Back In The Bedroom (The Wrong Bed #29)(25)

“An ex. Shocking. Do they have any idea which one of the thousands it might be?”

“There weren’t thousands. Hundreds maybe, but—”

“Get to the point, Eddie.”

“It was Sheila Vanetti. Your mother always refers to her as the crazy one and it turns out, she’s right.”

“Where is she now?”

“Missing, funny enough, and the police haven’t been able to track her down. And they think…well, this is embarrassing, to tell you the truth.”

“They think what?”

“That she’s trying to scare me,” Eddie said laughing. “Funny, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” Reilly said. “A laugh riot.”

“They even think I need protection. Can you imagine such a thing? Me being stalked? How hysterical is that?”

“Hysterical.” Christ. “Did you hire a bodyguard?”

His mother appeared in the doorway. She’d always had a sort of sixth sense when it came to Eddie and, sure enough, she wore her worried frown.

“I thought,” Eddie said, “that given your last occupation, you could handle it for me.”

“I’ll be right over.”

“Thanks, son.”

When he’d hung up, Tessa said, “Is everything okay?”

He rubbed his eyes. “Not really.”

“What is it, Reilly?” This from Cheri, who looked far more worried than an ex should look. But he told them everything and, when he was finished, both of them watched him with that look that said they believed he could do anything.

Apparently Eddie thought so as well.

All these damn tugs at his heart. And he didn’t have a clue what to do about them.





9




THE NEXT MORNING, Tessa turned the key of her VW Beetle, but for the second morning in a row, nothing happened. Yesterday she’d thought it was just a dead battery and she’d charged it overnight.

Apparently she’d been wrong. “Come on, baby,” she coaxed, and tapped the console lovingly. She tried again.

Nothing.

With a sigh, she leaned back. Her sister had already left for work, so she couldn’t get a ride from her. If she called Rafe, he’d probably get on the next plane.

She couldn’t call Eddie again.

So she got on the bus and decided not to worry about her car until she could do something about it. By the time she got onto the elevator in Reilly’s building, it was one minute after eight and her heart was pumping. She hated to be late and she ran off the elevator the moment the doors opened.

“I’m sorry,” she said breathlessly to Cheri, who stood there stripping off her sweater, clearly having also just arrived.

“No need to be sorry, you’re close enough.” Cheri smiled. “And since you’re holding a Krispy Kreme doughnut bag in your hand, you’re my new best friend.”

Tessa laughed. “It’s a shameless bribe for your son, but I brought enough for all of us. I’m determined to see him smile today.”

“Now that I’d like to see. He’s working out now; there’s a gym on the fourth floor he sometimes uses in the mornings. Between that and the doughnuts, it might just do the trick.” Cheri turned on the stereo to soft rock, opened the shades to the beautiful view and flipped on the lights to the hall that led to the offices.

Apparently there wasn’t a regular receptionist, because there wasn’t enough phone traffic to warrant one, which left the two of them taking turns answering phones. Knowing Reilly liked his messages first-thing, Tessa sat at the front desk to check his machine.

“He’s not easy to get to know,” Cheri said behind her. “And yet you already seem to have him pegged.”

“Yes, well, we got what you might call concentrated time together that night we spent locked up in Eddie’s house,” Tessa reminded her.

“It’s funny what the long nighttime hours will do to a person when they’re awake,” Cheri said. “How much more open you can be, how much more you’ll share.”

Tessa had to smile wryly at that. They might not have shared a lot of words, per se, but there’d been enough kissing and touching to make her feel extremely open. And vulnerable.

She wasn’t comfortable with that. Not one little bit.

“Is that what happened, Tessa?”

She sighed. “In a manner of speaking. And now, in the light of day, facing each other over accounting ledgers, it’s been a little…awkward. Sometimes a lot awkward.”

“Plus, Reilly has a way of making things as awkward as possible, doesn’t he?” Cheri said, smiling sympathetically. “I love him, I love him with my entire heart and soul and yet I want to just smack him sometimes for not letting people…I don’t know…see him. He’s so afraid he’s going to end up like his father. He’s a bit hung up on his privacy.”

“I noticed.”

“He doesn’t get that from me, I’ll tell you that. Actually, I don’t know where he gets it. Probably from working for the government as an operative doing…well, I’m not really sure, to tell you the truth. I’m just glad he’s not still doing it.”

Tessa stopped in the act of opening the bag of doughnuts. “You mean he was…CIA?”