Текст книги "Charming The Highlander"

Автор книги: Джанет Чапмен

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Текущая страница: 12 (всего у книги 21 страниц)

With a curse of frustration, Grace climbed out and followed him. Talking to Michael was like pulling teeth. She caught up with him just as he knelt down to look at the underside of her truck.

Grace got down on her own knees and looked at him instead. “Is that what killed your friends?” she asked. “The storm that brought you here?”

He turned only his head to look at her, staring for an overlong minute before he stood up, grabbed her by the shoulders, and lifted her to her own feet in front of him. And it was a good thing he kept holding onto her, because his glare would have knocked her over.

“We will talk about this now, Grace, on the condition that ya never bring it up again.” His hands tightened on her shoulders. “And I’ll have yar promise that ya won’t tell anyone else this story.”

Grace could only nod mutely. Michael released her, sighed deep from his chest, and ran a hand through his damp, dark brown hair. He paced several steps away, pivoted, and paced back toward her, stopping only a few feet away.

“Four years ago my men and I were in the middle of a battle when a great storm suddenly swept over our heads,” he softly began, not looking at her but staring into the woods, obviously picturing the scene in his mind’s eye.

“I looked up and saw a man standing on the bluff. He was holding a staff as thick as my arm and longer than I am tall. It glowed like a shaft of lightning in his hand.”

He looked at Grace, his eyes large but his pupils narrowed to pinpricks. Sweat had broken out on his brow again.

“The man suddenly threw the stick, and it bounced off a rock and then began floating over the gleann we were in. A great rain broke from the heavens, and lightning flashed—not from the clouds but from that stick.”

Facing her but with his vision turned inward again, Michael slowly shook his head. “As God is my witness, I can’t describe what happened next. Light so bright it was blinding consumed us. I could hear the shouts of my men over the howl of the wind. My horse reared in terror, and I was thrown, but my body never reached the ground. It was as if the wind carried me, lifting me further into the sky.”

“A tornado, Michael?” Grace whispered, drawing his full attention. “You were caught in a tornado?”

He slowly shook his head. “Nay, lass. This was an unnatural storm. Tornados are dark, littered with debris. This was blinding white light. And once I was lifted, there was no wind. No sound. It was as if…I felt…”

He stopped speaking, staring at the ground, slowly shaking his head back and forth.

“As if what, Michael? What did you feel?”

He looked back at her. “As if I ceased to exist. For one suspended moment, I was not me.” He held his hands up, looking at them. “I had no body. I remember thinking I am here, but I had nothing to show of myself. There was just me…my mind…and the accursed light.”

Grace fought to keep her frown to herself as her own mind frantically worked to understand what had happened. Had Michael been struck by lightning? Had he lived through a near-death experience?

“What happened then?” she asked. “You’re obviously here right now. How did you get here?”

“I simply existed again. The light disappeared as suddenly as it appeared, and I was lying on the ground, along with nine other men and our horses.”

“Nine men? But Mary said only five men were with you.”

Michael averted his gaze. “Others were caught in the storm with us.”

“Others? The men you were fighting when the storm came? Where are they now?”

His glare returned as he stared directly at her. “I have a wish they’re rotting in hell,” he growled, suddenly pivoting on his heel and heading back to his own truck.

Grace started after him, only to have to grab the tailgate of her truck to keep from falling. The rain had started again and was making the ice as slippery as buttered Teflon. Michael returned carrying a tow strap, which he looped over the trailer ball on the rear bumper of her truck.

“Drive my truck up here and point the back toward yours,” he instructed.

Grace took the tow strap off her bumper and tossed it on the ground. “Just as soon as we’re done with our discussion,” she told him. “I promised not to speak of this again, so, by God, we’re going to speak of it now. Where did you wake up after the storm?”

Eyes narrowed against the rain, he stared at her in fuming silence. Grace didn’t care if they both drowned, she wasn’t leaving until he gave her the whole story.

“Did these other men experience the same thing you did?” she asked. “Did they all see this bright light?”

“Yes.”

“And everybody lived? Including the horses?”

“Yes.”

“If you were in Scotland—what was it—eight hundred years ago when the storm came, where did you wake up?”

“In Scotland. In the same gleann. But everything was different.”

“Different how?”

“There were buildings there that hadn’t been there before,” he said. “And roads, covered with hardened black tar. And automobiles and large trucks. We were nearly killed by the speeding demons.”

It was Grace’s turn to shake her head, and she couldn’t seem to stop. Michael’s story seemed outlandish and would make sense to her only if she believed in time travel.

“Michael? Do you remember how you were dressed when you woke up from this storm? What you looked like?”

“I was wearing the same clothing I’d had on the day of the battle: my hunting plaid, which is a darker, more muted version of the MacBain tartan.”

“Anything else? Were you wearing pants that had a zipper, boots with a buckle, a knit jersey? Or a watch, maybe?”

He frowned at her question. “I wore leggings, a shirt, and my sporran. And we knew nothing of watches back then.”

“Did the shirt have buttons?”

His frown turned into a scowl. “Nay. It pulled over my head and tied at the neck.”

Grace sighed. “Everyone was dressed the same, I take it.”

“Nay,” Michael said again, one corner of his mouth suddenly lifting into a half grin. “Two of my men were naked.”

“Naked?”

“It wasn’t uncommon for warriors to fight naked,” he elaborated. “So there was nothing for an enemy to grab onto.”

Grace snapped her mouth shut. Warriors? Having a battle in the middle of a storm, then waking up in modern time?

It didn’t make sense. None of it did.

But the sad part was, it was obvious Michael believed—he sincerely believed—it had really happened to him.

“What year were you born?” she asked.

“It was the year 1171, if you go by the calendar ya use today.”

Good Lord. His delusion was based in fact. Michael even knew that today’s calendar was not the one in use eight hundred years ago.

But what he believed was impossible.

Which meant that Michael really wasn’t of sound mind.

There was no way she could turn Baby over to him. Not her precious, innocent nephew. Who knew where Michael’s delusions might lead him—looking for another thunderstorm to take him back home?

With Baby?

“Were ya telling me the truth, Grace?” Michael asked, taking her by the shoulders, making her face him squarely as he peered down into her eyes. “Was Mary really coming back to me, to get married?”

Tears suddenly mingled with the rain washing down her face. “Yes, Michael. She was coming home to marry you,” Grace said hoarsely, barely getting the words past the lump in her throat.

She was suddenly pulled forward into a fierce embrace. Grace buried her face in the opening of Michael’

s jacket, feeling his pounding heart beneath her cheek, and she burst into uncontrollable sobs.

The arms holding her tightened. “I’m sorry ya lost your sister,” Michael whispered into her hair, the warmth of his breath sending confusing emotions through her saddened heart.

Grace wrapped her arms around his waist and clung to him. “I’m sorry for both of us, Michael. You have no idea how sorry I am,” she whispered. “So very, very sorry.”

God might consider the two miracles he’d given her today insignificant, but Grace thought they were wonderful. The first miracle was that the socks Baby had worn to Ellen Bigelow’s were the same socks on his feet now. Ellen hadn’t changed them, and she hadn’t discovered Baby’s twelve toes.

The second miracle was the smile Baby had given Grace when she returned to pick him up. He had not only recognized her but had been happy to see her.

Grace took her attention away from her slow, careful drive down the icy road long enough to peek at Baby. He was awake, very busy waving his arms wildly in front of his face, blowing bubbles out of his mouth. And he was smiling again.

Her spirits had lifted the moment she had taken him into her arms after returning to the Bigelows’ with her rescued truck. She had kissed Baby all over his face, only to be stunned speechless when he had looked up at her with wide gray-blue eyes and smiled.

“We’re going home to stay,” she told him, reaching over and pulling the left side of his cap back over his ear. “No more running around in this weather to any of our neighbors. I’m finishing that book I started reading you this morning, and we’ll find another good one to follow it with.”

She grinned sadly at the road ahead of her. “It’s you and me now, kid. Just the two of us. We’ll give you another month of growing and time for us to be alone together, then I’m taking you home to Virginia.”

She looked at Baby to make sure he was listening, then turned her attention back to the road. “We don’t need anyone, especially not any man. Not Grey, or Michael, or even Jonathan.”

Grace carefully slowed the truck to make the turn into her driveway, remembering from her trip out that there was a large branch that had fallen halfway across it.

“And I’m making you this promise now, sweetie. You’re going to make some woman a perfect husband, and she’ll have me to thank for that.”

She stopped talking when she realized the branch was no longer there. Someone had cut it up into short sections and had stacked it on the side of the driveway in a neat little pile.

Remembering Mavis and Peter’s visit yesterday, Grace didn’t wonder who had done the chore for her.

There was probably more food in her fridge, and her animals had been looked after as well. This is what had happened nine years ago, during the days after her mother and father’s accident. Enough food had arrived at the house to feed eight grieving children who might not otherwise have eaten.

Grace suddenly pushed on the brakes a little harder than she intended when her now wet, blurry eyes discovered a car parked next to the back porch, blocking her way into the garage.

She wiped at the tears streaming down her cheeks and shut off the engine. The sound of sleet pelting the wind-shield drummed through the cab of the truck as she stared in dismay at the dark windows of her house. She distinctly remembered leaving the lights on, both on the porch and over the kitchen table.

The power must have gone out. Ellen had said it had been flickering all afternoon. The lines had finally lost their valiant battle with the ice.

It would probably be days, if not weeks, before the electricity returned. Pine Creek would not be at the top of the power company’s priority list. The town had no hospitals, no nursing homes, not even anything that would pass as a real firehouse. At best they had two stores, one gas station, a church, and a grange hall.

Grace unfastened the blissfully unaware Baby from his car seat. “My God, sweetie, you’ve had the worst kind of luck dogging you since birth, and you don’t even know it. It’s back to sleeping in the living room for us, next to the fire. And it will be lukewarm formula and sponge baths for another few days.”

If the smile he gave her was any indication, he didn’t seem to mind one bit. He was proud of his new trick and the response it got him, and he was playing it up for all it was worth.

She kissed his cheek to reward him for being such a steadfast little trooper, then tucked him under her jacket for the walk to the house.

She went in through the garage doors she had left open earlier but stopped before entering the house. A stack of wood, nearly half a cord’s worth, was neatly piled next to the entrance. She sent up a prayer of thanks to whichever thoughtful person had done this for her. She needed it now more than ever.

The house was unusually quiet, no sounds of fridge or furnace working. There was no sign of the owner of the car parked outside. The person was probably in the upper barn, tending the animals. Grace hoped he knew his way around goats.

She walked straight through the kitchen to the downstairs bedroom. Without putting Baby down, she grabbed the cradle and dragged it into the living room. She set Baby in it, stuck his pacifier in his mouth, took off her jacket, and threw it on the couch.

Grace was on her knees building the fire back up in the hearth when she heard the sound of footsteps coming down the stairs. She spun around just as Jonathan took the last step into the living room.

“Grace.”

“Jonathan,” she said, scrambling to her feet to face him. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be in Virginia, monitoring Podly.”

“I was. But something’s gone wrong. I grabbed the first available flight here but was only able to get as far as Boston.” He shook his head in disgust. “It took me all night and most of today to get from Boston to here. There weren’t any flights to Bangor, so I rented a car. I nearly killed myself trying to keep it on the icy roads.”

“But why?”

He walked up and took her by the shoulders, as if to brace her against something unpleasant. “It’s Podly, Grace. She’s malfunctioning.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

“I don’t know,” he said, his hands tightening on her shoulders. “That’s why I’m here. The data Podly’s sending back are scrambled. And our computers can’t sort it out.”

She gaped at him. “That’s impossible. I ran several tests on that program before Podly even went up.

Everything was working fine.”

Jonathan let her go and paced across the room, running a hand through his hair before he turned back to her. “I know. It was the damnedest thing. We discovered the problem two days ago, and I’ve spent hours trying to straighten the mess out myself.”

He paced back to her, his expression desperate. “You’re the only chance we’ve got, Grace. You designed that software. You’re the only one who can unscramble the data.”

“But you didn’t have to come up here, Jonathan. I can link up with Podly, fix the glitch from here, and then you can start downloading to the computers back at the lab. I have the program in my laptop.”

“There’s something you don’t know, Grace, about Podly,” he said, suddenly pacing back across the room. He stopped and stood facing the window, his hands shoved into his pockets. He kept his back to her when he finally spoke.

“Do you remember six months ago, when Collins pulled his money out of our project?” he asked softly.

“I remember. But you said you found a new money-man.”

He turned toward her, still keeping his distance. “I did. But the new money came with a condition.”

“What kind of condition?” she asked, hugging herself against the sudden chill of the quiet house.

“A transmitter, Grace. Placed in Podly before she went up.”

The hair on the back of her neck stirred, and Grace felt something churn in the pit of her stomach.

“Transmitting what?” she whispered.

“Our data,” Jonathan said succinctly. He pulled his hands from his pockets and started toward her.

Grace took a step back.

Jonathan stopped. “Our competition gave me eighty million dollars for the data, Grace. And now they can’t get it.”

“You sold out StarShip Spaceline? To who?”

“AeroSaqii. But I didn’t sell out. I kept StarShip alive.” He shook his head. “Without Collins’s money, I would have been bankrupt in twelve months.”

“You will be anyway,” Grace snapped, her stomach now churning with the violence of a thousand angry bees. “They’ll win the race, and we’ll be left with nothing.”

He moved closer, holding one hand out beseechingly. “We’ve still got the shuttles, Grace. We can concentrate on those. AeroSaqii will contract with us to build them.”

Angry beyond words, Grace turned her back on Jonathan and returned to building the fire in the hearth.

The ion propulsion experiment was hers; she’d designed it, laid down the groundwork, and put the processor into Podly herself.

And Jonathan had sold it without telling her.

“That still doesn’t explain why you had to come all the way up here,” she said, her back to the room. “I could have just unscrambled the data and sent the results to you.”

“There’s something else, Grace,” Jonathan said from right behind her. He took her shoulders and lifted her up, turning her to face him. “I have reason to believe my deal with AeroSaqii is not exactly…well, it appears there’s more involved in this deal than I thought there was.”

“What do you mean?”

Jonathan shook his head. “AeroSaqii also intends to sell our experiment, once they’ve perfected it. But to a private consortium that hopes to turn it into a weapon instead of a propulsion agent.”

Grace felt the blood drain from her face. “How do you know this?” she whispered.

“I’ve had a mole planted in AeroSaqii for several months now,” he told her. “And he told me that when the transmission came back garbled, people at AeroSaqii became very upset. Paul—that’s my mole—

thought their reaction was way out of proportion to the problem, and he started digging deeper. It seems that several of the men there were from this consortium and not really AeroSaqii scientists.”

“A weapon?” Grace whispered, shrinking away from Jonathan. “They plan to use my experiment to build a weapon?”

His grip tightened. “Of mass proportions,” he confirmed. “Can you imagine what an ion-based weapon would be capable of? It would make a nuclear detonation look like a firecracker going off in comparison.”

“Jonathan,” Grace hissed on an indrawn breath, reversing their positions and grabbing his arms. “We’ve got to stop it. You need to give AeroSaqii their money back, and we’ve got to block the transmission they’re receiving, garbled or not. Now, before they find a way to unscramble it.”

“I tried to reason with them, Grace. I told them the deal was off, but they’re having none of it. It’s too late. And now I’m afraid they have sent someone here to make sure they get what they paid for.”

Grace pushed away from Jonathan and moved to the opposite side of the room, alarmed by what he was implying. Hugging herself against the sudden chill in the room, she turned back to face Jonathan.

“What do you mean, they’ll make sure they get what they paid for?”

“Just that, Grace. According to Paul, they’ve sent men to bring you back to their lab to straighten out the transmission and process the data.”

“That’s kidnapping, Jonathan.”

He nodded. “Yes, it is. But to the devils AeroSaqii crawled into bed with, it’s worth the risk. And that’s why you’ve got to come back with me, Grace. Today, before they get here. We have the security in Virginia to protect you.”

Hugging herself again, Grace looked at the cradle where Baby was sleeping. “I…I can’t just up and leave, Jonathan,” she said softly. “I’m right in the middle of my own obligations.”

Baby started fussing, and Jonathan snapped his head around in surprise. He turned back to her and frowned. “You’ve still got that kid?”

“Yes. And his name’s Baby.”

Jonathan snorted. “That’s not a name, either. Why haven’t you given him to his father?”

“I haven’t decided if he deserves him yet,” she said, picking Baby up and sticking his pacifier back in his mouth. She headed for the kitchen.

Jonathan followed her.

“Who is he, Grace? Have you even met him?”

“I’m not saying.” She reached into the cupboard and took down a bottle of formula. She turned to Jonathan, only to discover that he hadn’t liked her answer. He looked…well, he looked stunned that she wouldn’t confide in him.

His eyes suddenly narrowed. “You have no intention of giving him up, do you? Dammit, Grace, you’re in no position to raise a kid on your own. You’re a scientist, not a woman who spends her days changing diapers and wiping up baby spit.”

“I can do both.”

“No, you can’t. Your work is too demanding.”

“No, Jonathan. Your work is too demanding. I hear there’s a semiconductor company in California looking for a person with my degrees, and they let their mothers bring their babies to work.”

Jonathan snapped his mouth shut so hard Grace heard his teeth click. He didn’t even want to entertain the idea that she might leave StarShip Spaceline.

She returned to sit by the fire in the living room and feed Baby. Her boss stayed in the kitchen. Grace knew he was silenced but not defeated. Jonathan was not a man easily thwarted; no five-week-old child, stubborn employee, or angry competition was going to get in the way of his company putting private citizens into space.

Jonathan Stanhope was a survivor.

He would simply change tack to get what he wanted.

While Grace fed Baby, she thought again about Jonathan’s startling confession and the problem it created for her. She shook her head, unable to believe that men might be on their way here now with the intention of kidnapping her.

Her first thought was not to run back to Virginia as Jonathan wanted but to run instead to the safety of Gu Bràth and Grey’s strong arms.

Would she be welcome at Gu Bràth after that memorable scene in the living room? Grey wouldn’t turn his back on her if he knew she was in trouble, but would Callum and Ian and Morgan?

And what about Michael? Could she, in good conscience, ask for help from a man she now had every intention of deceiving?

But then again, could she simply run away from her problems here and hide from her promise to Mary by cowering in Jonathan’s lab?

The one answer to all of her questions was no. And Grace’s scientist mind finally kicked in. She’d start with Podly and AeroSaqii’s threat. She had a computer, a satellite link, and the ability to make her problem with Jonathan simply go away. Then she would deal with the MacKeages. She would fix their damn ski lift without demanding they help Michael, and then she would save Michael’s trees if she had to shake the ice off every damn seedling in the twelve-acre field.

And then she would sit Greylen MacKeage down and have a little talk with him about commitment and belonging and neighborly obligations and explain to him exactly how this…this…thing between them was going to proceed.

Grace tucked a full-bellied and sleeping Baby back into his crib and headed into the kitchen to solve problem number one. She ignored Jonathan standing by the wall talking in a low voice on the phone and took her computer off the counter. She set it on the kitchen table and turned it on. While it booted up, she went into her bedroom, grabbed the suitcase that held the satellite link, and headed out onto the porch.

“What are you doing?” Jonathan asked, standing in the door, watching her.

“I want to see for myself what’s happening with Podly’s transmission,” she said, climbing on a bench and hanging the antenna over a hook sticking out of the icy eave of the porch. Satisfied that it would work this time since there weren’t any mountains or trees to block the signal, she climbed down, rubbing her cold hands together, and faced Jonathan.

“I might be able simply to make this entire problem go away.” She gave her boss a good glare. “I’m dumping the data, Jonathan. Instead of unscrambling the transmission, I’m going to erase the entire experiment. And you can contact AeroSaqii and tell them to call off their men.” She pointed her finger at him. “Then you can go back to Virginia—alone—and build your damn shuttles,” she finished, sweeping past him into the kitchen.

“Grace,” he said, following her to the table. “I didn’t know what they were planning. I did what I had to in order for us to survive.”

Grace sat down in front of her computer and clicked open the program she needed to receive Podly’s data, then attached the link antenna to the back of the laptop. Jonathan leaned over her shoulder to watch and continued his plea that she understand his actions.

“I know how you feel about this pod, Grace,” he said, his voice subdued and beseeching. “And I know I had no right to sell your experiment without telling you. But you have to understand my position. We couldn’t have launched Podly without AeroSaqii’s help.”

Grace tapped several keys and started her program running, then waited for the data to begin downloading. “You could have told me, Jonathan,” she said, looking up at him and glaring again. “And you damn well could have looked into the deal more closely before you made it. But what I don’t understand, if you truly thought everything was above-board, why the secrecy? You could have come to me and told me about your financial problem. I would have understood.”

His hand squeezed her shoulder. “Would you, Grace? Do you now?”

“I understand two businesses merging.” She turned and looked up at him. “But I don’t understand the secrecy. Why not just announce your partnership with AeroSaqii?”

Jonathan sighed over her head, and his hand dropped away as he straightened. He moved to the other side of the table and sat down facing her, his hands clasped in front of him.

“It’s a business problem, Grace,” he explained in a tired and somewhat defeated voice as he stared at her. “StarShip is a publicly held company. AeroSaqii isn’t. And neither is our European competition. If I’

d announced to the world that I was in trouble, there could have been a hostile takeover from Europe.

We’d have been swallowed up, with no chance of survival.”

“AeroSaqii didn’t want to merge?”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “They just wanted the experiment and only gave me a promise to contract the shuttles from me.” His smile was sad. “It was the lesser of two evils. And the only option available if I want to stay in business.”

“That still doesn’t explain why you couldn’t confide in me. I thought…I thought we had something between us.”

“We did. We do, Grace,” he whispered, reaching his hand across the table and grasping hers. “But I was scared. I was afraid you might walk. And without you, I had nothing to sell.”

Grace pulled her hand back and balled it into a fist on her lap. “Trust means putting yourself at risk, Jonathan,” she said. “And I trusted you.” She waved an angry hand in the air. “All I receive in return are some men trying to kidnap me.”

“I can fix this, Grace. Just come back to Virginia, and I’ll keep you safe.”

“No. I’ll fix it,” she snapped, turning her glare to the screen. “And you’ll go back to Virginia by yourself.”

He stood, opened his mouth to protest, but snapped it shut when Grace gasped at what she was seeing on her computer screen. Jonathan walked around the table and looked over her shoulder again.

“That’s it,” he said. “That’s the mess we were getting back at the lab.”

Grace hit several keys on the laptop, and still all she saw was the jumble of codes that would run in sequence for maybe six lines, only to suddenly be interrupted by ten lines of garble. And just that quickly, Grace found herself caught up in the familiar and very comfortable world of mathematical physics and infinite numbers, probabilities and unimaginable possibilities.

Jonathan, her home, the ice storm, and even her own body slowly slipped out of existence as Grace stared at the computer screen and looked into the future.

Chapter Fifteen

It was another three hours before Grace could bring herself to give up. She angrily shut down her computer and stood, stretching her back to get out the kinks. She jumped when Jonathan spoke.

“Were you able to make any headway?” he asked, walking in from the living room, only to frown at the closed computer.

“No. The battery is dying, so I shut it down. But even if we had power, I wouldn’t be able to fix it.” She looked out the window at the freezing rain that refused to let up.

“And I can’t even recharge the battery.”

“Don’t you have a spare?”

“No. That one fried up on the mountain.” She turned and frowned at the computer. “And when it did, I think it compromised my program. There are glitches in it that have nothing to do with Podly’s transmissions.” She looked over at Jonathan. “Did you bring your computer with you?”

“Yes. But it doesn’t have your program installed.”

“I have backup disks,” she said, walking to the kitchen door and picking up the satellite link suitcase. She spoke over her shoulder. “Is Baby still sleeping?”

“Yes,” Jonathan said, going into the living room.

Grace set the suitcase on the counter and opened it, rummaging around to find her case of backup disks.

Jonathan returned to the kitchen, set his own computer on the table beside hers, and turned it on.

Grace continued looking for her disks. They weren’t in the briefcase. She went to her bedroom and looked through the empty luggage Grey and Morgan had brought down from the mountain. She checked every pocket and nook and cranny in both bags, and then she straightened and stared at nothing while she thought.

Jonathan stood in the door of the bedroom. “What? Do you have the disks?” he asked.

Grace shook her head. “No. They must have gotten misplaced on the mountain,” she said, more to herself than to him.

He came into the room and stood facing her. “What do you mean, ‘on the mountain?’”

She looked up. “My plane crashed. The pilot died. Baby and I and a neighbor who was traveling with us were able to make it down off the mountain okay. But some of my stuff is obviously still up there.”

Jonathan’s eyes grew wide with shock, and he took hold of her shoulders. “You were in a plane crash?

Just a few days ago?”

“Yes. But miraculously, neither Baby nor I was hurt.”

She was suddenly pulled into a crushing embrace. “My God, Grace. Why didn’t you call and tell me?”

“I forgot,” she said into his shoulder. She leaned back and smiled at his stricken expression. “I would have called you today, Jonathan,” she quickly assured him. “But you showed up before I got the chance.”

“I could have lost you,” he whispered, pulling her back against him, hugging her tightly.

Just as Michael had done only a few hours ago. But where Michael’s body had been warm and desperate and filled with emotion, Jonathan’s embrace stirred nothing inside her.