“I saw Olivia’s name on the sign-in sheet at the gym and was surprised, so I asked Rudy. He said she came in regularly, that the two of you are friends. So I let things go where they would. I kept an eye on the sign-in sheet and Rudy kept me filled in.”
Her brows lifted. “He really is a weasel.”
“I prefer ‘confidential informant,’” he said and her lips twitched. “What?”
“That’s what I said to Liv. So you met her at a wedding, were obviously taken with her, you two did the horizontal shuffle, and then you don’t call? That’s not nice, David.”
“She left me,” David protested. “I woke up and she was gone. No note, no nothing. And I did call, but the number I found in the online phone book had been changed.”
“She moved right about that time. You could have asked her sister for her number.”
David thought about Olivia’s sister, Mia, who was one of the few who’d known how hopelessly he’d fallen for someone else. “That was… complicated.”
“You slept with Mia, too?” she asked, her voice rising to a shriek.
“Goddammit,” he hissed. “Be quiet. I did not sleep with Mia, too. I may not even have slept with Olivia. Whatever happened between Olivia and me is our business. I hoped she’d call and figured when she didn’t that she regretted what happened.”
“Which she says she does.”
David lifted his brows. “And does she?”
“You’ll have to ask her. Why did you come to Minneapolis? I want the truth.”
He sighed. “Evie needed help fixing her roof. I’d been looking for some kind of… I don’t know, a sign or something. I get here and Evie gets attacked, then I get run off the road by that psycho and Olivia’s the cop on the case.”
“Hell of a sign,” Paige said.
“Yeah. I should have left Chicago a long time ago. There was a woman named Dana…”
Her mouth drooped sadly. “She died?”
“No. She met someone else.” And he’d thought he’d never live through it.
She sighed. “Been there, done that. And?”
“And nothing. Dana was happy with this other guy. She never knew how I felt, and she never felt the same. I walked away. Just not far enough. Our families are all… connected. Birthdays, anniversaries, holidays. I had to see her all the time.”
“I know that name,” Paige said. “Dana was in the wedding, too. I saw her picture.”
“She was Mia’s matron of honor. I was glad I didn’t know Mia’s fiancé well enough to be asked to be the best man.”
“That would have sucked.”
Paige had a way with understatement. “True,” he said. “I’d been looking for a way out of Chicago for a while, but my job was there. My family. Evie gave me the shove I needed to make the move.” She’d dared him to stop hiding from the world, to stop watching other people be happy. And she’d been right.
“So after two years, you moved here. Why didn’t you call Liv for seven months?”
“Because Olivia was digging bodies out of that psycho’s lime pit, informing all those families. Evie would tell me how withdrawn Olivia was becoming, so I watched her for a few weeks. I wanted to see if she looked better, less stressed. I wanted to walk up to her front door and”-he drew a breath-“take up where we left off. But she looked worse as the weeks passed, and there was never a good time. Look, Evie told her I’d bought this place. I figured if she didn’t call, she didn’t want to take up where we’d left off. So I waited. I could be patient.”
“Seven months?” Paige shook her head. “Not even you’re that patient. I want the truth.”
He closed his eyes. He wasn’t certain he could handle the truth. “The truth is, I don’t remember much of that night.”
“Yeah, right. You remember everything you’ve ever seen or read. You have a photographic memory. How could you possibly not remember that night?”
“I had too much to drink at the reception. I never get drunk. Never.” A memory jabbed at him. He hadn’t gotten drunk since that night nearly twenty years ago. A night that ruined so many lives. A night for which he’d done penance ever since, but all the good deeds in the world would never bring the dead back to life. “I don’t know why Olivia ran. I don’t know what I did.”
“Can I give you some advice?” she said softly.
He opened his eyes, found hers warm again. “Why not?”
“Olivia can take whatever demons you’ve got burning you from the inside out. Tell her the truth. Let her decide if you can take up where you left off. David, you can’t take care of everyone. By trying to protect her, you did the exact opposite. You hurt her.”
“I never meant to. She said she’d talk to me.”
“Good. Don’t fuck it up again.” She leaned up and kissed his cheek. “Good luck, David. Trust yourself.”
He shook his head. “I can’t. It’s too important.”
“You have to. I’ll see you tomorrow at the dojo. And don’t worry.” She made a locking motion across her lips. “I won’t tell. Gotta get back. My lunch break is over.”
Chapter Six
Monday, September 20, 12:15 p.m.
You are batshit crazy,” Albert said, backing away, palms out. “No fucking way.”
Mary sat on the grass in front of the library, her eyes red-rimmed. “Eric, Joel’s dead. How can you even suggest such a thing, now of all times?”
Joel’s death had actually given him the argument he needed to convince the others to help him torch the texter’s target. Just this one, he thought. Tomorrow, we run.
When do you tell them about the video so they know they need to run?
Tonight. After the job is done.
The warehouse belonged to a guy named Tomlinson who sold plumbing fixtures but who had to have done something bad to be a target of blackmail and arson.
“Albert, come over here and stop pacing like a tiger. People will notice.” Eric sat down next to Mary and patted her hand. “Look, Tomlinson’s warehouse was next on Joel’s list.” Which was so totally not true, but fortunately Joel was not there to refute it.
“He sells plumbing fixtures. What does he have to do with wetlands or habitat?” Mary asked. “Joel never mentioned Tomlinson to me.”
“He mentioned him to me, lots of times,” Eric lied smoothly. “Tomlinson’s an investor in KRB, Inc. One of the bigger investors, in fact.” Of course he was not. But he didn’t expect either Mary or Albert to know how to double-check him. “If KRB goes forward with their project, it’ll be with money this guy gives them.”
“You’re batshit crazy,” Albert mumbled again. “Doing another one, after last night?”
“It’s the perfect time,” Eric said. “Look at it this way. Who knows what Joel told his parents or what they may have suspected? He goes home upset. He’s been going on about saving the wetlands and there’s a fire. You all took showers, but his clothes still smelled like smoke. The Fischers aren’t stupid. If we never do another, they’ll think Joel did the condo fire. If we strike again, they’ll know Joel had nothing to do with it.”
“They’ll suspect you,” Albert said stonily. “You were his friend.”
Hell of a friend. I gave the order to have him killed. “No, they won’t suspect me,” he said flatly. “Mr. Fischer used to say I had no imagination. No passion. Just a number cruncher. He’d laugh about it. Say I was the one safe person to have around Joel. That I kept him from running off half-cocked to do his causes.”
“How could this happen?” Mary lamented. “Joel was upset when I dropped him off last night, but he wasn’t… you know.”
“No, what?” Albert asked.
“Suicidal,” she said. “The road was dry. It was daylight. I think he ran off the road deliberately. If I’d thought he’d hurt himself, I never would have left him.”
Eric didn’t dare look at Albert. “It was an accident, just like the girl. Nobody meant for the girl to get hurt. It was an accident.”