“You expect us to forget that our children died,” Harold Guthrie bellowed.
In spite of his accusation, sympathy for the man welled inside Kate. Harold’s seventeen-year-old daughter Agnes had been Ned’s third victim. A bullet had pierced her aorta.
Kate shook her head. “No one here will ever forget that tragedy, Mr. Guthrie. But I believe it’s beneficial for today’s students to stop living in fear, fear created because our town still dwells on that devastating event.” She pressed her hand over her chest. “That tragedy defined us, but we can’t let it destroy us.”
“Tearing down the school won’t wipe out our grief or bring back our children,” a man in the back row yelled.
“It won’t stop us from being afraid when we send our babies to school,” another woman shouted.
“I can’t promise we won’t have trouble again. No one can,” Kate said earnestly. “But rest assured, we’re incorporating security measures to make Briar Ridge High as safe as possible.”
A tall man Kate didn’t recognize stood and aimed a look at Jose Fernandez, one of the refugees who’d attended the school the year of the shooting. “Terrorists get guns past security all the time.”
“My son is not a terrorist,” Jose’s mother said angrily.
Suddenly protests erupted.
Riggs Benford stood and waved his hand. “Kate is right. Being held hostage to fear is not living at all. We can honor those who’ve fallen with the new building.”
The mayor’s wife shot up from her seat. “It’s easy for you to say that because you survived and can still walk. My daughter is confined to that chair.”
“Mother!” Brynn grabbed at her mother’s arm in an attempt to force her to sit. Her look of horror made Kate want to comfort her as they’d comforted each other as kids. But she sensed Brynn wouldn’t want that now.
The outburst escalated, angry accusations flying through the room over who was to blame for Ned’s breakdown.
The cryptic note Kate received earlier was burned into her brain. She attempted to regain control of the meeting, but no one was listening. A heated exchange in the back erupted and one man raised a fist.
Sheriff Lawson rushed to stop a fight from breaking out while Deputy Bridges made an effort to calm others. Kate’s pulse pounded and she slowly backed away from the podium. Images of her classmates running and screaming flashed behind her eyes.
Her mother’s blood...
The rage, and then the blank look in Ned’s eyes, as if he hadn’t quite comprehended what he’d done.
The gun turning on her...
Suddenly she couldn’t breathe. She’d suffered from panic attacks for months after the shooting. She was on the verge of one now.
Her gaze met Riggs’s for a second. Concern darkened his eyes and he stepped forward. Humiliation washed over her. She couldn’t have a meltdown in front of him or any of these people.
The room was blurring, lights flickering wildly, colors fading to black. She pushed past the other town council members and clawed her way to the side door. Instead of heading toward the front entrance where she’d have to deal with the angry crowd, she staggered toward the rear exit.
RIGGS HAD SEEN enough hotheads in his lifetime, and he didn’t like the atmosphere in the room. Hell, he’d been worried about protestors, but the situation was quickly escalating to the point of violence.
Sheriff Lawson and his deputy worked to calm the outburst, and Riggs decided to check on Kate. She hadn’t deserved to be under attack, not after all she’d suffered and lost.
And certainly not because of her good intentions. He’d heard she’d instigated measures to stop bullying in school and to keep troubled kids from falling through the cracks. Just like her mother, she cared about students.
And God knew, he owed her mother.
As he wove his way to the front door, he spotted classmates he hadn’t seen in over a decade. Jay Lakewood, then Duke Eastman. He’d been buddies with them back in the day, but they’d lost touch over the years. He’d heard Jay had joined the military and become a bomb expert. Duke was a Navy SEAL.
Gretta Wright, another former classmate, who currently worked for the local news station, darted toward a group of angry protestors with her microphone. Gretta had started a gossip rag in high school and had made more enemies than friends whenever she threw anyone in her path under the bus for a byline.
He cut a wide berth around her and stepped into the lobby. Jay and Duke strode toward him.
“Hey, man, long time no see,” Jay said.
Duke pounded him on the back. “I saw the way you were looking at Kate. Do you have something going on with her?” he asked with a chuckle.
Riggs snorted. “She barely gives me the time of day when I see her around town.”
“Guess it’s your reputation as a ladies’ man,” Jay said with a grin.
Riggs’s gut tightened. His old friend was probably right. He had made mistakes, mistakes that had cost him. “That was a long time ago. I’m not the same guy I was in high school.”
Duke rubbed a hand over his stomach where his scar from the shooting would have been. “None of us is.”
A tense silence fell between them for a minute, the memories returning. Good and bad.
“I’m surprised to see you two here,” Riggs said.
Jay shrugged. “Figured it was time I got up the courage to come back.”
That admission surprised Riggs. “You work with bombs. I didn’t think you were afraid of anything.”
Jay flexed his hands and looked at them, his expression strained. Riggs felt like a heel for his callous remark. Jay had escaped physically unhurt from the school shooting but psychological scars ran deep.
While Riggs had lain writhing in pain, Jay had run to tackle Ned to get his gun. But Ned had grabbed Jay’s girlfriend, Cara Winthrop, as a hostage and forced everyone to back off. Then he’d shot Cara five times.
Jay had beaten himself up for years, saying he should have saved Cara.
But no one could have saved her.
“How about we grab a beer and catch up?” Duke suggested.
Riggs hesitated. “Rain check? I need to get going.”
They exchanged cell numbers before Riggs hurried through the exit. The scent of impending rain swirled around him as he paused on the steps and scanned the parking lot for Kate’s black SUV. He spotted it, but Kate wasn’t inside.
Worry knotted his belly. She’d had time to make it to her vehicle by now. Where was she?
Adrenaline pumping through him, he darted down the steps then around the side of the structure. The parking lot was full, several people heading to their cars, some deep in conversation, others ranting about Kate.
The urge to shut them up slammed into him, but he resisted. Violence wasn’t the answer.
After he’d recovered from the shooting and worked through his self-pity, he’d made it his life’s work to save people, not hurt them.
Worry tightened his muscles as he jogged toward the rear of the building. Kate stood on the back stoop, leaning against the railing. She looked pale, her hands clenching the iron bars as if she needed them to hold her up.
Billy Hodgkins crept up behind Kate, his beady eyes practically disappearing in his face beneath that bushy beard. He looked like a mountain man, wild and dangerous, a predator about to pounce on his prey.
Protective instincts surged through Riggs. “Kate?” Riggs rushed toward the stoop.
Billy’s head jerked up and he darted back inside the building.
Riggs climbed the bottom step. “Are you okay?”
She seemed dazed, even confused, but slowly shook her head and looked down at him. Something deep and unsettling stirred in Riggs’s chest.
He’d seen that frightened look in his mama’s eyes just before his daddy unleashed his temper on her. He’d hated it then.
He hated it now.
Not that Kate was fragile. But at the moment, she looked so vulnerable and frightened, he had the insane urge to pull her into his arms and hold her.
A ridiculous thought. Kate didn’t even like him.
Riggs offered his hand to her. “Let me walk you to your car.”
She moved down a step, but didn’t accept his hand, proving he was right. Even when she was scared, Kate didn’t want anything to do with him.
KATE DRAGGED IN AIR, still battling the panic. The moment she heard Billy mutter her name, déjà vu struck her with the force of a blow to her chest.
“What did Billy say to you?” Riggs asked.
Kate bit her lower lip.
“Did he threaten you?” Riggs pressed.
Had Billy threatened her? She hadn’t heard exactly what he’d said. Then Riggs had appeared. “I...he mumbled something, but I didn’t catch his exact words.”
“I don’t trust him,” Riggs said.
“Neither do I. He has a right to be at the meeting, though,” she said in a low voice. “He suffered, too. His family had to live in the shadow of what Ned did.”
Riggs muttered an obscenity. “Don’t be naïve, Kate. That guy’s a bully and always has been.”
She shrugged but tensed at his tone. “Maybe. But he lost his brother that day. And everyone in town and at school treated him like he was a killer, too.”
Except he’d blamed her. And, unknowingly at the time, she’d played a role in Ned’s breakdown.
They reached her SUV and she leaned against the driver’s door and looked up at him. Riggs had been popular in high school. As soon as he’d broken up with one girl, a string of others lined up to take her place. As far as she knew, he was still a womanizer. With his good looks and charm, women fell at his feet.
She didn’t intend to be one of them.
Still, he’d turned into a town hero. And it was impossible not to notice the smoky hue of his dark brown eyes.
“I figured some people would be emotional about the demolition of the old building,” Kate said. “But I didn’t expect the bitterness that’s surfaced.”
“The town has been steeped in grief and anger for years, Kate. It’s time someone forced everyone to move on.”
Kate sighed. “I just want Briar Ridge to be a happy place again, for it to be like it was when I was little.”
Riggs clenched his jaw. “After all that’s happened, I can’t believe you look at life through rose-colored glasses.”
Kate tensed. He had no idea how she struggled with finding the positive. “Better than seeing the bad in everyone.”
She reached inside her purse for her keys before she did something stupid like lean into Riggs for support. Her keys jangled as she removed them from her bag.
Riggs’s dark gaze searched her face. “Why don’t I follow you home?”
The earlier message, then the animosity at the meeting, and seeing Billy again, had shaken her to the core.
Sexy bad boy Riggs Benford was a danger of another kind.
She couldn’t interpret his concern for anything more.
“I’m fine, Riggs. Thanks for walking me to my car.” She didn’t wait for a response. She slid into the driver’s seat and waved goodbye, then slowly backed from the parking spot. More than one vehicle gave a rude honk as she passed.
Only a few days until the dedication for the new building. She refused to allow a few disgruntled residents to keep her from implementing her plans.
With the news constantly reporting about mass shootings in other cities and towns, nerves ran high. Several students this year had visited the counselor because of anxiety issues over attending school. Students deserved to feel safe and happy. Parents deserved it, too.
A momentary tug of longing enveloped her. She didn’t have children herself but her biological clock was ticking, and sometimes she imagined having a little one of her own. A baby nestled in her arms. A home...
But with the craziness in the world and seeing it firsthand, she was afraid to love and lose again.
Maneuvering her way onto Main Street, she passed the park situated in the heart of town, then the library, hardware store, the ice cream shop, the Mercantile, Pearl’s Dine & Pie, Joy’s Fabric and Crafts, and the empty lot where the church sold pumpkins in the fall and Christmas trees in November and December.
Headlights behind her nearly blinded her, and she slowed and checked the rearview mirror. She couldn’t make out the car or tell if it was following her. But it was too close for comfort.
Irritated, she pulled over in front of Briar Ridge Inn. For a moment, the car slowed beside her, and she felt eyes piercing her. She didn’t recognize the dark sedan, but it was a common make and model. With dozens of visitors in town, it could even be a rental.
Finally, the car moved on. She breathed a sigh of relief then veered back onto the road. She’d almost reached her street when she smelled smoke. A second later, the scent of gas assaulted her.
Pulse clamoring, she checked the rearview mirror. Smoke seeped from the rear near the gas tank. Panic seized her. She jerked the SUV to the side of the road, threw it in Park and jumped out.
Just as her feet hit the graveled shoulder, her car burst into flames.