Saints and Sinners (A Classic Romance) (21 page)

"And so you ran away with the kids."

"Not for a while. It wasn't easy, but I managed to get copies of their school and shot records when I picked them up the last day of class. By then I was friendly with the man keeping tabs on us. He finally joined me for a drink one night in August."

"Spiked it, did you?" Matt smiled, and she warmed to his pride in her desperate act.

"Let's just say by the time he woke up, we were gone. I told the kids we were taking a walk. I got them ice cream cones and I bought a fern. All the while I kept looking over my shoulder." The memory of that plant's role in their first meeting coaxed an ironic chuckle from Matthew and a painful sigh from her.

"I can just see it, Dee. A woman shopping with two children eating ice cream. Perfect. Perfectly innocent."

"That was the general idea. Once I was confident we weren't being followed, I took them to where I'd parked the car I bought with cash. I left everything I owned behind, except for a few clothes I stashed at the last minute in a big purse. I made several car trades before we ended up here in Hayes."

"Incredible
," he breathed. "How much do the kids know?"

"Enough to keep quiet and pretend I'm their mom. Which isn't hard. I can still hear them crying to me for help every time they saw their father slap Alexis around. They are my children, Matthew, and I'd kill before giving them back. We're a family, and we're bound by more than blood. We share loyalties. We share shame. We shared you."

"You still share me. You always will."

Didn't he get it? Didn't he grasp where all this was leading? But no, his voice was calm and his face expressed some odd expectation.

"The children and I share other things too, Matt. Protection. I'm doing my best to protect them from being sucked into their father's world. Vince won't get them as long as I'm around."

"Not as long as I'm around either... and that's going to be for the rest of our lives." Matthew grasped her shoulders. His gaze was tender, as was his smile, but what she wanted was his wrath. Anything except this gentle touch that made her long to embrace his hope.

"I knew the first day we met, there was something special inside you, though I had no idea you were so courageous." His words were an intimate murmur. "I hope you like the ring I picked out. The only thing that has kept it off your finger is the trust you've just given me."

She thought she was going to be sick. When she covered her mouth, he winked, obviously mistaking the cause.

"Surely, you're not surprised that I'm proposing for the second time in an hour. After all, your first refusal doesn't count since the reason you refused is gone."

He released her and pulled out a desk drawer. And then he was holding out an open heart-shaped white velvet box. A simple gold and diamond ring winked up at her. Dee's mouth worked, but no words would come. Oh, this seemed cruel, crueler than any punishment Nick or Vince could devise.

"Shut the box," she whispered sharply. "Didn't you hear me? Shut it! Put it away. Get it away from me, now. Now!"

She clutched at her heart, which was breaking apart like shattered glass. The way he was looking at her, stunned and then hurt—-oh, dear Lord, she couldn't bear it.

"I guess I can take that as a second no." He closed the box and slammed it down on the desk, then threw up his hands. "What the hell is it now? You've told me everything. Nothing's between us any more but this damnable refusal of yours to accept what's meant to be."

"Nothing between us but that?" she cried in disbelief. "Matt, it's a lost cause, don't you see? The problem hasn't gone away. There's no future for us." Dee gripped his arms and tried to shake him out of his maddening stillness. He was immovable.

"Where is your faith, woman?" he said quietly. "If not in heaven, then in me. How many times have I vowed to you my protection? My love? Do you believe in me so little that you would spit on what I'm offering you?"

Tears slid down her cheeks. She wiped them, praying for a strength to counter his.

"Your love means everything to me. Matt, but you have to realize that I'm living on borrowed time. Your protection I covet, but it can't compete with this thing that won't stop until I'm found. It could be soon."

"What makes you think so?"

"The reason I came here today. A man had just called and said 'wrong number,' then hung up. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't, but we can't live our lives wondering how much time we have left each time the phone rings."

"But we won't live that way because we're making a call of our own." He reached for the phone.

"Who are you calling?" she demanded.

"The authorities, Dee. I have friends who can intercede."

"No! You don't know who you're dealing with or you wouldn't even suggest something so stupid."

"What's stupid is being a sitting duck."

"Maybe so, Matt, but better sitting than napping in the bottom of a casket." She put her hand down over his. "I forbid you to call anyone you know, no matter who they are."

"I say it's time we bring in some honest officials who have a stake in justice, not casinos."

"Okay, go ahead," she said haltingly. "But before you hang up, the house across the street will be vacant."

"Is that a threat?"

"A promise. Unless you can meet my terms."

"Your terms?" he repeated caustically. "I suppose that means you want an affair, not marriage? Maybe settle for a few stolen fornications until you get nervous and run again?"

"Yes," she said in a rush. "Yes, exactly. Tell your church that I tempted you and you fell. With luck and a prayer you can stay employed here. Without it, you have the homeless shelter to go back to. You couldn't see me often either way, but, Matthew, it is something."

"So I can live in my parsonage or hundreds of miles away, but never share a home with you." He stared at her hard. "That's something, all right."

She gripped his robe. "But you can visit. Late at night, once the neighbors are asleep. We'll give every appearance of having cut our ties. Then, if questions are asked, the answer will be that we're no longer involved. If I have to leave fast, I'll get in touch once it's safe. Okay? Say it's okay. Please, Matthew. I'm begging you,"

Her voice was moving, pitiful. His sympathy ran deep even while his anger and determination escalated. Poor Dee, he thought, that you could believe I would debase us to this. How much you still have to learn about me.

"So," he said slowly, "the honeymoon's over. If I want to be in your life, I settle for less than what we both deserve and go along with the farce. Some choice, Dee." He drew his hand from the phone.

"Then you won't call your people?"

"Looks like your call cancels mine. Can I come over tonight after the kids are in bed? Or does that violate your standards of subterfuge?"

She winced but didn't back down. "Don't. Give it one month from today—at midnight."

"And if I don't abide by your rules?"

Dee hugged herself close to keep from coming apart. "Then I'm gone and we're finished."

He held her gaze as he reached for the door, stretching out the taut moment until he was certain she realized the potential consequences of her ultimatum.

Then he turned the lock and walked slowly back to his desk. In one abrupt movement he slid papers, the phone, the engagement ring to the floor.

"In that case, lover, the affair's in full swing and I want something to dream about for the next month. Happy, Dee?"

Though her eyes shimmered with hurt, he was compelled to drive home a crucial point.

"Matthew, please.
Please.
Don't reduce us to this."

"I didn't reduce us. You did." When he motioned her to the desk, she stiffly obeyed. "What's wrong? Why aren't you taking off your panties for the gigolo? Time's short, and that's something we have precious little of," he said as he pulled out a foil packet from his wallet.

"Why are you being so horrid, Matthew?"

"Weren't these your terms for our relationship?" He scratched his head, pretending to look confused. "Did I misunderstand somehow? Had you meant that you'll marry me and let me handle the problem, trust me enough to see this through with you? No?" The sound he made smacked of distaste. "Okay, I'm easy. We'll switch roles. Instead of me being your boy-toy, spread your legs and be my mistress. Unless you've got the guts to put that ring on your finger and be my wife."

She was crying, her hands shaking badly as she took off her jeans and panties, then laid half clothed upon the desk.

"You're not enjoying this," he said quietly. He couldn't see her face because both of her hands were covering it. "Look at me," he demanded, jerking them away. "Why aren't you enjoying this?"

"How can I?" she said in such agony that he cringed inside. "This isn't us. This isn't who we are."

"It
wasn't
what we were until you gave us no alternative. I've had affairs, several, in fact, even if you haven't. This is it, Dee. This is what you insist we be for as long as we can steal it. Great, isn't it? Don't you love getting nailed by a man who knows all the right buttons to hit? C'mon, babe, let's get it on. We're on a stopwatch, not a lifetime or eternity together."

"I hate this," she sobbed.

"But you don't hate me." He kissed her softly, achingly sweetly, priming her for a swift seduction. "You love me."

"Yes. More than my own life, I do love you."

"And because you do, you'll give me what I need—to be inside you before we say good-bye." He let the possible nightmare of parting forever linger before taking her.

He bathed her face with hungry kisses, tasting salty tears. "If this is all we can have, let's take it while we can. You said a month without this, without so much as a single 'I love you' or a shared confidence. You got your way, and that means we can never know which meeting will be our last. Should this be it, let's make it count."

Her arms went around his neck; her legs gripped him tightly and she sobbed against his shoulder. Matthew hid the grim set of his lips at the base of her throat.

There was an urgency to their lovemaking that had never been there before. The caresses they shared were fevered and demanding, as if each touch, each open-mouthed kiss, might be their last.

There was only the sound of labored breathing, the faint creak of the desk. They smelled of sweat, of lovers in heat. Each stroke he gave and she greedily took was a bonding. As he cradled her head and shielded her back from the hardness of wood, her cry of ecstasy emerged as a desperate sob.

And while he drank it from her lips, he pushed against her womb. And came. In silence he came while he stared down at this woman who he had claimed as wife.

"There now," he murmured, stroking wet hair from her temples. "Cry, just cry it all out. Let me hold you until you can't cry anymore and then... then I'll let you go."

His last few words only made her cry harder. It took a while for her tears to run dry.

Matthew dressed her while he whispered words of comfort and patience. But he was far from feeling patient. There was much work to be done, and the sooner Dee left, the sooner he could get to it.

"Ready?" he asked, rocking her in the cradle of his arms. He kissed her, then released her and walked to the door.

Matthew had to admire the courage evident in Dee's straight posture as she walked out of the office. She turned once, and raised her hand in farewell. He answered with a curt nod. Then she was gone.

Matthew shut the door and locked it. Reaching for the phone, he said a prayer before placing his call. All was silent in the church as he dialed.

But silent he would be no more.

Chapter 16

"No, Trudy, not like that." Dee said sharply to her last student for the day. "Like this."

"I'm sorry, Ms. Sampson," the little girl whined. "Please don't be mad at me. I practiced, really I did."

What is wrong with you, Dee, scolding poor Trudy even more than you did the others? Keep this up and you will have to move, because you won't have a single pupil left and you've already lost five since Mrs. Busybody got busy and blabbed
.