Buried Secrets Read online

  Leave it to Lance to ask that.

  Mac grinned. “Uh-huh.”

  “Cute?”

  “Very.”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Adele.”

  “Can’t say I’ve heard that name much. It’s kind of old-fashioned.”

  “Not when she was born.”

  Silence.

  “Okay, you got me. How old is she?”

  “Eighty-two in April. And cute as a button.”

  Lance muttered some comment he couldn’t make out. “I hope there are some better prospects around.”

  “I thought you were coming to visit me, not pick up women.”

  “Anything wrong with doing both?”

  Vintage Lance.

  “Nope. But don’t expect me to introduce you to anyone. I’m too new in town.”

  “You’ve been there a whole month. Are you telling me you haven’t met any hot chicks?”

  An image of Lisa Grant flashed through his mind—not that she’d appreciate either of those labels.

  “I’m still learning the new job. No time yet to play.”

  “Yeah?” Lance sounded skeptical. “Since when haven’t you made time to play?”

  “Since I left the military and joined the nine-to-five crowd.”

  “You’re not turning into a stick-in-the-mud, are you?”

  “No, but the quieter life has its advantages.”

  “Well, Finn and I will liven things up for you once we get there.”

  “I have no doubt of that. Give Mom and Dad my best.”

  “Will do. See you in three days.”

  As Mac holstered the phone and turned back to the crime scene, he did his best to switch gears.

  But he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that the upcoming reunion was more than a simple, friendly visit from his brothers. Lance hadn’t hinted at an ulterior motive, but his voice had held an undertone of . . . tension? Excitement? Trepidation?

  Whatever it was, something was up. He could feel it in his bones.

  Still, as long as his brothers were on his turf for a few days, he wouldn’t have to worry about them being in the line of fire—and that was worth celebrating.

  Even if he had to wait until they showed up to satisfy his curiosity about the real reason for this visit.

  “That was great, Mom. Sorry again about getting hung up at the office and delaying dinner.” Lisa speared the last piece of chicken in her Caesar salad and leaned back in the patio chair as she munched.

  “No problem. I’m just glad it cooled off enough to eat outside. Though maybe this wasn’t such a smart idea. You look like you’ve gotten a fair amount of sun since I saw you last week. Shall I tilt the umbrella to give you a little more shade?”

  “I’m fine, thanks. Besides, the sun will be below the trees in a few minutes.” She waved toward the golden orb dipping low in the sky. “I did spend a lot of hours outside at the excavation site this week. I guess I should have used more sunscreen.” She smoothed a finger over the sensitive tip of her nose.

  “I wasn’t going to bring that up in case you were trying to disconnect from work for the evening, but as long as you mentioned it . . . I saw a short item about the discovery on the evening news.”

  Her friendly reporter hadn’t wasted any time publicizing the latest update.

  “What did he have to say?”

  “Not much more than the first story. He said the bones appear to be female and are quite old. He showed the same video as the first story, along with some shots from the traffic cam and from behind the police tape at the site. There was one new piece of footage, though. You were talking to a tall, nice-looking man near a canopy. He had on a sport jacket.”

  Lisa picked up her plate and her mother’s and stood. “That’s the County detective who came out to assist.”

  “You two seemed to be having a very intent conversation.”

  “When you discover a skeleton, things can get serious fast. Stay put. I’ll clear the table and load the dishwasher.”

  “I’ll help. Many hands and all that.” Her mother picked up the pepper mill and basket of crackers and followed her inside. “What’s this detective’s name?”

  So much for her evasive maneuvers.

  “Mac McGregor.” Best to get the third degree out of the way ASAP.

  “Is he nice?”

  “Personable.”

  “Married?”

  “No.”

  Her mother stowed the pepper mill in the cabinet and tucked the uneaten crackers back into their box. “Is he going to stay involved in the case?”

  “I don’t know. He’s a busy man. What’s for dessert?”

  “Strawberries and whipped cream.”

  “Yum. My favorite. So what’s on your agenda for tomorrow?”

  “Changing the subject, hmm?” Her mom put the crackers away and closed the cabinet. “Why don’t you want to talk about this detective?”

  Turning aside, Lisa reached into the cabinet for two dessert bowls. “We can talk about him if you want to, but I just met the man two days ago and I’ve only spent a couple of hours with him. There isn’t much to say.”

  “I don’t know . . . you had an interesting expression on your face in that news clip when the two of you were deep in conversation.”

  Oh, for goodness’ sake!

  She retrieved the bowls and swiveled back to her mom. “I couldn’t have been on camera more than five or ten seconds, max.”

  “It was long enough. I know that look. I had it once myself, years ago when I met your dad.” A gentle smile softened her features. “A woman never forgets what that feels like.”

  “What what feels like?”

  “The sense that maybe, just maybe, he could be the one.”

  This was getting way out of hand.

  “Mom, listen to me.” She fixed the older woman with an intent look. “I don’t even know this man.”

  Her mother winked. “You’d like to.”

  The bare truth nailed in three words.

  How did her mother do that? Since her older daughter’s second-grade crush on Timmy Maloney, Stephanie Grant had been able to delve with the precision of a neurosurgeon into the romantic crannies of her brain. It had been kind of entertaining, in a comical sort of way.

  Tonight, however, she was not amused.

  This might be a short evening.

  “You know, it’s silly to jump to a lot of conclusions when . . .” Her phone began to vibrate. Yes! She handed her mother the dessert bowls. “I need to take this.”

  “Saved by the bell—for now.” After tacking on that caveat, her mom took the bowls and began preparing the dessert.

  Huffing out a breath, Lisa pulled the phone off her belt—and froze as the name on the caller ID panel registered.

  It was Mac.

  Talk about bad timing.

  Of course she’d expected him to call her back. He’d said he would, and he struck her as a man of his word.

  But did it have to be right this minute?

  “I thought you had to answer that?” Her mother arched an eyebrow.

  “I do. I’ll meet you outside.” She headed toward the back door and the privacy of the patio, phone to her ear. “Lisa Grant.”

  “Lisa, it’s Mac. Sorry to call so late, but I got hung up with the homicide. Did I catch you in the middle of dinner?”

  “No. We just finished.”

  Silence. “Look, if I’m interrupting anything . . .”

  “No.” Her reassurance was fast—and firm—as she pushed through the door. No way did she intend to leave the impression she was on a date. “I have dinner with my mom every Wednesday. We’re at the clearing-the-table stage.”

  “Oh. Good.” The relief in his voice was obvious—and encouraging. “I’m getting ready to nuke a dinner myself. Can you fill me in on the bones while I work? I’m starving.”

  “Sure.” Keeping her mother in view through the sliding door, she retook her seat at the table while sh
e briefed him on the latest news.

  “Not much to go on, is it?” As he spoke, she heard the familiar sound of a microwave door being opened, then closed in the background . . . followed by several beeps.

  “No. Barbara said she was checking out a few things, but I’m not optimistic there’ll be a breakthrough.”

  “So what’s your plan?”

  Excellent question.

  “It’s still in the development stage. If there’s no obvious lead in Barbara’s report, I’ll go over it with a fine-tooth comb and try to connect some dots. If I can do that, I’ll move on to a review of missing persons files fifteen years and older from within a hundred-mile radius of the excavation site. What you said earlier in the week is true—most people who go missing locally get found locally.”

  “That kind of review could take a while, even narrowing it down by the age, gender, and race criteria you have.”

  “It will give me something to do in my free time.” Her mother sent her a curious look through the glass door, and she averted her head. She’d had enough mind-reading for one day, thank you very much.

  “Do you have a lot of that?”

  She tried to recall what they’d been talking about. Free time. Right.

  “More than I had in Chicago.”

  “I have a feeling that’s not saying much.”

  “You sound like my mother.” She peeked back toward the kitchen. Her mom was still watching her.

  “Is that a bad thing?”

  “Not necessarily.” In truth, it was kind of nice to think the man on the other end of the line might care how many excess hours she worked. “But I’ll have less free time if I have to dive into this case.”

  “Remember, if you want any help, all you have to do is pick up the phone.”

  She used a finger to gather up the cracker crumbs on the glass-topped table, brushing them into a nice, neat pile. “To tell you the truth, I wouldn’t mind having someone to bounce ideas off of as the investigation progresses—assuming it does. I did a lot of brainstorming in Chicago with the other detectives, and even though I’m training the Carson officers, they’re not at the level yet where they can contribute much to a case like this.”

  “I’d be happy to be your bouncer.” She could hear the smile in his voice. “Why don’t you send me a copy of Barbara’s report and we can touch base after we both have a chance to review it?”

  “That would be great. Considering how busy you are, I expect I’ll finish my review first. Do you want to call me once you look it over?”

  “Sounds like a plan.” The muffled clunk of ice from an ice maker came over the line.

  Much as she was tempted to prolong their conversation, the man needed to eat dinner.

  “I’ll let you go, then. Enjoy your meal.”

  “Not likely. The package said this was pork, but it looks more like the mystery meat in an MRE . . . also known as a ready-to-eat military ration.”

  “I hear you.” She let her eyelids drift closed and lifted her face to catch the last rays of the sun. “What about the leftovers from our Panera lunch?”

  “I finished them off for dinner last night —but you were right about a lot of that stuff not holding up very well. The limp lettuce and soggy chicken salad would have made Julia Child cringe.”

  “At least your dinner will be better than that.”

  “I’m not placing any bets on that.”

  “So . . . I guess I’ll talk to you early next week?”

  “Count on it. Enjoy the rest of your evening.”

  As he ended the call, Lisa gave a soft sigh, opened her eyes—and found her mother standing on the other side of the table, bowls of strawberries in hand, beaming like she’d won the lottery.

  How long had she been there?

  “You had lunch at Panera with that handsome detective?”

  Too long.

  She sat up straighter, scattering the crumbs she’d gathered. “He brought some takeout food to the excavation site. It was a working lunch, not a date.”

  “Uh-huh.” Her mother set the strawberries down and took her seat.

  Lisa braced for the next question.

  It didn’t come.

  Weird.

  Shooting a wary glance across the table, Lisa picked up her spoon. “Aren’t you going to ask me a bunch of other questions?”

  “Why, when I already know the answers?” Her mother gave her a smug smile and kept eating.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Her mom began to hum “Some Enchanted Evening.”

  Oh, for crying out loud.

  “That’s crazy.”

  “Is it? We’ll see. Eat your dessert before the topping deflates.”

  Lisa looked down. Too late. It had already collapsed—sort of like the arguments she was trying to dredge up to counter her mother’s assumptions. Not that any protest she might make would matter. Once Stephanie Grant made up her mind about anything, getting her to budge was harder than convincing Tally to give up his spot in the corner of her office.

  Better to let it ride.

  Besides . . . even if her mother was rushing things . . . even if logic told her it was much too soon to be thinking about enchanted evenings . . . even if she’d never believed in that love at first sight nonsense . . . she couldn’t help but hope that she and Mac might, indeed, find they had more in common than a case involving old bones.

  6

  As the wheels of the Boeing 747 clicked into position for landing at LaGuardia Airport, Jessica Lee looked across the first-class aisle at Robert Bradshaw. The younger founding partner of Peterson-Bradshaw was out cold, as he’d been for most of the London to New York flight. Yet several hours of sleep hadn’t erased the lines of fatigue on his face. He might have laughed earlier today about getting too old for all the jet-setting required of the CEO of an international PR firm, but at sixty-five, her mentor was, indeed, showing the strain.

  How fortunate for him he had her waiting in the wings when he retired, now that Drake Peterson was sidelined by Alzheimer’s.

  Such a sad end for the senior partner.

  The corners of her mouth lifted as she reached into the Louis Vuitton shoulder purse at her feet and removed her makeup bag. Which lip color to apply—Dior’s Rouge Blossom or Chanel’s understated Peregrina? She examined her reflection in the mirror of her compact. The red might be too much after such a long, tiring flight, even with a retouch of blush. Better to go with the more demure Chanel.

  After freshening her makeup and spritzing her hair, she peered again into the mirror. Was that a gray hair among the ash-blonde strands?

  Yes.

  She snapped the compact closed. Considering Kenneth’s exorbitant fees, mistakes like this were unacceptable. In her business, image was everything—especially when one was being groomed for the top slot.

  An attendant smiled at her as she passed by for a seat-belt check, but Jessica averted her head. If she had to conjure up one more pleasant expression, her face would crack. Being the point person for every major client meeting on both sides of the Atlantic was getting old. Once she took over the firm, she’d delegate the bulk of those duties to her replacement. The next Senior VP of Client Services and New Client Development could handle chores like that, just as she had since her promotion five years ago.

  Until that day, though, she’d continue to perform at the stellar level that had impressed her mentor. All she had to do was hold out another few months, and the prize she’d had her eye on for the past fifteen years would be hers. Maybe Robert hadn’t yet announced his retirement, but why else would he have bought a place in Florida? Why else would he be letting his many board memberships lapse? Why else would he have secured her a place on the strategic planning committee last year, if not to groom her for his position?

  As the plane banked and began its final descent, she exhaled. One more flight, and she’d be back in St. Louis, insulated from the world in her high-rise condo. Best of all, the whole weekend
stretched ahead. Robert had insisted they needed a couple of days to decompress after the rigorous round of meetings that had kept them on the go late into the evening every day of their weeklong visit, and for once she hadn’t demurred. Long hours and weekend appearances at the office were important—and rewarded—but she’d take at least Saturday off.

  She rested her elbows on the arms of her seat, planning her Saturday. A stop at Starbucks. A circuit through Saks to check out new merchandise. A swing by Gourmet to Go for a takeout dinner. And if she didn’t talk to a single soul—heaven.

  Returning her purse to the floor, she leaned closer to the window and watched the runway approach as the plane returned to earth.

  A successful European trip, a CEO job on the horizon, and a quiet weekend.

  What could be more perfect?

  At the impatient, staccato buzz of his doorbell early Saturday afternoon, followed by vigorous knocking, Mac grinned.

  His siblings had arrived.

  Leaving his laptop humming on the kitchen table, he crossed the living room and pulled open the door.

  Lance and Finn, duffels over their shoulders, grinned back at him—lean, fit, tanned . . . and best of all, safe.

  “About time you answered. We were just getting ready to bother Adele. Finn wants to meet her.” Lance winked at him—meaning he hadn’t let their youngest sibling in on the joke.

  “It can wait.” Finn moved into the room, dumped his bag on the floor, and sniffed. “You have any food in this joint?”

  “Good to see you too, bro.” Mac stepped back to allow Lance to enter, sizing up his middle brother. “Did you have a growth spurt, or what?”

  “Still six-two—but these boots give me an inch on you.” He motioned to his feet, then directed his attention to Finn. “Hey, runt—you want to say hello before you stuff your face?”

  Color surged on Finn’s cheeks, and Mac reined in a snigger. That auburn hair had always been the bane of his baby brother’s existence. “Don’t call me runt, old man. You’re only two inches taller than me. Besides, you’re two years older—and weaker.”

  “I could take you any day.”

  “Yeah? You want to prove that?”

  “Hey!” Mac held up his hand. “Rule number one in this house—civility.”