Darcy and Mary Jo headed straight to the edge of a ravine, stumbling down the dirt hillside to Darcy’s Jeep. Darcy pushed Mary Jo into the passenger seat, tossed in her bag, then slid behind the wheel. The engine started up on the first try and she gunned it, racing away from the Archer place.
“Is he dead?” Mary Jo asked.
“No.”
“Then he’ll find me, I know it!” she cried.
Darcy smothered her impatience, understanding coming quickly. “He won’t find you, Mary Jo.” Even if Eli had the balls to go to the police, with his record, they’d be slow to react to his claims. “I’m taking you someplace safe. Within twenty-four hours, someone will come to you at the safe house and document your abuse with photos and a statement.”
She’d helped a hundred women in the last three years, from women who drove Mercedes to ones who’d never seen the inside of a hospital before and would be scarred for life. Each time, the situation seemed more desperate. More hopeless. Often, Darcy was their last chance. For some, the legal system had failed them, letting wife beaters out on bail to find the women and do it again—often resulting in death. Some were too scared to venture into the unknown without support. Or worse, they’d become so brainwashed by verbal abuse that they thought they needed these men to survive.
Mary Jo Archer had a right to be scared.
Darcy understood that kind of fear only too well.
It made her an expert at evasion and deception. Five years as a Hollywood special-effects makeup artist made her unrecognizable even now. Using disguises at every leg of a rescue protected the women’s lives, as well as hers.
Darcy coveted her privacy like a fanatic. With good reason. She was a kidnapper. Plain and simple. She’d taken her baby son from his father and hidden from the world. From her perspective, the end justified the means. Saving a life. In her case, it was two lives.
But in the eyes of the law, she was the criminal. It wouldn’t matter that, before she’d escaped her abusive husband, she’d gone to the police and filed reports. Maurice’s influence had a long reach. The cops had dismissed her accusations, just as Maurice’s family and their friends had. Maurice had money, power and a stellar reputation as an executive film producer behind him, and in Beverly Hills and Hollywood that put him above reproach. Above the law.
Darcy had had nothing, and Maurice had made sure she was trapped from all directions. Till she escaped with her friend Rainy Miller Carrington’s help.
Suddenly her throat tightened with unspent grief. Rainy was dead. Killed in a car crash only weeks ago. With Mary Jo’s call coming soon after the funeral, Darcy hadn’t even had a chance to mourn.
Rainy would be mad that I’m still hiding, Darcy thought morosely. Even the Cassandras, her school-mates from the Athena Academy for Women, didn’t know the full extent of her ugly past. Rainy had known. And she’d told Kayla some of what Darcy had gone through to escape. The others knew she was no longer with her husband, and to them she was still Darcy Allen Steele, hairdresser and owner of the Chop Shop Salon. She was ashamed to admit the full truth to them.
To the rest of the world, including Jack, she was Piper Daniels, an alias she’d been using for nearly three years.
Everything in my life is an alias.
A forgery, a mask to keep herself and her son, Charlie, safe and hidden. She did nothing that would alert her husband to her whereabouts and was certain he was still searching for her.
Maurice wasn’t the kind of man who gave up control. Ever. Power and control were the root of who he was. And you didn’t cross him without consequences.
She took a deep breath, searching for calm. She needed a clear mind for the next hours of the journey.
At least Mary Jo had a fresh chance.
“You’ll file a report with the police,” Darcy said, her eyes on the road, “and then disappear till Eli is behind bars.”
“He should be in prison,” Mary Jo muttered bitterly. “See how he likes it.”
Darcy glanced her way. The girl’s face was a mess.
Maurice had never struck her face—it would have been proof to the public that he abused her. No, he had more deadly ways of keeping her under control.
“Eli kept me in a prison for years,” Mary Jo said, oblivious to Darcy’s thoughts. “That house might as well have had bars.”
The comment hit Darcy square in the chest.
A prison without walls. She was still locked in hers.
“Why don’t you try to get some sleep.” She spoke quickly to bury the feelings struggling to surface. “It’s a couple hours till we make it to the safe house.”
Mary Jo snuggled down into the seat. Darcy drove, aware of every flash of light in her rearview mirror. Every car they passed. Tonight, Mary Jo had her freedom.
After three years, Darcy didn’t.
Because Maurice was out there. Waiting for her to slip up. Hunting her.
A pearl of fear slid down her throat.
She hated it. It tasted foul and pitiful.
And Darcy knew she couldn’t live like this anymore.
But even after three years, she hadn’t figured out a way to outsmart Maurice. Legally, he still had the power.
And she wasn’t giving up her son, not even for her freedom.
Chapter 2
Nevada
J ust past the state line, Darcy pulled into the Sleep Easy Motel parking lot, wishing it was her own driveway. But she was still hours away from Comanche, Nevada, and at two in the morning, she was bone tired, her eyes gritty.
She turned off the engine and leaned back into the seat. Mission accomplished. Mary Jo was at the safe house in Utah, and she’d zigzagged her way toward the motel to make sure that no one followed her. She’d removed the mask and wig somewhere in between when she’d stopped to grab a bite to eat. Her skin itched from the glue and all she wanted was a hot shower and a soft bed.
Grabbing her bags from the back seat, she climbed out, locked up, then headed toward her room. She stopped short when she saw a figure braced against the overhang support post outside, smoking a cigarette.
Jack Turner.
No man wore a black cowboy hat that easily.
Just seeing him made something under her skin shiver. But Darcy didn’t want to be anywhere near Jack tonight. Hours in the car with her own unpleasant thoughts for company, she felt combustible. Rainy’s death, the grief she’d shelved to help Mary Jo and leaving Charlie again when she just wanted to cuddle up with him and be safe had left her riddled with a mountain of emotions just waiting to crush her. Succumbing to them anywhere near Jack would just make a bigger mess of her life. He’d want to know too much, and right now, she felt weak enough to slip up.
“Well at least you didn’t get arrested,” she said.
He stared at her hard for a second, then pitched the smoke onto the pavement. “Don’t do anything that stupid again,” he said coldly.
She didn’t need a reminder of the danger she’d put herself in. The bruise on her hip would do that. “I didn’t have a choice. And I can take care of myself.”
He sent her an arched look that said after the stunt she’d pulled tonight, he wasn’t so sure. “Why do you keep doing this, Piper?”
Piper. God, what she wouldn’t