Linda Conrad - Safe by His Side

“The door was open. Standing ajar. I rang the bell, called out and stepped inside to find out what was wrong.” Ethan studied her movements carefully and decided her eyes were the key to what she was feeling. “Why didn’t you answer me when I questioned you at the front door?”

“I didn’t know who you were. I thought…I thought the stalker was inside. After I saw the note, I was—”

“What note?”

“Stop interrupting. Didn’t anyone ever teach you any manners?” Gold sparks shot through those plain brown eyes as irritation colored her expression. Ethan found himself absorbed with the fascinating changes he observed in what he’d originally assumed was a rather ordinary face.

Just as he was about to give her another one of his charm-’em grins to get himself off the hook, Ashley and the housekeeper came back into the kitchen.

“Mrs. Hansen says she’ll make my favorite dinner tonight. Isn’t that cool, Blythe?”

Another more interesting change came over Blythe Cooper then. Her whole body seemed to soften as she stood to talk to the girl. The strict, set shoulders rounded as she hugged Ashley to her body. A smile lit up her face as if it were suddenly Christmas morning.

This wasn’t simply a tutor turned guardian talking to her employer. Ethan hadn’t seen anything like the transformation of Blythe’s demeanor since…since before his own mother had died. It must be a kind of motherly thing he was witnessing. He didn’t know yet how the little girl felt about Blythe, but the woman definitely harbored more than mere obligation inside her heart.

Interesting. And annoying. The simmering anger he’d buried from the day his mother died snuck up on him and left him trying to hide his emotions. Again.

“Are we talking chicken nuggets and French fries?” Blythe teased Ashley in a low, smoky voice that suddenly fueled Ethan’s fantasies in a decidedly non-motherly way.

Well, sexual urges might be one method of relieving his old annoyances and pain. But with the rather dowdy guardian? Maybe he needed a day off instead.

“Yes!” Ashley said in a loud whisper. “And chocolate ice cream with rainbow sprinkles. But don’t tell Mom.”

Blythe moved back a step but still had a faint smile on her face. “Not a chance. Your mother doesn’t need to think about such things tonight.

Blythe slid easily into a totally different tone. “Where were you and Mrs. Hansen coming from when you noticed that man? What were you doing outside the house?”

Ethan’s senses picked up on the subtle change in Blythe’s demeanor. A casual question for the girl’s benefit belied the seriousness of the subject. Blythe’s protective instincts seemed to scream silently from her every pore.

“Excuse me, but where is Ashley’s mother?”

“My mom’s sick,” Ashley told him.

He bent down on one knee again. “I heard that, sweetheart. I’m sorry.”

“They moved her into the pool house this morning. She said she didn’t want to disturb me anymore. But I wasn’t disturbed. I just had to be quiet while she slept. And I had to stay in my room or with Blythe, but only when they were giving her the treatments. It was lots better that way than having her in the hospital all the time.” Ashley’s wide eyes glazed over, but Ethan sensed a strength underneath them that surprised him.

He could think of several more things to ask. About the relationship between mother and daughter. About the relationship between child and guardian. But for the moment he decided to stick to the point.

“So you’d gone out to visit with her when all the noise started?”

Ashley nodded, and Mrs. Hansen the housekeeper spoke up from across the room. “It was my fault, sir. I was running late in bringing dinner out to the nurses and I asked Ash to help me carry the dishes so it wouldn’t take so many trips. I’ll do better when we get the schedule down.”

Ethan straightened up and addressed Mrs. Hansen, making sure Ashley could hear as well. “I don’t see how either of you made any mistakes, ma’am. Ashley ought to be able to visit her mother whenever she wishes without being afraid.

“Do either of you remember anything special about the man you saw?”

“It was like Ash said,” Mrs. Hansen began hesitantly. “The fog was really thick. I only got glimpses of a dark shadow moving down the stairs. If the alarm hadn’t started going off, I don’t think I would’ve noticed him at all.”

“Okay.” Ethan gave her one of his crooked smiles—reserved especially for female clients. “But the police are probably going to ask both of you these same things. If you think of anything at all about the man’s appearance, be sure to tell them.”

“Are the police coming?” Ashley asked Blythe. She began blinking wildly. “Mama won’t like that.”

Blythe went to her again and gave her a hug. “We’ll only tell your mother if we have to. Let’s wait and see what the police have to say. And since Uncle Max is coming by in a little while, we’ll check with him, too, before we say anything to upset her.

“You know that’s the real reason the doctor wanted your mom moved, don’t you?” Blythe added softly. “It wasn’t anything to do with you. She needs to stay quiet and not be bothered by phones or visitors and such upsets. You know, like the stuff that goes on around here most of the time. And it was your mom who decided on the pool house instead of returning to the hospital just so you could visit any time you wished.”

Ashley hung her head and swung her body from side to side. “I know. But maybe if I stopped acting for a while, it wouldn’t be so noisy around here. All the reporters and photographers would go away and leave us alone.”

She glanced up at Blythe and apparently saw an answer she’d heard before. “Oh, I know. Mama doesn’t want me to quit. And I really do love acting. Really. It’s just…”

Ethan’s heart went out to the child as her words ran down. She looked nothing at all like the huge megastar Ashley Nicole Davis. With hair stringing down to hide her face and her chin resting against her chest, she looked like what she was—a lonely little seven-year-old whose mother was dying. He nearly asked why she couldn’t quit if she wanted to, but figured he had better keep his mouth shut. That wasn’t any of his business. His job was to keep her safe. Period.

He turned to Blythe. “I didn’t see any reporters outside when I pulled up. Are they here most of the time?”

Instead of answering him, Blythe kissed Ashley on the forehead. “Don’t worry about anything, honey. It will all work out the way it’s supposed to. Why don’t you stay and help Mrs. Hansen make the supper while I take the new bodyguard upstairs to talk for a minute? Okay?”

“Can I?” The little girl’s face brightened immediately. “I don’t have to go back to my room?”

Blythe whispered quietly to the child for a second and then motioned for Ethan to follow her out of the kitchen.

When they were out of Ashley’s earshot, she explained, “We’re doing our best to keep those terrible tabloid reporters away for the present. As far as they know, there’s nothing newsworthy going on here. We want to keep it that way. The reporters and photographers upset Ashley. And Melissa doesn’t want them to get wind of how bad her illness is just yet, either.”

“Okay.” There was something else behind her words. Ethan had the feeling it was personal, but again, asking wasn’t his job. “Where are we going?”

She started up the wide staircase. “I want to show you something before the police arrive. It’s one of the things we need to keep hidden from the tabloids. And I’d rather Ash didn’t have to see it.”

Ethan dogged her steps up the stairs. He tried cataloguing in his mind everything he’d learned so far but got distracted by Blythe’s generous backside as she climbed each stair above him. His first choice in women tended toward the ultrathin model type. The kind that looked sexy in their push-up bras and little-boy briefs. But he found himself admiring Blythe’s rounded curves a lot more than was appropriate.

Maybe it’d been too long since he’d had any woman. What with his recent “female” problem, he’d not even considered taking someone out just for fun. And thinking that way about this woman, a client and an irritant, would make him too stupid to live.

Hadn’t he learned a lesson from the fiasco that had cost him his career? Stay totally professional with the female clients, he chided himself. Professional. Period.

“So, I understand Ashley has received other notes like this one.”

Blythe maintained the five-foot invisible barrier she’d erected between herself and Ethan. “Yes. She’d gotten several e-mails similar to this one before we cut off Ash’s Internet access. And the same sort of disgusting stuff in handwritten notes, too.”

When he just shook his head and checked the computer, she continued. “We’ve had to hire a fulfillment firm to open Ashley’s fan mail and a new business firm to handle all the other mail that arrives. We no longer receive any mail here at the house. And my computer is the only one that can send or receive e-mail.”

“The police have copies of the other correspondence?”

She nodded and then folded her arms over her waist to keep herself together. “The notes are the reason Max and Melissa decided to hire new bodyguards. But this one had to have come from somewhere inside the house. It nearly scared the life out of me when I found it.”

“I can imagine.” Ethan turned his attention to her, and the sensual glint in those gorgeous eyes hit her full blast. “I’m beginning to understand why you were so frightened at seeing a stranger inside the house.

“You have any guesses as to which of the house’s computers might have been used to send this note?” His gaze went from sexy to concerned to all business and threw her into another kind of tailspin.

She worked to keep herself from stammering. “Probably Melissa’s old computer, the one located in her suite.” It had to be. All the others would have been in places too difficult to reach without being seen.

“In the rooms she vacated this morning?”

“Yes.” Blythe felt like an idiot. Ethan was so spectacular looking and she was so regular, probably a hundred and eighty degrees from his usual type of women. She’d met a few actors in the course of her job who were as good looking as Ethan, but none of them had ever gazed at her with quite that kind of intensity.

Fighting the urge to fall at his feet, Blythe reminded herself of her two previous failed attempts at finding love with gorgeous, charming men. With a jolt of self-deprecation, she pushed her shoulders back and reverted to her normal, confident attitude.

“I haven’t had time to contact the computer gurus to come unplug it yet. Come on. I’ll show you.”

When she led him into Melissa’s old rooms and to her computer setup, Ethan reminded her not to touch anything. Then he asked to see the French doors that went out to the balcony and the stairs leading down to the pool.

He studied the door and the lock without using his hands. “Doesn’t look like anyone broke in this way. But someone definitely set off the alarm when they opened this door from the inside without disabling the system. Maybe the police will be able to pull fingerprints from in here.”

A chill rode down her spine. Someone really had been in the house with her. And this close to Ashley, too.

What if Blythe had turned to check out Melissa’s suite before she checked downstairs—would she have run into the real stalker? The thought clogged her throat for a moment, and then anger took over. Refusing to cower to a stalker’s deliberate attempt to paralyze them with fear, she vowed to start carrying pepper spray or a stun gun in her pocket. She also made a promise that from now on someone would keep Ashley in sight at all times.