“It’s the right number,” he said, embarrassed. “She hasn’t had the money to pay her phone bill for a while.”
Maddingon nodded. “I’ll send up one of my deputies to her place whenever we get a free moment here.”
The deputy brought over the cots and set them up in the midst of the large common-area office of the police station.
“Lie down too, Jake,” Harper whispered to him when the deputy walked away to get some blankets. He started to lie down on the cot next to her. “No. Here,” she whispered, scooting over on her cot to make room for him.
He hadn’t realized how numb he was until he lay down next to Harper and she put her arms around him. Her body felt warm and good next to his. It thawed his shock. They huddled together, chasing each other’s shivers away. After the deputy came over and covered them with a blanket, Harper whispered to him.
“You did it, Jake. You saved my life.”
She pressed her lips to his cheek softly, the bandage at the corner of his mouth tickling his skin. It was the first kiss he’d ever gotten from a girl.
It was the sweetest caress he’d ever received in his life.
“They’re going to split us apart soon,” he said through a swollen throat. He knew that by some unspoken agreement, they didn’t speak of the invisible bond between them, but he couldn’t seem to stop himself at that moment.
“No they’re not,” Harper whispered fiercely, pulling him closer against her. He felt so raw, so turned inside out. “I’m going to talk to my parents about you. It’s going to be okay. You’ll see. Jake?” she asked softly when he remained stiff and frozen, trying to hold in so much feeling, straining like crazy to do it while holding her in his arms. He felt her warm lips brush against his temple, and he shuddered.
“I’m yours,” she whispered. “And you’re mine. Not in the ugly way, like your uncle thought he owned the dogs. In a beautiful way, like Mrs. Roundabout was yours, and you were hers, because something tied you to each other. And you just feel the bond, and you know it’s true. No one can change that, Jake.”
He couldn’t believe she was saying his thoughts out loud. It was too incredible to believe. He lifted his head slightly, needing to see her face. Without really telling himself to do it—if he’d thought about it, he would have chickened out—he leaned down and touched his lips to hers.
“Go to sleep,” he said quietly. In those moments, her insides were his. He knew how exhausted she was.
Her heavy eyelids drooped, but then she fought it, opening them again.
“I can’t,” she whispered. “I don’t want to leave you.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” I ain’t got nowhere to go. “Get some rest, Harper.”
He watched as her eyelids finally grew too heavy to support anymore, and she succumbed to exhaustion. As much as he wanted to believe the things Harper had said about her parents and the future, he was Jake Tharp.
He hadn’t been taught to believe in miracles.
• • •
That was how Harper’s distraught parents first saw their daughter following the nightmare of her kidnapping: fast asleep, bandaged, pale, and obviously traumatized . . .
. . . And held fast in the arms of the nephew of the monster who had stolen her from them.
thirty-nine
Present Day
“Jake Tharp? It is you, isn’t it?”
His rough breathing ceased completely at her whisper. Harper, too, held her breath, the handful of words seemingly hanging suspended in the air between them. Suddenly, he rose from the bed, naked and beautiful.
“Jacob?”
She saw a muscle flinch in his cheek as he went to the corner of the bed. One by one, he released her restraints and loosened the rope from her limbs. By the time he’d gotten to the fourth one, he still hadn’t responded to her question. She watched him methodically go about his task, his face and body rigid, his cock still formidable and slick from their combined essences. It was that vision—the very image of a viral, powerful male—that made impossibility crash wholesale into reality.
Harper flew off the bed.
“Harper?”
She ignored him, hurrying into the bathroom and finding the two soft robes they’d used occasionally in the past week alongside each other on hooks. When she returned, he took the proffered robe wordlessly. She hurried into the garment, needing armor, no matter how fragile that protection was. She was relieved that he shrugged into his robe, as well. They faced each other. For a stretched moment, she just stared at his face, absorbing every detail. He looked very hard to her in that moment . . . indescribably miraculous. His agate eyes moved over her face.