by Helen Brenna
“He was pretty broken up,” she whispered, turning.
“Yeah. Whatever.” Jonas couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice.
He’d been only twelve when he’d lost all respect for his father. The man had lost one job after another and finally their home. He hadn’t even been able to cover the medical bills that had accumulated as doctors treated Jonas’s mother’s heart condition. Eventually, they’d lost her, too. How could a man call himself a man if he couldn’t provide for his family?
Jonas pulled a cereal box out of the cupboard and glanced at it. Organic sticks and twigs. “You got any coffee?”
“What do you think?”
“Still on that health kick, huh?”
“Jonas?” She put her hands on the counter and stared at him. “What are you doing here?”
That was the toughest question of all. He turned away, opened the refrigerator and held out a carton of soymilk, unflavored to boot. “This all you have?”
“Why here?”
The damned cat sat in the middle of the kitchen floor staring at him as if he, too, waited for an answer.
“I’ve always wanted an island vacation.” He shrugged, taking out a bowl. “Figured—”
“Don’t mess with me.” She grabbed his arm and, as he turned toward her, just as quickly let go.
She was so close he could smell the scent of something spicy coming off her hair, see the dark green flecks in her pupils, and nearly feel the suppleness of her pink lips. If he kissed her, would he be able to remind her how much she’d once wanted him and no other man?
Lot of good it would do.
“Why Mirabelle?” she asked. “Why now?”
The cat proceeded to weave itself between his legs. Damned thing didn’t have an ounce of sense. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask Missy how she’d ended up with the animal, but the question would imply an interest in her life and he couldn’t afford to open that door. He was here to heal and think. That was all. He backed away and the cat, as if it’d had enough of him, crossed the room and hopped outside through a kitty door. Jonas might as well do the same thing and get this over with.
“I’ve been in Chicago undercover for the last four years,” he said. “We were only a couple of weeks from making a huge bust when something went wrong. I haven’t figured it out yet, but somehow my cover was blown and all hell broke loose. They jumped me in an alley. It all happened so fast I’m not even sure who they were. One thing led to another and somehow I got shot. I need time to put the pieces together.”
“Why here? Why me?”
“I needed a place to hide. Somewhere I wouldn’t be found. And no one knows where you are. You did a damned good job of getting lost.”
Shortly after he’d died, she’d changed her name several times and her attorneys had made the paper trail extremely difficult to follow. She didn’t want her family to find her, and Jonas understood. While they’d been together, Missy had shared in great depth her family issues, mostly her problems with her overly controlling father. His own father might be a loser, but Missy’s was an outright asshole.
Jonas would never forget the shot to his pride when her dad took him aside on their wedding day. “She met you in a bar, Abel,” he’d said. “You might as well give it up right now. If your father’s track record is any indication, you will never be able to provide the lifestyle my daughter deserves.”
While it’d pissed Jonas off to no end that Missy’s father had run a background check on Jonas, the man had called it all right. Jonas had worked his ass off. No matter what he did or didn’t do, it was never enough. He would never earn her father’s respect. In the end, he’d only ended up regretting putting a bigger wedge between Missy and her family. It was another reason why his death had seemed like the right thing to do. With him out of the way, he’d hoped she might reconcile with her family. So much for that.
“Obviously, I didn’t get lost enough,” Missy said, bringing his thoughts back to the present. “ You found me.”
Only because he’d kept track of her since day one, following her name changes and moves from town to town for the first couple of years. She’d done a helluva job covering her tracks, and just when her trail had finally gone cold to the rest of the world, she’d upped and moved once more for good measure, settling on Mirabelle. What had surprised him more than anything was that she’d settled on using Missy, the nickname he’d given her within the first few weeks of meeting.
“How?” she asked. “How did you find me?”
He shrugged again.
“You’ve been following me all this time.”
“Following? Don’t flatter yourself.”
“What would you call it, then?”
“Morbid curiosity?” Or the need to make sure she was at least at peace, if not happy, that he hadn’t completely ruined her life.
“I don’t buy it,” she said. “You could hide anywhere.”
Time to suck it up. “Okay. The truth.” As hard as it was, he held her gaze. “I know it’s going to sound crazy, but you’re the only person I can trust.” He might not be able to trust her with his heart, but with his life? She could no sooner turn him in than gnaw on a T-bone. “You’re all I got, Missy.”
CHAPTER FOUR
THE ONLY PERSON HE COULD TRUST ?
To anyone who didn’t know Jonas that might’ve sounded like quite the stretch, but he’d always been a loner. And she’d always been a sucker for lost causes, especially where Jonas was concerned.
Oh, for God’s sake, the man broke your heart. Twice. First by proving over and over again he’d preferred his job to her and then again when he’d faked his death.
Her memories tracked to the deep despair and loneliness that had set in not long after they’d returned from their honeymoon. One day Missy and Jonas were lying together in each other’s arms making plans for the future, and the next she was lying alone, night after night, weekend after weekend while some invisible demon pushed Jonas in his job. Trying to talk about it had only seemed to push him farther away.
Then, just when she’d begun contemplating divorce, she’d gotten pregnant. Hope had bloomed inside her. A child is what they’d needed to bind them more closely together, but she’d held off telling Jonas. What if things didn’t change? What if he remained lost in his job?
Maybe somewhere deep inside she’d known something was wrong with the pregnancy. She’d miscarried at ten weeks. In the blink of an eye, it was all over. She’d curled up in that hospital bed alone, unable to reach Jonas, cramping, bleeding, losing not only their baby, but all hope for their marriage. She’d been completely unprepared for the pain that had set in after she’d thought Jonas had died.
“Missy,” he said, pulling her back to her kitchen, to this reality that seemed so unreal. “I need—”
“No,” she said. “You can’t stay here. I can’t—”
“Missy—”
“There must be another agent. What about Brent Matthews?”
“Dead. This time for real.” Jonas paused, swallowed. “They nailed him in the alley. He took two bullets directly in the chest before the shooter turned on me.”
She felt herself wavering. Brent had seemed like a good man. Years ago, just after she’d married Jonas, she’d met him once or twice at various Bureau functions along with a few other agents and their wives and girlfriends. She’d always wondered whether or not getting a chance to connect with those other women would have helped her weather the—mostly—downs of Jonas’s job.
She gave a brisk shake of her head. “You must have someone else—”
“Some things aren’t adding up. Someone at the Bureau might be involved, and I don’t know who I can trust.”
“What kind of assignment were you on?”
“Undercover in a Colombian drug-trafficking ring.”
Drugs. Something about that raised the fine hair on the back of her neck. Oh, God. “Does my father know you’re alive?”
Missy’s father, Arth
ur Camden, had been a United States senator, ultraconservative and extremely powerful, for as long as anyone could remember. Although he was the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had FBI oversight, he had a reputation for putting his fingers in any governmental pie that struck his fancy. He’d been as controlling and manipulative at home with his family as he was on Capitol Hill.
“No,” Jonas answered. “The Judiciary Committee wasn’t getting briefed on the status of our mission.”
“Are you sure? The war against drugs was one of his pet projects for years.”
“This was a covert op,” Jonas said. “These days Congress is concerning itself more with national security. You know damned well your father is at the front of that line.”
He was probably right, but Missy had a bad feeling about this whole deal. “You have to leave.”
“Why?” He studied her with a gaze that left no stone unturned, promised to ferret out every secret.
Damned FBI agents. “Because I said so.”
He shook his head. “It’s good to know some things never change. You’re still as irrational as ever.”
She spun toward him. “I’m irrational? Just because I follow my instincts rather than analyze every decision?”
“Call it whatever you want. Impulsive. Hasty. Spontaneous. All the same to me.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being spontaneous, but you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?” The man wouldn’t know how to relax and have fun if he was sitting on a sandy beach and someone shoved an umbrella drink in his hand.
“And some people use spontaneity as an excuse.” He narrowed his eyes. “Covers up a helluva lot of irresponsibility.”
“I am not now, never have been, irresponsible. No matter what you think.” Immature once upon a time, yes. Never, ever irresponsible.
“Well it certainly helps having some money in a trust fund backing your play, doesn’t it?”
She straightened her shoulders. “For your information, I support myself from the proceeds from my own gift shop. For years, the only substantial money going out of my trust fund has been for donations.”
Oddly enough the biggest drain on her resources had been Mirabelle itself. The island had been sucking air a couple years back and a lot of businesses had been about to go under. Marty Rousseau had proposed building a golf course and pool and had promised to pay for part of it himself. When no other investors could be found, Missy had stepped in and directed her trust fund advisors to secretly buy the rest of the municipal bonds necessary to fund the projects. But she sure wasn’t going to explain that to Jonas.
He narrowed his eyes at her. “You support yourself entirely off income from your gift store?”
“Not entirely.” She backtracked. “I could if I focused purely on sales, but my gift shop is about something other than profit.”
“So you do tap the trust fund for yourself?”
“Only small amounts for monthly living expenses.”
“Figures.”
As if they hadn’t spent more than a few days separated, the old arguments that had torn them apart resurfaced. They stood, glaring at each other. Neither of them admitting any wrongdoing. Both of them stubborn in their righteousness. How could she have ever believed this man was the one true love of her life?
But she had. Jonas had steadied her world after she’d dropped out of college and spent years running from the only life she’d known as the privileged daughter of wealthy, connected, and ultraconservative parents. He’d treated her like a normal, everyday person.
He’d helped her grow, mature, and reaffirmed for her what she’d always known in her heart. That there was so much more to life than the one her father had wanted her to live. She’d been happy for the first time. She’d been ashamed to tell him her background, afraid it would change things between them. Maybe it had. It wasn’t long after he’d found out the truth about her family that his work had taken hold of him and she couldn’t seem to shake him loose.
“Still sending thousands of dollars off to rescue turtles or baby seals or dalmatians?” he asked with disdain.
She straightened her shoulders, preparing to argue, but he was right. While they’d been married, she’d liberally tapped into her account for any and every cause. If someone asked, she cut a check. “I’m more careful with donations these days.”
“Buy any houses lately?”
That was a low blow. “Maybe if you’d been around more,” she ground out, “I wouldn’t have had to buy a house on my own.” She’d thought making a cozier home for them would make him want to be there more often. Instead, she’d been left behind getting bored in their house rather than in their apartment.
No, not bored. Lonely. She’d missed him terribly. Missed his energy, his dark sense of humor, his deep, hearty laugh. She’d missed the way her body felt when he was near, the way he’d listened to her as if she was the only person that mattered in his world. Before Jonas, she’d lived such a sheltered life in so many ways. He’d always encouraged her to find herself, to find things she enjoyed doing and creating. He’d helped her begin to see that Melissa Camden had a Missy Charms locked inside.
Then he died. That’s when the real loneliness set in. Her family, the people she should’ve been able to lean on, had only made things worse.
She glanced away from Jonas, the memories almost overwhelming. Her anger lost its fire. “My family came to your funeral. Even Charlie.”
Charlie Steele was the man Missy’s parents had tried to steer her toward most of her life. He was sweet and pleasant enough, but cut from the same cloth as his parents, her parents and her siblings. “The dirt had barely settled on your grave before my father turned to me and said…” She paused, unable to force out the words.
Jonas’s glare softened ever so slightly.
She’d never forget the superior look in her father’s eyes that day, or the way the words had felt branded into her brain. “‘You’ve had your fun, Melissa,’ he said. ‘Now come home. Consider yourself fortunate you’re through with the man without losing a penny. Charles has already agreed to take you back. All will be as it should be.’”
Jonas clenched his jaw.
“I’m not ready for him to find me, Jonas. Not now. Probably not ever.”
Knowing she could never go back with her family, she’d packed her bags and floundered on her own for months, desperately trying to break free from her family, her name. Her father had hired detectives who always seemed to find her. The media would track down his men tracking her down. Very quickly, she’d gotten good at hiding her trail.
She’d transferred her trust fund to a management firm that had no dealings with the rest of the Camden clan. The company was given strict instructions to never disclose any information on her whereabouts to anyone. When the decision to start her own family and adopt had settled in her heart, she’d gotten serious about getting lost and finding a place to raise children. She’d found exactly what she was looking for on Mirabelle—a home, people she cared about and who cared about her.
Another blink of an eye and all that could change, too.
“I understand, Missy. I do.” Jonas ran a hand through his long hair. “Dammit, all I’m asking for is a few days. At most a couple weeks.”
“Weeks? Living here? Are you out of your mind?”
“Missy—”
“I’ll give you one day and one day only to rest up from that gunshot wound.”
“Mighty gracious of you.”
“The first ferry leaves Mirabelle at seven in the morning.” She wrapped her arms around herself, hoping to contain her emotions. “Tomorrow. I want you on that boat.”
“Sorry to disappoint, Miss, but I’m not going anywhere.” He sat at the counter with a carton of soymilk and a box of cereal. “Not yet, anyway.”
“You can’t stay here. I mean it, Jonas.”
“I can. I will.”
“This is a small island. I know everyone and everyone knows me—�
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“Lot of friends here, then?”
“Yes—”
“They’d do anything to protect you? Like your doctor?”
“One call and our police chief, Garrett—”
“What, Missy? He’ll arrest me? Throw me in jail? Kick me off the island? For what? I show him my badge and explain that I’m your husband. It’s only a matter of time before the fact that you’re a Camden comes out, and everyone on this island knows you for the liar you are.”
She stepped back, feeling as shocked as if he’d slapped her face. It wasn’t just that her father was a well-known senator. The name Camden fell right in line with several other historically famous, not to mention extremely wealthy, American last names. Missy’s great-great-grandfather had not only been an inventor and engineer, he’d also been one of America’s early entrepreneurs, making millions while this country’s economy boomed.
“I’ve never lied to anyone on Mirabelle,” she said. “Or to you. Never.”
“A lie of omission is still a lie. I’ll bet my last dollar you’ve omitted telling everyone on this island who you are and where you come from. Right, Missy Charms? What will all the simple folk of Mirabelle think of you after they find out your real last name is Camden?”
In truth, she hadn’t purposefully lied to anyone. She’d stopped using her father’s name back in college. Sick of year after year of having people act differently around her as soon as they found out who she was, she’d decided to be someone else.
She never told anyone her real last name. Not anymore. These days people saw Missy the way she wanted to be seen. She hadn’t even told Jonas until a few days before their wedding. He’d told her it didn’t matter, but a part of her had always wondered if he’d ever truly forgiven her. He didn’t understand. Not really.
“When all your friends here find out you grew up in a mansion out east,” he went on. “Spent your summers flitting between your family compounds on Long Island and Los Angeles and the villa in the south of France. How many folks here on Mirabelle do you think have skied the Swiss Alps? Gone to an Ivy League university? Got driven around by chauffeurs most of their childhood?”
