Secretly Married

by ALLISON LEIGH,

  Of course you didn’t. He waited for her automatic rejection of the idea. The waiting went on seconds, minutes, eons too long.

  “Did you?”

  He sat back in the chair, absorbing that as the gulf between them widened. Her lashes lowered for a long moment.

  Tears, he thought. She hated them.

  He exhaled roughly and leaned forward again, arms braced on his thighs. “Are you sure you’re not in pain?” Because he couldn’t help himself, he reached out. Smoothed the hair from her forehead, away from the bandage.

  Her eyes opened finally, but she didn’t meet his gaze. “I’m fine,” she said eventually.

  But they both knew that for the lie it was.

  She wasn’t fine. He wasn’t fine. They weren’t fine. Maybe it was time they faced it.

  Sam sighed, heading off the road when he saw Winnie Haggerty waving madly at him. But even as duty called, his thoughts were on that time, nearly two years ago.

  The day after the doctor had confirmed the baby was gone, Delaney returned home. The day after that, she was back at work. The bandage on her forehead was replaced by a narrow strip. Barely noticeable when she parted her hair differently. But the damage had been done. Only a portion of it caused by an accident that should never have happened.

  The rest of the damage, he knew, rested squarely in their own hands.

  Two weeks after her release from the hospital, he’d moved out.

  Chapter 7

  “What do you mean she’s gone?” Sam squinted against the sunlight that speared through the gathering clouds. “I dropped off Delaney hours ago.”

  Annie sat back on her heels, a small gardening spade in her hand. Her eyes rested on his face for a moment, probably taking in the welt he’d gotten from getting in the way of Vern trying to pummel his brother. But she didn’t comment on it. “I’m sorry, Sam. Delaney visited briefly with Alonso, then left.” Her head whipped around at a movement beside her. Two of her charges hefted a large flat of plants. “The marigolds go over by the steps,” she instructed, pointing with the spade.

  She waited long enough to be sure her request was heeded, then looked back up at Sam. “She might have told Alonso where she was heading. He’s around here somewhere if you want to talk to him.”

  The last person Sam had any desire to talk to was Alonso Petrofski. “Thanks, Annie.”

  “If you can’t find him, check with Logan. But I’ll warn you now, if he sees you, he’s probably going to draft you into helping him with some wiring he’s doing.”

  Any other day he’d have freely volunteered his help. “I’ll find him,” he said, and turned from Annie and her little troop of gardeners. If there really was supposed to be healing in the art of gardening, he’d have to say Castillo House was proof of it. For generations the earth hadn’t had the ability to support a single plant. Now, with Annie and Logan at the helm, and their youthful charges working at it, the grounds around Castillo House were beginning to flourish.

  A mutual case of the earth healing the people and the people healing the earth.

  Delaney had brought Alonso here.

  They’d be lucky if Castillo House—nearly fully restored thanks to the mountain of money sunk into it—was still standing when the kid was finished.

  Sam found the tall boy on the half-size basketball court he’d helped Logan lay out the year before. Sitting, balanced, on a basketball, his long legs splayed while he talked with Caitlin. The pregnant girl.

  When both of the teens saw him, twin expressions of defiance and dislike came over their faces. Sam had nothing against Caitlin—had never had much encounter with her at all. But where Alonso was concerned, the dislike was mutual. “Where’s Delaney?”

  “Dude. How should I know?”

  “She came to talk to you.”

  Alonso shrugged. He shared a look with Caitlin.

  “Did you upset her?”

  “That ain’t my job, man. It’s what you do.”

  “Did she say where she was going?”

  Alonso shrugged again.

  Sam crouched down, getting in the kid’s face. “Dude. What’d she say?”

  Alonso jerked back, but at least the scorn left his face. “Goodbye,” he said flatly. “She said goodbye. Again. Like she did last night. That tell you anything important?”

  Sam straightened. “Watch yourself here, Alonso. I’m the only law around. No liberal-minded judge on hand at a moment’s notice to keep your tail out of the sling. Cross one line of legality and you’ll be sitting in my jail cell for the three weeks it takes for the judge to come calling.”

  As he was walking away, he heard Caitlin’s whisper. “See? I told you Logan was a walk in the park compared to the sheriff.”

  He ignored the observation. After enough years on the force in New York, he didn’t expect to be loved by the public. But his mind was on what Alonso said. It shouldn’t matter that Delaney told Alonso goodbye. She couldn’t go off-island without him knowing about it.

  Still, he drove from one end of Turnabout to the other. Avoided looking at Etta’s house as he passed it. They’d all be sitting down to dinner by now, acting as if the prodigal father had finally returned.

  There was no sign of Delaney.

  He drove down to the dock. She’d told Alonso goodbye. After a long while he turned away from the emptiness of the ocean stretched before him and headed back to the emptiness of home.

  Delaney carefully hung up the phone and sat there, looking at it where it rested on Sam’s granite countertop. She needn’t have worried about him being nearby when she made the necessary call to Chad; he’d been absent since she’d returned from seeing Alonso. Her idea of using a phone at Castillo House had been nixed because Logan had been doing some rewiring.

  “Life on the island,” Annie had said with a shrug when Delaney learned that bit of news. It was a refrain she suspected the residents had to repeat frequently.

  She had, in not terribly flattering terms, when she’d walked all the way back to Sam’s place. She’d refused Annie’s offer of a ride, knowing the woman’s day was already busy enough.

  The silence pressed in on her, and she slid her fingers over the cool surface of the phone. Toyed with the cord.

  Sam’s absence was a good thing, she reminded herself. She could just imagine what kind of comments he’d have had to make if he’d come in while she was talking to Chad.

  Understandably, Chad had been upset.

  For years—even before the collision of Sam in her life—Chad had made it plain that he cared for her. Then, after Sam left, he’d started in again. But only recently had she finally agreed to seriously consider marrying him. They worked well together. They had common ideals, common tastes. She liked the calm, sane relationship they had. She liked knowing what to expect and knowing that whatever Chad did would never tear her soul in two.

  But, even after she’d told him she couldn’t marry him…and why…he’d never lost his temper. Never raised his voice. He’d simply calmly, reasonably, assured her that he had their practice well in hand and she should take her time. Once she’d dealt with Sam and handled the legalities to completion, they would revisit the matter.

  Revisit the matter.

  Hardly an impassioned response.

  Which you don’t want anyway, right?

  She shook her head and reached for the phone again, punching out her father’s number at the hospital care center. He answered on the second ring. Their conversation was woefully brief.

  She wouldn’t have minded talking longer.

  Randall Townsend didn’t like to talk at all. It used to be only her he’d tended to shut out of meaningful conversation. Now, with his speech so difficult, he shut out nearly everyone.

  She propped her head in her hand, staring blindly at the glass bowl of seeds sitting by the phone. She was a grown woman. Yet she still wanted her father’s approval.

  Might as well wish for the moon, Laney. You’ll get it easier.

  “P
roblems between the lovebirds?”

  She jerked, her nerves jangling. The man moved like a cat, even with those scuffed boots of his. “It’s rude to sneak up on people. I’d have thought your grandmother would have taught you that.”

  “It’s my house. And you need to keep your nose out of my family’s business.” Sam entered the kitchen more fully.

  Then she saw the bruise on his face. She slid off the bar stool and hurried toward him, the sting of his warning taking a back seat, alongside the baggage of their shared past. “God. Sam. What happened?”

  He shrugged off her tentative touch. “Two fools named Haggerty who seem intent on pushing each other off a cliff.”

  Delaney’s hands fell back to her sides. She watched him pull out the ever-popular bag of frozen peas and press it over his eye.

  Then he turned and looked at her. “I thought you’d left.”

  “I wish I had.” Her stomach flip-flopped. “All the charter services I called in San Diego were booked solid. So, I guess I’m not inventive enough to figure a way off the island other than Mr. Montoya’s ferry. I still can’t believe nobody else on this island owns a proper boat.”

  “Not one that’ll handle the crossing well.”

  “Yes. I realize that.” Particularly after she’d thoroughly questioned Annie and Logan Drake on that point. She crossed her arms. “Does it hurt?”

  Sam’s gaze narrowed. “If I said yes, are you going to kiss it better?”

  “Don’t be clichéd.”

  “I’ll take that as a no.” His tone was odd as he moved past her to slide open the glass door to the deck, scooping up a handful of seeds from the bowl before stepping outside.

  It took Delaney a moment to realize that it was the lack of mocking in his voice that was odd.

  She followed him. Hovered next to the glass door as he tossed the seeds far beyond the rail. Seagulls and a host of other birds she couldn’t identify immediately dove, their songs raucous.

  His hands closed over the wooden rail, his head lowered for a moment. The frozen bag sitting on the rail seemed forgotten. “Why’d you bring Petrofski here, Delaney?”

  She tried not to bristle. “Does he have something to do with the bruise you’re sporting?” He’d have a black eye by morning.

  Sam didn’t look her way. “If he did, he’d be sitting in my jail cell.”

  “So, who is?”

  He sighed sharply. “Nobody.”

  “You took a punch and didn’t lock somebody up?”

  He angled a look her way. “Why bring him, Delaney?”

  Naturally he wouldn’t be deterred from that. “I’ve told you that you’re too hard on him. Yes, he’s shown some bad judgment, but that was years ago, and he’s paid the price. For heaven’s sake, his mother died last year.”

  “Whatever.”

  “I can’t believe you are so unsympathetic toward him! Your mother died when you were young, didn’t she?” The mother that Etta claimed to be no-good and not decent.

  He finally turned. “Yes and it’s not the same.”

  “Only because you’re too stubborn to see otherwise.”

  “And you’re gullible.”

  “Well. As usual, I appreciate your vote of confidence in my professional abilities. Nice to know that some things haven’t changed. You still think I’m a fool.”

  “You have no objectivity where he’s concerned. You never did. Not about Alonso. Not about your brother. Not about your father.”

  “Neither my brother nor my father have anything to do with Alonso.”

  “It was your dad who assigned me to Anton’s murder investigation,” he reminded.

  “So?”

  “So, sixteen years ago—before he got pulled back into the Russian mob—Anton was your mother’s gardener at that big, fancy estate of hers.”

  She could feel the hard plane of the glass door pressing against her spine. Sixteen years ago she and her mother hadn’t been speaking. “So?”

  “So, what do you think Anton and Jessica were doing together? Pruning rosebushes? Come on, Delaney. They were lovers. You know that.”

  “What if I do? She and my father had been divorced by then for years. She was a free woman. It didn’t matter to anyone what she did.”

  “Mattered to you. You hadn’t been able to save Randy from himself and the drugs and booze and larceny he got into. But you’re determined to save Alonso—a kid who could easily have been your own brother if Jessica hadn’t tired of trysting in the gardener’s toolshed.”

  Delaney blinked, absorbing that. “That’s quite a leap of logic, Sam.” She managed a respectable touch of lightness. “When did you come to such lofty conclusions?”

  There was nothing light in his tone. “I’ve had nearly two bloody years to think about it. So how’d Do-Wright take the news? You did call him, I assume.”

  “He was understanding.” She’d choke before she’d tell about Chad’s “revisit the matter” comment. Sam would have a field day with that. “That cold bag isn’t going to do your eye any good unless you use it.”

  He closed his hand over the peas and threw them—hard—onto a padded chair.

  She jumped.

  “What’s he do for you, Delaney? Were you already sleeping with him before I left?”

  “No! I told you we’re not—” She caught the gleam in his eyes, and anger shored up her own spine. “I never broke my vows.” Even when she’d thought they were divorced. “Can you say the same?”

  A muscle ticked in his jaw. “Would it matter? You’ve already tried divorcing me once. Only a matter of time before you take care of that detail.”

  Fury bubbled inside her. “Well, you didn’t, and you were the one who walked out. What would you have me do, Sam? Stay married forever to a man who doesn’t want to be with me?” She realized with a sort of removed surprise that she was shaking. “So maybe I do want to marry Chad. At least he’s steady and reliable and—”

  “Trustworthy? Honest?”

  A single raindrop fell between them. It landed with a heavy plop on the redwood deck.

  “I never said you weren’t honest.”

  “You just believed I was capable of stealing evidence. It was money, you know. Counterfeit as all hell, but it was in Anton’s effects that we seized after his death.”

  She hadn’t known that. “I never believed that you’d stolen anything.” She’d barely been functioning back then.

  His lips twisted. The past loomed over them, as oppressive as the clouds had become. “Is he? Honest?”

  “Chad won’t hurt me,” Delaney finally said. How could he? She’d never put her heart in his hands the way she’d done with Sam. She wouldn’t be so foolish again.

  He stepped closer, his boot covering the pearling splatter of that raindrop. “Do you love him?”

  Her chin angled. She couldn’t step back even if she’d tried. Thick panes of glass were at her back. “He’s a good friend.” He’d been there before Sam. And he’d been there after.

  “But you haven’t slept with him.”

  “A person might think you’re jealous, considering the way you keep dwelling on that.”

  “You’re my wife.”

  “Well, you weren’t sleeping with me!” Her voice rang out. Her face flamed hot.

  He leaned closer, one hand pressed against the glass above her head. “We could always get each other into bed. That was never the problem. It was living with each other that was the problem.”

  She tried to deny it, but words wouldn’t come.

  “I wanted it all with you,” he said flatly. “You wanted nothing to change. Except that you’d have someone to keep your feet warm at night. I was your gardener, Delaney. And as soon as I wanted more with you than a toolshed—things like a house outside the city, a couple of kids—you froze me out.”

  “That is not true.”

  “You put your career, Alonso, between us every chance you got. Hell, when we get right down to it, you never really wanted to ge
t married in the first place.” He drew his finger down her neck. “You only agreed because you were pregnant.”

  He’d only asked because she’d been pregnant. “Considering what a poor wife I was, you could have done something when those papers came back from the court.”

  “One would think,” he murmured.

  “Then you could marry someone like S-Sara Drake.”

  “True enough.”

  Her throat ached. “So you admit it. You are involved with her.”

  “She’s a good friend,” he said deliberately.

  A raindrop fell on her forehead. “Sometimes I really hate you, Sam.”

  “Guess that’s better than nothing,” he muttered.

  She put her hands on his shoulders, intending to push him away.

  Then he brushed his lips over hers.

  Once.

  Twice.

  Her heart kicked up in her throat, and her stomach hollowed out. And instead of pushing, her fingers curled, suddenly clinging.

  He caught her chin in his hand, tilting her head. “Open your mouth, dammit.”

  She stared into his eyes, seeing her own reflection.

  And heaven help her, she opened her mouth.

  She tasted his hiss of satisfaction. Felt the race of it in her blood. Then his mouth covered hers, his kiss deep. Hot. Sweet.

  His arm slid behind her back, cushioning her against the unyielding glass door. But his hard body was no more yielding.

  Raindrops fell on her face. Tears from heaven?

  She tore her mouth away from his. “We can’t do this.”

  He caught her chin, his gaze boring into hers. “You mean you won’t.”

  “We’re adults.” She swallowed, giving up on regulating her uneven breath in favor of speech because she couldn’t seem to master both. “Not teenagers ruled by hormones.”

  A raindrop hit her shoulder, and his fingers trailed over it, then along the vee of her shirt. Down, down, and up again. Her nerves jumped and her skin felt too tight.