have to bring him into the picture.
She was in bed and ready to turn off the lights when Chris came home a little after one. He tapped on her door and then entered the bedroom, where he perched on the edge of Ali’s bed. “I went to see Athena,” Chris said.
Ali nodded without saying that she knew as much.
“We talked,” Chris added. “And I think we got some things straightened out; we came to an understanding.”
“That’s good,” Ali said.
“I’m glad you told Athena about you and my father running away to Vegas to get married. She liked that.”
“Your grandmother didn’t like it,” Ali replied. “She still doesn’t.”
“That’s all right,” Chris said. “Just knowing about it made Athena feel better, and that made me feel better. So thanks for the good advice, Mom.”
“You’re welcome.”
He glanced at his watch and made a face. “Now I’d better get to bed,” he said. “First period is going to come very early.”
Ali lay awake for a long time after Chris closed her bedroom door. Athena had told him that she and Ali had discussed the situation with Bob and Edie, but Ali was well aware that in telling the story to Athena, she had neglected to finish mentioning what had gone on with Chris’s other grandparents-with Angus and Jeanette Reynolds of Boston, Massachusetts.
For years Ali had managed to keep any remembrance of them locked away. She had never forgiven them for turning their backs on their only son. Even now she couldn’t imagine how they could have done such a thing. Angus was an attorney with some big law firm, and he had been offended when Dean had spurned the idea of his going to law school in favor of getting a Ph.D. in oceanography, of all things! That, combined with Dean’s decision to marry Ali, had been enough for them to walk away. For good.
Once Dean had been diagnosed with glioblastoma, Ali had tried to get him to contact them, but he’d proved to be his father’s son. He had adamantly refused to take the first step on trying to effect a reconciliation. And after that one abortive phone call, Ali hadn’t tried again either.
There were several times while Chris was growing up when he had asked about his “other” grandparents. Ali had told him he didn’t have any, and that was the truth. He didn’t. But tonight, pondering Athena’s complicated family situation, Ali couldn’t help thinking about her own. Whatever had become of Dean’s parents?
What would Angus and Jeanette Reynolds think if they saw their grandson now, a grown, good-looking man who was almost a mirror image of their long-dead son?
Do they ever regret what happened back then? Ali wondered as she drifted off to sleep at last.
CHAPTER 11
As usual, Peter had played a round of golf at the Biltmore on Wednesday afternoon with a couple of other docs who also had Wednesday afternoons off. They’d had drinks and dinner afterward. When he’d come home, he had tumbled into bed fairly early-into bed but not into sleep.
The whole time he’d been out golfing and buddying around, thoughts of Ali Reynolds had lingered in the background. Now he found himself tossing and turning and thinking about her again. He was convinced she was a problem. The question was, how serious a problem-major or minor?
It would have helped if Peter had known what had brought Ali Reynolds to Singleatheart in the first place. Had she logged on for the same reasons most other people did-because she was lonely and looking for a date? Sedona was a small town. Peter assumed it was possible that Morgan and Ali were good enough friends that Morgan, as a satisfied Singleatheart customer, had referred this Reynolds woman to the website so she could join in the fun and games. Or was that wishful thinking on Peter’s part?
Several things gave him cause for concern: Ali’s alleged tendency to be a crimefighter; her license to carry; and most of all, her long-term relationship with Morgan Forester’s widower. Since she was one of Bryan Forester’s customers, the far more likely scenario was that she had learned about Morgan’s involvement with Singleatheart through him. If Bryan was under suspicion for his wife’s murder-as Peter most certainly hoped he was-it made sense that Ali had visited Singleatheart while snooping around on his behalf.
It was well after midnight before Peter drifted off to sleep. He did so only after deciding that he would take another serious look at Ali Reynolds first thing in the morning. By logging on to her computer and seeing what she was up to, he’d be able to ascertain whether or not she posed a threat to him. If she didn’t, fine. If she did? That was another matter. In that case, Peter would find a way to take care of the problem-forever.
Once Belinda Helwig became Arizona’s auditor general, she was determined that she and everyone on her staff would lead by example. Worried that too many state-funded employee hours were being squandered on personal Internet activity, Ms. Helwig had instituted and enforced a comprehensive workplace ban on personal e-mails.
Matt Morrison was someone who always strove to be an exemplary employee. Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t have dreamed of violating that particular rule, but these were desperate times for him. As such, they called for desperate measures.
In their phone conversation earlier, Detective Holman had mentioned the dead woman’s name. Unfortunately, Matt had been in such a state of shock that he hadn’t been paying close enough attention. It seemed to him now that the name started with an M, but he couldn’t remember exactly. Whatever the name was, he hadn’t recognized it.
Once he was off the phone, Matt had sat numbly in his cubicle, staring at the shoulder-high walls and mulling his plight. The detective may have called the dead woman by another name, but she had to be Susan Callison.
As the hours passed, Matt called into question everything he knew or thought he knew about Suzie Q. She had claimed to be separated from her husband and had said she lived in Glendale. Now Matt wondered if any of that had been true. According to Detective Holman, the dead woman had been married and living near Sedona. Where did that leave Matt? Out on the end of a limb, while Detective Holman, armed with a chain saw, was ready to lop it off.
From the time Matt’s mother had first put a red Crayola in his hand, he had done his best to color inside the lines. Fearing disgrace, he had always played it safe and had never taken chances. Not until Monday. But now disgrace was coming anyway. Matt knew he wasn’t guilty of murdering anybody. Surely, with the help of someone, somewhere, he’d be able to prove that, no matter what phony evidence the cop had manufactured about him. But in order to prove his innocence, Matt knew he would end up losing everything else. Jenny would know he had been unfaithful-at least he had tried to be. Their friends at church would know all about it, and so would everyone at work.
That was particularly galling. Work had always been Matt Morrison’s safe haven. No matter how tough things were at home, he’d always been able to escape by going to work. Once word about this got out, though, he knew what would happen. Everyone in the office would recognize Matthew Morrison for the loser he was. They’d laugh about him behind his back and whisper about him before and after he left the break room. It would be like the checkout line at Lowe’s-only worse.
So Matt set out on a course of action that he hoped would spare him some of that humiliation. It might spare Jenny some ugliness as well. He did it the way Matt Morrison did everything-in a thorough and organized fashion.
First he brought up his folder of Suzie Q correspondence. One at a time, he went through all the e-mails that had come and gone between them, reading each message as he went. The ones that hurt the most weren’t the ones at the beginning, when they’d been testing the waters, or the plaintive ones he’d written to her this week after she hadn’t written back. No, the ones that made his heart ache were the ones in the middle of their not-quite-affair, the sweet-nothing silly notes from when they had both believed-well, both had
