LITMIR.BIZ

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least not in any way that mattered. He had Laura and the kids. And at all costs, this other part of his life had to be kept away from them. The new owners could have Spiros Shipping.

      Best to just stay hidden. A ghost.

      But how in the hell was he supposed to do that with this trial coming up?

      What had happened to Nikolas Spiros? Had he gone mad for real? Had something horrible happened at the shipping company that had driven him over the edge? What would leave such a residue of terror within him?

      The walls of his office started to close in on him unpleasantly—which was a first—and he actually felt a driving need to get out of there. He erased his browsing history and shut down the computer before heading for the kitchen.

      Pulling on a jacket, he turned off the elaborate security system and headed out the back door toward the woods behind the house. Tonight he didn’t feel up to trekking across one of the pastures and challenging his agoraphobia. He’d been taking secret hikes for several months now, trying to desensitize himself to open spaces. It was getting better, but by maddeningly slow degrees.

      He’d been walking for a few minutes when the panic attack hit. It slammed into him like a freight train, sudden and overwhelming. He stopped, breathing as if he’d been sprinting, and glanced around in terror. And then something odd dawned on him. This panic attack was different. It was accompanied by a strange certainty that he was being watched. Great. Was he slipping back into the paranoia of the early days, too?

      He couldn’t help himself. He slid into the darkest shadow he could find and crouched, pressing his back against the trunk of a huge sycamore. He let his gaze roam, his peripheral vision taking in a wide angle view of the woods. The night sounds had gone dead silent. Maybe he wasn’t so paranoid, after all. The crickets never lied.

      Who else was out here? And why?

      The motion sensors at the house would warn of any human-sized intruders … if he hadn’t turned the alarm system off before he came out here. He swore at himself. Laura and the kids were unprotected. He had to get back to the house. Get the alarms back on. Protect his family.

      He stood up and was stunned to discover his feet wouldn’t move. Literally. By sheer force of will, he overcame his panic, ignoring the hyperventilation, ignoring the wild imaginings of being kidnapped again, crammed in another box. His family came first, dammit. He’d die for them!

      His stumbling walk turned into a jog, and finally into a full-out run. Whether he was running toward Laura or away from the bogeyman in the woods, he couldn’t say. But either way, his long legs devoured the distance with powerful strides and his lungs burned with exertion by the time the mansion came into sight. Its Georgian grandeur was dark. Quiet. Undisturbed.

      The silliness of his terror struck him forcefully. His mind was playing tricks on him. It was only his past pursuing him. A figment of his imagination. With a last look over his shoulder into the shadows of the night, he let himself into the house and turned on the security system.

      Shaken to his core, he climbed the stairs quietly. No sense waking everyone because he’d had a panic attack. He put his hand on the doorknob to let himself into the master suite, but he couldn’t bring himself to enter. He was still too wired to lie down beside Laura as if everything was perfectly normal.

      Instead, he headed for another door farther down the hall. A small, walk-in linen closet. About six feet by eight feet inside, its tight quarters felt like a comforting embrace. He slid down the wall and sat on the floor, his elbows on his knees and his head on his arms. He had to get over this. Get a grip on himself. But how? If anything, he was getting worse, not better.

      As understanding as Laura tried to be, she couldn’t begin to comprehend what he’d been through, what the past few years had been like. It was his own private hell, and no one could climb into it with him and lead him out. He was lost, and getting more lost by the day. Oh, the shrinks said all the right things, but they had no more clue what he’d been through, really, than Laura did. They had a little more book learning about it, had a list of suggestions to offer out of some counseling text, but their psychobabble was mostly crap.

      How could everything be so perfect and yet so screwed up? He ought to be insanely happy. But instead, he was marching at a brisk pace toward the mental meltdown he’d been falsely accused of having six years ago.

      There hadn’t been anyone in the woods. A deer or some other creature had moved, and the crickets had gone quiet for a minute. He’d flipped out over nothing. So why was his fight-or-flight response still in full readiness? He took several deep, calming breaths, the way the yoga instructor had taught him, breathing out the fear and stress.

      It accomplished exactly nothing, dammit.

      He sat there, panting in terror for who knew how long when, without warning, the door swung open. He started to surge to his feet when a little voice whispered, “Daddy?”

      Nick sank back down to the floor, his heart about pounding through his rib cage. “Hey, buddy. What are you doing up at this hour?”

      “I dreamed a bad man was coming for me.”

      He held out an arm to Adam, who wasted no time climbing into his lap. “No bad man will ever get you. Mommy and I will always protect you and keep you safe.”

      “Promise?”

      “I promise.”

      “Cross your heart and hope to die?” Adam added.

      “Cross my heart and hope to die,” he repeated. “Need a pinkie swear on it, too?”

      Adam held out his right pinkie finger, and Nick hooked his much larger finger in his son’s. They shook on it soberly.

      “Why are you in the closet, Daddy? Are you hiding from the bad man, too?”

      “I didn’t want to wake up you and Ellie and Mommy, and I needed some time to think.”

      Adam’s little palms rested on his cheeks. “Is your heart hurting again?”

      Since when were five-year-olds so damned perceptive? “I guess it is, a little. I’m so happy it hurts. I think about all the ways it could go wrong …”

      Adam nodded wisely. “And then you’re not so happy anymore.”

      He stared down at his son, but it was too dark to make out his face. “Nothing’s going to go wrong, Adam. Not if I can help it.”

      “Don’t be scared, Daddy.”

      “I won’t if you won’t. We can be brave for each other.

      Okay?”

      Adam nodded against his chest. They cuddled in the dark for several more minutes, and predictably, the boy drifted back to sleep, his nightmare long gone. Nick stood awkwardly, careful not to wake his son, and carried him back to his rocket-ship bed. He tucked the little boy in and kissed his forehead, memorizing Adam’s face in that peaceful moment.

      He was going to defeat his own demons if it killed him. No way was he about to let his paranoia bleed over to his children and damage them. And furthermore, his past wasn’t going to hurt them, either. He knew what he had to do. And he had to do it alone. Leaving no note that Laura could use to track him down, he treaded quietly back down the stairs, this time being sure to reactivate the alarm from the panel in the garage, and headed out into the night.

      * * *

      Laura woke up to Ellie’s fussing amplified through the baby monitor, disoriented at how well rested she felt and that the first light of dawn was peeking in around the curtains. She looked at the clock. Six o’clock? Nick must’ve taken the 2:00 a.m. feeding, bless him. She rolled over to thank him and was startled to see his side of the bed empty. He hadn’t struggled with insomnia for months, now.

      Shrugging, she got up, threw on a bathrobe and headed for her daughter. Ellie was hungry, and nursed for longer than usual. Laura carried her into the bathroom and laid her on a big soft bath towel on

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