this for Amanda and Isabel. My only concern now is if she will actually be better off with you rather than with my mother and stepfather. At least they would have had the courage to threaten me directly first before going through an innocent man and his family.”
She was going. Relief hit him hard and it wasn’t until he recovered his cell phone and left the barn that he realized how badly he had needed her to say yes and how much he wished he could have let her say no.
***
“Swear to me that you’ll leave the second things look bad. Watch the papers…if there’s any mention of me in the hearing just go and don’t look back, okay?” Seeing the concerned look in Casey’s eyes, Jonas decided to forgo teasing her about her mothering and settled for a serious nod instead. “You have Father Kinley’s address, right?” she asked.
“Yes,” he answered.
She nodded and looked like she wanted to say more but couldn’t. She bit back tears as he hugged her. “Be careful,” she said softly.
“I will.” He pulled back and studied her. “We’re gonna make it okay? Both of us.” Trying very hard to ignore the stiffness of her body, he gave her another long hug and then kissed her forehead.
“Call me when you get there?”
She nodded, grabbed her shoulder bag, and hurried down the porch stairs. Stopping at the paddock, she gave Jack a quick hug and then made her way to the limo where Devlin stood with his cell phone to his ear. Sampson trailed behind her.
“You all set?” Devlin asked her as he hung up the phone. She ignored him and walked past him to where the limo driver held the door open. As soon as she climbed in Sampson leaped in behind her. Devlin went to the door and looked in the car to find Sampson already comfortably sprawled out across her lap. Casey was staring out the window, her hand idly resting across the dog’s body. She seemed to be in her own little world.
“Miss Wilkes, the dog stays here.” When she didn’t even look at him, Devlin knew he wasn’t going to win this battle and he quietly climbed into the seat across from her and the dog. The limo driver suppressed a smile as he closed the door and went to the front of the car.
***
For once she wished she was in one of her nightmares and that she would wake up any second. She couldn’t move or cry out like she wanted to because then he would know that she was weak. She was a prisoner once again but she had chosen it this time. It would be so much easier to blame the man sitting across from her but the reality was that he hadn’t truly forced her into this. It had been the way Jonas had looked at her and the things he didn’t say that had swayed her. He didn’t want another child to end up like her, living a half-life.
Casey had no doubt that Jonas cared about her but even his friendship couldn’t bring her peace and she had to struggle not to flinch each time he touched her. No other person knew her better or looked out for her the way he did yet she couldn’t let go and give him the only thing he had ever wanted…her trust.
As if he could read her thoughts, Devlin said, “He’ll be okay, you know.”
“Who?”
“Your boyfriend. He seems like a capable young man.” Devlin chided himself for the ridiculous and not so subtle attempt to learn more about her relationship with Jonas. He shouldn’t care…he didn’t.
“He is” was all she said.
“Seems a bit young for you though.” She fixed her gaze on him as he studied something on his cell phone. Apparently she hadn’t thrown the damn thing hard enough to break it.
“Is there a question in there somewhere Mr. Prescott?”
He lifted his eyes and held hers for a moment before returning to his phone. “Just trying to make conversation Miss Wilkes. Your love life is of little concern to me.”
“I guess your private investigator was a little lax in his job because otherwise you would know that you’re more Jonas’s type than I will ever be. In the
Cassandra Zara, Lucinda Lane