The Hostage Bride by Janet Dailey Page A

didn’t think of that before you got greedy, isn’t it?” He slowed the car and turned it into the curb, parking it in front of her house.

Chapter Six
    There was a gasp of alarmed surprise when Tamara walked into the house ahead of Bick. It was followed by a relieved “Tamara” as Sadie identified the intruder and pressed a reassuring hand to her fluttering heart. “My land, girl, you gave me a fright walking in like that. What are you doing home?”
    “I—” How on earth could she explain? Tamara wondered. So she didn’t try. “I’d like you to meet … my employer, Bick Rutledge. This is Sadie Kent, the nurse who looks after my mother.”
    She saw the sweeping and cynical look Bick made as the two exchanged greetings, a look that appeared to find fault with Sadie because she wasn’t wearing a uniform. It had been a mutually agreed decision. Perhaps it was unprofessional, but it kept the house from seeming like a miniature hospital ward.
    “How is Mrs. James?” Bick inquired with droll blandness.
    Sadie cast a hesitant glance at Tamara before she answered. “I imagine she is overwhelmed with curiosity at this moment to find out what her daughter is doing home in the middle of the morning.”
    “Then perhaps we should go into her room,” Tamara suggested quickly.
    “By all means,” he agreed.
    She was first to enter her mother’s room and walked to the hospital bed, bending to kiss her mother’s cheek and murmur a greeting. As she turned to face Bick, her hand automatically sought the limp hand of her mother’s in an instinctively protective gesture. Her proud look defied Bick to challenge the state of her mother’s health.
    Making the introductions, Tamara watched his expression, but he showed no reaction—not pity, not doubt, not acceptance—nothing. She wanted to scream at him to admit that her mother was tragically ill and she hadn’t been lying. But, of course, she didn’t.
    “This is a surprise, Mr. Rutledge,” her mother said in her concise speech pattern to make her slurring voice more distinct.
    “I insisted that your daughter bring me here so I could meet you,” Bick stated. “She has told me frequently about you.”
    “Tamara has mentioned that you have taken her to lunch and given her rides home. She was much too casual about it, I thought, but now Iunderstand why.” It was a brightly knowing look she darted to Tamara.
    “Mother, please,” Tamara murmured, because that remark that had once been very close to the truth was now very far from it.
    Her mother made an attempt at an understanding smile and let her gaze return to Bick. “Would you like a cup of coffee, Mr. Rutledge?”
    “I would like that, thank you,” he said, accepting.
    But Tamara was reluctant to leave him alone with her mother. She wavered uncertainly beside the bed, still clutching her mother’s hand in a mute attempt at protection.
    “I would like very much to talk to you at a greater length, Mr. Rutledge,” her mother said with concentrated effort. “But I tire easily. Perhaps it would be better if you drank your coffee in the kitchen with Tamara.”
    “Of course, Mrs. James.” He agreed to that, too. “It has been … a pleasure meeting you.”
    Her mother’s eyelids drifted down in a silent acknowledgment of the polite statement before she looked at Tamara to prompt her into movement. Bick waited to follow her out of the front bedroom through the living room to the kitchen. Sadie eyed them curiously as she passed them to check on her patient.
    In the kitchen, Tamara walked directly to the cupboard and took two mugs from the shelf. Fresh coffee was in the chrome-plated percolator and she filled the two cups, keeping the mugwith the chip in it for herself and handing the other to Bick. Turning her back on him, she walked to the white-painted kitchen table and chairs.
    “I suppose you still think it was an act, that my mother was faking it,” she accused tightly. “Maybe you’d like to talk to