Summer Shadows by Gayle Roper Read Free Book Online Page B

away his life, letting Mom earn what little money they had. On days he was feeling kind, he wondered if Pop had narcolepsy, he slept so much. On the 364 other days of the year, he hated Pop.
    Forget Pop. Forget McCoy. What are you going to do?
    He ran his hand over the steering wheel and fondled the tan leather seats. He loved this car; he really did. It was absolutely gorgeous and handled like a dream. Some psychiatrist could probably have a field day with his affection for a piece of metal and machinery, but it was a symbol of how far he’d come.
    He sighed. It had to go, of course. It was too damaged in too telltale a manner. He hadn’t come this far to throw everything away over his sloppy, sentimental attachment to a piece of metal. He scowled out the window, furious all over again at the bad hand life had dealt him.
    Stupid little girl!
    Okay, so the car had to go. But how? Where?
That was the trouble with living inside the law these days. He wasn’t used to thinking like McCoy anymore.
    At the thought of McCoy, the answer—obvious and inevitable—leaped to his mind. The Pine Barrens, that 1.1 million acres that covered much of South Jersey. Deep. Secret. Impenetrable. If what they said was true and the Mafia got rid of all those bodies there, why couldn’t he get rid of a car?
    He’d laugh if he weren’t so upset. Here he thought he’d never find a plus to being raised in Atsion, in the Pines. Hard as it was to imagine, everything he’d hated as a kid was going to save him as an adult.

Six
    A BBY WALKED TO Marsh’s car with hardly a wobble. She thought she was doing very well, considering. Apparently Marsh didn’t agree. When she veered just a smidgen to the right, he grabbed her elbow.
    “I’m fine.” She pulled her elbow free and proved herself a liar by lurching to the right again. If only she didn’t feel quite so woozy.
    “Yeah, you’re fine and I’m Santa Claus.”
    She closed her eyes for a minute. A sarcastic care-giver. Just what she needed. He made Helene, the sadistic PT, look gentle and loving. Why had she ever given the police his name?
    She grimaced. The answer to that one was easy: She didn’t know anyone else in Seaside except Nan Fulsom, her soon-to-be boss at the library. She had rejected calling Nan as soon as she thought of her. There was no way she was going to get to know Nan while lying flat on her back on a hospital gurney, all woozy from drugs. It was not the way to begin a strong professional relationship.
    Not that she actually
knew
Marsh, not like you know people you call in times of trouble. In fact, all she knew about him were his name and where he lived. And that he owned a monster dog named after a city.
    “Have you ever been to Fargo?” She put out a hand to steady herself on a red convertible.
    “What?”
    She nodded, feeling like he’d confirmed her original opinion of him. “I didn’t think so.” She lurched to the right another time.
    With a sigh that would have done her mother proud, he took her arm again. This time when she tried to free herself, he tightened his grip.
    She glared at him. “Please let me go.” A shallow acquaintance like theirs meant that she didn’t care a fig whether she fell flat on her face in front of him, irritating man that he was. Of course she’d prefer not to do so. Some modicum of dignity and decorum was always desired, especially after the way she’d sobbed all over him mere minutes ago.
    She glanced at his shirt and saw a wet amoeba-shaped patch over his heart. It’d take some doing to recover her self-respect after the pathetic scene that had caused that watermark. She tilted her head to look at his face—he was one tall man—and saw the unfocused glaze in his eyes. Instantly she recognized boredom and preoccupation. Just when she was remembering how nice he’d been when she drenched him, he checked out. Still, she’d take his ennui over her parents’ smothering any day.
    She shuddered at the thought of their