“No.” Her voice was sharp, and she started sweeping the floor with short, jerky movements. The conversational topic was clearly over.
Strange, she seemed even more uncomfortable talking about her faith now than three months ago, when they had been closer and chatting together more often. They’d rarely discussed God, but she’d never avoided the subject. She had said she was a strong Christian. Was her faith wavering in the face of all the recent problems?
She suddenly stopped and stared at the ground, her broom lax in her hands. He caught the sheen in her eyes, the painful way she pressed her lips shut. Even the red tinge of her nose made his concern well up in him, and before he knew it, he’d crossed the room to gently grasp her shoulders. “Rachel, it’s okay.”
The smell of her perfume brought it all back to him. He was surrounded by lavender-citrus—the way it melded with her musk made it distinctly Rachel. It brought back the memory of dinners spent talking and laughing. The unique way she viewed the world made him think, made him laugh. Being this close to her, he missed that.
She relaxed under his touch, but her head dipped down. He peered over her shoulder at what had caused her distress—a mangled uprooted basil plant, its leaves dark green with damage, the roots tangled into a brown yarn ball. Forlorn and dying.
“Stupid,” she whispered. “Crying over a plant.”
“It’s not just a plant.” He knew it was the crux, the “secret ingredient” of her scar-reduction cream, which made it like gold to her.
He gently lifted his hands from her shoulders and stepped back. “Don’t worry. You’ll have more than enough basil for the product launch.”
“How can you be sure?” Her voice was worrying.
“Because I’m the one raising your plants.”
“But you can’t guarantee I’ll have enough. This product launch is important.”
Edward couldn’t understand why this launch was everything to her. “Rachel, the world is not going to end if your product launches a month later.”
She shook her head. “You never understood the kind of pressure I’m under as the spa’s dermatologist.” Her shoulders had become stiff again. “You’re the good son, the oldest of two brothers, successful and confident.”
What? He frowned at her. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“You can’t understand what it’s like being the oldest of three sisters and yet not as successful as the two of them.”
“What do you mean? You are successful. You create innovative products for your father’s spa, which has international renown.”
She was shaking her head. “In company, my father praises Naomi for her management of the spa while he has been recovering from the stroke. He praises Monica for her nursing helping him recover so quickly. But he bemoans the fact that my last research project had to be canceled because it wasn’t going well. He worries that my last product launched isn’t selling as well as he had hoped.” She rubbed her forehead.
“Have you talked to him about it?”
“I try, but he just doesn’t listen. He doesn’t understand me.” Her voice cracked.
Her unexpected vulnerability shocked him. Her frailty made him want to wrap her in his arms. In the year they’d been working together on her basil plants and growing closer as friends, she had never been this emotional with him. Then again, she hadn’t been suffering under this kind of setback before, either. “I want to understand you, Rachel. If you’d only let me.”
She met his eyes, touching him with her gaze like a caress to his cheek. But then her eyes wavered, doubt filling them, stress drawing lines down her face, and she turned away.
He’d lost her.
She turned quickly and grasped a basil plant, shaking it loose from the clumps of dirt on the floor, but holding it so tightly that she bruised its leaves.
Despite the fact that he didn’t agree with her workaholic tendencies, they had been more than researcher and gardener. They had been becoming friends. He couldn’t deny that this kind of brutal attack on her, leaving her shaken and vulnerable, made him want to help her.
He put his hand over hers, taking the forlorn basil plant from her fingers. “Don’t worry, Rachel. Things will turn out fine.”
She shook her head, biting her lip. “I’ll never find out who did this.”
“Yes, you will. Because I’ll help you.”
TWO
Rachel’s stomach was a block of ice despite the sun warming her back and the sweat dripping down her neck. She pedaled harder, making the wind sting her face as her bike tires ate up the sun-bleached asphalt of the Sonoma country road.
Yesterday had been awful. She couldn’t believe that she hadn’t been safe in her own spa parking lot. The attack on her plants at Edward’s greenhouse felt like an even deeper violation—not just against her, but against her research, against her family’s spa.
And last night in the greenhouse, she’d wanted Edward to protect her—to hold her and make everything all right. She’d wanted to unburden herself and wrap herself in his concern.
But she didn’t have the right to ask that of him.
Her father had been concerned, but even more than that, he’d been worried about the research, about the product launch. As usual. Unspoken was the specter of her last disastrous venture, and how he’d blamed her for it.
Four years ago she had developed a grape-seed extract moisturizer for the spa to launch as a new product. A month before Joy Luck Life spa released it, Avignon spa in New York happened to release a grape-seed extract moisturizer, as well. It wasn’t the exact formulation, even though it also used a grape-seed extract ingredient, and Rachel hadn’t thought it would be a problem to continue with their product launch. Plus, it was too late to stop it. But then Internet news reporters had accused Joy Luck Life of “stealing” Avignon’s formula. The spa received a lot of bad press and had been subjected to false rumors, which her father had taken hard, asking her again and again why she had suggested they continue with the product launch.
And now this sabotage of her basil plants, causing a setback for her latest product launch.
She’d considered skipping her daily bike ride this morning, but aside from a low-level headache and some tenderness around her eye, she felt fine. She needed to be alone with her thoughts.
As she neared the base of an upcoming hill, the hum of a car engine came from behind. Her heartbeat sped up for a second as the gleam of chrome seemed to appear directly next to her, blinding her—the vehicle was too close!
Then the auto blazed past her, whipping her in the wind of its wake, making her wobble a bit. She caught a glimpse of the bright sticker of a car-rental company on the bumper before it disappeared over the hill.
Another tourist, viewing the sights of Sonoma County or maybe getting a very early start on a wine-tasting tour. She couldn’t complain, since the tourists contributed to the spa’s popularity, but their recklessness on the roads sometimes made her hug the sides more than normal.
She struggled up the winding hill, the breeze dropping with her dwindling speed. The sun warmed her head inside her bike helmet. Her lungs heaved, and she welcomed the exertion, trying to somehow purge her body of all the confusing, frightening feelings of last night.
The greenhouse destruction made it obvious that someone else knew about her research and wanted to stop the product launch. While anyone could have followed her to the greenhouse at any time, they couldn’t know how central those plants were to her current project unless they’d somehow gotten her research notes, which were only on her computer at work.
She couldn’t