Quietly he said, “We had a big day today.”
“Uh-huh.” Her agreement was drowsy.
“It, uh, kind of distracted me from thinking about what you told me last night.” He’d been expecting her reaction and he quelled her immediate, brief struggle to pull away. “But I’d really like to hear what happened.”
She had stopped trying to get away from him, but her voice was as tense as her body. “There’s not much to tell. I gave you the big picture last night.”
“No.” He did his best to keep his voice level, quiet and soothing. “You gave me the bare bones last night. Tonight I want the details, the feelings.” He paused, searching for the right words. “I know you love children. And I know you wouldn’t have made such a drastic decision without carefully weighing all the options. It must have been very painful for you.”
She was silent. Her body felt as taut as a guy wire, almost radiating nervous energy. Just when he was nearly convinced she wasn’t going to talk to him, she sighed, a long, quivering ragged exhalation that hitched several times as she fought for control.
“I have a daughter,” she said. “She’ll be six years old in February. And she was adopted six years ago in April by a couple who could offer her far more than I could have at that time.”
He stroked her arm with a touch designed to comfort. “Your husband died before she was born?”
She nodded. “I was five months pregnant when he died. But we’d been separated for half that—since he found out about the baby.” She shrugged. “We met shortly after my high school graduation and got married a month later. Looking back, it’s easy to see how desperate I was for someone of my own, someone to belong to. My parents were both dead. I was very conscious of being alone.”
He couldn’t imagine how she must have felt. “It must have been a frightening feeling.”
“I thought getting married would change my loneliness, that finally I’d have someone to share my life with. Perhaps, with the right person, I’d have found that. But at the ripe old age of eighteen, it was too easy to confuse sex with love.” She sighed. “Jimmy needed a mother, not a wife. But I didn’t realize that until after the wedding. After a year, I knew it was a mistake. And when he found out I was pregnant, he couldn’t make tracks in the other direction fast enough.”
“And then he died.”
Her eyes were open, trained on the ceiling, and he sensed that although she still lay in the circle of his arms, she was miles away. “Yes.” She paused. “He crashed his pickup after a drinking spree one night.”
He swallowed convulsively and clutched her to him, remembering that she’d lost her father to a violent death only a few years before she’d lost her husband.
She let him hold her, but after a moment she raised her head and one hand lifted and fell in a gesture of futility. “I was a high school graduate with no skills to speak of. But I wanted my baby. It took me a long time to acknowledge that keeping her would be nothing but an act of selfishness on my part, that I could barely afford to feed myself, much less provide for a child.”
She turned and sought his gaze. “Children are the most precious gift in the world. They deserve the best that we can give them. Even before she was born, I knew I couldn’t give my child what she needed to grow up healthy and secure. So when she was a little less than two months old, a couple from Tucson adopted her.”
Tears were running down her cheeks and her voice was ragged. “I’ll never forget tying her little bonnet for the last time, nursing her and holding that sweet little bundle in my arms before I handed her to her new mother. She had just started smiling and she smiled at me.”
Angel’s pain was more than he could take. But she wasn’t finished and she waved him away when he tried to embrace her again.
“I named her Emily, after my mother, but I called her Emmie.” She stopped and closed her eyes, then opened them and went on. “The O’Briens, her adoptive parents, promised never to change her name. They love her dearly. Once a year I receive a progress report and pictures from them.” She sniffed and attempted a smile. “Then I cry for a week. It’s a little bit of comfort to know that Emmie is a happy, well-adjusted child, that I made the right decision.”
“Will she—Emmie—ever be able to get in touch with you when she’s grown?” His mind was working feverishly. Surely there had to be a way to relieve some of her anguish.
“It will be up to Emmie to decide if she wants to contact me. I wrote her a letter that she’ll receive on her twenty-first birthday. Every year I send Mrs. O’Brien a new one to add to it. She’ll read them all one day and maybe she’ll see how much I loved her.” She stopped, and he was thankful for her catharsis, for the chance to better understand her, to feel what she was feeling.
Then she went on, her tone heavy with bitter irony. “To forget, I took acting classes and worked my fingers to the bone waitressing. The only way I could sleep was if I was totally exhausted, and when I woke up, I had to get out of my apartment and be busy, or I’d have gone crazy. I didn’t give myself time to think, to feel. Two years later, I got my big break.” She sent him a tremulous smile. “And now I have to live with the knowledge that giving up Emmie enabled me to become the sort of success that most people only dream of. I have enough money now to raise a dozen children.” Softly she added, “And I’d give it all away tomorrow, along with the fame and recognition, if it meant I could somehow go back in time, relive the years I’ve lost with my child.”
She made it sound so black and white, as if there weren’t shades of gray that she hadn’t considered. He couldn’t resist asking, “Have you ever thought about trying to get Emmie back? Or at least get visitation rights?”
She smiled sadly. “Every day. I’ve already missed so much. But it wouldn’t be fair to her or to her adoptive parents. All rights I had ended the day she was adopted, and if I tried to become part of her life now I could do more damage than good. A child’s world needs to be stable and secure.”
He could see the wisdom of her words, and he could only marvel at her strength. He doubted he could be so unselfish if they were talking about Beth Ann. At the same time, he became aware of how upsetting this discussion must be for her.
Abruptly he knew he’d heard enough. Anything more she wanted him to know, she could tell him in her own good time. He wasn’t going to pressure her a minute more.
Quietly he drew her fully into his arms. “You’re going to be exhausted tomorrow. Let’s get some sleep.”
She twisted like an energetic calf in his arms, so fast that before he knew it she was lying sprawled atop him. “I’m not as tired as you think.” She nudged his legs wider by nestling one leg between them, rubbing lightly against him with her angled knee. Under her teasing ministrations, his soft relaxation disappeared, replaced by a steady pulsing that brought full, leaping life with every heartbeat.
In an instant, he was wildly aroused. As she dropped her head and sought his mouth, he rolled her beneath him, kissing her with hot, frantic intent, settling himself between her legs and pulling handfuls of her lacy nightie out of his way. “Is that an offer?”
She laughed, a husky, inviting sound that raced along his nerve endings as she twined her arms around his neck and urged him closer. “Are you looking for one, cowboy?”
Ten
Angel felt closer to Day than she’d ever felt before. Sharing her past with him had brought them together as nothing else could have. He had acted as if he cared. Did he? Could he? Did she dare allow herself to imagine that he might love her, that he might ask her to stay with him forever?
Three days passed, days in which she pretended that nothing was wrong with the picture-perfect moments of life on the ranch, that she wasn’t being threatened by some unknown evil, that her time to be Day’s wife and Beth Ann’s mother wasn’t limited.
About ten minutes after Day left the house one morning, the telephone rang. Startled, wondering who would be calling at such an early hour, Angel sprinted to pick up t
he receiver before the ringing woke Beth Ann. “Red Arrow Ranch,” she greeted the caller.
No one spoke.
“Hello? May I help you?” The only reason she could imagine someone calling so early was if there was a problem, an emergency at a neighboring spread. Or maybe it was Dulcie....
“Angelique.” It was a masculine voice, deep and distinct.
Instant recognition streaked through her. Her idyll had ended. “Who is this?” she demanded, making her voice as firm as she could.
“You know.” The man’s voice was definitely familiar.
Her stomach muscles quivered—she’d heard that voice before, though not so clearly. Again she forced herself to speak in a calm, polite tone. If she could keep him on the line long enough, maybe the sheriff would be able to have the call traced. “I’m sorry, I don’t recognize your voice. Who’s speaking, please?”
“You know me!” The caller’s voice lost a little of its smooth suavity. He sounded irritated, agitated. Then, with chilling ease, his tone became confident again. “Soon we’ll be able to talk face-to-face. I’ve missed you, Angelique.”
She was silent. How was she supposed to respond to this madman?
“Did you hear me?” He sounded angry again.
All of a sudden she’d had enough. Enough of looking over her shoulder all the time, enough of staring at the ceiling in the dark sweating out every unusual noise. Enough! “I don’t know who you are and I don’t really care,” she said, intense rage at this unwarranted invasion coating her tone with steel. “I want you to stop bothering me. No more letters, no more calls, no more flowers. Just go away!”
The hiss of an indrawn breath sounded in her ear. “It’s because of him, isn’t it? Your marriage has come between us—”
“There is no ‘us’! Day has nothing to do with this.” Panic edged into her voice as she realized this madman might be capable of anything, and that he might transfer his obsession to the man she loved.
“I’ll never let you leave me again. Never!” Insanity rang clearly in the caller’s voice in the instant before the receiver on the other end crashed down, making her yank the phone away from her ear with a wince.
In the shocking silence, she began to shiver convulsively; she wrapped her arms defensively around herself. He was close, she knew it. Too close. He sounded completely mad.
But she was sure she’d heard that voice before. But where? If she’d ever known him, it must have been just a casual encounter...perhaps a fan? To keep from screaming, she forced herself to concentrate on recalling the exact details of the conversation, not so much for its meaning, but as a way to identify him.
His speech was almost totally devoid of any accent that she could detect, which was odd in itself. In fact, he sounded almost as if he’d had lessons in elocution, much as she had in an effort to wipe out her Southwestern twang. Could he be an actor?
For the rest of the morning she went through all her leading men, all the behind-the-scenes assistants she could recall who had worked on the movies she’d made, but by the time lunch was on the table she was no closer to identifying the man. She simply couldn’t picture any of the actors she knew doing something this sick. Besides, there had to be literally hundreds she didn’t remember. Finally she decided it was hopeless. Odds were it was someone she’d never even met, someone who’d singled her out for reasons that only made sense to a sick mind.
After lunch, Beth Ann begged to go to the paddock and feed carrots to the horses that hadn’t been ridden out. They were standing in the warm sun at the rails with one of the mares nuzzling Beth Ann’s palm for more carrots when Angel heard hoofbeats. As she squinted in the bright light, her heart picked up its pace as she recognized Day riding toward them.
He was waving a large envelope at her. After reining in his mount, he vaulted out of the saddle and strode toward the paddock with the peculiar rolling gait only a man who spent most of his days on horseback could develop. She smiled at the sight, loving the way his lean hips shifted beneath the black leather chaps he wore. Then her attention was caught by his expression.
He was smiling, but not the cautious, guarded smile he’d turned on her so many times, and not the gentle, indulgent smile he bestowed upon his daughter. This smile verged on laughter—wide, full and exuberant. It made him so handsome he literally took her breath away, and she stopped stock-still as the force of his charisma hit her full force.
He swung the envelope in the air as he approached.
“What’s got you so happy?” she inquired, feeling her own mood lighten.
He cupped her elbow and led her a little ways away from where Beth Ann was perched on the fence rails. “Good news,” he said, his lips nearly brushing her ear.
A thrill of pure sexual anticipation raised goose bumps all over her arms and she chided herself for having such a one-track mind. “What good news?”
He flicked the edge of the envelope he’d been waving. “Custody papers. Signed, sealed and delivered.” He laughed aloud, catching her to him and dancing her in a circle. “Nobody can ever take my little girl away from me now.”
She was pleased for him, she really was. But a part of her registered with dismay his use of the singular words “my” and “me.” Day wasn’t thinking in terms of a partnership with her, that was clear. In his mind he was still a single father.
She knew her dreams were just that—dreams. Fantasies. But admitting that he didn’t need her or want her for anything more than her body hurt deep in her heart. Shunting the hurt away, she plastered on a bright smile of her own. “That’s great!” Stretching up, she aimed a kiss in the general direction of his cheek.
At the last moment, he turned his head and caught her mouth squarely with his own. “This calls for a celebration, and I have some ideas on exactly how we should go about it,” he murmured.
“I like a man with ideas.” She forced another smile. “This celebration could double as a farewell party.”
His brow furrowed. “A farewell... Who’s leaving?”
Taking a deep breath, she summoned her most reasonable tone. “I am. You only married me because you needed a wife for your custody battle. Now that you no longer have that to worry about, you don’t need me anymore.”
“But you can’t leave.” He sounded stunned, then almost angry. “I still need you.”
She tried to smile, but her lips trembled at the edges and she pressed them together. “No, you don’t.” She touched the papers he still clutched in his hand. “You have what you need right here.”
“What about Beth Ann?” He switched gears, hitting her in a spot only slightly less vulnerable than her love for him. “She’s going to be shattered if you leave. She loves you.”
“And I love her.” I love you, too. If you tell me you love me, even that you need my love, I’ll stay. “But we agreed to this marriage for reasons that would help each of us. We knew from the start it wasn’t permanent.”
His eyes had narrowed into slits of silver determination beneath the brim of his hat, and she saw a gleam in his eye that she didn’t trust. “That’s right,” he said slowly. “Each of us was getting something out of this marriage. What about this guy who’s after you? Where will you go if you leave? You won’t be safe until he’s caught.”
He’d caught her unprepared, mirrored her own fears so exactly that she couldn’t hide her expression.
Immediately his tone grew serious and commanding. He clasped her upper arms and rubbed his thumbs gently up and down her soft flesh. “What’s wrong? Something else has happened, hasn’t it? Did you get more flowers today?”
She shook her head, fixing her gaze on the studs fastening his shirt. “No.” That wasn’t a lie.
“Angel.” He shook her lightly, then drew her in close to his strength. “Don’t shut me out. What’s wrong?”
The gentleness slipped under her resolve as nothing else could. She turned her head so that Beth Ann wouldn’t see her face as tears of helplessness ran down her cheeks. �
�He called this morning.”
“Called here?” His voice was incredulous.
She nodded as she drew back.
“What did he say?”
“H-he told me he’d see me soon—face-to-face. I got the impression that he’s somewhere near here.” She stopped, afraid to articulate her worst fears. “I have to leave.”
“No!”
“Yes.” She saw that he wasn’t going to listen, and wearily she realized that she’d have to tell him everything. “He didn’t just threaten me, Day. I told him to leave me alone and he got angry. It was as if he just snapped for a minute. He said that my marriage had come between us—” Her teeth began to chatter and she couldn’t control the shivering again. “What if he tries to hurt you? Do you know how I’d feel if anything happened to you because of me?”
“How would you feel?” He gripped her shoulders, and his eyes were intense, searching.
“I would...” She couldn’t go on, too unsure to say the words. Was he asking for her love? If only she knew. “I would never forgive myself,” she finished. “You have to let me leave.”
“You can’t leave,” he said again. “I need you. Beth Ann needs you.” He pulled her into the comforting warmth of his arm and turned her toward the paddock. “You’re staying. I’ll call the sheriff right now, see if he’s found out anything new, tell him what happened. Then I’ll rearrange my schedule so I can work close to the house for a few days, keep a couple of the men here, too. If he’s in the area, he’ll surface soon and when he does, we’ll be waiting for him.”
She hesitated.
“Promise me you’ll stay.”
She watched Beth Ann skipping ahead of them, felt the strong, safe warmth of his arm protectively cast around her, and she knew she wasn’t strong enough to deny herself a few more days with him. “I promise.”
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