Rachel Dahlrumple. Shea McMaster

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       Let him go. We want to be together. Start divorce proceedings. Or better yet, end your pitiful life. Your choice. For now.

      I could only imagine my expression at that moment. Dan’s gaze was glued to my face, which first felt hot, then cold. My head swam and my breathing wheezed in and out, as ragged as my stuttering heartbeat.

       That bastard. The low down, scheming, rotten, lying, slimy, vile, despicable…

      “Care to revise your statement?”

      A few quick blinks brought the deputy back into focus, though I could feel the airways in my lungs constricting.

      “I know who’s going to die, and isn’t going to be me,” I whispered. “Chinese water torture is too good for him. Splinter those bamboo chopsticks and the minute he gets home, they’re going under his fingernails. After that, his balls.” I’d learned a few things from my father’s stories of ’Nam. And of course, reading about the war. After all, I was a librarian. A curious one. I’d read nearly every book on our well stocked shelves. Except the really dry science and technical books, which I left to the geeks. And I meant that in the nicest way. I liked geeks. Briefly, I considered doing a search on torture techniques when I returned to work Monday morning. If I could hold off that long.

      The tanned face so near mine blanched as he flinched. “Easy going, ma’am.”

      Right. I wasn’t known for saying such things. I wasn’t known for saying much.

      “Well?” I demanded, possibly a tad harshly, but I’d earned the right. My fragile world had just vaporized before my eyes and it was far too soon to see what might be left. If anything. The only future visible looked like a rapidly expanding black hole.

      Someone wanted me dead. But who? My husband? His girlfriend? God, that hurt. I hated cheaters. I hated what they did to families, especially the children. Even though I had no children, divorce loomed in front of me like a huge gaping maw. I wanted to wail, gnash my teeth, and obliterate something, anything. Of course, I was Rachel the Mouse, so I did my best to hide the violent urges building inside. Rachel the Meek never, ever, let loose with her most primitive emotions. She hid them deep, keeping a calm, submissive, accepting face turned toward the world at large.

      Then again, my harsh tone might have been part of that breathing trouble I so very much wanted to control. “What would you do?”

      For the first time I could remember in our long, long history, Dan looked directly, and very deeply, into my eyes. The sympathy, sincerity, and concern on his face hit me before the actual words did. Already overwhelmed from too many emotions boiling in my heart and head, I had no defense or response for his reply, or the way he ever so lightly caressed my cheek with the back of his fingers. When had he gotten so close?

      “Well, Rachel, since I’m not the kind of idiotic ass your husband is, I wouldn’t be stupid enough to screw around on the most amazing woman anywhere. Were I the lucky one to have you, I wouldn’t leave you alone long enough for you to ever feel abandoned.”

      Aside from the asthma and allergy thing, I was a healthy woman. I’d never, ever, once fainted in my life. But the shocks to my system that night hit too hard. A poisonous gift, a nasty note, knowledge I didn’t want of my husband’s cheating ways, and a gorgeous, younger man, telling me he considered me amazing and not plain, boring, and mousy… The zing I felt in my tummy from his touch did me in.

      Black waves engulfing me, limbs losing strength, I slowly collapsed and Dan caught me at the last moment of consciousness. Like any nineteenth-century heiress worth her crumpets and tea, I fainted right into his arms.

       Chapter 3