He’d follow her now and demand an explanation for her intrusion into his home.

He remained unmoving, however. She’d annoyed him, but her appearance had lightened him somehow as well, freshened him like a lungful of sea air after a night of debauchery.

He stared out at the black lake, lost in thoughts that, for once lately, weren’t bitter and morose.

Chapter 4

At the end of her shift the next night, Emma entered the bedroom to say good-bye to Cristina. Her patient had fallen asleep while Emma gave her report to Debbie, the night nurse. Emma paused next to the bed. Cristina looked even more shrunken than usual, her skin like dry, gray parchment stretched too tight over bone. A hospice nurse’s main goal was to make the last days of her patient’s life as comfortable and fulfilling as possible. Finding out what that meant for Cristina was proving to be a challenge for Emma. She sensed Cristina’s soul was heavy. Shedding that weight—even a little—might help ease her passage from this world.

“Night, Cristina. Sleep easy,” Emma whispered before she turned to leave the hushed room.

“It’s your own fault. You knew what I was capable of and what I wasn’t. You were capable of even less.”

Emma blinked and spun around at the death-rattle voice.

“Cristina?” she whispered, confused to see that her patient hadn’t moved from her sleeping position. She turned to go again after a pause. Cristina was having increasingly disturbed sleep, nightmares, and occasional hallucinations.

“It was too much for me. Not only one, but two! You knew as well as I did I wasn’t cut out for it. So you found yourself a martyr. Is it my fault she died? And then you had the nerve to think I’d transform into her overnight and replace her, you bastard!”

Emma started at the venomous shriek. She hurried toward Cristina, who was now jerking and tossing on the bed, her mouth bared in a snarl, arms flailing.

“I’ve got her,” Debbie said, appearing by Emma’s side as Emma gently restrained the swinging arms and spoke in firm, soothing tones, calling Cristina back to the waking world.

“I think she’s okay,” Emma said after a moment when Cristina began to quiet and settle. Still, the invisible threads of her patient’s nightmare seemed to brush against Emma . . . cling to her.

She waited until Cristina settled fully into sleep before she walked out of the bedroom and retrieved her purse. She noticed the stack of clean towels on a small table.

The vision triggered the memory of wandering around the house last night, of being trapped in that armoire. Lots of things triggered that memory. Almost everything, in fact, Emma reminded herself grimly as she searched for her keys in her purse. She’d finally escaped from that miserable experience and found her car, the laundry bag still slung over her shoulder like an inexplicable artifact she’d brought from another world.

She’d witnessed a lot of grief in her life, and understood the complexities and paradoxes of loss. Death transformed the living. It changed them, whether they wanted it to or not.

She’d been changed somehow last night, breathing the singular male scent that clung to the garments hung in the armoire, listening to the sounds of sexual excitement ringing in her ears. She’d been altered, but not by death, by something she found far more disturbing. The whole strange incident had upset her in a way she couldn’t name. Something had rocked her comfortable world, and she resented the man—irrationally, she knew—for that earthquake.

She hadn’t wanted Colin to touch her this morning when he’d stopped by before catching his train for work, a fact that bewildered her almost as much as it had Colin. She hadn’t seen him since Saturday night, after all. Sure, their physical relationship had mellowed lately—and it had never been firework explosive since they’d started sleeping together two years ago—but she’d normally be glad to see Colin and eager to express her affection.

As a means of punishing herself for her odd behavior and her inability to shut off her brain in regard to the man at the Breakers and his perversities, she’d sentenced herself to labor. She’d gone to the Laundromat this morning, one of her most hated errands, and finished what she hadn’t last night.

It’d been hard to return to the Breakers today following the “armoire incident,” as she’d taken to calling it in the privacy of her mind. Once she was there, however, burying herself in work helped, like it always did. She hadn’t slept well after she’d returned home last night. As good and exhausted as she was, all she could think about was dreamless, deep sleep, a rest blessedly devoid of the disturbing image of that man—Vanni—locking down his climax as though he thought he didn’t deserve the pleasure.

Who was he? One of Montand’s guests? A relative?

She constantly found her mind wandering, taking little imaginary excursions through the mansion, seeking him out. Was he in the mansion at the same time as her? What was he doing? She’d asked Margie this afternoon in a deliberately offhand manner if there were any other inhabitants of the house beside Montand. Margie had told her only Michael Montand lived there on a full-time basis—although he was currently away, to her knowledge—while Mrs. Shaw, two maids, a gardener, and the cook were day help. Alice, the maid, had told Margie that Montand was known to have guests there, though. Occasionally he threw lavish house parties, which affluent guests from all over the world attended.

Who was Vanni then, and how was he related to Montand? Or perhaps her original suspicion was right, and they were one and the same man?

No. They couldn’t be. That didn’t make any sense.

Stop thinking about him. He was cold and heartless about something that should have been intimate. He was a sick, strange man.

No, another voice in her head argued.

He was suffering. And something about him had called out to her . . .

A good night’s sleep would end her stupid obsessions. She flung her purse over her shoulder and started for the exit. She came to a sudden halt and gasped.

“Oh my God, you startled me,” Emma said to Mrs. Shaw, who stood in the entryway to the suite, unmoving.

“I’ve come to get you. Mr. Montand would like a word,” she said unsmilingly.

Her mouth fell open. “With . . . with me? Mr. Montand? Why?”

“He didn’t tell me his reasons, but I assume it’s about your work here. He’s very particular in regard to his stepmother’s care,” Mrs. Shaw said with a tiny smug smile.

“I see,” Emma said, even though she didn’t. To her knowledge, Montand had never spoken to any of the nursing staff individually. His expectations had been discussed with Dr. Claridge, who was the hospice doctor, and Monica Ring, the nurse supervisor. A flicker of anxiety went through her. What if this request was somehow associated with the armoire incident? Was she about to be called out or accused? Her heart started to beat uncomfortably in her chest.

There was only one way to find out.

“Okay. I’m ready,” she said briskly, hitching her purse higher on her shoulder.

She followed a silent Mrs. Shaw down the hushed staircase, past the lavish workout facility and indoor pool, her heartbeat pounding louder in her ears with every step. Mrs. Shaw left the staircase behind on the next level. She led Emma into the luxurious living room she’d seen last night, the lush ivory carpeting hushing their footsteps. Emma could almost feel the housekeeper’s disapproval and dislike emanating from her thin, stiff figure.