CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

ONCE THE SHOCK of his words wore off, a cold, stark image came to Emma, worming into her brain like some kind of insidious bug, tunneling its way in and bringing with it all the pain, all the horror, all the truth she’d been trying to escape. For a second, for just one single second, she actually thought she might agree. Everything would be over that way, wouldn’t it? Facing the consequences of what she’d done here, facing the fact that she’d never have her children, even facing the truth of Raul’s betrayal, it would all be in the past, part of her history.

She’d be dead; she wouldn’t care.

Then she thought again, and the truth of what her death would really mean came to her. It would mean he won. And no one, except Raul, would know the truth. Within a very short time, he would probably be dead, too. Kelman would find a way to murder him, or almost worse, lock him up again, and then Kelman would be free to do whatever he wanted.

Suddenly she understood the depth of Raul’s commitment to this evil man’s destruction. If she’d been Raul, she would have been equally committed. She would have used him just as he’d used her, if it meant stopping this man. She closed her eyes and forgave Raul, forgave him and accepted that she loved him-even though he’d never know that either.

“Drink up, Emma. Wash down the pills.” Kelman spoke almost compassionately. “All of them.”

She locked her eyes on his. “When hell freezes over.”

He waited, as if thinking about what to do, then all at once, he was at her side. In a heartbeat, he had both bottles open and her jaw in his hand. Slapping his other hand over her nose, he cut off her breath. She lasted as long as she could, her vision growing dim, until nature took over and she opened her mouth to gasp in air. Instantly, he poured in the pills and liquor, then he snapped her mouth shut and held her face tight.

“Swallow,” he said, all pretense gone. He shook her face. “Now!”

Choking and gagging, Emma tossed her head violently but after a few seconds, the inevitable happened. She swallowed. Then swallowed again. The vodka burned, the taste of it unbelievably strong as it mixed with the pills and began to dissolve them. He kept her jaws clamped together and she continued to fight. In a moment it was over and he released her.

Still on all fours and coughing uselessly, Emma scrambled to the opposite corner of the room, her breathing ragged and hoarse. She opened her mouth and tried to spit. There was nothing left, though. She’d swallowed all of it. She lifted her head, her stomach churning. She wanted to curse him, to scream, to attack him as she’d planned, but all she could do was stare at him blankly.

He crossed his arms and leaned against the wall with an air of casual calmness as he waited for her to die.

DESPITE EVERYTHING, some vestige of the man he’d once been still lived in Raul. He knew this was true because it’d never been his intention to kill Kelman. But as he leaped over the wall separating the two houses and sprinted for Emma’s house, this last reminder of who he had been disappeared. Rage and pent-up frustration filled him, and he could think of only one thing: seeing Kelman dead. It was no longer enough to take his money or ruin his life. Raul wanted to kill him. Preferably with his bare hands.

The front door was locked. Cursing, Raul turned and ran to the back of the house. Someone had already jimmied open the door off the terrace. He stepped inside the house, his heart pounding loudly enough to reveal his presence, he was certain. He paused and forced himself to listen.

There was nothing but silence, then he heard conversation, faint but definitely there. He lifted his face to the ceiling and wished he could see through the rafters to the floor above. They were there, but where? And doing what? Did Kelman have a weapon?

It didn’t really matter. Raul slipped through the house and made his way up the stairs, pulling the drunk’s ancient pistol from the waistband of his pants. Holding his breath, he paused at the top, his hand on the doorknob. He turned it slowly, then exhaled a prayer of thanks when the knob gave way. He tensed, then threw open the door.

The room was empty.

But from the adjoining bathroom, the muted sound of voices could be heard. He crossed the bedroom, stopping once more when he reached the door to the bath. The sound of Kelman’s smug voice, mixing with the low and pleading tones of Emma’s, reached out and grabbed Raul. The sensation was physical; he felt it come under the door and jump up and choke him.

With his hand gripping the pistol, Raul put his shoulder to the door, twisted the knob and burst into the room.

EMMA SCREAMED as the door flew open, but it was a reflexive action borne of survival. Her body and mind had already started to shut down, the drugs beginning their work. Lying in the corner of the room, she fought to focus, blinking rapidly, but the man tumbling into the room moved too fast for her to follow. Even Kelman’s voice, as he bellowed in surprise, came to her from a well. It was stretched out, too, like music played too slow, the name he uttered making no sense to her cloudy brain.

The two figures wrestled in the tiny confines of the bathroom, their curses and grunts signaling the violence of their fight. Emma commanded her legs and arms to lift her up and get her out of the hell she was in, but they wouldn’t listen. It was all she could do to raise her head from the cold marble floor. A second later, the two men came crashing in her direction, locked together, rolling as one. She tried to escape the inevitable, but she simply couldn’t move. The two heavy bodies collided with her limp one. She blinked and cried out, the knee of one of the men slamming into her stomach.

Her breath left her in a whoosh, and the jolt of it, the pain of it, cleared her mind, if only for a second. Raul came into focus. He was on top of Kelman, struggling to hold him down, a gun in his hand only inches from her face. She strained to figure out where the gun had come from-hadn’t Kelman left it downstairs? Before she could reason it out, Raul lifted Kelman’s wrist and smashed it into the marble, the sickening crunch of breaking bone sounding above their rasping breaths.

“Take the pistol,” Raul screamed. “Take it, Emma! Take it and shoot him!”

Their eyes connected, but Emma could no more have seized the weapon than she could have fired it accurately. In another second, the two men rolled away from her. Instead of moving inches, they seemed to travel miles. Paralyzed, she watched them go, but before they did, she saw the expression in Raul’s wild gaze. It was pure disbelief. He didn’t understand why she refused to help. He didn’t know it was because she couldn’t. He believed it was because she wouldn’t.

It was her final thought. Emma’s eyes rolled back into her head and everything else disappeared.

EMMA’S REFUSAL stunned him, but his instincts kicked in and saved him from distraction. Raul pounded Kelman’s hand once more into the marble, the pistol trapped between them, neither willing to release his grip. Raul should have shot him the minute he’d pushed open the door, but he’d been too startled once he’d seen Emma. Kelman had taken advantage of the moment and managed to grab the gun.

Kelman’s knuckles were bloody and ragged, yet he continued to hold on. Another whack against the marble and this time something bigger broke. Raul heard the snap and took advantage of the moment. He popped Kelman’s wrist one more time, then twisted it. The gun fell free. Unable to get to it himself, Raul did the next best thing. He batted the pistol with his elbow and sent it spinning into a corner. He wouldn’t be able to reach it, but neither would Kelman.