My One And Only (20 page)

"It could," Ethan mused. "But what I want to know is, how was he getting that information and why was somebody giving it to him?"

"Hell, Ethan, the trail is over ten years old."

"I'm willing to lay bad odds that it leads right back to Harrison. I just have to figure out why."

"And that's where Hansen Wells fits into this?"

"Yes. MDS was heavily involved with the Defense Department during that time. If Hansen can give me a couple of contacts, I might make a trip to Washington this week."

"Good. You can take Lewis with you and put the fear of God into Edward Kinsey."

At the mention of his embattled client, Ethan groaned. "What's the status of that?"

"Lewis wants to—" The ring of Ethan's intercom interrupted the CFO.

Ethan held up a hand and hit the button. "Yes, Edna?"

"Hansen Wells for you."

"Great. I'll take it."

Edna put the call through to Ethan's private line.

"You want me to leave?" Jack asked.

Ethan shook his head. "I might need you. Your memory's better than mine." He picked up the receiver on the second ring. "Hansen," he said cordially. "Thanks for getting back to me."

"I think I've found what you need," Hansen told him.

Satisfied, Ethan propped his feet on the desk. He gave Jack a slight nod. "Go on," he told his caller. "I'm listening."

twelve

T
rying to pin the man down, Abby decided two days later, was worse than trying to bottle a cloud. She sat in the cluttered confines of Detective Nick Krestyanov's office and waited patiently while he barked orders to some hapless clerk on the other end of the phone. He slammed down the receiver with a grunt of frustration. "Sorry, Ms. Lee. You were saying?"

Abby took a fortifying breath. "About the break-in. I—I just wondered if anything had turned up about that envelope."

The detective jerked open the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out a pair of worn loafers. "I don't think we got a report on that yet." He propped one sneakered foot on the drawer and tugged at the laces. "Do you mind?" he said, giving her a quick glance and indicating the shoes. "I have to be in court in thirty minutes."

By the time Abby had shaken her head, he'd already pulled off the first shoe and jammed his foot into the loafer. "So you don't have anything else?"

The detective confirmed her question with a short nod. "I can double-check with Detective Garrison. He might have heard something and forgot to mention it." Krestyanov swore as the laces on his other shoe knotted beneath his blunt fingers. "I doubt it, though. We'll have to follow up, and we just haven't gotten to it."

"I understand," she said.

His hand stilled on the shoe. "Ms. Lee, is there something you want to tell me?"

Abby hesitated. More than she wanted to breathe at the moment, she wanted to unload the worries she'd been carrying for the past three days and hand them over to someone who'd take care of them for her. Ethan called her two or three times a day and continued to press her for information. She'd resisted thus far, but her determination was waning. If only she hadn't promised, she thought glumly. And if only she didn't fear that whatever she told him would create even bigger problems for her and for him.

He'd told her this morning that he was headed back to Chicago today. She was supposed to meet him for dinner at a downtown restaurant. He had something important to tell her, he'd said, and
he'd sounded grim. When she'd asked him for details, he'd revealed only that he didn't want to talk about it on the phone.

She'd hung up feeling anxious and dreary.

Finally, she'd decided to see Detective Krestyanov today, hoping that somehow the police would have discovered something about that card. She desperately wanted answers. But he'd confirmed her worst fears. She was buried again in a sea of bureaucracy, and if anything were to be done, she'd have to do it herself.

"Ms. Lee?" he prompted.

Abby flinched. "Oh. Sorry. I was—thinking about something."

He lowered his foot to the floor. His expression turned utterly serious. "I can't help you if you don't level with me," he said. "If there's something you're not telling us—"

She shook her head. "No, there's not. I just wanted to know if any progress had been made."

He studied her for a few moments, then shook his head. "We'll call you if we find anything."

With a short nod, Abby rose to go. "Thank you, Detective.
I
…
"
She wavered, assailed by memo
ries of the last time she'd sat in a place like this and told her story. Suppressing a shudder, Abby scooped up her purse from the chair. "I'd appreciate that," she said. She felt crowded suddenly, compelled by a strong urge to flee his office and the oppressive atmosphere that went with it. After
hurrying from the precinct and out onto the busy sidewalk, she leaned wearily against the brick wall.

The summer sky had turned gray with impending rain. A thunderstorm was probably blowing in off the lake. Abby stared at the dismal clouds and thought they mirrored her mood. Why? she wondered. Why now, and why this? Why, when she'd waited ten years for answers, did they have to present themselves in a way that left her feeling frustrated and confounded?

She briefly closed her eyes. An image of Ethan, his expression concerned and probing, popped into her mind. Fool that she was, she had tumbled for a man who held himself so firmly in check, she barely knew what he was thinking half the time.

In stark contrast to Ethan, her own father had had a very different approach—an ever-present laugh, a winning smile, a generous affection. Jack Lee had been a bo
rn
entertainer. Abby's mother had watched her husband's gregariousness with an indulgent smile. Abby was sure she had never needed to study the man she loved in a vain effort to read his mind.

"You're a fool, Abby," she muttered to herself as loneliness assailed her. She felt a deep need to talk things over with her parents—even if they couldn't provide her with answers. On impulse, she stepped forward to hail a cab.

*
*
*

E
than heard her fiddling with the key in the lock and he strode across Abby's living room to jerk the door open. A rumble of thunder punctuated the steady pounding of his heart.

It was after midnight, and he'd been pacing the floor for the past five hours, growing steadily more panicked. When he'd arrived in Chicago that afternoon, he'd been unable to reach her by phone. Her assistant had informed him that Abby had left the office shortly after lunch and had not returned for the day.

When she failed to show for dinner, he'd known something was drastically wrong. He'd called her house and received no answer. He still had LuAnne's business card in his wallet, and tried that number next. The stylist hadn't heard from Abby that day, but said that Rachel was spending the weekend at a friend's lake house. LuAnne had assured him that she knew where Abby had probably gone. Given the break-in on Tuesday night and the stress of reliving the memory of her parents' death, Abby would likely have taken the time to pay a visit to their graves.

LuAnne didn't know the name or the location of the cemetery. Ethan had called his investigator, who was also unable to supply him with the information. Frustrated at his own helplessness, Ethan had talked again to LuAnne. She'd agreed to let him into Abby's house with her key, but had chastened him not to worry. Abby frequently made
visits there, L
uAnne had explained. She'd obvi
ously needed the space.

The lecture hadn't helped. The later the hour became, and the harder it rained outside, the more his anxiety had increased. He'd called Detective Krestyanov and discovered that Abby had paid him a visit that afternoon. She'd seemed tense, the detective told him, but not unusually upset.

By the time her key rattled in the lock, Ethan's usually calm nerves were shot to hell. He jerked open the door and found Abby standing there, soaked to the skin. "Where the hell have you been?" he demanded as he struggled with a simultaneous desire to rage at her and to hold her so tightly she could never scare him like that again.

Abby blinked. "Ethan, what are you doing here?" She looked exhausted. She shook her head and drops of water splashed onto his shirt.

"God, you're soaked." He reached for her arm. "Come on, get inside." He pulled her through the door. "Do you have any idea how late it is?" He rubbed his hands on her upper arms to ward off the chill. "Why the hell didn't you call me?" He couldn't seem to rein in the terror and frustration that ha
d been clawing at him all night.

"I don't know."

She sounded hoarse. His hands had grown cold from touching the sodden sleeves of her jacket. "Have you been out in the rain since this afternoon?" he asked as he kicked the door shut with his foot. "I need to call LuAnne and tell her you're all right."

She coughed. "You told LuAnne?"

Ethan reached for her jacket. "Here, take this off." He shoved the jacket off her shoulders and it dropped to the tiled floor with a wet plop. Abby swayed toward him. He steadied her with a hand on her shoulder. "You probably made yourself sick," he said, and touched her forehead. "You're burning up. I think you have a fever."

She shook her head. "No, I'm just cold." She shivered and placed a hand on his chest. "Ethan, please don't—"

"You need to lie down." He led her to the living room and guided her onto the couch, then reached for the phone and punched the redial. LuAnne answered it on the first ring. Abby snatched the receiver from his hand with a frown.

"Lu? Yeah, I'm fine." She listened to LuAnne's question while she wiped the dripping rainwater from her forehead. Ethan used the rest of the brief conversation to wring some of the water out of her hair. She finished with LuAnne and handed him the receiver. He slammed it back into its cradle.

Abby sniffed. "She was going to come over if I'm going to be here alone tonight," she told him noncommittally.

"You won't." He tugged her shoes off. "You've got to get out of those wet clothes. I'm going to
find a robe and a thermometer." He moved toward the stairs, but she made an inarticulate sound in her throat that stopped him dead.

"Ethan—"

"It's going to be all right," he promised her, and kissed her forehead. "I just need to get some things."

"How did you get in here?"

He brushed her wet hair off her forehead. Now that she was here and apparently in one piece, some of his terror was beginning to ebb. He still felt too emotionally raw, however, to trust himself with anything other than the barest of facts. Tomorrow, reason might return, but now all the horrible visions he'd had during his extended wait were looming over
him like specters from a best-
forgotten nightmare.

"LuAnne let me in with her keys," he replied. "When you didn't show for dinner—"

She frowned. "Sorry. Oh, God, I'm sorry. I forgot."

He shook his head. "I was worried. I talked to Krestyanov. He s
aid you came to see him this af
ternoon."

"Yes." She shook her head. She was so cold, her lips looked blue. "He didn't know anything."

"That's what he said." Ethan stroked her face. Abby had begun to shiver again, so he jerked a cotton throw off the back of the couch and wrapped it around her shoulders. "Honey, have
you been at the cemetery all this time?"

"I walked to the restaurant." She clutched the edges of the coverlet. "I just wanted to see it again. It had been a long time."

Ethan remembered his investigator giving him the location of the waterfront restaurant. It was at least a mile from the nearest cemetery. Abby sniffed. "I just sort of lost track of time. My car was at the office, and I had to go back to get it to come home."

He nodded. "No wonder." He touched her forehead again. "I still think you've got a fever."

"I don't."

"Baby, this is not the time to argue with me." She had no idea, he thought, of the internal war he was waging. "It's going to get you nowhere." He pressed a fierce kiss to her forehead. "Later you can be annoyed with me. Right now, I'm going to get you dry and warm."

"You don't have to do this."

He ignored her remark as he studied the pale color of her face. "Maybe I should call a doctor."

"No, really, Ethan, I'm fine."

The distress in her voice made his temperature rise. She was hurting, deeply. If she'd gone from the cemetery to the restaurant as she'd said, she'd spent the past several hours reliving the most h
or
rifying experience of her life. The powerlessness he felt made him angry. There was nothing he could do to ease the desolate look in her eyes—a look he
remembered seeing in a mirror the day his mother had died and Letty had taken him to her funeral.

What was worse, he was beginning to think he could have spared Abby all this if he'd simply told Harrison to go to hell the day he'd challenged him at Carlton's party. She didn't deserve any of it. At the thought, he felt the door of the vault slam open. He had to take several controlled breaths while he struggled for balance.

Abby drew his hand to her lips and placed a soft kiss on the palm. "I'm okay now. I'm sorry I worried you."

Could she know? he wondered. Something went still inside him. Could she understand? His fingers captured hers. "Honey, you're sick," he said, and now
his
voice sounded hoarse.

Her hand tightened on his. "No." She shook her head. "I'm not sick."

"You look sick," he protested.

She buried her wet face against his forearm. "I'm not."

"You feel feverish."

"I am," she said quietly and met his gaze. The haunted look stil
l shadowed her eyes, but her ex
pression had subtly shifted. "I've been waiting for you."

His world tipped off its axis. Dear God, he thought. Not now. Not when he'd waited so long and his emotions were so removed from his control. "Honey, you don't—"

"I miss them so much
,"
she whispered. "Mother and Dad. It's been so hard for a long time." Her voice sounded hollow. "Don't you remember what it feels like—to think you have no one in the world?"

He felt her shudder all the way to his scalp. His heart beat a maddened rhythm and this time the internal dam burst. He remembered. Some days, it seemed, he did nothing but remember. "God, Abby," he said. "You don't understand. I don't want to hurt you." He threaded his fingers into her damp hair.

"You couldn't," she assured him.

"Now is not the time." Not when she'd hate him for it later.

Abby shook her head. "It's the perfect time. I'm here. You're here. We're here alone. Make love to me, Ethan."

He tilted his head back and fought for control. "I can't," he told her gently. "Not now."

The hurt in her eyes clamped around his heart in a tight band. He deliberately ignored it and eased her backward until she lay stretched out on the couch. "You're exhausted, emotionally and physically. How much have you slept since Tuesday?"

She shrugged. He nodded. "Get some rest. I'll be here when you wake up."

A
bby fought her way through a few hours of sleep to find herself curled up on her sofa. Her
head ached. The splatter of rain on glass drew her gaze to the window. Pale light revealed streaks of rain sluicing down the glass. Even the weak morning sun made her eyes bu
rn
. She dropped her head back with a low groan as she remembered the events of the previous night. She'd gone to the cemetery, where she'd stayed too long and wept too hard.

Melancholy and a need for answers had driven her to the waterfront address that used to house her father's restaurant. A new bar was open there now. Trendy, with an Art Deco interior, it bore no resemblance to the battered but homey place of her childhood. She'd turned and walked through the rain all the way back to her office building, where her car sat in the garage. She barely remembered the drive home.

Ethan had been there. Concerned, maybe even a little angry, he'd greeted her at the door and promptly refused her offer to make love. Abby squeezed her eyes shut and shuddered.

"Feeling better?" his rough voice asked.

Startled, she saw him standing near the kitchen. She struggled to sit up. "What time is it?"

He held two mugs of coffee. "Early. Not quite five." He crossed the room and gave her one of the mugs.

She accepted it with a look of gratitude. "Did you sleep at all?"

"Off and on," he said. "I was worried about you."

"Don't be. I'm not cracking up or anything." She took a fortifying sip of the coffee.

He studied her for a minute, then sat down next to her. He propped his bare feet on the coffee table. "I didn't think you were."

"Yes, you did," she told him with a slight smile. "I'm really sorry I worried you."

He raised his eyebrows over the rim of his mug. "You do seem to be feeling better."

Abby put her mug down on the table, then tucked her feet underneath her. "Sometimes I forget how much it all hurt. I need to revisit it on occasion, just to find my center again." Her gaze turned contemplative. "It's one of the ways I keep them close to me—by forcing myself to remember."

He didn't respond. She watched him curiously. "Don't you do that with your own mother?"

He shook his head. "No."

Somehow, his response didn't surprise her. That formidable calm she'd first noticed gave him the strength not to look back. "Never?" she probed.

"Not if I can help it."

"What if you can't?"

He was starting to look uncomfortable. "Then I deal with it. I don't let it consume me."

"Oh." She thought about that for a moment. "Is that why you're always so controlled?"

"Controlled?" He set his mug down.

"You know what I mean. You don't have emotional outbursts." She gave him a little half smile. "You're the only Montgomery who doesn't."

"I had one last night."

She frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"When you came in. Don't you remember me yelling at you?"

For a moment she thought he was kidding. She actually started to laugh before she realized he was completely serious. "Yelling? Good grief, Ethan. You probably thought I'd been hit by a bus or something. I stood you up for dinner. I didn't come in until after midnight, and when I did, I looked like I'd taken a swim in the lake. No wonder you were keyed up."

He visibly winced. "I shouldn't have lost my temper."

Poor m
an
, she thought. There was such depth there. He had a wel
l of untapped feeling just wait
ing to spring free, and no one had ever given him permission. What, she wondered, would it take to really send him over the edge? "If I'd been you, I would have been screaming like a banshee."

He gave her a small smile for that comment. "No, you wouldn't. You're not a shrieker."

Abby shrugged. "Shows what you know. Just ask Rachel."

"Teenage girls tend to overdramatize."