“Where is it?” she asked.

  “It’s about a three hour drive from here,” he answered. “Wilcome is looking into the jurisdiction issues for us to see if the locals will allow us to have the scene.”

  Rilynne pulled an evidence bag out of her desk and sealed the journal up in it. “I’m going to go drop this off in evidence and head home then. I’ve been putting off unpacking for days. If I don’t get it done soon, I have a feeling I’ll end up living out of boxes forever.”

  The line in the evidence room was abnormally long, even for a Friday. It took Rilynne nearly thirty minutes to get the journal signed in and make it back to her desk. After grabbing her purse, she reached in her drawer for the blood stained shirt and walked toward the elevator.

  She had just pushed the down button when Ben walked up behind her, bumping her with his hip. “Big plans tonight?”

  “Oh yeah,” she said sarcastically as she stepped through the doors as they opened. “I have a date with a stack of moving boxes and a bottle of wine. You know how much I love unpacking.” She rolled her eyes as she reached toward the buttons.

  “Well, if you want some company, I don’t have anything going on tonight. I can’t say that I’ll actually help you with the unpacking part, but I do a pretty good job refilling wine glasses.”

  “You don’t have anything better to do on a Friday night than watch me drunkenly organize?” she asked.

  “It’s either that or…” he stopped himself, following her out of the elevator. “Nope, nothing better. I’ll pick up a case of beer and meet you there. Do you want me to grab anything to eat?”

  “I wouldn’t say no to a burger.”

  “With swiss and cheddar right? And a side of ranch.”

  Ben held the door open for her as they stepped out onto the street. “You know me so well,” she said with a smile.

  *

  Rilynne was just pulling her shirt on when she heard the front door shut. “I grabbed your mail on my way in. It looks like you haven’t checked it since you moved in,” she heard him call from the kitchen.

  “That’s because I haven’t,” she admitted, walking out of her room. “I’m still not used to the mailbox being on the street. I’m always walking through the door when I remember and don’t feel like going back out to get it.”

  “Ah,” he said. “Well here.” He held out the large stack of envelopes. “Now let’s eat before these get cold.” He tossed the to-go bag at her and walked into the dining room.

  Rilynne had finished half of her burger when she started sifting through the mail. After the seventh letter addressed to “Current Resident”, she found one that sent tingles down her spine, making her feel like her insides were being twisted.

  After slowly ripping the side of the envelope open, she pulled out the two-page letter and unfolded in.

  The air left her lungs as her eyes flew rapidly across the page. Although it was right there in front of her, she thought that there must be some mistake. She just wasn’t ready, not yet.

  “What is it?” Ben asked when he saw the look on her face.

  She read over the letter again, but couldn’t see to form any words. Finally she just handed it over to him. After quickly reading it himself, he sat it back down on the table and leaned back in his chair, knuckles dragging across his chin.

  “Death in absentia. Wow, that’s… big. Are you all right?” he asked gently.

  “I knew it would eventually happen,” she found herself saying. “I just… It hasn’t even been a year and a half. I guess part of me always hoped there was a chance he could still be alive.”

  “Doesn’t it usually take seven years to have someone declared dead if there isn’t a body?”

  “A judge can have it ruled sooner if there’s enough evidence and if a family member requests. Sarah, Christopher’s sister, must have wanted to get some closure. I can’t say that I really blame her. I just wish that I would have known.”

  He slid the letter across the table to her. “I take it the two of you don’t talk much?”

  Rilynne shook her head. “She blames me for Christopher’s death. Although, she was never really a big fan of mine in the first place. I actually heard her trying to talk him out of marrying me after the rehearsal dinner.”

  “Ouch,” he responded. “What was her problem with you? If you ask me, you’d be the perfect match for any guy.”

  She looked up at him, but he kept his gaze trained on the table. Before she looked back down herself, she saw his ears reaching that familiar shade of pink. “Apparently a detective isn’t the best choice in a bride. There was something about me having a risky job and how having to raise kids alone with a career like his would be too difficult.”

  “Well, it doesn’t sound like she was shy about her opinions.”

  Rilynne laughed. “Not at all. She was good about putting on a sweet face in my presence, and after Christopher put her in her place after the rehearsal dinner, I don’t think that she said anything else to him. She always had that look about her when I was around, though.”

  “The ‘I hate you but I’m going to play nice’ look?” he asked.

  “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  Ben nodded, but didn’t say anything. After several minutes of silence, he placed his hand gently on hers and stood up. “You look like you need a beer.”

  “I actually feel like going for a run,” she said, leaning back.

  “It’s almost midnight.”

  “So I’ll go on the trail instead of the streets.”

  “No,” he said firmly. “It’s too dark, and you’re going to get yourself lost or killed going out into the woods.”

  Rilynne was shocked by his demanding tone, and couldn’t bring herself to argue. She was still sitting wide-eyed at the table when he came back with an opened beer and handed it to her.

  He dropped back down in his chair and sat in silence, waiting for her to collect her thoughts. “It just doesn’t seem real,” she finally said before draining half of her beer in one swig.

  “That’s understandable,” he said. “It’s hard enough to lose someone when it’s right there in front of you. At least then you have closure. I can’t even begin to imagine never knowing for sure.”

  “Well, I guess this is as close as I’m going to get to closure,” she said, running her fingers over the letter still in front of her.

  Ben raised his knuckles back up, dragging them along his chin as he quietly watched her fingers tracing over the same word: death.

  They sat in silence for what seemed like twenty minutes before Ben stood up and walked back into the kitchen. He came back out a few moments later with a cooler tote hanging off of his shoulder. “Come on,” he said, taking her by the hand and pulling her to the back door.

  “Where are we going?” she asked, pulling on her shoes.

  Instead of answering, he just led her out the door and onto the path. The full moon above them was providing just enough light for Rilynne to see the leaf littered ground below her feet. “Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “Nope,” he said with an almost pleased tone in his voice.

  “Do you even know where we’re going?” she asked hesitantly. “It’s too dark to really see the path beneath the trees. We’re going to get lost out here.”

  “If memory serves,” he said. “You’re the one who got us lost in these woods, not me.”

  She couldn’t argue there. While they had been searching a crime scene, she had gotten them so turned around that they ended up two miles from where they were supposed to be. She decided to quietly follow him until they arrived wherever he was leading them, knowing that if he did get them lost, she would have the satisfaction of being able to give him a hard time.

  After another twenty minutes of weaving through the trees, they stepped out into a large clearing. Just beyond the giant boulder sitting twenty feet in front of them was a ledge overlooking the city lights below.

  “Wow,” she said, walking toward the edge. “How did you ever find this place?”

  He walked forward and climbed up on the boulder, perching himself on the top. “Laney brought me out here whenever I was having a hard time after my parent’s died. Then after she was murdered I came back out,” he explained as he pulled two beers out of the cooler, handing one down to her. “I guess you could call it my happy place. I come out here anytime something is really bothering me.”

  “It’s so beautiful out here. I can see why you like it.” Ben reached down and pulled her up next to him, not removing his hand from her waist until several moments after she was in place.

  “It’s really quiet out here, and not many people know about it,” he said softly as the wind whipped through his hair, sending the strong smell of peaches floating toward her. “I’ve actually only seen one other person in all of the time I have been coming here.”

  Rilynne leaned back on her elbows and looked out at the lights below. “Doesn’t it defeat the purpose of having a secret little place like this if you’re going to tell people about it?”

  He shrugged and laid back next to her. “It’s not like you could ever find your way back out here.” She could hear him grinning.

  One of the things that Rilynne enjoyed about Addison Valley was the sky at night. When she looked up, she saw more stars than she had even imagined there could be. In a way it made her feel both tiny and alive, though she couldn’t explain why. After taking a long swig of her beer, she let her head slowly drop down to the rock as her eyes drifted shut. With a satisfying sigh, she felt her mind start to drift.

  Ben was sitting in his car in front of the police station, watching her drive way. This was after we had dinner, she thought to herself. His hand pulled up and dragged along his chin, as she felt the uncertainty building within him. Finally he pulled back onto the street, but didn’t go to his apartment. Instead, he stopped outside of the entrance to the trails.

  Suddenly he was sitting on the very boulder they currently occupied.

  “I don’t know what to do, Laney,” he said to the stars above. “Why do things have to be so complicated?”

  Chills shot down her spine as she pulled herself up. Ben sat back up beside her and pulled another beer out of the bag as she emptied the one already in her hand. “Taking me out in the middle of the woods and getting me drunk,” she joked. “I think this is the kind of thing that mothers warn their daughters about.”

  He chuckled softly as he took a drink of his beer. “Damn, you caught me.”

  The cool breeze picked her hair up off of her shoulders and made it dance. When she drew a deep breath, the air stung the back of her throat. “We should probably head back soon,” Ben said as he swallowed the last of his beer in one swig. “It looks like there are clouds starting to roll in. If we lose the moon light we’ll end up stuck out here until morning.”

  “Would that really be a bad thing?” she asked.

  “I can think of worse ways to spend a night,” he answered lightly. She peered over to see him staring up at the sky. The moonlight hitting his face made the gold flecks in his eyes sparkle.

  “Thank you,” she said softly. He turned his gaze to her and smiled the kind smile that Rilynne had grown to find so comforting. He slid off the edge of the boulder and reached up to take her hand.

  Rilynne put her empty bottle back in the cooler and let Ben lead her by the hand back onto the path. The clouds were slowly creeping over the moon, leaving it darker with every step. After just ten minutes of walking, Rilynne could no longer see the path below her. If Ben was having the same problem, he showed no signs of it as he continued to lead them steadily between the trees. Before she knew it, they had stepped out of the tree line just behind her back gate.

  “Well, it’s getting late,” he said, glancing at the clock on the wall when they walked back in the house. “I should probably be going.”

  “You don’t have to,” Rilynne said quickly. “I mean, it’s pretty late. I do have a guest room now, so you wouldn’t have to sleep on the couch. You know, if you wanted to.” She tried to sound as casual as she could. It was difficult.

  She could tell by the look in his eyes that he knew she had her own reasons for wanting him to stay, but he didn’t bring them up. “Yeah, I could do that,” he said simply.

  They cleared the empty bottles off of the table and Rilynne showed him to the room at the end of the hall.

  “When did you have time to get a second bed?” he asked when he walked into the fully furnished room. “You’ve been working pretty much nonstop since you moved in.”

  Rilynne threw him a smile and handed him a pair of shorts out of the top dresser drawer. “Online shopping is my favorite way to shop.”

  He was still shaking his head when she pulled the door shut and walked down the hall and into her room. She dug through the box of pajamas that she had finally open the night before and found her favorite pink and gray flannel bottoms. After quickly changing and brushing her teeth, she cracked her windows open and turned off the lights.

  Her head was still reeling when she climbed into bed. Rilynne stared up at the ceiling fan spinning silently above her for nearly an hour before finally drifting off.

  Chapter Six

  Rilynne heard a noise coming from the foot of her bed and bolted up to find a tall, shadowy figure staring down at her.

  “Ben, you scared me. What’s going on? What’s wrong?” she asked as she reached for her lamp. After switching it on, she turned back to him and let out a shocked little squeal when she realized that it was not Ben standing before her.

  She slid off the edge of the bed and rushed toward him. “Christopher, what are you doing here?” she asked as she wrapped her arms around him. When he did not return her embrace, she let go and took a step back. As she looked him up and down, a sudden shudder passed through her. He was dressed in his favorite green dress shirt and his best slacks. She remembered packing them for him before he left for that last business trip. The front of his shirt was wet with fresh blood, and his hands were completely covered.

  “This is all my fault,” she said as she touched his blood soaked chest. “I’m so sorry. It’s my fault this happened to you.”

  He reached up and pushed her hand gently away.

  “‘Til death do us part,” he said smoothly as he turned and walked out of the room.

  She followed him through the door and onto a bright, sandy beach. Her pajama pants were dragging through the warm sand as she chased Christopher toward the ocean ahead. “Wait,” she called out, but he did not stop. Instead, he just calmly repeated himself. “‘Til death do us part.”

  “But you are dead Christopher. They just made it official,” she tried to explain. “I waited for you. I have been waiting the whole time.” She reached out and grabbed him by the arm, spinning him gently around to face her.

  Instead of looking upset, he was smiling down at her. “Death brings freedom,” he said. “Death means that it’s over. It’s time for a new life, free from the past.”

  “But you could still be out there somewhere,” she argued.

  “Christopher Parker is dead, and he isn’t coming back. It’s time for a new life to begin, free from the past.”

  Before she could say another word, a small monkey ran past her. She turned to watch it, and when she looked back, Christopher was gone.

  “Christopher!” she yelled, looking around the beach, but the only sign of him were the footprints he had left in front of her. Panicking, she took off running down the beach. She ran for what seemed like an hour. When she finally stopped, she found that she was right back where she had started.

  She dropped down in the sand and watched the tide drawing slowly closer with every breaking wave. She had resigned to letting it just sweep over her when the monkey ran past her again.

  She pushed herself up and followed it up the beach until it jumped up onto an awaiting man.

  “Shane?” she asked. “Shane Villarreal? What are you doing here?” She continued to move toward him, but did not appear to be getting any closer.

  “Good monkey,” he said as he scratched the top of its head. He reached into the maroon journal in his hand and pulled out several pages. “Here monkey,” he said, placing the pages into the tiny, awaiting hands. “They’ll be safe with you.”

  “You left the pages with a monkey?” She felt overwhelmed with confusion. “I don’t understand. What does a monkey have to do with anything? And how are the pages safe with it?”

  Villarreal just smiled at her as the monkey jumped from his shoulder and ran toward the trees. After one last bewildered look at Villarreal, she started running after the monkey. She reached the tree line in just enough time to see the monkey’s tail vanishing through the same door she had walked through before. She quickly followed, reaching her arms out to catch him.

  Before she could, an intense pain shot through her feet. She looked down to see the familiar shattered glass covered hallway below her. Panic spread through her as she pushed herself to move forward. As she drew closer to the door at the end of the hall, she could see the dark puddle creeping under it.

  Her mind was telling her to turn around and run, but her heart made her continue. No matter how bad she wanted to leave, she knew that she would not find answers unless she could see what was in the room. When she pushed the door open, she felt the air leave her lungs as she let out a long, painful moan.

  The wall above her bed was splattered with blood, and her sheets were stained red. This can’t be real, she thought as she dropped to her knees. “No,” she moaned loudly. She knew she needed to go in, but she couldn’t will her body to move. She looked down to find her gun shaking in her hand. “Someone help,” she said to herself. She reached down for her phone and pulled it up to her ear. “There’s too much blood,” she heard herself saying. “He’s…he’s… there’s just too much blood.” The phone fell to the floor at her feet as she forced herself up.

  Before she could take a single step into the room, searing pain shot through her back and she fell back to the ground. “No!” she yelled. “I need to see this time. I need to know what happened!”