Tangled Web (22 page)

The game started. Joey's team was first to bat. Because the Batemans were undoubtedly the strongest players on the team, they headed the hitting lineup. The first got a double, the second a triple. Between them, they scored the first two runs of the game. By the time Joey got to bat, the bases were loaded. His team had two outs. It was all up to him. Knowing it, the Batemans were unable to resist. “Hey Barrister,” one of them yelled from the bench, “don't blow it for us, okay?”

Listening to the verbal bullying, Hope felt her temper begin to rise.

“Yeah, get us a hit,” the other twin yelled. “
If
you can.”

Joey turned toward the dugout and dropped his bat. Oblivious to everyone else, he stared at his teammates until they began to squirm and their coach said something in a reprimand to both boys.

Watching how well her son had handled the heckling, Hope felt a swell of pride.

Satisfied, Joey turned back to the pitcher and leveled the bat over his shoulder. The pitch came. Confident, he swung. The bat contacted the ball with a solid smack, and he was off, knocking in another run before the inning ended.

As the teams exchanged places, Hope looked up to see Chase slipping into a seat at the other side of the bleachers. Evidently he'd seen Joey get his hit, for he gave her a thumbs-up sign. She smiled back, then turned away, both glad and disturbed he didn't fight the crowd of parents to take a seat right next to her.

The game resumed. Hope was relieved to see Joey do as well as he had the first inning, but her happiness over that faded when she saw yet another person join the crowd. And this one didn't mind threading his way through the people so he could sit right next to her.

“Hello, Hope,” Russell Morris said.

Hope felt her stomach twist miserably. Aware of all the people around her, within earshot, she said as calmly as she could, “Russell.”

“That your son playing left field?”

Again, it took all her strength to answer calmly. “Yes.”

“Nice looking kid.”

A faint pounding began in Hope's temples. “If you'll excuse me, I need a drink.” Not waiting for a response from Russell, she climbed down from the bleachers and made her way blindly to the concession stand. She was going to have to take her migraine medicine right now if she wanted to avoid a blinding headache.

By the time she'd ordered a cola, Russell had caught up with her. “You don't look too well,” he observed smoothly.

You're making me ill, Hope thought.

“I could help you, you know.”

“I don't think so.” She moved away from him stiffly. She wished she could just get in her car and leave, but she knew she couldn't, not as long as Joey was still playing his game.

He paused. “Have you given any more thought to what we discussed?”

Out of her peripheral vision, Hope saw Chase standing in the distance, at the edge of the bleachers. Hands thrust into the pockets of his jeans, he was watching her. She knew all she had to do was give him the signal and he would rush in to rescue her, for the moment anyway. But she would also have to tell him everything. He wouldn't keep on operating in the dark. Nor could she blame him.

Hope turned back to Russell. Just knowing Chase was there if she needed him made her feel stronger. “I've already given you all I can,” she returned calmly.

Russell shrugged, looking not the least bit dissuaded. “Custody suits are such nasty affairs, don't you think,” he pointed out. “Especially when the mother hasn't ever told the father of the child's existence.” He waited a moment, for his words to sink in. “Think about it, Hope,” he said heavily, “then get back to me. Tomorrow, noon at Maxim's. I'll be waiting.”

Hands still in his pockets, he sauntered off.

Hope took her paper cup of cola and headed straight for the ladies rest room. It was deserted. With trembling hands, she pried open the cap on her medicine bottle and downed a tablet. Glancing
into the mirror above the sink, she saw her skin was ashen. A fine sheen of perspiration dusted her face. She mopped it dry with a tissue.

I never should have given Russell that first payment, she realized with sickening clarity. I knew better. Blackmailers are never satisfied with just one payment. This would go on and on until she was penniless unless she put a stop to it right now. But how? She had no doubt that Russell was every bit as cold-blooded as he said. He wouldn't hesitate to make their past a current public scandal if she didn't cooperate with him. She couldn't have cared less about herself at this point, but she didn't want Joey hurt.

Her mind awhirl, she walked back out of the rest room. Chase was standing fifteen feet away, a curious, concerned look on his face. She knew he wanted to help, but he wouldn't interfere. It was all up to her now, just like it had all been up to Joey in the first inning.

It was her choice. She had let Chase down once, by withholding the truth from him. She didn't have to do it again. Did she have the courage to tell him everything?

Rosemary was waiting for Chase when he returned to the guest house after the game. He heard her out impatiently. “Forget it, I'm not voting to have Hope ousted as store president.”

Rosemary stared at him incredulously. Impeccably coiffed and attired in an ice-blue Chanel suit, she looked as imperious and controlled as ever. Chase couldn't help comparing her to Hope. He couldn't help wishing that Rosemary had but a fraction of Hope's warmth.

“You saw what she's done,” Rosemary continued persuasively.

“Sales aren't half what we needed to get the store on a firm footing again.” To her, the solution was obvious.

Fortunately for Hope, Chase didn't agree. “They're not as bad as they were, either,” he countered reasonably. “I vote we give her another six months, minimum.”

His mother's gaze narrowed suspiciously. “What's gotten into you?” When he didn't answer right away, she continued, “Are you involved with her?”

To be involved with her, Chase thought, I'd have to be close to her, and there's no way Hope will ever let that happen. If he'd had any doubts, it had been hammered home to him during the game when he'd seen her sitting with that creep Russell Morris. Judging from the tense, ill look on Hope's face as she'd fled the bleachers, she'd been about to get another migraine. Chase had wanted to grab Russell Morris by the collar and toss him out of the park, but he'd also known what a hopelessly pointless act of violence that would have been. Hope would have just let Russell Morris get to her again when he wasn't around.

He had to face it. He couldn't help someone who didn't want to be helped. And Hope had demonstrated more than once she wasn't about to confide in him or anyone else. She just wasn't the sort of woman who could open up to a man, really let him into her heart and her life. He wasn't interested in cursory, superficial relationships. He'd had enough of those growing up. No, when he became involved with a woman again it was going to be because it was the real thing. Because she loved and trusted him with all her heart and soul. Because she felt she could tell him anything and count on him to understand. And though it hurt him to admit it, Hope couldn't give him that. Wouldn't give him that, he corrected.

“Chase,” Rosemary demanded impatiently, breaking into his thoughts. “Stop woolgathering and answer me. Are you romantically involved with Hope?”

Resignation twisted the corners of his mouth down. He looked his mother straight in the eye and said calmly, “No, I'm not. Not the way you mean, anyway.” He amended silently, I would be if I could. “I am her friend, however.”

His mother uttered a short, repudiating laugh. “You expect me to believe that?”

“I don't care what you believe,” Chase said shortly. Then, on impulse, he decided to go for broke and really speak his mind.

“Frankly, Mother, it's none of your business.”

Rosemary's mouth opened in a round “oh” of surprise. Her porcelain-perfect skin reddened with outrage. “I can see I'm going to have to talk to you another time, when you're in a more reasonable frame of mind.” She stormed out.

Hope stood in the shadows, watching Rosemary stalk to her car. Judging from the wrathful look on his mother's face, perhaps now wasn't the best time to approach Chase. But then what choice did she have? She knew if she didn't talk to him soon, she would lose her nerve. For Joey's sake, and her own, she couldn't afford to let that happen. She needed him. He was the only person who could help her, the only person she trusted enough to even approach.

He flung open the door on the first knock. “Look, Mom, I told you I wouldn't—Hope.” He stopped, chastened. “Sorry,” he amended gruffly. “I thought you were someone else.”

Hope swallowed and said, “May I come in?”

He gave her a steady look, then as if recalling all that had
happened between them, he shrugged indifferently and gestured her in.

Knowing she'd hurt him, she hoped with all her heart it wasn't too late. Lifting her eyes to his, she said in a trembling voice, “I need your help, Chase,” and then everything came tumbling out.

He listened to the details of Russell's blackmail and her complicity as if he had known all along. And maybe he had, Hope thought. Or at least suspected.

“What does he have on you?” Chase demanded frankly at last. He was filled with helpless anger. It was so damn senseless, he raged inwardly. All she would have had to do was ask for his help and he would have given it. But she was here now. And he had to concentrate on that.

For Hope, this was the worst. She knew Chase might not believe her about what had happened that fateful night any more than anyone else had. And the thought he might not was devastating to her. Swallowing hard, she said in a trembling voice, “You remember I told you I dated Russell a couple of times?”

Chase nodded, looking every bit as grim and apprehensive as she felt.

Struggling to remain calm, she took a deep, steadying breath and plunged on. “The first date everything was as I expected it to be. We went out for a pizza and saw a late movie. He was a gentleman. But on the second, it was a completely different story.” She shuddered violently at the memory and rubbed her hands up and down her arms, to warm herself. “We were supposed to go to dinner.” She lowered her eyes briefly, feeling pathetic in her naiveté. To her relief, Chase remained calm and empathetic. That, in turn, enabled her to go on, to tell him things she had never even told his father.

“Instead Russell took me to a popular bar in Lubbock. He said we were going to wait there and meet up with some friends of his before dinner. It soon became apparent they weren't going to show. Meanwhile, he proceeded to get very drunk, very fast.” She shuddered again, reliving the awful tension she'd felt that night. Swallowing hard, she said, “He ordered drinks for me, tequila sunrises, and when I refused to drink anything, or to even take a sip, he drained the glasses for me and ordered another round.” She lifted her eyes to his. They were dark with the pain she felt.

“I was really scared.” She shook her head in abject misery. “I
knew I was in trouble and if I'd been smart I would have called my parents then and there and asked them to come and get me. But it was a fifty-mile drive one way, and I knew they'd be furious, that they wouldn't understand, so I decided to drive him home, and walk back to my place from his house.” Her face flamed as she heaved a derisive sigh and admitted to him that giant mistake in her judgment, one that had been motivated by pride more than anything else. “I figured that way no one would ever have to know what a fool I'd been.”

Sensing this was becoming too painful for her, Chase covered her hands with his own. “Hope, you don't have to go on if you don't want to,” he said. Suddenly it wasn't important to him that he knew every detail, just that she was there, just that she was willing to talk, to share.

But Hope shook her head defiantly. “No,” she said softly, “I want to tell you. I need you to know this.” Only if he could accept it, accept her, could they be close.

“Everything was okay until we got out of the city, but once we were on the country highway that led back to his parents' ranch, he started—well, he wouldn't leave me alone. He kept pulling at the hem of my dress, touching me.” Her face burned at the helplessness she had felt. “I tried to get him to quit but he wouldn't listen and with my hands on the wheel…I thought about pulling the car over but I was afraid to do that because we were so far from help. I knew he was stronger than I was and he had this crazy look in his eyes.”

Chase tightened his grip on her hands. What she was describing made him livid. Worse, it sounded exactly like something Russell Morris would do. Bullies like him never played fair. “You did the only thing you could,” he soothed, wishing he could make Hope feel better, yet fearing in his gut the worst was yet to be told.

“I thought so, too,” Hope replied in a voice that was both numb and sad. Tears welled up in her eyes. “But he grabbed me again, harder this time. The next thing I knew, the car left the road and we ended up in a ditch. Luckily, neither of us were hurt, just shaken up a bit. I was scared and furious, but he just thought it was funny. We started to get out of the car, to go for help. We knew we were just a few miles from home by then. And that's when he—he did what he'd been wanting to do all night. He
dragged me down into the ditch and—” She choked up, unable to go on.

And Chase found, she didn't have to. The next he could imagine with no trouble at all. A killing rage started in him, lessened only by his need to comfort her.

Running both hands through her hair, she related miserably, “Afterward, I got away and walked the rest of the way home. Once there, I tried to tell my parents what had happened, but they didn't believe me. Russell told everyone that we'd both been drinking that night and that we'd been trying to make love while we drove and that was how the accident had happened. He'd explained the grass stains on my clothing by saying we'd been so drunk that we'd finished it in the ditch.” Tears flowed down her face. She couldn't look at him. “I tried to go to the police anyway but they didn't believe me, either. The doctors at the hospital knew I'd been violated but couldn't guarantee that my bruises were from the rape and not the wreck.”

The incompetence of the officials was infuriating. “Couldn't they tell you'd been forced?” Chase asked.

She shrugged as if it no longer mattered, and released a bone-weary sigh. “Russell freely admitted to the fact he'd been very rough.” She shut her eyes, gritting her teeth against the memory. “He told the police I—” she swallowed hard, looking ill again “—liked it that way.”

Oh God, Chase thought. She'd been through so much, without even her parents to stand by her.

Bitterly she continued, “The bartenders at the bar only remembered serving us both drinks and taking away empty glasses. I was so hysterical by the time I got to the emergency room hours later that no one thought to give me a blood test, so we had no proof later that I hadn't been drinking.” She shook her head miserably, whispering, “It was such a mess, Chase, and it didn't end with that night, either.” Her lower lip trembled. “His insurance company sued me for the loss of his car because I'd been driving. I lost my license. His parents, livid about the whole thing, threw my family off the tenant farm and then spread some money around, insuring that the case would never make it as far as the grand jury for indictment. They told everyone that I was trying to milk their family of money, that Russell was the victim of my drunk, irresponsible actions, not the other way around. And because we'd
had those two dates, because I was poor and he was rich, everyone believed him.” Her voice broke. “Everyone thought the worst of me, including my parents.”

“That's why you got so mad at Mr. Bateman at the baseball game,” Chase said slowly, recalling her vehement reaction to a similar injustice.

Looking pale and drawn, she clenched her fists. “Yes. I can't stand it when people use their power and position and wealth to hurt others. It brings it all back.”

“I'm sorry, Hope.” He put his arms around her, and gently turned her face to him. She saw only understanding in his face for what she'd been through. “And that's why you broke with your family?”

She nodded, admitting, “I couldn't stay.”

And, Chase thought sadly, they hadn't wanted her. How had she been through so much, he wondered, and come through with her heart and soul intact?

“I came to Houston and I got a job at Barrister's.” She took a deep breath. Now came the really hard part. “It was only later I realized I was pregnant.” She teared up again, looking heartrendingly vulnerable. “For Joey's sake, I wish I could say that it hadn't bothered me how he had been conceived, but it did,” she said. “I couldn't bear the thought of having Russell Morris's child. I decided to have an abortion. And so I went to Atlanta to have an abortion.”

Suddenly it all made sense to Chase. Edmond, in a blue funk himself about his own situation, had reached out to help someone else. And he'd been drawn in by Hope's beauty and warmth and innate capacity for love. “And my father went with you,” he said.

Composing herself slightly, Hope nodded. “Yes. Only once I got there I realized I couldn't go through with that, either.” She sighed tiredly. “I realized I wanted the child because it was my child.” Tears ran down her face and she wiped them away. “And that's when Edmond came up with the idea to marry me. It was only supposed to be for a little while,” she confided hoarsely. “He was just going to give the baby a name, but in those first few months we grew to love each other. Not passionately, but deeply.” She shrugged, not knowing if he would understand, but wishing desperately that he would. “I know we were years apart in age,
but we had so much in common, Chase, our love of the store, of Joey. He was so good to me and I tried to be good to him.”

She didn't have to convince him. Chase knew she had done that and more. She had loved Edmond and he had loved her. “You knew about the consequences of his illness when you married him?” he asked kindly. He only felt a little jealous that Hope had been closer to his father than he had been at that point in his life.

Hope nodded. “Yes, I knew he was incapable of making love with me, but it didn't matter.” She gestured helplessly. “I was never a physical person prior to that and the rape left me with an aversion to even the idea of trying to make love.” It was an aversion she had kept until Chase held her in his arms. Then, something different, something magical, always seemed to happen. She had felt guilty at first, but now she accepted it. It had nothing to do with Edmond and everything to do with Chase.

“He gave me everything I wanted, all the security, all the love. He was like a parent to me and a best friend and a father confessor. And I loved him with all my heart and soul.”