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  “What would you like to do now?” he asked after a moment, dropping the hand that held the bunched-up towel to his side.

  “Do?” she repeated. To hide her confusion, she busied herself with fastening the towel above her breasts.

  “Do you want to go? Or do you want to stay the night?”

  She looked up slowly.

  “Surely you’ll give me another chance at this,” he said when she didn’t reply immediately. “You’re not going to let that stand as my record.” He waved vaguely in the direction of the shower.

  This time she couldn’t stop herself from laughing. He really was something. So cool and intimidating one moment and yet so self-deprecating the next. She warmed even more when his low chuckle twined with her own.

  “You don’t have anything to prove. I’m . . . quite satisfied,” she said after a pause, a smile lingering on her lips. Very satisfied, in fact. Very curious about what other secrets you hold, what other mysteries you might unlock in my body with the ease of a master thief. She pushed the incendiary thought aside. A cool breeze rippled over her damp skin. The rush of humor and warmth had suddenly abandoned her.

  “But . . . I really should be going. It’s an early morning for me.”

  He nodded and quickly wrapped the towel around his lean hips. “I’ll just go and get your purse, then.”

  Disappointment flooded her when he didn’t persist in his invitation to stay. In his absence, she scurried to find her clothing. By the time he’d returned, she’d donned her socks, underwear, and pants, and was fastening her bra. It was as if with every garment she put on, the unreality of what’d just happened grew greater. She glanced up self-consciously when he returned, her clutch purse looking tiny in his big hand. She was glad for the cloak of semidarkness. He bent down and retrieved her shirt.

  “Thanks,” she murmured when he handed it to her. She shoved it over her head.

  “I meant what I said. Before.”

  “What?” she asked, jerking her shirt down over her abdomen. He stepped closer, and she froze.

  “I can make you forget some of your sorrows,” he said. “For a little while, anyway. If you let me. What’s the harm in that?”

  Her mouth fell open.

  “What?” he asked, obviously sensing her unease.

  “This is weird,” she replied in a rush.

  She saw his brow furrow. “That I want you? That you want me?”

  “No, not that,” she said, flustered. She jammed her foot into one of her shoes. “I mean . . . I was told by someone that you usually don’t . . . date local women,” she explained, flushing at the word date. She hid her eye roll by looking down while she put on her other shoe. He didn’t want to take her to dinner and a movie, for Christ’s sake. He wanted her for the purpose of exchanging single-minded pleasure. Which sounded pretty damn exciting at the moment. The thought of his rigid face and bulging arms as he’d made both of them come a moment ago flashed into her mind’s eye, stealing her breath.

  “I don’t.” She looked up sharply. He’d stepped closer. “I don’t like complications.”

  “And you don’t think I’ll give you any?” she wondered in amazement.

  “I think in your case, the complications are unavoidable,” he replied, his voice deep and rich and weighty in the still night air.

  She realized he’d calmly extended his arm, handing her the clutch. She swallowed thickly and reached for it.

  “What do you say, Harper?”

  “I’ll think about it,” she muttered, head bowed.

  His voice just now had sounded beguiling. Close. She didn’t want him to kiss her again. She didn’t want to give in to a powerful urge to kiss him. This whole situation was already murky and confusing enough without adding more of the intoxication of his mouth and touch into a serious decision. “Good night, Jacob.”

  She moved past him.

  “Let me see you home, at least—”

  “No,” she said, biting her bottom lip when she realized how abrupt she’d sounded. She glanced back at him. His face looked shadowed from this angle. Had she offended him? “The beach is well lit all the way to my place. Good night,” she repeated, feeling foolish. He didn’t reply.

  She flew down the stairs to the moonlit beach, highly aware of his stare on her back. Maybe it was her imagination—because she refused to look back to confirm it—but she had the distinct impression he watched her for her entire trip home.

  • • •

  The complications are unavoidable.

  The thought kept reoccurring in his head as he lay in his bed later, moonlight spilling into his suite and onto his naked body. He’d already masturbated again, a fact that didn’t surprise him at all.

  He’d screwed up out there. That was a simple, unavoidable reality. The wise choice would be to avoid Harper altogether. If he couldn’t see fit to be wise and restrain himself—which apparently, he couldn’t—then his other choice would be to possess her completely . . . to get her out of his system once and for all.

  Instead, he’d acted like an impulsive, clumsy teenager, getting so turned on by the feeling of her wet, supple body and the taste of her sweet mouth beneath his, he’d jerked off on her.

  He grimaced at the exciting, embarrassing memory.

  He’d given her the wrong impression of him.

  Or had he?

  Was that yearning, desperate kid really still alive in him?

  Jacob didn’t think so. But still . . . even though Jake Tharp was dead to him, he was having an effect on Jacob’s present reality. Somehow . . .

  It wasn’t the first time in his life that he’d thought Harper McFadden was worth the complication. It probably wouldn’t be the last. In the case of himself—Jacob—the complication was risking his exposure. His shame. His weakness.

  For Jake Tharp, the stakes of getting involved with Harper had been even greater. In helping that girl so many years ago, Jake had risked nothing less than his own life.

  seven

  Twenty Years Ago

  Jake woke up to the sound of the dogs barking furiously. His uncle, Emmitt Tharp, ran one of the largest dogfighting and gambling operations in the Appalachians. Emmitt’s run-down house, barns, dog cages, and fighting rings were well hidden in the mountains and forest from the police.

  There was no fight scheduled tonight, though; no dozens or hundreds of loud, drunk men arriving in their pickups or with the boat service Emmitt provided, which dropped off gamblers at nearby Shaker’s Landing. The dogs had been alerted to something—or someone—on the property, though. Jake sat up on the thin mattress when he heard Jarvis, one of their more aggressive dogs, bawl extra loud.

  Maybe the mountain lion that had prowled around the dog pens last summer had returned? If so, it’d be best to leave dealing with it up to Emmitt. Jake hated his uncle, and feared him more than anything he could imagine, but one thing was certain: Emmitt could handle a mountain lion. Emmitt Tharp was as lean, mean, and strong as the bred killers bawling right now out in the pens.

  Word had it that Jake’s father, Emmitt’s older brother, Marcus, had been even taller and stronger than Emmitt, a rumor that fascinated Jake. He still doubted it, though. Emmitt was brutal, but he was still the most physically intimidating, fastest, and most fearless man Jake had ever known. His uncle was probably already shaking off his nightly whiskey drunk and reaching for his shotgun at this very moment.

  But Jake heard no sounds emanating from the direction of the living room, where Emmitt usually passed out every night in front of the television. His uncle must have really overdone it this time. Jake usually made himself scarce once the bottle left the cabinet at around four o’clock every afternoon. Hell, he made himself as invisible as possible from Emmitt all the time.

  Earlier that afternoon, Jake had tried to make an escape to the cave to avoid his yelling and his
heavy hand for a few blessed hours. Emmitt had been unusually aware today, however, grabbing Jake by the too-long hair at his nape when he’d tried to slink silently out the back door.

  “You’re not sneaking off anywhere to play whatever games you play all alone. I’m starting to think you’re a little faggot. Probably dolls you’re playing with out in them woods,” his uncle had said around a wet, sagging cigar.

  This was a new bullying theme Emmitt had taken a liking to since Jake turned thirteen: insinuating he was gay because he was five foot two and skinny as a rail.

  Using his hold on Jake’s hair, Emmitt shoved all eighty-three pounds of him. Jake flew across the worn wood floor of the living room, landing with a thud against the wall. He scrambled to his feet quickly, ignoring his pain, so that Emmitt wouldn’t find him in that vulnerable position. Jake prayed daily for a bigger, stronger body so that he could start to defend himself against his uncle . . . but was starting to worry it’d never happen. He’d be weak and helpless forever.

  “You get on back to your room and don’t come out until tomorrow. If you do, I’ll make you sorry. You know I will.”

  “But I gotta see to Mrs. Roundabout.”

  “You don’t need to worry about that born cold bitch. She’s done for. Only use she has is to train the other dogs on her.”

  Terror had shot through Jake’s veins at that. Mrs. Roundabout had suffered multiple puncture wounds, severe bruising, and a shattered thighbone in a recent fight. A pit bull’s jaws were lethal, horrible weapons. Dogfights were brutal, and not primarily because of the dogs’ savagery. In Jake’s unvoiced opinion, the true offenders were the men who got off on the violence.

  He’d been terrified when Emmitt had declared two weeks ago that Mrs. Roundabout would go in the ring. It’d been nearly two years since the frisky brown and white puppy had been unfortunate enough to be brought onto Emmitt’s property. Jake had hid his bond with the dog as best he could but his efforts were useless—just like most things were when it came to caring about something in the vicinity of Emmitt Tharp.

  After the fight, Emmitt had left Mrs. Roundabout to heal, suffer, or die. Each was the same to him. But Jake had silently set up a bed of sorts for her in one of the barns and was tending her as best as he could with limited supplies. At the edge of his awareness loomed the idea that he was just prolonging the dog’s agony, but he refused to give up hope. Emmitt hadn’t interfered with Jake’s doctoring of Mrs. Roundabout until now, mostly because the situation had been beneath his notice. But he’d just called Mrs. Roundabout cold, which meant Emmitt believed she was born not to fight. Emmitt had no use for a cold dog . . . except to use her as a patsy for the other dogs to sic on, to nurture their killer instinct for the ring.

  “She’s not cold,” Jake insisted, knowing the only way he could try and save Mrs. Roundabout’s life was to defend her as a worthy contestant for the ring. “You saw her fight—”

  “I saw her cower and whimper, just like you. No wonder you like that bitch so much. Two of a kind,” Emmitt had bellowed, shoving Jake toward the hall. “Get back in your room and stay put. Don’t you come out, even for food, until I say so. Hear?”

  Jake had known better than to argue. Sometimes Emmitt got like this when he was planning some kind of dirty deal—a drug or a weapons exchange. Emmitt’s illegal endeavors spread far beyond dogfighting. Or more correctly, dogfighting, by its very nature, drew in a variety of ugliness and crime.

  His room had been sweltering hot. He’d drowned in his own sweat, lying on his bare cot. He’d found a book abandoned at a campsite three miles through the woods—Dune. He’d reread it thirty-one times now, and guarded it like a religious icon. Usually, he reserved all his reading for the public library in Poplar Gorge. If Emmitt saw a book in his room, Jake cringed to think of the shit he’d get.

  But it was too hot to focus on reading tonight. Luckily, he’d brought a glass of water into his room last night, or he might have dehydrated. With nothing to do in the nearly empty room, he’d eventually fallen asleep.

  Only to awaken hours later to the sound of the dogs barking in excitement . . .

  He heard the scuffling sound of footsteps near his window and flew out of bed. Cautiously, he peered around the wooden frame of the curtainless, dirty window. It was a clear night with plenty of star shine. He saw the unmistakable outline of Emmitt’s tall, powerful form walking toward one of the barns. There was a pack or bag of some kind thrown over his shoulder. As Jake watched, a slender, pale forearm fell from the bag. The hand hung limply in the empty air, the fingers unmoving. A sick feeling rose in his stomach.

  Oh no. Not again.

  Anxiety shot through him at the recollection of finding another girl once, two summers ago. Afterward, he’d prayed it’d only happen that one time. He’d hoped Emmitt would never venture into this particular scheme for profit again. Wasn’t it bad enough that he abused and took advantage of animals the way he did? Now he was going to subject innocent human beings to his, and other men’s, sick appetites?

  But fear shot through Jake’s veins for yet another reason. Emmitt had gone batshit crazy when he’d found out Jake had seen and spoken to that other girl two years ago. He’d promised to kill Jake, and Jake believed wholeheartedly he’d do it. Emmitt had held him down on the barn floor and nicked his tongue with his huge buck knife, ranting about how he’d cut his tongue out completely before he killed him if he ever uttered a word to anyone about seeing that first girl.

  And now, here was another one.

  What if she was dead?

  No, Emmitt had as much use for a dead female as he did a cold dog.

  An icy sweat broke out over his body despite the fact that it was probably ninety degrees in his tiny, unventilated room. He may not get the exact specifics, but he understood now more than he had when he’d been eleven years old and discovered that first girl. He knew what rape was from the sly, ugly innuendo of not only the adult men who were drawn to Emmitt’s place, but his experience at Poplar Gorge Junior High. Boys could be graphic, even if most of his idiotic classmates didn’t understand a tenth of what they were talking about.

  Whatever his uncle had in store for that female was the stuff of nightmares. He knew about sex and breeding, not only from living with dogs and in the middle of the woods surrounded by nature, but from his uncle and other men who attended the fights. Prostitutes were often brought in on fight nights—rough-spoken, hard, usually drug- addicted women that Jake regarded with mixed distrust, pity, and disgust. He’d heard the disturbing exchanges between those women and men in the woods or out on the landing in the darkness of night. Whatever his uncle had in mind for that female with the slender hand, it somehow involved turning her into one of those pitiful women.

  Where’d Emmitt nabbed her from? Surely his uncle couldn’t have been so bold as to snatch her from nearby Poplar Gorge, the town where Jake sporadically attended school. He hadn’t known at first where Emmitt had gotten that first girl. Later, after doing some research at one of his favorite sanctuaries, the Poplar Gorge Public Library, he’d found out. There’d been several newspaper articles on the kidnapping in the Charleston Gazette. She’d been taken from a campground ten miles down the river.

  She’d never been found by the police, that Jake knew.

  Could he possibly scout out a couple of the campgrounds in the morning? If there was news of this new missing girl, maybe he could somehow leave a hint as to where she was before Emmitt transferred her elsewhere?

  Don’t think about it. Block it from your mind. There’s nothing you can do.

  Jake couldn’t help that girl any more than he could save the other one two summers ago. And he couldn’t save Mrs. Roundabout from what was going to be an agonizing, painful death from her injuries no matter how much he tried to doctor her. Emmitt reminded him several times a day of how useless he was. He couldn’t save himself from Emmitt. How could he p
ossibly save anyone else?

  Nevertheless, he didn’t go back to bed that night. The memory of that small, motionless hand haunted him. For some reason, he needed to see the face of its owner.

  He waited until he saw Emmitt leave the south barn and lock the doors with a heavy chain and padlock. He pretended to sleep as he listened to Emmitt’s heavy tread approach the house.

  Eventually, even the dogs his uncle had put into the south barn to guard the girl quieted their bloodthirsty barking. Jake waited until the sky over the trees turned a pale gold.

  Dawn was for the clean of spirit. That’s what his Grandma Rose liked to say. Jake knew from experience it was the period when Emmitt slept the deepest. He also knew dogs that had been given an excessive amount of blood and meat often slipped into a deep sleep afterward. Jake suspected Emmitt had given the guard dogs just that, not only to gain their cooperation and temporarily silence their bloodlust, but to amplify their murderous hunger upon awakening . . .

  Moving with the silence of an experienced eluder, Jake snuck into the kitchen and opened a cabinet, searching for food. He slipped out the back door and across the grounds to the south barn. He could pick the lock his uncle had put on the door. Being a prisoner of sorts himself, Jake had learned long ago how to open every lock Emmitt owned on the property. But he hesitated. The clanking sound of the chain sliding through the clasp was a risk. It might awaken the dogs. Or Emmitt.

  But he knew of other openings and secret places. He was small enough and agile enough to slip through them.

  As he climbed to the highest branches of the old maple at the back of the barn, the sun’s rays shone through the top of the tree line and pierced the thick foliage. Ignoring the forty-foot drop below him, he shimmied out onto a narrow limb. There were some advantages to being skinny . . . although this trusty branch was bending more and more with his weight each passing summer.