“Okay. Thanks.” He moved toward the door, only to stop when she didn’t move out of the way. As it was, she blocked the exit.
It took about three beats for her to realize. “Oh, God, sorry.”
She stepped to the side, and when he brushed past her, all he was aware of was her scent. Sweet like honey, with a hint of fresh strawberries.
He was about to leave when he suddenly stopped. “Before I go, are you doing okay with everything?”
“Everything?”
“Macy.”
“Macy…right. Um, yeah. I didn’t really know her. Areyouokay?”
No. He was frustrated and mad as hell that this had happened in his mountains. “I will be…when we find the killer. Stay safe, okay?”
She nodded slowly, then he stepped out of the room.
CHAPTER 3
Tilly had ogled him. In a didn’t-even-try-to-hide-it kind of way. The width of his shoulders. The thickness of the muscles across his chest. She’d taken it all in, in the most obvious way.
Argh.And then she’d just stood in his way like some kind of zombie psychopath.
Jesus Christ. She pulled up in front of her house and dropped her head to the wheel. How was she supposed to see him tomorrow? And the next day and the day after that?
Groaning, she slid out of her car and walked toward the house, her gaze drawn to the surrounding mountains. At least her home offered her a fraction of peace. The trees. The greenery.
A cool breeze brushed over her face, almost distracting her from the windows. Still broken…and they’d remain that way until she found someone to fix them.Ifshe found someone to fix them.
Man, the hastily placed boards made her home cold. But then, the broken heating system didn’t help…another thing she couldn’t get fixed.
The old floorboards groaned beneath her feet as she stepped inside. The house was big, and back in the day it would have been quite grand. But after years of neglect, it was not looking so grand. There was an open living and kitchen area to the right and a bedroom and bathroom to the left with more rooms upstairs.
Her first day here, she’d almost turned back around and driven away. Because of the stench and the trash and the dirty flooring. The broken windows had been just one of her problems. Water had gotten inside, none of the lights had worked, the walls had been graffitied and the bathroom trashed.
Her entire first week had been spent scrubbing every surface, fixing the little things that she could, like replacing lights, painting the walls, and changing the locks. It had been backbreaking, and there was still so much to do, but day by day, this house was starting to feel like her old childhood home again.
She moved into the bedroom and dropped her bag on the bed. All she wanted to do was collapse into it and sleep, but she needed to shower and eat and all that other adult stuff that she had no energy for, then maybe she could devour a tub of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream on the couch with a good sitcom.
In the bathroom, she caught her reflection in the mirror, and yep, she looked as tired as she felt. Exhaustion from endless emails and phone calls from tourists canceling tours and visits.
After stripping off her clothes, she stepped into the shower. This was the room she’d scrubbed the hardest because, well, it had been in the worst condition. She wasn’t sure if it was because squatters had stayed here, people had intentionally trashed it, or maybe even wild animals had gotten inside. Hell, maybe all three. Whatever it was, the room had made her gag more than once.
When she stood inside the shower, the warm water beat down on her shoulders, allowing some of her tense muscles torelax. She’d run into Theo and Hendrix a couple of times today, and each time, she’d been met with the same passive hostility. Aggressive glares and barely even a hello…the way they looked at her made her feel like a bug to be squashed under their shoes.
No matter how hard she tried to tell herself it didn’t affect her, it still hurt. Some days she just wanted to scream at people that she was innocent. That she’d had no part in what her father had done, and she shouldn’t be punished by association.
But even if she stood smack dab in the middle of town and screamed those words at the top of her lungs, there wouldstillbe people who wouldn’t believe her. They needed someone to blame, and with the absence of her father, that someone was her.
When the air around her started to mist and her fingers grew wrinkly, she stepped out of the shower and into the bedroom. It had been her parents’ bedroom, and yeah, it was strange staying in it now. But when she’d arrived,herbedroom had smelled of dead animal, and that smell still lingered a bit.
She’d just pulled on a pair of yoga pants and a T-shirt when something sounded from the front of the house. She paused to listen with a frown.
Was that a car stopping out front? Her driveway was long and the house pretty isolated—people only stopped here if they were visiting.
She hadn’t moved a muscle when soft, crashing thuds sounded against the house.
What the hell?
