Sarah felt her eyes fill with tears. She was sure Jake wanted to rip Caitlyn out of her arms and take her into his own protective embrace. But he wouldn’t do that to his child. He wouldn’t scare or hurt Caitlyn by taking her away from her mother—the woman who had also betrayed him.
Instead, in a move that reminded her exactly why she had loved him so much, Jake put his arms around both of them, pulling Sarah close, keeping Caitlyn between them. His forehead touched hers. She closed her eyes at the tender gesture. They were safe. They were back together—at least for the moment.
“Look who I found,” Catherine said, leading a dazed Teresa into the living room. “She was tied up in the kitchen.”
“Oh, my God!” Sarah whispered. Teresa had always been a short, scrappy brunette, but she looked even tougher now with a black eye and a bump the size of a golf ball on her forehead. “What did they do to you?”
“I would have gotten away if they hadn’t double-teamed me,” Teresa complained. “At least I got a few punches in. I’m sorry, Sarah. I went outside to the garbage early this morning and they came up behind me. They told me they were only letting me live so I could keep the baby alive until you got here. That’s when I took a swing at one of them. I guess he hit me harder than he intended, because when I woke up, I was alone and tied up in the kitchen. I heard Caitlyn screaming upstairs. It scared the shit out of me. But Catherine says they’re dead—or at least one of them is.”
“Victor is dead. The other one Catherine took out with a baseball bat. I didn’t do anything except grab Caitlyn.” Sarah realized that she had always felt so alone, but today her friends had risked their lives to save her and her daughter.
“Hey, I saw you,” Jake said abruptly, his gaze on Teresa. He pointed a finger at her. “You were in the hospital outside of Sarah’s room a couple of days ago. I thought you were waiting for someone, but you were watching me.”
“You were there?” Sarah asked in amazement.
Teresa nodded. “I saw the report of the accident on the news, and I came to see how you were. I left Caitlyn with my neighbor just for an hour. When I got to the hospital and realized you had amnesia, I wasn’t sure what to do. You never told me who was after you except that it was a guy, and when I saw him,” she said, tipping her head toward Jake, “I didn’t know who he was. I decided it was safer to just keep Caitlyn with me until you got your memory back. You told me not to tell anyone no matter what happened. But maybe I should have.”
Sarah shook her head. “You did the right thing. I didn’t get my memory back until this morning, when Jake found Victor’s picture on the Internet. I’m really sorry you got hurt, Teresa. I knew I was putting you in danger. I shouldn’t have done it.”
“Don’t say that. You were forced off the side of a cliff. If you’d had Caitlyn with you, who knows what would have happened? It was my fault they got in here today. I should have been more careful.”
As Teresa finished speaking, Sarah heard sirens in the distance.
“The police,” Jake muttered. “Take Caitlyn into the living room.” He gave Sarah a gentle push.
She hesitated. “Jake—did you kill Victor? Or did Dylan?”
“I did,” he said calmly. “We were fighting for the gun and it went off. The bullet hit him in the heart— if he even had a heart.”
“I can’t believe he’s dead. Are you sure?”
“Positive. You can take a look at him when the coroner brings him out, but right now you need to stay with Caitlyn.”
“I don’t want you to go to jail. This was my fight.
Victor was my enemy. You’re the one who needs to take Caitlyn. I’ll say I killed Victor in self-defense. I’ll put the gun in my hand, cover your fingerprints with mine.” Her mind raced with what else should be done to protect Jake.
Jake’s gaze searched hers in amazement. “You want to lie for me?”
“Well, you know I’m pretty good at it,” she said, trying to make a joke, but she choked on a sob.
“Don’t tell any more lies, Sarah. It’s time for the truth.”
“Not at your expense.”
“It’s going to be all right. It was self-defense.”
She shook her head at his naïveté. He didn’t know what he was talking about. He’d never been on the wrong side of the law. She had. “You believe the system will work, that justice will be served, but that doesn’t always happen, Jake. Sometimes the bad guys win.”
He cupped her chin with his hand. “And sometimes the good guys do. Trust me. For once in your life, Sarah, trust me.”