“Dash.” He could hear it in her voice. Knew what was coming. A carefully constructed excuse. A denial of what he knew would happen.
“Don’t.” He laid his finger against her lips. “It’s going to happen, Elizabeth. You know it and I know it. Don’t make excuses and don’t try to deny it. When the time is right, when I have the privacy and the time to make you burn so hot you’re screaming, it’s going happen. Don’t think it won’t.”
Her eyes widened. Her little pink tongue peeked out to moisten her rose-tinted lips. The low moan that rumbled from his throat had her cheeks flushing further.
“Hey, Dash.” Mike forestalled anything she would have said as he walked in from the hallway.
He paused, staring back at them. His expression suddenly reflected a wry apology. “Sorry. I was going to get lunch as soon as I could drag Serena back into the house. Hungry?”
Oh, he was hungry all right, Dash thought. He glanced at Elizabeth, seeing her chagrin.
“Lunch?” he asked softly.
She cleared her throat. “Lunch.”
Chapter Ten
The tension slowly building between them didn’t ease. Dash stayed locked in the study with Mike for the better part of the day, but he came out often. And when he did, he came searching for Elizabeth.
He gave her soft touches. A hand on her shoulder, at her waist, as he eased her against him. He smiled down at her, stealing cookies when she and Serena weren’t looking, his eyes glittering with heat. He wouldn’t wait much longer. Elizabeth could feel it in his tense body, see it in the way he looked at her. He had claimed her before he ever met her and soon, he would make good on that claim.
Finally, that evening, she found a few minutes to pin him down on the progress being made. Sitting around the house and waiting was wearing on her nerves. She could only rest so much. Serena was a perfect hostess, the kids got along well, and Elizabeth found herself filled with so much nervous energy now it was hard to control it. She was used to running and worrying. She wasn’t used to a place of safety or any amount of time on her hands that wasn’t filled with the fight for survival.
After dinner, Mike and Serena took the girls to the living room, leaving her and Dash in the kitchen to talk. Dash watched her closely as they left, his eyes somber, reflective, though arousal lurked hot and impatiently in the very depths of his gaze.
“What have you found out?” she asked him after the children were resting in front of the large television in the Toler’s family room.
Serena and Mike were sitting in the living room with the girls as Elizabeth and Dash finished their coffee in the kitchen. Elizabeth watched Cassie for long moments, seeing a shadow of the once playful little girl she had been. Her heart clenched. Cassie had lost so much.
When Dash didn’t speak, she turned back to him, seeing his narrowed gaze on the little girl.
He turned back to her, his golden eyes pensive.
“Only more questions,” he said quietly. “Grange has a lot of money on her head, Elizabeth. More than reasonable, given the situation.”
Elizabeth snorted. “She saw him kill her father, Dash. She could have him locked away for a long time.”
Dash shook his head.
“Look at this logically, Elizabeth.” He leaned forward as she felt nerves replace the quiet calm that had been settling inside her. “Your husband was in deep with Grange. So he sells Cassie to him. I can see Grange wanting to get rid of the bastard, I really can, but,” he paused as he watched her closely, “why in front of Cassie? To scare her? I don’t think so. He has enough sense to see how much easier it would be to achieve his ends if he takes her away and then kills her father. None of this adds up.”
Elizabeth licked her lips nervously. There was no other explanation. It had to add up.
“Maybe he just didn’t care,” she hissed. “He’s killed and killed, Dash, and not cared.”
He shook his head again. Elizabeth clenched her fingers on the coffee cup as he began tearing down the only reasons she could find for the hell she and Cassie had been through.
“He’s killed secretively,” he told her softly. “Everyone but Dane Colder. They were obvious murders but there was no way to tie him to them, or to you and Cassie. He’s been trying to throw a very carefully constructed shield around the two of you. Running you ragged when he could have caught you several times.”
Elizabeth breathed in roughly. “We were lucky.” At least, that was what she had been trying to tell herself.
“You were.” He was watching her intently. “Too lucky, Elizabeth. Things aren’t adding up here. Until I can find a way to make them add up, then I keep working. If I have to, I go hunting. But I would like to get the information I need before I take that route. What exactly does Cassie remember about that night?”
The threat of an intended hunt hung between them as the final question was voiced. The one Elizabeth had been dreading.
“She wasn’t making sense when I got her out of that room. She was almost hyperventilating she was so terrified, trying so hard not to make a sound. I couldn’t make sense of anything she was saying once we got to the car. I couldn’t understand a word of it.” She fought to hold back the pain, the horror of that night. “She was completely silent for hours after that and then tried to act as though nothing had happened. I dressed her, took her straight to the police, and while we were there, two of his goons slipped in. Right before they got to the office we were in, Cassie started going crazy on me. She was adamant they were coming. I was so terrified I rushed her from the room. His men were coming down the hall as we left the office. We barely got away.”
Dash frowned. “How did Cassie know?”
A bitter smile twisted her lips. “Her fairy,” she sighed roughly. “Whatever the hell the ‘fairy’ is, it’s saved us more than once.”
Dash pushed his fingers through his hair wearily, causing the soft strands to feather around his face. He was worried. Elizabeth could see the frustration building inside him. Just as it had built inside her over the past two years.
They went over and over her memories of that night. Dash questioned her until she was ready to explode, until her nerves were strung tight and fear twisted her gut. It didn’t make sense. It never had. Facing that wasn’t easy.
Finally, he returned to the study with Mike to make more calls, to search for more answers. Elizabeth watched him leave then turned, searching for Cassie. She frowned, seeing the pinched, almost fearful, expression in her daughter’s face as she watched the two men leave the room.
Finally, the little girl’s head lowered and she stared down at her hands as though they were someone else’s before turning back to the television. Elizabeth frowned as a sudden fear struck her. Was there more to it? Something more that Cassie was aware of and hadn’t told her?
Elizabeth raked her fingers through her hair at that thought. She had questioned Cassie relentlessly those first months, fighting for answers. “I don’t know, Momma. I don’t know,” was her standard response to most of them.
She remembered her father stripping her gown from her body and pushing her to Grange as the other man picked her up.
“If you can keep her mother off your back,” Dane had challenged him. “A bit more time and I’ll have custody.”
“Who needs custody? No one will find her where she’s going,”Grange had responded before killing Dane in front of his daughter.
There was nothing else Cassie could tell her. Grange had come for her and Dane had wanted to wait until he could hand her over without problems. Grange had been unwilling to wait.
Later than night, after bathing Cassie and tucking her into bed, Elizabeth stood and watched the sleeping little girl. Dash’s questions had bothered her, made her look harder into the past two years now that she had a chance to take a breath and think. She didn’t like the confusion filling her mind or the sudden need to question Cassie further. The only person here who held the answers they needed was Cassie, and she feared the day was rapidly approaching that she would have to be questioned.