For the Sake of their Baby. Alice Sharpe

added. “The old church at Taylor’s Crossing was on fire.” She shuddered as she thought about that fire, mercifully without victims.

      Alex stopped dead in his tracks and pinned her with a laser stare. “When I left you, you were still furious with Devon.”

      Tears puddled in her eyes as old feelings of inadequacy welled up inside her. “Of course I was furious. For years I tried to please that man. I never could. That night was the last straw. The things he said—”

      “He didn’t want you saddled to someone like me,” Alex said. “He wanted better for you than one of the Chase boys.”

      One of the Chase boys. Sure, Alex had come from a disreputable family but he’d grown into a wonderful, trustworthy man. Her uncle had refused to see that. To him, Alex would always be the boy he’d forced Liz to break up with in high school—the boy with no future.

      Did wonderful, trustworthy men commit murder? an inner voice demanded.

      Alex a murderer. It didn’t sit right, it never had.

      But he confessed.

      It always came down to his confession.

      “Later that night, you went back to his house,” Alex said softly.

      “How do you know that?” She’d never admitted that bitter, pointless trip to anyone.

      Alex said, “I saw you.”

      Before he killed her uncle? Had she been that close to being able to stop him? A cry of anguish erupted and died in her throat. “I thought Uncle Devon might have had a…I don’t know, a change of heart,” she mumbled. “Except he didn’t have a heart and I should have known it. I guess I was still hoping he might come through.”

      “But he didn’t.”

      “Of course not. It was foolish of me to think he would. He was more sure than ever that I’d eventually do just as he wanted, like I always did. He said he was going to call his lawyer in the morning and set up the papers giving everything he had to a local nature conservatory. He didn’t care about the wetlands, it was just his way of showing me he had control. Because he judged everything by its monetary worth, he thought I did, too.”

      Alex cleared his throat. “He never understood you.”

      “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

      He stared at her so hard she felt the back of her skull throb. Finally, he said, “Don’t ever tell anyone else you went back there that night. Do you understand? Not a soul.”

      “Why—”

      “Not a soul,” he repeated. “Promise me.”

      She took a deep breath. “Okay.”

      “You didn’t tell Kapp, did you?”

      “I was in shock when he came, but I kept thinking the less I said the better it would be for you. After he left, I called your lawyer. I told him I wanted to help you. I couldn’t believe you’d ever kill anyone. But he confirmed that you’d confessed. He said you didn’t want any help from me, you didn’t even want to see me or talk to me. Alex, do you have any idea how much that hurt?”

      “I—”

      “Because for all intents and purposes, I lost you that night. I thought I was going to lose our baby, too. I’d lost one before and the thought of losing another… The doctor put me in bed for a week.”

      “I—”

      “It doesn’t matter if you’re out on a technicality. You’re still a murderer. I won’t have you around me or my baby.”

      To her astonishment, Alex laughed. He laughed until a single tear rolled down his cheek, then he sat abruptly in one of the wing back chairs that flanked the stone-cold fireplace and buried his face in his hands.

      Liz watched him with growing alarm until she found herself standing by his side. She shrugged off his coat and laid it aside. He apparently sensed her closeness for without looking up, he reached for her, caught the hem of her sweatshirt, pulled her onto his lap. He rested his cheek against her breasts, his chin on the curve of her belly.

      While one tear did not a crying-jag make, she’d never seen Alex shed even that before. She’d always been the one to weep at the drop of a hat, not him. She wrapped her arms around him and smoothed his hair with an unsteady hand. She tried to dismiss how sitting in his lap made her feel. The way her body came alive. The way the world suddenly seemed to be okay again despite the fact that nothing was okay. It was like finally waking from a long, dreary sleep.

      But where would this feeling of renewed life take her? Into heartbreak territory, that’s where. Into a new trial, the outcome of which didn’t matter because he was guilty and that was enough to destroy them. She concentrated on feeling pity. It was safer.

      Eventually, he looked up. She fought the urge to touch his lips with her own. How else does a woman comfort a man she loves, even a man she knows she shouldn’t love?

      His expression guarded, he said, “I found your long green scarf.”

      She blinked a few times, totally at sea.

      “The one I gave you for your birthday because it matched your eyes.”

      “I know which scarf you mean,” she said. “But I don’t understand—”

      “You left it behind. I only had a second before I heard the sirens so I did the only thing that came to me. I hid it.”

      Blood pounded in her ears, making it hard to follow his words.

      “Liz,” he said gently, “I passed you a few miles from your uncle’s estate. It’s a narrow road and it doesn’t go much of anywhere else. You were driving back into town.”

      “I didn’t see you.”

      “It was dark and my old black truck looks like half the other black trucks in the county. But you have that white sports car.”

      “I don’t understand, Alex. What’s this got to do with my scarf?”

      “I found your scarf in your uncle’s hands. For an eternity or two, I just stared at it, trying to make sense of it until I heard the sirens. Then I untwisted it somehow and hid it. By then, the sheriff was there. He took me into custody. I tried to call you. I tried for hours. You weren’t home.”

      Liz had a hard time finding her voice. Her throat felt dry and raspy. She said, “After I talked to my uncle for the last time, I went to my office at the mall and started packing my things. I wrote a letter of resignation. I was going to give it to him the next day. I was going to quit.”

      “When I couldn’t reach you, I thought it meant you were hiding,” Alex said. “The sheriff started talking about finding you. He started saying that everyone, even him, had heard you threaten your uncle. He said everyone knew you were just waiting for your uncle to die so you’d be rich. He said maybe you’d killed your uncle. I’ve had time to think about it since then. I think he was goading me. At the time I just wanted to strangle him.”

      “Why would he do something like that? He was my uncle’s protégé, and while we weren’t exactly friends, he’s always been pleasant to me.”

      “He wanted me to admit I killed your uncle.”

      Liz found herself on her feet, trembling. “What are you saying, Alex?”

      He took her hands and held them firmly. “I think your uncle came at you with that letter opener and you struggled with him. I think your fear gave you enough strength to protect yourself and our baby. I think that during the struggle, the letter opener got turned on him or he fell on it, I’m not sure which. I think it was an accident or self-defense.”

      She pulled her hands away and backed up. “You think I killed my uncle?”

      Brow furrowing, he nodded. “Yes. Of course I do.”