hated the idea of her having to snuggle up in bed with a Colt .38. His voice had descended to a growl when he said, “I suppose you can’t carry a handgun at school.”
Faith looked shocked. “I hope you wouldn’t seriously suggest that!”
He reached up and kneaded the taut muscles in his neck. “No. You should be safe there, anyway.”
“You know, he might have given up. Or … shocked even himself, when he saw what he’d done to Charlotte.
That’s what—” She stopped so abruptly, his eyes narrowed. “What?”
Her pupils dilated. “I was just going to say, that’s what I think.”
Uh-huh, sure she was. Damn it, had she talked to the scum and wasn’t admitting it? Why?
“I saw the pictures that were taken the night you came into Emergency,” he said flatly. “I’ve seen damn near everything, and those shocked me. Seems what he did to you didn’t shock him. Don’t kid yourself—all he’s doing is lying low.”
She stared at him for a stricken moment, then turned and walked away.
Swearing under his breath, Ben followed.
“Faith …”
Radiating anger and pain, she spun to face him. “Why are you here?”
To see you. To know you’re okay, if not happy. “I’m doing my job.”
“Scaring me? Trying to intimidate me? That’s your job?”
He willed his expression to go blank. “I have never, and will never, try to intimidate you. Scare you, yes. Until you’re willing to admit Hardesty is capable of really hurting you …”
A shudder ran through her, and then she was screaming at him, “I believe it! I saw what he did to Charlotte! I know what he did to me!” She swallowed. Ended in a whisper. “Do you think I wasn’t there?”
He couldn’t stand it. Ben reached out to pull her against him.
Faith backed away so fast she bumped against one of the stools behind the counter. When he took another step toward her, she whipped behind the stool and gripped it with both hands as if she was prepared to brandish it like a lion tamer to hold him off. Her eyes were wild.
“I want you to leave.”
“I didn’t mean to …”
“Now.”
God. Feeling as though his chest was being crushed—as if he’d been the one under the tractor, not Don Russell—Ben backed away.
“I’m sorry, Faith,” he said, throat feeling raw.
She didn’t say anything, only stared at him with that same angry ferocity. He’d been right; she didn’t like him any better than she did her ex-husband.
No, Ben realized, as he made himself turn away and walk toward the open barn door, right now she hated him even more than she did Rory Hardesty. She still had a habit of softening sometimes where Hardesty was concerned. Pretty clearly, she’d be happiest never to see Police Chief Ben Wheeler ever again.
That, he thought grimly, was one thing he could do for her. Stay away.
Unless he could bring her the news that Hardesty was behind bars.
Or until a 911 call came in some night after Faith’s ex-husband returned to make sure no one else could have what he couldn’t.
Ben didn’t look back. He got in his patrol unit and sat behind the wheel while he calmed himself enough to drive without killing someone.
He was scared in a way he didn’t ever remember being before. Scared that the next time he saw Faith Russell, she’d be lying battered and bloody on a gurney—or dead, being fitted into a body bag.
It was a good five minutes before he could back out and drive away.
CHAPTER TWO
FAITH MADE IT THROUGH the day, and the next day, on sheer willpower alone. She didn’t know why Ben Wheeler’s visit had shaken her so badly, but it had.
He had.
From the minute she’d seen West Fork’s new police chief, she’d tumbled hard. It would be silly to call what she’d felt love, but it was more than lust. Maybe it was most accurate to say she’d known right away that she could love him. The shocking thing was, she’d never felt anything so potent and next-thing-to-painful for Rory. Rory and she had dated for over a year before he’d asked her to marry him. She’d liked him, felt comfortable with him. He’d felt right, as if he fit into the life she wanted.
Ben, Faith had known from the first moment, could blast her life as she knew it to smithereens.
In fact, he’d hurt her right away by asking Charlotte, not her, out to dinner. For all the troubles that lay between Faith and her twin, jealousy over a man had never been an issue. That night, while her sister was out with Ben, Faith had sat at home and burned with envy.
She still didn’t quite know what had happened between them, only that Char had said there weren’t any sparks. She’d been convinced that Ben was really interested in Faith and not her. Sometimes, Faith thought that, too. The night when Rory had tossed the cherry bomb through the window, Ben had seemed to have eyes for no one but Faith. He’d cradled her on his lap while the medic plucked shards of glass out of her flesh, and he’d rushed her to the hospital himself. His tenderness had made her feel safe.
But it seemed as if every time he held her and comforted her, he regretted that he had. She’d never seen a face close down tight the way Ben’s could.
Either he felt nothing for her, or he didn’t like what he did feel and refused to act on it. Either way, seeing him hurt.
She might have told Ben about Rory’s last phone call if only he wasn’t always so irritated with her, so scornful. She knew he didn’t understand any more than her own father and sister did why she had endured three years of marriage to a man who was abusing her. She despised herself enough, thank you; she didn’t have to spend time with a man who believed she was so spineless, he had to bully her into defending herself from Rory.
That was why she’d bought the handgun, why she’d spent a total of thirty-six hours to date shooting at the range. She would defend herself, and Daddy and Char, too, if they were in Rory’s way. Faith still felt queasy every time she picked up the Colt .38, but her hands were steady when she lifted it and aimed, and she could rip the heart out of the target.
Char was always the one who’d been adventurous, strong. Faith was the timid twin, the compliant one. The one easily wounded.
The perfect sucker for a man like Rory Hardesty, she knew now.
The worst thing about seeing Ben this time, she thought, was that she’d had to lie to him. Rory had called, a couple of weeks after he broke into the house and slashed Charlotte with the knife thinking she was Faith.
During
