Bridal Reconnaissance

by Lisa Childs

  “Ask him.”

  “He’s still gone?” He’d left when the paramedics were treating her, his dark gaze tender on her face before he’d caught himself and turned away.

  Lindsey nodded.

  “Tell me where to find him.” She flung back the covers, uncaring that she wore only her underwear in front of her sister-in-law. She was a woman with a mission.

  “Maybe the office. Maybe the police station. I don’t know where they all went to powwow.” Her dark eyes burned with resentment. “But they damn well better fill me in. I need tomorrow’s headlines. It’ll look pretty pathetic if the local paper doesn’t get the biggest story…”

  Lindsey blushed as she trailed off. “Sorry…”

  “Where’s his office?” She had the van here; all she needed was to know where to go to find her husband.

  Lindsey relayed directions with a native’s vagueness. But Amanda figured she could stop somewhere and get more information if she got lost.

  “And,” her sister-in-law added, “it probably is a good idea to go as you are. Might make it harder for him to think scientifically.”

  Amanda glanced down at her coral bra and panties. A giggle slipped through her lips. “Um…I can always use that idea later. I probably should get dressed first.”

  EVAN’S OFFICE WASN’T close enough. A little over a half hour later, she rode the elevator to the top floor. She’d driven fast, but thirty minutes was too long to wait to see him again. To plead for their marriage.

  William Weering III had been right when he had claimed that she would beg for her life. But Evan would be the one to whom she’d beg.

  When the doors slid open, she strode off, determination in her quick step. But she faltered outside his office door. What if he wasn’t there? Should she leave a note? Where should she look next?

  Inside the office someone moved about. Papers rustled. Fingers tapped on computer keys.

  Amanda gathered up her flagging courage and walked inside. “Hello?”

  Cynthia Moore, the secretary, lifted her brassy blond head. Her dark eyes, swollen and red, burned with resentment. “He’s not here.”

  She had an open box atop her desk and she filled it with a mug and some picture frames. Her fingers closed around her brass nameplate.

  “You’re leaving?” Amanda asked, not certain why she cared. She had known at their first brief meeting that this woman was in love with her husband. But then maybe that was why she pitied her now.

  Cynthia nodded. “I can’t keep working here.”

  “Because of me?”

  “No, you were never a threat.”

  “What?” Pride replaced the pity. “I’m his wife.”

  “Not for long.” The younger woman laughed at what must have been a confused look on Amanda’s face. “Didn’t you wonder why he found you now? Why he looked so hard?”

  She had. “That’s not your business.”

  “But I know. I know everything about you, Mrs. Quade. But you won’t be Mrs. Quade much longer.”

  The woman’s fingers, with long talonlike nails, reached for a folder, shoving it toward Amanda. “Here. This is why he wanted to find you.”

  Although she knew she shouldn’t, that it would bring her nothing but pain, Amanda reached for the folder, noting the letterhead of a legal firm.

  “He wanted to find you to divorce you.”

  The folder did contain divorce papers. And knowing what Evan believed about himself, she shouldn’t have been surprised. Or hurt. But she couldn’t deny the pain that clenched her heart.

  “He didn’t need to find me. I was gone a long time. He could have divorced me years ago if he’d really wanted to.”

  The secretary’s face flushed with anger. “He would have realized he loved me if you weren’t so pathetic. If he hadn’t felt like he needed to take care of you, to save you. He’s a good man. He couldn’t turn his back on you, not when you were helpless.”

  Anger chased away Amanda’s pain. She hated feeling like a victim. Anyone’s victim. “I’m not helpless now. And you’re still leaving. Why?”

  “It’s over. What William planned. It failed.”

  Alarm shot through Amanda now. “William?”

  The other woman nodded. “Yes, William. I heard he’s dead. And you’re alive. His plan failed.”

  “You knew him?”

  Cynthia laughed. “We were e-mail buddies. He contacted me some time ago. Minimum-security prisoners have Internet access, you know. But it wouldn’t have stopped William even if he hadn’t.”

  “He would have bought the privileges,” Amanda concurred. “Did he buy you?”

  Was this one of the people who had been unable to refuse Weering’s parents’ guilt money? How else had she helped the madman, besides supplying him with information?

  Cynthia shook her head. “He didn’t need to buy me. I was happy to help. You’d hurt him, just like you’d hurt Evan when you left him.”

  “But you helped him? You supplied him with personal information on Evan, his private phone number, what he had discovered about his biological parents. You betrayed Evan. How could you, when you claim you love him?”

  “I do love him! I would never leave him. You don’t deserve him! I worried that he would change his mind if he saw you again. I figured you’d manipulate him just like you’ve done when you came back. Damn Royce Graham for finding you! It was better when you were gone.”

  The deranged woman drew a sharp brass letter opener from the holder on her desk. “So maybe you need to leave him again. As William had planned. Forever.”

  EVAN KILLED THE ENGINE on the Viper and drew a hand through his mussed hair. Betrayal by someone close was the most disheartening.

  His cell phone pressed to his ear, he waited for someone to answer at his house. Alarm churned in his stomach as it continued to ring.

  “Hello.” Lindsey’s breathless voice didn’t relieve his anxiety.

  “Everything okay?” Although Weering was dead, he’d learned from the D.A. that it wasn’t over. Not yet.

  “Yeah, just giving Christopher a piggyback ride. He’s a bit heavier than Serena, you know. He’s such a big boy he could probably give me one.”

  Christopher’s giggles rang out, softening Evan’s anxious heart. “Thanks, Lindsey.”

  “For what?”

  “For being a great aunt. How’s Amanda?”

  She sighed. “I guess that means she hasn’t found you yet.”

  “Found me?” He had expected she would be resting, exhausted from her horrifying ordeal. “She’s not in bed?”

  “Not yet. But I think she was hoping.”

  “What?”

  “She wanted to talk to you, knock some sense into your hard head.”

  “She’s out looking for me?” His anxiety increased, churning in his stomach as he glanced up at the converted warehouse that housed his office. Beyond the building, Grand Traverse Bay glittered with the reflection of the late-afternoon sun. And closer, parked just a few spaces over, was a familiar-looking beat-up van. He could almost read the painted-over letters of the florist who had owned the van before Amanda.

  “Yeah, she—”

  “Oh, my God!” He dropped the phone and threw open the door. Amanda had unsuspectingly gone right to Weering’s accomplice—the one Evan had learned about from talking to Sullivan. Last time he’d almost been too late. He hoped he wasn’t this time.

  Mere minutes later when he crashed through his office door, he found the two women together, Amanda’s arms locked around Cynthia’s and a letter opener lay on the floor.

  “She didn’t hurt you?” he asked, moving to help Amanda restrain William’s accomplice.

  Amanda shook her head, and his breath shuddered out in a ragged sigh. But from the wounded look of her wide green eyes, he determined something had hurt her. Then he glanced atop the desk at the divorce papers strewn across the surface.

  They didn’t speak again, not until the police had come, taken Cynthia awa
y and taken both their statements. Amanda stood near the windows, gazing out over the bay where the brilliant hues of a sunset turned to shadows on the surface of the water. Night was falling. Did she still fear the dark?

  “So that’s it?” she asked. “It’s over.”

  He nodded, knowing she could see his reflection in the darkening glass. “Pretty much. There was another accomplice on the boat who distracted the guards. And another who cut down the tree to barricade the road to the estate. Cynthia probably found them for Weering. She’ll reveal who they are.”

  Amanda sighed. “Yes, she will. She doesn’t care anymore, not now that she can’t have you.”

  He grimaced. “She never did have me. Never would.”

  “You didn’t see her that way.”

  He hadn’t ever seen anyone but Amanda that way, with the eyes of love. But he couldn’t tell her that now. He had to be strong enough to let her go, as he had originally intended. She had a life for herself. She would be safe now, safer without him in it.

  “So Mr. Sullivan will be all right? At least he wasn’t part of it, was he?” A thread of doubt crept into Amanda’s voice.

  “Yes, he’ll heal, but it’ll be a while. And no, he had no clue Weering had gotten in the car trunk while he was at the diner, meeting Cynthia. She had claimed to have information to help him. And she had enough information about Weering to entice him to meet her before picking you up.”

  “She really wanted me out of the way.”

  He said nothing, hating himself for not seeing that Cynthia’s interest in him was obsessive and that she had become dangerous.

  “But Cynthia wasn’t the only one.”

  “What?” Evan asked, confused.

  “You want me to sign these papers now?”

  “Amanda…”

  She turned from the window and walked toward the desk. After finding a pen, she held it over the documents. “It’s all over now, right? Weering’s gone. Cynthia arrested.”

  “Royce found links between Weering and the disappearances of those other women. And with the information you got him to reveal about the gravel-pit lake, we’ll find them. We’ll give those families some closure.”

  “Is that what this is, Evan?” She tapped the pen against the papers. “Closure. You could have divorced me without finding me. You needed to do it for closure? To end our lives together? If that’s what you want, I’ll sign right now.”

  He fought the urge to sweep the papers away. After what he’d done, killing Weering, how could she not see that he was dangerous? How could she not want to leave him? “I don’t blame you for wanting to sign.”

  “You think this is what I want?”

  “You left me once.”

  “Because I was young and stupid and at the mercy of pregnancy hormones before I ever knew I was pregnant.”

  “You remember?” Evan asked.

  “Everything. I didn’t know I was pregnant when I left. I just jumped to conclusions when you wanted a baby. I thought you thought something was missing from our marriage, that maybe we needed more love in it.”

  He couldn’t let her believe that, no matter what the future held. “That wasn’t it. It was because we had so much love that we had plenty to share.”

  “I realized that later, when I put my insecurities aside and stopped listening to my parents’ bad advice. I was coming back to you when Weering grabbed me.” Wincing, she squeezed her eyes shut, and he knew she remembered the rest of it. The attack.

  He stepped closer, reaching out to her before he caught himself, and his arms dropped back to his sides. He had no comfort to offer her.

  She opened her eyes, tears glistening in them. “And today, I realized I shouldn’t go. That I shouldn’t run away again. But by then, it was too late. Weering had already gotten inside the house.”

  “I’m sorry, Amanda.”

  “About what?” Her blond eyebrows knitted together. “If I hadn’t lied to you, if I hadn’t tried to leave, Weering never would have gotten in.”

  She snorted derisively. “Ironic, really. I was leaving in order to protect you and Christopher, but I put you in more danger. Every time I close my eyes I see you falling instead of him. It’ll haunt me, Evan.”

  She would haunt him if he let her just walk away again. “I killed him, Amanda. How can you forget that, even for a minute?” He wouldn’t be able to, ever. He had killed a man. Now he really knew what he was capable of, and so did she. He couldn’t expect her to stay.

  “You were fighting for your life. And mine. You had no choice.”

  “Amanda…”

  “It was him or you, Evan. You had to. It has nothing to do with what your biological father was. That man, his DNA, has nothing to do with you, with the good man you are today.”

  “Amanda, you don’t know that.”

  “And when you think about it, Christopher has those genes, too. Once you found out, you probably never intended to have a child, did you?”

  He winced, remembering the pain of his decision.

  “I remember everything, Evan. I remember how badly you wanted a child.” Her green eyes glittered with unshed tears. “And now you have one. Do you think Christopher is defective because he carries the same genetic material you do?”

  “No! Of course not. He’s a sweet little boy. Smart and loving…”

  “And you’re just going to let him go, so you what?—don’t contaminate him?”

  The way she said it made him sound foolish. Evan was never foolish. “It’s not that simple.”

  “No, it’s not. Life isn’t simple. We all have things that affect who we are. Things that have happened to us. Lack of love, nurturing.”

  He knew she remembered what Weering had told her about his childhood. And that she hurt for the child he’d been. Evan did, too. A child needed to be loved.

  Now that Christopher knew he had a father, it would hurt him to lose him. And it would hurt Evan more. “I will want to see Christopher, to build a relationship with him.”

  “And me? Do you want to see me? Or do you want to sever your relationship with me? If you want me to sign these papers, I will. But you better not be letting me go to save me from yourself. The only reason I’ll sign these papers is because you don’t love me anymore. Because I’ve broken your trust so many times that you can never love me again.”

  The pen shook in her trembling hand. “Do you want me to sign, Evan? Do you want me to leave again?”

  He took the pen from her and pitched it over his shoulder. Then he swept the papers from the desk. “No, Amanda. I can’t let you leave. Winter Falls is your home now. Surely you feel that it is?”

  More tears glistened in her eyes. “Home? I don’t know, Evan. I have nothing to compare it to. What makes a home a home?”

  “Friends.”

  He strode around the desk, coming up hard against her soft yielding body.

  She smiled and melted against him. “Sarah. Royce. Jeremy. Yes, I have friends now.”

  “Family.”

  “Lindsey. Dylan. Your mother that I can’t wait to meet. Yes, I have family now.”

  And he’d track down her mother and father, bring them back into her life from whatever ends of the world they were in now. If she stayed…

  “I know the house needs work.” He hadn’t built it with the idea of having a family but of always living alone.

  “I don’t know. The sun streams through it so beautifully…”

  But would she ever be able to live there without remembering Weering? “I have more land on the lake. We can build another. We can build a life together, Amanda.”

  “We already have a life together, Evan. A son together. And since we never used protection, maybe another on the way…”

  He, who was always so in control, never had it around her. While once it might have frightened him, he knew now that he would never hurt her…unless he let her go.

  Hope brightened her eyes, but she waited, fearful that he might still pull back. He wante
d to protect her from all her fears, and the only way he knew how was to face his own.

  “I love you, Amanda. I have always loved you, and I always will.”

  A sigh slipped through her lips, her breath fluttering against his throat. “Evan, I love you, too, so much. Always and forever.”

  When he reached for her, she stepped back with a teasing smile playing over her full lips. “Not yet, you have a piece of my jewelry I need back.”

  With a teasing smile of his own, he pulled the necklace from his pocket. “This?”

  The chain slid through her fingers and puddled on the floor. “I don’t care about my first name. I want my last back, Evan.”

  She attacked the buttons on his shirt, her palms sliding over his chest as she bared it. “Hmm…oh yeah, my ring. Where’s my ring?”

  He’d taken off the chain, no longer needing to remind himself of anything where Amanda was concerned. He’d already accepted that she hadn’t betrayed him. And he knew he’d never forget loving her.

  He reached inside his other pocket, pulling out the diamond. Despite the darkness descending on them, the ring gleamed like a beacon of light. Of hope.

  He lifted her hand from his chest, and as he slid the band onto her finger, he repeated his vows, “With this ring, I thee wed. I promise to love, honor and cherish you until death do us part.”

  A tear slid down Amanda’s cheek as she gazed down at the ring. He hoped happy tears.

  “I promise to love, honor and never forget you, Evan. And I hadn’t.” She pressed a hand to her heart. “Not here. Maybe my mind had hid the memories of you from me, but from the moment I opened my door to you in River City, my heart knew. I had never stopped loving you. The heart never forgets, Evan.”

  “No.” His hadn’t ever forgotten, ever stopped loving her, either. “The heart never forgets.” It held memories as clearly as the mind, maybe more clearly.

  How much of the horror of the last six years would live on with them in haunting memories? But it would only make them remember how very precious their love was. And they would never take their happiness for granted.