by Shelly Bell
Mail in hand, she went to her bedroom and pulled closed the curtain to give herself at least the pretense of privacy, trying to block out Chloe’s animated voice from the other side of the wall.
Sitting cross-legged on her twin bed with her back up against the wall, she tore open the first envelope, knowing exactly who’d sent it once she caught sight of the photo of a half-naked fireman on the front of the card. When she went to read the inside, a twenty-dollar bill fluttered to her lap. Her cousin could barely afford it on her parole officer salary, which made Isabella appreciate it all the more. She stuck it in her pocket and giggled over Dreama’s well wishes for a “kick-ass freshman year” and her recommendation to “get laid as often as possible.”
The next piece of mail was a receipt from the university showing that her tuition and board had been paid in full for the term. Not needing another reminder of her debt, she crumpled the paper into a ball and threw it across the room, just narrowly missing the wastebasket. She picked up the final envelope, noting its unusual thickness and lack of return address before tearing it open. Growing curious, she realized it was a letter, several pages long, if the thickness was any indication.
A feeling of dread wrapped around her torso and squeezed until it stole her breath from her lungs. Hands shaking, she unfolded the letter and choked back the rising bile at the sight of the familiar handwriting.
How had he found her address here at school? It wasn’t as if it was listed anywhere.
Her stomach cramped as she read page after page after page of Tony’s ramblings of his undying devotion and love. Even after all this time, he still thought they were meant to be together.
There were no threats against her life.
No mention of his kidnapping of her or apology for his attempt to end her life.
It was as if he’d erased that day from his memories.
Looking at the reminders on her wrists, she wished she could do the same. Even if she had plastic surgery to remove the scars—maybe someday, when she had the money to pay for it—she’d never forget the helplessness of waking up as a prisoner in her own body, frozen and unable to save herself from death. From that point on, she knew firsthand that monsters not only hid under the bed, they were often masked with the faces of those who purported to love her.
Damn it.
Tears slid down her cheeks and dropped onto the page. She wiped her face, refusing to allow Tony the power to suck her back into the deep hole of depression she’d found herself in a year ago.
He had no right to try to victimize her all over again.
She wouldn’t let him.
He no longer had that power.
Clearly, the time he’d spent in the hospital hadn’t helped stabilize him.
Maybe she should have pressured the prosecution to proceed with a trial. Instead, she’d agreed to a plea deal in which Tony would receive no less than a year of inpatient hospitalization and wouldn’t be released until the doctors believed he was no longer a threat to himself or others.
Erin, the state attorney assigned to her case, had explained that Tony’s attorneys had hired some of the best psychiatrists in Michigan to testify that he suffered from mental illness and that at the time of the crime, could not determine right from wrong. Tony would have gone free if a jury had found him not guilty by reason of insanity. Isabella hadn’t wanted to take that risk. Besides, she’d just wanted to put it behind her and know that Tony couldn’t get to her.
Now it was eighteen months later, and if this letter was any indication, he was as disturbed as he’d been when he’d gone into the hospital. Either the doctors hadn’t effectively treated his mental illness or he’d played them from the start. She didn’t know. And at that second, she didn’t care. Mental illness or not, Tony had been ordered by the court not to contact Isabella or her family. So how had he been able to mail her this letter?
The old Isabella might have ignored the warning signs, but the new and improved Isabella wouldn’t tolerate it.
She immediately called Erin. Since the prosecutor spent most of her time in court, Isabella wasn’t surprised to get her voice mail. She left a detailed message and informed her she’d fax her a copy of the letter tomorrow.
After shoving the note back into the envelope, she tossed it onto the coffee table as if it were just another piece of junk mail. She wouldn’t let Tony ruin her first night at college. Grabbing both her bathroom caddy and robe, she strode toward the community shower. Tomorrow, she’d follow up with Erin. Tonight…
She was in the tequila room.
Six
Tristan sat at his desk, staring at the empty bookshelves and wondering how the hell this had become his life. He’d never given a single thought to becoming a teacher. Even when he was a student, he’d had a difficult time sitting still and concentrating. He needed to be constantly in motion, negotiating deals and selling the unsellable.
Teaching two classes a day, four days a week, wasn’t exactly where he’d thought he’d wind up at his age. By now, he was supposed to have made his first million and proven to his son-of-a-bitch father that he didn’t need him or his money.
Not that he believed money bought happiness. Money hadn’t kept his father from abandoning Tristan’s mother when she’d been six months pregnant with him. Ten years ago, money hadn’t saved her life when she got pancreatic cancer. As for his own marriage, he had no doubt Morgan had married and divorced him precisely for the money he’d inherited upon his mother’s death. When it came to the Kelley family, money brought nothing but misery.
But while money didn’t buy happiness, it did buy respect. He’d watched from afar as his father was lauded by the president of the United States for his biotech company’s generous donations to children’s charities and named Man of the Year by Time magazine for his contributions to the scientific community in the treatment of childhood leukemia. All the while, his father never acknowledged the son he’d left behind when he’d married his second wife and created a whole new family.
No, money didn’t buy happiness, but it sure had bought his mother’s silence.
A shrink would probably theorize that Tristan’s drive to succeed in business was his desire to get his father’s attention. But honestly, he didn’t give a shit if his father ever found out about Novateur. Unlike his father, he wasn’t looking for public accolades or adoration.
No, money didn’t buy happiness, but it could buy him the peace of mind that he’d never have to depend on anyone else. Because if there was one thing he’d learned, it was that the people he loved would inevitably leave him.
As it had several times, his mind wandered to his Angel. What was she doing right now? He pictured her as she’d been that night, wearing that ridiculous pink shirt as a dress with all that red hair flowing over her shoulders, only instead of being at Ryder’s, he imagined her working at a bakery, her hands in a bowl, squeezing and kneading some dough between her hands as if it were his cock.
He opened his middle desk drawer and retrieved the black satin bag he’d recently purchased on a whim. Reaching inside, his hand folded over the cotton contents. He pulled it from the bag and brought the panties to his nose and inhaled. Her scent still lingered days later, a combination of vanilla, salt, and sugar.
At the firm three knocks on his door, Tristan quickly shoved her panties into the bag and threw it back into his desk drawer. “Come in.”
All he needed was someone to catch him sniffing panties in his office. He might be a pervert, but he didn’t need that fact broadcast across campus.
The door opened and Dean Isaac Lancaster, the man responsible for Tristan’s current position at Edison University, strolled into his office. Isaac looked as though he had aged twenty years in the ten years Tristan had known him. If that’s what university life would do to Tristan, he wanted no part of it. He was here for one year and then it was back to the real world, where he didn’t have to worry about lesson plans and taking attendance.
At fifty-five
years old, Isaac was now bald, no sign of the graying hair he’d sported a decade ago. He’d lost weight too, the extra pounds he’d carried gone from his frame. His skin had wrinkled around his eyes and mouth, giving him the appearance of constantly smiling, which Tristan knew wasn’t the case.
Over drinks a few years ago, the inebriated Isaac had admitted the job as dean of the business school had caused him plenty of sleepless nights and problems in his marriage to his wife, Cassandra. But as the great-grandson of the founder of the university, and the son of the man for whom the Lancaster Business School was named, he had a legacy to protect. Tristan had no doubt that if Isaac and Cassandra had been blessed with a child, he or she would have been expected to follow in the family’s footsteps.
“Your office is looking a little sparse,” Isaac said as he crossed the short distance to Tristan’s desk. “Most professors complain there isn’t enough room for all of their possessions.”
Tristan stood and shook Isaac’s hand, surprised by his firm grasp. While his mentor may look frail, he certainly hadn’t lost any of his strength. “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem for me.”
Rather than giving Tristan Professor Crawford’s office, Isaac had assigned Tristan to his own. It came furnished with two oak desks, one situated by the door for his assistant. His desk was placed in front of the window. Other than the empty bookcase to his left and a filing cabinet to his right, there wasn’t much space in the dusty room. But then again, he didn’t have much. Unlike the other professors, he didn’t have to worry about things like tenure or getting published in business journals. As an adjunct professor, he received a quarter of the pay that full professors made, but none of the headaches—unless he counted dealing with the occasional argument from a self-entitled little shit over his failing grade. That couldn’t be avoided.
Isaac took a seat, his eyes weary. “I received a phone call this morning from a distressed Morgan.”
Tristan swore under his breath. How the hell had his ex-wife already found out about his working there? Did she have some kind of LoJack on him? Or was there a simpler explanation? Had Isaac or Cassandra told her? “I doubt she called to have you pass along her well wishes.”
His friend’s lips parted momentarily, then pressed together in a severe line as if he was holding back what he really wanted to say. Isaac didn’t have to tell him a word. Whatever she had called about, it hadn’t been good. “No well wishes. Only more unfounded accusations.”
He snorted, rolling his eyes. Morgan should have become an author since she had such a gift for making up stories. “What’s she accusing me of this time? I haven’t seen her in over six months.” Not since she’d come crawling back to him with an apology and a promise that she had changed. She had begged for another chance and had given him pitiful excuses as to why she’d betrayed him. But he’d refused to listen and slammed the door on her. Both literally and figuratively.
For good.
“Oh, more of the same,” Isaac said, waving his hand. “You’re a pervert with uncontrollable sexual urges and can’t be trusted around a bunch of coeds. But that wasn’t what worried me. She asked me a lot of questions about Novateur.”
Not surprisingly, that meant her apology six months ago had been a lie. She seemed determined to prove to him that a leopard couldn’t change her spots. The only thing that mattered to Morgan was Morgan. How she’d blown through his millions in just a few years was beyond him.
A while ago, he’d heard rumors she’d hooked up with a rich businessman from Detroit, but Tristan hadn’t cared enough to get the poor bastard’s name. Must not have lasted long, since it was shortly after that she’d come begging him to take her back.
Things hadn’t been all bad with Morgan. When they’d met, they spent hours talking both in bed and outside of it. He’d told her about his parents, and how he’d give all the money in the world to have his mother alive again. She shared that she’d grown up with a drug-addicted mother and had spent years being shuffled between a filthy trailer and temporary foster homes.
He’d been looking for someone to love, and she’d been looking for security.
It was he who’d confused it with more, never imagining she’d marry him for his money.
But why was she asking questions about Novateur? Their divorce had been finalized years ago, and when she’d taken his entire fortune, she’d relinquished any right to alimony.
She had no claim on his current earnings.
“I hope you told her it was none of her fucking business,” Tristan said drily.
“Of course, but I have the feeling she’s up to something.”
Isaac had stood up for Tristan in his wedding to Morgan. Standing in for Tristan’s father, Isaac had counseled him before the marriage, pleading for Tristan to reconsider their quick nuptials and to instead have a lengthy engagement to get to know Morgan better. When Tristan refused, Isaac had kept his mouth shut and treated Morgan as if she were his own daughter. Cassandra and Morgan had developed a friendship that had survived even after she had shattered Tristan’s world with her lies and deceit.
Tristan didn’t understand it, but he often thought Morgan was the daughter Cassandra never had. Maybe that’s why Tristan had pulled away from the Lancasters after his divorce. It was too difficult to admit that Isaac had been right about Morgan, and with his ex-wife remaining a part of their lives, he’d felt a bit resentful.
But when Tristan had needed a job, Isaac came through for him.
“Don’t worry about it,” Tristan said. “Morgan’s always up to something. It wasn’t enough that she blackmailed me in our divorce and took everything I had, she has to constantly remind me of the mistake I made in marrying her.”
“You couldn’t have known. She had everyone fooled.”
Tristan picked up one of his most prized possessions off his desk, a baseball signed by Detroit Tiger Justin Verlander, and tossed it to Isaac. “Not everyone. You and Ryder never liked her.”
His friend caught it with the ease of a younger man and returned it to its spot on the desk. “Just be careful. I don’t think she’s done with you.”
He had a feeling he’d never completely get her sharp talons out of him. Not until he died—or she did.
For the first time, he was grateful that Edison University was in the middle of nowhere. Morgan absolutely despised the small town. “I’m living twelve hours away from her. What’s she going to do? Besides, I’m broke. I’ve got nothing she wants.”
Isaac rubbed his temples as if he had a headache. “You should have never allowed her to get away with blackmailing you. You had plenty of friends who would have taken your back at a trial.”
“My innocence would have been irrelevant. All people would remember is that I liked to spank and tie up my wife.” Not to mention the numerous other things he didn’t want to discuss with his mentor. “No one would care that it had been consensual.”
“I still can’t believe she threatened to bring abuse charges against you,” Isaac said with disdain.
It was one of the darkest times of his life, second only to the months following his mother’s death. But he’d learned from his mistake and hadn’t fully trusted another woman since. At least not until Angel. He didn’t know what it was about that girl—perhaps it was her innocence—but he wanted to believe she was different. It was a shame rotten timing had gotten in the way of finding out if he was right.
Tristan folded his arms over his chest and sat back in his chair. “To get what she wants, there’s no length that woman wouldn’t go to. But it’s over. Our divorce has been final for a long time, and I’ve got nothing left to give her. Her call was just a fishing expedition. Ignore her. I do.”
“She still calls you?”
“About once or twice a month. I let her go to voice mail and delete the messages without listening to them.” He swatted the air. “She’s like a fly buzzing around my head. A nuisance but completely harmless.”
“For your sake, I hope
that’s true.” Isaac paused for a moment, crossing his legs. “Now, onto more important matters. I have a monthly get-together at my home for the professors of the business school. First one is tonight. I’ll expect to see you there.”
Tristan grimaced. He’d prefer to get a root canal than socialize with a bunch of teachers. “We both know I’m not really a professor,” he said, hoping that fact might get him out of it.
Isaac smiled, knowing full well what Tristan was trying to do. “Adjunct professors may not be full members of the faculty, but I’d like you there just the same. It will be good for you to meet the others.”
“Not trying to play matchmaker, are you?”
“Of course not. I realize it’s unlikely you’d meet someone…” His friend squirmed in his chair, seemingly at a loss for words. “Suitable…for you. But it will be good for you to make some connections here.”
As much as he owed Isaac, Tristan had a life to get back to. He had big plans, and teaching wasn’t part of them. By this time next year, he and Ryder would have secured their loan and would be in the process of making Novateur a global competitor in restaurant automation. “You’re hoping I’ll like it enough to stay. I told you, two semesters and then I’m moving back to the city, Isaac.” He ran his finger over the outside of the drawer that housed his Angel’s panties. “And there’s nothing here in Edison that will change my mind.”
