Except the note had appeared in the Lavender Room before Ophelia’s lockdown. That meant that anyone could have snuck into the bed and breakfast and left the note—if, in fact, there was a note.
“You don’t think they meant it? The threat?”
She shook her head. “Looking back, I know that it had to be a prank. Some sick person’s idea of a joke. I only wish you and Maria and the deputy didn’t have to see me fall apart like that last night. I feel like such an idiot. Just because Jack’s gone, it doesn’t mean I’m next.”
He wasn’t sure if she really believed what she was saying or if she was trying to convince herself that it was a joke so that she didn’t have to be afraid. Taking a sip of his coffee, he studied her over the rim of his mug. That was what was missing today, he realized. She didn’t seem so afraid.
“I didn’t want to say anything before but, now that you say that, there's something different about you now.” Lucas set his mug down, absently rearranged the cutlery so that the fork and knife were parallel to the mug’s handle. “That must be why. I told you. It had to get worse before it got better. I never expected someone to play such a mean-spirited prank, it's not what we do here, but maybe it helped a little if it made you accept Sullivan’s death at last. Twisted closure, yeah, is closure all the same.”
“Yeah. I guess. Hey, thanks,” she said to the young waitress as Sally refilled her empty mug.
Sally wordlessly offered the carafe to Lucas. He shook his head and she moved on to her next table.
Three creamers, three sugars. He took three pink packets from the ceramic holder, palmed three half & half containers from the chilled bowl and slid them across the table to Tessa. She beamed at him. With a gracious nod, she prepared her second cup of coffee with all the precision of a chemist working at her station.
Lucas leaned back in his seat, taking the time to really observe her. The sleeping pills were a big help. The dark circles under her eyes no longer looked like puffy purple bruises. A soft smile lingered on her lips more often than the sad frown he’d become accustomed to seeing. There was steel in her spine. Her husband’s death had bent her, tied this woman in all sorts of knots, but it hadn’t broken her.
“It’s something else,” he observed.
Tessa stopped, her mug halfway to her lips. “Excuse me?”
“It’s not just because someone tried to scare you.”
“Try nothing,” she muttered darkly. “They sure as hell succeeded. I about convinced myself that I was going to die in the woods behind your sister’s house.”
Lucas raised his eyebrows. “And then Deputy Walsh rode in and saved the day.”
“Yes, well?
??” Tess let her sentence trail to a close. She filled the silence by taking a big gulp of her coffee. The creamers hadn’t cooled it entirely. As the heat scalded her tongue and the back of her throat, she choked and forced it down.
Okay, she decided. That was enough for now.
Something warned her against allowing Lucas to bring Mason into their discussion. She cast around for an idea of something else to talk about before settling on the truth. Besides, she didn’t think he would let her get away with anything less. For a man she hardly knew, he was far too good at reading her.
“I’ve been thinking about Jack a lot,” she admitted.
“That’s not a surprise. You lost your husband suddenly in a very brutal way.”
“Yes, but…” Tess exhaled roughly. The confession was a hard one, but if there was one person in Hamlet who wouldn’t judge her for it, she was betting that would be the doctor. “I guess I’m kind of glad he’s gone. Is that terrible of me?”
“I can’t say.”
She felt compelled to explain. “He wasn’t a bad man. He just wasn’t the man I wanted. Don’t get me wrong, I loved him, but I think I stopped being in love with him a long time ago. I still tried to make it work, though. He was so good to me in the beginning, but he could tell… we just drifted apart. There never was that that sort of ah-ha moment. I didn’t love him one day, then resent him the next. It's just… he kept me caged, Dr. De Angelis. The pretty little bird expected to sing on command. And all I wanted was to be free. Maybe not the way it happened, but I can spread my wings now, can’t I? And because I’m happy, it makes me feel even worse that I am.”
Lucas reached out, placing one of his hands over her slender one. “Some beauties were meant to fly,” he told her. “I would never clip your wings.”
No, he thought. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t want to clasp a chain around her ankle and keep her close.
That was dangerous. To imagine owning this woman. He tensed slightly, caressing the top of her hand with his palm before pulling his arm back to his side of the table. Busying himself, he picked up his mug and took a deep drink.
Tessa seemed to remember herself at the same moment. Clearing her throat, she looked around the busy coffeehouse, staring at anything and everything except the flash of lust and heat of desire in his icy blue eyes.
She recognized it all the same.
When Lucas drove her back to Ophelia an hour later, there were two cars parked nearby. One was a mint green two-door coupe that had Maria written all over it. She had parked it in the driveway rather than the garage which made Tess wonder if she had taken another market trip or something else while Tess was at brunch with her brother.
The other was parked on the opposite side of the street, directly across from the bed and breakfast. It was a police cruiser.