Passion to Die for

by Marilyn Pappano

  Once more tears stung her eyes. She’d cried during sex before, but never good tears. She’d wept every one of the first dozen times, until something inside her had died and she’d just gone numb in its place.

  Nothing was numb now. Her nerves tingled, her muscles contracted, her nipples hardened. Heat flowed with her blood, and her heartbeat competed with the ragged rasp of her breathing to echo in her ears. She felt alive. Desired.

  Loved.

  “I’ve missed you, too,” she whispered. “I never meant to hurt you.”

  He lowered himself until his forehead rested, warm and damp, against hers. “I know.”

  “I was just…” Her throat clogged, and she dashed away a tear before touching his face. He turned to press a kiss to her palm.

  “Afraid,” he finished for her. “I understand. But from now on, when you’re afraid, you come to me. Don’t push me away. Let me be strong when you need it, and you be strong when I do.”

  Her smile was teary, her lungs tight, and though she tried to tease, there was a hiccup in her voice. “When have you ever needed someone else’s strength?”

  “Every day of my life, darlin’. Especially—” his breath hitched, and his voice turned dark and strained “—right now. I can’t…Damn it, not yet…”

  She knew just how to make him finish quickly—how to move against him, how to clench muscles deep inside around him, how to make his body stiffen and his breath stop and his vision go dark.

  And he knew exactly how to do the same to her. Her gasp was soundless, heat flaring through her like wildfire, everything quivering and trembling as sensation grew wickedly sharp, clawing, then exploding. She clung to him, eyes squeezed shut, body damn near humming, and he held her through his own orgasm, offering thick guttural words that were little more than a soothing whisper underlying the pounding of her heart.

  God, I’ve missed you, he’d said, and tears seeped from her eyes as she pressed her face to his shoulder.

  She’d been worth missing.

  Imagine that.

  Instead of growing lighter outside, sometime in the last half hour, it had gotten darker, and now thunder rumbled somewhere far off. In Tommy’s opinion, it was a good morning for staying in bed. Sleep an hour or two, make love again, listen to the rain…

  Ellie was so still that he might have thought she was asleep if he hadn’t known better. Good sex made some women drowsy, but it always left her wanting to talk. It was nice knowing that about her.

  It was better knowing everything else.

  “Thank you.”

  He lay on his side, snuggled skin to skin with her, her soft murmur vibrating through him. His right arm was over her waist, and her silky blond hair was just a breath from his mouth, too tempting to ignore, so he didn’t. Nuzzling it aside, breathing in the fresh citrusy scent of her shampoo, he brought his mouth near her ear. “You’re welcome.”

  He didn’t ask what she was thanking him for. He could think of a dozen answers she might give, and specifics didn’t really matter. And she was welcome. In so many more ways than the trite phrase implied.

  The rain started then, and she breathed deeply as if she could smell it through the closed windows. They’d made love in the rain once. On the beach. In the middle of the day. It had been a slow week at the deli, so they’d taken off for a few days at one of South Carolina’s barrier islands. It had been an experience—torrential rain, surf pounding, no one in their little corner of the world but them.

  Sex in an unusual place had been more a novelty for him than her, he now knew. But she’d had a choice with him. She’d chosen to get involved with him, to be with him.

  To not marry him.

  “Ellie.”

  “Hmm.”

  “I still want to get married.”

  She froze, but she didn’t try to pull away or change the subject. Instead, she wriggled around until she was facing him, in the process giving him the beginnings of another hard-on. Her expression wasn’t the cool blank he’d grown accustomed to whenever the subject came up. It was pretty damn wary. “Do you still want to marry me?”

  He collapsed on his back with a great dramatic grunt. “God, you’re killing me. Of course I want to marry you. Would I be here now if I was planning to propose to someone else?”

  She didn’t answer but raised herself onto one elbow to see him better.

  “I’ve been telling you for about four years that I love you. I want to marry you. I want to grow old with you.” He hesitated, then went for broke. “I want to have kids with you, El. I want it all.” He stared at her, searching for some response. Her muscles didn’t tense. Her breath didn’t catch or her eyes fill with tears. She didn’t jump out of bed and start searching for her clothes. She just stared back at him.

  His hand shook as he stroked her cheek. “The kids aren’t a deal-breaker. If you can’t face that…it’s okay.”

  They might have been the hardest words he’d ever said—well, second to the ultimatum he’d given her six months ago. He’d always been close to his father and to Pops; whenever he’d imagined himself grown up and married, kids had always been a part of the picture. He’d known practically from the beginning with Ellie that he wanted those kids with her, and the desire had only strengthened after his friends all started having babies.

  But if it was a choice between Ellie and babies…hell, he’d make a great uncle to all the Calloway kids. He could be satisfied with that, as long as he had Ellie.

  “Wow.” She sank back down on the bed, her head resting on his shoulder. For a time she just lay there, her breathing slow and steady; then she quietly said, “I don’t even think of my baby as my daughter. Is that awful?”

  He wanted to talk about their babies, not the one she’d had with the man she’d loved before him. But it was really part of the same discussion. Her first daughter might have left a big enough hole in her heart that she couldn’t bear to have a second.

  “No. You gave her parents. She was your baby, but she’s their daughter.” And though he would have said it anyway, he believed it. Even if it did make him wonder: did his mother still think of him as her son, or was he just the little boy in her past?

  “She lives in Marietta. She’s got an older brother and a younger sister who are also adopted. She goes to a private school and studies gymnastics and dance and goes to cheerleading camp every summer.”

  “Have you met her?”

  “No. But Randolph Aiken, Andrew’s lawyer, knows the family, and he gives me updates if I ask for them.” She paused as lightning flashed, then thunder shook the house. When she went on, her tone was resigned. “I don’t ask anymore.”

  Anyone who’d grown up in Georgia knew the Aiken name. They’d owned plantations before the Civil War, had survived the conflict with most of their fortune intact and been quick to expand their business interests after the war. They were the Calloway family on a grander scale.

  Which meant that the bastard who had broken Ellie’s heart was Andrew Aiken III. He chaired the Aiken Foundation, which seemed to mostly involve handing out checks to worthy charities, hosting fund-raisers and getting his picture taken a lot with celebrities.

  I threatened to show up at his family home. Said home being nothing less than a mansion, visited by everyone who was anyone, site of a ball hosted every year by the governor. The idea of his pregnant, seventeen-year-old ex-prostitute mistress inviting herself onto hallowed Aiken ground must have put the fear of God into ol’ Andy.

  Tommy wished he could have the chance to do the same.

  Ellie unfolded his fingers that had clenched into a fist, then clasped his hand in hers. “I never see him, either,” she offered. “Oh, on TV, in the papers, in People, but it’s like seeing a familiar face, someone you can identify but you don’t really know.”

  “You don’t still have feelings for him?”

  Her chuckle was short. “The last tender feeling I had for Andrew died when I was seven months pregnant and had to beg his uncle for m
oney to keep myself alive long enough to give birth to his baby.”

  The image was painful. Had Andrew’s uncle treated her with respect and human decency? Had he acknowledged that the oh, so privileged Aiken family blood ran through the child whose adoption he was arranging—whose mother he was silencing? Or had he seen Ellie and the baby as just another of his nephew’s messes to clean up?

  Something nagged at the back of Tommy’s mind. Closing his eyes, he took a few deep relaxing breaths, easier to do with her naked and in his arms, and waited for the thought to become clearer. Something about Ellie, the last few days, a phone call…

  Friday evening, in the deli, while he’d waited for his to-go order. Would you please ask Mr. Aiken to call me as soon as he can? He has my numbers…it’s really important.

  His muscles tightened as he met her gaze. “Which one of them did you call Friday?”

  “Randolph. I wanted to ask his advice—how did you know?”

  “I was standing outside your office door, trying to find the courage to either knock or walk away. I heard you leave a message. You’ve stayed in touch with him all these years?”

  She shrugged. “He didn’t approve of what Andrew did, or of his own part in it. He knew I needed more than money to get back on my feet, so he helped me find a place in Charleston. He got me a job. He found the general store and suggested I buy it, and he’s given me advice when I ask.”

  “Does he do that with all of Andrew’s exes?”

  “I don’t know. We never talked about the others.” She smiled wryly. “Lawyer-client confidentiality. Scorned-lover disillusionment.”

  “What advice did you want this time?”

  “I was leaving. I wanted him to handle selling the restaurant and the house so…”

  So no one from Copper Lake would be in touch with her. Jamie Munroe-Calloway had been Ellie’s lawyer since she’d come to town. Had she worried that, client privilege or no, Jamie would give up her location to save Tommy’s sanity?

  “I would have found you.” He said it quietly, a promise. One way or another, legal methods or not, he would have tracked her down. He couldn’t have just let her disappear.

  “I would have been stunned to think I was worth the effort.” So softly that he had to hold his breath to hear, she went on. “All I ever wanted was a normal life. But my parents and fate and circumstance made sure I didn’t have that for a long time. I thought I didn’t deserve it. But maybe…”

  She lifted her gaze to his and said the sweetest words he’d ever heard. Well, second sweetest. He hadn’t heard those yet, though he didn’t need them to know they were true. I love you.

  “A baby. Your baby. I like the sound of that.”

  He couldn’t stop the grin that spread across his face. When he’d first fallen in love with her, he’d just assumed that marriage and a family were a given. Then she’d turned down his first proposal, and he had thought that surely she would come around in the near future. Finally he’d realized that the only coming around to be done was by him; he had to accept that she didn’t love him, or at least didn’t love him enough to marry him and have his kids.

  Good things come to those who wait, Pops would say. Tommy had waited long enough.

  He lifted himself over her, covering her body with his, pressing his erection against her. “Want to start trying now?” he asked, his mouth brushing hers.

  Twining her arms around his neck, she smiled a slow, sexy smile. “I’d like that.”

  Outside, the storm was intensifying. Inside, the room heated, the air growing heavy and shocky. For the first time since, well, their first time, they made love without a condom, and Tommy found himself hoping that first time would be the charm, just in case she had second thoughts. Not that he would be averse to trying as often as necessary.

  Not that he would lose out to second thoughts, or seventieth. They belonged together. End of discussion.

  She came first, and that was all he needed to finish. They were lying side by side, their skin and the sheets and the air itself damp with sweat and smelling of sex, when the phone rang. He checked caller ID—the restaurant—and handed the phone to her.

  “Hey, Ramona,” she greeted. Did the baker hear that she was short of breath? Did she catch that little quaver in Ellie’s voice? “Sorry. I’m running a little late this morning.”

  A little? he mouthed, holding up his wrist so she could see that it was 7:05. She rarely got to the deli later than 6:00 a.m. By the time she showered—again—and dressed—again—she was going to be nearly two hours late.

  Leaving her to talk, he went into the bathroom and turned on the water for his second shower. Sweaty and sticky from head to toe, he adjusted the temperature to lukewarm, then stepped under the spray. A few minutes later, the curtain opened and Ellie slipped into the tub with him.

  “Any chance you’re here to fulfill a few fantasies of mine?”

  She smiled at the hopefulness in his voice. In the last six months, he’d hardly ever seen her smiling. It was a really good look for her.

  “Ask me again this evening. Ramona’s not happy, and I try very hard to keep my staff happy.”

  “Yeah, you could keep my st—” He broke off when she shot him a look and grinned instead.

  She ducked under the spray, letting water stream over her head, turning her hair a shade darker, spiking her lashes, cascading over the perfect lines of her face. She was beautiful. He loved her. And she loved him back.

  No matter what else was going on, life was good.

  Chapter 10

  Though the storm passed within an hour, the rain continued, but it didn’t affect business at the deli. During the day, while people were at work, they had to eat lunch somewhere.

  At least, that was what Ellie preferred to believe, rather than think the steady business had anything to do with her possible involvement in Martha’s death.

  Tommy had made a few calls from Ellie’s office that morning and located the cemetery in Atlanta where Oliver was buried, and during the morning lull, he’d gone with her to the funeral home to pick out a casket. There would be a graveside service on Friday for any friends Martha might have had, but Ellie hadn’t yet decided whether she would go. It seemed wrong of a daughter to stay away from her mother’s funeral, no matter how bad the relationship. But at the same time, it struck her as hypocritical to attend, considering the circumstances at the time Martha had died.

  Now it was the afternoon lull, and the only customers were in the front dining room. Balancing a tray as easily as she had in her waitressing days, Ellie went into the back room, where Tommy, Robbie and A.J. sat. The table already held four drinks, napkins and sets of silverware. She handed out sandwiches—a Reuben for Robbie, paninis for the rest of them—before sliding into the empty chair.

  A cop investigating a murder, one of his suspects, a second cop who was dating said suspect and her defense attorney having lunch and discussing the case. Only in a small town, she thought as she took a bite of roasted veggies, creamy guacamole and mozzarella.

  “Do you know if Martha had any ties to Athens?” A.J. asked.

  She shook her head.

  “Do you have any?”

  Underneath the table, Tommy’s knee bumped hers. On the way to work, she’d asked him whether anyone else needed to know about her and Andrew. Don’t volunteer it, he advised, but don’t lie to keep it quiet. Lying makes you look guilty.

  “I know a man there. A lawyer. He helped me get off the streets. Why?”

  “We pulled Martha’s phone records. There were a dozen or so calls to and from numbers in Athens. She also made two calls there from the Jasmine. All the Athens numbers are pay phones.”

  A good way, she imagined, to keep calls from being traced back. What was more anonymous than a pay phone?

  “She couldn’t have called Randolph. He’s on an extended vacation to Europe.”

  A.J. took a bite of his roasted turkey sandwich. “This lawyer…he knows your real name, the name yo
u’re using now and where you live?”

  Ellie’s gut tightened. Randolph Aiken wouldn’t have betrayed her. There wasn’t a lot she trusted in the world, but she trusted in that.

  “He wouldn’t be involved with this,” she insisted. “He’s got too much to lose.”

  “People will risk just about anything for the right amount of money,” Robbie pointed out.

  “He doesn’t need money.”

  “How did you choose Ellen Chase for your new name?” A.J. asked after a pause.

  Ellie gazed past him to the herb garden out back. The mulch that surrounded each bedraggled plant gleamed in the rain. Everything would look so bright and renewed once the sun came out again, but for now that reddish bark was the only bit of color in a dreary scene.

  “Randolph suggested it,” she said at last, hating that the answer sounded almost like an indictment against him. “Ellen’s parents were clients of his. She had died several years earlier. He had her birth date, her Social Security number, and he helped me get the necessary documents.”

  “So he betrayed one client to help another,” A.J. said.

  Though it sounded bad put that way, she emphatically shook her head. “He wouldn’t have told Martha anything.” Over the years, Randolph had spent a lot of Aiken money as well as his own time and effort to make women like her disappear from Andrew’s world. Outing Ellie as Bethany Dempsey increased the risk of exposing Andrew as a two-timing pervert who liked sixteen- and seventeen-year-old girls.

  A.J. wasn’t convinced, but instead of arguing, he asked, “How do you think Martha found you?”

  She’d finished half of her sandwich, but the rest didn’t hold much appeal. Pushing the plate away a few inches, she rested her arms in its place and repeated the theories she and Tommy had come up with: that she’d been recognized by a guest from Jared’s birthday party or some long-ago acquaintance who had stopped at the deli on her way through town.

  “You’ve been in the newspaper a few times,” Robbie added. “And the deli was featured in that Southern food magazine.”