Taken by Barbara Freethy Read Free Book Online Page A

appealing as it was to numb his brain with alcohol, he needed a clear mind.
    “If Nick . . . I mean Evan — it feels strange to call him that,” Kayla said. “If he was robbing you, why was he with me? Why did he marry me?”
    “He must have wanted something from you.”
    She frowned at that. “I don’t have much. And he didn’t take anything from me.”
    “He didn’t get you to put him on your bank account or ask you for a loan or anything like that?”
    “No, nothing. There really wasn’t time, because he vanished right after we got married.”
    Nick was surprised that Evan had married Kayla. Why had he taken that step? “Tell me again what happened the last time you saw him.” He leaned forward, resting his arms on his thighs.
    Kayla drew in a deep breath. “He went to get ice, and he never came back. I looked all over the hotel for him. I called security. The next morning they found his coat in a bathroom off the casino. It had his wedding ring in the pocket. That was it. I didn’t know if someone had robbed him, kidnapped him, or hurt him in some way. I actually still don’t know what happened to him. I just know he’s gone.”
    “I wonder why he needed to leave that night,” Nick mused. “Did something happen between the two of you?
    Did you have a fight?”

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    Barbara Freethy
    “No, everything was perfect.”
    Nick watched Kayla play with the silver chain around her neck. The glittering diamond heart drew his attention.
    “Is that new?” he asked. “Your necklace?”
    Her hand paused, her eyes widening. “Yes, Nick — I mean Evan — bought it for me. It was a wedding present.”
    “That explains the charges at Clarington Jewelers.”
    “I didn’t know it wasn’t his money.” Her hand dropped to her side and a wash of guilty red colored her cheeks. A moment later she unclasped the hook and tossed the necklace on the coffee table between them as if she couldn’t bear to wear it a second longer.
    “Maybe you can take it back and get a refund,” she said.
    He didn’t bother to pick it up. “Tell me more about your relationship. How long did you know each other?”
    Her cheeks flushed again. “About a month,” she muttered.
    “A month?” he asked, sure he hadn’t heard her correctly. “Are you serious? You married a man you’d only known for a few weeks?”
    She fidgeted in her chair, crossing, then uncrossing her legs. “Yes. I know it was fast, but it felt right. For once in my life I wanted to take a risk, dive into the deep end. I wanted to feel alive, on the edge. There’s nothing you can say that I haven’t heard before. I was stupid, impetuous, crazy, foolish, reckless, generally an idiot. . . . Have I left anything out?”
    Her eyes sparked with anger, and he saw a touch of steel beneath her soft exterior. “I don’t think so,” he said prudently. “Where did you meet Evan?”
    “At my grandmother’s house. Evan was a real estate TA K E N
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    agent. He was selling the condo next to my grandmother’s. They started talking about the market one day, and he offered her a free appraisal. She introduced us.
    That was it. It was fate.”
    “I don’t think so,” he said grimly. “Evan always had an agenda. And the way he left so abruptly . . . Evan was either done doing what he wanted to do, or someone was catching up to him. As for your part in it all — there has to be a reason. Evan never did love for love’s sake.”
    “You don’t know that for sure,” Kayla argued. “You’re speculating about a relationship you know nothing about.
    You weren’t there. You didn’t see him with me.”
    “I saw him with plenty of other women, including my sister. Jenny thought he was in love with her, too. No,” he said with a definite shake of his head. He knew their marriage hadn’t been about love, not the way it had started, and certainly not the way it had ended. “You had something Evan wanted. What did he take with him when he left?”
    “I told you —