With This Ring
Authors: Patricia Kay
By
Patricia Kay
Copyright © 2011 by Patricia Kay
These stories are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from Patricia Kay.
Cover art by Web Crafters
Editing by Patricia Kay
Patricia Kay is an award-winning, USA Today bestselling author of more than fifty novels of romance and women’s fiction. Early works of hers were published under the pseudonyms Trisha Alexander and Ann Patrick. In addition to her writing, she is an acclaimed writing teacher who has taught classes at The University of Houston and in workshops around the country but now limits her teaching to online classes. You can read all about her on her website, www.patriciakay.com.
This book was originally published by Kensington Publishing Company in 1996 as
THE CONSTANT HEART
. I have always loved the story and am so glad to now be able to offer it in a re-edited, e-book format. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and I hope you’ll try some of my other books, as well.
I always love to hear from readers. You can write to me through my website or at
[email protected]
. Happy Reading!
Houston, Texas - Friday, October 28, 1992
Pregnant!
Amy Carpenter couldn't stop smiling. She tapped her fingers against the steering wheel in time to Bonnie Raitt's "Let's Give 'Em Something to Talk About" and grinned from ear to ear.
She knew she shouldn't be so happy. After all, this pregnancy was a bit premature since her wedding wasn't scheduled to take place until the start of her Christmas break—still eight weeks away.
But she didn't care. Joy, like champagne, bubbled inside, giddy and irrepressible. She felt like shouting from the rooftops.
And her parents! They would be thrilled. They wanted grandchildren more than just about anything. Of course, they would have preferred she wait until she was married—especially Amy's mother—but she didn't think the fact that she and Sam had jumped the gun would matter much in the end. It was the baby that was important.
A delicious shiver raised chill bumps on her arms as she thought of her fiancé. Sam.
Oh, Sam, please be happy, too.
She told herself he would be. He wanted kids, and even though he'd said "someday" the one time they'd discussed the subject, Amy didn't think he'd mind if that "someday" was sooner than they'd anticipated.
She wished she could call him and tell him immediately. Unfortunately, where Sam was, there were no phones. Amy would have to wait until she heard from him again.
He'd originally expected to be back in Houston by now. Sam was a staff photographer for
World of Nature
magazine, and he'd thought this assignment to shoot the elusive snow leopards who made their home high up in the Himalayas would only take a couple of weeks, a month at the most. But the snow leopards had proven more elusive than ever, and Sam had been in Nepal more than two months already.
It might not be so bad if she could at least talk to him regularly, but he was in such a remote area that his base camp was a three-day hike, so she'd only talked to him twice since he'd been gone.
If Amy thought her married life would be like this—a long series of absences with no communication—she might not have been so eager to marry Sam, no matter how much she loved him. But he'd promised her he would do his best to avoid assignments that would keep him away longer than a week or two, and he had also promised he would take her along with him whenever he could.
Now that she was pregnant she wouldn't be able to travel with him as planned, at least not until the baby was old enough to go, too, but that was okay. The trade-off was worth it. She was going to be a mother.
A mother. Imagine.
Less than four months ago she'd despaired of ever finding the right man, and now she'd not only found him, but she was going to marry him over the Christmas holidays and have his baby in May. Some days she could hardly believe her good fortune.
She smiled contentedly, her momentary unease gone. As she braked for a red light, her big emerald engagement ring sparkled in the afternoon sunshine slanting through the windshield. Amy twisted her hand a little, admiring the rich color and fire of the stone, which was surrounded by tiny diamonds.
She loved the ring. It was so like Sam: out of the ordinary, a bit larger than life. She hated removing it, even to wash her hands.
She was still smiling as she pulled into the driveway of her parents' home, punched in the security code that would open the electronic gates, and drove around to the back of the property where she lived in an apartment over the garage.
The first thing she saw was Justin Malone's dark green Toyota. She frowned. What was Sam's best friend doing here so early in the day? Justin and Sam worked together and had even lived together for a while. Several weeks ago Amy had given Justin the code to the security gate because he was helping her paint the inside of the apartment while Sam was gone. Even though she and Sam were planning to find another place to live when he returned, Amy wanted to leave the apartment fresh and shining in case her parents decided to rent it to someone else. And Justin being Justin had insisted on giving her a hand.
Her unease deepened.
It was only four-thirty. It wasn't like Justin to leave work so early. Since he'd been promoted to business manager at the magazine, he'd been working long hours. Amy had enjoyed teasing him about his diligence, saying she guessed that now that he was "one of them" she'd have to be careful what she said in front of him.
Justin was fun to tease because he was so earnest and serious. Too much so, Amy thought. She'd already decided that once she and Sam were married, she would try to find someone for Justin so that he'd loosen up a bit. "The Quiet Man," Sam called him, always there, always the person you could count on.
She waved as she passed him, pulling her Miata into the garage. "Hi!" she said as he walked toward her. "What a surprise! What're you doing here at this time of the day?"
As he came closer, she saw a peculiar expression on his lean, angular face. His blue eyes, normally so bright and riveting, seemed shadowed and troubled, and he wasn't smiling.
"Hello, Amy." His voice sounded odd, too—rough and strained.
Her smile slowly faded. Everything inside her went still except her heart. Something was terribly wrong. She wet suddenly-dry lips and stared up at him.
"Amy," he said again. He reached for her, placing his hands on her shoulders and looking down into her eyes. "I-I've got some bad news."
No.
She shook her head. She wanted to put her hands over her ears. Whatever it was Justin was going to tell her, she didn't want to hear it.
"I came right over," he continued. "I didn't want you to hear about this on T.V. or the radio."
Sam.
Please, God . . . please, God . . . please, God.
She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came.
Justin's face was rigid and tightly controlled. Only his eyes betrayed his inner torment. "We heard an hour ago. Sam . . . " He took a long, shuddering breath. "Sam had a bad accident. He fell down the side of a cliff, and . . . and when the search party finally reached the place where they thought they would find him, his . . . his body was gone."
He swallowed hard, and the part of Amy's brain that still functioned normally noted in a detached way how his Adam's apple bobbed and how his dark hair, normally neat and well-groomed, looked as if he'd been running his hands through it.
He squeezed her shoulders. "They . . . the authorities believe he's dead."
"Nooooooooo . . . noooooo . . . " Amy heard the keening sound, hardly aware it came from her mouth.
"God, Amy, I'm so sorry."
Amy felt his strong arms go around her, she heard him continuing to talk, continuing to say comforting words, continuing to explain, but nothing he said mattered. "No, no, no," she moaned.
She tried to hold on. She tried to listen. To think. But she felt sick to her stomach and lightheaded. A loud buzzing filled her head, and then there was nothing but blackness as she slumped against him.
Early July, 1992
The offices of
World of Nature
magazine occupied two floors of the Transco Tower in Houston, Texas. The tower, sixty-four stories of faceted glass, was the third tallest building in the city and the dominant piece of real estate in the Galleria area, dubbed the Magic Circle by Houstonians. A sleekly handsome Art-Deco marvel of architectural design, on sunny days it smiled benevolently down upon the plush retail shops and restaurants of the affluent Westheimer/West Loop/Post Oak configuration and on overcast days it rested its head among the clouds.
At night, its beacon light made a languid 360 degree arc over the western end of the city, and reminded those with more fanciful imaginations of a lighthouse warning away encroaching planes or birds. It was an upstart building, rising like a phoenix from the plains of suburbia, perfectly suited to the upstart city it graced.
On this muggy, insufferably hot Friday afternoon in July, the various departments of
World of Nature,
located on the twentieth floor of the tower, were all astir as a handsome, rugged-looking young man with strong, muscular legs shown to advantage in khaki shorts and hiking boots strode through the double doors leading from the reception area to the inner sanctum. His light brown hair was burnished by the sun into a shade of dark gold that perfectly complemented his tanned face and amber-flecked brown eyes. Deep dimples cut grooves into his cheeks, bracketing a brash smile that exposed very white teeth. Even a casual observer would immediately know that this man was completely comfortable in his skin.
