The Texas Millionaire's Runaway Wife by Mary Malcolm Page A

not have another happy day in this lifetime. Do you understand me?”
    Just as he was about to remind her of her place, the door opened. Liz stood at the door looking frazzled, her brown hair a messy frame for the havoc playing across her face. “Cassie, I’m so glad to see you, it’s Annie. I’ve been trying to call.”
    Immediately Cassie’s face paled. “Liz, is she...?”
    Liz spared him the briefest of glances before ignoring his presence completely. “She got out this morning. I couldn’t find her, I was so scared. I had to call the police, CPS came by.” As she said the last part, her voice hitched in her throat. Her cheeks flushed and it looked as if a slight wind might blow her to the ground.
    Every instinct told him to take over, be a man, take charge. One look at Cassie told him it wasn’t his place and he needed to stand by and support his wife. He touched her back lightly, not sure if she even felt it. He’d never met her niece, but in that instance she was his family, too and he thought of Matthew, his nephew and how devastated he would be if anything happened to him.
    “Liz, she’s home now?”
    “Yes.” With that, the woman broke down and leaned back against the wall. Her body shook with silent sobs. Cassie wrapped her arms around her and led them into the tiny living room. With the two women on the couch, Stephen stepped away to try to give them some space.
    This wasn’t what he’d expected. All of the anger he’d harbored only minutes before disappeared as a puff of smoke. Living like this was hell and no one deserved to go through what they were experiencing. Especially with no help. He’d been around plenty of autistic children and their families, but he’d never cared as much as he did for Cassie. He could see now how things got to the point they got. How hopelessness could lead a person to make bad decisions. He’d never been financially desolate, but had certainly had his share of hopeless situations. No mother, and a father who worked all the time…and was even more absent during the rare moments he was around. Being told time and time again how women only wanted Sands men for their money. How they couldn’t be trusted.
    How love wasn’t real and marriage only a financial arrangement.
    Stephen had been a romantic, had wanted to believe he could live differently than his father, that not all marriages were about signing on the dotted line. He knew now how wrong that was.
    A noise drew his attention to a closed door toward the back of the house. He knocked gently, then pushed it open. Inside, a young girl with curly brown hair—Annie he presumed—sat on the floor stacking blocks in color order: red, orange, yellow. All the same colors together. The tower toppled and she hit her head against a dresser before going again.
    “Hello.”
    Annie didn’t acknowledge him as she continued stacking. Her brow furrowed in concentration and she tapped the fingers of her left hand against her thigh as she stacked. Block, tap, block, tap. The room was small but clean, no clutter. No posters of kittens on the walls, no messy doll clothes strewn about. Everything was in an exact place.
    The tower grew to over thirty blocks before it toppled again. And again, she slammed her head into the dresser.
    “I’m going to read a book, but you don’t have to listen, okay?”
    She continued building as Stephen pulled one of the books from her shelf. The back cover was torn and the spine broken, but it looked to have all the pages. He settled onto the floor across from her, legs crossed and started reading aloud.
    Slowly, he noticed her acceptance of his presence. The tower fell again, but this time instead of hitting her head, she kicked the floor and let out a mewling whine. Next time, she merely threw one of the blocks against the wall.
    Stephen was more than halfway through the book when he noticed she’d stopped building entirely and was listening to him. Pangs of sympathy went out for that little