The Outcast tp-3

by Beverly Barton

  "Dammit, Reece, you're the most distrusting man I've ever known." When he pulled her closer, his face only a breath away from hers, she squirmed in his arms. "Let me go."

  "I have reason not to trust people, believe me." He pulled her so tightly against him she could barely breathe.

  She looked up into his eyes, those searing amber eyes so like MacDatho's. He was as much a lone wolf, as much a wild animal as Mac. But with her, Mac was a gentle beast, confident and secure in her love. Reece didn't trust her enough to be tamed. A man as hard and tortured as Reece would have to trust a woman completely, would have to love her with his very soul before he would give her the power to tame him.

  "Aunt Margaret has psychic abilities. That's the reason I'm here in Sequana Falls. My mother and stepfather brought me here so that she could be my guide, my teacher."

  "Are you telling me that your whole family is a bunch of gypsy fortune-tellers?"

  "Believe what you will. I'm telling you that Aunt Margaret sensed I wasn't alone, that there was danger lurking about." Elizabeth wasn't sure she could make Reece understand; in the three days he'd been with her, she hadn't been able to convince him of her psychic abilities. There was no point in explaining that she had felt Aunt Margaret's worry and concern, and had plugged in the telephone so her aunt could get in touch with her without the elderly woman delving into Elizabeth's mind and discovering Reece's presence.

  "What's your aunt done to upset you?" Reece asked.

  "She's sending O'Grady up here just as soon as the roads clear a bit."

  "O'Grady?"

  "He's Aunt Margaret's gentleman friend. He works for me. Helps me around the greenhouses. He drives my nursery van and makes deliveries into Dover's Mill and surrounding towns."

  "When will the roads be clear enough for him to get up the mountain?"

  Elizabeth hesitated momentarily, then told Reece the truth. "By morning if he drove the van. The weather's changing pretty quickly. A warm front is headed our way. O'Grady won't try to come in the van. He'll either borrow his grandson's Explorer or he'll get the boy to drive him up here today."

  "If O'Grady can make it up the mountain today, then the sheriff's deputies can make it up here." Reece shoved Elizabeth away from him. She staggered slightly, then regained her balance.

  "Now that the storm is over, they'll start checking Dover's Mill and the area around Hunter's Lake again. They're setting up roadblocks at all the major intersections and will be going to all the towns close to Dover's Mill, doing door-to-door checks. O'Grady will come up the mountain today because Aunt Margaret sent him. The local authorities won't start combing this side of the mountain until late tomorrow. They'll be looking for your frozen body."

  "They think I'm dead?"

  "They know that if you stayed in the mountains your chances for survival were slim. Once they've checked the few places you could have found shelter, they'll be convinced you froze to death."

  "Are all these great revelations coming from shrewd female intuition or from your hocus-pocus abilities?"

  "Would you believe me if I told you the truth?"

  "Which is?" he asked.

  "That I'm clairvoyant, precognitive and have limited telepathic powers."

  Reece's gut tightened into a knot. Damn, but she talked a good game. She had him half-convinced she was a witch. After all, she had left her door unlocked for him, and she seemed to believe in him, in his innocence, with no proof whatsoever. She had nursed him back to health with astonishing speed and without the aid of modern medicine.

  "Well, if you know all and see all, then you're aware that I'm planning on getting the hell off this mountain today. Before your aunt Margaret's boyfriend comes calling or before the deputies get within ten miles of this place."

  "There's no need for you to leave yet." She knew he would be safe with her for another day. If only she could persuade him to stay until she'd had a chance to call Sam. In his business, Sam had contacts all over the world. It shouldn't be any big deal for him to run a check on Reece and get all the details about the murder, the trial and the possibility of other suspects.

  "If you think you can persuade me to stay, then your soothsaying abilities just went haywire. No way am I hanging around here long enough to get caught. I'm not going to prison."

  While they'd been talking, Reece had unconsciously backed himself against the wall. He balled his hands into fists, his whole body tightening into a rigid statue of fear and anger.

  Elizabeth took slow, even steps, moving toward Reece with the unwavering certainty that she had to get through to him, she had to reach his mind, convince him that she wanted to help him, that he could trust her.

  Reece glared at her. She came closer and closer. He wanted to warn her to stay away from him, but he didn't say a word. He simply watched as she stood in front of him, reached out and placed her warm hands on each side of his face. She shut her eyes.

  Reece swallowed. A sensation of tender concern seeped into his mind. What the hell? She held his face, tracing his bones with her fingertips. He didn't know what she was trying to do, but he wanted her to stop.

  When he wrenched his face out of her grasp, turning his head to the side, Elizabeth opened her eyes and smiled.

  "I can't read your mind, Reece. You won't let me."

  "Good for me!"

  "But I can sense things. Just little things."

  "Like what?"

  "I can sense your loneliness. You're completely alone. Or at least, you think you are." Reece's inner turmoil stirred within Elizabeth, the great sense of bitterness almost overwhelming her. "You resent others. Your mother. Your father. Everyone who has touched your life in any meaningful way. You won't let anyone close to you for fear of being hurt."

  "Shut up, dammit!" Reece turned his back on her and walked away, out into the hallway.

  Elizabeth followed him, placing her hand on his back when he braced his open palms on the wall and leaned his forehead against the wooden surface.

  He tensed at her touch, but she did not withdraw her hand. "You've been locked away for five months. All I could sense was a cage. But now I know it was a jail cell. The first time I saw you, I saw the shock and pain on your face. I saw the blood on your hands."

  Reece whirled around, grabbing her by the shoulders, his eyes wild with the realization that Elizabeth knew things she couldn't possibly know.

  "How the hell did you know I had blood on my hands? That was never in the newspapers, never on television or radio. How did you know?" He shook her soundly.

  "Reece, stop it!"

  He stared into her pure blue eyes, and the truth came to him as surely as if he'd been struck by a bolt of lightning and survived the ordeal. "I didn't kill him. I heard the gunshots. I ran into the library and found him. I tried to stop the bleeding, but it was too late. He died. Damn him, he died and his blood was all over my hands."

  "It's all right, Reece. I believe you. I understand."

  "How the hell could you understand? I'd hated him all my life, prayed for his death, but when the moment came, I didn't want him to die. I tried... I tried___"

  Elizabeth felt the tears inside Reece, choking him, constricting his breathing, squeezing his heart. But his eyes remained dry, his face set in tense agony. She reached into his mind, but he shut her out. He wouldn't allow her entrance, refusing to accept her mental comfort.

  Elizabeth slipped her arms around his waist. He was rock solid, his body rigid with control. "You're right, I don't understand. But I could, if you would tell me about him. About B. K. Stanton."

  Reece felt her strong, supportive arms around him. Elizabeth Mallory was as sturdy and solid as the rock-and-log cabin in which she lived, as hardy and vigorous as the mountain she called home. He'd grown up mothered by a weak woman. Reliability and responsibility hadn't been Blanche's strong points. She'd been a fragile, needy woman who hadn't been able to take care of herself, let alone a child.

  In his mind's eye he could see Blanche. Small,
frail, her gray eyes looking to him for help, the only color in her pale face were the bruises left by Harry Gunn's big fists. Even though he'd been a scrawny kid, she'd expected him to help her. And God knew he'd tried. But in the end he hadn't been able to help her. All he'd gotten for his efforts were bruises and broken bones of his own.

  He'd had no one to depend on, no one to defend him, and he'd learned not to care, to never expect anything from anyone. He'd lived his whole life alone, shielding himself from emotions, priding himself on the fact that he needed no one.

  Elizabeth's embrace seemed to surround more than just his body. He felt cocooned in safety. Without thinking about what he was doing, without second-guessing his mo­tives, without giving his doubts and uncertainties time to take control, Reece pulled Elizabeth into his arms, holding her against him, absorbing the power of her generous heart.

  He'd been alone all his life, long before his mother had died. He had taught himself not to need anyone, not to depend on anyone. And here was this woman, this beautiful, unique woman offering him her comfort and her trust. Would he be a fool to accept what she offered, or would he be a fool to refuse?

  Elizabeth tightened her hold around Reece, easing her hands up his back, stroking him, caressing his tight muscles. He lowered his hands from her waist to her hips, cupping her buttocks, dragging her into his arousal, telling her without words what she was doing to him.

  She looked up at him with those trusting blue eyes, eyes that smiled at him, eyes that offered so much.

  "You shouldn't look at a man like that. You're liable to give him ideas."

  She opened her mouth on a sigh, her lips parting. Her face bloomed with color. Her fingers bit into his neck as she lifted her arms around his shoulders. "I want you to know that I care, that I can help you."

  She could not, would not admit that she wanted him as a woman wants a man. The feeling was new to her, far too new for her to accept the desire and allow herself to act upon it. If making love with Reece was meant to be, and in her heart of hearts she believed that it was, then she and Reece would become lovers. But not now. Not yet. He wasn't offering anything except sex; she wanted nothing less than love. When he was prepared to make love to her, she would know. Her heart and her instincts would tell her.

  Reece could not resist the temptation Elizabeth Mallory represented. She was comfort and safety and pleasure. He wanted all three. Lowering his head, he brushed his cheek against hers. She smelled like flowers-sweet, so very, very sweet.

  "You smell good, sweet Lizzie. Like roses." He nuzzled her neck with his nose, breathing in that flower-garden scent.

  "My perfume." She breathed deeply, succumbing to the heady intoxication of his touch. Turning her face upward, she offered him her lips. "I make my own perfume from roses."

  Never having been a romantic man, Reece was stunned at his own thoughts. Her mouth looked like a rose, opening its pink petals just for him. And her eyes, half-closed now, were as deep and dark a blue as sparkling sapphires.

  His lips touched hers, tentatively at first, and then as she responded, he took her mouth with total possession, savoring the feel of her body molded securely to his. She fit him; he fit her. Their bodies had been formed to entwine perfectly. Her full breasts pressed against his chest, her feminine softness centered on his male strength, her arms claiming him as surely as his did her, and their lips mating with the fierceness of lovers preparing to join in a more intimate fashion.

  Reece ran his hand down her hip, lifting up her leg, pressing her to him. Elizabeth moaned into his mouth, clinging to him, squirming against him.

  "If you want to help me, Lizzie, then be my woman. Now. For today." He kissed her again, taking both their breaths away.

  She held on to him, but broke the kiss, laying her head on his chest. She heard and felt his wild heartbeat. "I can't have sex with you, Reece."

  The instant tension in his body notified Elizabeth that he had understood only too well what she was telling him. He released her abruptly, turned and walked into the living room.

  Elizabeth waited a few minutes, willing her raging senses to calm. It would have been so easy to give in to his needs and the needs of her own body. For the first time in her life she wanted to be with a man, to offer herself to him. But there was too much standing in the way, keeping them from the union of hearts and souls as well as of bodies.

  She found him sitting on the sofa, bent over, his clasped hands resting between his knees. He didn't look up when she walked over and stood in front of him.

  "Talk to me, Reece. Tell me about B. K. Stanton."

  "You're damned and determined to hear the whole sordid story, aren't you?"

  MacDatho, who'd been asleep in front of the fireplace, reared his head, focusing his amber gaze on Reece and Elizabeth. He stretched, then lowered his bead, keeping his eyes open.

  Elizabeth knelt in front of Reece, taking his hands into hers. "My knowledge of your life is limited. I really can't read your mind, and I can't help you if I don't know what we're dealing with."

  "I don't see how you can help me, anyway, but if you want to hear my version of Reece Landry's life story, then I'll tell you. Once you've heard the truth, you may not be so eager to help me, after all."

  Lifting Reece's right hand, Elizabeth sat on the sofa beside him, entwining their fingers, giving his hand a tight squeeze. "I want to know whatever you want to tell me."

  Leaning back on the sofa, Reece closed his eyes. He didn't want to rehash all this old misery, but his gut instincts prompted him to share his past with Elizabeth.

  "My mother, Blanche, was a beautiful woman. Blond and china-doll pretty. She worked at Stanton Industries years ago. A minimum-wage job. Anyway, to make a long story short, she had an affair with B. K. Stanton himself, who was a married man with children. When my mother discovered she was pregnant, good old B.K. offered to pay for her abortion."

  Elizabeth sensed his anger. She tightened her hold on his hand. "But she didn't get an abortion."

  "No, she decided to have me. I don't know why. All of us would have been better off if she'd just gotten rid of me."

  "Don't say that, Reece. It isn't true."

  Opening his eyes, he glanced at her and saw the tears caught in her thick, dark lashes. Sucking in a deep breath, he pulled his hand out of her grasp. "My mother didn't have anyone to take care of me, so she had to quit work. Stanton gave her a little money so he could keep on sleeping with her. But when his wife found out about Blanche and me, she made a lot of threats. I was six years old. That was the last time my father came around. Then about a year later my mother married Harry Gunn."

  Silence hung in the room like a threatening black cloud promising a killer storm. Elizabeth shut her eyes, absorbing Reece's pain, a child's pain. In her mind she saw clearly a man's big, broad hand striking a little boy's face. The child fell to the floor, his amber eyes filled with hate.

  As suddenly as the vision had appeared, it faded away. Elizabeth knew Reece had closed his mind to the memory. She tried to prize her thoughts back into his mind. She couldn't. He had, once again, safely shielded himself from his emotions.

  "Your stepfather was abusive." She made the statement as unemotionally as she could, but she could not conceal the tears escaping from her eyes.

  "Yeah, he was a real son of a bitch. Knocked me and Blanche around whenever the mood struck him." Reece placed his knotted fists atop his thighs.

  "What a horrible life for the two of you."

  "Blanche died when I was twelve, and things got worse. I was fifteen before I grew big enough to defend myself properly. The beatings stopped. I found trouble everywhere I looked, and I was always looking for trouble. I've had problems with the law since I was a kid."

  No wonder Reece was such a hard man, such a loner. Elizabeth wanted to know more, wanted him to share all of his past with her. Her instincts told her that he had never told anyone else the things he was telling her.

  "All those years, you knew B.
K. Stanton was your father?" Elizabeth asked.

  "Yeah, I knew the richest and most powerful man in town was my father. And I knew he didn't give a damn whether I lived or died." Reece closed his eyes, shook his head and groaned. "Damn, I wish I'd left that town-his town-before he decided to take an interest in me."

  "When was that?"

  "When I was sixteen he stopped me on the street one day. Just like that-" Reece snapped his fingers "- B.K. grabbed my arm and asked me if I was Blanche Landry's boy." Reece's stomach churned. A sour taste coated his tongue. Hot, bitter anger rose in his throat. "He offered me a part-time job. I had quit school, and he said if I'd go back to school he'd give me a job after school and full-time in the summer. We made a deal, my old man and me. Then when I graduated high school, I joined the marines, did my time and came out determined to make something of myself. My only mistake was going back to Newell."

  "Why did you go back?"

  "Damned if I know, unless..." Reece slammed his fist into the sofa arm.

  MacDatho rose from the floor, watching Reece intently.

  "I'm not going to hurt her, Mac," Reece told the wolf-dog. "You should know that by now."

  "He knows." Elizabeth placed her hand on Reece's arm. "You went back to Newell because you had something to prove, didn't you?"

  "I guess. I suppose I wanted B. K. Stanton to know I was going to college, that no matter what I'd come from, I was going to be somebody."

  "You had a lot of mixed emotions about your father, didn't you?"

  "I hated him. Plain and simple." Reece stood, stretching, exercising his muscles.

  "Did you hate him enough to kill him?"

  Reece turned sharply, glaring at Elizabeth. "I thought you believed me, believed that I didn't murder him?"

  "I do believe you."

  "Then why ask me if I hated him enough to kill him?" Reece walked to the windows, staring out at the sunshine spreading over the snow, glistening on the velvety white surface as if it were scattering crushed diamond particles everywhere it touched.

  "What happened when you returned to Newell after the marines?" She should have known he'd been in the marines. Sam had been a marine. Reece Landry and Sam Dundee shared some common traits.