Whiskey Beach by Nora Roberts Page B

Because he’d dug under her skin so quickly she’d been rude.
    Not her life, she reminded herself, not really. Eli’s.
    Regardless, it struck her as monumentally unfair and intrusive.
    She knew all about unfair and intrusive.
    When Maureen texted her about taking a run, she nearly made an excuse. Instead, she decided the exercise and company might be just what she needed.
    She changed, zipped on her hoodie, pulled on her cap, tugged on fingerless gloves and met her friend at the beach steps.
    “I need this.” Maureen jogged in place. “Eighteen kindergartners on a sugar high. Every teacher in America should have their salaries doubled and get a bouquet of roses every freaking week. And a bottle of Landon Whiskey’s gold label.”
    “I take it the cupcakes were a success.”
    “They were like locusts,” Maureen said as they started down to the beach. “I’m not sure there was a stray sprinkle left. Everything okay?”
    “Why?”
    “You’ve got that little deal here.” Maureen tapped herself between her eyebrows.
    “Damn.” Instinctively, Abra rubbed at the spot. “I’m going to get lines there. I’m going to get culverts there.”
    “No, you won’t. You only get that crease when you’re really upset or pissed off. Which is it?”
    “Maybe both.”
    They started off at a light jog, the ocean frothing on one side, the sand with its clumps and pockets of snow on the other.
    Knowing her friend, Maureen said nothing.
    “Did you see that guy when you were leaving class this morning? About average height, brown hair, nice face, little paunch?”
    “I don’t know . . . maybe, yeah. He held the door for me. Why? What happened?”
    “He came downstairs.”
    “What happened?” Maureen stopped dead, then had to kick up her pace as Abra kept going. “Honey, did he try something? Did he—?”
    “No. No, nothing like that. This is Whiskey Beach, Maureen, not Southie.”
    “Still. Damn it. I shouldn’t have left you alone down there. I was thinking cupcakes, for God’s sake.”
    “It wasn’t anything like that. And who taught that course on self-defense for women?”
    “You did, but that doesn’t mean your best friend just strolls off and leaves you alone that way.”
    “He’s a private detective from Boston. Come on,” Abra said when Maureen stopped again. “Keep up. I have to run this mood off.”
    “What did he want? That bastard’s still in prison, isn’t he?”
    “Yes, and it wasn’t about me. It was about Eli.”
    “Eli? You said private detective, not the police. What did he want?”
    “He called it information. What he wanted was for me to gossip about Eli. He wanted dish and dirt, and he offered to
pay
me. Looking for an inside man,” she spewed. “Somebody who’d spy on Eli and pass on what he’s doing, what he’s saying. I don’t even know because Eli’s not doing or saying
anything
. And when I told him, basically, to get lost, he asked if Eli and I were involved. Which sounded a hell of a lot like asking if Eli and I were screwing like bunnies. I didn’t like it. I didn’t like him. And now I’m going to get culverts on my face.”
    Temper and exercise pinkened Maureen’s face. Her voice, breathless with both, lifted over the surge and crash of waves. “It’s none of his damn business if you
are
screwing like bunnies. Eli’s wife’s been dead a year, and they were already in the middle of a divorce. And they don’t have anything but the most circumstantial of evidence against him. The cops can’t prove anything, so now they’re reaching, digging in the dirt.”
    “I don’t think cops hire PI’s.”
    “I guess not. Who does?”
    “I don’t know.” As her muscles warmed, as the chilly air washed over her face, Abra found her mood leveling. “Insurance company? Maybe his wife had insurance, and they don’t want to pay. Except he said he was hired by a client. And he wouldn’t tell me who. Maybe insurance company lawyers, or, I don’t know, the dead