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“What rong with it?” she’d asked, and he launched into arecitation that involved a dirty air cleaner and so called a ballast resistor Dawn listened, nodded once or twice as if she understood what sounded like a foreign language, and finally the rinned and said the bottom line was that they’d bill her at the end of the month
The good neas that her old car still had plenty of life in it Good news? It onderful news And it was heaven to be home at last
Dawn kicked off her shoes, waggled her toes and sighed with relief Wearing heels every day was so new Her dealer’s uniform had consisted of a shirt, vest and pants Flat had been okay The new job required heels Nothing outrageous, just pumps, but she wasn’t used to heels at all Suone barefoot; winters, she’d worn heavy walking boots Never heels, no matter what the season Harman hadn’t approved They made a woman look like a slut, he’d said, but then he’d said that about al she wore, even the shapeless dresses she’d sewed herself in hopes they would be acceptable…
Dawn took off her jacket and carefully placed it on a hanger She was doing it again, wasting energy thinking about the past Was it because she’d missed her Sunday visit with Toot up at five, was on the road by five-thirty, arrived at Rocking Horse Ranch at seven and they spent the entire day together, just she and her son
Sometimes she took him to a wonderful place Tommy called their hideahere water rushed down over sreen and lush you forgot you were in the desert Or they drove to what re camp, where Tommy had found a battered tin cup that made his eyes shine If the weather was iffy, they drove to the mesa not far behind the ranch, followed a steep path to the bottom and explored the little canyon at the base
She saw her son during the week, too, if time permitted, but those Sunday visits hat she lived for—and she’d missed the last one Becky had asked her to cos For one wild moment, Dawn almost said she couldn’t do it, that she had a little boy waiting for her… But nobody knew Tommy existed, not even Cassie
He would always be her secret It was his only protection
It still aood her escape from the mountain
That night, she’d known Haro after her He had friends; one of them would surely lend him a car or a truck As she’d huddled with To for the 1:00 am bus that would take her to freedohts that cahway, she’d looked out theto see a faed to Har buddy, but her husband was at the wheel
“Harlanced at the bus, even seeht into the here she sat with her baby in her lap, but then he’d pulled ahead She’d al for the truck His truck He hadn’t thought she would have abandoned it and taken the bus instead
The look of him, wild-eyed at the wheel of that car, haunted her It was how she iht in search of her It hy she would never tell her secrets to anyone, why she’d said no, she wouldn’tup her Sunday when Becky asked She’d called the ranch, told Tommy she had a cold because she was afraid he’d think she put her job before her love for hiiant kiss to tuck under his pilloas a gale
Maybe she couldn’t wake upface or tuck hiht, but she had saved hiiness tonight…well, the incident this afternoon had shaken her A perfectly pleasant man had tea
sed her a little and she’d alht she was past all that, the feeling of suffocating terror when a man leaned too close, when she saw that look, that tautness in ayou to bed to do whatever would give him pleasure…
“Stop it,” she said briskly
The apart closed up for so urgled and groaned to life, then checked her answeringDawn felt her heart in her throat, told herself she was letting her ied with relief when Cassie’s voice flowed from the speaker