On Shadow Beach (30 page)

Once he’d told Erica they had evidence that tied her car to the hit-and-run, she’d caved, admitting that she’d run down Devlin in a moment of panic.

“I didn’t mean to hurt him. I just wanted him to go away,” Erica reiterated, her words slurring a little. “I saw him, and something in me snapped. I hit the gas, and I don’t remember anything else.”

Joe looked up as Rick Harrigan opened the door. Rick was one of several defense attorneys in town, and Joe had anticipated his arrival.

“My client is done talking,” Rick told him.

“My husband is a good man,” Erica declared. “He didn’t have anything to do with that girl’s death, and that man was telling everyone that he did. Do you know how vulnerable a male high school teacher is to accusations of misconduct?”

“Mrs. Sorensen, don’t say anything more,” Rick said firmly.

She sank back in her chair as Rick took the seat next to her.

Joe left the room and found Tim Sorensen pacing in the hallway. The man looked far less sure of himself than he had when they’d spoken earlier in the week.

“This is a mistake,” Tim said. “Erica wouldn’t hurt anyone.”

“She said she did it for you,” Joe told him, gauging his reaction. Sorensen looked upset, but he didn’t seem that surprised. “To protect your reputation,” Joe added. “You told me you didn’t know Abby Jamison
outside of school, so why would your wife be worried about whatever Mark Devlin came up with?”

“I want to speak to Erica.”

“I’ll bet,” Joe muttered.

“You’re not going to hold her, are you?”

“Your wife is in serious trouble.”

“This is a big misunderstanding. Erica is suffering from postpartum depression. She’s not herself. She imagines things that aren’t true. She’s been paranoid for months, thinking that I’m falling out of love with her because she weighs more than she used to. She’s not herself. Whatever she did, she didn’t do in her right mind. I need to see my wife.” Sorensen moved past him and entered the interrogation room.

Tim’s assessment of his wife’s mental condition jibed with Joe’s, but her mental state at the time of her crime was something for the court to debate. And confession aside, Joe had a gut feeling they’d have enough forensic evidence to tie Erica Sorensen to the hit-and-run. Now he just had to figure out how to tie Tim Sorensen to the murder of Abigail Jamison. Obviously his wife had had suspicions. Tim had an alibi for that night, but Joe intended to check it out more thoroughly.

Unless . . .

Was he on the wrong track?

Erica was her husband’s protector. She didn’t want his reputation tainted, his job put in jeopardy. Was it possible that she had committed murder to protect her husband thirteen years ago?

*   *   *

The moon was high when Lauren moved through the side yard next to the Murray house. Shane had called her a half hour earlier and asked her to meet him in the old treehouse. He’d told her that he wanted to tell her
everything.
She wasn’t sure what
everything
meant, but she definitely wanted to find out. She also wanted to talk to him about what was going on in town. He’d been out on his boat all day, and she had no idea if he knew Erica Sorensen had been arrested for the hit-and-run.

There was nothing at the moment that tied Erica to Abby’s murder, but certainly there was an assumption of some connection.

She tripped over a tree root and stumbled, knocking into a trash can. Great. She’d have Shane’s parents out here any second. She waited a moment, but no one came out. Maybe Shane’s parents were at the hospital with Kara.

As she made her way through the backyard, she was reminded of the last time she’d been in the treehouse. She’d gone looking for Shane because he’d gotten in a fight that day, and she’d wanted to find out if he was all right. He hadn’t been happy to see her at first, but one thing had led to another, and they’d ended up making love.

It was like taming an angry beast with long, deep kisses; she’d felt the tension go out of him with each touch. She’d reveled in the thought that she could
ease his pain in a way that no one could. And Shane had made her feel beautiful and wanted, treating her with a tenderness that had surprised her. She could still remember him putting his hand under her head to cushion it from the wood floor as he moved inside of her.

The old memory blended with the more recent ones, and the potential to make new ones. She was playing with fire coming to see Shane, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. Well, it would all be over soon. But while next week was coming closer, reality was getting farther away. She barely remembered her life in San Francisco, her friends, the men she’d been dating. It was all Angel’s Bay, Shane, her father, Charlotte, and Kara. She’d even gone by Martha’s Bakery again, wondering what the rent might be on that space, as if she was going to do anything about it.

She wasn’t ready to make that commitment. She wasn’t ready to give up a life that was safe and controlled for one filled with the potential for more pain and disaster. But she had to admit that she was weakening.

“Lauren? Is that you down there?” Shane called.

She cleared her throat, realizing how long she’d been stalling. “I think this is a bad idea, Shane.”

“You said you wanted me to tell you everything.”

“Does it have to be here?”

“It’s where it all started.”

She had no idea what that meant, but she’d come this far. She had to juggle the plastic container in her hands while she made the climb, but eventually crawled into the treehouse with a breathless smile. “Okay, that was easier when I was seventeen.”

Shane gave her a slow, lazy smile that sent the usual thrill down her spine and told her she was in big trouble. Unfortunately, she had a feeling it was the kind of trouble she’d enjoy—a lot. He slid a familiar envelope across the floor to her. “I brought you the photos in case you still want to look through them. What did you bring?” he asked, eyeing the container in her hand.

“Cookies. But you don’t get these until you tell me why I’m here. You were awfully mysterious on the phone.” She picked up the envelope and stashed it in her purse, then scooted against the opposite wall of the treehouse, stretching out her legs as a barrier between them.

The moonlight provided just enough light to see his face, and while he was smiling, she sensed a tension in his body.

“Do you remember the night we made love here?” Shane asked. “I was in a bad mood, angry with the world. I didn’t want you here but you pushed your way in, and you wouldn’t leave.”

“I had to push, or you would have kept me out.”

“I thought you were shy and really sweet when we first met, but you had a stubborn side. You kept coming back even when I told you to go away.”

“Because you didn’t really want me to go away.
You wanted me, even though you didn’t want to. I could see the battle in your eyes, and I was determined to win, to make you see that I was perfect for you.”

“But I wasn’t perfect for
you.
I had a lot of— issues. I shouldn’t have gotten involved with you, but you drove the demons away with your beautiful blue eyes, your honest smile, your generous spirit. You let me take way too much from you, Lauren.”

“Now you make me sound like a doormat. I took from you, too—your strength and your confidence. You made me try things I’d never tried before. You made me feel brave and special. At home, I was second best to Abby. At school, I wasn’t particularly smart or athletic or gorgeous. But when you picked me over all the other girls, I felt a lot better than average.”

“You were never average,” he said with a frown. “You didn’t believe in yourself, that’s all. You let other people’s opinions mean too much. You tried to make everyone else happy before yourself.”

“You knew me pretty well.” She paused, giving him a long look. “But I didn’t really know you, did I? Isn’t that why you asked me to come here tonight?”

He nodded. “I’m still working up to it.”

“I figured. Did you hear about Tim Sorensen’s wife being arrested for the hit-and-run?”

“Yeah, the chief filled me in this morning when I returned his call. He said there’s no evidentiary link that ties Tim Sorensen to Abby’s murder, but I’m guessing there will be.”

“I still can’t believe Abby was having an affair with her teacher. I’d need solid proof to accept that. And I can’t imagine how my father will react when he hears that. She’s become a saint in his mind.”

“She was fifteen. We all made mistakes back then,” Shane reminded her.

“Are you going to tell me about your mistakes now?” she prodded. “The secret you’re keeping for someone else?”

“Yes.” He drew in a deep breath. “It’s why I went to the law offices the night Abby died.”

“Okay. But if you tell me something that changes the investigation regarding Abby, I can’t promise I won’t let the police know.”

“It’s not about Abby, but you can decide what you want to do with the information after you hear it.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest. “So here goes. My mother had an affair almost thirty-two years ago—and I was the result.”

Surprise rocketed through her. Shane’s parents had always been so tight. The whole Murray family had seemed close to perfect. “When did you find out?”

“Sophomore year. I came home early one day, and I overheard my mother talking on the phone to my biological father. Our family was going through tough financial times, and she wanted his help. She thought he owed her that.”

“What did you do?”

“I confronted her. She begged me not to tell my
dad. He didn’t know that she’d cheated on him, that I wasn’t his son. She said it had been a moment of temporary insanity and one that she regretted ever since.”

“But she didn’t regret you,” Lauren said quickly. She could tell by the hard gleam in his eyes that he didn’t believe her. “Shane, she
didn’t
regret you.”

“By the time I found out, the affair had been over for years,” he continued. “My parents had gotten back on track, and they had had three kids after me. When I learned the truth, Patrick was away at college, Kara was a freshman in high school, and Dee and Michael were just little kids. My mother felt sure my father would divorce her if he knew about the affair, and I couldn’t break up the family. So I said I’d keep her secret.”

“But it made you crazy—reckless and angry,” she murmured, his past making so much more sense now. “I never understood where the pain in your eyes came from. People told me how you’d changed, how you used to be friendlier, not such a loner.”

“I was furious, and I didn’t know how to handle it. I couldn’t tell anyone. So I’d just ride my motorcycle and count the days until I could leave home. I felt like an impostor every time my father called me
son,
and when he talked about leaving the business to me someday.

“I couldn’t stand to be around him,” he added. “I couldn’t stand to see him with my mother. I hated her, because she was the one who made me lie. She
was the one who betrayed the man she supposedly loved. So how could I ever believe her when she said she loved me? It made me sick to my stomach.”

Now Lauren understood where Shane’s inability to declare his love for her came from—his unwillingness to commit to anything long-term, his restless feet, and dark moods. How could his mother have asked him to keep such a secret?

She’d always liked Moira Murray; she never would have suspected that she’d cheated on her husband, or lived a lie for thirty years and asked her son to go along with it.

“Oh, Shane.” She moved across the clubhouse and put her hand on his arm. She could feel the tension in his muscles. “I’m so sorry. Your mother should never have asked that of you. It was wrong.”

“It was for the greater good, and she was right. My siblings got to grow up with two parents living together in the same house, and what they didn’t know didn’t hurt them. If I’d told the truth, my father might have moved out. I couldn’t take the chance that that would happen.”

She couldn’t believe how much Shane had taken onto himself. “God, I’m so angry with your mother! Do you know who your biological father is?”

“No. That’s why I broke into the law offices that night. I was sure that one of those men, Rick Harrigan or Jeff Miller, was my real father. The office phone number was listed on our telephone bill. I just didn’t know which man my mother had spoken to, and she refused to tell me. She was afraid that I’d
confront him. They were both married men with kids. Everywhere I looked, I could see that I was going to hurt someone, but I couldn’t get it out of my head. I just wanted to know who my real father was.”

“I can understand that.” She wanted Shane to look at her, but he was avoiding her gaze, and in the shadows she couldn’t get a clear read on his emotions, which was why he’d probably wanted to have the conversation here. He wasn’t a man who was comfortable with showing what he was feeling. He’d closed himself off a long time ago, and those walls were now almost impenetrable. But there were tiny cracks, and she was determined to get through. “Tell me the rest.”

“There’s not much more. I had the crazy idea that I might be able to find evidence in their offices—a note from my mother, an old check written out to her, something. There had been some contact over the years, some exchange of money, and I figured any proof would be at the office, not at home. I even thought I’d swipe a used glass or a comb and see if I could get a DNA test done on it. I had a lot of ideas.”

“What did you find?”

“Nothing. That’s the worst thing of all. I went through the entire office, and I came out empty-handed. I was so pissed. Abby said I looked like I
wanted to kill somebody. I told her that’s exactly how I felt, but I didn’t know who to kill.”

“And you didn’t tell her the rest?”

“No. If I was going to tell someone, I would have told you.” He put his hand over hers and gazed into her eyes. “When I dropped Abby off at the high school parking lot, she gave me a hug and said I should go and find you, that you’d make me feel better.”

His words hurt. She could see Abby in her head, hear her voice, and knew that might have been the last good moment her sister had had.