The Trophy Wife

She smiled. As if it required a conscious effort, he broke eye contact and slowly resumed his retreat. Rather than leave via the house, he changed directions, veering toward the side yard. Less than a minute later, she heard his car start on the other side of the house.

What in the world had just happened?

She stared at her iced tea. Closing her eyes, she placed the cold glass against her forehead.

She’d reacted to the sight and sound and touch of Tripp Calhoun. And he’d reacted to her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so breathless without doing a thing. Her entire body felt sensitized. If she were to jump in the pool right now, she would sizzle all over.

A door opened, and Inez bustled outside. “Your father is off the phone.” The other woman looked all around. “Where’s Tripp?”

Amber’s vision remained fixed on the path Tripp had taken. “Something came up. An emergency at the hospital. He had to leave.”

Inez made no reply.

Amber could feel Inez’s penetrating gaze. “What is it?” Amber asked.

Turning her hand over, Inez said, “He left his watch inside. Did he say when he will return?”

“No. I’m afraid he didn’t.” Amber reached for the watch. “I’ll be sure he gets it, Inez.”

“That is a good idea, I think.” Inez turned away before Amber could decide what to make of the dark-haired woman’s beaming smile.

Amber strode to the shaded side of the pool. Bending down, she gently shook her friend. “Claire, wake up.”

A pair of baby-blue eyes fluttered open. “I don’t want to wake up. I was dreaming about this amazing, ruggedly attractive, dark-haired man.”

Amber smiled. “It wasn’t a dream, Claire. Believe me. Come on. I have to go to Ukiah.”

Claire sat up languidly. “Ukiah, really?” she said, pushing her straight, coffee-colored hair away from her face. “Could you drop me off at the gallery first? You can fill me in on the way.”

Half an hour later Amber pulled her car into the alley behind Claire’s art gallery in Prosperino. Claire opened her door and climbed out, then leaned down to say goodbye through the open window. Behind her, Amber noticed a door opening on the second story of a building in the distance. Something about the woman descending the stairs seemed familiar. Very familiar.

“Amber, is something wrong?” Claire asked.

Amber didn’t take her eyes off the woman, whose hair was hidden beneath a scarf, her eyes behind dark glasses, until she’d disappeared around the corner. “I thought I just saw my mother.”

Claire turned to look behind her, but the woman was gone. “Your mother, here?” Claire asked incredulously.

“I know.” Amber couldn’t imagine her mother lowering herself enough to visit the art district of Prosperino. It must have been somebody else. For the sake of curiosity, she pointed to the building in the distance. “Is that a business or an apartment?”

Claire shuddered. “I guess you could call it a business. A shady private investigator rents the upstairs office. I can imagine your mother there as easily as I can imagine her strolling the streets in the red-light district.”

“Prosperino doesn’t have a red-light district.”

“I’m thinking about starting one.”

“Claire.”

Claire winked. “Now, don’t you have someplace to go and some ruggedly attractive man to see?”

Amber shook her head, nodded, and finally smiled. While Claire strolled into the second of the two art studios she’d opened a few months ago, Amber put her car in gear.

The engine purred like a contented tiger. Her mother had given her the shiny little sports car for her last birthday. It was red. She didn’t even like red. Before the car accident, Meredith Colton had known that.

What would her mother have been doing visiting a shady private investigator in Prosperino, when she’d made such a point these past ten years of finding fault with everything about the town? It must have been someone else.

Amber glanced at the sky. The clouds had thinned, forming a haze, the one shaped like Smoky the Bear blurring with all the others. Joe Dimaggio, indeed. Tripp’s smile, stark and white, shimmered across her mind.

What was it with men and baseball players?

Her last boyfriend had been a Giants fan. He’d enjoyed using baseball metaphors to describe their relationship. He’d spent the biggest share of their dates trying to get past first base. The night he’d presented her with a three-carat diamond, he’d expected a grand-slam home run. The ring had been pretty, but it wasn’t home run material. And neither was he. She’d turned down his proposal. Last she’d heard he was pursuing some other rich girl down in San Francisco.

Amber thought about Tripp. Until his arm had brushed the outer swell of her breast, she’d thought she was the only one aware of the attraction between them. Gracious, he probably wasn’t even admitting that he’d felt any such thing.

Whether he admitted it or not, she knew he had.

She touched the watch in her pocket and smiled. This was better than a vacation.

She wasn’t bored anymore.

Two

A blast of hot air hit Amber the moment she opened her car door. Taking a deep breath, she placed a steadying hand on her queasy stomach and climbed slowly to her feet. It had been cool and foggy along the coast when she’d left Prosperino, which just went to show that the locals were right. There really were three seasons in this part of California, often all in the same day.

She rotated a kink from between her shoulder blades then stepped away from her car. The drive to Ukiah seemed like forever. Though it was only forty-five miles, it was like her father always said: “Prosperino is near a lot of places, but you can’t get there from here.” Joe Colton compensated by flying whenever possible. Not Amber. She’d reached the brink of motion sickness negotiating the twenty-five mile stretch of Highway 101 that wound around cliffs and up and down hills over the coastal mountains. Flying would have done her in. Thank goodness the road that ran north and south on this side of the mountains was straighter and mostly four-lane.

She took a shaky step, popped a breath mint into her mouth and peeled off her jacket. So this, she thought as she looked around, her heels clicking over the paved parking lot, was where Tripp worked. He was going to be so surprised to see her.

The streets of Ukiah were lined with beautiful old Victorian houses. The sprawling hospital was old, too, but it looked as if it had been remodeled in recent years. Double doors slid open as she approached the building. Folding her jacket over one arm, she peered around the lobby trying to decide where to go from here.

Across the waiting room, a short, heavyset nurse with broad shoulders and a hairstyle that resembled an army helmet stood behind a high counter.

“Hello,” Amber said, sauntering closer.

Clutching a pen between thick fingers, the gray-haired nurse looked at Amber over the tops of the reading glasses perched low on her broad nose. “May I help you?”

Amber put on her friendliest smile. “I’d like to see Dr. Calhoun.”

The only things that moved on the stern-faced nurse were the brown eyes giving Amber a thorough once-over. “He isn’t taking appointments this afternoon.”

Amber eased closer and smiled conspiratorially. “That’s okay. I don’t have an appointment.”

She knew the blunder for what it was the second it was out. Nurse Proctor—that was what her name badge said—turned her attention back to the chart. Amber was dismissed.

Obviously, Nurse Proctor didn’t know that Amber wasn’t easily dismissed. “I won’t take up much of his time,” she said, trying on an even bigger smile.

The nurse’s eyes remained fixed on the chart.

Amber tried another tack. “I know he’s here because he told me he was coming here in answer to an emergency call.”