From the Heart

blocked the morning from her mind—taken her away somewhere, someplace where no ugliness could touch her.
    “I couldn’t stay on the beach when I heard the shots.”
    “No.” He kissed her hair. “I suppose not.”
    “I thought you were dead.”
    “Ssh.” He took her lips this time with a tenderness neither of them had known he possessed. “You should have more faith in the good guys.”
    She wanted to smile for him but threw her arms around his neck instead. The contact was another reassurance that he was whole and safe. “Oh, Slade. I’m not sure I could live through something like that again. Why? Why would anyone want to kill me? It just doesn’t make sense.”
    He drew her away so that their eyes met. Hers were red and swollen from weeping, his cool and direct. “Maybe you know something and don’t even realize it. The pressure’s on, and whoever’s in charge of this business is smart enough to know it. You’ve become a liability.”
    “But I don’t know anything!” she insisted, pressing the heels of her hands to her temples. “Someone wants to kill me and I don’t even know who it is or why. You said that . . . that man was a professional. Someone paid him to kill me.”
    “Let’s go inside.” He pulled her to her feet, but she jerked away. The helpless weeping was over and the strength was back, though it had the dangerous edge of hysteria.
    “How much was I worth?” she demanded.
    “That’s enough, Jess.” He took her by the shoulders for one quick shake. “Enough. You’re going to go in and pack a bag. I’ll take you to New York.”
    “I’m not going anywhere.”
    “The hell you aren’t,” he muttered as he started to pull her toward the house.
    Jessica yanked out of his grip for the second time. “You listen to me. It’s my life, my shop, my friends. I’m staying right here until it’s over. I’ll do what you tell me to a point, Slade, but I won’t run.”
    He measured her slowly. “I’ve got to call this business in. You’re to go straight to your room and wait for me.”
    She nodded, not trusting his easy acceptance. “All right.” He nodded, not trusting hers.
     
    The moment she stepped into her room, Jessica began to peel off her clothes. It was suddenly of paramount importance that she scrub off every grain of sand, every lingering trace of the time she had spent on the beach. She turned the hot water in the tub on full until the room was misted with steam. Plunging in, she gasped at the shock of the heat against her chilled skin, but took the soap and lathered again and again until she could no longer smell the scent of salt water—the scent of her own fear.
    It had been a nightmare, she told herself. This was normalcy. The cool green tile on the walls, the leafy fern at the window, the ivory towels with the pale green border she had chosen herself only the month before.
    A month ago, she thought, when her life had been simple. There’d been no man then coolly attempting to kill her for a fee. David had still been the brother she’d never had. Michael had been her friend, her partner. She hadn’t even heard of a man named James Sladerman.
    She closed her eyes, and pressed hot, damp fingers to them. No, it wasn’t a nightmare. It was real. She had lain curled behind a pile of rocks while a man she barely knew—and loved—had risked his life to protect hers. It was horribly, horribly real. And she had to face it. The time was over when she could try to pass off what Slade had told her as a mistake. While she had been blindly trusting, someone she loved had deceived her, involved her. Used her.
    Which one? she asked herself. Which one could she believe it of? Would either David or Michael have stood passively by while someone arranged to have her killed? Lowering herhands, Jessica forced herself to be calm. No, whatever else she would believe, she wouldn’t believe that.
    Slade thought she might know something without being aware of it. If that was true, she was no closer to the solution than she had been before. Jessica slid her body down in the tub and closed her eyes again. There was nothing for her to do but wait.
     
    Anything but satisfied with his conversation with his contact, Slade put a call through directly to the commissioner.
    “Sergeant, what have you got for me?”
    “Someone tried to kill Jessica this morning,” he answered curtly.
    For a moment there was dead silence on the wire. “Give me the details,” Dodson