In Protective Custody

by Beth Cornelison

  Rialto waved the Glock at them, his icy control clearly slipping. Max knew they were running out of time.

  “Laura,” he said quietly. “You’ve got the ball. You know what to do.”

  “But—”

  “Go. I’ll cover you.”

  “Nobody’s going anywhere until I have that baby!” Rialto roared. His hand shook, and the Glock wavered ominously before them.

  “Go. Now!” Max repeated.

  Laura hesitated only another second before darting for the door.

  “Stop!” Rialto shouted. He swung the Glock toward Laura’s retreating back.

  And fired.

  Laura crumpled to the ground.

  Icy horror squeezed Max’s heart. “Laura!”

  Rialto angled the Glock to fire at Laura again. Without hesitation, Max squeezed the trigger of Theo’s gun.

  Once. Twice.

  Rialto jerked as the bullets hit him, then he slumped to the floor.

  As the echoes of gunfire faded, Elmer’s piercing wail wafted through the eerie stillness. Bitter bile rose in Max’s throat as he hurried to Laura’s side.

  He’d told her to go, and she’d been shot. He’d sworn to protect her and failed. She’d trusted him, and he’d let her down.

  Oh, God, let her be all right, and I swear I’ll do what I should have done weeks ago—get out of her life.

  He dropped to his knees beside her and gently rolled her to her back. A red stain spread at her waist.

  “Laura? Can you hear me?” He plucked Elmer from her arms and checked the baby for injury.

  She moaned and grimaced. Given the signs of life, Max released a whoosh of air from his lungs.

  “Elmer?” she mumbled.

  Her concern for the baby, while she lay bleeding, tugged something deep inside him. Even now she put the baby first.

  Amazingly, Elmer seemed unharmed, though he screamed his displeasure with the tumble they’d taken. Laura had somehow managed to curl her body around the baby, protecting him as she fell.

  “I think he’s okay.” He set the baby gently on the ground beside her while he tugged her nightshirt up to check her wound.

  The bullet had torn an obscene hole in the milky skin at her waist. Skin he’d explored every inch of with his hands and mouth.

  His throat tightened. Yanking his own shirt over his head, he balled it up and pressed it against her side, hoping to stem the bleeding.

  Weakly she raised a hand and stared at the blood on her fingers. “Blood.”

  “Hang on, sweetheart. I’m gonna get you to a doctor. You’ll be all right.”

  “Blood…makes me…sick,” she whispered.

  “Not this time. You have to hold on for me. Understand?”

  “I’m sorry…Max.” Her eyelids fluttered, and her hand fell limply at her side.

  His chest constricted. He framed her face with his hands and looked straight into the fading light in her eyes.

  “Listen, Laura, you have to fight. No quitters on my team. No excuses. You have to hold on a little longer.”

  She gave him the slightest of nods. But it was enough.

  He moved Elmer to her chest and scooped both of them in his arms. After strapping both of them in the car, he headed down the twisting mountain road at breakneck speed.

  Every mile he drove was anguish, every passing minute an eternity. He castigated himself for all the mistakes he’d made with Laura. She fought for her life now because he’d been too selfish to send her away when he should have.

  He’d been wrong to let her stay well after he’d learned to care for Elmer, keeping her in unnecessary danger. Wrong to prolong their time together once he’d realized her deepening attachment to him and the baby. Wrong to let her believe he could give her more than sex. It didn’t matter that he cared more about her than his next breath. He couldn’t burden her with his infertility.

  She deserved more. She deserved the family he couldn’t give her, deserved her freedom so she could find a man that could fulfill her needs.

  Over and over he repeated his litany.

  Let her be all right, and I’ll let her go. Please, God, let her live, and I’ll get out of her life.

  It wasn’t much to give a woman who’d risked everything for him, for his nephew. But it was all he had.

  Chapter 17

  By the time Max finished answering all the sheriff’s questions, it was late. He stopped by the small county hospital to check on Laura before going by Parson’s to pick up Elmer. The elderly couple had been more than willing to watch the baby while Max settled his business with the sheriff.

  He’d explained to the sheriff everything that had happened, who Anthony Rialto was and why Max had shot him. The evidence at the scene and the forensic tests from the cabin supported Max’s claim of justifiable homicide. He was free to return home, where the New Orleans police were waiting to question him, as well. The deputies had found Theo at the cabin, still unconscious, and he’d been revived and arrested.

  After performing surgery to repair the damage done by the bullet, Laura’s doctor had assured Max that she’d pull through in fine form. But Max’s concern for her wouldn’t be quieted until he checked on her himself. When he reached her hospital room, the attending nurse met him outside her door.

  “She’s resting now. She woke a moment ago and asked for you, but I think it’s better that she sleep right now.” The nurse opened the door for Max to peek inside.

  He was pleased to see that Laura’s color had returned. In fact, other than the IVs hooked to her hand, she looked like the same gutsy angel he’d watched sleep every night for the past several days.

  He dragged a hand down his face and sighed his relief.

  But his relief was bittersweet. With a sinking remorse, he remembered the bargain he’d made with God, his promise to do what he knew in his heart was best for Laura.

  Let her live, and I’ll get out of her life.

  A knot of frustration and despair clogged his throat. A clean break was the kindest, the simplest. It was time to move on.

  Max cleared the emotion from his throat and faced the nurse. “Will you give her a message for me when she wakes again?”

  “Sure. What is it?”

  Anguish gripped his chest. What did he tell her?

  Thanks for the memories, sweetheart, but I can’t give you a baby. Your strength and courage made me fall in love with you, but we have no future? I’ve never met a woman I wanted to spend my life with more than with you, but you deserve more than I have to give?

  Max gritted his teeth, steeling himself to the onslaught of guilt and pain, the sting of tears. “Just…tell her I said thanks.”

  The nurse blinked. “That’s it?”

  Leaden regret weighed his lungs. “Yeah. That’s all.”

  “Should I tell her you’ll be by in the morning?”

  Max shook his head. “I can’t stay. There’s a police officer from New Orleans waiting in the lobby to escort me back to New Orleans with the baby. I have to answer more questions about this mess for the New Orleans authorities before I’m totally cleared. And I need to check on my sister.”

  The nurse frowned. “She’ll be disappointed she missed seeing you.”

  Max swallowed hard and glanced back to the bed where Laura slept peacefully. “But it’s for the best.”

  “He left?” Laura struggled to process the news that the night nurse gave her the next evening when she came back on duty. She’d waited all day for Max to come visit.

  A sheriff’s deputy had stopped by just after lunch, and she’d recounted everything that had happened from the day Max had commandeered her car. When the deputy said her testimony cleared Max of wrongdoing, she’d counted on having a chance to talk to Max herself.

  But when he’d come by, he hadn’t stayed.

  Laura met the nurse’s sympathetic gaze. “I…I don’t understand.”

  But deep inside she did understand. Max was gone. Just like so many before him. Searing pain
that had nothing to do with her gunshot wound flowed through her body.

  “He said to tell you thanks and that a policeman was escorting him and the baby back to New Orleans.”

  “Did he say…anything else?”

  Like “I love you”? Or “I’ll be back for you”? Or “I’ll call”?

  “Sorry. Just ‘thanks.’”

  Thanks. Just thanks.

  For what? Putting her life on hold to help him save his nephew’s life? For the hot sex to help pass the hours until he dumped her? For the trust she’d given him, even though experience had taught her the cost?

  “But this letter arrived a little while ago along with a bunch of your personal belongings.” The nurse’s comment interrupted Laura’s reverie and sparked hope inside her. The nurse handed Laura a plain envelope from the bedside stand. “Maybe there’s more information in it.”

  Moving her arms to take the envelope sent a wave of sharp pain through her chest, but Laura ignored the discomfort as she ripped open the letter.

  Inside the envelope she found a one-way plane ticket to New Orleans, money for a cab to the airport and a short handwritten note.

  I’ve taken your car back to N.O. I knew the doctor wouldn’t let you drive for a while after surgery.

  I owe you so much, yet I know the thing you need most is the one thing I can’t give you. I’m sorry. Your future is with another man.

  Get well soon. Max

  Despair doused the spark of hope.

  Rather than show the nurse her disappointment and the razor-sharp ache that twisted inside her, Laura gave the woman a short, wry laugh. “He took my car. Again.”

  The nurse chewed her lip without answering. “Can I get you anything? Do you need another painkiller?”

  Laura shook her head. Her worst pain had no remedy.

  How did one treat a broken heart?

  Four days later, Laura paid the cabdriver who brought her home from the New Orleans airport and shuffled stiffly into her tiny, lonesome apartment.

  Home again.

  Everything looked the same. Her cluttered kitchen counter, her mystery novel waiting by the sofa, the dim light filtering in from her bathroom night-light. Nothing in her apartment had changed, yet everything about her life had changed. Max had changed her, challenged her, made her feel things she’d never thought she could.

  Yet, thinking back, she realized he’d never told her he loved her, never promised her anything beyond the moment. Certainly not a commitment, a future or a white picket fence.

  She’d simply let her desperate longing for love and family, a place to belong, override the cruel lessons she’d learned over the years. Love didn’t last. People didn’t stay in her life long enough to build a family.

  Laura stumbled over to her sofa and sank into the cushions. She fought the tears that swelled in her throat, choking the breath from her.

  Max hadn’t cared enough to stay. The sooner she accepted this truth, the sooner she could move on with her life. Alone. As always.

  The idea of facing the next day and the next without Max sent a blinding ache through her. Finally she gave up the battle and let the moisture fill her eyes and stream down her cheeks.

  Giving in to her tears made her feel like the helpless and lonely child who’d drifted through the system with no control over her future, no place to call home, no one who truly cared.

  She knew crying was an exercise in futility. A waste of energy. All the tears she’d spilled growing up had never changed her circumstances, so why should things be different now?

  Laura blew her nose and tried to push the memory of Max from her mind. Memories of quiet nights by a crackling fire, crisp mornings waking in his arms, sunny days playing touch football.

  If you ever get the ball, run. Head for the goal line and don’t let anything stop you.

  Now there were words to live by, she thought with a snort. She’d keep that gem in mind the next time she spent a Sunday afternoon with the Kennedys at Hyannisport.

  I don’t believe in casual sex.

  Laura growled in frustration and pressed a throw pillow to her ears as if she could block out the sound of his voice playing in her head.

  You have to fight. No quitters on my team.

  Laura shivered as Max’s command filtered through her mind, along with the terror she’d known that last morning staring down Rialto’s gun. Much of what had happened after Anthony Rialto had shot her was hazy. She remembered the blood, the jarring ride down the mountain, Elmer’s crying.

  And Max’s voice. The urgency and fear in his tone.

  She’d focused on his voice to keep from slipping into the darkness that beckoned her.

  No quitters on my team. No excuses. Hold on….

  She had fought for him. She’d held on despite the searing pain as her blood and her strength seeped from her. And for what? She’d awakened in a hospital to find that he’d left her alone.

  A fresh flood of tears stung her eyes, and she gritted her teeth in aggravation.

  Pushing to her feet, careful not to pull her stitches, she stalked to the kitchen to heat a frozen dinner. She refused to sink into the despondency and sense of helplessness that had shadowed so much of her youth. She’d come too far and struggled too long to put those years behind her for her to lose control now. She wasn’t a scared, powerless little girl anymore.

  She was a woman with control over her life and her future. Swiping at her damp eyes she drew a slow, cleansing breath.

  No quitters on my team. No…quitters.

  Laura froze. Her breath hung in her lungs, and her pulse kicked up its pace.

  “Oh, my God,” she whispered, hope swelling inside her.

  When she’d learned Max had left her at the hospital, she’d allowed the resurgence of past pain, the memories of old hurts to paralyze her.

  But she wasn’t a helpless child anymore. She had the power to fight back, to shape her future and fight for her happiness. For a few precious days with Max, she’d shed the manacles of her fear, let him into her heart, and she’d known a joy and hope she’d only dreamed of before.

  Laura smiled as determination and purpose flowed through her. “I will fight, Max. For what I want, what I need. For you.”

  “You named my son what!” Emily shrieked.

  Max winced, wishing he’d waited until his head wasn’t pounding to tell Emily about Elmer.

  As her doctor had predicted, Emily had regained consciousness. Once assured that Max and her son were safe and back in town, she’d made significant progress. Moved back to a regular hospital room, Emily quickly regained her fighting spirit and her strength.

  Max rubbed his temples and tried to explain. “I named him after our grandfather. Mom’s dad.”

  Elmer had cried all night, apparently missing Laura as much as he did. The lack of sleep had left Max with a splitting headache. Missing Laura left him aching deeper in his soul.

  “Out of all the names on God’s green earth, you picked Elmer?” His sister covered her face with her hands, and her shoulders shook.

  Max groaned. “C’mon, Em. Don’t cry. It’s not written in stone. Put whatever you want on the birth certificate.”

  She moved her hands to peer out at him, and he saw that she was laughing, not crying.

  “Elmer?” She held her side as she chuckled. “Oo, oh, ouch. It hurts to laugh.”

  He rolled his eyes and scowled at his sister churlishly. “You’re welcome for nearly losing me my job and risking my life and Laura’s to save your son. Don’t mention it.”

  Emily bit her bottom lip and gave him a wide, dark-eyed look of remorse. “Oh, Max. You know I appreciate everything you did. Everything you’ve always done for me.”

  Her expression sobered, and her eyes reflected warmth and love. “That’s why your name is on my son’s birth certificate.”

  He drew his eyebrows together sharply and frowned. “What?”

  “I named my son after you.”

  Max sat back in
his chair, stunned, touched. “You did?”

  She nodded. “Maxwell Trey Rialto. I’m going to call him Trey. To avoid confusion.”

  “Trey. I like it.” He smiled.

  “But…” Emily said, sobering. “Even though Rialto is on his birth certificate, I don’t think I’ll use the name for him. Neither of us will. I want to put the Rialtos behind us for good and never look back.”

  Max nodded, a fresh concern nagging him. “Have you heard from Joe’s mother? Is she still pursuing the custody issue?”

  Anthony Rialto might be dead, and his henchmen in custody, but Max worried his sister hadn’t heard the last from Lydia Rialto.

  “My lawyer says Lydia doesn’t have a case since I’m Trey’s mother. I honestly don’t think she was the one behind the custody question to begin with. Her husband totally dominated her, made all the decisions. She knows after everything that’s happened, if she wants any chance ever to see her grandson, she has to make amends.”

  “That’s a relief.” Max sighed.

  “What about the investigation into the drug smuggling?” Emily asked, her eyes dark with concern. “Do you think anyone would try to hurt us in retaliation?”

  Max turned up his palms. “The police don’t think so. Theo Malone, the thug Anthony brought with him to North Carolina, was still unconscious in the cabin when the cops arrived to secure the scene. He had a pretty bad concussion and a go-directly-to-jail card when he woke up at the hospital. With Rialto dead, Theo decided to save himself and was quite willing to talk. From what I understand, the cops have gotten enough information to close down the drug operation. Apparently the process was pretty cut and dried. They cleared me of wrongdoing once I answered all their questions, so…I think it’s over, Em.”

  “Thank God. Now can we talk about something happier?” Emily’s eyes sparkled.

  Max narrowed a skeptical gaze on Emily. “Such as?”

  “Tell me about this Laura that you mentioned.”

  Laura. She hadn’t been far from his mind since he’d left North Carolina under police escort four days ago. As it did every time he thought of her, his chest tightened with regret and longing. How the hell was he supposed to get over her? “Long story.”