Deception by Carol Ericson Read Free Book Online Page B

rock.”
    Grady took it anyway. “Maybe a witness will come forward in secret. These were all friends and neighbors out here. Nobody’s going want to be labeled a rat.”
    “Even if that rock could’ve seriously injured Mia?” Dylan shook his head. “If so, this town doesn’t have the values it did when I was growing up here.”
    Grady pocketed the rock and returned to his squad car. The few remaining onlookers disappeared when the ambulance rounded the corner.
    Dylan turned to Mia. “Do you need to go back inside the house?”
    “I left my bag in there.” She turned and put a tentative foot on the first step of the crumbling porch.
    “Sorry I couldn’t get here sooner. Uh, police business.”
    Actually, he didn’t have much to do back at the station. Mia had made it clear she didn’t want his hovering presence, and he didn’t want his own issues to get in the way of his relationship with her.
    Relationship? They had no relationship. She’d returned to Coral Cove for business, and she’d be back in New York once she made a decision.
    And he’d returned to Coral Cove for…redemption? Whatever his personal reasons, he couldn’t drag Mia into the middle of them.
    “You were here when someone decided to chuck a rock at me, so it wouldn’t have made a difference anyway.”
    “If I had come earlier, I would’ve seen the protest forming and I would’ve dispersed the crowd before things got sketchy.”
    Mia shrugged and picked her way over the last two porch steps. She’d left the front door open, and she pushed at it. The squealing hinges made Dylan clench his teeth.
    Light from the open door and the windows streamed across the floors and shrouded furniture. He sneezed from the dust.
    “Pretty bad, huh?” Mia grabbed her canvas bag from a chair and cruised to the front door. “I’ve had enough for one day.”
    As Mia locked up, Dylan faced the street and saw a blue compact car squeal around the corner.
    “What kind of car is your ex-husband driving?”
    “I have no clue.” She hitched the big bag over her shoulder. “Why, did you see him?”
    “If he’s driving a blue compact, yeah.” Dylan narrowed his eyes in the direction where the little car huffed off. “Maybe he was here at the protest.”
    “He could’ve been. There was a sea of faces out there, all blurred together.” She hit the remote on her car and yanked open the driver’s side door. “I could see Peter leaving the voodoo doll easier than I could imagine him chucking the rock. Peter is not a rough-and-tumble kinda guy.”
    “Money can make people do crazy things. Look at you.”
    Mia had been tossing her bag on to the passenger seat and jerked up at his words. “Wait a minute. I didn’t trick Marissa and marry Peter for money…it was for this house.”
    “And the house doesn’t represent money? Who are you kidding, Mia? It sits on a prime piece of beachfront property. I know a few developers who would kill to get their hands on this lot.”
    She stomped her foot. “It wasn’t like that, Dylan. Both Marissa and I had plenty of money. It was just a game to get the house. And I won.”
    He ground his teeth together. He hadn’t meant to go all judgmental on her. That was the old Dylan. The Dylan who used to believe he could do no wrong. Make no mistake.
    That Dylan died with Melody Firenzi.
    Dragging in a breath, he traced his fingertip along her bandage. “I know that. You and Marissa always played by different rules, and you both knew those rules.”
    Mia bit her lip. “I thought we both knew the rules, but then Marissa disappeared. I assumed she’d figured out what I had done and wrote me off.”
    “Or she never figured it out and felt too ashamed and guilty to contact you while she was having fun with Paolo, the Brazilian Adonis.”
    She slugged his arm. “His name was Raoul.”
    “I’m sorry.” He held up his hands. “Can I take you out to dinner tonight to make up for accusing you of money lust?”
    He held