After he parked in his garage, he pulled a wooden crate from a shelf and laid the bloody hammer in the bottom. Then he emptied his pockets. The pepper spray and driver’s license he’d impulsively taken from the woman went into the box next. He shoved the crate and the attache case into a corner. After that, he stripped and put his muddy clothes and shoes in a trash bag.

He had to be quiet. He didn’t want to awaken Nina, and so he decided he’d sleep in the guest room. He silently crossed the house and climbed the stairs. When he saw his face in the bathroom mirror, he gasped and recoiled in horror. What had the woman done to him? His face looked like raw hamburger. He quickly turned on the faucet and used a cloth to gently wash the blood away. Her nails had ripped long tears in his skin on both sides of his face. There was even one long scratch down the side of his neck. He raged against her as he stepped into the shower and turned the water on. His arms were a mess, too.

My God, what if someone had seen him on the drive home? How many times had he sat at stoplights looking left and right. Maybe one of the other drivers had already called the police and given them his license plate number.

He began to bang his head against the tile. They’ll catch me; they’ll catch me. What will I do? Oh, God, what will happen to Nina? Who will take care of her? Will she be forced to watch me being dragged away in handcuffs? That humiliation was too appalling to think about, and so he did what he had trained himself to do while Nina was in the critical care unit at the hospital. He forced himself to block the image until it disappeared.

He stayed inside his house all weekend, glued to the television set, waiting to hear the newscasters talk about the murder. As time went by, he became strangely detached because the woman hadn’t been discovered. By Tuesday, he counted himself lucky and was feeling quite confident.

Not bad, he told himself. Not bad at all for a dress rehearsal.

He’d even come up with the perfect explanation for his scratches. The rain had made the ground slick and he’d slipped and fallen into some thorny bushes.

His department head, a pissant of a man, called him into his office on Wednesday at four to tell him that everyone had noticed how hard he was working and how cheerful he had been these past three days. Why, one of his colleagues had mentioned that he’d even told a joke. The pissant hoped that he would continue with this bright, fresh, wonderful attitude.

As he was leaving his boss’s office, he was asked a question. What had caused this transformation? Spring, he’d told him. He was ignoring the foul weather and relandscaping his entire backyard. He was having a delightful time, but he wasn’t doing any planting yet. The ground was warm now, and he was tearing up everything. Out with the old and in with the new. He was even thinking about building a gazebo.

“Do be careful pulling out those shrubs,” the pissant cautioned. “You don’t want to fall into any more thorny bushes and get hurt again. You’re lucky the scratches didn’t become infected.”

Indeed. He most certainly didn’t want any more scratches, and yes, he was a very lucky man.

Chapter Four

The week went by in a blur. By Friday, Ragan was in a much better mood. She’d caught up on all of her paperwork, and she was able to get back to what she loved to do.

Even running into Aiden’s assistant didn’t dampen her spirits. Regan had been hurrying down the hall to her office when Emily Milan called out. She turned and waited for Emily to catch up to her. The woman was at least three, maybe four, inches taller than Regan and towered over her when she wore high heels. Her blond hair was cropped short with jagged wisps framing her striking features. Everything about Emily was trendy, from her short, tight skirt to her bold, colorful jewelry.

Regan didn’t like Emily, but she tried her best not to let her personal feelings interfere with work. For some reason, Emily had taken a real dislike to Regan too. Emily’s animosity had been building over the past couple of months, and she was becoming more openly hostile.

“Aiden would like me to take over the meeting you were scheduled to run this morning. I’m sure he wanted to make certain it ran smoothly.”

It was an insult, and not even a veiled one. Regan had to remind herself why she put up with the woman. As unpleasant as she was, she did ease Aiden’s workload, and that was all that mattered.

“That’s fine,” she said.

“I’ll need the notes Aiden e-mailed you. Print them out and have your assistant bring them to me.”

No please or thank you, of course. She simply turned and walked away. Regan took a breath and decided she wasn’t going to let Emily ruin her morning. Think of something good, she told herself. It took a minute, but she finally came up with something. She didn’t have to work with Emily. That was definitely good.

Most days, Regan believed she had a dream job because she got to give away money. She was the administrator of the Hamilton Foundation. Her grandmother Hamilton had begun the philanthropic program, and when she had a fatal stroke a couple of years ago, Regan, who was already being trained for the position, stepped in and took over. It wasn’t yet the multimillion-dollar foundation Regan hoped for, but it was successful and had provided money and supplies to many struggling schools and community centers. Now all she needed to do was convince her brothers to increase the funding. And that was no easy task, especially with Aiden, whose entire focus was on expanding the hotel chain.

The Chicago Hamilton was just one of Aiden’s babies, but he used it as the model for other ventures. Customer service was the number one priority, and because of the staff’s attention to detail, the hotel had won every prestigious award possible since the year it had opened. The operation of all the hotels ran very smoothly because Aiden took pains to hire people who shared his commitment.

Henry Portman was waiting for Regan when she entered her office. Her young assistant worked part-time while he attended college. The young African-American man had the body of a lineman, the heart of a lion, and the mind of a young Bill Gates.

“The dragon’s looking for you,” he said in greeting.

She laughed. “I ran into Emily in the hall. She’s going to take over the ten o’clock meeting. Anything else going on I need to know about?”

“I’ve got good news and bad news.”

“Give me the good news first.”

“The supplies are on the way to two more schools for their art programs, and there are sixteen more letters waiting for your signature.” Grinning from ear to ear, he added, “Sixteen very worthy high school seniors are going to go to college now, all expenses paid.”

She smiled. “That is good news. On days like this, I do love my job.”

“Me too,” he said. “Most of the time anyway.”

“Which leads you to the bad news?”

She sat down behind her desk and began to sign the letters. As she finished each one, she handed it to Henry, who folded it and put it in an envelope. “There was a problem this morning. Well… actually, the problem’s been ongoing for about a month, but I thought I could handle it. Now, I’m not so sure. Do you remember a guy named Morris? Peter Morris?”

She shook her head. “What about him?”

“You turned him down for a second grant about a month ago. When he received the denial letter, he immediately reapplied. He thought it was some kind of clerical error or that he hadn’t dotted all his i’s or left a line blank or something on what he called the automatic-renewal application, and that’s why he filled out another one. Anyway, he called several weeks ago and asked when he could expect the money. He had this crazy notion that, once he’d been approved for the first grant, it was gravy from then on. I straightened him out on that score,” Henry said. He shook his head as he continued. “Then he calls me again and tell me he doesn’t think I understand what an automatic renewal means.”