How Secrets Die

There was a sour taste in the back of Mac’s mouth. “Found what?” He ground out the words.

“Don’t know. She didn’t say. Maybe I’m wrong about the whole thing.”

“No. I don’t think you’re wrong.”

Phil had good instincts when it came to people. So did Mac. And he’d thought from the first moment he’d set eyes on Kate Beaumont that she was hiding something.

“Listen, about Kate...” Phil hesitated. “Whatever she’s up to, she’s a cop’s kid.”

“Yeah, I get it.” Professional courtesy again, he supposed. Kate, like it or not—and he suspected she didn’t—was part of the fraternity. Protect and serve. He owed that to every person in his community, yes. But he also owed it, and more, to someone like Kate.

So whatever it was she thought she’d found out about her brother’s death, he had to take it seriously. To help, if he could. And to do that, he had to convince her to open up to him.

“Thanks, Phil. I’ll do what I can.”

* * *

BY EVENING, KATE was feeling less than satisfied with her progress. She’d been hired by Emily Waterston with no problem, but the woman hadn’t been as forthcoming as Kate had hoped.

Emily, as she’d insisted Kate call her, looked like the stereotypical chatty elderly lady, with her halo of curly white hair and bright, inquisitive eyes. However, when Kate brought up the subject of her brother, Emily had shied away like a skittish cat that didn’t trust a stranger’s hand.

Kate would have to take time to earn the woman’s trust. Patience. Unfortunately, patience wasn’t her strong suit.

Tomorrow, she decided, she’d find a way to make contact with Nikki, the receptionist. Nikki might not be entirely reliable, but she’d clearly been ready to gossip. In the meantime—

Kate rubbed the back of her neck, where tension seemed to be setting up permanent residence. The only useful course at the moment was to go back to the video diary once more. Painful as it was to watch Jason alive again, she might begin to understand some of his esoteric references now that she’d met a few of the people he’d known.

Pushing past her reluctance, she settled in front of the computer, a notepad ready at hand. A few clicks brought up Jason’s image. She’d start with the one posted on his arrival in Laurel Ridge and work through them.

Jason’s hope and enthusiasm for his new start came through so clearly in the first entry that it brought hot tears to her eyes. This was how he’d looked when he’d discovered a new fantasy game or a wonderful author. He’d seen a new world opening up in front of him. What had gone wrong?

Listening intently, she began jotting down every reference to the people he’d met in Laurel Ridge. She’d get them down, then try to figure out what they meant.

When a sound impinged on her concentration, Kate glanced up, startled to see that darkness crowded against the window. She’d been so intent she hadn’t noticed the passing of light. The noise had come from outside, she thought, and her heart thudded uncomfortably.

A second later someone knocked at the door. Cautious, she advanced to within a couple of feet of it. “Who’s there?”

“Mac Whiting. I’d like to speak to you.”

I don’t want to speak to you. But she opened the door.

“Sorry to bother you so late.” He was coming in even as he spoke. His movement was casual, but beyond that Kate had the sense that he held himself under tight control.

Whatever this was, she didn’t want to deal with it now. “I don’t want to sound unwelcoming, but it’s late.” She managed a smile. “And I have it on good authority that the neighbors will talk.”

Mac’s face tightened, all planes and angles. “They’d talk more if I asked you to come to the station to meet with me.”

“You can’t be serious.” She was instantly poised to fight. “You can’t have any possible reason—”

She stopped, realizing he wasn’t paying attention to her words. He was focused on something beyond her. Kate spun to see Jason’s face looking out at them from the computer screen.

She sped toward the computer, but even as she reached for it, Mac caught her hand.

Her breath caught. “Let go of me. That’s private.”

“Not just yet. What is it?”

“Nothing. Just a video clip of my brother.” She tried to twist away, to no avail.

“Something you found among your brother’s belongings when you cleared the house?”

Her gaze met his, her temper flaring. “How do you know about that? Who told you?”

His eyes shifted. She felt his reluctance and knew the answer.

“Don’t bother.” Bitterness laced her words. “I should be able to guess. Phil Durban, I suppose. You cops stick together, don’t you?”

“We have to.” Answering anger flashed in his face, and she saw him fight to control it. She suspected he didn’t often let impulse get the better of him. Unlike Tom, who would have exploded by this point in the conversation. He’d had a short fuse, and it wasn’t until she’d grown and gone that she’d appreciated the stress that went into his temper.

“Whatever your buddy guessed, he doesn’t know anything. I wasn’t foolish enough to confide in him.” She threw the words at him, clinging to the enmity between them.

But Mac didn’t flare back. Instead he studied her face, and his expression softened. “Phil’s a good guy. If you needed help, he’d have been the first to offer it.”

That sudden gentleness got under her guard. She turned away, and this time he didn’t try to stop her. “I don’t need help. Not from him. Not from you.”

“Well, now, that’s too bad.” The country-boy casualness was back in his voice again. “Because Phil thinks you found out something that made you suspicious about how your brother died, and I can’t leave it alone. If I made a mistake, I have to fix it.”

Kate hadn’t expected that, and the admission jolted her. “You mean that?”

He lifted an eyebrow. “Do you have any reason to think I don’t?”

“No, I suppose not,” she admitted. Even Tom, as much as they’d fought, had always meant exactly what he’d said.

“Okay.” He made it sound as if they’d taken a giant step forward. “Let’s start over. What makes you think there’s something I didn’t find out about how Jason died?”

She tried to arrange her thoughts. Her instinct was to tell him nothing, but that had become impossible. But she didn’t have to say she suspected suicide. “It’s not a question of how he died. But why he died.”

Mac seemed to process the difference instantly. “An overdose...” he began, his voice gentle.

“An overdose, yes.” Her throat tightened. “I don’t imagine any coroner could miss that. But why? He’d been clean for nearly three years. He’d graduated with honors. He had a bright future. Why would he throw all that away?”

“Addiction is a day-by-day battle.” Mac rubbed the back of his neck, and frustration threaded his words. “Twenty years ago the worst thing Laurel Ridge cops had to deal with was a Saturday night drunk. Now we fight drugs like every other place in the country.”

“Do you think I don’t know that? I helped him through a couple of relapses. But he was doing so well. Something happened to him while he was here in Laurel Ridge that summer. Something that ended with him lying dead in that cemetery.” What? A breakup? A fresh battle with his father? Trouble at his job? There had to be something. Each time he’d relapsed, something had triggered it.

And if she never found that trigger? Either way, the responsibility came back to her. Her throat closed entirely, and she fought to hold back tears, shaking her head as she turned away from him.

He touched her arm in mute sympathy and guided her to the sofa. He drew the armchair closer and sat like a man prepared to wait as long as it took.

Kate sucked in a breath and swallowed hard. “All right,” she muttered.

“The coroner did confirm that there hadn’t been drugs in his system for some time before the overdose.” Mac’s tone was carefully neutral, as if he understood she needed that to hang on to her precarious control. “But what makes you think it was something that happened here that pushed him into it? Did he say anything to you about dealing?”

His attention seemed to sharpen on the question. Naturally that would be his first thought—that someone was bringing drugs into his town.

“If you’re thinking it was Jason, you’re wrong,” she said flatly. “He wouldn’t. And he hadn’t left here all summer, anyway.”

That had been part of Jason’s determination to make it on his own this time, without leaning on his big sister. He’d stay here for the duration of his internship. Phone calls only—no visits. And Jason never had expressed himself well on the phone. She needed to see his face to know what was happening with him.

“I know that. Obviously we looked into it—the drugs had to come from somewhere. Since he didn’t go anywhere to get them, someone brought them in. We never found out who.”

That had frustrated him. She could see it in his suddenly taut face.

“You don’t know who. But you must have some idea.” She leaned toward him, suddenly urgent. “There can’t be that many potential dealers in a place like this.”

“You’d be surprised.” His lips twisted wryly. “I had some ideas, yeah, but they all came up empty.” He jerked a nod toward the computer. “That file—what does that have to do with it?”

Kate rubbed her forehead as if she could scour away some of the confusion. “Jason kept a sort of video diary. Not every day, but most of the summer.”

“You didn’t find it until your stepfather died.”

She nodded. He was putting the pieces together. “Tom had kept everything that was returned to him, but I doubt he ever looked at it. When I started watching the diary...” She paused, not wanting to say more than she had to. Still, the time for that might have already passed. “I could see how excited and enthusiastic he was at the beginning of the summer. But something changed. He was worried, maybe even scared, about some situation. I think at his work, but I can’t be sure.”

“What precisely did he say? You must know that much.” Mac glanced at the computer again, probably longing to wrest the truth from it.

“It’s not as easy as that. Jason wasn’t exactly direct. He had a way of talking about places and people in a kind of code. I doubt you’d understand any of it.” Just in case he was thinking he’d walk away with her file.

Mac stood, as if he couldn’t pretend to relax for another moment. “Let me see it.”

“No.” She rose as well, facing him. “It’s personal, and you have no right...”

“It could be evidence in a drug case.” He left implied the threat that he could get a subpoena if she didn’t cooperate. “Whatever this code is, it can be broken.”

She’d laugh if this were anything but deadly serious. “It’s not that kind of code.” It was no good—she’d have to tell him more, or she’d never get rid of him. “Jason always loved fantasy—books, games, movies, whatever. I tried to keep up, just so I could share something with him. He’d refer to people and situations with references from fantasy that even I didn’t always understand.” She nodded toward the image of his face, frozen on the screen. “That’s what he did in the diary. He would have known what he meant, but the chances that anyone else could figure it out are slim to none.”

“But that’s what you’re trying to do. That’s why you came here. To see the layout for yourself, to meet the people, to figure out what or who led your brother to his death.”

There was no point in denying it. “It’s my own business,” she repeated stubbornly. “If I find anything that looks like a police matter, you’ll be the first to know.”

“Not good enough.” Mac could apparently be equally stubborn. “You’re not going to be conducting any sort of crusade in my town. Not unless I’m involved every step of the way.”

“You can’t force me...”

He raised an eyebrow. “Force? Who said anything about force? But either you let me in on it, or I’ll make it impossible for you to find out anything about anyone here. It wouldn’t even be hard. A few words to a few people, and you won’t find a soul in Laurel Ridge willing to talk to you.”

She didn’t doubt he could do it. “That’s blackmail.”

“That’s me, doing my job, whether you want me to or not.” His lips quirked, but his eyes were intent. “Take it or leave it.”

Kate wanted to kick him out. To say she’d manage this herself. Trouble was, he held all the cards.

“All right,” she said finally. “You win. I’ll take it.”

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