Along Came a Husband. Helen Brenna
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give you one day and one day only to rest up from that gunshot wound.”
“Mighty gracious of you.”
“The first ferry leaves Mirabelle at seven in the morning.” She wrapped her arms around herself, hoping to contain her emotions. “Tomorrow. I want you on that boat.”
“Sorry to disappoint, Miss, but I’m not going anywhere.” He sat at the counter with a carton of soymilk and a box of cereal. “Not yet, anyway.”
“You can’t stay here. I mean it, Jonas.”
“I can. I will.”
“This is a small island. I know everyone and everyone knows me—”
“Lot of friends here, then?”
“Yes—”
“They’d do anything to protect you? Like your doctor?”
“One call and our police chief, Garrett—”
“What, Missy? He’ll arrest me? Throw me in jail? Kick me off the island? For what? I show him my badge and explain that I’m your husband. It’s only a matter of time before the fact that you’re a Camden comes out, and everyone on this island knows you for the liar you are.”
She stepped back, feeling as shocked as if he’d slapped her face. It wasn’t just that her father was a well-known senator. The name Camden fell right in line with several other historically famous, not to mention extremely wealthy, American last names. Missy’s great-great-grandfather had not only been an inventor and engineer, he’d also been one of America’s early entrepreneurs, making millions while this country’s economy boomed.
“I’ve never lied to anyone on Mirabelle,” she said. “Or to you. Never.”
“A lie of omission is still a lie. I’ll bet my last dollar you’ve omitted telling everyone on this island who you are and where you come from. Right, Missy Charms? What will all the simple folk of Mirabelle think of you after they find out your real last name is Camden?”
In truth, she hadn’t purposefully lied to anyone. She’d stopped using her father’s name back in college. Sick of year after year of having people act differently around her as soon as they found out who she was, she’d decided to be someone else.
She never told anyone her real last name. Not anymore. These days people saw Missy the way she wanted to be seen. She hadn’t even told Jonas until a few days before their wedding. He’d told her it didn’t matter, but a part of her had always wondered if he’d ever truly forgiven her. He didn’t understand. Not really.
“When all your friends here find out you grew up in a mansion out east,” he went on. “Spent your summers flitting between your family compounds on Long Island and Los Angeles and the villa in the south of France. How many folks here on Mirabelle do you think have skied the Swiss Alps? Gone to an Ivy League university? Got driven around by chauffeurs most of their childhood?”
Embarrassed, Missy looked away. She’d never felt a part of the Camden clan. It wasn’t just about her father, either. As a vegetarian, tree-hugging hippie she’d never fit with any of them. While her sister and two brothers had excelled in competitive sports, Missy had preferred yoga. They consumed, she recycled. They voted right-wing, she left. They spent on designers, she donated to nonprofits.
“What would Mirabelle folks think, Missy, of your hundred million dollar trust fund?”
There was no telling for sure. A few would think nothing of it. Others would want—expect—things from her. Still others would act strangely, awkwardly around her. All she wanted was anonymity. “You wouldn’t do that to me.”
“Wouldn’t I?”
“Just for some time to figure out what went wrong with your stupid assignment?”
“You got it.”
“There it is. Still alive and kicking,” she said bitterly. “That blind and unwavering commitment to the job.” In the end, she’d been bested by the Bureau.
“You’ve never been more right.” He cocked his head at her. “Nothing’s changed. I was the job. I still am the job. So until I figure out what went wrong on my job, I’m not leaving here.”
As they faced each other off, his gaze momentarily landed on her necklace. Last night, after he’d first fallen asleep in her bed, she’d flashed on the image of him naked and her skin had flushed with heat. Feeling the need for a shield, she’d snatched up the crystals along with a change of clothing.
“Those look suspiciously like Arabic letters.” He reached out and examined the pendant. “The Ayat al-Kursi,” he whispered. “Verse of the throne.” Jonas could not only read Arabic, he could speak a couple different dialects, along with German and Spanish. “What do you need protection from?” he murmured.
“Not what,” she said softly. “Who.”
Looking surprisingly offended, he dropped the crystals as if they’d singed his skin. “Still have those divorce papers?”
“Oddly enough,” she said, “I kept them.” She’d needed a reminder that a divorce is what she’d intended even before he died.
“Give me two, three weeks tops to heal and figure out who tried to kill me and why.” Looking entirely spent, he started back toward her bedroom. “Then I’ll sign your damned divorce papers and get the hell out of your life. This time for good.”
CHAPTER FIVE
“ARE THE T-SHIRTS ON THIS RACK discounted, too?”
A couple of hours after Missy’s confrontation with Jonas, she stood in the middle of her gift shop, looking steadily into a tourist’s sunburned face. For the life of her, she couldn’t seem to focus on the words coming out of that lipsticked mouth. All she’d been able to think about was the fact that her husband was alive.
Four years, five months, one week and three days.
That’s how long it had been since Jonas had—supposedly—died. If necessary, she could calculate the passage of time down to the minute. The FBI had come to her house to tell her the helicopter had crashed at exactly 1:58 in the afternoon. He’d died on impact, they’d said. There was nothing anyone could’ve done. Still, she’d insisted on seeing his body and had fallen apart at the sight of what she’d believed were his charred remains.
Now where was that son of a bitch of a dead husband? Hanging out in her home, doing God only knows what. Simply imagining him in her private space, in the house she’d worked so hard to turn into a relaxed and comfortable haven, threw off her balance. She glanced around at the other tourist or two moseying around her shop and took a deep breath, hoping to clear her head.
“T-shirts?” the woman in front of her said, not a little irritated. “On sale?”
“I’m sorry. Just the rack in the corner is thirty percent off.”
The woman shook her head and rolled her eyes. “Then you should be more specific with your signage.”
Normally, Missy would’ve ignored the comment, but this morning was nowhere near normal. “Don’t like it?” she said, raising her eyebrows. “You can leave.”
The unrepentant comment had no sooner left her mouth, than she recognized it as having come from the old Missy. The spoiled, immature, reckless and rash Melissa Camden. The young woman who had unapologetically married Jonas less than three months after meeting him. The woman who had pouted—she had to be honest, at least with herself—when Jonas had had to work late or leave town for an assignment.
“Well, I never!” The woman roughly hung the shirt back on the rack and huffed out of the shop.
Missy glanced around. One down. Two more to go.
Apparently, Jonas barging back into her