to the Harley-Davidson shop for some leathers so she’d look like a biker chick.”
“I guess she didn’t go for that.”
“Not my Trina.” He met her gaze and the worry in his brown eyes made her heart ache. “She tries to stay upbeat for me and the kids but it’s been tough on her. That’s why the shift change. She’s onto her second round of chemo and they changed the day to Fridays. I didn’t want her to do that on her own.”
A dozen questions crowded through her mind—Trina’s white blood cell counts, her med regimen, how she was doing emotionally after her radical mastectomy—but she managed to clamp down on them. Despite Richard’s affectionate nickname for her, she wasn’t a doctor. An almost-doctor, maybe, but she hadn’t been part of that world for a long time.
“Trina is in good hands with Dr. Kim. He’s the best around.”
“That’s one of the things that keeps her going. We both know we never would have gotten in to see him if it hadn’t been for you.”
Taylor just shook her head. “I didn’t do anything, only pulled a few strings.”
“Well, we sure appreciate it.”
Under other circumstances, she would have given his hand a reassuring squeeze, but she knew this wasn’t the time or place. “Please let me know how things are going.”
“I sure will,” he said, with a smile that filled her with shame at her own self-pity.
This kind man’s wife was waging a fierce, losing battle against breast cancer and he could still manage to smile. All she had to do was spend an hour in a place she loathed. Surely she could be at least as cheerful as Richard Gonzolez.
“Sorry to tell you this,” the guard said, “but you’ll have to wait a few minutes. Your brother already has a visitor in the last group. Time’s almost up, though.”
That was odd. Hunter rarely had visitors besides her. They had no other family and her brother had never been much of a pack animal. Most of his so-called friends had abandoned him after his arrest. She wondered who it might be.
“I don’t mind waiting,” she assured the guard, then took her seat with the other visitors waiting their turn.
She had never been very good at coping with unexpected blocks of free time. Usually she tried to carry around at least one law book at all times so she could use her time constructively and keep up with her reading lists—probably a hold-over from the judge’s frequent edicts against wasting time.
In this case, she had no choice, as she’d left all her books in her car. She picked up a news magazine and tried to leaf through it but found little of interest.
She was trying a woman’s magazine—with much the same malaise—when the volume in the room increased as the previous group of visitors was led out.
She recognized a few familiar faces and was once more struck by how insular this prison community could be. She had watched people make friendships, business connections, even romances while they waited to visit someone on the inside.
A few minutes later, she had risen to wait her turn to go into the visiting area when a familiar face appeared in the crowd—this one unexpected.
Wyatt McKinnon walked out, looking tall and lanky and gorgeous.
The same reaction she’d had to him the other times they’d met started stirring around inside her. The same butterflies in her stomach, the same silly breathlessness, the same surge of awareness.
What was the matter with her? This wasn’t at all like her. She just wasn’t the kind of woman to lose brain cells over a man. Especially not this man—and especially not in these circumstances.
She drew in a deep, steadying breath. He hadn’t seen her yet, she realized as she watched him stop to exchange words with one of the guards—not Richard but another she had met only a few times.
Wyatt greeted the man with a ready smile, though from here it looked as if it dimmed a little when the corrections officer produced a book from beneath the desk. From here she could see it was Wyatt’s latest bestseller. The guard wanted it signed, she realized, just like all those silly little coeds who had flocked to the lecture the other night.
She couldn’t be too derisive of them, she thought with brutal self-honesty. Not with her pulse skipping and this weak trembling in her stomach.
Wyatt signed the book with a flourish, handed it back to the guard with a polite smile, then turned to leave.
She knew exactly the moment he noticed her. Surprise flickered in those grey-green eyes and he froze for an instant, then walked toward her.
“Taylor. Ms. Bradshaw. I didn’t realize your brother had another visitor waiting. I’m sorry—I’m afraid I went a little long. I hope I didn’t take all your time.”
A few days earlier she might have given him some sharp reply about how her time was just as valuable as his, but she decided that wouldn’t be diplomatic, not if she still wanted his help.
In theory, Kate’s idea had seemed a good one. Wyatt McKinnon could be a powerful ally. His words had influence, and she had just seen more evidence that he had readers everywhere. If she wanted his help, she knew she would have to ask for it. But being confronted by the man made her tongue feel as slippery as a hooked trout.
“He’s still allowed another half hour of visitation.” She sucked in a breath for courage. “Listen, I…”
Richard cut her off. “Doc Bradshaw, you’re up. You ready to go back?”
She rose, aware as always of the time and how limited it was.
She had learned since Hunter’s arrest that life behind bars was ruled by the clock. Inmates talked of marking time, doing time, hard time. Their world revolved around the tick of each passing second.
“Look, I’ve got to go or I’ll miss my chance. Would you mind…that is, um—” she faltered. Oh, this was hard! She would rather be foxtrotting with the sweaty-palmed Troy Oppenheimer who had been the bane of her dance-class days than be forced to grovel to Wyatt McKinnon.
But she had no choice.
“Would you mind waiting for me?” she asked in a rush. “I…I need to talk to you.”
His eyebrows rose in surprise but he nodded. “Of course. I’ll be here when you come out.”
The guard led her to one of the visitor chambers. In the maximum security unit, visits were always non-contact and were carried out in individual rooms separated by a Plexiglas divider.
Hunter was already on the other side of the glass, dressed in the obligatory orange jumpsuit. His dark, wavy hair could use a trim and he had a bruise along his jawline that hadn’t been there the week before.
He looked big and mean and dangerous, and she grieved all over again for the dedicated, passionate cop he had been.
He didn’t smile when he saw her, but she thought perhaps his eyes softened a little. She wanted to believe they did, anyway, though she thought that was probably just more self-delusion.
