You Betrayed Me (The Cahills #3) - Lisa Jackson Page 0,61

the notoriety and mystery surrounding James Cahill’s missing girlfriend, even more people had arrived. Not just searching for Christmas trees at the farm or staying at the inn with its renowned Christmas theme, but because they wanted a glimpse of the place where all the intrigue had started: lookie-loos and gossips.

But they were also readers who would lap up the details of the newspaper’s report on the scandal. Details Charity expected to provide. If she could ever get through this knot of traffic, grab a cup of coffee at the shop near the office, and plead her case to her editor, who happened to also be the owner of the Riggs Crossing Clarion.

She tapped her fingers restlessly on the steering wheel, then gave a sharp beep with her horn as the older Cadillac in front of her wasn’t keeping up with the snail’s pace. “Come on, come on,” she muttered, wondering just how old the woman behind the wheel was. She was so small she seemed to be peering through the steering wheel rather than over it, and she certainly was in no big hurry.

But Charity was.

The Cahill story was hers! And she couldn’t allow some reporter from Seattle or Tacoma or Portland to steal it from under her!

No effin’ way. But she was stuck. She’d tried to phone Cahill at his home, on his cell, and through his businesses. And she’d struck out. She gave the horn another impatient tap. He was avoiding her. And it pissed her off.

As the traffic inched toward the main intersection of town, she fiddled with the dial for the radio, hearing snatches of rap, country, hard rock, political talk, and sports before settling on a station that played Christmas carols 24/7. But the notes of “Frosty the Snowman” got on her nerves, and she snapped the damned thing off. Agitated, she reached for her Juul and remembered she’d left it at her apartment. “Shit.” She’d given up smoking after college and switched to vaping; now she was trying to wean herself off nicotine altogether as vaping was getting a seriously bad rap. Still, right now she could sure use a hit.

Again the white Caddy lagged, and once more Charity gave a quick, pointed beep of her Hyundai’s horn. “Come on, lady! Wake up!” Charity was beginning to understand road rage at a very intimate level. Didn’t the old woman see how much space was between her and the truck in front of the Caddy? Of course not. So Charity said, “Screw it,” and hit the gas, shooting past the older car and tucking her minivan into the spot in front of the white behemoth, narrowly missing a small SUV speeding in the opposite direction.

For her efforts, she was rewarded with a glare and the finger as the driver, a girl in her teens, whipped by.

Charity resisted the urge to return the favor and gritted her teeth, cranking on the wheel around the next corner and maneuvering her van through a side street. Once she was moving again, she thought about her story on James Cahill and the research she’d already done, searching as best she could for information and backstory on Riggs Crossing’s most eligible bachelor. But she had to face the stark fact that there was only so much a girl could do on the Internet.

It wasn’t enough.

She didn’t feel she had a strong enough hook for the series of articles she intended to write, or for the book that was beginning to form in her brain.

Taking another corner, she sped around the parking lot of a convenience store, then down another side street that ran parallel to the main drag.

Sometimes, damn it, a writer needed something more, something tactile to deal with. It was more than just facts and figures; it was a feeling, an emotional connection to the story that she could convey to readers.

She’d tried dealing directly with James himself, and she’d struck out.

For now.

But, she figured, as she adjusted the defroster, if she could just get some background on him or on his family, she would have something to work with, maybe even something to use against him. She wasn’t really going to blackmail him or anything, but she needed a bit of leverage to get him to open up, and the place to start was with his family. For some reason, he was estranged from them. Why in the hell would a person intentionally break off with one of the wealthiest families in San Francisco? Well, maybe