Authors: Stephanie Rowe
Screw Jimmy. She was never going to be his victim again—not physically, not emotionally.
This morning, she was going to call the police station and tell Sean that the whole thing was a false alarm and to forget it. Because Jimmy wasn’t in Maine. At worst, he was still in L.A., stalking her empty apartment.
She would
not
live in terror anymore, and the first step was to admit that her fears were irrational.
The doorbell rang, and she almost smiled at the sound. How weird to hear that familiar tune after ten years. Last night, she’d been so obsessed with being murdered she hadn’t even noticed it, but today it struck her.
She kicked the fireplace implements aside and stepped into the hall. No one jumped out at her, but she still peered through the window before opening the front door, just to make sure Jimmy hadn’t marched up to the house. An elderly man with gray hair, leathery wrinkles and a faded Red Sox cap grinned at her.
Relief and happiness cascaded through her and she tugged the door open. “Eddie!”
He held out wiry, ancient arms and she accepted, hugging the man who’d been in charge of the boats at the Loon’s Nest for forty-three years.
The Loon’s Nest was the official name for the rustic vacation resort-slash-camp that had been in her dad’s family for over a hundred years. The ninety-two cabins lining the
shores of Birch Tree Lake were rented out every summer. With no kitchens or any sort of utility room, all the families ate at a central dining hall three times a day, and there were plenty of programs to keep the guests entertained: picnics on the islands, hikes in the mountains, softball games and more. Kim’s childhood home was on the outskirts of the camp, giving the family some privacy from the guests.
Her dad had moved out when he remarried, but he’d kept this house while he and Helen set up their cozy love nest a few miles away. The old home had sat fully furnished and empty, sustained by Max’s hopes that one of his wayward daughters would someday return to run the place.
And here she was. Back in the house. But it wasn’t on Max’s terms, and she wasn’t here to stay.
“Kimmy!” Eddie kissed her cheek. “I can’t believe you’re back.”
“It’s so good to see you.” She gave him a big hug, the scent of his pipe tobacco cascading back to her, a memory long forgotten. It made her want to curl up in his lap and listen to stories about the old days.
As a kid, she’d spent thousands of hours following Eddie around, sucking up all his knowledge about the lake and boats and nature. She adored him. God, it was good to see him.
Okay, so there was one good thing about being back in town.
“Come in.” She held the door open. “I want to hear all about everything.” As Eddie stepped inside, she stuck her head out and peered around. The woods were quiet, the underbrush jiggling from chipmunks. Birds were chirping, and a squirrel was running around with a pinecone in his mouth. No Jimmy.
Still, she bolted the door behind them. Yeah, he was probably hanging around her apartment in L.A., but it didn’t hurt to be careful.
“How did you know I was back?” She steered Eddie toward the kitchen table he’d sat at many times, then pulled a pitcher of lemonade out of the fridge.
“I’ve been watching the house. Figured you might come back when your dad got in the accident.”
Oh, crap. “Does everyone know I’m back?”
He shook his head. “This house is too far away from the rest of the camp. No one comes out here. I’ve been driving by on the lake, keeping an eye on the place.”
Phew. She wasn’t up to facing people yet.
“Thanks for stopping by.” And she meant it. Eddie was dear to her, the only vestige of her past that wasn’t tainted.
“We’re real sorry about your dad.”
She managed a civil nod. “Thanks.”
“That boat was okay. It wasn’t my fault.”
Surprised at his response, she touched his hand. “Of course it wasn’t your fault, Eddie. It was an accident.” Wasn’t it? Hadn’t Cheryl told her it was an accident? Cheryl had been Kim’s conduit for all the town news since they’d left.
Not that she cared about the details of what had happened to her dad. But Cheryl cared, so she had to ask. “What exactly happened? No one has told me.”
Eddie frowned. “Some kids were camping on Big Moon Island about a week ago. They heard a boat motor roaring and then a crash just before midnight, so they went down there and checked it out. The moon was out, so they were able to see your dad unconscious under the water, the boat cracked up on the rocks. Smashed his head on a rock, apparently. Kids hauled him out and gave him CPR while their buddies got help from the marina. Kept him alive, but he never woke up.” Eddie blinked several times. “Best friend a man could have. Should never have happened.”
No kidding. Her dad was the guru of boating safety and could navigate the lake blindfolded, even at night. He’d
never, ever run aground, let alone smashed a boat full speed into one of the islands. The darkness wouldn’t have made a difference to him. He didn’t need daylight to navigate the lake. No one who had lived on it for fifty years did. The moon and stars were more than enough.
“The gearshift was locked down, so people figure that it got stuck,” Eddie said.
So what? That wasn’t enough to cause her dad to crash into an island. “What about the propeller? Couldn’t he have turned?”
“Jammed, too.” Eddie shook his head. “Weirdest damn thing. Makes no sense. I take care of that boat, and it was fine. Sure, it’s twenty years old, but it’s in perfect shape. I didn’t screw up.”
“Of course you didn’t—”
He interrupted her, anger resonating in his voice. “The cops won’t listen to me, but you will. I know what happened.”
“What?” For an instant, Jimmy flashed through her mind. Would he target her entire family? Except that he’d still been in prison when the accident happened. Thank God for that. One less thing for her to be paranoid about.
“It was that new wife of his.
She
tried to kill him.”
“Helen’s trying to murder him?” How ironic if his new beloved
did
kill Max, after he’d taken the life of his first wife. Poetic justice, although there would never be justice for the loss of Kim’s mother.
Then Kim sighed. This wasn’t the movies. Wives didn’t go around offing their husbands. Especially by cracking a boat up on some rocks. A very bad way to try to kill someone because the chances of death were minimal. Only a total idiot around the water would think that might work.
Eddie grabbed her arm, his gnarly fingers digging into her skin. “Helen despises the camp. She hates everything about his past life. She’s been trying to get him to sell the place for years and he won’t. Saving it for you girls, and she don’t care.”
A second wife who hated the lake? Her dad sure could pick his women. But Helen apparently spoke up. Joyce had kept quiet and suffered until a bottle of antidepressants became her only solution for escape from the man who had destroyed her. Damn him!
But Eddie wasn’t finished and wouldn’t leave Kim to suffer the memories of her past. “That’s why I came over here today. You gotta save the camp.”
Um, hello? No chance of that. “What are you talking about?”
“Helen’s destroying it. You gotta take over until your dad can come back.”
“No.” She pushed back from the table. “I can’t. I’m only out here to check on Max. I have to go back to L.A. in a few days. My job.” Not precisely true. Her leave of absence from her job as an editor at
the
Hollywood insider magazine would last a month, but she would be on the first plane back to L.A. as soon as it was safe.
She and Alan had figured it would take only a couple of weeks for Jimmy to come after her, so she could be back at work shortly. She had a gorgeous apartment, lots of friends, and invites to all the best parties so she could keep tabs on celebrity gossip. Everything that made life complete. Most of the time.
Unfortunately, in order to stay hidden from Jimmy, she’d had to go MIA from work entirely. No calls, no e-mails. She was going insane, wondering how much her replacement was screwing up. But she and Alan had decided it was too risky to have any contact with the office. Someone would need to mail her something, her address would be released and then she’d be in trouble. Total silence was the only way, and she was going through definite withdrawal. L.A. was her home now, not the lake.
Besides, there was no way she could reinvest herself in this place. Not with Sean here. Not with Helen lurking around. She had to leave, not dig herself deeper. “Eddie, I can’t help with the camp.”
Hope faded from Eddie’s eyes. “I understand.”
Could she feel guiltier about the despair on his face? “Eddie…”
He let go of her arm. “I gotta get back. July’s a busy time. Boats are going in and out and my assistant don’t know a propeller from a life jacket.”
She bit her lip as he trudged to the door, his shoulders
stooped and his gait shuffling. He’d gotten so old since she’d last been here.
Who was she kidding? He’d gotten old in the five minutes since she’d turned him down. “Um…Eddie? How bad is it?”
“We’ll be bankrupt by the end of the summer.”
Oh, no. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah.”
“But then the place will be sold.” And Cheryl would have nowhere to come home to when she was finally able to resume her life.
There was no way Kim could let her little sister down. It would take her a lifetime to repay Cheryl for the two times she’d already betrayed her.
The first time was when Kim had left ten years ago, abandoning her little sister to a suicidal mother and a clueless father.
Yeah, sure, Kim had left because her mom had talked her into it with her whispered confessions while she and Kim were huddled in the alcove of the church, Sean waiting at the altar. Heck, Joyce had helped her pack, so desperate she was that Kim not make the same mistakes she’d made. Giving up dreams, being stuck in a dead-end marriage with a man she didn’t love, being trapped in Ridgeport forever, miserable beyond anything she could endure—all because of teenage love that hadn’t been real. The stark anguish in her mother’s eyes had terrified Kim, and she’d realized that if she stayed in town, she’d never be able to resist the lure of Sean, his safe and familiar arms, things that would destroy her the way they’d devastated her mother.
Of course, Kim would never have left if she’d truly understood how desperate her mom was. Joyce had sworn that she’d follow Kim soon after with Cheryl and they would all be happy. But her mom had killed herself six months later, driven to it by her husband, the man who refused to let her go. Never would Kim forgive Max for destroying her family. Ever. Not after she’d received the letter.
Kim should have realized how bad the situation was when she’d left or, at the very least, come back for Cheryl after Joyce killed herself. Instead, Cheryl had tried to take her own life, and Kim still had nightmares about it. Convincing Cheryl to come to California for school, then paying for her expenses didn’t begin to make up for the fact that she’d almost lost her sister.
The second time Kim had let Cheryl down was with Jimmy. When Kim had known it was wrong for Cheryl to marry him, but hadn’t stopped her.
Mistakes that had nearly killed her sister—twice.
No way would she let Cheryl lose her legacy, as well. Sweet, innocent Cheryl, who had never realized how bad their dad was, keeping in touch with him even after all that had happened. “Give me five minutes to change and I’ll follow you up to the office.”
Eddie’s face lit up with hope, hope that wrenched Kim’s stomach. “I’m not a business expert, Eddie. I don’t know if I’ll be able to do anything.”
“You will.” He beamed at her and Kim felt her gut sink. How could she save the camp?
S
EAN HAD HIS BOOTS
up on the desk and his eyes closed when the door banged open, jerking him awake.
Chief Bill Vega knocked Sean’s feet off the desk and they thudded on the floor. “It’s almost eleven in the morning. What are you still doing here?”
“Waiting for an e-mail.” Sean stretched and glanced over at his empty in-box. He was waiting for the police report on Jimmy Ramsey’s attacks on Kim and Cheryl. And he had a call in to Jimmy’s parole officer to check on his whereabouts.
“How was last night?” Bill casually poured himself a mug of cold coffee. “Any interesting calls?”
Sean eyed the man who’d given him his start in law enforcement so many years ago. “No.”
“How’s she doing?”
“Who?”
“Kim Collins, that’s who.” Bill sat down on the edge of Sean’s desk. “I heard she’s looking fine.”
“Screw you.” He shot Bill a hostile glare, but he laughed and didn’t budge. The man obviously didn’t give a rip that his question made Sean recall how Kim looked last night. How she’d felt when he’d held her for that one moment. It had felt like coming home. It had been right, so absolutely perfect. And then he’d remembered that everything about her was wrong. Everything about
them
was wrong.
Unfortunately, recalling that fact hadn’t made her look any less appealing in her oversize T-shirt and sweats. Her casual outfit reminded him of the innocent teenager he’d loved. Last night, she’d looked so young and vulnerable he’d wanted to sweep her up in his arms and take her home to protect her. Except she wasn’t innocent, and she’d made it damned clear what she thought of being in his arms when she’d left ten years ago.
“Did she throw herself at you?” Bill grinned. “Let me guess. It was a trumped-up phone call to get you over there, wasn’t it? No sign of a prowler. Did she have you check her bedroom?”
“Don’t you have work to do?”
“Nope. That’s why I hired you, so I don’t have to work.”
It was weird to have someone teasing him. Sean didn’t joke anymore. Hadn’t for a long time. He wasn’t interested in striking up a friendship with Bill or anyone else. “Well, I have work to do.”
“You’re off duty and you’ve been here for a month. What could you possibly have to do?”
“Stuff.” Not that it should surprise him that Bill was giving him a hard time. After all, they’d been friends when he worked here before, even though Bill was about five years older than Sean. Back then, Sean had called him Billy
and talked about things that mattered. Bill hadn’t respected his privacy back then and apparently, he still didn’t. Difference was, now Sean didn’t want that kind of relationship. Watching your best friend die could have that effect on a man.
Bill nodded. “Yeah, stuff like finding a place to live. You still living at the motel?”
“No.” Just yesterday, he’d finally rented a cottage. He’d stayed at the hotel his first four weeks to avoid obligations in case he decided he couldn’t deal with being back in town. But it hadn’t been so bad, and he’d spent some time with Kim’s dad and his new family. Yeah, it wasn’t the same as it had been, but his bond with Max was still there. Once Max had had the accident, that had sealed it for Sean. He’d stay around for as long as the man might need him—and maybe longer. For the first time in ten years, he felt as though he might find a place for himself again. With Max, he had hope for the first time in a long time.
And then Kim had shown up and changed everything. It made him want to pack up and leave, the way he’d done before. But he wasn’t going to. This was
his
town, and he’d come back to claim it. All he had to do was stay away from her while she was around. Especially since all he wanted to do was haul his sorry behind right back over to her house and strip away the past ten years to find out what had happened that night.
But he had too much pride for that.
“Glad to hear you’ve finally decided to stay awhile.” Bill grinned. “So? Did she get a boob job while she was living in L.A.? I hear that all the chicks out there have boob jobs.”
“For God’s sake, Billy, back off.” He picked up a pencil and drummed it on the desk.
Bill lifted an eyebrow. “So there are still some feelings there, huh?”
“No.” He tapped the pencil harder. Faster.
“Liar.” Bill dropped into a nearby chair and pulled it
closer. Tossed his hat on a desk and ran his hands through his spiky red hair. “Listen, sorry about sending you over there last night. I didn’t realize it would mess you up. I mean, it’s been ten years and all. Kinda figured you might be over it by now.”
Sean snapped the pencil between his thumb and index finger. He let it drop to the ground, then gave Bill his most hostile glare. “I don’t give a rip about her anymore, so drop it.”
Bill stared back for a long moment. “What happened to you in the Army, man? You’ve turned into a major SOB.”
It wasn’t what had happened to him in the military. It had started in this town, at the merciless hands of Kim Collins when she’d ripped away the innocence of a young kid. “Kim might have a stalker.”
“You?”
“Shut up.”
Bill grinned. “Just checking. What’s up?”
“Cheryl’s ex-husband, Jimmy Ramsey. Wife beater that Kim put in jail. He’s out on parole and he swore he’d come after her.” Just saying it made his blood pressure escalate again.
“What do you have so far?” Bill settled into his cop persona, so much easier for Sean to take. He’d counted on their friendship to get him the job, and now he was regretting it. Friends demanded more than he was willing to give.
“I have a call in to his PO to see if he’s checked in.” The message from Kim on his phone that morning had aggravated him. She’d been so flippant and dismissive that Jimmy was after her, telling Sean to drop the case.
Not that he had any intention of listening to her. He was a cop, and his job was to protect and serve, even if the civilian in question happened to be the woman who had left him standing at the altar with two gold rings in his tux pocket. Yeah, sure he hadn’t been able to turn up any
evidence of a prowler outside her home, but when he’d stood there in the dark, he’d been certain something had been disturbed. The night sounds of the forest had been too quiet. Until he was convinced no one was after her, he wasn’t going to back off.
“What about Cheryl? You talk to her?”
“She’s in hiding.”
Billy gave a low whistle. “It’s serious stuff then, huh?”
“Kim helped her disappear and took the heat after Cheryl left.” Impressive as hell that Kim had stuck around and faced Jimmy when she knew what he was capable of.
Billy grinned. “That’s our Kimmy. She always protected that little sister of hers.”
Sean tossed the thin file he’d created at Billy. “You take the case.”
Billy handed the folder back. “It’s yours.”
“I don’t want it.” He set the papers on the desk. “Find someone else.”
“We’re understaffed, even with you here. With all these summer folk causing trouble, no one’s got time to be following up on some psycho from California.”
Sean folded his arms. “I’ll switch duties with someone. I don’t want it.” Just because he couldn’t drop the case didn’t mean he was the one who had to be her shadow. Already tried that ten years ago and it wasn’t his gig. Not anymore.
“I got a bunch of rookies on staff here. All our experienced guys went off to Portland when they got the funding for more positions. Not one of these guys knows how to do an investigation. All they can do is write up traffic tickets and OUIs. That’s why I wanted you back. I need some hardened badass for these boys to follow.”
“This case is a good opportunity for someone to learn.” He didn’t want to get involved with Kim. But putting Kim’s life in the hands of a rookie? “You can provide oversight. Train the kid.” His computer beeped that he had new mail
and Sean nodded at it, even as he stood up and walked away from his desk. “That’s the info from L.A. It’s yours.”
Bill swung to his feet and lumbered his large frame across the small office that looked as if it hadn’t had a face-lift in thirty years. Stained ceiling tiles, warped wood paneling on the walls, battered desks shoved against one another to make room in a too-small space.
Luxury compared to Sean’s life in the Middle East, where he’d been for the past few years.
While Bill opened the e-mail, Sean picked up his car keys. Time to get away. He’d go visit Max. Remind himself why he wanted to stay in town. “I’m taking off.”