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Sanders said nothing for a few minutes. “Kit, Derrick told me the same story but with just a little different ending. He said he tossed the kid into the tank to cool him off, letting him up as soon as he quit fighting. Then Derrick ordered him off the job site, and the kid left. And he told me about the fight before he knew you had taken off.”
“He’s lying. Don’t you see—he made up that story after he saw me. I stumbled into some lumber. He looked up. He knows I saw what he did.”
“Kit, I’m telling you, he didn’t see you. And he certainly didn’t—”
“Is everything all right, Kit?” asked a male voice from the house.
Kit turned to find her boss, Tim Anderson, in the doorway. “Fine, Tim,” she said, unable to hide her relief that he’d come home early. “But would you mind taking the babies inside? I’ll join you in just a minute.”
“You didn’t tell him, did you?” Sanders said after Tim had closed the door.
She shook her head. “I haven’t told anyone. Just you.” She glanced toward the grove of trees, unable to shake the feeling that they were being watched.
“I understand now why you ran, Kit.” He sounded sympathetic, but also sad. “I just can’t believe you’d think Derrick could kill someone. Let alone that he’d somehow gotten away with it.”
“Everyone knows how powerful the Killhorns are in Big Sky—in the whole county.”
“Do you really think my family has that much power?”
“Yes,” she admitted, knowing that had been part of the reason she hadn’t gone to the authorities once she reached Texas. “Your father’s a judge, your uncle’s the sheriff.”
“You can’t think they’re in on it?”
It did sound ludicrous. It made her doubt herself. Hadn’t Derrick always said she was foolish, young, incredibly naive? She replayed the memory of the last time she’d seen her husband. She studied each detail, looking for something, anything that proved Derrick’s story, anything that proved her own vision somehow faulty. Sanders had explained it so well. Just a foolish misunderstanding by a pregnant woman. And yet…
“Who was the man, the one Derrick fought with? Jason what?”
“St. John,” Sanders said. “Jason St. John.”
“Has anyone seen him since?”
“Derrick has. He caught Jason sabotaging the job less than a week ago, but Jason got away.”
Why didn’t she believe that? Because she’d seen Derrick kill Jason seven months ago.
He must have seen the doubt in her expression. “Kit, I wouldn’t be here trying to get you to come back if I thought Derrick was a killer. I think you know me better than that.”
She felt in her heart that was true. She even started to concede, started to bend to his will the way she’d bent her whole life. But then she looked toward the house, thinking of her young son, and felt that jolt of motherness, that iron-strong will of protectiveness. “I believe you, Sanders. But I need you to find Jason St. John.”
She knew he’d never locate him. Not alive, anyway.
“Find Jason St. John?” he repeated. “That’s no small order. There’s an APB out on him for sabotaging the job site, so I would imagine he’s hiding.”
Kit held her ground. “I need you to prove to me that Derrick isn’t a murderer. Or help me to prove that he is.”
Sanders looked at the toes of his shoes for a moment. “Kit, there’s something I have to tell you. I called Derrick right after I saw you on television, then again this morning when I knew you and the baby were safe.”
“You told him where I was?” she cried. Just the thought of her husband terrified her.
“Why wouldn’t I tell him? I had no idea you thought he’d killed someone.”
“Where is he, Sanders?”
“I’m meeting him up at the airport in less than two hours.”
A shot of pure terror drove Kit back a step. “I’ve got to get out of here.” Frantically, she turned and started for the house, but he stopped her.
“Where will you go?”
She shook her head, her eyes blurring with tears.
“You can’t have saved much money,” Sanders reasoned. “Do you know anyone in Texas you can stay with?”
She shook her head again. She had no one, no family. Derrick had cut her off from her friends, but she wouldn’t have involved them in this, anyway, not with a murderer after her and Andy.
“What about the baby?” Sanders asked. “You won’t be running alone now.”
“I know,” she said, hearing the panic in her own voice.
“Kit, be reasonable. How long can you and the baby last on the run? That isn’t any kind of life for your son.”
She knew he was right, but what choice did she have? She couldn’t stay here. And she couldn’t go to the authorities. Derrick Killhorn and his family were too powerful.
“You need some place to stay until Jason is found or I can prove your story. Somewhere you feel safe,” Sanders said. “Maybe…” He seemed to hesitate.
Kit looked up at him hopefully.
“I know someone who has a place near Huntsville,” he said after a moment. “She’s a friend from college.”
Kit wanted to grasp on to the idea as if it were a life raft in a stormy sea. But she hesitated. It seemed too easy. “Does Derrick know this friend?”
Sanders looked disappointed in her. “Kit, you have to trust someone. If you can’t trust me, then who do you have?”
The truth of his words hurt. She had no one but Sanders—and he knew it.
“All right,” she said, praying she was doing the right thing.
He looked relieved. “I’ll take you myself.”
“No, you’re supposed to meet Derrick at the airport. You’re the only one who can convince him to leave me and Andy alone.”
“All right. Then I’ll hire a limo to take you to Huntsville.”
“I don’t need a limo.”
“I want you and the baby to be comfortable,” Sanders said, sounding a little hurt.
She nodded, ashamed for being so ungrateful.
“When can you be ready? I think the sooner you leave, the better, don’t you?”
Just knowing Derrick would be flying in made her want to be out of Galveston as quickly as possible. “I don’t have much. Besides…I’ve already started packing.”
Sanders nodded as if not surprised. “I’ll have the driver pick you up in an hour-and-a-half.”
“Thanks.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a cell phone. “Here, I want you to have this so I can make sure you’re all right on the trip to Huntsville.” He pressed the phone into her hand. “Keep it turned on in your purse.”
She nodded, touched by his gesture.
“Don’t worry,” he said, giving her a reassuring smile. “I’m taking care of everything.”
Chapter Four
When the limo pulled up in front of the house early, Kit was ready. She’d said goodbye to Tim and his daughter, as difficult as that was. Tim thought she was reconciling with her estranged husband. It was best to let him think that. She didn’t want to involve him and his daughter anymore than she already had.
He’d insisted on carrying her bag out to the waiting car. Kit felt as if she were always saying goodbye to the people she cared about.
But now that Derrick had found her hiding place, she had no choice. She wouldn’t be safe at the Andersons. Nor would the Andersons be safe from Derrick if she stayed.
She picked up the baby carrier, with her son sleeping peacefully inside, and, praying she’d made the right decision, headed for the waiting limo.
As she walked, she found herself glancing around, still feeling uneasy. She was relieved, however, to see no unfamiliar cars parked along the wide, treelined street. Knowing Derrick would be flying in terrified her more than she’d thought possible. What if he’d taken an earlier flight?
As she and Tim approached the long, sleek black car, the uniformed driver emerged from behind the wheel. Kit watched him move to the rear and open the trunk, unable to hide her surprise. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected, but this man didn’t fit her inexperienced image of a chauffeur. He looked too fit, his shoulders too broad, his arms too powerful, his body too compact and controlled. No, this man looked less like a chauffeur than a bodyguard—or a hired thug.
Her heart suddenly seemed a drum that she could not quiet. Did Sanders think she needed protection on the way to Huntsville? Was he worried that he wouldn’t be able to talk Derrick into returning to Montana? All too easily panicked, she felt the way she had the day she left Montana. Here she was again. Running for her life. But this time with her baby son. What would she have done without Sanders here?
She hugged Andy to her as the driver took her single bag from Tim, placed it in the trunk and closed the lid.
“You’re sure you’re going to be all right?” Tim asked.
She nodded, dragging her gaze away from the limo driver to reassure Tim with a smile, to reassure herself. “We’ll be fine.”
The driver touched the brim of his cap as he moved past Kit to open the rear door. He looked strong and capable as both a driver and a bodyguard. He turned toward her, reaching for the baby carrier and diaper bag.
Reluctantly, she handed the carrier to him, watching closely as he leaned into the back of the car. He quickly strapped Andy into the rear seat, as if he’d done this sort of thing dozens of times before, and she began to relax a little.
As he stepped back, she noticed he wore a pair of worn brown cowboy boots. Only in Texas, she thought. Or Montana.
He stood back to hold the door for her, waiting, his eyes downcast, his demeanor subservient. And yet, Kit sensed a wariness in him that seemed to confirm her suspicion that Sanders had hired her a lot more than a limo driver.
“Good luck, Kit,” Tim said. “If there’s anything I can do…”
“Thank you. I really appreciate everything you’ve done for me and Andy.”
She had wanted to say more, but afraid she’d cry, she quickly ducked into the back seat of the car beside her son. She was even more afraid she’d break down and tell Tim the truth. The last thing she would do was put any more lives in jeopardy.
The driver closed the door and hurried around to slide behind the wheel. Kit looked back through the dark tinted glass—one final goodbye to Tim and the sanctuary she’d found in Texas—as the limo pulled away from the curb Beside her, Andy fell into the sleep of angels and babies.
“Please let me know if there is anything you need, Mrs. Killhorn,” the driver said.
“Thank you,” she said, surprised by how deep yet soft his voice was, and how completely free of a southern accent.
Kit quickly dismissed the driver from her thoughts, confident that Sanders had seen to her safety in every possible way. As the car sped down the street, she didn’t look back again.
“I’ll give you and the baby some privacy. Just use the intercom.”
The driver hit a power switch, and a tinted window went up between them, leaving her in the silent darkness of the back seat with only her sleeping son and her cell phone.
Kit watched the houses along the wide streets of old Galveston blur by: gleaming white works of art, ornate with spacious verandas and gentle roof lines, lounging in the shade of live oaks and palms under the Texas sun.
But the sky was filling with ominous dark storm clouds.
She closed her eyes, trying not to worry. About the past. Or the future. Sanders had seen to it that she and Andy were safe for the time being, she thought, glancing toward the privacy window that hid the limo driver. She snuggled against the deep leather of the seat. Warm and safe in this quiet cocoon, she drifted off.
* * *
SANDERS GOT the page just as Derrick’s plane touched ground at the airport. He hurried to the nearest phone and picked up, half expecting to hear Kit’s voice, afraid she’d changed her mind or there’d been some sort of problem. He’d thought he’d covered everything. By now Kit should be safely in the limo and on her way with Derrick Jr. to Huntsville.
“Uh, this is Maury with Unlimited Chauffeur Service, and, you know that pickup you ordered? Well, I’m at the address, only she isn’t here.”
“What do you mean, she isn’t there?” Sanders demanded.
“I was supposed to pick up a redhead and a baby, right? Well, I got here and the guy in the house says she left in another car with another driver about twenty minutes ago.”
Sanders stared in stunned silence at the gate Derrick would be coming out of at any moment. “Someone else picked her up?”
“A chauffeur in a limo,” Maury said.
Sanders swore. “Unlimited sent two cars and drivers to the same address?”
“Afraid not,” Maury said. “The other limo wasn’t from Unlimited. The guy at the house saw an A-1 Rent-a-Ride sticker on the rear of the vehicle..”
“A-1-Rent-a-Ride?”
“It’s a place near the pickup address. So unless you called two limo companies, I don’t know what to tell you.”
Kit must have gotten cold feet, decided to take off and had called her own limo and driver. Only Kit would never do that even if she could afford it. She’d jump on a bus. Maybe even splurge and take a train or plane. But she’d never hire a limo and driver. Not Kit.
So what had happened? He’d been so sure he’d convinced her to go to Huntsville, or he would never have left her alone.
He spotted Derrick coming through the arrival gate and cursed his bad luck. Derrick stopped, caught sight of Sanders and no Kit or the baby, and scowled angrily, obviously unhappy that Sanders had had to go to Plan Two: Huntsville.
Wait until he heard that something had gone wrong with both plans and that Kit and baby were missing. Again.
Chapter Five
The sound of a phone ringing pulled Kit from a less-than-peaceful sleep. She sat up, disoriented, instantly afraid. Then she remembered where she was and realized the phone she heard was the cellular Sanders had given her. She reached into her purse.
“Hello?” Her son stirred beside her, stretching, his small fists reaching out, his sleep-wrinkled face so adorable and sweet. She leaned over and kissed his warm cheek.
“Kit.” Sanders sounded far away. “Where are you?”
She glanced out at the passing landscape, at what appeared to be a tiny fishing village. She sat up a little straighter, surprised by what she was seeing. “I’m not sure.” The sun had sunk beyond the front of the limo into scrub and sand. Off to her left, she caught a glimpse of a large body of water beneath a bank of dark clouds. The Gulf of Mexico? But Huntsville was to the north.
“Kit, I don’t want to alarm you, but—”
She heard a thunk, then another voice.
“Is my son all right? What’s going on? Where are you?”
Kit recoiled. “Derrick.”
“Yes, your husband. I’ve been worried about you. You and the baby.”
She swallowed, unable to force down the fear that threatened to choke her. And the revulsion. He was acting as if nothing had happened. “I told Sanders I didn’t want to see you,” she said.
“I know. Kit, you’re confused. I don’t want to argue about it. I want to see my son.”
She closed her eyes. “No, Derrick.” Her voice came out hoarse. “I saw you kill that man.”
Silence. “You’re wrong. You just made a mistake. But we can fix it. As soon as I see you.”
“I want you to leave me alone,” she demanded, glancing at the driver’s outline through the privacy window. He had his back to her, his head facing forward, and seemed unaware of the drama being played out in the back seat. He must have the intercom turned off.
“Leave you alone?” Derrick repeated, sounding calm. Only someone who knew him the way Kit did could hear the rage behind his words. “For months you’ve denied me my son. You’ve made me look like a fool, marrying a woman who’d run off like you did.” He took a breath. “And yet, I’m willing to forget and forgive, for my son’s sake.”
“He’s not your son,” she snapped, tired of the charade.
“Like hell.” All pretense of calm was instantly gone from his voice. “Maybe you’ve forgotten, but my father’s a judge. It shouldn’t be too hard to convince him that my wife’s unstable and an unfit mother—a woman who takes off nine months’ pregnant, then starts spreading some insane story about her husband being a murderer.”
She could barely hear her own voice above the thunder of her heart. Hadn’t this been her worst fear—that Derrick would somehow get Andy? “Running away from you wasn’t insane and you know it.”
He laughed; the sound had a bite to it. “It was insane for you not to take the limo Sanders hired for you. We could have worked this out.”
She closed her eyes. What game was he playing now? “You know I took the car he sent.”
“You stupid woman. You got into the wrong limo.” He sounded confident that she’d just made the biggest mistake of her life. “Now who knows where you are or where you’re going or what’s going to happen to you. But I promise you this, Kit. I’ll end up with my son.”
Her gaze flew up. She stared at the back of the driver. He tugged at the collar of his white shirt with his index finger. Alarm knifed through her as she remembered the way his uniform looked on his powerful-looking athletic build, the jacket too snug in the shoulders, the pants too short. But it wasn’t just the ill-fitting uniform, she thought, remembering the cowboy boots, the way he moved, the hidden power beneath his clothing and the wariness she’d sensed in him.
She noticed now that his dark blond hair needed trimming. It fell beneath the back of his cap to plaster damply against the tanned nape of his neck. And his hands—large, sun-browned, weathered and worn, like a pair of used leather gloves. Not the hands of a chauffeur.
She felt panic race through her veins. Hadn’t she thought he looked like a bodyguard—or a thug? Only she’d believed Sanders had hired the man to protect her and Andy. Her heart pounded in her ears. “Who hired this limo?” she asked, her voice breaking.
Derrick made a pitying sound. “You were so busy trying to save yourself from me, you’ve gotten yourself into even worse trouble.”
She turned her face to the side window and looked out at the miles of sand spit, feeling hot tears scald her eyelids. The line of clouds she’d noticed earlier now hung on the horizon above the darkening waters of the gulf. The driver had been following the coastline, not heading north, not going to Huntsville.
“Are you ready now to put all this foolishness behind us?” Derrick demanded as the telephone connection grew more faint. “Otherwise, what do I care what happens to you?”
He was just trying to scare her. He’d hired this limo and driver to confuse her, to bully and berate her—to frighten her into coming back to him, into forgetting she’d seen him murder a man.
She glanced over at her son. His eyes sparkled as he smiled up at her and waved his dimpled arms in the air. Anger, and her inborn need to protect her child at all costs, overpowered her fear and gave her a false confidence.
“You’d better hope nothing happens to me,” she snapped. “I can prove that you murdered Jason St. John.” The lie passed her lips before she could stop it. “I have evidence. And if anything happens to me or Andy—”
She didn’t hear the privacy window slide down, didn’t even realize the driver had seen her on the phone, not until he reached back and ripped it from her fingers. With a curse, he turned it off and tossed it onto the seat beside him as the window closed again.
She sat in stunned silence for a full minute, her anger spent, fear making her tremble.
“Who are you?” she demanded, pressing the intercom button. “What do you want with me and my baby?”
He pushed back his cap and met her gaze in the rearview mirror. A pair of startling steel gray eyes glared at her from a ruggedly handsome male face. His good looks surprised her. But the fury she saw in his expression left her stunned.
Her terror escalated. She was trapped in the back of a limo, racing along the two-lane at sixty-five miles an hour, with this man, who was no hired bodyguard, headed where? “Where are we?” she pleaded. “Where are you taking us?”
“We’re almost there, Mrs. Killhorn.”
She felt a fresh wave of panic. “That isn’t what I asked you. Stop this car right now and let me out. Do you hear me?”
He didn’t look back. Nor did he answer. She saw him reach for a car phone and begin speaking into it. She couldn’t hear what he was saying.
She pushed the intercom again. But when she spoke into it, pleading with him to, please, not hurt her baby, she realized he’d turned it off.
“Damn you!” she cried, beating her fists against the window between them. “Damn you, stop this car! Let me and my baby out! Now!”
Andy began to scream, a high thin wail. Kit quit screaming, realizing she was only frightening the infant. She leaned over him, stroking his face, cooing softly as she soothed his cries. She had to try to quell her own panic. If she hoped to get them out of this, she had to keep her head.
Raindrops splattered the windshield as the storm moved inland. Through a break in the clouds, she could see the gulf, its surface a gunpowder gray. The driver had hung up the car phone.
Having calmed Andy, she gained a little control herself. She tried the intercom again. “Can you just tell me this—” she asked. “Did Sanders Killhorn hire you?”
She thought for a moment that he wouldn’t answer, that he still couldn’t hear her. But then he looked back in the mirror, his eyes almost silver in the darkness of the storm.
“No one hired me,” he said.
Music suddenly filled the back of the limo. Soft but at the same time deafening to her. Christmas music.
Kit felt sick inside. Somehow, she knew, Derrick had outwitted his brother. Her mind refused to accept the possibility that Sanders had been in on this kidnapping all along.
Derrick had said she’d made a terrible mistake. And now he had her right where he wanted her.
* * *
DERRICK SLAMMED the pay phone receiver against the wall until the plastic flew in all directions. Slowly, he hung up what was left of the phone.
“Call her back,” he commanded. “I have to talk to her.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Sanders said, noticing that people were watching. “Come on, let’s get your luggage and get out of here before someone tells security about the phone you just destroyed.”
Derrick handed his brother another receiver. “Call. If I can just talk to her, I know I can make her understand. She’s just got it all wrong.”
Sanders started to argue, decided it wouldn’t do any good, and dialed.
He hung up when he got a recording saying that she was unavailable. She’d turned off the phone. “I still can’t believe she rented a limo and driver.”
Derrick swore. “She didn’t, you moron.”
Sanders stared at his brother. He had to admit he’d never seen Derrick this crazy over a woman. Not even Belinda could put him in this kind of a frenzy, and if there was one thing Belinda loved to do, it was set Derrick off. “She didn’t rent the limo?”
“Someone’s kidnapped her and the baby and she said that if anything happened to her—” He slammed a fist against the wall, once again drawing attention to them.
“Who would kidnap her?”
“How would I know that?” Derrick snapped.
Sanders reached for the pay phone. “We have to call the police—”
Derrick grabbed his wrist. “Are you crazy? We can’t chance calling the cops. I won’t risk my son’s life. We have to wait until we hear from the kidnapper and see what his demands are. He’ll call me back in Montana. I’m sure of it. I’ll have to take the next flight home.”
Sanders blinked. “You’re going to just leave Kit and the baby in the hands of some kidnapper in Texas and go back to Montana?” He couldn’t believe his brother. Couldn’t believe Kit had been kidnapped. How had the kidnapper known where she was, let alone that she’d be taking a limo?
“I’m not just leaving them,” Derrick snapped. “You’re staying here. You track that limo and driver and call me as soon as you know something.”