Free In the Dark by Heather Graham

and shoving him out of the way. “I’ll make coffee. You talk.”
    “What did she look like? The woman on the beach. What did she look like?”
    She turned around and stared at him. “Like…a woman. Blonde.”
    “You didn’t recognize her?” He stepped past her, impatiently taking the carafe and starting the coffee.
    “Recognize her?” Alex said, startled.
    “Yes, did you know who she might be?”
    “No. She was at a strange angle. And she had long…or longish hair. It was covering her face. I touched her throat, looking for a pulse. And then…I don’t know how to describe it exactly, but there was no way not to know she was dead.”
    “But you let them convince you that she couldn’t have been, that you were wrong, and she just got up and walked away?” he demanded.
    There was a note of disappointment in his tone.
    “The sheriff was there,” she told him sharply. “He doubted me. There was no body. What the hell was I supposed to do?”
    He turned his back on her, opening a cupboard door.
    “Cups are over here,” she said impatiently, producing two from another cabinet.
    He poured the coffee. He drank his black, so she was startled when he went to the refrigerator, absently taking out the milk to put a few drops into hers.
    She accepted the coffee, watching him, feeling again an embarrassed awareness of his crisp, tailored appearance and her own tattered T-shirt. Ridiculous tothink about such things when they were talking about a corpse, she told herself.
    “Did you mention your discovery to lover boy?” he inquired, sounding casual as he put the milk back in the refrigerator.
    “I don’t like your tone,” she told him.
    “Sorry, I don’t like what’s happening.”
    “Are you actually jealous?” she demanded.
    “I’m not trying to run your life, if that’s what you mean,” he assured her. “I just don’t like what’s happening here.”
    “You haven’t explained a damn thing yet, David.”
    “Did you tell him?” he persisted.
    She let out a sigh of irritation. “No, but that doesn’t mean I won’t. For tonight…tonight I’m waiting. The sheriff will get back to us, let us know if anybody’s missing from one of the ferries or the Middle Keys. He and Jay might have made me feel a little foolish today, but Nigel Thompson is a good man and no fool. And I could accuse you of many things, but being a total idiot isn’t one of them. So get to it. What’s going on?”
    “I’m afraid I might know your corpse,” he said quietly, his eyes a strange cobalt by night, and steady upon her.
    Her heart seemed to skip a beat.
    “Who?”
    “Alicia Farr.”
    “Alicia?” she exclaimed. “Why…why would she be around here? There’s not much to attract a woman of her reputation at a place like Moon Bay…but then again, there’s not much here for you.” She stopped speaking suddenly, staring at him. “I see. Great. You would have told me about this ‘technicality’ in the divorce, but onlybecause it would have been convenient while you were here. You came to meet Alicia.”
    “No,” he told her.
    “You liar,” she accused him softly. “Get out—now.”
    “I didn’t come here just to meet her.”
    “David, I’ll call security if you don’t leave.”
    He arched an eyebrow, fully aware that “security” at Moon Bay meant two retired cops who were happy to putter around the grounds at night in retooled golf carts. There had never been serious trouble at Moon Bay—until today. And then they hadn’t bothered with security; they had called the sheriff’s department immediately.
    “David, get the hell out.”
    “Alex, will you listen to me—I think Alicia is dead.”
    An eerie feeling crept along her spine. How could she be jealous of a corpse?
    But she had been jealous of Alicia. The woman was—or had been—a free spirit, intelligent, beautiful and filled with knowledge, curiosity and a love of dangerous pursuits that nearly equaled David’s own.
    Could she be dead?