An Inconvenient Husband (3 page)

She turned on a couple
of lamps as she found her way to her room which lay at the back of the house.
Inside, she switched on the light. She dropped her bag onto a chair, noticing
the French doors that opened into the garden were standing slightly ajar.

She had closed them
before she left. Hadn't she? She shrugged. Well, maybe not. She bit her lip,
feeling uneasy. Something felt.. .wrong. Some ghostly awareness feathered
across her skin, as if something unseen was right here with her—a presence, an
energy in the air. She surveyed the room. There was nothing unusual. Everything
was just the way she had left it.

She went into the
adjoining bathroom, found some aspirin and swallowed it with a glass of water,
making a face at herself in the mirror. "You are a nut case," she
said out loud.

There were no ghosts
in her room; they were in her mind. She felt haunted by shadows from the past,
that's what it was. She'd been thrown off her equilibrium because she'd seen
Blake again.

"You haven't seen
him in four years," she told her reflection. "You're divorced. So
what's the big deal?"

She took off her
clothes and got ready for bed. She drifted off into a restless sleep, full of
images of Blake- Blake sitting by a fire and reading a book. Blake pouring
wine, giving her a secret smile. Blake sprawled on the bed, naked, asleep. She
wanted to touch him, run her hand over his body, feel his warmth, his strength.
She reached out, but her hand did not make contact, no matter how hard she
tried, as if some force field protected him from her touch. She awoke, crying.

It took a long time to
get back to sleep.

The next morning she
was dragged into consciousness by the call to prayer broadcast from the
mosque's minaret. It was almost six, and the faint glimmer of dawn filtered
through the thin curtains. She listened to the monotonous chanting, knowing the
meaning, but not understanding the Arabic words.

She lay still in bed,
until the sun washed the room in the bright light of a new day.

"You just
disappeared," Nazirah accused her an hour later as they were on their way
to the Central Market in town. The chauffeur-driven car was compliments of
Nazirah's father.

"I had a
headache."

"I saw you
talking to that guy. Did he tell you who

he is?"

"A consultant on
a World Bank contract. He's here only temporarily." Nicky tried to sound
bored. She did not want to discuss Blake. She did not even want to think of
him.

"What else did he
tell you?"

"He loves curry
puffs," she said with sudden inspiration. "And he's crazy about satay
with peanut sauce." All of which was true, but it certainly was not newly
garnered information.

"Is that what you
talked about with an interesting man? Food?" Nazirah's tone indicated a
severe lack of admiration for this particular tactic.

"Food's a great
subject," Nicky said brightly. "Everybody has to eat it. It's
uncontroversial, but everybody has an opinion."

Nazirah rolled her
eyes.

Nicky laughed.
"You can learn a lot about people by finding out what kind of food they
like. Whether they're adventurous, have imagination, are conservative,
romantic, boring stick-in-the-muds. I did an article about how to use food in
character analysis last month. I think I did my readers a great service."

"And what did you
find out about him?" Nazirah asked doubtfully. "What kind of food
does he like and what does it say about his character?"

"He likes
everything," Nicky said casually, which was basically the truth.
"Which makes him a conservative, imaginative adventurer with
stick-in-the-mud tendencies."

Nazirah laughed.
"And how does he do in the romance department?" Amusement glimmered
in her blue eyes.

"Romance?"

"Is he a
romantic?"

Nicky braced herself
mentally. "He has his moments," she stated in a businesslike tone.
"Flowers, chocolates, jewelry, that sort of thing." Sometimes luxury
cookbooks, and odd knickknacks from exotic places in the world.

"Mmm. What about
love letters and poetry? What about sexy phone calls?" Nazirah lowered her
voice. "I
love
sexy phone calls."

Nicky's chest tightened
and she swallowed at the sudden painful lump in her throat. She looked away.
"Nope."

"Is he a good
lover?"

Her heart turned over.
Good God, she had to change the subject. The last thing she wanted to think
about was Blake's talents in bed. "Listen," she said impatiently,
"there are limits to what you can find out about a man by knowing his food
preferences. If you're so interested in the man, go out with him, sleep with
him and find out for yourself."
Good Lord!
she thought
in a panic.
What am I saying?

Nazirah stared at her.
"Why are you mad at me?"

"I'm not mad at
you." Nicky bit her tongue. Oh, God, she was giving herself away.

"Sure seems like
it. I was just making conversation, having a little fun with this idea of
yours."

"I'm sorry."

Nazirah was silent for
a moment. "I'm not trying to make you angry, but if you're interested in
him, I'll stay clear of him."

"I'm not
interested in him. You can have him." Nicky heard the snappish tone of her
own voice, took a deep breath, and forced a smile. "Maybe your mother can
ask him to dinner. He loves home-cooked meals." She bit her lip. "He
told me," she added.

Confusion, hesitation
chased each other across Nazirah's face. "You know this man, don't
you?" she asked softly.

"No," Nicky
said, feeling herself turn cold. "I only thought I did."

*  *  *

She'd been twenty-one
when she'd met Blake at a party given by her parents in Washington, D.C. At the
time Blake worked with her father at USAID and her father thought the world of
him. One look at Blake and Nicky had thought the world of him, as well. Her
heart had nearly stopped and she'd almost forgotten to breathe. The world
around her had ceased to exist. The glass of wine she'd had in her hand had
slipped and fallen to the floor, the glass not breaking but the wine soaking
irreverently into her mother's priceless Persian prayer rug.

Blake had found her
another glass of wine and had not left her side for the rest of the evening.
The days and weeks that followed had blurred into a whirlwind of love, laughter
and passion.

She'd been in love
plenty of times, but nothing compared to this. This was the real thing! She
loved this man with all her soul. She knew it. Absolutely.

A month later they
were married.

Nazirah stopped asking
questions and for a while they drove on silently through the city and Nicky
looked outside taking in the sights and the people.

She was in love with
Kuala Lumpur, with its wonderful mixture of architecture illustrating the
country's turbulent colonial history. Contemporary high rises blended in with
Moorish mosques, Chinese temples and Victorian buildings left by British
colonial rule. Lush tropical greenery shaded the roads and buildings.

Her stomach growled
inelegantly and Nazirah grinned. "Didn't you have breakfast?"

"No. I didn't
want to spoil my appetite." There'd be plenty of food to eat at the
market, and Nicky was ready for some. It was only fair that if she was going to
write about the food, she should try it first. She had her notebook and pen
ready, as well as a good dose of enthusiasm to help her along. Open markets
were her most favorite places. She grinned at herself. It was going to be an
exciting day. She could feel it already.

Lighted minarets stood
silhouetted against the dark night sky like an image from the Arabian Nights as
Nicky rode home in a taxi that night. She felt exhausted but exhilarated, and
she didn't think she was going to eat again for a week.

The large gates stood
open and the car drove noiselessly up the drive toward the front door of her
father's house. Nicky got out, paid the turbaned Sikh driver and moved up the
veranda steps. The night watchman lay asleep on his mat and didn't stir as she
let herself in. Poor guy. He probably had a day job, as well, to make ends
meet.

The house was silent.
Her father had flown to Singapore for business and wouldn't be back until
sometime tomorrow. The house felt empty and lonely. She sighed and turned on
the brass table lamps in the living room and dropped her notebook and purse
amid the silk embroidered cushions on the sofa. She might as well work on her
notes tonight, but first she'd get out of her clothes and shower off the days'
heat and dust.

Quickly she moved
through the hall to her room, opened the door, switched on the light and froze.

Her heart made a
sickening lurch, then started racing when a rush of adrenaline flooded her.
Chaos. Drawers had been turned over, clothes strewn everywhere. The French
windows stood wide open, the lacy white curtains wafting eerily in the breeze.

Never had anything
like this happened to her before and for an interminable moment her legs would
not move and she stood rooted to the floor, her heart pounding like a
sledgehammer.

Burglars, was her
first thought. Burglars searching for money, jewelry.

Jewelry! Her mother's
diamond necklace! Oh, God, no! It was an heirloom, passed on from mother to
daughter for several generations. She rushed over to the dresser, found the
velvet jewelry bag emptied out on the top—her rings, earrings, her mother's
necklace. It was all there. Nothing had been taken. Relief washed over her,
then utter confusion. If the burglars hadn't wanted her jewelry, then what had
they been looking for? The rest of the house had been untouched. Or at least
the living room had appeared to be and that's where the TV was, and the VCR and
the CD player.

What did they want in
her room?

Her legs were
trembling as she scanned the room, trying to see, to understand.
I've got
to do something,
she thought.
I've got to call somebody. The police.
She reached for the bedside phone, realizing at the same time that 9-1-1 would
do her no good outside the United States, that she didn't know the local
emergency number, if there even was one.

She realized something
else, as well. The phone was dead.

Never before had she
known such fear.

And then it got worse.

Movement behind her.
As she swung around, a hand clamped over her mouth and she was bodily lifted
off the floor and carried out of the bedroom door.

CHAPTER TWO

Paralyzed
by fear, Nicky felt
herself being carried through the hall and living room and out the front door.
She was gasping for breath as the two powerful arms that held her pressed her
face forcefully against a hard chest. She started struggling, kicking her legs,
but she was nothing more than a doll in the steely grip.

"Not a sound or
we're both dead!" growled a low voice, the tone deadly and ominous. A
voice intimately familiar.

Fear flooded out of
her. "Blake?" she asked, but her voice was smothered by his chest,
barely audible.

"Quiet!"

His chest was warm and
solid against her face. For a fleeting moment she had an odd sense of déjà
vu—as if once before she'd been carried off like this in the dark of night.

She heard the pumping
of his heart against her cheek and her senses reeled with the familiar warm
male scent of him, overwhelming for one delirious moment all other thought.

He pushed her almost
roughly into the back seat of a car, slid in beside her, giving an order to the
driver and before she could catch her breath they were tearing down the drive.

She was panting, her
throat raw. "What the hell is this all about?" She struggled for the
words, rubbing at a scratch on her arm where a branch had scraped the skin, her
confusion greater than her fear now. They were in a taxi, she realized, and
going at great speed.

"Be quiet,"
he said on a low note, warning in his voice. "Later." He glanced out
the back window.

"Later what?
Where are you taking me?" she demanded. "Are you insane, what is this
all about?"

Steely eyes met hers.
"I said be quiet." His voice was ominously low. "You'll be fine
as long as you act normally."

She suppressed a
hysterical little laugh. Sure, no sweat. She was used to being carried off into
cars against her will. Of course she would act normally. "Are you out of
your mind?" she whispered fiercely.

His silence was
eloquent.

She hated his superior
manner. She hated him. This, of course, was nothing new. She had entertained
about this man every emotion known to mankind, except one: physical fear. And
she wasn't afraid of him now, which, under the present circumstances, was
something to be grateful for.