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I frowned at him. I’d hardly classify my comment about his name as an interruption. He frowned back.
“—this is my project.” He waved his hand, tablet and all. I understood he meant not the living room in which we were standing but Freedom’s Chase with its mini-mansions under construction, each house all but overflowing its mere quarter-acre lot. There’d never be much call for a lawn service around here. There weren’t any lawns.
“If you fall and kill yourself,” he said, “your survivors will doubtless sue me for all I’m worth.” He looked as put upon as if the suit were already in progress.
Thinking he needed to lighten up a bit, I asked oh-so-sweetly, “And you’re worth how much, Edward? Just so I can tell the family an amount to ask for if the unthinkable comes to pass.”
He stared at me, dark eyes narrowed. “Cute.”
I grinned. “Thank you.”
He shook his head and reluctantly grinned back. My heart went pitter-pat as if I were sixteen, and the star quarterback had deigned to smile at me.
“Will you be much longer?” He glanced at his watch. “It’s eight o’clock. Past time to go home.” He practically vibrated with impatience.
I turned to the fabric, carefully lifting the beautiful, pricey Tuscan Vine. The large clusters of aubergine grapes, the green leaves and the brown vines were embroidered on cream silk. I loved the pattern. I glanced at him over my shoulder. “I’m not sure how long I’ll be. It depends on whether I have the peace and quiet I need to do my job.”
“Ha-ha,” he said.
I searched for and found the top edge of the drapery. “You don’t have to wait for me, you know.” I pointed to the other long windows. “I managed to hang those all by myself. I’m sure I can manage this one, too.”
He flicked a glance at the windows I indicated. As he did, the sofa caught his eye. “The couch is purple!” He sounded offended.
“Aubergine,” I corrected, glad I wasn’t the one who had picked the color. The interior designer who had subbed out the windows to me had made that selection. I decided not to mention that I thought it went well with the grapes in Tuscan Vine and the purple in the Sinclair plaid on the slipper chairs.
“It’s purple. Bright purple.”
“It’s not bright purple,” I said patiently. “It’s aubergine.”
He sniffed, walked to it, and ran his hand over the seat. “It’s slippery!”
“It’s taffeta.”
“Taffeta? Taffeta is for dresses, not sofas.” He suddenly looked uncertain. “Like evening gowns, right?” At my surprised expression, he said, “I have four sisters.”
“Huh,” I said eloquently. “I have four brothers. I’m youngest.”
“Oldest. And you can call purple aubergine until you’re blue in the face, but it’s still purple.”
“Deep purple. Eggplant. In fact aubergine is the French word for eggplant.”
“Semantics. And you need to pack up. I’m not leaving until everything is locked up tight. We’ve had some nighttime thieves recently, and I’m not taking a chance with this model home.”
I stopped fussing with Tuscan Vine and its clusters of grapes. “You’ve had thieves?”
“Storage shed broken into, tools taken, nails, lumber. Nothing has been vandalized, nor has anything of great value or quantity been taken. Still, I’ve hired a night guard to patrol the development.”
I frowned. “I saw a man walking around one of the houses on the next street.” If he was the thief, that would explain his skulking air, and if he was the guard, I guess he was sneaking around trying to catch people.
Gray stiffened. “The guard doesn’t come on until midnight. When did you see this man and at what house?”
“I was watching him when you startled me. And that house.” I pointed out the back window.
He walked over and looked. He immediately relaxed. “It’s all right. The Ryders bought that house, and Dorothy Ryder comes out practically every day to see how the work is progressing. Drives my men crazy. Ken must have decided to come with her today, so they came later, after work and dinner.”
Relieved, I nodded. Thank goodness I hadn’t called anyone.
Gray turned from the window and sat in one of the plump armchairs covered in Scalamandré’s plum Bali pattern, and began ticking mysterious things off the lists on his tablet. His cell rang, and he silenced it, checking the readout. He made another note on his pad.
He looked good in the chair.
Of course, that was solely because the chair looked good. The whole house was being done in fabulous fabrics from Scalamandré, the high-end company that did one-of-a-kind orders for clients like the White House and limited quantities of hand-loomed fabrics for the wealthy. I’d never cut and sewn such expensive material in my life and probably never would again. I calculated over and over to be certain of my measurements, and every time I cut, I hyperventilated. The thought of ruining material worth three to four hundred dollars a yard tended to do that to a person.
While Gray checked things off on his list, I repositioned my ladder.
He looked up suddenly. “Our first official Open House is Saturday.” He nodded toward the partially draped window. “You will be finished by Saturday?”
“I will be finished by Saturday,” I agreed. “Absolutely.”
“Today’s Tuesday. You only have three working days left.”
“How convenient. I only have less than three days worth of work left,” I said, the very soul of reason. I didn’t mention that several pillows and the round table skirt, aubergine taffeta like the sofa, weren’t yet cut out, let alone sewn. Neither was the square table topper of Sinclair tartan in soft green, mauve and aubergine on cream.
I put a foot on the first rung of my ladder.
Gray jumped to his feet. “What are you doing? Don’t use that ladder!”
I mentally rolled my eyes. “I have to use the ladder.” I climbed the first two steps. It swayed drunkenly. “How else can I hang the treatments?”
“Look—” He halted. “By the way, what’s your name?” He actually appeared interested.
“Anna Volente.”
He nodded. “Look, Anna, get a decent ladder.”
“I am not going to go buy myself another ladder. My father gave me this.”
“Your father—” He stopped abruptly, wisely thinking better of saying whatever he was thinking. “This is a building site. We have plenty of ladders.”
“And they would be where? Oops, not here.”
He muttered under his breath. “I’ll get you a decent ladder. Just get off that thing before it collapses under you.” He stalked to me, grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me gently but decisively off. He indicated a point at my feet. “Stand there. Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Do I look like a cocker spaniel or something?”
“No, though the hair’s about right for an Irish setter. Stay.” With a grin and a hand held up to emphasize the command, he left the room.
I stared at the doorway through which he’d disappeared. I looked at the spot at my feet. With calm deliberation I took my first step. Then my second, and soon I was at the front windows where I had already hung Tuscan Vine. I worked with the folds of the heavy silk fabric, adjusting them to drape just so. I stepped back and eyed the overall effect. I nodded. They looked good, if I did say so myself. Apparently he wasn’t going to say so.
Gray returned, lugging a stepladder that was taller than mine and obviously much sturdier.
“Now you won’t have to stand on the top step, so you can lean into it to keep your balance. No more falls.” He folded my old standby and set up his ladder in its place. It looked strong enough to hold both of us, an unexpectedly cozy thought.
“Now get up there and let me hand you this heavy thing.” He indicated the Tuscan Vine lying on the chair. “Or better yet, let me hang it.”
“That’s all right,” I said as I climbed quickly. I recognized potential disaster when I saw it. “I know what I’m doing.”
He didn’t say a word, merely gathered the fabric in his arms and stood there radiating energy and cooperative spirit. He handed me the top of the panel, and I began attaching it beneath the swag I’d hung earlier. I had to admit that the task was going to be easier now that I didn’t have to both hold the material and attach it.
Movement outside caught my eye. I glanced again at the house kitty-corner from the one I was decorating. The man I’d seen earlier stood at the opening for what I guessed was one day to be the kitchen door. He jumped to the ground. I squinted. What was it about him that was so strange? As I watched, he unscrewed something and stuffed part of it in his pants pocket. The rest he stuck in his waistband at the small of his back, pulling his red shirt over it. After wiping the back of his wrist across his forehead, he peeled flesh-colored gloves from his hands, balled them, and stuffed them in his other pocket. I frowned.
“Gray.” I motioned for him to come look. “The man’s back. He just took off some gloves like the ones doctors wear.”
“Gloves? Why is he wearing gloves in August? And why that kind?”
Like I knew. Shrugging, I moved as far to one side of the ladder as I could so he had room to climb. It vibrated under me as he took the first two steps, then stopped.
“Move to the center,” he said. “I think it will be better if I put one foot on either side of you. Otherwise we’ll be unbalanced.”
I nodded absently and slid to the center, concentrating on the man outside. I blinked in disbelief as he suddenly pulled what could only be a stocking from his head. His features leaped into focus.
“No wonder he looked so funny. He was wearing a stocking over his head.”
“What?” Gray stood on the step below me and tried to peer around me. “Can’t quite see yet.” He slid one foot beside mine, looking down to be sure of its placement. He began to raise himself to slide the other foot in place.
I froze as the man in the yard swiveled his head and looked directly at me. I knew I was highly visible with the westering sun streaming over me, just as he was clearly visible to me, blond hair, hook nose, mustache and all. I’m not very fanciful, but I could feel the malevolence of his stare across the distance and felt goose bumps spring up on my arms.
“What’s wrong?” Gray asked, straightening to peer over my shoulder.
“He’s—” I’d been about to say that he was looking at me, but the sentence changed when he pulled something from the waistband at the small of his back “—got a gun!”
TWO
“He’s got a gun!”
At least that’s what I meant to say. What came out sounded more like I was gargling with a particularly offensive mouthwash. I hurled myself backwards, away from the window, away from the danger.
I slammed hard against Gray who made his own gargling sound. Together we tumbled to the floor, a wild pinwheel of arms and legs. I thought I also heard a particularly heartfelt grunt from Gray when we struck the unforgiving floor. Over the crash of the falling ladder and the terrified beating of my heart, it was hard to discern one sound from another.
There was a brief moment of silence as I lay on my back, breath squished from my lungs by the bone-jarring impact. I stared at the ceiling and the little circles of red dancing across it. I gave a mighty gasp, and oxygen rushed into my depleted system. The red circles disappeared.
A gun! The man had a gun! I had never seen a handgun like that in real life before, and the hairs at the base of my neck twitched as I remembered how one looked pointed directly at me. I rolled off Gray, who had unintentionally buffered my fall, and scuttled on my knees to safety in the front hall.
“Out here should be safe, don’t you think?” I crouched, curled into a ball, and hugged the wall. “He can’t see us here.”
Of course he could decide to walk over to the house and in the unlocked front door that I was staring at. I groaned at the thought, crawled to the door, and turned the lock.
“There!” I pulled myself into a tighter ball. “My phone’s in my purse across the room. You’ll have to call 911.”
Gray didn’t answer, and he didn’t punch numbers. All I heard was a peculiar gasping sound.
“Gray?” I turned, surprised to find he wasn’t in the hall with me. I’d thought he was right behind me. “Gray?” I crawled back to the doorway into the living room and peered in. I clapped my hand to my mouth to stifle a scream. It leaked out anyway.
Gray lay on his back where he’d fallen, his mouth open, his eyes closed, his face covered with blood.
“He shot you!” I crawled toward him. Why, oh why hadn’t I decided to be a nurse rather than an art teacher? “You’re bleeding!”
Gray made that gasping sound again. At least he wasn’t dead.
“Don’t move!” I tried to remember the first aid class I’d taken as part of my health requirement in college. What did you do first? Staunch the blood! That was it. All I had to do was find where the blood was coming from. I put a tentative hand to his head, burying my fingers in his thick hair.
Gray pushed my hand away none too gently, rolled to his side, and pushed to his hands and knees.
“You shouldn’t move.” Gently I tried to push him back to the floor. “Everyone knows you don’t move when you’re shot.”
He resisted my push with a growling sound that reminded me of our neighbor’s ill-tempered schnauzer, Daisy. He gasped again, his back arching like he was doing the cat stretch exercise. Blood poured onto the hardwood floor.
Thank goodness the soft green rug wasn’t being laid until tomorrow.
Gray snaked out a hand to grab the Tuscan Vine, its unattached end sagging from the rod so that a large puddle of silk lay on the floor. His intent was obvious.
“No!” I leaped to my feet, gunman or no gunman, and snatched up the fabric. “Don’t get that material bloody!” I pulled it as far from him as I could without ripping the already attached end, flinging it over the plum chair, for once mindless of wrinkles. “It costs two hundred and twenty-five dollars a yard.”
“Bake dat three hundred and fifty,” he muttered in an odd voice. He began pulling his T-shirt from his waistband.
“Don’t use your shirt either,” I told him. “You’ll never get the blood out. There are some towels in the kitchen. I’ll get them.”
I ran to the back of the house and grabbed the designer towels laid artistically beside the sink and raced back to Gray. I found him sitting cross-legged on the floor, his head tilted back, his T-shirt bunched under his arms and wadded against his face.
I dropped to my knees beside him and handed him the towels. “Where did he shoot you?” My heart hammered. What if Gray’s handsome face was scarred for life? What if he’d taken a bullet in the eye? Of course, reason told me, if he’d taken a bullet in the eye, he wouldn’t be sitting up holding his nose.
His nose.
“Are you having a nose bleed?” I demanded as my fear and relief transmuted to irritation.
He lowered his head enough to glare at me. “Yes, I’mb having a dose bleed, doe thanks to you.”
“Me? It’s not my fault heights give you nosebleeds.”
“Heights, by foot. Id was your hard head.”
“My head?” I lifted a hand to the back of my head and hit a sore spot. I realized suddenly that I had a miserable headache, one I’d been too frightened to notice before.
“Firs’ you gib me a header, den you dock me flad on by back—and id’s a wonder I didn’t break id—and den you fall on me and dock my breaf out of me so I thought I’d neber breafe again.”
“Well, you don’t have to get so testy about it.” Tears filled my eyes. “I thought you were shot!” Thank You, God, that he wasn’t!
“Shod? Me?”
