Suddenly One Summer

by Barbara Freethy

  “What happened to you?” she asked in surprise.

  He scowled. “I ran into someone’s fist.”

  “Looks like more than one fist.”

  “What do you want, Jenna?” he asked, his voice less than welcoming.

  For the first time, she was the one pursuing him. It was nice to be proactive instead of reactive for a change. “We need to talk.”

  “Are you actually going to talk?” he challenged.

  “Well, not unless you let me in.” She certainly didn’t intend to have a conversation with him in the hall.

  He stepped back, waving her inside. Reid’s room had a masculine feel, with dark wood paneling, heavy, weathered antique furniture, and pictures of seascapes and fishing boats adorning the walls. A small black suitcase stood against one wall, and she spotted his shirts hanging neatly in the closet. The sheets and blankets on the king-size bed were tangled, and there was a smear of what looked like blood on the pillowcase—probably from his nose, which appeared a bit more crooked than it had the day before.

  “Who did you fight?” she asked.

  “A couple of guys at Murray’s Bar.”

  “Over what?”

  “A simple misunderstanding.”

  She tilted her head. “A simple misunderstanding that left you looking like a boxer who just went ten rounds in the ring?”

  “You should see the other guys,” he said with a cocky grin.

  “Guys—as in more than one?”

  “Apparently brothers—the Harlan brothers.” As she waited for him to go on, he sighed. “I thought I saw someone I knew at the bar. I got up to check it out and some drunken asshole thought I shoved him. He pushed me. I ended up knocking into his brother, and the next thing I knew we were being hauled off to jail, where we sat for a couple of hours until the chief decided to let us go. That’s the story.”

  She had a feeling he’d glossed over a few details. “Does your face hurt?”

  “Do you really care?”

  She was surprised at how much she did care. She was also very aware of just how alone they were and just how close the bed was. It wouldn’t take much to tumble onto those sheets with Reid and forget all about why she’d come here.

  “It wasn’t that difficult a question,” Reid said.

  She realized he was still waiting for an answer. “I was being polite.”

  “I’m fine. Now it’s your turn.” He folded his arms in front of him. “What’s up? You tell me to stay away from you last night, and here you are first thing this morning. What exactly did you come here for? Conversation? Or something else?”

  She ignored the challenging look in his eyes. “I have to know if you’re planning to tell the police that I’m not Lexie’s mother.”

  He stared at her for a long moment, his gaze completely unreadable. “I haven’t decided. I need more information.”

  “All you need to know is that by keeping my secret, you’ll be protecting Lexie, an innocent little girl.”

  “I only have your word for that, Jenna, and since I don’t know you, I have no idea if your word is good. If you want my cooperation, tell me something about yourself.”

  “I can’t, Reid. I can’t trust you. If it were just me, maybe I could, because you seem like you might be a decent person.”

  “What a compliment. I’m stunned.”

  “But it’s not just me. I have Lexie to consider, and she is the most precious thing in the world to me.”

  He frowned. “I believe you care about her, but it could be a crazy, obsessive kind of love.”

  “It’s not. Lexie is my niece, and I have good reasons for the deception.” How could she convince him? She had no concrete proof to wave in front of his face. She paced back and forth in front of the bed, searching for something to say that would give him enough information to trust her, but not so much that he could cause more problems.

  “You’re in way over your head, aren’t you, Jenna?” Reid asked.

  “More than you can imagine,” she admitted, pausing in front of him.

  “Who else knows that you have Lexie?”

  “Only one person. The person who helped me start over.”

  “And you trust this person?”

  “So far it’s worked out. It can keep working out if you pretend you didn’t hear anything last night.”

  He shook his head, his gaze softening. “Jenna, Lexie is a seven-year-old child. She’s going to crack again. She’ll tell someone else, probably one of her friends. They’ll tell their parents. This whole thing is bound to explode in your face.”

  “Down the road, perhaps, but right now I just need a little time.” The longer she kept the secret, the more opportunities she would have to figure out her next move. For two months her only goal had been to make it from one day to the next. She couldn’t think any further into the future than that. “Well? What do you say?”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  She shook her head. “I need an answer now, Reid. I didn’t sleep all night, worrying about what you were planning to do. Just tell me you’ll keep the secret.”

  He stepped toward her, and she instinctively took a step back. He frowned. “You’re not really scared of me, are you?”

  She could lie and say yes, but for some reason she wanted to tell the truth about this. “I’m more scared of me. I shouldn’t have kissed you last night. I am in no position to get involved with anyone, and I shouldn’t have acted on impulse.” She took a breath, knowing she had to finish it. “I did not kiss you to seduce you into keeping my secrets.”

  “And I didn’t kiss you to get the story,” he said, his gaze clinging to hers.

  She saw the honesty in his eyes and took a quick breath as another jolt of electricity swept through her. “To be completely truthful, I might have kissed you to cover up, or to get you on my side, if I’d thought of it. I know that doesn’t make me a very good person, and you probably won’t believe this, but deception used to be a foreign concept to me. Growing up, I always told the truth. Now everything has changed. Some days I wonder if the lies will get so complicated that I won’t remember who I really am.”

  “That could happen. It’s difficult to lead a life of pretense. At some point, the truth always comes out.”

  She sighed. “That’s not what I want to hear.”

  “If your sister was murdered, you should go to the police and tell them who you suspect of killing her. They can protect you and Lexie.”

  “In other circumstances I would agree with you, but the person who killed my sister has extensive connections in law enforcement. I can in no way be certain that Lexie or I could be protected. And there’s a possibility that…” She hesitated. Was she insane to tell him as much as she was? If he got an inkling of who was involved, he wouldn’t be able to let the story go.

  “A possibility that what?” he prodded.

  “That the police might think that I took Lexie. They might try to return her to someone who shouldn’t have her.”

  “If you’re truly her aunt, I’m sure you’d be a good candidate to take care of her, especially if it’s her father who is under suspicion, which I’m guessing is the case. Are there grandparents available?”

  “No, not really.”

  “Not really isn’t no.”

  “Then we’ll just leave it at no,” she said, waving a frustrated hand in the air.

  “Jenna—I grew up in a lot of tough neighborhoods. I was a foster kid. I saw my share of women getting knocked around by men. I’ve also been writing about crime for more than a decade. If everything you’ve told me is true—if your sister was killed, and her murderer wants to kill you, too—then you will never be safe. You can’t hide forever. Someday, sometime, something will happen, and he’ll find you.”

  “If you’re trying to scare me—”

  “I’m trying to wake you up. What are you doing to actually protect yourself besides hiding?”

  “There’s nothing else I can do.”

 
“What about trying to find some evidence against the killer?”

  “I can’t do that and stay here to protect Lexie. My sister was killed on the other side of the country.”

  “You’d be surprised what you can do if you know how to do it.”

  She stared at him, feeling a tiny seed of hope begin to grow inside of her. “Are you telling me that you can help me?”

  “I’m good at digging up facts.”

  But what if his investigation became known? What if his questions set Brad off, gave Brad a trail to follow? “I can’t take the risk,” she said slowly.

  “You can’t afford not to. Someone who has killed once won’t be afraid to do it again.”

  “If I do nothing but lay low, maybe he’ll just forget about us.”

  “Forget about his only child? Come on, Jenna. You know better than that. You won’t be doing Lexie or yourself any favors by pretending that the problem will go away. It won’t. Talk to me, Jenna. Talk to me before it’s too late.”

  ELEVEN

  Jenna knew that Reid was right. She couldn’t stand still forever. She couldn’t just hope they’d be safe; she had to take action to make sure of it. Trusting a reporter was a huge leap of faith, but Reid already knew so much. He wouldn’t stop digging even if she refused to talk to him. If she let him go off on his own, who knew what he would come up with, what alarm bells he would trip?

  “If I tell you my story,” she said finally, “will you promise me that you won’t go to the police and that you won’t write anything about me or Lexie until it’s all over? Until we’re truly safe and the murderer has been caught? That’s the deal.”

  “I agree.”

  She searched his eyes for the truth. He didn’t look away. Her gut told her that Reid was a man whose word was good, but that’s all she had—her gut. “I hope I’m not making a mistake.”

  “You’re not.” He took a seat in the chair by the desk, waiting for her to begin.

  Jenna sat on the bed and clasped her hands together. “Okay, here goes. The truth is that I don’t really know what happened between my sister and her husband. Kelly and I were not close. For the past five years I spent most of my time in Europe, where I toured as a concert pianist. A couple of months ago I had a crisis in my career, and I came back to the States. I needed some time away from the pressure to regroup. I went to see Kelly, who lived outside of Boston. I got a hotel room near her house, because I wasn’t sure she’d be happy to see me. It had been a long time since we’d talked.

  “When Kelly came to the hotel, I was shocked at her appearance. She was very thin, and there were bruises on her arms and one on her neck. She told me that she was in trouble and that she had been for a while, but she hadn’t realized just how much trouble.” Jenna’s voice caught in her throat as she remembered the panic in Kelly’s voice, the terror in her eyes. Why hadn’t she made Kelly stay with her that day? If she had, Kelly might still be alive.

  “Take your time,” Reid said quietly. “Do you want some water?”

  She drew in a deep breath and slowly let it out. “No, I’m all right.”

  “Your brother-in-law was abusing your sister,” Reid said. “That’s what you found out, right?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think that was all of it. I’ve been going over in my mind the last two conversations that we had. Kelly told me that she’d met with someone about three weeks before I arrived. A man had told her some horrible things about Brad that she didn’t want to believe, but now she thought they were true.”

  “What kind of things?”

  “She wouldn’t elaborate. She told me she was going to leave Brad, but she had to make sure that everything was set before she did.”

  “What was the man’s name?” Reid interrupted.

  “She didn’t say. I suggested that we pick up Lexie from school that minute and leave town. Kelly refused. She convinced me to wait until the next day. She asked me not to call or come by the house, because she didn’t want Brad to know I was in town. She had one last thing to do. Before Kelly left, she gave me an envelope and asked me to meet her and Lexie at the park by her house the next day. If anything happened to her, I was to find Lexie and follow the instructions in the envelope. I was to keep Lexie safe, no matter what. Most important, I could not let Brad have Lexie.”

  Jenna looked over at Reid. “Kelly said that everything would be fine as long as she kept pretending.”

  “Did you ask her why she didn’t go to the police?” Reid queried.

  “I didn’t have to ask. My brother-in-law is a cop.”

  His lips tightened. “Got it.”

  “The next day, I went to the park as scheduled. I saw police cars on Kelly’s street on my way over there, and I had a horrible feeling, but I went to the park anyway. At first I didn’t think anyone was there; then I heard crying. I found Lexie hiding inside one of those round tubes in the playground. She was sobbing her heart out, and she had blood on her shoes.”

  Jenna swallowed back a choking knot of emotion. “Lexie said that her daddy hurt her mommy, and that her mommy told her to run to the park and find me. I don’t know exactly what Lexie saw that day. Sometimes it sounds like she was hiding and saw them fighting, but her father didn’t see her. Then it sounds like Brad went looking for her, and while he was out of the room, she went to her mom and Kelly told her to run, which means that Kelly was still alive at that point.” Jenna’s voice broke as she thought of her sister wounded, dying, desperate and so very alone. Had Brad come back and stabbed her again? Had Kelly suffered even more after Lexie left?

  Jenna’s hands began to shake, and she couldn’t get any breath into her lungs. Her muscles were so tight; she felt as if she was about to snap.

  The next thing she knew, Reid was sitting next to her, pulling her into his embrace. She resisted, afraid to accept the help. She’d been operating on her own for a long time, desperately trying to keep every potential for danger away. But as Reid’s arms tightened around her, she couldn’t resist his solid strength, his intense warmth, the comfort he offered. She was exhausted from carrying the weight of Kelly’s murder and Lexie’s safety on her shoulders, worn out from the unrelenting fear of being discovered.

  She finally slid her arms around his waist and rested her face against his chest just for a minute to pull herself together—then she could go on again. But emotion still welled up inside her, threatening to swamp her. She bit down on her bottom lip and squeezed her eyes tight, afraid she was going to lose it. She couldn’t lose it. She had to be strong.

  “It’s okay, Jenna. You can let go,” Reid whispered against her hair. His hand stroked her back. “You’re safe here. You’re safe with me. You’re not alone anymore.”

  A sob escaped her, then another, and Jenna cried for the first time since her sister had died. She cried for the future she would never have with Kelly. She cried for the wasted past, the harsh words, the misunderstandings, the pettiness, and most of all, the regret she would carry her entire life.

  She’d never imagined she would lose her sister. She’d never believed that they wouldn’t some day have an opportunity to be close. She’d told herself a million times that next Thanksgiving or next Christmas or next summer, she’d spend time with Kelly.

  She’d always thought she had tomorrow, and what she’d put off for too many years could never be regained now. The sister who had once shared her bedroom, shared her confidences, shared her life, was gone. And she was never, ever, coming back.

  Her tears soaked Reid’s shirt, but he just held her until the storm passed. When her sobs turned into gulps, and she struggled to breathe, he handed her a box of tissues from the side table. She blew her nose, aware of her puffy eyes and teary face. “Sorry,” she muttered. “I don’t know why I did that.”

  “You were due.” His gaze was warm and understanding.

  “I was weak.” She never indulged in tears. Her father had always told her that emotion must be saved for the music. Don’t cry it, play it. Now she
felt completely naked and vulnerable. She’d never meant to let Reid all the way in, but somehow that’s where he’d ended up.

  “Weak doesn’t describe you, Jenna. You’re one of the most courageous women I’ve ever met,” he said softly.

  “You don’t know me that well.”

  “I know you’re hard on yourself.”

  “Most people don’t think I’m hard enough.”

  His gaze narrowed. “Most people being…”

  “It’s not important. Thanks for the shoulder. You might need to change your wet shirt.” Her gaze drifted across his broad chest, and she had to fight the urge to help him take that shirt off. It would feel so good to give in to desire, to lose herself in the wonderful, mindless oblivion of—

  “Jenna,” he said sharply.

  She met his eyes and saw the same flare of desire there.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he warned.

  Embarrassed, she said, “I—I don’t know what you mean—”

  “Yes, you do.” He jumped to his feet and returned to his chair. “You need to finish the story so that I can help you. Let’s get back on track. You picked up Lexie at the park. What happened next?”

  She drew in a deep breath and let it out. It took her a minute to regroup. “I wanted to go to the house to see if Kelly was all right, but I had her voice in my head, telling me to take Lexie and keep her safe. I knew the police were at the house, so I did what Kelly had asked. I drove for the next four hours and I stopped in a motel a couple hundred miles away. I had my laptop with me, so I went on the Internet. That’s where I learned that Kelly had been stabbed to death during an alleged burglary.

  “They showed a picture of Brad sobbing, pleading for someone to find his wife’s killer. He had bandages on his hands, self-defense wounds, supposedly. He was also flanked by his brothers in blue, and he was so good, I almost thought his grief was real. Then I remembered what Lexie had said, and the bruises on Kelly’s arms, the terror in her eyes. Brad killed my sister. I’m sure of it.” She met Reid’s gaze. “If I hadn’t had Lexie to keep safe, I would have gone after him. I would have made sure he paid.”