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about the caller, but when David had phoned, she decided that he would find out soon enough anyway. It was a matter of public record, and sooner or later the news would filter across state lines. “I’ve talked to the police, and I’m having all the locks changed. I’ll be okay. Don’t worry.”
    “I don’t like the sounds of it, Samantha.” She imagined the tightening of the corners of his mouth. “Maybe you should look at this as some kind of…warning…you know, a sign that you should turn your life in a different direction.”
    “A sign?” she repeated, her eyes narrowing as she stared at the lake stretching from her yard to the distant shore. “As in God is trying to talk to me? You mean like the burning bush or—”
    “There’s no reason to get sarcastic,” he cut in.
    “You’re right. I’m sorry.” She balanced her hips on the arm of a wing chair. “I guess I’m a little edgy. I didn’t sleep well.”
    “I’ll bet.”
    She didn’t mention the boat; she was certain a sailboat had been drifting just off her dock, that in the barest of light from the shore, she’d seen running lights and the reflection of giant sails with a man’s contour against the backdrop. Or maybe it had been her imagination running wild….
    “So where are you, again?” she asked, reaching to the nightstand and retrieving a knitting needle she’d found in the closet, part of the personal items she’d inherited from her mother. Feeling a twinge of guilt, she slipped the needle between the cast and her leg and scratched. Her doctor would probably kill her if he knew, but then he was the crusty old guy down in Mazatlán, the expatriate she’d never see again if she was lucky.
    “I’m here in San Antonio, and it’s a deluge. I’m standing at the window of my hotel room looking over the River Walk and it’s like a wall of water—can’t even see the restaurant across the river. The sky just opened up.” He sighed and for a second his cell phone cut out, the connection was lost, only to return. “…wish you were here Samantha. I’ve got a room with a Jacuzzi and a fireplace. It could be cozy.”
    And it could be hell. She remembered Mexico. The way David had smothered her. The fights. He’d wanted her to move back to Houston, and when she’d refused, she’d witnessed a side of him she didn’t like. His face had turned a deep scarlet and a small vein had throbbed over one eyebrow. His fists had even clenched as he’d told her that she was an idiot not to take him up on his offer. At that moment, she’d known she never would.
    “I thought I made it clear how I felt,” she said, watching a raindrop drizzle a zigzag course down the window. She gave up on the knitting needle and tossed it onto the bureau.
    “I hoped you’d changed your mind.”
    “I haven’t. David, it won’t work. I know this sounds corny and trite, but I thought you and I, we could—”
    “—just be friends,” he finished for her, his voice flat.
    “You don’t have to put the ‘just’ in there. It’s not like being friends isn’t a good thing.”
    “I don’t feel that way about you,” he said, and she imagined his serious face. He was a good-looking man. Clean-cut. Athletic. Handsome enough to have done some print work while he was attending college, and he had the scrap-books to prove it. Women were attracted to him. Sam had been, or thought she’d been, but in the two years they’d dated some of the luster had faded, and she’d never really fallen in love. Not that there was anything specifically wrong with him. Or nothing she could name. He was handsome, intelligent, the right age, and his job with Regal Hotels was certain to make him a millionaire several times over. They just didn’t click.
    “I’m sorry, David.”
    “Are you?” he asked with a bite. David Ross didn’t like to lose.
    “Yes.” She meant it. She hadn’t intended to lead him on; she’d just wanted to be careful, to make sure this