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Long, ground-eating strides carried him to the hallway. Just as he reached it, Cat came around the corner, glistening wet-black hair slicked back from her face and a peacock blue robe wrapped high and tight around her. She recoiled from him with a gasping cry, color draining from her face. The fear in her eyes was closer to terror.
“You startled me,” she managed shakily. “I didn’t expect you home so early.”
Logan gave her high marks for recovery. “Your uncle called me.”
Eyes blazing with hurt and anger, she looked past him to her uncle. “How could you do that? You gave me your word you wouldn’t tell him. I trusted you!”
“You’re my wife, Cat. I have a right to know.”
“But nothing happened. Do you hear? Nothing happened,” she insisted as Culley slipped back outside.
“I’ll be the judge of that. Why don’t we go over here and sit down, and you can tell me how it happened,” Logan suggested, deliberately letting her believe that he knew more than he did.
“Look, I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to put it out of my mind and forget that Lath was ever here.”
Lath. Of all the possibilities that had occurred to him, Lath Anderson wasn’t one of them. An anger, black and cold and ugly, welled up. Logan had to work to keep it from showing.
“What time was this?” Such minor details were always easier for a victim to supply. And each answer opened the gate a little more until the whole story flooded from them.
“Some time shortly after three. I’d gone in the kitchen to get the roast ready for supper—” She stopped abruptly, a hand flying to her mouth. “I forgot to put the roast in the oven. It’s still sitting on the counter.”
“We won’t worry about supper right now.” Logan placed a hand on her back, keeping its touch light and impersonal while he walked her to the big easy chair by the fireplace. “So you were in the kitchen when Lath came?”
“Yes. Look, do we have to go over all this?” As he had expected, she sank into the chair in agitation. “All he did was grab me, okay?” When Logan said nothing, she went on. “It was my fault anyway. If I hadn’t left the stupid doors propped open, he wouldn’t have been able to just walk in without me knowing it.”
“You propped the doors open when you were carrying your things into the house, right?” Logan sat on the large ottoman, keeping his distance from her with an effort.
“Yes. It made it a lot easier than trying to open the doors with your arms full. After Dad and the boys left, I went out to close them, but the phone rang. I went to answer it. Afterward I…I just forgot about the doors.”
“Who called?” He watched her expression.
“Nobody. Or, at least, whoever it was, hung up when they realized they had the wrong number.” Cat lifted her head, a sudden thought dawning in her eyes. “You don’t suppose—”
“Suppose what?”
“That it could have been Lath calling to see if I was here? He said he’d heard that we were married, but he had to see it with his own eyes. Do you think it was him?”
“It’s possible. What else did he say?”
Piece by piece, Logan drew the information from her until the whole story came in a rush. Listening to it, Logan knew he had felt anger before, but nothing like this, nothing like this savage rage. Despite his attempt to maintain a dispassionate facade, some of it must have shown.
“I’m not going to press charges, Logan,” Cat stated, her chin jutting at an assertive angle.
But he looked at the shimmer of tears in her green eyes. “He assaulted you, Cat.”
“That won’t be his story. Or have you forgotten that I had a knife? That I threatened him with it? All he has to say is that he was trying to take it away from me, that he was defending himself—-not the other way around. And how can I prove differently? Look.” She pushed the sleeve back on her robe, showing him her wrist and arm. “I don’t have a single bruise.”
“Anderson has a record—”
“Which wouldn’t be admissible. And please don’t suggest that Culley could testify on my behalf. You know as well as I do, they’d bring up all those years he spent under psychiatric care, and completely destroy his credibility as a witness. Not to mention what his lawyer would try to do to my reputation. No.” Cat stood up. “I’m not going to file any charges. That’s final.”
“All right.” He placed his hands on his knees and pushed to his feet, a part of him knowing too well that she was right in thinking she would be on trial as well.
A pickup truck with a horse trailer in tow rumbled into the yard. Hearing it, Cat wiped a quick hand over her eyes, wiping away any trace of tears. “That’s Dad and Quint.” She turned to Logan. “I don’t want them to know about this. It would be pointless.”
“He’s your father,” Logan reminded her.
“Yes, but there’s nothing he can do. It would only upset him.”
