Harlequin Superromance May 2016 Box Set

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “But...”

  “I need this, Jem,” she said. That look of hers...it sank into him. As deep as he went. “I need you to call the police. For me. That way if she does try to threaten my career, I’ll have the means to protect myself.”

  “She could go to jail...”

  “If she does, it would only be for one night.”

  And that one night would unleash a hurricane...

  “You don’t understand, Lacey.”

  “I do understand, Jem. And I’m telling you. This isn’t negotiable. I need you to call the police, or I have to end my association with you.”

  “You’re threatening me.” Tressa was a master at it.

  “No, I’m telling you you’ve put me in a position where I have to make a choice. If you can’t stand behind me, protect me, then I have to go.”

  One thing he’d learned, well, at the hands of his sister and Tressa, was that the minute he gave in to a threat, he gave up himself. He pulled his keys out of his pocket.

  “Take my truck. I’ll be by for it in the morning.”

  He expected her to pretend to go. Even to collect her purse and head out the door. When his truck started, he gave her marks for trying.

  It wasn’t until his truck had been gone for more than an hour that he realized the truth. She wasn’t coming back.

  * * *

  LACEY HAD THREE weeks of vacation coming to her. On Sunday, when she was already on her way to Beverly Hills, she made an emergency call to arrange to have the next week off. She’d had to get out of town and home to Kacey. Had to have some distance from the worst night of her life. To figure out where to find the rest of her life.

  She knew she was running and admitted it fully. To herself. To Kacey.

  Her sister, for once, didn’t tell Lacey to look on the bright side. Her words “He actually chose to put her first over you?” still rang in Lacey’s mind.

  She wasn’t overreacting, or feeling sorry for herself. Living in the past, or being paranoid. She was facing the truth.

  Jem had put Tressa’s needs over hers. And his own.

  “I know why,” she told Kacey later that night as the sisters sat on Kacey’s balcony with a bottle of wine on the table between them. “It’s because I don’t make waves. I get mad, but I get over it. And everyone who knows me knows that.”

  Kacey’s silence didn’t hit her at first. Until it hung there, between them, for more than five minutes. She glanced over to see tears sliding slowly down her twin’s face.

  “What? Oh, my gosh, Kacey, are you in pain? What’s going on?”

  Shaking her head, Kacey looked over at her. “You’re right.”

  “What? That you’re hurt?” Ready to call an ambulance, she knelt at Kacey’s feet. She couldn’t lose her. Kacey was her rock. Her foundation. Her...other self.

  “Don’t you dare kneel at my feet,” Kacey said, pulling Lacey up and directing her back to her chair. She knelt then, at Lacey’s feet. “You’re right that you’re easy to disappoint, Lacey. To take advantage of. Because your mad is so...not ugly. You get quiet. That’s it. And then you get over it and life goes on. That’s why you got passed over and I got chosen, don’t you see? Even with Mom and Dad. Because I made a stink. I made noise. I made it hard for people to pass me up.”

  “So what are you saying? That I should make more of a stink?”

  “No! I think you’re perfect.” Kacey ran a hand along Lacey’s cheek and Lacey turned her head, placing her lips in her sister’s palm. “Don’t ever change,” Kacey said. “The world needs more yous. More kindness. Understanding. More selflessness. And the rest of us...we need to protect you from our own selfishness.”

  She was talking nonsense, of course. And yet...her words struck a chord. Hadn’t she had a similar thought about Jem? About Tressa taking advantage of his goodness?

  Tressa the noisemaker, the one who would create hell if she didn’t get her way. While Lacey...she’d understand. Be steadfast in her kindness. Get quiet. And get over it.

  Except that she hadn’t.

  She’d gotten out. For the first time in her life.

  She walked out on the one person who truly loved her above all others. Forever. When he’d needed her most.

  * * *

  JEM DIDN’T CALL Tressa Sunday morning. He called Lacey. And when she didn’t answer, he went by her house. His truck was out front right where he’d told her to leave it. He’d told her he’d bring a second set of keys when he came to pick it up.

  He pretended that all was well. With Levi by his side, he mudded Lacey’s birthday-gift room. She’d be back. She was as steadfast as the sun that set each night. And when she showed up, he’d be there.

  He had a key to her home, just like she had a key to his.

  He cooked dinner from the leftovers in her fridge and put his son into her bed. And sometime after midnight, he joined him there.

  Tressa had left sixteen voice-mail messages and sent him eighty-two texts. He didn’t respond to any of them.

  On Monday morning, after dropping Levi at day care, but before going to work, he called Kacey. And almost dropped the phone in relief when she answered. She was still talking to him.

  Boy, was she talking to him.

  She told him, in no uncertain terms, that he didn’t deserve her sister. And that Lacey had taken a week’s vacation. He was told to leave her alone.

  He knew, in Lacey’s world, exactly what that meant. Leave her alone. Do not call her. Do not attempt to see her. Or to contact her in any way.

  To do otherwise could mean a restraining order.

  On Monday, Tressa left fourteen voice mails. And sent ninety texts. He spent Monday night in Lacey’s bed again. Levi slept in Kacey’s room.

  On Tuesday, Jem dropped Levi off at preschool and went to see Sydney. They talked for a long time. When he left her office, he had a name: Brett Ackerman, the founder of a local shelter for abused women. A man who’d been a victim of domestic violence himself.

  He and Levi had dinner with Brett and his wife, Ella, while their infant child slept in a bassinet nearby. In a few short hours his life changed forever.

  He saw himself, a young self, in some of the childhood feelings Brett described. He heard Lacey in Ella’s words.

  He spent Tuesday night in Lacey’s bed, with Levi right there beside him.

  On Wednesday, right after he dropped Levi at day care—with a request to Mara, who’d always had a special affinity with Levi, to keep his son close to her that day—Jem called the police. He called victim witness—a public service that provided support for victims of domestic violence who needed to obtain restraining orders. And he went to court.

  By Wednesday night, he had a restraining order against Tressa Bridges, with Levi as a named victim. He spent Wednesday night at home in his own bed.

  He woke Sunday morning to banging on his front door. Gut instantly tight, he flew out of bed.

  It took him a second to realize that it couldn’t be his ex-wife. She’d had a visit from the police the day before, telling her she’d go to jail if she came within twenty-five feet of either Jem or Levi, their home or any of their property. The one thing Tressa feared, more than anything else, was going to jail.

  Hoping to God it was Lacey, breaking out of her shell and that eager to see him—maybe having heard from Sydney that he’d finally seen the light and done the right thing—he raced down the hall in his cotton pajama bottoms.

  Sometime in the few seconds it had taken him to get from hall to front door, he’d realized that if Lacey was pounding on his door, the news wouldn’t be good.

  More likely it was the cops....

  The banging was still happening as he yanked the door open.

  “Jem, let me in! Quick!” Tressa stood there, sweaty and dishe
veled, talking in a hushed tone.

  But banging loudly on the door?

  He looked for her car, but didn’t see it.

  “What’s wrong? Where’s your car? Were you in an accident?” Their history didn’t matter. If she was in danger, he had to help her.

  “No! Let me in!”

  “Tell me what’s wrong.”

  “I just needed to see you. And Levi. Amelia’s at church, and I only have a little bit of time. She’s going to leave me if I contact you, but this is you and me. Nothing and no one keeps us apart, right?”

  What the hell was she talking about? After all of this?

  “No, Tressa. You aren’t right. Do you get that? You are legally banned from seeing your own son.”

  “You bastard! How dare you say such a thing to me?”

  “Because it’s true. And you know it’s true. You also know that up until now I understood you enough to let it all go. But no more, Tressa. Get this very clearly. No. More.”

  He didn’t raise his voice. Didn’t need to.

  He just calmly closed the door, found his cell phone and dialed 9-1-1.

  * * *

  THE POLICE DISPATCHER took his call, holding him on the line until a cruiser made it to his residence. When they pulled up in two cars, one right after the other, Tressa, damn her, was still out there, alternating between begging him and cursing him. Demanding to be let in. Interspersed with threats of how she was going to make him pay.

  An hour later, the police called back to let him know that she was going to be held in custody, at least overnight. By that time he and Levi were showered and dressed.

  The officer wanted to know if he wanted to press charges. He didn’t want to, but he did so. He trusted that with time, and the counseling Brett had recommended, his guilt over that would ease.

  By lunchtime that same day, the day Lacey, hopefully, would be returning home, the day before she was due back at work, Jem put the finishing touches on her dream room. With his son’s hand in his, he took a last look around, put a couple of toothbrushes in his tool bag, left a key on the table and walked out, locking the door behind him.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  SHE’D THOUGHT LEAVING Kacey was going to be the hard part. It wasn’t. Pulling up in front of her house, seeing Jem’s truck gone, was horrible. But Lacey got past the moment. She pulled into her garage. Grabbed her suitcase and went into the house.

  She was going to have to find someone to finish her dream room. Kacey had already told her she’d be home that next weekend and they’d find someone together. Her sister thought she was going to pay the second contractor, too, but she wasn’t. Lacey had enough in savings to build a whole new house if she wanted to. And she was going to stand firm on this one.

  No more lying down in the middle of the road for her.

  She didn’t kid herself into thinking she was suddenly going to be bright and bold and bitchy, or even anything close. She was who she was. She got mad and she got over it. But she was going to learn how to speak up for herself. To demand what she needed.

  In a kind way, of course, because it wasn’t fair to those who cared about her if she didn’t. Kacey’s pain, her sister’s guilt, had been a real eye-opener to her. She’d set Kacey up for failure by not expressing her feelings until the one night they’d spilled over and ruined her sister’s world.

  They were past that now. Had been over and over and over it all over and over and over again during their week together.

  Avoiding the unfinished dream room, she passed through the kitchen and grabbed the key off the kitchen table, shoving it in the first drawer she came to, blinking back tears.

  She’d made her ultimatum. He’d made his choice.

  Neither one of them could take either back.

  She’d been unfair to him. He’d been unfair to her, too. Neither of them could help who they were.

  And if they couldn’t stand up for each other, they weren’t good for each other, either.

  Promising herself that if she got through the night, the morning would be easier, she rolled her suitcase down the hall. She and Kacey had already talked everything through. She was going to unpack. Take a hot bath. Go to bed. Get up in the morning and go to work.

  If she couldn’t get to sleep, she was going to call Kacey.

  And on Friday, Kacey would be there, filling her home. Just as she’d filled Kacey’s the past week.

  She flipped on the bedroom light.

  Something wasn’t right.

  Heart pounding, she froze, looking around. The room had been disturbed.

  She didn’t have a gun. Her cell phone was still in her purse on the kitchen counter.

  Had her bed been slept in?

  Nothing else was out of place. Just the stripes on the comforter weren’t lined up along the edge of the mattress. And the pillows were wrong. Cases went on the bottom, shams on the top.

  There were wrinkles, too. As though someone had climbed around after the bed was made.

  She stepped farther into the room and peeked into the adjoining bathroom. A cartoon caricature bandage wrapper was in the trash.

  A washcloth had been used, and there was a glob of toothpaste in the sink. She definitely did not leave globs behind.

  But Levi did.

  Curious now, shaking, she moved through the house.

  The bed in Kacey’s room was made. But equally disturbed. The spare bathroom didn’t look as though it had been touched. Except for the raised toilet seat.

  The pillows on the living room couch were there, but not how she arranged them. The remote was on the left side of the table, not the right.

  There were used glasses in the dishwasher that she hadn’t used. And paper plates in the trash.

  Had Jem and Levi stayed at her house while she’d been gone? She supposed she should be mad about the intrusion. She wasn’t.

  But she wanted to know why.

  Attempting not to glance around the corner and down the hall from the kitchen toward the wall that was going to have an archway into her dream room, Lacey failed. She did a double take. There was an archway where an outside wall had been when she’d left.

  It was rounded, drywalled, textured and painted. Feeling like a zombie, she walked down the hall to the archway. Stood and stared.

  The room was finished. The porcelain tile she’d picked out for the floor was laid and grouted exactly as she’d pictured it, only better. Her furniture had been delivered. It wasn’t arranged exactly as she’d planned, but it looked good. Inviting.

  For what she noticed. Because she couldn’t really focus on flooring or furniture. She couldn’t take her eyes off the far wall. It was supposed to have been painted a sand color. It was windows instead, looking out over a newly planted garden with a rock waterfall. She could see it all, in spite of the darkness outside, because of the landscape lighting that had been installed.

  But even that didn’t hold her attention. She couldn’t stop staring at the portion of the wall above the windows.

  It was a mural of an exquisite sunset. And in the rays of the setting sun there were three cloud-like forms—a tall, broad one, another that was a little shorter and more slender and then a tiny one. The tiny one seemed to be reaching toward the slender one. She knew she was just imagining the figures in the clouds. But every time she looked back, there they were.

  She’d been standing there five minutes or more before she saw the envelope on the table. She recognized Jem’s business logo where the return address should be.

  A final bill?

  It was so like him to finish the job he’d agreed to do. To finish his business, leave the key and go silently on his way. He also wasn’t one to make waves. Unless you counted the ones painted beneath her sunset...

  She wasn’t goin
g to open the envelope. Didn’t want to spoil the moment with an accounting of cost owed. But she’d also never been one to avoid hard tasks. She was who she was. So she picked up the envelope and pulled out the pages inside.

  And fell down to the couch.

  The stop sheet was official all the way. A restraining order. Against Tressa Bridges. Protected persons were Jeremiah and Levi Bridges.

  The second sheet was official, too. A police report delineating all threats against Lacey. As well as a timeline of how she’d come to be in the lives of Jem and Levi Bridges.

  The third sheet... She could barely make it out through the tears blurring her vision.

  It was a single piece of plain white paper, with childish scrawl in awkward, uneven letters. She made out the word Levi.

  The fourth page was easier to read...if she could just quit crying long enough.

  I am a victim of domestic violence. I have spent the past ten years being manipulated, attacked and humiliated by my ex-wife. I am not proud of that fact. I am told I will have residual effects of this circumstance. I am also told that recognition and acknowledgment is the biggest part of my battle. Apparently I managed to be a survivor before I knew I was a victim.

  I credit my parents and my son, Levi, for that.

  Recently I found the love of my life. I couldn’t believe in my luck at first. I was truly happy for the first time in my adult life. I felt complete. Hopeful for the future. And weighted down by the albatross I carried around my neck.

  The albatross has been captured. Restrained. And my love...it’s overflowing, like the water over the rocks outside your window. I am the water. You are my rock.

  If you have an interest in feeling my touch flowing across you for the rest of your life, please call. If not, know that I love you first. Last. Always.

  Jem.

  She was crying so hard she could hardly find her purse in the kitchen. Or find her phone in her purse. Stumbling back to her dream room, she tried to see enough to touch Jem’s picture in her speed dial widget.

  Blinking away tears, she sniffled, looked outside at the fountain...and blinked some more. She couldn’t see his picture on her phone, but she could see him outside. Him and Levi, too, pressing against the window.