On Her Side

Besides, without Griffin’s help, without the information he could provide, would a P.I. be able to track down Dale? What were the chances someone in the private sector could do so when the police had failed?

She toed off her shoes, began to pace in front of her desk, the low-pile, pewter carpet rough against her bare feet. Maybe Griffin’s refusal to help was fate’s way of telling her to back off. Maybe it was her salvation.

She shut her eyes and could’ve sworn she heard the Hallelujah chorus. She could blow off this whole idea right now by calling the P.I. and telling him she changed her mind.

Wouldn’t everyone be thrilled if she decided to finally be the meek, mild-mannered girl those who took her at face value expected her to be? The girl her family had long ago stopped hoping she’d turn into. One who didn’t make waves, didn’t cause problems and kept her mouth shut. Who sat back and let her older sisters and father take care of everything. Who trusted things would somehow magically work out with no help, input or manipulation from her.

Yes, she could do that. And she would. Right after she gave herself a lobotomy with a cereal spoon.

Trust me, the best thing that could happen for everyone is for Dale to remain missing. Leave the past alone.

Griffin’s words floated through her mind…strengthened her resolve. She dug her phone out of her purse and placed a call.

“Good morning,” a perky female voice said. “Thank you for calling Hepfer Investigations. How may I help you?”

“Uh…good morning.” She cleared her throat. “This is Nora Sullivan. I have an appointment with Mr. Hepfer Thursday at five.” Her fingers tensed on the phone. “I’d like to reschedule.”

“Of course, Miss Sullivan. What day works best for you?”

“Actually I’d like to offer Mr. Hepfer twice his normal consultation fee if he can meet with me in Mystic Point. Today.”

Leave the past alone?

No way in hell.

* * *

“AFTERNOON,” SOMEONE CALLED later that day as he walked into Griffin’s garage.

Griffin rolled out from underneath the Impala he was working on, sat up and nodded. “Can I help you?” he asked.

The man, Jimmy if the script written on the left of his blue uniform shirt was anything to go by, held out a clipboard. “I just need you to sign here and tell me where you want it.”

Griffin glanced at the clipboard then got to his feet and wiped his hands on the rag he kept in his back pocket. “I never sign for something I didn’t order.”

“This Eddie’s Service?” Checking his paperwork, Jimmy frowned. His stomach hung over his belt, strained the buttons of his shirt. “At 1414 Willard Avenue?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re Griffin York?”

“That’s right.”

“Then it’s your delivery,” Jimmy said mulishly, holding out the clipboard again.

This time Griffin took the paperwork, skimmed it. He had no idea why his name and the garage address were listed under delivery recipient. “I didn’t order a ’69 Firebird,” he said, handing the clipboard back. “And I haven’t been hired to do a restoration on one.”

Jimmy scratched his round head, knocking his hat off center. “Says here—” He flipped a page, scanned it. “The owner’s name is Tanner Johnston. He a customer of yours?”

“No,” Griffin said. Tanner Johnston. Hadn’t he always known the quiet, seemingly harmless ones were who you had to look out for most? “Not a customer.”

“I gotta call my supervisor.” Jimmy’s face was red and sweat dotted his upper lip and brow. Guy looked like he was one heavy breath away from a heart attack. “See what he wants me to do.”

Griffin lifted a shoulder. “Suit yourself.”

While Jimmy pulled out his cell phone, Griffin went outside, too damned curious not to. Squinting against the bright afternoon sun, its warmth beating down on his head, he crossed the lot toward a shiny blue truck bearing the name of a towing company from Boston on its side.

Hands in his pockets, he circled the back of the truck where the remnants of what could possibly have been, at one time, a red—or maybe orange—Firebird sat on two front bald tires. The body looked like it was held together with rubber bands and a prayer. There was no rear end, no front grille and it looked as if the car had been overrun by leaves and possibly squirrels. He hopped onto the back of the truck, peered into the interior. Gutted. Seats, carpets and dash.

He eyed the hood. Opened it warily. Sighed. No motor. No transmission. He let the hood shut, brushed off his hands.

A tan minivan pulled slowly into the lot, creeping to a stop at the back of the truck. A moment later, Tanner Johnston, star center for Mystic Point’s varsity basketball team, unfolded himself from behind the steering wheel.

Tanner shut the door and studied Griffin. Christ, but he hated when the kid did that, looked at him as if he could read his mind. See into his very soul. Gave him the creeps.

“Hey,” Tanner said, walking toward Griffin in his usual easy pace. The only time the kid moved fast was on the basketball court.

Griffin crossed his arms and leaned back against the Firebird. Hoped it would hold up under his weight. “Something you want to tell me?”

Tanner stopped and tipped his head back to maintain eye contact with Griffin. He nodded slowly once. “I bought a car.”

“Don’t delude yourself. You bought a pile of scrap metal.”

He lifted a shoulder. “It’ll look better when we’re done with it.”

Griffin froze. Aw, hell. This was worse than he’d thought. “We?”

At his quiet, deadly tone, Tanner dropped his gaze to the ground. “I thought you could help me fix it up,” he mumbled to his high-tops.

“What made you think that?”

Tanner’s shoulders hunched, his head ducked even farther down as he muttered too low for Griffin to hear.

“What?”

The kid raised his head, a blush staining his smooth cheeks. “I said because we’re brothers.”

Scowling, Griffin stared at the kid. Tanner was tall and lanky with light brown hair and their mother’s green eyes. He was a good-looking kid. Popular despite his quiet nature. Smart and athletic.

He was, in every way that mattered, Griffin’s complete opposite. Polite. Thoughtful. He didn’t break the rules, didn’t even try to bend them. He’d been raised by two parents who loved each other and him. By a father who rarely raised his voice and would never even think of raising his fist. By a mother who’d somehow found the courage to trust in love again, who hadn’t had to shield him from another man’s wrath by succumbing to it herself.

They may be brothers but they had nothing in common except a shared mother and their eye color. And despite Tanner’s best efforts to get them to bond, Griffin wanted to keep it that way.

“No,” he said then dropped lightly to the ground and headed back toward the garage.

“Why not?” Tanner asked, catching up to him.

“Because I’m running a business here, kid. Not a charity.”

“I could pay for it,” Tanner said after a moment. He slid in front of Griffin, walked backward. “For the parts and stuff. And your labor.”

“You can’t afford it.”

Though even he wasn’t that big of an asshole to charge his teenage brother for working on the kid’s car. But Tanner didn’t know that.

“I could pay you back a little at a time,” he insisted quietly. “Like a loan. Or I could work here and you could take it out of my wages.”

“And have you around all the time? No thanks.”

The kid’s face fell. Shit. Griffin tipped his head side to side until his neck popped. He wanted to apologize, to tell Tanner he hadn’t meant it. But the kid was smart enough to recognize a lie when he heard it.

“You and your dad can work on it,” Griffin said brushing past him. “I’ll tell the tow driver to take it over to your place.”

“You can’t,” he blurted, looking guilty as hell.

“Why not?”

“You just can’t.”

“Not good enough.”

He walked away but couldn’t miss the sound of Tanner’s loud sigh. “I sort of already told Mom and Dad you’d agreed to help me fix it,” he admitted.

“And why would you sort of tell them that?” Griffin asked, not sure he wanted to hear the answer.

“I had to. They didn’t want me to buy a car at all so I had to convince them it wouldn’t be that much to get a junker and fix it up…” Tanner lifted his shoulder again in that careless shrug. “But they didn’t get on board until after they found out you were all for it.”

“Except I’m not.”

“Mom’s really excited,” Tanner told him solemnly. “She keeps talking about what a great experience this will be, for the two of us to do this together.”

Griffin grabbed the back of his neck. Wished he could seize Tanner by the throat instead, maybe give him a few shakes. But that was too reminiscent of how his old man would’ve reacted.

Besides, Griffin didn’t want to hurt the kid. Just make him pay for putting Griffin in this situation. Their mom was probably doing backflips at the idea of her sons bonding over carburetors and exhaust fans.

He could walk away. All he had to do was tell Jimmy, who watched their little family drama with no small amount of interest, to take the car over to the Johnstons’ house. Or, better yet, back to Boston. It would serve Tanner right if he lost out on the tow truck fee.

Yeah, he thought, exhaling heavily. He could do that. Sure, his mother would be disappointed, but she was used to that from him. It was how they worked. She continually pushed him for more than he was willing to give, and in return he made it clear she wasn’t getting it. No sense changing the dynamics between them now.

But if he walked, Tanner would have to admit the truth to his parents. Hey, if you broke the rules, you had to be prepared to face the consequences. And knowing his mom and stepfather—having been punished by them many, many times during his own teen years—those consequences would be major. At least to a seventeen-year-old.

Nothing less than the kid deserved for lying.

But he was watching Griffin with such freaking hope in his eyes, saying no to him would’ve been like kicking a newborn kitten in the head.

“How much did you shell out for it?” Griffin asked, nodding toward the Firebird.

“One thousand.”

“You were screwed,” he said flatly. “It’s not worth more than a couple hundred. Hope you have some cash left for the restoration.”

For the past three summers, Tanner had worked down on the docks with his father. It wasn’t an easy job and he didn’t get to hang out at the beach all day like his friends, but it did pay well.

“Mom and Dad said I could use a total of five thousand on the car,” Tanner said. “The rest of my wages are being saved for college.”

Four thousand dollars wasn’t nearly enough to get the job done, but it’d make a good start.

“Here’s the deal,” Griffin said, unable to believe he was actually agreeing to this. Pissed that the kid had backed him into a corner this way. “We work on it Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday nights and Sunday afternoons. I’m not putting any time in on it on my own. If you’re not here, the work doesn’t get done. In exchange,” he continued when Tanner opened his mouth, “you’ll clean up the garage and do anything else I need done around here. You can pick your own hours but you’d better put in at least twenty a week or the deal’s off. You hear me?”

Tanner nodded like a bobblehead doll. “Yeah, yeah. I hear you. It’s a deal.”

And then he grinned, slow and easy, like he’d won the lottery and a night with the hottest cheerleader in his school.

“Enjoy this moment,” Griffin told him. “Because that was for working on the car. The deal for me not ratting you out to your parents is going to cost you even more.”

“You’d blackmail your own brother?” he asked, sounding merely curious.

“Don’t think of it as blackmail. Think of it as me kicking your butt for dragging me into this in the first place. The way I see it, you have a choice. You can take my punishment. Or we can tell Mom and Roger you lied and tricked them. Your choice.”

Griffin imagined Tanner was having visions of himself spending the rest of the summer grounded. Or worse, completely losing his driving privileges.

“What do I have to do?” Tanner asked.

“You are now in charge of all yard work and exterior maintenance at my house for exactly one year.”

“Huh?”

“You’ll mow the grass, do the trim work. In the fall you can rake leaves—”

“You never rake your leaves.”

“Well, they’ll get raked this year, won’t they? You can also clean the gutters. In the winter I’ll expect my walk and driveway cleared each and every morning before I go to work.”

Tanner gave him a long look. “That’s fair.”

It wasn’t. It was overboard and Griffin had the feeling Tanner knew it. Or maybe he knew Griffin had been trying to get him to back out of their deal, which would then let Griffin off the hook.

Now he was stuck, for the second time that day, with a deal he didn’t particularly want and that his instincts told him would somehow come back to bite him on the ass.

* * *

“THERE’S A GENTLEMAN here to see you,” Jodi told Nora over the office phone. “He won’t give his name.”

Jodi’s tone was disapproving, either at the audacity of the man showing up five minutes before the office was to close or because he hadn’t shared his name or the reason for wanting to see Nora.

Jodi did love knowing everything that went on in the office.

Nerves jumped in Nora’s stomach. He was early. When she’d spoken with Mr. Hepfer that morning, he’d told her he probably wouldn’t make it to Mystic Point before six. She’d asked him to meet her at the office instead of her house or a local restaurant so she could claim he was just another potential client, should anyone ask.

“Thanks,” Nora said. “You can send him in.”

Setting the phone down, she hurried across the room and opened the door then raced back behind her desk and took the small mirror out of her top drawer. She freshened her lipstick, did a quick hair check then tossed the mirror back inside.

She sat. Stood. Sat again. Then jumped to her feet when she saw him round the corner. She froze, her polite smile sliding from her face.

Because the man walking toward her looked nothing like the picture of the balding, retirement-age man on Hepfer Investigation’s website. Trepidation filled her.

He was an older, harder version of Griffin.

Not the P.I. she’d hired, she realized numbly. Which was fine, as it seemed she no longer needed him to find her mother’s ex-lover.

Dale York had found her instead.

CHAPTER FOUR

NORA’S BREATH LOCKED in her chest, made each inhalation painful. Panic-inducing. She’d wanted this moment, wanted to face this man down but now that he was here, her body was frozen, her mind numb with terror.

She couldn’t take her eyes from Dale as he slowly crossed her office, his confident stride bordering on predatory. She’d only seen his face once—a grainy photo the Chronicle ran the day after her mother’s remains were found, but there was no mistaking him.

She’d spent the past eighteen years thinking about him. Wondering what kind of man he was. Hating him. She’d expected him to be taller. Her father was tall. Tall and kind and honorable. A good, decent man who’d worked hard to support his family, who’d always taken care of them.

But her mother had still chosen this man over her husband. Over her daughters.

She’d paid for it with her life.

As a kid, Nora had always imagined Dale as some sort of monster. Huge and dark and deadly. Now she saw he was just a man. Not so huge, but still dangerous.

Despite his age—he had to be closing in on sixty—his short hair was still thick, the dark strands threaded with silver. His shoulders were wide, his waist narrow. He was handsome, she was forced to admit. With his sharply angled face and smooth-shaven jaw.

It was easy, so pathetically easy, to see why her mother had been attracted to him.

What she didn’t get, what she’d never understand, was how her mother could love him.

He stopped in front of her desk, his expression hard, his brown eyes cold. Nora’s mouth dried. Fear coated her throat. Made it impossible for her to speak, to get any words out. Words that should’ve put him on the defensive, made him wonder and worry. Made him realize he faced a worthy and formidable opponent.

All she could do was stare. And wonder if Griffin had been right.

Trust me, the best thing that could happen for everyone is for Dale to remain missing. Leave the past alone.

“If it isn’t little Nora Sullivan,” Dale said, his deep voice tinged with some accent she couldn’t quite put her finger on. Her skin crawled as his gaze drifted lazily over her face, sexual and appreciative. “All grown up, I see. I’m Dale York.”

“I know who you are,” she said, barely above a whisper. Her scalp prickled, her breathing quickened. She gripped the edge of her desk, held on when her knees threatened to buckle. “You’re the man who killed my mother.”

“Now, is that any way to greet an old friend of Valerie’s?” He winked. “I never laid a hand on her. Not unless she wanted me to.”

Her stomach churned sickeningly. “Wh-what are you doing here?”

Why had he come back to Mystic Point now, risking arrest? What kind of game was he playing by seeking her out?

“I’m here to do my civic duty.” Hitching up his dark slacks, he sat in the chair across from her, looking like a successful salesman instead of a cold-blooded killer. “I would’ve come sooner but I was out of the country and didn’t hear about Valerie’s death—and that the local police department wanted to interview me—until a few days ago. But before I talk to the new police chief, I wanted to see you. Offer my condolences on your loss.”

“You want to talk to the police?”

“Of course. I want to do anything I can to help them find out who hurt Val.” He studied her, like a fox watching a rabbit. “I never would’ve pegged you for one of Valerie’s girls,” he murmured, reclining in the chair as he linked his hands behind his head. His arms were well muscled, his biceps flexing against the sleeves of his dress shirt. “Now your sister, the cop, I knew she belonged to Val the moment I saw her. But you’re as far from your mother as light is from dark. Guess you take after your daddy. Except you didn’t take after his career, did you? Followed your uncle’s footsteps there.”

All her nerves, her fears at having her mother’s killer sitting calmly across from her, flew out of her head. He’d seen Layne? He’d been watching them?

“What do you know about my sister?” she asked hotly. “Or me?”

He smiled slowly and those nerves spiked. “You’d be surprised,” he said softly.

She covered her cell phone with her palm, feeling somehow stronger, safer having it in her hand so that she could call the police in a second if he threatened her. When in reality, all she had to do was yell and a half a dozen people would come running. Including her uncle. “You really expect anyone to believe you’re here because you want to help in my mother’s murder investigation?”

“Why else would I come back?”

She didn’t know and that was what worried her. “You won’t get away with it.”

“That so?” he asked, watching her with his hooded gaze, his damn smirk.

Realizing her knuckles were white from gripping the desk and her phone so tightly, she let go and tucked her hands behind her back. Damn it, she should be the one in charge of this conversation. Should be controlling it and keeping him on edge.

Instead she felt off balance and inadequate. And that was unacceptable. She refused to let this man, with his flat eyes and cocky grin, get the best of her. He’d taken her mother away from her and her sisters. She’d do whatever she had to in order to make him pay for that.

Pressing her lips together, she inhaled deeply and held it for the count of five. When she spoke again, she was more composed. “Yes, that’s so. Because I will do everything in my power to make sure you’re brought to justice. I won’t rest until you’re convicted of my mother’s murder.”

He didn’t even blink. “Is that a threat, baby girl?”

Her blood ran cold. Baby girl. The nickname her mother used to call her. Bastard.

“It’s a promise,” she said, hating how her voice shook, how sick she felt at the reminder that her mother had shared so much of herself with this man. “One you’ll have plenty of time to think about when you’re serving a life sentence in state prison.”

Shaking his head, he sat up. “That’s a nice fantasy you’ve spun for yourself. But it’s going to be tough for anyone to get a conviction against me when there’s no evidence connecting me to Valerie’s murder.”

“There will be.” There had to be. They had to find something, anything that would help the case against him.

“You go right on believing that,” he said as he stood. “But it’s not going to happen.”

A lump formed in her throat. Oh, God, he was right. Unless new evidence surfaced, or he confessed, the police would have no reason to arrest him, to even hold him. He’d come back because he knew the chances of him being charged with murder were slim to none at this point.

For the first time since they’d discovered the truth about what happened to her mother, Nora was afraid. Terrified Dale would walk away a free man when it was all said and done. And that there would be nothing she could do to stop that from happening.

“You’re upset,” he said in a soothing tone that made bile rise in her throat. “That’s understandable. But I didn’t come here to argue with you. I came back, voluntarily, to give my statement to the police.” He stepped forward and though her desk separated them, she jerked back, bumping into her chair. “Since it looks like I’ll be in town for a little while, maybe we’ll see each other again.”

With another of those disturbing winks, he walked away. At the still-open door he faced her. “And, baby girl? Be sure and tell your father I dropped by to see you.”

* * *

“DO YOU WANT anything else?”

As with every other time she’d stopped by Tanner’s booth during the past hour, Jessica Taylor’s gaze stayed somewhere on the wall above their heads as she spoke. She’d been polite and attentive, had made sure their glasses were always filled and had even brought Josh extra napkins for his rib dinner, but she hadn’t made eye contact with any of the four guys she waited on.

“We’re good,” Tanner said quietly. Other than when he’d given her his dinner order, they were the only words he’d spoken to her—tonight or ever. But he hoped to draw her attention his way.

No dice.

“Separate checks, right?” she asked, tearing four slips from her order form. She studied each one before handing them out. Reaching across the table, she took Nate’s empty plate, the V of her white T-shirt tugged down showing a flash of beige lace and the curve of her breast.

Tanner’s gut—and, damn it, his groin—tightened. And the last thing he needed was his buddies giving him grief about getting a hard-on in the middle of the Ludlow Street Café. Jerking his gaze to the table, he gulped down the soda left in his cup, the melting ice cubes hitting his lips. He wished he could toss them in his pants.

“I’ll be back in a few minutes to take those up for you,” Jessica said.

He didn’t look up until she walked away.

“Dude,” Nate said, kicking Tanner’s shin under the table causing his drink to slosh out of the cup and drip down his chin. “You’re drooling.”

Nate laughed at his own lame joke.

Tanner glared at his friend and basketball teammate. Sitting back in the booth, he wiped the back of his hand over the wetness on his chin.

Josh smirked as he counted out money. “If you want to tap that, you’re going to have to do more than stare at her like a loser.”

The back of Tanner’s neck heated. “I don’t even know her.”

No one did. Jessica had moved to Mystic Point a few months ago, and while she’d attended a few local parties, for the most part, she’d kept to herself.