A Deadly Reunion (13 page)

I didn’t like the look in Nancy’s eye
though; it was deeply unsettling. I also thoroughly believed that
there was safety in numbers. And right now, despite my wavering
feelings for the man, I was counting Denver as a friend. So yeah, I
nuzzled up to him, getting as close as I could without pulling him
back into the electrifying kiss Nancy had interrupted.

“You don’t remember him? How could you not
remember him?” Nancy asked accusingly.

“He changed his name.” Denver now took a
step backwards, his arms still held wide and stiff. In fact, he
didn’t put them down until he accidentally banged into my chest and
quickly coughed a “sorry.”

“From what?” I was happy to turn my
attention off Nancy and back onto the world’s biggest jerk – or the
world’s hottest motel man. The jury was still out on that. Yeah,
I’d been about to indulge in a fling with Denver before Nancy had
barged in, but now the heat of passion was abating and cold reason
reminded me it would likely end in tears.

“Do you remember Steve Marshall?”

I bit my bottom lip and rolled it around
against my teeth. Then it struck me.

“The shit stirrer who spent most of his time
bragging about implausible conquests while systematically picking
on every girl in Wetlake?” I hazarded.

Denver nodded, eyeing Nancy warily as he
took another step back and closer to me.

Maybe Denver believed there was safety in
numbers too – or perhaps if Nancy tried anything again, he’d just
scoop me up in his arms and claim he was already busy.

I gave a twisted little smile at that
thought, yet it quickly soured when I remembered someone had just
been murdered.

Steve Marshall.

Okay, I’d hardly known him. He’d just been
another bully at a high school I’d already hated.

Now he was dead.

I placed my shaking hand on my stomach.

Denver flicked his gaze over me.

He would know what I was thinking.

Amongst the concern, horror, and grief, that
spark of paranoia caught fire.

There’d been another murder.

James Wood clearly hadn’t been an
accident.

Someone was going through my reunion
class.

“
Hank had made a name for himself as a big
shot radio-host down the East Coast,” Nancy suddenly filled in.
“It’s just... so senseless for someone to kill him. He’d made such
a success of himself. The same with James. Why would someone want
to kill those guys?” She brought her hands up and covered her face
with them. Sobbing loudly, her chest punched in and out as if it
were a ventilator pump for an oxygen machine.

While no doubt she intended it to be
distracting, Denver didn’t react.

He was only looking at me.

Though I wanted to hate the guy and I really
wanted to stay away from him, right then he pulled me in.

There was something so darn reassuring and
reliable about the quality of his fixed gaze that I could almost
pretend Nancy wasn’t in the room anymore.

“Oh, Denver, you have to do something. You
work for the FBI. That’s why I knew I had to find you and tell you
this unspeakable news.” Nancy pushed herself forward, her hands
still covering her face.

While she clearly intended for Denver to
jump in and wrap those solid and strong arms of his around her
back, pulling her into a passionate and yet supportive hug, he
clearly didn’t intend to do that.

Instead he took another step back and closer
to me until he brushed right up against my arm.

“The local police are dealing with this
case,” he began.

“Police? But you’re an agent for the
Government. Isn’t there something – anything – you can do? I would
just feel so much safer knowing that you’re here for us, for
me.”

“Wetlake Police Department is doing
everything it can. And if this case requires escalation beyond this
jurisdiction, we will escalate it. Rest assured everyone will be
doing everything to catch this killer.” Denver straightened as he
spoke. He also slipped into what sounded like a rehearsed set of
statements. “Right now, Nance, I suggest you go to your room and
get yourself a glass of water. I’ll go make some polite enquiries
with my brother.”

Polite? More like pointed and delivered on
the tips of his bone-white knuckles.

I didn’t interrupt though. I just waited
until Denver eventually managed to force Nancy out of the room.

Without a word to me, he silently closed the
door and crossed to the middle of the room, plucking out his
cellphone as he did.

I stood there and watched in total silence,
my arms hooked tight around my middle.

Though he held my gaze, he fidgeted as he
waited for his call to go through. Running his thumb over his nose
and jaw, he tapped the phone with his fingers and scraped his stiff
lips across his clenched teeth.

“Shit,” he managed eventually, “Thorne’s not
picking up.”

“Is that any surprise?”

“He might hate me, but he knows how to do
his job. He also knows – deep down – that I’m only trying to help.”
Denver pocketed the phone and ran his hands over his head, no doubt
letting the short stubble of his crew-cut pluck against his fingers
and palms.

“
What...” I tried to ask what we’d do
next.

I couldn’t force the words through my choppy
and erratic breath. Heck, that I was breathing at all was a bloody
miracle. My chest was such a tight mess of emotion and shock it
felt like it was turning to stone.

“I’m going to go and try and find out about
this murder. See if I can confirm what Nancy told us.”

“
Denver, that’s not...” I trailed off,
about to point out that was not what I wanted to know. I needed him
to tell me what I had to do next, if I was going to be next. By the
sounds of it, Hank Reaver had made a true success of himself,
lending yet more evidence to my theory that the killer of Wetlake
High was going after its most successful graduates.

I stopped myself though. I couldn’t be this
selfish. Not now. Not when the news of Hank’s murder had just
broken.

Denver took a long time to face me. In fact,
he looked solidly around the room until he stared at my feet. Then
he flicked his penetrating gaze all the way up to my face. “Patti,
you have to trust me, we’ll do everything we can to figure out
what’s going on here. And if you are in danger, we will take
immediate and effective steps to mitigate any threat.”

There he went again, sounding as if he’d
rehearsed every one of his words. There was undeniable comfort
behind them though, so I forced a breath and managed a nod.

“I’m going to go and find out what’s going
on.” Denver nodded towards the door.

Panic suddenly filled me. Hard and palpable,
it felt like something sharp had made its way into my very veins
and arteries. “No, Denver, I can’t stay here.”

“No you can’t. That’s why you’re coming with
me.”

Though he spoke quickly and directly, I
swear there was a slight smile behind his words.

Nodding firmly, I took another enormous
breath. Though my chest punched out about a mile, Denver didn’t
glance down at it once. With all his attention, he focused like a
laser on my eyes.

I was starting to realize I’d underestimated
Denver Scott. Maybe I’d been too quick to judge the guy. Perhaps
I’d been too willing to bury that epic teenage crush.

Under all the questions and the grumpiness,
Denver was still there, just as simmering hot as ever.

“Get your jacket, grab a bottle of water,
and meet me in my car.” He walked past me and started to open the
door.

He stopped.

His brow crumpled with confusion.

He looked like he desperately wanted to ask
me something. For a man who was entirely comfortable with pouncing
upon you with question after question, it was remarkable to note
how indecisive he looked right now.

I didn’t need to be a clairvoyant to realize
what he wanted to ask and why he didn’t want to ask it.

What, if anything, had just happened between
us?

It was a question I couldn’t actually
answer, so rather than give him the time to ask it, I grabbed up my
bottle, trundled into the bathroom to fill it, and then met him
back at the door with a sharp nod.

“
Patti...” he began, turning to me
slowly.

I reached past him for the door handle and
tugged it open. I barely met his gaze. Shit, I was doing it again –
trying to hide from him while standing right next to him.

I practically raced out the door, though not
too fast, and I certainly didn’t get too far ahead.

While I was trying assiduously to avoid
having that conversation with Denver, I hadn’t lost my mind
completely.

Out there could be someone who wanted me
dead. From ax-wielding woodsmen to vengeful nanas to plain old
psychopaths.

There had been two murders in the space of
two days.

Shaking, and feeling cold and confused, I
trampled over the short grass and over to the car park.

I turned, pressing my back hard into the
passenger-seat door as I waited for Denver. Glancing up when I
realized he was taking too long, I saw him slowly pacing up and
down in front of my room while he held his cellphone hard against
his ear. Though I couldn’t see his face too well, I bet he glanced
my way more than once, and I bet his brow furrowed with
incalculable confusion at the same time.

“Stop being an idiot,” I told myself through
a whispered breath, “either get over it or do something about
it.”

Before I could decide whether I really
wanted to get over Denver Scott, something happened.

That something was a scream.

Loud and penetrating, it came from one of
the motel rooms.

Though I was all the way outside, the shrill
quality of it still made me jump with surprise, my jacket snagging
on the door handle of Denver’s car.

Denver pivoted on his foot, dropping the
phone to his side.

Then he ran forward.

My heart was a beating, wild mess in my
chest, and my mouth was bone dry like the sands of the Sahara.

Suddenly one of the motel doors burst open
and someone flung themselves out.

I took several darted steps forward, eyes so
wide open they started to sting.

I waited to see blood, to see the flash of a
knife, to hear the ear-splitting bang of a gun.

Nothing.

Except for Nancy.

She came pelting out of the room as if Death
itself chased her.

Denver reached her just as Nancy fell and
slammed hard against the concrete of the porch.

She was still shouting, screaming at the top
of her lungs, her words a jumbled mess.

No longer frozen to the spot, I pushed
forward. Slow at first, once I hit the grass, I managed a jerky
jog. “What’s going on?”

No one answered me. Instead Denver leant
down to Nancy then snapped up and entered her room.

If my heart had been a wild mess before, now
I lost all connection to it. As my fear and panic peaked, a cold
wash of dread passed over me detaching me from every sensation as a
fog filled my mind.

“Denver?” I called out to him. “Denver?
What’s going on?”

I made it up the steps of the porch, my
knees wobbling everywhere.

Nancy was still on the ground, sobbing, her
hair drawn in a tangled mess over her face and arms.

I didn’t like the woman, and probably never
would, but that didn’t stop me from leaning down and trying to
comfort her. As I did, I saw other doors opening as people popped
their heads out to see what was going on.

“What’s going on?” the kid from reception
called out as he pelted across the lawn.

I had no frigging idea; Nancy was a
screaming mess and Denver had disappeared into her room without a
word.

“Nancy, are you okay?” I asked, not
expecting an answer. As I did, I tried to lean back to glance in
through her half-open door.

Before I could peer around it, Denver
appeared.

His face was ashen white.

If there had been any doubt in my mind that
this was serious, it dried up in the exact ghostly quality of his
gaze.

The kid from reception reached us. He gave
Nancy a freaked-out glance before trying to duck past Denver to get
into her room.

Denver put a hand up and stopped him in
place.

“I work here,” the kid snapped, “if there’s
something wrong with the room—”

“And I work for the FBI. This is now a crime
scene. I’ve already contacted the police, and they are on their
way. I need you to keep people away from this room and to try to
calm the other guests down.”

“Hold on, how the hell do I know you’re in
the FBI, man?” the kid spluttered, still trying to lean past
Denver.

Denver reached into his pocket and drew out
his wallet. “You got any questions, you call the FBI and you quote
the number on my badge.”

The kid swallowed. He obviously realized
this was not some game and shit had very much just gotten real.

I slowly stood up. “Denver...?”

“Patti, just stay there with Nancy.”

“What’s in the room?” I too tried to lean
past Denver. “What’s going on?”

“The police are on their way,” he dodged
around my question deftly.

Wordlessly I stared at him. I knew that no
matter how much I questioned him, he wasn’t going to reveal a
thing.

So I just stood there and waited. Feeling
cold all over and hardly capable of drawing a breath, I watched in
a daze as the police arrived, drawing into the car park at full
pelt, their tires skidding over the gravel.

Flashbacks of the body at the reunion
haunted my mind, and the lights of the squad cars sent cold
memories of the aftermath seeping through my bones. Though I stood
there in dazed astonishment – exactly as I had after I’d found
James’ body – at some point I was told to return to my room.