Half an hour later, I’m feeling steady again. I’m watching something on the Science channel, still glowing my post-fuck glow, when I get a text from Juniper: ‘Mr. Obar coming this evening. Which cottage?’

A quick call to Rachelle, another call to my grounds manager, and shit! I’m out of cottages.

I put Juniper in the rear room of a cottage Leslie is using, and work on pacing a hole in my floors. Suri Dalton will be back with her bags in a few days, and there’s nowhere for her to stay.

I call Rachelle once more, just to confirm the grim news—but I’m correct. Stacy returned from a brief vacation and is taking clients in a cottage with Alicia, while the third cottage across the yard is closed because of sewerage issues. Which means the only spare room on the whole damn premises is inside my place.

I’m not sure I can stand to be so close to her. If I’m honest with myself, I guess I just find it…fucking weird that she wants anything to do with me. I mean, yeah, I’m in pretty decent shape and I’m not too tough on the eyes. But she pulled me out of a fucking pool.

I guess objectively, that’s not too weird. Not unless you know what I know: that I drowned that night on purpose. Because without Lithium, I do that sort of thing.

I’m wondering if I can keep my shit together, wondering if I can share my space with her and keep my secrets tucked away, when I get a text. I slide the lock key on my phone, wondering for a moment if maybe she’s canceling. But it isn’t her.

The first clue it’s something strange is that it comes from an unknown number.

I open the text, wondering if I gave my number to any of the escorts my bank statement tells me I ordered after getting back from El Paso.

What greets me makes my head feel too light. Like a balloon that just might float away.

“You going to pay me, or should I take down something dearer to you than your precious whore house?”

I lie down on the couch and stare up at my ceiling. Then, instead of calling Suri Dalton, telling her not to come back, I call my financial coordinator.

I give him Hawkins’ bank account number, the one my P.I., David, dug up, and have him deposit the amount I owe, plus twenty-five percent. I’m not sure anymore what’s dear to me, but I’m not taking chances.

SURI

After I leave Marchant’s cottage, I have coffee with Rachelle and her partner, meet the team of gem-finders I hired to find Gran Gran’s ring, and take a quick flight back to Napa.

I spend three days getting the house in order, collecting my “toolbox” full of fabric and textile samples I think would interest Marchant, and lying low.

Most of the lying low is because of Adam and Brina. My sisters have given me the heads up that Brina is parading Adam all over town, and the last thing I need is a run-in with the two of them. I’m ashamed to admit, I’m hiding from Lizzy, too. Because once she knows I took the Love Inc. job, she’ll know about Marchant and me. I just know she will.

When she texts me the first day I’m home, I tell her I’m chin-deep in a new project and need to talk later. When she calls the second day, we talk for half an hour, focused completely on how she and Hunter are dealing with the pregnancy. (Hunter is playing the part of nurse but not saying much about the baby, which is fine at the moment because Lizzy has just started getting morning sickness).

I spend the third day at Crestwood Place cleaning. I’m kind of a neat-freak, and I can’t leave the house without cleaning it. I’m feeling even tidier than usual because moving around helps me avoid dwelling on Marchant. Not that I don’t want to think about him. Because I do. I just don’t want to dwell.

Finally, it’s go time.

The plane is in the air just a few minutes after ten on Monday morning. I spend the flight jotting down design ideas and indulging a rare classical music mood with a little Chopin.

The CRV I rented this time is white and waiting for me at the little private airport about twenty minutes from the ranch. I stop by a little grocery store before heading toward Love Inc., still feeling good about things.

But by the time my grocery-laden Jeep is bouncing down a ribbon of freshly paved county road, it’s mid-afternoon, and I don’t feel relaxed. My heart kicks into an erratic rhythm as I turn onto an even smaller drive. As I follow it through a grove of trees, toward a small, square parking lot, I try to convince myself that I took this job for personal reasons. Because I need a few weeks to lie low. Because it’ll be nice to get out of my big, lonely Crestwood Place for a little while. Because the job will look good on my resume.

I see a swatch of stone through brush—one of the cottages—and my stomach knots, because I know I’m lying to myself. I’m here because Marchant Radcliffe offered me the job. I’m here because, despite all logic, I enjoy sex with him.

He’s obviously got problems, but when I’m kissing him, I don’t think about anything but him. I don’t worry. I don’t feel lonely or sad. In a way, he is like my drug. His skin and his scent. I like the way he moves, the way he speaks. He intoxicates me, and like an addict, I’m parking my CRV and opening the door because I’m back for more.

It’s not just his body that intrigues me. I want to know his secrets, too. What does that tattoo mean? Why the drug problem? I want to fix him. And that’s not just stupid, it’s reckless. Yet I’m hoisting my duffel bag onto my shoulder, scooping up bags of groceries. Walking down the little pebble path that leads from this discreet parking lot to the row of cottages. To his cottage.

It’s my choice. I can choose to be stupid if I want to be.

Before I see his cottage, I see the main house, and whoaaaaa. During my breakfast with Rachelle the morning I was here last, when she told me the main house would be built in under a month, I didn’t believe her.

But...whoa. I’m not construction site-savvy, but I’ve worked on a few new builds with clients, and there have to be at least five crews working on this building. And what they’ve done in four days! There are walls now. Scaffolding walls, but walls nonetheless. Stone is piled high around the newly resurrected building skeleton; stone and shingles and shutters.

Marchant’s place is on the end of the row of cottages—the one that’s closest to the pond and the new “main house” at Love Inc. As soon as my eyes hit the front door, my pulse goes crazy and I start to sweat.

I tell myself this can’t end badly. He’s a pimp. I could never fall in love with a man like him. But I can have fun. And I’m overdue for some fun.

Marchant meets me on his porch. He’s wearing dark slacks and a white shirt. His face sports stubble that’s making its way into a beard. His eyes are sharp. I can feel him look me over. Can literally feel the heat.

I smile a little, but his lips don’t curl at all. He looks…like a hungry tiger. It’s a long moment before he takes the groceries from me. Our bodies brush, and I have a hard time making my legs carry me through the door he pushes open for me.

“Let’s put your groceries in here,” he says. “I’ve got the contractor waiting for us so we can talk about the timetable.”

I watch the way his back ripples under his shirt as he puts my orange juice, butter, milk, and eggs into his wide stainless steel refrigerator. I watch the way his strong hands flex as he lets go of the other bags, leaving them lined up on his counter.

“I’m excited to meet him—or her.”

“Him,” he tells me, leading the way back to the front door. He’s walking slightly fast, a step ahead of me; when he looks at me, he’s glancing over his shoulder. I get the strange sense that he’s wound up. Slightly tense. Is it possible I’m making him as antsy as he makes me? With his history, it seems doubtful. But still, I entertain the idea as I follow him out onto his porch and stand behind him while he locks the door.