Cassidy and the Princess. Patricia Potter

came, and the other detective entered, the one she remembered from yesterday. “Miss Merrick,” he said with concern. “Hoppy said someone came into your room last night, and—”

      “Hoppy?” she interrupted.

      He looked over at MacKay and his face turned red. Detective MacKay glared at him.

      “Hoppy?” she asked again with a smile.

      “His first name is Cassidy,” the detective named Manny said without looking at his partner, who was glowering.

      The name didn’t mean anything to her.

      “Hopalong Cassidy,” the detective prompted. “He was a cowboy on television in the fifties, a guy in a white hat.”

      A guy in a white hat. She liked that image.

      “Hoppy,” she tested again, and MacKay turned his glower on her.

      “I prefer Cass,” he said.

      She did, too, after thinking about it. Still, she tried to think of him as MacKay. That fit him, and it was far less personal.

      The artist had packed up his equipment. “Gotta go,” he said. “A lot of business today. You were great, Miss Merrick.”

      She felt a momentary pride. He had discovered more information that she thought she had. “You’re good at extracting information,” she said.

      Detective MacKay was also inching toward the door. “Thank you, Miss Merrick,” he said. “I’ll be in touch later today.”

      She watched him leave with the police artist.

      The second detective looked at her with interest. “My wife is a big admirer of yours,” he said. “So am I.”

      That surprised her. She hadn’t imagined a burly homicide detective would have an interest in figure skating. “Thank you,” she said.

      “My wife, she loves figure skating,” he continued. “It sorta grew on me, too. And our kid.”

      Just then, the door opened and her mother and Paul entered, eyeing the detective warily.

      “I’ll be outside,” the detective said.

      She wanted to ask him to stay, but this, she knew, was something she had to do alone.

      “Thank you,” she said.

      The two waited until the door closed.

      “We talked to your doctor,” her mother said. “He said there’s no reason you can’t leave today. And you can start skating in several days.”

      “We still have the plane on standby,” Paul added. “And now that you’ve talked to that police artist, you’ve done everything you can do.”

      “Not exactly,” she said.

      They both stared at her as if she’d grown two heads.

      “I might remember more,” she said lamely. She wasn’t ready to tell them she’d offered herself as bait for a trap.

      “You probably won’t,” Paul said sensibly. “If you do, you can contact them from Seattle.”

      “I’m just not ready yet,” she said. “There are more questions…”

      “We’ve lost days,” Paul said patiently. “We need practice.”

      “You go ahead,” she said. “You and Mom. You can start practicing. I’ll be there in two or three days. I promise to be there for the competition.”

      “If you insist on staying,” Paul said, “I’ll stay. We can practice here.”

      “You said it would be several days before I can skate,” she said. “You need the time to get accustomed to the rink. And Mother needs to be there for publicity and to scout the competition. You two and David can make adjustments in the routine. And make sure the costumes are ready.” There was a different set of costumes for the Sectional. And a new program. It would have some of the elements they were perfecting here in Atlanta, but changes were always made.

      “I’m not sure…”

      Her mother was not often unsure of anything, but she was weakening. The costumes were her pride and joy. She’d designed them for the past six years.

      “The detectives can’t properly protect me if they have to watch out for all of us,” Marise said. “Doing it this way will get me to Seattle much faster.”

      “I don’t like it. You shouldn’t be alone,” her mother countered.

      “I won’t be alone,” she said patiently. “I will be surrounded by the entire police department.”

      “The publicity…”

      “You can tell them I decided to stay and recuperate here,” she said. “Just think how bad the publicity would be if someone tracked me to Seattle and killed me.” She regretted the words almost immediately, when tears formed in her mother’s eyes. She went over to her and took her hands in her own. “I couldn’t be safer,” she said. “This really is for the best.”

      “I want to stay here with you,” her mother said stubbornly.

      Marise was surprised. She knew her mother well, and usually knew how to assuage her. “I need to do this, and I need to do it alone. I can’t help the police if I’m worrying about you.”

      Paul looked rebellious, then resigned. “You’re determined?”

      “Yes.”

      Her mother looked horrified. “Paul?”

      He shook his head. “If I’ve learned anything about Mare, it’s that when she makes up her mind, we might as well do as she wants.” He gave her a small grin. “She doesn’t do it often, but I’ve learned to heed her when she does.”

      He looked back at Cara Merrick. “And I don’t like the idea of her living in terror for the rest of her life.” He turned to Marise. “When will you join us in Seattle?”

      “I’m not sure,” she said. “A few days. No later than the middle of next week.” She knew that was pushing it. But she could do their skating program in her sleep. Two weeks of practice should be sufficient. She was fully aware how important the Sectional was to Paul, and she would never, never ruin his chances.

      “You’ll try to make it sooner?” he asked.

      “Yes. I won’t let you down.”

      He hesitated, then took her hand. “You never did answer me. The question I asked…before all this happened.”

      She hesitated, then said, “Too much has happened in the past two days,” she said. “I…can’t make a decision now.”

      But she had. And from the disappointed look in his eyes, he suspected it.

      He said nothing. “We’ll stay with you until that detective returns and we know exactly what he plans to do,” he said. “We can stay at the hotel tonight and fly to Seattle in the morning.”

      “You chartered the plane for this afternoon,” she reminded him.

      “We can cancel that.”

      She nodded. She couldn’t deny them that.

      Her mother tried once more. “I couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you, after all…”

      The familiar guilt surged through Marise again. But this time she wasn’t going to let it guide her. “Nothing is going to happen to me.”

      Despite Paul’s seeming acquiescence, she knew they hadn’t given up. They were just going to give her time to reconsider on her own. She would surely see sense. She always did.

      But she wouldn’t. Not this time. It was too important. Not only for her, but for others.