No One Knows Part 10

She felt an answering pull in her gut and realized that she was smiling. "I'm afraid I was a little drunk last night."

"I know. It was charming."

"Gracious of you. I hardly imagine that's true, but there it is. Thank you for . . ."

For what? For getting her shit-faced and taking advantage of her? For helping her move on, something she'd never have had the courage to do on her own? For leaving her alone to grapple with her emotions?

It hit her, that's exactly what he'd done. He hadn't abandoned her this morning. He'd given her some space to come to terms with what happened.

Oh.

"Just . . . thank you."

"You're welcome. Thank you for taking my call. I don't normally- Well, none of this is normal for me. I'd really like to see you again, Aubrey. Last night, yesterday, today . . . I can't stop thinking about you."

Her heart beat a rapid tattoo inside her chest, a sudden rush of adrenaline that signaled something abnormal, something unique, something different. It flooded her body, and she felt tingly all over. It was almost as if, with Chase's words, the band of invisible metal around her heart had sprung loose, and she could suddenly see, hear, and feel again. She took a breath for courage.

"I'd like to see you again, too," she whispered.

"I'm so happy to hear that." She could practically see the edges of his brown eyes crinkling, like they had last night, when she memorized the movement. "I can come back to Nashville tomorrow. Catch the first flight out of O'Hare so we can spend Sunday together. Are you busy? Maybe we could go to the movies? If you like that sort of thing."

"I do. I can't remember the last time I went to one, though."

"Then we need to rectify that. You pick. I'm game for anything."

Josh had never been game for anything. He had distinct ideas of what he wanted to see. Action, thrillers, and war movies, mostly. He hated chick flicks, or romantic comedies, or anything that involved period costumes. She'd always gone along with his decisions because, honestly, she didn't really care. She could watch her movies when he was at school, the long hours away she'd need to fill with something. But it was nice to have a choice.

Stop it, Aubrey. You can't move forward if you measure each piece of the man against a ghost.

She glanced at the clock. It was nearly six. Twelve hours suddenly seemed too long to wait. What was she going to do with herself?

"Do you want me to pick you up?" she asked. Oh, God, now he was going to think she was desperate.

He laughed instead. "It's okay. I can get a car. I'll come straight over, all right? We can make a day of it."

"All right. See you tomorrow." Unsure of what to do next, she hung up. The air in her kitchen seemed full and happy, pregnant with possibility. He wanted to see her again. He hadn't just used her for sex and disappeared.

She mounted the stairs with a spring in her step. The shower felt good, all her earlier aches and grumbles gone. She had a date with a man she couldn't stop thinking about.

It was disloyal, certainly. But it had been five years. She'd been in her widow's weeds the entire time. Surely Josh would understand. Surely he would want her to be happy. She hadn't planned this at all, hadn't even thought to start dating again. But there was something about Chase that made her want to throw caution to the wind.

Hair combed out and sweats on, she went outside to join Winston for a play date in the backyard, frolicking in the grass. He caught her mood and capered like a puppy, all legs and barks and rolling silliness. They were both in high spirits when they came back in the house.

She fixed a quick Lean Cuisine for dinner, and as the microwave irradiated her meal, she remembered Tyler's warning and finally allowed herself to think about what her foster brother had said.

Josh, not the man she'd thought he was. Involved with bad people.

Rivers of goose bumps slithered their way across her body. Damn Tyler. Couldn't he just leave well enough alone? Did he have to come and throw this in her face again?

She didn't want to relive any of it, especially the days when she was so scared every noise made her jump, and she couldn't sleep for fear that whoever had harmed Josh was coming for her, too.

The familiar panic began, racing through her chest.

She needed a distraction.

She stalked from the kitchen to the living room. Ran her fingers along the bookshelf, touching the spines of her favorite novels. No, reading would take too much energy. TV, then. She sat on the couch and flipped through the stations, but nothing caught her eye.

She poured a glass of wine.

And another.

Could Tyler know what really happened?

She picked up her phone and dialed his number, hoping it was still in service. Hoping he'd be coherent. It was a risk, at this hour, especially if he'd used the money she gave him.

He answered on the first ring, voice clear and lucid.

"Hey, sis. I thought you were pissed at me?"

"I am. Were you just mouthing off, or did you really hear something about Josh?"

CHAPTER 17.

Chase Chase clicked off his cell phone and felt vaguely uneasy. He was good at fabrication. He was a writer. Embellishment was his forte. But he was doing more than adding in a few flourishes to make the ends come together neatly.

He was staying at the Sheraton on Union, only a couple of blocks off the main strip. The room was anonymously nice: fourteenth floor, a corner king with large glass windows overlooking the small downtown area called South Broadway, SoBro, and the well-lit bridges over the Cumberland River that led to East Nashville.

He had omitted that little detail when he talked to Aubrey. She was under the impression he'd gone home to Chicago and was coming back, and he'd done nothing to dispel that assumption. There was no way for her to check on him; all he had to do was show up at her house at the right time in a new set of clothes, and she'd believe. She'd told him she didn't go downtown much; he felt confident he wouldn't run into her by accident.

She'd been pretty bombed, anyway, the first time. They'd gotten back to her house and were going at it hot and heavy when he stopped, worried she might be one of those who have next-day second thoughts, but she'd urged him on, and he asked if it was okay to go all the way, and she said yes, that's what she wanted. She was wasted, but still together enough that he didn't feel she wasn't serious, and it had been rather amazing, screwing in her kitchen. She wanted to fuck, and she wanted to talk. About her dead husband, about the trial. And she wanted to fuck again, so he took her to her bedroom and laid her down on the soft sheets, but she didn't want it gentle, and the dog watched mournfully from the corner as she rode him.

He got turned on again just thinking about it. She was an athlete, had the grace and unconscious security that came with being in good shape, and the liquor had killed whatever other lingering inhibitions she might normally carry around. If he were honest, it was the best sex he'd ever had.

He wanted to go back and do it again. He wanted to feel her lips on him, that hair tickling his thighs, driving him mad, those strong legs urging him on. Wanted to run his hands all over her body. Wanted.

Now that he was in, so to speak, in the most personal way possible, he didn't want to mess it up.

He found a table at the hotel bar and ordered a beer. His mind kept drifting back to Aubrey. She was prettier than he'd imagined. The mug shots and court photos didn't do her justice. She'd looked scared and lost and hopeless. Now she was strong and resilient, her skin glowed, and he couldn't help remembering running his hand along her strong, taut leg. She'd given herself to him unreservedly last night, sparking a passion in him he'd never felt before with any woman.

There was an intoxicating darkness within her, swimming behind her eyes. He'd felt it the first time they touched, when she took his mug at the coffee shop, her eyes landing on his briefly as the spark shot between them. Electric and dark and unfathomably deep. Something secret. Something she was hiding from the rest of the world.

Remember, Chase. Remember your purpose.

He was getting nowhere. He finished his beer, tossed a five on the table. The lights of Nashville beckoned him. He decided to go for a stroll.

Music blared from speakers on every street corner. There were lines around the block to several bars: Legends Corner, Tootsies. Drunk girls weaved on too-high platforms and too-short skirts, arms around one another. Bridal parties crowded the sidewalks, none of them looking at all happy. He didn't understand that. Wasn't a wedding supposed to be a dream? Or had women these days gotten so entitled, so ferociously into themselves, that even the fun parts of the process were misery? Were they simply marrying because it was expected?

Was that what happened with Aubrey and Josh?

She'd told him they'd been childhood sweethearts. That she worked two jobs so Josh could go to medical school. He couldn't help but think Hamilton was a total idiot. Clearly he'd gotten greedy somewhere along the way. He'd been up to no good.

"Watch out, asshole!"

Two drunk girls had weaved into his path, bumping his arm, spitting their vitriol his way instead of apologizing. He almost retorted, but the face of the one on the left was green, and he figured he would be safer just stepping away rather than getting puked on. He liked his Italian leather loafers, thank you very much.

The heaving mass of humanity on the Saturday night streets was endlessly fascinating. He parked himself on the rooftop of Rippy's, ordered a barbecue sandwich and a beer, and watched.

And thought about innocence, and curly blond hair spilling carelessly across a white pillow, and his next moves.

CHAPTER 18.

Aubrey Five Years Ago "9-1-1, what is your emergency?"

Stay cool, Aubrey. Don't get hysterical.

"My husband has gone missing."

Aubrey felt rather than heard the sigh on the other end of the line.

"How long has he been gone, ma'am?"

"It's been a little over four hours since anyone has seen him."

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but we can't take a report until he's been gone for twenty-four hours."

"No, you have to listen to me. We were in a car accident this afternoon. He seemed fine, but he could have some sort of medical issue that we weren't aware of. He's a doctor. Please. Something is wrong. I can feel it."

"Ma'am, our policy-"

"Fuck your policy. This is my husband we're talking about."

Aubrey heard the woman's sharp "Ma'am!" before Arlo wrenched the phone from her ear.

"My name is Arlo Tonturian. I am a friend of the missing man, and I'm also a lawyer here in town. Josh Hamilton is supposed to be the best man at his best friend's wedding tomorrow. He never showed up to the bachelor party, despite arriving on the premises of the hotel where the party was located four hours ago. We fear there has been foul play. We would appreciate being able to speak to a detective immediately."

Arlo gave Aubrey the thumbs-up, his brown eyes soft but insistent. Aubrey mouthed a thank-you, sat on the floor with her arms wrapped around her legs, listening with half an ear.

She and Arlo had looked everywhere in the hotel for Josh. He'd vanished into thin air. No one seemed to remember seeing him. Without some sort of warrant, the hotel security people weren't willing to look at their videotapes. Everyone-the hotel staff, their security-seemed to think Josh had just left her. Walked away after giving her a kiss, off into the sunset. They were all acting like this was nothing, that he'd probably snuck off to meet someone, a lover, perhaps, not expecting people to be looking for him. She didn't even know how to combat that sort of idiocy. All she could do was tell them, over and over, Josh wouldn't do that. She knew it, deep down. He was loyal to the core.

Especially since that day when she'd seen him at Starbucks, talking to a fellow med student, a pretty girl with shiny blond hair, straight as a whip, who laughed with her head thrown back and touched Josh's hand, making him smile widely, and lost her ever-loving mind at him when he got home. In the face of her rage, he'd assured her they were just friends, he hadn't been doing anything, he'd never loved anyone but her.

He never had. She knew that was true.

Arlo bent down to her, squeezed her shoulder gently. "I think they're going to help. They want to know what he was wearing. Do you remember?"

She thought back to the moment she walked down the stairs at the house, Josh's wide smile floating into her mind. She fought back tears.

"White button-down, khakis, Topsiders, dark brown with a white sole."

"His exact height?"

"Six foot one. He weighs one seventy-five now."

"Okay." Arlo relayed the information, along with brown hair, blue eyes. He listened for a moment, looked at Aubrey. "Any scars? I know he doesn't have any tattoos."

She glanced at Arlo, coloring. "He has that scar in the shape of a U on the inside of his right leg. By his groin."

"Right." He relayed the information. "She put me on hold. These are good details."

"For when he's found dead."

Arlo looked at her in horror. She couldn't believe she'd said it aloud. But it was true. She watched all the cop shows. They needed identifying features to match his body to the one lying in a cold steel drawer under a crisp white sheet. She knew there were no sheets, not really, but the image stuck in her brain-Josh cold and silent, unmoving, gaping wide incisions across his chest from the autopsy, his organs dumped in a plastic bag and shoved inside his stomach cavity. He'd done a rotation in forensic pathology; he'd shown her what it all looked like. She didn't want that, didn't want them to cut him open, mar that perfect expanse of sun-dappled skin that stretched across his strong chest. It was profane.

No, no, he was okay; she knew he was.

"I don't want an autopsy. Tell them, Arlo. Tell them."

Arlo hung up the cell phone.

"You didn't tell them," she said dully.

"Aubs, let's cross that bridge when-if-we need to, okay? They said to call back tomorrow if he doesn't show. They can't file an official missing person's report for twenty-four hours. We're just going to have to keep looking ourselves." He helped her to her feet. "We can go to the station, see if a personal plea will work. I can throw my boss's name around, too."

Arlo smelled like vomit. What if the police arrested him for being drunk in public? It would be her fault. All her fault.

"Arlo, you might want to change, maybe brush your teeth."

He started, looking guilty. "Yeah, I'm probably pretty rank. I'll take some gum if you have it."

She didn't have gum, but managed to dig out an old roll of spearmint Life Savers she'd left in her fancy bag the last time she'd carried it. She gave it to him.

"You're a good friend, Arlo."

She saw him shaking his head. He popped a Life Saver in his mouth and started to crunch it to pieces.

"Josh's been my best friend for years. I'm as worried as you are."