Page 13 of Colton's Last Resort

He came forward, stepping quickly between the tables. “You’re damn right that’s why I’m here.”

She dismissed the inclination to put her back up against the door. There was a gun in a holster on his hip, she noticed. Her pulse picked up pace. He had no reason to hurt her. None whatsoever. And yet he looked capable of murder. “Whyare you so angry?” she demanded.

“Why is your family so determined to keep Allison Brewer’s death quiet?” he challenged.

She searched his eyes. They were green. Not leafy green, or algae, or even peridot. They were electrodes. Vibrant, steely, stubborn. She saw downed power lines, snapped electrical cables, writhing and sparking—about to blow her world off the grid.

She had to focus on the music, flutes and pipes, something merry and soothing Allison would have loved, to maintain a sense of calm. “What are you talking about?” she asked.

“Your brother Adam told officers at the scene this morning that Allison’s death should be kept quiet,” he seethed. “You’ll tell me why. Why do you and your brothers want this buried? What happened to her?”

“You’re acting like there’s some sort of cover-up.”

“Is there?”

She would have laughed if he were someone...anyoneelse. “No. This is a resort. People come here for privacy. To get away from the world.”

“So close.”

“What?”

“Close the resort,” he said. “Let the police come in and investigate properly.”

“There are over eighty people booked at Mariposa through this week alone,” she explained.

“If you really care about Allison—”

She stepped to him, fears squashed as her ire rose. “Allison Brewer was my friend. She was one of my closest friends. And I willnotbe accused of covering up her death. Who are you to march in here and accuse me of that?”

If she’d expected him to cower, she was sorely disappointed. He closed the marked bit of space between them, lifting his chin. “If you’re so close to her, why has she never mentioned you before?”

He spoke in present tense, just as she had even after witnessing the coroner carrying Allison’s body away under a sheet. His fury...his near lack of control. It was cover for something else.

Adam had done this, she realized. After their mother’s death. He’d been angry, precarious, until he’d learned to put a lid on it. Until he’d developed control and that laser focus that was so vital to him. “You knew her,” she realized. “You knew Allison.”

He blinked, and the tungsten cooled. Going back on his heels, he moved away.

She watched him rove the space between tables and chairs, his head low.

Allison hadn’t had a type, Laura recalled. But Laura couldn’t see her with someone this high-strung. Someone this lethal. She had, however, spoken of her brother often—her foster brother.As thick as thieves, Allison had said regarding the two of them.

Laura’s brow puckered. “Your last name is Steele.”

He turned his head to her, scowling. “So?”

“You don’t share a last name,” Laura pointed out.

He cursed under his breath. Was he mad that she’d made him so quickly?

“Are you really a detective?” she asked, bewildered.

“Of course I’m a detective,” he snapped, pacing again from one end of the room to the other. “Why else would I be here?”

“Other than to accost me and my family?” she ventured. “You act like we’re culpable.”

“Everybody’s culpable,” he muttered.

Her eyes rounded. “So...therewasfoul play involved in whatever happened last night?”

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