WindSwept Narrows: #6 Eve Hastings Read online

  “I was thirteen. I guess I knew the basics of boy girl stuff…curiosity had sent me to books and I listened to kids talking around me,” she drew her tongue around her lips, her voice cracking slightly. “I came home from school early because of some problem with the heating…and stumbled into…I went to the study. My father’s car was outside, so I knew he was in the house somewhere…and heard him with one of the young maids. It wasn’t just sex…she was protesting…telling him not to rape her…I…I pushed the door open and shouted at him,” Eve swallowed hard, lashes closing over eyes filled with the vision. “And she laughed…and he got angry…ordered me out and to close the door…”

  “Eve…”

  “I went to my room. I couldn’t think. I couldn’t wrap my mind around what I had seen…what I had heard. My mother came to talk to me a while later,” Eve struggled to find the words. “She told me that men were different. They had needs that…well, she didn’t want to play those games…I listened to her, stunned…not sure what to say. The next day, I talked to the maid…she was in her late twenties…she said it was how she got the good clothes and jewelry and it was a game…playing like he was…was raping her…play acting such a despicable…” Her voice cracked in disbelief. “Even now…anyway…I went to Sam’s house and was a wreck. So confused…I had actually looked up to them both, my parents…Sam’s mom listened…and she tried explaining in a way a thirteen year old could grasp, but I don’t think I did. I think the…the betrayal…the…loyalty that I believed had been there between them…it was all shattered. I told them I was moving in with Sam for a while…that I was too upset to talk to them…they sent me to see a therapist…my first one…imagine that…”

  “Eve, that is not anything to do with you…the choices of your parents to behave that way…” Zach let her words fall into what other things he knew about Eve Hastings.

  “No…but it was the beginning, in a way…it’s why I started in the efforts I did with Sam when I got older and finished college,” Eve shook her head slowly. “A human is made up of so many things, Zach…so many messed up views and messages. It was many years before I allowed myself to accept a date. The one man I had…had believed in…had shown me what men were like…”

  “Eve, you’re intelligent and intuitive, you realize that the one example…”

  “You’re asking for a lot of grief before you try and sleep, Zach,” Eve slid her fingers from his. They shook slightly as she touched the side of his face, leaning in and closing her eyes before brushing her mouth softly over his.

  She felt him lean closer. Felt his mouth take control of the kiss, caressing and pressing over the shape of her lips. For the first time during a kiss, the only thing in her mind was Zach. The only vision was the shape of his mouth, the warm feel of his tongue teasing hers out to play, urging her into a longer, deeper kiss than she’d ever allowed.

  Zach remembered his own words about controlling what his body choose to do, holding himself sternly in check. His palm rose, touching the hand she had placed on his cheek and caressing along her arm to her shoulder. Cautiously, he eased himself and her closer, their bodies touching beneath the quilts. He could feel the firm, roundness of her breasts against his chest.

  Eve felt herself relax against him, her palm leaving her head and both of them moving to circle his neck. She could think of the warmth; the combination of softness and a comforting firmness that soothed and aroused. She felt warm, nicely warm, she thought with a soft sigh breaking free when he pulled back slightly. She opened her eyes, blinking and meeting the curious brown circles watching her.

  “I think that was a good start,” he said gruffly, too aware of her effect on him.

  “I…I’ve never been able to…relax…” she admitted, amazement in her whisper.

  “You aren’t afraid of me,” he whispered against her mouth, not settling down for another kiss, just speaking gently against the parted lips. “It’s just a kiss, Eve…”

  “One more…please…” she let her fingers sift through the thick hair at the back of his head as his mouth lowered to caress over hers once more.

  “Eve…” her name whispered from his lips when he lifted his head again. “What did you think was going to happen?”

  “I…I usually…it’s a strange panic thing…” She swallowed hard, her head shaking as she stared at him, slowly pulling her palms from his shoulders. “I don’t understand it…it’s always ended so badly…I can take shouting at you…and even you shouting back…but I don’t want…you can be so accomplished at so many given tasks…and yet, fail at one that hurts someone…or disappoints them…”

  “You were worried about disappointing me?” Zach asked in disbelief, her nod almost instant. He leaned forward, brushing her forehead with his lips. “Go to sleep, Eve.”

  Eve nodded and rolled to face the patio door, thick lashes closing with a quiet, sweetly contented sigh.

  Zach listened for a long time, staring into the darkness around him. He rolled to face her, his arm out and settling possessively on her waist, urging her back against him. He fell asleep with the scent of her shampoo weaving its way through his dreams. When her body tensed a long time later, his palm went to hers, holding her firmly, safely in his arms.

  He knew there was a lot more to Eve Hastings that he wasn’t aware of yet. The words Sam had used about fear being the most prominent, he thought as he dressed the next morning. He could smell the coffee brewing. He’d never asked her to do that, it just became part of her morning.

  For him.

  Somehow she managed to ease from the bed without waking him. It was slightly past six when he pushed his arms behind him and headed to the shower, the fresh steam telling him he wasn’t far behind her.

  His tie hung open, the vest unbuttoned when he entered the living area, spotting Eve at her computer, head tilted and juice untouched beside her. She glanced up to see him, her fingers tapping lightly on the keys.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you…” she began to say, stopping when he came to stand beside her, his palm beneath her chin.

  Zach figured the only thing he had going for him was to catch her off guard and get her used to his touch, accustomed to his kiss. Catching her off guard also sent her into a kind of freeze mode that allowed him to kiss her for a long, slow caress that he knew would remain with him through the day. She responded, her mouth softening and her tongue fencing with his until he backed away with a gentle finale.

  “You didn’t. I wanted to be awake and have a little of the morning with you,” Zach poured his coffee. “And to thank you for this…”

  “I don’t drink it, but I understand morning needs for it,” Eve said when she was sure her voice was working. She wasn’t aware of her fingers touching her lips.

  They felt swollen. They tingled, she thought, blinking and returning to finish the letter she wanted for the new set of applicants.

  “Work?”

  “A new stack of applicants. I…I don’t like taking people who have never had dealings with children, but I have found a few with genuine interest in advancing in the field into teaching and other things. They’re part time while going to school, so I’m trying to give them a probation period,” she tried explaining. “It’s difficult to explain that it isn’t a prejudice. It’s one thing to train them to be a waitress or secretary…but kids…especially the little ones…you either have an affinity to work with them or you don’t…and I don’t like the idea of using the kids as training tools.”

  “The kids you were playing with…they looked like they were enjoying being there,” Zach commented, leaning against the counter and watching her close the computer and slide it into the bag she carried with her each day.

  “I hope so. Usually…sick kids aren’t fun, no matter what…we have a small infirmary for them instead of pulling the parents from their jobs if it’s just sniffles or teething,” Eve found her jacket and pulled her keys free, staring into the late September sunshine outside. “I have to go…oh, I left
a form for you…behind you…kindly fill it out for me…bye…” she pointed to the counter only to have her fingers snagged. “Zach…”

  “Shhh…good morning rituals…” he told her, coffee flavored lips moving softly over hers. Again, he reveled in the gentle, uncertain response. A learning response, he realized, lifting his head and offering a small smile. “Form…fill it out, got it…” He lifted the form, reading over it and laughing as she left the house.

  He pulled his pen from an inner pocket and read down the long columns of items, the heading making him chuckle. ‘Please mark out the items you will not eat.’ It looked like she had adapted it from a form she used for the kids in the daycare. He marked through a few things, glancing toward the table and frowning at the untouched glass of orange juice.

  Eve Hastings left more unfinished food than she ate. He stood for a long couple minutes staring around the large open room of the house he had begun to call home with a woman more and more often in his thoughts. He went into the bedroom, opening the drawers of the nightstands.

  She told him to rummage. A bottle of almond scented lotion. A couple small bottles of wild nail polish colors that had him blinking until he remembered the bright orange color on her toe nails. The bottom drawer on her side of the bed held a normal looking notebook.

  He half heard a warning voice but he lifted it from inside and opened it to the first page. It had one long entry dated over a year ago.

  ‘So she tells you to journal. What the hell does that mean? Relive the stupid things that are giving you nightmares? I don’t want anyone telling me what they think I need. I want someone to go inside my head and take away the images of raped and battered, broken children. I want the sounds of their pain and fear erased from my thoughts.

  Children. They never asked to be born and they certainly never asked to be used and abused by the adults in their lives. They didn’t ask to be sold to brothels so men with sick fetishes could have sex with them. You think about all these countries with all these religions with all these gods and not one of them has the decency to stop the foul behavior.

  I watched several friends hurt and killed. I spent two long days locked in a room listening to men rape children, waiting for my turn. Waiting for them to decide what they’re going to do with me. And even when you are somehow found, somehow rescued and taken away, a part of you wakes every night expecting the evil that they are to come through your prison door and drug you, turn you over to one of the brothels that catered to the use of older females.

  You’re afraid to eat anything they give you, it might be drugged. You must stay awake, never closing your eyes and missing a chance to escape.

  Too many things stuck inside your brain. How many kids can you steal away with you into the night if you get the chance? If you order them to run, will they? Can I cause enough trouble, enough damage to help them flee? They’ve been so brain washed, so addicted to the drugs they don’t understand that this is wrong. That there is so much more right than this out there for them. How can I make them believe when I don’t believe it anymore?’

  Zach knew his knuckles were white where he gripped the notebook. He knew his teeth were clenched and his breathing almost non-existent. He closed the notebook, sliding it back to the bottom of the drawer where it had been.

  He drove through the morning traffic, barely noticing it for the first time in his life. No radio. No talk shows. He didn’t want anything in his brain for the moment. His stint in the military had involved building and re-building. He was an engineer and architect.

  Yes, he’d seen death and it was far from pleasant. But he had never been a prisoner and he had certainly never been a young woman in the situation outlined in the text she’d written.

  He had changed into work clothes when his cell sounded, the read out making him smile as he spoke. “Good afternoon…tell me you ate some lunch, Eve.”

  “I didn’t call to hear you nag me, Zach,” Eve returned with a sigh. “But I had a sandwich with Sam.”

  “Good girl…so why are you calling me?” Zach leaned against his desk, working his feet into the work boots.

  “I…do you know a man named Eric Milton?”

  “Yes. How do you know him?” Zach stopped everything, focusing on her voice, her tone. Something wasn’t right.

  “I’ve gotten letters from him, similar to the ones you sent me,” Eve told him quietly. “Hold on, I want to close my office door.”

  Zach waited patiently, listening to the soft sounds of the daycare abruptly gone when the firm click of the door resonated through the phone.

  “He tried making you an offer on the property?” Zach’s voice fell.

  “He tried contacting me,” she corrected. “I never responded. I had him investigated, Zach. He has a very bad reputation with safety violations, several missed deadlines, hiring employees who aren’t exactly legal and paying them dirt for wages…”

  Zach forced himself to remember Eve was far from naïve. “Have you heard from him again, Eve?”

  “He just left my office,” she said with a quake in her words that she hadn’t wanted free.

  “Eve, are you alright?” Zach frowned into his phone.

  “I…I’m fine…fine…he’s very…angry.”

  “Why did he come to see you?”

  “To convince me to sell the property to him.”

  “What happened, Eve?”

  “He upset Myra…and would have bullied his way into my office if I hadn’t returned from HR at the same time. I was very annoyed,” Eve told him tensely.

  “Eve…tell me exactly what happened, please,” Zach tried again. He could tell she’d put him on speaker phone, which meant she was probably pacing her office. Something in her voice said she was more than agitated but unwilling to say the word afraid.

  “He asked to speak with me. I said, okay, here I am, what do you need? He introduced himself and asked if I had received his correspondence,” Eve sat on the corner of her desk, eyes closed as she reformed the visit. “I led him into my office and closed the door. I told him I did receive his correspondence, but that the property was not for sale. He said he checked with deeds and it was still in my name and for me to name my price. I repeated that it was not for sale. He…he asked me to go to lunch with him,” she felt the anxiety forming again.

  “Eve…slow down…close your mouth…breathe slowly…” Zach listened to her slow down her breathing. “Okay?”

  “Yes…yes…I told him no thank you….that I wasn’t interested and that lunch wouldn’t have me change my mind on the property, that he was wasting his time,” she stopped, drawing in a long breath. “He…he said he’d heard that I was…was frigid…and maybe I just needed to be thawed out…”

  “Eve…”

  “I opened my office door and went out, Zach. I told him to leave now before I called security. That he was not welcome in my office again,” the rush of words came to a stop. “I lifted the phone receiver and had my fingers over the direct dial number but he…he said something rude and left. Why does he want the property, Zach? I don’t understand.”

  “He wanted the complex on a different site,” Zach said crisply. “And he lobbied hard for it, which happens to be property he owns a big part of, but he doesn’t have the reputation or funding or skills to pull something this size together, and Logan and Cade know that. I’ll deal with him, Eve. I’m sorry he bothered you.”

  “I’m okay, Zach. It’s…it’s a little like an asthma attack…the anxiety thing…”

  “Like what happens in the middle of the night,” he said softly. “That’s why you have the sleeping pills that you don’t take.”

  “From the nightmares,” she said, nodding slowly. “Yes,” she said aloud remembering that he couldn’t see her head shake.

  “I need the address to the house, Eve,” Zach decided a shift in topics was needed about now, reaching for a pen and note pad on his desk. He wrote the address she read off to him, jotting her cell number beneath it. “I’ll
be home about six…if you need anything, call me, okay?”

  “Thank you…I didn’t know what to do about him…I don’t like him,” she said with a shudder, her head shaking to no one inparticular.

  “I’ll take care of it. I’ll see you later, Eve.” Zach copied the information to another piece of paper and took it to Dora. “I need you to contact a moving company. I want my apartment boxed and labeled.”

  “You’re moving?” Dora took the paper he held out. “You’ve been holding out on me,” she said with a scowl.

  “I’m moving. I got a girl. I’m getting married this weekend and I want my stuff moved,” Zach announced with a friendly growl. “And if you hear from or see Milton, I want to know immediately. Oh…the name on the address and cell number is Evelyn Hastings. If she ever calls the main line instead of my cell, she gets immediate access.”

  “Wow…”

  “Hey, a girl sends you red roses…you know you’ve got a winner,” Zach teased, grabbing his briefcase off his desk and the hanger with his suit on it. “Be back in the morning. I’ll be at the site if anyone needs to see me.”

  “I’m in shock!” She called after him, her laughter mixing with his as he walked to the elevator.

  Chapter Eight

  Eve knew she checked the lock on the front door twice before fixing a large salad and the simple little pizzas for dinner. She poured a glass of the wine and curled into the large chair, staring into the streaks of color spreading over the mountains to the west.

  Zach wasn’t surprised to find her dozing when he came into the house. He left his briefcase on the sofa and went quietly to the back, leaving the dirty clothes in the basket and stepping into the shower.