J.T.'s love poured over Caitlan, warm and sweet and pure. The emotion grabbed at her heart-a deep, abiding love that echoed her own devotion for him.
"Yes, John Thomas Rafferty, I'll marry you. I've loved you forever… "
The buried words escaped Caitlan's memory like a well-preserved keepsake. Heaven help her, she felt as though she had loved him forever.
"I want to feel you inside me. Please, Johnny…"
Caitlan gasped when the sensation of her and J.T.'s body meshing as one cascaded over her, their souls twining in an eternal devotion that superseded a mortal lifetime. Their union coalesced love and need and longing into a glorious completion.
She blinked her eyes open, her heart pounding in her chest. Shaken by the visions and feelings provoked by the engagement ring, she started to remove the solitaire. As the band slid down her finger, tragedy rushed in on her. A sharp jolt pierced her temples.
Screams echoed in her head, her screams and Amanda's. Or were they the same? The screech of tires, the grinding crush of metal, shattering glass, then the awful, wrenching feeling of being physically, spiritually torn from J.T…
"Where is she, Dad?" J.T. demanded from his hospital bed. A bandage swathed his forehead and a plaster cast encased his left arm. His eyes were glassy, but determination fired from his gaze. "I want to see Amanda. Now."
Jared touched J.T.'s shoulder. "I'm sorry, son, but Amanda didn't make it. She died instantly."
"No!" J. T. raged, the one word overflowing with hurt and grief.
A sob caught in Caitlan's throat as J.T.'s loss and sorrow became her own. Excruciating pain wrenched at her heart. Before another vision could cripple her ability to remove the ring, she pulled it off her finger and put it back in the velvet lining. She shoved the cigar box back onto the bottom shelf, hoping to dam the flood of images and emotions swamping her.
An emptiness enveloped her, and she buried her face in her hands, the wetness of tears dampening her fingers. "Oh, no," she choked, unable to bear any more of this craziness. She had to contact her Superior before she went insane, if that hadn't already happened. The visions, the identical drawings, the link to J.T., the mortal emotions, all needed explanations. And what about her falling in love with J.T.? Oh, what a mess of things she'd made!
Spurred by an urgency to find answers, she rushed from the office, swiping away the tears on her cheeks with the back of her hand. She opened the front door and nearly knocked down Laura in her haste to get somewhere private and secluded. She stopped short, her mind whirling in a hundred different directions.
"Oh, Caitlan, you scared me!" Laura exclaimed, her eyes wide. "I was just about to open the door and I didn't expect…" She frowned, her brow furrowing in concern. "Caitlan, are you okay?"
Caitlan mentally shook herself and forced a smile for Laura's benefit. "Yes, I'm just fine."
Laura looked unconvinced. "You've been crying. Did something happen while I was at school?"
"No, really, I… I just need to get some fresh air. I think I'll take a walk near the pasture." Caitlan took a few steps across the porch, anxious to be gone.
Laura started toward her, a hopeful spark in her eyes. "How about if I come with you? We can talk-"
"No!" The hurt look on Laura's face stabbed at Caitlan, and she immediately softened her voice. "I'm sorry, sweetie, but I need to be alone for a little while. How about we play a game of checkers or cards when I get back?" If my Superior allows me to come back after I divulge all my transgressions.
"Okay," Laura said reluctantly, her worry obvious.
Caitlan walked down the path until she was out of Laura's sight, then she broke into a run, needing to work off the anxiety nearly smothering her. She jogged alongside the fenced-in pasture, then up and over a knoll covered with wildflowers. Exhausted, she fell to her knees, gasping for breath, wondering when her heart and soul had become so tangled up with J.T.'s life. And if she'd ever be the same again.
"Anybody home?" J.T. called as he entered the house.
No answer.
"Caitlan? Laura?" Still, no reply. He glanced at his wristwatch. Three-thirty. Paula would be gone, but where were Caitlan and his daughter? After checking the kitchen and the den and finding them empty, he started up the stairs. He glanced in Laura's room first, then moved to Caitlan's, hesitating on the threshold when he saw it too was unoccupied.
He stared at her impeccably made bed, a sudden streak of guilt assailing him for the way he'd handled things with Caitlan this morning. He'd been anything but a gentleman in her bedroom when he'd asked her about birth control, and like a coward he'd left the house before she'd had a chance to come downstairs. But, dammit, whenever he was around her she brought out feelings in him he didn't want to deal with. He refused to deal with them, or label them, when she'd be gone in a few days. Yet he couldn't quite fully convince himself that keeping his distance until she left was for the best. He couldn't convince his body that he'd had Caitlan and she was out of his system, because she wasn't. The soft, silky feel of her skin and the feminine scent of her would haunt him for a long, long time. Not to mention those uncanny violet eyes, her dimple, and how incredibly perfect and fulfilled he'd been with her.
Frustrated, he stepped into the room, wishing he knew more about Caitlan besides the vague tidbits she'd shared. He found himself walking toward the nightstand, where he'd seen her put her pad of paper. Amanda had loved to draw. He remembered many lazy Sunday afternoons down by the creek when she'd made him lay there while she sketched him. Afterward he'd have to sweet-talk her into showing him the drawings; she'd been that modest about her ability. Just like Caitlan.
Why had he even thought that? Shaking off the apprehension climbing his spine, he opened the drawer and withdrew the pad. His conscience argued with him to put it back unopened, but he wanted more insight into Caitlan, wanted to know who or what occupied her mind in the late hours of the night while she sketched by moonlight.
Before he changed his mind, he opened the cover. He stared in stunned disbelief at a sketch of himself as a young boy, the sensation of being punched in the stomach rendering him breathless. She'd reproduced him in precise detail, right down to the stubborn tilt to his chin and the faint lines around his eyes when he smiled. He flipped through the pages, seeing that she'd drawn him in different stages of youth and as a grown man. All the pictures were meticulously detailed-eerily so-as if she'd known him fifteen or twenty years ago.
He turned to the next page and thought the clamping pressure in his chest was a sure sign of a heart attack. His blood roared in his ears and prickles of heat skimmed along his nerve endings.
In remarkable exactness Caitlan had drawn Amanda, every delicate feature of her face finely etched, along with her beautiful, beguiling smile and her dimple. Amanda's head was tilted back, her long hair streaming over her shoulders, that mischievous twinkle he'd loved sparkling in her eyes. The pose was a likeness that only could have been captured in a candid moment-how in the hell had Caitlan managed that?
"Christ," he muttered, thumbing through the rest of the pages. Caitlan had drawn a few pictures of Laura and King, and even one of Randal, but the majority of the sketches were of him and Amanda.
Once J.T.'s initial shock wore off anger settled in, prompting him into action. He wanted explanations for these bizarre reproductions. And he wanted them now.
Taking the pad, he bounded down the stairs. The kitchen screen door slammed shut, and he headed in that direction. "Caitlan?" he called, unable to contain the fury lacing his voice.
"It's me, Dad."
He ignored the curious look Laura gave him when he walked into the kitchen. "Where have you been?" he asked, glancing out the window to see if Caitlan was outside.