The Welcoming

would have the right to love her. As it was, all he could do was save her.

Chapter 6
    The weather was warming. Spring was busting loose, full of glory and color and scent. The island was a treasure trove of wildflowers, leafy trees and birdsong. At dawn, with thin fingers of fog over the water, it was a mystical, timeless place.
    Roman stood at the side of the road and watched the sun come up as he had only days before. He didn’t know the names of the flowers that grew in tangles on the roadside. He didn’t know the song of a jay from that of a sparrow. But he knew Charity was out running with her dog and that she would pass the place he stood on her return.
    He needed to see her, to talk to her, to be with her.
    The night before, he had broken into her cash drawer and examined the bills she had neatly stacked and marked for today’s deposit. There had been over two thousand dollars in counterfeit Canadian currency. His first impulse had been to tell her, to lay everything he knew and needed to know out in front of her. But he had quashed that. Telling her wouldn’t prove her innocence to men like Conby.
    He had enough to get Block. And nearly enough, he thought, to hang Bob along with him. But he couldn’t get them without casting shadows on Charity. By her own admission, and according to the statements of her loyal staff, a pin couldn’t drop in the inn without her knowing it.
    If that was so, how could he prove that there had been a counterfeiting and smuggling ring going on under her nose for nearly two years?
    He believed it, as firmly as he had ever believed anything. Conby and the others at the Bureau wanted facts. Roman drew on his cigarette and watched the fog melt away with the rising of the sun. He had to give them facts. Until he could, he would give them nothing.
    He could wait and make sure Conby dropped the ax on Block on the guide’s next trip to the inn. That would give Roman time. Time enough, he promised himself, to make certain Charity wasn’t caught in the middle. When it went down, she would be stunned and hurt. She’d get over it. When it was over, and she knew his part in it, she would hate him. He would get over that. He would have to.
    He heard a car and glanced over, then returned his gaze to the water. He wondered if he could come back someday and stand in this same spot and wait for Charity to run down the road toward him.
    Fantasies, he told himself, pitching his half-finished cigarette into the dirt. He was wasting too much time on fantasies.
    The car was coming fast, its engine protesting, its muffler rattling. He looked over again, annoyed at having his morning and his thoughts disturbed.
    His annoyance saved his life.
    It took him only an instant to realize what was happening, and a heartbeat more to evade it. As the car barreled toward him, he leaped aside, tucking and rolling into the brush. A wave of displaced air flattened the grass before the car’s rear tires gripped the roadbed again. Roman’s gun was in his hand even as he scrambled to his feet. He caught a glimpse of the car’s rear end as it sped around a curve. There wasn’t even time to swear before he heard Charity’s scream.
    He ran, unaware of the fire in his thigh where the car had grazed him and the blood on his arm where he had rolled into a rock. He had faced death. He had killed. But he had never understood terror until this moment, with her scream still echoing in his head. He hadn’t understood agony until he’d seen Charity sprawled beside the road.
    The dog was curled beside her, whimpering, nuzzling her face with her nose. He turned at Roman’s approach and began to growl, then stood, barking.
    “Charity.” Roman crouched beside her, and felt for a pulse, his hand shaking. “Okay, baby. You’re going to be okay,” he murmured to her as he checked for broken bones.
    Had she been hit? A sickening vision of her being tossed into the air as the car slammed into her pulsed through his head. Using every ounce of control he possessed, he blocked it out. She was breathing. He held on to that. The dog whined as he turned her head and examined the gash on her temple. It was the only spot of color on her face. He stanched the blood with his bandanna, cursing when he felt its warmth on his fingers.
    Grimly he replaced his weapon, then lifted her into his arms. Her body seemed boneless. Roman tightened his grip, half afraid she might melt through his arms. He talked to her throughout the half-mile