In a Heartbeat Read Free Page A

Digger had struck.
    She sped up, anxious to pass the area and enter the small town, where everyone was friendly. She’d purposely left Atlanta after her ordeal because in every crowd she’d seen a potential attacker. In every dark alley, a psycho waiting to grab her. In every smile from a man, an invitation for trouble.
    Would she ever get over her paranoia that someone would attack her again? That becoming involved with a man would end in danger?
    William is dead, she reminded herself for the hundredth time that week, as she turned into the day care parking lot. He’s never coming back.
    And you have a new life.
    Or did she?
    How could she really have a life if she continued to be afraid of her own shadow? If she held herself back from friendships, from involving herself in the community because she didn’t want to become a victim again?
    No, it had to be this way. She was just trying to survive.
    Now, she was safe. She’d changed her last name from Langley to Long. She’d rented a small cabin on top of a rolling hill with apple trees surrounding it. She could see anyone approaching from miles around.
    No one in Ellijay knew her true identity, or what had happened to her four years ago.
    She intended to keep it that way.
    Didn’t want the pitying looks. The curious questions. The suspicious eyes wondering if she was crazy. The condemning ones that screamed she was to blame for her own assault. And for those other women’s. If only she’d been smarter, come forward sooner….
    Just as her father had thought. Oh, he hadn’t come right out and said it, but she saw it in his eyes. The disappointment. The shock that she was no longer daddy’s perfect little princess. His conviction that she was playing into the victim role.
    But she had been fighting it on a daily basis.
    She parked, then climbed out of her Toyota. Instantly, heat suffused her, and her feet crunched the dry blades of grass of the lawn. Glancing around quickly, she noticed a tall, broad-shouldered man with wavy hair standing on the corner. He was watching her with hooded eyes.
    Chilled by the realization, she hurried into the Love ’N Play Day Care, where she’d worked the last four summers. Thanks to Special Agent Brad Booker, who’d helped her relocate, she’d secured a teaching job at the local elementary school, and supplemented her income by working at the day camps in the summer. She waved good morning to the director, Luanne Roaker, who was talking to a parent in her office, and rushed to her classroom to set up for the activities.
    Teaching preschoolers wasn’t the career she’d chosen before the attack, and certainly not the career her father wanted for her, but her priorities had changed drastically when she’d been pulled from that grave. Of course, Dr. Liam Langley, prestigious surgeon, didn’t understand that. First he’d wanted her to be the society wife, marry a doctor, serve on the volunteer committees as her mother had done when she was alive. When Lisa had mentioned a career instead, he’d suggested she follow in his footsteps and become a doctor.
    When she’d chosen teaching, and relocated, he’d been furious.
    But she liked working with the children—they were so innocent.
    Just as she’d been once.
    Never again.
    Since the attack, she’d lost her sense of trust, given up on her dreams of marriage and a family. The kids she taught filled that void. They gave her the love she needed, their innocence a precious commodity, offering her hope that one day she’d be normal.
    Free of the nightmares that haunted her.
    Thirty minutes later, after she’d greeted each of her students with a hug and given Ruby Bailey, her assistant, instructions for setting up the daily art activity, she gathered the group into a circle for their morning share time.
    “Miss Lisa,” four-year-old Jamie said in a low voice. “I had a bad dream last night.”
    Lisa patted the little girl’s back, grateful she’d finally opened up to share. For