by Rebecca York
Max broke into her thoughts of the past. “You’ve got me in your corner—your man who’s going to make it very clear to the jerks out there that if anybody gives you a hard time, they’ll have to answer to him.”
She liked the way he said that with absolute conviction, as if he weren’t just playing a role. Still, you could argue that it was true. Watching out for her was part of his job.
Absorbing the words, she allowed herself to lean into him, comforted by the feel of his solid body against hers. Unlike most guys, he was taller than she was. And in fighting shape. He made her feel protected, and she fought the impulse to close her eyes, shut out the world, and stay right here in the car. But they had business to attend to.
They sat together for long seconds, until he reminded her of reality. Straightening, he said, “We’d better get in there while the getting’s good.”
“Right,” she answered, then opened the car door and joined him in the parking lot.
***
Max slid a glance at the tall, slender blond walking beside him. From her expression, he knew she was wondering what the hell she was doing here, dredging up memories and feelings from long ago. He had similar doubts about his own past. The only good thing about tonight that he could focus on was that the meeting wasn’t being held at Donley High School. If he never set foot in that place again, it would be just fine with him.
They were halfway across the parking lot when Max felt Olivia stumble on an uneven patch in the sidewalk. Automatically, his arm shot out to steady her.
As she had in the car, she leaned against him, and he cradled her slender body protectively against his.
“What happened?”
“I guess I’m too out of it to pay attention to where I’m walking. My foot caught on something.”
“Okay,” he answered, thinking that she had plenty of experience walking gracefully—in front of very critical audiences. But tonight, not so much. She’d confessed she was nervous before they’d left home, and in the car she’d been jittery. Still, he hadn’t realized how much this was getting to her, maybe because he’d made assumptions based on her successful career.
“Are you okay?” he asked, sensing the tension rippling through her body and wondering if she could really pull off this performance. It had seemed like a good idea in the planning stages. Now he was thinking they should have considered a plan B.
“I’ll be fine,” she said in a voice that sounded far from fine. “Just give me a minute to center myself.”
Truth be told, he hadn’t wanted this assignment. But Olivia Winters had come to the Rockfort Security Agency for help, and he was the only member of the team who could in good conscience handle the job. Not because of any special skills he possessed, but because the other guys in the agency had obviously ruled themselves out.
As he stood with Olivia, he used the opportunity to take in the details of the area, pretending he was watching for new arrivals to the meeting.
Still with his arm around her, he turned his back on the open area and pulled his cell phone out of his pocket, hiding his action from view with his body. Punching in a number, he waited until Shane Gallagher, one of his partners, picked up. He and Jack Brandt were nearby, stationed where they had a good view of the restaurant—from two different angles.
“See anything we should watch out for?” he asked.
“As far as we can tell the area’s clear.”
“Okay. Thanks,” he answered, hoping their reassurance was solid. Or maybe the person who had killed Angela Dawson would come sneaking up on the meeting, and Shane and Jack would grab them before anything else bad could happen to former members of the graduating class.
Max, Shane, and Jack had pooled their resources to start Rockfort Security more than two years ago. Unlikely as it sounded, they’d met in a Miami jail—which was an excellent instant evaluation of their strengths and weaknesses. When they’d found they had a lot in common—including being from the DC-Baltimore area—they’d kicked around the idea of starting the agency. Since they’d opened their doors, Rockfort’s reputation had spread through recommendations from satisfied clients. Now he was the point man on this case, and his two partners were his backup.
“Your phone’s on vibrate?” Jack asked.
“Yeah.”
“We’ll signal if we see anything you need to know about.”
Max signed off, wondering who else might be out there. In his mind, he hadn’t called the perp “him.” In some ways, being a woman would be an advantage for the killer. A woman would have an easier time hiding in small spaces or pretending to be a customer at Angela’s boutique.
When he put away the phone, Olivia gave him an anxious look. “Anything wrong?”
“No. I was just checking with Jack and Shane.”
“And?”
“Nothing suspicious.”
“Good.” The four of them had gotten together for several planning sessions, and she was more or less comfortable with his partners. Maybe more comfortable than with him, because they could keep a professional distance, like backstage crew members. With her, he didn’t have that luxury.
“Were you expecting trouble?” she asked in a voice she couldn’t quite hold steady.
“No. It would be stupid to attack this meeting. But you could say it was stupid to attack Angela so blatantly. I have to be prepared for trouble now.”
“Or—to put it another way, for the killer to be a nutcase,” she whispered.
“Yeah.”
He dragged in a breath and let it out, switching his focus to his role in this drama. He was going to mingle with a whole bunch of people from his high school days. If they remembered him, it would be by his bad boy reputation. And he might even remember some of them, although he certainly hadn’t run with their crowd back in the day. But it had been difficult not to notice the school celebs parading their status through the halls of Donley High. It was different with Olivia. She’d gone to classes and partied with them. But he’d made up for the lack of personal knowledge by studying the backgrounds of everybody who was on the reunion committee—and a lot of the other people in the class as well. He’d also discussed most of them with Olivia, getting her take, although sometimes her answers made him wonder if she was being entirely honest.
Like had she been intimate with some of the boys back in high school? Under ordinary circumstances, he could have said that was none of his business. Now any intimate relationships would have given him more insight into the dynamics of the group. But he wasn’t going to ask her about it.
They started for the restaurant again, and when they stepped through the door into the air-conditioned atmosphere, Max took a moment to orient himself. Although the exterior was an old barn, the interior had been completely remodeled into an upscale grill, converted after he’d left Howard County with a parquet floor, dark wood booths along the walls, and tables in the middle of the room. There were diners at many of the tables in groups of two or four. Nothing that looked like any kind of meeting. But that probably wouldn’t be in the main room.
As he stood taking in the scene, a redheaded hostess wearing three-inch heels and a strappy green sundress approached them.
“Can I help you?”
“The Donley reunion committee meeting?”
“Oh, that’s in our party room. Just down the hall.” She gave Olivia a studied look, then gestured toward a corridor on their left.
“Thank you,” he answered, wondering if the hostess recognized Olivia from some of the commercials she’d done. Or perhaps her pale skin just stood out against the darkened interior of the restaurant. He knew she didn’t want to be here, and he would have handled this part of the assignment on his own, if that had been possible. But she was his ticket into the group, his best opportunity to meet them in a casual way.
When she’d first come to the Rockfort Agency with her suspicions, Max and his partners had been skeptical. They’d thought she was overreacting to the murder of her high school frie
nd, Angela Dawson, and to the lack of leads in the case. When she’d told them someone was murdering people from her high school class, they hadn’t seen any evidence of a serial murderer. But she’d asked a couple of questions that had gotten them at least considering her supposition.
“What if someone wants a bunch of my classmates dead? And what if they want it to look like the murders aren’t connected? So they do it in different ways to make it seem like random events.”
The theory had been intriguing—especially since Olivia had brought them newspaper clippings and Web accounts of three deaths among her classmates. One was Angela. One was a guy named Gary Anderson, and the third was Patrick Morris. The problem was they hadn’t come up with a motive. The best they could do was that all of the victims had been part of the “in crowd” back in high school.
The Rockfort men had discussed the case with Olivia, and she hadn’t been able to give them a reason for the murders, but Max was pretty sure she wasn’t telling them everything she knew. Since the two of them were spending a lot of time together, he had the chance to get it out of her—if he used the right approach. Unfortunately, he still wasn’t sure what that would be, but he sensed that he’d need to tread cautiously. Maybe her reactions to the people on the committee—and their reactions to her—would give him a clue. Then he’d have a better idea of questions to ask after the meeting.
***
As they walked down the corridor lined with photos of local scenes that must have been taken in the ’20s and ’30s, Olivia felt Max reach for her hand and knit his fingers with hers. If she were honest, it felt comforting to hold onto him. He was a physically imposing man, tall and well-muscled. And her talks with him had convinced her that he was a top investigator. Of course, some of the questions he’d asked her had made her uncomfortable. Like, for example, did she think she was a target of the killer, and why? She’d said she didn’t know, and she’d wondered how much she was going to have to say about her past.
She stopped worrying about that as they approached the Oak Room, where the meeting was being held, her professional training kicked in. Her head rose. Her shoulders straightened, and she took several breaths of the stale, refrigerated air. Max noticed the change in her immediately. Turning his head he murmured, “That’s my girl.”
His girl. She didn’t want to react, but she felt the warmth of those words spreading through her overcharged system, even though she was sure he had only meant them as a figure of speech. Or as part of the roles they were playing.
Before she could worry any more about the implications, they reached their destination.
Olivia took in the scene in one quick sweep. Small tables had been pushed together to make one long conference-type table. Around the room were about twenty people, some sitting in captain’s chairs, some loading small plates from a snack buffet, and some standing in informal knots talking. Included in the latter group were the people she’d seen in the parking lot—plus a bunch of others she remembered from her high school days. Was one of them a predator? Or were they all potential prey? Or was she wrong about this whole thing? That could be true, but her gut told her that the previous deaths were connected, and more people would die if she and Max didn’t figure out who wanted her classmates dead.
As her gaze swung to Tommy Larson and his date, Olivia had the feeling that they’d rushed inside to tell everyone she was going to be walking through the door with a hunky-looking guy, because it felt like everyone had been waiting for their arrival. Now all eyes turned toward them.
For a moment her facial muscles felt frozen, like the first time she’d stepped out onto a runway and known that her life was about to change for the better—if she didn’t screw up. The weight of that knowledge had almost choked off her breath, but somehow she’d managed to walk out there without falling on her face—or fainting. Back then she’d felt so unsure of herself. But since then she’d had years of experience playing the part that was expected of her. She swallowed hard and forced a smile that she knew didn’t meet her eyes.
“Hi, everyone. I’m so glad to be back in Howard County for a while. I’d like you to meet my fiancé, Max Lyon,” she said. “Max, these are some of the people I’ve been telling you about from my high school class.”
Chapter 3
Olivia could hardly believe she’d spoken those words. And it looked like a lot of the people in the room were having a similar moment of confusion. She stood in the doorway, taking in the varying reactions to the short speech. Some eyes widened. One or two of her former classmates shook their heads. And a minority at least made an attempt to look as if they welcomed her and her new fiancé at the meeting.
Linda Unger, who had sent out the letters inviting people to the event, crossed the room to greet her. Linda had always seemed like her head was screwed on straight. When Olivia had looked her up, she’d found out that Linda had been married to a guy she’d met in college, but he had been killed in an automobile accident a few years ago. They had no children. The revelation had saddened Olivia. Linda had been a good kid, and Olivia had hoped her life had turned out well. Of course, it still could. Like it still could for Olivia herself.
“It’s good to see you after so long. We thought you were in New York.”
“I was. But Max and I are treating ourselves to a little break,” she answered. As the lie left her lips, her grip tightened on Max’s hand. “I, uh, heard about your husband. That must have been so hard,” she added, shifting the focus away from herself.
“It was,” Linda answered.
Back in high school, Olivia and Angela Dawson had been sort of friends with Linda, although there had been some rivalries between them. Like that Linda had been one of the girls who’d vied with her for starring roles in the drama club productions. But that was ten years ago. Did any of what had happened in high school matter now? Apparently it mattered to someone. At least that was how she was interpreting the deaths of her classmates. And Max wouldn’t be here with her if he hadn’t subscribed to her theory.
To her vast relief, Olivia didn’t have to say anything else, because Max took over, reaching out to shake Linda’s hand like a long-lost friend, explaining in his deep, warm voice that he and Olivia had gotten engaged recently and that he’d considered the reunion committee a perfect way to meet her former classmates. Plus, it meant that she wasn’t going to leave him home alone while she went out.
Brian Cannon, one of the former big men on campus, walked up to them, studying Max. Seeing him and the other guys in the class was a test for her, and she gave him her best smile. But his focus was on Max.
“I’ve seen you before. But not recently,” he mused. “Hmm. Didn’t you go to Donley?”
“Yeah. I was a couple classes ahead of you,” he said, making it clear from the tone of his voice that he didn’t want to talk about his high school years.
But Brian didn’t let it go, and Olivia remembered that he’d often been pushy back in high school. “Strange that the two of you ended up together,” he said, raising his voice to carry around the room.
“Both of us are different from the high school kids we were,” Olivia said, hoping it was true for her. She knew for sure Max had changed. The confident detective standing next to her was nothing like the defiant boy she remembered from the bad old days. Or probably he had some of the same traits, but he was using them differently. For herself, mingling with these people again was having a strange effect on her—as if she were slipping back into the role she’d played at Donley.
“Did you know each other then?” Brian asked.
“Not really,” Olivia clipped out. They’d met, but she wasn’t going to explain that to Brian.
“Of course I’d noticed her,” Max interjected. “Who didn’t?”
“So where did you meet—officially?” Linda asked.
“I was on a business trip to New York,” he answered easily. “And a friend who thought we’d like each other introduced us.” He flashed a grin. “He was right.”
“Why haven’t we heard anything about your engagement?” Brian asked. “You’d think it would be on one of those celebrity gossip shows.”
“We’re keeping it a secret for the time being,” Max said. “And we’d appreciate it if you helped us out with that, by not talking to the press or anything. We’re still enjoying our privacy.”
Olivia watched the group’s reactions. Some nodded. Others murmured agreement, but she wondered if that many people could really keep quiet about the engagement of a former classmate who was a minor celebrity.
“How come you aren’t off in the Caribbean or somewhere exciting?” Linda asked.
Max slung his arm around Olivia and pulled her close. “We’ll do that later. Right now, we can make our own excitement.”
Olivia flushed. And she was almost relieved when one of the men in the back focused on Max. Almost—because any questions would mean he was going to be telling the tall tales they’d agreed on.
“You said you were on a business trip to New York. What business?” one of the men in the back demanded in a challenging voice. It was Troy Masters, the most successful member of the reunion committee. Olivia knew that Troy had graduated from Princeton and used his connections to become a rich money market manager. She also knew that he liked being thought of as the guy who’d made it big.
“Financial advisor,” Max answered, using the cover story that the Rockfort men had worked out for him. They had also quickly constructed an online background for him that would substantiate the claim.
“I might be able to use your services,” Mark Tate allowed.
“We can make an appointment in a few weeks,” Max answered easily. “Olivia and I are both taking some time off to look for a place to live.”
“In New York?”
“No. A place where we can get away.”
Within minutes, Max had introduced himself to everybody in the room. And as five more people arrived, Linda told them who he was. As Olivia watched him interact, it was obvious he knew how to work a crowd, how to get people to like him. The women were practically eating out of his hand as she watched them flirt with the handsome new fiancé of their former classmate. But despite the female attention, he was able to quickly make friends with the guys, too.