CHAPTER SIXTEEN
KATE WAS SURPRISED that Collin hadn’t already left. She’d gone to breakfast by herself. Bessie had made sure that she ate, sitting down to visit with her as if they were old friends.
After that, she’d gone to see Jon. Each time she pushed open the old carriage-house door, she was half-surprised to see him. Earl Ray had warned her that he might run. But each time, she was relieved to find him hard at work. She had seen that he was finishing a rocker as if it was for a customer. Was that all that was keeping him in Buckhorn?
She’d taken her seat in the rocker she knew he’d brought out to the shop for her. It was the same one that had been in his house—the one he felt wasn’t good enough to sell.
Today, she’d told him about a summer day she and Danny had spent at the beach in Galveston. As she talked she could almost feel the salty spray on her face, smell the briny scent, sense the soft sand between her toes.
Jon had given no sign that he’d been listening, but she’d known he was. At times he had stopped for a few seconds, looked away as if remembering something before he’d returned to his work.
There was so much she had wanted to tell him, but she promised herself there would be other days. She had slipped out, leaving him to his work, hoping he knew she would be back, praying he wouldn’t run away from her, and fearing her stories of a past meant nothing to him because they hadn’t been his.
And yet, she couldn’t help the closeness she felt to him. Her heart always beat a little faster in his presence. Whatever the connection between them she felt, it was as real as the snow and cold outside his workshop. At least it was for her. She told herself she would keep trying. She wasn’t giving up. Today there had been a moment when Jon had stopped working and looked at her. Their gazes had met and held. It was as if he was trying to reach out to her from some dark place inside him.
But the moment had passed, and she’d known it was time for her to leave. Talking about the past was exhausting enough without the weight of hope she felt each time she told Jon her treasured memories.
Now as she neared the motel, she saw with regret that the rental car was still parked out front of Collin’s room. She’d hoped he’d left without telling her goodbye. Drawing closer, she saw exhaust coming from the back of the SUV. He had the engine running. She hesitated, not wanting to argue with him, hoping he was still congenial and would just leave. After all, he’d be back in a couple days. He hadn’t wanted to leave her here. She figured he’d come back to try to convince her to leave with him.
As she started to reach for her motel room key, she realized the door was already ajar. She pushed it open and blinked into the dimness. Collin had her suitcase on the end of one of the double beds. He was just closing it.
“What are you—”
He cut her off before she could ask what he thought he was doing. Anyway, it seemed pretty obvious.
“I packed your suitcase for you,” Collin said. “I heard from my associates. We’re meeting them this evening on the other side of the border. Which means we have to leave now.”
“We? Collin, we discussed this. You were going alone. I already told you—”
“I know what you told me, Kate. And I just told you. You’re going with me.”
“Collin,” she said, stepping into the room and closing the door behind her to get out of the cold and away from any prying eyes. She’d gotten the feeling that Shirley only cleaned the motel room next to theirs when they were in one of theirs arguing. All day she’d felt as if she were being watched. “You can’t force me to go with you.”
He looked at the floor. His hands fisted at his sides. When he looked up, she saw that his face was flushed, and even though it was cool in the motel room, he appeared to be perspiring. “You don’t seem to get it. I need you.”
Was he still talking marriage? “After everything that has happened, I would think—”
“Nothing’s happened,” he said too loudly for the size of the room. “This man has told you repeatedly that he isn’t your husband.”
She shook her head. “I don’t believe him.”
He scoffed at that. “I’d hoped that by now you would have come to your senses.”
“I’m not delusional,” she snapped.
“But you are incredibly gullible,” he spat right back. “I’m curious. What were you planning to do? Stay here the rest of your life? Or are you still thinking that you’ll take him back to Houston to live in your big house?” He let out a snort. “Even if he would go, he wouldn’t fit into your life any more than you fit into his. I got news for you, baby—”
“Don’t call me that. I’m not your baby. I’m a grown woman. I know my own mind.”
“Do you?” He ground his jaw muscles as if holding back sharp words that promised to bring blood. “His name isn’t Jon Harper. You got that much right, anyway. But it’s also not Daniel Jackson. It’s Justin Brown. He used to be cop. He took down some crime syndicate, and even behind bars, they want him dead. They have a bounty on his head. Someone already tried to kill him. Blew up his car. He’s hiding out here. See why he wanted you to get lost and leave him alone?”
She stared at him, telling herself it was a lie. Just something he’d made up to try to convince her to leave with him. “That’s not true.”
“Oh, it is. I borrowed his coffee mug and sent it to a friend of mine. He ran the man’s prints. There is no doubt. He’s not your Danny, and all I have to do is drop a dime on him, and those mobster henchmen looking for him will come up here and—”
“You wouldn’t do that.” Even as she said it, she knew he would. If he was telling the truth...
She turned to pick up a sweater of hers that he had missed stuffing into her suitcase, her back to him, breathing hard as she tried to calm down. Jon wasn’t Danny. Collin had found proof. Not that it mattered. She’d known he might not be. But there was something about the man. It was more than a resemblance to Danny. Had she fallen in love with Jon Harper...?
Would she be responsible for getting the man killed because of her feelings for him? Collin would make that call just to spite her if she didn’t go with him.
Turning around to face him, she tried to reason with him. “Collin, I had no idea when we drove into this town that—”
“Yes, that we’d stop in some tiny Montana town in the middle of nowhere in the middle of winter,” he mocked, “and you’d see your dead husband. Then again, are you sure it wouldn’t have been some other town, some other man?”
“Don’t say that. You don’t know how much I hate this. I know I’ve spoiled your trip.”