Free Open Season for Murder (A Mac Faraday Mystery Book 10) by Lauren Carr Page B

who almost crushed them. They were finally able to make out a pair of bare legs with the feet encased in heavy work boots making their way downward.
    “I’m so sorry.” Focusing on the branches she clung to while descending to the ground with the agility of a monkey, she kept her back to them. “Lucky thing your dog came running by. I didn’t hear your car. I had no idea anyone was here. Unfortunately, I had pretty well cut through the branch and couldn’t stop.”
    When she broke through the bottom branches to come fully into view, Mac saw that she was a young woman, most likely in her early-to-mid-twenties. She wore her dark hair short in a boy’s cut. There was not a hint of makeup on her naturally pretty face. Clad in shorts, with a heavy tool belt, and a tank top, she had a sleek, muscular build that came from hard manual labor—not the gym.
    “Please accept my apologies.” She offered them her hand.
    While David’s mouth hung open, Mac shook her hand. “Apology accepted. No harm done. I’m Mac Faraday, by the way. And you are …”
    “Carlisle Green.” She cocked her head at David. “It’s nice to see you again, David. I see you’re chief of police now. I’m glad. You deserve it. I’m sure you’ll be able to find out what happened to Ashton—better than that other jerk who was running the police department before.”
    David blinked.
    Seeing that he still could not find his voice, Carlisle turned her attention back to Mac. “I assume you’re here because you’ve reopened Ashton’s case.”
    “Yes,” Mac said.
    The corner of her lip curled up. “I expected you yesterday.”
    “Why yesterday?” Mac asked.
    “That’s when I left the note for you at the Spencer Inn.”
    “That was you?” Mac asked. “Are you behind the phony invitations, too?”
    “No,” she said. “I believe that’s Jasmine and Rock Sinclair’s little trick.”
    David finally blurted out. “What happened to you?”
    Carlisle grinned at him. “I died. And then I was reborn.” With a wave of her hand, she guided them toward the dock. “Five years ago, I was a pathetic excuse for a human being. I had to be right here when my best friend died and I couldn’t help find out what had happened to her because I was too messed up. I admit it. I did have a little bit further to sink before my survival instinct kicked in and I voluntarily spent a year locked up in a rehab center rebuilding myself from the ground up.”
    They came to the end of the dock. Wistfully, Carlisle gazed out across the water while she recalled, “There, I came to realize that I hated who I was. I hated what my life represented. I was so pathetic that if I’d died, all anyone could say about me was that I took up space and air without giving anything back. So—” She turned to them. “I died. If you don’t like who you are, then kill yourself and come back as another person. So that’s what I did. I cut off everything and everyone from my old life. I read. I studied and I prayed to God for a clue about what I could offer back to the world. I’ve spent the last three years growing up into who I am today.”
    A crooked grin worked its way to her lips when she turned her attention to David. “I’m sorry for the way I treated you before, Chief O’Callaghan.”
    “Forget it.”
    “I’d rather not,” she said. “It was the height of disrespect—”
    “ Forget it.”
    Curiosity getting the best of him, Mac asked, “What?”
    “Nothing,” David said in a firm tone that demanded the subject be dropped. “Can we move on?”
    “Where’s Gnarly?” Mac suddenly remembered the German shepherd who she had seen running under the tree. They hadn’t seen him since he leapt out of the cruiser.
    Carlisle pointed. “He took off down the path that leads over to Ashton’s house.”
    “Gnarly!” Mac called in the direction of the mansion next door. There was a bark from in the woods between the two houses. Mac went up the dock to corral his