This morning the promise of spring was impossible to miss.
Blooms and leaves sprouted from every bare limb. This was her favorite time of
year. A new beginning. Anything could happen.
Rowan sighed. Funny how being back in Winchester had come to
mean so much to her these past several months. As a teenager she couldn’t wait
to get away from home. Growing up in a funeral home had made her different from
the other kids. She was the daughter of the undertaker, a curiosity. At twelve
tragedy had struck and she’d lost her twin sister and her mother within months
of each other. The painful events had driven her to the very edge. By the time
she finished high school, she was beyond ready for a change of scenery. Despite
having spent more than twenty years living in the big city hiding from the
memories of home and a dozen of those two decades working with Nashville’s
Metro Police Department—in Homicide, no less—she had been forced to see that
there was no running away. No hiding from the secrets of her past.
There were too many secrets, too many lies, to be ignored.
Yet, despite all that had happened the first eighteen years
of her life, she was immensely glad to be back home.
If only the most painful part of her time in
Nashville—serial killer Julian Addington—hadn’t followed her home and wreaked
havoc those first months after her return.
Rowan took a breath and emerged from her SUV. The morning
air was brisk and fresh. More glimpses of spring’s impending arrival showed in
pots overflowing with tulips, daffodils and crocuses. Those same early bloomers
dotted the landscape beds all around the square. It was a new year and she was
very grateful to have the previous year behind her.
She might not be able to change the past, but she could
forge a different future and she intended to do exactly that.
Closing the door, she smiled as she thought of the way Billy
had winked at her as he’d left this morning. He’d settled that cowboy hat onto
his handsome head, flashed that sexy smile and winked, leaving her heart
fluttering. Four months ago he’d moved into the funeral home with her. The
one-hundred-fifty-year-old three-story house didn’t feel nearly so lonely now.
She and Billy had been friends most of their lives and, in truth, she had been
attracted to him since she was thirteen or fourteen. But she’d never expected a
romantic relationship to evolve. Billy Brannigan was a hometown hero. The chief
of police and probably the most eligible bachelor in all of Franklin County. He
could have his pick of any of the single women around town. Rowan hadn’t
expected to be his choice.
She had always been too work-oriented to bother with
long-term relationships. Too busy for dating on a regular basis.
Billy had made her want long-term. He made her believe
anything was possible, even moving beyond her tragic past.
The whole town was speculating on when the wedding
invitations would go out. Rowan hadn’t even considered the possibility. This
place where she and Billy were was comfortable. It felt good. Particularly
since fate had given them a break the past four months. No trouble beyond the
regular, everyday sort. No calls or notes from Julian. No unexplained bodies
turning up. And no serial killers had appeared looking for Rowan.
Life was strangely calm and oddly normal.
She would never say as much to Billy, but it was just a
little terrifying. The worry that any day, any moment, the next bad thing would
happen stalked her every waking moment. Somehow she managed to keep that worry
on the back burner. But it was there, waiting for an opportunity to seep into
her present.
“Not today,” she said aloud.
Today was important. She and Burt Johnston, the county
coroner, had breakfast on Monday mornings. She locked her vehicle and started
for the sidewalk. The Corner Diner was a lunch staple in Winchester. Had been
since the end of the Great Depression. Attorneys and judges who had court often
frequented the place for lunch. Most anyone who was someone in the area could
be found at the diner. More deals and gossip happened here than in the mayor’s
office.
But breakfast with the coroner wasn’t the only event that
made this day so important.
Today she intended to offer her assistant, Charlotte
Kinsley, a promotion and a part-ownership in the funeral home. Since there were
no more DuPonts—Rowan had no children and couldn’t say if that would ever
happen—she needed to bring someone into the family business. Someone younger
who could carry on the DuPont legacy.
Rowan paused outside the diner. The iron bench that sat
beneath the plate glass window was empty. Surprise furrowed her brow. Burt
usually waited there for her. She surveyed the cars lining the sidewalks as far
as the eye could see. No sign of Burt’s. He was never late but there was always
a first time. After all, he wasn’t exactly a young man anymore.
She sank down onto the bench, dug her cell phone from her
bag and sent him a text. She was the one who generally kept him waiting and he
never once complained. She certainly wasn’t going to do so. His car was a
little on the vintage side as well. Maybe he had car trouble this morning.
Worry gnawed at her. A dead battery or a flat tire. Surely he would have called
her.
“Morning, Rowan.”
She glanced up, smiling automatically. Lance Kirby, one of
the attorneys who was not fortunate enough to have an office on the square. The
ones who had been around a lifetime held on to that highly sought-after real
estate. The others, like Kirby, waited patiently for someone to retire or to
die. Meanwhile they showed up for coffee in this highly visible location bright
and early every morning.
“Good morning, Lance.”
Kirby was a couple of years older than her. He’d lived in
Winchester his entire life other than the years he spent at college and law
school. He was divorced and had three kids. He’d asked Rowan out to dinner on
several occasions. She hoped he didn’t ask again this morning. Coming up with
an excuse to turn him down was becoming tedious. Surely he was aware that she
and Billy were a couple now.
The idea startled her a little. This was the first time in
her life that she was half of a couple in the truest sense of the word.
“If you’re waiting for Burt, he’s parked around back. Every
spot around the square was taken before seven this morning.” Kirby reached for
the door. “People have come early hoping for a chance to get into the Winters
trial. Everyone wants to hear the story on that family.”
Rowan had been reading about the trial for weeks in the
Winchester Gazette. “That explains why I had to circle around for a while
before I found a spot.” She’d forgotten about the small parking area in the
back alley behind the diner. “Thanks for telling me. I was worried he’d stood
me up.”
Kirby laughed. “I don’t think any man still breathing would
stand you up, Rowan.”
She glanced at her cell phone as if it had vibrated. “Oops.
I have to take this.”
The instant she set the phone to her ear, Kirby went on
inside the diner, the bell over the door jingling to announce his entrance.
Thank goodness.
For appearances’ sake she kept the phone to her ear a half a
minute, then put it away. To pass the time she counted the yellow daffodils
brimming in the rock planter built around the tree at the edge of the sidewalk.
Those lovely yellow flowers were coming up all around the funeral home, too.
Her mother had loved gardening. Early-spring blooms were already bursting all
over the yard. Maybe her mother had hoped to chase away some of the gloom
associated with living in a funeral home.
Since her father’s death, Rowan had hired a gardener.
Somehow her father had managed to keep her mother’s extensive gardens alive and
thriving for all those years. Rowan did not have a green thumb at all. She had
killed every plant she’d ever tried to nurture. She was not going to be the one
who dropped the ball on the family garden.
She glanced up then down the sidewalk. Still no sign of
Burt. With a sigh, she pushed to her feet. Maybe he was on the phone, which
would explain why he hadn’t answered her text. Rather than keep waiting, she
cut through the narrow side alley to the small rear parking lot. With his
taillights facing the back of the diner, Burt’s white sedan was nosed up to the
bank that faced North Jefferson Street.
Rowan quickened her pace and walked up to the driver’s side
of his car. Burt sat behind the steering wheel, staring out the windshield.
For a moment Rowan waited for him to glance over and see her
but he didn’t move. Whether it was the lax expression on his face or some
deep-rooted instinct, she abruptly understood that he was dead.
She tugged at the door handle. Thankfully it opened. Her
heart pounding, she bent down. No matter that her brain was telling her he was
already gone, she asked, “Burt, you okay?”
Her fingers went instantly to his carotid artery.
Nothing.
Rowan snatched her cell from her bag and called 911. She
requested an ambulance and the chief of police, then she laid the phone on the
ground and reached into the car and pulled Burt from his seat. She grunted with
the effort of stretching him out on the pavement. On her knees next to him, she
pressed her ear to his chest. No heartbeat. She held her cheek close to his
lips. No breath.
Rowan started CPR.
The voice from the speaker of her cell phone confirmed that
the ambulance was en route. She informed the dispatcher that she’d started CPR.
Rowan continued the compressions, her eyes burning with
emotion. Burt was her friend. She had been gone from Winchester for a very long
time and he had made her feel as if she’d neve
r left. She did not want him to
die. Other than Billy, he was the person she felt closest to. The voice of
logic reminded her that Burt was just two months shy of his eightieth birthday.
She ignored the voice and focused on the chest compressions.
“Come on, Burt. Don’t you die on me.”
Facial color was still good. Skin was still warm. He
couldn’t have been in this condition for long. Hope attempted to make an
appearance. But it was short-lived. Even a few minutes could be too many.
Damn it!
The approaching sirens drove home the realization that this
was all too real.
