High-Calibre Christmas. B.J. Daniels

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СКАЧАТЬ it was you do.”

      “Still,” he said, also feeling defensive.

      They stood like that, just looking at each other, neither of them seeming to know what to say. Jace wondered why she didn’t tie into him, tell him what a jackass he’d been to break things off so close to their wedding date. He deserved her anger after what he’d done to her. He thought they’d both feel better if she just let him have it.

      “How are you doing?”

      He shrugged. “I’m okay.”

      She nodded, clearly knowing he was lying. That was the problem with a woman knowing you too well.

      “It’s tough, you know, with everything that came with Marie’s death.”

      “Marie?” She raised an eyebrow. “She was still your mother no matter what.”

      “Yeah.” And Audie was still his uncle, and everyone in the county knew his life history even before he did.

      “I know it was hard for you to come back,” she said.

      He almost laughed, because he was just wishing to hell he hadn’t. Seeing Kayley made it all worse. If that plane crash had laid him up just a little longer in the jungle …

      “If you need any help, or just someone to talk to, for old time’s sake,” she said, “I bought my folks’ place. If you don’t remember the phone number, it’s in the book. They moved to Arizona, spend most of the year there and some with my sister in California, only a month here in the summer.” She stopped abruptly.

      He figured she knew he wasn’t going to call.

      “My thoughts will be with you tomorrow,” she said.

      “It was good to see you,” he said. Good and painful. All these years, he’d tried to convince himself that he’d gotten over her. No wonder he’d gone out of his way on his other visits back home to make sure he didn’t run into her.

      “You, too, Jace.” She studied him for a moment, her smile rueful.

      As he watched her walk away, he felt all those old feelings rush at him like fighter planes. He swore under his breath, wishing she’d told him what a bastard he was instead of offering to help him through the next few days.

      Just the sight of her still stirred a desire in him like no woman ever had.

      As he turned toward his rental SUV, he told himself as he had twelve years ago that he would have hurt her worse if he’d married her and stayed in Whitehorse. But even as he told himself that, he couldn’t get one thought out of his mind. What if he hadn’t left? What if he’d stayed and married her? Hell, they could have a couple of kids by now.

      That struck him like an arrow to the heart. He stopped as he reached the SUV and was reaching for his keys, when he felt it again. That insane sensation that someone was watching him.

      He realized with a sobering shock that normally he was more aware of his surroundings. It was a survival skill in his business. But he’d been so shaken up over everything since getting his mother’s letter and the news of her death and his uncle’s that he’d gotten sloppy.

      Now, though, he took in the street. On this side was a row of businesses, a half-dozen pickups parked diagonally in front of them. An elderly woman came out of the hardware store. A man went into the bank at the end of the block. A car came up the street.

      He thought for a moment that he’d imagined the feeling of being watched. He’d already realized that he couldn’t trust his instincts earlier with that moment of panic before he’d boarded the plane.

      But his instincts told him that he wasn’t so out of it that he’d imagined this.

      His gaze fell on a silver SUV like the one he’d rented. It was parked across the street by the park. Someone was sitting behind the wheel, but with the sun glinting off the window …

      A pickup went by, casting a long shadow over the SUV across the street. That’s when he saw her. She wore large sunglasses and a hat. She quickly looked away, but he’d recognized her. As he started to cross the street, she hurriedly started the engine and took off, her face turned away. But there was no doubt.

      The woman driving the SUV was the woman he’d met at the airport. Ava Carris. What was she doing in Whitehorse? Or maybe more to the point, why was she sitting on the main drag watching him?

       Chapter Three

      Kayley Mitchell climbed into her pickup, telling herself she was fine. But after several attempts to put her key in the ignition, she gave up and quit pretending, letting the tears come. Jace.

      She’d known seeing him again would be hard. She’d thought she was ready to face him. She’d been wrong. Nothing had prepared her for this, even though she’d known he would come home for his mother’s funeral—if he could.

      But then Jace had been running from his feelings for years. Could she really be sure what he would do? Especially now after hearing about not only his mother’s death, but also his uncle’s suicide and all that that entailed.

      The story was all over town. Her friend and local reporter Andi Jackson had finally done an article about the murders, the baby switch and how Jace Dennison was actually the son of Virginia Winchester. It was all anyone had been talking about for the past month.

      Kayley could just imagine how hard all of this was on Jace. She knew seeing her didn’t make things easier for him. Did he think she didn’t know that he seldom came home even to see his mother and uncle, and, when he did, he avoided town? Avoided even the chance he might run into her if she was home visiting?

      She had thought for sure that he would come home when he heard about his mother’s illness. But he hadn’t, so she had begun to doubt he would show up for her funeral—until she came out of the store, and there he was.

      It had taken her breath away. She was still trembling inside. One look at him and she saw that he’d heard about his uncle. Her heart had gone out to him, even as badly as he’d hurt her. He’d lost his mother and uncle. As far as she knew, he had no other family.

      Kayley brushed angrily at her tears. She felt just as she had in high school, her heart pounding, pulse racing, mouth dry as cotton. Hadn’t she cried enough tears for Jace Dennison? He’d broken her heart and she’d never gotten over it. It had taken everything in her not to let him see the effect he had on her.

      Not that she ever wanted him to know how much he’d hurt her. Twelve years had dulled the pain but done nothing to temper the desire she still felt for him. She’d moved on, and yet just seeing him had brought it all back, the memory of the two of them together.

      She looked around now, afraid she’d been seen crying over him, or, worse, that Jace had witnessed it. Everyone in town would be talking about the two of them as it was. She didn’t need them gossiping about her breakdown on the main drag.

      But as she glanced around, she didn’t see Jace. Still, she felt as if someone was watching her.

      AVA HAD PANICKED WHEN she’d seen Jace coming across the street toward her car. That had her less upset than the fact that he’d somehow СКАЧАТЬ