LITMIR.BIZ

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“Alicia?”

      He nodded. Tense enough that the cords in his neck framed his next swallow. “I met her in high school.”

      “Your girlfriend?” She wasn’t jealous. Had no reason to be jealous. Obviously Scott hadn’t stuck with this girl. Still, had she ever seen that warmth in his eyes when he’d been focused on her?

      “She was more than just a girlfriend.” His voice took on a distant quality, almost as though he was talking in his sleep. His sight had definitely focused inward, leaving Tricia sitting there alone.

      And yet… He was sharing this with her. That meant something.

      “How so?” she asked softly, dragging a blue-and-white throw pillow onto her lap, hugging it, pulling at the tasseled trim she’d sewn on by hand.

      He tilted his head slightly, a restless hand coming to rest on the side of his boot.

      “It sounds crazy,” he told her. “Always has, even in my own mind, but Alicia was special. Different. From the first time I met her, it’s like we connected. Suddenly everything in life made sense. I felt as if I’d been thrown from a hurricane into a rainbow.”

      Which described exactly how she’d felt when she met him. Emotion burned at the back of her throat. She felt that way about him. He’d felt that way about someone else.

      “It doesn’t sound crazy.” But this love story didn’t have a happy ending. Had the woman dumped him? For someone who was more…what? Couldn’t be richer. Meaner, then? Politically motivated?

      Or had their families been involved? Disapproved of the match?

      “Did your parents like her?” Was she rich enough for them?

      “Everyone liked her. Alicia was the only daughter of one of California’s most influential bankers. But unlike the other girls at school, her attitude wasn’t defined by her family’s wealth. She was blond, small, popular. She liked nice things. But she spent her time thinking about poetry. And social problems—how she could help people.”

      Tricia had spent most of her teenage years dreaming about clothes. But she’d volunteered at the animal shelter every weekend and during the summer. Leah had taken her there. Among the animals Tricia had found peace. Security. Unconditional love.

      “So what happened? I can’t imagine she didn’t like you.”

      His grin was slow, not fully present, but Tricia felt heat in her cheeks anyway.

      “We were pretty much inseparable the last two years of high school. We graduated. Celebrated our eighteenth birthdays that summer.”

      His was in July. Three months away. Last year had been the first she’d celebrated with him. He’d been embarrassed by the fuss she’d made—which had consisted of one new shirt and a homemade cake.

      “The third Saturday in August, just before we were due to leave for college, we took the Porsche out for a long drive along Highway One.”

      The coastal road followed the Pacific Ocean all the way up the state of California and beyond. Tricia and Leah had run away for a couple of weeks one summer during college and driven the entire craggy coastline, marveling at the natural beauty that took their breath away, the mountains and drop-offs, the mammoth rocks and roaring waves, stopping wherever the spirit took them. They’d spent three days in Carmel.

      Tricia had sworn she’d go back there with a lover someday.

      She never had.

      “Somewhere about a hundred miles north of Santa Monica I pulled into a deserted overlook and asked her to marry me.”

      This was where the story got sad. Those narrowed, glistening eyes said so.

      “She turned you down?” She hadn’t meant to sound incredulous, but she really couldn’t believe it.

      “No.” He glanced up with a bit of a smile. She’d never seen a smile look so sad. “She said yes. And started to cry when the ring I nervously pulled out of the glove box fit her finger perfectly.”

      “How’d you manage that?” She was hurting and didn’t even know why.

      “Got one of her rings from her mom and took it to the jewelers.”

      His thoughtfulness didn’t surprise Tricia. Except as confirmation that he’d always been like that. She’d occasionally wondered if he was so different from the other men she knew because of something that had happened to him. Apparently not. Apparently he’d been born thoughtful and kind.

      “An hour later, flying high on life, I took a corner twenty miles an hour too fast, lost control of the Porsche and slammed into the side of a mountain.”

      San Francisco Gazette

       Wednesday, April 6, 2005 Page 1

      Socialite Still Missing

      Forty-eight hours after thirty-one-year old charity fund-raiser Leah Montgomery was reported missing by her brother and sister, there has still been no word on her whereabouts. According to a police source, they have no clues other than the black gown hanging in her shower. The missing woman was apparently planning to wear it two evenings ago at a charity gala. There was no sign of struggle in her Pacific Heights security-system-controlled home. Montgomery’s white Mercedes convertible has not been found.

      Standing at the checkout counter at Gala Foods, her basket empty except for the fresh vegetables she’d suddenly decided she wanted for dinner, Tricia read the article a second time. Her hands were trembling so hard she could barely make out the words bouncing in front of her.

      They weren’t what she’d expected to read. No inane idea to explain her friend’s sudden disappearance. No embarrassing statement of apology for the rash or naive behavior that had made her miss her own black-tie function. No Leah.

      Dammit, Leah, what have you done this time? Who’s rescuing you from whatever mess you’ve created now that I’m not there to do it?

      And whose gown did you buy?

      It was almost one in the afternoon. The paper had gone to press before six that morning. Perhaps Leah had been found by now.

      Yeah, that was it. Tricia folded the paper, putting it on top of her purse in the metal child-seat in the front of the basket. Tomorrow she’d read all about it. The harebrained scheme. The embarrassment. Leah safe and sound and laughing it all off in such a way that everyone would eventually laugh along with her.

      Taking a deep breath, hooking the hair that had fallen over the shoulder of her T-shirt back behind her ear, she pushed her basket closer to the moving conveyer belt, unloading a head of cauliflower, broccoli florets and peeled baby carrots.

      The San Diego daily paper was there at the checkout—without any mention of Leah on the front page. Somehow that was comforting.

      “Paper or plastic?” the older man who bagged groceries asked.

      His question startled her. Brought her back to the present moment—the only moment she had to worry about right now.

      “Plastic, please.” She pushed her empty basket through to the end of the aisle.

      “Where’s your little one this afternoon?” asked Gabriella, the young, slightly plump and quite beautiful Hispanic cashier.

      “Home napping with his dad.” She’d snatched the opportunity to get out alone to grab the paper. Away from the house, she could freely study news from the town where she’d grown up and dispose of the evidence with no one but her eighteen-month-old son the wiser.

      Only occasionally during Scott’s four-day rotations on would she spoil herself, bringing the paper home to enjoy over a cup of coffee as she had the day before.

      “You are one lucky woman!” Gabriella was saying, her fingers flying over the number keys of the computerized register, typing in prices for the fresh vegetables. “Most of

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