The Silent Widow

‘You’ve had people tailing me!’ She backed away again, farther this time. ‘Just like you did in Mexico. Spying on me!’

Luis was unapologetic ‘The fact we aren’t together any more doesn’t mean that I’ve stopped being concerned for your safety, Anne.’

‘What do you mean, my “safety”? I’m perfectly safe. Why wouldn’t I be safe?’

‘Well,’ he responded, still smiling, ‘in case you haven’t noticed, my dear, people close to your therapist friend seem to have developed a nasty habit of showing up dead. I know the police warned you to be cautious, but what are they actually doing to protect you? And what are you doing to protect yourself? Nothing, as far as I could see.’

‘I don’t need your protection, Luis,’ Anne whispered, frightened by how quickly her own resolve was crumbling. ‘I didn’t ask for it. I don’t want it.’

Lunging forward, he grabbed her suddenly by the wrists. Anne struggled half-heartedly, waiting for a bystander to step in, but nobody seemed to notice or care.

‘You do need it,’ Luis whispered in her ear, pulling her close. ‘Trust me when I tell you, your Dr Roberts is not who she claims to be. Do you understand me, Anne? She’s no innocent in any of this.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’ Anne looked at him defiantly. ‘Nikki’s completely innocent.’

‘No.’ Luis shook his head urgently. ‘There are things you don’t know, my darling. Many, many things. She’s poisoning you against me, but it’s not me you should be afraid of. It’s her.’

With one hard yank, Anne wrenched herself free from his grip.

‘Leave me alone, Luis!’ she shouted at him, loud enough that no one in the valet line could pretend not to hear. ‘I mean it. If I see you again, I swear I’ll call the police.’

‘Anne! Please!’

But it was too late. Anne had already turned and fled, bolting inside Nikki’s building like a hunted rabbit.

‘Are you all right, miss?’ The elevator attendant came over, seeing Anne shaking and repeatedly pounding on the call button.

‘I’m fine, thank you,’ she lied.

She didn’t believe what Luis had said about Nikki. Even so, his words seemed to have embedded themselves in her brain:

‘Dr Roberts is not who she claims to be. She’s no innocent.’

What did he mean by that? And why would he say such a thing?

Oh God! Why did he have to come here at all?

Anne waited until she was alone in the elevator with the doors safely closed. Only then did she give way to tears.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Kim Choy held her breath and pretended to be typing something into her computer as Lana Grey emerged from Dr Nikki Roberts’ consulting room.

A graduate intern at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience, Kim was Nikki’s newly hired assistant, a hasty replacement for poor Trey. Although both brilliant and beautiful, with perfectly smooth Asian skin, wide eyes and a long mane of silken black hair, Kim had been raised by strict Chinese parents and had led a very sheltered existence thus far in her twenty-four years on earth. As a result, she was utterly star-struck to see Lana, a famous TV star, walk right past her in the flesh!

‘May I schedule another appointment for you, Miss Grey?’ Poor Kim’s heart was pounding so fast it was hard to get the words out. She’d never interacted with a ‘celebrity’ before. Evidently her new part-time job was going to bring her into contact with a whole new world, a side to Los Angeles that she’d heard about but never seen, beavering away at the library on UCLA’s Westwood campus or spending late nights cramming in the neuroscience department. It was all too exciting for words!

Lana looked at the slim, attractive Asian girl behind the desk in Dr Roberts’ lobby and felt envy choke her like a golfball lodged in her throat. As if the therapist’s smugness weren’t bad enough on its own, with Nikki rubbing her perfect life and beautiful figure and barely lined skin in Lana’s face at every session, now the bitch had gone and hired some teenage beauty queen to run the office.

There was no way she wasn’t doing it on purpose. She wants my self-esteem on the floor, so she can keep me coming back for more therapy at three hundred dollars an hour. You couldn’t trust anyone these days.

Leaning over Kim’s desk threateningly, Lana snarled: ‘If I wanted to schedule another appointment, I’d say so, wouldn’t I?’

‘Oh.’ Kim blushed to the roots of her hair. She’d put her foot in it somehow, made a mistake. Was she not supposed to speak to clients, or ask about appointments? ‘I’m sorry, Miss Grey. I just thought …’

‘Yes, well don’t. I won’t be coming back,’ Lana announced, sweeping out of the office and slamming the door behind her.

Hearing the commotion, Nikki emerged to find her poor receptionist close to tears.