Ricky shook his head. His lips smacked as he chewed a stick of gum. “I don’t care what a piece of paper says. You’re my wife, and you always will be. We went to church. You swore before God to love, honor, and obey me. Until death do us part. Remember? There’s nothing a court can do to change that.”

“Get the hell out of my house.”

“Our house,” Ricky fired back at me.

He stood up from the chair. When he walked toward me, I cringed. I put my hands over my belly, as if I could cover your eyes, Shelby. I didn’t want you to see this man, to hear him speak, to have him be any part of your life. Maybe he was your father, maybe not, but he was dead to both of us.

“What do you want?” I asked again. “Money?”

“No, I don’t need money. I’ve got money now. I wanted to see you. I’ve missed you.”

Ricky caressed my face with the long barrel of the revolver. I didn’t wince or turn away. Not from him. The thought of grabbing the gun flashed through my mind. If it had just been the two of us, I would have done it. I wouldn’t have cared who lived or died. But I wasn’t alone. I had you, Shelby.

“You look good, Bec,” Ricky told me. “I’d forgotten how pretty that face of yours is. Glowing. Isn’t that what they call it?”

I swore at him in a loud voice. My eyes burned with defiance as I stared back at him, but he just laughed, because he was the one with the gun.

Physically, he’d changed since he’d been away. He’d shaved his bushy mustache, which only made his damaged nose more prominent. His blond hair was shorter. He’d lost the lazy flab he’d put on while he was unemployed, and he looked tough and muscled again. His stomach was taut, his forearms rippling, his fingers thick and strong. But the menace radiating from him hadn’t changed at all.

“I heard you were in Pennsylvania,” I said.

He shrugged. “I was, but only for a month or two. Then I moved on. I figured I’d try the desert for a while. I’ve been working construction in Nevada. There’s good money out there if you don’t pour it all into the slots.”

“So why come back?”

He dragged the barrel of the gun down my neck to my breast. “You and me. We have unfinished business, Bec.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I called a friend in town,” Ricky said. “Just to see what was up. Just to get all the news. Naturally, I asked about you. I wanted to know what was going on with my wife. He told me about that.”