Texas! Chase #2 (24 page)

But only because she loved him so much.

He had denied believing in Pat Bush's speculations that her obscene calls were only a ploy to get attention, an old maid's last, desperate attempt to keep her man. But could she really blame Chase if he had his doubts?

The calls were real. The threats were real.

She could sense that they were. And as soon as the man called back and Chase heard a replay of his voice, he would know she was telling him the truth. This time, she wasn't trying to trick him.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Marcie."

At last! It was he! Her heart began to pound.

"You've got to stop calling me," she said, trying to keep the elation out of her voice.

Finally he had called. Chase would believe her now.

"I won't stop calling till I get what I want.

You know what I want," he said in the raspy

tone of voice that sent chills up her spine. "I

want you under me. Wet and wiggling."

"You're disgusting."

"Are your nipples hard? Touch them for me, Marcie. Hmm, Marcie, that's good. That's good." He moaned.

"They ought to lock you up and throw away the key. You're sick. You're a menace to society."

He laughed, sounding superior and condescending.

"I know the sheriff has tapped your phone, but I know how to get around that."

Was he bluffing? How could he know the sheriffs office was now apprised of her calls?

He couldn't. It was only a lucky guess.

"I know just how long to talk before hanging up so they can't trace the call."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"They don't believe you, do they, Marcie?

Not the sheriff. And not your husband. They think you're making me up, a figment of your imagination."

"No." Her mouth had gone dry. She gripped the receiver harder, until her knuckles turned white. She tried to swallow, but had no saliva.

"Chase believes me."

Again that nasty laugh. "I'm coming for you, Marcie. Soon."

"Leave me alone. I'm warning you—"

"You'll like me, Marcie. I'm a better man than your husband." He cackled. "And he doesn't even believe you. He won't be there to save you when I've got you naked and spread open."

"Stop." She whimpered.

"Good-bye, Marcie. Be seeing you."

"No," she said, suddenly panicked. "Wait!

Don't hang up. Please, not yet."

"Goodbye."

His voice was singsong. He was playing with her. She knew better than to cry. Her intellect told her that was what he wanted, but she couldn't stop her tears or hiccupping sobs.

"My husband will kill you when they catch you."

He laughed, with more malice than before.

"He doesn't love you."

"He does. He will."

"Never, Marcie. You tricked him," he taunted.

"Good-bye. See you soon. Soon, Marcie. Marcie.

Marcie… Marcie…"

The voice changed; it became Chase's voice.

Her eyes flew open and she sprang erect. Chase was there, sitting on the edge of the bed, rubbing her shoulders gently and speaking her name, drawing her out of her nightmare.

With a harsh cry she flung herself against

his bare chest, despising the feminine weak ness that caused her to clutch at him. She had always been contemptuous of women who weakly clung to men and used tears to get attention. But when Chase's strong, warm arms enfolded her, she forgot to be resentful of her own frailty. She nuzzled her face in his chest hair.

"You were having a nightmare," he whispered.

"I could hear you crying all the way into the other room. But you're awake now and I'm here."

"Hold me, Chase. Please."

He lay down with her, drawing her even closer against him and pulling the covers over them. He stroked her back, cupped her head, and tucked it beneath his chin.

"He was on the phone."

"Shh. He's not there now."

"But I want him to be," she cried frantically.

"It's been two weeks since we went to the sheriff. I want you to hear him. I want you to know. Then you'll believe me."

"I believe you."

"He reads my mind, Chase. It's like he knows that I want him to call. He's not calling on purpose."

"Shh. Just relax. Go back to sleep."

"When he calls, you'll know I'm telling the truth." She was babbling, but she couldn't help it. She was desperate to regain his trust.

"When he calls, you'll believe me, Chase."

"I believe you."

"He's got to call."

But another week went by and he didn't call.

Lucky came into the office, stamping the mud off his boots. He inspected the bottom of them, decided they were reasonably clean, then glanced up to find his brother slumped in the chair behind the desk, his feet resting on the corner of it, staring into space.

"I thought you would be on your way home by now."

Chase roused himself and lowered his feet to the floor. "No, not yet."

"It's still coming down in buckets out there."

"Hmm."

Chase had regressed into the strong, silent type again, Lucky thought. For a while there, he'd actually acted like a human being. For the past several weeks, though, he'd been morose, uncommunicative, surly.

"That guy from Houston called again while you were at lunch," Lucky told him. "Harlan Boyd. Did you get the message?"

"Yes."

"Did you return his call?"

"No."

It was on the tip of Lucky's tongue to ask why the hell not, but that would no doubt provoke a quarrel, which would serve no purpose.

Or maybe it would. Maybe it would clear the air. He knew, however, that his brother's problem wasn't with him. It wasn't even directly related to Tyler Drilling.

"I take it that Marcie hasn't heard from the creep." Chase's head came around quickly, his expression dark and suspicious. Lucky gave a helpless shrug. "Pat told Mother about it."

"That was nice of him." Chase bolted from his chair. "Dammit! Now I'm sure all of you think she's a nut case."

"No, we're relieved to know what the problem is. We all thought she was sick and dying or something too dreadful for y'all even to tell us about."

Again Lucky was on the receiving end of a glower that demanded explanation. "Do you think we're blind, Chase? She's lost weight.

She's pale as a spook. She's as jumpy as a turkey the day before Thanksgiving. None of that characterizes the Marcie we've come to know and love. She's usually in control, unruffled and well balanced. Didn't you think we would notice this personality change?"

"Why go to Pat? Why didn't you ask me?"

"Mother didn't go to Pat specifically. They were just talking, and she expressed her concern over Marcie, and to lay her mind at rest that Marcie didn't have cancer or something, Pat told her about the pond scum that's calling

Marcie."

"While he was giving away privileged information, did he also mention that he thinks the caller is a product of Marcie's imagination?"

Lucky looked away guiltily.

"I can see that he did."

"Well, I for one think that's crap. And the strength of my opinion can't even compare to Devon's. She went positively berserk when it was even suggested. To his face she called Pat a redneck conservative and a chauvinistic dinosaur.

I'll tell you something, Chase," he said, shaking his head, "if our two ladies ever team up against us, we've had it."

Chase's stern lips cracked a smile, but Lucky could tell his heart wasn't behind it. "How're things otherwise?"

Chase asked testily, "What things?"

"You know, things."

"You mean like our sex life? That kind of things? You want to know how many times a week I make love to my wife, is that it?"

Lucky refused to get angry. One man with a rigid stance, balled fists, and red face was about all the small office could accommodate.

"For starters. How many?"

"Why, are you keeping score?"

"Something like that."

"None of your damn business."

"Come on, Chase, have a heart," he wheedled.

"Devon and I have had to taper off these last few weeks. I've had to resort to voyeurism,."

"Are you sure you haven't been making those phone calls to Marcie?"

Lucky laughed, not the least bit offended.

But within seconds he grew serious. "I hit it, didn't I? Y'all aren't, uh, sleeping together."

Chase flung himself back into the chair, frustration incarnate, a man whose skin had suddenly shrunk too small to fit him.

"I recognize the symptoms, big brother."

Lucky said sympathetically. "Remember how much I wanted Devon but couldn't have her because she was married? I nearly went out of my freaking mind. If being horny was a terminal illness, I wouldn't be here to tell about it."

He dragged a stool across the floor and set it a few feet in front of Chase. "Abstinence was forced on me. What I can't figure," he said, leaning forward from his seat, "is why you're not availing yourself of your very lovely, very sexy wife, who is very much in love with you."

"She's not in love with me," Chase grumbled.

"Bull. And I'm not the only one who thinks so. Mother and Devon agree. So does Sage."

"Oh, well, hell, if Sage thinks so…" He let the sarcastic response trail off. "What are we, the constant topic of conversation out there?"

"Actually, y'all are about on equal par with the baby."

Chase muttered a series of curses. Not to be so easily dismissed, Lucky reminded him that he hadn't answered his question.

"No, I haven't," Chase said, "because it's none of your business."

"You're not put off by this pervert who's calling her, are you?" He got a dirty look for an answer. "You don't think Marcie's turned on by it, do you? Or that it's somehow her fault?"

"What do you take me for, an idiot?"

"Well, what else could it be? Did you do something to make her mad?"

"No."

"Did she lock you out?"

"No!"

"So if it's not Marcie, then you're the one whose holding out. Why, Chase?"

Chase made to get up. Lucky shoved him back into the chair. The brothers stared one another down.

Finally Chase shrugged indifferently.

"Okay, you might as well know. You'll probably find out sooner or later. By accident.

Just like I did."

"Find out what?"

Chase told him about the telephone call from the house painter. "It made no sense until I figured out that he wasn't talking about the current Mrs. Tyler, but the late Mrs. Tyler.

He was talking about Tanya. The house we're living in now was the house Tanya had picked out, the one I was supposed to be looking at with her the day she died, the one I subsequently had you buy.

Marcie told you she had a buyer for it. She was that buyer."

This time when Chase left the chair, Lucky made no attempt to stop him. He was preoccupied by this astounding piece of information.

He swore softly. "I had no idea."

"No. Neither did I."

"She told me she would handle everything, the closing and all that. I never would have guessed."

"Startling, isn't it? You can imagine how I

felt when I found out."

"To think that she loved you that much, all that time."

Chase caught Lucky by the shoulder and spun him around. "What did you say? What are you talking about? Love? She tricked me.

She played the dirtiest, rottenest trick—"

"Man, are you muleheaded!" Lucky shouted, surging to his feet. "You're too stupid to be my brother.

They must have mixed up the babies at the hospital."

"Make your point," Chase ground out.

Lucky roughly poked him in the chest with his index finger. "You can't see past Marcie's deception to the reason behind it." Then he peered shrewdly into Chase's gray eyes, which were as turbulent as the low clouds that scuttled across the twilight sky.

"Or maybe you can. Maybe that's what's

eating at you. It's not the house that bothers you so much. What you can't accept is that you have been loved so well. Twice."

He placed a hand on each of Chase's shoulders.

"What's the single worst thing that could happen to you, Chase? The worst possible thing?"

The following silence was broken by the shrill ringing of the telephone. Chase, grateful for the interruption, snatched up the receiver and growled a hello.

"Chase, is Lucky there?"

Lucky saw the expression on his brother's face change as he passed him the telephone receiver. "It's Devon. It sounds urgent."

Lucky grabbed the phone. "Devon? Is this—"

"Yes. My water just broke. I called the doctor.

He said to come to the hospital right away. The pains are coming hard."

"Christ." He pulled his hand down his face.

He was a good five miles from home. "Okay, okay. Everything's fine. I'll meet you at the hospital. Hurry.

But tell Mother to drive carefully.

It's raining and the roads—"

"She's not here."

What?"

"She went out."

"Out? Out where? When?"

"A while ago. I think she was taking some food to a sick friend. Anyway she left with a jar of homemade soup and a pecan pie. Or maybe it was an apple pie."

"Devon, who gives a damn about a pie!" he roared. "Sit down. No, lie down. Yeah, lie down. Stay calm. I'll be right there."

"I am calm. And I'm perfectly capable of driving myself to the hospital."

Every blood vessel in Lucky's head seemed to explode. "Don't pull that feminist crap on me now, Devon!"

"Stop yelling at me! As soon as I shave my legs I'll drive myself."

"Shave your legs? If you even attempt to drive, I'll murder you. I mean it, Devon. I'm on my way. Five minutes. Lie down, for crissake!"

He hung up before she had time to respond and raced for the door. Chase followed closely on his brother's heels. He had a fair grasp of the situation even hearing but one side of the conversation.

"We can call an ambulance to go get her." he suggested.

"I'll beat their time."

"That's what I'm afraid of."

Chase jumped into the passenger seat of the

Mustang because Lucky took the wheel. They sped off into the rain.