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Not a Moment Too Soon
Linda O. Johnston
As a private investigator, jaded Hunter Strahm thought he'd seen every kind of cruelty. But someone had kidnapped his precious daughter, and Hunter would move heaven and earth to bring her home safely–even if that meant inviting beautiful, bewitching Shauna O'Leary back into his life.Shauna had never forgiven Hunter for dismissing her psychic ability to channel a killer's mind–and leaving her with a broken heart. But now she was the desperate father's only hope to track down his baby girl. Could she finally prove she'd been right all along–not only that she had the gift, but also that their love was just as real?
“I know you’re hurting, but let me help you. Don’t push me away.”
“Sorry.” He shrugged. “I’m not blaming anyone but the piece of crud who stole my daughter. But what you wrote—”
“I wish I could change everything, Hunter,” Shauna said, her pain magnified by his. She laid her hand on his bare arm. “But I need you to trust me—”
She stopped speaking as his eyes, trained on hers, suddenly turned from dull green to flashing jade. He bent down, took her into his arms and kissed her. Hard.
She knew it was simply to shut her up. Prevent her from finishing what she’d been saying. Because the fact was, he still didn’t believe she could help him find his daughter.
But she kissed him back with a longing born of seven years of missing him.
He pulled back. Even as she knew he would. Even as she knew she should. This wasn’t seven years ago, when they were lovers. This was today, and they were drawn together by circumstances too horrible to contemplate. And they didn’t need any more regrets….
Not a Moment Too Soon
Linda O. Johnston
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
LINDA O. JOHNSTON
Linda O. Johnston’s first published fiction appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and won the Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for Best First Mystery Short Story of the Year. Now, several published short stories and novels later, Linda is recognized for her outstanding work in the romance genre.
A practicing attorney, Linda juggles her busy schedule between mornings of writing briefs, contracts and other legalese, and afternoons of creating memorable tales of the paranormal, time travel, mystery, contemporary and romantic suspense. Armed with an undergraduate degree in journalism with an advertising emphasis from Pennsylvania State University, Linda began her versatile writing career running a small newspaper, then working in advertising and public relations, and later obtaining her JD degree from Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh.
Linda belongs to Sisters in Crime and is actively involved with Romance Writers of America, participating in the Los Angeles, Orange County and Western Pennsylvania chapters. She lives near Universal Studios, Hollywood, with her husband, two sons and two cavalier King Charles spaniels.
To all fellow writers. We all sometimes wish that what we write would come true, don’t we? Well, be careful what you wish for….
And, as always, to Fred, one writer’s dream who happily came true.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Prologue
Shauna O’Leary opened her eyes slowly. As she remained seated on her stiff desk chair, apprehension contracted her body into the same tight, quivering mass that it always did when she wrote something at her computer.
Most of the time, the tales that poured from her fingertips were fine, even delightful. Suitable for reading to the kids who came especially to her restaurant, Fantasy Fare, to hear them. She would laugh aloud as she read, in relief as much as enjoyment. Chastise herself gaily, push the print button and—
As she automatically began to scan the words on the screen, she gasped aloud. This was one of those rare, yet nevertheless too-frequent, other times.
“Oh, no,” she whispered, though no one else was there, in her small, secluded home, to hear. “Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no.” She repeated the words in a mantra born of despair as she continued to read:
Andee was scared. So scared. “Daddy,” she cried.
But Daddy didn’t come. Instead, the bad man came back into the room.
“Help me, Daddy!”
Shauna stared at the hand clutching the computer’s mouse as if it belonged to someone else. The long, slim fingers with blunted, pink-polished nails—fingers that were so skilled on the computer keys—were trembling. Resolutely, she highlighted the entire file, prepared to push Delete. Get rid of it.
But that wouldn’t get rid of the problem.
She did it nevertheless. Erased everything. Closed the file.
Opened it again.
The story was still there. Of course.
With a small moaning sound, she pushed Print.
There would be a physical record of what had already been set into motion.
Shauna took two long, deep breaths, steeling herself for what was to come. Anxiously running fingers through the sides of her long, ash-blond hair, she looked at the telephone beside her computer. It sat on the antique door that had been taken from her grandmother’s house and was now propped on wooden file cabinets, serving as her desk.
She studied the phone, delaying the inevitable.
And then, filled with dread, she lifted the portable receiver and pressed in a familiar number. Elayne Strahm’s. She needed to speak with her immediately. Get another phone number from her.
For the little girl in her story was Elayne’s grandchild.
Hunter Strahm’s daughter.
Chapter 1
Hunter Strahm steered his speeding rental car off the Interstate and onto the main road toward his mother’s home.
Oasis, Arizona. Lord, it seemed like ages since he’d been back. It was late afternoon, desert time, though he’d already put in a full day of work and travel. He ignored the pounding of his heart as he hurtled through town, trying to silence the inner voice that told him he was on a fool’s mission. Wasting not just minutes, but hours of precious time.
He’d made the decision to come here first. He’d live with it.
Yeah, but would Andee…?
“Damn,” he muttered aloud, forcing his thoughts from the direction that could only make him crazy.
He stared out the windshield. Oasis looked the same as he remembered. Except—where was the restaurant he knew Shauna O’Leary now owned?
He’d find out, if he had to. First, he’d go see his mother. Would Shauna still be there? If not, his mother would know how to find her.
He turned onto the street where his mother lived, and he looked around.
What kind of car did Shauna drive?
It had been more than five hours since that series of phone calls which made him want to lash out in total frustration and fear at whatever, whoever, was convenient.
He usually thrived on dealing with the worst of situations. Taking control, and resolving them.
But the calls had concerned his five-year-old daughter. Andee.
She’d gone missing from Margo’s home in L.A. Wandered off from the backyard. Or at least that was what his ex had said in the first of those damnable calls.
Hunter, a private investigator, had been a thousand miles away on business, unable to do a blessed thing but head for the airport. He’d left a job unfinished. He had never done that before.
He’d never faced an emergency this urgent before.
Shauna’s had been the second call. And Margo’s next call had confirmed what Shauna had claimed.
Andee hadn’t just gotten lost. She had been kidnapped.
Emergency, hell. It was a crisis of a magnitude he’d never imagined.
Shauna had called from his mother’s, where she said she’d gone to be with Elayne. And though what she said reminded him too much of the past, he couldn’t ignore it—just in case she could provide a clue, no matter how absurd, about where Andee was. That was the major reason he’d come here, instead of straight to L.A.
Surely Shauna would have gone home, or to her business, by now. Yet when he strode up the familiar walkway to Elayne Strahm’s tan stucco hacienda, he figured it wouldn’t necessarily be his mother who answered the door.
He rang the bell, reluctant to use his key after not being here for so long.
He heard footsteps inside. Light, quick ones.
And when the door opened, he found himself staring into soft brown eyes that were wide but not with surprise, the way her call had startled him. With…what? Uneasiness?
Pleasure?
No way.
She hadn’t changed at all, except to become prettier. Her blond hair was a little longer, a little lighter. She was slim in her T-shirt and shorts, with shapely, endless legs.
Steeling himself for what was to come, he took a step toward her. Parroting the initial, friendly greeting she’d given him over the phone earlier—before she had dropped her bombshell—he said simply, “Hello, Shauna.”
He looked so tall, standing there.
That was the first thing Shauna thought. She hadn’t forgotten Hunter’s imposing height. Though she was above average stature for a woman, he had always towered above her. Before, it had seemed exciting and masculine and very, very sexy.
Now his daunting size seemed magnified by his anger. Those flashing green eyes she remembered so well glared, as if she were to blame. But she was just the messenger.
“Hello, Hunter,” she said softly. She consciously pulled her gaze from his, hoping to relieve some of the tension building between them.
His blue sport shirt, tucked into khaki trousers, wasn’t tight, but she could tell that the young cop she’d fallen for all those years ago was now even more muscular. With his prominent, straight brows, his wide jaw, he still was the most handsome man she had ever seen. Maturity would have looked good on him, if it hadn’t been combined with the other emotions spewing from him like water from a broken sprinkler.
Like the emotions of the nonfiction characters in her latest story…
Daddy!
Needing to break the building silence—and escape her own heartrending thoughts—she said, “I’m surprised to see you here.”
“This is my mother’s house.” His voice was even deeper in person than on the phone. Perhaps it was also amplified by his obvious fury. “Did you have to worry her, too? But of course you did. You wouldn’t keep such a feat of realistic storytelling to yourself, now, would you?”
She reeled back as if he had struck her. In a way, he had.
Malice spewed from lips that had once kissed hers sometimes sweetly, sometimes passionately, but always caringly.
Years ago. But she had loved him. And lost him. And he had married another woman.
Elayne spoke from behind her, reiterating Shauna’s earlier question. “Hunter? What are you doing here?”
Staying silent, Shauna retreated a few steps. Elayne burst by her, and in a moment mother and son were locked in a tight, emotional embrace. Even though Elayne, too, was so much smaller than Hunter, she seemed to be the one comforting him. Reaching up, she stroked his head, his back.
