Karen sighed, a touch of relief on her face. “Keep it as long as you need it. But would you e-mail me the scan? I’ve been meaning to get that done to the old pictures anyway.”
Tyler tucked the picture into his shirt pocket as Laurie brought his four coffees to go in a cardboard box. “Sure. I’ll send it over as soon as I have it.” He stood, put his hat on, then handed Laurie a five-dollar bill as he took the box. “Thanks.”
Mason watched him go, then turned to find Karen staring at him. “What?” he asked.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
He glanced up at Laurie as she set his plate in front of him. “Thanks, Miss Laurie,” he said, picking up his knife and fork. “It looks better than anything even my mama ever put in front of me.”
Laurie grinned. “Thanks, sugar,” she said, picking up on his accent. She placed Karen’s plate down and winked at her. “Don’t let him sweet-talk you into anything.”
Karen stifled a giggle. “I won’t.”
Mason looked from one to the other, his eyes carefully held wide in what he hoped was an expression of innocence. “I have no idea what y’all are talking about.”
“Oh, I’m sure you don’t.” Laurie refilled their cups and beat a discreet retreat.
Mason watched her for a second, then turned back to Karen. “I didn’t have to do what?” he asked, a bite of French toast crowding one cheek.
“Distract Tyler. Thank you for doing it. That was just weird, him looking at the vase as if it were someone he knew.”
Mason swallowed and looked her over carefully. “Karen, how long has Tyler been a cop?”
She paused. “Not sure. Since college, I know. We went to high school together, but he’s older and I didn’t really pay attention. Maybe ten years. Why?”
“All that time here?”
“Yeah, I guess.”
He leaned back in his chair. “I know how you feel about the vases and that face, but you need to think about something, as well. Tyler’s powers of observation are skilled. Trained. This is a small town. He’s going to know most people in this area. Has to—it’s his job. Cops I knew back home could tell you family histories for every kid at the local high school, including who their granddaddies ran around with when they were kids. If he thinks he recognizes the face, then he probably does.”
Karen stared at her plate. “I don’t want to hear this.”
“Why? What if he’s right? What if your memory is picking up on someone you really know and plopping it on those vases?”
She put down her fork and turned to him. “It can’t be.”
“Why not?”
She took a deep breath and dropped her voice so low that he had to lean forward to hear her. “Don’t you understand? That face was chasing me. I was running away because I was terrified. I was running because the person attached to that face was trying to kill me.” Karen leaned back, watching Mason closely, waiting for a response.
He took a deep breath, not wanting to say the words that begged to come out. But if her dreams were a memory trying to work its way out, they were the logical response, the only response. He swallowed hard, dropping his voice. “So has anyone ever really tried to kill you?”
Karen’s eyes met his, evenly, solidly. “Yes.”
From a car across the street, the cold eyes of Luke Knowles’s client watched Karen and Mason’s intimate conversation. “How cozy. Whispering sweetness to him?” The soft voice spoke in the smooth cadences of a practiced speaker, despite the New England edge it held.
The client had not expected Karen and Mason to leave the house so soon, but this provided an advantage, opening up the time frame for the plan by at least fifteen minutes. The client chuckled. A lot could be accomplished in fifteen minutes.
Those blue eyes finally looked away from the café, scanning the street, the mostly closed storefronts. Watching carefully each movement, each blown leaf or strolling citizen. Despicable little town, actually, with its pretentious quaintness and that laughable “arts district.” When this was all over, leaving would be a pleasure as well as a necessity.
But not yet. There was still much to be done, although the first parts of the plan were already in play. First Knowles, now…
The client watched as Tyler Madison bounded out of his office and ran up the street toward the arts district, more lumbering bull than sprinting elk. Even from this distance, the client could hear the rattle and squeak of the leather and metal belts and instruments hanging from the police chief’s body. An even younger—and substantially thinner—officer soon followed, and the client smiled and sat straighter, starting the car’s engine and slipping the car away from the curb. Time for the next step.
THREE
Karen watched as Mason froze for a second, then struggled to swallow the remaining bit of French toast. “You’re not joking, are you?” His voice had a note of disbelief in it, almost as if he wanted her to say she’d only been kidding. He took a quick gulp of coffee, then cleared his throat. “Is this about your parents?”
Karen closed her eyes. She didn’t want to think about it, much less talk about it, but it wasn’t as if it was a big secret; everyone who’d been in Mercer more than a few years knew. She should have realized he would have heard about her parents by now, if not all the details where she was concerned. Sooner or later, Tyler would bring it up, anyway…better that Mason not be caught off guard.
She pushed her plate away and leaned toward him. “Yes. My parents were murdered. I don’t know what you’ve heard, but when I was seven…” Her voice trailed off. No, that was not the way to tell him. She took a deep breath and sat a little straighter, waving away the previous words with one hand. “Most of what I know I’ve learned from folks around town. Old newspapers.” She sighed. “My aunt won’t talk about—but other people have said—” Why is this so hard to say to him! “My father,” she said slowly, “was a real estate agent, one of the most successful in the area. Mom stayed at home with me, and she wanted to make sure neither of us ever got bored. She enrolled me in all kinds of stuff—dance classes, art camps, community theater. I’ve been told she was sweet but quite the determined stage mom. I think she might have had designs on me being a star someday.”
Mason remained still, silent; his eyes focused solely on her face. He did nothing to confirm what he had heard…or what he hadn’t. He just listened.
She took a sip of the coffee. “That day, they tell me I tried out for a local production of Annie. The director later told the police that they loved me. Gave me the role on the spot. My aunt says I had a voice that could make the rafters shake. Mom was so proud. Later, the cops assumed that instead of going home, we went to find Daddy to tell him, to celebrate. Mom had called his office, and his assistant told her about one of his open houses, gave her the address.”
She stopped, hitting the wall of darkness that always occurred at this point in the story. She looked down at her fingernails. Sometimes she wanted to remember; mostly she was glad she couldn’t. Everyone who knew—and sometimes that felt like the whole town—said it was for the best that she never recalled what happened next. Karen took a deep breath.
“Sometime after we arrived, my parents were attacked and killed. Stabbed. A neighbor heard my mother screaming and called the police, but my parents were dead by the time they arrived. They found me in the backyard, bloody and catatonic but alive.”
Mason, frozen in place, muttered something under his breath that she couldn’t quite hear. From the dark look on his face, she was afraid to ask.
“The next thing I remember,”