Killer Summer, Lynda Curnyn [books suggested by bill gates .txt] 📗

to the Police Benevolence Society.”

My eyes widened.“You don’t think the police looked the other way because—”

“I’m not saying that, Zoe. I’m just telling you what I found out.”

I studied his gaze, saw that he was questioning the ethics of this case, just as I had all along. “Come with me,” I said, jumping up and heading for the master bedroom.

Once we were both inside Tom’s private bathroom, I shut the door. Then opened the medicine cabinet, my eye roaming over the contents. Tylenol. Midol. Aftershave lotion. I reached out, grabbing the two prescription bottles I came across. Both for Valium. One Tom’s. One Maggie’s.

“Well, look at this—his and her tranquilizers,” I said, studying the labels and realizing that Tom’s prescription had about twice the number of milligrams as Maggie’s did. I showed Myles.

“She could have taken his by accident,” he said, but I could see the uncertainty in his eyes.

“Or Tom could have given her his. Hoping it would look like an accident.”

“There’s no way to prove that, Zoe.”

“Which is what Tom was probably counting on.”

I felt a sudden tension in Myles. “We probably should get out of here. In case he comes back.”

I nodded, opening the door and heading back into the living room, stopping short of the sofa and turning to Myles. “So what do we do now?”

He sighed. “I’m not sure there’s anything we can do, Zoe. It’s all circumstantial. It doesn’t necessarily mean—”

“I know, I know. But something doesn’t feel right about this whole thing.”

He smiled at me, though I noticed his eyes looked a little sad. “Always the renegade, Zoe. I mean, short of getting Tom to confess, what can you do?”

“I don’t know,” I said, realizing that despite the fact that Myles seemed to be tilting toward my side now, it might not do me any good. “Maybe I can get him drunk.”

“Zoe,” Myles said. “Don’t do anything stupid.”

I looked at him, taking heart at the concern in his eyes. “I won’t.” Well, maybe just a little stupid. I smiled at him. “Thanks for helping me out, Myles.”

“Anytime,” he said. “Really. I shouldn’t have been so hasty the other day, it’s just that I—”

“It’s okay.”

“Promise me you aren’t going to try and confront him.”

“Myles—”

“Promise,” he said.

“Myles, I can’t promise you that.”

He shook his head. “Well, you could at least promise me that you’ll call me first. To talk it out. You know you can be a bit of a hothead.”

My insides warmed. “I will.”

Suddenly a cell phone began to ring, the sound muffled. I whipped my head around, spotting my cell on the coffee table inside just as I realized that it wasn’t my ring I was hearing. It was Myles’s.

“You gonna get that?” I said.

“Nah,” he said, dropping his eyes. The phone rang again, and he began to rattle the keys in his pocket. “Listen, Zoe, I have to go. I have dinner plans.”

So that was what the spiffy little outfit was about.“Oh. Where? The Inn or The Out?” I said, trying to make light of it.

“Actually, I’m going to try out Le Dock tonight. In Fair Harbor?”

I knew Le Dock. Or I knew of Le Dock. Sage had told me about it. She’d gone there on a date once. Apparently it was very romantic. “Sounds very cozy,” I said, hearing his cell phone beep as the call rolled into voice mail. “You better call her back or she might worry she doesn’t have a date for tonight.”

“Zoe, it’s not like that,” he began, then stopped, realizing he’d gone right where he didn’t want to go.

“No?”

He started to shake his head, but something stopped him. Something in his eyes. I knew that look. Myles was incapable of lying. That’s what I’d loved about him. But now I wished like anything he could be untruthful. I didn’t want to know he had a new girlfriend.

“It’s not anything serious anyway.”

Because I was a glutton for punishment, I asked, “It’s her, right? The girl in your beach house? Haley.”

He didn’t answer, which was as good as a yes in my mind. Then he sighed. “Look, Zoe, I’m trying to be a friend to you, but I just don’t know how.”

Neither did I, I thought, realizing that maybe I shouldn’t be relying on this man I had relied on for almost two years.

And wondering if I had a choice.

Chapter Twenty-two

Maggie

Wliat to do in the event of an emotional emergency.

Maybe it was the haze of prescription happiness I was living in, or maybe it was just some old discontent within me that had never died, but I started to become paranoid about Tom.

Perhaps it was all those late nights at the office, but I began to wonder if my husband was sleeping with someone else.

He certainly had opportunities. He had his pick of the sales reps who worked for and worshipped him. The buyers—mostly female—from his nationwide customer base. The models he used in his advertising. I wasn’t so worried about the models. Tom wasn’t the model type. I knew Tom’s type. Vulnerable, sweet-faced and a little bit lost. Kind of like I used to be, before he gave me up as a hopeless cause. You see, that was the thing about Tom. He only liked problems he could solve. And my problems, he had discovered, were beyond his reach.

I started looking for evidence—hotel receipts, lipstick stains. I started to suspect every little mouse of a girl who marched through his life. That’s why when I came into the Luxe offices on one of my “surprise” visits and found him having a cozy little lunch in his office with his admin, I was certain I had found the one.

Danielle Winston was twenty-seven, living with her parents and pathologically addicted to the idea that she would never amount to anything. In other words, a train wreck waiting to happen.

But not if Tom could stop it. He must have thought I was blind to his desires, considering the fact that he