Carol Ericson - Obsession & Eyewitness

He joined her at the table as she scrolled through her inbox. “What did the emails say?”

“I was too chicken to open them.” She drummed her fingers on the tabletop. “But the subject line said, Like mother, like daughter? ”

“That sounds like a threat to me. Or at least harassment.” He sat in front of the computer and opened her Deleted Items.

“Don’t bother. I did a hard delete and sent them to cyberspace oblivion.”

“Do you think Bicycle Boy can help?”

She huffed and punched him in the arm. “He’s a good guy.”

“I hope he knows how to retrieve those messages.” He rubbed his biceps where her delicate hand had nailed him. “Do you know if Amanda had been receiving any emails? Any threats?”

“She didn’t mention anything to me.” She hugged herself and wedged a hip against the kitchen table. “Amanda didn’t have any enemies.”

“Had she been on any dates since the separation from her husband?”

“No. She talked a good game, but she missed Ryan.” Michelle’s face tightened and she pursed her lips. If she was going to burst into tears, he had a strong shoulder.

Her cell phone played some hip-hop song and Colin raised his brows.

“I like to keep current with the kids.” She answered the phone and moved to the window.

Colin clicked around Michelle’s computer as she talked in a low voice across the room. He’d have to give over to Alec’s computer skills and hope the guy knew what he was doing and could retrieve those messages. Maybe someone was trying to scare Michelle, put her on edge. Killers played games, especially the smart ones.

“That was Chief Evans. He wants to see me this afternoon. You, too.”

“Is he still convinced he has his man?”

“He wouldn’t go into it with me.

“Any luck?” She pointed at the laptop screen.

“No. I’m going to have to defer to Alec. Dammit.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know why you took an instant dislike to Alec. He’s harmless.”

Harmless is not the way Colin would describe the way Alec had looked at Michelle. Did the woman have no clue how sexy she was? She’d probably be uneasy to hear herself described as sexy…thanks to that mother of hers. Hootchie-cootchie mama. What had he been thinking?

“I hope Mr. Harmless can get those emails.”

“They may be nothing, Colin, totally unrelated to Amanda’s…death.”

“Anything out of the ordinary needs to be examined.” He smacked his forehead. “I completely forgot.”

“What?”

He shoved his hand into his pocket to dig out the chain he’d found in the basement at Columbella House. He dangled it from his finger. It was a bracelet.

“I found this in the basement right before you screamed bloody murder. Do you recognize it? Is it Amanda’s?”

Michelle fingered the bracelet and the charms hanging from it. She plucked one charm out from the rest and squinted at it. Then she dropped her hand as if the charm had scorched her.

MICHELLE RUBBED THE tips of her tingling fingers against the leg of her shorts, trying to erase memories.

“Is it Amanda’s?” Colin cupped the charm bracelet in the palm of his hand.

“N-no.”

“But you know the owner?”

Warmth flared in Michelle’s cheeks. It’s like the woman had come back to haunt her this summer. “It’s my mom’s.”

“This is your mom’s bracelet?” Colin hooked his index finger around the chain and dangled it in front of his face.

“It didn’t belong to my mom. She made it.”

“Oh.” He dropped the bracelet next to the laptop, where it coiled like a snake. “She made jewelry?”

“Yeah. No big deal. She crafted the pieces at home and sold them to her friends and some of the teenaged girls.”

“But it didn’t belong to Amanda.”

Michelle poked at the bracelet, a bit tarnished and forlorn. “There’s a charm with the initials MS. I’m assuming it belongs to one of the St. Regis twins since they were both in and out of the house when they were last here.”

“Mystery solved. I won’t bother turning it over to the police today.” He glanced at his watch. “Do you want to head to the police station now?”

“Sure. Do you have a car or do you want me to drive?” She swept the bracelet into her hand and stuffed it into her pocket.

“I have a rental.”

She hooked her thumbs in the pockets of her shorts where the bracelet burned against her leg. Maybe she should leave it here. She didn’t need the constant reminder of her mother gouging her thigh. “You know, I never even asked you where you live now. Are you in San Francisco?”

“L.A., although I’ve been thinking of requesting a transfer to San Francisco. One of my buddies is with the Bureau up there. He’s the one who first told me about Tiffany Gunderson’s murder.”

“The local cops realize now that you’re not here in any official capacity.”

“I know, but I still feel obliged to share my opinions with them—that the Gunderson and Frank murders are related, and I believe Amanda’s death is tied to theirs. This is the same guy.”

“But why? Does he plan to work his way through the entire Coral Cove class that graduated ten years ago? Does he have something against those particular women…or me?” She couldn’t stop the goose pimples that rushed across her arms.

Colin must’ve noticed her shiver because he took a step forward and rubbed his knuckles along her skin. “That’s what I’m here to find out, whether the local cops like it or not. My parents were friends with the Gundersons. I at least owe it to them.”

Michelle practically purred at his touch. If the local cops didn’t like Colin’s presence in Coral Cove…she did.

Two hours later, Colin stepped onto the sidewalk outside the Coral Cove Police Station and squinted at the sky. The sun was staging a valiant attack against the stubborn marine layer, hurriedly pricking through the gray muck before it was time to sink into the ocean.

Settling his shoulders against the brick facade of the building, Colin crossed his arms and dug his heels into the sidewalk. The small-town cops hadn’t appreciated his meddling. They’d found a smear of blood on the transient’s sleeve and had closed the case before the blood analysis had come back from the lab.

They hadn’t been interested in rose petals, class connections or class reunions. The summer tourist season loomed less than two weeks away, and the chief and the mayor wanted to make sure nothing more than the haze from the ocean was hanging over Coral Cove by the time the crowds staggered in from L.A. and San Francisco.

Michelle rounded the corner, accompanied by a pumped-up guy in jeans and a Coral Cove High School sweatshirt, and waved. After she’d had her turn with the police, she’d gone to the high school to collect an answer key for some quizzes she had to grade. Looked like she’d brought the mascot with her.

Colin pushed off the wall of the police station. Michelle had been holding up well under the shock of her friend’s murder and her proximity to the killer. But Colin had sensed her busywork and interest in helping him investigate sprang from a desire to keep her sadness at bay. Whatever worked. God knows, he’d employed a million devices to hold his own sorrow at arm’s length.

“That didn’t take long.” Her eyes sparkled above flushed cheeks. “Colin Roarke, this is Larry Brunswick. He’s head of the math department.”

Colin shook the man’s hand. Brunswick looked familiar. Must’ve been teaching when he’d attended CCHS. “I don’t think I had you for any classes, but I think you were teaching when I was in high school.”