Marital Privilege

“I’ve seen enough to know we can’t handle this alone.”

She might be right. God knew he’d come awfully close to losing everything this morning, closer than he could bear thinking about. But who the hell could they trust? In his father’s world, trust was for dead men. And whether he liked it or not, this morning he’d been sucked back into his father’s world. And so had Laura. “We don’t have a choice. We have to handle this alone.”

She shook her head, as if she couldn’t imagine it.

She probably couldn’t. She was raised by a cop, taught to trust cops. He wasn’t. And the one time he’d trusted the authorities, they’d let him down. It had taken ten years, but they let him down nonetheless. “I understand you’re angry with me. Hell, you probably hate me. That’s okay. I deserve it. But you need to think beyond that. You have to trust me. You have no other choice.”

“No. I have a choice.” She narrowed her eyes to brown slits and set her chin. “I don’t trust you. I don’t even know you. I want out. Now. Take me to the police station.”

He tightened his grip on the steering wheel until his knuckles ached. “Like hell.”

“You’re kidnapping me?”

“Damn it, Laura. I’m not staking our lives on the police. If that means I’m kidnapping you, so be it.”

She reached toward him. Before he realized what she was doing, she unsnapped his cell phone from his belt. She flipped the phone open. “Now do you want to drop me off at the station, or should we do this the hard way?”

Alec gritted his teeth. He could just pull the car over and wrestle the phone from her before she had a chance to punch in 911, but somehow he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not to Laura. “All right. Call them.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“Tell them to meet you in an hour at Conason Park. Near the shelter.”

“What are you up to?”

He didn’t answer. She’d understand soon enough. If his plan worked, either Laura would be as safe as possible with the cops or as safe as possible with him. And all that mattered now was that she and the baby were as safe as they could be. “Make the call.”

LAURA JOINED ALEC on the edge of the bluff overlooking Bear River and the Conason Park shelter. A cool wind gushed through the valley and swirled over the bluffs. Laura shivered and pulled the blanket, rummaged from the winter driving supplies in the van, tighter around her nightgown. She hadn’t felt cold since she’d become pregnant. Through the Wisconsin winter she’d worn short-sleeved tops most days. But even though she wasn’t exactly dressed, the chill she felt now went deeper than any clothing or blanket could warm. It drilled into the very marrow of her bones.

She wanted to get this over with. Leaving the life she’d thought she had, the husband she thought she knew, was painful enough. The last thing she wanted to do was draw it out. But Alec had insisted they stay on top of the bluff, watch for the police’s arrival and make sure his father’s thugs were nowhere in sight before he would let her go.

Shading her eyes with one hand, she peered down into the valley. Noon sun sparkled off the river that wound through the park. Maples and oaks had yet to leaf out, and their bare branches camouflaged little of the parking lot, playground and shelter below. From here they could see the park entrances and roads approaching the shelter in both directions. If something wasn’t on the up-and-up, they would see it.

It seemed Alec had thought of everything.

No surprise. She’d always known he was smart. His intelligence was one of the things that attracted her to him the first time he’d shown up at her newly established restaurant to take her liquor order. What she hadn’t recognized was his cunning. She’d never guessed he could think like a criminal, anticipate what they would do, how they would strike.

But then, she hadn’t known so many things about him.

He stood next to her, eyes shifting back and forth, covering both entrances of the park. Tension rolled off him in waves. His body seemed to vibrate with restlessness.

He’d always carried a certain intensity, a need to move, ever since she’d met him. If seated, he’d jiggle his leg. If standing, he’d pace. More than once, she’d jokingly asked him why he needed to keep moving, what he was running from.

Now she knew.

“Where will you go?” The question escaped her lips before she could bite it back. She probably shouldn’t have asked it. She probably shouldn’t care.

He didn’t look at her, his concentration rooted to the park. “I don’t know. Maybe the Twin Cities. Maybe farther. Somewhere I can get lost in the crowds.”

“Your money won’t last long in a city.”

“I’ll find work. Off the books.”

That was easy enough. Although she never used undocumented workers, she knew countless other businesses did. There were a lot of advantages for the business owner. Low wages. No need to provide health care and other benefits. And no unemployment, worker’s compensation or payroll tax. The underground economy was alive and well in the U.S. It was certainly possible for Alec to simply vanish from the system. She would never see him again.

And he would never know their son.

She steeled herself against the thought. Alec had made his bed when he’d decided to lie to her about who he really was. She couldn’t let herself feel sorry for him. She wouldn’t. But still, the idea that he would miss his son’s birth, his first words, his first steps, left a hollow feeling in her chest.

But even worse, their son wouldn’t have a dad.

As much stress as her father’s job had caused during her childhood, she couldn’t have imagined growing up without him. His encouragement. His unwavering faith in her. His love.

She wanted those things for her child. When she’d chosen to marry Alec, she’d done so as much for their future children as she had for herself. She’d thought he’d be a gentle and caring father. A protector who would keep them safe. A role model.

How could she have been so wrong?

She couldn’t think about it. None of this was in her control. Alec’s lies had rendered all her plans useless. All her dreams of a happy family unattainable. She just had to do the best she could from here on out. “What am I supposed to tell the baby about you?”

“Nothing.”

“I have to tell him something. He deserves to know.”

“I don’t want him to be part of that world. My father’s world. I don’t want him to know anything about it.” Muscles clenched at the corners of his jaw. Tendons stood out along his neck. “If everything works out with the police the way you’re hoping it will, promise me you’ll tell him I’m dead.”

“I’m not going to lie.”

“You don’t know it will be a lie.”

His words knocked the air from her lungs. He was right. She wouldn’t know. His father could find him, kill him, and she would never know.

“Promise me.”

Tightness pinched her throat. Swallowing hard, she smoothed her hair back from her face and scanned the park through the haze of leafless branches. “I’ll tell him you’re dead.”

“Good.”

Where were the police? Why weren’t they here by now?

As if conjured by her thoughts, a sedan slowed on the highway below. It swung into the entrance of the park and crept toward the parking lot. She’d never cared about makes and models of cars, couldn’t tell one from another, but the plain lines and dark blue of this one seemed like just the type the police favored for their unmarked cars.

The time had come.

She forced herself to keep her eyes on the car. She couldn’t allow herself to glance at Alec, to look one last time at the intense gray of his eyes, the gentle hook of his nose, the full lips she’d once relished kissing. It wouldn’t get her anywhere. It would only make the moment more bitter. Only remind her of what she’d once thought she’d had with him. What she’d never really had at all.

The car wound past the first parking lot and toward the shelter.

“There’s a cabin up near Minoqua. On Lake Tomahawk. 1342 Brinberry Road.” She could feel his gaze on her, sense the question in his eyes. “It was my dad’s fishing and hunting cabin. The one in pictures of me as a kid. Before he died, he sold it to his former partner. No one uses it until summer, so it should be empty this time of year. The key is hanging under the edge of the siding, near the door.”