There was the tiniest shade of weariness in his tone, and Lucas felt another of those unfamiliar flashes of alarm.
He said with determined heartiness, “The Alpine Chop House? You like that place.”
The Alpine Chop House was Silver Pine’s swankiest restaurant. It wasn’t all swank, though. In fact, the food was so good, the Chop House was as popular with residents as it was with vacationers. The décor was elegant in its simplicity: dark wood paneling, steel-framed Ansel Adams photographs, and breathtaking mountain views. The leather booths were deep enough to require rappelling ropes. Well, nearly. And the wine list had more pages than your averageNY Timesbestseller. The steaks were dry-aged and, like everything else on the menu, so outrageously overpriced they made even tourists blink.
The last time they’d dined there had been Riley’s birthday. That had been in April, after the accident, and Riley had just returned to work after two weeks of sick leave. It had been a great night, and every time Lucas met Riley’s smiling gaze in the golden candlelight, his heart felt as though it expanded with happiness and relief.
“I do like that place,” Riley agreed.
Lucas knew enough to quit while he was ahead. He said lightly, “Okay, it’s a date,” and retreated to his office.
Unsurprisingly, Saturday night, little more than a week before Christmas, the Alpine Chop House was packed. But one of the perks of being head of the local FBI office was Lucas could always get a table at any place in town.
Not that he’d trade on it, usually, but that night was an exception. Even so, he and Riley had to wait, which they did outside in the very cold December night because the reception area was crammed with loud and boisterous holidaymakers.
Even if there’d been room indoors, the noise level—all those buoyant voices, all that elevated laughter bouncing offthe polished pine walls and floors—was a real mood killer. The whole restaurant was as loud and rowdy as a frat party. The only things missing were feedback on loudspeakers and puddles of spilled beer.
Lucas and Riley walked a little way from the wooden porch, boots crunching on packed snow, the cold nipping at their noses. From discreet speakers mounted under the eaves, the familiar strains ofIt’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Yeardrifted, schmaltzy sentiment meandering through ancient sentinel trees—soft, tinny, and cheerfully at odds with the sharp whisper of wind coming off the ridge. Stars glittered like ice chips overhead.
Riley had said nothing since they’d left the restaurant. He was always quiet, but this was a different kind of quiet. Lucas recognized that, but he didn’t know what to do about it. He considered and discarded several topics of conversation. He didn’t want to set Riley off again. He’d have liked to say something light and charming to break the ice, but the fact was, he was not a light and charming guy.
Anyway, the silence between them was not icy. It was just…
Solid.
Heavy.
The distant aroma of seared steak and unearned money faded into the honed scents of woodsmoke and pine trees. Behind them, the warm glow of the Alpine Chop House windows spilled across the icy path, casting golden shadow squares on the snow.
A few yards beyond the valet station, breath clouding in the frigid dark, Lucas asked a little desperately, “Find anything interesting in those old case files?”
He happened to be studying Riley’s profile, so he caught the faint curve of Riley’s cheek. That small private smile wasanother jolt in a long day of unpleasant realizations. Clearly, he was fulfilling somebody’s worst expectations.
But Riley sounded like always as he replied, “I don’t think I’m going to turn up anything that cracks the Lewis-Clark Valley case, but there are a couple of loose ends I’d like to follow up on in the in the Hayley Corbin disappearance.”
Lucas nodded automatically. The notorious Lewis-Clark Valley case was a series of unresolved killings around the Lewiston-Clarkston area that had occurred between 1979 and 1982. The chances of solving a nearly-half-century-old cold case were pretty slim. But the 2005 disappearance of 17-year-old high school senior Hayley Corbin from Silver Pine continued to haunt the village to that day. Lucas had reviewed the file himself when he first took over the RA. Ultimately, he’d concluded there weren’t really any angles left to explore.
They continued to walk, the surrounding mountains swallowing the sound of boots crushing snow, the icy bite of silence between them. Lucas was grimly aware he’d got this—dinner at the Alpine Chop House—wrong, too. He should have picked another night, made a reservation, made an evening of it. Made it a genuine date. But no, he’d sprung the idea on Riley, timed it so they had to come straight from the office, even driving separately. He hadn’t given Riley so much as time to take a shower. Nor had he left himself time to comb his hair, put a tie on, treat it like a special occasion.
Coulda, shoulda, woulda.
That odd little smile of Riley’s bothered him for a lot of reasons, not least being Lucas had indeed been about to launch into work chat instead of…whatever he’d implied—promised—by saying earlier they would talk.
Into his stricken silence, Riley added, “I know Silver Pine wasn’t part of the crime pattern area, but did anyone everconsider the possibility that the Corbin kid might have been a victim of the Roadside Rip—”
For perhaps the first time in his adult life, Lucas had zero interest in the topic of work. He interrupted, “You know, Riley, if taking this time off was so important, you could have reminded me.”
He was expecting an argument—he could think of at least one legitimate objection to that line of reasoning, but Riley said only, “Yeah.”
His admission gave weight to Lucas’ mounting feeling of being placed in an impossible situation, of being judged unfairly. “I didn’t deliberately ignore your request.”
“No. I know.”
“You know what year-end is like. You know I’ve got a lot on my mind this time of year.”
“Yes.”
Lucas felt like his point had been made.
