Nathan's Vow (3 page)

Empty plate and paper cup in hand,
he stood and dumped them in a nearby trash receptacle. Returning to the bench,
he shrugged off his suit jacket and flipped it over his arm.  "Will you at
least think about taking my case?"

His white shirt enhanced his tan
and seemed to make him look even taller, his shoulders broader.  She suspected
he was a proud man, not accustomed to making a request more than once.  Rising
to her feet, she dropped the remains of her supper into the trash bin, then
turned to face him.  "I'll think about it.  That's all I can promise."

The creases on Nathan's brows
relaxed slightly as he pulled a business card and a sheet of paper from his
shirt pocket.  "My office number is there as well as my home phone and
cell.  Call me anytime.  I go to bed late and get up early."

The warmth blossoming inside her at
the idea of seeing Nathan either late at night or early in the morning had
nothing to do with the evening sun beating on her back.

He continued, "On the
notepaper you'll find three names for references.  The first is the P.I. who
gave me your name.  You can discuss all of this freely with him.  The second
name has been a close friend since college.  Linc knows I was thinking about
contacting you to help with the search.  He doesn't know you're a psychic.  The
third is the girls' pediatrician.  I told her someone might be calling to make
character inquiries."

When Gillian took the card and
paper from his hand, his fingers folded around hers.  "Thank you," he
murmured.

"Mr. Bradley--"

"Nathan," he reminded a
third time, gazing at her with such intensity, she repeated his name slowly
after him.

Silver sparks glimmered in his eyes
as she stood immobile before him, unable to tear away.  She managed to say,
"There's nothing to thank me for."

Still holding her hand, fueling the
warmth in her body with his gentle touch and voice, he said, "Yes, there
is.  For the first time in months, I have hope."

Suddenly, giving Nathan hope was
more important than her new life and demands on her time.  Yet caution advised
her to take a deep breath and step away.  Pulling back her hand, she broke eye
contact and fingered his business card.  After a good night's sleep, maybe she
could make a decision that was right for both of them.

#

The cool morning breeze wafted in
the window as Gillian stared into her second cup of coffee at seven the next
morning.  A good night's sleep had been a sheer figment of her imagination.
After the three phone calls to Nathan's references, she'd heard their words
over and over.

Jake Donovan, the P.I., had told
her, "Nathan Bradley is a top rate IT security professional in this
community.  He cares about his daughters and he needs them.  The longer this
takes, the harder they will be to find.  I know."

Gillian knew that, too.

Linc Granger, the second name on
Nathan's list, had verified the fact that he'd been a friend of Nathan's since
college.  "You won't find a better friend than Nathan.  He's helped me
through some rough times."

Gillian had left a message on the
pediatrician's service explaining there was no emergency.  An hour later, the
doctor had called back.  "Nathan cares about his daughters a great deal. 
Since his divorce, he phones me every time they have a check-up or a problem to
get the full details and to carry out my instructions."

So, unable to sleep, Gillian had
tossed, turned, paced, listened to music, and finally cleaned out her closet
until the sun rose, all the while seeing Nathan Bradley's face in her mind's
eye.  She couldn't forget him, she couldn't ignore him, she couldn't decide
what to do about him.

Carrying her coffee mug to the
bright yellow kitchen counter, she set it next to a rolodex.  Nathan's business
card lay on the counter beside it.  She flipped through the file, pausing at
one number, then another.  It would be simple, really, to recommend another
psychic.  She wasn't the only one who did this type of work.

Her flipping stopped when she came
to Brian Reston's name and address.  She'd never taken it out. 
Hanging on
to lost dreams?
her heart asked.

Possibly.  Or maybe she'd kept the
card as a reminder of what could happen when she became too involved.

Was there a chance she would become
too involved with Nathan? His intelligence, intensity, and physical impact were
lethal.  She could tell he was a man to be reckoned with, simply by listening
to his messages on her machine.  In person she'd felt the full power of his
personality.

The scenario seemed too familiar--a
man she was attracted to, an ex-wife in the background, and children.  She
remembered the photo of his children, his voice when he spoke of them.  The
situation could be different this time.  She wouldn't fall in love.  Maybe this
could be handled quickly.  She'd help him find his little girls and return to
the serenity she'd found before he'd called.  No one in Los Angeles had to know
what she was doing.

With a prayer for the courage and
insight to use her gift the best way possible, she dialed his home number.  An
hour later, she climbed flagstone steps leading to his house in the hills. 
Like Nathan, the structure wasn't pretentious but spoke of quality from the
clean lines of the stucco exterior to the red-tiled roof.  Stepping under the
overhang, she rang the doorbell.

Nathan came to the door in a white
oxford shirt and dress slacks.  She supposed he'd been dressed and ready to go
to his office when she called.  But he looked much more casual than yesterday
with his shirt sleeves rolled to his elbows, no tie, and the top two buttons of
his shirt open.  Dark hair swirled in the gap.

Her heart raced and then almost
stopped as he surveyed her white shorts and red boat-necked pullover.  A moment
later, he opened the screened door and stood to the side so she could enter. 
She couldn't think of one appropriate thing to say.

As she slipped by him, she finally
murmured, "Your directions were good.  I had no problems finding your
home."

He led her into the spacious living
room.  Spruce green and earthtones created an atmosphere of serenity from the
extra-long sofa to the ceramic lamps.  Oak glass-topped tables reflected the
light pouring in sliding glass doors.

They stood and stared at each other
for a moment.  Finally, Nathan raked his fingers through his hair and asked,
"What do we do first?"

"Can I see the photo of your
girls again?"  She could hope this would be simple, but she knew from
experience, it usually wasn't.

"I can give you ten
photos."

"Just one will do for
now," she said softly and calmly.  She suspected Nathan was a man of
action who believed forging ahead was the only solution.

Nathan quickly extracted his wallet
from his pocket and slid the picture from its interior.  She'd been so afraid
to make a connection with it the first time she'd seen it, she hadn't examined
it carefully.  The edges were worn, as if he pulled it out of his wallet often
to look at it.  He missed his daughters. She could feel it as strongly as she
could feel Nathan's sense of loneliness in this house without them.

Taking the photograph from his
hand, she sank down onto the sofa and studied it.  He paced to the windows,
looked out, then turned around.  She could feel his gaze on her.  With her eyes
closed, she held on to the picture and tried to let the energy flow freely. 
But after a few moments, she knew it wasn't flowing.  She didn't feel
anything...except Nathan's desperation as he waited for a response from her.

She stood and approached him, not
knowing why she needed to be close instead of across the room.  "Nathan,
what do you expect from me?"

"To tell me where my daughters
are."

"You expect a city, a country,
an address?"

He threw his hands in the air. 
"I don't know what the hell to expect.  I don't know how you do what you
do."

She had the strongest urge to reach
out and soothe his troubled brow.  Fighting the sensation, telling herself she
would not get personally involved, she stepped back.  "This could take
time."

"How much time?"

"Days.  Possibly weeks."

"But when you saw that boy's
mother..."

"I saw a worried woman on a
porch.  I didn't know who she was or where she was."

He shook his head.  "I don't
understand."

"I know.  But you're going to
have to be patient and not expect a miracle."

"What you're telling me is we
might not discover anything."

"That's a possibility,"
she admitted.

"All right.  Fine.  The
picture doesn't do it.  What next?"

"I think I'm asking for
patience from someone who doesn't know the meaning of the word," she
murmured more to herself than to him.

He grasped her arm.  "I've
missed half a year of my daughters' lives.  How can you expect me to be
patient?"

His grip was firm and commanding,
communicating the same frustration as his voice.  The warmth of his fingers,
his body so close to hers, made her stomach flutter.  Trying to ignore it, she
pulled out of his grasp.  "I'm not a computer.  You can't feed information
in and expect a print-out a few minutes later.  Pressure won't work and neither
will intimidation."

He sighed and rubbed his hand over
his face.  "I'm sorry."

Just as he wasn't used to being
patient, she didn't think he was accustomed to making apologies.  "Nathan,
I want to find your daughters for you.  I'll do everything I can."

"And you won't let me run
roughshod over you in the process."

She smiled.  "Not if I can
help it."

Some of the tension between them
dissipated.  But the silver sparks in his eyes warned her again not to get too
close.  "Show me where your girls spent the most time."

Nathan preceded her up the
staircase, leading her down the hall.  He stopped at a closed door, paused,
then turned the knob. Gillian followed him inside, not knowing what to expect. 
A purely "little girl" room surrounded her.  Peppermint pink and
white eyelet spreads covered the two beds.  One was a youth bed with side
rails, the other was a regular single.  The walls were white smattered with
pictures of puppies and kittens, a tiger cub, and a baby seal.  A white wicker
desk bore the same scroll design as the headboards.

But what surprised Gillian the most
was the disorder of the room.  A pink cotton nightgown hung haphazardly on the
corner of one bed and stuffed toys sprawled across both.  At least three pairs
of sneakers strayed across the pale pink carpeting.  Several dolls, doll
clothes, and a miniature cradle lay in the section of the room with two bedroom
chairs and a small table littered with crayons and markers.  Gillian also
noticed the baseball glove, cap and plastic ball tossed haphazardly into a
corner.

"This is the way they left it
the last time they stayed with me."

The pain in his voice wrenched
Gillian's heart.  "How often did they come over?"

"Usually every other weekend. 
A few days over Christmas vacation.  A week here and there in the summer." 
He crossed to the bedside table and picked up a photograph.

Gillian peered around his
shoulders.  His daughters were in the photograph, but so was a beautiful
raven-haired woman wearing a large picture hat.  It was tilted back and didn't
hide any of the contours of her face.

"Is that your ex-wife?" 
The question had popped out before she could catch it.

"Yes."  With a last look
at the photograph, he set it on  the nightstand.

Restrained emotion etched Nathan's
forehead and a slew of questions ran through Gillian's mind.  Did he still love
his ex-wife?  How long had they been married?  Did he have regrets?

She had no right to ask those
questions.  But others might help her get her bearings.  "What are your
daughters, names?"

"Dana and Madison—Maddie for
short."  He moved to a set of louvered doors and opened them.  Half of the
long closet was filled with children's toys and games, the other half held an
assortment of girls' outfits and shoes.  "What do you need?"

She was beginning to believe what
she needed was more than a few miles between her and Nathan Bradley.  But she'd
agreed to help him and she would.  The problem was he was distracting her. 
Every one of her senses came alive when he got within a foot.  All he had to do
was look at her and she felt an inner trembling. She couldn't work with her
receptors blocked.

"Do you trust me?"

His blue eyes narrowed.  "I'm
not sure I trust anyone anymore.  Why?"

"Because I'd like to spend
some time here alone."

"You want me to leave."

She understood that leaving this
room was as difficult for him as entering it.  Unable to stop herself, she put
her hand on his arm.  "Nathan, I feel your pain.  But I need to make a
connection with the girls, not with you."

He searched her face for a long
moment.  She thought he leaned closer, but that must have been her
imagination.  Yet she didn't imagine his finger lifting her chin or the silver
in his blue eyes as he bent his head.  She thought of Brian, her need to stay
detached, the look in Nathan's eyes as he'd studied the picture of his
daughters and ex-wife.  And before something they'd both regret could happen,
she stepped away.

Picking up a teddy bear on the bed,
she clutched it in front of her.  "I promise I won't steal the TV or the
silver."

A stunned expression marked
Nathan's face, as if he couldn't believe what had almost happened.  His chest
rose and fell. "There is no silver."  After an awkward pause, he
asked, "How long do you think you'll need?"

"I don't know.  Why don't you
go to work and keep busy.  I'll stay as long as I need to and call you
tonight."