Shattered. Joan Johnston

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СКАЧАТЬ film clip that followed showed a grim-faced man with silver-winged black hair shoving his way through a crowd of reporters as he left the federal courthouse.

      It was the man she’d picked up in the bar of the Four Seasons, a man passionate beyond her dreams and tender beyond belief.

      Kate had blanched with horror at the discovery that she’d lain with a man who’d been accused, along with his mob boss father, of having business competitors maimed and murdered. She’d followed the trial on TV. Neither Shaw nor his father had been convicted. The witnesses had all recanted or disappeared.

      The pictures Kate had seen in the tabloid newspapers of that poor strangled woman had put an end to her romantic fantasies about the stranger with whom she’d spent a precious night of lovemaking.

      She’d viciously squelched the memories that arose whenever she compared that single night of passion to sex with J.D. She’d comforted herself with the knowledge that her husband might be a selfish lover and a womanizer, but at least he wasn’t a criminal.

      Or so she’d thought.

      “You don’t have to worry about Lucky and Chance growing up without a father,” she told Shaw. “I’m involved with someone. I love him very much, and we’re going to be married.” She was certain Jack wouldn’t mind if she stretched the truth in a good cause. They hadn’t discussed marriage yet, but she was sure it was only a matter of time before they did.

      Jack’s divorce would be final within the next month. And J.D. was…no longer in the picture.

      “Since I’m going to be married,” Kate began, “I—”

      Shaw was already shaking his head. “No, you’re not.”

      “You can’t stop me!”

      “We both know your first husband isn’t dead. Which precludes your marriage to another man.”

      Kate’s face blanched. “How could you possibly…? Why would you think…?”

      “I’ve done some investigating of my own in the week since I discovered I’m a father. You can’t marry another man, because you’re still married to J.D. Pendleton, who isn’t buried in Arlington Cemetery after all. He’s alive and well and left the country for Brazil the day after you were shot.”

      “J.D.’s in Brazil?” Her husband had threatened to kidnap her sons and take them to South America if she didn’t pay him a quarter of a million dollars to get out of her life, but she’d been shot before she could ask one of her grandfathers for the money. Although Kate was the daughter and granddaughter of wealthy men and women, J.D. had gambled away her personal trust fund within a few years after she’d gotten control of it when she turned twenty-five.

      However, J.D.’s mother had given him $250,000 in “hush money” which he’d presumably used to disappear. The governor didn’t want the world to know her son was a live deserter, rather than a dead war hero.

      Kate’s greatest fear, before Wyatt Shaw had shown up on her doorstep, was that J.D. would return, once again threatening to steal Lucky and Chance, and demanding money that she didn’t have to disappear. “Do you know where J.D. is now?” she asked.

      “No. But there are dangerous men out there looking for him.”

      “Dangerous men?” Kate asked, confused. Your men? she wondered.

      “Your husband was trading military weapons for heroin in Afghanistan.”

      Kate gasped. She’d known J.D. was in trouble. He’d hinted as much to her when he’d shown up in her kitchen last fall looking gaunt and ragged a year after she’d supposedly buried his remains. But she’d never suspected him of doing anything so awful. “How do you know that?”

      Shaw ignored the question and continued, “Your husband blew up that ammo dump in Afghanistan—and faked his death—to avoid paying the consequences for skimming profits on the arms-for-heroin deals he was negotiating between parties here in the States and the Taliban. He absconded with twenty million dollars worth of heroin that didn’t belong to him.

      “There are people who intend to find him, get back their product—or the cash he got for selling it—and make an object lesson of your husband.”

      “What does that have to do with me?”

      “The bad guys are closing in on J.D.”

      “How do you know all this?”

      He lifted a dark brow as though the answer should be obvious, although it wasn’t to Kate. Did he know about J.D.’s situation because he, personally, was chasing him? Or was it some other criminal element with whom Shaw had close ties, like his father, Dante D’Amato?

      “Suffice it to say, you and your—our—sons aren’t safe with your husband on the loose.”

      Kate lifted her chin. “The man I’ve been seeing is a Texas Ranger. He’ll be happy to protect me.”

      “Who’s that?”

      Kate debated whether to tell him, then decided it was better not to bring Jack into this. “None of your business.”

      Kate didn’t like the look in Shaw’s eyes. He had no right to be jealous. Or possessive. But she didn’t want to exacerbate the situation, so she said, “Nevertheless, this man is willing, and able, to keep an eye on me and my sons. His divorce will be final any day now and—”

      “He’s planning to move in?”

      Kate heard the challenge in Shaw’s gravelly voice, watched as his eyes narrowed and his hands formed into powerful fists. It seemed safest to say, “We haven’t planned that far ahead.”

      She was still looking forward to making love to Jack for the first time. They’d been on the verge of consummating their relationship last fall—kissing in the hall, on the way to her bedroom—when Jack had been called away to confront a killer. Shortly thereafter, Kate had been shot. She’d only recently come home.

      So, despite the fact she’d first attempted to seduce Jack ten years ago, when she was nineteen, she still had no idea what kind of lover he was. Which was surprising, when Kate thought about it, because she’d gone to bed with Wyatt Shaw within thirty minutes of meeting him.

      Kate felt her breasts peak at the memory of his mouth on her naked flesh. She quickly lowered her gaze, mortified at where her thoughts had led her. Again.

      She made herself picture Jack’s beloved face instead. She imagined his dark brown eyes looking down at her, imagined her fingers threading through his sun-streaked chestnut hair. Jack was tall, like Shaw, but his skin was burnished by wind and sun. She ached to have Jack kiss her, touch her, in places where… Where Wyatt Shaw already had.

      “You can’t marry anyone so long as J.D. is still alive,” Shaw said, interrupting her disconcerting thoughts. “The way I see it, right now—and for the foreseeable future—my sons don’t have adequate protection.”

      “My sons,” Kate automatically corrected, her chin lifting pugnaciously, “are my responsibility.” When Shaw continued to stare at her, she grudgingly corrected, “All right. Our sons are my responsibility. СКАЧАТЬ