Hostage Heart

by Renee Roszel

  Lifting a sandy brow, he quipped, “Right, and you also didn’t remember I work for Science and Engineering Magazine, and that we met four years ago when I was covering that fusion conference in Chicago. Besides”—his eyes narrowed as he peered closely at her—“I’ve found that letting you know I’m coming doesn’t insure a warm welcome.”

  She could feel her nails cutting into her palms with his sarcastic reminder that he knew she had run to Berlin to avoid his last announced visit. Counting slowly to ten, a difficult control-gathering exercise considering her present mental state, she managed to remain civil. “Actually, Jim, I just didn’t think. I’ve had my mind on other things.” She let it drop. She wasn’t required to explain her actions to Jim, and she just didn’t feel up to an argument.

  He put an elbow on the table and toyed with one of the marks Rolf had left. “No doubt. An international celebrity like you has probably got fan mail to answer, speaking engagements. Hell, sugar, you’ve really come up in the world since we split!”

  Drew fought a crazy urge to smile at the irony of his remark. She wanted to say that she had nowhere to go but up after leaving him, but she restrained herself. “That’s all pretty much died down now.” Shifting uneasily, she mused that soon the news of Rolf’s defection must come out, and if a connection were made between them, it all might be stirred up again. She added, “Besides, it’s all over and best forgotten.” Her thoughts took her a step further. Like our marriage!

  “If that’s the way you feel,” he winked, “but if it were me, I’d milk it for all it’s worth!”

  Drew let out a slow breath rather than answer. Jim hadn’t changed at all—he was thirty, still going on thirteen.

  “Well, I hate to leave so soon, sweets, but I’ve got to go. Covering a swank cocktail party this afternoon.” He paused and looked pointedly at her. “Will you be there?”

  He meant, of course, the welcoming party for the delegates at the Hotel Alois Lang, which had been booked entirely by the convention to handle their conference activities. Drew’s mind raced toward an escape. She had planned to be at the party, but now with both Jim and Rolf in Oberammergau, and most likely in attendance there, she cringed at the thought of going.

  “No. No, Jim. I don’t believe so.”

  He shook his blond head and made a clucking sound with his tongue. “Too bad. Well, no problem. We’ve got plenty of time to get together during the next couple of weeks.” He tossed the last over his shoulder as he left, “I’ll catch ya later. . .when we can have more privacy.”

  Drew bit her lip. She had no intention of “getting together” with Jim Pollard ever again, in public or private! She hated the thought of spending two weeks at the conference avoiding him. And then there was Rolf, he could very easily decide to remain at the conference for the entire time. After all, as one of the world’s leading authorities on fusion reactors, he would be a sought-after celebrity.

  She ran a hand across her forehead, pressing her lips tightly together, the only visible sign of her inner turmoil. Within just a few moments, she had been presented not only with an all-too-friendly ex-husband who seemed perfectly contented with the idea of getting back into a husbandly role, but also a real husband, however temporary, who seemed more than willing to be nothing more than a casual acquaintance!

  After some moments, her emotions still in a disheveled heap, she stood up from the table feeling numb and walked on leaden feet out of the small weinstube.

  She wandered aimlessly along the narrow lanes of the picturesque village for several hours. To others, Drew appeared merely to be window-shopping, yet inwardly she was anything but placid as her mind conjured up scowling visions of Rolf that changed, melted into Jim’s lighter, leering image. . .and back again to Rolf. Though in different ways, thoughts of both men were equally disquieting in their effect on her. More than anything she wanted to catch the first flight back to the States. But she discarded that thought immediately. Obviously, running away was not the answer. Jim still refused to believe that it was over between them. Besides, she was here at the conference, not only as her father’s assistant, keeping report paraphernalia organized for him, but also to cover the conference for the Scientific Monthly. She looked down at her watch—nearly six o’clock—time to get ready for the opening dinner. She must attend. It would not do to behave like a frightened little girl, always running away from her problems. She had to face things as they were, the reality of Rolf’s rejection as well as Jim’s unwelcome interest. And she had to handle things as an adult—talk it out with Jim, and then go on with her life as best she could. And her life at this moment required her to be at the fusion conference’s opening dinner.

  Sighing, she entered the quaint Gasthaus where she and her father had acquired rooms, and trudged tiredly up the central staircase shrugging off her down-filled bubble jacket. Rummaging in her bag for her room key, she walked to her door. Unlocking it, she entered, stopping short. She was not alone.

  “Jim!” It was a surprised gasp. “How did you get in here?” Her jacket slipped unnoticed from her fingers to fall to the polished pine floor.

  As he slid off the bed, carefully balancing a full high-ball glass in one hand, Drew leaned back against the door, unconsciously wanting to put distance between them.

  “Hi, sugar.” His smile was confident. “Said I’d see you later.” He raised his glass in a salute. “Let me fix my pretty lady a drink.” Gesturing toward the half-empty bottle of rye on the dresser he went on, “You’re behind.”

  Drew’s chest rose and fell in her agitation. Ignoring his drink-lightened banter she retorted resentfully, “Jim!” Her voice rose with the angry color in her cheeks. “I asked you how you got into my room?”

  He gave her a smirking look. “It’s not hard for ‘Mr. James Pollard’ to get a key to ‘Mrs. James Pollard’s’ room, sweets. Just told ’em I’d arrived on a later plane ’cause of business delays.” Nodding sagely, he went on. “Seeing that you’d registered as my wife was the best news I’ve had in a coon’s age!”

  His features creased into deep dimples as he walked toward her, taking a swallow of his drink. “Tells me a lot about how you feel.”

  Not wanting to be trapped against the door, Drew moved away, circling into the room’s center, near the foot of the bed.

  “Don’t be absurd, Jim!” It was a rasped, irritated whisper.

  He cocked his head. “What’s absurd? You’ve had a year to get that passport changed. You may say we’re through”—his wink was as wicked as his leer—“but your actions, or lack of them, speak pretty loudly too, and they say you want me back.”

  She closed her eyes in exasperation, irked by his unbounded conceit. Before her fateful trip to Berlin, she’d never given her passport a second thought, and was forced to travel under her married name, having had no time to get it changed. But as it happened, the name “Pollard” had proven to be a blessing of sorts, disguising her relationship to Dr. Drew McKenna. . .to all but one.

  Since her return, she had purposely hesitated having her passport changed. Certainly not for Jim’s reason! She knew that the last person on earth she wanted a relationship with was her ex-husband! But since becoming Mrs. Rolf Erhardt, she had hesitated officially becoming Drew McKenna again. At the time she had refused to analyze this lack of logic, but now she knew why. She had wanted to be able to change her passport to read “Mrs. Rolf Erhardt.” She had wanted their marriage to be real, lasting. . .but after her encounter with Rolf in the weinstube, she had been forced to see that that hope had been a flight of fantasy all her own, a completely one-sided desire. Dejectedly, she realized that she would never be Mrs. Rolf Erhardt, not in any real sense of the title—not a woman loved enough by a man to give her his name forever.

  Her mind caught on the fact that Jim was still talking, his words now slightly louder as he rambled on. “The way I figure it, sweets, we could use these two weeks to get reacquainted, sorta’ like a second honeymoon.” He emphasized the last word
and reached out, touching Drew’s cheek with the knuckles of his hand, fisted about his glass.

  He was very drunk, she could tell, remembering all too well how he was when he’d been drinking, a little too loud, and a lot too confident! To anyone who didn’t know him well, he appeared to be completely sober, a man who could hold his liquor. But Drew knew better. She knew when he drank, his temper became thin-walled, and expanded like a balloon, easily pricked by opposition, exploding into violence.

  She stiffened, backing away from his unwanted touch. “Jim,” she started nervously, “please understand. There’s just no us anymore—and there never will be again. It’s over. We’re not married.” She gulped as the last slid out quietly, her heart hammering heavily as his face darkened in an ominous frown.

  “There’s where you’re wrong, sweets.” Cold dread stabbed through her midsection at his icy tone as he slowly ground out his words. “I figure I’ve been pretty patient, letting you run home to Papa and pout.” He took a step forward, swallowing heavily on his drink. “And letting you get that damn divorce!” He growled the words, gesturing broadly, sloshing rye on the colorful braided rug that brightened and warmed the rustic room. “Then you ran like a scared rabbit when I came to get you.” Green eyes narrowed between sandy-brown lashes. “But hell, Drew! I figured by now you’d know that no stupid piece of paper can take you away from me!”

  Taking a final swallow, he slammed his glass heavily down on the nearby dressing table, the ice landing and settling with a loud clatter, like an earthquake’s aftershock, startling Drew jarringly in the room’s foreboding quiet.

  “You’re mine, Drew”—it was an ugly snarl—“and you’re gonna stay mine.”

  He grasped her arms with fists of cold granite, the one that had held the glass burning icily against her skin.

  “No!” she cried, as raw terror slithered up her spine.

  The balloon had burst. There was no reasoning with him now. It would do no good to bring up old wounds. All the other women he had flaunted in her face, nurturing his macho ego, while at the same time, in unreasoning jealousy, he had condemned every innocent encounter she had with men—and then the final straw, when he knocked her to the floor in a drunken, possessive rage!

  “No!” she repeated in a flat, fearful breath. Her only thought now was to escape, to get away.

  Placing her hands, fingers spread against his barrel chest, she pleaded, “Jim, let me go! This is no good!”

  His lips peeled away from his teeth in a sneer. “The hell it isn’t.” He snorted, “I’m gonna prove to you once and for all that you belong to me. You’re mine. . .and I’m not about to let you forget it!”

  “Jim—I—I. . .don’t,” she gasped in a pain-filled whimper, as his hands bit mercilessly into her arms. “I don’t belong to you. You’re not thinking clearly.”

  She suddenly staggered back as Jim’s hand struck her savagely across the mouth.

  “Shut up, you damn tease!” he hissed, his eyes strange, wild. “I’m thinking clearer than I have in a long time!”

  She stumbled back, the force of the staggering blow spinning her away from him. Stunned, unable to speak, she ran an unsteady hand across her throbbing lip. It felt damp, sticky. She licked it as her vision cleared, and then scanned the room in panic, locking her eyes on the door—and her only route to freedom! She knew that Jim was bent on hurting her now, and her sense of self-preservation told her that she must get away, and quickly.

  An uncomfortable unease prickled her flesh as she realized how silent the room was. She gulped, not knowing what Jim was planning. Her throat was dry with apprehension, and what was worse, her legs wouldn’t move, wouldn’t respond to her mental command to run! She suddenly understood the reality and total helplessness of being paralyzed with fear.

  Before she could make her traumatized body respond to her shock-dulled mind, she felt a sharp jerk on her hair, pulling her head painfully back, and forcing her to stare up into Jim’s sneering face.

  He spat out, “Listen to me, Drew, and listen good.” His liquor-coated breath turned her stomach. “I do own you! You became my property when you promised to honor and obey me.” His features were twisted into a vicious mask, an evil caricature of a man. Yet, it was the identical expression she remembered from the night she had run away from him, numbed, bruised, and fearing for her life.

  Once again she was in his power. And once again he was capable of harming her to get his way, and her blood ran cold with terror.

  He raged on angrily, “What the hell do I care about some slip of paper saying you divorced me? That was your idea, not mine. . .and as far as I’m concerned, it doesn’t exist!”

  He grasped her arm with his free hand and jerked her to face him as he pulled his face into a taunting smile. “Don’t be such a cold fish, baby.” His lids lowered as his hungry gaze dropped to pass slowly across her heaving breasts, partly exposed at her open shirt-neck as he held her in the twisted position. “Guess ol’ Jimmy’ll have to warm you up.”

  She was revolted to be held so closely in his rough grasp. Her neck ached sharply from being pulled so far back. “Jim. . .” It was a faint squeak, and she closed her eyes to block out his crazed face. “You—you need professional help. This—this isn’t right, it’s not nor-mal.”

  Her desperate attempt to talk rationally to him was stifled as he lowered his broad lips to hers, muttering, “Shut up!” He devoured her mouth with moist zeal. It was a sour, offensive kiss, making Drew’s stomach churn in disgust. She hammered her fists against his chest and tried to turn her face away. But he tightened the hurtful grip on her hair as his groping mouth held hers in agonizing imprisonment. To Drew, his unwanted embrace was like being wrapped tightly in a hot, damp blanket on a muggy day, stifling and afflictive. In desperation, she raised a hand to his face and slapped him hard.

  Abruptly pulling his lips from hers, his eyes sparking angrily, he hissed, “So you want it rough!” His mouth twisted into a misshapen smile as he dragged her toward the bed, his hand still clutching the mass of tawny hair at her crown.

  She was flung roughly on the brightly colored quilt spread. An instant later, Jim’s bulk landed heavily on top of her, knocking the breath achingly from her lungs.

  “N-no—Jim. . .you. . .can’t. . . .” she choked out with tremendous effort.

  “The hell I can’t! I’ve waited a long time for this!”

  He fumbled with the top button of her blouse with one hand, while the other searched intimately beneath her pleated skirt and up the inside of her thigh.

  Shuddering with revulsion, she tossed her head convulsively, catching her lips between her teeth. Her mind was on fire, terrified by the realization that Jim would resort to criminal rape to have his way with her!

  At that instant, her eyes fell on a heavy crystal ashtray on the bedside table. Without hesitation, she flung her hand out, grasping at it in reckless abandon. Jim had opened the front of her blouse and moved his clammy hand inside to cup a breast, his breathing now heavy with desire. As he lowered his lips to the soft rise of flesh, the moan that escaped his throat began as lustful anticipation, but ended in surprised disbelief as Drew hit him sharply on the forehead with the heavy piece of leaded crystal.

  He went limp over her, and Drew gasped, horrified, and lay in shocked stillness beneath him a moment before she was startled into action as the ashtray dropped from her fingers and landed with a loud thud on the floor beside the bed.

  Pushing frantically at his prostrate form, she squirmed free of his cloying, sweaty warmth and rose weakly to stand at the edge of the bed. Tentatively, she lifted his wrist, feeling his pulse. It was strong; he was just stunned.

  He groaned. Wild alarm stampeded through every fiber of Drew’s body and she dropped his hand as though it had been red hot. She had no intention of being there when he regained consciousness!

  Pulling her blouse together with trembling fingers, she dashed from the small room, running full-tilt down the curved sta
ircase to the rustic lobby and through the nearly empty Wohnzimmer—a sitting room—where a cozy fire blazed in a smoky, ancient stone hearth.

  The small scholarly group of guests sitting in casual camaraderie around the fire, started at her rash intrusion, and stared curiously after her as she fled the warmth of the old-fashioned Gasthaus and ran instead out into the growing chill of an early spring evening. . . without even a coat.

  Chapter Eight

  Dorfstrasse 48.

  Drew hugged herself, rubbing icy hands along her bare arms, suddenly aware of the encompassing chill. . . and of where she was!

  In a daze of panic she had run from Jim’s punishing advances, away from him, the room, and the Gasthaus. At the time, she had let her tormented body move her onward, getting her instinctively away from the immediate danger. But now her rational mind had taken control, and she was appalled to realize where she had run: Dorfstrasse 48. Rolf’s address.

  What irony that her mind, hearing the number only once, would cling to the memory of it like an emotional lifeline, and then, unconsciously, even in these strange surroundings, take her directly there!

  She was standing, shivering from the rapidly dropping temperature on the low curb fronting the charming, Bavarian country house. In the growing dusk she scanned its outline. The low-pitched roof was decorated with a little belfry, and at regular intervals along the wooden-shingled roof were blocks of stone.

  A long balcony ran the length of the upper story, with two multipaned doors leading out onto it. There were six small windows on each story fronting the house. Their colorful shutters were flung wide revealing the lower floor lit from within with a flickering glow. And three of the windows above were flushed with a brighter, steadier light. Rolf was, no doubt, at home.

  She gritted her teeth, angry with herself. This was insane! He had made it clear that he wanted nothing more to do with her. . .except in the most godforsaken, barren way. Why couldn’t she accept that and stay away from him? She shook her head, sighing heavily. Lowering her eyes from the closed, blank door, she turned away.