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Hoping to find a radio station with a weather report or, at the very least, some soothing music to block out the sounds of the storm, she reached for the control panel. At the same moment, the car’s front tires hit a sheet of water on the highway and the steering wheel was wrenched from her hand. She bit back a scream as she grabbed for the wheel, gripping it with both hands, trying to regain control. But the car spun crazily, around and around and around, then slammed into the ditch.
A scream rent the air. Her own.
Darkness followed.
Link hung back, not wanting Isabelle to know he was following her. He feared that if she picked up on the tail, she might panic and end up wrecking her car. And at the speed she was traveling, he was pretty sure she wouldn’t walk away from the accident unharmed.
When the rain started, he shortened the distance between them, but stayed only close enough to keep her taillights in sight.
“Slow down, Isabelle,” he warned under his breath.
He’d no sooner muttered the warning when a bolt of lightning lit up the sky, illuminating her car fully. He saw the water that covered the low spot in the highway ahead and prayed she saw it, too. Pressing the accelerator closer to the floor, he closed the distance between them, silently willing her to slow down.
“Oh, God, no,” he moaned when he realized the sports car was out of control. He eased on the brake, his heart lurching to his throat while he watched helplessly as the car in front of him spun wildly, headed straight for the ditch. Whipping the steering wheel of his Blazer to the right, he slid to a stop on the shoulder of the highway, jerked on the emergency brake and jumped out. Rain stung his face, blinding him as he ran for her car. Within seconds he was drenched to the skin.
He jerked open the door on the driver’s side but could see only the top of her head above the inflated air bag. “Isabelle!” he yelled, trying to make himself heard over the pounding rain. When she didn’t respond, he rammed his hand into his jeans pocket in search of his knife.
“Isabelle!” he shouted again, louder. “Hang on. I’ll get you out.” He stabbed his knife into the air bag, ripping a long slit to speed its deflation, then pressed both hands against it, forcing out the air. Shoving the bag out of his way, he bent over her. Her face was covered with the fine white powder the air bag had emitted. Carefully, he brushed it away, searching her face for any sign of injury, then moved his fingers to the long, smooth column of her throat, feeling for a pulse. Relieved to find one, though thready, he hunkered down beside her and framed her face with his hands. “Isabelle,” he whispered, frightened by the paleness of her skin, eyes that remained stubbornly closed.
After what seemed an eternity, her eyelashes fluttered and her lids slowly lifted. He could see that her pupils were dilated, and was sure that, although conscious, she wasn’t aware of his presence. He grabbed her hands and chafed them between his own. “You’re all right,” he told her, as if in saying it, he could make it true. “You’re going to be okay now.”
She blinked twice, slowly bringing him into focus. “Link?” she whispered in disbelief.
“Yeah, it’s me. I followed you from the church.”
Tears flooded her violet eyes. “Oh, Link,” she cried, and fell against his chest.
He wrapped his arms around her and shifted his weight until he was sitting on the edge of the seat beside her. “It’s okay,” he murmured, stroking a hand over her wind-tangled raven-black hair. “I’ve got you. You’re all right now.”
She tightened her arms around his neck, holding on as if her very life depended on it. “You’ve got to help me,” she sobbed hysterically. “I’ve got to get away.”
“Shh,” he soothed. “Don’t worry. I’ll take care of you.”
Rain streamed down his back, reminding him of the storm and his need to get them to safety. He pushed her to arm’s length. “Are you hurt?”
Her breath hitched, and she lifted her gaze to his, her wide eyes drenched and darkened with fear. “N-no, I d-don’t think so.” She pressed her palm between her breasts. “Just m-my chest.”
He slid from the seat to stand outside the car, then leaned back inside, his face inches from hers in the cramped quarters. “I’m going to carry you to my truck. If you feel any pain, tell me.”
Her breath hitched again, and she nodded, never once moving her gaze from his. “All right.”
“Here,” he said, and took her arm and guided it around his neck. “Hold on to me.” He slipped one hand beneath her knees and the other behind her back. “Ready?”
“Y-yes,” she stammered, her teeth beginning to chatter.
Straightening, he lifted her from the car, then looked down at her. Rain sluiced down his face and over his chin, dropping to stain the satin of her wedding gown. Bowing his head over hers and hunching his shoulders, he tried his best to protect her from the worst of the storm’s fury. “You okay?” he asked, raising his voice to be heard over the storm that continued to rage around them. “Any pain?”
“I’m o-okay.” She tucked her face into the curve of his neck. “P-please. Just h-hurry.”
He jogged his way back to his truck, slipping and sliding on the rain-slick ground. When he reached his truck, he braced her against the side in order to free a hand to open the door. Quickly, he slid her onto the seat, then straightened, his breath coming in hard, grabbing gasps. “I’ll be right back. I need to lock up your car.”
He slammed the door and ran back for her vehicle. He ducked inside and grabbed the keys from the ignition. As he withdrew, he noticed the suitcase on the back seat and grabbed it, too. By the time he reached the Blazer again, his boots were saturated with water and felt as if they were filled with cement. He heaved her suitcase into the back, then hopped inside the truck, slamming the door behind him. He dragged a hand down his face, wiping away the rain, then braced a hand against the steering wheel and turned to face her. Her gaze was on his, her eyes wide, her lips trembling. Her fingers were twisted into a knot on her lap. “You okay?”
She nodded. “Y-yes. Th-thank you.”
Always polite. Always the lady. But there was an edge of desperation, of hysteria, behind the polite manners. “What happened?”
“I—I lost c-control of my c-car.”
“I mean before. At the church.”
“I—I ran away.”
He watched her eyes fill again, and hated himself for asking. But he had to know. “Last-minute jitters?”
The violet eyes turned stormy, wild, and she grabbed for him, her nails biting deeply into his forearm. “I’ve got to get away. Please, Link,” she begged. “You’ve got to help me.”
Seeing the panic swirling in her eyes and hearing the hysteria rising in her voice, he knew he couldn’t press her for answers. Not now. He stared at her a moment, wondering if he’d regret asking the one question he needed answered. “Do you trust me?”
When she hesitated a second too long, he looked away, scowling at the rain-streaked windshield and the shadowed mountains ahead. “Doesn’t matter,” he said gruffly, and reached for the ignition key. “Right now I’m your only hope.”
The decision to head for the mountains with Isabelle wasn’t one Link made easily…nor was the drive he made to reach them. The storm that had blown up so quickly in the desert decided to hang around awhile, seemingly chasing them into the mountains and making the narrow roads treacherous to navigate in the growing darkness. More than once Link had felt the Blazer’s tires spin on the muddy incline and the rear of the vehicle fishtail out of control. Even with the four-wheel drive engaged, progress up the mountain was slow and tedious.
By the time he reached the well-concealed turnoff he’d been watching for, the tendons in his neck and shoulders felt like steel rods and a headache was punching him between his eyes. After making the turn, he glanced over at Isabelle and found her still curled against the passenger door asleep. How she’d been able to sleep through the hair-raising drive, he wasn’t sure. But after assuring himself she hadn’t suffered a head injury, he had let her sleep, thankful that she could. He wasn’t in the mood to make polite conversation…not that he’d know how.
She was the one with the manners, he reminded himself bitterly. All those years spent at that fancy boarding school back east where her parents had sent her, the finishing school in Europe that followed. The only school Link’s parents had ever sent him to was the school of hard knocks.
He bit back a growl and turned his face away from her, narrowing an eye at the road ahead and the trees that crowded it on both sides. But it was that school of hard knocks that had nudged him toward law enforcement, he reminded himself, and it was that same school that had given him the instincts he needed to succeed where others had failed.
And those instincts were the ones he’d use to protect Isabelle. Keep her alive.
The Blazer’s headlights bounced off the cabin’s windows and reflected the light back at the Blazer, making Link squint. He slowed, downshifting as he pulled as close to the front porch as he dared. Switching off the engine, he turned to look at Isabelle again. Asleep she looked even more innocent and fragile than she did when she was awake…and, if possible, more beautiful. He reached out a hand to brush the tendril of hair that curled like a damp question mark against her cheek…but caught himself just shy of touching her. That porcelain skin. All that womanliness. That innocence. Curling his fingers into a fist, he withdrew his hand and turned to shoulder open his door.
The storm had lost most of its steam and now only a light rain fell, misting his face and hair as he circled to the passenger side of the truck. He opened the door carefully, not wanting to startle her. “Isabelle?” he said softly. When she didn’t respond, he leaned inside, bracing one hand against the dashboard and laying the other on her shoulder. “Isabelle,” he said, gently shaking her. “Wake up. We’re here.”
She moaned softly and turned away, snuggling her cheek deeper against the Blazer’s worn upholstery. With a glance over his shoulder at the dilapidated cabin he was taking her to, he decided it might be better to let her sleep. He guided her arm around his neck and scooped her up into his arms, then headed for the porch. As he brushed past the post that supported the sagging front porch, the train of her dress snagged on the rough cedar, stopping him. He gave the train a sharp tug and swore under his breath when he heard the delicate fabric rip.
She awoke then, shoving at his chest as she tried to struggle free.
He tightened his grip on her. “Be still now, or you’re going to make me drop you.”
Her fingers froze on his neck as her eyes snapped to his. He saw the remembrance slowly settle there…as well as the fear.
She tore her gaze from his and glanced nervously around. “Wh-where are we?”
“At a buddy of mine’s cabin in the mountains. You’ll be safe here,” he added as she turned those wide, violet eyes on his again.
“He can’t find me,” she whispered, her grip on him growing desperate. “Please don’t let him find me.”
Something twisted in Link’s gut as he looked down at her. Something he thought he’d lost long ago. The ability to care. “He won’t find you,” he said gruffly, and reached for the door. “Not on this mountain. Nobody could.”
He pushed open the door and caught up her train as he hefted her higher in his arms. As he stepped inside the cabin, he was struck at the irony in that gesture. Link Templeton carrying a bride across a threshold. The man who’d sworn he’d never marry, who’d sworn he’d never be foolish enough to fall in love, was carrying a bride across a threshold.
The only comfort he found in that thought was that the bride wasn’t his.
She was a runaway.
Two
After stripping off his wet shirt and changing into a pair of dry jeans he found in the closet, bare-chested Link pulled fresh linens from the dresser drawer and began making the bed. Anxious to finish the job before Isabelle emerged from the bathroom, he kept an ear cocked to the sounds coming from behind the door she’d closed between them. The soft gurgle of water as it ran from the ancient faucet and splashed into the rust-stained sink. The dull thump of a satin heel striking the old footed tub, or perhaps the side of the toilet. The whisper of satin and lace as it whisked against the scarred plank floor.
He tried not to think about Isabelle unbuttoning that long row of tiny, satin-covered buttons, of slipping the dress from her shoulders and letting it fall to the floor. Of her stepping from the cloud of white, her bare flesh pebbling as the cabin’s cool air struck it…the bobbing of ripe, full breasts, free now from constraints…the feminine curve of her waist…the heart-shaped buttocks he’d already defined earlier when he’d carried her into the cabin.
But the vision was there, filling his mind and making his fingers knot in the quilt he held.
Furious with himself and his wayward thoughts, he sailed the quilt over the freshly made bed, then stretched to tuck one end under the foot of the mattress. He jerked his head up when the hinges on the bathroom door squeaked. His breath locked in his lungs as Isabelle stepped into the opening, dressed in an ankle-length gown and robe of ivory silk. She looked as virginal and nervous as any bride might on her wedding night. Straightening slowly, he let the quilt slip from slack fingers and simply stared, letting his gaze slide from liquid eyes to bare toes that curled self-consciously against the hardwood floor.
Her hair hung past her shoulders, its dark ends curling gently around the swell of each breast, emphasizing their fullness and the twin knots of flesh puckered at their peaks. The silk hugged her body like a second skin, skimming over her flat abdomen, molding her slim hips, rising above the sharp planes of her pelvic bones, then dipping slightly into the juncture of her legs, before tumbling like a moonlit waterfall to her feet. When his gaze reached the gown’s hem, he saw the fabric’s slight quivering and realized it was caused by trembling knees.
Slowly, he moved his gaze back to her face. “My God” was all he could say when his eyes met hers again.
Color flamed in her already flushed cheeks and she hugged one arm at her waist while crossing the other over her breasts. She pressed her fingertips at her throat in a failed attempt to cover herself. “I—I’m sorry,” she said, dropping her gaze from his. “All I have with me is my trousseau, the clothes I packed for my honeymoon.”
Link forced a swallow, then drew in a ragged breath. “No problem,” he murmured, his voice sounding raw even to his own ears. But it was a problem, he knew. A big one. There was no way he’d be able to stay in the cabin with her. Not with her dressed like that. Not and keep his hands off her.
But he had no other choice.
Knowing that, he scowled as he strode to the closet, snatched a flannel shirt from a hanger and tossed it to her. “Put this on,” he ordered gruffly, then pulled another out and shrugged it on to cover his own bare chest. “I found a can of stew in the pantry,” he said, and gestured toward the bedroom doorway and the main room beyond, indicating for her to precede him. “It’s probably hot by now.”
With an uneasy glance his way, Isabelle darted for the door. Link watched her and slowly released the breath he’d held. How he’d ever survive the night without touching her, he didn’t know.
But it was his duty to keep her safe, he reminded himself. And Link Templeton was a man who honored duty above all else. Even his own safety.
His own sanity.
Setting his jaw, he followed her into the kitchen, pulled down heavy mugs from the cupboard and filled them with the thick stew while she hung back, watching, her arms hugging the flannel shirt over her breasts. He gestured with one of the mugs toward the small, crude table, waited until she was seated, then plunked a mug down in front of her and sat down in the chair opposite hers.
Picking up a spoon, he stirred, keeping his gaze on his stew, watching the steam rise from it. “Think you can tell me now what happened at the church?” he asked after a moment.
When she didn’t immediately respond, he glanced up to find her gaze on his hands. Her eyes slid up to his. Their gazes met, held for a moment, his narrowing in steely determination, hers going from shy curiosity to fear in the time it took for his heart to take one more rib-threatening kick at the mere sight of her.
“I’m a cop,” he said gruffly. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
“You arrested my brother.”
Link frowned at the accusation in her tone. “I had no choice. The evidence was there against him.”
She fisted her hands on the tabletop and leaned toward him, her defensive stance taking him by surprise. A lamb turning lioness before his eyes. “Riley didn’t kill Mike,” she said angrily. “You know him better than that. Riley would never harm anyone.”
Yes, Link acknowledged silently. In his gut, he had known that. In his heart, too, if he thought he had one. But gut instincts didn’t hold any weight in a court of law. Evidence did. And the evidence stacked against Riley Fortune had been damning. So, Link had done his duty, arrested a man for a crime he knew he didn’t commit…then busted his ass to uncover the evidence he needed to clear his name. Now all he needed was enough evidence to win a conviction against the real murderer. But Isabelle didn’t know any of that, nor would he tell her.
“Do you know who did?” he asked instead.
He heard her quick inhalation of breath, saw her body stiffen, before she dropped her gaze to the hands she still held fisted on the table. “Yes,” she said, her voice trembling. She slicked her tongue across lips that fear had parched. “I know who killed Mike.”
“Who?” he asked, needing to hear her name the man his gut told him was responsible for the crime, the man the current evidence pointed to. The man she’d planned to marry. The man he despised for no other reason than Isabelle Fortune had agreed to marry him.
Slowly she lifted her face until her eyes met his again. “Brad,” she whispered, then said more strongly. “Brad Rowan.”
The certainty with which she named her fiancé, the venom behind the accusation, took Link by surprise. He’d expected her to defend him, to try to protect the man she loved. “You have proof?”
“No. But Brad killed Mike. I know he did.”
With a snort, Link dropped his spoon into the mug and reared his chair back on two legs, eyeing her sardonically. “I know a lot of guilty men who are walking the streets, but without proof, that’s exactly where they’re going to stay. On the streets. The same as Brad Rowan will.”
Her lips parted on a shocked gasp, her eyes shooting wide. “What! You aren’t going to arrest him?”
He lifted a shoulder. “On what grounds? On the circumstantial evidence I currently have? On your unfounded accusation?”
She yanked her hands to her lap and glared at him across the width of the table. “It isn’t unfounded. I heard two men talking in the vestibule.”
He dropped his chair back to all four legs. “What two men?”
She waved away the question. “I don’t know. Just two men I overheard talking—”
The diamond engagement ring she wore caught the light and shimmered, drawing Link’s gaze to it. She stopped when she realized that he wasn’t listening to her any longer, then followed his gaze to the hand she held aloft. She stared at the ring, as if unaware until that moment that she still wore it. Then, with a whimper, she twisted the ring off and hurled it across the room. It bounced off the far wall, then fell to the floor, rolling a few feet before coming to a stop at the edge of a braided rug spread on the floor before the dark fireplace. The diamond caught the light again, glimmered, seeming to wink at Link, as if teasing him with all it symbolized.
Arching a brow, he slowly shifted his gaze back to hers. “Feel better?”
She scrubbed her fingers over the spot where the ring had rested for the last several months, as if ridding her skin of something vile. “Yes,” she said, her breath hitching. “Much.”
He pursed his lips and gave his chin a jerk. “Good. Now, about those two men…”
She drew in a deep breath, placed her palms over the top of the table as if to steady herself, and then told Link what she’d overheard. When she’d finished, she leaned forward, her eyes unwavering in their conviction as they met Link’s. “He killed him. Brad killed Mike. I know he did.”
“Did you recognize the voices?”
She caught her lip between her teeth as she sank slowly back against her chair. “No,” she said, shaking her head. “Though they were both familiar.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because they were!” she cried, her frustration returning with a vengeance. “I’ve heard the voices before. Where, I’m not sure. But I’ve heard them.”
Link leaned across the table, convinced that the two unidentified men were the key he needed to put Brad Rowan behind bars where he belonged. And Isabelle held that key. “Think, Isabelle,” he growled. “Think. Without a name, or a place, I have nothing to go on.”
Her eyes filled with tears and she pressed her fingers against her temples, shaking her head. “I’ve tried,” she cried miserably. “While I was driving through the desert, their voices played through my mind over and over again, but I simply can’t place them.”
“Could they be friends of your father’s? Employees of his?”
