Fearless - Fern Michaels Page 0,26
happening. You let me know when you’re up, and I’ll take care of breakfast.”
“You’re right. I’ll see you then,” Anna said. She took her cell phone from the charger, to bring it up to her master suite, in which she’d had the same hidden chargers and flash drive ports installed. She put her phone on to charge again and checked for any text messages from Mandy or Christina. None, just as she’d expected. Anna glanced at the clock, saw there was plenty of time to relax in the bath before making her call to Christina.
She walked into the master bath, or en suite as they were called now. She preferred master bath. She’d had thousands of viewers ask this on her channel, and they’d pretty much agreed that master bath sounded better.
She filled the giant Jacuzzi tub with the hottest water she could stand and threw in a full bag of lavender-scented Epsom salts. Anna stripped, tossed her clothes into a hamper, then placed a foot into the hot water.
“Dang,” she mumbled when she put her other foot in the water. Gradually lowering the rest of her body into the water, she reclined against the back of the tub. She clicked a button, and the jets turned on, instantly providing relief to her sore muscles. Knowing she was doing all that she could to avoid thinking about the cruise, Anna gave in, surrendering to the images of Ryan Robertson.
He was extraordinarily handsome. If he had been unkind, she didn’t remember. Closing her mind to all negative thoughts, she pulled up her ability to calm herself by visualizing the flow of a stream—smooth, clear, and constant. Sounds of water gently lapping against stones, the sweet scent of honeysuckle, the light touch of a breeze against her bare skin.
“Forgive me for staring, but aren’t you the Anna Campbell?”
“I am, indeed.”
“I’m a big fan.”
“Thank you.”
Anna sat up so fast that she knocked a small candle off the edge of the tub, sending it shattering to the floor. She grabbed a towel from a decorative wire basket she kept beside the Jacuzzi and stood, wrapping the towel around her, and stepped out of the deep water, careful to avoid the shards of glass.
Her hands shook as she sidestepped around the sharp objects. She dropped the towel on the floor, removed her robe off a hook, slipped it on, and secured the belt. “Just what I need,” she said aloud. She hurried downstairs to the kitchen for a broom and a handheld mini vacuum. Quickly, Anna cleaned up the mess, going over it several times, hoping she hadn’t missed any tiny shards. Mr. Waffles roamed the house, and it would only take a tiny sliver of glass to cut his tender paws.
Ryan Robertson. His name had a nice ring to it.
His name!
Given how tech-savvy she had to be in her profession, she sure as hell had missed the boat here. Before she changed her mind, she went to the small writing desk in her room and booted up her laptop, the one she used for personal business.
Anna brought up the search engine and typed in his name, then added “Lubbock, Texas.”
One million two hundred thirty thousand hits. Knowing what he looked like, though she couldn’t remember if he’d said what his profession was, she clicked on the first one. She clicked for the next hour, finding no image of the Ryan Robertson she’d met. Next, she went to Facebook and brought up her private page, the one in which she only used her surname and her initials in order to keep it private. She’d opted to use a stock photo image in place of a legitimate picture. In the search bar, again, she typed in his name. Several hits. She scrolled through the dozens of Ryan Robertsons until she finally hit pay dirt!
Anna recognized him immediately. She clicked on his page. TO SEE WHAT HE SHARES WITH FRIENDS, SEND A REQUEST.
No way, she thought. She went through the tabs at the top of the page. TIMELINE ABOUT FRIENDS’ PHOTOS.
Anna couldn’t stop herself. She clicked on the ABOUT tab. Two red capital T’s, one imposed over the other, the college she’d attended, her alma mater. The good old Red Raiders. Texas Tech.
Then she remembered.
“I’m a professor at Texas Tech.”
Chapter 7
There’d been more to his statement, but it didn’t matter. After debating with herself for a few minutes whether or not to send him a friend request or e-mail him through his public e-mail address at the