Page 137 of Whispers and Wildfire
“I know. I’m just so fucking frustrated. I hate feeling like there’s nothing I can do.”
I leaned my head against his shoulder. “Yeah, me too.”
A guy in a baseball cap wandered in and joined a few people at the bar. I remembered him, and several of the others, from high school.
Which reminded me of the other thread in my tangle of emotions. It was bright red, weaving in and out of the rest, a painful reminder of a once-broken heart.
Ever since our dinner with Paul and Marlene the other night, I’d been inundated with memories. Maybe it was because their house hadn’t changed. From the knit throwblankets on the blue couch to the hint of pine and lemon in the air, it felt like stepping back in time.
Or maybe it was all the photos displayed on their mantel and walls. So many of those memories were adjacent to my own, times that I remembered too.
Like the photo of Luke and Zachary in suits before prom. I’d been his date that night. His bow tie and vest had been pale blue to match my dress.
It was a night that hadn’t ended well.
But why was I letting that bother me? Who cared what had happened back in high school? I kept telling myself it had been so long. What we had now was different. We weren’t going to fall into the same traps, the same patterns.
Except what if we did? What if Luke Haven was a colossal mistake? What if I was attaching myself to him out of fear, like I had with my ex?
After all, I’d moved in with Jared because of the abduction. There I was again, basically shacking up with my boyfriend out of fear.
I took a drink of my beer, trying not to give in to my frantic emotions. But what if I was repeating the past, rushing headlong into another heartbreak?
The door opened again, and my back tightened. It was only Theo, but I wished people would stop doing that. Every time someone new came in, I wondered if it was going to be The Whisper.
Not that I’d know who he was. But if it wasn’t someone I knew, I’d have to wonder.
Then again, what if it was someone I knew? What if The Whisper was one of the townspeople? A regular member of society no one would ever have guessed was capable of murder.
Oh my god, was it Theo?
He grabbed a chair and pulled it up to our table.
“It’s not you, is it?” I asked.
He sat and his eyebrows drew in. “Is what not me?”
“The Whisper.”
Luke turned to me. “Seriously, Mel? My brother isn’t a murderer.”
“I’m sorry, I know you’re not. I blurted that out without thinking.” I shook my head. “It’s just, every time the door opens, I wonder if he’s going to walk in. And then I was thinking that I wouldn’t know if he walked in because no one knows who he is. Which made me think, wait, what if he’s someone we all know?”
“That is a weird thought,” Theo said.
“It’s like that cold case Garrett solved last year,” Luke said. “No one saw that coming.”
Theo shook his head. “That was crazy. Hey, have you talked to Mom and Dad?”
“No, why?”
“Dad’s been tailing Mom everywhere she goes. He even went to her knitting group. I guess he stood there with his arms crossed, glaring at everyone in the store, like a bouncer outside a club.”
“Sounds like Dad.”
“My dad isn’t letting my mom out of his sight either,” I said. “She claims it’s driving her up the wall, but she secretly loves it when he gets protective.”
“This whole thing is wild,” Theo said. “One guy has the whole town held hostage.”
