For the next three years Ry had kept his distance, though he did see Margo from time to time at the duFray Fish Market helping out her mother. It had all started out so innocently, so he had wanted to believe. Only he knew it had never been innocentfrom day one, hed wanted
her.
The night her father died, Ry found her weeping in the alley behind the fish market. Hed wanted to console her. He didnt even remember what hed said, but suddenly she was in his arms, clinging to him as if he were her lifeline. And like a hungry old fox, hed reveled in the fact that he had a legitimate reason to touch her and feel her body against his. She was jailbait; shed just lost her father, dammit. What kind of bastard did that make him?
The guilt had driven him crazy, then it had driven him into the arms of another woman. Hed wanted Margo out of his head and out of his dreams; any woman would do as long as she made him forget his fantasy.
A year later hed pulled over a carload of young peoplethe driver obviously intoxicated. He had motioned to the young man to get out of the car. When he did, Ry caught a glimpse of a shiny black head in the back seat. When he saw it was Margo something inside him snapped. Hed hauled her out of the car and into the squad so fast, the group of young people had fallen dead quiet.
On the way home shed pleaded with him to let her out of the car. She hadnt been drinking, she promised, not at allshe wasnt going to go to jail, was she? He knew she hadnt been drinking, and he told her he was just taking her home. Relieved that he believed her, that she wasnt going to end up in jail, shed leaned over and kissed his cheek. It had happened so fast, but just as fast he had pulled to the side of the rode and dragged her across the seat and kissed her the way he had always dreamed of kissing her. The next thing he knew, she was in his lap wrapping her arms around his neck offering him her hungry little mouth.
Hed done the math quickly. She was nineteen, no longer jailbaitno longer off-limits. And she was kissing him like she knew what she was doing.
Hed lost control after that, and before he had taken her home, they had stopped off at his apartment.
It had been the beginning of the end for them. A short month of heaven, and then hell had arrived in town and ripped their lives to shreds.
Rys gaze locked on Margos jeans where hed tossed them to the foot of the bed. Immediately his body reacted to the memory of undressing her, stripping her long legs bare, exposing her slender thighs. If he was a man who believed in fate and happy-ever-after, hed say Margos sudden appearance in his bed after two long years meant something.
Swearing softly, Ry walked to the window that overlooked the backyard. It had stopped raining, the night air as heavy as a flannel blanket and twice as warm. He closed his eyes, tried to chase the sight of Margos lithe body out of his head, but it was no use. Content to simply suffer, he relived each agonizing minute of easing her jeans down her narrow hips, then moved on to his fingertips brushing her satin panties, grazing her tanned, flat belly. And like hed been doing for the past two years, he relived his own body going through its tortured ritual each and every time he allowed himself the pleasure of remembering how unbelievable that one incredible month with her had been.
The sound of her mumbling the word cold jerked Ry back to the present. Feeling the effects of the weather as well as his own physical frustration, he couldnt imagine how Margo could be cold. Nonetheless, a sheen of perspiration covering his bare chest, he left the room and found a blanket in the hall closet. On his return, he spread the covering gently over her, then left the room again.
While he paced the hall, he went over everything shed told him. He played back phrases shed used, dallied with the what-if game and ten minutes later he was back inside, shedding his boots and socks, prepared to spend a sleepless night in the stuffed chair hed pulled close to the bed.
Halfway through the night she started to babble incoherent phrases. Ry reached out and felt her forehead, expecting to find her burning up with a fever. To his surprise and relief, she was cool. When the babbling continued, he pulled the nightstand drawer open and flipped the switch on a sophisticated three-inch recorder. When she began to thrash and fight the visions haunting her minds eye, he leaned forward and placed his hand on her cheek. Easy, baby. Youre safe with me.
Still caught up in whatever it was, torturing the dark recesses of her mind, she cried out Blus name. And there it was. Rys greatest fear had just been realizedwhatever dirty business Margo had fallen into tonight had been prompted by her brotherand he figured that could involve damn near anything, knowing Blu the way he did.
Ry dozed off an hour later, something he had fought hard against. How long he was out, he didnt know. The sound of water running in the bathroom jarred him awake, and he slammed himself upright, his