Leaving Hunter to chase imaginary prey, they entered the house. Juliet retrieved the bag she’d tucked in a drawer while Martin locked the door. She led the way to the bedroom, and he followed, his gaze so intent that she could feel it. It made her self-conscious of every step, every sway of her hips, but at the same time, it made her feel graceful. Sensual. Womanly.
“I’m kind of new at this, you know,” Martin said, his grin less than confident, his lack of assurance endearing.
“I think it’s like riding a bike. You never forget.”
He slid the bag from her hand, removed the box inside and left it on the night table, then claimed both of her hands. “There are a few things I’d like you to forget, starting with the bastard in Texas and the incredible sex.”
“What bastard in Texas?”
He backed up until he was sitting on the bed and drew her between his legs. In the dim light from the single lamp burning on the night stand, he raised his hands to the first button at the point of her dress’s V-neck. He slid it open, then moved to the next one, his palms brushing her breasts. He opened it, too, and the next and the next, all the way to her waist, where he stopped.
Just as she’d done last week, he drew his fingertips along the opening to her waist, easing fabric back, exposing skin, stroking. Just as she’d known last week, his heat, rougher skin and stronger hands felt incredibly different from her own tentative touches. Sexier, full of promise and pleasure.
Each time he stroked her, his hands explored a little further, sliding underneath the cotton, brushing the sides of her breasts, teasing her nipples, then covering her, pressing his palms against her flesh, kneading, teasing, massaging. Her legs grew weak, and his touch became both vital and unbearable. Her skin quivered everywhere he touched, the heat so intense that she was damp with it, the sensations so potent that she trembled. If he stopped touching her, she might die. If he didn’t stop, she surely would, an erotic death of pleasure so pure it would destroy her.
He unfastened a few more buttons, slid the dress off her shoulders. It caught on her bent arms, exposing her breasts to his gaze, his deliberate caresses and the sweet torment of his kisses. He kissed her breasts, suckled her nipples, bit and soothed and drew hard on them, sending heat through her body, sending wicked need to pool between her thighs.
“Oh, Martin.”
He pressed his cheek to the warm, shivery skin between her breasts. “You like that?” She heard his smile, felt his tongue making lazy circles. He must know the answer she couldn’t give voice to, must know that her lungs were tight, her every breath needed for things more important than talk. “You like this?”
He slid his hand underneath her skirt, gliding it quickly along her thigh to the heat and moisture that awaited him. Stroking her through the thin cover of her panties, he chuckled softly. “You’re ready for me, aren’t you, darlin’?”
From some wicked place inside, she found the strength to raise her head, to gaze into his intense blue eyes as she feather-stroked her fingers over faded denim and swollen flesh. “No more than you are, sweetheart,” she said with her own husky laugh.
For an instant her boldness surprised him, but when she would have withdrawn her hand, he caught it, spread her fingers over the length of him, pressed her palm hard against him. “Juliet…” His groan made her name barely recognizable. “Please…”
She pulled free of his hand, then stroked him again and again as she claimed his mouth. Tangling his hands in her hair, he took control of the kiss. It was harsh, demanding, greedy. There was no gentleness, no tenderness, just pure passion, pure determination.
Their touches clumsy, their movements frenzied, they stripped off their clothes and fell across the bed. He knelt between her thighs, fumbling with a condom while she tried without success to pull him closer, so close they could never find their way apart again. Then he was there, pressing in, one deep, stretching inch at a time. She thrust against him, wanting more, needing more, none of this slow and easy, but hard and fast and full and now. Oh, please, now.
Her cries were soft, felt rather than heard, but Martin understood. Oh, please, now. Yes, he needed her now. Sliding his hands underneath her, he pushed hard, filling her in one powerful thrust. Her hips cradled his, and her body fitted his as tightly, as heatedly and perfectly as he could have wished. His head told him to remain still, to give her a moment to adjust, but his body insisted he didn’t have a moment. He stroked her, kissed her, moved with her and against her, faster, harder, deeper, and the release he was struggling for built inside him, stronger, stronger, threatening to explode, to destroy him, to—
It washed over him, over and over, racking his body with violent shudders, robbing him of all thoughts, all fears, all needs but this one. Dimly he was aware of her own release, of the tightening of her body around and beneath his, of her trembling and helpless cries. He wanted to comfort her but had no comfort to offer, wanted to soothe her but couldn’t find his voice. All he could do was hold her, kiss her, rock with the tremors that shook her.
Moment after moment passed. Her fingers eased their grip on his arms, and the tension eased its grip on his body enough so he could breathe, enough so he could control the twitchy responses of his muscles, enough so he could see her in the lamplight. She was beautiful, her pale face flushed, the delicate pink extending down her throat to the still-swollen tips of her breasts. Her lips were parted, her breathing uneven, but her eyes were clear and free—thank God—of embarrassment, shame or regret.
Her smile faint and packing a punch, she raised her hands to his face. He pressed a kiss to one palm before she evaded his mouth and slid her fingertips across his cheeks, his jaw, his forehead, into his hair. They were simple touches, the sort lovers indulged in, the sort she’d never had the courage to try with him. Her hand on his arm was about as intimate as her gestures had gotten before tonight, and he’d been grateful for even that.
After tonight he would always want more.
“See? You didn’t forget.” Her voice was throaty, her smile satisfied.
“No,” he agreed. He’d remembered the mechanics, but not the emotions. Now he was more convinced than ever that there was no woman waiting somewhere for his return. He could never forget this. It was part of his heart, part of his soul, always and forever part of him.
She slid her hands down to his shoulders, across his chest, brushing his nipples and making him shiver. “Again.”
Her command made him grin. It also made his body jerk and start to swell inside her. “Again. What kind of request is that?”
“It’s a demand. An entreaty. A plea.” Her fingers were tickling across his belly now, working between their bodies to touch him where they were joined.
“What happened to sweet, shy, innocent Juliet, who doesn’t do well face-to-face, who blushes when a man looks at her the way he looks at a woman?”
“It’s hard to be shy and innocent when you’re naked and in bed with a man,” she said primly.
“Especially when your fingers are wrapped around his—”
She cut him off with a kiss and yet another intimate caress, her hand sliding lower to cradle him. By the time she let him breathe, he could think, want, need only one thing.
Again.
* * *
Juliet lay on her stomach, supporting her weight on her elbows, her hip pressed snugly against Martin’s, and studied him in the shadowy light. He was on his back, with one arm at his side, the other loosely around her. His head rested on her pillow, his skin was slick with sweat, and his breathing was almost back to normal.
Hers might never be normal again.
She had insisted just this morning that she had experienced incredible sex before, but she’d been wrong. Sex—making love, the romantic in her whispered—with Martin was incredible. Amazing. Exquisite.
He raised his free hand to stroke her cheek. “Why aren’t you married and raising babies?” His tone was lazy, sleepy, a little bewildered. It was sweet of him to think that surely some man in the last fourteen years should have wanted her, but the truth was, none had.
“I never planned to be thirty-four and alone. It just happened.”
“I’m glad it did.” He found the energy to raise his hand where it rested against her and stroked her breast. Odd, how what had made her ache a short while ago was now comfortable and soothing. “I’d like to think you were waiting for me.”
All her life, she agreed. And she would spend the rest of it being grateful for however long she had him.
She forced a smile to lighten her mood. “Maybe you were waiting for me. Maybe that’s why you were coming to Grand Springs and that’s why you had the accident and developed amnesia—to keep you here until I got here. Maybe the fates and the heavens conspired to bring us together.”
“Then it was worth the price. Who needs memories, after all?”
He did. He needed to know that he wasn’t some awful, horrible person not fit to walk the streets free. He needed to know that he deserved to be wanted, that it was all right to be loved.
She rested her arm on his stomach, patted her hand gently on his chest. “Tell me about last night’s dream.”
Immediately his muscles tightened and his features shifted into a scowl. “No.”
“Please, Martin.”
“There’s nothing to tell.”
“It was enough to convince you that you killed a man. Please.”
He turned his face away from her, then, after a long silence, spoke. “It was just images. Impressions. Feelings. Angry voices. The smells of fear, blood, something burning, someone— Someone dying. And a woman whispering, ‘He’s dead. Oh, my God, you’ve killed him!’ She was talking to me, Juliet.”
As far as she was concerned, it was a bad dream and nothing else. But he saw it as so much more. Truth. Verdict. Damnation.
“You can’t accept it as real until you have proof. You’ll get that proof when you remember.”
“And if it is real? What then?”
If it was real, it would be self-defense or some other form of justified killing. She was convinced of it—but he wasn’t. “Then we’ll deal with it.”
“How? Pretend it didn’t happen? Accept it and forget about it? How do you accept, then forget, that the man you’re sharing a bed with is a killer? How do you pretend—”
She bumped her entire body against his, jarring him into silence. “We’ll deal with it then. Right now I’m not going to worry about something that might not have even happened. Right now I’m going to deal with you.” She was going to turn onto her side and take a long, leisurely look. She knew how he tasted, how he felt, how he moved. Now she wanted to know how he looked. She wanted to see his broad chest, flat belly, lean hips and his long, strong-muscled legs. She wanted to see the part of him she knew most intimately now, wanted to behave like a giggly teenage girl seeing a naked man for the first time and see, examine, appreciate everything.
He was beautiful…which made the scars even uglier. She’d felt them earlier, one thick and raised, the other a smooth line, pale against his tanned chest. Someone had shot him, had tried to kill him, not once but twice. Why? What had he done to deserve such hatred?
“If you want to rub something, darlin’, I can make a suggestion.”
Subconsciously her fingers had rubbed back and forth across the surgical scar. He pulled them away and slid her hand down his body. Her cheeks turning pink, she pulled away. “Let me see the others.”
“No.”
“I know you don’t like them. I know they’ve been the cause of a lot of concern for you about what kind of man you were when you got them. Let me see them, just this once, and I won’t ask again.” When he was still resistant, she offered her coyest smile. “Let me see them, then I’ll rub whatever you want.”
After a moment, he rolled onto his stomach, his face hidden in her pillow, and lay very still. The gunshot wound and surgical scar on his lower back were virtually identical to the ones on his chest. There were a few smaller scars, including one higher, a few inches below his shoulder. It was no bigger than a quarter, raised and ridged, particularly ugly. In his dream he had smelled something burning. His own flesh? Had this burn been an accident, or had someone deliberately inflicted it on him, then died for his brutality?
She touched his skin lightly beneath the scar. “How old is this?”
“Old.”
“How old?”
“Doc Howell couldn’t say, just that the scar is mature.”
If the dead man in his dreams had been responsible for the burn, then he’d deserved to die a vicious and painful death, and Martin had had every right to be glad about it. He didn’t owe the bastard a moment’s regret.
He continued to lie utterly motionless. Leaning over, she pressed a loud, smacking kiss to his spine, then murmured near his ear, “Roll over here and tell me what you want me to do. Tell me where to touch you, where to kiss you and how it makes you feel.”
He turned over and settled her close against him. “This guy in Dallas…the incredible sex—”
“It wasn’t.”
“Were you in love with him?”
I imagined myself well on the way to falling in love with him, she’d told him this morning. Had he interpreted it as a face-saving remark to cover a broken heart? “No.” She offered no explanations. The answer didn’t require any.
“Under normal circumstances, I think this would be where you ask me if I’ve ever been in love.” His tone was dry. “All I can tell you is I don’t think so.”
She tightened her arm across his waist. “If you have, I don’t think I’d want to know.”
“Why not?”
“Because if you were, you probably still were, right up to the time of the accident. Because she would probably be waiting somewhere for you to come back.”
“If anyone out there wanted me back, don’t you think they would have filed a missing persons report by now? But no one has. No one cared enough.”
If that were true—and it seemed to be—then he must have been even more alone than she was. Knowledge like that must be hard to live with. “We could try one other thing,” she suggested, her fingers straying back to the scars high on his chest. Immediately he captured her hand and held it, clasped in his, on his stomach. “It’s a requirement of law that gunshot wounds be reported to the local police. Granted, big cities might have thousands of gunshot victims a year, but smaller cities and towns might have only a few. According to your doctor, one set of scars is probably a couple years old, and the other is double that. Maybe we can send out a bulletin to all law enforcement agencies in the country, asking that they check their records for the last…oh, five or six years for a shooting victim who matches your description.”
“Kind of a long shot, isn’t it? There must be thousands of possibilities.”
“I don’t know if I can do it, but I’ll find out tomorrow. Still, at least it’s a chance.”
He grunted again, then began moving her hand back and forth over his stomach. Closing her eyes, she flattened her palm and enjoyed the lazy caresses as they dipped lower. Once she was touching him intimately, he released her hand and brought his own hand to her body, tickling her belly, making her skin quiver, rubbing her breast. When he shifted to lean over her, she sighed. When he covered her mouth with his, the sigh became a groan, low and needy.
“You’re a beautiful woman,” he murmured as he filled her again, stretched her again.
He’d called her beautiful before, and she’d heard it with a large dose of skepticism. She was much too familiar with her own face to consider it anything but plain. But right now, right this moment, with the way he was looking at her, touching her, making love to her, she had no problem believing. She felt beautiful. Overcome, head-over-heels, definitely-in-love beautiful.
* * *
The credit bureau was downtown, a half block off the main thoroughfare. Martin stood across the street for ten minutes, watching through the plate-glass windows as the two women inside chatted and worked. In another few minutes one of the women would be going to lunch while one remained to keep the office open. He hoped Sherri was the one who stayed, but it didn’t really matter either way, as long as he could talk to her alone.
He didn’t know Sherri Stevens well, but she’d always been friendly, and she’d made it clear over the winter that she was interested in a relationship. He hadn’t been at the time—hadn’t been in a long time, since even before last June, he was certain—and she had accepted that graciously. He hated to come back now, when any interest he might ever have in a woman was all tied up in Juliet, but they needed Hal’s credit report.
Thoughts of Juliet sent his temperature up a few steamy degrees. After they’d made love the last time, he’d left her in bed only long enough to let Hunter in, then they had all gone to sleep. The dog had snored, but it hadn’t disturbed Martin. Hell, with Juliet’s slender body curled close to his all night, nothing could have disturbed him, not even dreams. If he’d had any at all, they’d been about Juliet, because the only time he’d awakened, he’d been hot and hard. He hadn’t awakened her, but had eventually drifted off to sleep again.
Tonight, though… Tonight would be a different story.
Across the street, the older woman left the credit bureau. She was followed a moment later by a man in shirtsleeves and tie. That meant Sherri was alone in the office.
He waited for a car to pass, then crossed the street. The electronic bell connected to the door dinged as he walked in, bringing her attention from the computer straight to him. Her smile was welcoming, her voice surprised but warm. “Martin. Long time, no see. How’re you doing?”
“I’m fine. How about you?”
“I get by. What brings you to my part of town?”
He knew the act—what to say, how to say it, with just the right degree of male interest. He’d sweet-talked things more important than credit records out of people less friendly than Sherri—though he didn’t know what things or which people. But when he opened his mouth, the smooth delivery, the easy invitation, the sexual interest, just wouldn’t come. Instead, he stumbled over his response. “I came downtown to get some lunch before—before I head to work. I thought maybe—maybe you’d want to go with me. To lunch. If you don’t have other plans.”
She gave him a long, steady look. “I do believe that’s the most unenthusiastic invitation I’ve ever received.”
“I didn’t mean—”
She brushed him off. “It’s okay. I don’t go to lunch until one. What time do you go to work?”
“One-thirty.”
“Too bad.” She spoke with only a hint of disappointment. “Though it’s been a long time since we’ve talked, I’ve seen you around town—lately with that new dispatcher.”
He was blank for a moment, then blinked. “You mean Juliet. She’s the records supervisor.”
“Whatever. Rumor is you two are pretty tight.”
The latest rumor was probably that he’d spent the night at Juliet’s house. He wished she didn’t have to be subjected to gossip, but the talkative folks in town still considered him enough of an oddity to warrant their attention. If he were truly concerned about gossip, he should have left her house well before dawn, and he certainly shouldn’t have kissed her in the driveway until her knees were weak, until his chest was tight and he was ready to explode.
“We’re close,” he admitted. It wasn’t the right answer when he was supposed to be charming Sherri into risking her job for him, but he couldn’t lie. He couldn’t diminish the relationship he shared with Juliet for any reason.
“So why aren’t you over at the police department asking her to lunch?” She left the desk and came to stand directly in front of him. “Exactly what is it you want here, Martin?” When he hesitated, she smiled. “Go ahead and say it. The worst that can happen is I’ll turn you down. Why are you here?”
“Because I need a credit report. I have no legal authority to request it, but it could certainly help clear up some questions for me, and I was hoping to talk you into giving it to me.” He didn’t think he’d been totally honest often in the past, but he liked the way it felt.
Her smile faded, and her light tone disappeared. “I could lose my job for that.”
“I know.”
“Is it important?”
“I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t.”
She simply looked at him for a time. “You’re friends with Stone Richardson. Why don’t you ask him to get it for you?”
“Because he’d tell me no.”
“Which is exactly what I should do.” But she didn’t, not right away. Instead, she continued to study him. “How many reports are you looking for?”
“Two.” The answer surprised him. He hadn’t given any thought whatsoever to snooping into anyone else’s business, but there was a second report he wanted. It might be of some use.
“Whose?”
“Hal Stuart’s—”
“Hal Stuart! Oh, geez, why don’t you just ask for the mayor’s, too? And the police chief’s and Father Kinneally’s? How about Maxwell Brown’s and—”
“Well, now that you mention it…”
“Hal Stuart and Maxwell Brown.” She grimaced. “You know, if I get caught, I could expect a little mercy from most people, but not those two. Firing wouldn’t be enough to satisfy them. They would want blood. What could they possibly have to do with finding out who you are?”
Martin Smith felt a twinge of guilt at misleading her but didn’t correct her. “I don’t know. It’s just a hunch.”
“For a man who didn’t want to go out with me even once, you’re asking a lot.”
More guilt. “It wasn’t you. I didn’t want to go out with anyone. There was just so much going on—”
“It’s okay. I’m over it.” She fell silent, and he didn’t speak, didn’t disturb her in any way. It couldn’t be an easy decision for her. Taking a risk for someone important to you was one thing. Doing it for someone who barely qualified as an acquaintance was, as she’d said, asking a lot.
After a while, she clasped her hands together. “I’ve liked you from the beginning, Martin. You’ve made the best of a bad situation, and you haven’t asked for help or handouts from anyone. I can’t even imagine what it’s been like for you, having no clue who you are. If you can promise me that no one will know about these—at least, no one besides Juliet…”
“You have my word.”
She returned to the desk, typed a series of commands into the computer, then, only moments later, presented him with the two reports. He folded them to fit into his hip pocket. “You don’t know how much I appreciate this. If there’s ever anything I can do…”
She smiled sweetly, a little sadly. “Oh, the answers I could have come up with to an offer like that four months ago. Good luck.”
“Thanks, Sherri. Thanks a lot.” He left the office and headed for the police department a few blocks over. Through the window in her office, he saw Juliet Crandall facing the computer. Her hair was pulled back at her nape and tied with a ribbon, and she was wearing his favorite of her dresses, the watercolor he had watched her button that first night at her house. He had helped her put it on this morning, had fulfilled one of his fantasies by buttoning the long row of small buttons himself, gliding his fingers over her skin, straying far from the task to caress and tease. Considering how easily he was aroused, she was lucky she’d gotten out of the house before noon.
He exchanged greetings with Stone, Jack and a few of the uniformed officers before going to her office. By the time he got there, the chair was empty, the computer unattended. She was sitting on the floor in front of the file cabinets, a thick file open in her lap, her head bent over the papers. He closed the door quietly, bent and pressed a kiss to her exposed neck.
The smile she gave him was sweet and a bit timid. She’d lain naked with him all last night without the least reticence, but today, fully clothed and in the businesslike confines of her office, she was shy. “Hi. Have a seat.”
He ignored the chair and sat on the floor near her. “Want to have lunch?” When she didn’t answer immediately, he offered another option. “Want to go home and make mad love? Or would you rather go over Hal Stuart’s credit report?”
“You have it?” One moment her face was alive with interest. The next she looked as if she had serious reservations. “You’re not having lunch with her? Why? Because you’re seeing her tonight?”
“Why, darlin’, it sounds almost as if you’re jealous. Good.” She still waited for an answer, so he gave it. “No lunch, no dinner. She gave me the reports free and clear.”
“You must have been very good.”
“I think I was. I think maybe I was a con artist. I was definitely a liar. Telling Sherri the truth felt awfully good, as if I hadn’t done it much in the past.” He considered that a moment, then gave her a nudge. “So…what would you like to do? Lunch, sex or work?”
She gave him a look that made his skin prickle and left no doubt whatsoever as to what was in her mind. The look was so intimate, though, that he knew he wasn’t going to get the most desirable answer. “How about if we go over the reports over lunch? Then we won’t have to do it tonight.”
Maybe that was the most desirable answer. She put the file away, exited the computer program and took her purse from a drawer before leading the way outside to her car.
They picked up burgers and fries from a drive-through, then went to Vanderbilt Park. With an old quilt from the back of her car, they found a sunny place that looked on distant mountains and settled in. While Martin unpacked the food, she smoothed the papers he’d pulled from his pocket. “Why did you get a report on Maxwell Brown? Isn’t he just a local businessman?”
He handed her a cheeseburger before unwrapping his own. “Monday night, after the dream, I was afraid to go back to sleep, so I went for a walk. I do that a lot. Brown was in his office downtown having a meeting with some guy. There were two other men waiting for them out in the alley. I’d been watching them for about ten minutes when Brown and the other guy came out. The three men got in their car and drove away, and Brown left in his own car.”
“What time was this?”
“Around 3:00 a.m. It gave me a funny feeling in the back of my neck. It just didn’t feel right.” He paused to take a few bites, washing them down with soda. “The next day I saw Brown and Hal having lunch together. Hal was not in a good mood.”
“So you think that not all of Maxwell Brown’s business is legitimate and that Hal might possibly be involved with him.”
“I don’t know. I just thought that getting his records was too good a chance to pass up.”
When they finished eating, she moved closer to him, and they studied the papers together. Hal’s risk score wasn’t very good. His credit cards—and there were plenty—carried high balances, and he was frequently late with his payments on everything from his car to his condo to his utilities. The sixty-six thousand dollars Olivia’s life insurance had paid would have made a good dent in his debt, but he still would have been up to his ears in it. Hell, maybe that was where he’d spent it and he still owed this much.
Maxwell Brown was a different story. His credit rating was perfect: reasonable balances, sensible debt and regular, on-time payments. There was no mortgage for a house or cars, which meant he must own those outright.
“So does that satisfy your curiosity about Brown?”
“It should.” Financially the man was as upstanding as they came. But that funny feeling was there again. If Martin knew only one thing for a fact, it was that he could trust that feeling.
“But it doesn’t. All right. Tomorrow why don’t you go by the courthouse and find out everything you can about him? I’ll check online and at the library.” She folded the papers, offered them to him, then slipped them inside her purse when he refused. “Grand Springs is such a pretty place,” she remarked with a look around. “It’s no surprise that Olivia loved it.”
“Coming here was a big deal for you.” Leaving her home, her family and friends, the only place she’d ever known, for someplace strange and new took courage that she probably hadn’t realized she possessed. “I hope you never regret it.”
“I never will. No matter what.”
He didn’t like the ominous undertones his mind supplied to her last words. Even after last night, she wasn’t convinced that there was no one in his past who could take him away from her. Truthfully, she was right to have doubts. There was the very strong possibility that someone in his past could separate them, though not another woman. The man he had been before the accident, the man who had killed, the man who knew too well how to live in the shadows—that man could come between them. He was his own biggest worry.
She withdrew a paper from her bag, then settled again even closer. “After talking with Stone this morning, I sent this out.”
He recognized the printout as being an NCIC entry—but how did he know that? It listed his name as John Doe, gave a physical description, including details on the scars, and asked each agency to check its records on shooting victims for the last six years.
“He says it could take a long time to get an answer, but unless you were shot outside the country, the chances of hearing something are pretty good.”
The suggestion that he might not have been in the country when the shootings occurred didn’t feel as foreign as it should. Had he traveled overseas often? Had he lived there? Maybe. It could explain why no missing persons report had ever been filed. It could also explain his fluency in Spanish.
After a time, they shook out the quilt and returned to the car. Juliet dropped him off at the church, drove the short distance to the library and went inside. Instead of going to her office, though, she headed for the reference section. She found an out-of-the-way computer and sat down, pulling up the files she needed.
The information available on Maxwell Brown was huge. There was coverage of business triumphs and charitable contributions. There was a wedding announcement, detailing a lavish wedding and featuring a picture of a handsome young man with a beautiful young bride. A few years later, there was a one-line mention of a divorce in the legal news column. He received honors and tributes by the handfuls and was active on Grand Springs’s social scene, though rarely with the same woman on his arm twice. His generosity apparently was exceeded only by his business acumen. His home, the site of charity balls and civic events, was nothing less than a mansion. He gave freely of his money and his time, the townspeople admired and respected him, children adored him, and he was kind to small animals.
He was almost too good to be true.
If Martin’s suspicions were correct, he was too good to be true.
There was much less to find on Hal Stuart, much less stellar. Most of the mentions of him dealt with city council business. There was an announcement of his engagement to Randi Howell, the bride who’d fled her own wedding and fallen in love with someone else. An older story covered his graduation from law school and setting up practice in Grand Springs, and there were mentions of his election and subsequent reelections to the council. There was nothing new or interesting.
With a sigh, she left the library and made the short trip to the police station. There was nothing more she could do for Martin. Now she needed to concentrate on her own work. Even if it was nearly impossible. Even if the hours did drag until the afternoon was finally over. With more relief than she would have believed possible, she shut down the computer, said goodbye to Mariellen and headed for the church.
She hadn’t offered to pick Martin up after work, and he might have already left, but it was only a few blocks out of her way. When she parked at the curb out front, she saw that she wasn’t too late. Several people were inside talking, and one was Martin.
The sidewalk led straight to the porch, where the double glass doors were propped open. She stepped into the hallway and hesitated until one of the men saw her and smiled. Martin turned and smiled, too, and held out his hand to her. He introduced her to the group—the Reverend Murphy and three of his parishioners, two older women and a man.
After a polite hello, one of the women continued talking. “Now, you see here in this picture, the carpet is definitely burgundy—and pretty new, too. This was taken thirty-three years ago at our oldest daughter’s wedding.” She beamed at Juliet. “She’s still married to the same man, and they have four children and three grandchildren. Now, this picture is of Emma’s grandson’s wedding, and it’s this same green carpet, and pretty new, too. This was taken—” She looked at the back, squinted to read the writing, then looked at the woman beside her. “When, Emma?”
“That was December. December 17, a Christmas wedding. His mother had always wanted a June wedding—”
“Of what year, dear?”
“Let me think. Their oldest boy just turned eighteen this month, so that means they’ve been married…” Emma’s fragile skin flushed a delicate pink. “Eighteen and a half years.”
No one blinked at the discomfort her grandson’s marriage-of-necessity still caused all these years later, but, out of sight, Martin gave Juliet’s fingers a squeeze.
The minister turned to Martin. “So you were here at some point at least eighteen and a half years ago but probably not more than thirty-three years ago. That’s more than a fourteen-year span. Not much help, is it?”
Martin was shaking his head when the other man spoke for the first time. “I don’t remember you. I’ve been here every time those doors opened for a service. I’ve known every family who worshiped here. I’ve been to every wedding, every christening and every funeral, but I don’t remember you.”
“He was a boy, Henry,” Emma said. “Maybe he’s changed.”
Henry stubbornly shook his head. “You look faintly familiar—it’s something about your eyes—but no. You weren’t a regular here, not even a semiregular.”
His very certainty gave Juliet cause to hope, and she said so to Martin once they’d said their goodbyes and reached the car. He gave her a flat, disappointed look. “Then you’re an incurable optimist, darlin’, because he didn’t leave room for hope.”
“What is the one physical feature that doesn’t change with age?” When he didn’t offer an answer, she did. “You can gain weight or lose it. You can straighten a crooked nose or put a crook in a straight one. You can cover a high forehead, reshape cheekbones, reconstruct jaws and straighten teeth. You can make your nose bigger or smaller, and you can change the way your ears lie in relation to your head. You can cut, curl, color or shave your hair. But the only thing you can do to your eyes is a tuck on the lids or change the color with contacts. Henry said there’s something familiar about your eyes.” She smiled. “They are your best feature.”
“They are, huh? And here I thought you were more interested in my—” He finished the sentence in a whisper, his mouth pressed to her ear, making her shiver and squirm before he kissed her mouth. It was the same sort of kiss he’d given her before work this morning, the sort that made her forget everything, including her name.
Sitting back in his seat, he fastened the seat belt. “How about stopping by my apartment? You can keep me company while I clean up.”
For a moment she looked blankly at him, her mind still occupied with sensations and not processing information. Finally, giving herself a mental shake, she started the car and pulled into the street.
His apartment was quiet, dimly lit and still full of the day’s warmth even though outside the temperature had begun its usual evening slide. Juliet wandered around the single large room, half her attention directed to the bathroom, where Martin was in the shower. Naked. Washing, touching himself. Such a simple, everyday task. Such erotic images. They left her throat dry and sent an edgy, dissatisfied feeling through her.
If she were bold, she would take off her clothes and be waiting in his bed when he came out. If she were brash and bold, she wouldn’t wait for him to come out but would shed her clothes and join him in the shower. She would take the soap from him, work up a lather in her hands and rub them over his body. She would tease and torment them both until they couldn’t stand any more, and then she would take him, first in her mouth, in a sinfully wicked kiss, then in her body, right there in the tub, with the water beating on them and around them, until—
Catching her breath on a groan, she stopped in front of one window and stared out sightlessly, all too aware of her body’s needs, of the tightness in her chest, of the tension deep in her belly. She had indulged in a few fantasies before—what woman hadn’t?—but the fantasy of Martin was more appealing, more enticing, than the reality of any other man she’d known. He wasn’t even in the room, but her breasts were swollen, her nipples achy, her muscles trembly. The man embodied pure, raw sexual fantasy, and he was a danger—
His arm wrapped around her from behind, and his fingers slid between buttons to stroke her midriff. He hadn’t made a sound crossing the room, but she could feel him now, could smell him—warm, damp, aroused, masculine. He came closer, until his legs brushed hers, until his erection was pressed against her bottom. Moving his hand lower, he worked a few buttons loose, then slid his hand inside her dress, his fingers leaving a damp, quivering trail across her belly, beneath the elastic band of her panties, probing between her thighs.
She gasped when he touched her, when he found her hot, damp and craving his attention. When he slid his fingers inside her, whatever sound she might have made was lost in the flood of sensation. He stroked deep inside her, then outside, concentrating his touches where her response was most powerful, his talented fingers drawing her closer and closer, coaxing her to feel more, to want more, demand more.
She clenched her fingers, then flattened them against the cool glass pane. She was so hot, so desperate, able to breathe now only in soft gasps that threatened tears, and still he tormented her, robbing her of everything but need, aching, killing need. It became unbearable, but she bore it, became painful, but she loved it, until finally, her body quivering, her back arched, with one great rush, with one writhing, whimpering shudder, she collapsed against him. She trusted him to hold her, to keep her on her feet, and he did. He wrapped his arms around her waist, held her tightly against him and spoke for the first time. “Hey, darlin’.”