Free Pretty Dead by Anne Frasier Page A

butts.
    Her daddy had been no more understanding than her momma. “We won’t support you in this,” he said the day Caroline confronted him with her decision to turn down the Harvard offer. They’d stood in his office in city hall. Flags in the corner, a photo of her on the wall behind his desk. “And by not support you, I don’t just mean emotionally,” her father had gone on to say. “I mean financially. If you attend Harvard, we’ll give you a nice stipend. All you have to do is concentrate on your studies. If you don’t go to Harvard, you’ll get nothing. Nothing.”
    She’d recoiled in shock, his cold and unemotional tone impacting her more than the message itself. No discussion. No understanding. Handed to her like one of his mandates. But her mother’s involvement, or lack of involvement, was worse. No sympathy there either. Just silence. The good wife, backing her husband’s decision, no matter what.
    So here she was, waiting tables five nights a week at the Chameleon in one of the shadier areas of Savannah, sharing a cramped apartment with two other students, going to school during the day, the boyfriend long gone. Her mother had been right about that. Once the plug was pulled on Caroline’s money, he’d vanished.
    Had she made a mistake?
    She’d never admit it to her father, but she might have gone to Harvard if not for her boyfriend. And it pained and shamed her to know she’d stayed in Savannah for a guy. A loser. But none of that really mattered anymore; the biggest issue was the way her parents had treated her. Like a disposable child. The very people who should have loved her had acted like strangers, like business people she didn’t even know. And now a year had passed since she’d talked to either of them. She was beginning to wonder if she’d ever see them again.
    At the next street corner, light from a bulb high on a pole radiated outward, encompassing the intersection. The scene was blurry, and with annoyance—and, yes, self-pity—Caroline realized she was crying. She stopped to wipe her eyes with the back of her hand.
    “Hey.”
    Startled, she turned.
    A guy. In a car, the passenger window down as he craned his neck to look up at her, one arm draped over the steering wheel. “You okay?”
    In the lamplight, she recognized him from the bar. He’d been polite and had left her a nice tip. Not the kind of guy you’d notice in a crowd, but someone a girl would feel comfortable around. Safe around.
    “I’m fine,” she said.
    “You don’t look fine.”
    She laughed, thinking he was probably talking about the mascara running down her cheeks.
    “Would you like to grab a cup of coffee?” he asked. “There’s a place on Abercorn that’s open all night.”
    She didn’t answer.
    “I’m a good listener,” he assured her. “And I have sisters,” he added, almost as an afterthought, smiling at what having sisters implied. He understood young women. He understood this kind of breakdown.
    It might be nice to talk to someone totally removed from her life. Her roommates didn’t get it. Poor rich girl, reduced to working and living just like the rest of them. No sympathy there.
    But it wasn’t about the work. It was about the rejection.
    She pulled in a stabilizing breath.
    Footsteps drew her attention away from the guy in the car. She looked up to see a man heading down the sidewalk toward her, his gait uneven.
    “And you really shouldn’t be out here by yourself,” the guy in the car said, not in a judgmental way, not in the way her parents would have done, but concerned. For her. And God, it had been so long since anybody had shown her any concern.
    He leaned across the seat and swung the passenger door open.
    The man on the sidewalk was getting closer, close enough for her to see his rough beard and tattered clothes. And he was coming straight for her.
    The city was buzzing about the two girls who’d been murdered. Not smart to walk home. She’d taken a cab for a few days,