Open Your Heart

by Cheris Hodges

  Also by Cheris Hodges

  The Richardson Sisters series

  Owner of a Broken Heart

  Won’t Go Home Without You

  Open Your Heart

  The Rumor series

  Rumor Has It

  I Heard a Rumor

  Deadly Rumors

  Just Can’t Get Enough

  Let’s Get It On

  More Than He Can Handle

  Betting on Love

  No Other Lover Will Do

  His Sexy Bad Habit

  Too Hot for TV

  Recipe for Desire

  Forces of Nature

  Love after War

  Strategic Seduction

  Tempted at Midnight

  Open Your Heart

  CHERIS HODGES

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Also by

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Epilogue

  Teaser chapter

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  To the extent that the image or images on the cover of this book depict a person or persons, such person or persons are merely models, and are not intended to portray any character or characters featured in the book.

  DAFINA BOOKS are published by

  Kensington Publishing Corp.

  119 West 40th Street

  New York, NY 10018

  Copyright © 2021 by Cheris Hodges

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written consent of the Publisher, excepting brief quotes used in reviews.

  If you purchased this book without a cover, you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as “unsold and destroyed” to the Publisher and neither the Author nor the Publisher has received any payment for this “stripped book.”

  The DAFINA logo is a trademark of Kensington Publishing Corp.

  ISBN: 978-1-4967-3191-3

  First Kensington Mass Market Edition: August 2021

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4967-3192-0 (ebook)

  ISBN-10: 1-4967-3192-1 (ebook)

  There are always so many people to thank

  when you enter into this writing life.

  The family who listens to you talk about

  some bright idea that may fizzle in the end.

  The family who understands that you’re going to sit

  in the corner and type all day because

  you’ve just got to get this idea in that document.

  The friends who support you and talks you off the ledge

  when you spill water on your laptop.

  And every reader who picks up your book and allows

  you to be a part of their world.

  Thank you to each and every one of you.

  Prologue

  It was a warm May night and Yolanda Richardson had spent more time in her Richmond boutique than she’d planned. But the summer dresses and suits that had just come in were beyond beautiful. The yellow, pink, and purple outfits just popped. When she’d opened the shipment, she knew she wouldn’t rest until she put those items on display.

  And that was what set her fashion boutique apart from every other store in the city. Yolanda dealt in one-of-a-kind items from up-and-coming designers. Her plan was to add some of her own designs to the fold at some point. But believe it or not, the outspoken wild card of the Richardson family was fearful to share her work with the world. Her youngest sister, Nina, had seen a few of her sketches, but Yolanda hadn’t shared them with anyone else.

  There was something about your baby sister telling you that the work was good that eased Yolanda’s ego for a while. She looked up at her display window and smiled. She had the mannequins dressed in the amazing sundresses and had sunflowers surrounding them. It looked like one of those fields that people stopped at on the side of the road to take pictures. But instead of a sun lamp, she had a spinning disco ball in the corner, just to add a little quirk to the scene. And because she’d accidentally ordered the silver ball two years ago and had no idea what to do with it.

  Now it had found a home that would call attention to the store. She was proud of her work, even if it was super late and she still hadn’t eaten dinner. Her stomach growled, echoing the point that she needed food.

  Just as she was about to take a picture of the display for her Instagram feed, Yolanda heard a couple of loud pops. She thought it was fireworks at first, but it was May. There were no celebrations going on in the middle of the night.

  Then there were more pops. Louder this time and Yolanda realized they were gunshots. She took off from the sidewalk in front of the shop and ducked behind the trash cans on the side of the building and watched a car speed into the alleyway. She closed her eyes and prayed this was a bad dream.

  Yolanda was frozen in place as the door to the white Chrysler 300 opened and a man was pushed out of the back of the vehicle.

  Another two men hopped out of the front seat, both holding guns. Their faces filled with anger and malice burned in her brain and she prayed they didn’t notice her quivering in the corner.

  “You think you can steal from me?” the tallest man growled. “There is always a consequence for every fucking action.”

  The man cowering on the ground threw his hands up. “Danny, man, you got it all wrong. I’ll get you the money. Things are hard right now, but I’m trying.”

  Danny took a step closer to the begging man and all Yolanda noticed were his shoes. Patent leather church shoes. Who wears their Sunday best to threaten someone? She held her breath and tried not to move as she watched the drama unfolding in front of her.

  “Don’t do this, man. I’ll get you the money.”

  “Too fucking late. You probably can’t even come up with the interest.” Danny pointed the gun at the man’s head and fired three shots. Yolanda covered her mouth with her hand. Seeing death in person was nothing like the movies. Blood oozed into the street; parts of that man’s skull littered the road. The smell of gunpowder filled the air and her nostrils.

  “Pick him up,” Danny ordered the other man as he crossed over to the car and popped the trunk. The other man, who was medium height but built like a muscular bulldog, picked up the dead man as if he were a pile of trash and tossed him in the trunk.

  When Yolanda saw brain matter ease out of the man’s head, her knee quivered and bumped the plastic trash can. Since it was empty and the street was silent, the thump echoed.

  Danny and the bulldog turned toward t
he trash cans and Yolanda closed her eyes as she curled up into a ball. Did they see her? Was she going to join that man in the trunk with several bullets in her head? She held her breath.

  “You think someone is out here?” the bulldog asked.

  “Let’s move,” Danny said as they got into the car. Yolanda waited until she heard the car pull out of the alleyway before she dashed into the boutique. She was too shaken to call the police. So, she hid in her office until the sun came up. To say she was afraid would be the understatement of the year.

  As Yolanda left that morning, she kept looking over her shoulder for the mysterious Danny and that bulldog-looking man. Perhaps she was being unfair to bulldogs. That man looked more like the devil than an animal or a human. If she was lucky, those men hadn’t seen her and knew nothing about who she was.

  Now she regretted ignoring the security warnings the Business Neighborhood Association had sent out over the last few months. But she’d told herself that she was too busy getting ready for the summer season to pay attention to scare tactics. Crime wasn’t a problem in downtown Richmond these days. Well, until last night. Yolanda took the long way home, trying to wash the memories of murder out of her head. But she kept seeing that man’s brains oozing out of his head after he begged for his life. What would happen to her if she reported this to the police? The killers already knew where her shop was. It would only take a simple Google search to find out who owned it.

  Doesn’t mean they would know you had been there last night. Yolanda may have known going to the police was the right thing to do, but she couldn’t do that today. All she wanted to do was go home and try to forget with the help of a bottle or two of wine.

  Once she got home, Yolanda called her boutique manager, Kelly Coe, and told her that she wasn’t feeling well and wouldn’t be in today.

  “You’ve been working too hard, boss lady. Do you need me to call Uber Eats and have some food sent over to you?”

  “No, no. I have some soup and crackers here. Just take care of the orders for me, and if any of my sisters call, don’t tell them I’m sick,” Yolanda said, trying to keep her voice light.

  “All right. Hope you feel better.”

  Yolanda told her good-bye, then curled up in her bed. She tried to close her eyes, but the images of last night’s brutality played in her mind over and over again.

  Yolanda tossed and turned until about noon. When her stomach growled and she knew she wasn’t going to get any sleep, she headed for the kitchen and made a tuna salad sandwich, poured herself a glass of wine, and headed for the den to watch the news. Before she could take a bite of her sandwich, she saw his face on the TV screen.

  “A local businessman was found dead in the James River.” The man’s face popped up on the screen and Yolanda dropped her wineglass. It was him. She listened intently as the newscaster finished the story.

  “Affectionately known as Bobby G., Robert Gills owned a few restaurants and a couple of clothing stores in Regency Square. Police say he suffered multiple gunshot wounds before being dumped into the river. Two fishermen found the body this morning and called the police.”

  Yolanda shut the TV off and headed for the kitchen to grab a mop, broom, and dustpan. This was becoming all too real. This man’s death wasn’t going to go away and those killers weren’t going to disappear. She said a silent prayer that they’d never connect her to what they had done. Yolanda was still too afraid to talk to the police about what she’d seen, even if she knew it was the right thing to do. Her lawyer sister, Robin, would be ashamed of her inaction. And her father, Sheldon Richardson, would tell her that she needed to do the right thing.

  She had no idea who Danny and the bulldog were, but they didn’t look like the kind of people you’d testify against in court. She tried to reason that the police would find the killers without her help. Yolanda had seen enough Law & Order and true-crime shows to know that police solved murders all the time without an eyewitness.

  At some point, you’re going to have to do the right thing, her voice of reason said. Yolanda closed her eyes and wondered why her voice of reason always sounded like her older sister Alex.

  After sweeping up the broken glass in her den and mopping up the wine, Yolanda had lost her appetite and decided to check in on her youngest sister, Nina. She hadn’t talked to her globetrotting sister in a couple of weeks and Nina, who was a freelance sportswriter, always had something going on.

  But what Yolanda really needed was someone to hold her and tell her everything was going to be fine, or better yet, wake up and find out that last night had simply been a nightmare. She grabbed her phone and started to call her sister when the phone rang. It was her boutique. She had already told Kelly in no uncertain terms not to bother her. If you can’t play sick at the company you own, then what is the point? Yolanda reluctantly answered the phone.

  “Hello?”

  “Yolanda,” Kelly said. “I know you’re not feeling well and I didn’t want to bother you, but I noticed a couple of our security cameras were off-line and then I saw something disturbing from last night.”

  Yolanda inhaled sharply. “What did you see?” She knew she should’ve deleted the video. Unlike Yolanda, Kelly paid attention to the business neighborhood watch newsletters. Made sense that she checked the security camera feed every day.

  “Two men shooting someone in the alley. Should I take this to the police?”

  “N-no,” Yolanda stammered. “We’re just going to keep this on the hard drive and not say a word about it.”

  “But, Yolanda, don’t you think. . .”

  “Kelly,” she said quietly, “I was there and I’m afraid they’re going to come back. If no one asks for the video, then we don’t say anything about it.” And maybe all of this will go away, she added silently.

  “You were there? Oh my goodness, Yolanda! Did anyone see you?”

  “I don’t know and I don’t want to discuss it further.”

  “All right. Well, if you need anything call me.”

  Yolanda ended the call and tossed her cell phone across the room. What was she going to do now? Since someone else knew what happened, Yolanda knew she had to do the right thing and go to the police. But first, she needed a little liquid courage.

  A bottle and a half of Chardonnay later, Yolanda was asleep on her sofa. The right thing was just going to have to wait.

  The ringing of her cell phone woke her up a few hours later. She smiled when she saw the face on the screen: a great distraction, Harrison Moore, her off-and-on boy toy, who could cook. If he wanted to come over today, she would definitely let him spend the night. Just so she wouldn’t be alone.

  Chapter 1

  Two weeks had passed since the murder outside of Yolanda’s shop and she hadn’t been back. She’d given Kelly all of the excuses she could muster, from being sick to going out to do some meetings with designers. All she’d really done was hide out in her house and talk herself out of going to the police about what she’d seen. Yolanda had called the Crime Stoppers hotline, but when she was put on hold three times, she’d lost her nerve.

  Today, she made the decision to head back to the shop. Kelly had taken on a lot of responsibility for the summer sale and the end-of-the-day reports proved that she’d been working hard. Yolanda couldn’t keep leaning on her store manager like this. As she drove to downtown Richmond, she felt as if every car was following her. Then when she saw a Chrysler 300, she yelped. Thankfully, there was an older man driving and not giving her a second look. Arriving at work, she parked in the garage across the street and headed into her boutique.

  “Aww, the prodigal owner returns,” Kelly said as she folded shirts for a display in the middle of the shop.

  “I’m here and you can go home for the day.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Yolanda nodded. “I can’t thank you enough for holding this place together over the last two weeks.”

  “It’s been my pleasure. And that display window has brought so ma
ny people in. I think it’s the disco ball.”

  Yolanda shuddered inwardly. That damned window had been why she couldn’t sleep at night. But since the story had left the headlines and the evening news, maybe the killers didn’t care who saw them.

  That made her feel a little better about not calling the police. Though, she’d never tell another person that she’d seen the killing. It was bad enough that Kelly knew.

  “Hey, Yolanda,” Kelly said before she headed out the door. “I meant to tell you, the neighborhood watch leader, Walton Kennerly, came by and said the detectives on the Bobby G. killing want the videos from the security cameras.”

  Yolanda’s breath caught in her chest. “Um, what did you do?”

  “I told Walton he’d have to talk to you.” Kelly took a deep breath. “I think you should just give it to them. There are a lot of people who want to know what happened to Bobby G.”

  “Let me ask you something,” Yolanda said. “If I give Walton the video, is there anything on it that identifies our shop?” She closed her eyes and watched the scene in the alley play out in her head all over again.

  “I don’t think so, it just has the time stamp and the alley. Have you been all right, being that you . . .”

  The bell above the door rang, indicating that they had a customer. Yolanda was about to smile until she saw it was Walton.

  Walton was the kind of guy who had gotten passed over for hall monitor in middle school and used his adult life to make up for that slight. She shook her head as she watched him walk in, dressed in dad jeans and golf shirt. His bald head glistened with sweat as he crossed over to Yolanda. He always looked as if he had tasted sour milk.

  “Yolanda, glad to see that you’re here,” he said, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “What’s going on, Walton?” she asked as she folded her arms across her chest.