Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 94512 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94512 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 473(@200wpm)___ 378(@250wpm)___ 315(@300wpm)
“God,” he muttered, remembering everything Liza had confided to him about her parents. How lonely she’d been. How alone. His shoulders sagged.
“Exactly,” Kelly snapped. “So I suggest for the moment that you don’t go over there with excuses and apologies. Take some time to get your head on straight. Don’t approach her again unless you’re in it for good. She doesn’t deserve to be jerked around.”
Dare stared at his sister-in-law in stunned silence.
Kelly drew a deep breath. “I’ll be with Tess,” she said, glancing at Nash. Then without waiting for Dare’s reaction to her speech, Kelly turned and walked out.
“She’s right,” Ethan said, cutting Dare no slack.
Nash nodded in agreement. “No argument here. But there is something else you should know. And I’m not telling you this to add more guilt or to send you running over there. Cara will handle it.”
From the tone in his brother’s voice, everything in Dare stilled. “What is it?”
“When I got to Liza’s office earlier, she was pretty shaken up. She’d had a visitor. Different guy from the one at Ethan’s, but someone showed up and obviously made some threats. He’d grabbed her and bruised her arm pretty badly.”
Dare remembered her wince when he’d encircled her smaller wrist and closed his eyes, hating himself with everything inside him.
He started forward, but Nash stopped him with a firm hand on his shoulder. “No. Cara can handle it.”
Dare forced himself to breathe. He exercised more restraint than he’d have thought he possessed in not going off half-cocked. He wanted to kill someone. To bash down Liza’s door and demand she listen and accept his apology.
“For tonight, we focus on Tess,” Nash said. “Then you figure out how you feel about Liza and what the hell happened here tonight. Then and only then do you go after her.”
Knowing his brother was right, Dare nodded.
But the sick feeling in his gut remained—and would stay there, he knew—until he made things right with the woman he loved.
* * *
Liza and Cara left the hospital. Thankfully, the dark-haired officer didn’t push or force Liza to talk about the scene in the waiting room. Liza could barely process it herself.
“Mind if I stop home and pick up a few things?” Cara asked.
“Of course not. I’m sorry to put you out.”
Cara smiled. “I don’t mind. But when we get back to your place, I am going to need you to tell me everything about your brother and the situation. I can’t keep an eye out if I’m in the dark.”
Liza nodded. What was one more humiliation in a night full of them? “Sure. No problem.”
A little while later, Liza curled up on her couch. Both she and Cara had dressed in sweats and T-shirts and had opened a bottle of wine.
“Man, I needed this drink after the day I’ve had,” Liza said, taking a long sip of the dry wine.
Cara raised an eyebrow over her glass. “And this nice Pinot Grigio was the best you can do?”
Liza laughed. “It was this or beer. I bought it for Dare,” she muttered, sobering. “And I’d much prefer not to be reminded of him. But good point. I ought to keep something harder in the house for just this kind of occasion.” Liza lifted her glass and drained the rest, hoping the buzz would kick in soon.
Cara eyed her with understanding. “Seeing as I’m your protection for the night, I’ll stay sober. So tell me what’s happening. I only know what was in the police report after the accident. And Dare was staying with you because someone deliberately sabotaged your car. Something to do with your brother?”
Liza nodded. Starting at the very beginning, she filled Cara in on her brother’s history with Dare, Stuart Rossman’s party, and the current situation, including Brian’s embezzling money from the firm and borrowing from a loan shark.
She ended her recitation with tonight’s threat and the deadline she’d received. “So that’s the story.” To her surprise, Liza felt more unburdened afterward.
Cara whistled. “Okay, then. I guess that explains an awful lot.” The dark-haired woman paused, going over everything Liza had said. “Your brother’s in deep.”
Liza nodded, appreciating how Cara had skipped over mentioning Dare or the scene at the hospital. Liza knew she’d have to deal with her emotions eventually, but she’d stuffed everything deep, waiting until she was alone in her bed tonight.
“I know. I can’t make excuses, and I don’t want to. He’s going to have to take responsibility for his life, but I can’t walk around with a target on my back. If that means paying off his debts, so be it.”
“Fifty grand?”
Liza briefly closed her eyes, then nodded. “I have it in savings. My grandfather left us both some money. I never touched mine.”
Neither of them mentioned the obvious, that Brian had probably gone through his already.