by Janet Dailey
Seeing Deke again, it had never occurred to Angie that the sexual attraction they had once known would still exist. But it did. She could still remember the intimate signals that silently invited a kiss or an embrace. The little tilt of her head that would bring his mouth down to hers. She was shaken by the discovery that her body was doing them without the conscious direction of her mind.
The faint lift of a dark eyebrow revealed that Deke noticed it, too. His gaze took on a lazy, sensual quality. Angie was suddenly and vividly aware of his forceful virility. His breath was warm and faintly moist against her sensitive skin, the brutish fragrance of his shaven cheeks stimulated her senses.
“You’re feeling it, too, aren’t you?” His low voice was husky with disturbed desire.
“Yes,” Angie admitted because she didn’t really understand it.
But she wasn’t given a chance to discuss it as hard, masculine lips covered hers. Their rough demand ignited an immediate spark of pent-up longing. Following habits ingrained long ago, she arched toward him. His hands glided over her spine to bring her more fully against him, her breasts flattening out on contact with the unyielding solidness of his chest. Beneath her fingers, Angie could feel the corded muscles of his neck, dark hair curling over her hands at the back of his head.
The shadow cast by his hat seemed to hide them, letting the embrace become a stolen moment that neither would have to pay for. His mouth moved hungrily over hers, parting its softness and plummeting its secrets. Angie strained closer, afire with an aching fever that made her skin hot to the touch. She was fully conscious of the powerful muscles of his thighs and the hard male outline burning against her. Yet, this was not like any of the other times, something was different, more disturbing by its very familiarity.
She was quivering inside when Deke dragged his mouth to the far corner of her lips. There was a roughness to his breathing and it excited her to know she had aroused him. Angie didn’t understand her reaction. There was an odd mixture of regret and relief when Deke pulled away from her. His hands framed her face and raised it for his inspection.
The look in his eyes shocked her. Instead of seeing desire for her written in them, Angie read the message of bitter loathing and died a little. His hands tightened as if he wanted to crush her skull.
“There was a time, Angie, when I would have ripped the moon out of the sky and given it to you on a platter,” he growled thickly. “But that was long ago. Now, I don’t give a damn.”
His complete lack of feelings for her was a shattering discovery, although precisely why, she wasn’t sure. Deke pushed her out of the way and opened the door. He paused halfway out and looked over his shoulder.
“Don’t try to see Lindy again.” There was an implied threat in the warning.
Voiceless, she could only stare. The door was closed with a very definite finality, just as if she was being shut out of his life—and Lindy’s. For a frozen moment, she could only stand there. Finally, she turned away from the door.
Her glance strayed around the small hotel room, so impersonal and empty—exactly like her life. It belonged to no one and no one belonged to it. The loneliness of it was almost more than Angie could stand.
In the face of that, Deke’s threat didn’t seem so intimidating. Lindy was her daughter as much as she was Deke’s. She was all Angie had in the world. Now, she knew that she’d never be able to go through the rest of her life without seeing Lindy again. If it meant fighting Deke to do it, then she would fight him tooth and claw. She wasn’t going to be separated from Lindy again.
There was no more indecision, and Angie was suddenly exhausted. Turning to the bed, she undressed and pulled back the bedsheets. She crawled naked between them and collapsed. Tomorrow was soon enough to work out the details of her life.
Despite her tiredness, she slept fitfully, never fully resting.
Chapter Four
The next morning, Angie woke up with a dull headache and the feeling that she’d slept for barely an hour, but the sun blazed through the window so she knew it was morning. She dragged herself out of bed and into the bathroom. The stinging spray of the shower revived her, but she still felt emotionally drained by the events of the previous day.
In the restaurant, she lingered over several cups of coffee, trying to decide on a course of action. She had a two-week paid vacation and most of that time left. That gave her plenty of time to see what work was available in the area. Plus she had managed to save a little money, enough to rent a small house or apartment locally.
Before going back to her room, Angie stopped at the motel office to reserve the room for at least two more nights. The same dour-faced man was on duty at the desk. He didn’t look pleased to see her when she walked up.
“Checking out?” He held out his hand as if expecting her to give him the room key.
“What?” Angie frowned, disbelief flickering across her face.
“We’re all booked up,” he repeated his previous assertion. “You said you’d only be wantin’ the room for one night, otherwise, I would have told you.”
“I see,” she murmured and partially turned away from the registration desk. There were other motels so it wasn’t really that bad. It was just that she would have to take the time to pack and load her suitcase in the car and she’d been hoping to get to the school while Lindy was on her lunch break.
“It’s nothing personal, you understand,” the clerk asserted.
“I understand,” Angie sighed.
Returning to her room, she began gathering up her clothes and toiletries that she’d managed to scatter around in a short time. She was just closing the lid on her suitcase when the maid knocked at the door. Angie let her in, then hefted the suitcase off the rack.
“Are you checking out?” the maid inquired with a glance at the suitcase.
“Yes,” Angie admitted absently. “I hadn’t realized it was so busy here at this time of year.”
“Busy?”
“Yes.” Angie looked at the woman, a half-formed suspicion suddenly rearing its head again. “I was told the motel was all booked up for the night.”
“All booked up? Ha!” It was a derisive laugh. “I’ve been cleaning here for four years. This place has never been full, except over the holidays.”
“I think I knew that,” Angie murmured and moved toward the door. Over her shoulder, she said, “Have a nice day.”
“Yeah,” came the doubting response.
Angie had half a notion to go back to the office and confront the desk clerk with her suspicion. It wasn’t the motel that was all booked up. It was simply a fact that there wasn’t a room for her. It didn’t take too much intelligence to figure out that Deke Black-wood was directly involved in that decision. She should have guessed that he would do something like this. More than likely, he wanted her to know that he was responsible so she wouldn’t have any doubts that he wanted her gone.
Her mouth was set in a determined line as she crossed the parking lot to her car. No doubt, the other motels wouldn’t have a vacancy either. Deke didn’t know her very well if he thought that was going to stand in her way.
She was almost to her car before she noticed the man lounging beside it. Her step faltered as she recognized Deke. His hard gaze touched her, then flicked to the suitcase she carried. His mouth curved, but she didn’t mistake the action for a smile.
“Are you leaving?” It was a mocking question.
“You made sure of that, didn’t you?” Angie countered without any show of anger. It was oddly difficult to meet his level gaze. In daylight, with all this space around her, Deke seemed more formidable. The suede vest lined with sheepskin added bulk to his wide shoulders and his long, muscled legs were encased in rough denim. Deke wasn’t wearing the dark charcoal Stetson he’d had on last night. The brown hat shading his face was faded and work-stained, circled by a band of rattlesnake skin. The years had whipped the softness of youth from him and smoothed the hard surfaces to expose a full-grown man. There wa
s no latent sexuality about him; he was too ruggedly male. Nothing could lessen the impact he made on her senses. Angie was unnerved by it.
She set her suitcase on the ground at the rear of the car and opened her purse for the keys to open the trunk. In her side vision, she was aware of Deke pushing away from the pickup parked next to her car, all in a leisurely flow of motion. His unhurried strides brought him to the rear of the car as she unlocked the trunk.
“I knew you’d be clever enough to figure out it wasn’t simple misfortune the motel was booked up for tonight,” Deke stated and reached down to pick up her suitcase and set it in the opened trunk.
“But, just in case, you came by so I would be sure to get the message,” Angie guessed, but her glance ricocheted away before it fully met the measuring force of his.
“Something like that,” he agreed on a lazily cool note. He pushed the trunk closed and paused to lean on it, his head turning to face her squarely. “I don’t suppose it will come as any surprise to you to learn there isn’t another vacancy in town.”
Angie resisted the urge to curl her fingers into fists and forced her expression to remain calm. “You’ve been busy this morning, haven’t you?” The key ring in her hand jingled as she walked to the door on the driver’s side, aware that Deke followed at his own unhurried pace. “Are you sure you don’t want to escort me out of town as well?”
“I don’t think that will be necessary.” His hand was there, holding the car door open as Angie slid behind the wheel.
“I’m surprised.” Outguessed and thwarted, she was irritated, more so because Deke knew it. She reached out to pull the door shut, but he closed it for her.
The car had sat all morning in the sun and it was hot and stuffy inside. Angie rolled down the window before she inserted the key in the ignition. She didn’t have to look to know that Deke was standing by the driver’s door. The motor turned over, then hummed steadily. She shifted the gear into reverse and half-turned to look behind her.
“By the way—” Deke’s voice came from the window, startling her. Angie turned back and found him bent down to look inside, his large hands resting on the frame of the open window. There was a hard look of satisfaction in his cool gray eyes. “—Lindy isn’t in school today. I’m keeping her home for awhile.”
His statement struck low and hard, choking her off in mid-breath. All her nerve ends screamed in protest as she stared at him in broken despair. The dark indigo of her eyes pleaded with him to show a little compassion.
“For . . . how long?” Her voice was incredibly hoarse.
There was no give in him. “For as long as it takes.”
Hopeless tears welled in her eyes as she swallowed the raw sob that rose in her hot, aching throat. Averting her face, Angie reversed the car out of the parking space without bothering to see if Deke had moved clear or whether any traffic was coming. She didn’t doubt for a minute that he would keep Lindy a virtual prisoner on the ranch, certain that, in time, Angie would give up. But he was wrong —he was so wrong to think she would tire of waiting for a chance to see her daughter.
Fighting the waves of despondency, Angie drove out of town without direction. Her plans were smashed and she had to make new ones. She paid scant attention to the Texas landscape rushing by the car’s windows. The highway sliced through coastal marsh lands, giving occasional glimpses of blue Gulf water. In the roadside ditches, herons stood one-legged, poised in their stalk for food, sometimes taking flight in a flap of wings. Windbreaks of brightly flowered oleander bushes dipped and bowed in the draft-generated winds of the traffic.
Angie drove south, seeing none of it. Her mind worked feverishly to find an alternative place to stay now that Deke had eliminated Rockport and Fultan. Aransas Pass and Port Aransas were too obvious; so were Refugio, Gregory and Portland. As she neared Corpus Christi, the sweeping arch of the High Bridge curved into the sky ahead of her. When she crossed it, tugs were guiding an oil tanker under the bridge to the deep-water port and the refineries. Angie had a spectacular view of the bay and the famous shoreline of Corpus Christi with its yacht basin crowded with pleasure craft. But it wasn’t the beauty she was observing. It was the hotels and motels that lined the scenic bay drive. The city was big—big enough for her to get lost in—big enough to make it difficult for Deke to find her. She tunned off the highway at the next exit.
It was the logical place. A full minute later, Angie realized it was too logical. This was exactly what Deke would expect her to do. So she had to do something else. No. She thought about it another minute. A plan formed to do the obvious—rent a room as Deke expected her to do, then go somewhere else. But where? She pulled into the least expensive-looking motel and took a Texas map out of her glove compartment. Goliad. The name of the town leaped from the others. It was farther from Rockport than Corpus Christi, but it was closer to the Blackwood ranch. Some instinct told her that Deke would only check Goliad if he found no trace of her in Corpus Christi. But he would find a trace of her here. She was going to make sure of that.
With a new plan, Angie entered the hotel and registered under her own name. After all, she didn’t want to make it too difficult for Deke to locate her, and she needed to use her credit card to pay for the week’s stay. She couldn’t afford to keep draining her supply of cash. She would need that in Goliad.
She carried her suitcase into the room and took out two outfits that she wouldn’t be needing. She hung them in the closet. Easily replaceable items like toothpaste, toothbrush, deodorant and hairbrush she left in the bathroom so the room would look occupied. Angie put the rest of her clothes and cosmetics in a disposable laundry bag. Before she left the room, she messed up the bed. Every couple days or so, Angie realized she would have to come back so the management wouldn’t become suspicious.
Using a circuitous route, she drove north out of Corpus Christi, then backtracked east to Goliad. Once she found a quiet, out-of-the-way motel, she tied a scarf over her blond hair and put on her sunglasses, then went into the little office. She registered under the name of Patricia Sullivan, borrowing Ted’s surname. The motel had monthly rates which were much more economical than paying by the day, so Angie paid for a month in advance, even though it seriously depleted her supply of cash.
By day’s end, she was feeling quite proud of herself. The only obstacle left was figuring out a way to see Lindy. There was no telling how long Deke would keep her out of school. It would be foolhardy to try to go to the ranch. Even if Deke wasn’t around, he would have left orders barring her from the house. As nerve-wracking as it sounded, the only thing to do was lie low and wait.
It was so much easier said than done. She wanted her presence in Goliad kept quiet, which meant keeping to her motel room as much as possible. It was an escape from boredom to drive to Corpus Christi and maintain her charade there. As the weekend approached, Angie realized that she was getting low on funds. She tried to cash a personal check at a bank in Corpus Christi, but since it was drawn on an out-of-town bank, they politely explained their policy didn’t permit it. They did allow her to draw the maximum amount of cash granted by the major credit card she carried, which was enough to get her by until the following week if she was careful.
In the meantime, she waited. By Tuesday of the next week, her patience had run out. Angie drove to the school in Rockport. This time, she didn’t venture into the building. Instead, she waited outside in her car and watched for Lindy when the children came out to play during recess. But she didn’t see her daughter among them—not that day nor the next.
After school was over on Wednesday, Angie noticed two little girls on their way home coming toward her parked car. They appeared to be Lindy’s age. She took a chance that they might be in her class.
“Hello,” she called to them, smiling widely to hide her nervousness. “Do either of you know Lindy Blackwood?”
The girls paused a little uncertainly. “Yes,” the brown-haired one admitted.
“Was she in school today?�
� Angie asked.
“No. She’s been sick all week.”
“And last week, too,” the little girl with glasses chimed in.
“Thank you.” It confirmed what Angie had already guessed, but it was still bitterly disappointing.
With a heavy heart, she drove back to Goliad. Her evening meal consisted of cheese and crackers and some oranges she’d bought from a man selling fruit out of the back of his pickup along the road. When she counted her money that night, Angie discovered that she had spent more than she realized. She counted again then checked her purse to make certain she had not secreted some bills away. There was none.
For more than an hour, she paced the room trying to decide whether she should drive all the way to Houston tomorrow, hand in her notice at work, close her bank accounts, and inform her landlord she was vacating her apartment. After all, she did intend to move here, but in the end, Angie reached for the telephone.
“Hello, Ted,” she said, the minute he answered. “It’s me, Angie.”
“Angie! How did you know I was just thinking about you?” he laughed with pleasure. Angie didn’t realize how lonely she’d been until she heard the warmth and friendship in his voice. “I’ve missed you,” he declared without apology. “I don’t know if I can wait until Saturday for you to come back. I’m taking you out to dinner. Where would you like to go?”
“Ted—” She hesitated, trying to find the best way to tell him. But she finally just blurted it out, “I’m not sure I’ll be back on Saturday.”
“Why?” He shot back. “What’s wrong? Where are you?”
“Goliad.”
“Wh—” Ted paused. “Should I ask what you’re doing there of all places?”
“It’s a nice, friendly little town.”
“So is Houston. Why don’t you come home?” he urged.
“I can’t.”
