Natural-Born Protector. Carla Cassidy

      “Lainie and I had kind of an unspoken agreement. Even though she told me when she was going out with somebody, she didn’t give me all the details. She knew I disapproved of her dating habits.” Melody laughed suddenly, a short but musical burst she instantly stifled. “I sound like a prude and I’m not, but I knew Lainie was promiscuous.” She said the last word with a wince, as if it hurt coming out of her mouth.

      Hank knew he had two choices. He could either protest her assessment of her sister or he could be completely truthful. He opted for truth. “Lainie was obviously looking for something she couldn’t find.”

      “Lainie was mentally ill.” Again there was a wealth of pain lacing her words. “She was never officially diagnosed with anything, refused to see a doctor. But I truly believe she was bipolar or something like that.”

      “We talked about that,” he said. She looked at him in surprise. “Lainie knew she was out of sync with the world, but she was afraid of taking medication, of somehow losing herself to drugs in an effort to be normal.”

      Melody stared at him for a long moment, her blue eyes thoughtful. “You must have been very close to her.”

      “I didn’t kill her, Melody.” He leaned forward slightly, wanting to take away any doubt that might linger in her head. “I had no reason to kill your sister. You saw how my daughter loved Lainie. Aside from the fact that I’m not capable of beating a woman to death, I’d never hurt my daughter by harming somebody she loved. She’s had enough loss in her life. I cared about Lainie. She was like a little sister to me.”

      There was no way to explain to her that when he’d arrived in Cotter Creek he’d still been deep in a grieving process that had lasted for far too long. It had been Lainie’s irrepressible sense of humor and warmth that had chipped away at the emotional shell he’d built around himself.

      Instead of taking away the faint frown that stretched across her forehead, his words deepened it. “You weren’t her lover?”

      “Never.” He leaned back against the booth. “Lainie had plenty of lovers. What she needed was a good friend, and that’s what I tried to be to her.” And that’s what he’d needed in his life as well.

      She picked up her coffee and took a sip, her gaze not wavering from his. He felt as if he were on trial and the jury was still out.

      She placed her cup back on the table, then picked up her pen. “Do you know the names of some of the men Lainie had been seeing just before that night?”

      That night. It was as if she found it impossible to say the word killed or murdered. “I know she was off and on with a man named Dean Lucas. He’s a mechanic. Works at Hall’s Car Haven.” He watched as she wrote the information down on her pad. Her long dark hair fell forward, looking shiny and soft, and he was surprised by his impulse to reach out and touch it.

      Throughout his relationship with Lainie, he’d learned a lot about Melody Thompson. He knew she had just turned twenty-six, that she’d been the one person Lainie had depended on and that, according to Lainie, Melody had never had a serious romantic relationship.

      He found the last hard to believe. She was gorgeous, and bright, with an underlying sensuality that was more than a little appealing. Not that he was interested. When he’d buried his wife, he’d made a vow that there would be no other woman in his life on a permanent basis…ever.

      “Who else?” she asked, pulling him from his thoughts.

      “She had problems with a guy named James O’Donnell a couple of months ago. I don’t think they were dating, but she thought he was obsessed with her. I think Lainie called the cops on him because she thought he was stalking her.”

      She wrote down that information as well, then took another sip of her coffee. “You’d better eat your pie before it gets cold.”

      He picked up his fork and cut into the pie, but the last thing on his mind was food. “Why do you want that information? I’ve already told the sheriff everything I know.”

      “Sheriff Ramsey is an idiot who couldn’t find a criminal if one came up and introduced himself,” she exclaimed, her voice rich with derision.

      “Ramsey isn’t the sheriff anymore,” Hank replied. “Zack West is sheriff now.”

      She raised one of her dark, perfectly arched brows. “Really? I didn’t know. I haven’t talked to anyone but family members since I’ve been back in town.”

      For a moment they were silent. He ate his pie and she stared down at the short list of names he’d given her.

      Lainie had been incredibly easy to read. She’d worn her emotions on her face where everyone could see them. Melody gave away little of what she was thinking or feeling. It was an easy guess that she was a far more complicated woman than her sister had been.

      “Your daughter is a little charmer,” she said, finally breaking the silence that had grown between them.

      “She’s far too smart and too outspoken for her own good. Which reminds me…” He dug into his pocket and pulled out two keys. “Here are the keys that Lainie gave us to her apartment.” He placed them on the table between them. “I don’t know who else she might have given a key to, so it might be a good idea to change the locks.”

      She nodded. “I’ll have somebody come out first thing in the morning. Is there anything else you can tell me about what was going on with Lainie around the time of her death? Anything unusual?”

      He hesitated a long moment, unsure about revealing the confidences of a woman now dead. “What?” she asked as she leaned forward.

      “Did you know she wanted a baby? That she was trying to get pregnant?” He could tell by the shocked look on her face that Lainie hadn’t shared that with her.

      A spasm of grief twisted her features and he bit his tongue, sorry that he’d told her. “That’s the last thing she needed. She couldn’t even take care of herself, let alone a baby,” she said.

      “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have told you,” he said, fighting the impulse to reach out and take her hand, offer some sort of physical support. She looked so sad, so lost.

      “No, I want you to tell me everything. If I’m going to find the person who killed her then I need to know everything.”

      He stared at her in surprise. “Don’t you think it would be best to leave the investigation to the sheriff and his men?”

      She leaned back, looking stronger than she had moments before. “I’ll let the sheriff run his investigation but I intend to run my own. If I know my sister, she liked to run with people who had at least as many problems as she did, people with attitudes and criminal records, not the kind of people who will likely cooperate with anyone in law enforcement. They’ll talk to me.”

      Hank thought about the blood he’d cleaned up. So much blood. Whoever had killed Lainie had been enraged. The violence that had taken place in that bathroom sickened him.

      He wanted to talk Melody out of whatever it was she intended to do, but he could tell by the fervent glow in her eyes that she was determined.

      “That could be dangerous. Do you have a plan?” he asked.

      “The first place I’m going to start asking questions is at the Edge,” she replied. “Maybe Lainie’s boss or one of her coworkers will know something.”

      Hank scowled. “That bar is no place for a woman to go by herself. Why don’t I tag along with you?”

      “I can’t ask you to do that,” she replied.

      “You didn’t ask. I offered.”

      Once again she stared at him for a long moment. He’d thought her eyes were a clear, sharp blue like Lainie’s, but he realized now they were deeper, darker and far more enigmatic than her sister’s.

      “I