Thread Of Deceit. Catherine Palmer

him. Smelled the dust on her soft skin as he lifted her in his arms.

      He could hear own his breath, heated and heavy. He heard her cries as blood dripped from a bullet wound in her abdomen. The pain he had caused. The terrible, inconceivable, unthinkable thing he had done.

      “Oh, God, help me!” The strangled words wrenched from his lips. Sweating, clenching his fists, he swallowed against the knot of pain in his throat. “Forgive me!”

      Propelled by the agony in his chest, Sam strode toward the front door. He passed Duke and the dog’s caretaker without a word. Bursting through the metal detector, he stepped out onto the searing pavement.

      “Where is she?” he demanded of the youth at the door.

      Raydell straightened. “Who?”

      “The reporter? Which way did she go?”

      “Down the street. Must have parked around the corner. You okay, Sam?”

      He started in the direction Raydell had pointed. “Tell T-Rex I’ll be back.”

      “What’d she say to you? What’s she gonna do to Haven?”

      Unable to explain, Sam broke into a run. As he rounded the corner, her tan Chevy was pulling away from the curb. He leaped in front of it, slammed his palms on the hood, forced her to stop.

      Ana braked, threw open her door and jumped out. “Hey, that’s my car you’re beating on, you jerk!”

      “The little girl. Flora. She talked to you? Where’s she from?”

      “I don’t know. She speaks Spanish.”

      “Spanish.” He let out a breath. “Where does she live? What does she need?”

      Ana frowned at him. “Why?”

      “I have to know.” He struggled to find a plausible reason. “Maybe I can help her.”

      She crossed her arms. “What’s going on, Sam?”

      He dropped his head, rubbed his eyebrows, fought the tide of emotion that threatened. “It’s nothing,” he managed.

      “You chased me around the corner. I nearly ran over you, for pity’s sake. It’s not nothing.”

      He nodded. “Okay. All right.” Filling his chest with air, he forced out the words. “Iraq, ’03. The start of the war. I was there. The girl reminded me of someone.” He paused. “Something happened there. In the desert.”

      Ana was silent. Her car engine hummed. People passed on the sidewalk. Staring.

      Sam tried to make himself move. Return to his normal life. But he knew if he went back into the center, she would be there. Sitting. Looking at him. Gazing with her brown eyes as if she knew.

      “Listen, do you want to get something to eat?” Ana asked. “It’s early for supper, but I’m hungry.”

      He considered her offer. A kindness, because she saw his obvious struggle. He didn’t much like the woman, didn’t care for what she was doing, the threat she posed to his dream. But for now, she was better than the memory. Better than going back into the center and facing the demon that wouldn’t let him go—no matter how many hours he spent with a counselor, no matter how hard he prayed.

      “Yeah,” he said. He rubbed his hand over the stubble of hair he kept short. “There’s a barbecue place down the street. We go there sometimes, Terell and I. We can walk.”

      She nodded, stepped back into her car and eased it into its parking space again. Waiting, he pressed his hands on his thighs, drying the perspiration. Ana shut her door and locked it. She walked toward him. Pretty, kind, wary, concerned. Her eyes were brown, too, but older and wiser. Not so frightened. Not so innocent.

      “Barbecue,” she said, joining him. “I hope they have onions.”

      Ana tugged another napkin from the rectangular dispenser and blotted her chin. This was a mistake. In the first place, she looked like an idiot—dribbling barbecue sauce from the oversize shredded-beef sandwich. Not that she cared how she looked in front of Sam Hawke. But she did want to be as professional as possible at all times. Hard to do when the man kept staring at her with those faded-denim eyes, as though he could see straight into all the places she kept so well hidden. His gaze made her feel off balance, one minute the intrepid reporter and the next a silly schoolgirl oozing barbecue sauce.

      She had hoped to talk with him about the incident on the sidewalk, the memory Flora had triggered. Her motive wasn’t all charitable, Ana had to admit. Without taking up too much of her precious remaining time—she had to eat, after all—she hoped she could actually interview Sam. She wanted to find out more about his reasons for founding Haven, his interest in children, the strict military atmosphere he had created there. If she could dig out some information on Terell, even better. And she could always use more details about the lead paint.

      But instead of some quiet neighborhood coffee bar where she could question him to the soothing strains of mood music, they had entered a hectic barbecue joint crowded with customers. The shouts of the kitchen workers, the clang of ladles on white ironstone plates, the whoosh of crushed ice falling into empty glasses and the hiss of soda dispensers filled the small room. On top of all that, rhythm-and-blues music blared from a jukebox.

      “Pork, chicken or beef?” someone yelled at a customer. The questions from the cooks came rapid-fire, loud and impatient. “Shredded or sliced? Pickles on that? Onions? Potato salad, baked beans or coleslaw? Make up your mind, fella—there’s ten people behind you! You gonna take all day, or what?” There was no way Ana’s recorder would pick up any information she could use. Her hands were so sticky she couldn’t hold her pen.

      She had a sneaking suspicion Sam had planned it this way. Despite his obvious distress on the sidewalk earlier, he was too smart not to know she would try to interrogate him. He took a bite of his sliced brisket sandwich, chewed awhile and then licked a dollop of barbecue sauce from the corner of his mouth—the whole time staring at her with those blue eyes. Every time she asked him a question, he tilted his head as though he couldn’t hear—which was probably true. Then he went back to chewing and staring.

      As the crowd began to thin, the sound level decreased several decibels. “I’ve got to tell you, Haven feels like a military compound to me,” Ana said. “The dress code, the dog, the guard at the front door. Do you really need so many rules?”

      For the first time since they’d met, he smiled at her. “Rules keep people safe. You like that.”

      “How would you know what I like?”

      “I know.” He tipped up his Coke glass and drained the contents. “You like rules.”

      “You don’t know anything about me. We’ve met exactly twice, and I’m the one who interviewed you.”

      “Tell me what you know about me, then.”

      “You played college basketball, you were in the Marines, you served in Iraq, you founded Haven—”

      “That’s not who I am. That’s what I’ve done.” He leaned back. “I brought you here for a reason. Bet you didn’t know that.”

      “ I asked you to dinner.”

      “I chose the place. Thought I’d see how you like my favorite barbecue joint. You don’t. Too messy.”

      “I do like it. The food tastes fine.”

      “Yeah, but the napkins. You’ve used seventeen.”

      “You counted my napkins?”

      “No, but it’s a good guess.” He leaned across the table, his long arms on the red plastic tablecloth. Setting his index fingers on her plate, he gave it a quarter turn. “You don’t like things out of order.”

      “How do you know?”

      “When I brought your plate