“I know you’re hurting, but let me help you. Don’t push me away.”

“Sorry.” He shrugged. “I’m not blaming anyone but the piece of crud who stole my daughter. But what you wrote—”

“I wish I could change everything, Hunter,” Shauna said, her pain magnified by his. She laid her hand on his bare arm. “But I need you to trust me—”

She stopped speaking as his eyes, trained on hers, suddenly turned from dull green to flashing jade. He bent down, took her into his arms and kissed her. Hard.

She knew it was simply to shut her up. Prevent her from finishing what she’d been saying. Because the fact was, he still didn’t believe she could help him find his daughter.

But she kissed him back with a longing born of seven years of missing him.

He pulled back. Even as she knew he would. Even as she knew she should. This wasn’t seven years ago, when they were lovers. This was today, and they were drawn together by circumstances too horrible to contemplate. And they didn’t need any more regrets….

Not a Moment Too Soon
Linda O. Johnston

www.millsandboon.co.uk

LINDA O. JOHNSTON

Linda O. Johnston’s first published fiction appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine and won the Robert L. Fish Memorial Award for Best First Mystery Short Story of the Year. Now, several published short stories and novels later, Linda is recognized for her outstanding work in the romance genre.

A practicing attorney, Linda juggles her busy schedule between mornings of writing briefs, contracts and other legalese, and afternoons of creating memorable tales of the paranormal, time travel, mystery, contemporary and romantic suspense. Armed with an undergraduate degree in journalism with an advertising emphasis from Pennsylvania State University, Linda began her versatile writing career running a small newspaper, then working in advertising and public relations, and later obtaining her JD degree from Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh.

Linda belongs to Sisters in Crime and is actively involved with Romance Writers of America, participating in the Los Angeles, Orange County and Western Pennsylvania chapters. She lives near Universal Studios, Hollywood, with her husband, two sons and two cavalier King Charles spaniels.

To all fellow writers. We all sometimes wish that what we write would come true, don’t we? Well, be careful what you wish for….

And, as always, to Fred, one writer’s dream who happily came true.

Contents

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Prologue

Shauna O’Leary opened her eyes slowly. As she remained seated on her stiff desk chair, apprehension contracted her body into the same tight, quivering mass that it always did when she wrote something at her computer.

Most of the time, the tales that poured from her fingertips were fine, even delightful. Suitable for reading to the kids who came especially to her restaurant, Fantasy Fare, to hear them. She would laugh aloud as she read, in relief as much as enjoyment. Chastise herself gaily, push the print button and—

As she automatically began to scan the words on the screen, she gasped aloud. This was one of those rare, yet nevertheless too-frequent, other times.

“Oh, no,” she whispered, though no one else was there, in her small, secluded home, to hear. “Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no.” She repeated the words in a mantra born of despair as she continued to read:

Andee was scared. So scared. “Daddy,” she cried.

But Daddy didn’t come. Instead, the bad man came back into the room.

“Help me, Daddy!”

Shauna stared at the hand clutching the computer’s mouse as if it belonged to someone else. The long, slim fingers with blunted, pink-polished nails—fingers that were so skilled on the computer keys—were trembling. Resolutely, she highlighted the entire file, prepared to push Delete. Get rid of it.

But that wouldn’t get rid of the problem.

She did it nevertheless. Erased everything. Closed the file.

Opened it again.

The story was still there. Of course.

With a small moaning sound, she pushed Print.

There would be a physical record of what had already been set into motion.

Shauna took two long, deep breaths, steeling herself for what was to come. Anxiously running fingers through the sides of her long, ash-blond hair, she looked at the telephone beside her computer. It sat on the antique door that had been taken from her grandmother’s house and was now propped on wooden file cabinets, serving as her desk.

She studied the phone, delaying the inevitable.

And then, filled with dread, she lifted the portable receiver and pressed in a familiar number. Elayne Strahm’s. She needed to speak with her immediately. Get another phone number from her.

For the little girl in her story was Elayne’s grandchild.

Hunter Strahm’s daughter.

Chapter 1

Hunter Strahm steered his speeding rental car off the Interstate and onto the main road toward his mother’s home.

Oasis, Arizona. Lord, it seemed like ages since he’d been back. It was late afternoon, desert time, though he’d already put in a full day of work and travel. He ignored the pounding of his heart as he hurtled through town, trying to silence the inner voice that told him he was on a fool’s mission. Wasting not just minutes, but hours of precious time.

He’d made the decision to come here first. He’d live with it.

Yeah, but would Andee…?

“Damn,” he muttered aloud, forcing his thoughts from the direction that could only make him crazy.

He stared out the windshield. Oasis looked the same as he remembered. Except—where was the restaurant he knew Shauna O’Leary now owned?

He’d find out, if he had to. First, he’d go see his mother. Would Shauna still be there? If not, his mother would know how to find her.

He turned onto the street where his mother lived, and he looked around.

What kind of car did Shauna drive?

It had been more than five hours since that series of phone calls which made him want to lash out in total frustration and fear at whatever, whoever, was convenient.

He usually thrived on dealing with the worst of situations. Taking control, and resolving them.

But the calls had concerned his five-year-old daughter. Andee.

She’d gone missing from Margo’s home in L.A. Wandered off from the backyard. Or at least that was what his ex had said in the first of those damnable calls.

Hunter, a private investigator, had been a thousand miles away on business, unable to do a blessed thing but head for the airport. He’d left a job unfinished. He had never done that before.

He’d never faced an emergency this urgent before.

Shauna’s had been the second call. And Margo’s next call had confirmed what Shauna had claimed.

Andee hadn’t just gotten lost. She had been kidnapped.

Emergency, hell. It was a crisis of a magnitude he’d never imagined.

Shauna had called from his mother’s, where she said she’d gone to be with Elayne. And though what she said reminded him too much of the past, he couldn’t ignore it—just in case she could provide a clue, no matter how absurd, about where Andee was. That was the major reason he’d come here, instead of straight to L.A.

Surely Shauna would have gone home, or to her business, by now. Yet when he strode up the familiar walkway to Elayne Strahm’s tan stucco hacienda, he figured it wouldn’t necessarily be his mother who answered the door.

He rang the bell, reluctant to use his key after not being here for so long.

He heard footsteps inside. Light, quick ones.

And when the door opened, he found himself staring into soft brown eyes that were wide but not with surprise, the way her call had startled him. With…what? Uneasiness?

Pleasure?

No way.

She hadn’t changed at all, except to become prettier. Her blond hair was a little longer, a little lighter. She was slim in her T-shirt and shorts, with shapely, endless legs.

Steeling himself for what was to come, he took a step toward her. Parroting the initial, friendly greeting she’d given him over the phone earlier—before she had dropped her bombshell—he said simply, “Hello, Shauna.”

He looked so tall, standing there.

That was the first thing Shauna thought. She hadn’t forgotten Hunter’s imposing height. Though she was above average stature for a woman, he had always towered above her. Before, it had seemed exciting and masculine and very, very sexy.

Now his daunting size seemed magnified by his anger. Those flashing green eyes she remembered so well glared, as if she were to blame. But she was just the messenger.

“Hello, Hunter,” she said softly. She consciously pulled her gaze from his, hoping to relieve some of the tension building between them.

His blue sport shirt, tucked into khaki trousers, wasn’t tight, but she could tell that the young cop she’d fallen for all those years ago was now even more muscular. With his prominent, straight brows, his wide jaw, he still was the most handsome man she had ever seen. Maturity would have looked good on him, if it hadn’t been combined with the other emotions spewing from him like water from a broken sprinkler.

Like the emotions of the nonfiction characters in her latest story…

Daddy!

Needing to break the building silence—and escape her own heartrending thoughts—she said, “I’m surprised to see you here.”

“This is my mother’s house.” His voice was even deeper in person than on the phone. Perhaps it was also amplified by his obvious fury. “Did you have to worry her, too? But of course you did. You wouldn’t keep such a feat of realistic storytelling to yourself, now, would you?”

She reeled back as if he had struck her. In a way, he had.

Malice spewed from lips that had once kissed hers sometimes sweetly, sometimes passionately, but always caringly.

Years ago. But she had loved him. And lost him. And he had married another woman.

Elayne spoke from behind her, reiterating Shauna’s earlier question. “Hunter? What are you doing here?”

Staying silent, Shauna retreated a few steps. Elayne burst by her, and in a moment mother and son were locked in a tight, emotional embrace. Even though Elayne, too, was so much smaller than Hunter, she seemed to be the one comforting him. Reaching up, she stroked his head, his back.

If only Shauna had the right to try to ease his pain that way…

No. Not now.

She had to escape the emotional involvement that would swamp her if she stayed here.

Elayne was the first to back away. The pale, drawn skin of her face contrasted with her short mop of curly hair that was probably too dark to be natural for a woman in her late fifties. It had looked the same from the time Shauna had met her eight years ago. In fact, little had changed about Elayne’s appearance during the time they’d been friends, except for the multiplication of tiny lines radiating from the edges of her eyelids and the deepening of the creases framing her mouth.

“You belong in California, son,” she said, “looking for Andee.” She held his arms and looked up, studying him.

“I’m here just for a couple of hours, Mom, on a stopover between planes.” His sweeping gaze seemed equally concerned about his mother. “Meantime, I called my best operative, and he’s started our search for her. He’s already talked to Margo and the cops. I’ll jump in soon, but for now I came to see how you’re holding up.”

Maybe. But though he might not admit it, Shauna figured he was also there to see if she had information that could help him.

“I’ll survive,” Elayne said. “Shauna promised to stay with me until I heard again from you. I guess you don’t have any news.” She didn’t wait for his answer. She undoubtedly could read it in his stark expression as easily as Shauna could. “As long as you’re here, come in.” She turned her back and motioned for him to follow her toward the kitchen. “I’ve got steaks in the freezer. It won’t take me—”

“No need to feed me,” Hunter said. “A cup of coffee would be great.” He put one arm on his mother’s shoulder as he accompanied her down the hall.

Shauna remained in the entry, feeling so alone that tears welled in her eyes. She had once been close enough to both of them that she would have tagged along and gotten drinks for them in their own house. During that time in the past, Elayne had been like a mother to her, for Shauna had lost her own when she was very young.

Now, mother and son needed time together to deal with a situation that could have no happy ending. Shauna had suggested so in what she’d said to each of them.

Neither knew just how bad it was…

Help me, Daddy!

Damn. The tears she’d held back flowed down her cheeks. She reached into her pocket for a tissue and swiped them away, even as she pulled the front door open again. She had done what she had to. It was time to leave.

“Shauna?” Hunter’s voice stopped her. He filled the end of the hallway.

He still was such a good-looking man…

“Join us.” It wasn’t an invitation, but a command. “We need to talk.”

She owed him that, at least. Not that she could describe what had happened, at least not coherently. And she absolutely didn’t want to provide any details about the ending of the story she had written.

But she was a psychologist. Her practice was very limited, of course. She made her living from Fantasy Fare. But she had gotten her license, become a therapist, to help people in crisis.

To help a select group of patients. Patients selected for her, by her stories. Though she had been sought out by former school colleagues to join their practices, she never took them up on it.

She maintained her license for the counseling she did intensely, but as infrequently as possible, when her writing called for it—mostly to work with strangers whose stories had swept through her without warning.

She had craved that kind of help when Hunter had left seven years ago, and when, soon after, another story had spewed from her fingertips, a tale as unbidden as the ones that had driven him away. As unbidden as the one she had written today. As unbidden as so many of them…

In that one, her father had died of cancer.

She hadn’t been able to help Hunter before. Or her dad. Not even herself.

Now she had the resources to at least try to make it a little less agonizing for Hunter.

“Okay,” she said. “We’ll talk.”

He stood still until she had passed him. After all this time, she was finally so close to Hunter that she could have touched him. Wanted to…but didn’t. He followed her down the hall. For an instant, panic throbbed through her. She felt trapped. She couldn’t get out.

But then they reached Elayne’s cheerful, bright kitchen. She had remodeled it since Shauna had last visited her. The painted cabinets along the wall had been replaced by light pine ones that didn’t quite reach the ceiling. Along their tops was a collection of antique pans. The new kitchen table was pine, too, with matching chairs on wheels pushed under it. The refrigerator was the same as before—a gold side-by-side.

On the new tile counter closest to the table, framed photographs, some of Hunter, were arranged in irregular rows. Nearest Shauna was a picture of an absolutely adorable cherub, a small girl with hair as dark as Hunter’s and as curly as Elayne’s. This had to be Andee. Her eyes were the same shade of green as her father’s and grandmother’s, too.

Shauna looked away quickly, her eyes dampening again. Her attention landed on Hunter. He was watching her. She turned away quickly, to help Elayne with their refreshments.

Soon all three sat at the table. The herbal tea Elayne and she had sipped earlier as they had talked had been refreshed several times, so Shauna opted to join Hunter in drinking fresh-brewed, strong coffee from large mugs.

And mother and son, black haired and with symmetrical facial features that resembled each other, trained similar emerald eyes on Shauna.

She looked back. Waited. Made herself remember every iota of her training as a psychologist. Compassion, yes.

But also detachment. Distance.

Please…

“Tell me more about this story you called me about,” Hunter commanded.

“All right,” Shauna began. “It came unexpectedly.” She watched those brilliant green eyes study her critically. Otherwise, he seemed emotionless. Cool.

Cold.

“They’re always unexpected, aren’t they?” Elayne asked. “This kind of story.”

“Pretty much so,” Shauna acknowledged, looking at her friend’s pale face instead of at Hunter.

Elayne, at least, believed in Shauna, for they had first met when a story had, long ago, caused Shauna to contact Phoenix’s Human Services Department. Elayne, a social worker, had been Shauna’s contact, and her kindness and curiosity had led Shauna to let down her guard and reveal—accidentally—the source of her knowledge about domestic violence in a child’s home.

Which was what had made it particularly hard to call Hunter’s mother today. Shauna hadn’t divulged the story’s contents over the phone but had come right over to be with Elayne. To stay with her.

To get Hunter’s current phone number from her so she could call him, for she alone had to be the one to relay this horrible news to him.

Even though she knew full well, because of the way he had acted in the past, that he wouldn’t buy it. Or at least he wouldn’t want to.

“Where were you when this story came to you?” Elayne asked.

“Better yet, why don’t you just tell us what it said?” Hunter’s arms were folded as he sat back on his chair. His blunt chin was raised belligerently. Talk about expressive body language. Shauna sighed inwardly. Sure, he would listen to her, but he would fight any belief in what she said with all his innate stubbornness. That, apparently, had not changed.

Trying for therapeutic distance, Shauna briefly responded to Elayne’s question first, needing to work into the rest. She explained that she’d sat down at her computer fully expecting—hoping—to write something especially for one of the kids who frequented the story time at her family restaurant, Fantasy Fare.

Instead, that hellish narrative had spewed from her fingers.

Looking unwaveringly into Hunter’s skeptical stare, she finally responded to his demand. She described the story but only sketchily.

“I realized at once who the kidnapped child was,” she finished, “and knew I had to notify you.”

“The story said she was my child?”

“Not exactly.” She had kept up with what was happening in Hunter’s life in a manner she did not want to mention, so she didn’t explain how she knew who Andee was. Instead, she asked questions for which she already knew the answer. Otherwise, why would Hunter have come here? “Hunter, have you called whoever’s supposed to be watching your daughter in L.A.? Maybe this story is wrong.” From experience, though, she knew better. “Do you know where she is?”

His strong features went as blank as if he had suddenly turned to stone. “She was with her mother. We’re divorced. I have primary physical custody, but Margo watches Andee when I travel. And yes, I’ve spoken with Margo.” His tone sounded bleak. “But no, I don’t know where Andee is.” He paused as if marshaling his internal forces, then demanded, “Is there anything helpful in your story, like something to identify the kidnapper?”

“There’s one thing,” she said slowly, rehashing the narrative in her mind. “The person—a man—thinks of himself as ‘Big T.’”

“That’s all?” Hunter sounded scornful. Damn, but his scorn, the same derision he had leveled on her just before he had exited her life for what she had believed would be forever, still had the power to wound her. “It’s got to be a pretty short story. I want to see it.”

“No, you don’t,” she replied quietly.

She hadn’t intended to injure him by a thrust of her own, but pain briefly shadowed his face, and Elayne’s, too.

“Shauna, don’t you think—?” Elayne murmured.

Her son interrupted. “Did you arrange to have Andee taken so you could impress me, after all this time, by proving one of your damned stories was coming true?”

Shauna’s sudden intake of breath was echoed by Elayne’s gasp. Another direct hit, right to her gut.

Similar accusations had been hurled at her by strangers when she issued warnings about other situations she had written about. She was a psychologist. She understood that people lashed out in fear and hurt. She had remained calm and soothing and understanding.

But seven years had passed since her last confrontation with Hunter. Seven years, two months, and—

Enough.

She stood. “Why on earth would I? I wouldn’t do anything to hurt a child. Or you, for that matter. Not now. And certainly not Elayne.” Hunter opened his mouth as if ready to interrupt, but she pressed forward, not letting him. “I know you didn’t believe in my stories years ago, and what I did at the end wouldn’t exactly encourage you to trust me. But I didn’t set out to write a story that’d come true this time, any more than I did then. I never do. This one involved you and your daughter, so I had to let you know. That’s all. Except that I’m very, very sorry.”

Hunter also rose. “Hell, me too. I was out of line.” He shook his head slowly. “I only wish the solution was that easy. If you took my daughter, I could just ask you to give her back.” The anguished smile he gave Shauna nearly broke her heart.

“You know I would if I could,” she responded softly, her voice hoarse with the moisture she held back. She turned away. Elayne, too, was standing, and tears flowed down the older woman’s cheeks. “I’ll leave, now that you won’t be alone,” Shauna told her. “If it’s not too hard for you, I’d like to keep in touch so I can learn how things turn out. And if there’s anything I can do—”

“There is,” Hunter interrupted. “Let me read your story.”

“Hunter, I’m not sure you—”

He didn’t let her speak. “You asked what you can do. Well, that’s the only thing you can do. Let me read it, Shauna. If it’s as you’ve always said, something that comes to you from the emotions of the participants, maybe it’ll have something to help me find my daughter. Let me see it now, so I can get on my way to L.A.”

Chapter 2

Shauna had argued with him, of course. Hunter, expecting it, hadn’t budged. He’d won. His mother had understood and said she’d had a bridge game planned with friends that evening. Not that she’d play, but at least she wouldn’t be by herself. She had encouraged them both to leave.

Hunter was so antsy to get on his way to L.A. that he ground his teeth together in frustration. Still he followed Shauna, in his rental car, along the streets of Oasis toward her home.

In the old days, he had enjoyed arguing with her. Shouts had led to surrender. Surrender had led to—

Damn. This was the present. His daughter’s life was in danger. That, and only that, was his focus.

Shauna had even tried to convince him that, for his own good, he should just trust her. She’d told him she’d written the damned story and had given him the only possible clue in it. Wasn’t that enough?

Hardly. She might be a professional shrink now—his mother had let that slip a few years ago—but he was the professional investigator. Shauna might have overlooked something that could lead to his daughter.

Except…others on the force had believed wholeheartedly in Shauna’s stories when Hunter was with the Phoenix Police Department. And sometimes even he couldn’t discount them entirely.

But Andee was all right. She had to be.

Hunter pounded one fist on the steering wheel of his rented sedan, then twisted it to follow Shauna’s little blue sports model down a street on the outskirts of town. She turned into a driveway, and he pulled in behind her.

Nice house. One story, not very big, but pretty. It was the obligatory Arizona earth-tone color, but brighter in shade than customary, almost red, like rich clay.

The garage door opened automatically, and Shauna pulled in. He parked outside and grabbed his cell phone for one more call.

“Simon? What’s happening?” Simon Wells, a Rolls-Royce of a British import, was Hunter’s second-in-command at Strahm Solutions, his P.I. agency. Hunter had called him first thing when he’d learned about Andee, got him started doing all the things he’d do himself if he was in L.A. His complete trust in Simon was the only reason he’d been able to convince himself to indulge in this delay.

“Nothing new yet,” Simon replied in his unabashedly English accent. “Soon, though. Banger’s on his way.” Strahm Solutions had developed an excellent working relationship with Los Angeles Police Detective Arthur Banner, whose nickname, perversely, was “Banger.” Straitlaced and all cop, he was the furthest thing imaginable from a gangbanger, though his nickname was also used to refer to those street toughs.

“He’s from LAPD’s West Bureau,” Hunter pointed out. “You sure he can deal with this? Margo’s place is in Sunland. That’s Valley Bureau. Foothill Division, I think.”

“You know Banger. He’ll figure it out. He understands this is high priority and low profile, so he’s called one of the best FBI agents he knows. A rare one who’s discreet. So far, the press hasn’t gotten wind of what’s happened. Where are you?”

Hunter told him. “I’ll be here for another hour or so, then grab a flight back to L.A.” A thousand instructions slammed through his head, but he left them there. Simon was smart. He worked well with minimal direction, and the others on Hunter’s staff at Strahm Solutions knew to listen to him.

“Good. I’ll let you know if I learn anything more in the meantime.”

“Thanks.” Pushing the flap down on his cell phone to hang up, Hunter looked toward the garage. Shauna had exited her car and stood beside a door that opened into the house. Slender and poised and utterly sexy, she was watching him. Warily. As if she expected him to pounce on her the moment they got inside.

Didn’t he just wish…?

Instead, he got out of the car, cursing himself silently for still wanting her. Cursing her. For looking so good. For inciting ideas inside him that he had no business feeling.

She stirred him still, as no woman had. Not even Margo. He wanted Shauna.

Was there some other way that Shauna had really known something had happened to Andee? So much about her stories had always seemed true, too much to be coincidental. Yet he’d always prided himself on being a realist, had never wanted to buy in to the idea.

Yeah? Well, if he hadn’t bought in to it, why was he here, when what he really wanted was to be home, looking for his daughter?

He closed the car door and hurried toward Shauna. He’d accused her earlier of having something to do with the kidnapping. That had just been his anxiety lashing out, and they’d all known it. Apologies didn’t come easily to him, but he’d owed it to her.

Years ago, though, he wouldn’t have put such a terrible hoax past her, not if it would have gotten him to admit that she had the power to write stories, out of the blue, that came true. She’d always been upset when he didn’t believe her.

And maybe if he had been more accepting, he’d still be living here in Oasis, his job with the Phoenix Police Department intact.

“Were you talking to someone in L.A.?” she asked when he drew near her. Her scent was much as he remembered it. Something too soft to be exotic, too spicy to be sweet and feminine. But very appealing. It suited the mystery of her.

“Yes,” he said. “My assistant, Simon. He’s with my ex-wife, trying to get better information. So far, there’s nothing of use.” He let his tone turn scornful. “Your story’s as likely to tell me something helpful as Margo is.”

Shauna’s eyes blazed, but only for an instant. Saying nothing, she led him inside.

They entered the house through her kitchen. It was a lot smaller than his mother’s. A lot more like a small, homey forest. Shauna had plants everywhere—on her tiny kitchen table, along her gold-tile counters, even on top of the refrigerator. A few had flowers. Most were simply large and leafy and green. The place smelled more like a garden than a kitchen.

“Sit down there.” Shauna pointed to a chair beside her table. “I’ll get you more coffee and…Hunter, I have to warn you again. I don’t think you should read the story.”

“Yeah, I got that. Is it because Andee’s father is described in it as an ugly old goat who doesn’t believe in magical stories that come true?”

She leveled her gaze on his. This time, what he read in her wide brown eyes, the tilt of her head that allowed her long, blond hair to cascade to one side, wasn’t hurt or anger. It was pity.

Damn. Now that hurt. He had never wanted Shauna’s sympathy before. He sure as hell didn’t want it now. Yet the expression again reminded him of the past, of what they had shared.

And not just that he’d thought he’d loved her.

The passion between them had been phenomenal. The thought of it once more sent his blood coursing, as if a flood-gate had been opened. Sure, he could imagine himself making love to Shauna again. Hell, yes. She was every bit as beautiful and desirable as she’d been then.

But the sympathy in her eyes brought him back abruptly to why he was here.

She thought she knew the ending to Andee’s story, and it made her feel sorry for him.

He had to learn all she’d written, so he would know what she figured he’d be up against. And then he’d dash home.

Wearily he did as she asked and sat down on a chair. Covered by a thick, fringed pillow, it was more comfortable than his mother’s kitchen chairs.

“What is it, Shauna? I know I never wanted to believe your stories came true, no matter what I saw. Some of the other guys swore by what you told them. Hell, maybe you’ve been right every time.” That was why he’d taken precious time to come here before hurrying home, why his hastily crafted strategy had included seeing Shauna—just in case. “Maybe whatever you’ve written now is real and there won’t be a damned thing I can do about it. But I’ve got to know, in case there’s anything to help me find my daughter. If it’s bad stuff, I’ll fight it.”

“I know you will, Hunter,” she said with a sigh. “And you’re right. If nothing else, I can at least let you prepare for it. But, honestly, the only clue to who the kidnapper is, is that he thinks of himself as ‘Big T,’ assuming that’s actually his thoughts, not my imagination.”

He couldn’t help raising his eyebrows. This all was her imagination…except that Margo had confirmed that Andee had been taken.

“And no hints about how to find this so-called ‘Big T’?”

She shook her head. “Hunter, the thing is…” She hesitated, then turned her back and opened the refrigerator door.

“Andee dies at the end,” he supplied through gritted teeth. Prepare himself? Hell. Nothing could prepare him for that. “Right? Why else wouldn’t you want to tell me?”

He heard a sound that might have been a sob. But when she turned back to him, a package of coffee in her hands, she looked composed. “Yes, Hunter. That’s the end of my story.”

Big T swooped down and reached behind a couch in the middle of the warehouse floor, lifting his Uzi. Before he could begin spraying bullets, Hunter ducked, rolled and came up shooting. His first volley got the guy in the gut.

The kidnapper fell to the hard concrete floor, moaning, as Hunter ran to kneel beside him, his weapon still leveled on him.

“Tell me where Andee is, you perverted bastard. Now.”

Blood spurted from between Big T’s fingers as he clutched his middle. “Too late.” His gasp was a ghastly laugh. “Good luck finding her.”

His eyes closed. He was dead.

Somewhere close by, but not near enough for Hunter to find her, Andee weakly cried “Daddy” for the last time.

Of course Hunter had guessed the ending, despite Shauna’s reluctance about telling him. And maybe that had been what she wanted—not to have to say the words herself.

Still, when she acknowledged he had guessed correctly, she winced inside at the pain that crossed his face, only to be replaced an instant later by stoic blankness.

“I still want to see it.” His voice held as much emotion as if he had requested the day’s weather report.

What he didn’t know yet was all Andee went through, all he went through, before that awful end. The story wasn’t always specific, but their torment was stark and real.

But she knew he wasn’t about to give up. He would fight it. Hunter always fought everything, and everyone, that didn’t comply with what he perceived as right and just and the way things should be. He wrestled with wrongs till he had them fixed, or at least wrapped up and within his control. That was why he’d made such a good cop.

And why things had gone so wrong for him at the end of his job with the Phoenix police.

“Okay,” she said quietly, realizing she had no choice. “I’ll get it in a minute.” She took the coffee carafe over to fill it at the sink first, buying herself a little more time.

“Forget about the damned coffee,” Hunter exploded.

She took a deep breath and put the carafe down. “Okay.”

She glanced at him before she left the kitchen. He was watching her, brows locked in a glower she remembered too well from their last days together. It signaled his impatience. The way he blamed her for not listening to him.

Oh, she had listened then. She’d heard too much, most of it things he was thinking, not saying. She didn’t need her special gift to tell her—only her eyes searching his, the mirrors to his very troubled, very angry soul.

Damn, how that had hurt her then.

It wouldn’t now, no matter what he thought or said or didn’t say. She wouldn’t let it.

The inside door to the kitchen opened onto a long, narrow room that was supposed to be used as a dining room. Shauna seldom entertained at home, since it was much easier to throw parties at Fantasy Fare. That allowed her to maintain the privacy of her home more easily, too. As a result, she had turned the would-be dining room into her office. She loved spending time in it, writing in it—except when her fingers spewed her tales of painful prediction—with its wall of multipaned windows overlooking the desert garden that was her backyard. Her antique door-desk sat right in the middle, on a wood panel that protected the room’s pale berber carpeting.

Ignoring her reflection in the large mirror along the inside wall, she sat at her desk chair and pulled open the top right drawer in one of the wooden file cabinets that acted as her desk’s legs. She had put the printout of the story in a folder right in front, and as she pulled it out, she couldn’t help scanning through it again. Surely she’d missed something, some glimmer of hope at the end that would mean—

“Is that it?”

Startled, she looked up. Hunter had sneaked into the room without her hearing him. Right behind her, he appeared to be reading the story over her shoulder. He stood so close he could have ripped the papers from her hands. So close that, if she rose, she could easily throw herself into his arms….

He was the one who would need comforting, not her. She wasn’t to get emotionally involved.

“Yes,” she said quietly. “Here it is.” She turned enough in her seat to hand him the papers. “It’ll be more comfortable in the kitchen. The only seat in here is my desk chair. You can use it if you’d like but—”

He muttered something that she took as refusal to move. His straight black brows were furrowed in concentration as he read the story.

She studied him as he studied the words on the page. She could tell what part he was reading by the alternating anger and scorn and concern in his expression. Not that those changes were obvious. When she’d known him before, when he’d been a cop, he’d prided himself on his ability to keep his face blank, unreadable. And it had been, to everyone but her.

But she knew the scornful twitch at the edge of his lips—lips she had once licked and tasted and kissed so often that she’d known their texture better than her own. The almost imperceptible hardening of his cool stare that signified fury.

Concern hadn’t always been readable on his face, but was there in the briefest of caresses from those strong hands, the way he held her in his arms.

And now, she recognized pain in the way he closed green eyes that didn’t flash but flickered and died, then opened again to read more. If only she could hold him, could comfort him…

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.” He barely responded. “Sure.” And then he looked at her, his scowl fierce.

Once, her heart would have shriveled beneath that scowl. Today, despite her efforts to the contrary, it still hurt.

“I don’t believe things will happen this way,” he spit. “They can’t.” The last two words were lower, evincing grief.

Stay detached. Yet Shauna wondered if there was a way she could physically restrain herself from trying to ease his pain. The way she wished someone had helped her…

And then Hunter demanded, “I want you to get on your computer and write a different ending. Maybe that’ll convince you what you wrote is nonsense. It can’t possibly come true. Then I’ve got to get the hell out of here, to go look for her.”

“All right,” she said calmly. “I’ll write a different ending.” But it won’t be me who’ll be convinced.

She turned on her computer, a laptop she left set up on her desk connected to a printer, then waited while it booted up and Hunter paced impatiently. In a minute, she got into the file where the story had been saved.

“Look over my shoulder as I do this.” She scrolled till she came to a part near the end that was a turning point, where Andee had nearly been found. She deleted everything after that and quickly wrote a new, happy ending. What would Grandma O’Leary say about it if Shauna could talk to her? Nothing good, she was sure. “Okay with that?” she asked Hunter.

“Good enough.” Hunter’s voice sounded grudging. “Go ahead and save it.”

Her brief laugh was ironic as she tried to do just that. She closed the file, then opened it again, going right to the page where she’d made her changes.

The old ending was still there.

“This isn’t something new, Hunter. The computer—any computer I use—won’t save a different ending. Or any other changes, for that matter.”

“Let me try.”

“Sure.”

She had barely gotten out of her seat before Hunter slid into it. It was too tall for him, but he didn’t take time to adjust it. He looked like an adorable giant, his legs cramped beneath the desk. His fingers flew over the keyboard. She knew he was skilled in the use of computers—as well as in the use of things less cerebral. Like firearms and other weapons. She’d seen him in training when he’d been a cop. And his hands on her body…his skill in that had driven her mindless so often, so passionately, with wanting him.

How could she let herself think of that now?

“There.” He sounded satisfied. Her thoughts back under control, she read over his shoulder. Though his new ending was different from hers, a lot shorter, it was similar, and of course Andee was fine at the conclusion. The biggest change was that he had added some directions for finding Big T—information that would let Hunter track him down when it was all over. “Do you have a floppy disk or CD that we can save onto?” She silently removed a floppy from a file cabinet drawer. Hunter both saved his story on the hard drive and used the “save as” command to copy the revised story onto the disk.

And when he checked both the hard drive and the floppy, the old version of the story was there.

“Damn. This can’t be.”

Shauna watched as he tried again. And then tried something else.

To no avail, of course. She knew better.

“What have you done to your damned computer?” He rose and towered over her threateningly. The slight scent emanating from him wasn’t simply the aroma she recognized, of man and soap and Hunter. It was sharper, more bitter—like feral fear.

She’d never been afraid of Hunter, not even at his angriest. Even now, she did not believe he would hurt her…physically.

But he shouldn’t have the power to wound her emotionally, either. Not today. He doesn’t, she told herself.

Yet that didn’t stop pain worse than if he’d actually assaulted her.

“I’m sorry, Hunter.” She reached out and gently touched his arm. It was hard, tensed by his anger. And warm.

She remembered when he had held her in his arms tenderly. When tenderness had turned to lust. Don’t go there, she reminded herself again.

“I know you don’t want to believe it,” she continued. “Neither do I. But I’ve lived with this a very long time. These stories can’t be changed. In fact, my Grandma O’Leary warned me, when she was alive, that I shouldn’t even try.” Of course Shauna had tried anyway, especially with her father. “It could be too dangerous.”

“For you? Well, what about the victims of your stories?”

She couldn’t stand much more of this. She knew he was lashing out because of his own misery. You’re a therapist. Counsel him. Better yet, counsel yourself.

Her mind fished frantically for the right words. Don’t take it personally came to mind.

As if she could help it. But she managed to move her hand from his arm and take a step back.

“Tell you what,” she said a lot more calmly than she felt. “Leave now. Take the story, if you think there are clues in it or that it’ll help you some other way. Keep in touch, and if anything different happens from what’s written, let me know. I’ll enter it, then let you know if it saves on the computer and changes the ending. Okay?”

A phone rang. Hunter’s cell, which he yanked from the back pocket of his khaki trousers. “Yeah?” Shauna couldn’t hear what was being said, but Hunter’s expression turned tormented before going blank again. “Yeah. I’m on my way.” He flipped the phone closed. “That was my assistant Simon. My ex-wife, Margo, is in hysterics about Andee. She’s upset that Simon’s brought in the cops, even someone we know and trust. The kidnapper told her not to, like that kind always does, so she’s distraught. Simon thinks I’d better get there fast to see if I can calm her down.” He snorted. “Fat chance.”

“But you have to try, of course. I’ll be thinking about you, wishing you—and Andee—well.”

“You’ll be thinking about me, all right. You’re coming along.”

She stared. “Why would I do that?”

“Because of your story. You say you can’t change it. Fine. I know you believe that. I don’t have time to argue.” His laugh was bitter. “I don’t want to believe any of it. But I can’t take chances.”

Shauna closed her eyes. “I can’t help you, Hunter.” But she knew she was lying. She had become a licensed therapist for just this kind of situation.

She knew how to help people in crisis situations.

Especially those whose crises were the subjects of her stories.

But most were strangers. Hunter wasn’t, despite the years they hadn’t seen each other. She would be too emotionally involved.

Going with him would be a mistake.

“Come with me, Shauna. You’ll tell me everything possible about your damned stories. And you’ll work with me to make sure this one doesn’t come true. Got it?”

“Hunter, I can’t.” She regretted bringing him to her house.

If they were anywhere else, she’d have fled.

For that wasn’t the end of it. If he’d continued to demand, or even threatened, she’d have stood her ground.

But he closed the space between them, reached out and took her hands in his much larger ones, gripping them tightly. She remembered when he’d held her hands before…lovingly.

His voice, too, sounded full of emotion as he said, “Please, Shauna. Please help me. For Andee’s sake. I’ll beg if I have to, but—”

She couldn’t stand that. She looked up into his sorrowful green eyes and said something she regretted even as she spoke it. “All right, damn it, Hunter. I’ll come.”

Chapter 3

Shauna stared resignedly into the passenger’s side-view mirror. The familiar small-town streets of Oasis receded behind them and, with their disappearance, all sense of serenity and comfort receded from her mind.

But this wasn’t about her.

She turned to watch the man sitting beside her. It was about him. His posture was stiff and taut, as if he maintained such discipline over himself that moving a muscle except to steer the car would snap him like a rubber band stretched to the breaking point.

His expression was as bleak as the rolling desert vista that abutted the highway, and he kept his eyes straight ahead, not even glancing toward her.

She struggled to think of something to say that would not sound too much like psychobabble, yet be of some help to this man who had once meant so much to her.

But what was there to say? His daughter had been kidnapped. A five-year-old child. And whether or not Hunter believed her, she had already told him there could be no happy ending.

And despite his earlier apology, she knew he somehow blamed her for this, as he once had blamed her for another situation she had written about that had gotten so terribly out of control.

She had packed and changed clothes quickly before leaving home. Now she wore a pink buttoned shirt tucked into navy slacks, a matching navy vest and sandals. L.A. wouldn’t be as warm as Arizona, so she’d stuffed a sweater into a small suitcase with a couple of changes of clothes and her night paraphernalia.

She considered turning on the radio, for the only sounds were the growl of the engine and the unending road noise of tires humming on pavement.

First, though, she needed to make a call. She pulled her cell phone from the bottom of the burlap tote bag that doubled as her purse and pressed buttons until the number she called most frequently showed on the display screen.

It was answered on the second ring. “Fantasy Fare. Hi, Shauna. Are you okay? Where are you going?”

“Hello to you, too, Kaitlin.”

Shauna smiled to herself in bittersweet irony. Kaitlin Verona, a lithe and exuberant dynamo, was her closest friend, and the manager she’d blessedly hired to assist her with running Fantasy Fare.

Kaitlin had dropped in one day when a child had fallen at the restaurant and his father was threatening a lawsuit. Not only that, but food deliveries were late. In short, when things had been particularly hellish.

Kaitlin had simply taken over, made both the kid and his parents laugh, and used her sense of humor to persuade the superintendent of the food warehouse where Shauna bought supplies to send her order after hours.

Later she had told Shauna she’d heard her cries for help and responded. Of course, Shauna’s pleas had been strictly internal.

As they’d gotten to know each other better, Shauna understood that they had something in common: they shared abilities that most people would believe bizarre and unreal, though each one’s manifestation was unique.

They both perceived when someone else’s emotions roiled.

Shauna’s abilities translated to her fingertips, from which her stories spilled onto computer keyboards.

Kaitlin simply knew and reacted. Like now.

“It’s him, isn’t it?” Kaitlin demanded over the phone. “That guy from your past, Hunter.”

This was one time Shauna wished Kaitlin didn’t have her uncanny perception. “Yes,” she said briefly.

“You wrote a story about him and now you’re back together.”

“Not exactly. Look, I need for you to—”

“Manage Fantasy Fare on my own for a while. Yes, I’ve got that. But tell me what’s going on.”

“Some other time.”

“You’re with him.”

“Yes,” Shauna acknowledged.

“And it’s not because you want to be. Oh, heck, it’s really bad, isn’t it? I’m so sorry, Shauna. Can I help?”

“Just take care of things for me. I’ll be back as soon as I can. Okay?”

“Sure. You take good care of yourself, you hear? Don’t take any unnecessary risks. And call me when you can talk.”

As Kaitlin hung up, a shower of shimmering rainbows suddenly appeared in Shauna’s mind, gently tumbling toward the ground. As they fell, they turned upside down till they formed a myriad of colorful, happy smiles.

Despite herself, Shauna laughed aloud. That was one ability she didn’t share with her friend. Kaitlin had the power to implant images into the minds of those whose emotions she sensed, the better to soothe them. Shauna had frequently enlisted Kaitlin’s help in the therapy sessions she held to assist those whose stories she had written.

But where had that warning come from? It wasn’t characteristic of what Kaitlin usually did. Did she see something that Shauna—

“What was that all about?” came a chilly masculine voice from beside her.

Shauna glanced toward Hunter. He still sat stiffly as he watched the road, gripping the steering wheel, as if by manipulating it he could reverse the diabolical incident that had suddenly taken control of his life.

“I had to tell my manager at the restaurant that I was going away for a while and that she’d need to take care of things.”

He finally darted a look at her, his green eyes quizzical but not as icy as before. “It didn’t sound like you did much talking, let alone giving directions.”

Shauna replayed her end of the conversation in her mind. He was right. But knowing Hunter’s antipathy toward anything that smacked of extraordinary abilities, she said simply, “I’m sorry you haven’t met Kaitlin. She’s been my manager for a couple of years, and we’re good friends. To other people it might sound like we talk in code, but we’re close enough that we understand each other.”

“Yeah.” He didn’t sound convinced, but Shauna doubted he’d push this issue further. She had known Hunter to be intelligent and intuitive in the past. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have made such a good cop. He had also been stubborn, refusing to acknowledge what he chose not to accept or understand. Right now, she suspected he’d gotten the gist of what she wasn’t saying.

But at least he was talking to her again.

“We’re not far from the airport now,” she said, eager for some conversation—any conversation—to avoid their former uncomfortable silence.

He nodded. “I haven’t been away long enough to forget my way around.”

Just long enough to forget her, Shauna thought. Or so he must have wished.

If only their reunion could have been under other circumstances. But there would have been no reunion between them if she hadn’t written that horrifying story.

And now they could only both wish they had never seen each other again.

The plane was finally in the air. The trip to Los Angeles International Airport, abbreviated LAX by most Angelenos, would take about an hour.

An hour too long.

Ignoring the aircraft’s typical loud engine noise, Hunter forced himself to lean back in his narrow seat that, despite the height of its backrest, was too short to cradle his head comfortably. He had to concentrate on something other than his edginess. He had become an adopted Angeleno, like so many other immigrants to the sprawling urban complex. Yet, despite his reason for being there, he’d felt a sense of nostalgia visiting Oasis and his mother. And—though he despised himself for admitting it—seeing Shauna again.

L.A. was home now. His business was there.

His daughter was there…

His restlessness was a demon sitting on his shoulder and taunting him to stare at the still-lit seat-belt sign. He looked at Shauna, who occupied the window seat. He had the aisle, and they were fortunate, in their row of three, that the middle seat was vacant. Shauna had obviously decided to take advantage. She’d pulled her carry-on bag from beneath the seat in front of her and rested it between them. She wrested her laptop from it, opened her tray table and placed the computer on it.

After she turned it on, a look of concentration etched a small furrow between the soft arches of her brows. They were darker than the deepest blond shade of her long hair, which was still highlighted in soft streaks by the Arizona sun. Her unique hair color was something he had found extraordinarily appealing about her long ago. One of many things.

If there hadn’t been a vacant seat, Hunter wondered if he’d have offered to trade with the person unlucky enough to have been assigned the uncomfortable middle. Would he have wanted to spend this hour separated from Shauna that way?

Not that he had any desire to be close to her…although desire was a poor choice of words. Hell, yes, he still desired her. But long ago he’d made self-control an unbreakable habit. It was the only way his P.I. business could survive.

The only way he could survive.

Without so much as a glance toward him, Shauna began to type. Was she writing another of her damned stories that she would use to drive some other poor jerk mad by claiming it would come true?

Muttering something without quite knowing what, Hunter bent to retrieve his small briefcase from under the seat in front of him and yanked out Shauna’s story. He started to read it…until pain forced him to close his eyes.

When he opened them again, Shauna was watching him.

“Hunter, do you want to talk about—”

He hadn’t brought her along to practice her psychology mumbo jumbo on him. “Is that another of your fortune-telling fairy tales?” His words spit out as he nodded toward her computer. Her graceful fingers still rested on the keyboard as if poised to peck out more nonsense.

“That’s not your business.” Her tone was conversational, but the glint in her eyes told him she was peeved.

She was right. It wasn’t his business, unless it concerned Andee. That didn’t make him any less curious. Or less peeved with himself, too, for taking his anxiety out on her. Again.

Maybe she couldn’t help writing that story. How would he know? It wasn’t like he’d bombarded her with questions before, when they’d been together.

He looked around. At least with all the plane noise, no one could have heard what he’d said.

When he turned back, Shauna’s smile was forced. “Actually, I’m writing the story I started out to do when…when the story about Andee came out. I do that, you know—write little tales I read aloud at story time at Fantasy Fare. Kids who come in tell me what they want to hear, and most often that’s what comes out when I sit at the computer. A boy whose parents bring him about once a week asked for a story about his dog Duke, and that’s what I’m working on.”

“Why didn’t you just write your shaggy-dog story before and leave Andee alone?”

He didn’t mean to ask that. Worse, though he could have taken another of her indignant glares, he hated the renewed look of sympathy she turned on him.

Shauna reached over with her closest hand and pulled his from where it clutched the armrest. He didn’t fight her as she rested it on top of her bag on the seat between them, and squeezed gently. Her hand was much smaller than his, but it was strong. He stared at the point of contact between them, at the light polish on her short nails, her slender, curled fingers, feeling as if her strength suddenly radiated through his skin and up his arm.

But it wasn’t her strength that singed him with that deceptively innocent touch.

“So tell me,” he said, trying to sound conversational as he restrained his anger with this woman and her sympathy and her seemingly unconscious seduction.

Or was he angrier with himself? He had been the one to coerce her into accompanying him. And now that they were together, he acknowledged to himself that he wanted her.

He’d missed her.

“Tell you…?”

“About your stories.” He kept his voice even. “You sit down to write something about a dog and a kidnapping comes out instead?”

Her eyes grew huge. Why were they dampening that way? Was she trying to lay a guilt trip on him for just asking a simple—well, maybe not so simple. Even if he believed it.

“You never asked before,” she said in a soft, husky voice. More forcefully, she continued, “And I know how hard it is for you to even pretend to give credence to my…my—”

“Let’s just use ‘fairy tale’ again,” he said wryly. “It’s all-purpose enough to suit many situations, right?”

The smile on her full, kiss-me-quick-or-die-from-wanting lips quivered for an instant, then grew wistful. “Sure,” she said. “You know I don’t ask for that kind of…fairy tale to come out. The firstborn woman in each generation of my family has the ability. It’s easier in some ways for me since I’ve grown up having computers. My Grandma O’Leary would just be sitting at a table somewhere, go involuntarily into…well, let’s call it a trance, and when she woke up, she found she’d engaged in automatic writing, pen to paper. My mother used a typewriter. I just sit at the computer and what I write is there on the screen when I…when I become conscious of it. I don’t know if I actually go into a trance, but my eyes close.”

“And these stories always come true?” He made little attempt to hide his scorn, especially since he knew what she was going to say. He’d heard this part of her claims before.

“You know the answer,” she said quietly, trying to withdraw her hand for the first time. He didn’t let her, exchanging her firm grip for his own. “It’s not so much that they come true. They are true.”

“Because you sense someone’s emotions? How bizarre is that? Is that why you became a shrink as well as a restaurant owner? To come up with an explanation of how those supposed emotions come from people you don’t even know, like this ‘Big T’? And Andee.” His voice grew hoarse on those last couple of words, and he cleared his throat.

“I never said I could explain why, Hunter. And I became a therapist for other reasons. But, yes, the stories emanate from someone else’s strong emotions while they’re feeling them. Like the people in this one. And those years ago when I picked up on those vicious bank robbers you were after.”

“I didn’t ask about that,” Hunter snapped.

“No, you never did.” Shauna’s voice was sad. “Or at least not in any helpful way. You didn’t want to hear about it then, but if you’d like to now—”

Hunter used the excuse of a slight rumbling behind him to turn his head. A flight attendant asked someone what he wanted to drink. “Some other time,” he said to Shauna. Yeah, like the twenty-second century. Pulling down his tray table, he considered ordering an alcoholic drink but discarded the idea. He needed his wits about him.

“Coffee,” he growled when the flight attendant asked what he wanted. “Black. Thanks.”

But what did he really want?

To be in L.A. a lot faster than this plane was going.

And then, his daughter.

Peace.

And Shauna back in Oasis. Out of his life again.

Every time she was in it, she messed with his mind. Made him feel like he’d lost control of everything important to him.

And that wasn’t all. Even now that he wasn’t touching her, he felt uncomfortable. Physically.

For now, and much too frequently since he’d been in her presence again, the involuntary reactions of his much too impulsive body reminded him vividly of some of the reasons Shauna had once been such an important part of his life.

Shauna took a sip of apple juice, then returned the plastic glass to the tray table of the seat between Hunter and her.

He was sipping his coffee.

And reading, again, her story about Andee’s kidnapping.

Anguish knit his thick, dark brows into a single tortured line. Anguish that she, however unintentionally, had helped to paint there.

She couldn’t change the story. But maybe she could ease the rest of this flight for him, if only a little.

“Tell me about Andee, Hunter,” she said.

He glanced at her. “I thought you were writing about a dog.”

She nodded. “But I’d like to hear about your daughter.” She’d known when Andee was born—and not just because Elayne had proudly yet sympathetically revealed to Shauna that she’d become a grandmother.

In fact, Shauna hadn’t had to see photos of Hunter at Elayne’s over the years to recall poignantly how vibrantly male he was—and how painfully missing from her life. Now and then, stories about him had flowed through her fingertips, generated by his own rampant emotions.

Like the day he had opened his own private investigation agency. The day he’d married.

The day Andee was born.

The day his divorce was final.

She had printed those stories and stuck them in one of her file cabinets. With improvements in technology, she’d changed computers over the years, so she’d had to save the stories onto disks before discarding the old equipment. In any event, she hadn’t looked at any of them afterward, on paper or on computer.

“Andee’s a great kid,” Hunter said. “She’s beautiful. Smart. She can even read a little already. She doesn’t deserve what’s in this damn story. And even if it’s not true and she hasn’t been kidnapped, she doesn’t deserve to be lost. Or scared. She’s only five years old.”

His voice cracked. Shauna reached toward him and touched his shoulder in comfort, but he flinched.

That hurt as much as if he had slapped her.

“Of course she doesn’t deserve it.” Inside, Shauna was screaming. What good did it do anyone for her to write those stories? Maybe it was better for people not to know what they’d be facing.

But that was why she had become a therapist: To help the friends and strangers she wrote about through this kind of horror.

But what good was she if she couldn’t, in some manner, help the man she had once loved?

She racked her brain for something she’d learned to balance her own painful emotions and came up with nothing.

“Okay, Shauna,” Hunter said after a long moment. “I never wanted to believe your stories were real, but sometimes things in them seemed uncanny. So let’s work this through, just in case. We tried to fix the ending on your computer but couldn’t save changes. But we hadn’t done anything different from what was on the pages. The story says I start my own search for my daughter. What if, when I return to L.A., I turn it over to the police and stay out of it? If you wrote that into your story, could the changes be saved? Maybe that would fix the ending.” He grabbed his forehead with one of his large hands. “Listen to me,” he muttered. “Talk about buying into craziness…”

“Okay, let’s engage in ‘what ifs.’ You’ve already told the police, and that’s in the story, even though you mentioned your—your ex-wife—said, when she called the second time, that she’d heard from the kidnapper and he said not to involve the authorities. That doesn’t change the story. You could just let the police look for Andee. But that’s not logical for you. You’re a former cop, a private investigator, so of course you’d look for her, like the story says.”

“But what if I didn’t?” he insisted.

Shauna drew in a deep breath. “I’ve learned that even changing in a logical way what happens in real life from the way it’s written in my stories…well, I was never able to save the changes. And the ending always stayed the same.” She’d tried to speak matter-of-factly. It didn’t work. Her respiration increased, and tears closed her throat. She turned to study the now-blank computer screen.

“You’re talking about your father, aren’t you?”

Amazingly, Hunter’s voice was filled with sympathy. Surprised, she darted a glance toward him. This time, he took her hand.

She nodded, wanting to talk about it. Not wanting to talk about it. Not now.

She was relieved when the sound of the aircraft’s engines changed and its altitude decreased. The captain announced the final descent into Los Angeles. She used the distraction to pull her hand back, shut down her computer and start putting it away.

She was not sure whether to be glad or sorry this ride was nearly over. She sensed a truce between Hunter and her.

He still wouldn’t admit to believing her stories…exactly. Nor did he shove his disbelief in her face.

But how would things go in Los Angeles while he searched for Andee?

And when it was all over, and the ending of the story had come to pass?

He might be ambivalent now. But then he would hate her.

So, for now, she had to dredge up every nuance of her psychology classes, everything she’d learned, to help Hunter. And his ex-wife.

And herself.

For, despite everything she had told herself in the past seven years, being with Hunter now made clear one very important thing: she had never completely gotten over him.

Chapter 4

Because it was summer, daylight still glowed when they arrived at Margo Masters’s home.

Shauna noticed right away that the light blue stucco house was larger than the others on its crowded residential block in Sunland, an area in the northern San Fernando Valley. It was the only one with a second floor. Had it had been added by Margo, or had she bought it that way?

Or had this been where Hunter, too, had lived when they were married?

That thought snatched all the charm she’d noticed from the home as she preceded Hunter along the winding front walk between patches of well-manicured lawn.

There hadn’t been a detailed description in her story of where the kidnapping occurred. But then, there never were great descriptions. Sometimes, she had to use intuition to determine the origin of the emotions that set her stories into play.

This time, because it had involved Hunter’s family, the origin had been obvious.

If only all connections with Hunter had been severed when he’d left. That was a laugh, after all those stories she’d written in the interim.

Hunter had driven them here in his sporty silver GTO, which he’d parked near LAX while away on business. Now Shauna waited while he stepped around her and rang the bell. Margo pulled the door open in less than a minute. Shauna recognized her. She’d looked the struggling actress up on the Internet after writing her story about Hunter’s marriage.

“Thank heavens you’re finally here,” she exclaimed, her low, throaty voice conveying simultaneously both relief and criticism. She glanced at Shauna without saying anything. “Oh, Hunter, it’s been terrible.” Tears glittered in her eyes.

“Yeah,” he said, that single word conveying both acknowledgment of her pain and the expression of his own. “Anything new?”

“Yes,” Margo wailed. “You need to control your assistant. And make sure that policeman he called doesn’t do anything to put Andee in worse danger—if it isn’t already too late.”

Shauna, inhaling the strong and probably expensive scent wafting around the woman, forced herself not to stare at her flawless beauty: high cheekbones, smooth skin, softly pouting lips, shoulder-length light brown hair shimmering with auburn highlights. She wore a short white shirt and slim black slacks. Margo wasn’t a tall woman, but even in her wired emotional state she held herself regally, and the movement of her hand as she motioned them inside was as graceful as a model’s.

Her eyes were pale brown. Shauna had no doubt that the way they’d been enhanced with makeup sometime earlier that day would have rendered them outstanding and gorgeous. But Margo’s crying had caused her makeup to run, turning her beauty fragile and sad.

Margo preceded them into her living room. Three men seated in the conversation area around a low, polished coffee table rose at their entrance. A woman, too.

Hunter made the first introductions. “Everyone, this is Shauna O’Leary. Shauna, you met Margo Masters at the door. This is Detective Arthur Banner.” He gestured toward one of the two men who’d been seated on chairs. “And Simon Wells.” Hunter pointed to the guy beside Banner.

Shauna knew that Simon was Hunter’s assistant at Strahm Solutions. He was not quite as tall as Hunter and barrel-chested, and had a brown mustache darker than the longish hair on his head. He wore a tweed sport jacket over a brown mock turtleneck. As he bowed his head in greeting, Shauna had the incongruous impression of old-world courtliness. If they’d been closer, she’d not have been surprised if he’d kissed her hand.

Arthur Banner, on the other hand, was tall, thin, reserved, and seemed to memorize everything about Shauna in a single, prolonged look with small but omniscient gray eyes. Hunter had told her about the police detective, whose nickname “Banger” was a joke, for he was trustworthy, an all-cop cop.

Margo had slipped past Hunter and now stood between the other two people in the room. “My friends BillieAnn Callahan and John Keenan Aitken,” she said, finishing the introductions. Not that Margo had said, but Shauna figured that BillieAnn and John were fellow actors. Though both were dressed casually, their self-possession suggested they awaited their next cue. BillieAnn was taller than Margo, but still resembled a pixie, with her short, wispy cap of dark brown hair around ears that protruded a little too much, pouty lips painted deep red with shiny gloss, and short, clingy blouse with flowing sleeves.

Aitken put a protective arm around Margo. He was of moderate height, slim, a Cary Grant type with an air of savoir faire punctuated by his raised chin and cool smile. The impression was destroyed, though, by his clothes: blue jeans and a muscle shirt adorned with the logo of a Hollywood theater.

“Can I get everyone something to drink?” Margo asked, as if this was a social gathering.

“I’ll get it,” BillieAnn said. But no one took them up on the offer, though Shauna was tempted. Her mouth felt dry.

Hunter sat down at the edge of one of two matched antique-looking sofas that faced one another, both with beige damask upholstery and carved backs and legs. He was brawny enough to look as out of place as the proverbial bull in a china shop. But maybe he liked this kind of furniture now.

Shauna noticed how he’d made himself right at home. And why not? Even though he was no longer married to Margo, he undoubtedly spent time here with their daughter.

Shauna ignored the hurt that constricted her throat. She was long past that particular pain.

As Shauna joined him, Margo’s friends resumed their seats on the sofa matching the one where Hunter and Shauna sat, and Margo slid between them. Simon and Banger sat once more on the high-back chairs they had vacated at the same end of the coffee table.

Vases, figurines and other knickknacks graced the table and glass shelves at the room’s corners. They looked old, too, and valuable.

A five-year-old child had played here? The place didn’t look childproof to Shauna, who made sure there were no sharp corners or anything she valued too much to get broken around Fantasy Fare, particularly in the small room where she told stories three nights a week. Just a lot of plants.

Margo rose again, as if too full of energy to stay seated. She walked to the side of the sofa where Hunter sat. And why not? She had every right to share his pain and partake in mutual comfort.

Instead, shaking her head, she moaned, “What are you trying to do, Hunter?”

She swayed, and BillieAnn and John immediately took their places again at her sides. She tossed them thankful smiles. “I promised to stay calm, so I will. But I told Hunter the kidnapper said we weren’t to tell anyone. And did he listen? No, he sent his assistant.” Pursing her lips, she blinked at Simon. “He called the police, which is even more against the rules.” Banger received her next fearful glower. “I couldn’t take any more, so I called BillieAnn and John. I know I can trust them, at least.” Her demeanor changing from anxious to angry, she took a step toward Hunter. “And then you bring this woman here.” Her glare at Shauna oozed malice. “Your old girlfriend. You told me about her before, and I recognized her name. Do you think this is a joke? Do you want Andee killed?”

Fighting the urge to wince, Shauna shifted her gaze to Hunter, to see his response to the verbal assault.

Cold fury gleamed in his green eyes. He stood and walked behind the sofa, glaring not at Margo but across the room, between Simon’s and Banger’s shoulders. When he spoke his voice was ominously quiet—a tone Shauna remembered well, from the end of their relationship. Then, when it was directed at her, it had churned her stomach, drawn tears into her eyes.

“I was out of town when you called, Margo. You know that. I didn’t want to wait to get a search for Andee started. That’s why I asked Simon to talk to you. He did the right thing by requesting police assistance. He called Arthur because we’ve worked with him before and know he’s a good guy.”

“But why her?” Margo cried. “She’s not a cop or an investigator. You told me she ran a restaurant. How will that help us find Andee?”

Shauna wasn’t about to explain her involvement. In fact, Hunter and she had discussed whether to tell anyone about her story. Their decision: no one but Simon. Hunter had insisted on telling him, since Simon was his closest friend, all-around assistant and near-partner in Strahm Solutions. He wouldn’t have to believe what he was told, but it would explain why Hunter had already asked him to start investigating stuff that otherwise would look off base.

And Margo? No way would Shauna want Hunter’s former wife to think of his long-ago lover as weird, an unnatural creature. Even if the thing she did that sounded weird was true.

Before Hunter attempted a reply to Margo, Shauna stood. “I understand how hard this must be for you, Ms. Masters. Hunter asked me to come here expressly to help you. I do own a restaurant. But I’m also a licensed psychologist and my specialty is working with people in crisis situations.” She felt the sting of Hunter’s glare but ignored it. Who knew? Maybe she could be of help that way. “I’m here for you to talk to, and if you’d like I can offer advice on coping with the stress.”

Ignoring Shauna, Margo moved from the circle of her friends. At Hunter’s side, she threw her head back and looked up into his face. “You brought your old girlfriend here to give me advice? That’s sick, Hunter. Get her out of here. Now.”

“I would welcome your advice anytime, Shauna,” said Simon in a British accent as upper-crust as his rigid posture as he stood and joined her. Shauna smiled gratefully at his teasing expression. Had Hunter told him about her story yet?

“Okay,” she said, in a tone that suggested she was bantering back, “I’d advise you to come outside with me while Hunter and Margo—”

“Bad idea.” Banger rose and strode toward Margo. “You don’t have to talk to Shauna or anyone about how you feel. But you’ve delayed enough. Now, we are going to talk. You insisted on waiting till Hunter got here before answering my questions.”

“I talked to Simon before,” Margo protested, “but—”

Banger continued as if she hadn’t spoken. “It’s time you cooperated with the police. So, we’ll sit down, Shauna included, and chat. Not your friends, though. They can come back later if you need company.”

“If she stays,” Margo hissed, “my friends can, too.”

Wondering why Banger, who didn’t know her background, wasn’t kicking her out, too, Shauna opened her mouth to say that was fine, she’d go—but Hunter gave a quick shake of his head. She didn’t want to argue with him.

She didn’t want to argue with anyone.

Least of all Margo Masters, whose emotions seemed to mutate moment by moment, from sad to accusatory, to who knew what?

Give her a break. The woman’s child was missing.

Hers and Hunter’s.

Once, Shauna had thought she would have Hunter’s child someday….

Dragging defeatedly, Margo retreated to the sofa and sat. BillieAnn joined her, and John took his place behind them both, one hand on Margo’s shoulder.

Margo aimed a baleful glance toward Shauna.

“Now, if you two would excuse us.” Hunter looked from John to BillieAnn and back again.

“We’re not going anywhere if Margo wants us here,” BillieAnn protested.

“I agree.” John’s voice was modulated but firm. “Although I’ve an audition coming up, so I can’t stay much longer.”

Then Shauna had been right; Margo’s friends were actors, or at least one was.

“It’s okay.” Margo’s tone was cheerfully courageous. “I’ll call you both later. Thanks so much for coming.” She followed them, presumably to see them to the door.

As the three left the room, Shauna said, “If it’s going to cause problems for me to be here—”

“Stay here,” Hunter commanded. And then, more softly, he added, “Please.”

She might wind up having to pick her battles with the man. This one was a no-brainer. Shauna stayed where she was.

A minute later, Margo returned. “All right,” she said, a catch in her voice. “I don’t like being ganged up on like this, but what do you want?”

“It’s our intention to find Andee for you, Ms. Masters,” said Simon, “yet we need your guidance. You are the closest to an eyewitness that we have.” His aristocratic accent added once more to the formality of his words.

“Start at the beginning,” Hunter told Margo. “I know you told me before, but I want everyone to hear. Tell us exactly what happened when Andee disappeared.”

Hunter wanted to get on the move to find Andee, if he only had a clue where to look.

He also wanted to throttle his ex-wife. She should be tossing them clues. That was in the strategy Hunter had started developing, since it made sense.

Hell, nothing made sense right now.

He’d seen the pain in Shauna’s expression when Margo attacked her. Found himself admiring Shauna for her composure under fire. She was here only because he’d dragged her along, in case she could be of help. Not as a shrink, of course, but no one else needed to know the real reason.

And though he would never admit it to her—didn’t want even to admit it to himself—as a psychologist or not, her presence was of some comfort, at least to him.

Banger must have picked up on it, or at least on something regarding Shauna, since he hadn’t told her to leave as he had Margo’s drama-society support system. Or maybe he just liked the looks of her. Who wouldn’t?

Right now, Margo’s cluelessness and nastiness were only a fraction of why Hunter wanted to wring her neck.

On top of everything else, now that she had an audience, her description of how she’d reacted to Andee’s disappearance was heartrending, as if Margo, and not their missing daughter, should be at the center of their concerns.

“I was only inside for a couple of minutes,” she said. She was seated now, her face in her hands, her voice muffled. “I—I expected a call about an audition, but I’d forgotten to carry the portable phone. Andee was outside, waving one of those wands that blow giant bubbles. I grabbed the phone and went right out again, but when I returned to the backyard, the wand was there but Andee wasn’t.”

Her voice broke, and she shuddered as she cried into her hands. “I’m so sorry,” she sobbed. “I know I haven’t always been a good mother, but I love Andee. We have to find her.”

If she hadn’t been Margo, an actress whose stock-in-trade of over-the-top emotion Hunter had seen all too often as she’d manipulated him, he’d have felt sorry for her. Might have held her, to ease her pain.

But as he’d gotten to know her, after they were married, he had lost all certainty as to what was feigned and what was real.

She’d given him custody of Andee easily enough. Having a kid burdened an up-and-coming unmarried actress.

On the other hand, even if she admittedly wasn’t an ideal mother, Andee was her child, too.

“Tell us how you attempted to find her.” Simon, bless him, had gone to Margo’s side and rested a hand consolingly on her back.

She looked up, and her eyes actually were red, swollen and wet—and they looked directly at Hunter.

Which made him feel about three inches tall. What a louse he was. Of course she cared that their daughter was missing.

“I’m sorry, Hunter,” she said. “It’s all my fault. The gate was shut, so at first I thought she’d followed me into the house without my noticing. I called her and looked around before I started getting really worried. But I couldn’t find her.”

More sobs. This time Hunter did approach her. Awkwardly, he touched her head.

In moments, she had stood and was crying against his chest.

Automatically his arms went around her. Even though it didn’t feel natural to have her so close. Especially now.

His eyes involuntarily darted toward Shauna. She was watching them, a look of compassion on her face. And sadness.

And pain.

For Andee, of course. And, in sympathy for him, whether he wanted it or not.

He had no doubt it felt awkward to her to be in the same room as her onetime lover and his ex-wife. She had made it clear, though, she no longer cared for him. Any more than he still cared for her.

But he did still care for her…sort of. Nostalgically.

Even so, he gently pulled away from Margo, his eyes on Shauna. He could see her struggle to hide any emotion. Did she, perhaps, still have some feelings for him—other than to despise him for leaving all those years ago?

He looked deliberately away from her and into Margo’s eyes. “We need to hear the rest,” he told his ex-wife. Even though he had heard it from her before, on the phone.

Her story didn’t change. She’d continued looking for Andee, then assumed she had somehow gotten out the gate and started wandering the neighborhood. Margo’s backyard abutted a narrow alley, as did most other houses along her street and the one behind it. She didn’t see anyone there, so she went up one road and down the next, knocked on a few doors. But no one had seen Andee. That was when she had first called Hunter.

The second time was after she had received a call from the kidnapper.

“It was a man. He said that if I told anyone besides her father, he’d kill her.” She looked straight at Banger. “I wasn’t to talk to the police. He said I could pay for her safe return and promised he’d be in touch to tell me what to do. And if I didn’t follow his instructions, I’d never see my daughter again. If he saw anything in the media, or one of those Amber alerts, or anything public, it would be all over for Andee.” Tears ran down her cheeks. Her gaze returned to Hunter. “I may have been at fault in the first place, but you brought in all these other people.” She darted another brief, disapproving glance toward Shauna. “We’ve got to do as he says, Hunter.”

He nodded, then turned to Banger. “Glad you’re here,” he said. “You’ve taken charge of this case, I hope, even though it’s outside your division.”

Banger’s narrow, solemn head nodded. “That’s right.”

“Do I dare ask how you’re managing it?”

“Not if you value your P.I. license,” Banger growled, though a corner of his mouth quirked up as though it attempted a grin without his permission.

“Okay, then, here’s something I do dare to ask. How about putting a listening device on Margo’s phone?”

“What do you mean?” His ex sounded horrified.

“To trace the kidnapper when he calls again,” Banger explained.

“Don’t you need a warrant or something for that?” she asked.

“Only if the subject of the wiretap isn’t aware or doesn’t agree,” Banger said. “Do you have any problem with it?”

“Of course not,” Margo said. “Not if it will help get Andee back. But that means more people will know. And if word gets out—”

“We’ll be careful,” Banger said. “I’ve already got an investigation started. Mostly Foothill Division guys.” He looked at Hunter. “They’re okay. I know all the detectives on the case. They’ll keep a low profile, don’t worry.”

For once, though, Hunter sided with Margo. “You’ll have to be damned careful,” he told the detective. “We can’t take the chance of a leak. Any publicity will spook the kidnapper. In fact, I want to handle the canvassing of this neighborhood myself. Do you have any problem with that?”

Banger didn’t look happy. “You know that if it wasn’t your kid, I’d tell you to go pound sand and not interfere with a police investigation. But you and I have a history, so I’ll cut you some slack and call off the guys I’ve got on the way—for now. We’ll work the case from some other angles. But I don’t like it. I won’t give you more than a day.”

“But that’s not—” Hunter protested.

“One day,” Banger repeated. “And only regarding asking questions around here. The rest of the routine is already underway. I checked out Margo’s yard personally when I got here, looked for evidence of the abduction, kept a log of what we did and what we found, dusted the gate’s latch for prints, took a zillion photos of stuff big and small, that kind of thing. Not that it’s regular procedure, but Simon assisted. Good thing you both were cops once and know the drill.”

Blessing Banger for having enough seniority and guts to take any heat for doing things his own way, Hunter asked, “Anything helpful?”

“Nada, so far. Not even Margo’s prints on the latch. Looked like it was wiped clean. But we gathered print samples from the house and yard, plus some of Andee’s things and other items from outside. Started a standard—more or less—report, including collection and chain of custody of evidence. I’ll send what little we found to the lab for analysis soon as I get back to my office.” He shook his head. “I’ll let you take the initial swipe at asking questions around here, but you’ll need to butt out otherwise. Though I’ll keep our investigation as quiet as I can, a kidnapping’s high priority. I’ve already called my most trusted FBI contact—maybe you know him, Lou Tennyson?”

“I know of him,” Hunter said. “The feds all tend to be heavy-handed. The kidnapper has made it clear he’ll harm his victim—” He almost choked on the last—it seemed like such a detached way to refer to his sweet Andee. “—if there’s any publicity at all. And the more people you get involved on this case, the more likelihood there is it’ll leak out.”

Banger’s slow nod made his long, thin face look even more doleful. “I’m doing my best, but you know I can’t do nothing. While you’re looking around here, my guys’ll be asking questions at Andee’s school, talking to parents of kids there, your neighbors, whatever. We’ll give ’em a good cover story, like they’re investigating you for a security clearance or something. Even so, word’ll get out, count on it. A day, two days—” He raised his hand to silence Hunter, who’d opened his mouth to protest. “That’s assuming we don’t get her back right away, which we hope to do. But I’ll keep a lid on it as long as I can—as much of a lid as can be on a kidnapping investigation.”

Through this discussion, Shauna appeared to be attentive, taking in every word. Only when they were nearly done did she venture a question to Margo. “Can you think of anyone who might have taken your daughter?”

Margo, who’d cried quietly into her hands during the discussion, looked up tearily. Her tone was disdainful as she replied, “I’d have told these men if I did.”

That had been a clue in Shauna’s story, if it was true. Andee apparently knew her kidnapper. It was something Hunter intended to pursue, just in case. Right now, he gave Shauna credit for not flinching under Margo’s contemptuous stare.

“Of course you’d tell them,” she said soothingly. “Tell me this, then. Do any of your friends or acquaintances go by nicknames that refer to letters, like their initials?”

Interesting question. Hunter had been racking his own brain for who this “Big T” could be but had come up with no one.

“What are you talking about?” Margo’s tone suggested bewilderment—unsurprisingly. It was a rather offbeat question.

“Just answer, please.” Shauna could hardly say it was a clue that came to her out of the blue, or Banger would demand to know what she meant. And Shauna and Hunter had already agreed to avoid mentioning her story to the official investigators.

Looking at Hunter with exaggerated tolerance, Margo said, “No, I don’t know anyone who uses initials for their nicknames.”

“How about friends or acquaintances whose names—first or last—begin with the letter T?”

“What—?” Banger began.

“Just humor her,” Hunter said. He jotted down the few names Margo mentioned, but they were mostly women. Shauna hadn’t specified men, but her story, and Margo, had indicated that the kidnapper was male. A couple of the men Margo named were clearly name-dropping—big Hollywood celebrities whom his ex might have met at large industry parties.

When Margo threw up her hands and proclaimed she couldn’t think of anyone else, Hunter suggested that they map out investigation tactics.

They continued their discussion until it became clear they could accomplish no more that night. Though what he wanted to do was to start pounding on doors right now, Hunter knew he’d only freak people out. He’d do what he could tonight on his computer, mapping out strategy, doing what research he could, directing Simon on the rest. Time for Shauna and him to leave.

Once they were in his car, Hunter headed for the San Diego Freeway, which he would take south toward his home. And his personal computer, which would serve him just as well, for now, as his office computer.

Then there was the other thing he intended to do. Or, rather, he intended Shauna to do.

“Are you okay?” Shauna asked.

“No. Are you? You should be pretty pleased with yourself. Everything’s following your story so far, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” she said quietly. “Andee disappeared, and the kidnapper called her mother. Her father did the right thing and told the authorities, and enlisted their cooperation while he starts the search for his missing daughter.”

“I’ll change things—the outcome, at least,” Hunter insisted. “Everything that’s come true did so without my input, or I did it because it made sense.”

“Don’t blame yourself for mostly following the story,” Shauna said. “Though I can’t tell you why, I don’t think you have much choice. And I can say from experience that even if you do things differently, it doesn’t change anything.”

“So you said.” He knew he sounded irritable, but, hell, he believed in free will. No damned story was going to be so engraved in stone that real life would follow it.

His daughter would be fine.

“I’m still changing your story, Shauna,” he finished. Fortunately, they were stopped at a red light near the freeway entrance. He looked at her.

The time was close to midnight, but they were under a streetlight. Shauna’s brown eyes were wide and puzzled and even a little irritated. “Hunter, I’ve already explained—”

“Yeah, I know you think that changing something won’t make a damned bit of difference. And even if I alter events and you enter the changes onto the computer, it won’t save them. But I won’t give up before I’ve even tried. Got it? And you’ve got to work with me, like it or not. That’s why you came, isn’t it—to help me?”

She was silent, biting her bottom lip as she obviously thought how to respond.

He once had nibbled on that same full, sexy lip. The top one, too.

And other places on her silky, sexy body—

But that was before. He’d keep his hands off her now, even if it killed him.

Because if he didn’t, if he upset Shauna enough to make her leave, it might imperil his daughter’s life even more.

Of course, that gave credence to the credibility of her damned story. But like it or not, he’d already given it credence. Ignoring it wasn’t an option.

He’d learned his lesson the hard way before.

“Okay, Hunter,” she said quietly. “I’ll stay, at least for a while. If I can do anything at all to help Andee, you know I will. And if the best I can do is to help you accept—”

“I’ll never accept that,” he retorted, his voice raised. “Don’t play shrink with me.” He noticed that the light had turned green. Fortunately, there was no one behind them.

“All right,” Shauna said sadly. Her hand touched his cheek. His eyes closed as his senses drank in the contact—the softness of her skin, her unique scent, which was neither too sweet nor too spicy. His entire body responded with awareness of Shauna and her touch, her closeness to him after so many long years. Good thing they were still stopped.

His eyes popped open, and he turned to look at her. She withdrew her hand, but it still hovered between them. He’d have shoved it away if all he’d seen was sympathy on her face. It wasn’t. Yet…was it desire darkening the brown of her eyes?

Did she feel it, too?

Lord, how he wanted to take her into his arms, the way he once did. Make love with her, to forget all that was happening, if only for a few, wonderful minutes.

She looked away first. “You missed the light.”

He glanced in that direction. “Yeah.”

“I don’t have reservations, but are there any hotels around here?” She swiveled in her seat. They’d driven a ways from Margo’s into a rougher area of town. There was no way he would leave Shauna here.

“You’re staying with me,” he said.

“I can’t, Hunter.” Her voice was low, husky, but this time, as the light changed, he didn’t look at her.

“Yeah, you can. I’ll keep my hands off you, don’t worry.”

He had to.

“Like I said, I’m changing your story, Shauna. And for that you need to hang around. You’ll come with me when I ask questions. Help me brainstorm what else to do. You can gather new and different stuff to type in while you’re along for the ride. In the story, I investigate alone. Now, I’ll have an assistant along. If enough is thrown into your story that’s different, maybe the ending will change. And having you with me, when in the story I go it alone, will be a good start. Deal?”

They were on the freeway, and the best he could do in the silence was to glance momentarily at her. She was staring straight ahead. Her upper teeth were again worrying her lower lip in that same, sexy manner.

He wouldn’t let it affect him.

“Well?” he prompted.

“Okay, Hunter,” she finally said. “Deal.”

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