rel="nofollow" href="#u74c587b8-dd98-5365-8ea5-9582ac5758ec">
CHAPTER ONE
IT WAS A perfect moment. Of course, if there was one thing Alicia Cook had a right to distrust, that was it. Perfect moments.
Still, with a sigh, and a sip of her lime-infused club soda, Allie gave herself over to it. The setting sun was gilding the foam on the ocean waves, and turning the beach sand to pure, luminous gold. From the hanging porch swing in the shadows of her covered veranda, she observed as the daytime crowds dissipated.
Now, one last family remained, the father deflating a humungous ride-on dragon water toy, the mother shaking out a picnic blanket and calling the children back from the water’s edge as she packed the remains of their day into an oversize basket.
A pang of pure longing hovered at the edges of Allie’s perfect moment, so she shifted her focus. Farther down the beach a couple strolled, hand in hand.
The sense of longing intensified.
“Don’t believe a word he says,” Allie muttered, watching through narrowed eyes as they stopped, leaned into each other and he nuzzled her ear and said something to her that made her laughter carry up the beach.
Allie’s muttered words were a defense, of course, against all that weakness that was still there, even though she, of all people, should know better than to long for dangerous things.
Perfect moments. To not be alone. To share life. To be deeply connected…there, her perfect moment was gone. She looked away from the couple, ignored the family and took a determined sip of her drink, concentrating furiously on the beauty of the setting sun, hoping to get it back.
No, the moment had been as iridescent—and as fragile—as a soap bubble blown from a child’s wand. It was gone.
She set down her drink, leaned over and drew her guitar from a shadowed corner.
“Perfect moments do not pay bills, anyway,” Allie told herself sternly. The contract to produce a jingle was the practical approach to solving her financial difficulties.
The guitar, however, was unmoved by the urgency she felt. She ran her thumb coaxingly down the six strings—E, B, G, D, A, E—but the guitar refused to be seduced. The instrument was acting like a friend who was mad at her, silent, refusing to speak.
It was almost a relief—a reprieve—when Allie heard a muffled noise through the patio door that opened into the cottage behind her. What was that? Was someone at her front door? She strained her ears. That had to be her imagination.
The very same imagination that would not give her a song, was quite happy to indulge her fears, she noticed.
But as she strained to hear, she could have sworn the sound she was hearing was very real. She was hearing the creaky front door handle being tried!
A recent newspaper article had been pinned to the community bulletin board in front of the post office. Mimi Roberts’s villa—located just down the beach—had experienced a break-in. An audacious thief had come in the front door while Mimi was home, but fortunately for the well-known celebrity, she was out back enjoying her deck. A Sugar Cone Beach police spokesman said there had been several similar break-ins in the neighborhoods surrounding the beach community and urged people to lock those front doors, even while they were at home.
Honestly, Allie had had trouble sleeping ever since, awaking to every sound, too hot because she was keeping the doors and windows firmly locked. No wonder she couldn’t write a simple jingle. Sleep deprived.
A muffled bang made her jump. Okay. It was definitely her front door. Being kicked in? No, probably something way less threatening, like a newspaper being thrown up against it.
You don’t get the paper, a little voice insisted on reminding her.
Still Allie tried to reason with herself. It would take an extraordinarily unambitious thief to choose her little cottage for break-and-enter purposes. The end of Sugar Cone Beach that was farthest away from her
