Hearts On Fire (13 page)

Chapter 24

    
“You’ll see to it
you
send someone competent the next time,” Arlene fumed at the small man standing
before her. “I will not tolerate losing one of my orchids to an inexperienced gardener.”

     The man twisted his hat
in his hands and nodded furiously. “Yes, of course, Mrs. MacGreggor. Had I
realized Leo lacked experience with the more delicate of the flowers I would
never have sent him. If any ill should come to your orchids I will make it
right with you.”

     “Good. See to it you
investigate you’re employees more carefully next time, Mr. Stasiss. These
flowers are award winning and they mean the world to me. To lose one…” She
shuddered. “Unacceptable. They are precious to me.”

     “Unlike your own
grandchild.”

     Arlene stiffed at the
roughness in her son’s voice. She had not heard him enter the house nor had
anyone announced him to her. Another blunder on this day. Would it ever end? Turning
from the gardener she watched JD very carefully as he stalked toward her. His
words and their potential meaning had not been lost on her. “You’re dismissed,
Mr. Stasiss.” Her smile was strained. “I don’t think you’ll want to be here for
this.”

     The man must have taken
her at her word. With one worried glance to JD he scurried from the room,
looking for the nearest exit.

     “My, God, Jeremiah,
what’s gotten into you?” She took in the casual jeans and sweater, but more
importantly the murderous look in his eyes. “Have you no manners at all?”

     He rammed his fists into
his pockets so he would not grab her and shake her. “You show more concern for
a flower than your own family.”

     “What on earth are you—”
She stopped herself and her eyes lit. “Oh, for Pete’s sake. She’s gathered her
courage and come to you with her sob story, I see.” Wishing for a cup of tea,
she clasped her hands demurely in front of her stomach. She’d been expecting
this, hadn’t she? Ever since she’d seen the girl at the hospital. But she’d
thought she’d done a better job of reminding her just what was a stake in the
matter.

      “Lizzie and I had a talk
this morning. She informed me I have a twelve year old son. Her son.” He cocked
his head at her inquisitively, deciding to give her enough rope to hang herself
with if she chose. “You don’t seem too shocked by this revelation.”

     Sighing deeply, as though
inconvenienced, Arlene pressed her lips together and ran her neatly manicured
finger tips over her peach colored slacks. “I learned a long time ago not be
shocked by anything you boys got up to.”

     She was good, he’d give
her that. “How long have you known?”

     Her coal black eyes
delved deeply into his. “You’re a good lawyer, son, but I’m a better mother.”
She waved a hand at him. “What does it matter how long I’ve known?”

     “I asked.”

     “I’ve known all along,”
she admitted, holding her head high.

     He dipped his head. A very
large part of him had hoped Lizzie had lied to him about his mother’s
involvement. But that same part had known the truth. Though his father had been
a kind, gentle hearted man his mother had never been. And she’d ruled the MacGreggor
home with an iron will. “You threatened her. You told her she could never tell
me about the boy.”

     “Yes. I did what I felt
best for you and your new wife. I will not apologize for it either, if that’s
what you’re looking for. That girl was nothing but gold digging trash. Girls
like her are only after one thing. A man’s money. They’re good enough to go to
on a cold lonely night but they are not good enough to become family. So I knew
just what to do to insure her silence in the matter. And look where that’s
gotten me. Money down the drain.”

     His breath caught.
“Money?” he asked, his blood running cold.

     Arlene flinched, though
it was barely noticeable. “I’d assumed she’d told you. I paid her to leave.”

     Lizzie had accepted money
to leave? But what about her claims of being threatened? “How much?” he asked
miserably. “How much did she take?”

     Inwardly Arlene smiled to
herself. This had worked out even better than she could have planned. She would
turn her son against that white trash girl without even lifting a finger. “She
wanted to attend medical school. I paid for it, along with all of the medical
bills associated with the pregnancy.”

    
“Dr. Waring,
can I
get you anything? A cup of coffee? Something to eat?”

     Lizzie looked up to
Annie, Katy’s daytime nurse and smiled. “No thanks, Annie. I’ve had enough
coffee for the day and I’m not feeling particularly hungry this morning.” As a
matter of fact her stomach was still turning from what she’d had to tell JD
that morning.

     “Well, all right,” Annie
told her, seeming unconvinced. “You just ring me if you need anything.”

     Squeezing Katy’s hand
between her own, Lizzie leaned toward her as the nurse left. “Well, I told JD
about Sean this morning,” she whispered to her. “And boy, is he pissed off. I
expected as much though.” A single tear slid down her cheek and she swiped at
it almost frantically. “What’s worse is that I think he hates me now. I knew he
would. I knew that. But what I didn’t know was that I’d fall back in love with
him again first. Or that I’d allow him to fall in love with me again. God, I’ve
done worse than piss him off, Katy, I’ve hurt him. I’ve hurt him so badly I
don’t know if he’ll ever forgive me.”

     She picked Katy’s hand up
and kissed it gently. “Damn you, why won’t you wake up? I need you right now.”

     “Still no change?”

     Jumping, Lizzie turned to
find Matt standing in the doorway. He was in his uniform and had a palm resting
casually on the butt of his sidearm. Leather squeaked as he shifted his weight
from one foot to the other.

     “Sorry, I didn’t mean to
startle you.” His smile was soft. “Or interrupt. I was just here to see about
Julie and thought I’d swing by.”

     Lizzie wondered if his
interest in either of the women was personal or professional. Standing, she
brushed her palms on her jeans. “Still no change,” she confirmed. “And still no
real idea of why she’s still out like this.”

     Matt frowned. “You’d
think they’d know.”

     Lizzie shrugged. “Doctors
don’t know everything.” Her smile turned rueful. “Trust me on that one.”

     “Personal experience.”

     “You could say that.”
Reaching down, she picked up her coat.

     “I’m not chasing you out
of here, am I?”

     She shook her head. “Not
at all. I was just getting ready to run over and check into the hotel and get
my things in a room.”

     Surprise registered on
Matt’s face. “I thought… I guess I thought you would be staying at Josh’s
place.”

     “With JD,” she finished
for him. “No. I’ve decided the hotel will be better.” Because she knew JD
wanted nothing to do with her. She’d seen that plainly in his wounded gaze
before he’d walked out on her earlier in the day.

     “Okay. Now that I know
I’ll have someone keep an eye on the place.” He started walking with her, his
shoes squeaking a little on the polished tiles beneath his feet.

     “That won’t be necessary,
Matt, really.”

     “But it is. We still
haven’t captured Grady Summers.” His golden brown eyes fixed on her neck. “And
I’m afraid he might not be done with you just yet.”

     She shivered at the
thought. “I’m more concerned with Katy’s safety right now. She’s completely
defenseless.”

     “The deputy will remain
in place, don’t worry.” As they came to the elevators and he punched the button
for the lobby, he reached out and took one of her hands in his. “Lizzie,
something’s bothering you other than Katy and the rest of it. You look like
you’ve been on a crying jag.”

     The softness in his voice
and the concern in his eyes brought tears to her eyes again. Fighting them off,
she said, “Yeah. There’s a lot going on right now.”

     “This has something to do
with JD,” he guessed, getting into the empty elevator car with her. Once the
doors had closed and they were alone he swore profusely. “Damn him, anyway.”

     She looked over to him.

     “I told him I’d kick his
ass if he hurt you again, Lizzie. I mean, I know you and I… we could never be…
I get that. But I still like to think of you as a friend.”

     Touched by his words, she
touched his cheek, cupping it in her palm. “You’re very sweet, Matt. But you
don’t need to worry about kicking his ass on my behalf.”

     “He’s hurt you. Again.”

     “No, not this time. This
time it was me to do the hurting.” The elevator doors slid open and she dropped
her hand from his face. And there, standing in the opening was JD, his jaw
hardened, his eyes filled with a knowing glitter of anger.

     “Well, that didn’t take
you too long, Lizzie. But then, it never does, does it?” His smile was cold.
His eyes colder. “I had some more questions for you,” his gaze flickered to
Matt for a moment, “but I can see the answers plainly enough for myself.”

     “JD,” she whispered, all
the color draining from her face.

     “We need to talk,” he
told her. “Later. Right now I’m afraid I might strangle you.” He gave her one
last cold look and turned from the elevators to the stairs.

     She had the urge to go
after him but knew better. He really did look like he wanted to kill her. She
didn’t have to wonder why. Arlene.

     Matt took her by the arm
and pulled her from the elevator as a group of doctors entered. “Christ,
Lizzie, what the hell’s gotten into him?” He looked after JD, who slammed
through the stairwell door without looking back once.

    
God damnnit,
she
swore to herself. She never should have let him walk away this morning without
hearing everything from her. Now that his mother had been at him the damage was
more than likely irreparable.

    
He’d known running
into Lizzie at the hospital was a distinct possibility. He’d even mentally
prepared himself to just walk by her without a word. But damnit, he hadn’t
expected to encounter her in an intimate moment with Matt. The sight of her
standing there with her hand on his friend’s face made his blood boil. After
what they had shared last night and this morning how could she turn to another
man so quickly?

    
Just like Brian
Castellanos
, he told himself. She’d taken Arlene’s money and run off with
another man. And let that other man raise
his
child.
Well, no more,
he vowed venomously. He would get to know his child, whether Lizzie liked it or
not. And, he thought with bitterness, his child would come here to live with
him. Yes, he decided on the spot, he would move back to the ranch so his son
could grow up as he had. To hell with Lizzie Waring.

     Now, he knew, he needed
to put her out of his mind, as much as that was possible. He needed to be calm
when he went in to see his sister. She was still on suicide watch and he didn’t
want to do anything more to upset her.

     “Mr. MacGreggor,” the
desk nurse chirped. “Your sister has just had her lunch. She seems in better
spirits today.”

     “Has she spoken to
anyone?”

     The nurse’s smile faded.
“No, I’m afraid not. But she did eat her meal on her own this time. And made
eye contact with me when I took her dishes.”

     Progress, he supposed,
though small. Stopping at an open door, he peeked in to see Julie sitting in a
chair looking out a window at the swirling snow. “Hey, Jules,” he said softly.

     She didn’t even blink,
just sat there with her hands folded in her lap.

     “Jules,” he repeated,
entering the room. He wanted to close the door behind himself but knew the
hospital staff would not allow it. Going to an empty chair he seated himself
beside her. Gently he stroked her blonde hair. “Hey there.”

     Slowly her eye lashes
fluttered and she turned her face to him. “JD,” she mouthed without making a
sound.

     He smiled for her. He’d
come to her with the express desire to ask her one question. Who her lover was.
He’d decided to tell her about the attempt on Lizzie’s life and hope that would
get her to name the man. But now… he saw such vulnerability in her eyes. Would
asking her send her back into the abyss which had made her try to take her own
life?

Chapter 25

    
“You went to visit
Julie,”
Lizzie prompted after swallowing her bite of sandwich. “Is she
getting any better?”

     “No.” Matt leaned forward
in his chair, putting his elbows on the table between them. “And you’re
avoiding talking to me about whatever happened with JD.”

     “Yes, I am,” she
admitted.

     “I get it. It’s personal.
It just surprises me. Last night the guy told me he loves you. Now he wants to
wrap his hands around your throat?”

     Hearing JD had admitted
to Matt that he loved her was a kick to the heart. But she beared up and made a
wisecrack to hide the hurt. “Being a police officer has made you nosey, Matt.”

     He chuckled. “Comes with
the territory.”

     “I gave JD some news this
morning which will take him a while to absorb.” Fiddling with a french fry she
added, “I told him he’s the father of my twelve year old son.”

     Matt froze with his cup
of coffee halfway to his mouth. “I thought… I thought Brian Castellanos was
your kid’s father. You two hooked up your senior year.”

     “No.” She dipped her head
and rested her forehead on the heel of her hand. After JD had left for college
and dumped her she had dated Brian a couple of times, that was true enough. But
they’d never really hit it off as a couple. Instead they had become fast
friends. Fast friends who had married because they both needed something from
one another. Lizzie had needed a plausible father for her child so no one would
ask questions. Brian had been looking at an internship he’d dearly wanted.
Having a family had made him appear more stable than some of the other
candidates.

     “JD was here too,” Matt
said, his eyes clouding over with the memory. “That’s right. He was here
because of his mother’s cancer scare. He was married at the time.”

     Her eyes closed. “I
didn’t know. I suppose I should have, seeing as how he didn’t want anyone to
know we were seeing each other. He claimed it would have made his mother’s
condition worse.”

     “I
knew
something
happened,” Matt said mostly to himself.

     “We were only together a
few times. But I guess that’s all it took, huh?”

     “He finally told you he
was married and you broke it off,” Matt guessed.

     The corners of her mouth
turned down. “No. As it turns out Grady Summers was the one to tell me JD was
married.”

     “Grady?”

     It was a long story she
didn’t want to relive again. “A lot of things happened that summer, Matt. Most
of them bad. Could we just forget about it for now?”

     He nodded and reached
across the table to place a hand over one of hers. “I’m sorry. That was none of
my business. It just bothered me to see you so torn up.” Rubbing a thumb over
her hand he asked, “You’re still in love with him, aren’t you? After all he’s
done you still love the guy.”

     Her gaze was miserable.
“Yeah. But that doesn’t matter anymore. Whatever his mother has told him has
turned him completely against me now.”

     “You don’t know that.
Maybe there’s still a chance.” He laughed a little. “I know he’s a lawyer and a
politician, but maybe there’s a chance you can talk sense into him. Make him
see your side.”

     “I think he would have. But
now… I’m afraid it’s too late.” Never before had she seen so much hate in one
man’s eyes.

    
Tick. Tick. Tick.
The time ticked by. And as it did he became more and more frustrated. “You’re
becoming more and more useless, bitch,” he growled close to her ear.

     Katy didn’t flinch. Not
so much as a change in her breathing. Not an eyelash fluttered.

     “There’s only one reason
you’re still alive, you know. Because you know where that fucking money is. And
because I want that money.” He reached down and touched her throat. The bruises
were still there but they were no longer purple. They were turning an ugly
yellow and green. Slowly he let his fingers slip around her throat. Just like
the first time. “I know you’re faking it, you little whore.” He watched her carefully,
looking for a sign, any sign, that he was right. “Maybe I need to take it out
on big sister. See if she can give me what I want.”

     Nothing. Not a damn
twitch.

     He caressed the side of
her face with his fingertips. “We had some fun, you and me. Maybe I’ll have
some fun with little miss Lizzie too. Yeah. Maybe I will.”

    
The damn money.
All of this was about the damn money. Lizzie hugged herself tightly as she
stepped out of the car and looked at the huge horse barn. Josh was at the
hospital and JD… she had not a clue where he was. Probably best that way.
Because when he did finally decide he wanted to talk to her she figured he
wouldn’t hold back. He’d let his full hatred of her loose. And she wasn’t ready
for that just yet.

     What she was ready for was
putting an end to this whole damn thing. And the only way she figured that
would happen was to find the stupid money everybody was so worried about and
turn it in to the police. There. End of story. No one won. Grady Summers would
slink back under whatever rock he’d crawled out from under and Julie’s lover
would stay hidden. Neither one of them would have any reason to bother her
anymore. And Katy could either finger the guy or not. Up to her.

     One of the ranch hands
stepped out of the barn, pulling out a crumpled pack of cigarettes on his way.
He looked Lizzie over, his brows raised. “Help you, miss?”

     “Possibly,” she told him.
“I’m a friend of Josh’s. He told me I could come ride whenever I wanted.” A
lie, but what the hell. She needed a horse if she was going to go traipsing
around in the woods. Especially to the spot she was thinking of.

     Cupping a palm over the
end of his cigarette he lit it and looked off to the north, his pale blue eyes
squinted. “There’s a storm brewing,” he warned calmly, shoving the lighter in
the front pocket of his jeans.

     So it would snow some
more, big deal. That’s all it had been doing since she’d come back. “I just
want to go for a little ride.” Giving him a coy smile, she asked, “Can’t you
help me out?”

     He thought for a moment.
“Well, I suppose I could. Josh would skin me if I turned away a pretty lady
friend of his. You’re going to stick to the ranch trails, right?”

     “Sure,” she lied. “I just
need to unwind. I’m a nurse at the hospital and it’s been a rough day.” When,
she wondered, did it become so easy to lie?
When you took money from Arlene
MacGreggor and left this place with JD’s son in your womb, that’s when.

     The light seemed to click
on for him. If she was a nurse at the hospital it would make sense for her to
know Josh. And it would make sense for Josh to flirt with her and offer her a
horseback ride. He brought pretty ladies home all the time. Crushing out the
cigarette on the bottom of his boot and sticking the butt in his coat pocket,
the man grinned. “I’ve got just the horse for you then. He’s got a little fire,
but not too much. Just enough to make your ride interesting. You wait right
inside the door here and I’ll get him ready for you.”

     She knew it was crazy,
but ten minutes later she was riding off across the field heading west with a
fond memory in mind.

     “It was one of my uncle’s
hunting shacks,” JD had explained to her between ardent kisses. “Not much to
look at but it’ll get us out of this rain.” Taking her long wet hair in his
hands he’d pulled her to him, crushing his lips to hers and telegraphing to her
a need so strong it had been all-consuming.

     She remembered the way
the rain had sang on the tin roof of the hunting shack. The way the walls
trembled with the wind. The way the ground shook with the thunder. And the way
she’d given herself to him as though he had been the only man on the planet for
her. “He was,” she whispered now. And he always would be, she knew that too.
Knowing he hated her now and that he would never want to see her again left a
hollow place inside her. It made her want to ball up on her bed under the
blankets and cry.

     Well to hell with that.
She was going to do something. Something which would give her control of her
own future again. Too many times in her life control had been taken from her.
By Arlene. By Grady. By her own mother. She closed her eyes against the
stinging wind and thought,
and by JD.

    
The horse plodded
through the snow, his proud head held high, his ears pricked forward. He seemed
ready for this too.

     She had to do this. For
herself if no one else. Sure it was crazy. But who would really care? Josh
wouldn’t mind she’d used one of his horses. And JD… he’d probably be glad if
she froze to death out in the woods somewhere. Then he could lay full claim to
his son.
But I won’t,
she thought.
I’m gonna find that money and be
free.

     She hadn’t even thought
of the damn place until she’d been sitting with her sister this afternoon
telling her about her most recent encounter with JD. A memory had flickered in
her mind of Katy mentioning the old place to her. Just a casual mention,
something about nobody, even in the MacGreggor family, remembering the old
place. Lizzie couldn’t even recall the context of the conversation or why her
sister had brought it up. But she knew one thing. If Katy thought no one knew
of the place she very likely would have used it for some of her scams. And she
very well could have hidden the money there.

     She looked up to the
darkening sky now and shuddered a little. She should probably turn back. Her
jaw set and her brows slammed together. No. Turning back was not an option. Not
until she had what she’d set out to find.