We’d have time for slow later. Right then, I wanted heat and passion. Reed’s smile told me I’d won the argument. We were past the point of no return, and I never wanted to go back.
“What about the local new stations? Anything being sent to them?” Reed asked his contact on the phone as he paced the living room in front of the television.
I couldn’t look at the couch without turning red in the face at the memories of what we’d done on that fabric just a few hours earlier. And then the bed. More than once.
Holy crap. I had smoking hot sex with a Navy SEAL—former—on a couch in a rental home in Savannah. And I didn’t regret a single second of it.
Reed lifted his brow at me and smirked, like he knew exactly what I was thinking while I stared at the couch.
Ahh. How embarrassing.
I had to find something to do.
Anything but stand around and stare at the hot guy.
I backed into my bedroom, doing everything possible to avoid glancing at the wrinkled sheets. While decorated adorably with Southern charm, the room wasn’t that big. It took me less than a minute to realize the only thing to do in here was sorting through the owner’s closet more.
Reed and I had pawed through a few boxes during our free time but hadn’t found anything of merit. It was mostly Christmas decorations and some high school yearbooks. Nothing that pointed to someone who wanted to murder Lisa. Not even love letters from an illicit affair to add spice to the podcast piece.
I moved a box from a stack we hadn’t touched yet and carefully opened the top. It seemed weird to be going through Lisa’s closet, but there weren’t many places to look for new clues. With Casey dead and my chance at a tell-all interview gone, I had to keep going. For both of them.
To help with seeing—so I didn’t accidentally grab a spider—I turned on the closet light and peeked inside the box. Two tall stacks of cards took up half. I flipped open the first few and read the messages on the insides. They were all from the Christmas before she died.
I pulled a card from the middle of the stack and read it. A holiday wish from Christmas four years earlier. It seemed Lisa kept her cards just like my mother. Did they ever go back and read them? I read a few more cards but found nothing substantial. There weren’t any death threats. Each card had a nice handwritten note that made my own adventure at sending cards last year seem pathetic since I used the same verse on everyone. It seemed in the South holiday cards required a more personal touch.
The box weighed practically nothing, so I slid it from the top of the pile and positioned it on the floor next to me, making room to go through the next. The contents of the second box were more exciting by far.
A small black over-the-shoulder purse sat right on top. I grabbed the well-used item and carried it out of the closet. Even with the light on, it would be easier to see in the bedroom. I sat on the bed, ignoring the comforter we’d tossed to the floor, and unzipped the purse.
My stomach fluttered. The bag had a little weight to it, meaning Lisa kept things in here. Was this the purse she had on her the night she died?
Positioning myself against the headboard, I reached into the bag and pulled out a few items. A mint from Chick-fil-A, two clicky pens, and a stack of coupons for The Cobbler Shop. I guess Lisa enjoyed sharing dollar-off deals as well. She and Samantha may have bonded over a love of sugar.
I pulled out her wallet and flipped through it. Nothing except a few credit cards and her license. Lisa’s unsmiling face started at me from the piece of plastic that served as her driver’s license. What a weird world we lived in that so many pieces of a person stuck around after they left.
Nothing else of merit was in the bag, but I flipped it upside down to be sure. I gave it a little shake.
Nothing.
Ugh. I dropped the purse on the bed and gathered up the items, ready to put them back inside. Something scratched my hand as I lowered them into the main pocket.
What the heck?
The tip of a piece of paper—a newspaper clipping like all her others from the folder—peeked out from the back pocket. I undid the zipper the rest of the way and pulled it free.
Holy shit!
I scanned the article, reading the details about the opening ceremony for the riverside condo development and studied the picture. The woman standing beside the property developer beamed out at me with a smile I recognized.
Holy shit.
Everything clicked into place. I stayed frozen as I finished reading and then jumped into action. The mint fell to the floor as I slid off the bed in search of Reed.
“Reed,” I called as I caught up with him, doing a pace in the kitchen while he drank water. “We need to talk.”
His eyes widened as I waved the article in front of him. “I’ll call you back, Spencer,” he said as he hung up his call.
“I know what Lisa had to tell Casey that night at the bar.”
