Vows of Silence

“Chelsea’s going to try out for the junior-high cheerleading squad next year.” Melinda placed the tea and sugar in front of Lacy. Her eyes shone with motherly pride. “The gymnastics coach says she’s a natural. Chuckie’s too academic minded to be concerned with sports, but Chelsea loves it. Dance, cheerleading, you name it. Just like we used to do,” she tacked on with a futile attempt at a smile.

“That’s great.” Lacy tried hard to pay attention as her oldest and dearest friend doted on her children, but the past kept nudging her. Voices, images, emotions. He’s dead. My God, what happened? He’s dead! I didn’t do it. Are you accusing me? It doesn’t matter who did it. It only matters that it’s done. We’re all in this together.

Equally guilty.

Lacy sipped her tea and struggled to zero in on Melinda’s nervous chattering. A sheen of perspiration moistened Lacy’s skin despite her best efforts to tamp down the mounting panic. She resisted the urge to swipe her palms against her thighs.

He’s dead.

Oh, my God. What do we do?

“You just won’t believe how tall he is, but basketball is the farthest thing from his mind,” Melinda gushed. “All he wants to do is read or work at his computer.”

Hold that damned door open. Lacy started, her pulse tripping, as the cold, harsh order reverberated in her head as if it had only just been issued. They had half carried, half dragged Charles’s body down the stairs and into the kitchen. When Lacy had tried to back through the door leading to the garage, she had knocked it shut. She could feel the dead weight of his body even now. He was so heavy. So…lifeless. Even the shower curtain they’d had him wrapped up in couldn’t disguise the feel of death. The door, Lacy, hold the damned door, Cassidy had barked.

Lacy’s hands trembled. She tightened her grip on the dainty white porcelain cup and forced her fingers to still. The hollow thud of the closing trunk lid echoed in her head. She tensed at the remembered sound. They had shoved Charles into the trunk and closed it. Cassidy had driven his Mercedes to the lake, Lacy followed in her rental car…the hastily packed suitcase from Charles’s room in her back seat.

One final glimpse of silver had winked at her as the Mercedes disappeared beneath the water’s murky surface. And then he was gone.

Lacy forced down another sip of her tea, her throat so fiercely dry she could barely swallow. They had thought of everything. When the police investigated and the suitcase and missing clothes from his closet were noticed it would make it look as if Charles had suddenly left town. He had a reputation for drinking and womanizing. No one would ever be the wiser. Cassidy had carefully chosen the deepest and most obscure area of the lake accessible by car. The unexpected and unusually heavy snowfall later that night had hidden any tracks they might have left. When the thaw came, sending the winter blanket melting into the lake, any leftover tracks had eroded as well. Even Mother Nature had been on their side.

We won’t speak of this again. It’s done. We’re in this together. Equally guilty.

It was the perfect cover-up…the perfect crime. Until some fisherman had to go and get himself drowned in the swollen waters of the lake after torrential rains last week. The rescue operation had dredged up more than the poor fisherman.

The cup clattered onto its saucer. Hot tea splashed over Lacy’s hand, and spilled onto the counter’s smooth white surface.

“Damn.” Lacy dabbed at the pool of brown liquid with her napkin.

“It’s all right, I’ve got it.” Melinda quickly mopped up the mess with a hand towel. “Did you burn yourself? I’ll get the aloe.”

Lacy licked the stinging patch of skin at the vee of her thumb and forefinger. “It’s nothing.” She blew out a disgusted breath. She had to pull herself together. “Sorry about the mess.”

Melinda frowned, searching Lacy’s face, then her eyes. Resigned to what she found there, Melinda murmured, “We’re in really big trouble, aren’t we?”

Manufacturing a confident expression, Lacy made a sound of denial in her throat. “’Course not. We’re going to be fine. When Cassidy gets here, she’ll know how to fix everything. She’s a damn good attorney, one of the best in San Francisco. She’ll keep us out of trouble.”

Melinda clasped the damp towel, desperation etching itself across her worried features. She shook her head slowly from side to side in defeat. “For ten years I’ve been free.” She stared down at her hands. “It wasn’t nearly long enough, Lacy. I don’t want to go to prison and not be able to finish raising my children.” She paused to compose herself. “Charles made my life a living nightmare our entire marriage. He took and took and took…” Her voice trailed off as she shook her head again. “I don’t want him to take any more.”

Lacy placed her hand over Melinda’s. “We won’t let that happen.” She swallowed the last of the uncertainty clogging her throat. “I won’t let that happen.”

Tears shining in her eyes, Melinda nodded her agreement. “You’re right. Cassidy will know what to do. We’ll be fine.”

Lacy blinked back the moisture gathering in her own eyes and glanced around the haunting kitchen. Snippets of memories best forgotten flitted like a slide show amid the other whirling thoughts in her head. She could feel the panic surging once more, threatening her own frail composure like the angry waves of the ocean pounding the shore during a violent storm.

“Come on, let’s get out of here.” She scooted off her stool and tugged Melinda toward the door. “We need to find some neutral territory.”

“What about the others?” Melinda reminded, hesitant to leave the house.

“We’ll leave them a note.”

Lacy had to get out of this house. She couldn’t stand one more minute of the voices…the images…the memories.

She had to find someplace where she could think. Someplace away from the scene of the crime.

Away from the reality of what they had done one desperate night all those years ago.

Chapter 2

O’Malleys was crowded at five o’clock in the afternoon. The bar that extended the length of the establishment was lined with patrons glad to have the workday behind them. Brightly lit beer signs and the same dancing neon leprechauns added whimsy to the Irish decor Lacy remembered from her senior year in high school. O’Malleys was the place to be even if you were underage and Coca-Cola was the only thing you could order.

Authentic items picked up on the family’s annual trips to their homeland embellished the walls. The barrage of windows that faced the street were shuttered in true Irish style, lending privacy as well as ambience. No big-screen TVs would be found here, only the small one at the bar. People came to O’Malleys for the imported beer, the conversation and the occasional darts contest. Two things could be counted on at the most popular pub in Ashland—lots of noise and enough people that blending into the crowd would be effortless. No one ever paid attention to what anyone else was doing. It was a kind of unspoken rule.

An Irish folk selection emanated from the jukebox as Lacy and Melinda settled into a booth at the back of the dimly lit establishment. “Two beers, please,” Lacy told the waitress, who appeared reluctant to leave their table without an order. The place was too busy for the help to dawdle, she supposed. And getting the waitress’s attention again might not be an easy feat.

When the perky young woman scurried away in a flash of Kelly-green short shorts and long tanned legs, Lacy directed her attention across the table to Melinda. “This is better, don’t you think?”

Melinda surveyed their boisterous environment. “When we were teenagers it was better.” She smiled faintly. “Now it’s just loud.”

Lacy laughed, a weary but relieved sound. Man, they were getting old. She’d turned thirty-three last month. Melinda, the youngest of the group, was next in line. She was an Independence Day baby. How had so much time passed so very quickly?

“We’re not that old,” Lacy protested, more in an effort to convince herself than her friend. “We could still party with the best of these guys if the urge came over us.” She glanced at the twenty-somethings clustered around the bar. Fashionably thin and dressed in the latest fads, they weren’t really that different from Lacy and Melinda ten years ago.

Before that night.

Lacy swallowed, her muscles constricting with the effort. He’s dead. We’re in this together.

The waitress plunked two chilled mugs of foamy beer before them. “Anything else?”

Shaking off the memories she’d come here to get away from, Lacy lifted her mug and took a sip of the refreshing beverage. She licked her lips as the cool liquid slid down her parched throat. “We’re good,” she replied, dismissing the long-legged waitress with the impossibly large breasts she had only just now noticed. She shook her head as the woman hurried to a table where three men waved their empty mugs, tongues practically lolling out of their mouths more from the tremendous boobs headed their way than the lack of hops in their glasses.

“What’s wrong?” Melinda ventured cautiously.

Lacy glanced down at her own minimal chest then at her friend. “Those breasts can’t be real.” She arrowed her gaze in the direction of the waitress. “Hell, they don’t even jiggle, and she can’t possibly be wearing a support bra under that skintight tank top.”

Melinda watched the woman flit from table to table. “You’re right.” She frowned, considering. “You know, I think that’s Wade Hall’s youngest daughter. I’ll bet her daddy sprang for a boob job in hopes of getting rid of her. All of her sisters are married already. You know how it is around here. If you’re still single when you turn twenty-five, they think you’re an old maid and an embarrassment to the family.”

“Well,” Lacy said, and shrugged, still tracking the perky waitress’s progress, “they certainly detract from the crooked teeth and slightly crossed eyes.”

A bark of laughter burst from Melinda, the sound almost painful. Lacy smiled, thankful for even that bit of relief from the tension. “It’s true,” she insisted, restraining her own building mirth and hoping to encourage Mel’s. “I wonder if her daddy even considered an orthodontist and an ophthalmologist before he coughed up the dough for the tits?”

Melinda laughed outright then, and once she got started, she couldn’t stop. When the non-jiggling waitress bounced past once more, Lacy erupted into her own fit of elation. She laughed until tears streamed down her face. It felt too good to stop. Each time her eyes met Melinda’s, the convulsive laughter started all over again.

“This is definitely not the scene I expected.”

Lacy’s head shot up at the sound of Cassidy’s crisp voice. The fourth member of their group, Kira, stood right behind her. “You guys made it!” Swiping at her damp cheeks, Lacy scooted out of the booth and stood to give Cassidy and then Kira a hug. Melinda did the same.

“Was there any doubt?” Kira drew back and smiled at Lacy. “Girl, you look good.”

“So do you.” Lacy surveyed her friend with approval. “I love your hair longer.”

Kira touched her shoulder-length, corkscrew curls. “The curls I hated growing up are all the envy now.” She winked. “Besides, Brian likes it this way.” A cell phone chirped and Kira dug into her purse. “Speak of the devil, this will probably be him.”

Lacy vaguely remembered that Kira had gotten engaged to a Brian earlier this year. She couldn’t recall Kira looking better, or happier. Despite being black in small-town Alabama, Kira had been accepted without condition considering the Jacksons were quite wealthy. Even a mere twenty years ago that had been a major feat. Kira turned her back and lowered her voice but Lacy heard the sudden tension in her tone. The change dragged Lacy out of the past. Apparently Brian wasn’t happy about Kira’s unplanned trip south.

Trying not to be nosy, Lacy shifted her attention back to the leader of their little posse. Cassidy. Still striking in her own right, Cassidy’s dark auburn hair remained short, with not so much as a strand out of place. The unusual color of her hair and the sparkling green eyes provided a vivid contrast to her pale, porcelain skin and sharply defined features.

Guilt suddenly swamped Lacy. It had been too long since they’d all gotten together. Years. Three to be exact. Not since the memorial service for Charles, and then the visit had been excruciatingly brief. Seven years after his inexplicable disappearance he had been deemed deceased by the powers that be. The girls had assembled in support of Melinda and her children…and they hadn’t been back together since.

They should never have allowed so much time to pass. She sighed and gave Cassidy’s arm a squeeze. “Cass, it’s been too long. You look terrific.”

“Life is good, what can I say?” Cassidy cocked her head and fixed Lacy with an analyzing expression. “You didn’t tell me you made senior partner at your firm.”

Lacy felt a flush of embarrassment rush up her neck. She should have done a better job of keeping up with her friends. “This has been a busy year. I don’t think I’ve written anyone.”

“You do have e-mail, don’t you?” Cassidy looked more hurt than accusing. “Everyone else in the world does.”

The road had been long and hard for Cass. Though smart and beautiful, this deep in the Bible belt there were some things that came as close as you could get to the un-pardonable, despite family wealth. Choosing not to go along with the set standard of sexual preference fell slap into that category in these parts. But in San Francisco it was a whole different world. Cassidy was no longer an outcast. She was a partner in a prestigious law firm.

“Besides,” Lacy teased placatingly, “I couldn’t let you get too far ahead of me.”

Cassidy smiled briefly, then turned to Melinda. “How are you holding up, Mel?”

“I’m managing,” she said, but her voice wavered in spite of her brave smile.

“Are you guys staying?” The big-breasted waitress wanted to know, no doubt already counting on a larger tip with two additions to the table. She eyed Kira suspiciously.

Lacy tensed. Had nothing changed in this damned town? The color of one’s skin shouldn’t dictate the quality of service.

“We’ll have what our friends are having,” Kira replied as she dropped her phone back into her bag. “Unless you have a problem with that.”

The waitress shrugged one bare shoulder, and her expression instantly shifted to indifferent. “Whatever.”

Kira turned back to her friends and added offhandedly, “Anything that could have you two howling with laughter considering our current predicament and is legal in this state, I definitely want some of.” She scooted into the booth they’d vacated and Melinda settled in next to her.

Lacy didn’t bother explaining the “joke.” Especially considering Kira had gotten a boob job herself shortly after graduating from college.

“I think the episode we witnessed is called hysteria,” Cassidy commented as she and Lacy slid into the booth across from Melinda and Kira.

As usual, she was too close to the mark. “We decided not to talk about the investigation until you two got here,” Lacy explained. “Mel wasn’t ready.”

“I’m still not,” she muttered, intent on her nearly empty mug as if it were a crystal ball containing all the right answers.

“Have you been interviewed by the police?” Cassidy demanded, ignoring Melinda’s comment and cutting right to the chase. “Do you have an attorney yet? You’re going to need a good one just to show the D.A.’s office you don’t intend to take any unnecessary grief.”

“I did that already. Got my attorney I mean. But Chief Summers didn’t really question me,” Mel said thoughtfully. “He came by the house this morning and told me that an investigation was in progress and that he would keep me informed.”

“That’s all?” Cassidy prodded, clearly suspect.

Melinda nodded. “He was actually the one who suggested that I contact my attorney to find out the legal ramifications of—” she swallowed tightly “—of this new development. He said it would be in my best interest.”

“Summers?” Lacy stiffened. “Do you mean Rick Summers?”

“You remember him, don’t you?” Melinda massaged her left temple as if an ache had started there. “I think he had a crush on you back in high school.”

Lacy wasn’t sure a crush was an adequate description of what she and Rick had shared. She had never been able to put that night completely out of her mind. Rick Summers wasn’t the kind of guy a girl could forget that easily.

“He’s the one who came by the hospital when…” It was Kira’s turn to falter this time. “Oh, Jesus.” Kira closed her eyes and let go a heavy breath. “We’re screwed.”

A chill sank clear through to Lacy’s bones.

Charles Ashland, Junior, was dead. Murdered. It was no longer their secret.

Kira was right. They were screwed.

Tense silence cocooned the group for a long, awkward moment as if they were on a deserted island instead of in the middle of a crowded pub.

How could this have happened? Lacy shuddered inside. They were all good girls. Happy kids, excellent students. Never once had they ever been in trouble. They’d grown up carefree and with life served up to them on a silver platter. Except Melinda. Her parents had lost everything when she was just starting her junior year. Then, after graduation, when Lacy and the others had gone off to their preppy private universities, Melinda had stayed home and married the town’s golden boy because she’d gotten pregnant.

Nothing had been right since.

The waitress paused at their table long enough to plop down two more frosty mugs of beer. No one made any effort to thank her or even to sip their drinks.

Nothing would ever be right again.

Between their hectic schedules at college and Melinda’s two pregnancies, the four hadn’t seen much of one another those four or five years immediately following high school until the reunion. And even the reunion hadn’t been on time. The committee had decided a Christmas reunion would insure higher attendance. Most of the alumni returned home during the Christmas holiday.

Maybe it was fate…or the devil himself. That reunion had brought them back together in more ways than one. They had done what had to be done and then they had been united in their vow of silence.

Lacy had come home several times since then. She’d made it a point to stop by and see Melinda, but everything was different after that long-ago night. Too many secrets…too much pain.

“They’re going to charge me with murder, I know it.” Melinda’s hand shook, and she immediately tucked it beneath the table and visibly grappled for control.

“They can’t.”

All gazes flew to Cassidy.

“They’ll use the money, the property, his drinking and the other women.” Cassidy morphed into hotshot attorney right before their eyes. “They’ll use the physical and mental abuse if they get wind of it. Anything they can dig up, they will. And they’ll have enough motivation for a dozen murders.” She drew in a calming breath, released it slowly. “But they don’t have a murder weapon, and they don’t have a single shred of evidence against you.”

“Will that keep us in the clear?” Kira said slowly.

Cassidy smiled, one of those sly, barely a cut above sinister, lawyerly kind of smiles. “They can’t even arraign anyone without sufficient evidence, no matter how strong the motive. Any judge would throw it out. Hell,” she added, “any district attorney worth his salt wouldn’t even pursue it under the circumstances.”

“Thank God,” Melinda said softly, her relief palpable.

“So what do we do?” Lacy feared that things would never be quite that simple. Nothing ever was—at least not where Charles Ashland, Junior, was concerned.

“We lay low.” Cassidy looked from one to the other. “We provide moral support for each other as we always have, but our primary objective is to insure that no one lets down their guard and makes a mistake.”

“A mistake?” Kira’s eyebrows drew together in question. “What kind of mistake?”

“No one knows our secret.” Cassidy studied each of them in turn. “Only the four of us know what really happened. The water and other elements have long since destroyed any fingerprints or trace evidence we might have left on or in the car. There’s nothing to find in the house.” She turned to Lacy. “The suitcase was taken care of?”

She nodded quickly. A frame of memory—her digging relentlessly into the cold, hard earth as the snow fell around her—flashed through her mind. “There’s no way anyone would ever find it.” Not where she’d buried it.

Again Cassidy looked from one to the other, her pointed gaze settling lastly on Lacy. “I also assume that any other evidence was handled as carefully.”

For the space of two beats, Lacy had the distinct impression that everyone at the table was waiting for her to confess having knowledge of some other pertinent detail or item.

“Can I get you ladies anything else?”

The tension shrank to a more tolerable level with the intrusion. “I’m fine,” Lacy muttered. She had to get past this silly paranoia.

“No more for me.” Melinda shook her head, her face as pale with worry now as it had been earlier when Lacy had first seen her at her door.

“We’re fine,” Cassidy assured the waitress, who quickly left in search of thirsty patrons.

“So you’re saying that all we have to do is stay calm and this will blow over,” Lacy suggested.

“That’s right. We keep our mouths shut and this investigation will die a natural death.”

“But it could drag on for weeks,” Kira said abruptly, her words echoing Lacy’s precise thought.

Cassidy leveled a firm glare on her. “We’ll do whatever we have to do for however long it takes.”

“But—”

“We’re in this together,” she said, ruthlessly cutting Kira off. “Equally guilty. We stick together until it’s over. Like we always have in the past. No buts. If we do anything differently, then people will get suspicious. Call your respective offices, let them know it could be days or weeks. Agreed?”

The hesitation was gone. Kira nodded. “I can work from here to some extent. So I guess I’m agreed.”

Cassidy turned to Melinda and waited for her to voice her understanding, as well.

“Agreed.”

“Lacy?” Cassidy shifted in the booth to look directly at her.

“Of course.” Lacy blinked, the words they’d chanted all those years ago reverberating inside her.

…never tell a soul…complete silence…forever…and ever.

“Well, if this isn’t just like old times.”

The deep male voice vibrated through Lacy like a lightning bolt.

Rick.

Her head went up. She couldn’t help the way her greedy eyes lingered on him in the seconds that followed as greetings were exchanged by all around her. There was no way Lacy could be in the same room with Rick Summers and be unaffected.

He had matured into a heart-stopping, handsome man. But then he’d always been extraordinarily good-looking. All the girls had thought so. His black hair was shorter than before, but it suited him. His body looked lean and hard still. Lacy remembered how the taut muscles of his chest had felt beneath her inexperienced fingers. And the way he’d gentled his eager hands so that his touch had been tender despite the lust raging through his young body. No other man had ever touched her quite that way.

“Lacy.” He was looking at her now and she couldn’t ignore him. Not then…not now…probably not ever.

“Hello, Rick.”

“It’s good to see you.” His voice was deeper, huskier than before, but there was no mistaking the underlying tension there. His expression grew harder, more intense the longer he looked at her. Was he remembering as she was?

“It’s nice to see you, too.” Lacy broke away from those disturbing gray eyes and sipped her warm beer.

“Is there anything I can do for you, Melinda?” he asked, his tone sincere.

Melinda managed a decent attempt at a smile. “I don’t think there’s anything anyone can do,” she offered listlessly.