“Yes, I need the bread. I think I had one cup too many today. My nerves are twanging. Will you look at the time! I have to pick up the kids at Joellen’s house.” She counted out a dollar and a half and laid it on the counter. “See ya, Julie.”

Her stomach in knots, her head pounding, Amy climbed into her Windstar. Instead of driving to her friend’s house, though, she turned the corner, drove down Central Avenue, crossed over Exeter, and parked in front of the Hollister Insurance Company. She tapped the horn lightly when she saw her twin brother walk out the door. He smiled and loped over to the car. Amy rolled down the window. “Get in, Andy.”

“You look awful, Amy. Are the kids okay? What’s wrong?”

“Cady Jordan is back in town, that’s what’s wrong. I stopped at the bakery, and Julie told me. She also told me our new police chief is going to be Boomer Ward. For God’s sake, Andy, say something.”

“What do you want me to say, Amy? We always knew this was going to happen someday. I wonder if Pete knows.”

“Oh, he knows all right. Julie said he was in the bakery thirty minutes before I got there. She told him what she told me. Boomer knows we were there,” Amy hissed.

“He was there, too. I still say he’s the one who called the police that day. Pete said he didn’t do it. You and I didn’t do it, so that just leaves Boomer. For Christ’s sake, he’s a police lieutenant in Pittsburgh. Now he’s coming here. This damn well can’t be good.”

“What if she calls one of us? My God, Andy, she’s back!”

“Listen, I have to run. I was on my way to the judge’s office. He’s unhappy with his group insurance and wants me to come up with something better. I’ll call you at home tonight. I’ll call Pete, too. Relax, Amy. You look like you’re guilty of something.”

“That’s because I am guilty, just like you are, as well as Pete and Boomer. You’re wrong about my thinking Cady would come back here. I never thought she would. Never, ever.”

“Go home, Amy, and have a drink. I’ll either stop by or call you tonight.”

Go home and have a drink, she thought. Like that was really going to make things better.

3

The sweet scent of lilacs permeated the evening air on Ribbonmaker Lane. Overhead the night was clear, with stars sprinkling the heavens. Porch lights glowed warmly, and off in the distance a dog barked from time to time.

Ribbonmaker Lane was in a quiet neighborhood, with two-story Tudor houses and well-manicured evergreens. Spring flowers in tended beds couldn’t be seen in the darkness, but they were there, a testament to the wives and mothers who planted their tulip bulbs in the fall so their walkways would look like rainbows when spring finally arrived.

The development, known as Indigo Grove, was divided into three parts: the expensive, high-end Tudors with swimming pools on full acres; the medium-size Colonials on half-acre lots; and the smaller Cape Cods on quarter-acre lots. Amy Chambers lived in the high-end section of Indigo Grove, as did her brother Andy and his wife. Pete Danson lived in one of the Colonials with a live-in housekeeper. His legal office was a separate structure behind the main house, with its own driveway.