9

Clay’s muscles shook as he pushed himself to bench-press more weight than ever before. Some days, in order to achieve any peace at all, he had to drive himself until he could scarcely think. Which was why he had a complete weight room in the basement of his house.

Today was one of those days. After his confrontation with Chief McCormick and the discussion that followed with Reverend Portenski, he was searching for the oblivion of absolute exhaustion.

Three hundred and fifty pounds hung suspended by his own power in the air above him. His body begged him to stop. But he wouldn’t. He could still picture Allie in that pretty top at church, the flirtatious smile she’d given him when he said he wasn’t as cheap as she might think—and the glower on her father’s face as Chief McCormick demanded Clay leave her alone.

Maybe getting close to Allie would enable him to control—to a degree, anyway—what Allie learned about Barker and how she interpreted it. At least he’d know where she was in her investigation. He could see the value in that, for him. But he couldn’t offer her anything. Unless she was just looking for a good time. Clay knew women enjoyed what he could give them in bed. Problem was, Allie McCormick wasn’t like Beth Ann or the others who pursued him so relentlessly. Clay wasn’t convinced he could get her to sleep with him even if he tried. She’d always been one of those straight-arrow types. I’ve only been with my ex….

One…two…three…Sucking air in between his teeth, he began to lower the barbell carefully to his chest. It wasn’t wise to lift so much weight when he was alone. Maxing out, as he was doing now, was supposed to be done in the presence of a partner who could help in an emergency. But Clay didn’t care about the risks involved. He preferred to lift alone, the way he did almost everything.

Briefly, the barbell touched his chest. Then he gritted his teeth and commanded his arms to lift it again. One…t-w-o…t-h-r-e-e, he groaned. For a moment, he didn’t think he could do it. But he refused to give up before he was ready.

Push, dammit. Push! he ordered himself.

His whole body trembled with the strain. The weight began to rise, but it was only through sheer will that he finally lifted the barbell until he could fully extend his arms.

As he gasped for breath, Clay wanted to believe he’d done enough. He wasn’t sure how much more he could take. But it was early. And he still wanted to see Allie, regardless of whether or not it’d be good for either one of them.

Another rep. He needed to keep lifting.

He managed two more, and then the phone rang.

Maneuvering the barbell into the holder over his head, Clay sat up and grabbed a towel to wipe the perspiration from his face. Allie had said she’d call him. He’d asked her to dinner.

But by getting to know her, he could lose as much as he stood to gain. Why bother? Without Barker’s remains, she couldn’t prove there’d even been a murder, whether Lucas was telling tales or not.

At least Clay hoped that was true. Since that night nineteen years ago, he could never be completely sure.

With a tired curse, he let the caller go to voice-mail and headed for the shower.

* * *

Allie hung up when Clay’s voice, in the form of a recorded message, came over the line. She had several people still to interview and planned to go down her list. But Clay had had plenty of time to get home and she didn’t want him to think her earlier lack of response and rapid departure meant she’d decided not to go out with him. Sure, she hoped to keep the peace with her parents, especially now that she was living with them and depending on them to watch Whitney while she worked. They’d always been close. But she had her limits. She wasn’t going to allow them to tell her who she could and couldn’t see.

To prove it, she’d go out with Clay in spite of her father. What was one dinner? They needed to talk. They’d been together a couple of times but had never thoroughly discussed the details of the night Reverend Barker went missing. In light of the photograph she’d just discovered at Fowler’s, Allie had some questions Clay might not have entertained before. Also, Lucas denied that he’d spoken with his family during the two previous decades, but Allie knew from what he’d inadvertently revealed that he’d talked to someone during that time. She was hoping to get Clay to explain a bit more of how, when and why Lucas might have been in touch.

In any case, having dinner with Madeline’s stepbrother should prove interesting. Dealing with him usually was.

Pushing the End button on her cell phone, she decided to try again later and slowed to turn into the property across from Clay’s farm. Bonnie Ray Simpson lived in the ramshackle old home set back a quarter of a mile from the road. Her aging husband, the victim of a recent stroke, and the wayward teenage granddaughter she was struggling to raise lived with her. According to the files and Allie’s memory, Bonnie Ray had claimed she saw Barker come home on the night in question.

Allie wanted to see how definite Clay’s neighbor was about that sighting. But as she looked over at the farm, wondering where Clay might have gone, she spotted the back end of his truck parked slightly behind the house. Had he missed her call because he was outside in the barn or somewhere else on the property?

Turning around, she pulled into Clay’s driveway instead of Bonnie’s and parked next to his truck. He hadn’t answered the phone, so she didn’t bother approaching the front door. She walked to the chicken coop in back, calling his name as she scanned the fields and the area between the outbuildings.

No one responded and nothing moved except the chickens pecking at the ground and the leaves on the trees, stirred by a gentle wind.

She crossed to the barn. Clay spent a lot of time restoring antique cars. She was betting she’d find him tearing apart one engine or another. But the barn doors were bolted shut and secured by a heavy padlock.

To the right, she recognized the small room that had been Barker’s office. She’d accompanied her father there once to hand in her brother’s permission slip for a youth campout. That was a long time ago, but she had a vivid recollection of the middle-aged, soft-looking Barker sitting behind his wooden desk, wearing a pair of reading glasses she’d never seen on him before.

Tossing a quick glance over her shoulder to make sure she wasn’t being watched, she hurried closer to the window. Sunlight reflected off the glass, making it difficult to see. But when she raised a hand to shade her eyes, she found herself peering into a room that had been stripped of absolutely everything—even the carpet and the dark paneling that had once covered the walls.

Obviously, Clay didn’t plan on Barker’s coming back. Allie could understand, now that Barker had been gone for so many years. But she wondered why Clay hadn’t turned the space into his own office. Or used it for some other purpose. Maybe he was in the process of doing so, she thought. But—she squinted to see more clearly—it appeared that someone had stabbed at the bare Sheetrock with a knife or some other sharp object.

Automatically, she began searching for the instrument that might have caused the damage, but the deep rumble of an engine distracted her. She looked between the buildings, toward the sound, just in time to see a tow truck heading toward town.

Was it Jed Fowler? Had he followed her here?

Hurrying toward the road to catch another glimpse of the truck, she charged around the corner of the house as fast as she could in high heels.

A strong arm reached out and grabbed her, halting her in midstride and causing her to step right out of one shoe.

“What are you doing here?”

Allie blinked up at Clay. She’d seen a number of closely guarded emotions flicker across his face in the past three days, more than she’d ever seen him reveal before—but now his expression was positively stony.

“You didn’t answer your phone,” she explained. She looked past him, trying to see the road again. But the tow truck was gone.

“And?” Clay prompted.

She gave him her full attention. “And when I was on my way to Bonnie Ray’s, I spotted your vehicle and thought you must be working outside.”

“I was having a shower.”

She could tell. Water dripped from his hair onto his bare shoulders. He hadn’t taken time to put on a shirt or shoes before coming out of the house.

“I’m sorry. I just wanted to let you know that I’m interested in dinner.”

He flicked his hair out of his eyes. “So you can dig a little deeper into my past?”

“So we can work together to discover what happened to your stepfather and bring Madeline and the rest of your family some closure.” Allie suspected he wouldn’t like that answer, but she knew he couldn’t complain about it, regardless of his true feelings.

“And your father?” he asked.

“Don’t worry about my father. He’s…confused right now.”

“About?”

“The nature of our relationship.”

“Which is…”

She wasn’t completely sure herself, but she knew what it needed to be. “Professional, of course.”

“Of course,” he repeated.

“So where should we eat?”

He wiped away a drop of water running down his chest. “I don’t like crowds.”

“We could find some out-of-the-way café. Or…wait, I know the perfect place.”

He hesitated as if he might refuse.

“Have you changed your mind?” she asked.

“Maybe.”

She sent him a challenging grin. “Why? Do I make you nervous?”

He chuckled softly—the cat laughing at the canary. “What time?”

“Is it okay if we go late? After I put Whitney to bed?”

“Your call,” he said.

“Fine.” She told him how to get to the back of her parents’ property and promised she’d be waiting at the guesthouse. From there, they’d drive on to the destination she had in mind. “Pick me up at eight-thirty.”

His eyes moved over her. The blouse she was wearing wasn’t particularly revealing. It wouldn’t raise eyebrows even in a church, which was why she’d felt perfectly comfortable wearing it to the service today. But Clay had a way of making her feel as if he could see right through it.

Her heart began to pound for no reason at all and she realized then, more than ever, that police officer or not, she wasn’t as immune to his sex appeal as she preferred to think.

The nature of our relationship is professional. Of course.

“See you at eight-thirty,” he said and went back inside as if he didn’t care whether she rambled around the farm. But now that he was aware of her presence, she knew she wouldn’t get very far if she started snooping again. Clay was infamous for guarding his own.

With a sigh, she wiggled her foot back into the high heel she’d lost, climbed into her car and headed to Bonnie Ray’s. The place she’d chosen for dinner with Clay was private indeed. Which could work in her favor, if it put Clay at ease and he actually talked to her. Or the seclusion could be a liability, if Clay was as dangerous as her father had suggested.

Was she foolish to take the chance? Possibly. But not because she feared Clay would hurt her physically. It was the promise of what he could do to make her feel good that worried her. The last thing she needed was to get intimately involved with her prime suspect.

* * *

Clay picked up Allie and they took his truck, but she insisted on driving, so they switched seats.

She drove about forty-five minutes from Stillwater to an isolated fishing shack upstream from Pickwick Lake. Then she cut the engine, grabbed the picnic basket she’d wedged into the seat between them and climbed out.

Clay wasn’t sure whether or not to follow her. He didn’t know where Irene and Dale spent time together, but he figured it had to be fairly close. Neither of them was ever gone for long. And Clay doubted the chief would risk meeting Irene at the guesthouse on his property in town. This small fishing hut, which Allie had described as her father’s favorite getaway, sounded like a much more viable option. It was always available to Dale, very private and somewhere Evelyn probably never went.

Clay stared at the cabin, which Allie had already entered. He’d never dreamed she’d take him to such a place. He hadn’t even known it existed. Now that he did know, however, he could easily imagine Allie’s father calling Irene and asking her to meet him here for a few hours on an available afternoon.

Not that imagining such a rendezvous created a picture Clay wanted to see….

“Aren’t you coming?” Allie called from the front step, her body silhouetted by the flicker of a kerosene lamp. She seemed uncertain about his delay, but she didn’t act as if she’d just stumbled on proof that her father was having an affair.

Releasing his breath, Clay got out of his truck and approached the cabin.

“This is definitely private,” he said.

“My dad comes out here almost every Sunday,” she told him. “He likes to fish.”

“With you?”

“When my brother and I were younger, he’d bring us along. These days he mostly comes alone.”

Or so he wanted everyone to believe, Clay thought. “What about today? He didn’t come up?”

“No, he had too much to do. I saw him at home before I left.”

More good news. “I can see why he likes it here.”

The qui-ko-wee of a lone whip-poor-will, which rose from the damp woods surrounding them, seemed louder than any Clay had ever heard. He liked that sound and the sense of seclusion provided by the dense vegetation. But he hesitated at the cabin door, still afraid he might find something of his mother’s inside.

“You seem…reluctant to be here with me,” Allie said, frowning up at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he said and stepped across the threshold.

Only about twelve by fifteen feet, the shack looked like an old miner’s cabin. There was a double bed pushed up against the wall. A dining table sat in front of a rock fireplace that had a spit and an iron hook dangling from above. Three wooden logs, crudely fashioned into chairs, were arranged by the table. White drapes hung at the window. The other furnishings included a small bookcase near the bed, some detached cupboards, a shelf above the fireplace with cooking utensils hanging from it and a knotted rug that covered the wooden planks of the floor.

“There’s no bathroom?” he said.

“The outhouse is downstream a bit. This time of night you’ll need a flashlight or you’ll never find it.”

“How long has your father owned this place?”

“Most of my life.” She gestured around her. “Luxurious, isn’t it?”

Maybe it wasn’t luxurious, but it was appealing. After all the unwanted attention he’d endured in his life, Clay felt as if he’d just stepped into another world, as if he could hide out here and avoid the prying eyes that watched him wherever he went in Stillwater.

It was easy to see how Chief McCormick and Irene might feel the same sense of security. Clay was almost certain this had to be their meeting place. But, fortunately, he saw no sign of his mother’s having visited once, let alone more often.

“Maybe someday my father will make improvements,” Allie said.

Clay shook his head. “I hope not. I like it the way it is.”

“If you had to cook here very often, you wouldn’t be so eager to keep it primitive,” she said. “I personally think it could use running water and electricity. And I’m not fond of trudging down to the outhouse in the middle of a dark cold night.” She moved the picnic basket from the floor to the table. “But considering how remote this place feels, it’s really not that far from civilization.”

She tilted her face up, expecting a reaction to her remarks, but he’d already forgotten what she’d said. Clay was beginning to marvel at the fact that he hadn’t originally considered Allie very attractive. She was so quick-witted and optimistic, so full of life and energy. She made him feel again—eagerness, hope, a deep-seated arousal—just when he’d decided he was beyond reach. Stillwater had become such a stagnant place, one that, for him, still revolved around the events of nineteen years ago. And yet, now that Allie was back, everything seemed to be changing….

He welcomed the way she made him feel, knew he needed it. At the same time, he feared the hope—because he knew no one could really change anything in his life. Certainly not the past…

“What?” she said when he simply stared at her.

“It’s perfect,” he said.

She smiled as if she was a little surprised he liked it so much. But he hadn’t been talking about the cabin. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“What’s for dinner?” He eyed her basket. “Or do the pointed questions come first?”

“Don’t worry about the questions. I’m going to ply you with wine before we start. Maybe I’ll get more out of you that way,” she said with a wink.

He arched his eyebrows. “More what out of me?”

She ignored the double meaning. “More than you normally say, which isn’t much.” She pinched her bottom lip, an action Clay found distracting, to say the least. Her lips were so full, so kissable. He was imagining what they might taste like, when she drew him back to the conversation. “Why is that? Why do you keep such a tight rein on yourself?”

Clay was beginning to believe they were far too alone…. “I don’t. Haven’t you heard? I do exactly as I please.”

She shook her head. “That’s not true. You push everyone who reaches out to you away. And yet I sense a deep desire to connect.”

“That’s bullshit,” he retorted, but he couldn’t meet her eyes. The way she watched him made him feel as if she could decipher every need, every longing. “I don’t trust just any idiot who comes along, that’s all.”

She folded her hands on top of the picnic basket. “Are you willing to trust me, Clay?”

He couldn’t trust anyone. Especially her. But he didn’t say that. He steered the conversation in a different direction. “Tell me what you think happened.”

“To Barker?”

“Who else?”

“As far as I’m concerned, it’s still a mystery.”

“Come on,” he said. “After everything you’ve heard, you have to wonder—am I the guilty party?” He advanced on her to see if she’d back away. “I don’t even go to church regularly. That makes me a heathen right there.”

She stood her ground. “Not in my opinion.”

“You’re avoiding the bigger issue,” he said softly. “What if it’s not safe for you to be alone with me?”

He loomed over her, hoping she’d cower in fear or retreat—so he could dismiss her as easily as he did everyone else in Stillwater. He had to destroy the confidence she seemed to have in him. He was pretty sure it was the way she treated him, as if he was good and not evil, that affected him so deeply. But she didn’t blanch or move. She seemed perfectly relaxed as she glared up at him. “You don’t intimidate me,” she said calmly.

“Then maybe you don’t know what’s good for you,” he scoffed. “I bet no one’s even aware that you’re out here.”

“Who would you have me tell?”

“Not your father, that’s for sure.”

“Good. We’re in agreement there.”

“So no one knows.”

“Does it matter?”

“It could if I’m the monster everyone thinks I am.”

Her expression turned thoughtful. “You’re not a monster, Clay. But that doesn’t mean you’re perfect.”

“Do I have to be?”

She studied his face, but he glanced away before she could guess how badly he wanted her to accept him as he was. “For what?” she asked.

To atone for the past. But it was a pointless question. He already knew he could never be good enough. And that was his problem, not Allie’s. He was the one who had to live with his role in what had happened. “To get fed tonight,” he said.

She jerked her head toward a small stack of firewood. “As soon as you build a fire, we’ll eat.”

* * *

The flames cast a golden haze of moving shadows over Clay, softening the harsher angles of his face. Allie wished she could see him more clearly, but once she’d warmed the gumbo over the fire and poured it into the sourdough bowls she’d brought, he filled two wineglasses with Merlot and turned off the kerosene lamp.

She’d considered turning the lamp back on, but, in the end, decided that she liked the darkness. It encircled them like a protective shroud, evoking the kind of intimacy that set them apart from the concerns of everyday life. She thought that might help Clay loosen up and talk to her. But she was a little concerned that it might loosen her up, too.

They ate mostly in silence. Then, because the chairs were so hard, they carried their wine over to the bed. Allie lay on her stomach, cradling her glass in her hands; Clay leaned against the wall and stretched his legs out in front of him.

“I could get used to coming here,” he said, gazing into the fire.

Allie had guessed he’d like the place, but she’d been surprised by how vocal he’d been about it. Clay wasn’t all that vocal about anything. “I’ll bring you again sometime.”

He raised his glass to her in a mock toast. “Providing I have more secrets to share, eh?”

She grinned. “You must have something I want.”

“I can play pool, remember?”

“And if I’m ever in the market for a 1950s Jag, I’ll know where to go.”

He shook his head. “Wow, such enthusiasm. You really build a guy’s ego, don’t you?”

She ran her finger around the rim of her glass. “I suspect your ego can withstand one less female swooning at your feet.”

“Swooning?” He took another sip of wine. “I never dreamed someone so prim and proper could be such a smart-ass.”

“Prim and proper?” she echoed. “What makes you think I’ve ever been prim and proper?”

“Maybe it’s the badge.”

“Not everyone who wears a badge could be called prim and proper. Why would you describe me like that?”

“I guess it started with the long skirts you wore in high school. And the way you hugged your books to your chest and walked to class with such purpose.”

“You remember that?” she said with a laugh. She hadn’t thought Clay had ever really noticed her.

“Along with the speech you delivered as valedictorian. What was it—‘Building on the Foundation of the Past’?”

“You just nailed the topic,” she said, astonished.

“They printed it in the paper. It was a damn good speech. If you had a past worth building on.”

“My parents made sure I had what I needed,” she said. But she knew he hadn’t been nearly as lucky. Once his stepfather went missing, his mother had been forced to take whatever job she could, and it was a standing joke in town that she’d work for slave wages. She’d had to. No one in Stillwater had wanted to give the person they held responsible for the reverend’s disappearance any breaks.

Clay wore the same clothes to school for several days in a row and never ate lunch. He didn’t have the money. Like his mother, he worked at the farm and took whatever odd jobs he could find. Some days he showed up at school so ragged around the edges he could scarcely stay awake in class. But he always looked after his sisters, even his stepsister, Madeline. And he would’ve died before admitting that he was going without because he had to. He made it seem very cool and rebellious, as if he liked what he wore and wasn’t in need of anything at all.

Most of the kids actually bought in to the tough image he’d projected but, as an adult, Allie could see it for what it was—a young man’s sacrifice and pride.

“They care about you,” he said. “You should listen to them.”

“And stay away from you? Is that what you’re getting at?” she asked bluntly.

His eyes settled on the small amount of cleavage showing above her shirt. “For starters.”

“Yeah, well, thanks for trying to protect me, but I’ll tell you what I told them. I’m a big girl. I’ll think for myself.”

“A big girl?” he scoffed. “Hardly.”

“I’m big enough.”

“For what?”

“To do whatever I want to.”

His grin slanted to one side, as if he found what she’d said rather endearing, like a puppy barking at a much larger dog.

“Stop with the patronizing bullshit,” she said irritably.

“Hey, I think you’re tough.” He lifted his hands in a show of sincerity, but his grin had turned into a full-fledged smile. The kind you didn’t get very often from Clay Montgomery. As if he was enjoying himself. As if he liked her. “You carry a gun, don’t you?”

She cocked her head to the side. “Don’t make me shoot you.”

He laughed softly. “Are all lady cops out to prove something? Or just the ones who weigh less than a hundred pounds?”

“I weigh a hundred and five pounds,” she said. “Anyway, haven’t you ever heard that good things come in small packages?”

“I’m growing more convinced of that by the moment,” he said, staring at her mouth.

Allie’s heart was now beating in her throat. She wanted to fill the silence but wasn’t sure she could speak. She felt as though all the oxygen had been sucked from the room.

Finally, he broke the tense silence. “What happened to your marriage?”

She scowled. “I thought I was the one who got to ask the uncomfortable questions.”

“You know the saying—all’s fair in love and war.”

“Which is this?” she asked.

His gaze returned to her lips. “You tell me.”

She swallowed hard. It sure as hell wasn’t war…. “He struggled with mood swings, had very little patience and different priorities,” she said.

Clay seemed to have lost the thread of the conversation.

“My ex,” she clarified.

“What were his priorities?”

“Affluence. Freedom.”

“And yours?”

“Children.”

“The other day you told me he didn’t want children.”

“Right. He couldn’t stand to have anything slow us down and resented the financial obligations and responsibilities. But mostly he hated sharing me with anyone else.”

“Did he tell you no children before you were married?”

“No. He mentioned it before I got pregnant, though. We argued about it all the time and decided to compromise at one.”

“And then?”

“And then he’d hardly look at Whitney and got jealous whenever she interrupted us or required my attention.”

“Where did you meet this guy?” he asked.

Allie liked that response. It told her that Clay found Sam as unbelievable as she did. “At college. He’s a bright guy, ambitious, social—and intensely possessive and selfish. I eventually realized that I couldn’t tolerate having a husband who wouldn’t even babysit our child if I needed it. I began to feel more and more torn between the two of them. Then, one day I came home to find that Sam had picked up Whitney before I got off work because the babysitter had a family emergency. He’d tried to call me, but I was working an important case and couldn’t be reached. So he brought her home, locked her in her room and let her cry for hours.”

“That’s the point where I’d make him very sorry.”

She laughed. “I was the one who was sorry—sorry I’d ever married him. To my mind, there was no excuse for such neglect.”

“Sounds like he didn’t deserve either of you.”

“Yeah, well, he’s with someone else now, and it’s for the best.”

“Are you happier on your own?”

“I’d never go back to him, if that’s what you’re asking.” She rubbed her free hand over the goose bumps on one arm. Now that it was later, the air was growing cold despite the fire.

Leaning over, Clay unfolded the quilt at the foot of the bed and pulled it over her.

“Thanks,” she said.

He grinned. “Don’t say I never did anything for you.”

“Okay, I won’t.” She drained her glass and set it on the bookcase. “Now can I ask you a few questions?”

“Am I going to need more wine to survive the interrogation?”

“Possibly.”

“Where are you going to start?”

She frowned apologetically. “With your father.”

He grimaced. “Great.”

“Should I get you another glass of wine?” she asked, sitting up.

“Actually, I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t want to talk about him even if I was falling-down drunk. So you might as well go ahead.”

Switching positions on the bed, she sat beside him with her back against the wall, and covered them both with the blanket. “When did he come back here?”

“Where’s here?” he asked.

“Stillwater.”

He blinked at her. “He didn’t, as far as I know.”

“He’s never contacted you?”

“No.”

She hated having to press him about this particular subject. She knew that what his father had done still hurt, although Clay liked to pretend otherwise. “What about your mother?”

He stared into his wineglass. “He didn’t contact her, either.”

“Would she tell you if he did?”

“I think so. For a while, I was all she had.”

For a long while, Allie added silently. “You’ve always been close.”

“She told me most everything.”

Allie suspected Irene had shared far more about her very adult problems than was good for a teenage boy. But, as Clay had just said, he was all she’d had. And somehow, at sixteen, he’d taken on the responsibilities of a man. He’d run the farm and picked up various part-time jobs. The way he’d supported her and his sisters was admirable, but no one in town ever talked about that.

Allie wondered why he never seemed to get any credit for the good things he’d done. He’d graduated from high school while doing the work of two men and acting as his family’s patriarch. And then he’d put himself through college, completing a four-year degree in only two and a half.

“Your mother’s lucky to have a son like you,” Allie said.

He finished his wine. “Someone about twenty years older would’ve been a greater help.”

“You did your best. What more could she ask?”

He grew quiet, pensive.

She craned her neck to look at him. “What is it?”

“Nothing. I’m just tired.”

He tilted his head back against the wall and Allie scooted a little closer, seeking the warmth of his body. He responded by putting his arm around her, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. She sensed that his first inclination was to shelter, to protect.

Did that mean he was protecting someone else—his mother, for instance—in the reverend’s disappearance? Allie was about to ask him about that night, when she realized Clay was asleep.

Reluctant to disturb him, she rested her cheek against his chest and counted the steady beats of his heart. Clay wasn’t what she’d expected. He was far more sensitive, far deeper. She was willing to bet a lot of people, including her father, would be surprised to learn that. Allie thought she’d never met anyone more misunderstood.

We’ve got to leave, she told herself. But she was exhausted, too. She decided they could afford to rest for another ten minutes….

The next thing she knew, birds were chirping in the trees. It was morning.