Marriage To A Stranger

Then he’d put it back down.

Harrison’s was Conley Harrison. His investors were a nervous group and any hint, however remote, that something was amiss would send them flying faster than a covey of quails spooked by a retriever. Stalker, casual thief, corporate spy…they didn’t care.

If this “accident” was in any way connected to the notes and his moneymen found out, Harrison’s would be history, no matter how successful the company was. The fortune he’d made, the success he’d become…all of it would disappear. He’d be yesterday’s news, another bad businessman who wasn’t smart enough to hang on to what he’d made, his childhood poverty a mocking ghost that threatened to return.

Without the drugs swirling in his body, Conley knew he wouldn’t have even allowed himself to think about any of this. He opened his eyes and looked at his wife. The horrific problems at work faded as he remembered her words that morning.

He’d known they were coming to this crisis but seemed incapable of stopping it. The long, cold silences, the angry accusations, the way she looked at him when she thought he didn’t know. Everything had turned to shit and he didn’t know how to avoid the inevitable. Conley let his eyes close again, the lids too heavy to hold up, his thoughts too onerous to consider anymore.

With Lara’s pronouncement that morning, his future loomed before him. No career. No capital. No wife.

No life.

LARA SLIPPED BACK into the hospital room, the door closing behind her with a whisper. She hadn’t wanted to leave, but with Conley asleep, she’d decided to run home and get him some clothes and give Ed a quick call to tell him what was going on. He’d been apoplectic when she’d refused his demands to bring Conley to Boulder, but Lara had persevered. “They’re keeping an eye on him for a while. Basically, he’s fine.”

And he was. The doctor had already signed his release form. Despite being covered with bumps and bruises, some pretty nasty, Conley seemed all right.

But not exactly.

Placing the extra clothes she’d brought him in the bathroom, Lara came back and sat down, her eyes going to his still form. He appeared to be sleeping comfortably now, but before she’d left, he’d been turning restlessly, moaning from time to time. Lara had been shocked; Conley was the heaviest sleeper she knew. Was it pain that was bothering him or something more? She thought back to the look he’d sent her when Dr. Sorelli had said he’d called the police. What had that been all about? She’d wanted to ask, but in the end she’d said nothing because Conley wouldn’t have answered her, anyway. He’d have to give answers to the two cops who’d already come by, though. Explaining that he was sleeping, Lara had asked them to return later and they’d agreed.

Too jittery to sit still, Lara opened the door and stepped into the corridor. She was halfway to the coffeepot at the nurse’s station when Bess MacDougal came out of the elevator. The older woman was clutching the stethoscope around her neck, her face wreathed in concern. Her gray hair was piled on top of her head in a haphazard bun, jeans and sneakers peeking out from beneath her white coat.

“Lara! I’ve been doing rounds and I just now picked up my messages and got yours! Is Conley all right? What happened?”

Just seeing Bess made Lara instantly feel better. Ed’s third wife and the only one closer to his age than Lara’s, Bess was a pediatrician and Lara’s surrogate mother. She confided in Bess in a way she couldn’t with Sandy, even as close as they were. Sandy was a good friend, but Bess was…something more.

“Your office told me where you were,” Lara said. “I knew you’d come when you could.”

“How is he?”

“He’s fine,” Lara answered, “at least physically…” They sat down on a nearby couch and Lara gave Bess the details. “He seems awfully nervous, though. I don’t understand it.”

“Well, good grief, child, he just got hit by a car. You’d be a tad nervous yourself!”

Lara nodded. “You’re right. Things were so crazy this morning before he left I’m not thinking straight, I suppose….” She gave the older woman the rest of the story.

Without comment, Bess listened until Lara ran out of words. “Sandy thinks I’m an idiot,” she concluded. With a troubled frown, she looked up at Bess. “Do you think I’m making a mistake?”

“Oh, Lord, Lara…I don’t know.” Bess reached into her pocket and pulled out an orange sucker. She offered it to Lara then stuck it in her mouth when Lara turned it down. “Relationships aren’t exactly my strong point, you know. Ask your father if you don’t believe me….”

Something more than her usual self-depreciating humor echoed in Bess’s voice. Any other time Lara would have asked the other woman about it, but right now, her concern about Conley overrode everything else.

“I just don’t know what to do,” Lara said. “The last time we got to this point, I let him talk me out of it. When things slipped back into the same old routine, the pain was twice as bad.”

Bess patted her on the knee. “It always is the second time around.”

“I can’t go through that again. And I’m tired of trying. I have to protect myself.”

“Well, you’ve already made your decision, honey, so stick with it and see what happens. That’s all any of us can do. Young or old—” She started to say more, then her beeper went off. Grabbing the device and looking at it, Bess jumped up. “Oh, Lord, I’ve got to run! I’ve got a sweetie on the fourth floor who needs me. A bad case of flu—” She gave Lara a quick hug then flew down the hall toward the stairs. Wishing they could have talked more, Lara watched her leave. Bess would have been good for Ed, Lara thought for the ten millionth time. If they’d stuck together, he’d be a different man.

Turning around, Lara headed back to Conley’s room, her emotions more tangled than ever. When she cracked open the door, her confusion only grew.

Conley was sitting up in bed.

With his rumpled hair and unshaven jaw, he looked vulnerable, defenseless…and sexy, Lara realized with a pang. Conley had always been one of the most handsome men she’d ever known, but he’d gotten more so as he’d aged. His eyes, forever dark and intense, now held shadows in them that drew her even closer. The few threads of silver that gleamed in the hair at his temples only added to his attraction. In one of those strange twists that couldn’t be explained, the further apart they’d grown, the more appealing he’d become.

He lifted a hand to his forehead and touched his bandage. Then he threw off the sheets and started to get out of bed. Moving his right leg too quickly, he paled immediately, a sharp curse following the movement as he fell back against the pillows with a groan and pulled up the covers once more.

Lara couldn’t help herself; she hurried into the room and to the side of the bed. “Are you all right? Do you want me to call the nurse?”

Before he could answer, the door squeaked open again. Lara and Conley both turned at the sound, but under his sheets, Conley immediately tensed, his whole body going taut and rigid. She glanced down at him in surprise then faced the two men who stood in the doorway. The two cops who’d stopped by earlier looked back at her.

“So you finally woke up, eh, Mr. Harrison?” The taller of the two, Officer Margulies, Lara recalled, walked to Conley’s bed and held out his hand. He introduced himself and then turned to the shorter man beside him. The other one, Officer Fields, nodded at Conley.

“We came by earlier, but you were asleep. Your wife suggested we come back later.”

Conley’s mouth went tight. “She didn’t tell me you had come.”

“I didn’t have a chance yet.” Lara sent an apologetic smile to the officers, then a puzzled look to Conley. He was always short with his words, but he was rarely downright rude. “I was going to—”

“Doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter,” Margulies dismissed her apology with a breezy wave of his hand. “We just wanted to talk to you about what happened, see if we can’t track down the son of a gun who put you here, that’s all.” His smile was friendly enough, but behind his demeanor, Lara caught an edge of determination. He pulled out a notebook and pen as a wave of tension rose from Conley’s bed. Lara was pretty sure the cops couldn’t tell, but she could. If he’d been able, Conley would have sprung from the bed and raced down the hall to get away from the men.

“There’s nothing to talk about,” he said. “I’m sure it was an accident. The guy just didn’t see me—”

“So it was a male driver?”

Conley tightened his mouth. “I couldn’t tell for sure. I just meant the driver. Whoever he—or she—was, they couldn’t see me. The snow was too bad and I was crossing the street against the light.”

The cop wrote something. “Car, van, truck?”

“It was a car,” Conley said, almost grudgingly. “A coupe, I think.”

Margulies looked up. “Didn’t get a plate number by any chance, did you?”

Conley shook his head.

“Color?”

“I don’t know.”

“Make?”

“No idea.”

Lara stood by in silence. She wasn’t surprised by Conley’s answers; he’d been focused on their argument and wouldn’t remember the details of the car. But why was he so nervous?

The other officer, who had said nothing up to this point, went to the opposite side of the room to lean against the wall. He spoke with his arms crossed, his face closed. “You own Harrison’s, right?”

“That’s right.” Conley’s voice sounded even tighter than it had before.

“Can’t you give us any details at all about the car that hit you? Any damage on it, for example? A broken headlight maybe?” Margulies tapped his pen against his notebook. “This isn’t much to work with.”

“I’ve told you everything I can.”

Fields spoke again, and despite her initial impressions, Lara realized he was the one in charge. “You have any enemies, Mr. Harrison?”

“Everyone has enemies, don’t they?”

The two cops looked at him and so did Lara. After a second, Conley shrugged. “None that would want to run over me,” he said finally. “At least none that I know of.”

Slapping his notebook closed, Margulies shook his head. “Well, I guess that’s it, unless you can think of—”

“Any problems at work?” Fields spoke as if the other man hadn’t. Then he shot a glance in Lara’s direction. “Any problems at home?”

“Everything’s fine.” Conley spoke quickly and Lara jerked her head in his direction. He smiled at her for the benefit of the watching policemen, but his eyes warned her not to call him on the lie.

Lara smiled back automatically. He was tighter than a watch spring, she thought in amazement. What on earth was wrong with him?

“I’d like to get home, though.” He looked at the cops. “If that’s all you need…”

“No problem,” Margulies said, sending a nod in Lara’s direction. “But you give us a call when you’re feeling better and maybe we’ll be able to do a little more. In the meantime, take care of yourself.”

The door closed behind them with a swish, and Lara turned immediately to Conley. “What’s going on?” she demanded without preamble. “You acted as if they were here to arrest you, for God’s sake!”

“Nothing’s going on.” His demeanor sharp once more, he eased to the side of the bed with a grimace and stood up, an audible groan escaping before he could stop it.

Her first thought was to help him but this time she stayed where she was. “Conley, come on! I know you! I know you’re hiding—”

Turning sharply, he cursed at her. “Dammit, Lara, I said nothing was going on. Would you believe me for once? Cut me some slack, for God’s sake. I’m in pain here!”

When he came out of the bathroom a few moments later, he was dressed in the clothes she’d brought him. “Let’s get out of here,” he said without looking at her. “I want to go home.”

CONLEY BROODED all the way home and Lara let him. It was pointless to try to get him to talk so she didn’t even make the effort.

They drove through the snow-locked town in silence, the beauty of the frozen landscape nonexistent to them both. The only thing Lara could think about were the two cops and their questions. At Mesa, she frequently dealt with the police about the various cases they were handling. Margulies and Fields were good but it would have taken better to pry anything out of Conley.

And he clearly had something to hide.

As she turned down their street and eased into the driveway, it hit Lara. Maybe Conley did have something to hide…but not from them. She’d been in the room, too. Maybe his reluctance to elaborate had more to do with her presence than theirs.

The idea upset her, but there was nothing she could do about it. If she had any sense, from now on she’d close her mind to thoughts like those. Their marriage was over. She’d declared it dead with her request. The only thing left to do was bury it. Getting hurt and wondering about what could have been made no difference now.

She pulled the SUV into the garage and parked, but by the time she got to the other side of the vehicle to help Conley out, he’d already managed to open his door and slide from the seat. Pale and clearly in pain, he stood stiffly as she rounded the truck’s fender.

“I would have helped you.” She stopped, her hand on the cold metal. “Couldn’t you have waited?”

“It’s okay,” he said from behind gritted teeth.

Always silent, always tough.

“Fine.” She turned around and abandoned him where he was. If that was what he wanted, she could play by those rules, she fumed. Let him make his own damn way inside.

She unlocked the door and went into the house. She’d left the thermostat up that morning when she’d rushed to the hospital and a comforting warmth wrapped itself around her. The place felt like home. Except one ingredient was missing—the essential one—and that was, as Sandy had so aptly noted, love.

A few moments after she entered, the door squeaked again and Conley stepped inside. One look at his face and the thoughts she’d just had fled Lara’s mind. Conley looked horrible, all his weight on his good left leg. She rushed to where he wobbled.

“Put your arm around my shoulder,” she commanded. “You need some help.”

“I don’t—”

“Oh, for God’s sakes, Conley! You’re white as a sheet and just about as strong. Let me help you get into bed!”

He started to say something, then obviously thought better of it. Lifting his arm, he draped it over her shoulder.

Her reaction was instantaneous.

It’d been months since Conley had touched her, even the most casual of brushes. When they passed each other in the hall, they both went to great lengths to avoid contact. Now the whole length of his body was pressed up against hers, the warmth of his arms and legs heating her too sensitive skin, his chest tucked against her shoulder in a perfect fit. Memories of other times they’d walked this way, with her snuggled under his arm, his cologne filling her senses, suddenly flooded her. She could even feel his heart beating, she thought with alarm. His pulse was pounding a rhythm so fast and powerful, it had to be painful.

Then she realized it wasn’t his pulse she was feeling. It was hers. And it was painful. Each beat spoke to her. This is what it used to be like. This is what you used to have.

She wondered for a second if he were experiencing some of the same conflicted emotions, then Lara gave herself a mental shake. What was she thinking? Of course, he wasn’t.

He brought their progress to a halt and looked down at her. She lifted her gaze to his, his mouth so close to her forehead she could feel his warm breath when he spoke.

“Am I too heavy?”

“I—I think I can manage.”

“What about the stairs?”

“Oh, my God…” Lara looked up at him. “I didn’t even think about the stairs! There’s no way you can go up there.” The master suite was on the second floor. “You’ll have to take the guest room.”

His expression shifted minutely, then she understood.

“I’ll move out,” she said stiffly. “It won’t take but a few minutes to get my things.”

“Don’t.” He tilted his head toward the den. “Just put me in there. I’ll sleep on the couch for a couple of days. As soon as the swelling goes down, I’ll be fine with the stairs.”

Without any argument, she nodded, and together they made their way into the paneled room off the kitchen. Lara eased him down onto the couch where he settled with a heavy sigh. “You’ll have to get my stuff from upstairs,” he said. “I need my briefcase and my cell phone. There’s a file on the chair beside the bed, too. Bring it and—”

Lara stared at him in amazement. “Conley, what you need is to rest! You can’t work right now.”

“I can’t just sit here,” he said in a tight voice. “I’ll go nuts.”

“Then here—” she handed him the remote “—watch a little TV. Do nothing for a change. Relax. That’s what normal people do sometimes, you know.”

He started to reply but the telephone rang. Lara crossed the room to answer it, and Theresa Marchante replied to her cool hello.

“Lara, is Conley there? I stopped by the hospital and they told me he’d checked out.”

“We got home a little while ago, Theresa. Would you like to talk to him?”

“I’m afraid I have to. It’s about the Baku situation….”

Without another word, Lara handed her husband the phone then stepped out of the room. He was going to work, with or without her help, so she might as well leave him to it.

In the kitchen Lara started dinner, her mind hopping from one thing to another. Her thoughts landed, as she knew they would, back on Conley’s behavior at the hospital. She opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bunch of onions to chop for the soup. He hadn’t wanted to talk to the police, that much had been obvious. If her presence in the room had been the main factor, why?

Her fertile imagination had Lara coming up with more answers than she needed. The knife flashed as she listed them in her mind, but all the variations centered on one thing: the Other Problem.

Conley was having an affair.

Lara didn’t know who the woman was and she didn’t want to know, but she recognized the signs; in her business, she had learned them all. Through the years, though, she’d studied Conley as well and that was how she’d finally figured it out. He’d been hiding something from her for months now. Not to mention the nights he didn’t come home. Or the times he raced to pick up the phone when they were both at home. And then there was the note, of course. The classic giveaway.

It was so clichéd, she’d wanted to throw up. On her way to the cleaners, she’d found a crumpled e-mail in one of his pockets. The message was clear, the point so personal and graphic, Lara’s guts had been turned inside out. She’d gone home and searched their computer for more. She’d found an encrypted file, but hadn’t been able to get past his security password. She was sure it held other e-mails.

She’d asked him point-blank if he was having an affair. He’d looked at her as if she’d sprouted horns then denied it—just as she’d known he would. That was when she’d moved out of the master bedroom.

A sound from the doorway brought her head up. She wondered how long he’d been standing there and watching her.

Their eyes connected over the kitchen table. “I think I need one of those pills Sorelli gave us. Do you have them?”

Lara nodded and wiped her hands on her apron. “They’re in my purse. I’ll get them for you.”

She handed him the medicine and a glass of water a few seconds later. When he finished, he set the glass on the counter with a sigh. He looked worn-out.

She spoke without thinking. “Why don’t you go back into the den and rest? I’ll bring you your soup on a tray.”

“You don’t mind?” He ran a hand through his dark hair, leaving it spiked and wavy. “Waiting on me like this?”

“You can’t very well do it yourself, can you?”

“No, but it’s been a long time since you did anything like that.”

“It’s been a long time since you’ve been around so that I could.”

Without a word, he turned around and went back into the den. Angry at herself for the pettiness, Lara returned to the sink.

An hour later, when she walked into the den with a wooden tray in her hands, Conley was asleep. Sprawled on the couch, he had a pillow tucked under his swollen knee and another one behind his head. In his restlessness, he’d already managed to throw off the afghan. It lay in a brightly colored pile at the foot of the sofa.

Lara put the tray on a nearby table and picked up the wool throw. Fluffing it out, she bent over to put it across his sleeping form, but it was too short; it barely covered his torso and the top part of his legs. Stretching it as far as the yarn would allow, she bent to her knees and tucked it in around him, then she stopped and looked at his bruised face.

Even in rest, Conley looked fierce and anxious, tension etching its way across his features. She reached out and gently smoothed a lock of dark hair that had escaped to curl over his brow. Long and silky, it was softer than she remembered. He was such a handsome man, she thought with a catch in her throat. Lean and hungry-looking, he was the type women glanced at then imagined in bed.

Her hand drifted lower, down to the edge of his jaw. A line of steel that never bent. His chin was dark with the shadow of his stubble, his skin felt warm, as warm as the rest of his body had been as she’d helped him inside. She let her touch linger for a moment, her eyes on the pulse at the bottom of his throat.

How many times had she kissed him in that spot?

How many times had he done the same to her?

For one crazy minute she thought about pressing her lips against his neck, then she came to her senses.

What was she doing? She’d told this man she wanted to end their marriage. She’d told him she wanted a divorce. She’d told herself she didn’t love him anymore.

She’d told the truth.

Hadn’t she?

CHAPTER FOUR

CONLEY HUNG UP the phone and started rearranging the papers in the file spread over his mahogany desk. It was busywork and nothing more, and with an angry curse, he stood and limped to the window that covered one wall of his office. In the crystal-blue distance, the Rocky Mountains glistened, their towering peaks blanketed in a thick layer of pristine snow, dotted with patches of green firs. Filled with a sense of doom, he stared out at the stunning view.

He’d gotten the first call the day after his accident. A second one had come the day after that. By the end of the week, it was clear his mishap hadn’t escaped the notice of his investors. Suspicious and wary, it was almost as if they’d been told about the other incidents. With no options left, he’d flown to Houston that weekend and met the primaries in an elegant hotel. The gracious surroundings had done nothing to smooth their worried brows. To say they hadn’t been happy was more than an understatement.

The shit had hit the fan.

They’d given him an ultimatum: Get security and get it immediately. Call the police. Call the FBI. Call whoever it takes, but have the stalker found and stopped. And by the way, make damn sure no one hears about this, either. No one.

Conley shook his head. He couldn’t deny their logic. The tech market was shaky enough on a good day; publicity as potentially bad as this could put a spike right through the heart of Harrison’s. The whole company would go straight down the tubes. This morning—a week since his accident—he’d brought Matthew Oakley in and discussed the situation, explaining the nervous investors and their desire for security. Matthew had reacted just as Conley had known he would.

“This makes my point, Con,” he’d said. “We need to move on the glass chip. I’m telling you, it’s the best way for us to get on top. The money guys will forget about everything when they hear about this idea.”

Standing beside Conley’s desk, Matthew had worn a familiar expression—one of stubborn persistence. Quiet and self-effacing, the gifted designer understood the world of computer chips better than anyone Conley had ever known. But he was also invisible. Light-brown hair, nondescript eyes, average height and weight. When he walked into a room, no one ever saw Matthew. Even fewer listened when he talked. And so he was dismissed.