Guilty as Sin

by Jami Alden

  He covered her mouth with his, sending a rush of warmth tingling through her body, sweet and pure, cutting through all the ugliness John had left in his wake.

  “Don’t let him kill our future. I love you, so much,” he murmured against her lips. “And I know we can get through this together.”

  Though she would live with the pain of what happened to Michael for the rest of her life, she knew in her heart Tommy was right. John had already taken so much from her already. She wasn’t going to let him steal her one chance at happiness too.

  “I love you too,” she said, feeling the words down to her very core. “I love you and I want to be happy. With you.”

  Tommy gave her one of those blinding smiles and kissed her again. The taste of him, the feel of his mouth moving against hers made her blood run thick and chased the last shreds of darkness away, leaving only bright hope for the future. And love, deep and true. Strong enough to survive tragedy and years of separation. Strong enough to get them through whatever life threw at them.

  With Tommy at her side, she could make it through anything.

  Epilogue

  Come on, just a few more bites,” Tommy insisted.

  Kate dutifully took one more swallow of the chicken soup Erin had dropped off a little while ago, then firmly pushed the spoon he brandished out of her face. Well, as firmly as she could considering two days after being shot in the chest she was still weak as a kitten.

  “You’re not going to get your strength up if you keep eating like a damn bird,” Tommy groused as he put the lid back on the soup carton and set it aside.

  “I’ll have a little bit more later,” she promised, hiding her half smile. Of all the insane happenings of the last several days, the fact that Tommy Ibarra was here, glued to her side as he had been for the last two days straight, watching over her, catering to her every need, struck her as the craziest.

  Craziest and, besides Tricia’s rescue, the only wonderful thing that had come of all of it. Kate clutched at it, the wonder, the happiness as she tried to keep the horrors of the last few days at bay. Eventually she would have to deal with it, she knew. Face the press. Hell, face a therapist to help her unwind the twisted mess that John had left behind.

  “It’s going to be okay,” Tommy said, as though he could read the unpleasant thoughts trying to wheedle their way into her brain. She loved the way he said it, not as a hollow reassurance, but forcefully, as a statement of truth. A statement she had no choice but to believe.

  Even more, she loved the way he followed it up with a sweep of his broad palm across her cheek, followed by a soft press of his lips. Warm, reassuring, telling her with his touch what he’d told her in words so many times the past two days. I will always be here for you, Kate. I’m never letting you go again.

  Kate turned her head to catch his mouth with hers and tried to shift closer. The movement sent a shock of pain through her right side. She tried to stifle her gasp, but Tommy, attuned to every wince and frown, immediately pulled away.

  “Dammit, you should have kept the morphine drip for another couple of days.”

  She didn’t take offense at the sharpness of his tone, accompanied as it was by the helplessness in his dark eyes. He hated seeing her in pain, a point he’d made abundantly clear. However, Kate was already over the weird drunk and disconnected feeling she experienced from the morphine, and Tommy’s aversion to seeing her hurt wasn’t a good enough reason for her to keep taking it.

  “Let me call the nurse—”

  Kate stopped him with a firm squeeze of his hand and shook her head. She breathed softly, pushing through it until the stabbing pain receded to a dull ache. “I promise I’ll let them give me something if it gets worse,” she said as she settled back against the pillows he’d tucked behind her.

  He shook his head in mock exaggeration, flipped open his laptop and clicked over to a video streaming site. “What will it be? Another movie? Or should we start another season of Mad Men?”

  This was how they had spent most of Kate’s waking hours between brief visits from Jackson, Brooke, CJ, and Tommy’s parents.

  Not once had they turned on the TV or looked at the news to see what was being said about the case. She could imagine the media storm occurring outside the four walls of this room, and knew that soon enough she and Tommy would be at the very center of it. But not yet.

  They’d just finished the opening credits of another episode when there was a sharp rap on the door.

  “Come in,” Tommy called as he paused the movie and slid his chair away from the bed to make room for the nurse who was no doubt outside the door.

  But instead of the nurse, it was Deputy Roberts, who was taking a shift guarding the door to Kate’s room to make sure no reporters or other unwanted visitors snuck in, who opened the door.

  “Kate, Senator Beckett—I mean, your father’s out here to see you.”

  A shock went through Kate, making her stomach seize up.

  “He didn’t seem happy when I told him I needed to check with you first,” Roberts continued.

  That would account for the uneasy look on the deputy’s face. The senator wasn’t used to being asked to wait, and no doubt made sure the deputy knew that.

  Tommy was up immediately. “I’ll tell him to hit the bricks,” he said and started for the door, the lines of his back and shoulders tense, ready for confrontation.

  “No,” Kate said softly. She’d known in the back of her mind that when the truth about Michael’s death came out, she would have to face her father. Face the cold accusation in his eyes once again. Though the identity of Michael’s killer no doubt shocked her father to his core, it still didn’t erase the mistakes Kate had made that night. And Kate didn’t hold any hope that it would change her father’s attitude toward her.

  “Are you sure?” Tommy asked, his face carved into harsh lines as he returned to her side and took her hand in a firm grip. “You’ve been through too much already and I don’t want you upset.”

  “It will be fine,” Kate said with a confidence she didn’t feel. But she’d known this confrontation would come. Now that her father was here, forcing the issue, she just wanted to get it over with.

  Tommy nodded an OK at Deputy Roberts. “I swear to God, one word out of line and I will throw his ass out of here,” he murmured under his breath.

  As the senator stepped through the door, Tommy positioned himself in front of Kate, a human brick wall.

  “Hello, Kate,” her father said. To her shock, his voice held none of the cold, emotionless quality she’d come to expect. Instead it was deep and thick with emotion. And when she met his eyes, there was none of the angry accusation she’d seen so many times. Instead they were dark, stormy with grief and regret.

  “Hello…” she trailed off, not sure how to address him.

  Her father grimaced uncomfortably and ran his hand through his still thick silver hair. “I realize we should have called first, but I couldn’t, I didn’t—”

  Kate squeezed Tommy’s hand, unsure what to make of her father, seemingly unsure of himself when he’d always dominated every situation.

  “We weren’t sure you’d talk to us,” a wry female voice cut him off. At that moment Kate realized her father wasn’t alone. Lauren and her mother were behind him, her view of them blocked by Tommy’s broad back.

  Her mother, small and birdlike, hovered at her father’s arm, her face thin and pinched as she remembered, her normally flawless complexion blotchy, her eyes puffy and red.

  Lauren didn’t hesitate as she hurled herself at the bed, ignoring the way Tommy stiffened as she grabbed for Kate’s free hand.

  “God Kate, we’re so glad you’re okay,” Lauren barely got the words out before she burst into tears. “And I’m sorry, I’m sorry I’ve been so distant after what happened, after Michael…”

  Kate felt her own eyes fill as she wrapped her fingers around her sister’s.

  “We’re all sorry, Kate,” her father said, hovering at t
he foot of her bed. “Me especially. The things I said to you, blaming you. I was so wrong, about everything… I…”

  Kate felt like her entire world was spinning off of its axis as her father uttered words she’d never expected to come out of her mouth.

  “I spent so much time blaming you for what happened, and I had no idea I’d brought that monster into our lives. If I hadn’t been so close to Phillip—”

  “Don’t,” Kate said quietly. She knew exactly what her father was going through, the way the what ifs and the second guesses could drag you down a rabbit’s warren of guilt. “You couldn’t have known. None of us did.”

  Her father reached out a hand, awkwardly, uncertain whether or not to approach her. Kate dropped Lauren’s hand, more from shock than anything else, and reached out to her father. His hand closed around hers, the fingers still strong, though the skin felt papery, more weathered. Long forgotten memories bubbled up at the contact, of her slipping her hand in to his as they crossed a crowded street.

  Her mother covered their joined hands with her own, the familiar scent of her perfume settling over Kate like a soft blanket.

  “When we heard the news, about John, what he’d done to you, to Michael—” her father choked on a sob.

  “We had to make sure you were really all right,” Lauren said, her voice thick with tears.

  “And tell you that we love you, Katie,” her mother said in a voice tight with grief and regret. As Kate met her mother’s gaze, she saw that she’d lost that dazed, cloudy look she’d had the last time Kate had seen her. Bright, alert, as though someone had jolted her awake after years of sleepwalking.

  Kate could relate.

  “We love you, Kate,” her father and Lauren echoed.

  Kate sat in stunned silence, struggling to take it all in.

  “I’ll leave you alone, let you catch up.”

  Kate looked up at Tommy’s voice, saw him standing in the corner. His arms were folded across his chest, taking in the scene, his expression carefully guarded.

  But she could see it there, the tightness in his mouth and shoulders as he watched her, surrounded by her family. She’s got them, she won’t need me anymore. He didn’t have to say it out loud.

  “No!” she said, a jolt of panic hitting her at the thought of him leaving. She gently tugged her hand from her father’s and reached out to Tommy. “Please don’t go. I need you.” Because in a strange way, as amazing as her family’s desire to reach out to her was, it was in its own way as traumatic as anything else that had happened in the past few days. There was no way she was going to get through it without him.

  A fact that was driven home as his big hand swallowed hers up and she immediately felt a rush of warmth, of peace. That feeling that with Tommy at her side, everything really would be okay. “I need you, Tommy.”

  He brought her hand to his lips, his eyes crinkling at the corners in a smile she couldn’t help but return.

  Her father cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Tommy, there are of course, things I need to say to you as well. I’m not entirely sure where to start—”

  “How about thank you for saving Kate’s life,” Lauren broke in. She reached over and grabbed Tommy in a quick hug. He stiffened at first, but gave her a gentle pat on the back.

  “Of course,” the senator said gruffly. “We’re of course incredibly grateful. But I also owe you an apology, for what I did after Michael’s death,” he glanced guiltily at Kate before turning his attention back to Tommy.

  Kate could feel Tommy’s fingers stiffen against hers. “What’s done is done. All I care about now is seeing Kate through all of this so we can get on with our life.”

  She didn’t miss a single detail, not the way he said our life, their future already intertwined. And not the way his entire body seemed to loom larger in challenge, making it clear to her father, to her family, they could apologize all they wanted, but Kate was his now.

  As he was hers.

  Her father nodded and turned his attention back to Kate. “I don’t expect you to forgive me right away,” he said gruffly, “or ever. I just want the chance to be in your life again. We all would.”

  Tears stung Kate’s eyes as she stared at their faces, apprehensive, afraid she would turn them away as they’d once turned from her.

  While she would always bear the scars of Michael’s death and the aftermath, she knew if she turned them away now, it would be out of pure spite. It wouldn’t be what she wanted.

  More importantly, it wouldn’t be what Michael wanted. “I’d like that,” she said, her throat tight with tears.

  They left a few minutes later, with promises to visit again the next day.

  “I really wanted to punch him in the face,” Tommy said when the door closed behind them.

  Kate smiled. “After what he did to you, no one would blame you.”

  Tommy stretched out onto the bed next to her, careful not to jostle her. He pressed a kiss to her cheek and murmured, “It would have been for you. I don’t care what he did to me.”

  Warmth pooled in her chest and she snuggled closer. Sensing she wasn’t quite ready to talk, Tommy started the movie up again while she tried to make sense of her jumbled emotions. She was happy her family wanted to reach out, pull her back into the fold, but wary too.

  She felt like a puzzle whose pieces had warped and worn over the years; complete, but not quite fitting together seamlessly like everything should.

  She didn’t even realize she was crying until Tommy brushed his thumb across her cheek. She wrapped her good arm around his waist, drinking in the feel of him, the scent of him, the sound of his heartbeat thudding steadily against her cheek.

  “It’s so strange,” she said, as much to herself as him. “How everything works. I lost everyone I loved the night Michael died. And finding out the truth has brought them all back to me.”

  “You’re never going to lose me again,” Tommy whispered. “You know that, right?”

  Kate nodded against his chest. “I love you.”

  He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “I love you too, Kate,” he replied, his voice suspiciously thick. “More than you even know.”

  As she lay there, folded in his arms, something welled up in her, pushing through the cracks of her puzzle pieces, washing past the tangle of conflicted emotions raging inside her.

  Happiness.

  After everything that had happened, it had seemed impossible, and she still wasn’t sure she deserved it.

  But it was here. It was hers. She was going to hold it tight and never let it go.

  All Talia Vega wants is a quiet, normal life.

  But a brutal killer from her past has come back to haunt her—and Jack Brooks, the man she swore she’d never let herself depend on again, is the only man she can trust…

  Please turn this page for an excerpt from

  Run from Fear

  Chapter 3

  You can go ahead and file a report,” the officer, who was not nearly as nice as Officer Roberts, said in a voice that managed to convey the emptiness of that gesture. “But your landlord admitted the lock is old and the house had been previously burglarized. There’s no proof those scratches are from the other night—”

  “They look fresh,” Jack interrupted. “Had they been from the previous burglary, they would have been smoothed out—”

  “So being a high-priced rent-a-cop makes you an expert in forensics?” the cop said, adjusting his belt under his hefty gut as he puffed his chest out.

  Ben rolled his eyes and went back into the house. Talia was pretty sure that crunching sound was Jack biting on his tongue. “What else do you suggest I do, Officer?”

  “Keep your doors locked and your alarm on,” he said with a smirk, and left.

  Jack muttered something under his breath.

  “Tal, do you want me to stay with you for a little while?” Rosario asked, her hand on Talia’s arm the only warm spot on her body.

  Talia shook her head. “I’l
l be fine.” Rosario loved living on campus, and Talia would never take that away from her. And maybe she was being paranoid, but if someone was specifically targeting her, she wanted Rosie well away, safe in her dorm, protected by the university’s own rigorous security protocols. “Just do me a favor—no missing any curfew calls this week. Deal?” When Talia had agreed to let Rosario live on campus, they’d agreed Rosario would call her every single night, no matter what, at eleven p.m. to let her know where she was. In the eight months since school started, Rosario had gotten a little lax. And try as she did not to overreact, nothing sent Talia into a tailspin faster than not being able to get ahold of Rosie. There had even been one humiliating—according to Rosario—incident involving her dorm RAs and the campus police.

  “Deal,” Rosario replied with a smile. “Eleven o’clock, on the dot, unless I go to bed early, and if I can’t call, I promise to text.” She gave Jack a quick hug good-bye and ran inside to get her stuff together.

  “Talia—” Jack got cut off as his phone beeped. He let out a low curse. “I’m sorry, but we have to go.” He nodded at Ben, who emerged from her house with his bag of gear. “We need to move it if we’re going to make it on time,” he called over Talia’s head, then focused back on her. “I’m on a personal security detail over in Atherton—our client has been receiving death threats, so they’re temporarily relocating from London. It’s going to be twenty-four-seven, so the next few weeks—”

  Talia held up her hand. “Jack, you don’t have to explain to me that you have a job to do. I know you didn’t come down from Seattle to see me. You don’t have to babysit me. I’ll be fine.”

  He cocked an eyebrow and looked meaningfully in the direction of her garage door.

  Talia shrugged and said, “Like Officer Friendly said, that probably happened ages ago.”