“You did. You texted Marni. She sent it to me. I’ve read it.” Stella delivered the words nice and slow, as if she realized their import as she said them.
I held out my hand. “Let me see your phones. Both of you.”
Stella unlocked hers and showed me the screen without bitching. From her stunned expression, I guessed she sensed the escalation in danger, too.
The text Marni forwarded to Stella purported to come from me. I took Marni’s phone and checked her contacts. My real number was in there. We didn’t have a history of texts. It had been years. “The name and number don’t match.”
Stella crowded in to look at the screen. “Is it fake? The text has Hanna’s name but no corresponding phone number.”
“I thought the text sounded weird.” Marni stopped straining to see the screen and plopped back on the stool. “Meet at the coffee place at 8.Place? Why wouldn’t you say the name of your café?”
“Because I didn’t send any texts.” I said it even as my mind raced ahead, plowing right into the abyss.
Jeremy lived on tech. He spent a ridiculous amount of time lecturing me in an exasperated-teen way about how things worked and artificial intelligence and a host of other topics thatI tried to tune out. He also made it his part-time job to warn me about phone scams and the danger of clicking on unknown links, as if I lacked common sense. This one time I appreciated his tech savvy.
“The texts must have come from some sort of app or email that hides the real sender’s identity.” I knew about that sort of thing because I kept getting fake messages claiming to be from the IRS.
“This is a setup.” Stella’s big brain had kicked into gear. She said the words we all wanted to ignore. “You’re thinking Aubrey pulled this off.”
That was the nightmare running through my head, yes. “I’ve thought of little other than her since she did her diva walk into the courtroom this morning.”
“Oh, God.” Marni rubbed her forehead with a shaky hand.
“Okay, enough.” Stella held up both hands. “We need to get out of here. We’re—”
The knock on the café door cut her off. For some reason the outside motion sensor light hadn’t clicked on. Whoever waited out there in the dark did so without giving a hint about who they were.
But I knew. We all knew.
My stomach dropped. “Too late.”
Chapter Ten
Marni
Not Aubrey. Not a woman.
A young man, probably twentysomething, stood at the threshold when Hanna finally opened the café door. He had that fresh-faced, recent-college-graduate look to him. Cute but a few years shy of distinguished and handsome. He wore jeans and a sweater. Nothing fancy, like he’d dressed intentionally casual to fit in as a local, which he wasn’t. Strands of windblown brown hair dipped down on his forehead. His smile aimed to charm and the dimple got him part of the way there.
Who the hell was this guy?
None of us said a word. He didn’t either.
Hanna blocked his entrance, keeping him confined to the doorway. “We’re closed now. Have been for hours.”
I liked this Hanna. She was more savvy, harder to push around than the younger version. Back then she’d been saddled with a squirming toddler and pummeled by rumors about the identityof the boy’s father. The town had buzzed with speculation. The question still flared up now and then. The fact she’d gotten pregnant while working for Patrick put a megaphone to the accusations.
That was one of the many reasons Victoria hated Hanna and blamed her for the rocky marital times with Patrick. I’d sided with Victoria because that was my job as best friend.
“I’ve been in town, on and off, for a few weeks. Stopped in here a few times.” The stranger smiled. “You serve the best muffins around.”
“As interesting as your food review is, who are you?” Stella got right to the point, as always.
“Gabriel Harbison.”
That name sounded oddly familiar. I’d taught what felt like thousands of kids over the years, but I didn’t think he was one of them.
“You can call me Gabe.” His smile didn’t dim. “May I come in?”
