by Joanne Rock
Was that what everyone thought? That they’d broken up, and Amy had left town because of it? Or that Sam had dumped her for another girl?
It didn’t matter now. None of it was true anyhow, a fact that had altered a lot of her view of the past.
“Sam was easy to be around ten years ago, and, in a lot of ways, he still is.”
She’d had a hard time admitting it to herself, but the truth revealed itself now. She liked Sam. Still.
“It’s funny you say that because a lot of people think he’s the most intimidating man in town.” Heather kept her head down, using one thick strand of the fringe from her sweater like a paintbrush to feather through the soft particles.
“He’s just quiet.” But she liked that, too. His silences gave her room to think.
“Well, all that quietness mixed with so much muscle makes it seem as if Heartache has its very own Secret Service agent.”
“That’s not a bad thing for a cop. And he seems good with his son.” She tossed that out there, curious if Heather knew any more than what Sam had already told her.
“I have no doubt that he’ll keep any child of his safe.” Heather arched back from her work. “Zach said Sam’s already looking to legalize his full custody to keep Aiden here.”
“He wants full custody?” That surprised her given his experience with the foster system. She remembered him saying two parents were optimal. It was a conversation that had come up once when she’d been so upset with her own mother she’d suggested she would be better off without her.
A cruel comment, she now realized. So many regrets. So much distance. And so damn hard to figure out how to work through it all.
“I guess he doesn’t want his son to ever feel unwanted, and he’s afraid that the mother could walk away at any time if she’s already floundering at parenting when the baby is so young.” She waved Amy over. “Come see it now.” She pointed to the plywood plank. “Doesn’t it look like the Chances’ house?”
Amy stilled.
Her sister had added a horseshoe-shaped driveway to the dwelling Amy had only half started. Heather had also finished the tree out front. Added dimension to the house with a door and a deep front porch.
“Does it?” She kept her face carefully blank. “It’s been so long since I’ve seen it—I don’t remember.”
Memories swelled, clamoring to be acknowledged. Freed.
A cold sweat started to bead on her forehead, and she hoped it wasn’t visible.
“Amy?” Stepping away from the plywood table near the saw, Heather moved closer. “Are you okay?”
Panicked that her emotions were showing, she nodded fast.
“Fine. Great. Just thinking about that interview with Sam and wondering if I should make some notes before he comes. Or a timeline.” Words tumbled out fast in her haste to put distance between them and the previous conversation. “I don’t want to overlook anything that might help Sam solidify this case.”
She hated that she couldn’t share the most important piece of information. But she was being completely honest about wanting to help with any other aspect of the trial preparation.
“Sure.” Reaching for her phone, Heather hit the screen a few times. “I told Zach we wouldn’t be long, anyhow. He’s down at Sam’s right now, waiting for me so we can drive into work together.”
“Is he?” Amy looked out the window. Her nervousness with Heather wasn’t anywhere close to what she’d feel with Sam once he arrived to take her through that last shared summer.
“Yes.” Her sister beamed as she toyed with her engagement ring. “I’m lucky to have him. He’s been nothing short of amazing to me.”
“I’m happy for you, Heather. I really am. Just because I haven’t been here doesn’t mean I haven’t been rooting for you. All of you.”
“I hope you’ll come to the wedding.” Heather headed toward the door, peering out a front window of the cabin as she retrieved her purse. “I’m praying the trial is done before then.”
Amy was, too. Although it would move faster if they couldn’t make all the charges stick where Gabriella was concerned.
“I’ll see what I can do.” Thinking too far in the future made her nervous. It seemed to take everything she had just to remain in Tennessee for a week, let alone a month. “A lot depends on how quickly I can finish the renovations.”
“Oh.” Heather dug in her purse. “Speaking of which, Scott gave me a check for you if you need to buy supplies from any store besides Finleys.”
Their oldest brother had given Amy an open account for the work on the hunting cabin, keeping track of her expenses so the family could divide them equally. The check, apparently, was for anything Finleys Building Supply didn’t carry.
She read the amount. “I’ll never need that much.” She’d gotten used to living on a small budget and didn’t see herself changing anytime soon.
“But we did decide to go higher end on the appliances and cabinets, right?” Heather bit her lip as her gaze darted around the small lodging.
“Yes. But I don’t pay full price for anything.” She couldn’t help the pride in her voice.
“Then we gave the project to the right woman.” Heather leaned in for a quick hug. “It’s so good to see you.”
Amy savored the words as much as the closeness, even if she didn’t squeeze back.
She wasn’t ready to rely on her family yet, not even a sister who’d been so kind to her. Waiting until Heather left the cabin, Amy moved back to the plywood table to stare at the familiar lines of the scene she’d seen in her nightmares for ten years. Her rudimentary rendering had been enough to make Heather recognize it and flesh out the details.
Which ought to serve as a reminder that she couldn’t afford to even think about that horrible night while she was here, surrounded by people who could be tipped off by the slightest detail. She needed to lock down that memory fast and not let it out anytime soon. No easy feat with the sheriff on his way to sniff out the truth about that summer.
Picking up the wastebasket, she held it under the edge of the wood and swiped all the sawdust into the basket’s depths. If only the memory could be discarded as easily.
But she’d do whatever she needed to in order to keep her secrets private. And if that meant distracting Sam from his questions? She was just the woman for the job. Lucky for her, he was the only man on the planet she’d never had trouble flirting with.
* * *
HE WASN’T SURE she’d really show up.
Sam had phoned Amy shortly after Zach left, asking her to come to his place instead since he had the alarm system and extra security in place for Aiden here. She’d agreed easily enough, and an hour later, he pulled open the front door to find her there, wind sweeping fall leaves in a swirl behind her.
She wore a gray sweater that was as long as her matching dress, and a pair of black leggings underneath that. Layers of gray and black, the colors of a woman who didn’t care to be noticed. Even her auburn hair was hidden under a dark gray knit beanie. He wondered what life had brought her way in the years since they’d dated to turn her into a more reserved woman than the one he remembered.
“Thanks for coming.” He led her through the front room and past the kitchen, toward the back of the house. “I’m doing everything I can to protect my son. And while I know he’d be safe with me at your place, I also know I wouldn’t be able to concentrate fully on our conversation if I always had one eye out for a threat.”
Stopping in the family room closest to Aiden’s nursery, Sam pointed to a tan microsuede couch that he’d cleared of all baby gear. He did most of his work in here, and a computer station had been built into a back wall. A couch and love seat sat adjacent to one another in front of the river-stone hearth, where he’d taken the time to lay a fire. The dried hickory wood smelled nice as it burned and,
he hoped, detracted from the general disaster of his housekeeping.
Amy slid off her cap and pulled off her boots, leaving both of them close to the fire before she took a seat. The sweater she kept on. She draped it over her knees like a built-in blanket as she drew them up onto the cushion. He liked the way she made herself comfortable. It pleased him to think that she wouldn’t do that move with just anyone.
“I don’t mind coming down here. The cabin is freezing even when I have a fire going. I’ve got a big hole in the ceiling since I took down that wall, and the heat seems to go straight through the roof.” Even now she tugged the sleeves of her sweater over her hands, tucking slender fingers into the wool. “But I tried to save you some effort on this interview by making you a timeline of that summer.”
She withdrew a crumpled sheet of paper from her sleeve and set it on the coffee table.
“You did?” He reached for it, smoothing the notebook sheet’s ragged edges against his knee. She had a list of dates and events, some of them with a few extra details.
“The dates I underlined are ones I’m certain about.” She fidgeted with the hem of her skirt. “The other ones are approximate.”
“This is great.” He couldn’t believe the details she’d captured, from a notation about the date her father bought a used truck to logging her shifts at the pizza parlor, where they’d both worked. “Did you have a diary for this time period?”
“No. Why? Do you need supporting documentation?” Frowning, she straightened on the couch as if she was prepared to run off and obtain just that.
“Hell no. I’m just surprised you could put all of this together so quickly.” He couldn’t wait to feed it into his computer against some of the other events in town that summer, including the movements of Covington and Gabriella.
“I have a degree in accounting. I tend to think in data and details.” She shot up off the couch to wander around the family room while he read her notes. “Besides, I remember that summer particularly well since it was my last year here. I’ve had a lot of time to relive my mistakes.”
That caught his attention. He raised his gaze to where she was studying a photograph he’d taken of the Harpeth River at sunrise, back when he’d had time to do things like drive out to the lake and fish.
“What do you mean? What mistakes?” He watched her carefully, studying her body language, which always told a story all its own.
Amy Finley had walked into this house well prepared with her list and her willingness to provide primary sources for her memory.
If she’d been on the witness stand, he’d think she had been coached. In fact, she didn’t seem surprised by his question. Almost as if she’d steered him into it.
“I argued with my mother. She heard about the skinny-dipping—I guess Harlan Brady saw me streaking through the cornfield toward the water that day. And you can imagine how well that went.”
“That’s why you left town?” He’d never known. And while there was a ring of truth to it, he’d bet money she was leaving something out.
Because she walked the perimeter of the room instead of looking him in the eye.
“You remember what she was like back then.” She wrapped the sweater tighter around her waist, pausing to test the spring action of a baby bouncy seat.
“Only from what you told me. You never brought me home with you.” He was used to that, being a foster kid who lived with the Hastings.
The townspeople had been reasonably nice considering the family had taken in a few bad seeds over the years who had earned the rest of the foster kids an unfair reputation. But Sam had never had many friends, which was why Zach’s friendship had meant a hell of a lot.
And which was why dating Amy had been a sweet surprise in a life full of hardship.
“I stayed at home as infrequently as possible myself. I never subjected someone I liked to Mom.” She toyed with the fuzzy animals hanging from a mini-mobile that dangled over the baby seat, turning each creature toward her so she could see its face.
“Where did you stay when you weren’t at home?” He set aside her list, more interested in what she had to say.
“The hunting cabin. The swimming hole out behind the Spencer farm. My dad’s office, which was a converted shed.”
“You never spent time anywhere near the quarry?” He braced himself for the answer, even though they were talking about things that had happened long ago.
Things he couldn’t change.
“No.” She met his gaze, perhaps sensing the answer was important to him.
Thank God. He couldn’t imagine how easy of a target she would have made as a teen—out by herself, with little parental supervision and a damaged relationship with her mother.
Of course, Gabriella had been in the same situation.
“Did you have a laptop? Or a family computer you used?”
“No. My parents said we should be outside doing things, not indoors and plugged in. And given how much my home life sucked by then, I wouldn’t have wanted to be glued to a laptop.” She rose from where she’d knelt by the baby seat and returned to the couch.
Did that mean she felt like the most stressful part of the conversation was over? He hated to think in terms of catching her off guard when he liked Amy. A lot.
But this case was too important to overlook key pieces of evidence just because he was attracted to her—then and now.
“When was the last time you remember seeing Gabriella?”
Her expression shifted. Shuttered. She went back to flipping the hem of her dress over her knees, tugging and tucking it under her.
He hadn’t been imagining it. She knew something.
“I listed a couple of occasions when I thought I might have seen her. I can’t remember for sure.”
Vague information from the woman who liked data and details.
He debated how tough to play it. How much to push.
But before he knew what was happening, she was on the love seat next to him.
“What about the last time I saw you, Sam?” Her voice had a soft, intimate quality to it that changed the air in the room.
Her knee brushed his. Her cool fingers landed on his arm.
Everything in him stilled for a moment. Right before his heart rate jacked up.
“What about it?” He had thought about that night a lot—especially lately. But he hadn’t planned to make it part of this conversation.
“I can remember a lot of details about that.” Her soft words weren’t flirtatious. She wasn’t a flirt.
So if she was bringing it up now, it meant...
She was totally serious about what she was saying.
His pulse moved into overdrive and stayed there.
“I don’t think a ten-year-old discussion of us going all the way affects the outcome of this case.” Because that had been the topic of their last conversation. He remembered that day just fine, and that was not the direction he wanted to take this visit.
So when his gaze slid down to the soft fullness of her mouth, he cursed himself for being ten kinds of idiot.
“I took a lot of grief from my mom about us having a physical relationship that we never actually had.”
“That seems like a technicality. Witness the skinny-dipping day.” Things had been physical, to say the least. Teenagers excelled at pushing those boundaries. They’d both known where the relationship had been headed.
“Still.” She tipped her head sideways against the love seat, contemplating him from just inches away. “It always struck me as damned unfair that I bore the punishment without any of the fun.”
He closed his eyes to try to dilute the appeal of this woman who’d gotten under his skin from the first time they’d met. Like she’d been born knowing how to turn him inside out when other women called him unapproachable.
Intimidating.
And, occasionally, an unfeeling bastard.
Why the hell had she never seen what everyone else did when they looked at him?
“I can’t afford relationships that are just for fun anymore.” That time in his life had ended when Cynthia showed up on his doorstep with Aiden in her arms.
“Or maybe you need fun in your life now more than ever.” Her fingers walked along his shirt cuff.
The smallest, least sexual touch he could imagine. Yet his temperature spiked like someone had thrown gasoline on the fire in the hearth.
Clearly, the woman he remembered with the sparkle in her eyes and the urge to live on the edge was still buried under all those gray clothes.
“Some people would point out that kind of thinking is the reason I have to buckle down now.” He nodded in the direction of the room where Aiden slept. “I’m still trying to get my feet under me after finding out I’m a father.”
Her fingers stopped their tantalizing walk. Her eyes flipped up to his.
“Lucky for us, ‘some people’ don’t ever have to know. Only you and me.”
She was propositioning him on his family room couch.
Something was wrong with this picture. But his brain had a hard time figuring out what when his heart slugged an insistent, pounding rhythm inside his chest. His hands itched to be on her, to pull her across his body and pick up where they’d left off ten years ago. He wanted to see if she still kissed the same way. If she’d still tunnel her fingers through his hair and press into him like she couldn’t get close enough.
Would she make those tiny noises in the back of her throat? Encouraging sighs when he touched her where she liked best? Remembering every detail of that last night together—when things had gotten way too hot and out of hand in his truck behind the closed pizza shop—Sam could almost convince himself it was okay to touch her again. To kiss her again.
To make her cry out his name while he helped her find release.
Except they weren’t together anymore, his brain chimed in at the last second. And she had changed gears during this sorry excuse for an interview when he’d mentioned Gabriella.