Identity Crisis (18 page)

‘But it was.’

She nodded. ‘It was. Then the expensive gifts and flowers started showing up at my door,
my
door, not K. Ryde’s office, my home which no one knew anything about. I couldn’t send them back, I had no address. I emailed and asked him to stop and he got angry. And the gifts got unpleasant. Rotting fish, a dead snake, horrible, horrible pictures. I don’t know if he took them or just downloaded them off really sick internet sites, but it got worse and so did the emails, more and more threatening. Awful stuff. I changed my email. It didn’t help. I moved. It didn’t help.’

‘Didn’t you call the police?’

‘Of course I did, but there was nothing they could do. Even when the death threats started, there was still nothing they could do, not really. He had my cell phone number and he called me dozens of times a day. I got a new phone and it started all over again. Then he found out that I worked for K. Ryde. I don’t think he ever learned that I was K. Ryde, though I can’t imagine how he didn’t know that. He knew everything else. But when he found out that I worked for the Ryde Agency, he found out about a client I was working with at the time, a very secretive client. He told me he’d turn his attention on the client. That’s the only time I ever turned a client over to the Bachman Agency. And I knew I couldn’t continue, that K. Ryde couldn’t continue without putting clients and people I cared about at risk.’

She lowered her head into her hands and tried to breathe, tried to get her heart to slow down. ‘I couldn’t take it anymore, Garrett. I left. I sold the Ryde Agency for a lot of money and I moved back to Portland.’

‘Fuck, Kendra! And I involved you in all this.’

She shook her head. ‘Garrett, it can’t be him. I hired a detective to find out who he was, to find him and get him off my back. I mean, I had to do something. The police were of no use. I gave them everything I knew, even went so far as to hang out in the places where he used to be with a wire.’

‘Jesus, Kendra! Were you crazy?’

He pulled her to him with such force that she groaned and wriggled for breathing space.

She offered a ghost of a smile. ‘I probably was. I certainly couldn’t have been far from it. All I knew was that I wanted my life back, and I wanted this bastard to leave me alone.

‘In the end, I sold up and left California. The stress was doing a number on me, and the detective thought I’d be better somewhere safe and out of harm’s way.’

‘So what happened?’ Garrett asked.

Kendra wiped at her eyes with the backs of her hand. ‘It was almost like the minute I took back my identity, my real identity, and came home to where I belong, the threats, the phone calls, the emails, everything stopped. I lived on eggshells for several weeks. Harris and Dee took me in, took care of me until I was fit to rejoin society again. Then, when I’d been home about a month or so, the detective agency got in touch with me. They’d found the man, a Frederick Parks. Called himself Edge. Apparently, I wasn’t the first woman he’d stalked.’

‘Did he go to jail for what he did?’ Garrett said.

She shook her head and shoved the hair back over her shoulders. ‘He was dead. They think he fell asleep with a cigarette, he was probably drunk or on something, and burnt his own house down around him.’

‘God,’ Garrett whispered. ‘And they were sure it was him?’

She nodded. ‘The ID was positive. So there’s no way this Razor Sharp can be my stalker. You said it yourself. He’s been emailing Tess for a long time now. And I still maintain that it’s probably nothing. I just … I never expected to react quite so strongly.’

‘Fuck, Kendra! Why the hell wouldn’t you react strongly? I mean, the man made your life a living hell. The nightmare. It was …’

‘It was about him, yes.’

For a long time, the two sat in silence on the bathroom floor, Kendra resting her head against the wonderfully steady beating of Garrett’s heart. At last she sighed. ‘I really need a Diet Pepsi, and maybe some more of that cold pizza.’

Later, when they had both eaten and had worked up an email to send Don that was evasive enough about what happened to protect Kendra’s privacy but they felt offered enough to satisfy his curiosity, exhaustion set in.

Garrett pulled Kendra to her feet and guided her to the stairs. ‘Shower in the morning,’ he said, then he nuzzled her neck gently. ‘Together. Rain check and all, you know?’ She smiled and nodded her agreement.

At the top of the stairs, he didn’t let go of her hand at the guest room door, but slid his arm around her and guided her to his room. ‘If you think I’m letting you sleep alone tonight after the day you’ve had, then you’d better think again.’ When she started to protest, he covered her lips with his and shushed her. ‘I won’t take no for an answer.’ He slid the shirt off over her head, then went to work on the fly of her jeans. ‘And don’t worry, I’ll behave.’ He nipped her earlobe lightly. ‘Unless you want me to misbehave. I’m fine either way.’

He helped her out of her boots, then her jeans, and settled her into his big bed, the one they had romped in together – was it just last night? It took him all of two seconds to shed his track suit and his sneakers, then he slid in next to her and pulled her tightly against him into a spoon position. ‘Get some sleep, Kendra. Tomorrow we’ll both see things more clearly.’ He kissed her ear. ‘And if you dream, I’ll be right here. I’m not going anywhere.’

‘Garrett.’ His name felt good on her lips in the darkness.

‘Hmm?’

‘Thank you.’

He kissed the back of her neck and cupped her breast in the curve of his hand. She could feel the press of his erection against her butt, and she would have loved to take care of it for him, but she was asleep before she could do more than think about it. This time it was the deep, dreamless sleep of exhaustion, sleep in a safe place, a comfortable place. Quite possibly the most comfortable place in which she had ever slept. In the arms of Garrett Thorne.

Chapter Nineteen

Dawn was paling when Garrett woke, feeling confused. For a brief moment he didn’t remember where he was or what his circumstances were. It was the muffled moan that came from the pillow next to him and a length of exquisite thigh extending from beneath the comforter that brought everything back to him, and he was suddenly wide awake, holding his breath, listening, listening to Kendra sleep. But after a moment of intense scrutiny, he relaxed and raised himself on one elbow to look down at her. She wasn’t dreaming. Thank God! There was no rapid eye movement, and her breathing was deep and even, completely relaxed.

He studied her blatantly, lying there sleeping, vulnerable, unable to avoid his gaze, unable to turn the tables on him. The red hair was a far cry from the creamy blonde she’d been only a few days ago, and the cut, the style, all different from the Kendra Davis he knew. Even in her portrayal of Tess she had emptied herself. She had become as nobody in order to embody the woman he had become as nobody to create. Jesus, what a pair they made! Did either of them even know who they really were?

He couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t been Ellis’s kid brother, even though there was less than a year’s difference in their age. He couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t felt inadequate to the task, the task of living up to the standards Ellis so effortlessly set from the time he was a little boy. Garrett was the other Thorne – the one who never amounted to much, the one who always found a way to disappoint. He swallowed back his bitterness. He might as well be Tess. At least Tess was somebody. It certainly wasn’t Ellis’s fault that he was the disappointing brother. Ellis was wonderful, Ellis was true and steady and always, always there for him, even after everything that had happened, even after all the pain he had caused.

He reached out a finger and traced the soft spiral curve of Kendra’s ear, exposed from the fall of her hair. He understood her. He understood her far better than she could imagine. He understood how much power one wielded when one was nobody, when one could simply fade into the woodwork and not be taken seriously. The invisible can manage so much in their anonymity. Did Kendra live in the shadow of an older sister or brother? He seriously doubted it. How could anyone so powerful, so exquisite, so brave ever live in anyone’s shadow? And yet how easily, how perfectly she had embodied Tess. To the rest of the world, she was Tess Delaney.

‘But not to me,’ he whispered, bending to brush a kiss across her hair. She stirred slightly and sighed. ‘You’ll never be Tess to me,’ he said. ‘You’re Kendra Davis, and that’s way more of a challenge than Tess could ever be.’

She stirred again and wriggled into the spoon position. The lovely naked arc of her bottom, pushing back against his usual morning stiffness, brought his cock to full attention and made his heart race.

‘You awake?’ she mumbled. The sound of sleep in her voice was outrageously sexy.

He tried very hard to hold still, to ignore the irresistible urge to shift his hips until his erection nestled tighter in the cleft between her buttocks, pressed there hopefully, eagerly. ‘You should go back to sleep.’ He brushed her throat with a kiss, and his insides leapt with excitement as her lips curved into a smile, heavy lashes fluttering over her still-closed eyes.

‘Make me,’ she whispered. Then she ground her bottom against his hard-on, and he gasped his surprise. She fumbled beneath the covers to where his hand rested on her hip and guided it first to brush across her breasts with their begging nipples full and distended. It was only a brief tease of a detour on the route to the soft curls of her pubis. They were golden curls, he recalled with great satisfaction. At the core of her, she was still Kendra Davis, and no matter how hard she tried, she could never really be otherwise. For a second she allowed him to stroke and caress her there, then she wriggled and shifted, guiding his fingers until the middle one brushed the marbled rise of her clit, causing a kitten-like whimper and a hitch of her breath. Then she rocked, first back to rub against his cock, then forward onto his fingers, which wriggled and squirmed and burrowed their way into the valleys and rises of her, desperate to tweak and probe her humid depths. Already he could smell her heat rising. Already she was open and yielding, her body gripping at the push and shove of his fingers like a nursing infant. Already he felt the weight of his own arousal surrounding and enfolding him.

Over her grumble of a protest, he pulled away and reached for a condom from the nightstand. And when he was sheathed, he slid down next to her. He eased her thighs open from behind and she pressed her bottom back toward him, meeting him, opening to him, yielding as he maneuvered his way home. As he pressed up into her, she released a long, quavering breath.

With one hand splayed low on her belly, he pulled her tighter to him, pulled her closer and deeper onto him until he could feel the full grip and release, grip and release of her need against him.

The press and strain and the rock and shift would have been barely noticeable to anyone looking on from above the comforter, but Garrett felt the gripping warmth of her, the caress of each undulation all the way to the crown of his head, and the buzz of being inside Kendra Davis was better than any drug, any drink he had ever experienced. He nibbled and caressed her neck and her nape and her shoulders. He thumbed and raked at her nipples. He ran his hand down the flat slope of her belly to stroke the softness of her tight curls, to tweak the hardness of her clit, to feel her fast, furious pull for breath low in her abdomen, to feel the tight edge of her imminent orgasm barley restrained, barely held back by her desire, by both of their desire to make it last.

Holding tight, holding his breath, holding to every last shred of control, he waited for her, waited expectantly, anxiously, needily, until at last her voice found its way up through her efforts to breathe. ‘Garrett, make me come now. I need you to make me come.’

It only took another sharp thrust and she convulsed into orgasm, gripping him tight enough to send him as well, shuddering and growling against her.

And when they could breathe again, she reached behind her and patted his ass with her palm. ‘That’s better. I’ll go back to sleep now.’ And she did. They both did.

Even though her father’s was a very small motorhome, it still dominated the street in front of Garrett Thorne’s house. Carla wasn’t sure how long she could park in the neighborhood before someone called the police and she’d have to ask her dad to come get it and bring her car back. It was still smaller than some of the news vans, she told herself, though she didn’t expect that to carry much weight with the police. Even though she could barely turn around without hitting her nose on the opposite wall, at least now she had the luxuries of a bathroom and a mini refrigerator. She could last for weeks if she had to with her father bringing her supplies. And he loved a good mystery as much as she did, so he had been all too happy to oblige.

Still, this mystery frightened her. This mystery made her feel there was way more at risk than a great story.

A tinny rendition of
Dueling Banjos
suddenly filled the tight space and she jumped and uttered a little yelp of surprise before she managed to retrieve her iPhone from the makeshift Formica table.

‘Carla, Barker Blessing here.’

There was only one reason she could think that he might be up at this hour. Her insides roiled at the sound of his voice, and it was suddenly difficult to breathe. ‘Have you heard from him?’ She hoped he couldn’t hear the nervous flutter in her voice.

‘No,’ came the breathy reply.

She slumped, feeling the tension drain away from her shoulders. Even though they really could use another message from the stalker about now, it was still a relief not to have one. There was an uncertain sounding pause, and she could hear Blessing take a deep breath. ‘Then there’s – nothing new?’

‘No. Nothing.’ she said, continuing her web search for stalkers in the Northwest who were notable enough to get the police’s attention. There were also some websites her father had given her links to. His resources were often at least as good as the police.

Blessing laughed nervously. ‘I didn’t wake you, did I?’

‘No. I was awake.’ She peeked out at the front of the Thorne house, bathed in the early morning sun. Her eyes felt like they were full of sand, but she was awake.

‘You haven’t told anyone, have you?’ he said. ‘I mean, he did say not to and we can’t put poor Tess at any more risk than she already is, can we?’

She rolled her eyes. ‘Of course I haven’t told anyone.’ Well, she had actually told her father, but the stalker hadn’t said she couldn’t and her dad had wheedled it out of her in exchange for the motorhome and help with the links he had access to. Besides, her dad was a resource she couldn’t afford to overlook. ‘I’m just doing a little research on my own. You’ll let me know if you hear from him, though, right?’

‘Yes, yes,’ he said. ‘Perhaps you should come over to my place, maybe for brunch, and we could discuss everything that’s happened. I’m sure you must have more questions about my time with Tess at the Golden Kiss Awards. Plus it would be nice to meet the woman in person who interviewed me.’

Jesus, was the guy really hitting on her? ‘Thank you, Mr. Blessing, but at the moment, I can’t get away.’

‘Are you still staking out Thorne’s house?’

‘Mmm-hmmm.’ A few of the press were now out of the vans, milling about. Some had cups from the local Starbucks, some were eating doughnuts. Her stomach growled.

‘Any sightings of our illustrious couple?’

‘Nothing since the press conference. I would imagine they’re still in bed.’

‘You suppose she really is writing?’ His voice was low, suggestive. ‘Thorne has a reputation, you know.’

‘I don’t know what she’s doing, Mr. Blessing. At the moment you know as much as I do.’ That was a lie, but his pumping her for information was a waste of her time if he had nothing he could offer.

For a second, there was silence on the line. An email from her father popped onto the screen of her iPad. She opened it to discover links to reports of recent sex-related murders, and her stomach churned at the sudden escalation in her research. She nearly forgot about Blessing until he forced an impatient little sigh.

‘You all right?’ she asked at last.

‘Yes, fine. I’m fine. It’s just that yesterday was a rather harrowing day, wasn’t it?’

‘Sure was,’ she said. ‘Look, Mr. Blessing, I really need to get back to it. I need to stay focused, you know? Thorne and Ms. Delaney could come out any time.’

‘Stay focused, yes, of course you do. I’ll just … I’ll just let you go, then. You will call, right?’

‘I will, I promise, Mr. Blessing,’ she said as she cut the connection. He might be famous, but he was irritating as hell when she was trying to work. This was the fifth time he’d called her since the press conference.

She laid her iPhone aside and began to sift the data her father had sent her, double checking to make sure all the doors to the motorhome were locked. Of course they were, and yet, she still couldn’t fight back the feeling that she was being watched.

She’d just poured the last cup of coffee from the Thermos her father had brought her when, out of the corner of her eye, movement caught her attention. She looked up to see a blue-grey Lexus pull in front of Thorne’s house. As the door opened, she set her coffee cup down onto the table, slopping it across the shiny surface as she grabbed her Dictaphone and shoved her way out of the motorhome, slamming the door behind her. This was just too much for even her to believe!

The sun was streaming through the bedroom window when they both were startled awake by a commotion from the press already gathered on the front porch. Then they heard the turning of the lock and the opening of the front door.

‘What the …?’ Garrett catapulted out of bed and practically fell on his face getting into his track bottoms. ‘Stay here, Kendra. I mean it,’ he called over his shoulder. He was halfway down the stairs before Kendra could shove her way into his robe. Outside, she could hear the press attempting to engage whoever was shoving their way into Garrett’s front door. But they were getting no joy. She raced out of the room and nearly ran into Garrett where he stood halfway down the stairs, and then she saw the reason why.

‘Stacie? What the hell are you doing here?’ Garrett’s voice was low and dangerous.

‘Your ex? Your ex has a key?’ Kendra felt a tug of jealousy in the pit of her stomach, and mentally kicked herself for caring one way or another.

The woman was locking the door behind her and checking the deadbolt. She was dressed to the teeth in a pinstripe power suit and matching navy stilettos, and damn, she looked way better than Kendra wished she did. Especially when she could only imagine what she looked like. She had gone to bed with Garrett without bothering to take off her make-up or run a comb through her hair. She wasn’t sure she could have stayed awake long enough to do either.

‘Sorry, Garrett, I didn’t mean to wake you,’ she called over her shoulder. ‘I just got into PDX after a very long flight. What the hell’s the press doing out there anyway? I thought they were going to tear me –’ She stopped mid-sentence when she turned to find Kendra and Garrett standing on the stairs, clearly just out of bed.

Everyone stood freeze-framed in the moment that it took the situation to register. The silence was broken only by the press, who sounded like they were ready for blood.

‘She has a key?’ Those were the first words out of Kendra’s mouth, and fuck if they didn’t make her sound like some kind of jealous bitch. She wasn’t jealous, damn it! She wasn’t!

Garrett ran a nervous hand through his hair and huffed out a harsh breath. ‘Stacie, you are the queen of poor timing. Have you been on another planet or something? Are you the only one who doesn’t know about Garrett Thorne absconding with the winner of the Golden Kiss Award and hiding her away from her adoring public?’ He pulled Kendra to his side and slipped an arm around her. She resisted the urge to elbow him good and hard in the ribs.