“Amy.”
“Amy who?”
“I don’t see how it’s any of your business.”
“I’m just curious, so when I see your obituary in the paper, I can put a face to the name.”
Katrina’s face flushed. “Oh, for goodness’ sake, Mike, is that really necessary?”
I blinked, surprised and unsettled. My chest tightened, and for a moment I was without words, then I found them.
“How about you go somewhere else in the room to write your conspiracy theories? Do be sure to start the story with ‘once upon a time’ though, won’t you?”
He merely scowled, then looked across the bar, his lips twisted like he was visibly repressing whatever it was he wanted to say. The waitress passed him another drink without asking. He nodded, thanking her, and waited until she moved off. Then he looked back.
“I don’t know about once upon a time, love. But let me give you some words of advice. Every story around here seems to cut short in a premature ‘the end.’”
“Mike.” Karson appeared from nowhere. “I see you’ve managed to crawl your way out of the sewers for the night.”
My heart kicked up a notch.
He looked overwhelmingly handsome. He wore black suit trousers and a white shirt, but, like Ethan, he didn’t adhere to standard dress. He wore no tie. It was a casual, sexy, confident style. I curled my ankles up to hide my shoes.
“Karson,” Mike said coldly. “I was invited by Mr. Jefferson.” He took a sip and looked across the room—at Jefferson, I assumed. “He has a story he wants me to run. I’m hoping it involves some information on Lucy.”
Karon rolled up the sleeves on his shirt casually. The move was the kind of thing a man might do right before they stepped into a physical altercation, and the vague threat rolled in all around us. Mike watched his actions with a mildly unsettled look.
“And yet, Jefferson is on the other side of the room,” Karson said. “Why don’t you scamper over there and get your hot little story.”
Mike’s lips thinned. “You all stick together like a pack of wolves who just slaughtered a lamb!” He jerked his whiskey off the bar, sloshing it over the top again, then leaned over Katrina’s shoulder. “When I find out what you’re covering up, I guarantee I’ll make you pay.”
Katrina reeled back.
I thought of the kitten and the ritual. For a brief moment I wondered if human sacrifices were a possibility. Would it explain the disappearances? Would it explain the sudden uncomfortable air at the dinner party when I asked about the missing hikers? I dismissed it as fast as it landed. If humans were sacrifices, they wouldn’t regress back to kittens.
“I won’t ask you to leave nicely again,” Karson said, with a terrible quietness.
Muttering a curse, Mike strode off toward Jefferson.
“Son of a bitch,” she hissed, watching him leave. I placed a hand on hers, and she gave it a grateful squeeze.
“Why does he think something happened to Lucy?” I asked carefully.
“He was her boyfriend. She rang him and left a message that said she had some information on the missing hikers and that she was heading into the mountains to camp for a few days and check out some things. She said she’d call him back that night. The silly girl went alone, and a massive storm came through. We couldn’t search for a week—it was too dangerous. When we could finally go, there was ten feet of snow, and we had no hope of finding her. We went again once the snow cleared, but there was no trace. We don’t even know which part of the mountain range she headed to. She could be anywhere up there, or animals—” She stopped and didn’t finish. Katrina sighed and drained her glass and ordered whiskey. The barmaid poured three and slipped them in front of us.
“He thinks,” Karson said, neither grim nor disturbed like Katrina, more matter of fact, “that because her body wasn’t found, she must have been murdered. He’s a city boy who couldn’t cut it as a reporter in the big smoke. He works for the paper in Two Peaks. He has no clue about the wilderness.”
“Oh dear,” Robert said lightly, eyeing Katrina’s glass. She swung her head toward him and smiled with relief. “You’re on the hard stuff. What have I missed?”
She stood up and drained the glass in one big swoop. “Nothing that your arms wrapped around your wife on the dance floor won’t fix.” He took her hand, and they moved off in that direction. I watched as he pulled her into his arms, and they did an old-fashioned waltz. I found myself smiling wistfully at them, then I looked back at Karson, and he was studying me. I smiled, conscious of his gaze, and dropped my eyes to the bar.
“I’d be honored if you would dance with me,” Karson said, with the full magnificence of his debonair charm.
He held out his hand expectantly, and I didn’t need asking twice. As soon as his hand touched mine, thousands of bubbles from the champagne I’d just consumed danced around my body. He leaned forward and kissed the top of my hand, and as he did so, he set his smoldering, intoxicating eyes on mine. There were people all around us, but in that moment, I forgot about Lucy. I forgot about everyone. The whole room faded until there was just him. Us.
He looked away first, leading me to the dance floor.
“I’m not a very good dancer,” I admitted as we wove between people.
