Love Me True

He shucked his clothes and opened a drawer. Yanking out a pair of pajamas, he pulled them on. In a panic he buttoned the shirt to the neck only to realize he’d started wrong and was a button off. He leapt into bed and doused the light.

“I’m tared,” he said grumpily. “So, good night.” He rolled over.

She got in beside him. He stiffened when he felt her warmth oozing nearer. Then she curled her luscious body against his back, mashing her breasts against him. He lay still, his muscles strained and taut. When her fingers groped inside his pajamas, he shoved her away.

“Not tonight, babe.”

“You pathetic bastard!” She jumped up. “What if I go to the tabloids and tell your fans about your...little... problem?”

Violence rose in him. “Go ahead.” His bluff was lethally soft. “That’ll be a refreshing switch from their usual fare.”

He shut his eyes.

When he got up the next morning, she was gone. So were the diamonds he’d borrowed for her to wear.

Joey punched his Caller ID, and Heather’s number came up again. He went to the fridge. Since he hadn’t warned Cass, there was nothing in it but beer and a coffee canister. He shook the canister and found it was empty.

He slammed the door and pitched the canister into the trash. The living room with its vaulted ceilings felt empty and huge. He was glad Danny was gone even if the house felt lonelier.

Heather.

What did he keep thinking about her? She and her family had made him feel worthless. He had scripts to read, phone calls to make.

Still, he paced restlessly across the room, finally pulling out a little drawer in a table by his sofa. Inside lay a dog-eared copy of a news magazine. On the cover a handsome dark man carried a little boy on one shoulder along a golden path through a sun-dappled forest. Heather’s Pulitzer-winning picture. At first glance, the man’s expression was rapt. Only at second glance did one see the evil. The child’s big-eyed gaze was equally fixed. Because of that photograph, Trevor Pilot, the man in the picture, a cold-blooded kidnapper, was in prison. The boy’s father had been the British ambassador. The kidnapping had been international news. When the child had been found alive because of that picture, Heather would have been honored at the White House. But she’d run, just like she had after Ben’s death.

The little boy’s almost paralyzed expression sent a chill through Joey. Heather was so good. Why had she quit?

He thrust the magazine back into the drawer and walked out onto his porch. As he studied the dark trees along the creek where he and Heather had played, he saw their childhood ghosts swinging on ropes. The golden-haired girl letting go, falling into the creek, water splashing all around her skinny body like geysers.

Every summer had been a time of enchantment. Long summer days spent lying in the sun till their skin heated and then cold swims in the creek. Shared refreshments afterward in his hideout; shared lunches at school because he never brought anything really good.

They’d trusted each other completely. Only she’d known that his father beat him and how his poverty stung him, especially the secondhand clothes and old boots that marked him as unworthy. That’s why she’d dressed so badly—to put him at ease. When she’d told him she was pregnant their first year in college, he’d asked her to marry him.

His mood grew darker. He got hungrier, too, but he couldn’t drive into town for coffee, eggs or a burger unless he was ready to answer questions about Heather.

Fame. He wasn’t handling it.

He rang Cass, who said he’d shop first thing. Joey decided to watch the news while he waited. He ambled over to the fridge, popped the top off a beer, grabbed his remote and collapsed onto his sofa.

There was a story about a shooting spree in an Austin mall parking lot. A jealous husband had plugged his wife’s lover through a grocery sack. The reporter noted that Texas and Mexico were engulfed by a record heat wave, that temperatures had never been so high in April, that violence seemed on the rise as a result. The next story featured Senator Wade’s upcoming election and his daughter’s wedding.

Blood rushed in Joey’s head at the sight of Heather in Larry’s arms. Six years ago, Roth had put his arms around her just like that right after Ben died. Funny, her turning to Roth, Alison’s old beau, that night. Funny he hadn’t realized that was the exact moment he’d lost her.

Roth still had the same flawless bone structure, the same slicked-back golden hair, the same smooth way, the same frozen eyes. Maybe he looked good to her after her other crazy boyfriends. Joey didn’t like the cynical droop of that carved mouth. He disliked even more the way the older man’s expression hardened every time Heather said anything offbeat. If Roth was edgy, Heather was even more so.

Her smiles were strained. Her bright lipstick and rouge made her look paler. She was too thin, too reserved, almost doll-like in her utter lack of passion. She used to be a mess—but an interesting mess. Not that the conventional dress didn’t flow over her slender curves. But her stylish attire and the severe knot at her nape would have suited her mother far better. The Heather he remembered was unpredictable and loved surprises. She favored loose clothes and ethnic jewelry; she wore her hair long and flowing.

This poised socialite with the tense smile and the incredible cool was a far cry from the girl with the constant grin and the tangled ringlets who’d been up to such mischief in his hideout. The Heather he’d known had wanted to experience life to its fullest, not to repress herself.