The Dead Man's Wife

June 10, 6:00 p.m.

224 Riverside Drive Kerra, Georgia

Why were there no vehicles in her driveway?

Hot, tired and frustrated, Penny Crown turned in and followed the long oak-lined drive up to the garage. What a day it had been! She’d been holed up with the planning committee all day on the big swim-team fundraiser at her daughter Lisa’s high school, and none of it had gone smoothly. Too many queen bees, too few worker bees.

Combined tempers and temperatures—Kerra was sweltering under the worst heat wave in its recorded history—made accom- plishing anything without extra effort impossible. Now here she was, finally home an hour-and-a-half later than expected, and still neither her husband, Mark, nor Lisa was home. So, even though it was Lisa and Mark’s night to cook, Penny would have to handle preparing the sides for dinner, too.

Pausing, she took in a couple of deep breaths, snagged her handbag and a sheaf of papers riddled with avoidable change-notes on the seat beside her and then headed inside.

The house felt blissfully cool, which meant Lisa hadn’t remem- bered to adjust the thermostat before leaving for school this morn- ing. Normally school would be out for the summer, but between snow and ice last winter that encroached on spring and a wicked hurricane that ripped up from the Gulf, the board had extended the school year until June 19th.

Considering the heat wave, and some of the less fortunate students not having air-conditioning at home, Penny considered the school extension a blessing. And considering how combative Lisa had been lately about anything to do with her life that didn’t require Penny to be directly involved… well, she was even grateful her daughter had neglected to up the thermostat this morning.

In the kitchen, Penny dumped her handbag and papers on the wide granite breakfast bar and then checked the fridge. The blast of cold air made her want to just park herself there in front of the open door. Ah, the steaks were still marinating on the center shelf. Scents of the spicy Italian marinade made her mouth water. Mark should be here to grill tonight, but his work at Kerra PD made for crazy hours at times, and apparently today was another one of them.

She loved the man dearly but if she had to eat quiche for dinner again tonight, things could get ugly. She’d been savoring the as-yet- uncooked steak in her mind for two days already, and the closest they had come to being edible was Mark lighting the grill.

After filling a glass with ice at the fridge, she added water and squeezed in a wedge of lemon. Mark was supposed to have been off- duty last night but, as happened more all the time, just as he was about to put the steaks on the fire, he got a call from work and off he went like the good detective he was to pull his third double shift in the last nine days.

That was last night. Now, tonight, he was still absent. And he hadn’t once checked in.

Finding that odd, she double-checked her mobile. No voice mail messages or texts from him or Lisa.

Being sixteen granted her a little leeway, but Mark…?

Penny crossed the kitchen then checked the landline voice mail.

Nothing.

A fissure of apprehension opened inside her.

“It happens,” she reminded herself aloud. Unfortunately, it did happen all too often. But pulling a triple shift? That didn’t happen unless a catastrophic event occurred. Mark should have been home this morning. By noon at the latest.

Walking through the expansive living room, she admired its picture-perfectness and suffered a stab of guilt that a room so beau- tiful was so rarely used. At the foot of the staircase, she looked up to the landing. “Lisa,” Penny called out, checking that she hadn’t just left her car behind somewhere else.

No answer—and the house felt empty.

More frustrated and still nervous about their absences, Penny returned to the kitchen. If she didn’t hear from them both in half an hour, she’d text. Likely Lisa had gone off with friends after school and not remembered to let her know. Her daughter was new to having her license and her own car to drive. Penny understood that but when Lisa got home, she would lay down the law on the matter anyway. Testy or not about growing up and standing on her own, Miss Independent Lisa was still a minor and her mother’s responsibility. Like every other teenager on the planet, she’d just have to endure parental control.

As for Mark—Penny took a drink of her lemon water—him not keeping her posted was highly unusual and worrisome.

That now persistent shiver of apprehension kicked up a notch and surged through her yet again.

“Don’t borrow trouble, Penny.” She chided herself. “Enough

finds us on its own.” In the laundry room, she filled the washer with a load and started the machine. As the lid lock sounded, certainty slammed into her. A knot of dread low in her stomach swelled, burst and then flooded her. Something was wrong.

Bad wrong.

She felt the heaviness of it, the certainty of it sink down to the marrow of her bones. “No,” she muttered. “No, you will not do this.”

Refusing to give into unsubstantiated fears, she stiffened and made her way back to the kitchen. Fears were normal for all police spouses, especially these days when so many officers were targeted, ambushed, or lured into dangerous situations intentionally. Yet giving into those fears was an exercise in futility and brought nothing more than a ticket to worry-induced insanity. Yes, Mark typically did call on his way home. Yes, all Penny’s life her high- school-principal mother had said Penny was sensitive, especially when it came to her loved ones. And, yes, her FBI father had deemed her an intuitive by the time she was five. Still…

Penny wasn’t sure what to call her sense of knowing, but when she got strong feelings about things, they often proved true. Not always, but more often than not, which didn’t do a thing to help her cope right now with the persistent, nagging sense of doom settling into her bones.

Do something to take your mind off them. Scrub some corn and potatoes. Make a salad to go with the steak. Do something!

“Good idea. Just get it done.” They’d likely be home before she finished.

She pulled the ingredients for a fresh green salad, corn on the cob and potatoes from the fridge, trying to ignore the tremble in her hands. The knots punching in her stomach. The painful throb in her left temple.

“They’re fine.” Annoyed with herself, she pulled out a cutting board and slapped it down on the granite bar next to the sink.

“Knock it off, okay? You’re just exhausted and hot and stressed by all the senseless bickering today. Mark and Lisa are fine.”

In a large bowl at the sink, Penny soaked the lettuce in baking soda, salt and water. The lettuce was organic, but she didn’t trust it hadn’t been contaminated with pesticides somewhere along the way from grower to grocer. If not, no harm done. If so, the salt and baking soda bath would nix the contaminates. “Mark and Lisa are fine. Just fine.”

Twenty minutes later, she tucked the salad into the fridge, then readied corn on the cob and new potatoes and set them aside. She rinsed her hands at the sink and rubbed them dry with a dishcloth, debating between having Mark grill them with the steak or boiling them in Zatarain’s seafood boil. She loved the tangy Creole spice they’d discovered on a trip to New Orleans. It ignited the taste buds.

Tires crunched on the driveway.

Penny checked through the wide, bay window. A black sedan she didn’t recognize pulled up the drive to the house and stopped. A spike of disappointment stabbed her. It wasn’t Mark or Lisa.

Two men got out of the sedan. Her view to one was blocked by a low-slung oak branch, and the other on the far side of the vehicle had his side to her. Who they were, she had no idea. They walked out of her obstructed line of sight and up onto the porch.

The doorbell rang.

Wary, Penny smoothed her hand down her jeans and over her top on her way to answer it. At the peephole, she paused to look. Harry McKaid, Mark’s partner, affectionately dubbed Scrapper by his fellow officers, and—oh my God!—the chaplain. Their expressions mirrored each other’s.

Stern. Serious. Filled with dread…

Penny’s heart staggered. She pressed a hand to her chest. Deep down, in places no spouse dares to talk about and rarely dares to even think about, she knew what this visit meant. Everyone attached to anyone on the force knew what this visit meant.

Someone was dead.

Her knees went weak, threatening to fold. She leaned against the door to stay upright, her hand instinctively covering her mouth to silence any screams in her mind escaping her lips.

God help her, someone she loved was dead. Was it Mark or Lisa?