“I need to speak with you, Brett.” Her frown held a question as she watched him. And for a second he wondered if he’d imagined her words. About swimming with him.

Or maybe it had just been the intonation he’d mistaken. She’d been making a casual comment, and he’d heard innuendo.

“It’s important.” Arms crossed now, she stood on his front porch, slender and tall with her dark hair tumbling around her shoulders, looking sexy and serious. Professional. Turning him on...

He spun around abruptly, before his body betrayed him. “I’ll just go get dressed,” he said. “Come on in.” Leaving the door wide, he strode back to his master suite, concerned about where this project was leading him.

* * *

ELLA WASN’T GOING to be affected by him. Or by his home. She’d never seen the inside before, of course. They’d only visited Santa Raquel during their marriage, not lived there. They hadn’t owned a home there. And he wasn’t hers anymore. Not her lover. Not her husband or partner or spouse.

But he had been once.

There was something in that.

As much as she told herself there wasn’t. As much as she tried for there not to be, there was.

So. Fine.

She knew. She was on top of it.

The danger was in not knowing what was behind you, catching up to you, preparing to take you unaware.

Meaning to stay in the foyer by the front door, her gaze focused off in space, Ella caught a glimpse of something in the room off to her right. A sunken room with lush beige carpet. And brocade furniture. An antique armoire.

The frame she’d seen drew her closer, and she saw that she’d been right. He had the photo they’d always kept in their living room on the mantel above the fireplace. It was a landscape, a small patch of beach with the ocean in the distance. Not anything that would stand out to anyone. Except the two people who’d made love for the first time there and then taken a cell phone photo of the beach as a promise to each other to never forget their first time.

She’d given him the framed photo on their wedding night.

And had wondered, after the divorce, what had happened to it.

Footsteps sounded behind her, and Ella turned, intending to say something to him about the photo—about the fact that he’d kept it, but all she saw was his back. As though he’d seen her standing there and had turned away.

“Come on out, and I’ll get us some tea,” he called from several feet down the hall, as though she knew her way around his home.

She followed the sound, wishing she could have just stayed in the foyer by the front door. Years of work, of healing, suddenly felt at risk.

She couldn’t help looking around her as she came into the large kitchen with the bay window alcove that held a butcher-block table with fall leaf quilted placemats. A gourd acting as a bowl to smaller gourds painted like fruit sat in the middle of the table.

And beyond the window was the loveliest backyard she’d ever seen. Bougainvillea climbed six-foot stucco walls off in the distance, cornering a rock waterfall. Behind the wall were some woods. She could see the tops of the trees. The pool took up half the yard and was flanked by a built-in fireplace and grill.

“Are those orange trees?” They were off to the side of the pool.

“One navel, and one ruby-red grapefruit. There’s a lemon tree on the side of the house.”

Lost in the beauty of his home, she didn’t think about the past. Or the future. She wanted to sit down. And stay a while.

“Here’s your tea,” he said, handing her a glass.

She took a sip to soothe her newly parched throat—unsweetened, with just a hint of lemon, exactly as she liked it.

He’d remembered. “These are lovely,” she said, pointing to the place mats. Their home had been nice, too, but they’d both been students when they’d first married, living paycheck to paycheck. “My mother’s doing,” he said, standing there with his tea, watching her.

She wanted to see the rest of the place.

And knew she didn’t dare. She was strong. Happy. And intended to remain that way.

She’d lost too much of herself to this man the first time around. Giving him everything, trusting that he was as invested in her as she was in him, only to find that he’d seen a divorce lawyer without even telling her that he wanted out.

Trusting that he wanted a baby as badly as she did only to find that he didn’t want one at all.

She wasn’t going to be drawn in again. Even if that meant they stood there, awkwardly holding glasses of tea while they talked.

Opening the sliding glass door off to one side of the alcove, Brett stepped outside. “Let’s sit out here,” he said and because she needed to get out of his house, she followed him.

He’d put on black pants and a striped business shirt.

“You have a meeting tonight?” Setting her glass on the table, she sat in one of the four padded chairs around it.

“A plane to catch. I have an eight o’clock board meeting in Oregon in the morning.”

A busy man. An important one. But he evidently had time for a glass of tea. In lieu of the swim he’d been about to take?

The pool was kidney shaped. Had a basketball hoop at one end, a hot tub off to the side and was surrounded by landscaped flower beds.

If they hadn’t divorced, this could have been her home...

“Did you talk to Jeff?” The question was a little more baldly stated than she’d intended.

“Of course. I said I would.” Sitting across from her, he raised an ankle to his knee and gazed out toward his yard.

“You told him you’d seen Chloe and that she was fine?” She glanced at him and then away.

“Yes.”

“How did he react?”

Brett’s gaze landed on her, and Ella lost her breath. “He was grateful that I’d checked up on her for him.”

“Did he ask how you found her?”

“I didn’t give him a chance. Before I told him I saw her, I told him I contacted you and asked you to arrange a meeting for me. After all, he knew I showed up because you contacted me saying you were worried about him.”

It had happened exactly as he said.

“And?”

“He was glad to hear that she agreed to see me. He sees that as a good sign.”

“Good sign?”

“Jeff wants his wife home. He wants to save his marriage. But he’s unsure of Chloe right now.”

That was what they needed. For Jeff to understand that if he didn’t get help, he risked losing his family forever, not just for now.

“Did he say anything about how he thought to go about saving the marriage? Like getting help for his anger issues?”

“He already told Chloe he’d go to counseling with her.”

“He needs to go to counseling himself, Brett. To figure out how to handle himself in stressful situations. Then he can talk about possible marriage counseling.”

“Is that what Chloe wants? For him to go to counseling? Is that what she’s waiting for?”

“He needs to figure out why he’s suddenly getting physically aggressive with his family when he’s angry. And do something about it. She’s waiting for him to realize he has to take accountability and make changes before she can safely return home.”

“There’s no way she’s afraid of Jeff. I talked to her. She didn’t exhibit any sign of fear. On the contrary, she misses him.”

“She’s not afraid of him. She’s afraid of what might happen in the future if he doesn’t get help.” Ella hadn’t forced Chloe to leave. Chloe had asked for help.

And not because of one incident, but because of two years of escalating ones.

Brett didn’t say anything. Ella let the subject of counseling go for the moment, afraid that he’d have to leave before they talked about her most prominent concern.

“Did you know that he’s calling her?”

Brett didn’t respond well to drama. To sensationalism. The most efficient way to deal with him was to take all the alarm out of her tone. She knew that. And tried her best.