Riptide

in the tip?"
    Not me, Sheriff," Tyler said, raising an eyebrow. "Who did you
    say? Melissa Katzen?"
    Yep, that's right. You remember her, Tyler? Didn't you go to
    school with her? Your ages are about right."

Tyler slowly lowered Sam to the porch and watched him wander
    over to a low table that held a stack of books, some of them
    very old indeed.
    "Melissa Katzen." Tyler frowned. "Yes, I remember her. A real
    sweet kid. I think she might have been in my high school class, or
    maybe a year behind me. I'm just not sure. She wasn't really pretty,
    but she was nice, never said a bad thing about anybody, as I remember.
    You really think she could be the skeleton?"
    "Don't know. Got an anonymous call about her."
    Tyler frowned a bit. "I think I remember hearing that she was
    going to elope, yeah, that was it. She eloped and no one ever heard
    from her again."
    Sheriff Gaffney said, "Yep, that's the story. Now DNA will tell
    us, at least if what those labs claim is true. Well, it's time for me to
    see the power company. Then I'll call that Jarvis guy in Augusta, see
    what they're doing."
    Sam was holding a small, thick paperback in his hands.
    Adam dropped down to his knees and looked at the little book
    with a fancy attack helicopter on the cover. He said, "It's Jane's Aircraft
    Recognition Guide. I wonder what Jacob Marley was doing with
    one of Jane's publications?"
    "Jane?" Sam said.
    "Yeah, I know, that's a girl's name. Hey, they're Brits, Sam.You've
    got to expect them to do weird things."
    Becca said,"Hey, Sam, you want a glass of lemonade? I just made
    some this morning."
    Sam looked up at her, didn't say anything, but finally nodded.
    Tyler said, his chin up, a hint of the aggressor in his voice, "Sam
    loves Becca's lemonade."
    "I do, too," Adam said. "Now, I'm out of here. I'll be back
    tonight, Becca."

She wanted to ask him where he was going, who he was going
    to talk to, but she couldn't say a blasted thing in front of Tyler.
    "Take care," she called out after him. She saw Adam pause just a
    moment, but he didn't turn back.
    "I don't like him, Becca," Tyler said in a low voice a few minutes
    later in the kitchen, one eye on Sam, who was drinking his lemonade
    and looking for the goody in the box of Cracker Jack Becca
    had handed him.
    "He's harmless," she said easily. "Really harmless. I'm sure he's
    gay. So you knew this Melissa Katzen?"
    Tyler nodded and took another drink of his lemonade. "Like I
    told the sheriff, she was a nice kid. Not real popular, not real smart,
    but nice. She also played soccer. I remember once she beat me in
    poker." Tyler grinned at some memory. "Yeah, it was strip poker. I
    think I was the first guy she'd ever seen in boxer shorts."
    "Rachel makes good lemonade," Sam said, and both adults
    looked at him with admiration. He'd said four whole words, strung
    them all together.
    Becca patted his face. "I'll bet Rachel does lots of really good
    things. She rented me this house, you know."
    Sam nodded and drank more lemonade.
    After they'd left ten minutes later to go grocery shopping, Becca
    cleaned up the kitchen and headed upstairs. She made her bed and
    straightened the bedroom. She didn't want to have anything to do
    with Adam Carruthers, but she sighed and walked down to his
    bedroom. The bed was neatly made. Nothing was out in plain
    sight. She walked over to the dresser and pulled out the top drawer.
    Underwear, T-shirts, and a couple of folded cotton shirts. Nothing
    else. She pulled his dark blue carryall out from under the bed. She
    lifted it on top of the bed and slowly started to pull back the long
    zipper.

The phone rang. She nearly leapt three feet in the air. The
    phone rang again.
    She had to run downstairs, as that was the only phone in the
    house. Her cell phone had run out of power and was recharging.
    She picked it up on the sixth ring. "Hello."
    Breathing. Slow, deep breathing.
    "Hello? Who's there?"
    "Hello, Rebecca. It's your boyfriend."
    Her brain nearly shut down on her. She stared at the phone, not
    believing, not wanting to believe, but it was him, the stalker, the
    man who murdered that poor old woman, the man who shot the
    governor in the neck.
    He'd found her. Somehow he'd found her. She said, "The governor's
    alive. You're not so great after all, are you? You didn't kill
    him. You were so ill informed, you didn't even know there would
    be a bunch of doctors around him."
    "Maybe I didn't want to kill him."
    "Yeah, right."
    "All right, so the bastard is