Jo Leigh - Confessions Bundle

She couldn’t tell the child much, couldn’t involve her, but clearly some kind of explanation was necessary to calm her. “It’s true that Aunt Marcie might want to go back to Maple Grove, but she knew that because I feel so strongly about the place, I wouldn’t be able to understand what she was feeling. There’s also another truth—that she hates Maple Grove as much as I do. Both things are true. But she just told me the one she knew I’d understand. The one about hating Maple Grove and understanding how and why I feel like I do about the place. She meant it when she told me she didn’t want to talk to Hank, she just didn’t tell me when she changed her mind because she knew I wouldn’t understand.”

Mary Jane let go of her spoon, scratched her nose, and then, reaching for her spoon again, accidentally knocked it aside, sending milk flying. Seeming not to even notice, she peered at Juliet, a sweet frown marking her forehead. “Kind of like when another girl has on a new dress and asks you what you think and you know she really likes it and you understand that, so you find something to say that’s the truth, like the lace is pretty cool, when it’s also true that you hate the dress?”

“Yes.” Juliet smiled, the tension in her stomach easing for the moment. “I think it is kind of like that.”

“So Aunt Marcie is still one of us?”

Juliet picked up the spoon and put it back in the bowl. “She’ll always be one of us, no matter what,” she told her daughter. “Just like you will be. Whether you lie or cheat or steal or grow up to be president, you’ll always be my little girl, just like Marcie is always my sister.”

“I know that,” Mary Jane said, up on her knees. With her hands on each side of her mother’s face, she put her nose within a couple of inches of Juliet’s and stared. “I mean that we can believe her again.”

“Absolutely,” Juliet said, peace settling over her as she hugged her daughter tight.

FREEDOM WAS A GREAT DOG. Great at gulping down huge bowls of chow, great at chewing off the edges of cupboards, great at waking Blake up just about anytime he managed to finally fall into a fitful sleep. And great at being man’s best friend. The puppy was already leash-trained—trained to know that he didn’t want one. For that privilege, he’d quickly learned never to leave Blake’s side when they ran on the beach.

To test his skills, and only to test his skills, Blake loaded the dog—and the leash, just in case—in his car on Saturday for a drive over to Mission Beach. He had no idea where Juliet lived and purposely did not try to find her address. Nor did he intend to watch for signs of her silver BMW. It was a long stretch of beach—a lot of it with private access, so not very crowded—and perfect for running with a new pup.

In his black running shorts, white muscle shirt and favorite running shoes, he wasn’t ready to acknowledge that there was any comfort at all in just being close to the woman who’d become some kind of savior to him—and not just because she might be able to keep him out of jail.

She’d shown him a part of life he’d subconsciously been searching for and had given up on ever finding. The existence of something beneath the surface, beneath the endless fight for success. Juliet had shown him that he could find peace no matter how horrible the daily circumstances, just by being with the right person.

He stopped the car in a public lay-by, got out, walked around the vehicle and opened the front passenger door. “Let’s go, Freed, and watch your manners.”

The pup squealed, jumped down and wet the toe of Blake’s sneaker. Patting the bouncing black head, Blake reached inside the black Mercedes SUV for a moistened towelette, wiped his shoe and tossed the towelette on the floor behind the seat.

“Come on, boy,” he said, slapping his leg as he started down the side of a small cliff to the beach below. Freedom pushed through the weeds, prancing joyfully beside Blake.

There weren’t any cottages on this section of beach and Blake ran easily, his mind wandering, as it always seemed to these days, to his beautiful barracuda defense attorney.

Now that he’d found her, he just had a few hurdles to cross so that he could do something about not losing her again.

A case to win. A jail sentence to elude. And a woman to convince.

The first people they saw weren’t a problem for Freedom—a teenage couple lying on a blanket tucked into a cove along the beach. They were so engrossed, Blake suspected they didn’t even know he and Freedom had passed.

Freedom must have sensed the same as, after a cursory glance, he ignored them, too.

So far so good.

At least if Blake was sent to prison, Freedom would have a better chance of finding a good home than he’d had when Blake got him. People preferred trained dogs to undisciplined ones.

He wasn’t going to put his house on the market. He could afford to have Pru Duncan come in every day for the next forty years if he needed to.

She’d be somewhere in her nineties then.

So he’d hire someone else.

He’d even considered having Pru look after Freedom for him. But what kind of life would it be for the dog, having no family of his own, living alone with only daily visits from the hired help?

Hell, Blake had chosen to live that way and had ended up with almost intolerable loneliness.

Freedom barked at a bird that flew just in front of his nose. Blake chuckled. He couldn’t ever remember a time of such innocence.

They passed a middle-aged couple walking along the beach hand in hand. After a quick sniff, Freedom continued jogging along, sloshing in the water now and then when he got too far ahead of Blake and had to stop.

He’d sell the Mercedes. The thing would be obsolete twenty years from now. With a pang, he left that thought behind. He’d only had the car a year and wasn’t anywhere near ready to part with it. They were just settling in together.

He and the puppy ran for an hour in the July midday sun along deserted ground banked by rocky coves, and across sandy beaches bordered by distant homes. Freedom was a friendly sort, greeting most humans he passed, but a slap of Blake’s hand against his thigh told the dog not to linger. And when they got hot, they dipped into the ocean just long enough to cool down.

The pup rounded a corner up ahead and Blake laughed out loud when he made the turn to find the little guy with his nose buried deep in the sand.

“Freedom, get over here,” he called. “You nut, you’re going to end up with a crab on the end of that snout.”

The dog barked and trotted on, as though proud of himself.

Yeah, the dog was great.

Freedom barked again, and for a second Blake was almost convinced the animal could read his mind and was barking in agreement. He heard the voices ahead just in time to see the pup tearing ahead of him. His target—a young girl waist deep in sand amidst what looked to be the most intricate sand village Blake had ever seen.

“Freedom!” he called sharply, trying to avoid imminent disaster. The dog skidded to a halt just before galloping on top of a sand roof that somehow had the texture of tile. Whether it was Blake’s call that had stopped the dog, or the little girl whose face was receiving a barrage of sloppy puppy kisses, he wasn’t sure.

“I’m sorry,” Blake said, only slightly out of breath as he stopped beside the little girl. And then his gaze moved to the two adults who’d been sitting in the sand with the child.

“Oh my God.” Juliet McNeil jumped up, her face completely horror-stricken.

“I hardly think being caught in a very attractive pair of shorts and equally nice bikini top is reason for such horror,” he said to her, pleased beyond reason to have run into her. Even if she was taking a little longer than he was to appreciate the chance to have their completely necessary professional distance breached for just a moment or two.