How could Maxi have invited someone else to stay? She’d felt safe from the curiosity of the world here, but that security had lasted for only two days.

Was she making too big a deal of it? The man she’d spoken to didn’t seem the type to care too much about fame. If he was that popular, he was famous himself, at least in some circles. Maybe who she was and her connection to Hollywood wouldn’t matter to him, and he wouldn’t tell anyone about it.

After the success of Expect the Worst, she doubted it would go that way, but one could always hope...

She checked the clock. Nearly seven. She needed to get over there. She’d already put off Kiki’s care as long as she felt comfortable.

She went into the bathroom and covered her scars with bandages as though she’d just come from the hospital. The big white gauze squares were unsightly, but not as unsightly as what lay beneath. And the bandages hid how much her face had changed, so if Maxi’s friend did recognize her and he decided to say something to someone, he couldn’t reveal too much.

If she were lucky, she wouldn’t even encounter him. That was the goal.

But when she stepped out, she found three more cars in the drive: a Cadillac Escalade, a Ford Explorer and a pretty Tesla. What was going on? Was this guy already throwing a party?

Maxi should be more careful about the people he allowed onto the property while he was out of town. But because she’d already gone to the trouble of covering the damaged part of her face and she needed to take care of the bird, she didn’t turn back as she was tempted to do. She told herself that it was a good thing her new neighbor had company. If he was distracted, she had a far greater chance of getting in and out without being noticed.

Pulling her sweater tighter around her body—she’d been gaining weight with all the emotional eating she’d been doing—she hung back behind the vegetation until she could confirm there wasn’t anyone in the yard. Then she hurried along the path leading to the main house and tried her key at the back door.

It didn’t work. Of course.

With a sigh, she ducked her head and marched purposefully toward the front.

“Activity at the front door.”

She froze the second the computerized voice of the security system announced her presence. But no one came to find out what was going on. She could hear voices in the kitchen/living-room area, and the conversation didn’t even pause. Either no one had heard the security system, or they couldn’t be bothered with it.