Again and again, Jessica dreamed she was choking on something. Sometimes it was a lollipop, other times a hunk of meat. Always it terrified her. Always it hurt.
When not dreaming of that, she found herself floating on a cloud. Or swimming in a sea made of fog and brightly colored fish. She’d never used drugs, other than once trying a joint at a high school party, but she imagined this was what it felt like. She was weightless, dizzy, and unable to focus. She didn’t like it, wanting her brain to stop spinning so she could think for more than a few minutes at a time.
The only time she felt safe and normal was when heard a concerned male voice promising she was going to be all right. Reece. That’s Reece.
She wanted to touch him back. Every time she started to feel more aware, though, a warmth would spread through her. It started at her wrist, traveling through her veins. Within seconds, she would disappear into cloud land again.
She didn’t understand why it wouldn’t stop. She wanted to ask him to make it, to let her come down to earth and be herself, but for some reason, she was unable to speak.
Because you’re choking on a lollipop.
“Oh, honey, baby doll, can you hear me? I’m here with you now. You’re gonna be okay.”
She grimaced. Whose voice? Not Reece’s deep, even tone. Not Liza’s. Someone else. A voice that made the cloud she was riding on spin faster and faster, making her sicker and sicker.
“Nobody’s ever gonna hurt you again, Jessie. I promise you.”
Something heavy landed on her leg, above her knee, and squeezed. The touch made her skin crawl, like a huge bug had fallen on her. She realized it was a hand when it began to move up her thigh, possessive and intimate. Jess tried to shift away to escape his unwelcome touch but couldn’t be sure she was moving, or if any of this was even real. Find out!
Pushing through the waves, swimming out of the cloud and the fog, away from the fish, the haze, and the lollipop, Jess forced her eyelids up. Little by little, she let in the light. It was harsh and artificial. Her eyes stung, and she had to blink a lot before she could keep them open.
Once she’d focused, she catalogued her surroundings.
Ceiling tiles. Fluorescent bulbs overhead. Cinder-block walls. Coarse sheets beneath her.
Johnny Dixon sitting beside her on a hospital bed.
Her heart pounded, her pulse raced, panic setting in. She didn’t understand why he was here; she only knew she didn’t want him to be. He shouldn’t be anywhere near her. Shouldn’t have his big meaty hand so high on her leg, as if he had the right to touch her, to claim her.
She tried to tell him to leave. No sound came out. She was choking, though air was still filling her lungs. But she could not say a word.
“Honey, baby, you’re awake! You gave me such a scare.”
She stared into his pale blue eyes as he hovered over her. He leaned too close, his breath hot on her face. She didn’t remember much, but she knew Johnny had no business being here.
“I saw the story on the internet this morning. They showed a picture of you from the night of the gallery shooting and said you’d been attacked again. I just about lost my mind.”
Pieces of the puzzle came together. The gala. The steamy stolen interlude.
Edward. His real name is Edward. How funny.
The man in the room, who was not the man she wanted to see, sneered, and tightened his grip on her leg. “Winchester left you alone, didn’t he? The asshole dumped you here and ran out, only wanting to save his own skin. He better not show his face again.”
Winchester. Reece. Where are you?
“Why didn’t you call me?” That little-southern-boy whine. How she hated it. “You know I’m always here for you, baby doll. I would have come runnin’.”
Thoughts and memories circled in her brain like ingredients in a mixing bowl. By sheer force of will, she plucked them out of the batter, one by one, and sorted out what was going on.
She’d been ambushed. It happened in the hotel bathroom. Chemical rain pouring down.
Now she was in a hospital. She was on heavy painkillers that oozed in from an IV at her wrist, keeping her drugged and confused.
Her stalker ex-boyfriend was right beside her bed, and nobody else was in the room.
A tube was in her throat to help her breathe, so there was no way she could have called this fucking moron, if she ever would have, which she wouldn’t.
He bent closer toward her face, as if he planned to kiss her cheek. She jerked away. Well, she thought she jerked. Her movements were sluggish and unclear, like moving underwater. At the very least, though, she got her cheek out from under his mouth.
“What’s wrong with you?” he snapped, looking down at her with storms in his eyes. It was the way he always looked at her when she rejected him.
Where the hell were the nurses? Liza? Reece?
He cupped her face in his hands and bent down again, lips scraping her forehead. There was no way to escape this time, and she closed her eyes, praying she wouldn’t vomit into the tube and choke to death.
“Get your hands off her, you son of a bitch!”
A shape ran across the room. Johnny went flying. A jolt of warmth hit her wrist.
No, not now! One surge of her pulse and heat traveled up her arm. Another and it hit her chest. Then her heart. And then it was off to the races, spreading through her body, and taking Jess to cloud-and-lollipop land.
When she came to full consciousness again—a minute or ten days later—Reece was there. He was sprawled on a chair beside the bed, asleep. He still wore his tuxedo shirt, unbuttoned, with the sleeves rolled up. It was dingy and had a smear of what looked like coffee on the front. His jacket was nowhere to be seen, and the pants were wrinkled. She looked over the side of the bed, seeing he’d kicked off his shoes and was wearing black socks.
Her brows pulled in a frown. Reece hadn’t been taking care of himself. She wondered if it was because he’d been too busy taking care of her.
She shifted. He must have heard her, because his eyes flew open. Seeing she was awake, he burst from the chair, coming to her side. “Don’t try to talk.”
She shook her head, already having figured out that much.
“They have you on pain medication. You’ve been in and out of consciousness.”
No kidding.
“The doctor said you’ll need to be given oxygen like this until it’s been at least twenty-four hours. Then they’ll run some more tests.”
She lifted her hands, putting them palms up to her side, shrugging a question.
“It’s Wednesday evening. It’s been twenty hours so far.”
Twenty hours? She’d been lying here, rolling in and out of some weird psychedelic world for almost a whole day? Those must be some powerful pain drugs.
A storm falling on her. The reek of chemicals.
Oh. Right. The powerful bleach might be involved, too.
She suddenly remembered something else, unsure if it had been real or a dream. Shivering to think that it had really happened, she had to ask now, not later. She held one hand out, palm up, and positioned her other over it, pantomiming writing with a pen and paper.
He shook his head. “You should rest.”
She glared and pressed the imaginary pen harder, insistent.
Realizing she wasn’t going to give up, Reece sighed, dug in his pants pocket, and got his phone. “It’s the best I can do.”
Good enough. She tapped the screen, trying to form letters, though her eyes stung and remained blurry. It was like looking at a screen through Vaseline-smeared glasses. But she believed he’d understand what she was asking.
Taking the phone back, he read aloud. Jony hre. His jaw tightened and she saw him grit his teeth. The flexing in his cheek said he might bite hard enough to break his own jaw.
God. Johnny had been here.
“Yes.”
She waited, but he didn’t say anything else, so she grabbed the phone back, scrawled a few letters, and held it up for him to see.
U hit hm? A slow smile creased the mouth that had done such amazing, wonderful things to her last night before everything had gone straight to hell.
“I might have.” Reece looked as self-satisfied as a cat. “He won’t be back. Ever.”
Her eyes grew as wide as saucers as a possible meaning crossed her mind. Rather than take the time to tap the shocked question on the screen, she quickly drew her index finger across her throat in a slashing motion.
Reece gaped, and then threw his head back and laughed. And laughed. And laughed.
“You crazy, wonderful woman. You are going to be all right, aren’t you?” Sliding on the bed next to her, he drew her into his arms. “No, I didn’t kill him. I might have broken his arm, though, and definitely broke his nose.”
Her expression must have revealed her surprise. Johnny might be a scumbag, but he was a big scumbag.
“Rowan and I fought our way through public school as teenagers. Now he’s a cop. Raine’s an ex–military bodyguard. We always have each other’s backs. I have to work my ass off so I can keep up with them in case they need a wingman.”
She liked that he always had backup. Being in the spotlight, he certainly needed it.
“Dixon won’t bother you again. I dragged him into the parking lot and taught him a lesson, until my brother pulled me off him.” He grinned. “Your sister showed up, too. When she heard he’d been in here, she almost ripped his guts out with a plastic spork from the cafeteria.”
Love you, Liza.
“My brother took him to the detectives investigating what happened last night. They’re going to question him.” She could feel a rumble and realized he’d let out a small growl. “If he did this to you, he’d better hope they put him in prison.”
Relief flooded through her. The nightmare with Johnny might really end. If he’d attacked her, he would be put away. If he hadn’t, he would probably leave her alone in the future anyway.
Johnny was a bully, but only to those he thought he could intimidate. If he’d gotten his ass handed to him, and had faced the prospect of going to jail, she knew he would steer clear of her. Deep down, he was a coward. He would not only be nervous about going up against someone who’d bested him in a fight; he’d also be too embarrassed to face anyone who might know about it. Like her and Liza.
She wished she could say thank you, and she didn’t want to scrawl it. So instead, she curled into the crook of Reece’s arm and reached for his hand. Their fingers entwined, she thanked him with her eyes. She knew she must look ridiculous—splotchy and tubed up—but he studied her face like she was the most beautiful thing in the world.
And then the pain medicine carried her away again. She drifted off in his arms.
By evening, when the rheumatologist Reece had brought in ran further tests, he said they had to keep the tube in overnight, just to be safe. Jessica wanted to cry.
The next afternoon, when they finally agreed to take it out, she wanted to cheer.
Either way would have hurt—the cheering more so—but her jaw ached from keeping her mouth open, her lips hurt from the pressure of the plastic, and her whole body rebelled against the foreign object inside it. The thing had to go.
“All right, sweetie, we’re going to remove the breathing tube now. Relax, don’t try to swallow or clench your throat, and it will be over in a jiff.”
Jessica didn’t entirely believe the chipper young nurse, and turned her attention to the other one, Alice, who was much older, and usually dour.
“It’s gonna be nasty,” the sixtyish woman said. “But we’ve given you a shot of analgesic. At least it will be over quickly. The aftermath will probably be worse.”
Jessica knew what she meant. She’d been conscious enough to learn there were chemical burns in her esophagus. Pulling out the tube that had been breathing for her for the last day and a half would not be pleasant. As the nurse had said, though, the aftermath would be a lot worse as her throat healed from the tube and from the burns.
She’d had strep throat as a kid, and she remembered it felt like she was swallowing broken glass. This would feel like throwing that broken glass back up.
She wouldn’t be able to sleep through it. Last night, she’d written a note to Reece, insisting they stop putting morphine in her IV drip. She’d been on a lighter pain reliever since. Already she felt more like herself, only a silent Jessica who couldn’t cover her fear by cracking jokes. She hoped she wouldn’t regret not having something strong to tide her over.
“Ready?” said the chipper nurse as they put some other doohickey on the end of the tube.
Closing her eyes so she didn’t have to see some slimy, plastic, snakelike thing coming out of her mouth, she nodded. Although Alice was experienced, the tube apparently extended from her lips down to her toes, and its removal seemed to take forever.
She felt every inch. It hurt like hell.
At least it was out, though. They suctioned her throat, and then she was able to lick her lips and take a deep breath all on her own. Heavenly.
At least until she coughed. Oh, God.
“Take it easy,” Alice said. “Your chest X-ray looked clear, but you might need to bring up a little fluid.”
A little? Felt like an entire lung.
“You’ll be fine,” said the other nurse. “It wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Jess didn’t want her first words in almost two days to be a litany of curses against the young, energetic caregiver, so she remained silent. She also tried not to swallow. Amazing how quickly spit built up in your mouth when you were desperate not to let it slide down your throat.
Fortunately, the annoying nurse left, leaving only Alice, whose brusque manner suited Jess better. “Let’s clean you up,” she said.
The nurse took a warm cloth and washed around her mouth. Jess waited for the rash to sting at the contact with an abrasive, industrial facecloth, but didn’t feel anything. Maybe the shot of painkiller had spread up into her cheeks. Or, hopefully, they had healed. Nobody had given her a mirror to check herself out while an alien probe was stuck in her face.
“There you go. Much better. Now your sister and boyfriend can come back in.”
Boyfriend? If it wouldn’t have hurt so much, she’d have laughed to hear Reece Winchester described as a boyfriend. He was her lover—she fully remembered their wild sexual encounter. But boyfriend? Who could ever consider him a boy? Besides, for all she knew, they’d had a one-night stand. It might never go anywhere else.
The thought hurt more than her injuries. Not just the idea of never having sex with him again, like the limo sex they’d been denied. Plus sex in a bed. On a beach. On the kitchen table. More than anything, she hated the idea of losing the intimacy they’d begun to share.
Given that Johnny had shown up at her bedside soon after the attack, she suspected he’d been behind it. He’d probably even been the one who shot at them. She even knew why: he’d seen her moving on with someone else, and had decided to make her think somebody was after her, so he could swoop in and play hero, or loving boyfriend.
Nobody had ever accused Johnny Dixon of being too smart.
As much as it hurt to admit, Reece probably should steer clear of her. The idea that she really had been responsible for the near miss in the gallery crushed her. She cared for him too much to continue heaping trouble on him.
Cared for? Are you out of your mind?
She might be. Out of her mind, and out of her heart. As she’d feared, by lowering her guard and letting him into her body, she’d let him into her life.
She could love him. Maybe she already did. It had happened quickly, but Jess had always been in tune with her emotions. While it had been lust, and not love, at first sight, now that she’d gotten to know him—seeing his brilliance, his talent, and even his damage—she wanted the whole man, not just his amazing body.
“I swear, those two ought to go home and at least shower and change,” Alice said as she tidied up the room, disposing of medical waste in one bin and the facecloth in another. “They’ve been here in the same clothes since you arrived.
Tears pricked her eyes; she would gulp if it wouldn’t hurt so much. Of course Liza had stayed, just as they’d both stayed by their mom’s bed day and night in her final days. But Reece? Why would he do it? Maybe he’d felt protective, guarding her until Johnny showed up. Johnny had been taken in by the cops, though. Why would he feel he needed to stay?
They’d had sex. That didn’t mean he owed her anything, especially if she’d been the target all along, not him.
“Has anybody ever told you he looks like the actor who was in Twisted?”
Her lips quirked up on one side, and she nodded.
“I loved that movie.” The nurse shivered. “My menopausal parts perked right up during some of those scenes.”
Ha. At twenty-four, Reece had even been turning on middle-aged women, not just horny teenagers like Jess. She found some words and dug them out of her throat. “I’ll…be sure…to tell him.”
The woman looked down at her, at first puzzled, and then shocked. Her mouth fell open. It was the first time she’d appeared to be anything other than stoic. “You mean he’s him?”
“Yeah,” she croaked.
“Jeez, I can’t believe it. I mean, we get stars in here sometimes. I changed Richard Burton’s bedpan once.”
TMI.
“But the young, handsome, healthy ones never show up in my ward.” The woman straightened her pink uniform top. Her hand went to her hair, and she tucked it into place.
“Look nice,” Jessica said with a weak smile.
“Do you mind if I flirt with your man? I haven’t done that here since Richard Burton.”
Jess chuckled, picturing the nurse coming on to a guy while cleaning his bedpan. That’s when she noticed the shot of analgesic had started to wear off. Now it felt like she was throwing up that ground glass she’d swallowed earlier, and she grimaced.
Alice touched her wrist, glancing at her watch, checking her pulse the old-fashioned way. “It’s okay. Try to relax. You sure you don’t want some morphine?”
Huh-uh. She wanted to go home, not back to la-la land. “No.”
“All right, we’ll continue with the nonopioids.”
Alice hadn’t been out of the room for more than fifteen seconds before Liza burst in. She flew to the side of the bed, cupped Jess’s face in her hands, and kissed her forehead and cheeks. “Oh my God, I’ve been so scared. Are you okay?”
“Fine.” Ground glass. “A spork?”
Her sister’s head tilted in confusion. Then she grinned, flashing a pair of dimples Jess had liked on their first day in kindergarten. “Good thing it was plastic. I tried to stick it in his ugly eyeball.”
“Not…worth it.”
“No, he isn’t.” She licked her lips. “That, uh, boss of yours sure took care of him, though. If his cop brother hadn’t been here to pull him off, he mighta been the one who got arrested.”
Reece. Where was he?
As if she’d called him with her thoughts, he burst into the room. Seeing her without the tube, he sighed so loudly she heard it from the bed. He took up position on the other side of her, gripping her hand, looking her over as if evaluating for damage.
“I’m fine,” she said, cutting off his forthcoming question.
“I know you are. You’re going to stay that way.” His warm eyes suddenly twinkled and the corner of his mouth lifted. “What did you tell that nurse? She planted herself in front of me to get an autograph and pinched my ass before I could get in here.”
Jessica chuckled. Ouch. But worth it, given the mental picture. She opened her mouth to yank his chain about it, but then closed it, reserving her strength for an actual conversation.
“Don’t talk, Jessie-girl,” said Liza. She went to a side table, picked up a pitcher, and poured a glass of water into a paper cup. Bringing it over, she said, “Here. Drink some.”
Jessica eyed the cup like it was a fat spider.
“You have to if you want to get out of here,” Reece said.
“Yep,” said Liza, lifting the cup to Jessica’s lips. “If you don’t pee, you gotta stay.”
If she had an embarrassed bone left in her body, she might have blushed. But since Reece had found her hugging a toilet like a lover, maybe they were beyond such things.
“Not staying,” she insisted. She took the cup. The first sip was agony. The second worse. By the third, though, she appreciated the coolness on her lips and in her so-dry mouth.
“Get out today?” she asked.
“Tonight,” Liza added. “They found no chemical pneumonia, though you’ve gotta be really careful to keep getting checked out for a coupla weeks. Bronchitis is still a possibility.”
What a cheerful thought. Especially on top of the hospital stay and expensive tests. More doctor visits added to the bills, which wasn’t good for someone who had only the most basic medical insurance. If he was responsible, she would sue Johnny’s ass off for every penny.
Now, though, she could only think about getting out of here. “Good. Need a shower.” She wrinkled her nose at her sister. “So do you. You stink.”
“There’s gratitude for you.” Liza looked happy that Jess was getting her snark on. She pointed at Reece. “Same goes for him. He hasn’t been farther than the coffee shop since Tuesday night.”
She studied him closely, from head to toe. Still in the rumpled tux shirt and pants, he did have shoes on now. He looked exhausted. Yet, with the hair standing on end, and the rough shadow on his unshaven jaw, he also looked sexy as hell. First-thing-in-the-morning-get-out-of-bed-after-a-long-night-of-sex sexy.
She beckoned for Liza to bend closer. “I kinda like it,” she whispered in her sister’s ear. Whispering was easier on the throat. Plus, she didn’t want him to hear her say she liked his musky, hot, masculine scent. She was just telling Liza, with whom she shared all her secrets.
He chuckled. He’d heard. Crap.
Pretending she hadn’t said anything at all, she continued to whisper. “This bed sucks. Wanna be home in my own.”
Liza and Reece exchanged a look. At some point while she’d been lying in the hospital, the two of them had become coconspirators. They knew something she did not. “What?”
Liza stroked her arm. “We think it’s best if you go stay with Reece for a couple of days.”
Reece nodded his agreement, appearing as solemn as he did the night they met. This wasn’t going to be a sexy-time sleepover, not that she was really up for one anyway. Something else was going on. A possibility came to mind. “Johnny. He was released?”
“It’s not Johnny,” said Reece, pulling up a chair so he could sit facing her. His gaze was steady, his expression worried. “The police got surveillance tapes from the hotel. It definitely wasn’t Johnny who attacked you.”
Not him? She’d been so sure after his unwanted visit here. “Who?”
Those eyes darkened to an angry amber. “A woman.”
“Huh?”
He tapped his screen, pulling up an image. “Do you recognize her?”
She considered, suddenly remembering the woman who’d disappeared into the crowd at the hotel. She’d had long, dark, gray-streaked hair. “She told me I should use the other bathroom.”
Reece muttered a curse. Liza said the same word loud and clear.
“She lured you right into a trap,” he said.
The woman was a complete stranger to her. “Why?”
“Because of me.” His hand swept through his hair. Judging by how messy it was, she figured he’d done it a lot lately. “It was my fault. I think she’s the one who’s been stalking me. She showed up at Liza’s opening, and I got a bad vibe.”
Jessica suddenly recalled seeing her there, too. She’d had hatred in her eyes. “Arrested?”
“Police don’t know her identity yet. They’re questioning the organizers and other people who were there the other night, and looking at photos on the state’s driver’s license database.”
Needle, meet haystack.
“Once they have her ID, she will go to jail for what she did to you.”
She licked her lips, thinking, putting things together. “And for…shooting?”
His hand tightened on hers. “Maybe. Probably.”
So none of it had been Johnny. Reece hadn’t been put in danger because of her. While she knew she should react with anger toward a woman who’d hurt her because she was so jealous of the attention Jess was getting from Reece, she wanted to weep with joy instead.
He, however, looked completely furious. “I’m so sorry she targeted you, Jess. I’ll never be able to make it up to you.”
She rolled her eyes. Yes, she’d felt the same way when she thought she’d been the one who’d brought darkness into his life. But him bringing it into hers? Well, hell, the man was a sexy superstar. Of course he’d have obsessive fans on his tail. It was part of the job. Whether they were personally involved or not, she could have come to the attention of a stalker just by working for Reece. Planning to work in Hollywood meant she knew all about the pros and cons, including the dangers. She accepted it.
His expression said he wasn’t ready to believe that yet, and she didn’t have the voice to argue it. Once she was better, however, she would argue, and she would make him believe it.
“Until they find her, Jessica, you are coming home with me.”
He said it firmly, like she might not agree. Ha.
“I have a rental house up in the hills. It’s secluded and secure. You’ll be safe there. I’ll make sure of it.”
She didn’t care where he lived, be it a house, a cabin, a condo, or a mobile home. Spending time alone with Reece, finding out what, exactly, she felt for him, whether he felt anything for her, and what they were going to do about it, sounded like heaven.
* * *
Hell. Her life had become a living hell with the ringing of a phone.
Maisy stared at Candace Waterstone, the snooty social climber who’d sat next to her at the charity gala, whose name she hadn’t even remembered. The woman had been so phony the other night, pretending to give a crap about Maisy, patting her shoulder and offering her advice. What she was really doing was sucking up to her for her money, and at the same time looking down on her for getting it from the lottery. Like this fake blonde hadn’t gotten hers by divorce.
“Believe me, nobody was more surprised than I when the police arrived at my door with your picture, asking if I could identify you.”
Actually, Maisy would bet she was more surprised. In fact, she’d been in shock since Candace had called her this morning, saying she simply had to see her, and it was urgent. No way would she let such trash into her perfect house, of course, and she’d refused, wishing she’d never let the woman talk her into exchanging phone numbers. When Candace told her the police were trying to identify her, however, Maisy had agreed to come to her place.
It was much smaller. And boring—every room painted the same ivory, none of the furniture or carpet matching it. The producer’s wife had no taste at all.
“I’m so scared for you, dear!”
“Of course you are,” she mumbled.
She knew what was going to come next. Candace didn’t have a genuine bone in her body.
She wanted money. She knew Maisy had it. She had something on Maisy. Therefore, she was about to blackmail her.
“The detective who came by said the police are interviewing people who were at the gala, trying to see if anyone can name the mystery woman. They’re also looking at state records.”
Maisy swallowed hard, glad—so very glad—she hadn’t changed her driver’s license from Pennsylvania to California yet. Lucky, lucky Maisy.
But if she was so lucky, how did they find out? She’d been so careful. There had been nobody around when she’d been stockpiling supplies in the ladies’ room, and nobody when she’d run out of it after delivering the whole kit and caboodle onto that head of brassy-red hair. So how had they figured out she was the one who’d done it? Was she now Unlucky Maisy?
“The picture the officer showed me looked like it came from the hotel security system.”
She jerked. “The hotel has a security system?”
“Well of course, silly. There are cameras everywhere. How did on earth you not notice them?”
Because I’m so stupid. That’s what you think, isn’t it?
She tried to bluff. “They have my picture from a camera. So what? I bet they have a lot of other people’s pictures, too. I bet they have yours.”
A hard, disbelieving, Don’t kid a kidder smile made the woman look more genuine. “But not one of me carrying jugs of bleach into the bathroom where a woman was later attacked.”
Oh, God. She was Stupid Maisy.
If only she hadn’t paid attention to the jealous thoughts in her head. She knew she and Reece would end up together eventually. Of course he wasn’t seriously interested in the red-haired woman, and Maisy should have pretended she didn’t exist. She had let her anger overwhelm her, like it used to before she got better.
She wouldn’t go back to being Crazy Maisy. She would never return to that place with people who screamed, people who drooled, people in white who shoved pills down her throat. She’d spent years in such a place, after the fire had killed her sister. I didn’t mean to kill her, but she made me so mad. Those years meant she’d paid for what she did, and winning the lottery had been her reward for doing it. There was no way somebody so lucky would ever have to go back.
“Honestly, Maisy, if anyone can understand your frustration, it’s me. I mean, I was just as shocked Reece would show up with someone like that.”
“Why?” Maisy asked, suspicious. Why did Candace think it was any of her business? She had no personal connection to Reece, while Maisy did.
“She’s not really our sort, is she? She’s so obvious, with that red dress.”
“You can’t help but notice her.” Poor Reece wouldn’t have much of a chance if somebody so determined to get him put her mind to it. Well, Jessica’s mind might have been to it lately, but Maisy’s had been for years and years. She had the greater claim.
“I don’t know how many people you met at the gala…”
“None.”
“Or how many of them already knew you.”
“Only you.”
“Good.” Candace sipped her iced tea. Her crystal glass had condensation on it. Delicately drying her fingers on a cloth napkin, she finally got to the point. “I am happy to help, but sooner or later, I have to be honest with the police. I’m sure people saw us talking at our table.”
Here it comes.
“I do hate to spill the beans, but…
“How much do you want?”
Maisy had brought her checkbook, knowing it would come to this. Candace had evidently anticipated it, too, which was probably why she’d seated them at the kitchen table, rather than in a more comfortable room. Easier for Maisy to write the check, or to count out cash. How considerate of her.
God, it made her blood boil. She hated the thought of giving her hard-earned winnings over to a blackmailer. But if the police were looking for her, and might take her back to that place, she needed time to get away and hide. She hated the thought of leaving her beautiful house and going far away. More than anything, she hated the thought of leaving Reece.
I just can’t.
Maybe she didn’t have to. What was the point of having tons of money if you couldn’t use it to get out of scrapes like this one? She could lie low until all this died down and everybody forgot some dumb intern had splashed herself with bleach in a public bathroom.
“Wait,” she whispered, suddenly thinking of something.
If she changed how she looked, how would they identify her? She’d been wanting to update her look, cut her hair, and maybe dye it. Maisy had always been the type who blended in. There was nothing really unique about her, except her hair, which was why she’d kept the gray streaks. It was the only distinctive part of her. If she got rid of it, she’d be able to go on living in Los Angeles, right under the noses of the cops, though she would have to leave her beautiful house for a while.
There was one more way to make herself unrecognizable. “Who’s your plastic surgeon?”
Candace lifted a hand to her heart, as if wounded. Maisy just raised an eyebrow.
“Oh, all right. He’s in Phoenix. I’ll get you his card. Now, are we agreed?”
“About what?”
“About the two hundred and fifty thousand, silly.”
Hiding her growing rage, Maisy knew she had to go along with it, or else this evil woman could ruin everything. “Agreed.”
“Excellent. That will be fine for the first payment,” the woman said. “We’ll talk about what comes next after the excitement dies down a bit.”
Whatever the first payment was, even if Maisy doubled it, Candace didn’t plan on it being the last. She would string this out, maybe forever. Filthy blackmailers always did, tormenting their victims by perpetually holding something over their heads.
It would never end. She would be imprisoned by this woman, like she’d been imprisoned in a place with soft walls.
She began to quiver, and then to shake.
“Are you cold, dear?”
Not cold. Furious.
When Maisy got angry, it was like someone stuck an electric wire inside her and she jerked and shook, needing to lash out, to do something to make the person angering her stop. She’d done it to her whining sister because the fifteen-year-old had borrowed her sweater and torn it. What wouldn’t she do to someone who was trying to ruin her carefully planned, lucky life, and her future with Reece?
She opened her mouth, about to tell the woman she could shove her blackmail scheme. But she knew she couldn’t. Candace knows who you are, and she knows you’re thinking about getting plastic surgery She could warn the cops you changed your appearance.
That was a problem. A very big problem. Much bigger than a tear in a sweater.
“You really are shivering. Why don’t I make you some warm tea,” Candace said, still pretending to be a friend, even though she’d just extorted $250,000 from her.
She got up and went to the stove. Maisy rose and followed her, not entirely sure why.
Well, maybe a little sure.
On the counter there stood a heavy lead-crystal pitcher from which Candace had poured the iced tea. Apparently plastic ones weren’t good enough for her.
The pitcher looked heavy. So heavy.
Maisy wanted to know how heavy. She picked it up by the handle and felt her arm sag under the weight. The thing was like a cement block. Candace probably used it only to show off how much it had cost.
“I have Earl Grey and herbal. Which would you—”
“Nobody blackmails me.” Caught up in the heat of rage, her whole body shaking, Maisy swung her arm at the woman, who’d just started to turn around.
She didn’t know what to expect. Maybe she would miss. Maybe the pitcher would break, leaving a furious, injured Candace to call the police right away.
If that’s what she expected, she’d been very wrong. When lead crystal came up against a human skull, crystal definitely won out.
The pitcher didn’t even break. But Candace’s head most definitely did.