Now that she looked back on it, Whitney decided she was stronger than she sometimes believed. Instinct had launched her at the fence. That quick action had saved her life. She shouldn’t have allowed the incident to cause an emotional meltdown. After the way she’d freaked out, no wonder Adam hadn’t wanted to tell her about his uncle. She could almost forgive him.

Almost.

If only he’d revealed Ashley’s part in Lexi’s disappearance, Whitney might have been more forgiving. But he hadn’t. It said a lot about his character, she reminded herself. It told her even more about their relationship.

“Come on, gang,” she said to Jasper and Lexi. “It’s chow time.”

They scampered behind her as she went down the sweeping staircase. After stopping to leave the notes for Adam, she’d swung by the supermarket and charged some necessities. While the dogs ate, she unpacked the groceries and put them away.

Inside the walk-in pantry, she froze. What was that? It sounded like a thump. The nearest house was too far for her to hear anything. She listened, attempting to detect something else over the crunching sounds of the dogs eating. Her hand shook when she eased the pantry door back so she could have a better look. She peeked out and saw the dogs with their noses in the fancy dishes that she was using for their bowls. Obviously, they hadn’t heard a thing.

What a sniveling display of shredded nerves you are.

Every house had its own special sounds, she assured herself. She would just have to get used to this one. She could put on the alarm, but Adam might drop by without calling. She scribbled a note, saying she was in the pool, and taped it to the front door.

When she returned to the kitchen, the dogs had finished eating. “Come on,” she told them, and they followed her out to the pool. Since the area was new to them, the dogs engaged in a sniff-fest. By the way they were hovering around the low-hanging bushes, Whitney guessed another dog had been out here recently.

“Stay away from the rock,” Whitney told Lexi even though the dog wasn’t anywhere near the obsidian sculpture.

It was dark now and the lights around the pool unexpectedly snapped on. Her limbs locked in place. Fortunately for Whitney, her brain was still functioning. The lights must be on an automatic timer.

Dozens of low-voltage exterior lights now artfully highlighted the plants and the house. Brighter lights on the rafters of the open-air overhang were aimed at the water. Like most pools, this one had a light at the bottom of the deep end. The rest of the yard was dark shadows.

When would she get over being so jumpy? she asked herself. A disturbing chill enveloped her. There was cause for concern. Calvin Hunter had gone to a lot of trouble to hide the information on a microchip and plant it under his dog’s skin. But the people after the info didn’t know Jasper had it-and couldn’t possibly find her if they did.

What she was experiencing was the psychological aftershock of the fire followed by the scare with the car. Get a grip! Taking a deep, calming breath, she tamped down the wave of anxiety. If she didn’t confront her fears, they would get the better of her.

She had a toe in the water when she remembered her cell phone was on the counter in the kitchen. Adam had the number of this house, but he might call her on the cell. She went inside and retrieved it. Returning to the pool area where the dogs were waiting, tails wagging, she again had the eerie sensation someone was watching her.

Get over it.

She put the cell phone down on a small table near the middle of the pool where she could get to it easily no matter where she was in the water. Lexi barked excitedly. Whitney whirled around and saw a big dark shadow blocking the light. A man.

The hulking shape moved and the lights trained on the pool hit her in the eyes, blinding her for a moment. He walked closer and a scream almost ripped from her throat. In the next breath, she realized it was Ryan. Whitney released a pent-up sigh of relief.

Ryan was dressed in a polo shirt, pressed jeans and a lightweight bomber-style jacket. As always he wore loafers that could have passed for new. Lexi scampered up to him, but Jasper scooted under a chaise.

“Ryan, what are you doing here?”

He looked around the dark yard. “Have you seen Ashley?”

“N-no, of course not.” His question surprised her. Why on earth would he think Ashley was here?

Ryan walked closer and Whitney instinctively backed up, but not too far. She was already near the edge of the pool.

“Have you heard from her?”

She’d lived with this man long enough to recognize stress and anxiety in his overwrought voice. “No. Why would she call me?”

“To explain about the clothes.”

She didn’t like what she saw in his eyes. Something had happened with Ashley and he clearly blamed her.

“She’s not here, and I have no idea where she is.” In her toughest voice, she added, “You’d better leave now.”

“I will.” He ground out the words. “But your nine lives are up.”

His unanticipated anger directed at her was like a slap in the face. “What do you mean?”

“You’ll see.”

Now there was a deadly calm about him, in spite of the lethal tone of voice. Whitney suddenly became disturbingly aware of her situation. She was standing-as good as naked-at the edge of the pool without a weapon of any kind. She didn’t need a weapon, Whitney told herself. She was panicking again for no good reason. She’d been married to this man. “Ryan, what’s wrong?”

His eyes narrowed, bore into her. “Get in the pool. Start swimming.”

“What? You’re not making sense.” Was he on something? she wondered.

Unexpectedly, both his hands slammed into her shoulders and shoved her backward. She hit the pool with a startled cry and sucked a mouthful of water into her lungs. She surfaced, gagging and struggling to get her breath in spastic gasps. Treading water and coughing, she looked up at her former husband looming above her.

She’d never seen Ryan this angry, this out of control. Suddenly all the years she’d put up with his antics infuriated her. What had she been thinking? This man was nothing but a self-centered egomaniac. Evidently, the beauty queen had seen the light and left him. It must have sent him over some psychological edge into lunacy.

“Start swimming, Whitney.”

She sputtered, still unable to catch her breath, her throat burning from the chlorine in the pool. Finally she managed to ask, “Why? What’s going on?”

He didn’t answer and that sent a fresh surge of panic through her. She tried to touch bottom with the tips of her toes, but it was too deep. She took a few quick strokes to the edge of the pool near Ryan’s feet. She grasped the rim of the pool with both hands.

“What’s wrong with you?” she asked.

“Nothing you can’t fix.”

Whitney laughed-more of a cackle really. Once she would have walked on water to “fix” any of this man’s problems. “I’m not interested in fixing a damn thing.”

Whitney dipped under the water and swam to the shallow end where she could walk out. She surfaced, stood up, flung her head back and swept her wet hair out of her eyes. Ryan had beaten her to the shallow end. He stood there pointing a gun fitted with a silencer at her.

It took a second to absorb what she was seeing. Where had he gotten the gun? He’d never had one when they’d been together. He didn’t know how to use it, did he? Doubts clouded her thoughts. The gambling. There was a lot about this man she’d never known. Often the craziest people appeared sane, she reminded herself.

“This can go one of two ways,” Ryan said with unexpected savagery. “You can swim until you’re too exhausted to take another stroke…and drown…or I can shoot you.”

This had to be a sick prank, didn’t it? That hope flared, then died when she assessed the hatred gleaming in Ryan’s eyes and noted the deadly weapon in his hand. This was no joke. “Why?” she managed to ask. “I had no idea Ashley had left me those clothes. It was just an accident that I was wearing the dress-”