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Michelle shrugged. “Yeah, I never spent a lot of time at Vinnie’s in high school.”
“I’m sorry, sweetie.” Amanda pulled her close in a one-armed hug. “Teenagers can be so cruel.”
Cruel enough to send hurtful emails?
Laughing, Michelle returned the hug. Amanda had been one of the girls who’d shunned her in high school, but they’d become good friends since Michelle had helped Amanda set up an accounting system for her home business a few years ago.
“Nothing much has changed. Here you are hoping to hook up with Colin Roarke, except this time it’s in a restaurant, not behind it.”
As they pushed through the front door of Burgers and Brews, Amanda pinched her. “Shh.”
Not that anyone in the restaurant could hear Michelle’s comment. The chatter from the group of people in the far corner of the room drowned out the music, and the hostess had to shout above the noise.
“Table for two?”
Michelle nodded and jerked her thumb toward the noisy crowd. “What’s going on over there?”
The young hostess shrugged. “Word got out that Colin Roarke was back in town, which created a ministampede of his high school buds.”
As Michelle pulled out her chair, she glanced at the clutch of people. A tall man at its center, oddly detached amid the furor, met her gaze. For whatever reason, an electric current zapped between them, and Michelle felt it down to her toes.
She averted her gaze and dropped into her chair. Must be those football-star good looks—the broad shoulders, the square jaw. She hadn’t been immune to those attractions in high school, and now the man’s appeal hit her like a sledgehammer all over again.
After the waitress took their drink orders, Amanda propped up her menu and peeped over the top. “They’re having their own class reunion over there. Mmm-mmm, Colin looks better than ever. A few more lines on his face, but the body still looks rock hard. He’s probably older, wiser…and more experienced.”
“He looks…sad.” Michelle shot a few glances at the group, bubbling with laughter and conversation. Colin contributed a word or a smile here and there, but he seemed aloof, separate from the people around him.
“Are you crazy? That’s Colin Roarke you’re talking about—football star, war hero, FBI stud.”
The waitress delivered their drinks and Michelle blew on her hot tea. “Why was he a war hero? What did he do?”
Amanda wrapped her lips around the straw from her soda, staring unabashedly at Colin across the room. “I think you were in Europe on that sabbatical when all the news came through. Taliban forces captured Colin in Afghanistan. He escaped, but…”
Ducking behind her menu, Amanda hissed. “He’s coming.”
Colin strode past their table, a frown creasing his brow. He waved to someone behind the bar and then turned the corner to the restrooms.
“I think he noticed us.” Amanda slapped the menu against the table. “Or at least you. He kept staring over here.”
Michelle scoffed even though she’d felt a jolt when her eyes had met Colin’s. Had he felt it, too? “Aren’t you going to follow him into the bathroom?”
Amanda’s eyes narrowed and she clicked her long fingernails on the side of her glass. “That’s not a bad idea. I could stumble in there and pretend I thought it was the ladies’ room.”
The waitress took their order and apologized for the slow service. “I’m a little overwhelmed tonight.”
When she walked away, Amanda shot a quick glance at herself in the mirror over the bar. “She’s not the only one who’s overwhelmed. I almost swooned when Colin walked past our table.”
Michelle smiled into her tea. Her friend desperately wanted to feel an attraction for anyone other than her estranged husband, but Michelle could see right through her. She nodded toward the tall man striding back into the dining room. “If you were planning on following him, you’re too late.”
Colin crossed the room, running a hand through his short, dark hair. His gait slowed as he approached their table, and Michelle held her breath for some absurd reason. Amanda had infected her with her silliness.
He stalled at their table, and Michelle’s heart jumped. “Excuse me, ladies. Did you both graduate the same year as Tiffany Gunderson?”
Nothing personal, just business. Michelle blew out a breath and answered, since Amanda seemed uncharacteristically tongue-tied. “Yes, we did.” She stuck out her hand. “I’m Michelle Girard and this is Amanda Stewart.”
As he clasped her hand in a warm embrace, she noticed scars crisscrossing his wrist. Had the sadness she’d sensed led him to try something crazy?
“Of course I remember you—the girl down the block. In case you’ve forgotten, I’m Colin Roarke.” He released her hand and Michelle had an acute feeling of loss.
He remembered her?
He turned to Amanda. “Stewart? Are you related to Sergeant Ryan Stewart of the Coral Cove P.D.?”
“Married to him.” A soft pink brushed Amanda’s cheeks. “Sort of.”
Colin raised his brows and a crooked smile claimed his mouth. “He’s a good man.”
That smile set into motion a chain of events across Michelle’s body, ending in butterfly wings in her belly. Her unrequited schoolgirl crush had sneaked up on her sensible adult self.
Colin reached into the front pocket of his denim shirt and pulled out two business cards. He slid them onto the table. “I’d like to talk to you about Tiffany while I’m in town. Give me a call.”
Michelle traced the edge of the card with her fingertip. “So Tiffany’s death wasn’t an accident? If not, why aren’t the San Francisco police handling the investigation?”
A spark of interest ignited Colin’s dark blue eyes. “I’d rather not discuss that here. Call me.”
“Hey, Colin. Come over here and set Jeff straight on how that game with Costa ended.”
Colin pinned Michelle with his dusky blue gaze and rolled his eyes. “Nice to…see you again.”
Michelle chewed her bottom lip as Colin ambled back to his high school classmates, their bubbling memories sweeping him back into their circle. The favorite hometown son didn’t wear the label with ease.
“We haven’t been in the joint fifteen minutes and we have his card.” Amanda scooped up the prize and pressed it to her breast.
“Because he wants to ask us questions about Tiffany.” Michelle rubbed her thumb against the embossed letters proclaiming Colin Roarke an FBI agent. “Why do you think the FBI’s involved in an investigation of Tiffany’s death?”
Amanda lifted a bare shoulder. “It happened in the big city. Anything can happen there. At least we have an excuse to call him.”
“How did he know we were in Tiffany’s class and what would we know about her life in San Francisco?”
“Why do you have to analyze everything to death? Just sit back and enjoy, because I swear the man had his eye on you. He even remembered you from the neighborhood.”
Michelle pressed her lips together as the waitress delivered their food. So Amanda had noticed that, too. Michelle hadn’t had much contact with the popular Roarke boys growing up, even though the family had lived down the road. But one scene shifted into focus, and Michelle’s cheeks burned with the memory.
She must’ve been fifteen because it happened shortly after her mother left. Michelle had retreated to her special place on the beach, a semicircle of boulders against the bluff, her own private hideaway. She hadn’t cried about her mother since she’d left, but that day the tears flowed like a river of sadness.
Suddenly, her world grew darker. She’d glanced up at Colin Roarke’s large form hovering at the entrance to her secret fort, blocking out the sun. He must’ve been home from college. He’d been surfing and his wet suit dangled around his hips. He’d asked her if she was okay, and Michelle was pretty sure she’d told him to buzz off.
Colin probably didn’t remember that. Why would he?
“Told you so.” Amanda tapped her fork against Michelle’s water glass. “You have a very satisfied smile on your lips right now. The man is hot and he noticed you.”
Michelle responded by taking a big bite of her burger.
Amanda stabbed a tomato with her fork. “I think I’d better find another friend for cruising—one who’s not tall, thin and gorgeous.”
“Moi?” Michelle choked down her food.
“Don’t moi me. Ever since you got back from Paris, you look more like a fashion model than a high school math teacher.”
Michelle dabbed her lips, hiding the lower half of her face behind her napkin. After Dad died a few years ago and Michelle fled Coral Cove for a summer in Paris, she had stepped up her game a little. She’d even gone out on a few dates, but she’d hardly describe herself as a femme fatale. She’d always shied away from that image because of Mom.
As they ate dinner and chatted around mouthfuls of food, Amanda sent fewer and fewer flirty glances toward the lively group in the corner. She pushed the last bits of lettuce around her plate and dropped her lashes. “So you think I should give Ryan another chance?”
“What’s wrong? Being on the prowl isn’t as exciting as you imagined? You’ve given up on the hometown hero already?” Michelle shoved her plate forward and planted her elbows on the table.
Amanda shook her head. “Colin’s hot, but he’s not my type. He’s not the life of the party like I expected.”
“Like Ryan.”
“Yeah.” Amanda managed a tremulous smile.
“Then get home and call him.” Michelle waved to the waitress. As she fumbled in her wallet for money, Michelle slid a glance toward the reunion crowd, but Colin had disappeared. He must’ve slipped out the back, escaping from his own party.
They stepped onto the sidewalk and Michelle blinked. The fog had rolled in from the ocean, blanketing Coral Cove’s main street in thick cotton. It would be even denser at her house.
“You okay to drive in this pea soup? It might be safer to walk.”
“Yeah, but you live in one direction and I live in the other, so we’d have to part company here.” Amanda dug her keys out of her purse. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to walk by myself in this wet blanket. Gives me the creeps.”
“Just drive safely.” Michelle took Amanda’s arm and they stepped into the street, peering both ways.
As Michelle grabbed the car door handle, two dark figures emerged from the fog, appearing almost next to her. She gasped, pressing her body against the car.
The two teenaged boys laughed and pushed each other. “I bet the girls are hiding in the parking lot.”
Michelle yanked open the door and dropped onto the seat. “Those kids scared the spit out of me.”
“The girls could be hiding right in front of them, and they’d have a hard time seeing them.” Amanda cranked on the engine. “Can’t wait until June is over and we get some summer sunshine.”
Amanda’s car crawled down the street and she edged around the next turn, hunching forward in her seat. “I hope you know where your house is because I can’t see a thing.”
“The Vincents’ house is on the right, the one with the big spotlight on their driveway. They left for a few weeks in Europe this morning.” Michelle pointed to a glow, diffused by the fog. “Then there should be two streetlights on the left, and my house is at the second streetlight. Across from the streetlights, there’s a long stretch of darkness where Columbella House is.”
“I see the first light.” Amanda eased off the accelerator. “And there’s the second one.”
Amanda made an abrupt illegal U-turn in the middle of the street. “Sorry to give you whiplash, but I don’t want to go anywhere near Columbella House. Now that place gives me the creeps.”
“Thanks for the ride, Amanda.” Michelle grabbed the door handle and glanced back at her friend. “You left your sweater at my house. I can bring it to you later.”
Amanda cut the engine. “I’d better get it now…just in case I don’t go straight home tonight.”
They both slid from the car, Amanda leaving her headlights on and the driver’s-side door open to the street.
The headlights created a glow, spilling light on the beginning of Michelle’s walkway beyond her little fence. She unlatched the gate and Amanda trailed after her.
“You really think I should call Ryan tonight?”
“Absolutely. Give him a chance to do the mea culpa. A few emails do not constitute a full-blown affair.”
“I’m surprised you’re so…forgiving, Michelle.”
Michelle shrugged. “It’s the opposite. You should be surprised if I weren’t.”
Amanda walked with Michelle to the front door and out of reach of the headlights. Luckily Michelle had turned on her porch light before she’d left, so she could actually put her key in the lock.
Thrusting open the door, she ducked inside and snagged Amanda’s sweater from the chair. She handed it to her friend and gave her a hug. “Call him.”
She watched as Amanda floated down the walkway, the fog sucking her into its embrace. Michelle waited, listening for the slam of the car door and the growl of the engine. Instead she heard…a soft thud. Fog this thick muted noise, but that didn’t sound like a car door.
“Amanda?” Michelle squinted into the white wisps swirling around her. The lights from Amanda’s car created a dull illumination on the sidewalk, but Michelle couldn’t focus on anything beyond that. Maybe Amanda couldn’t wait to get home and decided to call Ryan on her cell phone.
Michelle descended one step, her hand clutching the banister beside her. “Amanda?”
Scuffling sounds broke the eerie silence, causing the hair on the back of Michelle’s neck to quiver. Her clammy hand slipped from the banister. Had Amanda tripped and fallen on the ground?
Clasping her sweater to her chest, Michelle inched down the walkway to the gate Amanda had latched behind her. Across the sidewalk, still parked in the street, Amanda’s Mercedes loomed in the fog.
“Amanda, where are you?” Michelle pushed open the gate and stumbled onto the sidewalk. She walked in front of the car toward the driver’s side, the door still open to the street. As she scuffed her feet along the asphalt, hands held in front of her like a blind person, her toe plowed into something soft and giving on the ground.
Michelle’s heart skittered in her chest as she crouched down next to the inert form. Amanda must’ve fallen and injured herself. The lights from the car’s interior cast a waxy glow on Amanda’s pale cheek. Michelle wedged a hand beneath her friend’s head and turned it toward her.
Amanda’s wide, staring eyes sent a river of chills down Michelle’s spine. Then she became aware of the sticky wetness oozing through her fingers.
As Michelle drew away her hand, Amanda’s head lolled back revealing a dark slash across her neck.
Michelle fell backward, as a high, keening wail pierced the blanket of fog. It wasn’t until she stopped to breathe that she realized the sound was coming from her own mouth.
CHAPTER TWO
THE CRY, LIKE an animal in extreme pain, shot through the fog and pierced his gut. But Colin knew human suffering when he heard it. He was intimately familiar with human suffering.
He dropped the rocks he’d been chucking into the water and lurched toward the sound. After a few seconds’ break, the wail began again and he glommed onto the sound of misery like a homing device. He stumbled from the sand onto the dirt path leading to the road.
Through the veil of white mist, he discerned a car parked on the street, its headlights on and the driver’s-side door open. As he jogged closer, the fog parted to reveal two figures, both on the ground next to the open door. Had there been an accident?
He heaved to a stop, his chest tight, adrenaline pumping through his system. One person lay crumpled on the ground and the other, a woman, leaned back on her arms, her head thrown back, her face twisted with anguish.
He squatted beside the nonresponsive person and jerked back. Someone had slit her throat. He’d seen her face before…at the restaurant.
