by Debra Webb
She hated this! She studied her half-empty cup and wrestled with the need to squirm in her seat. She might as well warn the others. “Brad Brewer just walked in. He’s wearing a deputy’s uniform and looking directly at us.” This whole thing was insane. How could they just keep pretending that all was as it should be?
Kira’s sharp intake of breath punctuated Lacy’s announcement, giving her something else to be confused about. Then again, maybe Kira was feeling just as uneasy as Lacy.
“Ignore him,” Cassidy ordered. “You have to stop letting these guys get to you. I’m telling you they’re on a fishing expedition and you’re giving them far too much bait. They don’t have anything on us. They won’t have anything unless one of us stupidly gives it to them.”
Cassidy was right. Lacy closed her eyes a second and fought to regain her composure. She had to get a grip here. The cops had nothing on them. They had nothing period. The only way anyone would know what happened was if they broke their silence.
“No one knows anything,” Cassidy added firmly, echoing Lacy’s thoughts. “All we have to do is keep it that way until this case is closed.”
As awful as all of this made her feel, it was the single tear that streaked down Melinda’s face that stabbed the deepest into Lacy’s heart. She wished she could take back the words. Her friend had been hanging on so rigidly to her composure until now. She shouldn’t have even told them about Rick’s visit.
“We’ll stick with the plan we’ve all agreed to,” Cassidy reiterated. “We all took the same vow. We’re not going to change our course now regardless of any one person’s personal demons.”
Lacy looked at Cassidy as another memory from ten years ago broadsided Lacy. Kira and Cassidy staring at her with suspicion in their eyes when she’d come back downstairs after checking to insure they hadn’t overlooked anything in the bedroom where they’d found Charles. They wanted to believe Lacy had killed him. She could feel it then, and she could feel it now.
“Was that comment directed at me?” She hadn’t consciously made the decision to ask the question, but there it was. She wasn’t going to let it go this time. She’d done so ten years ago…not this time.
“Lace, this isn’t about you,” Cassidy returned coolly. “This is about all of us. Keeping everyone in emotional turmoil isn’t going to help.”
“Why don’t we just put our cards out on the table this second,” Lacy challenged, any chance of staying calm gone now. She lowered her voice to a harsh whisper. “Let’s all tell where we were that day. No more dancing around the facts.” She leaned into the table, stared each one straight in the eye in turn, fury overriding her better judgment. “Let’s just get it over with once and for all. Clear the air. We all need to know what really happened.”
Melinda’s hand went to her chest and her ragged sigh was all that followed Lacy’s bitter words. The silence echoed deafeningly, obliterating the sounds around them, narrowing the scope of their world down to the suddenly too tiny table.
Regret for causing Melinda more discomfort crashed into Lacy, but even that stinging emotion wasn’t enough to fully quell her flash of anger. She was sick to death of the suspicions directed at her. She hadn’t killed Charles, even though she would have liked to on too many occasions to count.
Cassidy took Melinda’s hand and then reached across the table for Lacy’s. Kira immediately did the same, taking Lacy’s then Melinda’s to complete the circle. A circle they’d clung to as kids…to protect one another no matter the circumstances. Lacy closed her eyes and struggled for calm. She had to get a hold of herself. These were her friends. She had no right to lash out like that. The suspicions she felt were probably just her imagination, her own guilt coming back to haunt her.
“We’re all in this together,” Cassidy said with uncharacteristic softness. “It doesn’t matter who killed him. He’s dead and that’s the only thing that matters. We all wanted him dead, and we all participated in covering up what happened. We are all equally guilty. No one is more or less to blame. And each of us will do whatever it takes to protect one another. Shall we reiterate our vow?”
“I swear.” Kira was the first to speak up, her eyes glittering with fear.
Melinda nodded solemnly. “I swear.”
Lacy wanted to believe they were doing the right thing. She wanted desperately to trust Cassidy’s judgment, just like they always had, but part of her couldn’t pretend away the truth any longer. One of them had killed a man. All of them had covered up the murder, making sure the evidence would never be found. What they’d done was wrong….
But it was too late to back out now.
It was done, end of story.
“I swear,” she said with a reluctance she could no more hide than she could stop breathing.
Kira offered up a big, however shaky, smile and a subject change. “Melinda, I’ll be keeping you company today. Anything special you’d like to do.”
She sounded upbeat and as calm as the proverbial cucumber, but Lacy didn’t miss the little quiver in her voice or the way she kept glancing over at Deputy Brad Brewer. Cassidy had to have noticed it, too—she never missed anything—but she didn’t say a word. Instead she picked at her doughnut.
Enough. Lacy had to stop looking for conspiracies among her friends. She had to pull it together.
“Lacy, you’ll relieve Kira at about seven?” Cassidy inquired.
“Sure.” Yes, she definitely intended to do her part. She’d caused enough trouble this morning. It was time to suck it up and do what had to be done.
Melinda shook her head, the move so weary no one would have noticed had she not groaned at the same time. “Really, I feel like such a burden to you guys. I’ll be okay by myself. You don’t have to stay with me night and day.”
Cassidy turned to Melinda, her expression unexpectedly gentle for a woman so stern in nature. “Melinda, you’re not a burden to any of us. We want to protect you. You’re vulnerable right now. Let’s not keep going over and over the issue. We have to be careful. We don’t want you alone if the chief shows up at your door like he did Lacy’s.”
Melinda nodded, surrendering. “You’re right. I know.” She tried to smile, but the effort failed miserably. “I just don’t want to put anyone out.”
“We love you, Mel.” Lacy felt a genuine smile spread across her lips. This was the one good thing in all the insanity, a friendship that had endured through the years. She had to stop selfishly obsessing about her own feelings. “You couldn’t possibly put us out.”
Just as some of the tension lifted, Cassidy had to toss out another directive. “You steer clear of Summers,” she ordered Lacy. “I don’t know why he’s singled you out, but he’ll have his reasons. I don’t want you inadvertently giving him any additional fuel to fire his suspicions. He can’t possibly have anything more than a hunch.”
“I believe he used to have a crush on Lace,” Mel put in thoughtfully. “He stared at her all through art class, as I recall. It’s a miracle he ever finished a project. I remember thinking how sweet the whole thing was.”
Lacy refused to entertain the memories the comment stirred. She couldn’t look back. Getting caught up in what she and Rick had felt all those years ago would be a mistake. She had to stay away from him just like Cassidy said. And no one could know what had happened between them…not right now anyway. She already felt as if she’d been singled out as the one in this nightmare by those she trusted the most.
“Whether he had a crush on Lacy or not,” Cassidy allowed, “we don’t need him trying to use that against us. No one knows our secret. We have to keep it that way.”
The voice of last night’s caller slammed into Lacy’s brain. She had to tell them about the call! How could she have forgotten? Maybe because it was easier to forget than to analyze what the caller’s words no doubt meant. God, she hated to stir up more conflicting emotions.
“There’s something else,” she said quietly, dread welling all over again. Would the fact that s
he hadn’t already mentioned the call look suspicious to Cassidy? Stop it! she ordered.
The collective attention of those seated around the table settled heavily on her and Lacy would have gladly cut off her right arm not to have to bring this up. She’d caused enough hard feelings this morning. But she couldn’t pretend it hadn’t happened. Not when it could be the real thing…a true threat.
“After Rick left last night I received a phone call.”
Lacy moistened her lips, wished her throat didn’t feel all tight and parched. “The caller asked if I was Lacy Jane Oliver.” Lacy cleared her throat, could hardly breathe. “I said yes, thinking it could be a call about my parents. I was…worried they might have been in some sort of accident.”
“But the call wasn’t about your parents?” Cassidy guessed, her guard going up once more to conceal whatever her true feelings might be. Even her tone gave away nothing. But Lacy could feel the doubt expanding between them like a bottomless void. She was suspect of Lacy’s story even before she heard it.
Refusing to be dragged back into that whole paranoid frame of mind again, she forged ahead. “No. He or she—” she shook her head “—it was hard to tell if it was a man or a woman. The voice was so low and distant, almost distorted, like a bad cell-phone connection. Anyway, whoever it was said I should be very, very afraid. For a split second I thought maybe it was a prank but then he said I know your secret.”
Another long beat of nerve-racking silence passed before any of them found their voices again.
“But that’s…” Kira looked at each of them in turn. “That’s impossible. No one knows.”
“Could someone have seen you guys…?” Melinda moistened her trembling lips. “You know…”
“No one saw us,” Cassidy said flatly. “If someone had seen or had known anything we’d all be behind bars serving out our sentences.” She leveled her most intimidating stare on Lacy. “This is a hoax. You say the call came in right after Summers left?”
Lacy nodded. “Almost immediately.”
“Damn him,” Cassidy swore. “He’s trying to scare you. He can’t get away with that.”
“What do I do?” Lacy argued. “Tell him that his creepy calls about my secret are not going to work?”
“You don’t tell him anything,” Cassidy cautioned. “That’s exactly what he wants you to do. Ignore it.”
“But what if it’s not him?” Melinda leaned in close. “From what I’ve seen so far, Rick is a good chief of police. I can’t imagine he would stoop to this kind of underhanded tactic. Someone had to have seen what you did.”
Cassidy glanced around the diner as if worried that they were being watched. Deputy Brewer seemed to be focused on his breakfast. “Melinda,” she said, turning her attention back to the woman at her side, “you’re overreacting. No one saw us. If they had, they would have talked years ago. Don’t forget that Senator Ashland offered a sizable reward for any information on his missing son.”
Lacy had forgotten about that. Rumor had it that Charles, Senior, had even hired a private investigator in hopes of locating his son, but the man had found nothing. She wasn’t sure whether the four of them had simply been smart or extremely lucky.
Either way, Cassidy was correct. If someone had seen anything, they would certainly have cashed in on the reward ten years ago. But would Rick really go to such extremes to scare her?
“Remember,” Cassidy reminded, “this is his first murder case. He’s going to be working twenty-four/seven to solve it. Aside from Melinda, we—” she motioned to Kira, Lacy and herself “—are the most logical suspects. We all hated Charles for what he did to Melinda.”
Some of them hated him for other reasons as well, but Lacy kept that comment to herself. Nothing good could come of bringing up that past. Hurting Melinda further was the last thing she wanted to do.
“More coffee, ladies?”
The waitress’s question jerked Lacy back to the here and now. Apparently the whole group had been lost in their own thoughts.
“None for me,” she said, placing her hand over her cup.
“Come on, girls,” Cassidy urged, “let’s eat and enjoy. How often do we get together anymore?” She smiled broadly for the waitress. “The doughnut was great, but I’ll have the Betty special.”
“Me, too,” Kira piped up.
The Betty special consisted of two eggs, ham, biscuits, pan-fried potatoes and gravy. Lacy was sure she couldn’t handle a bite, much less a meal like that, on top of the worry churning in her belly.
“Just toast and orange juice,” she said when the waitress looked her way.
“Pancakes and more coffee,” Melinda announced, joining in. She smiled at the waitress and then said to those seated around the table, “My husband left me practically the same day we married. Why should I be sad now? Nothing’s changed, not really.”
The startled waitress hustled off to place their order. Lacy worked up a smile for her friend, but she was as surprised by Melinda’s odd comment as the waitress had been. If Kira or Cassidy thought anything of it they didn’t say a word. Maybe they thought it was for the best.
And perhaps it was. Lacy felt confused and uneasy with the whole situation. She’d struggled with what they’d done for ten long years. Having to face it now only sharpened the intensity of her regret.
But there was nothing she could do. It was done. Charles was dead and they were responsible. Assuaging her conscience would ruin not only her life, but also her friends’ as well. She wasn’t prepared to do that. Melinda’s children needed her.
The bell over the door broke into its tinny clatter, drawing Lacy’s attention in that direction. She’d tuned out the sound during the tenser portions of their meeting, but now, as the four of them grew somewhat relaxed again, her surroundings came back into full focus.
Rick Summers entered the diner and walked over to where his deputy, Brad Brewer, sat. The two men spoke for a few seconds before Rick’s attention drifted across the room to settle onto Lacy.
Every instinct warned her that he wasn’t here for breakfast, not really.
He was watching them…waiting for one of them to take a misstep.
As his intent gaze bored more fully into Lacy’s, she knew without doubt that she was the one he expected to falter.
And he intended to be right there waiting for the fall.
Chapter 5
“You gonna order, Chief?”
Rick dragged his attention from the four women seated across the diner. “In a minute.”
Brewer looked from Rick to the objects of his distraction. “Even before you told me what you wanted me to do, I had a feeling you didn’t ask to meet me here for the sake of a decent breakfast.”
No point arguing that. Rick had seen Lacy come into the diner. Mama Betty’s sat on the east side of the town square, directly across from his office. Since his office came with only one window, that was generally where his focus rested whenever he had something on his mind.
He’d known that Lacy’s friends wouldn’t be far behind her. The foursome had always traveled in a pack. Some fifteen years out of high school hadn’t changed that fact. But it wasn’t their cliquish behavior that nudged his curiosity. Nope. It was the likely subject of this morning’s get-together—his visit to Lacy the night before.
“You notice anything unusual?”
“Yep.” Brad downed a gulp of coffee. “Been some damn tense moments during their discussion, but they kept it too quiet to overhear anything.”
Brewer had always been able to anticipate Rick’s needs in a given situation. Rick had never appreciated that fact more than now. Not that he’d actually expected his deputy to overhear anything this morning. Rick had gotten just what he wanted: the climate between the ladies.
Tense.
That meant trouble.
He’d watched these ladies from afar since junior high school, maybe even before. He’d been infatuated with Lacy for as long as he could remember, for all the good it ha
d done him. Not once in that time had he ever seen these four suffer a falling-out. Always United appeared to be their motto. Through thick and thin, they backed one another up.
That was how he knew for certain they were hiding something.
There wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Charles Ashland, Junior, had gotten himself murdered without one, and that would ultimately mean all, of them knowing it. He wasn’t ready to label one of them as the killer, but they knew something they weren’t telling. No two ways about that.
Lacy’s gaze collided with his and heat immediately seared his blood. Rick didn’t look away. He let her stare. He needed her to know he wasn’t backing off. But the move cost him. Every single muscle in his body went on edge, tightened unreasonably. It irritated him to no end that she still held that kind of power over him after all these years.
“Coffee, Chief?”
Rick smiled for Katie Jo, the waitress who always made it a point to take his order no matter where he sat in the diner. “Sure thing, Katie Jo. I’ll take the usual to go along with that fine-smelling brew.”
She grinned and blushed to the roots of her bottled-blond hair. “Coming right up.”
Katie Jo Hawkins had gone to school with him, as well, but she’d been a couple years behind him. She’d already been married twice, but that didn’t stop her from looking for the next available prospect before the ink was even dry on the last divorce decree. Well, at least she’d had the good sense not to have any children. The kids were always the ones who paid the highest price when things went sour. Maybe that was why Rick had opted to remain single.
