by J. R. Ward
Mad recoiled as if she’d been sucker-punched.
Ducking back out of sight, she clamped her hands over her mouth to keep from screaming…or maybe it was to catch herself when she threw up.
Wheeling around blindly, she took off, making no noise in her bare feet as she raced back to her room.
When she got there, instinct took over where pain rendered her numb and stupid. She yanked on a pair of jeans, pushed her feet into her Nikes, and shoved the few things she’d brought with her for the weekend into her bag. She didn’t bother to change shirts, and flashed out of her bedroom with her duffel while wearing the tank top she’d slept in.
She was down the stairs and crossing the foyer at a race/walk when Richard’s voice cut through the nightmare.
“Where are you going?”
She didn’t acknowledge him, didn’t stop, just punched through the front door and made a beeline for her Viper.
As she tossed her bag into the passenger seat, Richard grabbed her elbow. “What the hell is going on?”
“I’m leaving.” She ripped her arm free and got in the car, jabbing the key into the ignition.
He kept her from shutting the door by gripping the top of the thing. “Why?”
She glanced up at him and his little smile told her he suspected the reason. Hell, he’d probably invited Amelia up for the weekend for the sole purpose of enticing Spike.
Mad pegged her half brother with hard eyes, utterly unafraid of him for the first time in her life. “You know exactly why.”
“Amelia?” he drawled.
Mad cursed, realizing she’d been played beautifully. By all of them. Spike included.
“You know something, Richard? I should never have come here and I’m never coming back.” She yanked the door out of his hold and slammed it then pushed her foot into the clutch. But before she threw the gearshift into first, she put the window down. “Oh, by the way. Do yourself a favor and don’t raise any objections about my trust.”
“Why must you be so unreasonable—”
“Did I mention I’ve hired a lawyer? Mick Rhodes. Ever heard of him?” As Richard’s mouth closed up tight, she smiled grimly. “Ah, I see you have. Good. Those shares are mine and I’m going to vote them. Back the hell away or get run over. It’s your choice.”
“Madeline, wait—”
“Not a chance.”
“But what about Spike?”
“He’s fine. Amelia’s taking care of him.”
Mad hit the gas and popped the clutch, spraying pebbles all over Richard’s linen pants.
* * *
Richard watched the Viper take off and realized he might have miscalculated his style of play.
He’d never seen Madeline like that. Ever. She’d been enraged to the core yet deadly calm.
It made him respect her a little.
And while the dust over the drive settled, he churned the implications of what she’d said. Mick Rhodes wasn’t a lawyer. He was a paving machine. The guy had leveled more opponents than any other attorney on Wall Street.
How the hell had Madeline gotten access to a man like him? Rhodes’s clients were Fortune Fifty companies…but maybe she’d gotten an in through one of her big-money sailing contacts? There were plenty of hard-core corporate players who liked boats—and say what you would about Madeline as a woman, she was, evidently, one hell of a sailor.
Richard crossed his arms over his chest and shook his head. Damn it, with Rhodes on board, the fight to hold on to those shares of hers was going to be a nasty one.
Except maybe all wasn’t lost. Clearly, Amelia had worked her magic on that chef, bless her heart. And Madeline was furious right now, riding a wave of anger, talking a good game. But later, when the fury bled out of her, she would know only rejection and hurt and she would revert to her normal state, forgetting about the shares and the trust. Without Spike in her ear prodding her toward independence so he could get his hands on her money, she would let everything return to where it had been.
Richard glanced back at his house, then refocused on the driveway.
The key of course, was making sure Spike stayed away from her. That man might have been momentarily blinded by an attraction for Amelia, but he wasn’t stupid. If he were looking for cash, Mad was a much better ATM candidate. Amelia needed money because she spent it constantly and a woman like that, with expenses of her own, would be a much harder target for bilking. Spike was going to figure this out quickly and then he’d go back to working on Mad.
And she was just enough of a sap to let him back in the door. So the mission critical would be cutting that avenue off.
Fortunately, Michael “Spike” Moriarty, had a hell of a history as it turned out. And Richard knew all the gory details thanks to the phone call that had come in late last night from his lawyer. The report on Moriarty’s background had been thorough…and thoroughly illuminating.
Surely there was a way to use it to his advantage.
Richard thought about the way Spike and Madeline had behaved around each other and suspected they couldn’t have spent a lot of time together. And regardless of her maintaining they were just friends, it was obvious they were having sex; any idiot could have read that over the breakfast table yesterday morning. Clearly, though, it was early in the relationship. Very early. They were cautious with each other still, batting that friends word around and ducking glances. To the guy’s credit, Spike was playing the cautious suitor brilliantly…while he was no doubt counting the ways he could finance his restaurant ambitions with Madeline’s trust.
It was a great thing that Amelia had come between them already. But there needed to be another wedge in there so Spike didn’t think he could come back.
“Where did Madeline go? Did she leave?”
Richard turned around to Amelia and had to smile. “Of course she did. And I have to give you credit, you work fast.”
“Excuse me?”
“Please, don’t be coy. It’s boring. I must say, Moriarty’s a bit of a roughneck for you, but I imagine a little change is good.”
“You think I…She thinks I was with Spike? Oh, God, Richard—”
“Weren’t you?”
“No!”
Well…that was a surprise, on a lot of levels. “The tattoos kill it for you?”
“Mad is with him!”
“Hasn’t bothered you before, has it?” he said offhandedly.
Richard started to worry but then told himself everything was still okay. Even if the deed hadn’t been done, the effect was the same. Madeline would be hard-pressed to get over the perception, however it had come about, that Amelia had been with yet another man of hers. However, the fact that nothing had happened made it even more imperative to convince Spike there was no shot at redemption.
Abruptly, a look of purpose came into Amelia’s eyes and that was the last thing Richard needed.
“Drop it, sister. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does. I must go…and explain. Though I don’t know how. And why does she think…Oh, perhaps I do know how she got that impression.”
“Don’t bother apologizing. She won’t believe anything you say because you have absolutely no credibility when it comes to things like this.” Amelia took a deep breath and seemed to deflate before his eyes. Which was perfect. “Darling, just forget about it. The two of them never would have lasted anyway.”
Without a sound, the butler came up behind Amelia. “Excuse me, the phone is for you. A Mr. Stefan Reichter. He said he’s returning your call from last night?”
Amelia blanched. “I…. I’ll take it in my room. Thank you.”
As his sister and the butler left, Richard stared at the front of the mansion. While he thought about Spike and Madeline and trusts and money, he noted absently that the boxwood on the right seemed a little thin.
That bush needed to be ripped out and replaced.
Following that thought, he settled on an idea. It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t his best. And it was risky.
But it was the only thing he had. And sometimes, as in chess, you had to play the moves you were given even if they were not as strong as you wished they were.
* * *
Spike was tucking a black T-shirt into his jeans when the door opened behind him without a knock.
Richard entered and shut the two of them in the room together. As Spike’s warning instincts went off, he kept cool.
“I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” Richard said.
Spike casually slipped his feet into his boots. “Why?”
“Because you were a guest of Madeline’s and she’s no longer on the premises.”
Spike narrowed his eyes, trusting the man about as much as a three-dollar bill. With a hole in the middle. “When did she go?”
“Just now.” Richard went over to one of the windows and pulled back the heavy drapery. “See for yourself. The Viper’s gone. And before you ask why, I’ll explain. You see, I told her about you.”
“What do you mean you told her about me?”
Richard’s eyes were steady. Rock steady. “Your prison record, Michael Moriarty. The five and a half years you did for beating a man to death. His name was Robert Conrad. You killed him by—”
“Why the hell would you tell Mad all that?”
“You need to ask? Don’t you know how her mother died? Or was that why you never said anything?”
With a horrible sense of bars locking him in, Spike asked, “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Violent felons sometimes kill innocent bystanders. You didn’t happen to, you just took out the one man, but not all murderers have your discretion. Madeline’s mother wasn’t so lucky when she was killed.” As Spike recoiled, Richard went on. “Did you know that Madeline was four at the time her mother died? Old enough to have memories. Old enough to remember how it felt to be told her mother was dead. And to hate and fear the kind of violent man who took her away.”
Spike shut down completely. If Mad’s mother had died in the course of a felony, of course she would flee. Especially because it looked like he’d hidden the facts from her.
Richard smiled a little. “Ah, yes. So you can see why she wouldn’t want to be around you. Especially because you didn’t tell her yourself. The association was too painful, but the lying by omission…not very heroic of you, was it? And there’s no way to apologize for all that. Not now that it came out as it did. She never wants to see you again.”
Spike felt like he was in a nightmare. God damn it, Sean should have told him about Mad’s mother. Why had the guy sent him down here to help her when he knew the horrible parallels?
“Spike? I mean, Michael?” Richard stepped in front of him. “I’d like to offer you a deal here.”
Spike trained his eyes on the other man. “Deal?”
“I’ll fund your new restaurant with Nate Walker provided you stay away from Madeline. I mean, you can understand why I have to protect my sister from you, given your past. But I’m also a businessman and there’s no reason to get totally wrapped up in emotions. Just keep away from her and I’ll take care of you.”
Spike reacted without thinking. He met Richard chest to chest and forced him up against the wall. Then he dropped his head so their noses were almost touching. As he did, he could practically smell the fear that rolling off the other man.
Spike bared his teeth. “You are going to get the hell out of this room right now. And I am going to pack up and leave. That way, no one goes to the emergency room with broken bones. You understand me?”
Richard’s voice was high. “I’m just trying to help.”
“I doubt that. Now get out of my sight.”
The man was out the door in a split second.
While Spike got his stuff together, his hands were shaking so badly, he dropped his wallet. As he picked it up off the floor, he thought of that first night when he’d come in and realized someone had been through his stuff. Richard. Of course. The guy had no doubt taken Spike’s social security number and address and run them through the usual databases.
Then the bastard had gone to Mad.
Spike left the room with his duffel, jogged downstairs and went out to the Harley. It took no time at all to store his clothes in the saddlebags and mount up. When he put his helmet on, he cursed because as he pulled it down over his head, he smelled Mad’s shampoo.
Oh…God, how she had to feel knowing what he’d done. The similarities with what had happened to her mother were no doubt nauseating, but the secret he’d kept made the situation untenable. He should never have been with her, never have made love to her.
And she was never going to let him explain. The omission cut her too deep and why wouldn’t it.
Spike fired up the Harley and tooled on out. As he headed back toward the Adirondacks, he was aware that he was cracking wide open on the inside. The fact that he had hurt her was…the worse part of the torture.
As soon as he got back home, he was going to call Sean and find out what the hell the guy had been thinking.
Although that was incidental. The true fault was Spike’s own. Completely.
Chapter Twelve
“God damn it!”
Six weeks later, Spike burned his wrist so badly he went momentarily blind. With a lurch he tossed the saucepan away and dimly heard it clatter across the industrial stove as he went right for the sink. Cranking on the cold water, he shoved his forearm under the spray and kept right on cursing. He was so loud that the sounds of the White Caps kitchen drowned only some of the words out.
Nate Walker looked over from the grill he was manning, flames roaring in front of him. “How bad is it?”
Spike took his wrist out from the water. “Ah, hell…it’s blistering up good.”
A third-degree burn. And all because he hadn’t been paying attention and had splashed hot oil on himself. Idiot. Stupid idiot.
But that was the way things had been going for the last month and a half. Ever since he’d come back to Saranac Lake on Memorial Day, he’d been a mess, all stuck in his head, making careless mistakes. Hell, he’d nearly sliced off his pinkie the day before.
With a grunt, Spike cut off his curses because he figured no one else needed the air show. Reaching for the burn cream they kept over the sink, he buttered up his wrist and wrapped the thing with gauze. Then he headed back over to the stove.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” Nate barked. “You need to get that looked at now. Reynolds, take over for Spike on sauté. Frankie! I need hands on salad.”
Tom Reynolds, the line cook, turned away from the small plates of leaves he was working on and went for the stove. Meanwhile, Nate’s wife, Frankie, put down the napkins she was folding and went over to the salad station.
“Two filets for pickup!” Nate called out as he tossed another sirloin on the grill. A mighty hiss was released as the steak landed. “Moriarty, you hit the road right now.”
Spike shucked his white apron and headed for the door, feeling pretty damn replaceable. When he remembered he’d come on the Harley, he turned to ask Nate if he could borrow the guy’s truck. With the pain as it was now, operating that bike was more than he could handle.
His partner was already tossing the keys to his F-150 across the kitchen. “Doc John will see you as a walk-in. Just knock on the back door. And don’t bring my wheels back until tomorrow.”
When Spike went out to the truck, he was about as mean as a snake.
And as he took the Lake Road into town, his mood only got worse. There was a lot of summer traffic, but it was of the lovey-dovey pedestrian variety. Couples strolled at the side of the road, holding hands or walking arm-in-arm while they looked out at Saranac Lake. It was the same when he got to the town square. Couples. Always couples. Since when had the world become full of people in love and looking at each other with doe eyes?
It was enough to make a guy sick.
Doc John’s office was just off the town square and housed in the old Victorian ark the guy lived in. Spike went to the ba
ck door as ordered and Saranac Lake’s only physician got up from a meal with his family to take a look at the burn.
As they walked down the hall to the clinic, Doc John said, “So, I guess you did yourself a good one if you’re coming to see me. Usually you cook types wait until something is falling off before you’ll show up here.”
“It was a stupid mistake.”
“They usually are.”
The two of them went into one of the treatment rooms. With Doc John’s brawny build and beard, the guy looked more like a woodsman than a physician, but somehow, this just made Spike trust the man more.
While the doctor washed his hands and snapped on gloves, Spike hopped up onto the exam table.
Doc John came over and reached out to remove the gauze. “So how’s business at White Caps? I’ve heard busy.”
“Yup—Good God,” Spike hissed as the man started to unwrap the burn. Just the act of taking off the dressing was enough to make a guy put cracks in his molars.
“I’ll go slower,” Doc John said.
“No, just do your thing. I deserve it for being such a jerk around the stove.”
When the doctor got a gander at the wrist, he shook his head. “I wish you hadn’t put that salve all over the burn. It’s not what I want on there right now and I’m going to have to clean it off.”
“Do whatever, Doc.”
“I’ll be right back.”
A couple minutes later, Spike’s whole forearm was in some kind of solution and the two of them were staring at it, watching it soak.
“Doc, can I ask you something?”
The guy reached out and pushed Spike’s hand down so it, too, was covered by the liquid. “Anything.”
“If a woman…” Spike cleared his throat. “If a woman doesn’t get her period, does that mean she can’t get pregnant?”
“Nope.”
The anxiety that had plagued Spike for the last month and a half sat up and howled. “But what if she isn’t ovulating?”
“How does she know she’s not?”
“Because she’s an athlete and her body fat is so low—”
Doc John shook his head and pushed Spike’s hand back under again. “No, I mean, how can she be sure? The human body has a way of doing what it wants. There’s only one sure way to prevent pregnancy and that’s abstinence.”
