Thief of My Heart Read online

  “Hell, yeah, it surprises me,” Decker exclaimed. He hugged her tightly, then released her and held her at arm’s length. “I want you to know that you can trust me with your heart, Desi. You completely own mine. I’ll never let you down.”

  She tiptoed and kissed his cheek. “And I’ll never let you down, either.”

  * * *

  About two weeks later, on Wednesday morning, Decker walked into his outer office at the firm and greeted his assistant, Kym Johnson, a tall, plus-size African-American woman in her fifties. She was grinning, which should have tipped him off that something was wrong. Kym was a friendly woman, highly efficient and thoroughly professional, but she wasn’t a grinner. She smiled occasionally; otherwise she had her nose to the grindstone running the office, and anyone who stood in the way of her doing that usually caught hell. He liked that about her. He could rest assured that Kym had his back in the office.

  He stood in front of her desk, briefcase in hand, and stared at her. “What’s the matter?”

  “There’s a surprise waiting for you in your office,” she said coyly. Kym being coy unnerved him. It was the word surprise that made him let his guard down. His thoughts immediately went to Desiree. Could she be waiting for him in his office?

  He eagerly walked into his office, expecting to find her there, but instead he found his ex, Yolanda, sitting behind his desk as though she owned the place.

  It took him a moment to recover from the shock, and then he saw red. Jaw clenched, he bit out, “What are you doing here?”

  She got up from behind the desk and walked around to prop her bottom on the corner of it. She was dressed to kill in what was undoubtedly a designer slack suit and stilettos. Her light brown eyes seductively raked over him. “Hello to you, too,” she purred. “Don’t be angry at your assistant. I charmed her.”

  “In other words, you lied to her to get in here,” he said, moving around her to set his briefcase atop the mahogany desk.

  She laughed. “Oh, Decker, can we please be friendly? I came all the way from California to see you.”

  He wasn’t falling for her con job. “Why?”

  “I need your help.”

  “What makes you think I would help you?”

  “You’re not still mad at me after five years, are you?” She actually looked hurt. She began walking toward him, her movements calculated for the most seductive effect. She was still using her sexuality to her advantage. He noticed she was coloring her naturally black hair red these days. She was a little on the thin side. But he supposed actresses had to toe the line where their weight was concerned.

  “I don’t waste time being mad at you,” he said evenly. “In fact, I don’t waste time thinking about you at all.”

  “Don’t be cruel,” she pleaded, lowering her lashes seductively and pouting. “Can’t an old friend drop by to say hello?”

  Decker had the satisfaction of realizing that he was immune to her. He glanced at his watch. “I have an appointment in five minutes. That should be sufficient time for us to reminisce. So if you really have something important to say, you’d better get to saying it.”

  She stuck her bottom lip out like a child about to throw a tantrum and pushed herself up from the desk. Then she dropped the seductive act and got down to business, looking him in the eye. “I need your help, Decker. My cousin is in trouble. He’s been languishing in jail for months now on trumped-up charges. He’s not cooperating with the public defender. He’s so despondent that recently he stopped eating. I’m afraid he’s going to starve himself to death if I can’t offer him some hope. You’re the best defense attorney in town. Please help him!”

  Decker thought her words had the ring of truth to them, but he still had to be cautious. She had proven herself to be untrustworthy in the past. There was no reason to believe she’d changed. “What’s his name? And what’s he charged with?”

  “Frederic Sawyer. He’s a teacher, and one of his female students claims he had sex with her.”

  “Did he?”

  Her eyes were alarmed. “Of course not,” she cried indignantly. “He’s not an animal. He’s been teaching at that school for over a decade. The students love him. Everyone is rallying around him. These accusations will ruin his career.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time a child molester was found working in an occupation that brings him in daily contact with the object of his obsession. Are you sure your cousin’s innocent?”

  “We grew up together, Decker. I know him. He’s a family man. He would never harm a child. Please, just go speak with him. I’m begging you!” Tears welled in her eyes.

  Decker sighed. He, like most men, had a low tolerance for women’s tears. “I’ll go see him,” he said. “But that’s all I’m promising.”

  “Thank you, thank you, thank you so much!” she said, grasping his arm in appreciation. But Decker walked over to the door and held it open for her instead.

  “When will you go see him?” she asked as she paused to look up at him.

  “Soon,” he said. “Now, if you don’t mind, I really do have an appointment.”

  “All right,” she said, disappointment mirrored in her perfectly made-up eyes. “Goodbye, Decker.”

  He closed the door and paced his office for a few minutes, wondering if fate was playing some sort of sick sadistic trick on him, bringing the woman who’d ripped his heart out back into his life shortly after he’d found love with his dream woman.

  And the way Yolanda had behaved, as if she’d been willing to seduce him into representing her cousin. That was messed up!

  * * *

  Decker didn’t get the chance to go see Frederic Sawyer until the following afternoon. He was well-known at the Raleigh Detention Center and had no problem getting in to talk to the teacher.

  One of the detention staff brought Sawyer into the room that was used for lawyer-inmate confabs. Decker had been waiting for about half an hour. He was used to the wheels of justice turning slowly.

  He didn’t know how thin Sawyer had been before his arrest, so he had nothing with which to compare the emaciated man he saw before him. Decker, being human, was immediately sympathetic.

  “Mr. Sawyer, my name is Decker Riley. I’m a lawyer, and your cousin Yolanda asked me to come see if I can help you.”

  Sawyer appeared too tired to even raise his bowed head.

  “Mr. Sawyer, do you understand how serious your situation is? You could go to prison for the rest of your life. Do you even care? Because if you’re so far gone that you have no fight left in you, then I’m wasting my time.”

  Frederic Sawyer raised his head and looked at Decker. “I have nothing to live for. My wife left me and took my kids with her. My life is over.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “Huh?”

  “Your wife,” Decker said. “Where did she take your kids?”

  “To her parents’ place in Terre Haute,” Sawyer said in a monotone.

  “That’s a ten-hour drive from here,” Decker said, hoping to get Sawyer to open up. “Why do you think she did that?”

  “Because she thinks I’m guilty, and she wants to put as much distance between us as possible.”

  “Didn’t you tell her you were innocent?”

  “I tried, but she wouldn’t listen. I told her Madison made it up because she’s obsessed with me. I never touched that girl!”

  “How long have you known Madison? What’s her last name?”

  “It’s Samuelson. I’ve known her since the beginning of the school year. She’s in my sixth-period trigonometry class. She’s also the class aide.”

  “She must be pretty smart, taking trig,” Decker said, his tone easy.

  “She’s one of my best students. I was very fond of her until she accused me of raping her.”

 
; “Have you ever been accused of anything like that before?” Decker had thought it a harmless question until Sawyer changed right before his eyes.

  His eyes were black orbs of hate when he turned his gaze on Decker. He leaned across the table and bared his teeth like a wild animal. Spit came out of his mouth when he demanded menacingly, “Who have you been talking to? Yolanda didn’t send you. Get the hell out of here!”

  That was when Decker knew he was guilty. Sawyer had gone from docile to vicious in a matter of seconds. Decker would bet that the Samuelson girl wasn’t his first victim. He intended to find out. The problem with police investigations was that cases were often assigned to overworked individuals who didn’t have the time to turn over every rock looking for evidence. The authorities would prosecute Sawyer, but they would do it based on one girl’s testimony, testimony that might easily be refuted by a talented defense attorney.

  Sawyer continued to regard him with a baleful stare. The hate that radiated off the man was palpable. Decker felt he was in the presence of evil. Sawyer might well be insane. That was something a psychologist would have to determine. But even if he was insane, he would still be punished to the full extent of the law for what he had done to the Samuelson girl.

  “I don’t want you on my case,” Sawyer said through clenched teeth. “I don’t want you anywhere near me. And stay away from my wife.”

  “You take care, Mr. Sawyer,” Decker said casually as he got up to leave.

  Yolanda didn’t know it, but she’d just made sure her cousin would spend the rest of his life in prison. Decker walked swiftly through the detention center to the part of the building that housed the police department.

  Ten minutes later, he had tracked down the lead detective on the Sawyer case and was sitting across from him in his tiny cubicle. He explained that he’d been asked by a relative of Sawyer’s to go see him with the prospect of representing him. “Have you spoken with Mrs. Sawyer yet?” was his first question.

  “Yes, but she wasn’t very helpful to us. She seemed to be focused on protecting her children. What good parent wouldn’t?” Detective Antonio Diaz’s eyes scanned his computer screen for a moment. “Two little girls, ages seven and four, it says here.”

  “Girls, huh?” Decker said contemplatively.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Diaz said. “You’re thinking he may have molested his own children. But if his wife was aware of that going on, wouldn’t she step forward and press charges?”

  “You’d be surprised what some people try to hide for the sake of their privacy. If it were true, that kind of stigma could follow those girls for the rest of their lives. If their mother can shield them from that, she will.”

  “I suppose you’re right,” Diaz conceded. “What are you getting at, Mr. Riley?”

  “May I ask who interviewed Mrs. Sawyer?”

  “I did it myself,” Diaz answered. “She said she knew nothing about Sawyer’s relationship with the Samuelson girl.”

  “Did you know she took the girls to her parents’ in Terre Haute?”

  “Of course,” Diaz said. “She mentioned she might be doing that to escape media scrutiny, which we understood. She and her girls aren’t under investigation.”

  “Does it strike you as odd that she wouldn’t stay in town to offer moral support to her husband, even if she sent her daughters to stay with her parents?”

  Diaz paused to think about that. He looked Decker straight in the eye. “She may be distancing herself from him for a reason.”

  Decker smiled, glad that the detective had gotten his point. “I believe she knows something. And from the reaction I just got from Sawyer when I mentioned his wife, I believe he knows his wife may know more about him than he’s comfortable with. I think he was glad she left town so fast.”

  “I think I’ll be going to Terre Haute to speak with Mrs. Sawyer again,” Diaz said.

  Decker rose and offered the detective his hand. “Good luck, and please let me know how it goes. I’m interested in making sure Sawyer gets what he deserves.”

  Diaz chuckled as he rose and shook Decker’s hand. “Then I guess you won’t be taking his case.”

  “No, I won’t,” Decker said emphatically. “I have to at least entertain the notion of a client’s innocence, and I don’t get that feeling from Sawyer.”

  * * *

  “Tell the truth, Petra,” Desiree said as she and her sisters sat on the floor in front of the couch in Meghan’s living room, drinking wine and eating popcorn. “You must get bored out of your mind living in the jungle with no other human for company!”

  Petra laughed with gusto. She had long black curly hair, like her sisters, but unlike them, she hadn’t cut hers in years, so it fell to her waist. “I don’t have time to get bored, Desi. I survive in the jungle rather like the great apes do. I forage for food, and I’m constantly moving because they’re constantly on the move, and I follow them. And I have to stay alert because they’re aware of my presence, and not being able to predict what they’ll do next, even after years of studying them, I have to worry that suddenly they’re no longer going to tolerate me and get rid of the irritating human.”

  Desiree, Meghan, Lauren and Mina all looked horrified. “Have you ever been attacked?” Lauren asked. She had Colton Jr. in her arms. The toddler was sound asleep, his aunts having lavished attention on him all day, which tired him out. It was early evening now.

  “No, never,” Petra said. She had golden-brown skin like her sisters, but hers had been darkened a bit by the equatorial African sun. She wore no makeup, a habit she’d acquired over the years from the inadvisability of doing so in her line of work. As a zoologist whose specialty was the great apes, she made her workplace the great outdoors. “Once I got too close to a silverback—that’s a mature alpha who’s generally the leader of his group—and he beat the ground, letting me know he wasn’t pleased about it. But I just stood still, keeping my gaze elsewhere because they don’t like you to look them directly in the eyes. That’s like a challenge to them. He soon lost interest in me and went back to foraging. Grubs were more interesting to him than I was.”

  “Are they aggressive by nature?” Desiree asked.

  “I’ve only noticed aggression in the case of guarding against enemies daring to enter their territory, as I did, and males fighting other males for a choice female during mating season. Otherwise they’re content to go about their business.”

  “What exactly is a choice female?” Desiree asked.

  “Young, strong and capable of satisfying the imperative to survive—in other words, fertile,” Petra answered with a smile. “You know, the same way human males pick females.”

  The sisters laughed at that. Desiree changed position on the floor, stretching her legs out and wiggling her toes. They were all dressed comfortably in jeans or shorts and T-shirts, and they were barefoot. “I’ve known some alpha males like that in my day,” she said with a giggle.

  “You’re dating one right now,” Lauren said.

  “Decker’s not an alpha. He’s too sweet to be an alpha.”

  “Alphas can be sweet,” Petra said. “But watch out if anyone threatens his woman. Then he’s ferocious.”

  “I kind of like that,” said Meghan dreamily. “Women these days have to do everything for themselves. It would be nice to have a man you can count on who can be your hero when you need him.”

  “That’s Colton,” Lauren said. She bent and kissed Colton Jr. on the forehead. In sleep, he looked angelic.

  “When is my hero going to come along?” Meghan lamented, tossing her head back dramatically and sighing loudly.

  Desiree smiled at her baby sister. “When you least expect it.”

  “Isn’t that the truth?” Mina said. She reached up and pushed a long braid behind an ear. “None of us who are in relationships wer
e looking for them. Maybe that’s the secret—once you stop caring whether or not you meet a man, he shows up.”

  “In that case, I’m never going to meet anyone,” Meghan said with a laugh. “I’m in love with the thought of being in love, possibly because I’ve never been in love.”

  “Believe me,” Desiree said. “When it does finally happen, it’ll be worth the wait. Sometimes when you wait a long time, you appreciate it more.”

  “I’m perfectly happy not being in love,” Petra spoke up. “I know. Being in love is the ultimate goal of all red-blooded girls. But with it comes expectations, and I don’t want any man expecting me to be at his beck and call. Or expecting me to bear his children and then take most of the responsibility of raising them from infancy to college age. Women get the short end of the stick in marriage. But because love, a mind-altering drug if there ever was one, is involved, women are brainwashed into believing they’re happy in marriage.”

  Her sisters looked at her as though she had taken leave of her senses, and then burst out laughing.

  “You’ve been in the jungle too long, girl,” Lauren said. “We’ve got to find you an alpha male in a hurry.”

  “Uh-huh,” Meghan agreed. “Like yesterday!”

  “How long has it been since you kissed a guy?” Lauren asked.

  Petra was smiling now. “I know my views aren’t popular, but if married women were honest, they would agree with me. They give a hundred percent, and if their husbands give fifty, they’re lucky.”

  “You just haven’t found the right man,” Lauren insisted.

  But Desiree refused to try to talk Petra out of her beliefs. As a psychologist, she found her views refreshing. Petra, in her opinion, had always been observant about human behavior.