to facilitate a reconciliation.”
“Yeah, or he’s warm for your form,” Carrie said and gave her a teasing close-lipped smile.
“Why that’s just, well, silly,” Lindsey spluttered. There was no denying the warmth that heated her cheeks, however. She turned and headed for her office. “I’ll call you if I hear from him.”
“You mean when you hear from him,” Carrie said. She laughed at Lindsey’s chagrin and left the building with a wave.
Lindsey ushered her staff out the back door and hurriedly set the alarm. As the large steel door swung shut behind her, she waved good night to her staff. The evening air was bitterly cold, and it felt as if it pierced her lungs on the inhale. As she circled the building to where her bike was kept, she was not at all surprised to find Sully there waiting for her.
“No Beth tonight?” he asked. His pickup truck was parked at the curb, and she wondered if he’d been waiting long.
She had a sudden pang of conscience for agreeing to lunch with Edmund Sint, which was ridiculous since, as far as she knew, she and Sully were just friends.
“No, she’s off today because she’s working Saturday,” she said.
“Ah,” he said and he grinned at her. Dimples bracketed his smile, making him even more handsome than usual, which was impressive, given that Sully could trip up most of the female population without even trying.
Lindsey felt her insides do the flip-flop thing. After her fiance had cheated on her, she hadn’t thought she’d ever feel that kind of sizzle-and-zip attraction for a man, at least not for a very long while. But Sully sure was making her change her mind about that, and suddenly she had no interest in having lunch with Edmund Sint, even if it did include a tour of the Sint estate, which she had been dead curious about since she’d moved to Briar Creek.
She found herself watching Sully as he loaded up her bike. She realized she hadn’t bundled up as much as she usually did. Her scarf was loose around her neck and she wore her hat back on her head. She hadn’t jammed up all of her hair under it either. She wondered if this had been an unconscious decision because she had hoped she’d be seeing Sully or if she’d just been rushing and forgot.
She decided she really didn’t want to know. If anyone asked, she’d been rushing. Yep, that was her story and she was sticking to it.
She glanced away from Sully and noticed a lone car out in the parking lot. Standing beside it was Carrie Rushton. Lindsey remembered she’d been late to the meeting because of car trouble. She wondered if Carrie was stuck.
She told Sully she’d be right back and hurried across the dark lot to make sure her friend was okay.
“Carrie, are you all right?”
Carrie looked at her and then quickly away, wiping at her face with her mitten as she did so, but not before Lindsey saw the trace of tears in the glow of the overhead streetlight on Carrie’s face.
“Carrie, what’s wrong?” she asked.
Carrie took a long shuddering inhale, and said, “My car won’t start.”
“Oh, no wonder you’re upset.” Lindsey glanced over her shoulder to see Sully headed toward them. “Don’t worry, we’ll help you.”
“I keep turning the key, but nothing happens,” Carrie said. She gestured at her tears with a mitten. “I’m not normally this much of a baby, but I think the stress of the day is getting to me. I was so stressed about the meeting tonight, frankly, my nerves are shot.”
“It’s understandable,” Lindsey said. “Don’t feel bad. Sometimes you just have to let it out. I cried the other day when I realized I’d left my wash in the washing machine for two days and accidentally felted my favorite wool sweater.”
“Bummer,” Carrie said with a big sniff.
“Big one.”
“Carrie, is everything all right?” Sully joined them beside her car.
“Her car won’t start,” Lindsey said.
“Mind if I have a look?” he asked.
“No, please do,” Carrie said, and she moved aside so Sully could sit in the driver’s seat. Lindsey saw him turn the key. Nothing happened. He frowned.
“I’m no expert, but I think it’s your starter,” he said. “It’ll probably need to be towed to Bruce’s garage over on Tyler Street.”
Carrie closed her eyes and Lindsey was afraid she might cry again, so she said, “Do you want to call your husband?”
“I already did,” Carrie said. She opened her eyes, and her face under the parking lot lights looked pale. “He’s not answering.”
Lindsey wasn’t terribly surprised. If he was as lazy as he seemed, he’d probably tell his wife to walk home.
“Don’t worry. We can give you a lift,” Sully said. “And Bruce can come and collect your car tomorrow.”
“See? This will work out,” Lindsey said. “Now, is there anything you need to take with you?”
“Well, I have two boxes of donated books that I don’t want to leave in the car,” Carrie said. “Warren said he’d take them out to Friends’ shed at the Drury Street storage facility this weekend.”
She opened the trunk, and both Lindsey and Sully took a box and started carrying it to his truck. Carrie locked up her car and followed.
“I really can’t thank you enough,” she said. “I don’t know what I would have done if you two hadn’t happened along.”
“You’d have managed, but I’m glad we’re here to help,” Lindsey said.
Sully put his box of books into the back of his truck and then turned to take Lindsey’s.
They all piled into the toasty-warm cab of the truck, and Carrie gave Sully directions to her house. She lived a few miles inland in a small development of raised ranch houses built in the seventies with the standard two-car garages and big bay windows.
Carrie’s house was at the end of a short cul-de-sac; it was white with black trim and a bright red front door. It looked well kept and cozy, with an outside light on and a yellow glow shining from its main window above.
Carrie hopped out of the truck and fished her keys out of her purse. Sully and Lindsey climbed out of the truck too and retrieved her boxes for her.
“Oh, no, you don’t have to,” she protested. “I can carry them.”
“It’s no trouble,” Lindsey said as they followed her up the walkway. “Just tell us where you want them.”
Carrie unlocked her front door and held it open for them. From the foyer, a short staircase led up while another went down. Carrie pointed to the top of the stairs and said, “Would you mind just putting them in the closet up there? I’m going to check on Markus.”
She went down the stairs to the lower half of the house while Sully started up. Lindsey watched him shoulder his box as if it were no heavier than a sack of groceries.
Admirable but also very annoying as she tried not to grunt and groan under the weight of her own box.
The closet door was on the right at the top of the stairs, and Sully put his box on the floor and then turned around to take hers. Lindsey was more than happy to relinquish it.
He had just taken her box when a blood-curdling scream sounded from the basement.
Lindsey met Sully’s startled look and then spun around and raced down the stairs. Behind her, she could hear Sully drop the box and pound down the stairs after her. At the bottom of the lower staircase, a hallway led to a couple of bedrooms and a bath in one direction and a large family room in the other. She went toward the family room.
She stepped into the doorway and saw Carrie slumped against the far wall. Her eyes were wide and her face was etched with a look of horror. As Lindsey rushed to her side to see what was wrong, she noticed that Carrie’s hands were covered in blood.
CHAPTER 6
