Fools Rush In
After a devastating tragedy sent her into a severe depression, Justine Montgomery gave up her newborn daughter for adoption. Realizing her mistake too late, she discovered her daughter had been adopted by divorced journalist Duncan Banks–and that he was looking for a nanny.Without revealing her identity, Justine took the job. But she never anticipated Duncan's growing suspicions about her–or the powerful attraction between them.A poverty-ridden childhood and a failed marriage left Duncan Banks unwilling to trust in anyone but himself. It didn't take him long to realize that there was something not quite right about his daughter's otherwise perfect nanny. But in trying to uncover Justine's secrets, Duncan soon found his own vulnerabilities were at stake. With divided loyalties and an unexpected passion threatening their fragile relationship, Justine and Duncan must risk revealing more than they ever imagined to achieve what they never dreamed possible….
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To my husband, whose love and unfailing
support sustain me and enrich my life, and to Karen Thomas, my editor, whose helpfulness, competence and upbeat approach make writing a pleasure and deadlines a less ominous thing.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 1
Justine let the white vehicle take her weight as she stood alone at the edge of the crowd, staring at the gutted Falls Church, Virginia motel in which, hours earlier, her faithful and loving husband of four years had perished with his white mistress. Perspiration matted her hair even as she tightened her jacket against the early fall chill. Her dry, tearless eyes stung their sockets as she gazed at the burned-out ruin still ripe with the smell of singed carpet, incinerated furniture, odoriferous rubbish, and charred flesh. Shivers coursed through her at the sight of the smoke-darkened glass and fragmented windows. Blackened bricks that had once gleamed red in the sunlight mocked her with their message of gloom and death.
âThey shore musta been busy,â a female voice declared, âif they was the only ones in there that couldnât hear the fire alarm.â
âYou tell it, girl,â another agreed.
The only love she had even known. Why couldnât she cry? Echoes shouted at her from the black ruins that jeered contemptuously at her. âLove ya, Baby!â He said it that way every time he left her. âYou be ready for me, Baby.â She opened the crumpled note that heâd left tacked to the refrigerator and read it again. âSorry I couldnât reach you at work, Baby, but the companyâs got an emergency of gargantuan proportions, and Iâm on my way to Boston to straighten things out. May take a couple of days, but Iâll call you. Explain it all when I get back. You be ready for me. Love ya, Baby. Your devoted husband, Kenneth.â Boston! And here he was, dead in a Falls Church, Virginia motel.
She looked up and stared in horror as men approached her wheeling gurneys carrying one long, black plastic bag and one shorter bag, each tied securely. Dazed, she would have touched the remains of her husband if an ambulance worker hadnât jumped between her and the lifeless object. Her fist pummeled the manâs chest until he held her hands to restrain her and folded her shaking form to his body until she gained control. She looked at the note, read it again, shredded it into bits, and let the wind have it. Then she turned from the horrifying scene where Kenneth Montgomery had perished with his lover, rested her hand on her bellyâdistended with their eight-months-along unborn childâand walked away. Thirty-five minutes later as she drove the Ford Taurus home, the first pains of a premature birth beganâ¦.
Justineâs screams awakened her, and she sprang forward in bed, tugging the sheet to her as though to protect herself, and gazed rapidly around her bedroom. It wasnât a dream. If only it was. If only that morning had never been, and she could sleep through one night without reliving it exactly as it had occurred that awful day. For nearly twelve months, that scene had been her constant companion, filling her thoughts during the day and her dreams at night. She wiped the perspiration from her face with her left hand and shook her right fist.
âI wonât let you do this to me. I wonât let you destroy my faith in human beings. You with your goodness, your humanitarianism, and your love for the common man. You for whom I ruined my relationship with my father. You treacherous bastard. You robbed me of my child. Youâ¦
âMy child. Why did Iâ¦?â She rested her head on her raised knees and folded her arms around them. What had she done? She jumped from the bed, got dressed, rushed to the social service department of the hospital in which sheâd given birth, and paced in front of the door for an hour and a half until the workers arrived at nine.
Maybe if she said if often enough, theyâd do something. âI want my child back. I was sick. You canât do this to me.â Her screams reverberated through the social service department of Alexandria, Virginiaâs Presidents Hospital. She tightened the woolen stole that she wore to ward off the September chill and leaned across the social workerâs desk, oblivious to the tears that wet the corners of her mouth.
âIâ¦Iâll sue you. Iâllâ¦â
âYou signed the papers, Justine. You couldnât stand the sight of that baby and it was our duty to protect her.â
âBut I was sick, and you knew it.â
âYou said you didnât want the baby. We know you sustained an unusually deep postpartum psychosis; many women do. Some of them have killed their babies when the psychosis was a deep one like yours. We thought youâd never come out of it. A week ago, Iâd have sworn you never would. Your refusal to look at the child, and your insistence that we do whatever the law allowed, left us no choice, but to do as you said. Your therapist agreed.â
