alarm Klaxons sounded in her brain, Nikki took a backward step and allowed him to enter. When she closed the door behind him, he leaned past her to twist the dead bolt. She shot him a startled look. “Humor me.”
He offered no explanation. She followed him into the living room and watched as he stood in the center of the room to examine it from all angles. He crossed to the patio door and slid a metal locking rod into place at the top of the frame. Nikki hadn’t noticed the locking device when she came inside before.
Ben pulled the drawstring to close the curtains, then turned and nodded toward the hallway. “Mind if I take a look in the bedrooms?”
Indignant, she opened her mouth to protest, but at the look on his face, closed it again. His lips formed a rigid line, with deep creases at the corners of his mouth. It was fear she’d heard in his voice at the door. She glanced toward the closed patio curtains, and the uneasy feeling she’d experienced earlier returned.
She gave permission with a jerk of her head, but remained in the living room. After he’d investigated both bedrooms, he returned. His expression was calmer, a touch more relaxed. The muscles in Nikki’s stomach loosened a fraction.
“You want to tell me what this is all about?”
He crossed into the kitchen and checked the lock on the window before answering. “I wanted to make sure you were okay, that’s all. You know, a single woman, traveling alone. You can’t be too careful.”
The explanation fell lamely into the empty space between them. Nikki folded her arms across her chest and gave him a stern look. The same look she gave Joshua when he was being naughty.
Ben’s head fell forward. “Okay, that’s a lie. I—” He swallowed and nodded toward the living area. “Maybe we’d better sit down.”
The impulse to refuse died before she could put it into words. In all the months they spent living together in Cozumel, she couldn’t remember ever seeing him wear such a serious expression. Without a word, she retreated across the room and seated herself in the over-stuffed chair on the far side of the sofa. Ben followed and dropped onto the cushion near her.
“I looked up where you were staying.” He stared at his hands while he spoke. “When I was outside, trying to decide whether or not to knock on the door, I saw a shadow. Looked like someone sneaking around the corner of this building. I wanted to make sure you were okay.” So, someone had been there, watching her from the darkness beyond the orange tree. Nikki shuddered and rubbed her arms with her hands. “But why were you here at all?”
He hesitated, then straightened his long legs to pull a folded piece of paper out of the back pocket of his shorts. A struggle appeared on his face as he unfolded the paper. His eyes moved as he studied it. Then, with a slow movement, he extended it toward her.
She took the note. Wrinkles spidered across the paper, as though it had been crushed in a fist. The words, scrawled in blue ink, were in Spanish.
Regresa el artículo y lo seguirá siendo seguro.
Though she’d lived in Mexico with Ben for six months, she’d never become fluent in Spanish. And she hadn’t spoken the language at all in the two-and-a-half years since she moved back home. She translated the words slowly.
“Return…the article…and…” She glanced up at him. “What does lo seguirá siendo seguro mean?”
Ben didn’t meet her gaze. “It says, Return the article and she will stay safe.”
“She?” A wave of fear raised goose bumps along her arms. “Who is she?”
“There is only one she they could mean.” His hands clenched in a tight knot. “You.”
Prickles of alarm inched up her spine. “That’s ridiculous.” He glanced up at the sharp tone in her voice. “We haven’t seen each other in over two years, Ben.” Nikki forced herself to speak calmly. “Until this afternoon, we’ve had no contact at all. And that was a coincidence. I don’t know what this is about, but they must mean someone else. Your girlfriend, maybe.”
“I haven’t had a girlfriend since you left Cozumel.”
A wave of pleasure warmed her insides at that news, but Nikki ignored it. “Then a friend, or someone you work with.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think our running into each other was a coincidence at all. I think someone arranged it. Are you sure you didn’t know I was in Key West?”
“I thought you were still in Mexico.” She held his gaze and spoke truthfully. “If I had known you were here, I wouldn’t have come.”
Guilt stabbed at her when he winced. She looked away. Brutally cruel words, perhaps, but she had no choice. Their relationship had been severed some time ago, and it must remain that way.
“What is this article they’re talking about, anyway?”
“Nothing.”
“Obviously it’s not nothing if they want it back badly enough to threaten someone over it.” She narrowed her eyes. “You didn’t steal anything, did you?”
“Of course not.” His hands sliced through the air in an impatient gesture. “That isn’t important. What is important is that someone arranged for you to be here, in Key West, and we need to figure out who did it.”
“I told you earlier. I’m here on vacation. A friend from work is letting me use her father’s time-share.”
He twisted his lips, clearly not buying the explanation. “Why didn’t your friend come with you?”
“Because she hasn’t been with the company long enough to take a vacation, and her father couldn’t find anyone to rent the place this year. She’s letting me use it to celebrate my birthday. And that certificate was a birthday gift. It was a coincidence that the shop she called happened to be the one where you work.”
“You came on a vacation for your birthday alone?” The words were heavy with skepticism. “The Nikki I used to know would have gotten a group of friends together to help her celebrate. She would have had people sleeping on the couch and in sleeping bags and even on lawn chairs.”
I’m not the Nikki you used to know! She wanted to snap the words, but bit them off. The Nikki he knew had been twenty-seven, fun-loving, without a care in the world. Now she was a thirty-year-old single mother struggling to raise an active two-year-old alone, with no one—except her mother—to help ease the burden of responsibility. She’d lost touch with all her former friends, and she was too busy and too tired to make new ones. Joshua took all her spare time. And he was worth every minute.
Nikki rose from the chair and rubbed a chill out of her arms as she crossed to the kitchen. She opened cabinets until she found the one with glasses in it and took down two short ones. The pineapple juice she’d bought at the grocery store earlier was thoroughly chilled now. She wasn’t really thirsty, but she needed to do something with her hands.
Ben followed her and perched on a tall chair at the high counter that separated the living area from the kitchen. “Listen, do me a favor, would you? Call your friend. Ask her why she chose Key West Water Adventures for the gift certificate.”
Though she wanted to refuse outright, it was a reasonable request. The numbers on the stove clock showed 11:10 p.m. That meant it was only 9:10 p.m. in Portland. Allison would still be up. “Fine. I will.”
She plopped a glass of juice on the counter in front of Ben before going for her cell phone. When she returned, he sat staring at the yellow liquid with a contemplative expression. Heat threatened to rise into her face. It was Ben who had gotten her hooked on pineapple juice in Cozumel. Joshua loved it.
With jerky gestures, she flipped open her phone and located Allison’s number.
The call went to voice mail.
“She’s not answering,” Nikki told Ben as she hung up without