by Eve Gaddy
“I suppose ‘I love you too’ is out of the question?”
She smiled. “How about I’m crazy about you, Dylan?”
“That’ll work,” he said.
Sam kissed him, pushed him onto his back and asked, “Where are those condoms?”
Dylan grinned. “You really are my kind of woman.”
Later, when both of them discovered they were starving, they went to the kitchen and raided the refrigerator. Dylan got out the stew Glory had made, ladled it into a couple of bowls and microwaved them. Glory had also left a loaf of French bread wrapped in foil with instructions to warm it up to go with the stew. He grinned, reading the note.
“What’s so funny?” Sam asked.
“Glory thinks I’m totally helpless in the kitchen.” He gave Sam the note and turned on the oven.
“Don’t forget to preheat the oven for the bread. On bake, not broil! And don’t unwrap it, either,” Sam read aloud. “Not broil is all in caps. What did you do?”
“I was in a hurry one time—one lousy time—so I decided to heat up the loaf without the foil in the broiler.”
“Oops.”
“Oops is right. It didn’t work too well. Especially when I forgot and left it in there. I didn’t realize the broiler would go up in flames.”
Sam laughed. “What a mess.”
“Yeah. I guess that’s why she feels the need to leave me the same damn note every time.”
“Poor thing,” she said, and patted his cheek. “Be grateful she cooks for you.”
“I am. Believe me, I am.” He poured them both a glass of wine and took them to the table. Then once the bread was hot, he brought the rest.
Sam wore one of his T-shirts and, he was almost sure, nothing else. He was so distracted by trying to figure out the answer to that question, he almost forgot to eat.
“He really is appropriately named,” Sam said, gesturing at Shadow who’d followed them to the kitchen.
“Pain in the ass would also be appropriate,” Dylan said, reminded of when he’d stood outside the bedroom door and barked until he let him in.
“Don’t you listen to him, Shadow. Can I help it if he loves me?” she asked, looking at Dylan.
“No. It’s impossible not to.”
“Flatterer.”
“Nope. God’s honest truth.”
After they finished they went back to his room and he found the answer to what she wore underneath the T-shirt. Absolutely nothing.
“Damn it, who keeps calling me?” Dylan said much later, when his cell phone buzzed yet again.
“Maybe you should answer it. If they’ve called this many times it could be important.”
“Everyone who might be making an emergency call to me is on my list of favorites. Which means it would ring through instead of buzz.”
“Still. You should see who it is.”
“Shit. I’ve finally got you exactly where I want you. Naked, in my bed. Talking to anyone but you is the last thing on my list of what I want to do.”
Sam laughed and propped herself up. She kissed him lightly and said, “I’m not going anywhere. Answer your phone.”
He got up and walked over to the dresser where he’d left the phone. “Just like I thought,” he said, looking at the list of callers. “I don’t recognize the number. And they didn’t leave a message. None of the five times they called.”
His phone buzzed again while he was holding it so he answered. “This better be good. You’ve got ten seconds to tell me who this is and what the hell you want.” The moment he said that it dawned on him that it could be Glenna calling him. Before he could ask the caller spoke.
“Dylan, thank God you picked up. It’s Gretchen. Gretchen Hoffman.”
Gretchen? He’d run into her a couple of months ago in town. She’d had a black eye, which she’d tried to hide with makeup but it hadn’t worked. During the short time they’d talked, Gretchen had been looking over her shoulder for fear her husband would see her and, Dylan didn’t doubt, lay into her again. Her husband was a class A controlling, wife-beating asshole. He’d forbidden Gretchen to talk to Dylan, never mind that they’d known each other since they were six and had gone to school together from then until they graduated high school. Dylan was sure he wasn’t the only person her husband had forbidden her to see.
“What’s wrong?”
“It’s Frank. He—he—I’ve got to get out of here. Before he comes back.”
He could tell she was fighting tears. “What did the bastard do to you?” This time, he thought, but didn’t add.
“My face is...pretty bad. I think he broke some ribs too. And—oh, God, Dylan. I can’t talk about it. He took my keys. He’s down at the Wolf Den. He could be back any time and I’m afraid of what he’ll do if I’m still here. He—he was drunk when he left. He’ll be worse.”
“Did you call the police?”
“No! I can’t. The last time I called them he nearly killed me.”
Maybe he could convince her to go to the police later. But for now he just needed to get her away, somewhere the fucker couldn’t find her. “I’ll come get you.”
“Thank you. Dylan, I’m so sorry to drag you into this. I didn’t know who else to call.”
Because her shithead husband had alienated her from most if not all of her friends and family. “You’re at home, right? Can you get out of there? Go to a neighbor’s until I can get there?”
“No. They’re all afraid of him.”
She didn’t elaborate but she didn’t need to. He could imagine what the bastard had done to make sure no one helped her. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
He hung up and rubbed his hands over his face. “Shit. Goddamn it.” He looked at Sam who was sitting up with the sheet drawn up over her breasts. “I have to go help out a friend.” But what the hell could he do with her once he picked her up? Take her to a woman’s shelter? Where the hell was a shelter? What if she wouldn’t go? He picked up his jeans and boxers and stepped into them, then looked around for a shirt. Where in the hell was the shirt he’d been wearing?
“I gathered that. Can I do anything to help?”
He started to lay it all out for her and then he remembered. The last thing Sam wanted or needed was to get involved in a case of domestic violence. The very thing she’d left Dallas to avoid.
“Thanks, but I can handle it. I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.” He gave up looking for his shirt and went to his closet to get a fresh one. “I’m really sorry but—” He stopped short as he came out of the closet to see Sam putting on her clothes. “You don’t have to leave.”
“I’m coming with you.”
“No. Sam, you don’t have to do that.”
She gave him a rueful smile. “Yes. I do.”
Chapter Fourteen
Sam brought Shadow downstairs and put him in the mudroom with food, water and blankets for his bed. He was clearly unhappy to be left behind, but he accepted it. Then she wrote a quick note for Glory in case they weren’t back by the time she came to work.
Dylan tried his best to talk her out of going with him. But it was obvious he didn’t really know what he was doing. “Have you done this before?” Sam asked him.
“What, helped out a friend? Of course.”
“That’s not what I meant and you know it. What are you going to do once you pick her up?”
“Take her someplace safe. A women’s shelter.”
“Do you know how to get in touch with one?”
“No, but I’ll figure it out.”
“She wouldn’t call the cops. How do you know she’ll go to a shelter?”
“I don’t, goddamn it. I’ll bring her here if she won’t.”
“For how long? She can’t stay here indefinitely. What if her husband figures out where she is?”
“He won’t. There’s no reason he would.”
“Oh, Dylan, you know that’s not true. This is Marietta. Someone will figure it out and eventually he’ll hear about it.”
He glared at her. “Shit, Sam, what do you want me to do?”
“I want you to quit arguing and let me come with you. I can help her, Dylan.”
“That’s not the point. The point is what will it do to you? Do you think I’ve forgotten why you moved to Marietta in the first place?”
It’s time you get over it. Think of all the women and children you helped and not the few cases that had a bad outcome.
Yes, but murder is a bit worse than a bad outcome.
Stop. Stop thinking that way.
She put her hand on his arm. “I need to do this. It’s time I dealt with it instead of running away.”
“Sam, no one, especially not me, would blame you for not wanting to get involved in this kind of situation again. Don’t put yourself through it.”
“It’s not up for argument. I’m going.” She put her coat on.
Admitting defeat, Dylan shrugged, put his coat on and went out the back door with Sam following.
Sam used the time in the car to call the hospital for a phone number for the women’s shelter in Billings. She was able to talk to someone from the shelter and arrange to bring Dylan’s friend to them.
“The shelter has room for her,” Sam told Dylan after hanging up.
Dylan snorted. “Now we just have to convince her that’s her best option.”
“Do you know how long this has been going on? Is this the first you’ve heard of it?”
“I’m not sure but I wouldn’t be surprised if the son of a bitch has been hitting her since they married. That was four or five years ago. He managed to cut her off from her friends and family by the time they’d been married a year. I saw her in town a few months ago, but it was by chance. She looked like shit, too. Besides the black eye she looked totally beat down.”
“Did you and Gretchen date?” Of course they did, dummy.
He shot her a speculative glance. “For about two weeks, in high school. We’ve known each other since we were six. We were always more friends than anything else.”
What did it say about her that she found his response comforting?
Idiot. It says you’ve fallen for him.
Ten minutes later they pulled up to a small, wood-frame house on the outskirts of Marietta.
Gretchen Hoffman was probably a pretty woman when her eye wasn’t swollen nearly shut and her mouth double its usual size with a split lip. She was small and slim with brown hair and brown eyes and she wasn’t happy to see Dylan show up with a woman she didn’t know. She hugged Dylan, then noticing Sam, asked, “Who is this? Why is she here?”
Dylan introduced them and Gretchen pulled him aside. Sam heard snatches of conversation, enough to know the woman was suspicious of her. But apparently Dylan got through to her.
“Dylan says you’re a doctor.”
“Yes, I’m a trauma surgeon. Would you let me examine you and see if you need to go to the hospital?”
“I don’t. I just need to get away before he comes back. He’ll calm down in a day or two.”
“He’ll calm down?” Dylan asked incredulously. “You’re going back to him? Are you kidding me?”
“I don’t have a choice. I have no money, no job, and no skills. And I’m pregnant. How am I supposed to support a baby without money?” As soon as she said the last word, she doubled over and cried out.
Sam helped her to a chair. “How long have you been having these pains?”
“Not...long.”
“Gretchen, tell her the truth,” Dylan said.
“A few hours. Since he...beat me.”
She wasn’t telling them everything. Sam said to Dylan, “Can you go get some blankets? We need to get her to the hospital, now. She could be having a miscarriage.”
Once Dylan left the room Sam said, “Gretchen, did he rape you?”
Tears ran down her cheeks as she nodded. “And then he beat me. Don’t tell Dylan... It will just upset him more.”
“I won’t. But don’t worry about Dylan. You need to think about yourself.”
“You were great tonight with Gretchen,” Dylan said, hours later back at the ranch. “Thank you.”
Sam gave Shadow a last pat before leaving him to his bed. He’d been overjoyed to see them, as if they’d been gone days instead of hours.
“I’m glad I was able to help.” She hesitated at saying anything else because he looked so hopeful. But she knew she should warn him that the outcome might not be what either of them wanted. “Dylan, you know this isn’t the end of it, don’t you? Gretchen was very reluctant to get the police involved. Plus, I’m not at all sure she’ll go to the shelter once she’s out of the hospital. All we can do is encourage her and give her the opportunity. In the long run, no one but Gretchen has control over what she decides. She could still go back to him.”
He unbuttoned his shirt and threw it in the general direction of an overstuffed chair that sat in the corner of the room. “Why in the hell would she do that? The bastard beat the shit out of her and made her lose her baby.” He sat on the bed and yanked off his boots.
“It’s hard to understand. There are so many factors involved. Incomprehensible as it seems, she could still go back to him. I doubt they’ll keep him in jail long.” After taking her statement at the hospital, the police had picked up Frank Hoffman on domestic violence and assault charges. “If he comes to see her before she goes to the shelter and promises he’ll never do it again—” She spread her hands. “She might forgive him. Then it would be up to the police as to whether they’ll prosecute.”
Dylan went to his dresser, opened a drawer and pulled out a clean T-shirt, which he handed to her. “Not that I mind you being naked, but I thought you might want something to sleep in.”
“Thanks.” Sam started undressing.
He sat on the bed and watched her. “Does that happen a lot? Once she gets away a woman goes back to the man who abused her?”
Sam pulled the T-shirt over her head. “It happens. More often than you’d think.”
“How do you deal with it? I mean, you do all you can to help and then they go back and it’s for nothing.”
“The way I usually dealt with it was to give them my card with the shelter’s number on it and tell them to call if they needed us. And then I helped someone else I hoped would get away and stay away.” And not get murdered. Don’t forget that one.
“You’re thinking about Dallas.” It wasn’t a question. “Come here.” Dylan pulled her between his legs and looked at her ruefully. “I’m sorry. I knew you shouldn’t have come. It was too big of a reminder.”
She put her arms around him and pressed his head against her chest. “I’m glad I did. I needed to do it. I hope Gretchen sticks to her resolve, but even if she doesn’t it felt good to be helping someone again.”
He pulled back to look at her. “You’re a doctor, for God’s sake. You help people all the time.”
“Yes, but not in the same way. The best thing is, I proved to myself that I can still do it. I might even be able to volunteer at a shelter again.”
“Are you sure you want to?”
“I don’t know. But at least it’s a possibility now and it wasn’t before. Let’s go to bed. I’m exhausted and even though I don’t go in until noon, I do have to work tomorrow.”
He looked at the clock on the dresser. “It’s going to be a short night.”
Sam slept the remainder of the night in Dylan’s arms. And thank God, she didn’t dream.
Chapter Fifteen
Sam left around ten to take Shadow home and get ready for work. Dylan had been up for hours, taking care of his horses and doing whatever chores she imagined he had every morning.
“How can you look so wide awake?” she asked him before she left. “You couldn’t have had more than three hours of sleep.”
“Good genes,” he said.
He kissed her, slow and leisurely, as if they had all day. It made her wish they did. “Will I see you tonight?” he asked her.
�
�No,” she said regretfully. “I won’t get off until ten. Later if I’m in the middle of an operation.”
“Tomorrow night, then?”
“I can do that.”
“Good, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Sam drove home in a bit of a daze. Partly because of lack of sleep, but also because she was remembering the night before. Specifically, when Dylan had told her he loved her.
She believed him. Or rather, she believed that he thought he was in love with her. Whether he really was or not...that would take time to know for certain. She glanced at Shadow, sitting up in the passenger seat next to her and looking out the window, his tongue hanging out and panting happily. “What should I do, Shadow?”
Head tilted, Shadow looked at her and barked.
“Yes, I know you adore him. But since he’s the one who found you and saved you, that’s not a surprise.”
Whatever she’d thought Dylan was going to say, I’m in love with you had been the last thing on her radar. And then he’d said it and he’d looked so sincere. She’d admitted she was crazy about him. But love? Love was complicated. Falling in love hurt. Whereas, if she wasn’t in love with Dylan... Oh, shit. What did it matter what you called it? If they broke up it would still hurt just as badly.
Since she was leaving again in a little over an hour, she parked in her driveway. There was a note on her front door, held on by something that stuck out. As she drew closer she realized with a burst of nausea that a knife held the note pinned to her door.
Shadow growled as he nosed around, then whimpered while he tried to pull her away. “It’s okay, Shadow.” But it wasn’t. It was sick.
Sam barely stopped herself from yanking on the knife and pulling it and the note off her door. Not that it would have fingerprints, but there was no sense making the cops’ job harder for them. She stepped closer to read the letters cut out from magazines and newspapers.
You might have left Big D but you can’t run from what you’ve done.
With shaking hands, she called the police. She asked for Officer Rogers and surprisingly got her. Sam told her what had happened, including that she hadn’t been home since yesterday afternoon, which didn’t narrow the time down by a whole lot. The officer promised to come right out.
