Serena Mckee's Back In Town Read online

  For a second, she made no response, and he thought she hadn’t heard him. And then Serena nodded, stripping off her gloves and shoving them into the back pocket of her jeans.

  “Okay.”

  That was the way she should have proceeded anyway, she thought, upbraiding herself. Once she learned that he was now the chief of police, she should have gone to see Uncle Dan, instead of asking Cameron to get the report. Seeing Cameron only made things more difficult for her, and things were difficult enough.

  The enthusiasm in her reply caught him off guard. “I didn’t mean now.”

  Serena picked up her spade and knocked off the dirt that was sticking to it. “Anything wrong with now?”

  “No, it’s just that—” Cameron let his eyes drift over her. She was wearing dirty jeans and an old T-shirt. If Carolyn McKee’s ghost was roaming around somewhere, it was probably moaning right now. As a young girl, Serena had never been allowed to even own a pair of jeans or a T-shirt. “I thought maybe you’d rather go when you were cleaned up.”

  What she looked like no longer made her feel self-conscious. That it ever had was her mother’s doing. “Then I’ll make myself presentable and go in.” Turning, she walked toward the house.

  Cameron was right behind, catching up to her in a single stride. “All right, I’ll take you to him.”

  She glanced at him, then turned her face forward. “You don’t have to.”

  Why was she constantly pushing him away? “I said I would, didn’t I? Besides, I do have to. I work there, remember?”

  She dropped her gloves and the spade into a wicker basket she’d left by the fountain. The towering stone statue of a young Grecian girl looked down on them mournfully. “I meant I’ll take my own car.”

  Cameron stopped where he was and shrugged. If that was the way she wanted it, he wasn’t about to force himself on her, in any sense of the word. “Suit yourself.”

  After a minute, Serena relented. Bedford had gotten a lot bigger. Maybe she did need him. “But I can follow you there,” she added. “There’re a lot more streets now than I remember. And they’ve probably moved the station—”

  “They did.”

  She was too impatient to fumble with maps and find herself traveling down the wrong streets. It would be just plain common sense to let Cameron guide her.

  “Okay, I’ll just be a minute,” she promised, hurrying in.

  He nodded and then slowly walked up the long path to the house. She was on the stairs by the time he crossed the foyer threshold.

  She’d been busy in here, as well, he noted, looking around. The house no longer bore that mummified look. The drop cloths had all been removed from the furniture and piled up in a corner, as if the change were only temporary.

  But for now, at least, the room looked less forbidding. And a hell of a far cry from the showplace he vaguely recalled it being. She’d brought him here only a handful of times, always when her mother was out, attending some function at the country club. He’d been so enamored of Serena, he hardly noticed anything else.

  “You took my advice and called in a cleaning crew?” he called up to her.

  Her voice drifted to him from one of the rooms upstairs. “I’m the cleaning crew.”

  And if Carolyn McKee wasn’t haunting the house, she was rolling over in her grave, he mused. Carolyn had never put her hand to a single task.

  Cameron followed the sound of Serena’s voice, climbing up the spiral staircase. “More rechanneled energy?”

  In her old room, Serena’s mouth twisted in a mirthless smile as she stripped off her T-shirt and tossed it on the bed. She was working on the garden out of love. What she was doing in the house had a far more practical reason behind it.

  Serena opened the top drawer of the bureau she’d dusted last night, after Cameron left, and took out a clean blouse. She shook it once to get the wrinkles out. “I thought looking around would be easier if everything wasn’t buried under tarp and dirt.”

  “What are you looking for?”

  She didn’t answer. Probably because she couldn’t hear, he decided, walking into her room.

  “I said, what are you looking for?”

  And then he stopped abruptly, staring at her. Because the door was open, he’d assumed she hadn’t begun to change yet.

  She had.

  He lost his train of thought. Her blouse hung open, clearly revealing the swell of her breasts above the lacy white bra she wore. Cameron could almost feel his hand gliding over them, skin to skin. Touching her...

  His palm seemed to throb. Their eyes met. Hers were accusing as she quickly did up the buttons. Cameron tried to turn away, but he couldn’t.

  “Sorry,” he murmured. “I didn’t realize...”

  She could feel heat rising in her cheeks. Heat generated by the look in his eyes. By the memory that once, that look had been all she needed to make her happy. But once wasn’t now.

  “Don’t you remember how to knock?”

  “I remember. I remember a great many things,” he answered tightly, struggling for control.

  Well, so did she. Remembered long, sleepless nights spent crying, wondering why. Waiting to hear footsteps that never came. She turned away from him before he could see the gleam of angry tears.

  Cameron couldn’t really help himself. He knew that, and he damned his lack of strength even as he came toward her. Standing behind her, he placed his hands on Serena’s shoulders, his fingers gliding softly along the length of her arms.

  She was trembling, she thought. Not where he could see, not yet. But inside. She was trembling, like a reed in the wind, and yearning. Serena called herself every name she could think of for being so weak.

  Serena pressed her lips together, praying for strength. “What are you doing?”

  “Touching you.” His breath mingled in her hair, lingering on her cheek. Serena shut her eyes tight. “Seeing if you’re real.”

  If he didn’t stop, she was going to dissolve right here, and she couldn’t, wouldn’t. He hadn’t cared enough to stand by her when she needed him. She wasn’t going to let him pick up the threads now because he had nothing else going at the moment.

  No matter how much she wanted him to.

  Somehow, she found the courage to shrug him off. “Very real,” she answered stiffly. She turned around, taking care not to let any part of her touch him. If it did, she knew, she would surely go up in flames. Or, at the very least, cling to him. “Well, am I presentable enough now?”

  Stupid, stupid, he berated himself. That had been a damn stupid thing to do. He’d allowed his control to slip for just a moment, and she’d seeped through. It wouldn’t happen again.

  “Never knew a time you weren’t,” he told her crisply.

  Just for a moment, she smiled the way she used to when he gave her a compliment, as if his words were a rare treasure. A smile that began from her heart rose to her eyes and found its way to her mouth.

  It undid him more than a well-aimed punch to the gut would have.

  “Thanks. Okay.” She gestured toward the stairs and what lay beyond. “Lead the way.”

  If Chief Dan Olson looked surprised when he saw Serena McKee walk into his office, none of his men knew it. His greeting was hearty and filled with warmth as his hand enveloped hers.

  And then he hugged her.

  The display of unbridled emotion amazed those of his men privileged to witness the sight.

  “Sit down.” Olson gestured toward the chair in front of his desk. His eyes seemed to devour her with genuine affection. “How are you? How have you been?”

  How did you answer something like that? she wondered. How could she have been, living all these years beneath the weight of what had happened here? She’d managed. Grown up, gone to school, gotten a degree. Two, actually. And tried to forget.

  “All right,” Serena replied, her voice mild. “Cameron said you’d be willing to see me.”

  “Willing?” Olson asked, surprised. He hadn’t phrased it
that way. For that matter, he hadn’t known if she wanted to see him. “Yes, I’m willing, more than willing.” He glanced at the squad room. “Listen, things are slow here this morning. Why don’t I take you out for some brunch, and we can do some catching up?”

  She wouldn’t mind doing some catching up with the man who’d been like a second father to her when she was growing up. And then there were questions she wanted answered. Serena smiled. “I’d like that.”

  Cameron couldn’t have explained what possessed him, but he heard himself asking, “Mind if I come along, Chief?”

  Chapter 6

  Olson appeared to hesitate for a moment after his initial surprise faded. He looked at Cameron, then shrugged.

  “Why not? You’ve earned a meal on the city, Reed.” The pale eyes shifted to Serena. “Serena? Any objections?”

  It seemed that no matter which way she turned, she was fated to be thrown in with Cameron. It was almost as if resistance were futile.

  Having him around tended to distract her enough to blur her narrow focus. But she didn’t want to appear contrary, not with something so much larger than her personal feelings at stake.

  Without missing a beat, she shook her head. “No objections.”

  Cameron doubted that. He’d heard heartier endorsements coming from patients in a dentist’s chair when they were asked if they wanted to proceed with a root canal. Under ordinary circumstances, the tone of Serena’s voice would have been enough to make him rescind his request. But these were not ordinary circumstances. The very fact that he’d invited himself along wasn’t in keeping with his personality.

  He was still trying to figure out just what had urged him to do it as they walked out of the precinct. Olson took Serena in his car while Cameron followed behind them.

  Maybe, he mused, it was because after all these years he still felt protective toward her. And he knew what she was going to ask Olson. She was going to want the chief to talk about the case. A case he’d handled to apparently everyone’s satisfaction but hers. Cameron wanted to be there with her as a buffer in case things got a little testy.

  Hell, he just wanted to be there with her. And this, he supposed, turning into the Heritage Plaza Shopping Center, was as good an excuse as any.

  Completely ignoring the cooling cup of coffee at her elbow, Serena stared out the window beside their corner table. She’d only picked at her blueberry muffin for form’s sake. She hadn’t had an appetite for some time now, especially in the past month.

  “I can remember orange groves being here,” Serena commented.

  Now, in place of the orange groves, there was a parking lot lending its services to one of the ever-growing number of shopping centers that were sprouting around to accommodate the new tracts of homes that were being built. Across the parking lot was a car wash. Busy, by the looks of it.

  Bedford boasted three car washes. Each place of business claimed that only human hands and not machines washed the vehicles. She could remember when there had only been two gas stations the entire length of the town.

  “I can do you one better,” Olson said, finishing the last of his hearty-man breakfast. “I can remember when this was a town, not a city.” He pushed his cup to the edge of the table, smiling up at the waitress who approached to silently refill his cup. “Aren’t any orange groves around anymore.” And then he remembered. “Except the one by your house.”

  Her eyes touched Cameron’s fleetingly, wondering why he hadn’t said anything yet. It had been his idea to come along, yet he’d sat there, just listening, while she and Olson talked. What was he doing here?

  What was he thinking?

  Even in silence, he preyed on her thoughts, she thought ruefully. Turning to look at Uncle Dan instead, she smiled sadly. “I guess I’d better walk through it quickly, then, before somebody decides to cut it all down.”

  “Talk has it that the Bedford Company’s already eyeing that piece of property for a golf course.”

  To tear up something that was so scenic, so old, just so that people in carts could move about and occasionally strike at little round balls, seemed like nothing short of a crime to her.

  “We don’t need another golf course,” Serena declared vehemently.

  Olson was surprised at the passion in her voice. Until now, she’d been the complete portrait of her mother, cool and composed. At least, that was the way Carolyn had been in public. “Some would say we don’t need orange trees around when we have supermarkets.”

  Serena’s mouth twisted into a small smile. It didn’t reach her eyes, Cameron noticed. “My mother would have been in that number.”

  Cameron toyed with his coffee. He’d said nothing since they left the precinct, other than to ask for coffee, black, when the waitress came to take their orders. He’d contented himself with sitting back, watching, waiting for the conversation to eke its way past the small talk that he knew neither of the participants was really interested in.

  He had the impression that, in his own subtle way, Olson was probing Serena to find out if her return had a deeper purpose behind it than just selling the family house.

  Olson leaned over the table and covered Serena’s hand with his own. The image of a hawk swooping down on a sparrow flashed through Cameron’s mind.

  “You look like her, you know,” Olson told Serena. “Same hair, same build. Even your voices are almost the same.” He shook his head, as if it took effort for him to distinguish between the two. “Gives a man pause to look at you.”

  Serena had been very careful to follow her father’s path. She’d even gotten a degree in the subject that was a particular passion of his, English literature. Because he’d loved it, she’d loved it, too. The comparison to her mother grated on her.

  She raised her chin defensively. “I’m nothing like my mother.”

  Olson nodded, understanding the reason for Serena’s quick denial.

  “Carolyn was a difficult woman,” he allowed. “And hard on your father. No one ever disputed that. But a handsome woman, for all that.” He sampled the fresh cup of coffee and allowed himself a moment to enjoy it. “None of us who knew them understood how he could have stayed with her as long as he did.”

  “He didn’t kill her!”

  Serena hadn’t meant for the words to just leap from her lips like that, like an explosion. She’d wanted to lead up to it, to explore Uncle Dan’s true feelings about the case before she said anything. But the implication in Uncle Dan’s words had been clear. He thought her father was guilty, too.

  “He couldn’t have,” she added in a more subdued voice, deliberately avoiding Cameron’s eyes. She wasn’t sure just how she’d react if she saw pity there.

  It was not pity, but compassion, that filled Olson’s eyes. “Honey, I know how hard it is for you to accept this, but you’re going to have to. The facts speak for themselves. Your mother was found in her bedroom, shot dead with a bullet to the head from the gun we found in your father’s hand. The same gun he used to shoot himself.” He saw the resistance in her face, even though she didn’t say anything. “Serena, we combed every inch of that place. We wanted to find evidence of an intruder. Some scum we could pin this on instead of your father.” Olson dragged a hand through his hair and sighed. “But there was nothing.”

  Olson suddenly felt old, older than he had in a long time. There were things that just couldn’t be changed, no matter how much someone wanted them to be different.

  “You’re going to have to make your peace with that. I loved your father like a brother, Serena. This last thing he did doesn’t turn him into a monster, or even an evil man. Just a man who broke.” The wide shoulders lifted philosophically. “If he’d have lived, the judge would have probably ruled temporary insanity.” He paused as the waitress approached with refills again.

  It was evident to Cameron that Olson had given the subject ample thought before now. It had to be difficult for him, standing on both sides of the law with this, as an upholder of justice and as a friend
of the accused.

  “I hate to speak ill of the dead,” Olson continued, after the waitress had receded from their table, “but your mother was a witch. A beautiful, tempting witch who knew how to twist the knife in a man once she had him. Leave it be,” he counseled. “Don’t do anything you might end up regretting.”

  Cameron expected Serena to argue with Olson’s view of the crime and with his advice, the way she had with him. But she didn’t. The passion seemed to have been siphoned from her voice, from her face. Cameron sat back and studied Serena. He had a feeling that something was up. He wouldn’t have felt that way if this was the old Serena, but the Serena who sat opposite him wasn’t nearly so easy to read.

  While Serena continued to talk to the police chief for another quarter of an hour, asking him a few random questions as they occurred to her, the rest of the brunch went by without any significant incident.

  Olson walked out of the restaurant thinking that the matter of her parents’ death was finally settled for Serena, once and for all.

  “Listen,” Olson said, clasping Serena’s hand between his as he stood in the parking lot beside his car, “if there’s anything at all I can do for you, you just let me know, you hear? You are my goddaughter, and I sure haven’t lived up to the part of godfather in the last eleven years. I’m sure that wasn’t what your father had in mind when he asked me.” Olson smiled down into her face. “I’d like to be part of your life again, if you’d let me.”

  “Of course,” Serena murmured. “But I’m not sure how long I’ll be staying here.”

  She was feeding Olson the same line she’d given him, Cameron thought, wondering again just what Serena was up to.

  “I understand.” Olson glanced at his watch, then looked at Cameron. “I guess it’s a lucky thing you came along after all, Reed, though you certainly didn’t talk much. Why don’t you take the lady back to her car at the precinct? I almost forgot, I’ve got an appointment I’m supposed to be keeping in a few minutes.”