Next Door. Блейк Пирс

wanted to do over dinner. Sally had wasted no time in getting to the dinner choice for the reception.

      “So how’s the house?” Wayne asked, just as eager as Chloe to move away from the topic of the wedding.

      “It’s great,” Chloe said. “We’ll make it through the maze of boxes in a few days.”

      “Oh, and get this,” Steven said. “A woman that Chloe went to high school with lives right down the street—like two houses down. Isn’t that crazy?”

      “Maybe not as crazy as it seems,” Wayne said. “This city is just too damned small. You’re bound to stumble over someone you know at some point.”

      “Especially in those neighborhoods where the houses are all on top of each other,” Sally said with a smirk, making a not-so-subtle jab about their choice of location.

      “Our houses aren’t right on top of each other,” Steven said.

      “Yeah, we have a decent-sized yard,” Chloe added.

      Sally shrugged her shoulders and took another mouthful of wine. She then seemed to think about her next comment, maybe even almost deciding to keep it in, but letting it out anyway.

      “Your high school friend isn’t the only one in Pinecrest, right?” she asked. “Your sister lives around here too, if I remember correctly.”

      “Yes, she does.”

      She spoke the answer firmly but without being rude. Sally Brennan had never made any secrets about her distaste for Danielle—even though they had only ever crossed paths twice. Sally had the misfortune of being one of those clichéd bored housewives who lived for scandal and gossip. So when she found that Chloe had a sister with a rocky and dark past, she’d been both appalled and intrigued.

      “Let’s not dwell there, Mom,” Steven said.

      Chloe wished this made her feel defended but if anything, it made her feel slighted. Usually when the topic of Danielle came up, Steven ended up siding with his mother. He did have the good sense to know when to shut up but his mother usually did not.

      “Will she be the maid of honor?” Sally asked.

      “Yes.”

      Sally didn’t roll her eyes at the comment, but her facial expression showed her feelings about it.

      “She is my sister,” Chloe said. “So yes, I have asked her to be my maid of honor.”

      “Yes, it makes sense,” Sally said, “but I always thought the maid of honor should be chosen carefully. It’s a big honor and responsibility.”

      Chloe had to grip the edge of the table to keep from coming back with a hard-edged reply. Noticing her tension, Steven did his best to salvage the situation. “Mom, give it a rest,” he said. “Danielle will do fine. And even if something should go wrong, I’ll make sure everything is covered. This is my wedding, Mom. I’m not going to let anything bad happen.”

      This time it was Chloe who nearly rolled her eyes. It was once again his way of standing up for her but of also not irritating his parents. Just once, Chloe would like for him to truly defend Danielle. She knew that Steven had no real problems with her but that he was doing his best to pacify his mother’s uneasiness of her. It was a little disgusting.

      “Enough of this nonsense,” Wayne said, reaching out for a second helping of the roasted potatoes. “Let’s talk football. Now, Chloe…you’re a Redskins fan, right?”

      “God, no. Giants.”

      “Just as bad,” Wayne said with a laugh.

      And just like that, the uneasiness of the night was swept under the rug. Chloe had always valued Wayne’s boldness in being able to ignore his wife’s bitchiness, pushing along to some another benign topic whether she was done or not. It was a trait Chloe wished Steven had picked up from his father.

      Still, as the night went on, Chloe couldn’t help but wonder if Sally’s worries were legitimate. Danielle was not the sort to dress up, stay quiet, and get in front of people. Danielle would be stepping out of her comfort zone at the wedding and Chloe herself had wondered how it might go over.

      As those worries floated through her head, she thought of the little girls from so many years ago, sitting on the front stoop as the body bag was carried out of their apartment. She could easily recall the blank look in Danielle’s face. She knew something had snapped in her at that moment. That, overnight, she had lost her sister.

      And she suspected that, from that moment on, Danielle would never be the same again.

      Chapter Four

      It was raining when Chloe and her field work instructor arrived on the scene. She felt very minor league as she stepped out of the car into the drizzling rain. Because she was an intern having to go alongside her instructor in shifts with other interns, they were not given high-profile cases. This one, for instance, sounded as if it were a typical domestic abuse case. And while the details of the case did not sound very graphic or brutal, the very words domestic abuse made her cringe.

      She had, after all, heard those words a lot after her mother had died. Her instructor must have been aware of her past—of what had happened with her parents—but had mentioned nothing of it this morning as they had headed out.

      They were in the town of Willow Creek on that first day, a small town about fifteen miles outside of Baltimore. Chloe was interning with the FBI to eventually become part of the FBI’s Evidence Response Team, and as they walked toward the simple two-story house, the instructor even let her take the lead. Her instructor was Kyle Greene, a forty-five-year-old agent who had been taken out of basic field work when he had torn his ACL while chasing down a suspect. He’d never healed properly from the injury and had been given the option to serve as an instructor and mentor of sorts for interns. He and Chloe had only spoken twice before this morning, having met via FaceTime a week ago to get to know one another and then two days ago, during her ride from Philly to Pinecrest.

      “One thing before we go inside,” Greene said. “I held this from you until now because I didn’t want you dwelling on it all morning.”

      “Okay…”

      “While this is a domestic abuse case, it is also a homicide case. When we get inside, there’s going to be a body. A relatively fresh one.”

      “Oh…” she said, unable to contain her shock.

      “I know it’s more than you were expecting. But there was some discussion when you came in. Discussions to maybe let you peek behind the curtain right from the start. We’ve been toying with the idea of letting the interns have more responsibilities, letting them stretch out a bit more. And based on your dossier, we thought you’d be a prime candidate to test that out. I hope that’s okay with you.”

      She was still taken aback, unable to form any real response. Yes, it was more responsibility. Yes, it meant more eyes would be on her. But she had never backed down from a challenge and she didn’t intend to start now.

      “I appreciate the opportunity.”

      “Good,” Greene said, his tone indicating that he never had a doubt.

      He waved her on to follow him as they walked to the porch and up the stairs. Inside, were two agents conversing with the coroner. Chloe did her best to ready herself for the scene and while she thought she’d done a pretty good job, she was still shaken when she saw a woman’s legs sticking out from behind the kitchen island.

      “So I need you to take a walk around the body,” Greene said. “Tell me what you see—both in terms of the body and the surroundings. Walk me through your processing.”

      Chloe had seen a few dead bodies in the course of her interning; When she lived in Philadelphia, they had not been all that hard to come by. But this was different. This one felt a little too close to home—a little too familiar. She stepped behind the kitchen counter and looked down at the scene.

      The victim was a woman who looked to be in her thirties. She had been hit in the head