Barbara Dunlop - Park Avenue Secrets - Marriage, Manhattan Style

“Joe, this is my wife, Elizabeth Wellington.”

The man stepped forward. He was at least six foot three, with broad shoulders, a burly chest, and very little in the way of a neck. His hair was cropped close, and he wore a dark, neat suit with a dress shirt and tie.

“A pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Wellington.” The man held out a strong, callused hand.

“Hello,” Elizabeth managed, giving a brief shake, catching a glimpse of a leather holster beneath his suit jacket. Then she met gray eyes, intelligent eyes, some might even say cunning.

“I’ve hired Joe as your driver,” Reed continued.

A driver?

Elizabeth might have been duped, but she wasn’t stupid. The man looked like he was half linebacker, half mercenary. He definitely wasn’t somebody she’d want to be alone with in a dark alley.

A visceral chill worked its way up her spine.

“Elizabeth?” Reed’s confused voice seemed to come from a long way off. “Are you okay?”

She looked back to her husband, her lying, cheating, untrustworthy husband. “I don’t need a driver.”

“Elizabeth,” said Hanna, her voice chastising as she dunked a tea bag into the teapot at her counter. “You have seriously gone round the bend.”

“He insisted, absolutely insisted I keep the guy as my driver.” Elizabeth had tried every argument in the book to change Reed’s mind, but his stubbornness had been off the charts, even for him.

“Maybe he simply wants you to have a driver. You did get pretty drunk last night.”

“That guy is not a driver.”

“He drove you here, didn’t he?”

Only because Elizabeth had been too frightened to try to escape. “I think he’s a criminal.”

“Now, why on earth would Reed hire a criminal?”

Elizabeth hesitated, reluctant to give voice to the fear that had followed her over. But she had to share it with someone. “What if they’re right?”

“Who?” Hanna returned to the living area of her loft, where rain pattered on the skylights, and dull daylight gave the airy room a gray atmosphere.

“The SEC. What if Reed has a secret life? What if his wealth really is from shady deals with the underworld?” Her mouth went dry and her voice shook ever so slightly. “You know, he’s got an awful lot of money.”

Hanna enunciated slowly and carefully. “Round the bend, Elizabeth. Reed is a husband and a businessman.”

But there were too many inconsistencies lately. He was being far too secretive for this to all be nothing. “Not that much of a husband,” Elizabeth pointed out. “He’s fooling around with the coconut woman.”

“You don’t know that he’s fooling around with the coconut woman.”

“He lied about her. And I know she was in our suite.” Elizabeth warmed to the theory. “You know, my parents warned me about rich people. They said they were sly and untrustworthy. They were rich for a reason, and it wasn’t hard work and fair trade practices.”

“Elizabeth.”

“What?”

“You disagree with your parents on that, remember?”

“I was wrong. And look where it got me.”

Hanna fought a grin. “You mean with the imagination of a conspiracy theorist? Forget being a script girl. You might want to consider script writing as your future career.”

“What future career? I’ll probably be killed in gangland crossfire before I can ever get a career off the ground. I might know too much already.”

“This is insane,” said Hanna, picking up her phone. “What’s his name?”

“Reed Anton Wellington III.”

Hanna shot her a look of dark disbelief. “I mean your driver.”

“Oh. Joe Germain. What are you doing?”

“I’m calling Bert Ralston. You give an investigative reporter an hour, and you’ll be amazed what he can find out.”

Elizabeth plunked back on the couch. That wasn’t a half bad idea. At least then Hanna would believe her. At least then Elizabeth would know if she was in any danger from Joe.

How could Reed do this to her? She’d been an innocent young college graduate from New Hampshire when he met her, wooed her, enticed her away from the safe bosom of her family. She never should have borrowed that red dress, or gone on the harbor cruise. Then she never would have met Reed.

Hanna hung up the phone. “You know, you were a lot more fun last night when you were drunk.”

“You’re not taking this seriously enough,” Elizabeth accused.

Hanna rose to pour the tea. “I’m taking this exactly seriously enough. You want vanilla cookies?”

Elizabeth’s stomach gave a little lurch of protest. “How come you’re not hung over?” she asked Hanna, rising to follow her into the kitchen area.

“Because you outdrank me. How are you feeling by the way?”

“You mean other than facing imminent death by either criminal gang wars or by annoying my driver?”

Hanna carefully poured two cups of steaming tea. “Yeah.”

“Bit of a headache. Reed left me some aspirins on the nightstand.”

“Yet more evidence of his evil cold-bloodedness.”

“He didn’t want me to suspect anything.”

“Well, that’s not working out so well for him so far, is it?”

“That’s because of my brilliant, deductive mind.”

“It’s because of your pickle-brained paranoia.”

“I heard the lies. I smelled the coconut.”

Hanna’s telephone rang and Elizabeth cringed.

Hanna picked it up. “Hello?” She looked at Elizabeth and mouthed Bert Ralston. She listened for a moment. Then her brows shot up. “Really?”

“What?” Elizabeth demanded in a stage whisper. Her heart rate deepened in her chest.

“Okay,” said Hanna. “Thanks. I owe you one.” And she hung up the phone.

“Well?” asked Elizabeth, easing into a chair, because the feeling had suddenly left her legs.

“Joe Germain isn’t a driver.”

A loud clanging grew inside Elizabeth’s head.

“He’s a bodyguard.”

“What?”

“He’s a bodyguard, Lizzy. He works for a national agency called Resolute Charter. Reed’s not trying to hurt you, he’s trying to protect you.”

An instant rush of relief shot through Elizabeth’s body.

For a split second, it masked all the other questions.

But then they percolated back. “Protect me from what? ”

“I’m guessing reporters. With Hammond and Pysanski’s involvement, this SEC thing is heating up.”

Elizabeth had no idea who Hammond and Pysanski were. But Reed wasn’t a member of a criminal gang. And her life as she knew it hadn’t just ended.

“It doesn’t explain the coconut woman,” she pointed out.

Hanna slid down into a chair beside her. “If you give it a little time, I’ll bet the coconut woman explains herself.”

“Dad called here looking for an explanation.”

Elizabeth was delighted to hear her brother Brandon’s deep voice on the other end of the phone.

“Why didn’t he call me? ” She crossed the living room to curl up in her favorite wingback chair next to the bay window. The clouds were still gray, but the rain had turned to drizzle.

“He thinks the FBI has your phone bugged.”

“It’s the SEC, and they don’t bug phones.”

Did they?

If they did, maybe she could get her hands on the tapes and get some information on coconut woman.

“You holding up okay?” asked Brandon.

Elizabeth traced a zigzag pattern on the smooth leather arm. “I’m fine.”

Truth was, the SEC was far from her biggest problem at the moment.

“So, you’re not worried?” asked Brandon.

“He’s got a good lawyer, and they say it’s going well.” As she finished the sentence, she realized that Reed hadn’t in fact said a single thing to her about the case since their initial discussion. In truth, she had no idea how it was going.