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“Did you ever think about
going to a shelter?” he asked.

“Sure, but I knew I wouldn’t
be safe there for long. He’d find a way to get to me.” She started twirling the
stem of the wineglass between her fingers to avoid looking him in the eye. “I
applied for a position as a receptionist in a wellness clinic. I didn’t really
have any skills, but the pay was decent and the hours were perfect. They were
nice enough to take a chance on me.”

He grinned. “I have no doubt
they’re glad they did.”

She looked up, surprised by
his vote of confidence. “I think they were impressed with my work ethic. I
wanted to do whatever I had to do to learn how to do the job to the best of my
ability. I didn’t want to let them, or myself, down.”

He took a sip of wine before
asking, “That’s how you became interested in massage therapy?”

Rachel took a generous sip of
her wine. She was already on her third glass and was divulging information she
probably wouldn’t have, had she been clear-headed. But it helped to talk to
someone who seemed to care about her journey. “Yeah, I became friendly with a
couple of the massage therapists at the clinic. They led me in the right
direction in terms of classes, financial aid, that kind of thing.”

“You had to hide that from him,
your work, your studies, everything?”

Tucker’s eyes darkened with
barely repressed fury when he mentioned Glen, and Rachel knew if the two men
were ever alone in a room together, there would be bloodshed.

“Yes. He didn’t want me to
work or make friends. He thought my dance was a stupid waste of time…”

He scowled. “It sounds like
the only time you wasted was the years you spent with that loser.”

Rachel chuckled. “You’re
right.” She would be able to wipe that man out of her memory completely, if not
for the fact that she saw him in their daughter every day. “Anyways, it took me
a few years to get my accreditation and save enough money to leave him, but
eventually I did.”

His eyes softened when he
looked at her. “I’m proud of you. It took a lot of courage to do what you did.”

She dipped her head to hide
her smile. He would never know how much his praise meant to her. She respected
him so much, and to know he felt the same way reminded her of how far she’d
come. “Thanks.”

“You mind telling me how you
got involved with him in the first place?”

She knew it would be best to
avoid his questions. The more Tucker knew about her, the greater the chance he
could eventually use the information to lock her up, but it felt like he was
slowing chipping away at the barrier she’d erected to protect herself, and
there was no way to keep him from getting closer to her and the truth about her
past.

“I was working at an ice
cream parlor the summer before my senior year of high school. He came in with a
bunch of his friends. He was cute and cool, one of the popular kids who rarely
gave me the time of day, unless…” Her voice trailed off.

“Unless what?” he said,
leaning forward. “You can tell me anything, Rachel. I want you to know that.”

She would give anything if
only that were true.
“Unless they
thought they had a chance of getting me into bed. When they realized they
didn’t, they started treating me like dirt again.”

A muscle twitched in his jaw,
revealing his frustration. “What made that dirt bag different?”

She couldn’t help but smile
at his accurate characterization of Glen. “He took the time to get to know me,
pretended he was interested.” She found herself clenching her fists when she
thought about those early days when he’d fooled her into believing she was the
center of his universe. “He made me believe he was falling in love with me.”

“But eventually you figured
out what kind of man he was. Why did you stay with him once you found out the
truth?”

“My mother had to leave town
during my senior year. I wanted to stay, so I rented a room not far from school
and worked part-time. I was alone, completely alone, and he took advantage of that.”
She couldn’t tell him that before long she was pregnant and she and her
daughter were totally dependent on him for their survival. “He brainwashed me,
made me believe that I couldn’t survive without him.”

He shook his head. “I can’t
even imagine what you must have gone through.”

She looked him in the eye.
“I’d never had any other sexual relationships. I thought that’s how it was
supposed to be. It took me a while to realize he was raping and abusing me
every night.” She drew a deep breath to force the vile words past her lips. “I
thought I was just engaging in some sort of kinky fuckery to keep my partner
happy… even though it was making me miserable.”

He closed his eyes.
“Sweetheart, what we shared last night, that’s the way it’s supposed to be when
two people l… care about each other.”

She nodded. “I realize that
now. I mean, I knew that even before I left him, but you showed me, first-hand,
how amazing it can be.” She reached across the table for his hand. “I’ll never
forget you for that.”

He looked sad as he glanced
down at their joined hands. “I never want to give you the chance to forget
about me, period. That’s just it. You continue to throw all these obstacles in
our path, and I can’t figure out why.” He looked up at her. “I just want to be
with you. Don’t you want that, too?”

She did, more than anything,
but wasn’t accustomed to getting what she wanted. “I told you, it’s not that
simple.” She withdrew her hand. “If you can’t respect that…”

He held his hand up. “I’m
sorry. Forget I said anything.” He rubbed his hands over his face. “I want you
to come over to the station on your lunch break tomorrow.”

Her heart started hammering
an unsteady rhythm in her chest. “What are you talking about? Why do I have to
come to the police station?”

“I want to know everything
there is to know about that piece of shit, so I can make sure he spends a good
long time behind bars.” He sneered. “Let him see how it feels to be beaten and
raped.”

If anyone deserved to be
punished for his actions, it was her ex, but she knew it wasn’t possible unless
she wanted to go down in flames with him. She couldn’t do that to her little
girl. Madison had already been through enough. “That’s my decision, not yours,
Tucker.”

He glared at her and she saw
a hint of the nasty cop who was hell-bent on running her out of his town.

“Don’t you see? You’ll never
feel safe. We’ll never be able to get on with our lives, unless he’s behind
bars.”

“You can’t promise me he’ll
go to jail for the things he did to me. It’s my word against his. He could say
I was into BDSM, that I wanted it. I have no proof that I didn’t.”

His eyes hardened and she
squirmed in her seat. He was clearly furious, and he wasn’t a man used to
backing down until he got what he wanted.

“I saw those fuckin’ scars he
left all over your body, Rachel. No woman in her right mind would want that.”

He was right, of course, but
that still didn’t buy her a guarantee that Glen would ever see the inside of a
jail cell. “He would say I wasn’t in my right mind.” She chuckled. “Hell, maybe
I wasn’t. I mean, I did stay with him after he did those things to me.”

“Honey,” he said, reaching
out to take her hand. “You were a victim. What he did to you was sick. He
deserves to pay.”

“That’s my decision to make,
not yours. I already made that decision when I left him. He’s a part of my
past, and I just pray to God it stays that way.”

“So you just keep running?
Every time you feel he’s closing in on you, you just run to another town,
another state?”

She shrugged. “It’s not a big
deal. I’ve been moving around all my life.”

“Yeah, but don’t you want to
put down roots, settle down somewhere, fall in love, and have a couple of
babies?” He grinned. “I’d suggest getting married first, of course. I’m an
old-fashioned guy.”

Her heart swelled. He was the
best man she had ever met, and there was no question in her mind that she was
falling in love with him, but she could never tell him how she felt about him.
It was too dangerous. She knew Tucker was getting too close to her, and the
truth.

Rachel knew she would have no
choice but to leave town soon. School let out in a couple of weeks. That would
be the perfect time to pack up and move on. For the first time, the thought of
moving broke her heart; she didn’t want to leave Tucker or her dance studio
behind. She wanted to build a life here in Brant County, with him, her mother,
her daughter, Dixie…

“Why so quiet all of a
sudden? Am I doing it again, pushing too hard?”

“Yes,” she said quietly.

He closed his eyes. “I’m
sorry, sweetheart. I can’t seem to help myself.”

“I think it’s time, Tucker.”

His eyes opened, widening
when he looked at her. “No! Damn it, Rachel, I’d hoped…”

“I know. I’m sorry. Please…
just take me home.”

Chapter Ten

They were sitting in Tucker’s
driveway, but he couldn’t let her go. He didn’t know what he could do or say to
convince her to stay, short of hand-cuffing her to his bed, but he knew in his
heart that if she left him tonight, she wouldn’t be coming back.

“Come in for a while.” It
wasn’t a question. He was tired of pleading his case. If she didn’t have the
courage to take a chance on them, he would take the decision out of her hands
the only way he knew how.

“I should get going.”

He was on her before she
could draw a breath. His hands and mouth were everywhere at once, licking,
sucking, caressing, and fingering her into a frenzied state of lust and
desperation.

“Oh my God,” she whispered,
holding his head against her breast as he spun his tongue in lazy circles
around her nipple. “That feels soooo good.”

He mimicked the action on her
clit, drawing tight circles on the sensitive bud with his finger. “Let me take
you upstairs. I want to do this right.”

She wrapped her arms around
his neck. “Yes…”

He knew he was a cad for
using sex to break down her defenses, but years as a cop taught him that you
had to use any weapon at your disposal, and sometimes it meant fighting dirty when
you were fighting for survival. That’s how this felt to him, like a fight for
survival, because he didn’t know how he could cope without her. Now that he’d
had a taste of what it felt like to be in love, he didn’t want to know what it
felt like to live without it.

Tucker jumped out of his
vehicle and slammed the door. He wasn’t going to take the risk she might change
her mind. He smiled when he reached in to the passenger’s side to collect her.

Her eyes were closed and she
was resting her head against the seat. After three glasses of wine at the
restaurant, he knew she was tired and probably a little hazy. Her inhibitions
were lowered, and she was already hot and wet for him. In no time at all, he
would have her naked and begging for him to make love to her. Seconds felt like
hours ticking by; he couldn’t wait to get her upstairs.

Tucker carried her in to the
house and up the stairs before depositing her on his bed. He stood back to look
at her under the dim light of the bedside lamp. She was so gorgeous. He didn’t
want to think about the vast hole she would leave in his life and his heart if
she left him and Brant behind.

She reached for the tie on
her dress. “I need you,” she whispered.

Those three little words were
his un-doing. He knew there was nothing he wouldn’t do to make this woman his.
He wanted her to need him, but even more, he needed her to love him.

He reached for the belted tie
around her waist and carefully pulled it free. “You’re so beautiful,” he
whispered as he spread the fabric wide to reveal the scraps of blue silk
beneath. She winced when he offered the compliment, and he knew she was
self-conscious about the scarring. He would gladly spend the rest of his life
convincing her that she was the most stunning woman to ever grace his bed. The
women in his past were little more than a hazy silhouette eclipsed by the
intensity of his feelings for her.

He pressed a tender kiss to
her abdomen and heard her breath hitch. He knew it would take a long time to
heal the emotional scars that monster had inflicted, and Tucker was prepared to
pay homage to her body every night for the rest of her life if that’s what it
took for her to re-gain the self-confidence her ex had stolen from her.

She braced her hand on his
shoulder. “I love the way you make me feel.”

“The feeling’s mutual.” It
wasn’t just the way she made him feel in bed. Rachel made him happier than he
could ever remember being. He thought about her all the time, and when they
weren’t together, he found himself counting the hours until he could see her
again. His buddies would tease him mercilessly, but he didn’t care. He would
willingly endure their mocking every day as long as he got to come home to her
every night. “I love everything about you, baby.”