Hotshot P.i.

She looked into his eyes, wondering what had happened to the boy she’d loved, the boy who had loved her. She saw nothing in all that gray but bitterness. But instead of hating him, her heart broke as she thought of all the years he’d suffered. Because of his father. Because of her. Jake should have trusted her. He should have known she wouldn’t lie, she wouldn’t hurt him or his father, and she wouldn’t have thrown away their love without a fight, the way Jake had.

“In the meantime,” Jake said, “you and I are going to be inseparable until you’re acquitted—or sent to prison.”

She bit back a curse. “You’re making prison look better all the time.”

His gaze met hers. “I think I know why you lied about my father, but no matter the reason, you’re going to admit it to me. And very soon.” He touched the brim of his baseball cap. “See you in the morning.”

She slammed the door and dropped into a chair at the table, feeling incredibly tired and despondent. Aunt Kiki had brought Jake back knowing how he felt about Clancy, knowing how she’d once felt about him. That old familiar ache seized her heart in a death grip. How Clancy still felt about him.

Tears welled up in her eyes and spilled down over her cheeks, bitter on her tongue. She wiped at them. She still loved him. Through all the hurt, she’d never stopped loving him. Could never stop loving him. But like him, she felt betrayed. And angry with him for not trusting her. She knew she’d have to draw on that anger to keep Jake from knowing how she felt about him—and using it against her.

Emotional exhaustion and lack of solid sleep stole at her strength. She leaned her head on her arms and closed her eyes, telling herself she’d rest for a while, just until she could be sure Jake was asleep. Crossing the lake at night seemed less dangerous now. Much less dangerous than facing Jake Hawkins. If there was more incriminating evidence out there against her, Jake would find it.

She wished with all her heart that she could turn back the clock, back before the night of the fire and Lola’s murder, back when Jake loved her. She closed her eyes. And saw Jake come sauntering up the sandy beach, sixteen and suntanned, that grin she loved on his handsome face. And she ran out to meet him, as carefree as the breeze that rippled the surface of the lake.

* * *

CLANCY OPENED HER EYES, shocked to find the sun streaming in through her bedroom window. Even more shocked to find herself curled in the middle of her bed, the quilt rough with sand from her bare feet. She lay perfectly still, her mind frantically trying to recall when she’d come to bed. No memory.

That’s when she noticed her left hand clenched into a fist, as if she held something that might try to escape. With dread, she slowly uncurled her fingers. There in her palm lay a single tiny blue bead.

Her heart pounded. There was nothing unusual or unique about the bead. Except Clancy knew where it had come from. With a tremor of terror she remembered Friday night when Dex had called and demanded she meet him at the Hawk Island Cafe on the other side of the island.

He’d been holding a necklace of colored beads when she’d walked up to him. The outdoor café was empty that late at night and that early in the season. Dex sat at a table in a flickering pool of light from the Japanese lanterns strung overhead. She had looked at the necklace with growing dread, thinking it was another present, wishing she hadn’t agreed to meet him.

He must have seen the expression on her face, because he gave a bitter laugh as she took a seat across from him.

“Don’t worry, it’s not for you,” he’d said, holding up the string of beads for her to see. With a jolt she realized she’d seen it somewhere before. The tiny beads were pale blue. A handmade ceramic heart hung from the center of the necklace. It was painted navy with a smaller pink heart in the middle.

“Where did you get that?” Clancy asked, trying to remember where she’d seen it before.

“It’s part of my mother’s legacy,” Dex said.

His mother? “What are you doing here?” Clancy demanded, wishing she’d never come, wondering how he’d even known where to find her. She’d never told him about the family’s lake lodge. When she’d broken it off with him in Bozeman, she’d thought she’d never see him again. She felt a chill as she watched him hold the necklace up to the light and smile.

“What do you want, Dex?” Clancy asked with dread.

His eyes narrowed as he glared at her. “You’re part of that legacy, Clancy.”

She felt her fear level rise. How could she not have seen this side of him from the very start? “I thought we’d agreed not to see each other again.”

“We agreed?” He reached across the table and grabbed her arm, squeezing it until she cried out in pain.

“Leave me alone, Dex. I’m warning you—”

He squeezed harder. “If you think you’ve seen the last of me you’re—” He looked past her, seeing something that made his eyes widen. He released her arm almost involuntarily. She turned to look but saw nothing in the darkness beyond the café.

He lowered his voice. “I’m not leaving this island, Clancy. Not until I get what I deserve.” He’d hurried off, leaving her sitting, head reeling, wondering what he’d seen in the darkness that seemed to frighten him. And what Dex thought he deserved.

Just hours later, he’d turned up dead in her garret.

Now she stared at the tiny bead in her palm, knowing this had to be one of the beads from the necklace. Apprehension rippled through her as she stared at her sandy feet. Something had triggered her night wanderings again. And she couldn’t seem to stop them. Now she’d returned from sleepwalking with a single bead from a broken strand. When had it been broken? And where had she found this one blue bead? Even more frightening, how had she known where to look?

She slid her legs over the side of the bed and staggered into the bathroom. As she dropped the bead into the toilet and flushed, she watched it disappear with growing terror. She couldn’t keep kidding herself. Like the broken string of tiny blue beads, her life was coming unraveled.

Chapter Three

Clancy glanced warily across the bay at Jake Hawkins’s lodge. The shades were drawn; she could catch no sign of movement behind them. The blue outboard was still moored at his dock, a boat she assumed he’d rented to get to the island. She looked at her watch, surprised to find it was earlier than she’d thought. Then she turned her gaze again to Jake’s lodge across the small bay. The coast looked clear. She picked up the overnight bag and her purse and opened the back door, expecting Jake to suddenly appear and block her escape.

As she stepped out onto the small back porch, she glanced apprehensively behind the lodge. While she found no one hiding in the lilac bushes that brushed the back side of the building, she did see something that stopped her cold. Slowly she put down her purse and overnight bag and moved toward the first lilac bush. Some of the branches along the lodge side of the bush had been broken. They hadn’t been yesterday afternoon when she’d returned from jail. She was sure of it. She’d stopped on the porch to dig out her key and picked up the sweet scent of the lilacs, now in full bloom. And she wondered where she’d be this time next year when they bloomed. In prison?

Clancy brushed back the branches, not surprised to find the grass beneath the kitchen window crushed where someone had stood, looking in. Through the glass Clancy could see her coffee cup at the table, the chair pushed back from where she’d sat last night. Someone had stood on this very spot, watching her!

She crashed her way out of the lilacs as if the person was at her heels. Scooping up her purse and overnight bag, she rushed down the beach toward her dock. Who had been at the window? The same person who’d called her down to the dock and tried to drown her? It hadn’t been a dream, her mind screamed. No more than the crushed grass beneath the window.

With relief she passed the old boathouse, and Jake didn’t jump out of the shadows to stop her. All that stretched ahead now was the dock and her boat waiting beside it. The sun danced on the slick surface of the lake, golden. The tall pines shimmered, a silky green at the edge of the water. She took a calming breath. The air smelled of so many familiar, rich scents. Safe scents she’d grown up with. But she was no longer safe. From Jake. From the phantom in the lake. From the real live person who’d stood looking in her window. As long as she kept sleepwalking, she wasn’t even safe from herself.

She reached the dock without incident and started down it, walking as quickly and quietly as possible. A sudden flash of memory tormented her. A hand coming out of the water. Grabbing her ankle. Pulling her. She walked faster, fear dogging her steps.

Just a few feet ahead she could see her boat, a yellow-and-white inboard-outboard; a coat of dew on the top and windshield glistened in the morning sunlight. Once she reached it and started the engine, Jake wouldn’t be able to stop her. The thought buoyed her spirits.

She shot a parting glance toward his lodge. Jake must still be asleep. He’d been so adamant about shadowing her every step last night, this seemed almost too easy. She smiled to herself, imagining his surprise when he woke and found her gone, as she untied the bow and started to swing her overnight bag into the hull.

“Good morning!”

Clancy jumped, nearly tumbling backward off the dock. She swallowed a startled cry, pretending she wasn’t trying to get away and his catching her wasn’t a problem. Jake grinned up at her from the bottom of her boat, where he lay sprawled on a sleeping bag, his arms behind his head.

“Going somewhere?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at the overnight bag still clutched in her hand.

She cursed under her breath.

“If you’re set on a life of crime, Ms. Jones, you’re going to have to be more devious,” he said, getting to his feet. “And jumping bail.” He wagged his head at her. “Bad idea.”

Clancy groaned. This man was the most irritating—She took a breath, trying to still her anger as well as the silly sudden flutter of her heart as he vaulted effortlessly from the boat to join her on the dock.

“Level with me, Clancy,” he said, his voice as soft and deep as his gray eyes.

The sound sent a tiny vibration through her, igniting memories of the chemistry between the two of them as teenagers. She wondered if it was still there and hastily brushed that errant thought away.

Having to deal with this man on top of everything else was too much, she told herself. She didn’t have the time or energy for this. Nor did she need the constant reminder of what she’d lost ten years ago—or how much more she had to lose now.

“Where are you going so early in the morning?” he asked as he stalked toward her, backing her against the edge of the dock, trapping her.

Clancy had to tilt her chin back to meet his gaze. He’d cornered her in more ways than one. And she acknowledged that it wasn’t going to be easy to get rid of him. But getting rid of him was exactly what she had to do if she held any hope of clearing herself.

“If you must know,” she said, coming up with the first plausible explanation that popped into her head, “I’m going to see my lawyer.”

Jake pushed back his baseball cap. “Good, I need to see your lawyer, too.”