EPILOGUE
“This whole thing was like an episode of Hotel Impossible gone bad,” Jack commented. He gripped Lacey’s hand tighter as they walked along the beach. Two days had passed since the shooting, and they’d come back to Seaport for a day trip to check on Terry.
“Really bad,” Lacey said. “Lott was completely justified in letting all those old employees go. Mathews’s mother included. He had pages and pages of complaints about those employees. I just don’t understand why the staff wouldn’t want their business to be a success. It would have meant job security.”
Jack simply shook his head. Terry had taken two bullets to his shoulder and one to his bulletproof vest. He had breezed through surgery and was already back on the job with his arm in a sling, even though he couldn’t do much but give orders. Mathews was sitting in the county jail with a broken nose and healing a concussion. The little police department couldn’t take the hit of losing two active officers at once, so Terry returned to work with the loan of another officer from the county sheriff.
Lacey was relieved that Terry would be fine. For a split second that night, she thought she’d caused his death by telling Mathews that Terry was armed. Thinking it through later, she knew Mathews would have fired no matter what she’d said.
An attempt at suicide by cop? Possibly. Mathews’s lawyer wasn’t letting him talk to anyone.
“Do you think he really had a relationship with Patty Marino?” she asked. “Or was it infatuation twisted by a bit of mental illness? Maybe he was stalking her and really believed that Patty loved him. And if he couldn’t have her, no one could.”
“I think a mental evaluation is in his near future,” Jack answered. “When you didn’t come right back in with that dress, I went out to look for you. And when I saw the cruiser was gone, I knew he was the guy we were looking for.” He kicked at a shell in the sand. “Terry didn’t want to believe me at first. But when Mathews turned off the radio after Terry tried to contact him, he knew.”
“I was praying there was a GPS system to track the patrol units,” Lacey said.
“Yep, although I have to say, watching that blinking light on Terry’s onboard computer as we raced after you guys isn’t an experience I care to repeat.”
“I drove as slow as I dared.”
“Didn’t matter. The computer showed the car had stopped moving when we were about a third of the way to the hotel. I thought I was going to lose it. Seeing it move meant that you were still alive, but once it stopped …” He shook his head.
She squeezed his hand and sucked in a deep breath of sea air.
“Terry figured out Mathews had held back his own name from the list of people who use that cabin. One of Will’s friends mentioned that Will and Mathews fished together frequently,” Jack said. “What motivates a man to kill his fishing buddy?”
“The love of a woman apparently.”
Jack scoffed. “Patty’s friends claimed she had nothing to do with Mathews. I think it was all in his head. And when she didn’t jump up and down for joy when he killed her ex-husband, Mathews overreacted. I think you’re right—it might have been one of those ‘If I can’t have you, no one can’ type of situations. And he assumed people would believe that Will killed her and then himself.”
“I’m still shocked that he was angry enough at a hotel to dump her body there.”
“In his head, he was punishing the hotel for his mother’s depression. He couldn’t strike out at his mother, so the hotel got the blame. In his head, it was completely logical.”
“I don’t want to get married there,” Lacey said.
Jack laughed. “Did you think I’d consider it now? This is the last place in the world I want to have a ceremony. Somehow, having my wife kidnapped and held at gunpoint seems to have soured it for me.”
She stopped and smiled at him. “Your wife?”
He took her face in his hands. “I’ve thought of you in that way for a long time. We just haven’t made it legal yet.” He kissed her on her nose. “By the way, the Oregon Coast is off the wedding site list. I don’t want to have anything to do with this coast.”
“You know, I don’t want a big wedding,” Lacey whispered.
Jack threw back his head and laughed. “Lord, why didn’t you say so?”
“Because I didn’t want to disappoint your sister and my father. They seem so happy making plans.”
“Lacey. This is our wedding. Not anyone else’s. I can handle my sister’s nosiness if you take care of your father.”
She nodded. “As long as he’s invited, I think he’ll be okay.”
“So where do you want to get married?” He held her captive with his questioning gray gaze. “Whatever you want to do is fine with me.”
“I don’t know. Outside. Small. Warm. And I do want water. Just not Oregon Coast waters.”
“We have a lot of options. Hawaii? Mexico? What about a Napa vineyard or Lake Tahoe?”
Some of the wedding anxiety melted away. She hadn’t realized how much she’d worried about satisfying other people for her own wedding. This was supposed to be fun to plan. “Now you’re talking. Shall we take some quick vacations to check out locations?”
“I’ll follow you wherever you want to look. We could have a lot of fun searching for the perfect site. Just tell me when to show up with the ring.”
She slipped her arms around his waist and lay her head on his chest. “I love you, Jack Harper.”
“And I love you, Mrs. Almost Harper.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kendra Elliot’s debut novel, Hidden, sold more than 100,000 copies in its first few months. She is the best-selling author of the romantic suspense novels Hidden, Chilled, and Buried. Her next novel, Alone, will be released in January 2014. She lives in the rainy Pacific Northwest with her husband, three daughters, and a Pomeranian, but dreams of living at the beach on Kauai.