River’s End Read Free Page A

on the set of a movie, fell wildly in love and were married within four months while the press raved and simpered over them. She’d worried, Jamie admitted. It was all so fast, so Hollywood. But Julie had always known exactly what she wanted, and she’d wanted Sam Tanner. For a while, it had seemed as happy-ever-after as the stories Julie told her daughter at bedtime. But this fairy tale had ended in a nightmare—blocks away, only blocks away while she’d slept, Jamie thought, squeezing her eyes shut as a sob clawed at her throat. The sudden flash of lights had her jumping back, her heart pumping fast. David, she realized, and turned quickly to the bed to be certain Olivia slept peacefully. Leaving the light on low, she hurried out. She was coming down the stairs as the door opened and her husband walked in.
    He stood there for a long moment, a tall man with broad shoulders. His hair of deep brown was mussed, his eyes, a quiet mix of gray and green, full of fatigue and horror. Strength was what she’d always found in him. Strength and stability. Now he looked sick and shaken, his usual dusky complexion pasty, a muscle jumping in his firm, square jaw.
    “God, Jamie. Oh, sweet God.” His voice broke, and somehow that made it worse. “
    I need a drink.” He turned away, walked unsteadily into the front salon. She had to grip the railing for balance before she could order her legs to move, to follow him. “David?”
    “I need a minute.” His hands shook visibly as he took a decanter of whisky from the breakfront, poured it into a short glass. He braced one hand on the wood, lifted the glass with the other and drank it down like medicine. “Jesus, God, what he did to her.”
    “Oh, David.” She broke. The control she’d managed to cling to since the police had come to the door shattered. She simply sank to the floor in a spasm of sobs and shudders.
    “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He rushed to her and gathered her against him. “Oh, Jamie, I’m so sorry.”
    They stayed there, on the floor in the lovely room, as the light turned pearly with dawn. She wept in harsh, racking gasps until he wondered that her bones didn’t shatter from the power of it.
    The gasps turned to moans that were her sister’s name, then the moans to silence.
    “I’ll take you upstairs. You need to lie down.”
    “No, no. no.” The tears had helped. Jamie told herself they’d helped though they left her feeling hollowed-out and achy. “Livvy might wake up. She’ll need me. I’ll be all right. I have to be all right.”
    She sat back, scrubbing her hands over her face to dry it. Her head throbbed like an open wound, her stomach was a mass of cramps. But she got to her feet. “I need you to tell me. I need you to tell me everything.” When he shook his head, her chin came up. “I have to know, David.”
    He hesitated. She looked so tired, so pale and so fragile. Where Julie had been long and willowy, Jamie was small and fine-boned. Both had carried a look of delicacy that he knew was deceptive. He’d often joked that the MacBride sisters were tough broads, bred to climb mountains and tramp through woods.
    “Let’s get some coffee. I’ll tell you everything I know.”
    Like her sister, Jamie had refused live-in staff. It was her house, by God, and she wouldn’t sacrifice her privacy. The day maid wouldn’t be in for another two hours, so she brewed the coffee herself while David sat at the counter and stared out the window.
    They didn’t speak. In her head she ran over the tasks she would have to face that day. The call to her parents would be the worst, and she was already bracing for it. Funeral arrangements would have to be made—carefully, to ensure as much dignity and privacy as possible. The press would be salivating. She would make sure the television remained off as long as Olivia was in the house.
    She set two cups of coffee on the counter, sat. “Tell me.”
    “There isn’t much more than Detective Brady already