Allison Brennan - If I Should Die

“Glad to do it, Tim.” He looked over at the lodge and frowned. The smoke and fire in the kitchen had blackened the walls outside the windows. “I heard you had a kitchen fire. Word is it was arson.”

“Word sure gets around fast.”

“The Getty boy is on Fire and Rescue, and he’s sweet on Trina. You tell Trina something, the entire town knows by sundown.”

“The sheriff is sending an investigator tomorrow,” Tim said.

“And what about the body in the mine?” Lucy asked.

“They will need to bring in equipment, the coroner, and a detective. Everyone should be here by eight in the morning.”

Lucy thought of the woman spending another night exposed like that. Someone somewhere loved her-a husband, a parent, a sister, a child. Her family deserved to know what had happened as much as she needed a proper burial.

“Where’s Adam?” Griffin asked, changing the subject. “Haven’t seen him around much lately.”

“He’s blowing off some steam,” Tim said. “This resort is his brainchild, and he’s really upset.”

“Well, Tim, some things just aren’t meant to be.”

Odd comment, Lucy thought.

“I’ll check on your guest in a couple days,” the doctor continued. “Holler if you need anything, Ms. Lucy. I’m overdue for my nightcap at the Lock amp; Barrel. Maybe you should spend more time in town, Tim. Get people used to seeing your face. Bring Adam. Might make them a bit friendlier to your wild ideas for Joe’s land.”

“A resort is hardly a wild idea,” Tim said. He rubbed his face. “I just don’t know who would do this.”

“I’m sure it’ll all work out,” Griffin said as he got into his car.

Lucy frowned as she watched him drive off. The doctor had contradicted himself. Some things “aren’t meant to be” followed by “it’ll all work out”? Maybe she’d misunderstood, or he was thinking about something else, but his words lingered in her mind even as his car disappeared from sight.

Tim turned to Lucy. “So Sean’s okay?”

“Sore, a few stitches in his leg, and he hit his head pretty good. But he’ll be fine. He’s resilient.”

“That’s a relief.” He turned back toward his house. “Would you like some coffee? Something stronger? I’m not much for liquor, but we have some beer.”

“No, thank you. I’m going to go back and sit with Sean.”

“I’ll walk with you.”

They started back up the trail that led to the cabin, discreet ground lighting guiding them along the path. “What did the doctor mean about people getting used to seeing your face?” Lucy asked.

“My parents divorced when I was five.” He stopped walking for a moment, looking out at the lake through the trees. The sun had set, but the twilight made the lake sparkle darkly. “My mom brought me to visit my dad once a year until she remarried, but she’d always hated this place. The isolation. The quiet. The last time I was here, before my dad’s funeral, I was sixteen. Adam was three. I barely knew my dad, and I don’t know my brother. Didn’t,” he corrected, “until last year.”

He said nothing for a long minute. “Adam lived here until he was ten. His mother divorced Dad, too-my father wasn’t the easiest person to live with. Stubborn and set in his ways, but he loved this land and in a certain way he had the patience of a saint. My best memories here were going fishing. Adam ended up spending every summer here. I’ve wondered that if my mom wasn’t so bitter, I might have had the same summers Adam had.”

They started walking again. “Adam loves this place,” Tim said, “and I’ve grown to love it. I know he’s quiet, but all this stuff that’s been happening is tearing him apart.”

Lucy thought a conversation with Adam Hendrickson was overdue-perhaps without his half-brother Tim around.

She said, “I think it’s a given that your saboteur is someone you or Adam knows, someone you’d recognize. Sean said the arsonist was a teenager. There can’t be too many in a town so small.”

“Everyone in Spruce Lake goes to school in Colton. But maybe it’s not someone from town. There are a lot of small communities in the area, outside of what’s considered Spruce Lake. At least three villages of more than two hundred people.”

“Whoever it is knows the area well,” Lucy said. “And they have a huge stake in making sure you don’t open this resort.” She stopped outside the cabin. “Can you put together a list of everyone you can think of who might have a reason-however lame it may sound to you-to stop the resort? Personal or financial.”

“Duke already asked for the same thing, and I told him there’s no one.”

“Either someone hates you-or Adam-so much they want to hurt you personally, or they have a financial interest in ensuring you don’t open this resort.”

“Adam would have said something.”

Another reason to talk to Adam alone. Maybe he hadn’t been as forthcoming with his brother as he should have been. Or he just needed to be asked the right questions.

“What about your father? Any enemies? Close friends?”

“None that I know of. My dad was stubborn, but everyone liked him.”

Except Tim couldn’t truly know that, Lucy realized, if he rarely visited.

She stopped outside her cabin. “Is the coroner coming here in the morning or going straight to the mine?”

“They didn’t say. I suspect they’ll check the body first, then talk to us.”

“I’ll meet them at the mine then. I’m hoping they’ll know who the victim is.”

“Victim?”

“The death may have been natural, there’s no way of knowing without an autopsy, but the position of the body was deliberate. I guess I’m wired to assume she was murdered.”

They said good-bye at the cabin’s doorstep. Lucy stepped inside and glanced at the bed. Sean lay right where she’d left him, on his back, eyes closed. He still looked pale, but he didn’t appear to be in distress.

“Sean, it’s Lucy. Wake up.”

Sean moaned when he heard his name. “Ten more minutes.”

“Good,” Lucy said. “You’re okay.”

Sean felt Lucy sit on the bed next to him. He opened his eyes and tried to glare at her for disturbing his sleep but it hurt his head too much. His leg throbbed as if it had been stitched by Dr. Frankenstein, making his sore shoulder feel downright good in comparison.

“Who beat me up?”

Lucy sighed. “Are you trying to be funny or trying to scare me?”

“I guess I’m not funny when I’m in pain.” He winced as he pulled himself up on the bed so he could lean against the headboard. Lucy put a pillow behind his head. He smiled. “Maybe I should get hurt more often, if you’re going to play Florence Nightingale.”

Lucy rolled her eyes at him, but he saw a hint of a grin. “I don’t want to keep you up too long.”

“I’m awake.”

“You need to sleep.”

Sean took her hand. “The faster we come up with a strategy, the faster I can go back to sleep.”

“You’re a rotten patient.”

“So you’ve told me.” Sean shifted to get comfortable. His leg itched, but when he touched it the pain shot up to his back.

“The doctor left some Vicodin,” Lucy said.

“Hell no. That stuff is nasty. Do you have any aspirin?”

“That’s like using a water pistol to put out a fire.”

“I’m not taking pain pills.”

“Fine, Tylenol it is, and your antibiotics.”

“Yes, Doctor Kincaid.”

She shook her head and read the bottles that the doctor had left. Sean never tired of watching Lucy, even now when he was hurt and exhausted. Her black hair hung over one shoulder in long, silky curls, damp from the shower she’d taken when they’d returned. Her profile was aristocratic without being sharp. Her skin revealed her half-Cuban heritage, neither light nor dark, but a perfect blend. Lucy had no idea how beautiful she was or how much he loved her. He’d told her many times, of course. He couldn’t hold it back once he’d realized how strongly he felt. That she hadn’t yet admitted that she, too, loved him wounded his ego a bit, but he knew her feelings for him scared her. He’d seen it especially today, in the pit, when she’d realized his injuries might be serious.