SUNDAY

1

After Sunday service, I decided to skip the usual after church lunch and give Cedar a call instead.

“Hey,” I said. “The sun’s shining, and the weather’s warm. How about a day at the lake?”

“Weren’t you supposed to be mucking out stalls or something?”

“A day at the lake with you sounds much better.”

“I should hope so!’ She laughed. “Sounds like fun, and I can use a break from my project.”

“Really?” I asked, the wind ripping through the open windows of the truck. “Thought you’d say no.”

“I’m not always inflexible,” she said. “Sometimes, I’m quite spontaneous.”

I swung by Cedar’s house to pick her up. I wasn’t surprised when she came out in a white cover-up and a large shore bag.

What did surprise me was the bright pink bikini that shown through the cover-up.

“Do you have swim trunks?” she asked as she climbed into the front seat.

“There’s a pair of cutoffs in the back.” I pointed my thumb at storage box in the truck bed. “Old habit. I used to water ski a lot, so I keep stuff on hand.”

With traffic and a stop for lunch and drinks, it took the better part of an hour to reach the lake .The good news was that the families were beginning to leave in droves, having taken in too much sun for one day.

I bought Cedar a chocolate cone from a lakeside store, where I changed into the cutoffs. When we reached the lake, Cedar ditched the cover-up and put it in her shore bag. With her tanned skin, the pink looked amazing on her. She had just the figure for it.

She took a lick of her cone. “So that’s your secret for staying so buff? Drinking water while I eat ice cream?”

“This buff thing is all new,” I said. “When I joined the Navy, my arms were so skinny, I couldn’t do five push-ups, much less the fifty my RDC made us do every time there was an infraction. A couple hundred every day for eight weeks, and you’d be buff, too. Not that you aren’t.”

“Hey!” Cedar gave me a playful slap. “Did you just ogle my butt?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And?”

“Nice.”

“Nice? Just nice?” She slapped me again. “You can’t think of a more descriptive word?”

‘Sure.” I grinned. “Luscious. Firm. Cute. Bodacious. Inviting.”

“Inviting?” She shook a finger. “Don’t press your luck, mister.”

 “You’re the one who asked.”

“Don’t flash those dimples at me, either. It’s not going to work.”

“I think it already has.”

“Time to cool off, mister.” She pushed me into the lake, soaking me to the waist. “So tell me about the case. That’ll get your mind off my lusciousness. Stumpy Meeks? Is he really a suspect?”

“I doubt it, but let’s forget the case like we’re forgetting your research.” I put an arm around her. “I’ve got more important things on hand right now.” I bent down and kissed her. “Want to come over and hang out tonight?”

“That’s so inviting,” she said, pretending to be genuinely disappointed. “But I can’t. My project still isn’t ready.”

“Too bad,” I said. “I was about to invite you to help muck out stalls.”

“Just my luck. You know how much I adore shoveling horse poo.”

For the next hour, we walked down the shore and then back. With sun setting behind the island, we climbed into an empty lifeguard stand. Technically, the lakeshore closed at dark, and we weren’t supposed to be there. I had spent most of my life on this shore, and I knew as long as you didn’t do something stupid like start a bonfire, no one would bother you.

As the last light of day slipped away, the empty shore dark except for the glow from the lighthouse. We sat on the ground watching the waves come in. Cedar snuggled up close, shivering now that it was turning colder. I tried to warm her up by rubbing her arms and legs, which did nothing to get rid of the goose pimples.

“You’re freezing,” I said. “I’ve got a blanket in my truck.”

She shivered. “A warm blanket would be nice.”

“Sit tight,” I said and jumped down from the stand.

I jogged back to the parking lot and grabbed the blanket.

“Here we go.” I spread the blanket over her. “That should warm you up.”

“Not quite.” Cedar snuggled to my chest, head resting on my shoulder. “Much better."

We kissed until the sun went down, and I was tempted to ask her what was next for us. But I didn’t want to ruin the moment, so I kept my mouth shut and sat there with this beautiful woman in my arms, watching the stars appear in the sky, and enjoying every second of it.

MONDAY

1

After a long, hot Sunday spent cleaning out the barn and taking care of the cattle, Monday morning couldn’t come soon enough. I arrived early for class and found Cedar hanging out in the student lounge with Luigi and Gretchen.

“Hey, Sheriff Hoyt was talking about you in the paper.” Cedar said when I came in. “Keep reading, Gretchen.”

“This tragedy could’ve been avoided,” Gretchen read aloud, “if the folks sworn to protect the citizens of this county had done their jobs instead of tampering with my investigation.”

“Tampering?” I said, my voice rising.

“Let her finish.” Cedar pulled me onto the chair arm. “It gets better.”

Gretchen cleared her throat. “Hem, hem. When ask if I was considering tampering charges, the sheriff said, I’m considering all kinds of charges. Uh-oh, Boone’s going to get busted.”

“Not in this lifetime.” Cedar picked up her notebook and blew the eraser dust in Gretchen’s general direction.

“Ew.” A fine cloud of dust settled on Gretchen’s flip-flops. She waggled her toes to clear them. “I was about to read the sports column about your outrageous ownage at tennis, but I can tell my reading skills are not appreciated.”

“Whatever,” Cedar said.

“I appreciate your skills,” Luigi said, his head resting on the desk. “Please, keep reading. It helps my listening comprehension.”

“Really?” Gretchen let out a tiny squeal. “Okay.”

Luigi’s comprehension was terrific. All he cared about was hearing Gretchen giggle. But their love was doomed, since Luigi was returning to Osaka soon.

“Galloway possesses a bullet-like serve that she can place within four inches of a target. She demonstrated the feat for this reporter, destroying six different targets in a row. Wow. Huh?”

“Impressive,” Luigi said.

While Gretchen read, my thoughts turned to the morning’s news. So much happened since Friday that I was still sorting it out. Learning the victim’s identity was a mix of emotions. It was satisfying to know that she had been identified and that a face and name had been put with the body. She was now a person, and that gave me peace. But the fact that she may have died because Eugene Loach had too much hate in his heart to rescue her made my stomach turn.

I hated dealing with human emotions. Human bones were another story. The information they held told you so much about a person’s body: How old they were, what injuries and diseases they had, what kind of dental problems they faced. But as my little voice reminded me, bodies couldn’t tell you names, and they couldn’t tell you personalities.