Selfish bastard.
He didn’t want to hurt her, not after all she’d been through and how far she’d come toward trusting him. However, some of his hesitance was selfish, his personal desire to not see the hurt look on her face when she found out what he’d done. His own heart would be broken because he’d wounded her—again.
“I’ll never lie to her again,” he muttered angrily as he pulled into the private drive of the guesthouse.
He’d gone into town to pick up a few things they needed for dinner and left Hope at home because she wanted to preview and organize some of the photos she’d taken the day before. Jason had been gone longer than he’d meant to be: he stopped at the flower shop to buy Hope some flowers, and the jewelry store, the same store where he’d bought their wedding rings before he’d flown to Vegas. He ended up buying a diamond heart necklace, surrounded in diamonds with an emerald heart in the center that matched her eyes. It was the best way to express how much he loved her, and she could wear it all the time. Still not satisfied, he’d ducked into a specialty shop and got her a waterproof camera, hoping to hell she’d be using it for trips out on the boat.
Jason exited the SUV, gathered up everything, and walked the short distance to the house with his heart hammering and his nerves about shot. He’d tell her now, before another minute passed. It wasn’t in his nature to put off something unpleasant, something he had to do, which was why his remorse gnawed at his insides. For both their sakes, he needed to get this task over with and rely on Hope’s generous heart, her capacity to forgive.
Maybe if she understands that I love her, that I was temporarily insane…
Jason put his key in the door, having locked it before he left. Surprisingly, he found the door unlocked.
I know I locked it.
It had been a priority, and he remembered doing it, not willing to leave Hope vulnerable, even if they were in a small town.
“Hope,” he bellowed as he walked in the door. She wasn’t in the living room where she had been when he left.
Jason plopped the load he carried down on the kitchen counter, and moved quickly to find her. Finally, he returned to the kitchen. The house was empty.
Where the hell did she go?
As he looked around the kitchen, hoping to find a note, he found something else that made him freeze for a moment as he stared at it. It was the receipt for their rings, a very similar piece of paper to what he’d gotten today when he made another purchase at the same store. How had it ended up here?
It hadn’t been there when he left. Jason’s heart sank to his feet. The receipt was dated, proof that he’d purchased the rings before he’d left for Vegas. It had to have dropped out of his wallet, probably when he’d put his credit card away.
Hope had obviously found it.
“Shit!”
Running outside, Jason checked around the house. His fear overtook his brain. “Hope,” he hollered futilely. There was no sign of her.
She’s gone. She left. Dumb bastard. I should have told her.
Not stopping to think, he yanked his cell phone out of his pocket and punched in Grady’s phone number.
“Have you heard from Hope?” Jason asked immediately, urgently, when Grady answered.
“No. Not for a while. Why?” Grady asked cautiously.
“We were together and she disappeared. I was hoping she’d call you,” Jason admitted. His mind raced frantically to try to figure out where she’d gone.
“You were together? Why?”
Jason took a deep breath and quickly explained what he’d done, and what had happened, not leaving out any of his own less-than-stellar actions. He didn’t tell Grady any of Hope’s secrets. Those were her secrets to keep…or not.
“You bastard,” Grady rasped. “You got my sister drunk in a strange town and forced her to marry you?”
Jason wasn’t even going to argue that Hope wasn’t forced. She was incapacitated, and he was a dick. “I love her, Grady. I didn’t want her to marry another man. Hope is my entire world now, my wife. I need to find her. Kill me later, but help me right now. Please.”
“She wouldn’t be missing if you hadn’t betrayed her,” Grady grumbled angrily. He was silent for a moment. “I’ll check with my brothers, but they’re going to want to castrate you, too.”
“Fine.” Jason didn’t care what anybody did to him as long as he could find Hope. “I’m going to search the trails. She didn’t have a car. She couldn’t have gone far.”
Jason’s heart sank as he saw the camera case next to the recliner. She must have been upset. Hope never left the house without her camera.