The Beachcombers: Prequel - Beachcomber Investigations Series

by Stephanie Queen

  Shana nodded. “I know. I should have talked to you first. But I didn’t. I told Marion who I was and that I didn’t believe that Elena had turned bad. Marion didn’t want to talk and mentioning your name didn’t help, but she confirmed that she knew her sister was not a bad cop. I also confirmed that Chicago P.D. had never filed any charges against her. Their official records say that she died in action.

  “So I asked Marion if there was proof and she said there was one thing that might be proof, but she couldn’t be sure. There was a note, but it was in code and only two people knew the code.”

  “Our code. Undercover code.” Dane croaked the words and bent forward to lean on his knees with his head in his hands as if he were in pain.

  Shana wanted to go to him then and felt herself lift from her chair, but she gritted her teeth and stayed put. He needed to go through this. He needed to hear and feel everything.

  “Marion told me the police didn’t bother going to the trouble of getting a code breaker and didn’t try too hard to find you.” Shana left out that Marion blamed Dane for that. “I asked to meet her and she said we could meet for coffee—said she’d meet me at the Corner Bakery Cafe at State and Cedar at ten the next morning and then hung up.” Shana paused, remembering how she thought long and hard about what she’d do next after that call.

  Dane had sat up straight again and prompted her, “So?”

  “But I was in Boston. Scheduled to leave on a flight to London the next day.” She paused again and stared at him, wondering if she dared to try and make him understand the decision she’d had to make and how and why she made it. How hard it had been. But she looked away then and said, “So I changed my flight to London to a flight to Chicago leaving that night.” She paused and looked out the window. She didn’t tell him she’d drained her savings account to do it. Maybe she’d get around to that later when she needed to borrow money to get back to London. She took a deep breath and continued under Dane’s new energetic stare.

  “I met with Marion. She said she tried to get in touch with you, but you’d already disappeared. Elena left the coded note and a letter—one of those letters that starts by saying ‘if you’re reading this now then I must be.’ It was in a backpack she’d left behind that last day for—well, for you. But you never bothered to pick up her personal effects. The envelope was in the backpack. It took Marion some time to figure out about the code. There was also a safety deposit box key and she had trouble with the bank letting her use it, but the Chicago PD helped her.”

  “The department helped her?” That piqued his interest. But not in a good way. “But they didn’t bother to find me.” The knowledge seemed to disgust him. Like they should have chased him to the ends of the earth to find him and let him know. He bent forward again and raked a hand through his hair.

  Maybe he was right. Maybe the department should have chased him. But judging from Dane’s behavior today, he could see why they might not go to too much trouble. He had a difficult streak. She knew how it was. Since she had one of her own. Elena had been his partner—the one who would have been designated to deal with him. That much Shana had gathered from her discussion with the then commander of the SWAT team. He’d put together the operation that got Elena killed.

  “They found out a few weeks after you’d disappeared. Apparently you know how to disappear very well.”

  He scoffed again and said, “It ain’t hard, girlie.” He stood. Turned away and looked at the door. She worked hard at keeping herself seated, at not going to him and wrapping her arms around him to console him. He sat back down, not looking at her.

  She shouldn’t be surprised that he’d regressed all the way back to the beginning as they sat in two wood chairs opposite each other, same way as the day they met. Except for the rose. She’d thought about that damn rose too often in the past week. Like it really meant something.

  He was a worse emotional coward than she had been. But then, he’d been betrayed by his lover—or so he thought—so maybe he had a right. And if she weren’t careful, he’d let himself believe that her poking into his past was another betrayal.

  “Look, Marion gave me the coded note to you from Elena—written during the undercover operation and meant for you. You should read it.” In a hurry to get this done suddenly, she lifted the envelope from her lap and held it out to him again with a steady hand.

  “You read it?” He eyed the envelope without taking it, letting her hand dangle there between them.

  “No. Marion read it but couldn’t make sense of it. She got a note too. She told me what it said.” She jabbed it in his direction and scowled at him. “Goddamn it, Dane. It’s a note, not a bomb.”

  “May as well be a bomb.”

  “You already believe the worst—do you have a need to be a martyr? I didn’t take you for someone who’d waste his energy on so useless a plight.”

  “I’ve been wasting my energy on useless plights all my life—”

  “We saved Susan Whittier.”

  He paused a beat and she watched him digest the notion of their triumph. It seemed so much bigger a week ago. Then he reached out and took the envelope from her. But he didn’t open it. “You gonna sit there and stare at me while I read it? Take my temperature, feel my forehead?”

  Shana got up, surprised to find her legs trembling, and left the room, closing the door behind her gently.

  The coded note told him everything he thought he always wanted to hear. That Elena had not betrayed him, that she’d been compromised and taken hostage. She’d been killed in the blast. But in the end, it hadn’t been about her betrayal. She was still gone. All his pain had been about the loss.

  It had been easier to think that she’d betrayed him. That gave him anger to fall back on. Far preferable to the awful gnawing pain of loss. And now. He felt it—all the pain. Fresh as a gutting with a fisherman’s knife.

  He tossed the envelope and her note on the floor and doubled over holding his hands over his ears as if it would stop him from knowing. From knowing everything he’d lost. From knowing how good she was. How dead and gone she was.

  It had been a long time—a good thirty years—since the last time Dane cried. But he made up for that now with excruciating anguished sobs, not caring that this was a public reception room in a hospital. For seven minutes he let his wracked body release all the pain and agony that had been bottled up.

  Still sitting in the chair, spent, he scraped a hand over his face and straightened. Lifting himself as if he weighed a thousand pounds, he walked back down the hall into the small washroom just inside Cap’s hospital room door and splashed cold water on his face and looked in the mirror. He had the same bloodshot eyes he started the day with. He had the same heavy heart.

  But there was a difference. He turned from the mirror. The difference was in his soul. The ravaged beaten-down soul inside him had new life. He felt relief from the hopelessness. Shana’s words echoed in his mind. We saved Susan Whittier.

  He emerged from the washroom and walked to Cap’s bedside. He’d no idea where Shana had gone while she let him wallow through his misery, but he bet it wasn’t far, knowing her. She’d stay close in case she needed to save him. He smiled at Cap.

  “Dane? You okay?”

  “Me? You’re the one in the hospital bed with a sling on his shoulder.”

  A moment later Shana appeared at the door, tall and lithe and gorgeous. She stopped and stared at him a minute as he stood bedside, like she was studying him for signs of lunacy before she thought it safe to come in.

  “Don’t worry. I’m unarmed. I won’t hurt you.” He looked at her without his mask on.

  She stepped into the room.

  “Thank you,” he said to Shana. She nodded, gave him a tentative smile.

  “By the way, you look goddamn gorgeous if you don’t mind me being a chauvinist pig or whatever un-PC thing it is to call a spade a spade.”

  She laughed. “I call it Dane being Dane, if you want to know.”

&nbs
p; Cap snorted a laugh at that. “Well said.” Then he turned to Dane and said, “Get the hell away from my bed. Have a seat. I’ll order us some coffees.”

  Dane and Shana resumed their chairs in front of Cap’s bed, same as if they were in front of his desk, like old times, Dane thought, except it was only a short time ago by the calendar.

  “So the note was enlightening?” Cap asked in a serious voice.

  “Confirms what I knew underneath.” That’s all he was willing to say on the subject. The rawness of it chafed him, pained him like a stab in his gut.

  “So what’ll you do next?” Cap asked. “Ever think of doing more local work?”

  Cap had that cat-and-canary look, being the poor poker player he was.

  “Spill it, Cap,” Shana said. Dane smiled at his girl.

  “By local I mean, say, the east coast.”

  “What kind of work?” Shana asked.

  “I might have some freelance assignments for you,” Cap said.

  “You?”

  “By me I mean the governor.”

  Dane grinned.

  “Then I’d have to go legit. Set up shop.”

  “I could see it now—Beachcomber Investigations,” Shana said with a half laugh.

  “Could work.” Dane looked at her, trying to decipher what was on that devious mind behind the perfect beach bunny exterior. Then he decided since she took a chance on him—a big one—he needed to take a chance on her. Wanted to, if he were honest.

  “Could use a partner.” He stared at her, struggling to keep his mask from shutting down his face and mentally crossing his fingers as he felt his chest tighten until he was no longer breathing.

  “You think you have room for me on the payroll? I’m expensive.” Her smile faded as she watched him.

  “I like it—Beachcomber Investigations. Blaise and George.” He winked at her and stood.

  She popped from her chair and flung herself into his open arms. She was far from sure what it meant, only sure she felt joy at that moment. He enveloped her, surrounding her with the faint scent of ocean, cigar smoke and gunpowder. It felt like home to her. It felt good. It felt unsteady and scary. They stayed put for a minute or two before she heard Cap cough and felt Dane get restless.

  Pushing herself from Dane, she smoothed her dress. He didn’t let her go, not all the way. He held one of his arms at her back as he faced Cap.

  “I’ll call you when the partnership’s official.”

  “Don’t wait too long,” Cap said, eyeing them, moving his glance from her to Dane and back. Emotions swirled through her, heady and new and confusing.

  “A business partnership or a love affair?” Cap asked.

  “Million dollar question,” Dane said.

  “We’ll let you know when we know,” Shana said.

  A Note to Readers

  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for reading Dane and Shana’ story. I sincerely hope you enjoyed your moments of escape into their world in The Beachcombers. This is the start of something big for them and it continues with the Beachcomber Investigations Series. I would love to hear any comments you have. I invite you to send me a note to stephaniequeen@rocketmail.com. You can also follow me on Twitter @StephanieQueen or on Facebook on my Stephanie Queen page.

  If you loved the story, please consider leaving a review on the site where you purchased this book. I would very much appreciate it.

  I especially invite you to sign up for my SQ Newsletter for new releases, contests and free stories.

  In the meantime, I’ll be working hard to bring you more stories from my heart, featuring characters you’ll love.

  Sincerely,

  Stephanie Queen

  Stephanie Queen Books

  Beachcomber Investigations Series:

  The Beachcombers – Prequel Edition

  Beachcomber Investigations – Book 1

  Beachcomber Santa – Novella – Book 2

  Beachcomber Valentine – Novella – Book 3

  Beachcomber Baby – Book 4

  Scotland Yard Exchange Series:

  Between a Rock and a Mad Woman – Prequel

  The Throwbacks – Book 1

  The Hot Shots – Book 2

  The Romantics – Book 3

  The Beachcombers – Book 4

  Small Town Romance Series:

  Small Town Glamour Girl Christmas

  Small Town Glamour Girl Wedding: a novella

  Small Town Hot Shot Bride

  Other Stephanie Queen books:

  Playing the Game