Page 142 of Kiss an Angel

“That’s not true.”

“You’re a proud man. You violated your sense of honor, and now you’re trying to make amends. I understand that, but I’m not going to let my life be dictated by words you don’t really mean. This baby is too important to me.”

“The baby’s important to me, too.”

She winced. “Don’t say that. Please.”

“I’d prove my love if I could, but I don’t know how to do that.”

“You’re going to have to let me go. I know it’ll hurt your pride, and I’m sorry about that, but being together like this is too difficult.”

He didn’t say anything. She shut her eyes and tried to slip behind the icy barrier that had been keeping her safe, but he’d put too many cracks in it. “Please, Alex,” she whispered brokenly. “Please let me go.”

His voice was barely audible. “Is that what you really want?”

She nodded.

She had never thought she’d see him look defeated, but at that moment some internal spark seemed to be extinguished. “All right,” he said hoarsely. “I’ll do what you want.”

A spasm of anguish ripped through her as she realized it was finally over, and she stifled a sob as he rose to his feet. If this was what she wanted, why was it so painful?

Off to the side a shadow moved, but both Daisy and Alex were too absorbed in their own misery to notice that their most private conversation had been overheard.

24

“Alex!”

His head shot up from the stake driver’s engine as he heard Daisy’s voice calling out to him and sounding exactly the way it used to. Hope surged through him. Maybe time hadn’t run out for him after all. Maybe she hadn’t meant what she’d said two nights ago, and he’d no longer have to put her on a plane for New York that very afternoon.

He threw down the wrench he’d been using and turned to face her, only to have his hope fade as he saw the expression on her face.

“Sinjun’s gone! They’ve unloaded all the animals, and he isn’t there. Trey’s missing, too.”

Brady came around from behind the stake driver where he’d been trying to help Alex. “Sheba’s behind this. I’d bet anything.”

Daisy’s face paled with anxiety. “Did she say something to you?”

“No, but she’s been a bitch on wheels these last couple of days.”

Daisy looked at Alex, and for the first time since he’d found her at the zoo, he felt as if she were really seeing him. “Did you know about this?”

“No. She didn’t tell me anything.”

“She knows how you feel about that tiger,” Brady said. “My guess is that she’s sold him behind your back.”

“But she can’t do that. He’s mine!” She bit her lip, as if she realized that what she’d said wasn’t true.

“I tried to find Sheba earlier,” Brady said, “but she hasn’t shown up yet. Shorty drove her RV, but her car’s missing.”

Daisy clenched her fists. “She’s done something terrible with him. I know it.”

Alex wanted to reassure her, but he suspected she was right. “I’ll make some calls and see what I can find out. Why don’t the two of you go talk to the workers and see if of them know anything?”

But no one did. For the next two hours, they spoke with everyone in the circus, only to discover that Sheba hadn’t been seen since the previous evening.

Daisy grew increasingly frantic. Where was Sinjun? What had Sheba done with him? She’d learned enough about the market for aging circus animals to realize that the chances of a reputable zoo taking him were slim. What was going to happen to her tiger?

The time came and passed for her to leave for the airport. Alex had insisted she go to her father’s until she decided what she wanted to do, but now there was no question of her leaving. She ignored the pearl gray Lexus with its Connecticut license plates—another of Alex’s guilt offerings—sat on the tailgate of the old black pickup that had carried her on her summer’s journey of the soul to this bleak October night. From there, she watched the lot.

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