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Deadly Reunion
Florence Case


Warren Detry killed his previous wife.Police officer Angie Delitano is convinced of it. She arrested the man herself, and testified against him in court. However, Angie's former fiancé, attorney Boone Walker, did too good a job with the defense. And now a murderer is free to marry Angie's sister.When Angie uncovers startling new evidence, she turns to the only person who can help before it's too late: Boone, the handsome, hardened man she once loved. But the deadly secrets they expose could lead Angie to her own early grave.









“Don’t risk your life just because you’re still in immediate danger,” Boone said.


“You’re wrong,” Angie said, her eyes flashing furiously.

“I am?”

“You’ve been wrong before.”

Boone knew she was right. He considered apologizing, for thinking the evidence had disappeared because of her negligence. But he’d played the murder case the way he needed to in order to free an innocent man. He couldn’t apologize for that.

“That doesn’t mean I’m wrong now. Making faulty assumptions could get you killed. How about if I keep my opinions to myself and tag along with you anyway?” he asked.

She frowned. “Why would you want to?”

Boone considered his answer carefully. Because he owed her. Because he thought she was wrong about the threat to her life and didn’t want her to be dead wrong. Because…

“Because I missed you.”




FLORENCE CASE’s


favorite novels in her preteen years were the Dana Girls and Nancy Drew series about teenage sleuths solving mysteries, and Grace Livingston Hill’s inspirational romances. Her first work of fiction was in fifth grade—a two-page mystery, which the teacher loved. She kept writing during her teenage years, earning her B.A. in German, marrying her wonderful husband and moving from New Jersey to the Deep South. The birth of her beloved son with his mental handicaps and autism, and all the struggles of raising him, drew her closer to God, and she felt called to write for the Lord. In addition to writing, she teaches the adult Sunday School class in her church and works the soundboard for the singing group her son belongs to, which visits nursing homes. You can contact Florence through www.shoutlife.com/FlorenceCase.




Deadly Reunion

Florence Case








Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.

—Ephesians 4:32


Thank you to my support ladies: Misty,

Barrie, Kathy, Alli, Danita and Maureen,

who hung in there with me.

Above all, a special thank you to my editor,

Melissa Endlich. I am still in the clouds.




CONTENTS


CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

EPILOGUE

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION




ONE


Seeing the dead body of her friend and mentor two days ago had been bad enough—seeing her ex-fiancé’s alive and breathing one in less than a minute was going to be torture. But Angie Delitano had examined the situation she suddenly found herself in from every angle, and out of all the people she couldn’t trust right now, Boone Walker was the only one she was certain was not involved. So here she was, going to a man who had betrayed her for help.

How dumb was that?

Resting her hand on the knob that would open the door to the Walker law firm, she took a deep breath. What to say? How to act? Six months ago, after he’d shredded her reputation—and her heart—she’d left Boone’s engagement ring on the witness stand in front of a packed courtroom, vowing never to lay eyes on him again. But earlier today, she’d found out she no longer had the luxury of that choice.

Someone had threatened her life.

So now her insides were doing jumping jacks, and her emotions were on the verge of boiling over. Having to go to Boone for help made her want to hit something. He’d been willing to wreck her reputation to defend a suspected wife-murderer, forgetting all about how he supposedly loved her. Worse, Boone’s expert defense of the man—who she still believed with all her instincts and heart had murdered his wife—had freed the creep…who was now dating her sister.

“Cope,” she ordered herself. She willed the tears burning behind her eyes to go away. Luckily she was a cop and had plenty of practice in appearing cool and detached, even when her heart was breaking for a victim. She would need that facade in front of Boone. She couldn’t let him think she might actually still care about him.

Because there was no way she could, right?

Resolutely, Angie turned the knob and opened the door, once again the in-control, never-say-die police officer. Her sister’s life—and maybe her own—depended on her getting Boone as a backup this morning. After that, she could really walk away and pretend he didn’t exist.

Which suited her just fine.



What on earth…? Boone Walker watched his former fiancée launch herself into his office for the first time in months. Thanks to years in the courtroom, where the unexpected often happened, he was able to sit back calmly and pin his well-cultivated, steady stare on her, concealing the confusion her sudden appearance caused inside him. After she’d left his ring on the witness stand, Angie hadn’t answered his phone calls or shown any signs of wanting to talk things over—so why now? It didn’t make sense.

Unless…something was terribly wrong and she was desperate. Or maybe…she was finally ready to talk?

His new secretary, Karen, appeared right behind Angie with an apologetic look. “I’m sorry. I asked her to let me announce her, but she said there was no need, you knew who she was.”

“Don’t worry about it. Tornadoes are hard to stop,” Boone said. His secretary sent him a faint smile, but Angie kept her cool, “can’t touch me” look.

Waving Karen out, he waited until she closed the door, then turned his attention to the woman he’d almost married. He thought of a hundred things to say. “Are you okay?” “Am I under arrest?” “Funny seeing you here.” But he lost his mind and instead said, “I missed you.”

For only a few seconds, her pine-green eyes, shaded by thick black lashes, softened. She splayed her fingertips through her chin-length, pale blond waves, a sure sign she was flustered; Boone watched her in fascination, like he’d always done. He doubted she realized how much she’d captivated him from the moment he’d first seen her well over a year ago. Or how much it bothered him to do what he’d had to in court months later.

The uncertainty in her eyes was either that she didn’t believe he’d missed her at all, or that she was second-guessing herself for coming here. It couldn’t be the last part—Angie Delitano hadn’t had an indecisive moment in all the time he’d known her. Not even in the courtroom that day. She’d left his ring behind and, just like his mom where his dad was concerned, never looked back.

He needed to remember that.

“Talk to me, Angie.”

“Things have happened this week,” she said. “Bad things.”

“I heard about Cliff Haggis’s suicide.” Boone never would have guessed the seasoned detective, Angie’s mentor at the station, capable of suicide. But neither was he surprised. Being a cop was hard anywhere, and Copper City, even though it was a lot smaller than nearby Cincinnati and had a lower-than-average crime rate, was no exception.

“I’m sorry,” he added, tapping the pile of papers at the side of his desk to distract himself. Relating to people on an emotional level was not easy for him, but even he knew how to be polite. “I know he was a good friend of yours.”

“Yeah, he was,” she said. She took a long breath, and he watched her slim fingers alternately grip and let loose of the oversize, chocolate leather handbag she had in her arms.

“Sit?” he invited with a gesture of his hand toward his client chair, since she seemed about to run away. She folded her slim, graceful build onto the seat, her face once again wearing what he thought of as her “cop stare.” She’d used it for the first time when he was ripping apart her testimony. He had a feeling before this day was through, he’d see the stare over and over again.

The detached look probably meant she wasn’t there to talk about their ruined relationship, or to set it right. That was fine by him. She’d hurt him badly when she’d been unwilling to understand his absolute need to do what he’d done and then broken their engagement—but he’d forced himself to recover. He refused to be his father, pining after a woman who couldn’t understand why he was the way he was.

“Indirectly,” Angie said, glancing at his once again tapping fingers, “my being here has to do with Cliff’s death. He told me something before he died, and I was on my way to investigate what he said this morning, but then something happened, and I don’t know if I can trust anyone at the precinct now.” She took a breath and gazed into his eyes. “All I am certain of is that I can trust you with my life.”

The air went out of Boone as her words about believing in him dug into his heart. He stilled his fingers.

“So I decided to put our past aside temporarily,” she added. “While I can’t say I’m happy about what you did to my reputation in court, I have to admit you tried to warn me ahead of time about your loyalty to your clients. They come first.”

Angie was correct, and that brought Boone no joy whatsoever. He had indirectly hurt her so he could get an innocent man freed. And he was sorry he’d had to. But he couldn’t be any different than he was, and that meant she was better off without him. And he was better off without a woman who was going to get in the way of his mission.

“But your loyalty to them also showed me,” Angie continued, “that if you give me your word you will help me, just like you help your clients, you’ll be there for me.”

Boone continued to stare at her. His first inclination—and heartfelt desire—was to say “of course, whatever you need, just ask,” but he couldn’t voice the words. He had rebuilt the emotional wall around himself that she’d broken through when they met and fell in love, and was refocused on his passion for helping people who had been falsely accused of crimes, like his father had been. He was, if not happy, at least content. Being around her again, even for a little while, could change all that. Divert him from his true purpose. He didn’t think it was worth chancing.

On the other side of the argument, Boone knew how alone Angie was. He couldn’t stand it when people had no one to turn to. Especially women. Besides, he owed her…something.

“Never mind,” she said, rising and swiping her indigo jeans with her hand as though she were brushing him off. “This was a mistake, coming here. I don’t know what I was thinking.” Pivoting, she headed across the thick emerald carpeting to the door, making no sound.

Her every step farther away from him squeezed Boone’s heart painfully. Man, he was no good at stuff like this. He needed to let her go.

Let her go.

“You haven’t even said what kind of help you need, Angie.”

She turned and stared at him again, working her shiny pink bottom lip back and forth slowly. “There was a time,” she said slowly, “you wouldn’t have needed to ask. You would have just agreed to help me.”

Boone tore his gaze from her lips to her eyes. He could see the deep pain she felt from having to come to him for help, and for a few seconds, he longed to wipe away that pain. To fix everything between them. But that was impossible. They were just too different.

“I’m treating you like a client, remember? Your rules.”

“I’m going to regret this,” she said with a doomsday sense of drama. “I know I’m going to regret this.”

Him, too. “Give me a try anyway.”

She remained on the other side of his office. Boone welcomed the distance from the woman so he could pay more attention to what she would say instead of how lovely her eyes were. At least it ought to have worked that way. From this perspective, though, he was only reminded of how willowy her frame was, and how gracefully she moved. And how much he missed her presence in his life.

Strange how getting hurt didn’t dissolve attraction.

“As I said, before Cliff…died…he gave me some information. A message on my answering machine. That missing murder weapon in the Detry case?”

The weapon he’d let the jury think Angie had either not really seen or had lost track of? The missing evidence that had brought about the end of their engagement and his dreams for the wonderful family he’d always wanted? Yeah, he knew that weapon. Tensing, not wanting to fight with her over a trial that could not be changed, he nodded.

“Cliff said that he took the evidence and buried it, and then let me take the heat for it.”

“That doesn’t make sense.” Cliff Haggis and his wife had taken Angie under their wing when Angie’s former husband, a no-good drug dealer, had been killed in a shootout with the police. They’d also led her to a relationship with Christ, one that Boone didn’t understand and felt no hope of ever achieving. “Cliff was one of the good guys.”

“Yeah. Rude awakening, huh? Most of the rest of his message was basically an apology for helping to wreck my life.”

Boone had read in the paper how Angie was investigated by her department for negligence—because of his innuendoes in the Detry trial—and that the investigation had been dropped for lack of conclusive evidence one way or another.

“Most of the rest?” Boone asked. “What else did he say?”

“That he was trying to make things right. He told me to dig up the gun, clear my reputation, but then to let the dead rest in peace. That doing anything else was too dangerous. I was worried about him and wanted more of an explanation than he was giving, so I went over there. The front door was open, and he was on the couch.”

She took a shaky breath. “Suicide is what they’re saying. But I have no idea why he would do that.” She paused and gazed at him. “It was brutal.”

Boone saw the shock at the discovery still in her eyes, heard her voice falter, but once again, he wasn’t sure what to say beyond platitudes. Words never failed him while arguing a case, but the second emotions came into play, his vocabulary dried up. He’d discovered that after he and Angie got engaged and the first problem between them arose. He’d never figured out how to help her feel better—he wished he had. Maybe things would have been…

Don’t go there, he warned himself.

For over a minute, they just looked at each other. Angie shook off the pain over Cliff and drank in the sight of Boone’s broad shoulders, squared-off jaw and penetrating, royal-blue eyes as if he were lifesaving water. That was okay—as long as she remembered that too much of that water could drown her.

Exhaling a quick breath from her mouth, she returned to the front of his desk, where she again plopped down in the client chair, almost as opulent as his own, and let her bag fall onto the carpet in a chocolate heap. Boone remained in his seat behind the mahogany monstrosity he called a desk.

She’d blinked first because it was hard to look at the man and not want him to take her in his arms—especially from the instant Boone had said he missed her and traded his distant look for a concerned one. Concerned was good. Good as long as she kept her head over it, got his help and then left him behind.

Because in reality, his concern meant nothing. He’d shown the same emotion for Warren Detry, the wife-murderer she’d arrested who Boone had sworn was innocent. Concern wasn’t love. Not even Boone’s interest in her from the moment they’d met, she’d come to realize, was love. She wasn’t going to fool herself again—she just wasn’t someone anyone could love. Hadn’t her own mother shown her that?

But she was getting lost in the past, and Boone was waiting for her to continue.

She swallowed down a lump in her throat. Cope. “Trouble is, Cliff wasn’t exactly clear about where the evidence was, and I wasn’t able to ask him.” She arced her hands in the air in frustration. “I could only figure he meant some of the message as a puzzle, trying to make sure he didn’t leave behind any information that might get into the wrong hands. He loved word puzzles. It took me a while, but I came up with one idea about the references to digging up evidence long buried and letting the dead rest in peace. It might mean he buried the gun at Detry’s wife’s gravesite.”

“You think?”

“I don’t know. There’s too much about this whole thing I don’t understand. Why he had to kill himself…” She shook her head slowly. “I especially don’t get that. But there’s more.”

“I kind of figured, or you would’ve brought the weapon here gift wrapped with an ‘I told you so.’”

Her smile was spontaneous. She could have shot herself for not holding it back, for as soon as Boone saw her grin, his solemn blue eyes took on that twinkle she remembered all too well. Peachy.

“I like making you smile,” he told her.

“Well, don’t like it too much.”

Instead of being irritated, he just grinned. She pretended not to melt a little, but it was hard. Diversion needed.

“This is where the ‘something happened’ part comes in,” she continued. “Before I came here, I was headed to the Last Stop Cemetery, where Laurie Detry is buried, and I stopped for coffee. When I came out to my car, I found a nasty little death threat under my windshield wiper. It warned me to forget what I think I know about the murder or I’m dead.”

Boone muttered a curse and his face darkened, surprising Angie. She’d never seen him look this angry. Sure, he had a heart for the underdog, and in this particular situation, she was the one barking. But he always hid his emotions from clients. Surely he didn’t see her as anything more than that? He understood it was over between them, didn’t he?

Not wanting to get into that—ever—she regrouped. “I could try to handle finding the evidence on my own, but if the missing evidence is buried there, I thought it might be smart to have someone watch my back while I’m busy digging.”

“Really smart,” Boone agreed.

“So will you help?”

“Of course.”

His instant response was a good sign. She was happy he was so willing to play bodyguard, but niggling little doubts immediately started to chomp away at that happiness. What if he really did have the wrong idea about a future for them?

“No strings attached,” she warned.

“Wasn’t even thinking in that direction,” Boone replied easily.

Too easily. Angie’s eyes narrowed. “Neither was I.” Really. “I only came to you because it’s possible someone at the department might have helped Cliff hide the weapon, and covered up for him. I don’t know that anyone did, but I can’t take the chance. If I hand in the evidence there, it might disappear again.”

“That seems possible,” he agreed. “I know the county sheriff’s chief deputy personally. Once we find it, we can bring the evidence to him.”

That would work. Angie nodded slowly. “I am sorry if I’m taking you away from important work—”

“Angie.” Boone held up his palm. “Please, don’t be nervous where I’m concerned. I can take the time for you. And I understand where things stand between us and am not reading anything into your asking me for backup.”

Good. Because she was over him—over men and the idea of a husband bringing her any kind of peace and security at all. Boone had been strike two. From where she stood, she now expected that if God wanted her to be married, He’d find her a husband, and she would have no doubts about the rightness of His choice. Boone could absolutely, positively, not be the right man, because she had a whole boatload of doubts about him.

Even if he was staring at her with eyes she could dive into.

“You do realize,” Boone said suddenly, “that you should get a search warrant to dig on private property?”

“The judge isn’t going to give me one on total speculation, which is all my theory is. Besides, I had my fill of looking like a fool at the trial, thank you.”

His eyes took on an apologetic look, which she ignored. The possibility a judge might laugh at her theory left her cold inside, and she had Boone to thank for robbing her of not only her reputation, but also her confidence in her ability as a cop. As a Christian, she had tried several times during the last half year to make the leap into forgiveness, but she couldn’t, not when Boone wasn’t the least bit sorry. Too much hurt lingered. And fear that if she stuck around Boone for too long, he could betray her all over again.

“You’ve got something else planned?” he asked.

“Instead of a warrant, I’m stopping in at the cemetery caretaker’s office, telling him important evidence might be buried there, and asking for permission to search.” Begging for permission, if need be.

“That should work, too.” Boone nodded. “Since you don’t want to go to a judge, I take it you don’t want my friend from the sheriff’s department coming as a witness, either, just in case the gun isn’t buried there?”

“You’re finally understanding me,” she told him.

“Only six months too late,” he said. The thought lingered in the air between them as Boone reached for a set of keys on the glass-topped surface near his phone, unlocked a desk drawer, and pulled out a Glock she knew he kept within arm’s reach on purpose. He had a wide reputation for being the best criminal-defense attorney in the county, and sometimes, he’d once told her, desperate people who were guilty came to ask him for help. He never knew how well they would take his refusal to defend them. He’d only drawn it twice, but he would shoot if he had to.

She believed him. He always told her the truth, like when he’d said he’d do anything to keep his client from prison. She just hadn’t thought that “anything” would include ruining her.

She swallowed. She had to stop the self-pity and focus. There was a life riding on it.

She watched Boone stand, pull open his black, designer suit jacket and place his weapon in a leather shoulder holster. Broad-shouldered and tall, he had a way of making her feel safe when in his presence, even when he wasn’t carrying.

Not that she was worried or anything. But if she got shot from behind, who would see justice done? Leaning over, she patted her own backup weapon, a Beretta, that was lodged in an ankle holster under her jeans. “Will I be keeping you from any appointments or court appearances?”

“Not unless we get murdered.”

She couldn’t resist rolling her eyes at him. “Like you would let the opposition get the best of you with a little old gun. You’d probably debate him to death first.”

He chuckled, but when he rounded his desk and joined her, his dark blue eyes were serious again. Angie didn’t like that look on him—it meant trouble for her.

“You realize if we find this evidence, it will more than likely be inadmissible in any court, right? The chain of custody can’t be proved. And since Detry’s wife owned the gun to begin with, Detry’s prints showing up on it won’t be a shocker, unless there are blood smears with his prints on them. The only usefulness it’ll have is if someone else’s prints are on the grip.”

“I actually hadn’t thought beyond that dumping it on your desk and the ‘I told you so’ you mentioned earlier,” Angie told him, standing. “But let’s leave it up to a judge to decide if Detry’s prints are usable.” She stressed his name to make sure Boone knew she didn’t doubt the outcome, even if he did. “I know he can’t be retried because of double jeopardy, but maybe they can get him for perjury.”

“Detry didn’t lie.”

What was with this one-upmanship thing? Had they always done it, but she’d been too in love with him to notice? Angie guessed it didn’t matter. She was getting what she wanted, so she flattened her lips together and refused to push his buttons further.

Boone, however, wasn’t as polite. “Your friend’s hiding crucial evidence and lying about its existence needs to be investigated.”

“If you’re suggesting Cliff would murder a woman in cold blood and then hide the weapon, stop. He wouldn’t. Wouldn’t have,” she corrected, glaring at Boone. A word formed on his lips, but she interrupted him with a wave of her hand. “If you say one more word in that direction, I think I’ll leave alone and risk getting shot.”

“Wouldn’t want that to happen. You ready?”

He’d caved in awfully fast. Angie frowned as she grabbed her handbag and walked out of the office ahead of him. He was making an effort to be helpful—she had to give him that much—but she knew better than to let her guard down around him. At least she wouldn’t have to see him again past today—if all went well, that was. She didn’t want to think about the alternatives. Sometimes, like when she was around Boone, it was better not to think too much.

Five minutes later they had retrieved a shovel for digging and a metal detector—both brand-spanking-new from Wal-Mart—from her trunk and got into Boone’s charcoal-gray sedan with tinted windows so dark she was sure they were illegal.

“I always thought this car had a sinister aura,” she said, pulling her seat belt around her. Sinister or not, she had to admit the inside smelled good. Like real leather and citrus. Then she realized the lime scent came from Boone, and butterflies fluttered in her stomach.

“I realize it’s low profile for you.” He turned the key, and the powerful motor came to life. “What exactly is that shade of orange you drive around in?”

“It’s called candy orange, and it’s not that bright.”

“Okay, vivid.”

“At least if anyone runs into me, they can’t claim they didn’t notice me coming. You, however, blend into the highway in a rearview mirror.”

“And you make a nice bull’s-eye if they want to murder you,” he pointed out.

“That’s why we took your car.” She smiled smugly.

“See? I’m already doing my job protecting you.”

He sent her the same impish grin that used to warm her heart. Turned out it still did. They were connecting again, like old times—there was no other way of putting it.

He put the car in gear and turned his attention to driving out of the small parking garage next to his office building, but she watched his profile, unable to tear her eyes away, feeling more alive than at any time in the last six months…

What was she thinking? How easily she’d fallen back into the electric, fun banter they’d once had, as if everything was normal between them. His agreeing to help her, a little verbal football, and a whiff or two of his cologne—was that all she needed to get wrapped up again in her emotions and feelings for him? Stupid. In about an hour, maybe two, Boone was going to drop her off at her candy-orange car and they would never see each other again, unless she had an occasion to arrest someone he was defending and have to testify. And she already knew how going up against him in court worked out. No, thank you. She did not need Boone Walker–type grief.

Lord, help me to let him go. Because at this point, she wasn’t sure what would be more dangerous—running into a murderous Warren Detry…or losing her heart again to Boone.




TWO


“I know you still believe Detry is guilty,” Boone said after they’d pulled out onto the busy, uptown street, “so tell me. Why do you think Cliff Haggis, a cop, would hide a gun to protect a guilty man from a murder rap?”

Her warm and fuzzy feelings toward Boone fled, and her nerve endings went on red alert. That had to be the quickest answer to a prayer she’d ever had. She hadn’t wanted to feel a connection to Boone again, but she also hadn’t wanted this irritation at him washing through her. She’d rather not be feeling anything for him at all.

“You’re trying to argue again,” she pointed out.

“I’m a lawyer,” he said with a charming smile. “Arguing is what I do.”

She sighed. “Can’t you just be my bodyguard and let me take care of the business end?”

“If I have to shoot somebody, that is the business end. The more knowledge I have about what’s going on, the better chance I’ll have of not picking off an innocent man.”

True. She took a deep breath. “I don’t know why Cliff hid the evidence. Maybe he knew Detry from someplace and owed him a big favor. Or maybe Detry offered a bribe to hide it and Cliff desperately needed money.”

“Or maybe Cliff hid the weapon because he killed Detry’s wife himself.”

She was wrong. Warm and fuzzy was preferable to wanting to box Boone’s ears in. “Get real,” she denied flatly. “I told you already, Cliff couldn’t commit cold-blooded murder.”

“Anyone could, given the right circumstances. Like right now, you look like you want to kill me.”

“That would be justifiable homicide, not murder.”

The boyish grin, so out of sync with his rugged, dark features, returned. She couldn’t help herself, she slowly grinned back. They both knew she didn’t mean it, about wanting him dead. And smiling at Boone didn’t mean she was any less irritated with him.

Did it?

“Cliff’s wife said they didn’t know the victim, and I believe her,” she said, preferring the arguing to examining how she was honestly feeling. “Detry killed his wife with the missing weapon, and I believe what we find is going to prove it. And the new evidence might just stand up in court, because no way a cop is planting Detry’s fingerprints on it to frame him, but then burying the weapon. That doesn’t make sense.”

“Look, Angie, they found no other evidence against Detry anywhere. So why are you so sure you’re going to find usable prints?”

“I just am.”

Boone shook his head, but Angie let the argument go, gazing out the window at the large city park they were passing, with its trees and walking trails. She actually had a lot of reasons for thinking Detry had murdered his wife, and they were all good.

The first reason stemmed from something that had occurred at the scene of the crime. She’d arrived soon after Cliff that afernoon at the Detry mansion in response to the 911 call reporting a murder. She’d checked the victim’s cold body and spotted what she presumed was the murder weapon several feet away. She had to help Cliff secure the huge place, so she didn’t remain there. In the next room, she’d found Detry, sitting with his face in his hands. The early middle-aged man, a total stranger, had looked at her, and his expression had changed from grief to surprise—and then to a coldness that had left a permanent chill in her. Before they could exchange words, Cliff had found them and given her rooms to search. Later, Detry metamorphosed back into the grieving husband, but Angie had walked away that day convinced he was guilty.

Another reason for still doubting Detry’s innocence was the e-mail she’d gotten a week after his acquittal that said, simply, “I will not forgive you.” She’d had it traced by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation’s computer division to a nearby library, but they’d never located the person who’d sent it.

And finally, there was Angie’s sister. Detry had gotten involved with a church’s Reach Out to Prisoners program while incarcerated to await trial and claimed to have found God. What he’d also found was her sister, Chloe, who was involved in the ministry. If that had been their only connection, it would have been a coincidence, sure. But not a month after Detry had been found not guilty, he’d tracked down and begun dating Chloe. Out of the blue, Chloe had called Angie up to forgive her for a past wrong and to try to reconcile—because Warren Detry had asked her to.

Angie shivered. She figured Detry was dating Chloe for revenge on her, since she’d refused to back down in court about having seen the presumed murder weapon. The man was evil, and she was not waiting around until he decided he would get his ultimate revenge on her—killing her sister. She was fighting him now with all she had in her.

Gut instinct, that’s how she knew the prints would point to Detry. But Boone didn’t trust instinct or feelings. He dealt in hard evidence. That was fine. She had a fact for him.

“I’ll give you one reason I’m sure about Detry’s guilt,” she told him finally, when they’d come to the outskirts of Copper City and were riding down a highway studded with ranch homes. “The insurance policy on his wife was for half a mil. That always screams husband.”

Boone shook his head. “Not this time.”

“Why do you say that?”

“The insurance broker said the wife was the one who took out the policy, not Detry. He even remembered her saying her husband wasn’t going to like it, but she wanted him to have money to keep up the house if she died.”

“A house he promptly sold after he was acquitted. You don’t think he influenced her at all?” she asked skeptically.

His look said “you know what I think already.”

How exasperating could one man get? “I can’t wait till we get a print match.”

“Me, neither.” He grinned like that would make him the happiest man on earth.

Since she was afraid she would say something that would get Boone talking about the relationship they didn’t have, she concentrated on watching the highway behind them for signs they were being followed. Boone also kept silent, for which she was grateful.

A few minutes later, they passed under the gateway arch at the cemetery and parked in front of a small building toward the front that resembled a homey cottage more than a place of business. Tiny flowers in various shades of pink and red growing in window boxes brightened the front, and a sign that read “Last Stop” in flowing script hung over the door.

Boone and Angie got out and scanned the area around them.

“No cars, no one lurking around the trees,” she observed. “No one followed us, either. We’ve been lucky.”

“It’s too quiet,” Boone said. “Dead quiet.”

“I am not walking down that pun trail,” she told him, swinging her shoulder bag from her side to her hands to dig for her badge and ID.

“I wasn’t trying to be funny. Somebody threatened you with death if you don’t forget about the Detry murder, which remains unsolved, with a murderer still out there—”

She opened her mouth to protest, but Boone narrowed his eyes, and she gave up, preferring to pick her battles.

“But there’s not so much as a hint of anything out of place on the trip over, or here.” He shook his head. “Something’s not right.”

“We took your car so no one would spot us. Maybe we’re just doing everything right.”

“Or maybe the danger isn’t who or what you think it is.”

“Boone, please go back to doing funny. I like you better that way.” She found what she needed to prove she was a cop to the caretaker and zipped her bag closed.

“Right. We can joke. Just don’t discuss anything serious, right?”

“You’re not talking about Detry now, are you?” She met him eye to eye and knew she was correct. His grim look was back. That warning, knowing stare that convinced jurors he was right and won court cases—but wouldn’t win her.

Sighing, she started toward the door of the caretaker’s cottage office, not caring if Boone followed or not.

Her cell phone rang before she got halfway up the walk. She slipped her badge and ID inside one pocket of her beige, cropped jacket and grabbed the phone out of the other. Her sister’s number showed in the little window.

Angie’s heart thumped against her chest. This call was not to chat. Chloe didn’t “chat” with her. They were both still too bruised and cautious about their renewed relationship, which was another reason she wasn’t jumping into the middle of her sister’s romance with her gun drawn on Detry. She knew who Chloe would side with.

The phone kept chirping. She turned around to find Boone staring at her curiously. He was still by his Mercedes.

“I have to get this,” she more asked than said.

Boone shrugged his broad shoulders, and she tried to convince herself she didn’t want to hide her face against one now. She never hid from anything, but she did not want to take this call. What on earth was wrong with her?

She was afraid of what Chloe was going to say, that was what.

With a deep breath, she walked well away from Boone to the back of his car, hit a key on the phone and cupped her hand over her mouth to keep her voice from carrying. She hoped.

“Chloe?”

“Ange, yes, it’s me. I have the greatest news, and I just had to call you. I hope that’s okay. You said the other night you would get this week off, right?”

“Right.” She’d called Chloe the night she’d found Cliff dead, unnerved by shock, wanting to make sure her sister was still all right. Maybe she’d also called Chloe because she wanted to hear the voice of someone familiar. It hadn’t comforted her, not when she’d really wanted to be talking to…someone else. She glanced at Boone.

“Chief Gregg gave me over a week of compassionate leave time,” Angie added. To pull herself together, which she would have to do all over again when she attended the funeral tomorrow. Nine days to get over losing a friend. It wouldn’t be enough. She already knew that.

She needed to focus on her sister. Chloe was chatting and gushing. Chloe sounded extremely happy. And given the circumstances of her sister’s life at the moment, that could only mean one thing.

“Warren proposed!” Chloe chirped in her ear. “We’re getting married Saturday.”

Oh, please, Lord, no, was what she thought. “Wow,” was what she said. What else could she say?

“I’m so happy,” Chloe added. “I was going to let you get the invitation in the mail, but Warren said he’d imagine a call would surprise you more.”

Oh, yeah. Angie rested her hips against Boone’s car, her knees threatening mutiny. Detry was a snake coiling around her neck. Tightly.

She couldn’t tell Chloe her suspicions yet. She needed absolute proof to back her up, like that murder weapon, with only Detry’s fingerprints on it. She probably could use more than that—maybe an indicting tidbit from Detry’s past that Boone missed when he ran the man’s background check. And hard as it was for her to accept, she probably needed to ask Boone to let her read his copy of that report. Detry was already making his moves. There was no time to waste.

As her sister bubbled over with hopes and dreams for her future with a murderer, Angie cast a long look at Boone. How on earth would she get him to go along with her game plan of ruining his former client, which would require his admitting to having made a mistake?

Around them birds chirped; an elderly woman, with a waterfall of red roses next to her, drove through the gate; and a plane flew through some clouds overhead. So much for the dead quiet. The world was back to normal—except for her own life.

“Ange, I really want you to be there for the shower, the rehearsal and the wedding. There’s a party, too, one evening. Mom said you can stay at the house if you don’t want to drive back and forth.” Some of the gush left Chloe’s voice as she added, “If you can come soon, maybe it will give us some time together to get to know each other again before I’m all caught up with being a wife. I’d like that.”

“I’d like that, too,” Angie whispered. She refused to tear up now, with Boone’s intense gaze on her. “I do love you, Chloe.” She couldn’t remember the last time she’d said that—if she ever had. She must have, right?

At the other end of the invisible line, Chloe hesitated, a reflection of the hard times they’d had. “I love you, too. My invitation will have the dates and times. Please let us know when you’re coming. Bye!” She disconnected.

Angie slipped her phone back into her pocket and straightened up. Boone moved to her side, so close their arms were touching. She longed to lean into him and absorb some of his strength. He was always a rock, no matter what, and she’d been on her own so long that leaning on him held great appeal. She ought to be thinking of God as her rock, but sometimes, like now when trouble was slapping her into a small, dark place, God seemed so remote.

“You hear my heart, Boone?”

“Is this a test?” he asked lightly.

“I’m surprised you can’t hear my heart,” she said, not joking. Her sister’s situation was life or death. She pulled her bag up into her arms to hold that instead of him. “I can hear my heart. It’s pounding.”

“You’re upset.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Whether or not now was a good time to ask him for permission to read the background check he’d done on Detry, she wasn’t certain. She doubted if he would let her if she didn’t first tell him about her sister’s engagement and how she was going to stop the wedding. Was it a good idea? She needed to think, but Boone’s intense gaze and nearness made that extremely difficult.

“Bad news?” Boone asked.

“Yes, I would say so.” She backed away from him a little to break the mental hold he had on her. “That was my sister.”

Boone’s face registered surprise. “I thought you two weren’t speaking.”

“We weren’t, until Warren Detry stepped into the picture. Chloe was part of a Bible study ministry for inmates. That’s how they met. When he was freed, he looked her up at her church, and they started dating.”

“You were going to tell me this when?” His eyes narrowed.

“Now?” She lifted her eyebrow. The edges of his lips lifted, but only briefly. His attention was diverted by the elderly lady’s car leaving. He watched the vehicle carefully, then resettled himself to look at her.

“Go on,” he said.

“Chloe never believed Detry capable of murder. At some point, Warren discovered we were sisters. Not too long ago, he made it a point to ‘encourage’ Chloe to reconcile with me.” Not out of any love of his fellow man, Angie was certain. The monster just wanted to assure she was out there, scared. Sweating. Petrified.

“The call just now was to tell me she and Warren are getting married Saturday.” She met Boone’s eyes again. “Warren encouraged her to call and invite me especially. He’s taunting me.”

“Angie—”

“He is,” she insisted, “because I know as soon as Chloe moves in with him, she’s readily available to be his next victim, and he wants me to worry. He must know we’re here, looking for the evidence. That I’m not giving up, despite his death threat on my car this morning. He’ll either kill her to get revenge on me for insisting the murder weapon existed, or he’ll hold her over my head to keep me from taking the murder weapon to the authorities.”

Boone’s skeptical eyes made Angie want to kick him in the shins, but she held back. At the rate today was going, she would probably just break a toe. Besides, she was trying to change inside, to mature as a Christian.

A hard battle, especially when it came to Boone, in more ways than one.

“I’ll admit,” Boone said, “that his choosing your sister to fall in love with and marry is very coincidental, but it’s not like he went looking to meet her in the first place just to get revenge on you. The trial hadn’t even happened yet when they met.”

Was she wrong? The memory of Detry’s evil eyes lacerating her appeared in her mind like fireworks, clear and sharp at first, then fading into nothingness, and she shivered, despite the warmth of the June morning. No, she wasn’t wrong. She’d met up with perps like him before, men who had it out for females, but never any with the intensity of hatred in their eyes that Detry had displayed toward her. Her guess was that Detry was a psychopath who hated women. When she’d claimed a weapon existed that he’d stated wasn’t there, she’d become tops on his hit list.

Maybe it had been a coincidence Detry met Chloe, and maybe even that he’d found out they were sisters. But it hadn’t been by chance he’d sought out Chloe later, after the trial was over, and begun dating her. No, that had been his plan.

But she’d never convince Boone of that.

“You’re also assuming Detry was guilty,” he added, “and that someone else didn’t commit Laurie Detry’s murder and write that note to you. Someone who doesn’t want the weapon found now.”

She sidestepped impatiently. “Do I really need to remind you there were no signs of any break-in or struggle at the mansion? That the forensics team found no stranger’s prints anywhere? I’d stake my life on there not being an intruder.”

“I wouldn’t stake your life on that,” Boone said fiercely.

That almost sounded like he cared. She supposed he did, in a way, but he cared more about his clients. He would never side with her over one of them. Ever. This was proving it. Worse, he was gazing down at her as though she were being an illogical child. Just like at the trial, he was still doubting her opinions and abilities. That hurt.

No matter what he thought, Detry was dangerous, and she believed that to the depths of her soul. Because he’d put Chloe up to this latest call, Angie was almost positive he wasn’t planning to murder her anytime soon. He would have too much fun getting his revenge by watching Angie squirm…while the clock ticked away the seconds till his next murder.

Her sister’s.

So physically, Angie was safe—for now. Mentally, though, she knew Boone would fight her the whole way on breaking up Detry and her sister, and he was a formidable enemy to have. She needed to stay on his friendly side until she got the information about Detry she wanted.

“Tell you what. Since there’s no danger, and we seem to waste a lot of time disagreeing with each other on this, I’m demoting you from bodyguard back to lawyer.”

To say Boone looked shocked would be an understatement. “You sure you want to do that, Angel?”

Hearing his nickname for her brought back memories that made her warm inside. He’d called her Angel all the time when they were together. She wished she could tell him to stop now, but if she did, he might think she was still bitter toward him. She was, and maybe he even knew she was, but if he didn’t, she didn’t want him to figure it out. She wanted him to think “help Angie.”

She kept her voice even. “I know you’ve been enjoying your elevation in status, but you can go back to your office, and I’ll take a cab there with the evidence when I’m done.”

“What makes you think I would just leave you here?”

“Because there’s no reason for you to stay.” Distracted by the movement of curtains in the cottage window, she paused. They needed to hurry up before someone got worried and called the police. That would be messy. Chief Gregg would not be pleased if she became the center of attention—again.

“The way I figure it, before he died, Cliff must have let Detry know that he told me that he’d buried the evidence, but not where exactly. I don’t know why Cliff would have done that, but that’s what I think happened.” She gave Boone a few seconds to process that. “So Detry, angry, decided to threaten me with the note. Not because he has plans to kill me. That’s no real fun when it comes to revenge. No, he’ll get his jollies from me panicking.”

“You don’t know any of this for certain.”

“He had Chloe call me to announce the wedding, Boone,” she repeated. “He was turning his knife in my gut. He’s totally aware my sister and mother are all I’ve got now that he tore you and me apart.”

Much to her dismay, Boone’s relaxed aura was gone, and he straightened, looking critically at her. “That’s the whole problem you have with him, isn’t it? We might still be together if I hadn’t taken him on as a client.”

“No, Detry is the whole problem I have with you. That you chose him to defend—and not me.” The burning behind her eyes started, and Angie knew she needed to get mad instead of cry. She’d done enough crying over her past already, before and after Boone. “Besides, we wouldn’t have lasted even without Detry. There are too many differences between us. But that doesn’t matter now. I need to make my sister understand he is dangerous—that’s what does matter to me. Not putting him in prison—and not you.”

Her words were like a gut punch. Boone turned away from her and scanned the trees and road, determined to focus on watching out for threats. But one thought lingered on his mind like fire licking at a log—he no longer mattered to her.

“So I don’t need you to watch my back any longer.”

“I think you do.” She had tunnel vision where Detry was concerned and would never accept that he was innocent, and she could still be in danger from sources unknown. Not good. She needed him and couldn’t even see it. Or refused to, because he’d hurt her.

Whatever she said, he wasn’t leaving her there alone. He was finally there for her, one hundred percent there, but he feared it was too late.

“Don’t risk your life just because you’re angry with me,” he said. “I think someone else wrote the note for some other reason, and you’re still in immediate danger—maybe more than you think.”

“You’re wrong,” she said, her eyes flashing furiously.

“I am?”

“You’ve been wrong before.”

In court, about her, she meant. Boone knew she was right. He considered apologizing, not for choosing to defend his client over her, but for thinking there were no other possibilities for the evidence having disappeared beyond her being negligent.

That the gun could have been purposely hidden had never occurred to him. Cliff Haggis, the first responder the night of the murder from the small, understaffed, Copper City PD, was a decorated, well-respected police detective. He’d testified he had not seen the weapon Angie had described. Likewise, there was no reason to believe the crime-scene investigation team, called in from nearby Cincinnati, would have any reason to thwart the murder investigation. The only possibility he’d come up with was that Angie had somehow missed the real perp inside the mansion, who had taken the weapon at some point and fled unnoticed before the rest had shown up.

He’d played the case the way he needed to in order to free an innocent man, and he couldn’t apologize for that.

“Okay, so I was wrong—once,” he admitted. “That doesn’t mean I’m wrong now. Making faulty assumptions about someone’s guilt could get you killed.”

“There’s steam coming out of my ears, Boone.”

As determined as she was not to listen to him, he was just as determined to protect her. “How about if I keep my opinions to myself and tag along with you anyway?” he asked.

“Why would you want to?”

Boone considered his answer carefully. Because he owed her. Because he thought she was wrong about the threat to her life and didn’t want her to be dead wrong. Because…

“Because I missed you.”

Her cheeks flushed pink. “Quit saying that!”

He shrugged. “Can’t help it.”

“And don’t be charming.”

“Me? I don’t know the meaning of the word.” He grinned, because he was getting through to her. He could tell. “I’m just trying to make you happy.”

Angie, exasperated, waved her hand in the air. “Never mind. Tag along if you want to, while I dig up the gun, but don’t talk to me.”

“Even if I see danger?”

“You’re causing me to have premature aging lines,” she told him.

“See? Even when I’m the exact way you want me to be, you’re not happy.”

He might be right about that, and what did that say about her?

“I’m not talking to you anymore.” Leaving Boone behind, Angie walked up the concrete sidewalk to the cottage, where she rapped once on the door to announce her arrival and entered.

A woman in her late sixties with frosted, dark blond hair and weathered skin sat behind the desk inside reading a bestseller Angie recognized based on a real serial killer. In a cemetery. Gutsy.

The woman met her eyes with some emotion in hers that came and went quickly, spooking Angie. Then her face took on a world-weariness that held a hint of amusement.

“Took you long enough to get in here,” the woman said, laying her novel carefully on the side of her desk and joining Angie at the counter. “I watched you two for a while, but then I got bored. Too much conflict, not enough resolution.”

Uncanny how that about nailed down her entire life, Angie thought.

“You and that fella married?”

“No,” Angie said firmly, ignoring the giant moth trying to take off in the pit of her stomach. “Never.”

“Good thing. You’d be a divorce waiting to happen.”

Wow, if outsiders could tell, she’d done the right thing disengaging herself from Boone. Or trying to, anyway. The door shut behind her and she sensed Boone right back at her side. Close. Very close.

She elbowed him. It was like hitting concrete. He backed off, and she turned her attention to the cemetery’s caretaker. The nameplate on the front counter said she was Ida Zlotsky.

“Ida, I have a problem.” Leaving out as much information as she could, Angie explained who she was and what she wanted to do, including the part about digging up possible evidence. Ida gazed unabashedly at Boone the whole time. Angie wondered if she’d even listened, but then Ida spoke without looking at her.

“Whose grave?”

“Laurie Detry’s.”

With a hard blink, Ida turned her attention from Boone to her—another strange reaction, Angie thought. But since the woman wasn’t saying no, she didn’t challenge her on it, just presented her ID and badge.

Ida checked both with half an eye, then returned her attention to Boone. “He a cop, too?” she asked with a wide smile at him.

“No,” Angie and Boone both said together, only Boone’s “no” sounded more like “no way, never.” Angie gave him a long-suffering look and put her identification away in her bag.

“That was too quick,” Ida said. “What, is he undercover or something? A rogue cop? ’Cause you look just like that rogue cop on that forensics show a couple seasons ago, the one who got killed—”

The very thought of Boone dying hit too close to home and made Angie cringe. Apparently some part of her wasn’t that mad at him. Go figure.

“I’m a criminal-defense lawyer,” Boone said. “I’m here to keep her out of jail.”

Angie thrust her thumb backward toward Boone. “And I’m pretending he’s not here.”

Ida’s pale green eyes lit up. Good thing someone was finding the whole situation funny, Angie thought, because she was nearing the edge of her patience.

“Now, Ida, have you noticed anything happening around here lately you might consider weird?”

“Yeah.” Ida nodded seriously. “You two.”

“You walked right into that one, Angie.” Boone chuckled.

“I’ll take that as a no.” Angie said to the woman. She threw a steely-eyed, “please be quiet” expression over her shoulder at Boone, then turned back to the caretaker. “So would it be all right if we looked for that evidence at the gravesite?”

Ida pushed back wayward bangs from her eyes and grinned from ear to ear. “Have at it. I’ll even look it up on our map and save you the trouble of finding it.”

“Excellent.”

“As long as I can watch what you’re doing.”

Angie sighed. This was just not her day. Not her week. If her sister’s life wasn’t hanging by a thread, she would cash in her metal detector and go home. “It’s police business,” she said, trying to dissuade the clerk and hoping the woman didn’t decide to call the precinct. “Could be dangerous.”

“Honey, I used to work in a biker bar. I can handle danger.”

“I might need Ida’s help,” Boone said. Angie shot him with her eyes, but he chose not to shut up. “She probably has self-defense tricks up her sleeve I never thought of.”

“You betcha,” Ida said, winking at him. “Honey, if you don’t want this eye magnet, I’d like a crack at him.”

“Have at it,” Angie said, rolling her eyes at Boone’s grin. Ida didn’t notice—she was too busy gazing at Boone.

“You sure you’re a lawyer?” she asked him. “’Cause I think you look like one of those handsome mobsters in the movies.”

Lawyer or mobster? Too good to resist, even considering she had taken a vow of silence where Boone was concerned. Turning, Angie opened her mouth, but Boone’s fingers suddenly covered her lips to shush her.

“Don’t even start,” he warned, his dark eyebrows slanting.

She couldn’t speak anyway. The last thing she’d expected was his touching her—or the joy flooding her from the contact.

She stared up at him, confused, and to her amazement, he looked just as startled as she did. But she wasn’t the reason. Turning, she followed his gaze.

Ida stood there, holding a gun in her hand.

Splitting apart to opposite sides of the room like they had been working together for years, Angie and Boone simultaneously drew their own weapons, ready for a stand-off.




THREE


“Relax. I was just holding it up to show you two I had it. I wasn’t going to shoot the thing.” Ida’s wrinkles grew even deeper as she gingerly put the gun down on the counter. “If you two don’t beat all. Saying how dangerous what you’re here to do is, and then spending time making goo-goo eyes at each other so you don’t even notice someone has a gun until they could have shot you.”

“She has a point, Angie,” Boone said, moving his jacket to holster his Glock. “Better stop making goo-goo eyes at me. You’re too distracting.”

Like she needed this? Angie scowled at the other woman. “I did not make goo-goo eyes at Boone.”

Ida just smiled at Boone, who gave her that boyish grin Angie thought he kept reserved for her. So much for thinking she was special. With a fast sigh, Angie reholstered her own weapon at her ankle and checked Ida’s. “It’s loaded.”

“Of course it is. What good would an empty gun be?”

She liked the logic. The woman reminded her a lot of herself, and Angie wasn’t sure if she liked that or not. She returned the weapon to Ida. “Better put it back wherever you keep it.”

“Sure,” Ida said. A few seconds later, the firearm was safely locked inside a steel counter drawer. “I only got it out because you said digging up what you’re after could be dangerous. But I should have figured you’d both be carrying already. I’ll be safe enough, I guess.”

Angie bit her tongue to keep from asking Ida if she had a permit for the weapon, because if the caretaker didn’t, then she would have to do something about it, and she didn’t need further delays. She could also have asked Ida what could go on at a cemetery that would require protection, but truly, she didn’t want to know.

Striding over to the door, she moved her arm in a windmill motion, gesturing for them to follow her. Outside, she took in the surrounding area, suddenly edgy again. What she was looking for, she wasn’t certain. She still didn’t believe Detry was coming after her right now, but Ida’s suddenly brandishing a firearm had made her anxious.

As had Boone’s touching her. She was still vulnerable to him, no matter how much she thought otherwise. But Boone was as much a threat to her sister’s life as Detry was in a way, because Boone refused to believe her. If she fell for him all over again, she might get goo-goo-eyed for real, and let him convince her he was right, and then she would give up her mission. Chloe could end up dead.

She had to remain strong and get this done.

First things first. She needed her metal detector and shovel, but she didn’t want to ask Boone for any favors. So she merely pointed to his trunk.

“Aren’t you being just a bit childish with this ‘no talk’ thing?” Boone asked, getting his keys out.

Probably, but she didn’t care. The less contact she had with him, the less she would think about him. But she wasn’t telling him that. Retrieving her tools, she saw Ida smile from ear to ear, and she lifted her eyebrows at her in question. “Something amusing you?”

“You two. You’re more fun than a soap opera.” Ida waved her hand in a northerly direction and set the pace, telling them Laurie Detry’s grave was a thousand feet or so from the office building.

“So, Ida, what was it like working in a biker bar?” Boone asked.

That was all the encouragement the older woman needed. In the next five minutes, Angie learned more about Ida Zlotsky than she’d ever imagined possible. Years ago, her husband had walked out on her, she’d had two babies to support, and no car, and waitressing at the biker bar was the only work within walking distance.

“I thought I was going to die when he left,” Ida said. “But I got my act together, and I made it.”

“I understand that,” Boone said. “My mom was in about the same situation when I was a kid. When she got married, she thought she would be able to stay home and raise me, but it didn’t happen that way, and she wound up working two jobs. It was rough.”

He asked Ida another question, but Angie stopped listening. Boone had gone through a really bad childhood, just like her? He’d never told her. And this caring side of him where Ida was concerned—she’d never seen it with anyone other than herself. He seemed genuinely interested in the caretaker as a person and not just in passing time till they got to the grave.

Her eyes sweeping the area, Angie listened to Ida talking about how she’d learned to make a mean tequila sunrise at the bar, and also how to swing a baseball bat effectively—at two bikers who just wouldn’t stop fighting. She’d also never gotten held up.

“The bikers watched over me.”

God had watched over her, Angie immediately thought. She knew she ought to tell Ida that, and would have before Cliff’s death. But now, doubt held her tongue captive. If God was watching over believers, He had to have been watching over Cliff. So what had happened? Cliff had told her many times he had great faith in God’s seeing him through his problems. So how did he get to the point of suicide?

No, she couldn’t say a thing to Ida. She still believed in God, but she was no longer so certain of the answers that she wanted to jump into leading people like Ida to Him—if Ida indeed was an unbeliever. What if the cemetery caretaker had questions that she just couldn’t answer—like she herself had about Cliff? Anything she might say, including doubts, might turn the woman away from God. So Angie kept quiet, feeling guilty for doing so.

“When he was young, my son didn’t like his mother working in a bar. He was gonna be somebody, and he didn’t want people thinking he came from the wrong side of the tracks.”

“Boy, do I understand that.”

Boone’s simple, earnest words got to Angie, and her heart went out to him.

“My daughter complained people at school called her trash because I worked there. But I stayed, because it brought in good money and kept a roof over their heads. In the long run, it didn’t matter anyway. My son ended up in jail, and my daughter—she died. I’m all alone.”

Angie’s heart clenched again, this time for Ida. She met the other woman’s eyes. Really looked at her—and saw the same pain she’d seen reflected in her own many times. “I’m sorry. I know how hard it is to not have anyone.”

Ida nodded.

“Belonging to a church helped me. It’s like having family around.” The next closest thing, especially when the family you’d been born into hated you. “We’re having a bring-a-dish lunch after services Sunday. Lots of ladies your age to talk to, if you’re interested.”

Ida waved her hand through the air. “I’d never fit in with church people. I’m not that good.”

“Don’t worry, neither am I,” Angie assured her.

“I actually loved church when I was a kid,” Boone said out of the blue.

Angie turned to look at him, frowning. The eccentric caretaker was getting more information out of Boone about his childhood than she’d ever managed to. Had she really been the right person for him, or had she just been fooling herself?

Boone added, “But I’ll never go back.”

“Why not?” Ida asked.

At first, Boone hesitated, but then he shrugged as they followed the access road past a couple of rows of gravesites. “Unfortunately, those nice, friendly church people soured when my dad got falsely accused of a crime and went away, and my mother couldn’t afford to meet her tithe. They asked her if she’d like to be taken off the membership rolls, and she accepted. We never went back.”

“That’s why I don’t go.” Ida sniffed. “Hypocrisy.”

“I agree—except for Angie,” Boone said. “You can trust her totally.”

“Oh, no, Ida, now I’m going to have to like the guy again,” Angie joked to cover up the flood of compassion Boone’s story had started in her. Even though she wasn’t looking at him, she sensed his gaze on her again, and she sucked in her breath to stop herself from telling him how sorry she was about his childhood and his father, and the church people. How she wished she could change his life for him. How she wished she could make everything right between them and overlook their differences because she needed to love and be loved.

Just like her sister was overlooking everything scary about Detry because of her needs. The realization brought Angie up short, but before she could explore it further, Ida stopped and pointed down a long row of graves.

“The Detry one is at the end.”

Boone followed Ida down the wide path, his dark blue gaze constantly watching everything around them, and Angie followed him. Ida stopped at a lavish gravestone with the engraving “To My Darling Wife. I never stopped loving you.”

Love as in two holes in his wife’s forehead. Angie’s skin crawled. Detry terrified her. That could be dangerous, because she needed to keep her wits about her. Lord, help me not to be afraid.

This is not about you, she thought.

Lord, please help me save my sister from him.

That was better—she felt a peace about that. Scanning the ground in the front and rear of the stone for signs of recent digging, she ended up disappointed. Nothing but nicely trimmed grass that colored the ground a rich green everywhere. Upkeep charges on the grave must run a fortune. What a man, that Warren Detry.

“At least we know where some of the insurance money went.” A lavish gravesite and romancing her sister, who liked nice, expensive things after growing up poor. Angie’s thoughts went back to her earlier realization about Chloe’s overlooking Detry’s past and that he was almost old enough to be her father. Her sister had always had a passion for money, which apparently Detry had, in spades. Detry could take care of her.

Yeah, like he took care of Laurie Detry.

Not that she was harping on Chloe. Angie rotated the power knob on the metal detector to On and swept it over the ground around the grave. She understood her sister’s need for money. It represented security. Her own passion had been finding love—that was her form of security. Love was something she’d sorely missed growing up and meant everything to her. Used to be, she’d do anything to get love.

But now, her focus was turned to Christ, and she was pursuing a relationship with Him and letting God supply the love and security. Only with Boone so close, her inclination was to forget all that and fall into his arms. It would be so easy.

Trying to forget what she wanted to do, she concentrated on what she needed to do and frowned at the expanse of grass around the gravestone. The gauge hadn’t budged. A wave of disappointment hit her. Maybe Cliff’s words about letting the dead rest in peace hadn’t been a word puzzle, but rather, an instruction to her, and he’d hidden the evidence somewhere else. If only there was some way of knowing for sure that he hadn’t buried it somewhere around the cemetery…

Her eyes darted up, surveyed the area, and she spotted a camera in a nearby oak. She was right. Spycams.

“Ida, do you have access to the surveillance footage?” she asked, pointing toward the tree.

Ida shifted position, as she took in the camera, and she shook her head. “Those are only up for show to scare off the juvenile delinquents.”

Disappointed, Angie turned toward Boone. He had walked from the graves to the chain-link fence that bordered the east side of the cemetery, his dark gaze studying everything but her. She’d have to break her vow of silence to him after all.

“Apparently, I was wrong,” she said in his general direction. He still didn’t look at her.

She carried the metal detector the dozen or so yards to where he was, and repeated, with a spread of her arms to emphasize she was speaking, “Apparently, I was wrong, Boone.”

A light squeal erupted from the detector, and startled, Angie almost dropped it. She stared down at the search coil at the bottom of the rod, and the cluster of marigolds near it.

Boone did likewise. She stepped closer to him. Right over the single cluster of candy-orange marigolds in the line of yellow ones, the squeal became louder and the gauge stick shot up.

“That’s either your evidence, or you’ve found buried treasure,” Ida said from behind them.

“In this case, maybe both,” Angie said.

Boone saw the light in Angie’s eyes. If she’d found the missing murder weapon and by some remote possibility Detry’s prints were on it in a manner that proved murder, that meant he had been wrong and had been directly responsible for a murderer going free. A mistake like that was inexcusable—not to mention what he’d done to Angie in court.

On the other hand, he was not looking forward to what was more likely to happen—someone else’s prints being found on the gun—maybe even Cliff’s. That would take all the light right back out of Angie’s eyes.

Either way, he almost wished the evidence could stay buried. He simply could not be wrong, and he didn’t want Angie hurt all over again.

The squeal was maxed out, so Angie turned off the metal detector. The sudden silence was velvet to her ears.

“Cliff must have picked those flowers specifically so you would notice them,” Boone said. He turned to Ida and explained in a manner that fully invited her sympathizing with him, “She has a car painted the same orange that’s on candy corn.”

For a change, instead of agreeing with Boone, Ida smiled at Angie. “Nice choice. At least other drivers can’t claim they didn’t see you coming.”

“Ida, I’m beginning to like you a lot,” Angie said. Boone shook his head in mock disgust, and she went back to looking at the flowers. The candy-orange flowers were smaller than the others, another tip-off they’d been planted later. Cliff had to have purposely dug up the site and replanted with those to get her attention. It was time to dig.

Pulling a camera from her purse, Angie checked the film and snapped a couple of pictures, then placed everything she carried except the shovel on the ground, making sure the camera was accessible.

With latex gloves ready nearby from the supply she brought with her, just in case she was successful today, she dug, stopping from time to time to document the uncovering of evidence with her camera. The wind that was supposed to bring in forecasted thunderstorms picked up, cooling her off some as she worked her muscles.

After a while, she glanced up at Boone. His eyes were sweeping the perimeter of the cemetery as he continued to protect her from an enemy he still considered unknown. As irritating as it was that he wouldn’t believe her about the danger being nil right then, that Boone cared enough to still be there no matter what kind of fire she set at his feet took just a bit of the hurt in her heart away.

A few minutes later, she unearthed the weapon, a Colt Model 1911, .45 caliber, semi-automatic pistol, a match to the bullets recovered and to the antique gun she’d seen near the body. It was in a sealed evidence bag along with the chain of custody form, which had only one name written on it—Cliff’s.

The murder weapon.

Ida’s whole face was puckered up, reflecting the “eeew” factor of reality murder that never could quite come through in suspense novels. “There’s dried blood on that thing, isn’t there?”

Blood, and Angie didn’t want to think about what else as she put on her gloves.

“Don’t detectives use evidence boxes for weapons now?” Boone asked her.

She started to speculate that maybe the bag was all Cliff had handy when he stole it from the scene, but Ida was right there, watching both of them like she was getting paid to do so, so Angie only shrugged, not wanting to give away too much information. Holding the bag by one corner, she carefully placed it into an empty compartment in her oversized purse, specks of dirt and all, and started to push the soil back into the hole with her shovel.

“Don’t worry about that,” Boone told her, taking a couple of bills out of his wallet. Angie stopped and watched him give the money to Ida. “This should cover replacing the flowers.”

Ida’s eyes went big. “Sure thing,” she said. “You leave me your business card, and I’ll be happy to send you the change.”

“Keep it,” Boone said.

Ida beamed. “You two have been fun, but I gotta get back so I can get a hold of the landscaper before someone sees the mess and has their serenity interrupted. If you need more help, just whistle.” Ida set off ahead of them back to the cottage.

Angie dusted off the knees of her jeans and then peeled off her gloves. With Ida gone, her thoughts cascaded back to Boone. She shouldn’t ask him about the money. She shouldn’t. But in the last half hour or so, she had witnessed a new, vulnerable side of him she hadn’t known existed, giving her a smidgen of hope he had it in him to change from the work-possessed person he was into someone who might really put her first. She had to find out. “What was with the handout?”

“She reminded me of my mother,” he said. “Always struggling, never coming out ahead, and never quite being noticed by anyone. So I noticed her.” He shrugged like it was no big deal.

“You never told me that much about your childhood.”

Every muscle of his body stiffened. She had to remember she no longer had any right to challenge him on anything he did. They weren’t in love anymore. They weren’t anything anymore, not even good friends.

“Sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have asked.”

His expression said he agreed with her, but then he spoke anyway. “Dad was wrongly accused of murder, got convicted and died in prison before I got my law degree and could help him. It was hard for Mom before I got old enough to work. I don’t like to talk about it.”

Bending, he scooped up the metal detector and the shovel and waited for her to start walking back. She did, stepping ahead, but she sensed him keeping up behind her. So close, she couldn’t avoid thinking about him.

His father’s misfortune explained a lot about Boone. Just like her and her sister, he was driven by a passion—he was freeing his dad with every man he defended. Now she understood why he’d chosen Detry over her. Problem was, understanding only lessened the pain a little; it didn’t take it all away. Didn’t free her up to fall back in love with him.

She walked up the lane, silently, the added weight of having to part from Boone very soon now on her mind. She was no longer as irritated with him as she’d been, and the man had a magnetic pull on her that she couldn’t deny. Eye magnet, as Ida had said, and maybe a heart magnet, too. She wanted him around. She wanted him to make her smile. She was so tired of frowning. Of being alone. Of not having anyone who loved her. Boone had. It was just that his priorities came first, and she came second.

She wanted someone to put her first.

God loves you, a small voice inside her reminded.

True. God would find her a husband who would fit into His will for her. All she had to do was wait. But she’d been waiting all her life to be really loved, and it was getting more and more difficult. Would it be better to accept Boone as he was, to settle for being second in his life? To have some love instead of none at all?

She gave herself a hard mental shake. Boone was dangerous. Being around him made her both ache with regret and wish upon a star. She couldn’t afford to have her emotions swinging her mind around in circles, distracting her from the most important thing in her life—saving her sister.

A wind gust blew her hair up around her cheeks, and she glanced up at the sky. The clouds were thickening. She hoped it wasn’t some sort of a sign.

“What do you say I take us right to the sheriff’s department and let my friend fast-track the print identification to the criminal-investigation bureau?” Boone asked from behind her.

“Sure,” she said, continuing to walk toward his car. Boone’s solution would mean putting up with him awhile longer, but it also took care of her problem with explaining to the bureau herself why she wasn’t filtering the gun through proper channels. She could live with that.

“So what did you have in mind while we wait for the results?” he asked.

Getting away from him. That’s what she had in mind. Wait a second…“While we wait? It could take a couple days, we both know that. You don’t have to stick around me all that time. What about your court cases?”

“I’m putting you first this time, Angel, remember?”

She sucked in a breath. That was eerie, hearing him say the exact words that had been on her mind a minute before. Eerie and sad. Some six months ago, right after the trial, she’d have been overjoyed at his statement—assuming it had been coupled with an apology. But presently, she understood what drove Boone. He was putting her first only because she’d proven him wrong about her negligence and he figured he owed her for ruining her reputation. It was more of a putting her first right now than forever kind of thing.

The big question was if she should make it easy on him to make amends or not and let him come with her to her mother’s. As a Christian, she needed to forgive him. As a woman, though, her hurt was still running so very deep, and she couldn’t pretend all was well between them when it definitely was not.

On the other hand, she didn’t like to whine.

“What I’m going to be doing while I wait,” she said, carefully keeping emotion out of her voice, “is heading to my mother’s house in Newton for the wedding festivities.”

“That’s fine. I’ll get a hotel room so I can stay close and attend all of it with you.”

“There’s no reason to.”

“Until we figure out who threatened you, I want to be there for you. Protect you.”

Make up for what he’d done, he meant. Finally reaching his Mercedes, Angie paused at the passenger’s side and met his gaze over the roof. “You know I can’t let this marriage happen. You’re going to just sit idly by while I make your former client’s life miserable by breaking up my sister and him? I don’t think so.”

Without waiting for his response, she opened his car door and slipped inside onto the soft seat. A few seconds later, the trunk slammed shut and the driver’s side door opened. Boone slid inside minus the shovel and metal detector and started the car. The air conditioner blasted hot air at first, and she took a tissue out of her bag and wiped her forehead.

“You know, you may not have to work that hard at separating them,” Boone said, causing her gaze to shift to him. “If those are Detry’s prints, he could be arrested on suspicion of perjury. He’ll be out of your sister’s life, and the whole problem can be settled before the wedding rehearsal. You don’t want to sit through that, do you?”

All the while thinking it should be her and Boone as the happy couple? You betcha, she didn’t. She frowned.

“Thought not. Meanwhile, I’ll be there watching your back.” He smiled faintly. “Protecting you from Detry.”

“Or from whoever, you mean.”

He lifted his palms in surrender. “As long as nobody hurts you, Angel, I’m happy.”

How could she keep from being hurt while attending the shower, the rehearsal and the dinner with Boone by her side, a constant reminder of what should have been? But she wasn’t going to tell him that.




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