Unsanctioned Memories

by Julie Miller

  Oh, Lord. The last thing she needed today was to be somebody’s scapegoat. She’d awakened feeling hopeful for a change. She’d finally remembered her life, even the worst part of it. She’d expected to feel raw and dysfunctional this morning, but she’d slept amazingly well, cocooned in the haven of Sam’s arms. She didn’t want someone else’s family tiff to spoil the illusory confidence she felt.

  Maybe she’d exorcised the demons that haunted her dreams by sharing her ordeal with him. It hadn’t been easy to finally relive that horrible night, but she’d gotten through it because Sam was there, offering whatever she’d asked for. God, he had a big heart. And patience she never would have expected from a driven man like him.

  Sam seemed to think she’d actually been helpful, that their professional relationship was a success. He would report the details she’d given him to his partner, Virgil, to feed into the FBI’s criminal database. After dropping her off here, he’d gone to talk to Sheriff Hancock about setting up an interview with Derek Phillips. They were going to piece this together, he’d promised. And she believed him. He’d get her attacker.

  And then maybe she could persuade him to use that patience and heart to give her another chance to develop a more personal relationship with him.

  “You’d think those damn trees were more important than the future of our community.” Trudy’s cultured voice had taken on an unladylike sneer. “Your father was the same way. Frittering away my money on things that were inconsequential. I thought you were stronger than that. I raised you to know your duty.”

  Jessica drifted toward the archway that led into the main hall. Maybe she should just bow out of this buying expedition gracefully, and let Charles and Trudy make peace with each other. Sam had given her his cell number and told her to call as soon as she was ready to be picked up. She didn’t doubt that even if she called early, he’d drop whatever he was doing and come for her.

  Her cousin Mitch was taking a long lunch himself today to keep a protective eye on her, and was parked down the road out of sight. It’d be a long walk or a short phone call to catch a ride with him, too.

  That was the ticket. She’d make a polite excuse, then head outside and call Mitch. She hurried her steps toward the front door.

  “This conversation is over, Mother.” Charles’s voice was closer now. She heard clipped footsteps on the marbled foyer.

  “Charles Kensington Kent.” Three names. In any class, that was a mother’s warning. Time to leave before the fireworks really started.

  Jessica pasted a smile on her mouth and rounded the corner into the hall. And plowed into Charles. She tacked an apology onto her startled yelp. “Sorry.”

  But Charles’s hands closed around her elbows to steady her. “My fault,” he grinned. “I apologize.”

  Her hands had braced against the finely cut tweed of his suit coat, and for a fleeting instant the discovery blipped through her mind that her gentlemanly, pale-skinned neighbor had been working out. Unexpected. Odd.

  Jessica quickly pulled away, straightening the sleeves of her brown leather blazer, breathing slowly in and out to get past the notion that boring Charles had pecs. Maybe that redhead he’d been so attentive to at the party wasn’t interested in him only for his money. “Look, if this isn’t a good time for you, I’d be happy to come back tomorrow.”

  He frowned as if she’d spoken gibberish. “But the sale is today.”

  “Yes, but,” she looked beyond his shoulder to Trudy’s stern, matriarchal countenance, “if you have other business? I could go to the sale by myself and report back to you.”

  “You see, Charles?” Trudy needlessly patted her silver hair into place. “Jessica understands the concepts of good business.”

  Charles turned to his mother. “As do I.” He gripped Jessica by the elbow and escorted her to the front door. “That’s why I asked the expert to evaluate the goods before I purchase them. Goodbye, Mother.” Despite their quarrel, he paused to lean down and kiss his mother’s cheek. “I’ll be home for dinner.”

  Once Charles had seated Jessica in the passenger seat of his white Range Rover and pulled out onto the gravel road, he reached inside his suit coat and pulled out his wallet. Handing it to her, he said, “Check inside, if you would. There’s a business card with directions to the estate sale on it. Would you get it out?”

  “Sure.” He pulled on his driving gloves while she thumbed through a sheaf of credit cards and photographs. She stopped at the picture of a beautiful young woman. Her Mona Lisa smile seemed familiar, but she didn’t recognize the blue-black hair or considerable cleavage exposed by the low-cut gown. “Who’s this?”

  He glanced across the seat, then returned his gaze to the road. “That’s Mother.”

  Jessica nearly dropped the wallet in her lap. “You’re kidding. I thought she was a girlfriend.”

  Charles laughed. “It’s a restored photo taken before her engagement to my father. She was a widow and prematurely gray before her twenty-third birthday.”

  “Wow.” Jessica flipped a few more pages and found the card. “She’s some lady. I’ll bet she has quite a story to tell.”

  “Yes.” He returned the wallet to his jacket. “You should ask her to tell you about all her accomplishments sometime.”

  “I’ll do that.”

  Jessica recited the directions from the card, then settled back into her seat. In the side-view mirror she spotted Mitch’s car turning around to follow them and relaxed. Charles slowed the Range Rover as they neared the crossroads. When they stopped, she automatically looked up the hill to her cabin.

  “Oh, no.” She nearly uttered something considerably less ladylike when she saw the red Porsche in her parking lot. Alex Templeton was pacing back and forth beside it, intent on winning the argument with whomever was on the other end of his cell phone.

  Charles bent down to peer out her window. “Customer?”

  “Old friend.” Alex stopped and waved as soon as he spotted her. She felt as if she’d just been sighted in the crosshairs of a target. Her panic was instant and intense. Why didn’t he understand no? Why wouldn’t he leave her alone? Jessica turned and shielded her face with her hand. “Just drive. I don’t want to deal with him right now.”

  “Is there a problem?” Charles’s face was wreathed with concern. “He’s not one of your vandals, is he?”

  In a Porsche? “Could we just go?”

  “Of course.” Charles punched the accelerator. Playing the hero wasn’t his forte. The car lurched forward, kicking up gravel and mud. She was thrown back into her seat as they raced up the hill. “Hang on!”

  “We were supposed to turn left back there,” she yelled, clutching the armrest. She was hanging on.

  “You said to drive,” he argued.

  Another engine revved into overdrive. The crunch of gravel spat in the distance. Jessica pushed herself up in her seat and turned around in time to witness a near collision as Mitch wheeled his Jeep into her driveway to block Alex’s speeding Porsche. Alex’s horn blared. Mitch climbed out and braced his arms between the door and windshield, a gun in his hand. He shouted something.

  “Oh, my God.” What was going on? What was Mitch doing? Had Sam found out something about Alex?

  “Hold on!”

  The whole scene disappeared as the Rover went airborne at the crest of the hill, then crashed back down onto the road. Jessica’s cheek smacked against the side window. Pain radiated through her skull as the car fishtailed and spun toward the ditch. “Charles!”

  “Shut up!”

  Shut up? She clutched at her throbbing temple. She was hearing things. The car came out of its skid, then jerked back toward the opposite ditch. His foot still hadn’t hit the brake when they crested the next hill. The car tilted onto two wheels and threatened to roll. Jessica’s stomach churned with the motion. She grabbed the dashboard to catch herself from falling into the driver. “Charles,” she warned. “You have to slow down. You’re gonna wreck the—”


  “Shut up, bitch!” He jerked the wheel to the right.

  Driving gloves. Black leather driving gloves.

  The car bounced down on all its tires again, throwing her into the door again. But she was already going into mental shock and didn’t feel the pain.

  “What did you call me?” She barely heard the words herself.

  The car ran out of road and hydroplaned across a pool of standing rainwater. Then it hit mud, trapped the left front wheel and pitched into a roll. Air bags popped open and her world careened into black.

  Seconds later, or maybe it was minutes, Jessica blinked her eyes open. Her chest burned with the bruising of the seat belt that had caught her and saved her life. Her head felt like gelatin and she wanted to throw up. She was surrounded by the fractured stalks of a cornfield, but she was alive.

  She looked across the front seat at Charles. His head lolled against the deflated air bag and his arms hung limp at his sides.

  Jessica squinted her world into focus and purpose. She unbuckled herself and crawled across the seat. But she wasn’t checking to see whether Charles was unconscious or dead. She pushed him back against his seat and tugged at his tie. Her addled brain made her fingers fumble with the buttons of his shirt. Tears stung her eyes. Anger kept them from falling.

  At last, she gave up on the buttons and ripped his shirt open. She was almost screaming now, frantic with the need to know the truth. She yanked at the neckline of the undershirt he wore until she reached bare skin.

  She already knew what she would find.

  She jerked away as if the man had singed her fingers.

  It was the damn cat.

  Charles Kent had the tattoo of a tiger on his chest.

  “CAT BOYCE TEMPLETON. Her father made a fortune with one of the largest advertising firms in the country.” Virgil’s research had been thorough. “I can see where Alex might have a grudge against women. His wife made him sign a prenup, so he doesn’t get a penny of what she brought into the marriage if they divorce.”

  “You think that’s a motive?” Sam asked, switching the phone to the other ear to unlock Jess’s truck and climb in.

  He could sense Virgil shaking his head. “Cat and her daddy may have provided the start-up money, but Alex has earned a cool eight million in his own right. The guy’s a player, rumored to have dated women all over the country, but he didn’t rape your girl in Chicago. He has an airtight alibi.”

  “What’s that? Stooping some other mistress?”

  “You really don’t like this guy, do you?” Sam didn’t comment. Virgil knew him too well. “Sorry, Irish. It’s not that sordid. The fund-raiser he was at that night? Guess who was the main speaker?”

  “Templeton?” He started the truck and drove out of the county sheriff’s office parking lot. His interview with Derek Phillips confirmed that he’d found his vandals, but he was still looking for a murderer.

  Alex Templeton had been in Miami and Chicago at the time of those attacks. He was a tall, white male and he mistreated women. That and the fact he’d hurt Jess emotionally made him a decent suspect.

  “He was at the podium at the time Miss Taylor was abducted.”

  Sam swore. He wanted it to be Templeton. He wanted an excuse to hurt the fool for the way he’d used Jess.

  Now he was back to square one.

  That meant staying close to Jess until her attacker showed his hand again.

  He’d be with her in five minutes.

  JESSICA FOUND HER PURSE on the floor of the back seat and dug out her phone and sunglasses. She climbed out of the wrecked Range Rover and tried to orient herself. Even damaged by hail, the corn was too tall to see the road, but it was easy enough to follow the path made by the car. The goose egg on her cheek was nothing compared to the way her skull throbbed with every step. She slipped on the shades to keep the sun from piercing her brain and aggravating her headache, then punched in Sam’s number.

  When she got a busy signal, she ended the call and dialed 911. There was the road, twenty feet ahead. Her feet weren’t steady, but she kept moving. “Come on, people.” Maybe she should have called Mitch instead. “Pick up the—”

  A viselike arm covered in expensive brown tweed grabbed her around the neck, pulling her back off her feet. Her scream gurgled in her throat as a hand reached over her shoulder and snatched the phone from her fingers and hurled it into the corn. At her first twist to free herself, a knife pricked the soft skin below her jaw. She felt the heat of her own blood trickling down her neck.

  “I had it all planned out,” Charles complained. “I can’t do it here.” He jerked Jessica by the neck. “Move it, bitch.”

  “WHAT THE HELL is going on here?” Mitch Taylor had earned every bit of his authoritative reputation. Sam had been scanning the horizon beyond the hills that surrounded the Lover’s Lane crossroads, but he snapped to attention as if he’d been addressed by a ranking agent. “I had the deputy pick up Templeton on suspicion of trespassing, but a good lawyer will have him out in an hour and he’ll be suing my ass. This isn’t about vandals, is it, O’Rourke?”

  An edgy sense of his world about to go horribly wrong was eating him from the inside out. “Where’s Jess?”

  “Answer the question.”

  “You answer mine.”

  Two leviathans going head-to-head. Two men who knew their business better than just about anybody else. Two men who loved the same woman in very different ways both sensed the danger.

  Captain Taylor pulled back the front of his jacket and splayed his fingers at his hips. He carried his gun and his badge and his attitude with intimidating force. “I was told we were looking for a threat to Jessie’s property. That’s not the whole story, is it?”

  Sam debated for several agonizing seconds before he decided that losing Jess’s trust was the painful price it would cost to save her life. “I’m breaking a promise, but you need to know.”

  He told Mitch everything as completely and concisely as he could in a few minutes’ time. The stages of shock, grief and anger that crossed the police captain’s face had stoically vanished by the time Sam had finished. “Her attacker’s here in K.C. now. She’s not safe on her own.”

  “She and Charles Kent are in a white Range Rover, heading east up that road,” Mitch reported. “Toward the Stuyvesant place.”

  “I thought they were going to Mission Hills.”

  “Only if they’re taking the scenic route. Mission Hills is across the state line.” He thumbed over his shoulder to the west. “In Kansas.”

  Sam ran to the truck. Mitch pulled out his phone and shouted over the gunning of the truck engine. “I’ll have the cavalry here in twenty minutes. We’ll find her.”

  Sam floored it. Charles, the snob, hired Derek Phillips to plant trees at his house. Charles, the tall, white male, knew a lot about antiques and collectibles. He’d bet his shield the man collected knives and jewelry. Charles, the country gentleman who flaunted his money and status, had pressured Jess over the phone when he didn’t get his way.

  Sam prayed.

  She might not have twenty minutes.

  “THERE.” The silk pinched her wrist as he gave it a final tug. “Now sit there and shut up.”

  “Charles, you won’t get away with this.”

  Jessica pleaded her case even as he began pulling out all those sick, familiar items from the black duffel bag he carried. A stocking cap. A foil-wrapped condom. A plastic bag full of long shocks of dark hair.

  A translucent white mothball rolled across the dusty floor.

  She was too frightened to cry, too smart to scream. She concentrated on breathing evenly—inhale, exhale—so she wouldn’t hyperventilate or pass out. She had blisters on her feet from the hike to the Stuyvesants’ abandoned barn, blood on her white blouse from her cut and the gash on Charles’s chin he’d received in the crash. He’d already removed his belt and tie and bound her wrists and ankles together so he could work without fear of her running away. He’d built a crude bed out
of straw inside a horse stall.

  Now he was changing his clothes. Stripping off the fine wool and imported leather that defined his landed-gentry persona, and putting on the musty stocking cap and grease-stained jeans that transformed him into a cab-driving bum.

  Like some sort of macabre magician he turned to her and beat his chest. “Do you see this?” The mask muffled his articulate tone. “This is a man’s chest. Can you feel my strength and power?” He rubbed his palm across the tiger tattoo. “I’ve killed other women. They understood that I was their master.”

  Jessica tried to think of a plan. Right now she was completely at his mercy. But she’d broken her bonds the last time. She’d survived.

  Until she could get her hands on his knife or free herself, she prayed for deliverance. Someone would see the wrecked car and start a search. Sam would come looking when she didn’t call.

  Sam. Oh, God. If she could just see him one more time, feel his arms around her. If she could tell him how much she loved him and beg him to give her a chance—give them a chance. Would he go to counseling with her? Would he be patient as she learned about lovemaking all over again?

  Would he destroy this man the way he’d promised her?

  “Answer me, bitch!” Suddenly, Charles was on top of her, stretching her arms up over her head, running his knife along her throat. He ground his hips into hers and Jessica did scream, fighting down the gag reflex that tore through her. “Shut. Up.”

  Charles sheathed his knife somewhere behind him and pulled her silver necklace out of his pocket. With a deft sleight of hand, he circled it around her throat and twisted the ends together until it cut into her neck and silenced her.

  She instinctively sucked in a breath of air, but it got blocked at the tourniquet around her trachea. Her lungs refused to expand. Her sinuses burned with the moldy scents of rotting boards and damp straw. She fought off the panic that tried to set in, but she was powerless against the dizzying spots swirling before her eyes.