"It's been a long time since I heard your voice, bitch. I've known the number since the second week after you changed it, but I wanted to make you think you'd fooled me. Surprises are always more effective. I'm having a little trouble getting your cell number, but I'll persuade someone in the phone company office to give it to me soon." He paused. "The house phone is in Nick Gilroy's name. You have him wrapped around your finger, don't you? Do you sleep with him, too?"

"We're friends," she said between her teeth. For God's sake, let him hang up. She didn't know how much more she could stand.

"No, I think it might be Dalks. He's younger and I know your appetite. Do you do it at the clinic?"

"No. And I'm sure you know it." She couldn't take anymore. "I'm going to hang up."

"And you're hoping I won't call you back."

"Yes. I don't deserve this, Lester."

"You deserve anything I want to hand out to you." His tone was suddenly ugly. "Whore. No other man, Devon. You're coming back to me. You killed my child. Now you're going to give me another one."

"I didn't kill-" The pain was searing through her as it always did when he reached this point. "You know I-"

"No other man, bitch." He hung up.

She was cold, shaking. She shouldn't let him do this to her. God knows she was used to this ugliness. She should be stronger. But the threat wasn't only to her, it was to the people close to her. This time he'd mentioned both Nick and Dalks.

It didn't mean that Lester would move on them, she told herself. It could be a tactic to make her more afraid and drive her back to him. But could she take the chance? Lester was getting uglier with every contact. If he didn't hurt Nick or Hugh Dalks physically, he could find ways to make trouble for them. In the years since she'd left him, she'd known him do everything from planting drugs in the car of her date to giving anonymous tips that another male friend was a child molester. All ugly, all permanently scarring. It mustn't happen again. Not to Nick, who deserved peace and some mea sure of contentment. Not to Hugh Dalks, who was just starting out and might face ruin at Lester's hands.