and fully expected her—to invest it. She fully expected to do so. Then she sold her first book. Not the fiction she used as an escape hatch, but a true crime work she’d spent nearly two years researching on her off time, her vacations.

She took the somewhat meager advance and her inheritance, quit her job, and moved to San Francisco. Never in her life had she done anything so bold. At the age of forty, she rented a modest apartment and, since she never entertained, set up her work space in the living room.

And there, thrilled with her solitary life, started on her next book. She found the courage to press for interviews—victims, inmates, witnesses, investigators.

An hour each day, as a reward, she worked on fiction where she became a female assassin who took lives and lovers as she pleased.

The modest sales of her first book encouraged her. By the time she’d finished her second, she felt more than ready to tackle the next.

She had Charlotte Dupont to thank for her inspiration.

She caught an interview over her usual Wednesday-night dinner of sweet-and-sour shrimp, began to take notes. Her initial thought to have the Hollywood actress, the mother, as the central figure flipped when she began more serious research into the kidnapping.

Grant Sparks leaped out at her. So handsome, so magnetic.

And what he had done for love! The price he’d paid for it.

Many, she knew as she dug in, saw Dupont as the dupe, but she followed a different angle. The rich, the famous, the beautiful woman had used Sparks, and continued to do so. Trying to profit off the bungled kidnapping while he remained in prison.

By the time she requested an interview, she was primed for Grant Sparks’s smooth manipulations.

By the third visit she’d agreed to become his attorney of record. By the fourth she was deeply—and just as madly—in love with him.

He opened the doors for her, showed her the power and thrill of breaking the rules. She smuggled things in and out for him, passed messages to and from without a qualm.

She believed in his cause—as much as he allowed her to know of it. Crime—and hadn’t she always believed it—sometimes had justification. And punishment too often fell on the wrong people.

She would help him correct that.

When she waited for them to bring him to her on a warm summer day a year and a half after their first meeting, the average, ordinary Jessica Rowe had long since crossed the point of no return.

He’d mentioned blue as his favorite color. She wore a blue dress. He’d been a personal trainer, and even now generously, selflessly offered his skills and advice to other inmates.

She couldn’t quite make herself go to a gym, but bought exercise DVDs and worked out fiercely at home. She’d had her hair cut, colored, styled, had studied YouTube to learn how to apply makeup.

He’d transformed her. Though she knew she’d never rival someone like Charlotte Dupont, she’d found a new confidence in her looks, felt she wouldn’t shame him when they built their life together.

Her heart pounded when she heard the locks give, the door open. She could barely breathe when he walked into the room, for that moment when their eyes met and she saw the love and approval in his.

Still, she nodded briskly at the guard, folded her hands over the file she had open. And waited until they were alone.

“I live for this,” he told her. “For just this moment when I see you again.”

Her already thundering heart swelled. “I’d come every day if I could. I know you’re right when you said we need to stick to once a week. Maybe twice when it makes sense. But I miss you so much, Grant. Tell me first, if you’ve had any trouble, anything.”

“No.” His eyes cut away from hers as if he had to compose himself. “I’m careful. As careful as you can be in here. But I’m afraid she might try again. She’ll wait for me to relax a little, for it to blow over, then she’ll pay someone else to kill me. The next may have better luck.”

“Don’t say that, Grant. Don’t.” As her eyes filled with fear tears, she reached out, gripped his hands. “I’m still fighting for your release. I won’t stop. I know you said no before, but I could hire a more experienced criminal attorney. I could—”

“I don’t trust anyone but you.” He looked into her eyes, deep, deep. “You’re the only person in the world I trust. She could get to someone else, my darling. It’s what she does. I know it’s only months now until I’m up for parole. Now that I have you, I could do that time without a single regret or worry. To know you’ll be waiting for me when I get out … But now it’s if I get out. If I get out alive.”

“Let me go talk to her. I always intended to for the book, but—”

“If she did anything to hurt you, do you think I could live with it?” He released her hands, used them to cover his face before dropping them.

“You can’t worry about me, Grant. I know I didn’t do a good job with that lying, conspiring sheriff, but—”

“That wasn’t your fault,” he said quickly. “I gave you the names of the men to hire. You stood up for me, Jessie, when no one ever has. But it did make me think…”

When he trailed off, she leaned close. “Tell me.”

“It’s a crazy idea. It’s too risky. For you.”

“I’ll do anything. You know that. Tell me.”

The excitement in her voice, the eagerness on her face told him he already had it in the bag.

“I had a lot of time to think after I was attacked. About what the cops said to me when they came here.”

“Accusing you of everything.” It lit a killing flame in her. “Always you.”

“But there was some doubt there. I saw it. Especially with the girl cop. Women are more perceptive, I think. If there was a way to throw more suspicion on Charlotte, they might stop her before she … before she had a chance to go after me again. I could do the next eight months knowing I’d walk out and into your arms. I could do anything knowing that.”

“But if I tried to hire someone to kill her—”

“No, darling, not her. And not hiring anyone. But no.” He shook his head, looked away again. “I can’t ask you to do something like this. I’ll just have to watch my back until the doors finally open.”

“I won’t have you live like that. I won’t live like that, afraid every day they’ll call and tell me you’ve been hurt. Tell me what you want me to do.”

“How did I live all these years without you?” Emotion—he could always call it up on cue—trembled in his voice. “You’re my guardian angel. I’ll spend the rest of my life trying to be worthy of you.”

He took her hands again. Looked at her as if she was his only salvation.

She’d have done anything for him.

“Charlotte’s having a gala in Beverly Hills next month.”

It thrilled. For a woman who’d experienced little excitement, even the act of donning a wig—ash blond, a smooth updo—equaled the thrill of a lifetime. She wore the body padding as well, padding that added several of the pounds she’d so diligently taken off.

The understated (boring) black gown fit over the padding well. A few fake jewels—but nothing eye-catching. She shouldn’t catch anyone’s eye. She applied her makeup meticulously, following Sparks’s instructions. Slipped on the black-framed glasses, then the mouth appliance that gave her a prominent overbite.