.

had to admit his wild speculations hadn’t done her justice.

      Her rose-tipped breasts were lush and natural, a sight he could appreciate in this age of implants. Her belly was sleek and flat, her hips flared out sensually from a slim waist and her legs…they went on forever.

      “We shouldn’t be watching this,” he said hoarsely. There was a protocol for surveillance, and ogling naked women in the shower didn’t follow it.

      “Definitely not,” Lacy agreed, making no move to turn off the monitor.

      

      Hugging her arms around herself, Sidney felt the hot press of tears against her eyelids as the cool shower spray pelted her back.

      She couldn’t stop the barrage of images assaulting her senses. Anika Groene’s red-marked body. Candace Hegel’s sea-ravaged face.

      Yesterday, Candace had been alive. Last night, she’d been fighting for her last breath.

      Sidney should have done something.

      She could have done something.

      Shutting off the water, she grabbed the towel hanging on the shower wall and wrapped it around her dripping body. In the kitchen, Marley was waiting expectantly for her dinner, reminding Sidney that she hadn’t eaten, either.

      While her cat munched on dry food, Sidney munched on cold cereal and milk at the kitchen countertop, staring mutely at the blank television screen. When the phone rang, she almost jumped out of her skin. Hands trembling, she picked up the receiver. “Hello?”

      “Sidney? Is that you, dear?”

      Who else would it be? “Yes, Mama.”

      “Thank goodness. I’ve been trying to get through to you all afternoon.”

      “Really?” Her message machine showed no calls. “I was at work.”

      “Oh. Yes, of course.”

      Her mother had a selective memory. She often “forgot” about the kennel, and any other detail of Sidney’s life she didn’t approve of.

      “I was so worried,” she continued. “Samantha called yesterday.”

      Sidney was torn between annoyance with her sister and annoyance with her mother. “It’s really not a problem,” she lied.

      “Not a problem? I beg to differ! Contemplating divorce is the biggest problem a married woman can have.”

      Sidney sank into a chair, kicking herself for thinking her mother had been worried about her, not Samantha, or that her egotistical older sister would have bothered to call home and talk about anyone besides herself.

      “You’ve got to do something,” her mother was saying.

      “Like what?”

      “Talk her out of it.”

      Sidney laughed softly, so she wouldn’t cry. “Samantha does what she pleases. She’ll get a divorce if she wants one, no matter what you or I say.”