The River Is Dark Read Online Free PDF Page B

brushed her cheek one more time and then looked at him, her green eyes unwavering in the low light of the bar. “You look different.”
    He tried to smile, but it crumpled and refused to take hold. “It’s been a long time.”
    “Yes, it has.”
    Liam searched her face and found himself studying the angles of her nose, the sharp lines of her eyebrows, the red of her lips, just as he had when they’d danced so many years before. He took a long drink of his beer, then set it down on the table.
    “It’s horrible,” she said after a moment. “I can’t even bring myself to accept it yet.”
    “I know what you mean. It’s a shock.”
    “I just can’t—” Dani’s eyes filled with tears again, and she shook her head. “Sorry. I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it. Suzie and I were pretty close, even for cousins.”
    “She wouldn’t have had just anyone as her maid of honor, I’m sure.”
    Dani jerked her head, the tears she fought to hold back streaming down her face again. She rubbed a shaking hand across her forehead and took a long pull from the glass before her. “You never think you’ll have to deal with this sort of thing, you know? You do your regular routine every day, and it’s easy to forget this type of stuff happens all the time.” Liam didn’t move; instead, he fought the bindings of panic beginning to tighten in the center of his chest. “You just don’t think it will ever happen to you. It’s terrible of me, but I didn’t want to come. I wouldn’t have, but there’s no one else on Suzie’s side of the family besides my parents, and they’re on a cruise vacation.” Dani wiped her eyes again.
    Liam struggled for words of comfort. Words he’d spoken before to families he didn’t know, wives, husbands, children, mothers, fathers. But now, he found nothing in the reservoir deep within him. It was hollow and empty, a tomb of dried emotions that lay silent in a dark place he couldn’t reach anymore.
    “I’m sorry,” Dani said after a moment.
    “For what?” Liam asked, rising from the depths inside him.
    “Here I am sobbing and carrying on, and it was your brother. Suzie and I were close, but I’m sure not as much as you and Allen were.”
    Liam curled his mouth at one corner and reached for his mostly empty beer. “Allen and I weren’t on the best of terms as of late.”
    “Oh, I’m sorry.”
    Liam shrugged. “We . . .” He shifted in his seat. “We just didn’t keep in touch anymore. He had his life here, his practice, Suzie. I was always busy. It just wasn’t conducive for us.”
    Dani looked at her lap. “I hadn’t seen Suzie for quite a while either. I think the last time was at Christmas two years ago. My mom and dad and I all came here for a weekend. We stayed with Allen and Suzie. It was nice.” Dani’s face contorted with grief again, and Liam reached out to grasp one of her hands in his own. Her fingers wrapped around his, and she squeezed as a sob hitched through her chest. “I’m sorry, I just can’t believe they’re gone,” she whispered.
    She took another drink of her vodka and glanced at him before staring at the table. Her hand remained in his, and neither made any move to release the hold. “Do they have any leads?” she finally asked.
    “Not that I can tell. They’re being pretty close-lipped about the whole thing. I met with the sheriff tonight. I got the feeling he doesn’t know much more than I do.”
    “It makes me so angry,” Dani said. “What did Allen and Suzie ever do to deserve this?”
    Liam said nothing. The door to the pub opened, and Liam watched the shaggy head of Nut appear and slouch to the bar, where he began to talk to the bartender.
    “Dani, I have to speak to someone,” Liam said, his eyes never leaving the vagrant’s back. “Can you give me your number so I can get ahold of you tomorrow? Maybe we can help each other make arrangements?”
    Dani glanced over her shoulder and then back at Liam. “Sure,” she