to me,” Lise said to Bella. “He wants retribution for something I’ve done.”
“What?” Jake demanded, his voice quiet so he wouldn’t startle his baby daughter, who had snuggled into his lap and looked about half-asleep already.
“I don’t know.”
“How do you know he wants retribution?” This from Joshua.
She’d forgotten to mention that part of the call to him. Which was not surprising, considering how muddled and exhausted she’d been the night before. “When he taunted me about being alone for the holidays, he said something about an eye for an eye. That implies vengeance to me.”
She looked at the other adults at the table, wishing they could answer the questions clamoring inside her head. “I don’t see how I could have done something heinous enough to invoke such a reaction without knowing it.”
“Chances are, you didn’t.” Joshua leaned back in his chair and rolled the sleeves of his dress shirt up to expose muscular brown forearms. “This is not about rational reality—this is about perceptions in a mind disturbed enough to fixate on a woman and stalk her.”
That made a lot more sense than her having done something horrible and not realizing it. She smiled her appreciation.
He smiled back, and she lost her focus for just a second.
“What kind of behavior are we talking about here?” Jake asked, reclaiming her attention.
So she told them about Nemesis, watching as her brother’s outrage grew with every incident she outlined. At one point, he asked something in a voice that startled Genevieve, waking her up. Bella took the baby from him and soothed her back to sleep.
“He’s been stalking you for months?” Jake asked with a forced but deadly quiet.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you say something?”
“She wanted to protect you.”
Her gaze flew to Joshua, who had been silent during her explanations. He wasn’t looking at her; he was looking at her brother.
“I didn’t need protecting.” Jake frowned at Lise, his emotion closer to the surface than she’d seen it since he told her Bella was pregnant with Genevieve. “You did.”
“It was my problem, not yours.”
“I’m your brother, for heaven’s sake. Of course I have a stake in your problems.”
She shook her head.
“Instead of telling me about your stalker, you lied to me and to my wife.” Jake sounded baffled and hurt. “I could be the one who told Nemesis where you live now. I didn’t know it was supposed to be a secret.”
The self-condemnation in his tone hurt her.
“Nothing happened and if it had, it surely would not have been your fault.”
“That wouldn’t have been a helluva lot of comfort if something had happened to you because of it.”
“I didn’t want to risk any of you being hurt.”
“Well, that backfired, didn’t it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Bella has been in torment for months because she thought she’d done something to drive you away from your family home.”
“I’m sorry about that.” She looked at Bella, whose expression was filled with concern, not censure. “I wanted to keep y’all safe, not hurt your feelings.”
“Torment is really overstating the case.” Bella frowned at her husband. “I was worried about your sister, not wallowing in obsessive guilt.”
Jake grimaced and turned away from the reproach in his wife’s eyes.
“How was I supposed to look out for my family if I didn’t know the threat was out there?” he asked Lise, his grievances taking another tack. “What if Nemesis had decided to get to you through Genevieve or Bella? Something could have happened to them because of my ignorance.”
She knew the angry words were spurred by Jake’s own sense of protectiveness, both toward her and his wife and child. But they still sliced straight into her heart. Because he had a point, one she had not even considered.
“She did what she thought was best, Jake. She believed moving away would remove the threat from you, Bella, and the baby.” Joshua’s expression dared Jake to disagree.
She’d never known her brother to back down from a challenge and could predict his next words with one-hundred-percent accuracy.
“She was wrong to lie to me,” he said, fulfilling her expectations.
Suddenly, Joshua was standing, leaning over the table toward Jake. “Get over it. She’s telling you the truth now.”
She hadn’t realized that when Joshua said he was going to protect her, he meant from her brother as well. It was an odd feeling. Even her ex-husband had never stood up to her family on her behalf.
“Don’t tell me how to deal with my own sister.” Jake was on his feet, too, and looking ready to hurt someone.
She thought he might be considering Joshua as a likely prospect. She knew in Jake’s macho mind, the other man made a better target for his frustrated anger than she did.
But she wasn’t about to let the confrontation get worse. “I’m sorry, Jake.”
Joshua turned his laserlike gaze on her. “You have nothing to apologize for. You weren’t acting out of selfish motives. You gave up everything familiar to you to protect your family. If your brother is too stupid to see that, I’ll gladly set him straight.”
“Joshua!” Bella’s voice was distressed.
Jake looked one step closer to violence and Joshua’s jaw was as hard as quarry rock.
Soon Genevieve would be awake and crying.
So much for a warm family dinner.
Lise stood up, not terribly impressed with either man and feeling sick inside for ruining Bella’s first Thanksgiving as a married woman. “I’m sorry I’ve upset y’all so much. Maybe it would be best if I leave. I didn’t mean to spoil everyone’s holiday.” She looked at Bella with a sad smile. “And I definitely didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”
Jake’s face clenched and pain flashed in his eyes. “You aren’t going anywhere.”
“Why not? You’ve made her feel about as welcome as ants at a picnic.” Bella’s tart voice startled Lise.
Her sister-in-law was busy glaring in equal measure at her husband and her brother, while she gently patted her baby’s back.
Jake grimaced and then came around the table toward Lise. He pulled her into a bearlike hug. It was a
