“For what?” Mary asked, assuming a haughty “I own you” tone Gabrielle hadn’t heard from her before now.

“Bribery. Theft from the police Evidence Room. And whatever else the district attorney comes up with,” he said, then read the mayor her rights, as well.

“Nonsense,” Mary spat. “I’m the mayor!”

“Which doesn’t make you exempt from the law,” Derek said, facing the woman who had been the bane of his family’s existence, at least in this generation. “Apparently you feared Richard Stern so much you must have panicked.” And Richard had managed to inform the police.

“We have proof you paid someone to steal evidence. We have an eyewitness,” Richard said.

As people surrounded her, the other woman began to shrivel into the old, frail woman she really was. “There was no bribery involved. I had no intention of exposing the photograph,” Mary said. “I only wanted to scare Richard into not running in order to protect his fiancée, but I never got the chance.”

“Then who sent me the note asking for money?” Sharon asked, stepping out of the shadows.

Gabrielle wanted to applaud her friend’s bravery. She didn’t have to. Richard was beaming enough for them both.

“Did you really think I was going to let the fact that age was softening you prevent you from winning, Grandmother?” Elizabeth tried to shrug off the police, but they held on tight. “I found the photo. I discovered the history behind it. I put the blackmail into motion. I thought the mousy librarian would go crying to her fiancé and beg him to drop out of the race. When she didn’t make the first drop, I realized maybe she was cockier than I thought and I stepped up the game. This is my town,” she said, hysterically. “Mine!”

“Grandma, Beth, come on.” Lauren Perkins, Mary’s other granddaughter whom Gabrielle had met in the mayor’s office, stepped forward and put a hand on her grandmother’s shoulder. “Let’s just go with the police. We’ll sort things out when we’re alone.” Her voice shook as she spoke, but she took control, instructing the police to take her family to the station and end the public spectacle.

The officers complied, but before they reached the police cars, George came running forward.

“Why?” he asked. “Why burn down my building? I have to know.”

“You’re as foolish as your son!” Elizabeth, her hands cuffed behind her back, said. “Isn’t it obvious? I burned down the building for the money. I’ll call in the loan for lack of payment and it’ll be mine.”

“You’re pathetic,” George spat.

“You all thought you could ignore my grandmother. Making that documentary and treating her as if she didn’t exist. But that film needs to include my grandmother, the mayor. Mary Perkins. That name means everything in this town. Instead you interviewed that sniveling man who thought he could take the job that belongs to my family. Mine.” Her eyes were wide, bulging, her insanity clear.

“Take her away,” Lauren insisted, her eyes filled with tears.

“Not yet. I have one more thing to say,” Elizabeth said. “You!” She turned her glare on Gabrielle.

The blood drained from Gabrielle’s head as she met the other woman’s icy stare. Maintaining her composure, Gabrielle wrapped her hands around her arms to stop the shivering and refused to show fear. Derek stepped up from behind and eased her against him, supporting her with his strength.

“Do not think you can undo the curse with one of your pathetic books. Everyone in this town knows the curse exists. And you’ll know it again when your life falls apart.” Elizabeth laughed again, the sound slicing through Gabrielle’s heart.

Derek squeezed her tighter.

“Not a chance.” Gabrielle stood up to the other woman. “Your family’s days of spreading fear are over. Whatever you wanted in life, you destroyed other people to get it. That’s your power, not some old, unproven curse. It’s over now. You’ve been exposed.”

Elizabeth shrieked, but before she could act, the police pushed her into the car. Her grandmother had already been taken away.

Lauren shot Gabrielle and the rest of the crowd an apologetic, sick look before following the police into the last remaining vehicle.

Gabrielle squeezed Derek’s hand. She couldn’t help feeling sorry for the young woman who, until now, had no idea what her own sister and grandmother were capable of.

As things calmed down, Gabrielle tried to remind herself both Mary Perkins and her granddaughter were insane, yet Elizabeth’s words chilled Gabrielle despite the summer heat. Elizabeth obviously meant to scare Gabrielle into not writing her book, but her words, if dissected, could go much deeper, to include her relationship with Derek. Her entire future was at stake.

She looked back at the Wave. The firemen had finally begun to get the blaze under control. The bar was basically destroyed. The ownership and insurance issues would have to be sorted out later. But the harm done by Mary Perkins and her granddaughter would be much harder to contain.

Gabrielle glanced at Derek, the man she loved, and prayed they wouldn’t become part of the other woman’s collateral damage.

“HELLUVA DAY,” GABRIELLE said as they walked into Derek’s house at last.

Exhaustion pummeled at Derek, settling in his bones.

They’d dropped Hank off at his house after stopping by to assure Uncle Thomas everyone was in one piece. The fire and Elizabeth Perkins’s breakdown and the mayor’s arrest was the talk of the town.

For Derek, coming off the argument with Marlene, and the idea of losing Holly fresh in his mind, today had been draining in ways he still couldn’t come to terms with.

“Who could have guessed that Elizabeth Perkins was determined to carry on her grandmother’s evil legacy?” he said.

“More like family insanity.” Gabrielle shivered. “Although Lauren seemed refreshingly normal. I hope she’s okay.”

Derek nodded. “I hope so, too. Thank God nobody was badly hurt in the fire.”

“The paramedics said Kayla didn’t have a concussion, just a nasty bruise.”

Derek was still struck by how close he’d come to losing Gabrielle. The minutes he’d waited for her to come out of that building had been the longest of his life.

She tossed her bag onto the couch.

The couch, Derek thought, where they’d made love. He didn’t think he’d ever forget. The memory would live with him forever.

Even if she couldn’t.

“Derek?”

“Hmm?”

Gabrielle walked over to him. She had no makeup on, her hair was a mess and her face was streaked from tears. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on.

“We need to talk,” she said.

Everything inside him rebelled at the notion. As long as things between them remained unspoken, they could go on as they were. But the moment they talked, this life they’d created, the illusion, came to an end.

But she was right.

It was time.

“Mary Perkins’s reign of terror is over. The police will sort through what she caused and what damage Elizabeth did, but it’s over. She can no longer claim her family’s curse over the Corwins gives her power. She’s been exposed as a fraud.” Gabrielle’s eyes flashed with the fire he so admired.

Despite the day she’d had, she maintained the spunk and determination that was a part of her.

“Hopefully people will feel freed,” he said, because he did agree with her. People who’d been blackmailed, bribed and hurt in Mary Perkins’s quest for power would feel vindicated.

“Do you?” She perched her hands on her hips, clearly challenging him. “Do you feel freed?”

He exhaled long and hard. “I feel relieved.” He chose his words carefully. “I’m relieved you’re not in danger anymore. I’m glad your plan to push Mary Perkins out into the open worked. But do I feel freed from the curse? Not really, no.”

A muscle worked in her jaw. “Why am I not surprised?” she asked sarcastically, her anger simmering just below the surface.

He understood. He did. He was angry at Fate, too. But he hadn’t lied to her. He’d never once made her a promise for more than today, and he’d never denied the fact that his family’s history played a role in the choices he made.

“Mary Perkins tormented people by preying on their weakness. Those people are freed. But me? The men in my family? Nothing that happened today changes the fact that for generations, every male who has fallen in love loses in unfathomable ways.” He drew a deep breath. “And, as an added bonus, not one of the women who’ve been involved with a Corwin man has escaped unscathed. Look at what nearly happened to you today. Because you were writing about my family. We are cursed,” he said clearly.

“That is such bull. How has the curse kicked in for you? It’s not as if you’ve said you love me, Derek. I doubt you’d even let yourself think it. So how does what happened today fit into the curse?” she asked, obviously frustrated.

He groaned, unable to argue with her logic. But logic wasn’t ruling his decisions. Fear and past evidence was. “Even if it doesn’t, I can’t take the constant fear that something awful is going to happen to you because of me. I’m not going to let you be hurt.”

She cupped his face in her hands, refusing to let him pull away. “Then don’t walk away from me.”

He swallowed hard, fighting not to respond to her plea, to keep his distance when everything in him rebelled against it. “I have to.”

“Make no mistake, Derek. If I leave this house today, it’s you walking away from me. Not the other way around. I don’t believe in curses, but if there is one, I believe our love is much more powerful.”

Her heart was in her voice and her eyes.

His heart filled every time he looked at her. “I’ve seen the history. Hell, I’ve lived it. I’m not tempting Fate.” He couldn’t.

Like his daughter, Gabrielle was too precious.

“That’s your final decision? Despite the fact that I love you with everything inside me?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Not despite the fact that you love me, Gabby. Because you love me.”

FOR THE FIRST FEW DAYS after the fire, Gabrielle kept herself busy with work. She had lost her man, but she was determined to write her book. Even if she’d failed to prove to Derek that circumstances, not curses, dictated the course of one’s life, she still believed it herself.

Like Gabrielle, Kayla wasn’t about to let the fire prevent her from continuing her story, which had grown in scope since Mayor Perkins’s arrest. Kayla wanted to continue working in Stewart and Perkins, so instead of moving home, she returned to Mrs. Rhodes’s inn for the duration of filming.

It wasn’t easy to stay in town and no longer be with Derek, but Gabrielle powered through. She’d be back at her big, lonely apartment in Boston soon enough. After five days, Kayla declared she had enough interviews and footage to go forward. She packed up her crew and returned to Boston.

Freed up from the constant camera presence, Gabrielle headed for Sharon’s house with a bottle of wine. Though she’d spoken with Sharon since the fire, they’d agreed not to hang out until they could have a girls’ night-no men and more important, no camera crew tagging along.

Sharon’s parents were at the movies and they had the family room to themselves. Sharon put the DVD of Ocean’s Eleven on television, satisfying Gabrielle’s George Clooney fix while giving Sharon her fill of Brad Pitt.

Half a bottle of chardonnay later, Sharon raised her glass in a toast. “To handsome men.”

Gabrielle grinned. “To handsome men who know how to treat women.” She clinked her glass against Sharon’s.

“To fictional men,” Sharon said with a wistful sigh.

“What’s going on? I thought with the threat to Richard’s campaign over, things between the two of you would be back on track.” Gabrielle took a sip of her wine.

Sharon stretched her legs out in front of her and wiggled her toes. “I think my toes are numb,” she said, laughing.

“Quit avoiding the question.”

Sharon shrugged. “You’re assuming things were ever normal. I told you, I don’t think he really knows me. I felt so lucky a good man would want to marry me, I let him think I’d become this docile, fragile female.”

Gabrielle frowned. “I thought that’s why you bought the lingerie at Victoria’s Secret. To show him the real you.” She nudged Sharon’s feet with hers. “What happened?”

“He’s been working nonstop. Or he’s been avoiding having the big discussion. I’m not sure which.”

Gabrielle raised an eyebrow. “Don’t you think it’s time you found out?”

Sharon downed the last of her glass. “You know what? I think you’re right. I’ll be right back.” She stood and ran upstairs.

Sharon was gone for a while. Whatever she had planned, Gabrielle figured the wine had put her up to it. But Sharon did need to face Richard once and for all.