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  When he arrived at the hard-packed water’s edge, he faced the hotel. Most balconies were empty, but a few vacationers lounged in plastic chairs, their feet propped up as they talked and laughed while the sun set.

  The concept of vacation fascinated James. He’d never had one, unless four years in prison counted.

  “What can I do for you, Chase?”

  James turned, surprised that the man standing behind him had walked up so silently. He wore a fishing hat, red shorts and a T-shirt, his feet bare. A stubby cigar was clamped between his teeth. A common tourist.

  But he was no tourist. And the decal of a shark on his T-shirt, its mouth opened wide to show sharp, killing teeth, was no joke.

  James swallowed the knot of fear that tightened in his throat. “I need cash, Sam.”

  “No kidding. And I thought you wanted to take a stroll along the beach with an old pal. How much?”

  “Fifteen grand.”

  The cigar’s tip glowed red before tangy smoke curled up into the humid air between them. “That’s more than usual,” Sam said.

  “I know.”

  “I heard you’re out of a job.”

  “Where’d you hear that?” James asked.

  “Word gets around.”

  Damn. James had known this wouldn’t be an easy sell, but it had just gotten fifteen thousand times harder. “Then I suppose you’ve heard that Kincaid is squeezing me.”

  “Rumor has it that it’s not without reason.”

  “I messed up a deal,” James said. “I’m trying to make it right.”

  “By screwing me over?”

  “Hell, no. I just need the cash until I can get back on my feet. I paid you what I owed you before.”

  “You had a job with Kincaid then. Now you don’t.”

  “What’s it matter to you as long as you get your money back?”

  “You need to have a plan, Chase. I’m not a bank, but I like to know there’s a plan, ‘cause if there isn’t, it’s likely there’ll be no payback. Get what I’m saying?”

  “You never wanted a plan before.”

  “You never wanted fifteen grand before,” Sam said. “And you had Kincaid to back you up.”

  “So that’s it? I can’t do business with you anymore because he’s got it in for me?”

  “If that’s how you want to look at it. But mostly, you’re just a lousy risk.”

  Lowering his head, James rubbed the knot at the nape of his neck, his skin cool and damp under his digging fingers.

  Sam gestured with his cigar. “I’m going to give you some advice, because I like you. I think you’re a major league screw-up, but I like you anyway.” He drew on the cigar, blew out smoke. “Your time has come to get the hell out of Dodge. Kincaid’s pissed off. And not because you blew off a client and spent money you didn’t earn. Don’t kid yourself. He makes more than fifteen grand an hour on some deals, and losing one customer won’t even knick his bottom line. This is about you. You, James. You killed his friend because you were too stupid to know better than to get high before sliding behind the wheel. He’s got a lot of rage bottled up inside him over that. He’s held it back because you were like family to him—the son he never had. He’s been cutting you a break for the past year, but now he sees you twisting in the wind again, screwing things up, losing jobs you’ve barely got, going to loan sharks for money, setting a bad example for your kid. Now you’re the son he never wanted. Now you’re just trash he plans to kick around until he’s ready to pull the trigger.” He pulled a wad of bills out of a front pocket of his shorts. “Here’s five hundred bucks. Take it.”

  James stared at the cash in confusion. “That’s not enough.”

  “This isn’t a loan, kid. I’m telling you to get the hell out of town. Alone.”

  Chapter 18

  Bailey lay on her back in A.J.’s bed, staring into the dark. She had tried to insist on sleeping on the futon in A.J.’s office, but her friend wouldn’t budge.

  “My neighbor listens to talk radio all night long,” A.J. had said. “It’d drive you batty. You know me, though, I can sleep through a freight train.”

  “Or a tropical storm.”

  “Just that one time,” A.J. countered.

  Turned out, Bailey couldn’t sleep anyway. She’d spent the entire afternoon dozing on the sofa while her friend had returned to work. And while she felt much better, and stronger, than she had in the morning, every time she closed her eyes, she saw a man in a motorcycle helmet coming at her with a knife or Cole watching her, his blue eyes warm and kind.

  Then there was the issue of her brother. How could she help him when he refused to admit a problem existed? She didn’t know how to reach him, how to get him to open up or ask for help. She couldn’t blame him, of course. She was the same. It apparently was a Chase gene. How could she impress upon James that he had to damn the gene and do the thing that ensured survival? For his son’s sake.

  She decided that she would consult with Uncle Payne. He would know what to do, or at least have some good advice. He’d always seemed to understand James in a way that she didn’t, and she was grateful that they had him to turn to at times like these. He was decent and reliable, and he cared about them.

  She concentrated on the faint clicking sound that the ceiling fan made, hoping to clear her head so she could drift off. Instead, the noise reminded her of the ceiling fan that had hung—probably still hung—in Daniel’s bedroom.

  She recalled sitting on the edge of his unmade bed, the blades of the fan stirring the air above her head, making a soft tick-tick-tick. She’d smoothed her palm over his pillow, smiling as she’d imagined his face when she told him the news …

  Their relationship was young—only six months old. But they were good together. They laughed a lot. And God knew she was going to need the laughter when she had to give Austin back to his father. She still hadn’t been able to imagine what the mornings would be like without her nephew. She’d already gotten a taste of it before she’d started dating Daniel. While Austin had spent every other weekend with his grandparents, Bailey’s loneliness had been maddening. She couldn’t fathom what would happen to her when she didn’t have the anticipation of Austin’s return on Sunday nights to get her through.

  But with a child of her own … and Daniel … she would never have to be lonely again.

  She pictured how much they would laugh when their newborn arrived, and a thrill shimmered through her. No one would be able to take this child from her. No one.

  Hearing the door open in the other room, she’d hopped up, her heart beating fast with excitement. “Hey!” she’d called, nearly skipping as she rushed to meet Daniel in the kitchen.

  Tanned and blond and gorgeous in black slacks and white polo shirt, Daniel set his laptop case on the floor and laughed as she threw her arms around him and hugged.

  “Hey, yourself,” he said, kissing the side of her neck. “What’s up?”

  Leaning back in his arms, she grinned. “What makes you think something’s up?”

  “Well, you usually don’t come running out of my bedroom to greet me when I get home. In fact, if I’d known you were coming, I would have made my bed.”

  “Why would you want to make it when we’re going to mess it up again?” she asked, pulling his head down for a lingering kiss.

  He responded instantly, already untucking his shirt and unbuttoning his pants, his mouth hot and hungry as he backed her against the wall. “Why bother with the bed, baby? We’ve got the floor.”

  Laughing, she grabbed at his wrists as his expert hands found their way inside her blouse. “Hold on there, cowboy. I have to tell you something first.”

  He didn’t seem to hear as his fingers deftly unclasped her bra, and he angled his hips so that she could feel his erection against her hip. “Can it wait?” he panted against her mouth. “I’m really into this. It’s my fantasy, coming home to my woman, who’s all hot for me.”

  She smiled, closing her eyes as he trailed kiss
es down her throat. My woman. She could get used to that. “Hot for you isn’t all I am,” she murmured, her breath catching when his mouth closed over her nipple.

  “You taste good,” he said, kissing his way back up to her mouth. “What else are you?”

  “What?”

  “You said you’re not just hot for me. What else are you?”

  “Oh.” She sank her fingers into his hair when he rubbed his five o’clock shadow over her breast.

  “Wet?” he asked, fumbling to undo her jeans. “I’m hoping to God you’re wet for me.”

  “I’m pregnant.”

  His fingers went still at her waist, and after a moment, he stepped back, his eyes wide. The flush of passion left his cheeks. “Are you shitting me?”

  Her euphoria died at the terror in his gaze, and she knew she’d miscalculated.

  Whirling away, he zipped and fastened his pants. “Goddamn it, Bailey,” he said, linking his fingers at the nape of his neck and leaning his head back so he could glare at the ceiling. “Everything was so perfect.”

  Bailey leaned against the wall behind her, rearranging the future in her head. Fine, she thought. If he didn’t want their child, she’d have the baby alone. She could do it. Raising Austin alone for the past several years hadn’t been easy, but she’d managed.

  Daniel swung to face her. “How did it happen?”

  She suppressed her growing nausea. His eyes had always been expressive, and they were no less so now. They screamed suspicion. “I’m thinking it happened the usual way,” she said. She sounded calm, cool, not at all like a woman who’d just realized that everything she’d thought was true about her relationship with this man was not.

  “I mean, did you do it on purpose?”

  She stared at him. “On purpose?”

  His laugh was humorless. “It’s written all over you how desperate you are to have a kid to replace the one you’re going to have to give up. I just didn’t think you’d play dirty to get one.”

  “Play dirty?” She knew she sounded like an idiot, repeating his words back to him. But this man standing before her was suddenly a stranger, and she couldn’t help but wonder if he’d been one all along and she hadn’t noticed because she had been so terrified of being alone. The future, she slowly realized, had never come up in their conversations. No talk of marriage. No mention of children. And she realized how foolish she’d been. Their relationship was six months old. Of course they hadn’t discussed the future. It was too soon.

  “What’d you think would happen, Bailey?” he asked. “You’d tell me you’re pregnant, and I’d drop to one knee and propose?”

  She raised her chin, trying to harden herself. She could deal with this. “That would have been nice.”

  “Well, it ain’t going to happen. Not now. Not ever.”

  She almost gasped at how easily he dismissed a life together. But she pulled it together and gave a short nod. “Fine.”

  He looked at her in surprise. “What?”

  “I said fine.” She walked out of the kitchen and into the living room, where she’d left her purse on the sofa. She had to get away from him now, before her composure crumbled and she embarrassed herself further. She took deep breaths as she moved.

  He followed her. “What does that mean? Fine.”

  “It means what it means.” Damn it, tears were stinging her eyes, clogging her throat. She had to make this getaway faster. She snatched up her purse and turned, startled that he was almost on top of her.

  “What are you going to do about it?” he asked.

  She tried to step to the side. “It doesn’t have to concern you. I got that loud and clear.”

  He seized her by the arms. “You’re going to get rid of it, aren’t you?”

  She jerked against his grip. “Let me go.”

  His fingers became bruising. “I’m not kidding, Bailey. I want you to get rid of it.”

  She pushed at his chest. “Let go.”

  “Not until we decide how we’re going to handle this.”

  She yanked free and, glaring at him, rubbed at the finger-shaped bruises already forming on her flesh. “I’m having this child, whether you want it or not.”

  “And what? You’re going to come after me for child support later? Try to label me a deadbeat dad? No freaking way. You’re going to take care of it, and I’m going to go with you to make sure you do it.”

  She tried to get by him. He blocked her way, shoving her roughly back. The dam burst, and she struck out at him with her open palm. He jerked back, his hand going to his face where the imprint of her fingers flared red.

  Bailey’s shock mirrored his. She’d already begun to stammer out an apology when he struck back.

  Chapter 19

  Sinking into the squishy cushions of her cheery red sofa, Bailey looked around her trashed apartment and fought the urge to put her head down and weep. A locksmith was due in an hour, and the insurance agent had just left. Photos of her destroyed belongings had been taken and recorded, a report would be filed. Now she had to make a list of everything she had lost, including the value of each item. Receipts would be especially helpful.

  But how could she put a price, or produce a receipt, on Austin’s smashed Lego windmill? Or the vase her father had brought her from Italy? Or the glass swan her grandmother had given her? Or the external hard drive that had backed up her digital life? All those things were priceless to her. And gone.

  A strong wave of emotion welled in her chest, and she struggled to hold it off. The lingering weakness frustrated her. She’d awakened feeling much stronger this morning. The shakes were gone and, after she took a pain pill, the throbbing in her side had receded to a gnawing ache. As long as she moved cautiously, and rested often, she felt mostly okay.

  Emotionally, though, she was raw. The shock of what had happened had faded, and she feared that shoving her over the edge into despair would take very little effort.

  “Looks like at least your clothes were spared,” A.J. said as she walked into the living room from the bedroom. “I piled everything on the bed. I imagine you’re going to want to run it all through the wash.”

  Bailey didn’t trust herself to respond as her stomach flipped at the thought of a stranger pawing through her stuff.

  A.J. paused before her. They were dressed almost identically, in black knit shorts with white stripes down the side seams and sleeveless tees, Bailey’s white and untucked, A.J.’s turquoise and tucked.

  “You doing all right?” A.J. asked.

  Bailey nodded.

  “Liar.”

  Looking up at her friend, Bailey forced a smile that felt unsteady. “You might not want to harass me right now or you could end up with me in a puddle at your feet.”

  A.J. put her hands on her hips. “I want you to be honest about how you’re feeling, and that’s harassment?”

  “Feels like it, yeah.” Her irritation had nothing to do with her friend and everything to do with the helpless rage building inside her chest. Yep, the shock had worn off, and now she was just plain ticked that someone had invaded her space and ripped apart her life.

  A.J. must have seen something in Bailey’s eyes, because she backed off. “You know what? I’m hungry. What if I run over to that Thai place you like and grab us some lunch?”

  “You hate Thai food.”

  “For you, I’m willing to give it a second chance.”

  Bailey laughed, touched that her friend was so intent on trying to make her feel better. “How about that taco place? We’re both into that.”

  “You got it. The usual?”

  “Sounds good.”

  A.J. paused at the door. “You’ll be okay here by yourself for fifteen minutes?”

  Bailey inclined her head toward the baseball bat propped against the wall by the door. “I’ve got your trusty Batboy to protect me. But I doubt whoever did this will come back. He either found what he was looking for or is looking somewhere else. Plus, Dave next door knows we’re here. If
I scream my head off, he’ll come running.”

  After several minutes alone, Bailey decided she couldn’t put off the inevitable anymore. Forcing herself to get up, she gingerly picked her way through the mess into the kitchen, where she pulled out a box of garbage bags. The only place in the apartment that had been left intact was right here, under the sink.

  Sitting back on her heels, she closed her eyes against another insistent rush of emotion.

  “Hello?”

  Bailey flinched at the familiar male voice calling from the other room. She struggled too quickly to her feet, straining stitches that sent a warning jab through her side. Pressing her hand to the ache, she turned just as Cole Goodman, in khaki cargo shorts and a navy T-shirt, ambled into the kitchen.

  “There you are,” he said, smiling. “You must not have heard me knock. And I might add that it’s awfully foolish not to have had the lock on your door fixed yet.” His gaze flitted to the hand she’d planted against her ribs before he met her gaze again. “I was wondering if you needed some help sorting through stuff.”

  He’d stopped by to help out? Hadn’t he had enough of her drama? And how had he known she would be here?

  He chuckled. “Geez, Chase, you don’t have to look so stunned.”

  She blinked. “I, uh, was just getting started. That’s nice of you to come by.”

  “Maybe I’m hoping to see some more of your sexy lingerie.”

  His effort at a lecherous grin made her laugh, and she relaxed, handing him the box of garbage bags. “Sorry, but you’re banned from the bedroom.”

  “Aw, come on. I came all this way …”

  “You live fifteen minutes away.”

  “I crawled.”

  Even though she knew he was kidding, she glanced at his legs. Tan and muscular and hairy but not too hairy. White ankle socks hugged his ankles above well-worn Nikes. “Right. If you wanted me to believe that, you should have at least smeared some mud on your knees.”