A Killing Kind of Love: A Dark, Standalone Romantic Suspense (7 page)

“You okay?” Bill asked. “Bob didn’t hit you too hard, did he?”

“What . . . do you want?” Adam clutched his gut, fought a wave of nausea.

“Us?” Bob said and shook his head. “We don’t want nothing. Now our friend Lando, he wants his mommy’s money back.”

“I’ll get it. I told him that.” Adam knew damn well they were Lando’s boys, had to be, but hearing the name nearly had him filling his pants.

“And when exactly might that be?” Bob, who was wearing a suit and tie and looked more as if he were planning a day in church than a parking-lot roust, or worse, leaned against the BMW with his arms crossed.

“Soon. Real soon.”
And goddamn you for dying, Holly!

“Soon?” Bob looked at Bill, made a big thing out of frowning. “You think that’s a good answer, Bill? You think Lando will go for ‘soon’?”

Bill moved like a snake on speed, grabbed a fistful of Adam’s hair, yanked it, then rammed his head against the pillar. Adam didn’t see stars; he saw the entire blazing universe. When he started to drop, Bill held him by his hair and set his face less than an inch from Adam’s; the scent of last night’s garlic floated up Adam’s nose.

“Lando is fresh out of patience. He says he’s screwed with you long enough. He wants his mother’s money.” Bob spoke while Bill held him. “Now if it were up to us, we’d have some fun making porridge of that pretty face of yours, but Lando says no. Says you need that face for all those pussies you work on. Says you’ll need it to get his money.”

Bob looked at Bill and jerked his head.

In turn, Bill twisted his fingers deeper into Adam’s hair and yanked, fast and hard, then let him go. Adam sagged against the pillar, stars spinning, bile rising.

“Lando says you’ve got a month to make things right for his mama or you’ll be—how’d he say it now?—oh, yeah, eating your own balls for breakfast. Bill and I, we’ll help with that.” Bob, scratching his jaw, looked at Bill. “You got any ideas on how this piece of crap here”—he nodded at Adam—“is going to come up with a half mil in four weeks?”

Bill shook his head.

Bob smiled at Adam. “Maybe him and me are going to get to make that porridge after all.” Again, he drove his fist into Adam’s stomach, and this time they let him fall to the concrete floor. “See you around.” They walked to a car a couple of spaces down, got in, and screeched off.

Adam curled into a ball, sealed his eyes shut, and moaned.

“Damn you, Holly . . .”

Camryn sat quietly in the rental car’s passenger seat while a morose and brooding Sebastian Solari slowed for the final turn into the cemetery. They drove through an ornate pair of wrought-iron gates.

If there was such a thing as a perfect day for a funeral, this was it: a pale sun, billowy gray clouds spotting a soft blue sky, and barely breeze enough to stir or loosen the summer-burnt leaves still clinging to the trees scattered among the gravesites. Sad and unlucky trees, Camryn thought, to seed in a burial ground, their twisted roots going ever deeper into the soil, curling into old bones, new deaths.

“You okay?” Sebastian asked, driving at a snail’s pace along the road taking them to Holly’s service.

“Been better. You?”

“I’ll make it.”

The conversation faltered, so Camryn changed course. “How’s Delores these days. Any change?”

He slanted her a glance. “Delores? Change? You’re kidding, right?”

Okay, wrong course.
“I talked to Gina the other day. I wanted to visit, but she—”

When Sebastian’s jaw set hard, she stopped midsentence.

“She put you off, didn’t she?” he said. “Made some lame excuse about her being too busy.” His hands clenched and unclenched on the steering wheel. “She’s bad, you know, and getting worse every day.” He glanced out the driver’s-side window. “Makes me nervous as hell.”

“How so?”

“Like mother, like daughter?”

Camryn shuddered at the thought. “What about the doctor you found for her? Isn’t he helping?”

“Same old story. Can’t help people who won’t help themselves. I think she’s playing him. And me.” Irritation replaced concern, but he still looked like a man dangling from the end of a frayed rope. It struck Camryn there was something dark and dire about all the Solaris, as if they’d all eaten too much bitter pie. Or someone had thrown acid in their gene pool.

“If there’s anything I can do, Seb, you only have to ask. You know that.”

If anyone could
play
a psychiatrist, Camryn thought, it would be Gina. She was sharp, clever, intuitive—and a brilliant lawyer, or had been until, inexplicably, she walked out on her firm and what Camryn had thought was a stellar career and returned to the lake to live with Delores. Which, knowing Gina’s feelings toward her mother, had shocked Camryn senseless. Then, less than a month after her coming home, there’d been that awful shooting that left Delores in a wheelchair.

The Solaris weren’t only dark; it seemed they were also doomed.

“Thanks, but my family is my problem.” His answer was curt, and he went back to staring at the road ahead.

Camryn resisted the urge to, not so gently, remind him Gina was also her friend and instead said, “You look tired.” The truth. His eyes were ringed, hollow, and he was too pale.

He shrugged.

Camryn knew Seb had flown all night and that his insides were as knotted as hers. She also knew nothing in the world would have kept him from Holly’s funeral.

Unlike Gina.
Thinking of her friend brought a surge of irritation along with worry. When she got back to Seattle, she’d march over there, welcome or not, and have a talk with her. There had to be some way of getting her out of that horrific house, getting her to live again. But she’d save those thoughts and plans for later; today was about Holly.

Her stomach rolled, and she again looked at Sebastian’s sad face. “Seb?” She touched his arm.

“Uh-huh?”

“Stay close, okay?” She told herself she was saying this for his sake, to give him something to focus on, but that was only half true. This was a day when a strong arm would be very welcome.

“Count on it, Cammie.” He squeezed her knee, then bent his head slightly to catch a directional sign.

Silence filled the car, and Camryn stared unseeing out the window, trying not to think, not to cry.

“Did you ever meet her husband?” she asked. Camryn had, but only once, when Holly, Dan, and she had crossed paths briefly at the airport. There’d been barely enough time to shake hands. She remembered Dan Lambert as a tall, lean, good-looking man with strong features—interesting, very sultry green eyes.
Holly’s type,
she’d thought at the time.

“No.”

“You think he’ll be here?”

His expression tightened. “Wouldn’t be much of a husband if he wasn’t.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Camryn turned back to the scene outside the car window, this time paying attention. The Forest Hills Cemetery, Holly’s final home, was beautiful, an unusual and intriguing mixture of serene and lively. There were people walking the paths, studying the gravestones. A young man sat under a tree, reading. An elderly couple stood looking over a pond, holding hands. Holly wouldn’t be alone here.

But the beauty of the place didn’t lighten her mood or ease her sorrow, because at the end of the drive, she and Sebastian would stop at the crematorium where she would say good-bye to her oldest and dearest friend.

They’d been friends since first grade, and until Holly’s sudden marriage and her move to L.A. a couple of years ago, there wasn’t a time they weren’t together; through their parents’ divorces, their fathers’ bitter business breakup, the death of Holly’s mother, Kylie’s magical birth. . . .

Like Holly had said, when you share Barbie-doll clothes, there’s no going back; you’re friends forever. She’d named them the Barbie Doll Club. When Gina came along that first year of high school, the club added its only other member—Gina Solari. When Holly and Camryn each gave Gina a Barbie doll for her fourteenth birthday, they’d all laughed, but Gina knew the doll made it official; they were a team, able to survive anything. It was Camryn, Holly, Gina—and Barbie—against the world.

And Adam, of course. They’d all had to survive Adam.

Camryn swallowed, refusing to cry. She wished Gina were here, that she hadn’t turned into a weird, frightened woman she barely knew anymore.

Damn it, they’d all become weird: Camryn with her single-minded baby quest, Gina with her sudden and inexplicable depression that brought her home to live with a mother she detested, Holly with her impotent but ongoing defiance of her father, and her hasty marriage.

Camryn swallowed, wiped her eyes, wishing regrets were tears that could be so easily swept away.

She’d barely seen Holly since she’d married and moved to L.A. Even their phone calls had become less frequent. Camryn sensed there was trouble in the marriage, but when she’d asked, Holly always cut her off. They’d make the usual arrangements for Camryn to see Kylie, then talk about nothing until it came time to hang up.

They’d grown apart, and Camryn had no idea why.
But I’ll miss you, my friend, miss what we once had.

A few errant red and yellow leaves dusted the orderly driving path as Camryn and Sebastian entered through the gate leading to the crematorium. When they neared the circular driveway fronting the building, Camryn looked over at Sebastian.

Despite his perfectly tailored gray suit, close shave, and pristine white shirt, he looked ruined—like a man who’d been kicked while he was down. When he pulled the car into the last parking spot and pushed the gear shift to PARK, she put a hand on his arm. “She loved you, Sebastian. Don’t ever doubt that.”

He turned off the ignition, sat for what seemed an eternity. “Yes . . . She loved me in her way—just not the same way I loved her.” He shot her a glance, his face hard. “The truth is, in a sick, twisted way, I’m glad she’s dead, that it’s finally over between us. Maybe tomorrow I won’t get up thinking about her . . . wanting her. Wondering who the hell she’s with—”

“Don’t! Don’t go there.”

“I’m not a fool, Camryn.” He shook his head, opened the car door a couple of inches and looked back at her, his expression flint-hard. “It was always Adam. I knew that, and I’m guessing Lambert knew it, too.”

Camryn frowned, confused. “Adam is old news, Seb.” So old she couldn’t believe his name had even come up. But then Sebastian—all the Solaris—had long memories. But, God, this was reaching back to college. Ridiculous.

He gave her an impatient, pitying look, then snorted. “God, you’re naive, Camryn.” He opened the door and stepped out.

She had a mouthful of words, and her door halfway open by the time he got around to her side of the car. He left her no time to say them. Taking her arm firmly, he led her toward the two Ionic pillars fronting the entrance to the crematorium.

Camryn pushed Sebastian’s odd statement aside. Now wasn’t the time to think about Adam Dunn.

Today was all about Holly.

Dan sat alone in the first pew on one side of the Lucy Stone Chapel. Paul and Erin Grantman sat across the aisle. An organ played quietly in the background as the pews filled up, and everyone waited for the service to begin.

With well over a hundred people in attendance, the chapel was full—mostly with Grantman’s business associates. It looked to Dan as if only a handful of mourners were under sixty. Other than her father, Holly had few ties to Boston since her mother died. Boston was always more her mother’s town than hers—or Paul’s. Both of them spent most of their time on the West Coast at the home Paul had built on Lake Washington when Holly was a child. It was where Kylie was born.

Dan had considered taking her cremains back to Seattle, having the service there, but decided Holly would prefer it here, her ashes in an urn next to her mother’s. So he’d let Paul’s arrangements stand.

He heard carpet-muffled footsteps coming down the aisle from his left and glanced over his shoulder to see a man and woman walking down the aisle, obviously in search of a seat. He knew the woman instantly. It was Camryn Bruce, Holly’s friend. He remembered meeting her briefly at the airport, and seeing her face in a thousand of Holly’s photographs. He didn’t know the man but assumed he was her husband. As they drew closer, he stood, stepped into the aisle—as did Paul Grantman.

The woman went directly to Paul and hugged him fiercely. Dan heard her whisper something, but he couldn’t make out the words. The dark-haired man shook Paul’s hand but said nothing.

Camryn looked back at him, then crossed the aisle to where he stood. “You’re Dan. We met once,” she said in a muted voice. “I’m Camryn, Holly’s friend.”

He nodded. “Yes, I remember you.” And he did, particularly her deep blue eyes. Eyes now silvered with unshed tears.

She took his hand in both of hers, moved closer. “I’m so terribly sorry,” she whispered, her hands cold, her gaze fierce with pain.

“Thank you.” He gestured to the empty pew he’d stood from. “Please.”

The man with Camryn gave him a cold look before touching Camryn’s elbow and gently urging her into the pew. She took the seat between them.

When the minister entered to begin the short service, she clasped Dan’s hand again, squeezed it, and gave him a sad, quick smile. Releasing his hand, she clasped her husband’s, and fixed her gaze on the minister, who was relating the story of Holly, age three, telling her mother she was going to the “Holy Woods” to make “mooies.”

Dan saw Paul Grantman straighten in his seat, saw the line of his mouth tighten as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a large white hanky.

Dan did not follow suit. He was done with crying, and a public show of it wasn’t his way. He swallowed and brushed his hair back. Sitting back in the pew, he listened stoically as the minister touched on Holly’s life from preschool to her tragic final moments.

Camryn Bruce wept openly but quietly beside him, shedding tears enough for both of them.

There was to be a short reception at the Grantman home after the service, and Dan didn’t intend to miss it. Finally, a chance to see Kylie.

When the last of the mourners headed for their cars, Dan stood with the Grantmans, Camryn, and Sebastian outside the chapel. Paul turned to Camryn. “You’ll stay at the house, dear. I insist. So does Erin.” He glanced at his attractive but oddly lifeless wife. “Don’t we, Erin?”