Lover, Stranger Part 8

Chapter Four.

The sun streaming in through the tall windows in the third-story master suite awakened Ethan the next morning. He'd tossed and turned for hours the night before, sleeping sporadically, dreaming about running through the jungle and then falling. As in most nightmares, he never remembered hitting the ground but instead would awaken abruptly in a cold sweat, his heart pounding, adrenaline still rushing through his veins.

He sat up now and looked around, slowly letting the events of last evening filter back in. He'd hoped that by morning his memory would have returned, but his mind was still pretty much a blank. He still had no idea who Ethan Hunter really was, what he might have done, or why someone wanted to kill him. All he knew for sure was that he had to somehow keep it together. He had to remain sharp until he could find out what the h.e.l.l was going on.

His body aching, he pulled himself out of bed and headed for the shower.

Like the bedroom, the master bath was huge and luxurious, with lush, green carpeting, intricate tile mosaics, a step-up marble bathtub, and a shower stall that could easily accommodate two.

Turning on the water in the shower, Ethan stood star e double vanity. The bruises on his face were still prominent, but the swelling had gone down, and the pain wasn't quite so severe. He almost looked human this morning, although his face was still one he didn't recognize. Stripping away the last of his clothing, he examined the appendectomy scar on his lower right side.

The wound was surprisingly large, about four inches long, and still tender to the touch. Ethan stared at the scar, trying to remember the surgery, but nothing came to him. Nothing but the fleeting memory of being pursued through the jungle. The echoing sound of gunfire. The lingering unease that Dr. Ethan Hunter was a man he wasn't sure he wanted to get to know. Ignoring the twinges of pain from the cuts and bruises, he stepped under the hot water, washing briskly, trying to elude the questions whirling inside his head by concentrating on the mundane.

Showering. Getting dressed. Finding something to eat.

Back in the bedroom, he gazed at the clothing hanging in the ma.s.sive walk-in closet. The expensive suits and custom-made shirts were as unfamiliar to him as the face he'd studied in the bathroom mirror.

Finally, randomly, he grabbed something casual, a pair of charcoal pants and a cotton knit pullover. The pants were loose in the waist, and he wondered if he'd lost weight after his surgery. The shirt fit fine, but the shoes he pulled from the closet were a little snug. He started to find another pair, but then froze when he heard a noise.

Somewhere downstairs a door opened and closed.

It occurred to Ethan that Rosa might have come back, but she'd said last night that today was her day off. She planned to spend the time with her daughter. So who was downstairs then?

Ethan scanned the room for a weapon. His eyes lit on the nightstand next to the bed, and he crossed the floor to search through the drawers. If he kept a gun in the house, he reasoned that would be the logical place for it, but his search was fruitless. Removing the shade from the heavy bra.s.s lamp on the night stand, Ethan jerked the plug from the wall and picked up the base.

As a weapon, it was c.u.mbersome at best, but he didn't have time to look for anything else. Whoever was in the house might even now be slipping up the stairs to ambush him.

Heart thumping, his senses on full alert, Ethan left the bedroom, making his way toward the stairs. He paused on the landing, peering over the railing into the jungle-like living room below him. Nothing moved. No sound came to him.

In sock feet, he slipped silently down the stairs, his gaze searching every nook and corner of the room. There were any number of places an intruder could hide, but the most obvious place seemed to be the study. The door was ajar, and Ethan was almost certain he'd closed it last night before going to bed.

He crossed the room and flattened himself against the wall outside the study, listening. From inside, he could detect shuffling sounds, as if someone was going through his papers.

Nerves pumped, Ethan glanced inside. And tensed.

A woman stood before an open safe, busily removing what looked to be bundles of cash. He recognized her immediately from the picture he'd found in the desk last night. The intruder was his wife. She didn't see him at first.

Ethan watched her for several seconds as she stood at the safe. The red suit she wore was so short and so tight that she didn't appear to be armed, but the thought crossed Ethan's mind that she was probably extremely dangerous anyway. A woman scorned could be deadly.

He set the bra.s.s lamp on the floor, then stepped into the room. Her head jerked toward the door, her hand flying to her heart when she saw him. She blinked once, then twice before she finally managed to get her shock under control.

"Ethan!" Her voice was lyrical and very feminine, traced with a Spanish accent.

"I didn't know you were home."

Ethan glanced at the bundles of cash.

"I can see that." She made no move to close the safe door, nor to hide the money she'd stacked on top of his desk. Instead she took one of the bundles and brazenly thumbed through the bills.

"I heard you were in the hospital."

Glancing up, her gaze flicked over his bruised features. Something flashed in her eyes, an emotion Ethan couldn't define.

"You look and sound terrible," she said.

"Thanks." He returned her perusal, taking a long moment to study her features, and decided that the photograph in his desk, as spectacular as it was, didn't do her justice. She was even more beautiful in person. The deep V-neck of her jacket revealed a magnificent cleavage while the impossibly short skirt highlighted impossibly long legs.

But what drew Ethan's attention more than her grace and sultry beauty was the fact that she appeared to be stealing him blind. As if reading his mind, she glanced down at the money and shrugged.

"It's not like you don't owe me." When he didn't protest, she gave him an odd glance, then turned back to the safe. Her hair cascaded down her back, almost to her waist, gleaming like ebony when she tossed it over her shoulder.

"What are you doing here anyway?" she asked, her voice m.u.f.fled as she reached inside the safe.

"Bob said you'd been beaten up pretty badly. He thought you'd be in the hospital for several more days."

She withdrew another packet of bills, then turned to face him, her dark eyes challenging.

"Bob who?" Ethan asked, without thinking.

She arched a perfect black brow.

"Bob Kendall. Your ex-partner, remember? Who else would I be talking about?"

Ethan was immediately on his guard. Kendall was hi s.e.x-partner? If the hostility in the man's eyes last night had been any indication, the arrangement had ended badly. Ethan wondered what had gone wrong, in his business and in his marriage.

He stared at his wife, trying to dredge up a memory, some leftover emotion, but nothing came to him. Nothing but a faint uneasiness as he watched her.

"When did you talk to Bob?" he asked.

Something that might have been guilt flashed over her features. She began stuffing the money into a large black tote bag.

"He called me last night. He was at the hospital when you were brought in, and he thought I'd want to know what happened."

Ethan remembered what Rosa had told him last evening, that Pilar had called here at the house because Kendall had told her Ethan was returning. Why? he wondered. There had been none of her clothing in the closet upstairs, no makeup or feminine toiletries in the bathroom. It was obvious she no longed lived here, so why had she called Rosa to find out when he was returning?

And why wait until he got back to rob his safe? Unless, of course, things hadn't gone according to plan-Had Pilar and Kendall been behind Ethan's attack last night? Had they somehow arranged for him to go to the clinic before coming home? Had they wanted to kill him?

Ethan studied his wife and wondered why that notion didn't seem preposterous to him. Was it because Pilar Hunter struck him as a woman who would get what she wanted no matter who she had to hurt in the process?

But she was also a woman Ethan had married, must have once loved. He wondered how he could feel nothing, not even anger, toward her now.

Her task completed, she closed the bag and slung the straps over her shoulder. She walked around the desk and started by him, then paused.

"Bob told me about Amy. I guess I should say I'm sorry." Ethan said nothing.

For the first time, he sensed an uncertainty about his wife, as if she didn't know whether to say more or end it here and now. Then she smiled.

"I never believed you loved her, you know. Not like you once loved me."

Gazing up at him, she lifted a hand to his face. Ethan resisted the urge to step back from her. Instead he held his ground, letting her place a cool palm against his bruised skin. For one long moment, he stared down at her perfect features, her incredible beauty, and wondered again why he felt nothing.

And she. knew. Like a lightning bolt, anger whipped across her features.

"Cabron," she muttered as she turned and brushed by him.

Outside the doorway, she glanced back.

"You do look terrible, you know. Besides the bruises, I mean. You've lost weight. Your eyes..."

she trailed off, studying him.

"What about my eyes?" he asked sharply.

"They're cold. Even colder than I remembered." She shuddered.

"You are not the man I married, Ethan. You haven't been for a very long time." when grace arrived at the house a little while later, she was amazed to see how much better Ethan looked. Even though the bruises hadn't faded, the swelling in his face had gone down so that his features were no longer distorted.

She could tell more clearly what he looked like, and when he'd first opened the door, she'd caught her breath in surprise.

"I ... hope I didn't get you up," she said, her gaze slipping over him.

He was dressed, but his hair was mussed and he wasn't wearing any shoes. His casualness made her feel stuffy in her beige pantsuit, silk sh.e.l.l and brown flats.

"I've been up for a while," he said, his voice still hoa.r.s.e. He stood back so she could enter. Grace stepped past him into the foyer, then waited while he closed the door and reactivated the alarm. "Have you remembered anything?" she asked anxiously.

He gave her a look.

"You don't waste any time, do you?" Grace shrugged.

"Why should I? Someone out there killed my sister last night, and he may come back to finish you off. Who has time for formalities?"

"I get your point," he said dryly.

"And the answer to your question is, no. I haven't remembered anything."

"Nothing at all?"

"Nothing that makes any sense."

Grace glanced up at him, trying to read his expression "Well, if it's any consolation, you look much better today. Almost like a different man."

"So I've already been told." He turned and started for the stairs.

"By whom?" Grace asked quickly.

"Has someone been here this morning?"

He paused on the bottom step, turning to glance over his shoulder. ' "My wife was here earlier. I caught her taking money out of the safe in the study."

Grace frowned.

"What do you mean, you caught her?"

' "Just that. Apparently she no longer lives here. But I guess she decided to come back and help herself to whatever cash I might have left lying around."

Grace took a moment to a.s.sess this new information. So Ethan had met Pilar Hunter face to face. Grace couldn't help wondering how the meeting had gone, or what he'd thought of the woman. What he'd felt for her. From the pictures Grace had seen, Pilar was an incredibly beautiful woman.

Absently, Grace ran a hand down her pantsuit, smoothing invisible wrinkles.

"So what was it like seeing her?" she tried to ask casually.

"Did she give you any clues about your relationship?

About what might have happened between the two of you? " Ethan paused.

"I don't have any idea what happened between us, but I'll tell you one thing.

She struck me as a woman perfectly capable of throwing acid on my car. Or in my face, for that matter."

The bluntness of his words threw Grace for a moment.

"Do you think she may have had something to do with Amy's death?"

"I wouldn't rule out the possibility," he said grimly. He turned and started up the stairs.

"Come on up. We can talk about this later.

I've located the kitchen, and I'm cooking breakfast. " Grace followed him up the stairs and through the living room. The parrot, fully awake and preening on his perch, let out a loud squawk when he saw her.

"Don't even start," she muttered.

"What?" Ethan said over his shoulder.

"I said that's a good start. Learning your way around the house, I mean."

He gave her a quizzical look, then led her through a dining room with a high ceiling and a magnificent stained gla.s.s window, into the kitchen, with its stainless steel appliances, sat illo tile floor, and wall of atrium doors that gave a broad view of a backyard pool and waterfall.

Ethan walked over to the range and dished up a plate of bacon and eggs, then added a pile of b.u.t.tered toast.

"Have you eaten? There's plenty for both of us."

Grace eyed the food longingly. She'd started the day with her usual meal, one half of a grapefruit and a cup of coffee. If she ate bacon and eggs, she'd have to add at least half an hour to her daily workout in the gym, not to mention an extra mile or two to her run.