Where the hell was she? What had happened after she’d left this very room? She’d turned his head because he thought she was more lighthearted and fun-loving than Rebecca, a woman with a glint in her eye that hinted at darker pleasures. And he, damn it, had been moved. Stupidly. Whereas Rebecca had been rock-steady, Megan had been constantly shifting, a puzzle he’d found intriguing. But he’d soon found out how free-spirited and ever-changing could easily devolve into mercurial and nasty.

Absently, he touched the scars nestled in his beard. Constant reminders of Megan’s temper. As Megan’s picture was dropped from the screen and the reporter, a narrow-faced woman in her twenties, started talking about the weather, James tuned out. He stared at the blackened fireplace, the hearth, where still a hint of bloodstain was visible in the mortar, a discoloration that Sophia hadn’t been able to bleach away.

He’d originally thought Megan’s disappearance had been a stunt, a way to get back at him. He could hear her voice now, as if she were in the room.

See what it’s like if I left. Not so great, huh? And how about if I were dead? How would you feel then?

Dead.

The word he hadn’t wanted to face seemed to hang in the air.

It had been so long since she’d disappeared, though, he had to face it.

He finished the rest of his scotch in one swallow, clicked off the TV, and refused to dwell on Megan’s fate. No one knew what had happened to her. With another drink at his side, he spent a few hours on the computer the cops had deigned to return to him and tried to bury himself in his work.

He had designs for future tiny homes to look over and even a proposal from a contractor who wanted him to partner on larger buildings in the area—or at least the contractor had showed interest before Megan had gone missing and James had become persona non grata. His notoriety was spreading. He’d noticed it in the hospital when he’d been in the emergency room, and later when he’d picked up a pizza. He’d called the order in, but when he’d walked up to the counter, he’d caught the sideways glances of patrons at the smattering of tables in the pizza parlor, people who had recognized him and quickly turned away, afraid to catch his eye. Where once he’d been the darling of Riggs Crossing, a major employer in the area, a man who was known to donate to any number of charitable causes, he was now considered toxic or, at the very least, dangerous.

This was a small town. He needed good relationships and the trust of the townspeople.