Light in Shadow (15 page)

“Whatever else you are,” Bonnie said, “you are not just another client. If you were, he would not have invited you to have pizza with us tonight. Ethan is very big on keeping his professional life separate from his private life.”

“I see.” Zoe couldn't think of anything else to say.

“The thing is, Ethan has simply been very unlucky in love.” Bonnie held up three fingers. “He married Stacy when he was twenty-two. She was only nineteen. They were both too young. Stacy was coming out of a very chaotic, very dysfunctional home life. She was searching for something solid, and Ethan fell into the trap of playing the knight in shining armor.”

“What happened?”

“After about a year, Stacy announced that she was leaving Ethan to follow a, uh, religious vocation.”

“Good grief, she became a nun?”

“Not exactly,” Bonnie said dryly. “She joined a small, very strict, very fringe religious group.”

“A cult.”

Bonnie nodded. “I'm afraid so. They got a divorce and got on with their lives. Then, just after Ethan opened his
own security agency, he met Devon. It was another serious mistake.”

“Why?”

“Devon fell for Ethan because she had a thing for men who have macho jobs. When she found out that most of his work was done behind a desk, on the phone, or with a computer, she left him to marry a professional race car driver.”

“Bonnie, I really don't—”

“Kelly, wife number three, came along after he had established his business and was making a lot of money. They did fine as long as he was financially successful. But she couldn't handle the bankruptcy.”

“I didn't know about the bankruptcy,” Zoe said.

“It was the direct result of a high-profile murder investigation,” Bonnie clasped her hands together in her lap and kept her attention on the waters of a nearby fountain. “Certain powerful people in L.A. did not like what happened when he identified the killer and exposed the financial maneuvers that had led to the murder. When it was all over, they made certain that Ethan paid a price for making them take some heavy losses.”

“Who got killed?”

“My husband, Drew,” Bonnie whispered.

It clicked. Zoe went still. “His brother?”

Bonnie nodded. “Yes.”

“So, that's why the children's father isn't here. I wondered. Oh, Bonnie, I am so very sorry.”

“Drew was murdered three years ago come November. It took Ethan months to find the killer and the man who had hired him. Just before the trial started, the contract killer, who was out on bail, was shot dead by person or persons unknown.”

“The logical assumption being that his employer decided to get rid of him so that he could not testify?”

“Yes. But there was no proof. The trial went on for weeks but in the end Simon Wendover, the man responsible for Drew's death, walked out of the courtroom a free man. The only consolation was that his illegal business
activities had been so thoroughly exposed by the media that a large portion of his financial empire fell apart.”

Zoe tightened her hands around the edge of the bench on either side of her knees. “Sometimes a financial blow is the only justice you can get.”

“Yes. It's not enough.”

“No,” Zoe agreed softly. “Not nearly enough.”

“In any event, the wealthy men who suffered some of the collateral damage due to the destruction of Wendover's empire felt that Ethan should be taught a lesson. Together they had the power to force Truax Security into bankruptcy. It took a little over a year to destroy everything Ethan had built in ten years. He went down with his ship.”

“I can see him doing that.”

“In the end, between the loss of his business and the divorce settlement, he was left with almost nothing. He was able to get consulting work with some of his old rivals for a while and a couple made offers. But Ethan is the kind of man who likes to be his own boss.”

“That doesn't surprise me.”

“We talked it over and decided to make the move to Whispering Springs. We both agreed that it would be good to raise the boys outside of L.A.”

Zoe glanced at her. “And where Jeff and Theo go, Ethan goes?”

“Ethan has taken Drew's place in their lives,” Bonnie said quietly. “I shall be forever grateful to him. Someday Jeff and Theo will be equally grateful. At the moment, however, they just take him for granted. And I think that's for the best. His presence gives them a great sense of security and stability. He also provides some emotional balance. I still get anxious too easily and I'm inclined to be overprotective. Left to my own devices, I'm sure I would have turned them into little neurotics by now.”

“I don't blame you for the overprotective instincts. If I were in your shoes, I'd be the same way.”

“What I'm trying to tell you about Ethan is that he is
fully capable of making a commitment,” Bonnie said. “In fact, I don't think he knows any other way to be. His problem is that no woman has ever really made a commitment to him.”

“Mmm.” Zoe doubted that was the full story. Three divorces took a little more explaining. But it was not her place to argue the point. What did she know? She had only met Ethan a few days ago. But she had to admit that Bonnie's determined loyalty to him was touching.

“It was knowing that we could all lean on Ethan that helped us get through the worst of the nightmare,” Bonnie concluded.

“I'm glad he was there for you,” Zoe said. “But what about Wendover? It is so unjust, so
wrong
that the bastard who murdered your husband is walking around free.”

Bonnie looked at her with clear, calm eyes. “But Wendover is not walking around free. I forgot to tell you the rest of it. Simon Wendover drowned a few weeks after the trial ended. He fell from his yacht, which was anchored off Catalina. He was alone at the time. Apparently he had been drinking heavily.”

A chill of understanding flashed through Zoe. She studied Ethan, who was walking back toward them with his nephews in tow. She had only known him a few days, she thought, but she knew enough about him to realize that if he had set out to find his brother's killer, he would not have let anything, including the vagaries of a less-than-perfect judicial system, stand in his way.

Whatever had happened to Simon Wendover that night on his yacht had probably not been an accident.

She envied Bonnie and Ethan and the boys, she thought. At least there had been some justice for them. She had not been so fortunate. Preston's murder had gone unavenged. She had plans to balance the scales somewhat, but even if they worked, the result would only be a weak, pale whisper of vengeance.

She wrapped her arms around herself. “I'm glad Wendover drowned,” she said fiercely.

“Nobody wept any tears for him, that's for certain.”

“What a dreadful time you must have had.”

“It was awful.” Bonnie rose to her feet. “But looking back, I think the psychic was the worst part.”

An unpleasant sense of impending disaster gripped Zoe. She got carefully to her feet.
I don't want to hear this,
she thought. But she had no option. “What psychic?”

“It was my own fault.” Bonnie shook her head ruefully. “I should have known better. You see, for a long time after Drew disappeared, I refused to believe that he was dead.”

“I understand.”

“A so-called psychic got in touch with me and said she could help me find him. She fed me a lot of nonsense about being able to see him in a small room somewhere, bound hand and foot. She told me she thought he was alive and being held captive. And I was so desperate that I willingly bought into her scam. It cost me a great deal of money, and in the end the false hope only made it harder to deal with the truth.”

Ethan, Jeff, and Theo were almost upon them.

“I don't blame you,” Zoe said. “I would have wanted to cling to hope, too.”

“If you ask me,” Bonnie said wryly, “the most remarkable aspect of the whole thing wasn't that Wendover got a dose of really bad karma. It was that the psychic survived Ethan's wrath.”

“Oh.”

“Ethan detests people who prey on others. After that incident, he absolutely despises people who claim to be psychics. As far as he's concerned, they are all frauds and charlatans. I swear, when he found out how that woman had strung me along, I thought he would strangle her.”

 

Half an hour
later Zoe said good night to everyone from the doorway of her apartment.

She looked at Jeff and Theo. “Thanks for a great evening, guys.”

“You can come with us again sometime, if you want,” Jeff said magnanimously.

“Thank you,” Zoe said. “That would be nice. Next time I promise to have some ice cream on hand.”

The discovery that she did not keep a supply of ice cream in the small freezer compartment of her refrigerator had produced baffled astonishment. Jeff and Theo had taken the bad news manfully, but she made a mental note not to be caught off guard next time. She was surprised to realize just how much she hoped that there would be a next time.

“I like chocolate chip,” Theo said helpfully.

“I'll keep that in mind,” she promised.

“I enjoyed talking to you.” Bonnie gave her a warm smile.

The temptation to tell Bonnie how much they had in common because of the manner in which they had lost their husbands had been almost overwhelming. But sharing confidences was as risky in this new life as intimate romantic entanglements.

“It was a wonderful evening,” Zoe said.

“We really will have to do this again.” Bonnie turned to Jeff and Theo and made shooing motions with her hands. “Come on, you two, let Uncle Ethan say good night to Zoe in peace.”

Jeff and Theo reluctantly left the doorway and went down the hall. Bonnie followed in their wake.

Theo's voice drifted back along the corridor.

“Is Uncle Ethan gonna kiss Zoe?” he asked.

“That's none of your business,” Bonnie told him. “Move, gentlemen.”

Ethan waited until the little group had started down the stairs. Then he smiled slowly.

“Yeah,” he said, “Uncle Ethan is gonna kiss Zoe.”

He put his hands on her shoulders and drew her deliberately toward him. Zoe felt a little fizzy sensation in the pit of her stomach.

Don't get addicted to this,
she warned herself.
It'll never work. Not for long, at any rate.

But intense curiosity swamped the warning. All day long she had wondered exactly how much of last night's heat had been generated by the aftermath of the adrenaline rush they had both experienced.

He covered her mouth with his own, and she got her answer in no uncertain terms. If it was adrenaline that had sparked last night's passion, the same drug was flowing just as strongly through her veins tonight. How long did it take for that stuff to wear off, anyway?

He sensed her response and deliberately deepened the kiss. His hands moved along her shoulders and then she felt his fingers on the nape of her neck. His thumbs braced her chin, holding her lips right where he wanted them. She was pressed so tightly against him that she could feel the contours of his aroused body.

“Uncle Ethan?” Jeff's voice echoed up the stairs. “Aren't you coming?”

“Hush,” Bonnie said. “Let's wait for him outside in the garden.”

Ethan slowly raised his head. “I think I just heard my wake-up call. I'd better get moving. Gonna be a little hard to get to sleep tonight, though.”

He did the smoldering-eye thing every bit as well as he did the narrow-eyed thing, she thought. She had to swallow a couple of times to find her voice.

“Good night.” Reluctant to let him go, she fiddled with the collar of his shirt, pretending to smooth it. “Thanks again for inviting me to join you.”

“Any time.”

She made herself let go of his shirt. He stepped back into the hall and stood waiting.

Very slowly she closed the door and methodically set all three locks. When she finally fastened the chain, she heard him walk away toward the stairs.

Turning, she slumped back against the door, drew a couple of slow, deep breaths, and tried to catalog her reactions objectively. She was definitely feeling a little lightheaded. Giddy, almost. There was a pleasant tingling in certain
regions of her anatomy. The fizzy sensation was still strong.

She had to fight the urge to unlock the door, dash out into the hallway, and drag Ethan back into her apartment. The only thing that stopped her from doing just that was the fact that Bonnie and his nephews were waiting for him.

All in all, it was pretty exciting.

Just like real life.

“I like her
very much.” Bonnie spoke quietly, not wanting Jeff and Theo, seated in the backseat discussing Singleton Cobb and his computer, to overhear. “She's different from your usual type.”

“You think?” Ethan did not take his attention off the road. “I haven't had a date in so long, I can't remember what my usual type is.”

“Don't get me started. If you want to compare dry spells, I'll beat you hands down.”

Ethan gave her a quick, searching glance. He did not comment, but the dashboard light revealed the slight curve of his mouth. She knew why her crack about a long dry spell had startled him. It had surprised her, too. She had chided him often enough for not doing more to jump-start his social life, but this was the first time since losing Drew that she had even mentioned her own lack of same.

All of her attention during the past few years had been focused on maintaining a safe, secure world for Jeff and Theo. The possibility of meeting someone and perhaps
even dating again had been the last thing on her mind. She wondered what had put the thought into her head today. Maybe it was seeing Ethan and Zoe together. You could feel the crackle of energy in the air when those two were in close proximity.

“When I said that Zoe was different,” she continued deliberately, “I meant that she was not like any of your exes.”

“So what? All of my exes were different from each other.”

“No, they weren't. Not really. You do tend toward a certain type of woman.”

“And that type would be?”

“All three of your ex-wives were pretty and smart and nice enough in their own ways, but they all had two things in common. The first is that they were attracted to you because you look like a pretty cool guy at first glance. Exciting. Mysterious. Maybe even dangerous.”

“But underneath I'm boring, right? You don't have to spell it out. Devon did a pretty good job of making that clear.”

“No, underneath you are definitely not boring.” She paused. “But you are complicated.”

“Complicated.” He tasted that word. “That doesn't sound much better than boring.”

“Complicated is hard work for a woman. The other thing your exes had in common was that none of them wanted to spend much time dealing with your complexities. They wanted
you
to spend all your time catering to
their
complexities. And let's face it, they were all very high maintenance.”

“Huh.”

“You are also very controlled. Maybe even a little obsessive about some things. Those factors make you good at your job, but they are not easy to handle in a relationship.”

“Obsessive?”

“Forget obsessive,” Bonnie said quickly. “That was a poor choice of words. Determined is what I meant. Focused. You keep going until you get your answers. Once
you've made a decision, you don't allow anything to deflect you. Look at what the investigation into Drew's murder cost you. Your company and your marriage.”

“It was worth it.”

She looked at him. “You're always willing to pay the price, aren't you?”

He shrugged. “No such thing as a free lunch in this world.”

“That attitude makes you a terrific investigator. But it also makes you a little scary.”

“Complicated, obsessive, and now scary. Great. My prospects for renewing my social life are not looking up here.”

“What I'm trying to tell you is that those traits have a certain appeal, but they aren't easy for a woman to handle in a serious, long-term, committed relationship.”

“You think maybe I'm doomed to a lifetime of serial monogamy?”

“What I think,” she said very deliberately, “is that you need someone who can deal with the part of you that makes you who you are.”

He was silent for a time.

“You think Zoe could handle that part?” he asked after a while.

“I don't know,” she said, coming down hard on the side of honesty. “But I'll tell you one thing, I think she's every bit as complicated as you are.”

 

Zoe sat on
the edge of the bed, tucked the phone between her shoulder and ear, and reached down to tug off her shoes. “The long and the short of it is that because of what happened after his brother's murder, Ethan despises psychics.”

“You're not a psychic,” Arcadia said. “You're just exquisitely sensitive to the ambience of some interior spaces.”

“Let's face it, by any definition, I'm a little weird.”

“You don't plan to tell him about your weirdness,
though, do you? There's no point. He wouldn't believe you, anyway.”

“I know.” Zoe flopped back across the duvet and looked up at the ceiling. “He would think I was crazy. Or a fraud. Or both.”

“Yes.”

“The story Bonnie told me tonight was chilling. The guy who paid to have her husband murdered actually walked free from the courtroom. That's exactly what would have happened even if I had been able to get anyone to believe me about—”

“Don't say it.”

“Sorry.”

In Arcadia's opinion, events from their other lives should not be mentioned in any way, shape or form, especially not on the phone. But Zoe found it hard not to talk about them sometimes. Probably because so much remained unresolved, she thought.
No closure,
as her so-called therapist at Xanadu, Dr. McAlistair, would say. And Arcadia was the only one she knew with whom she could safely discuss the past.

“At least in the case of Ethan's brother, there seems to have been some justice of the bad luck variety,” Arcadia said.

“Bad luck, my sweet patootie. If Wendover died because he got drunk and fell off his yacht, I'll eat a saguaro.”

Arcadia gave one of her throaty chuckles. “So, are you going to see Ethan again?”

Zoe thought about the heat in Ethan's good-night kiss. “I got that impression, yes.”

“Good. You need to get out more.”

“Getting out is one thing. Playing with fire is something else.”

“Just keep it light and have some fun. You deserve some R & R, Zoe. You've had a rough two years.”

Zoe levered herself up on her elbows. “Right. Light and fun.”

Arcadia made it sound so simple. The truth was, she
thought, from where she sat, there was nothing simple about Ethan Truax.

She got to her feet beside the bed and grasped the top of the duvet. “Well, I'd better get some sleep. I've got an early morning appointment to look at plumbing fixtures.”

“Sounds exciting.”

“Oh, yeah.”

She tossed the duvet to the foot of the bed.

And froze when she saw the letter-sized sheet of business stationery lying just below the bottom edge of the pillows.

“Oh, my God.”

“Zoe?” Arcadia's voice sharpened instantly. “Are you okay? What's wrong?”

Zoe stared at the sheet of stationery, unable to speak. She recognized the logo imprinted discreetly at the top of the paper. It was a small, stylized, black-and-white drawing of an austere brick mansion crouched on the edge of a dark lake.

Beneath the image the name of the establishment was written in elegant type,
CANDLE LAKE MANOR
. There was no address or phone number.

Individual letters had been snipped from a newspaper and glued to the page to spell out a message.

Wish you were here.

Below that line were more words.

The opportunity to stay out of Room 232 can be yours for a price. You will receive instructions in the near future.

“Zoe?” Arcadia's voice was laced with tension. “Talk to me. Is something wrong?”

“Yes,” Zoe said.