couldn’t be in? Too many to count. And all the times she’d taken a leave of absence, moved away for several months, only to return and have Judith pleased she was back and ready to go to work again. Of course, when she was there, she worked hard, but she still felt lucky to have Judith on her side.
Tate slipped off her shoes and began undressing. Lucky. It wasn’t a word she associated with herself ever really. Luck wasn’t something a person could rely on anyhow. We make our own luck, good or bad, her father used to say. How true those words were, she thought as she stepped into the adjoining bathroom and turned on the water. A hot soak would feel good.
Pinning her hair up onto her head, Tate gazed dispassionately at her image in the mirror. Most of her life, she’d had people tell her how lucky she was to have such lovely skin, such beautiful hair, such a lovely figure. She supposed that was luck of a sort, being born to good-looking parents from a great gene pool. But it was nothing she’d personally done. Her looks were just there, no big deal.
Others often made it a big deal, Tate acknowledged, testing the water with her fingers, then adding fragrant bubble bath. Men fell over backward over a beautiful woman until the woman no longer heard the compliments and wound up wondering if only her looks were of importance to them and not who she truly was. Women often became jealous even if she did nothing more than walk into a room. Tate knew she’d never deliberately done anything to earn that reputation, but there it was. Which was probably why she trusted only Molly and Laura.
And men not at all.
Shutting off the water, Tate climbed into the bubbly, steaming water gingerly, then lay back, closing her eyes. Her mother, from the little she could remember, had also been beautiful. Only she’d gloried in it, flirting outrageously, breaking hearts along the way. Especially her father’s when she’d walked away from her family the year Tate turned eight and her brother, Steve, was only six. Later Tate had learned that she’d left a note saying she simply couldn’t stay the wife of a small-town tailor. She needed to be free.
Dad had handled her departure better than Tate or Steve, who’d both blamed themselves way into their teens. Her father never spoke of their mother with bitterness, saying that she was like a beautiful butterfly who’d stayed with them a while, then had flown off to share her beauty with the world. However, he’d warned Tate that beauty was a gift and that she mustn’t take unreasonable pride in it. She’d heeded his advice.
Tate inhaled the warm aroma, letting the soothing water heal her tired body and mind. Where, exactly, had being beautiful gotten her? Because she’d instinctively known early on that men wanted her mostly for one thing only, she’d been reluctant to date. Then one had come along who’d seemed way above the crowd, a handsome, charismatic man who’d looked into her eyes and actually listened to what she said as if her words mattered, as if she were important, special.
He hadn’t rushed her into bed, but rather they’d talked for hours—about books and music and horseback riding and hiking—all manner of things. They’d taken long, leisurely walks in the woods together, cooked dinner at his place, camped by the river and slept under the stars. Gradually she’d allowed herself to trust him. Loving had followed as surely as night follows day. The morning she realized she’d been thinking of love and he’d been thinking of an interlude was one of the worst times in her life.
Tate trailed damp fingers through the floating bubbles, her mind floating, too, back in the past. Everything had fallen apart then and nothing had been the same since. Her warm and tender love had turned to bitter ashes. At first, she’d wanted to die—of heartache, of shame. But Maggie had pulled her through, talking softly, encouraging, some nights just holding her while she wept. And there’d been Molly and Laura, more like blood sisters than friends, always there for her in those days when she’d been so needy.
The only good thing that had come out of that terrible time was Josh, her beautiful boy. He was the only male she could trust without question, the only one she’d ever allow to get close to her. And yet, because of her mistake, her error in judgment, both Josh and Maggie were in danger. Last year, when they’d been on the run, she’d known that Molly had been threatened, too. Then Laura had been stalked and even forced off the road, landing in the hospital. That had somehow frightened even the madman hounding all three of them, for there’d been no sign of him for many months. Tate had prayed he’d abandoned his sick plans.
How could she have been so naive?
No, she might as well admit her suspicions. The invasion at Maggie’s wasn’t caused by some intruder looking for valuables rumored to be hidden in her home. Tate could think of only one person who might have ordered the break-in and she could guess what his hired thug had been searching for. What she didn’t know was how to handle him.
Sitting up, she soaped her washcloth and swished it around her shoulders and arms. Her thoughts drifted to Detective Nick Bennett. She could tell he wanted her to open up to him, but how could a man who’d come from the warm and loving family he’d described ever be able to relate to her problems? Get a restraining order, he’d suggest probably. But if she named names, he’d realize she couldn’t do that. If she revealed too much and if somehow the news got out, the stalker would turn up the heat and somehow manage to take Josh. She couldn’t be with her son every minute. And what could she do to stop such a man? Move again? The very thought started her trembling.
The bathwater had cooled. Tate pulled the plug, rinsed off and wrapped herself in a large white terry-cloth towel. As she walked into her bedroom, she thought she heard a car engine start up right outside. Cautiously, she moved to the window and peeked out between the soft folds of the sheer curtains. Just then, a sleek black car with tinted windows flashed on its lights and slowly pulled away from the curb.
Damn him!
With shaky hands, she drew the drapes closed over the windows, then did the same across the room before hurrying to Josh’s room, his windows facing only the rear of the house. He was sleeping soundly, thank heaven. The new dead bolt had been installed and before she’d come upstairs, she’d checked the back door as well as made certain the window locks were all secure. Yet she knew that if someone really wanted to get in, they would. Not overtly though, for the man in question had too much to lose if an illegal move could be proven and traced to him.
Just because she felt better doing it, she went around and pulled drapes closed over all the windows. Both she and Maggie hated the closed in feeling, but Tate felt she had no choice if she wanted to get even a small measure of sleep tonight. Gazing around the living room, she felt such a wave of repulsion, of violation, that someone would come in here and touch their things. Would she ever truly feel safe here again? Was there even a secure place for her somewhere?
Climbing the stairs, Tate forced herself to square her shoulders. Damn it, she was not going to let him win. She would find a way to fight him. He was trying to spook her, to intimidate her into giving up. Apparently, he didn’t know her as well as he thought he did, for she wasn’t a quitter. Maybe Nick was right and she should persuade Josh to look at pictures of known area criminals. If the stalker was among them, if the henchman of the man she feared most landed in jail, perhaps he’d back off. She held little hope for this scenario, but it was worth a try.
Tate hung up the towel and slipped on an old University of Arizona football jersey that she liked to sleep in. Slipping under the covers, she prayed sleep would come and without the accompanying nightmares that so often interrupted her nights.
Closing her eyes, she tried to concentrate on something pleasant. Unbidden, her mind conjured up a pair of steady gray eyes in a tan face and a mouth that looked hard and a little grim, but that she imagined could be soft and warm. Nick Bennett wasn’t the man for her. No man was. But she could dream…
Nick
