Harlequin Superromance September 2014 - Bundle 1 of 2: This Good Man\Promises Under the Peach Tree\Husband by Choice (80 page)

Head bowed, he nodded.

“It takes a very special man, a very strong man, to be sensitive,” she said softly, instilling any hint of love she'd ever felt for him into her voice. “Your father didn't understand that. But I do.”

He glanced up at her. “This is why you're mine, Meredith. You understand.”

“I do. I always have.”

Raising a hand to gently caress her face he said, “I love you so much, sweetie. And I am so, so sorry for all of the times I've hurt you. It's going to be different this time.” His voice broke. A first.

And she knew it was now or never.

* * *

T
HE
PHONES
HAD
started ringing as soon as the first image of Steve Smith had appeared on the news. And continued to come in when Meredith's image followed. She'd been sighted on the beach. He'd purchased a six-pack of beer the night before.

She'd been spotted on Canal Street. In another state.

He'd had fast food for breakfast.

She'd been seen at a bus station with three kids.

He'd sky dived that afternoon.

All in all, over a thousand calls came in during the first hour.

“We've got operators and police following up on every single one of the tips, Max.” Chantel sounded breathless as she relayed the latest news. The sky had turned cloudy, hiding the sun. The house was growing dark, in spite of the fact that it was only midday.

As he took Chantel's call, Max turned on some lights. He'd been pacing in the near darkness without realizing it. Now he paced in soft light.

It didn't make much difference.

“Is it true that the longer she's gone the less chance we have of finding her alive?”

“Don't go there.”

“The statistics about the first three hours being critical—”

“Those are for kidnapping victims, Max. This is different. Meredith left of her own accord. The cameras at The Lemonade Stand confirmed that.”

He kept seeing a pool of blood on the street.

And knew that Meredith deserved better. He'd promised to be the calm in her cacophony.

“She's out there, Chantel. And she's alive. Bring her home.”

Those were the words that rang true.

And he was going to keep believing them if it killed him.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

“T
HERE
...
DOES
THAT
feel good?” Meredith sat on the floor at Steve's head, gently massaging his temples. She had no professional training as a masseuse, but he'd taught her, a long time ago, to know what he liked, what made him feel good and cared for.

She'd led him into the master bedroom by the hand. Had him lie down on the floor. He'd been as pliable as a child.

“You've always had trouble relaxing,” she reminded him softly. “And I've always been able to help.” Her voice was almost melodic, as she used every ounce of strength she had to touch the man with tenderness, to find love to transfer from her fingers to his heart.

“Mmmm.” His eyelids relaxed and the muscles in his face softened. When his fingers lay flat on the carpeted floor of the bedroom, she said, “You go to other women, but you need me, Steve.”

“That's right.” The words were almost drugged-sounding. Drugged with drowsiness. Contentment.

For a quiet moment, Meredith worked her magic on him, as he'd taught her so long ago. And believed that she was with the real Steve Smith. The kind, sensitive boy who'd grown into a man who wanted to help people. Not the tortured child who grew into a man who had to hurt people to feel his own strength.

“That's why you always come back to me.” She was merely repeating his words back to him. The ones he'd uttered in the weak moments. The ones that came in moments of contrition. When he'd been afraid he'd lost her love.

“Yesss.”

Reaching down, she found the spots where his shoulders met his neck and gently pulled upward, to just behind his ears, and then ran her fingers through his hair to the top of his scalp.

“I'm sorry I ran away from you.”

“It's okay, love, I wasn't the easiest guy to live with,” he murmured, eyes still closed. “But I'm going to be better this time.”

He believed those words. She understood that now. And knew that his own conviction was, in part, what had convinced her to believe. All those times. Which one of them had quit believing first?

Or forgotten the truth?

She had to stay calm. To do this. And somehow, from someplace deep within her, she found the ability to continue to touch him without shaking, to move forward with her plan.

She couldn't look back. Or question what she was doing. She had to be willing to die for this, and she was.

“I won't ever run from you again, Steve,” she said softly. “I promise you.”

“You always kept your promises,” he said, sounding more and more like a little boy.

She'd succeeded. She'd taken him back to the man he'd been. To the boy he'd been.

“And I'll keep this one, but I need something from you this time.”

His eyes didn't open, but she saw the fingers lying on the floor stiffen. “You said this time would be different, and I've grown up,” she told him, infusing her tone with as much goodness as she could find.

Which meant pretending she was talking to other people. Whoever flashed in her mind that would work. Olivia. Lila.

She focused on Lila. Anyone closer to her... she couldn't think of them right now. Couldn't let anything draw her away from the moment.

But Lila was there, in her mind. Not quite a mother figure, but almost. And Renee.

Steve's fingers relaxed again.

It wasn't her fault that her family had died, that Chad had died. She'd had things left to do here on earth. It hadn't been her time.

Reaching under Steve's shoulders, she scraped her knuckles on the carpet and pulled upward, from his shoulder blade to his neck and up to his scalp. Widening her range.

She didn't speak anymore. Relax, she sent the word silently. Relax....

She'd lived because she'd disobeyed her father. She'd left her seat belt unbuckled.

And she'd done it because she'd listened to herself, to her own instincts. Probably to her child's inner voice. She'd trusted herself. And she'd lived.

Chills spread through her.

And she heard Lila's voice in her mind, telling her she wasn't to blame for Steve's violence. She'd chosen to marry a like soul for all the right reasons. And somewhere along the way, Steve had made some very bad choices. Choices that were prompted by bad things that had happened to him, yes, but still his choices.

Not hers.

I deserve to be happy.

The words were loud in Meredith's mind. Drowning out every other thought. Every impression, until all she saw was sunlight.

And Lila. An indefatigable spirit that floated in and out of people's lives without seemingly having one of her own. An angel with secrets she wouldn't share.

Just like Meredith had had secrets she didn't share.

“Steve?”

“Mmm-hmm?”

“I need you to do something for me.”

“Sure, love, anything.”

“I need you to let me go.”

The muscles beneath her fingers bunched and Meredith slid back and away from the man she'd allowed to steal too many years of her life. Standing, as calm as she'd ever been, she moved as far away from him as she could get, keeping her arms behind her.

She was ready to die if it came to that.

“What on earth are you talking about?” He was sitting up, eyes open, looking confused.

“I need you to let me walk away.”

It was an impossible order. She recognized that even as she issued it. And pressed forward because there was no other course.

“You promised never to leave me again.”

“I promised not to run from you. I need you to let me go, instead.”

“Are you crazy?” The tone in his voice warned of building anger. Of violence to come. And she stood her ground unafraid.

“You have a problem, Steve. Created by your father, but driven by something inside you. And I can't live with the constant threat of your violence.” Meredith's tone faltered as the woman she'd been surfaced. The young, vulnerable woman who'd had her heart, her trust and her body broken.

On her journey to find and return the younger Steve to the room, she'd connected to her younger self, too.

A complication she hadn't planned on.

He was standing, hands on his hips. “You know I can't do what you're asking, Meredith. And I'm not the one with the problem. Anything that happens to you, you bring on yourself.”

Meredith was proud of herself. She didn't back up. Or back down. “No, Steve, your inability to control your temper or your fists is not my fault.”

“You've grown a sassy mouth, Meredith.” He took a step closer. She took a step back. If he got any closer it would be time. “I don't like it.”

“I'm not backing down on this, Steve.”

He took a step toward her. “Oh, yeah? Well, get this, little girl. You are mine. You married me for better or worse until death do us part. I am not letting you go. And there's nothing you can do about it.”

She'd been prepared for this moment. And when it came, she wasn't afraid at all.

“I think there is,” she said. She backed up as far as she could go. To give him as much chance as possible to think. “Because I can't live another minute on this earth with you as you are,” she said. He'd used her deepest insecurities, her fears and needs, to control her. It might work the other way around. “If you let me go, I promise to keep in touch with you, to be a part of your life.” She didn't know how she'd work that out. But she would. To buy her freedom.

“I've got you, Meredith. You're already part of my life. So why would I let you go?”

“Because if you don't I'm going to tell the world about your issues. I'm going to tell them how you wet the bed until you were ten. About how your father was embarrassed by you. I'm going to tell the world about your constant need to prove your manhood through affairs, and beating your wife. I'll go to the news, if I have to, you know. Decorated Vegas detective exposed. I'll write a book and publish it myself....”

As Steve's face turned beet-red, his big brown shoe came one step closer. And then another. “I'll deny every word. I'll tell the truth about you. Your lack of social skills. Your jealous threats. I've got connections, Meredith, a lot of them. You have none, because you're so antisocial. I'll drag your reputation through the dirt and no one will believe a word you say about me.” The facial features that were relaxed mere moments before were twisting into a sneer she knew well.

“You know how the human race works, Steve. Once I place doubts some will believe, others will start looking for proof. And I have a feeling that if they look hard enough they'll find something. You've had a lot of people cover your ass who might not be so willing to do it anymore. Are you willing to take that chance?”

One more move forward. Her back was against the wall. “Are you?”

“I've got nothing left to lose, Steve. You do.”

The menacing forward movement stopped.

“I won't live another day with the threat of you and your stalking and your violence. I can't do it anymore, Steve. Either you let me go or kill me. Because if I'm alive after today, and not free from you, I will expose every dirty secret you ever had. Any way you look at it, you lose me. But if you let me go, I'll be the friend who keeps your secrets safe.”

Her words carried all of the weight of any threat he'd ever made. Because she meant every single word.

And her truth rang in that pretty bedroom with the ocean so close, the horizon filled with possibilities only yards away.

“You bitch!” With lightning fast reflexes, Steve lunged at her. He grabbed her wrist and wrenched her arm out of its socket. She could hear the cracking noise, just as she felt the sting to her hand as he broke her fingers.

“You actually think you're going to blackmail me?” he said. “You think you're going to rob me of my wife?”

She'd had to be free from the fear. And maybe she'd succeeded. Because she didn't feel afraid. Or did she?

She didn't think so.

A slap to the face, the spinning in her head, was making it hard to think. Steve's heavy leather shoe swooped in, kicked her feet out from underneath her. The carpet wasn't nearly so soft under her hip as she landed. She was going to have a bruise.

The hard leather toe in her back hurt.

One to her left shoulder, one to her ribs and she thought she was going to throw up.

Curling into a ball, Meredith thought of her mother. Couldn't picture her face. Lila's was there. She was a fetus and the other woman would nurture her.

“Get up, woman. Don't you dare think you're going to start this and not finish it.”

Steve's hands pulled her up, set her on her feet, and then dug into her arms as she swayed.

Why didn't he just do it and get it done?

But she knew. He didn't want to kill her. He just wanted to hurt her so bad he'd break her spirit, and then he'd be happy again.

Nice again.

For a while.

She knew how this went.

She started to laugh. Funny, he was going to half kill her because he was enraged over the fact that she'd told him he'd have to kill her.

“What are you laughing at, bitch?” he asked. And she laughed again. She couldn't help it. Life was funny.

And she wasn't afraid.

She wasn't afraid.

“Shut up!” He slapped her mouth, and her lip split. Blood pooled in her mouth.

She was glad Caleb would never see her like this. Such a good little boy. Who was going to grow up to be a man just like his daddy. A good man. There were so many of them out there....

One more slap to the side of the head and Meredith swooned. Too dizzy to think, she just knew stars and ringing...and pain, too. A lot of it. Everywhere.

She didn't care. She was free of him.

With a rough thrust, Steve let go of her.

He always did when it got to this point. When there was no challenge left in her.

“You disgust me,” he said.

“No, Steve,
you
are disgusting.” How she got the words out, she didn't know. And wasn't sure he could understand them, but she didn't care. They were for her.

And for Max. And Caleb.

“Either kill me or let me go,” she said. “Because I'm not playing your game anymore, Steve. I don't care what you do to me. I'm not afraid. Don't you see? You've lost your power over me.”

She was standing up to him. Finally.

She'd come here to finish this. To be free of the fear.

“You're kidding, right?” His sneer was nasty.

And her head hurt so badly she was going to puke. Meredith tried to move, to stand. She got up on all fours, and started to gag.

“You stupid bitch.” Arms grabbed her midsection, dragged her the few feet to the adjoining bathroom and hung her over the toilet.

“You got to do something you do it there,” he said. “And don't even think about turning this on me.”

He stood in the doorway. She could see him out of the corner of her eye.

Steve never touched her face above her mouth. And she'd always known why. He needed to be able to see her life shining out from her eyes.

He'd never managed to snuff out that life. Another funny.

Something sharp touched her hand, the blade of a knife. He wrapped her fingers around the handle and then it was gone.

“You tried to kill me, Meredith. I have a knife here and when they find it, it will have only your fingerprints on it. So just remember this, my love, if you ever, ever think about disobeying me again, or turning me in, or telling any more of your ugly little lies about me, I
will
turn you in. I will tell everyone how you tried to kill me. It will be your word against mine and I know what to say and to whom and don't you doubt for one second that I will do it.”

He knew the police commissioner. Had saved his daughter. Steve had saved a lot of good people. And caught a lot of bad guys.