away.
But he was too strong and determined. When she wouldn’t comply, he’d slapped her. The more she’d struggled, the more violent he’d become, until she blacked out.
The next thing she remembered was being shoved out of his car onto the side of the highway, cold rain assaulting her bruised body.
Suddenly Brittany pulled herself into a fetal position on the bed and sobbed quietly into the pillow. If the stranger in the other room hadn’t come along, she shuddered to think what would have happened to her. She couldn’t have walked much longer. Worse, some other sick, violent person could have come along and finished her off.
Still, she hated the thought that she was at another man’s mercy. For all she knew, he could turn out to be worse than Rupert. Her instincts resisted that thought, though. She barely remembered what her rescuer looked like, but she sensed he would never hurt a woman.
The way he’d touched her had told her that.
Brittany’s breath caught as she thought about how she’d inhaled the subtle yet expensive scent of his cologne, how manly he’d smelled. But it was the way his hands had felt on her bare flesh that lingered. Stop it, she told herself, panicking. The fact that he would never touch her again was what was important.
As soon as she got up and dressed, she could return home, she assured herself. She could escape from this nightmare, then figure out how best to put herself and her life back together. No matter what Collier Smith advised, she had no intention of reporting Rupert to the police for fear of repercussions, both professionally and emotionally.
She had no confidence in the justice system, especially against an adversary like Rupert Holt. Who would believe a nobody like her, whose brother was a jailbird?
What about Tommy? Another hard shudder went through her, and Brittany panicked. She was due to visit him in a couple of days, on Sunday, but she couldn’t go with her face all bruised.
Suddenly she wished she could get her hands on Rupert, first for hurting her and second for dashing her hopes of getting help for Tommy. Every time she visited him in that awful place, her heart broke anew.
What a difference there was between her circumstances and those of the man who had helped her. From what little she had noticed of her surroundings, it was obvious he was someone of means, the complete opposite from her. She and Tommy had been left to fend for themselves after the death of their mother when they both were young. Her drunken stepfather and Tommy’s father had contributed little to their upbringing; most of the time they hadn’t even known where he was.
Brittany had struggled all her life to get where she was today, which still wasn’t where she wanted to be. At thirty, she was still trying to get her degree so that she could become financially secure, something she had never known. After that, she would like nothing better than to flee her hometown and live somewhere else. Anywhere else.
But leaving Chaney wasn’t an option, not until she was able to hire an attorney and start working to get Tommy released from prison.
Because of her brother’s one terrible error in judgment, she might as well wear a scarlet letter on her chest. Even though the accident had happened three years ago, she was still shunned and talked about. Long before the mishap, her family was considered trailer park trash. Now she had no chance of earning anyone’s respect in the town where she’d grown up.
The fact that Tommy was in prison would never be laid to rest, especially since he had permanently injured the son of the town’s most prestigious family.
Yet Brittany loved her brother and felt responsible for him, though she definitely saw his faults. He’d caused her more than her share of heartache during his teenage years, even joining a gang for a short time and getting arrested, though she’d believed him when he told her someone had set him up in order to get even with him. Still, it was the accident that had done the real damage.
Following the accident, they had hauled him down to the police station, since he hadn’t had a scratch on him. Once there, Tommy had called her almost in hysterics. Clamping down on her own hysteria, she had gone to him immediately. She never would forget the desperate look on her brother’s face when she’d walked into police headquarters.
“Sis,” he’d told her, “I swear I didn’t know my head wasn’t clear when I left the party.”
“Come on, Tommy, surely you felt something.”
“Not until I turned onto the highway, then, wham, it hit me. Suddenly I didn’t know where I was or what I was doing.” He paused, his voice cracking when he spoke again. “Hell, I don’t even remember hitting the guy’s car. My drink was doctored. I know it was. Someone’s out to get me.”
“Tommy—”
“Say you believe me,” he pleaded, grabbing her hands and clinging to them. “I know I’ve been in my share of trouble, but you know I’ve never driven drunk. You know that.”
And she did. Yet there was always a first time. Still, she wanted to believe him—for her own sake as well as his. “Oh, dear Lord, Tommy, what are we going to do?”
“Make this go away, sis,” he sobbed. “You always make things right. I know you won’t fail me now.”
But she had failed him, and miserably, too. Because she’d had no means to hire adequate counsel to represent him, Tommy had been assigned a court appointed attorney who failed to substantiate his claim that he’d been drugged. As far as she could tell, the man had hardly bothered to try. That was why, when Rupert had offered to champion her cause with an attorney, she’d dropped her guard.
Never again.
Deciding she’d wallowed in self-pity long enough, Brittany forced her sore limbs to move into a sitting position, then upright. Soon she would be dressed and on her way home.
Four
Stranded.
No other word adequately described the situation. During the night, the rain had come down in buckets. Without even having to walk outside and take a look, Collier knew the bridge was impassable. Whether he liked it or not, he wouldn’t be taking his guest anywhere. And whether she liked it or not, she wouldn’t be going anywhere.
Through the years, Mason had kept saying he was going to do something about the bridge, get a crew up here to rebuild it, so this kind of problem wouldn’t rise every time the water did. But he hadn’t followed through. Collier figured it was because the retreat wasn’t used all that much anymore, which was a shame, since it was a great place for R & R.
And work.
He began to pace the floor again, as he had been on and off for hours. Good thing the floors were hardwood; otherwise, he would have worn a trail in the carpet. Lord knew he’d tried to work—all night, in fact. Yet he hadn’t made a dent in the case. Instead he’d been consumed with thoughts of the woman in the next room and his bid for the judgeship.
Though far apart in reality, they seemed closely related in his disjointed mind. He shouldn’t be holed up in this cabin with a lovely woman with an obviously shaded past. With secrets. The worst kind of woman to get involved with.
The hell of it was, he wasn’t involved. So why was he getting himself all worked up over something he hadn’t done? Loaded question. Loaded answer. When he’d touched Brittany Banks, it had been like tossing gasoline on an open flame. And that flame was still smoldering in his gut.
He’d never reacted to a woman as strongly, certainly not Lana. He could go for days, even weeks, and not touch her, and it wouldn’t bother him.
But he knew the woman in the nearby room was a different story. He would bet that underneath her aloof exterior were seething emotions that, when tapped in the right way, would run as hot as molten lava. Of course he would never find out. He didn’t intend