by Mallory Kane
Afterward, she’d kicked herself for not seeing through the cruel prank. But on the night of the Homecoming Dance her sophomore year, she’d really believed that senior football captain James Dupree, who was the Homecoming King, wanted her to dance the traditional first dance with him. Although she was smitten with James’s younger brother Cade, there was no way she would pass up the biggest honor in a sophomore girl’s year.
Remembered excitement and apprehension swirled through her as she relived that awful moment. Standing on the dance floor in a brand new gown, clutching the note from James in her hand.
Please do me the honor of dancing the first dance with me.
Her heart fluttering as James’s cocky gaze swept the room, stopping to wink at her.
Then he held out his hand and smiled. And Laurel had started climbing the stairs to the stage.
Still smiling at her, James named another girl. Everyone’s laughter still rang in her ears. By the next morning, it was all over school and Laurel was humiliated.
Now here she was, facing Kathy for the first time since she’d graduated and moved away with her parents. Despite her success, she suddenly felt like the plain, shy girl she’d been ten years ago.
Kathy’s blond hair was sleek and newly colored, her makeup was perfect, but her eyes were bloodshot, and not even expensive makeup could hide all the tiny veins visible around her nose. A lit cigarette smoldered in her perfectly manicured hand. She looked thin and pinched and miserable.
Laurel stood straighter as Kathy walked purposefully up the steps.
“Pardon me,” Kathy said, waving the hand that held the cigarette. Even with the cigarette smoke, Laurel could smell whiskey on her breath.
“Sorry, Kathy. This is a crime scene. No one’s allowed inside.”
Kathy’s perfectly shaped brows drew down as she eyed Laurel. “Nonsense. Misty’s my friend.”
Doubt it, Laurel thought.
Kathy made a shooing gesture toward Laurel. “Check with Cade—Police Chief Dupree. Now excuse me.”
Laurel’s initial flutter of apprehension at facing Kathy evaporated in a flash of anger. She held her badge in front of Kathy’s face.
“Sorry, Kathy. FBI. Please step back.”
“Who the hell are you?” Kathy nervously flicked ash off her cigarette.
“Special Agent Laurel Gillespie.” She met Kathy’s hard green gaze and was rewarded by a look of frank shock.
Just as Fred Evans walked up, Kathy recovered.
“You have got to be kidding.” She tried to sidestep Laurel.
“Hold it, Kathy,” Officer Evans said, taking her arm.
Kathy looked down at his hand. “You don’t want to do that, Fred.”
Laurel frowned. Were Kathy’s words slurred? She’d smelled the booze on her breath. But was she really drunk at just after eight in the evening?
“One word to Harrison and you—” Kathy pointed her cigarette at Fred, “will be facing assault charges.” That came out as ashault sharges.
“Right.” His brown eyes twinkled as he glanced at Laurel. “Your husband’s a real estate attorney. Come on, let’s take you home. All the excitement’s over. I’ll tell Harrison to get you into bed.” He gestured to Officer Phillips.
“Oh, please, Fred. Harrison hasn’t gotten me into bed in two years.”
“Shelton, walk Mrs. Adler home and make sure Harrison’s there. I’ll stay here in case the chief needs anything else.”
Phillips led Kathy away.
Laurel didn’t have any more trouble, although several more people she’d known in high school showed up. Obviously, word still spread as fast as it always had in Dusty Springs.
Within a couple of minutes, the EMTs rolled Misty out on a gurney. Fred and Phillips and a couple of guys they’d recruited kept the rubberneckers at bay as the EMTs loaded Misty into the ambulance.
Static erupted from Fred’s radio. He listened, said something, and then walked up the steps.
“I’ve got everything under control out here, Agent Gillespie,” Fred said. “Chief Dupree wants you inside.”
“Thanks. But please call me Laurel. It’s good to see you. So you’re working with Cade now.”
He chuckled and nodded. “Yep. Worked for his dad and now for him. Kind of a tradition in Dusty Springs I guess.”
“How is Debra?”
His chuckle faded. “She’s fine. Cade’s waiting for you.”
Laurel thanked him again and went inside. The living room’s overhead light was on. It spotlighted the scrapbooks and photo albums that were torn and tossed all over the floor amidst dozens of loose photos and piles of books.
Somebody had been looking for something, and Laurel was afraid she knew what it was. The question was, had they found it?
Cade’s head turned a few degrees. “I guess you’re here for the reunion. You were in Misty’s class, right? How’d you happen to turn up just in time?”
He faced the back of the couch, looking down at the spot where Misty had lain. Laurel had her first fully lighted view of him.
Her mouth went dry and her throat fluttered, just like in high school. Most of the girls in Dusty Springs would have given their eyeteeth for a smile from his brother James, but it was Cade who’d always been able to stop her heart.
He filled up the room, just like he always had. He’d never been as big or tall as James. And while James’s sparkling personality and talent in sports made him the envy of every guy and the heartthrob of every girl in town, Laurel had always preferred Cade’s quiet good looks and shy smile.
She blinked, and the image of the boy turned into the reality of the man.
He stood, legs hip-width apart. Worn, perfectly fitting jeans emphasized his buttocks and muscled thighs. His fists were propped on his hips, which pulled the cotton of his Ole Miss T-shirt tight across his back. Under his baseball cap, his brown hair was dark with sweat.
He was surveying the crime scene, which was what she should be doing.
She forced her gaze away from him and looked at the floor where Misty had lain. Her brain queued up a stop-action movie of the crime, based on Misty’s position, the blood spatter and the condition of the house.
She put herself into the head of the attacker. I sneak up behind Misty and hit her while she’s sitting on the couch.
No. If Misty had been sitting, she’d have slumped over onto the couch, not fallen on the floor in front of it.
Cade turned his head and pinned her with his electric-blue gaze. “My question wasn’t rhetorical.”
She forced herself not to look away. “I didn’t think it was. What do you think about her position on the floor?”
“I asked you first.”
“Fair enough.” She stepped closer. “Yes, I’m here for the reunion. I flew in to Memphis this afternoon and drove straight here.”
“Flew in from where?”
“D.C. I work at FBI Headquarters. I’m a criminologist with the Division of Unsolved Mysteries.”
His gaze sharpened, but all he did was nod.
“Misty invited me to stay with her. I tried to call her several times, on her cell and her home phone, but she never answered, which was odd since she’d made me promise to call. I pulled into her driveway at 8:03 p.m. Rang her bell, knocked on the door, then drew my weapon and turned the knob. It was unlocked.”
Cade turned around and crossed his arms. “You said that. Do you know how unlikely that is? Misty’s—”
“Borderline agoraphobic. I know.” She nodded. “Not to mention a tad obsessive-compulsive. Even in grade school she couldn’t stand to be inside a house alone with the doors unlocked.”
“Which means either she let someone in or they picked the lock.”
“That lock’s at least sixty years old. It could probably be opened with a credit card.”
“So you walked into a dark house that you knew shouldn’t be unlocked, not knowing whether you’d find a burglar, a murderer or a rapist?”
“Or my
best friend from high school.” Laurel kept her expression neutral, but it was an effort. “I’m a trained agent with field and crime-scene experience. I know how to enter a suspicious dwelling.”
His face darkened. “Without backup?”
Laurel shrugged. She knew he was right to question her, but she wasn’t wrong. Not totally. She let it drop. “So what do you think about her position?”
“Someone conked her from behind.”
“While she was sitting on the couch?”
“Nope. She’d have slumped over.”
Images of what must have happened played out in Laurel’s head. “Picture this.” She turned to look at the foyer door. “I come in the door. Either it’s unlocked—doubtful—or I somehow unlock it without Misty hearing me.” She stepped toward the couch and raised her hand. “I’m holding the baseball bat. Did I bring it in or pick it up here?”
Cade still had his arms crossed. He nodded toward the couch. “I’m thinking the bat was Misty’s. It was probably near the front door—for protection.”
“What did you do with it?”
“I gave it to Shelton—Officer Phillips—to check for prints.”
“Okay, I’m holding the bat. I raise my arm and swing—” She demonstrated.
“What are you doing?”
The scene in her head freeze-framed. She looked up at him. “Trying to get a picture of what happened.”
“You do realize you’re talking as if you’re the attacker?”
“Oh. A lot of the time I work alone, looking at forensic evidence from photographs or video. I talk to myself.”
His brows drew down. “So you walk in the perp’s shoes. I reckon I see the crime unfolding like a movie—it’s how my dad always did it. I guess everybody’s got their own way of doing things.” He scrutinized her. “So, Gillespie, if you’re acting out what the attacker did, you need to use your other hand. The blow was to the left side of Misty’s head.”
She felt her cheeks heat up. “You’re right. The attacker had to be left-handed.” She looked at her hands. “Wouldn’t you think at least one perp would use the wrong hand, just to throw off the police?”
Cade’s mouth turned up at the corner and Laurel’s pulse jumped at the hint of his killer smile.
He shrugged. “Plus you’ve still got Misty sitting on the couch.”
“Okay. Let’s start over.” She started to turn back toward the door.
“Hold it.” Cade stopped her with a hand on her arm. A large, blunt-fingered, warm hand.
Crime scene, she thought. Crime scene, not high school.
“Are you planning to act out the entire thing?”
“I like to when I can.”
He cocked his head to one side. “Okay, go ahead.”
She gave him a sheepish smile. “Why did Misty get up? Did she hear something and turn around? Here. You be the attacker and I’ll be Misty.”
Cade sent her a look. “Might as well. We don’t have much else to go on. Shelton lifted prints off the dining table, but Misty had a reunion committee meeting here a couple of days ago, so there are going to be dozens of prints.”
“It was three days ago. You stand here, behind the couch.” She moved to go around to the front but Cade caught her arm again.
“Aren’t you going to give me the blunt object?”
“Ha ha. Don’t make fun of me unless you have a better idea.”
He shook his head.
“Here’s something else to think about. Look at the couch.”
“Yeah, I know. Blood spatter across the cushions. Proves she wasn’t sitting.”
“Have you taken samples?”
“Got a few. Don’t forget that this isn’t D.C. It’s Dusty Springs, Mississippi. We’re not equipped to handle a lot of lab work, and I can guarantee you that the state lab won’t consider a minor breaking and entering, even with injuries, top priority.”
Laurel didn’t comment. She knew she could use the FBI lab in D.C., but if she offered, Cade would want to know why she’d use their resources for such a relatively insignificant crime. And she wasn’t ready to explain the reason she’d violated her promise to herself never to set foot in Dusty Springs again. She knew the suspicion that had drawn her back here was flimsy at best. She needed to gain Cade’s confidence before she told him her theory.
“Okay,” she said. “I’m sitting on the couch, watching TV. I hear something. I get up and turn around. It would explain the blow to the left side of her head—”
Cade swung the imaginary bat. “But not her position on the floor.”
“Use your left hand.” Air stirred against her cheek as he feigned a blow to the left side of her head. “I crumple into the exact position where she was found.”
“So she had to be facing the TV.”
“But if she stood because she heard the intruder, why didn’t she turn around?”
“Her cell phone.” Cade said it at the same time as Laurel spotted it on top of the TV.
“She got up to answer her cell phone.” Her stomach sank to the floor. “It was me. I called her from the airport at that very moment.”
“Your call may have saved her life.”
Laurel frowned at him.
“If she’d been sitting on the couch, the attacker would have had a much better angle, and the blow would have struck much harder. It could have killed her.”
Laurel looked at the cell phone. “Have you got gloves?”
“Nope. You’ll have to use a tissue.”
“Misty assured me she’d be at home. She always watches Secret Lives at six. At first I thought she didn’t answer because she was engrossed in the show.” She pulled a couple of tissues from a box on the end table and used them to pick up Misty’s phone. She accessed the incoming calls.
“I called her at 6:25 when the plane landed. Then at 6:58, and 7:20.” She looked at the muted TV. The logo in the corner of the screen identified the station that carried Secret Lives. “If she was watching the show, then she was attacked after it started but before it ended. So she was attacked between 6:00 and 6:30.”
As soon as she’d seen Misty’s floor littered with photos and paper, she’d known what the attacker was after. But now she had to face her own responsibility for Misty’s attack. Her mouth tasted like cotton. She couldn’t delay any longer. No matter what Cade thought of her shaky theory, she had to come clean. She needed his help.
“So you think my phone call kept her from being hurt even worse. I suppose that’s some comfort, considering—” She stopped. This was as hard as she’d known it would be.
His intense blue eyes held hers, lasering holes in her confidence. “Considering what?”
She didn’t know if he was reacting to the guilt that must be written all over her face or the sudden tension that tightened like springs through her entire body, but his demeanor changed.
He uncrossed his arms and casually flexed his fingers near the pocket of his sweats. At the same time he shifted his weight to the balls of his feet. He was poised and ready for anything. The transformation was an awesome and frightening sight.
“Do you see what’s all over the floor? Photos. Scrapbooks. Journals.” She gestured toward the hardwood floor. “I know why Misty was attacked.”
Cade didn’t speak, nor did he move his hand.
“All this—” this time she included the bloodstain on the floor and the couch in her sweeping gesture “—is my fault.”
Chapter Two
Cade Dupree didn’t know what it was about Laurel Gillespie, but he was having a devil of a time taking his eyes off her. If it hadn’t been for one glaring incident back in high school, he wouldn’t even have remembered her. She’d been a year behind him and two years behind his brother. His memory of her was of braces and glasses and wildly curly red hair.
The reason he remembered that much was because of the part his brother James had played in embarrassing her in front of the whole school.
She’d changed. Now her dark red ha
ir was pulled back into a loose braid, but it still wasn’t totally tamed. Wisps and waves floated around her face. Unobscured by braces and glasses, her delicate features were lovely.
Yep. She’d changed a lot.
“Cade, I want to get to the hospital and check on Misty. She’s going to be scared to death when she realizes where she is.”
Cade took off his baseball cap, folded the brim and stuck it into his back pocket. “Five seconds ago I’d have said go ahead, but you just inserted yourself into the middle of this. You want to explain why this is your fault?” He leaned against the door facing and crossed his arms.
To his surprise, her face turned pink.
“I got an invitation to our ten-year high school reunion, but I hated high school. I never intended to come back to town. But Misty begged me to come. I told her I’d think about it.”
Cade blew out an impatient breath.
“This is relevant, Chief Dupree. I was going to wait a day or two and call her back with an excuse. In the meantime, I pulled out snapshots from high school—mostly of graduation night. I wanted to review faces and names.” She turned back toward him and reached into her jacket pocket.
Instinctively, he tensed. It was a ridiculous reaction, totally at odds with her words and body language.
“I found something.”
He flexed his fingers as she pulled out a small stack of snapshots. She held them out.
He took them and shuffled through them. “Yeah? What?”
“Something that would never happen in a million years.”
He frowned at her but she just leveled a gaze at him. He stepped over to a small desk and turned on a lamp. He scrutinized the photos under the bright light. They were mostly snapshots of Laurel and Misty.
The two girls wore white dresses and held their caps and gowns. Both were grinning from ear to ear. Cade studied the awkward high-school Laurel. She wore a dress that hung on her like a sack. Her delicate bone structure and pretty features were not quite obscured by those ugly glasses and braces.
If he or any other guy had bothered to really look at her, they’d have seen what he saw now. Little skinny carrottop Laurel had been destined to be a knockout.
