That’s what he liked about Pamela Hatcher—her efficiency. With just those few words she’d know what to do. It wasn’t that they were intimate. He’d hired her because he wasn’t attracted to her. She was a steel stork of a woman, with a face like a scarecrow and delusional fantasies of being the next Lara Croft. But her mind was sharp enough to cut paper and she understood him. So few people did. A vengeful woman was a force more fearsome than an atomic bomb, and he never wanted pleasure to interfere with business. No sex. No jealousy. No need to worry about female revenge. Pamela got that. What she wanted from him wasn’t passion; it was adventure.
“Have my tailor cut a dress for you while he’s at it.” Raphael pulled on the cigar he’d paid a small fortune for.
“Really?” Pamela’s squeal of delight was real. In his generous understanding of her fantasy, he’d offered her the kind of assignment that would send someone like Pamela in throes more satisfying than any orgasm. How often had she asked for a more hands-on part in this game he was playing with his captors? Now she’d get to tackle the role of private investigator.
“Any word on the Belgian chocolates yet?” Abbie was a sweet more delicious than any candy, as Pamela already knew. But Abbie had escaped the box he’d put her in, and he needed her back.
“You don’t pay me enough for all this runaround.” Pamela pretended to whine.
Another little ruse. The censors heard an overworked, underpaid assistant. But Pamela knew the worth she brought him, and he paid her accordingly. Nothing Uncle Sam could get his hands on, mind you. All part of the fun for Pamela. “I just gave you a designer dress.” Out of fabric so secret, being caught wearing it would have her tried for treason.
“Um, so you did.” She giggled like a schoolgirl, already anticipating the thrill of the hunt. He beamed at his foresight to hire her.
“Check the order confirmation and track down that chocolate. And make sure the contents aren’t damaged.” He blew out rings of smoke. As soon as he got what he needed from Abbie and erased her from the picture, he could get back to business. She’d already cost him almost a year of his life. He’d make her pay for all of her sins. “I want to celebrate my release in style.”
Chapter Two
Gray had sent Mercer to sniff Abbie’s trail at its last known point, but the shortcut to information lay in this armpit Gray had sworn he’d never come back to.
The skeleton of houses forming the backbone of Echo Falls appeared through the rain-drenched windshield of his Corvette. How could so little have changed in thirteen years?
Echo Falls squatted in northwestern Massachusetts, east of Highway 91, north of Route 2. A town lost in time, tucked in its own little world. Settlers had followed the law of least effort, taking advantage of the natural fall of water from Holbrook Pond to Bitter Lake, which then emptied into the Prosper River and into the Connecticut River. To make up for the falls’ lack of grandeur, the founding family had somewhere along the road built a spectacular granite arch bridge over the fast-moving river.
Originally water powered the wool mills; now it was electricity. The surviving mill buildings still stood on their original site, reflecting on the pond on sunny days. Built in 1774, Holbrook House still faced south, overlooking the river. As the family grew, more estates were built on Holbrook land. Five grand brick homes once lorded over the lower village where the peons lived in boardinghouses on Peanut Row. In the late 1800s, that constituted enough political power to divert a railway to this nothing town.
The train had long ago stopped coming and the tracks turned into nature trails. Modern gabled capes, contemporaries and colonials mixed in with the old brick homes, Victorians and farmhouses. Posh homes still cropped up in the small upper village. Working stiffs still lived paycheck to paycheck in the larger lower village. Of course, Holbrooks didn’t own all the fancy homes now, only the original house on Mill Road.
As Gray crested over the last hill, he let out a breath he wasn’t aware he’d held. Orange construction barricades closed off the old bridge and redirected traffic through the lower village. Great. He’d hoped to avoid meandering through the center of town.
At least the rain watered down the hard edges. He didn’t really want to see the old hometown and all the bitter memories that stagnated there. The plan was to talk to his sister, get a lead on Abbie and get out of this hellhole as fast as possible. Take it in like a reporter, Gray. Or a travel writer. Notice, don’t feel.
He gritted his teeth as he passed the middle school. Even through the slosh of rain and the tint of his sunglasses every ugly detail glared at him. His grip tightened on the steering wheel and he pretended not to see the redbrick building. Voices from the past crowded in, making his skin shrink too tightly around him. Cry-baby. Loser. Wimp. You can’t do anything right. Run, you coward, run.
Coward.
He rolled his shoulders, trying to dislodge the old taunts that had been the steady staple of his school years.
To his left, the high school’s mustard-brick facade smeared between swipes of his wipers. There he was voted most likely to fail and end up in jail. This in spite of being ranked ninth in a class of one hundred and three, lettering in three sports and working twenty-five hours a week. Ironic really that his job was putting scumbags back behind bars where they belonged. Including, once, a former classmate. The all-grown-up Mr. Soccer Star still liked to pick on boys who were smaller than he was.
Who’s laughing now?
It was all in the past. He was no longer the runt who had to play class clown or run to save his hide. He no longer had to fight his sister for the last scrap of food on the table. He could stand up straight and be proud of who he was and what he’d become. He was good enough for anyone—including Abbie.
Yeah, right. Her old man would still have found fault with him.
At Peanut Row he slowed. The old weight of doom he’d dragged around like a ball and chain fitted itself around his neck. He loosened his tie. You’re not that kid anymore.
Spinners’ Tavern still stood on the corner. Still had a steady clientele even at eleven in the morning. His mother had probably spent more time on the second bar stool from the right than she had at home. Like a stick of peppermint gum was going to mask the booze and fool them into thinking she’d actually gone to work for a change.
The last house on this dead-end street looked better than the last time he’d seen it. The door and shutters wore a fresh coat of lipstick-red paint. But not even the bright color could erase the tired slouch of the roofline or the defeat of the sagging siding. The wipers taunted him, coward, coward, coward.
Now that he was here, he wasn’t quite sure what to do. The last time he’d talked to Brynna, she’d screamed at him to never call her again and had slammed down the phone. All of his calls after that were screened through a voice box, and she hadn’t returned any. But then Bryn had never played by anyone’s rules; she’d made up her own. That’s what got her kicked out of the police academy. Last he’d heard she’d gotten a P.I. license. He couldn’t imagine that business was booming for her here.
Maybe she was right. Maybe he was a coward for not pushing the issue. Maybe he had run from his responsibility to her. But only an idiot went where he wasn’t wanted.
Rain drummed impatiently on the ragtop of his Corvette, reminding him of his mother’s red nails clicking against the cracked kitchen table. Are
