The fine hair on the back of her neck stood on end. She slowly looked over her shoulder but didn’t see anything other than the regular faces she saw on any other given class day.
Leah sighed and turned her attention back to her exam. The only problem was that every time she blinked, she saw J.T.’s handsome face imprinted everywhere. And with each hour that passed, each second that ticked by, she grew more and more afraid that she might never see him again. Might never again experience his touch. Melt under the power of his kiss.
She swallowed hard and turned the test sheet over although she hadn’t finished the first side yet. The ache that had begun the moment she’d watched him ride away had rolled into an ever-present pain that was part of everything she did. She might laugh at a joke her father cracked about his recent surgery. Or trade off-color gossip with Rachel while having lunch. Or enjoy some true quality time with her daughter, Sami. But often were the times when she’d stare wistfully over their shoulders, looking at nothing, hoping for something she was beginning to fear she might never have again.
It had even gotten to the point where merely waiting wasn’t doing it for her anymore. But her father and sister had been unable to uncover any more information than she already knew. So last week she’d looked up the phone number of a private investigator in Phoenix and placed a call looking to secure her services to find J.T. Two days later the P.I. had called back to say that she’d found no trace of the man.
Leah had shivered and hung up the phone, her heart pounding in her ears.
She told herself the not knowing was what affected her most. She was prepared for anything that might happen. But not knowing what was going on, not knowing if J.T. had headed for points unknown, again on his own, again on the run, was what turned her inside out.
But she knew that wasn’t true. What was eating her alive was not knowing how J.T. was doing.
If he, indeed, had discovered there was no way to clear his name, and had decided that living life on the lam was his only option, she at least wanted to know that. Wanted to hear his voice one last time before she resigned herself to the fact that she’d never see him again.
She longed for something, anything, other than this infernal nothingness.
Two hours later the time bell rang, signaling the period allotted for the final was over.
Leah blinked then slowly closed her exam booklet, barely remembering a single thing she’d done in the past hundred and twenty minutes. She passed the test forward then gathered her class material and purse and headed for the door.
It seemed odd for some reason that the sun should be shining when she emerged from the underground classrooms of the University of Toledo Business College, nicknamed The Bomb Shelter. Strange that the world continued to run at normal speed while the pace of her life seemed to be running in slo-mo. She made her way to her car, thinking of plans she’d made to fill her day.
Then she got into the car and instead of driving home, she headed to the house outside of town that J.T. had worked on before he left. The house they had made love both inside and outside of.
She slowed on the two-lane route outside the house and squinted at the two-story Victorian in the bright midday sun. Apparently the owners had taken possession and she watched as a young woman tried to catch a toddler running away from her on the front lawn, sans diaper, blond curls blowing in the late spring wind, while another older child played with a cocker spaniel a few feet away.
Leah smiled regretfully. Could that have been her with J.T.’s children? If things had worked out differently? If his father hadn’t moved after that summer so long ago, taking J.T. to a different place and leaving her to move on to marry Dan?
Her hand dropped to her stomach. She had secretly hoped that she had become pregnant as a result of their one irresponsible night of making love without protection. But she’d gotten her period a week and a half ago and even that hope had been crushed.
Of course, poor Sami likely would have run away had her mother gotten pregnant so soon after her father had had another child.
Leah dropped back against the headrest. Dan had gotten himself a little boy. She had taken Sami to the hospital to try and ease her into accepting her half sibling, not expecting to be drawn to the child herself. Oh, no, she harbored no feelings either way for her ex-husband. She certainly knew they could never be more than Sami’s parents. But there was something about the…promise in the new family that made her heart pulse and her body yearn for something she preferred to leave unnamed.
Surprisingly, the instant Sami had gazed through the nursery window at her little brother, it was love at first sight. Leah doubted her daughter would ever share the closeness with her father that Leah wished for—or was that a father-daughter thing? While Leah adored her own Dad, he wasn’t her friend. It had always been her mother she had run to. Anyway, she was glad Sami was learning to forge a path for herself in both families that didn’t include constantly conspiring to reunite her parents.
Dan and Glenda were set to get married in a simple ceremony next week, and Sami was going to be the maid of honor.
“Nothing’s impossible, Leah. All you have to do is believe.”
She recalled her father’s words to her that first day following his surgery.
She also recalled the story he’d told her.
Leah shifted in the leather seat and stared out at the road ahead of her trying to imagine her father as she’d never seen him before. Trying to see him at twenty-three, a week before he was to marry a woman he’d always loved, her mother. Tried to envision him wearing his best suit and accepting his friends’ offer to fly him to Las Vegas for one last outing as a bachelor.
She wasn’t surprised that gambling hadn’t been his thing, while his three friends had spent the entire weekend at the betting tables.
She had been surprised that he’d fallen for a showgirl whose heel had broken during her first show and who had fallen from the stage and into his lap where he’d sat in the front row.
He’d said he’d tried to reason away his attraction to the young woman. Tried to remind himself that he was getting married in a week to the woman he loved. But his heart refused to hear what his mind was trying to tell it and he’d spent the whole three days with her, exploring feelings he’d never experienced before. An excitement, a shimmering lightness that had both drawn him in and scared him to death.
And it had been that fear, and his own sense of duty to his bride back home, that had made him get on that plane Sunday night and vehemently vow never to look back.
The problem was that he had looked back. Often. He’d find himself lying in bed late at night next to his wife and wonder what had happened to that beautiful woman who had taken his breath and a piece of his heart away during that fateful weekend.
No, he’d never thought about trying to contact her.
Until his wife had died and his life had gaped empty and dark.
“I didn’t believe it could work. I didn’t believe that the life I had planned out for myself, my career in law, would go anywhere if I married a showgirl,” he’d told Leah as he’d lain in that hospital bed, having come as close to death as one person could get. “And while I don’t regret my life with your mother or my life with you girls, I sometimes wonder what would have happened if I hadn’t gotten back on that plane….”
Leah blinked then turned her head to glance at the young mother in front of the house to her right. The woman used her hand to shield her eyes from the sun, having spotted the lone car on the road and the woman looking in her direction. Leah raised her head from the rest, gave a small wave then finally put the car into gear and headed for home.
If only she didn’t feel like she was getting on her own plane of sorts and leaving something behind her.
LATER THAT NIGHT, after dinner had been eaten, chores seen to, and after Sami had gone up to finish some homework before going to bed, Leah ticked yet another day without J.T. off her mental calendar. Her movements were lethargi
c as she put away the last of the dishes from the dishwasher then checked for the things she would need for breakfast in the morning and for Sami’s lunch.
No bread.
She leaned against the counter, staring blankly into the empty bread box, trying hard not to think about how she felt just as hollow.
And trying not to think about how it had been a bread run that had brought J.T. back into her life.
She closed the bread box door with a dull, tinny click. Maybe she’d just give Sami money to buy lunch at school tomorrow.
And toast in the morning?
She turned and took a plastic pack of frozen English muffins out of the freezer, the bag clunking against the countertop.
Her shoulders slumped as she slid onto the stool on the other side of the island counter and propped her head in her hands. It was always this time of day that did her in. When night fell and the day was done and there were no more mundane activities with which to fill her time. More often than not she ended up sleeping on the couch in the family room, rather than enduring the torture of climbing into that huge bed she swore still smelled like J.T. alone no matter how many times she changed the sheets.
It was times like now that the self-pity monster she strained to hold at bay cracked through her barrier and ran wild, pointing out that everything seemed to be working out for everyone else. Rachel was getting married to a wonderful man in less than a month. Her father was well on the road to recovery and looked better than ever. Sami’s grades had improved and she suspected she had a crush on a boy at school. Even Dan was marrying a woman Leah hadn’t even known existed a short time ago. A woman who had just given birth to his child.
And she…
And she moved through the days of her life on automatic pilot, finishing school, pushing forward with her plans to open the satellite shop of Women Only in a little over two months, taking care of and nurturing her daughter.
And crying at the kitchen counter over something as stupid as a loaf of bread.
“One thing I’ll never be able to handle is the sight of a beautiful woman crying.”
Leah’s head jerked up and she hiccuped, running her fingers over her face to wipe away the dampness. The wholly male, utterly intoxicating voice had sounded quietly from behind her.
And she didn’t dare turn around for fear that she’d discover it was nothing more than her imagination.
Something brushed against her hair and she shivered, her eyes drifting closed and a groan crowding her throat.
“I’d like to promise that you’ll never have reason again to cry, but I don’t think I can,” the voice continued, so close to her ear she started trembling. “What I can promise is that your tears will never again be over worrying about me.”
Oh, God, J.T…..
Leah swung around and threw herself at the man she’d been so worried about, the man she’d missed like an amputated limb, the man who filled her heart and haunted her dreams, clutching him tightly to her chest as if she might never let him go.
And she never intended to. Not again. Not ever.
J.T. chuckled softly as he edged his thumb under her chin and lifted her face. Her pulse skittered and an all too familiar melting sensation took hold of her body as she stared into those sweet golden brown eyes.
He’d come back to her.
Then he was kissing her.
Kissing her so deeply, so thoroughly, so passionately that Leah’s heart felt like it was breaking all over again. In that instant she knew that what her father had told her at the hospital following his surgery was right. Love, true love, could never be denied or ignored. It thrived and breathed with a life of its own.
And she loved J.T. with everything that she was and would ever be.
She framed his face in her hands and pulled back. His features were a very welcome blur and she blinked rapidly to bring him back into focus. She knew a moment of panic. Could he have come to say goodbye one last time?
His smile was soft and loving and made her insides feel like water. “Are you back? For…good?”
He ran the backs of his fingertips over her cheek as if unable to believe he was touching her again. He nodded. “I’m back…for good.”
Leah melted into his embrace again, instantly forgetting the long, unrelenting torment of the past three weeks. Pushing aside the memory of her cold, empty bed and all the doubts and fears that had clung to her like so many layers of unwanted clothing.
“What happened?” she barely dared to whisper. “Is it over?”
“It’s over, baby. It’s over.”
She pulled back to search his face.
He took her hand and tugged her to her feet. “Sheriff Dumont is safely behind bars, where he belongs.”
She’d lived with the fear of losing him for so long, she couldn’t bring herself to believe it. “But…how?”
He kissed the top of her head. “It seems our unfriendly sheriff married another young wife. And when things started turning sour a year and a half ago, she began fearing for her life. With good reason. It seems Dumont figured he got away with it the first time, the second time should be a piece of cake. But the Arizona District Attorney’s Office wouldn’t act on the second wife’s fears. At least until I came back onto the scene. I was the one last cog needed to set the whole machine into motion.
“I helped set up the sting with the Phoenix Police Department’s Homicide Division, and see it through, the end result being a video tape with Dumont not only outlining his plans to do away with his new wife, but giving a detailed description on how he got rid of his first.” His hands skimmed down her back and he pressed her to him, making her aware of every inch of his body and just how much he wanted her on every level, made apparent by the thick ridge behind his zipper that pressed into her quivering belly. “I wasn’t going to tell you now, but I brought the sheriff’s young wife to Toledo with me. Would you mind giving her a job at your new shop?”
An image of J.T. in bed with the sheriff’s first wife singed her mind.
He grinned down at her. “Baby, you never have anything to worry about in that department. I was born to love you. And I’ll die loving you.” He kissed her, his mouth conveying the truth in his words. “There’s no one else in this world for me but you.”
Leah’s entire body swelled with heat and love.
“And I’m going to do my best to be all I can for you. I’ll be there for Sami. I’m going to keep working, but I’m also going to get that mechanical engineering degree I always meant to—”
“Mom, I…”
Sami.
Leah told herself she should pull away to address her daughter. But she couldn’t seem to let go of J.T. as she looked at Sami where she had just entered the room. The eleven-year-old stood staring at the two of them in confusion.
Leah knew a fear that J.T.’s return would set back the painstaking progress she’d made with Sami.
Instead Sami stepped over to her side, and looked up at J.T. “I’m glad you’re back. Maybe now my mom won’t spend every night crying.”
And just like that Leah believed. She believed that J.T. was back for good. She believed that her daughter had begun to accept her as a person and not just a mother. And she began to believe that they, the three of them, had the makings of a family so full of promise she thought her heart might burst.
Epilogue
One month later…
RACHEL HAD TO BE THE PRETTIEST bride Leah had ever laid eyes on. However, she was in contention for the title of happiest. The latter role would have to go to herself, because the day after J.T. had rolled back into town on his Harley, he’d whisked her to the county courthouse and within an hour she had become Mrs. Joshua Thomas Westwood, something it seemed she had waited a lifetime for.
Jonathon Dubois had just knocked on the door to let his daughters know that he was waiting in the hall, ready to give his youngest daughter away to her groom.
Rachel dropped her voice, although Leah was pretty sure nothing could pene
trate the thick wood and stone room.
“I can’t believe Daddy’s rescinding his bid for Ohio Supreme Court Judge and leaving for Vegas tomorrow,” Rachel said as she straightened her veil in the cheval mirror in the antechamber of St. Joseph’s Church. “I mean, what is he thinking?”
Leah glanced at her sister’s reflection and tugged the veil back to its rightful position. “He’s not. He’s feeling.” She hugged her sister from behind. “Which is exactly what you should be doing instead of thinking about Daddy’s plans right now.”
Rachel’s smile could have easy rivaled all the lights in Paris. “You’re right.”
Leah smoothed her hands down her sister’s silky smooth arms, envying the flawlessness of her skin. “I’m always right.”
The two sisters smiled at each other for a long moment in the mirror, enjoying the moment, this moment, right before Rachel was due to marry the man she loved, knowing that with the words “I do” so much would change.
“Do you think he’ll find her?” Rachel asked.
Leah didn’t have to ask who she was talking about. She knew that their father was the “he” and the “her” was the woman, the young showgirl he’d had that premarital fling with so long ago and hadn’t gotten out of his heart since.
“I don’t know. But I think it’s a good thing that he’s trying.”
Rachel nodded, her features clouding over.
Leah searched her sister’s face. “What’s wrong?”
She blinked, remaining silent for a heartbeat before slowly shrugging. “I don’t know…. I guess today, when I’m wishing with all my heart that Mom were here, it’s difficult to think of Dad with anyone else.”
Leah idly touched the lines of flowery lace interwoven with freshwater pearls on the bodice of her sister’s dress. “I know.”
The yards of fabric that were Rachel’s skirts rustled as she turned to face Leah. “What do you think she’d say, Lee? You know, if she were here right now?”
Leah smiled as she picked up the bouquet of peach-colored roses and baby’s breath and handed it to her sister. “Oh, probably that you wouldn’t want to keep that very handsome groom of yours waiting.”
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