by Rita Herron
Her heartache over him had intensified each day they’d been apart.
His hand brushed her cheek, then he took her hand in his and kneeled on the floor.
“I love you, Charlotte. I hope you don’t mind the flowers, but I wanted to surprise you.”
Love mushroomed inside her. “You did.”
He slowly opened her palm, and she bit her bottom lip as she felt him place something inside.
“I’m not going away,” he said. “I want to marry you and have a family with you.”
She traced her fingers over the ring in her hand. An oval diamond, thin band with tiny stones inlaid in it. She imagined how it looked, but knew it didn’t matter.
It was beautiful because Lucas was giving it to her.
His breath quickened as he closed his hands around hers. “I’ve dreamed about holding you and kissing you again every night.” He brought her hands to his lips and kissed them. “Please say you want to be with me, too.”
She clung to his hand, then kneeled in front of him. “I love you, too, Lucas.” She looped her arms around his neck, then pressed a kiss to his lips. Her heart was bursting with happiness and love. “Yes, Lucas, I want to be your wife.”
He swept her into a kiss that made her tremble Then he slipped the ring on her finger and kissed her again.
A kiss that promised that nothing would ever tear them apart.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“You look beautiful,” Honey said, a note of wistfulness in her voice as she dabbed blush on Charlotte’s cheeks.
“Thanks, Honey.” She squeezed her friend’s hand. “And thanks for helping me with my makeup.”
“Not that you need anything,” Honey said. “You have gorgeous skin.”
Charlotte bit back that inner voice reminding her that it hadn’t always been that way. She was grateful to the plastic surgeon who’d donated her time to repair Charlotte’s birthmark at no cost.
Honey hesitated, and Charlotte imagined a tiny frown crinkling between her eyes. “Are you okay? Nervous?”
Charlotte shook her head. “No, sorry, sometimes the ghosts come back to haunt me.”
Honey adjusted Charlotte’s veil. “No ghosts today. Only happy thoughts.”
“I am happy,” Charlotte admitted. Even if she couldn’t see her reflection in the mirror, she felt beautiful.
Lucas had given her that gift. As much as she wanted to see his face when she walked down the aisle, she’d learned to feel things with her other senses. She heard the love in his voice when he spoke to her, felt it in his touch, knew it in her heart.
“I wish I could see what you look like today,” Charlotte said with a smile. “Your baby bump is growing.”
“So are my boobs,” Honey said with a laugh. “But Harrison doesn’t seem to mind that.”
They laughed together, then Honey took Charlotte’s hand and she stood.
“Lucas is a lucky man,” Honey said.
“I’m the lucky one.”
Honey gently touched the end of Charlotte’s hair, where she’d curled it around Charlotte’s shoulders. “You’re both lucky so don’t sell yourself short, Charlotte. He needs you. I’ve seen it in his eyes. Those weeks you were gone, he was lost.”
So was I.
But they’d found each other and she didn’t intend to let go for a second.
Honey took her hand and guided her outside the big farmhouse. Giggles and whispers from the girls echoed in the background, blending with the guitar music. Finding out that Dexter played had been a surprise.
Having Adrian, Agnes, Evie and Mae Lynn, who was flourishing at Hawk’s Landing, present was the icing on the cake.
“Deputy Bronson is here with Haley,” Honey said. “I think they may be getting married next.”
Charlotte smiled to herself. Since her hospital stay, she and Haley and Honey had become close friends. Rebecca, her vision therapist, had joined them for their weekly girls’ night out.
The guitar music strummed softly in the background, and Harrison’s gruff voice whispered her name as he stepped up to walk her down the aisle.
“It’s gorgeous here,” Honey said. “The fall colors are in full bloom. We made an aisle for you with white chairs decorated in rose petals on the ground. Roses are everywhere, too, just like Lucas requested.”
Roses reminded her of the night he’d proposed. Of the moment she realized she couldn’t live without him.
“Lucas is a jittery mess,” Harrison murmured as they started down the aisle. “He’s still afraid he dreamed that you said yes.”
A smile filled Charlotte’s heart. Harrison walked slowly, careful to keep pace with her, but she could have walked the aisle by herself. Her pull to Lucas was that strong.
Harrison paused, and Charlotte inhaled Lucas’s masculine scent. Lucas cradled her hand in his and she squeezed his, silently telling him how happy she was.
The reverend cleared his throat and began the ceremony.
His words faded though as she turned to face her groom. The power of Lucas’s love bloomed deep within her, healing hurts and pains with its sweet intensity.
She not only felt safe at Hawk’s Landing, but she also felt honored to have found this man.
Suddenly a quick pain flashed behind her eyes. Then light.
She tensed, dizzy for a second.
“Charlotte?” Lucas’s concern resonated in his voice.
She blinked, then slowly colors began to slip into place. A sea of yellow, the moon, the reds and oranges of the leaves, the soft pinks of the roses, then... Lucas’s face.
Lucas cupped her face between his hands. “Charlotte, honey, what’s wrong?” She couldn’t speak. She was mesmerized by the chiseled shape of his face, by his strong jaw, by the deep brown of his eyes as he looked into hers.
Time stood still. The wind sifted through the trees, creating its own music. Moonlight glimmered off his face.
“Charlotte, talk to me, honey,” he murmured.
She lifted her hands and traced his jaw with her fingers. “I can see you, Lucas. I can see your eyes and that tiny scar on your forehead and that mouth that drives me wild.”
A slow smile spread on Lucas’s face as the truth dawned. Then he swept her in his arms and swung her around.
No one in the crowd understood what had happened yet, but they cheered and clapped.
Charlotte wrapped her arms around her husband and sealed their vows with a kiss.
Blue had always been her favorite color, but now brown had replaced it—the brown of Lucas’s eyes because they were the color of love.
* * * * *
Look for the next book in USA TODAY
bestselling author Rita Herron’s
BADGE OF JUSTICE miniseries
later in 2018.
And don’t miss the previous title in the
BADGE OF JUSTICE series:
REDEMPTION AT HAWK’S LANDING
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SPECIAL EXCERPT FROM
FBI Agents Macey Night and Bowen Murphy
are on the hunt for a vigilante killer, but will the
dark attraction that burns between them
jeopardize their mission...and their lives?
Read on for a sneak preview of
INTO THE NIGHT,
the next book in the KILLER INSTINCT series
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Cynthia Eden.
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Into the Night
by Cynthia Eden
THE LIGHT WAS in her eyes, blinding her. Macey Night couldn’t see past that too-bright light. She was strapped onto the operating-room table, but it wasn’t the straps that held her immobile.
He’d drugged her.
“I could stare into your eyes forever.” His rumbling voice came from behind the light. “So unusual, but then, you realize just how special you are, right, Dr. Night?”
She couldn’t talk. He’d gagged her. They were in the basement of the hospital, in a wing that hadn’t been used for years. Or at least, she’d thought it hadn’t been used. She’d been wrong. About so many things.
“Red hair is always rare, but to find a redhead with heterochromia...it’s like I hit the jackpot.”
A tear leaked from her eye.
“Don’t worry. I’ve made sure that you will feel everything that happens to you. I just—well, the drugs were to make sure that you wouldn’t fight back. That’s all. Not to impair the experience for you. Fighting back just ruins everything. I know what I’m talking about, believe me.” He sighed. “I had a few patients early on—they were special like you. Well, not quite like you, but I think you get the idea. They fought and things got messy.”
A whimper sounded behind her gag because he’d just taken his scalpel and cut her on the left arm, a long, slow slice from her inner wrist all the way up to her elbow.
“How was that?” he asked her. His voice was low, deep.
Nausea rolled in her stomach. Nausea from fear, from the drugs, from the absolute horror of realizing she’d been working with a monster and she hadn’t even realized it. Day in and day out, he’d been at her side. She’d even thought about dating him. Thought about having sex with him. After all, Daniel Haddox was the most respected doctor at the hospital. At thirty-five, he’d already made a name for himself. He was the best surgeon at Hartford General Hospital, everyone said so.
He was also, apparently, a sadistic serial killer.
And she was his current victim.
All because I have two different-colored eyes. Two fucking different colors.
“I’ll start slowly, just so you know what’s going to happen.” He’d moved around the table, going to her right side now. “I keep my slices light at first. I like to see how the patient reacts to the pain stimulus.”
I’m not a patient! Nothing is wrong with me! Stop! Stop!
But he’d sliced her again. A mirror image of the wound he’d given her before, a slice on her right arm that began at her inner wrist and slid all the way up to her elbow.
“Later, the slices will get deeper. I have a gift with the scalpel, haven’t you heard?” He laughed—it was a laugh that she knew too many women had found arousing. Dr. Haddox was attractive, with black hair and gleaming blue eyes. He had perfect white teeth, and the kind of easy, good-looking features that only aged well.
Doesn’t matter what he looks like on the outside. He’s a monster.
“Every time I work on a patient, I wonder...what is it like without the anesthesia?”
Sick freak.
“But not just any patient works for me. I need the special ones.” He moved toward her face and she knew he was going to slice her again. He lifted the scalpel and pressed it to her cheek.
The fingers on her right hand jerked.
Wait—did I do that? Had her hand jerked just because of some reflex or were the drugs wearing off? He’d drugged her when she’d first walked into the basement with him. Then he’d undressed her, put her on the operating table and strapped her down. But before he could touch her any more, he’d been called away. The guy had gotten a text and rushed off—to surgery. To save a patient. She wasn’t even sure how long he’d been gone. She’d been trapped on that operating table, staring up at the bright light the whole time he’d been gone. In her mind, she’d been screaming again and again for help that never came.
“You and I are going to have so much fun, and those beautiful eyes of yours will show me everything that you feel.” He paused. “I’ll be taking those eyes before I’m done.”
Her right hand moved again. She’d made it move. The drugs he’d given her were wearing off. His mistake. She often responded in unusual ways to medicine. Hell, that was one of the reasons she’d gone into medicine in the first place. When she was six, she’d almost died after taking an over-the-counter children’s pain medication. Her body processed medicines differently. She’d wanted to know why. Wanted to know how to predict who would have adverse reactions after she’d gone into cardiac arrest from a simple aspirin.
It’s not just my eyes that are different. I’m different.
But her mother...her mother had been the main reason for her drive to enter the field of medicine. Macey had been forced to watch—helplessly—as cancer destroyed her beautiful mother. She’d wanted to make a change after her mother’s death. She’d wanted to help people.
I never wanted to die like this!
But now she could move her left hand. Daniel wasn’t paying any attention to her fingers, though. He was holding that scalpel right beneath her eye and staring down at her. She couldn’t see his face. He was just a blur of dots—courtesy of that bright light.
She twisted her right hand and caught the edge of the strap. She began to slide her hand loose.
“The eyes will be last,” he told her as if he’d just come to some major decision. “I’ve got to explore every inch of you to see why you’re different. It’s for the good of science. It’s always for the good. For the betterment of mankind, a few have to suffer.” He made a faint hmm sound. “Though I wonder about you...about us. With your mind...maybe...maybe we could have worked together.”
And maybe he was insane. No, there wasn’t any maybe about that. She’d gotten her right hand free, and her left was working diligently on the strap. Her legs were still secured, so she wasn’t going to be able to just jump off the table. Macey wasn’t even sure if her legs would hold her. The drug was still in her body, but it was fading fast.
“But you aren’t like that, are you, Dr. Night?” Now his voice had turned hard. “I watched you. Followed you. Kept my gaze on you when you thought no one was looking.”
She’d felt hunted for days, for weeks, but she’d tried to tell herself she was just being silly. She worked a lot, and the stress of the job had been making her imagine things. She was in her final few weeks of residency work, and everyone knew those hours were killer.
Only in her case, they literally were.
“You don’t get that we can’t always save every patient. Sometimes, the patients die and it is a learning experience for everyone.”
Bullshit. He was just trying to justify his insanity.
“You see things in black-and-white. They’re not like that, though. The world is full
of gray.” He moved the scalpel away from her cheek...only to slice into her shoulder. “And red. Lots and lots of red—”
She grabbed the scalpel from him. Because he wasn’t expecting her attack, she ripped it right from his fingers, and then she shoved it into his chest as deep and as hard as she could.
Daniel staggered back. Macey shot up, then nearly fell off the table because her legs were still strapped and her body was shaking. She yanked at the straps, jerking frantically against them as she heard him moaning on the floor.
The straps gave way. She sprang off the table and immediately collapsed. She fell onto Daniel—and the weight of her body drove the scalpel even deeper into him.
“You...bitch...”
“You bastard,” she whispered right back. Then she was heaving off him. Her blood was dripping from her wounds and she crawled to the door. He grabbed her ankle, but she kicked back, slamming her foot into his face, and Macey heard the satisfying crunch as she broke his nose.
He wasn’t so perfect any longer.
“Macey!”
She yanked open the door. Her legs felt stronger. Or maybe adrenaline was just making her stronger. She ran out of the small room and down the hallway. He was going to come after her. She knew it. She needed help. She needed it fast. There were no security monitors on that hallway. No cameras to watch her. No help for her.
Her breath heaved out and her blood splattered onto the floor. She didn’t look back, too terrified that she’d see Daniel closing in on her. The elevator was up ahead. She hit the button, smearing it with her blood. She waited and waited and—
Ding. The doors slid open. She fell inside and whipped around.
Daniel was coming after her. He still had the scalpel in his chest. Because he’s a freaking doctor. He knows that if he pulls it out, he’s done. He’ll have massive blood loss right away. But the longer that scalpel stays in...
It gave him the chance to come for her.
His lips were twisted in a snarl as he lunged for the doors.
She slapped the button to close the elevator, again and again and again, and the doors closed.
