From the Shadows (Buckhorn, Montana #2) - B.J. Daniels Page 0,24

back up, each of them with their own ugly stories and bad memories. Could she trust her memory of the events of that summer night after all this time? Could any of them? Worse, could she trust her own lies to stay a secret?

She stood in the middle of the room, knowing what she had to do. If she didn’t go down to the fire, she would feel like a coward who had something to hide. She laughed, since both were true.

Worse, Finn was right. She, too, wanted to know who’d put this reunion together. She feared that person’s motivations. Did one of them want revenge? All she knew was her own pain from that summer. No one had saved her from Megan. Had the vindictive teenager been tormenting the others—just as Megan had Casey? If that person had felt even more alone and abandoned than she had, would they still be feeling angry enough to kill again?

Or was the person behind this merely looking for the truth?

Either way, Casey knew she had reason to be afraid.

* * *

DEVLIN WRIGHT HAD been on the fast track and about to make the biggest deal of his life when he’d picked up his mail and seen the Crenshaw Hotel on the return address. His heart had dropped. He’d been playing it cagey, hoping to stall and get Casey Crenshaw to take less for the hotel and land. What if he’d overplayed his hand?

“This had better not be what I think it is,” he’d said and had hurriedly ripped open the envelope.

The invitation definitely wasn’t what he’d expected.

He’d stared at the card, turned it over, then finally read it through. For a split second before he’d pulled it out, he’d thought it would be a note from Casey telling him that she’d decided to keep the hotel and land. Or that she’d gotten an offer from someone else.

His pulse had pounded as he’d tried to make sense out of the invitation. Why would Casey do this? Was she kidding? She hadn’t mentioned anything about this the last time they’d talked. Why in the world would she send these out—right before they were supposed to finally make a deal on the hotel and land?

He felt sick to his stomach. Did she have some reason she wanted to hold off the sale? Why else would she even bring up Megan’s name, let alone get everyone back to Buckhorn, back in that boarded-up hotel for a weekend?

Unless... He’d gone weak at the thought. Unless she was trying to trap the killer. If so, then Casey had lost her mind, and he’d better get her to sign on the dotted line before she was hauled away. Or before she got herself killed and his investors backed out.

* * *

PATIENCE RILEY HAD laughed when she’d gotten the invitation. Of course it was a joke. A bad joke at that. She’d turned away from her massive desk to look out over the city of Manhattan. From the wall of glass that was her corner office, she admired the view—and her reflection.

Tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, she didn’t look much different than she had ten years ago. Slim, petite and cute with her short dark pixie cut that accented her big gray eyes, she’d kept in shape. She’d always looked young, something she’d used to her advantage. Ten years ago, she’d looked even younger than Casey—and Anna’s granddaughter had been merely a child.

Looking young and naive had always served her well, but she had been neither. Just as she hadn’t had the luxury of growing up like most of the staff that summer. Rich, privileged, spoiled rotten, it had angered her that Megan, Claude and Jason had taken jobs that kids like her really needed—not to mention Casey, whose grandmother owned the place. Jen and Shirley had been the exceptions. Local girls with no big plans for the future, they’d at least had a roof over their heads their whole lives. Patience hadn’t been so lucky.

But her upbringing had given her a kind of strength that the others lacked. She demanded more of herself, while hiding that raging desire inside her. That was why Megan had underestimated her time and time again. Megan hadn’t seen what was really inside her, or she would have run for her life while she could.

As Patience had turned back to her desk to peruse the invitation again, she was sure that Casey hadn’t sent it. That would have been completely out