Yes, mom, I’ll run. And I’ll go. You won’t have died in vain.

Nem grabbed the nurse’s hand and squeezed, so she would understand this wasn’t a whim or a sick woman’s fancy. She felt a tingle that caused her to pause for a moment. The nurse gave her a strange look as if she knew something was about to happen.

Their hands seemed locked in a moment of odd connection, but she had no time to ponder the feeling, as she said, “Can you please tell him that I hope he understands. Everything’s how it should be. This was just bad luck. But you mustn’t let him in this room again, no matter what.”

Belinda’s brows furrowed and then she seemed to catch herself. “Oh you can’t mean that. After you take a nap, you’ll feel differently.”

“I’m sure,” said Nem, her heart breaking, as she spoke the terrible words to a stranger she sensed didn’t seem to care, who had probably seen too much heartache every day.

“A nap won’t change my mind.”

She closed her eyes and sank away into the swirling waters of another dream, and entered her new life. Without Greg.

40

Four days now he’d followed Orelia, and she did nothing which he perceived as unusual. She attended Morris’ funeral, the event which had put a halt to her tour. He thanked his luck—whatever she’d left him—that she wasn’t doing interstate publicity because he could hardly follow her onto a plane and around a strange city. He wouldn’t know the streets well and he couldn’t afford the cost these days. So for a change, thank you Lady Luck.

Since Orelia’s publishing success, she’d moved to a large house in a suburb in the very outer reaches of the town. The property was in a development of stylish, five-bedroom, multiple bathroom homes sitting on well-groomed acre blocks.

He’d done some research on a real estate website and learned the place set her back $1.6 million. Not much of a setback he imagined. One or two royalty checks from her first book. Fox Studios had optioned her romance series despite only the first book released so far, and he guessed the compensation for that would cover furnishings and a pool.

By the look of the outlying boundary, which he’d walked several times trying to view the house, he surmised she enjoyed her privacy. The fence was high and the trees alongside thick, providing a perfect screen, so that from the road nothing of her home was visible. The ridges of broken glass cemented along the top of the barrier said more than a Do Not Enter sign.

Had she something to hide? Or did she simply want to be alone in a peaceful, forest setting? When they’d met, she seemed a genuine, outgoing, enthusiastic woman with a passion for books. This home shouted overkill for one person, no family and, as far as he knew, not even a dog.

The first night he walked the boundary looking for a vantage point well-concealed from the road. At first, he imagined he’d climb over and get a close look at the house. He considered returning with a thick rug or canvas and a hammer, and use that to bypass the crude security. However, scaling the eight feet would require a ladder, and that became all too complicated.