Beauty (A Midsummer Suspense Tale) Read Online Free PDF

of the sandy hills. A fire pit, probably. There were other houses in the area but each far off—it could be one of them, even during this season, or kids having fun on a Friday night.
    He should probably head back to the house, just in case it wasn’t innocent kids but something else. Surely, though, if some photographer or something had followed him from town, they wouldn’t have a bonfire going. He found himself moving forward, shoes sinking into sand and slowing him down, just to check it out. It might technically be on his rented property, after all, and if so, he didn’t want any trouble while he was there—it was the last thing he needed—and he’d either shoo them off or call Scott to talk to them. Some other accident or something would just rile up the tabloids even more.
    The closer he drew, the more he made out—at least twenty people or so all scattered, with most near the bonfire and the rest in little groupings nearby. Maybe a couple in their late teens but most in their twenties, the oldest around his age of mid-twenties. Laughing, talking, a couple dancing to soft rock from someone’s iPod set on a towel. A couple splashed at the edge of the water, two girls shrieking about the temperature of the lake. Most had beer, a few smoked.
    Normal college kids. Normal . Christ, he forgot what that looked like.
    Someone near the bonfire caught sight of him and squinted in his direction. “Hey!” the girl called. “Come on over!”
    Sawyer froze.
    He should retreat. Fast. Of course a history of being recognized taught him not to flee—people were like wild predators that way, they’d always chase.
    “If you’re waiting for someone, they’ll probably be here soon,” she continued, then shifted her attention back to the guy she’d been talking to.
    Not recognized then.
    Admittedly, he was curious. It had been so long since he’d just hung out with normal people, no one knowing his name. And his clothes were casual, just jeans and a plain T-shirt under a navy button down; chestnut hair a little longer than it normally was and unstyled. The roughness of a five o’clock shadow clutched his jaw. If he stayed back from the light and mostly kept to himself, he might not be recognized.
    It was stupid to even risk it, of course, but Sawyer did a lot of stupid things. They always got him into trouble, too, but that had never stopped him before.
    He silently accepted the invitation, nodding but avoiding eye contact with the girl who’d called him. She sat on the lap of another young guy who nuzzled her shoulder while she squealed and giggled. Good—she was occupied and the invitation was strictly friendly; he’d soon be forgotten. When someone thrust a beer his way, he accepted and found a spot to sit, an old thick log that stretched away from the glow of the bonfire. Enough to keep him in shadows. It was there he sat and observed, just enjoying being in the background for a bit. The iPod shuffled to another song, and the murmur of voices was a soothing white noise.
    Steps whispered over sand behind him. Sawyer tensed immediately—force of habit—and glanced over his shoulder, not fully turning but enough to see a figure moving in his peripheral vision. He relaxed when he saw it was just another college-age kid come for the bonfire.
    Kid wasn’t really accurate, though—young woman. Early to mid-twenties, roughly what the rest of the crowd was. Why he kept thinking of them as “kids” when they were his age but not himself, he didn’t know. Probably because he felt like he’d aged decades in the same amount of time.
    The girl swept past him without a glance in his direction, headed straight for the cooler. The guy sitting nearest—the surfer type, with floppy sandy hair and a big goofy grin—grasped a bottle of beer and held it up to her in his big maw.
    “Something stronger’d be better,” she said, pausing in the sand with her back to Sawyer. She wore a short beat-up leather jacket and tight