Dr. Rachel Grant had walked only a few feet out the back door of her  family's Sonoma day spa, Joy Luck Life, when the patter of running  footsteps behind her made her turn.   
  She had only a glimpse of a dark hoodie and a tall, lanky figure before a shove sent her sprawling onto the sidewalk. Thwack! Her left cheekbone collided with the cement, sending pain lancing through her head.
   
  Snow  clouded her vision and she struggled to open her eyes. Her heart  pounded in her throat, making it hard for her to breathe. Frantic, she  opened her mouth wide but no sound came out.
   
  She glanced up. The  backsides of dirty sneakers filled her field of view as they trotted  away from her. Then a hand scooped up the bag strap of her sister  Naomi's laptop computer, which had flown from Rachel's grip to land on  the edge of the pool of light from the parking lot streetlamp. The  sneakers hustled away.
   
  Breathe! Rachel forced her wooden  lungs to fill and tried to scream, but only a harsh croak came out.  Where were the security guards? They should have seen the attack thanks  to the outside video cameras. How long would it take for them to run out  here?
   
  Even worse, Naomi would be devastated to lose that laptop, which she'd bought barely five hours ago.
   
  She  heard the creak of the spa's back door, then more footsteps. "Rachel!  Rach, are you okay?" Naomi fell to her knees beside her, hands on  Rachel's shoulders. "I was talking to Martin, and we saw it all on the  security camera." Martin, one of the security guards, raced past them,  pursuing the stranger and the laptop.
   
  In the distance, a woman's  voice screeched, "What are you doing? Don't leave me!" It sounded as if  it had come from the front of the spa.
   
  Who was that? What was going on?
   
  Rachel  pushed herself up, her cheekbone throbbing as she rose. She squeezed  her eyes shut to the wave of pain and paused on her knees, her head  bowed.
   
  Naomi put her arm around her. "Where are you hurt?"
   
  "Just my cheek."
   
  Naomi  pulled Rachel's hair away from her face to look at her. Rachel had a  hard time opening her eyes again as the pain splashed across her  forehead, trickling back inside her skull. "How bad is it?"
   
  "You'll have a black eye, that's for sure. We need to get you to the hospital."
   
  "No, I'll have Monica look at it first. If the family nurse says so, then I'll  go to the hospital." Just the thought of all the people in a crowded  emergency room made Rachel cringe. She only wanted a quiet place to lie  down and recover. "I'm sorry about your laptop."
   
  "Forget the laptop, I'm worried about you."
   
  "I only took a fall, nothing worse. But that laptop was new—"
   
  "I  can buy a new one. Besides, I'm almost glad it was new because it  didn't have anything on it, so the spa didn't lose any sensitive  information. That would have been worse." Especially since Naomi still  managed the spa while their father recovered from his stroke. Naomi had  bought the computer to help her with the spa's accounting.
   
  "We should call the police and report it stolen."
   
  "We should call Dad and Aunt Becca first." Naomi dug her cell phone out of her pocket.
   
  "Call  Aunt Becca. Aren't she and Detective Carter out to dinner tonight?" The  two of them were dating again after an argument that had kept them  apart for a few months. It was almost 10:00 p.m., but they might still  be together at a movie.
   
  As Naomi talked to Aunt Becca—who indeed  was with Detective Horatio Carter—Rachel managed to sit up, although the  evening sky spun around her. She clutched her hands together, trying to  stop their shaking. She'd been attacked in the spa parking lot!
   
  Clicking  heels made Rachel look up. Gloria Reynolds, one of Naomi's massage  clients, tripped toward them. "Dr. Grant, are you all right? Did that  man hurt you?"
   
  "Ms. Reynolds, you're still here?" Not the most tactful thing to say, but her headache was making it hard for her to be polite.
   
  "Ms. Reynolds was my last client for tonight," Naomi told Rachel as she ended her call with Aunt Becca.
   
  Gloria  flipped her highlighted hair with a manicured hand. "The security guard  was walking me to my car when he saw that person running away. Miss  Grant," Gloria said to Naomi, "you really should talk to that guard. He  ran after the person and left me by myself. Even when I called to him.  And it was obvious the other guard was after the man, too, so there was  no need for him to give chase."
   
  Naomi smiled politely and responded with amazing courtesy when Rachel knew she must be rolling her eyes inside.
   
  A flash of car headlights made Rachel wince as a vehicle headed down the spa driveway.
   
  Then  alarm jolted through her. The spa was closed, and the security guards,  running after the thief toward the drive way, would have stopped the car  from entering. Were the guards okay?
   
  The car maneuvered into the staff parking lot, then stopped right next to them. A door opened and slammed shut. "Rachel!"
   
  Edward  Villa's voice made her heart leap into her throat, then settle back  down in her chest, racing. Edward was here. Suddenly everything seemed  okay.
   
  No, she had to stop reacting this way to him. He didn't think of her as anything other than a client.
   
  "Are you all right?"
   
  She  smelled him—pine, a hint of the orchids he worked with at his  greenhouses and earthy musk—before her eyes registered that he was  crouched in front of her, edging out Ms. Reynolds.
   
  "The guards told me what happened when I drove in."
   
  She  had been able to keep it together when talking to Naomi, but somehow,  his concern for her undermined her control over her emotions, and she  steeled her jaw against a sudden onslaught of wild sobbing. Casting  herself into his arms would only solidify his cool opinion of her, which  he had made abundantly clear a couple months ago.
   
  "Rachel." He reached out for her.
   
  She held up a hand to stop him.
   
  He grasped her hand, engulfing her fingers. His callused fingers rubbed her knuckles. His touch made her head spin.
   
  "I'm fine," she whispered, breathless. She pulled her hand away.
   
  The  security guards walked up to them. "I'm sorry, Miss Grant, he got away.  He ran up the driveway, and there was a car waiting for him at the end  of it. They took off."
   
  "Dr. Grant, are you okay?" the other guard asked, peering at Rachel.
   
  She  felt like a bug on display. "I'm fine." She heaved herself to her feet,  but it made the blood pound painfully in her head. She swayed.
   
  Edward's arm wrapped around her, making the earth stand still again. It felt good to be held by him. It felt…
   
  Too good. She pulled away from him.
   
  Edward  paused a moment, then he bent down and collected her purse, which had  dropped and scattered its contents when she fell. As he handed it to  her, his eyes were calm, but somehow she could sense a fire burning  behind them. As if other emotions ran deeper.
   
  She didn't  understand. While they had been working together for the past year on  Rachel's new product for the spa, they had gotten closer, and she had  felt free to be herself with him. But then, in the past couple months,  he had withdrawn from her, become distant and polite.
   
  Maybe he had seen who she really was…and he hadn't liked what he saw.
   
  The thought was like a punch to her gut, every time she thought it. Which had been often in the past two months.
   
  No,  maybe he had never been interested in her, and he'd suddenly become  aware that he was leading her on. Regardless, recently he had been clear  in showing that he had no interest in her beyond a good business  relationship.
   
  She was just imagining the emotion in his eyes was  deeper than natural concern. "Thank you." She took her purse from him,  avoiding touching his hand again.
   
  The silence was thicker than cold cream.
   
  "Rachel—" he began.
   
  "Here  you go, Miss Rachel." Martin, a security guard who had been with them  for years, handed her an ice pack he must have gotten from inside the  spa. "That'll keep the swelling down from that shiner."
   
  His light  words made her smile, made the situation not seem so horribly  violating. "Thanks, Martin." She pressed the cold pack to her eye, and  found that it enabled her to avoid looking at Edward.
   
  "Ms. Reynolds," Naomi said, "let me escort you back inside. We can wait for the police in one of the lounge rooms."
   
  Rachel  stayed outside and watched them reenter the spa. She tried not to  remember what had happened, but it came to her in flashes. She shivered.  She'd been bullied in grade school because she'd been a geek and a bit  odd, but no one had ever assaulted her. Even bickering with her sisters  Naomi and Monica had never gone beyond a little hair-pulling.
   
  But tonight, someone had deliberately hurt her. It made her feel weak and vulnerable. Not in control.
   
  And she didn't like it.
   
  She especially didn't like that it had happened here, at the spa.
   
  She  suddenly realized that Edward had no reason to visit her here. They  usually talked on the phone about the basil plants he was growing for  production of her new spa product and met at his greenhouses. Why was he  at the spa this late at night? "Edward, what are you doing here?"
   
  His eyes were deep obsidian pools as they studied her, then he surprised her by looking away.
   
  "Edward?"
   
  He sighed. "I called your home and your sister Monica said you were still here."
   
  "Did  you try calling my cell phone? Did I not hear it ringing?" She fumbled  in her purse and grasped the rubbery edge of her rugged waterproof cell  phone—a necessity since she'd ruined two phones by using them while  working in the lab with chemicals.
   
  "No, I didn't call."
   
  Avoidance wasn't Edward's style—neither was this vague evasiveness. "Then what…?"
   
  He didn't answer immediately, and his face was grave. "I came to the spa to tell you something you're not going to like."
   
  Her heart beat hard, once. But really, how could her day get any worse? "Lay it on me. I'm ready."
   
  "Earlier tonight, someone broke into greenhouse four."
   
  "Greenhouse four? My greenhouse?" Technically, it was his greenhouse, but the only things in it were her Malaysian basil plants. "Were you there? Are you okay?"
   
  He  paused, and his searching gaze made her stomach flip. But she lifted  her head and tightened her muscles to keep her molten insides in place.
   
  "I'm fine. I wasn't there when it happened."
   
  "Oh. Good." She tried to slow her racing heart. "Did you call the police?"
   
  "Yes.  I left my brother, Alex, to meet with them while I came to talk to you.  On the way, I called Horatio Carter, who said he was also headed here  with your aunt, so that was fortunate. I'm hoping he'll come back to the  greenhouse with me tonight."
   
  "How did you find out about the break-in?"
   
  "I  left my cell phone in greenhouse six, so I went to get it. I noticed  movement in the yard, and when I went to check the greenhouses, I found  yours unlocked."
   
  Her headache became a jackhammer against her skull. "Was everything okay?"
   
  The lines deepened around his mouth. "No. Someone trashed it—all your plants."
   
  She gasped.
   
  "Don't panic too much. Alex is moving the plants to greenhouse seven right now, and I can salvage most of it."
   
  "Most  of it?" She needed Edward to cultivate a certain number of plants so  she could make the extract for her scar-reduction cream, scheduled to  launch in only five months. She couldn't be late. The spa depended on  her new product launch. "Will you be able to grow more? I need…" She  faltered at the shadow that crossed his eyes.
   
  He replied evenly, "Your research will be fine, Rachel."
   
  His  distant tone confused her. What had she said? She switched tactics.  "You left your cell phone in a greenhouse? You never do that. If you  hadn't forgotten it…"
   
  A half smile twitched at his mouth. "God was watching over your plants, I think."
   
  The  familiar way he said it made something squirm inside her. Edward had  always had such a different relationship with God than she did, and it  seemed to widen the gap between them. "Why didn't the alarm go off? I  thought the greenhouses all had security alarms in place."
   
  "They  do—to monitor temperature and humidity, and also to alert when a window  or door is opened. But the system in greenhouse four didn't go off. I  checked it, and it looks like the thief tampered with it."
   
  "Aren't those security alarms top-of-the-line? High-tech?"
   
  He nodded. "Whoever did this was a professional, not your average thief."
   
  The mild California fall breeze was suddenly frosty against her skin. "How about the other greenhouses?"
   
  "I checked them all. Only yours was broken into."
   
  "Only  mine?" This was a blow she didn't know if she could bear, not on top of  everything that had happened tonight. She bit her lip.
   
  It almost  looked as if he didn't know what to do with his hands, finally resting  them on his slim hips. "I don't understand it. Some of the plants in my  other greenhouses are extremely rare and valuable, but whoever came by  didn't even touch them."
   
  She'd seen those plants—exotic orchids  and rare rain-forest species, mostly commissioned by wealthy clients  because of Edward's reputation for cultivating delicate tropical plants.  "None of them were taken?"
   
  If the burglar could have dismantled  the security alarm for one greenhouse, surely he could have dismantled  the security alarms for the others. Or maybe he hadn't had time to  because Edward had discovered the thief's activities. But why bother  with destroying her plants when he could have more quickly gotten into  the other greenhouses and stolen the rarer species?
   
  Edward's eyes pinned her with concern and gravity. "The thief entered only greenhouse four, Rach—the thief was only after your plants."
   
  Edward  hated chaos, and it surrounded him in greenhouse four—broken pots, torn  leaves and potting soil dusting everything. He stood in the midst of  the destruction and sighed.
   
  It wasn't actually that bad. He'd  discovered the open door before the temperature had dropped too much,  and now Rachel's plants were all in greenhouse seven. He was also  planning on paying for an evening guard to walk the greenhouses—at least  until the person responsible for this was caught.
   
  Detective  Carter glanced up from where he surveyed some toppled tables. "It would  have been better for me if you'd left the scene as is, Edward."
   
  "Sorry,  Detective, but Malaysian basil is extremely sensitive to temperature  and humidity. The plants could have died within the hour."
   
  Detective Carter shrugged and went back to taking notes.
   
  "Thanks for convincing Rachel not to come out here tonight, Horatio," Edward said.
   
  The  detective shook his head, his thinning red-gold hair glinting dully in  the fluorescent light. "She didn't need to see this. She's had a bad  night already. How many plants survived?"
   
  "Almost all of them, actually."