No Place to Run

CHAPTER 25

SOPHIE was shaking so bad she was going to fall if she didn’t sit down. Her senses were shattered, and she needed to get away from the overwhelming presence of so many people. There was no friendly welcome from Rusty, who sat isolated in the corner of the room, and Sam would never let her get a foot outside the door without him.

She’d never been more scared or more overwhelmed in her life.

Sam pressed in and put a hand on her shoulder. She jumped and skittered sideways, the light touch hard on her already frayed nerves.

“Sophie,” he said softly. “I’m going to take you down the hall so a doctor can examine you.”

Her baby. Yes, she wanted to make sure everything was okay with her baby.

Numbly she allowed Sam to lead her from the room. He kept her tight to his side, and they only traveled three doors down to what looked to be a private doctor’s lounge.

It was empty when they went inside, and he directed her to sit on one of the leather couches that lined the wall. Then he sat beside her and took her hands in his.

She stared down, watching as his fingers grazed lightly, soothingly over her palms.

“The doctor will be here in a moment. I wanted a chance to talk with you privately.”

She raised her head in alarm.

He held her gaze, and she was surprised by the tenderness in his eyes. No anger. No judgment.

Never before had she felt quite so overwhelmed. The events of the last few minutes had somehow unhinged her. She felt so desperately adrift, and she was more afraid now than she’d been when she’d run so many months ago, and kept running.

Before, she’d had nothing to lose, and now? She stood to lose so much and maybe nothing at all.

Angered by the tears that slithered down her cheeks—had she done nothing but cry for the last hour?—she scrubbed at the wetness with the back of her hand and looked away so Sam wouldn’t be witness to her awful, gut-wrenching weakness.

But he turned her back. Ever so gently, he touched her chin and brought her back around. He swiped at one damp trail with his thumb, and his gaze softened all the more as he stared into her eyes.

“I lied, you know,” she said brokenly.

He looked startled by her admission. “About what?”

She pulled away from him and stood, unable to just sit there when every muscle in her body fidgeted uncontrollably. She paced three steps and then stopped, her back to Sam. Her heart raced, and even as she wiped at the tears, she felt the uncontrollable urge to weep more.

“I gave you a bullshit line about why I killed my father, and maybe some of it was true. But I killed him for my mother. And now because of that, you could lose yours.”

She turned then so she could at least look him in the eye.

“I’m so sorry, Sam. I never meant for this to happen. I never dreamed ...”

“What did he do to you, honey?” Sam asked. “What about your mother? You never mentioned her.”

“You’re so lucky,” she said with all the envy in her heart. “Even with all that has happened, you’re so fortunate. You have such a wonderful family.”

He rose to stand in front of her. He seemed indecisive as to whether he should touch her or not, and finally he just stood there and watched her.

“And you didn’t have a family.”

She slowly shook her head. “My mother was the closest thing to family, but even she was too cowed by my father to ever do anything to gain his disapproval. He didn’t marry her. He didn’t want me to have his last name. He thought it would be inconvenient were his enemies to ever try to use me to weaken him. Inconvenient. What they didn’t know was that he wouldn’t have cared. He would have never given or sacrificed anything for me or anyone else. But he didn’t want to be inconvenienced. God.”

“Ah Sophie,” Sam said quietly.

“He killed her. And do you know why? He wasn’t angry with her. She had nothing to do with it. She was unfortunate enough to be in the room when a man my father was cutting a deal with questioned whether or not he had the stomach to do what it took to get the job done. Want to know what my father did then?”

Sam closed his eyes. “Jesus, Sophie, you don’t have to tell me this.”

“Yes, yes, I do, so maybe you’ll understand, because even I don’t understand. I don’t understand any of it. We were eating dinner. He had this asshole over to discuss business. When the man questioned him, he simply pulled out a gun and shot my mother in the head. At the dinner table. And then calmly went back to eating. His only comment? ‘Do you doubt me now?’ ”

“Holy shit, how old were you?”

She was quiet for a moment because all she could think of was the image of her mother, slumped forward in her chair, the sound of her fork clattering to the table. And the blood. So much blood. It had run onto the pristine white tablecloth. Sophie hadn’t screamed. She hadn’t reacted. She’d known even as young as she was that if she’d made any sound, it was likely her father would have killed her too. Just to make a point.

“I was ten,” she finally said. “He went back to eating and then complained because his steak was too well done. I remember being afraid for the cook, but his mood was strangely relaxed, and aside from pushing his plate aside and wiping his mouth, he did nothing more than stare at the man across the table. Then he asked him if he’d like an after dinner drink. They retired to my father’s study while I sat there staring at my mother. I sat there until the maid came to lead me away, and my father’s men then disposed of my mother’s body just like they disposed of everything else in my father’s life that displeased him.”

She lifted her gaze once more to Sam’s. “You wanted to know why I killed him. I killed him with the same disdain that he once killed my mother, and I killed him so I would finally be free.”

“Jesus, baby, I don’t even have words. I don’t know how you survived as long as you did.” He pulled her into his arms and cradled her protectively against his chest. He stroked her hair with one hand and held her tightly with the other. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

She closed her eyes and inhaled his comforting scent. Hot tears continued to leak down her cheeks, absorbed by his shirt. She’d never cried for her mother. She’d been too afraid. Even in the darkness of her room at night, she’d been too afraid her father would hear. He abhorred weakness, and she’d spent years removing any hint of it from her demeanor.

A knock sounded at the door, and she quickly stepped away from Sam, wiping at her face in an effort to hide her distress. He gave her a moment, then leaned in to kiss her on the forehead.

“That’s the doctor. Have a seat and get comfortable. I want him to give you a thorough checkup before we leave here.”

She sagged onto the couch and only half-listened as Sam went to the door and spoke in low tones to the doctor. A moment later, an older man walked in, pushing a portable piece of medical equipment, with Sam close on his heels. It didn’t escape her notice that Sam’s hand was on his gun, and he watched the doctor closely when he stopped in front of Sophie.

“Sophie, I’m Dr. Richards. I’d like to check you over, listen to the baby’s heartbeat, and if you consent, I’d like to do a sonogram as well. Just to make sure everything’s as it should be.”

He smiled as he spoke, and Sophie relaxed a little.

“I get to see the baby?”

Hope and excitement welled in her chest, and ridiculously, she felt like crying all over again.

“Yes, we can even see if you’re having a little boy or a little girl if you want.”

Her gaze flew to Sam. He looked a little gobsmacked.

“I do,” she breathed. “Do you?” she asked Sam.

Sam circled around the doctor and slid onto the couch beside her. “I do. I’d love to know.”

The doctor began with a cursory exam of Sophie. He listened to her heart, took her blood pressure, asked her general questions about her health history. He asked to see her arm, poked and prodded at the stitches and seemed surprised that the sutures looked so clean and that there was no sign of infection. Then he asked her to recline on the couch, smiling as he did so.

“I’m afraid it’s not the best of exam tables, but Mr. Kelly felt strongly about me performing the exam here and not in one of our rooms.”

“No, it’s okay,” she said hastily as she looked right and left to determine the best way to lie down.

Sam answered her dilemma by simply rotating and easing her down until her head was in his lap. He smoothed a hand over her forehead as the doctor slipped the waistband of her jeans below the swell of her belly.

There was a muffled sound from the machine as the doctor placed the wand over her belly and moved back and forth. Then he settled on a spot and a rhythmic whop whop whop echoed over the room.

Sophie yanked her head to the side to see a pulsing blob on the screen.

“That’s the heart,” the doctor said. “A good, strong heartbeat. Right where we want it.”

She was mesmerized by the sight. This was her baby! She stared in awe as the image moved. Occasionally the doctor stopped and typed on the small keyboard attached to the sonogram machine.

He pointed out arms and legs, the head and even a tiny mouth. And then a hand, seemingly held out as if to wave, the little fingers splayed.

Sophie’s heart contracted. She was hit by a wave of love so fierce that it paralyzed her. Her child. A tiny life nestled in her womb. She couldn’t even wrap her head around the idea.

“Okay, here we go. Let’s see here. We have a shy one.”

Dr. Richards probed harder on her stomach and then turned the wand.

“Aha, there she is. Take a look, Sophie. You have a daughter.”

Despite her vow not to shed another tear, the screen went completely blurry. A daughter.

“I was right,” she whispered. “A girl!”

“You called it right,” Sam said softly above her.

The catch in his voice had her tearing her gaze from the screen to look up at him. He was staring at the monitor with such awe in his eyes that she felt her chest squeeze a little harder.

Then he glanced down and their eyes caught and held. He touched her cheek, and the emotion in his gaze nearly undid her.

“She’s beautiful, Soph. Just like her mama.”

She looked back at the monitor and smiled. The small burst of joy was so welcome, so wonderful that she wanted to hold on to it forever.

Dr. Richards pulled the wand away from her belly and carefully pulled her pants back up over her waist.

“I’d leave those stitches in your arm for another few days. Keep the area clean and a bandage over it. It’s healing quite nicely though. Everything else looks good. I’d say you have a healthy little girl there.”

“Thank you. Thank you so much. It was so nice to see her for the first time.”

The doctor smiled and backed away from the couch. “I’ll leave you two now. I have patients to get back to.”

He wheeled the sonogram machine away, and a second later, she heard the door close behind him. She tried to push to a sitting position, but it was awkward. Sam helped her up, and she leaned against the couch, suddenly exhausted, but euphoric at the same time.

“A daughter.”

Reverently she palmed her belly and rubbed softly over the swell. Sam put his hand over hers and squeezed.

“I just want her safe,” Sophie said.

Sam cupped her chin and pulled until she faced him. His expression was hard now, devoid of his earlier tenderness. There was determination there.

“She will be, Sophie. We’ll find a way. I need you to believe that.”

“I want to,” she said honestly.

“Help me then. I need information. I know you’re tired. But I need you to tell me and my men everything you can about your uncle, about your father’s holding in Rock Springs. Every detail you can think of. They’re gathering intel now and we need to move quickly, but you can help us a lot if you tell us what you know.”

“Of course I will.”

“Where is the key? I asked you in the truck, but you never answered.”

She covered her face in a tired gesture, knocking his hand from her chin in the process. She rubbed at her eyes and sighed.

“The night I took the boat, when I was coming to you, I hid the key in a box and buried it in the planter that was at the bait shop where I got the boat. It’s there. The Ice Box. That’s the name of the store.”

“I know of it. It’s a few miles down the lake from Paris Landing. I’ll send one of Rio’s men for it.”

She shook her head. “No, I should go.”

He frowned. “You’re not going anywhere you’re unprotected.”

There was determination in her eyes as she stared back at him. “That key is all the insurance I have, Sam. All the insurance our child has. I won’t take a chance with it.”

“I know I don’t have a right to ask, and you have every reason to be unsure and scared, but trust me, Sophie. Trust me. Trust that I won’t do anything that puts any of you at risk. I’ll send him for the key and he’ll return it to us—to you.”

She swallowed hard, and he could see the conflict so readily apparent on her face. His hand closed over hers, and he felt her tremble in his grasp. Finally she nodded.

“Okay, send him.”

He lifted her hand and kissed her fingertips. “Come on then. Let’s go find the others.”