Authors: Emily March
Besides, presenting the motive would mean presenting the photograph. Did Cam want to do that? Did he honestly believe it would be enough to overcome a jury’s prejudice against him?
The answer had been clear. Cam kept his mouth shut.
In the end, his case hadn’t gone before a jury. Andrew Cook awoke from his coma and recovered from his injuries, and Cam’s public defender wrangled a plea deal and convinced Cam it was in his best interest to accept it rather than risk a trial, since Andrew’s father was promising vengeance. After Andrew awoke from his coma but before he’d recovered from his injuries enough to be released from the hospital, Cam had been whisked off to juvie jail.
A knock on the driver’s-side window startled Cam. He twisted his head to see the end of a flashlight and a uniformed man bent over and peering into his car. A sheriff.
Oh, great
. Cam thumbed the button and the window slid down.
“Good evening, sir. May I see your license and registration, please?”
Cam fished the items from his wallet and handed them over. “Is there a problem, sheriff?”
“Wondering what your business is here, sir. This spot tends to be a trouble magnet for the young people in the area.”
“I’m not meeting anyone. Just visiting with some old demons.”
“Demons? Oh.” The sheriff looked up from Cam’s driver’s license. “You’re Cam Murphy.”
“My reputation precedes me.”
“More than you know.”
Cam waited for him to instruct Cam to get out of the car so he could be frisked and cuffed, just like the old days. Instead, the sheriff returned his pen to his pocket and the identification to Cam, and extended his hand. “I’m Zach Turner. Welcome home. I’m a good friend of Sarah and Lori Reese.”
“Oh.” Shocked, it took Cam a moment to accept the handshake.
Sheriff Turner said, “I’ve been curious to meet you for quite some time.”
“You have?” Cam hesitated, then qualified, “Even before I showed up here?”
“Lori told me about you a few years ago, back when Sarah and I were dating.”
Dating?
Cam gave the sheriff a disgruntled look.
Dating
. Sarah and the sheriff. Was there a man in this town she hadn’t dated?
“I looked at your file,” Zach Turner continued, causing Cam to stiffen. “I’m also friends of Gabe and Nic Callahan.”
The significance of the comment wasn’t lost on Cam.
“Just thought you’d want to know that my predecessor kept a particular item in your file buried.”
“Oh.” Cam drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. “I had hoped that had disappeared.”
“It was buried deep. I doubt it saw the light of day since Sheriff Norris put it away.”
“Good. I’d hope it never sees the light of day again.”
“Rest assured on that, Murphy, unless circumstances lead you to choose otherwise.”
“Me?”
Zach Turner glanced toward the Bear Cave’s back door. “What happened here that night was a bad break for lots of people, but I have to tell you, I’d have gone for Andrew Cook’s throat, too. Nic and Sarah didn’t deserve what he did to them.”
What a difference decades and a new sheriff make
, Cam thought. “Did anybody ever tell them?”
“About the photograph?” When Cam nodded, Zach Turner replied, “No. I don’t believe so. Not that I’ve ever heard, anyway. I’m sure Sheriff Norris didn’t say anything. He had your file locked up tight.”
“I’m surprised he didn’t destroy the evidence. He was a friend of Sarah’s father.”
“He did everything but destroy it.” Zach straightened and stepped away from the car. “I need to be going. Nice to meet you, Murphy. And as one friend of Sarah and Nic’s to another … thanks.”
He was halfway back to his cruiser when Cam called after him, “Do you know what happened to him? To Andrew Cook? Someone told me his parents are in Pagosa Springs, but they didn’t know where Andrew ended up.”
“Actually, I was curious myself, so I looked into the question. He’s a real estate broker in Phoenix. He’s married and has two kids.” Displaying insight, the sheriff added, “He made a complete recovery from his injuries, Murphy. You can let that worry go.”
After the sheriff’s car pulled away, Cam sat, lost in thought, for a few more minutes, brooding about Andrew Cook, Sarah Reese, and bad breaks. Finally, he put his car into gear and pulled around to the front of the Bear Cave. Instead of following the sheriff’s car back toward town, he turned the opposite direction. Tonight was apparently the night to face old ghosts, to bury old demons.
Two miles later, Cam took the turnoff that led up to Lover’s Leap.
Sarah sat atop the painted wood picnic table at the scenic overlook officially marked on maps as “scenic overlook” but known to area residents as Lover’s Leap since the 1940s, when a grieving widow jumped to her death following official notification that her young husband, a Marine, had fallen at Iwo Jima. High up a tall mountain, this piece of public land was in an isolated corner of an isolated county, far enough away from town so that teens on the hunt for a parking spot usually stopped before getting here. Not Sarah and Cam. Due to the clandestine nature of their relationship, they’d made Lover’s Leap “their” place.
Sarah had loved the big sky above Lover’s Leap. She’d loved the vast panoramic beauty of the Rockies visible from this spot. She’d loved the special sense of joy that filled her whenever she visited. She’d known from the first time she came here as a child that Lover’s Leap would be meaningful in her life. Unfortunately, “meaningful” didn’t always happen in a good way.
This was only the third time Sarah had returned to Lover’s Leap since the night Cam Murphy was arrested. Her first visit had occurred after her visit to the juvenile detention center, when she’d told him about the baby and he’d sent her away. She’d gathered up all her mementos of him, and all the gifts he’d given her, and brought them up here. She’d thrown them off the cliff.
She’d made her second visit after her father died, looking for somewhere she could mourn in private and in peace while she adjusted to her new reality as caretaker to both her daughter and ultimately her mom.
She had always experienced big, intense emotions here at Lover’s Leap. Under this huge sky, surrounded by infinite beauty, she had grieved to the depths of her soul. Here, she had loved freely and completely with every fiber of her being. On this little piece of the planet, she had embraced her inner turmoil, suffered through her unbounded grief, and surrendered to soul-shattering heartache.
What drew her back to Lover’s Leap tonight, she didn’t know for sure. Big confusion, maybe. She was in a weird mood.
What a roller coaster she’d ridden of late. It was enough to make her head spin. The one thing she knew for certain was that now, tonight, she didn’t want to worry about anybody else. Tonight, for just a little while, she’d indulge in being selfish, self-pitying Sarah.
“I’m lonely,” she said to the closest fir tree. “I’m lonely and alone, and I don’t like it.”
For so long, Lori had kept Sarah’s life full, but now Lori was filling up her own life away from home and Eternity Springs. Sarah’s mother was still there, and while Sarah would be loath to admit it, having Ellen’s body around but her mind off on another plane only intensified Sarah’s loneliness.
The recent changes in her friends’ lives played a part in her lonesomeness, too. Nic and Sage were giddily married, and Ali acted like a newlywed. Sarah was happy for her friends—truly, she was—and they all went out of their way to ensure she never felt like a third wheel. But their kindness didn’t change the fact that she often was the odd man out.
It was too bad that she and Zach Turner had never fallen in love. That would have made life neat and tidy. She wouldn’t go through life making numbers uneven, and she certainly wouldn’t have kissed Cam Murphy today if she’d been in love with Zach Turner.
And wasn’t that kiss at the heart of the confusion plaguing her tonight? She could understand why she hadn’t resisted him. Curiosity and all that. What she couldn’t wrap her head around was her reaction.
With one touch of his lips against hers, the years had melted away. She’d forgotten the heartache, forgotten the struggles and resentments, forgotten the other men who’d passed through her life. Cam had come home and kissed her, and she’d forgotten everything she’d held against him for two whole challenging decades.
Well, wasn’t that just peachy.
Sarah stretched out her legs, leaned back on her elbows, and raised her face toward the sky, searching for peace. Light from the almost full moon muted the stars, but the beauty of the silver sphere against the black velvet sky was a worthy trade-off. The world up here was a delight for the senses, even at night. The world was moonlight and shadows, perfumed with evergreen and serenaded by the faint rush of a waterfall and a gentle breeze whispering through the trees. Such beauty. She’d been a fool to deny herself the pleasure of this place all these years. It … healed … her.
When she heard the hum of a car engine climbing the hill, she slowly straightened. She wasn’t afraid, and maybe that was stupid of her, since she was a woman alone in an isolated spot. She did take the precaution of turning around to face the road.
When the vehicle stopped, the door opened, and the dome light flickered on, she wasn’t even surprised.
“Sarah, is that you?” Cam asked.
“You didn’t follow me up here, did you?”
“No. I was out driving. Took this turn.” He waited for a moment, then asked, “Care if I join you?”
“Be my guest.” She turned back around, scooting over to one side of the picnic table as she did so. When he sat beside her, she noted that he’d changed from the jeans and T-shirt into khakis and a sport shirt. She could smell that darned Irish Spring soap again. He’d taken a shower since their trip up the mountain. Pride made her hope it had been a cold one.
“You spoke to Lori?”
Sarah took a moment to choose her words carefully. “She’s going to need some time to get used to the idea of your being here.”
“That good, huh?”
Her mouth twisted. “She’s young.”
He sighed. “That’s okay. I have time.”
Sarah decided it was time to change the subject. “Just how is that, Cam? How can you afford so much time away from your business?”
“Good people working for me, primarily. We’ve worked together for so long that everybody knows his own job and everyone else’s, too. Plus, I made extensive preparations. That’s why it took me more than two months to follow you here. I admit that on one hand it tweaked my ego a bit to learn how little I’m actually needed, but on the other hand, it’s a blessing. I can manage most everything that needs my attention with a few hours every day online while I wait for Lori.”
“What about the diving? Devin has told me that you usually join the tours a couple of times a week. Do you miss it?”
She sensed, rather than saw, his mouth twist. “Honestly, not as much as I expected.”
He turned his head and looked at her. “Speaking of diving, are you going to let me teach you?”
Sarah considered it. Saying yes probably wasn’t smart, but tonight, the mood she was in … the
place
she was in … old dreams and desires prodded her response. “Yes. Yes, I am.”
“Good.” His smile flashed in the moonlight.
They sat without speaking for a few minutes, and Sarah found the silence surprisingly comfortable. She was almost sorry when he spoke again. “Do you come here often?”
“Hardly ever.”
“It’s still beautiful. That was a long time ago, wasn’t it? Last time we were up here together.”
“More than half our lifetimes.”
“Ouch. That makes me feel old.”
Cam rested his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. “I went by the Bear Cave earlier.”
Sarah glanced at him in surprise. He told her about the fight Devin had gotten into and how that had precipitated tonight’s old-times’-sake tour. “I met a friend of yours there.”
“At the Bear Cave?” she asked, shocked.
“Actually, behind the Bear Cave. Fellow knocked on my window with his flashlight. I thought he was going to arrest me at first.”
“Oh. Zach.”
“Yep. Zach Turner. He said the two of you dated?”
Sarah silently debated her response. Her inner hussy urged her to talk up her relationship with Zach, but she didn’t want to lie to Cam. She simply said, “Yes.”
He wasn’t willing to leave it to simple. “Was it serious?”
“No. Unfortunately.”
“Why unfortunately?”
“I think Zach and I both would have liked it to become serious, but we figured out pretty fast that we were meant to be friends, not lovers. He is a good friend.” She grinned and added, “I’m surprised he didn’t arrest you.”
“Me, too,” Cam replied. “So anyone else I should be worried about running into? Someone who you were serious about, perhaps?”
“Are you asking me about my relationships, Murphy? Again?”
“Yeah, I guess I am. I should know about the guys in your life, because that might factor into my situation with Lori.” After she chastised him with a look, he added, “Okay, I’m curious.”
“Me, too. You first.”
He pushed off the picnic table and walked toward the knee-high stone wall that divided the overlook area from the edge of the bluff. He stood staring out into space for a long minute. “I tried to fall in love. I came close twice, but I never could take those last few steps. Could never make the leap.”
“Why not?” Sarah asked.
“I think … I didn’t realize it before …” He turned around. “I never got over you, Sarah.”
Okay, call her foolish, but that made her feel darn good. Especially since she felt compelled to be just as honest when she replied, “I tried, too, Cam, but halfheartedly, I think. At first, I pretty much waited for you to change your mind and send for us. Then when I knew you had been released after serving your time, I waited for you to show up.”
“And I didn’t.”
“No, you didn’t.” She extended her legs and circled her ankles, stretching away the kinks. “For the longest time I had this fantasy that you’d gone somewhere to make your fortune. I told myself that any day you’d come roaring back into town—probably on a motorcycle—and you’d sweep me and Lori up and cart us away to a three-bedroom, two-bath house in the suburbs somewhere.”