“So, we’re looking at a family reunion, huh?”

Stone grinned ruefully. “I never thought of it that way. Arrington and I have spent so little time together over the years.”

“So, how are you feeling about this?” Dino asked.

“Scared stiff,” Stone said.

2

Arrington Calder awoke in her rented house in Virginia and immediately smelled the man lying next to her. It was odd how he had this consistent personal odor—not unpleasant, but certainly distinctive. He even had it immediately after showering. It was strange.

She carefully lifted his arm from across her body, because she didn’t want to wake him yet. Today, she had to have a conversation with him that she didn’t want to have and that he wouldn’t want to hear, and she was putting it off until the last minute. He was extraordinarily jealous, something she had found a little attractive when she had first started seeing, then sleeping with, him, after she had hired him to design her new house. He was prominent among Virginia architects and was a professor of architecture at the University of Virginia in nearby Charlottesville. His name was Timothy Rutledge.

She managed to slip out of bed without waking him and tiptoed across the bedroom, through the dressing room, where her packed bags, still open, awaited her departure, then into the bathroom, where she closed the door to shut out the sound of the shower. She washed her face, having not had time to do that the night before, because of his persistence.

She got into the shower and began to feel better. In a couple of hours she would be away from here for a while, and that would give him time for his ardor to cool.

She was washing her hair, her eyes closed against the shampoo, when he let himself into the shower. She tried to drive her elbow into his belly, but his arms were around her from behind, pinning hers to her body. He fumbled around, trying to enter her from behind, but she struggled free. “Get out!” she said, pushing him out the swinging glass door.

He stood on the bath mat, fuming. “What’s the matter with you?” he demanded.

“Go down and start breakfast,” she said. “I’ll be there in half an hour.”

“Why are your bags packed?” he asked.

“I’ll talk to you downstairs. Now go!”

Reluctantly, he went.

She rinsed her hair thoroughly, then shut off the water and felt for the bath sheet on the hook outside the door. She dried herself, then picked up the hair dryer and dried her blond hair, helping it into place with a brush. That done, she applied her makeup, then got into her traveling clothes, a pants suit. She picked up the phone in her dressing room and pressed a button for her son’s room. “Peter,” she said, “time to get up.”

He picked up the phone. “I’m way ahead of you,” he said. “I’m packing.”

“Good boy.” She hung up and went downstairs. Tim had prepared eggs, bacon, and toast, and she sat down and began to eat.