Good Night, Gracie. Kristin Gabriel
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voraciously over his body. “But you have definitely improved with age.”
Zach sensed it was time to move on, but before he could make an excuse to end their conversation, Sandra sidled closer to him.
“Can you believe it?” she asked in a hushed whisper, her gaze fixed across the room. “I think that’s Allison Webb. Right over there, next to the punch bowl. Imagine her just showing up here like she graduated with all the rest of us! That certainly takes some nerve. Especially since I didn’t even send her an invitation.”
Zach followed her gaze and saw a tall blonde scoping out the room. “Did she drop out or something?”
Sandra looked up at him with a snort of disbelief. “How could you forget? It was the talk of the school for months. Allison just disappeared in the middle of our senior year. No warning. No explanation. Some people said she got pregnant. Others claimed she got busted for drugs and thrown in jail. But nobody ever knew for sure.”
Now it clicked. In the back of the yearbook had been a mock-up of a wanted poster with Allison’s picture on it and text underneath that read:
The senior class of Kendall High is offering a reward of one dollar for any information about AWOL classmate Allison Webb. She was last seen in the computer lab, wearing a pink sweater and white denim jeans.
“Well, it looks like the mystery will be solved tonight,” Zach said. “All we have to do is ask her where she went and why.”
Sandra smiled as she swept her arm in Allison’s direction. “Be my guest, Mr. Holloway. I’ll be waiting to soak up all your juicy tidbits.”
Zach walked across the room, driven more by a desire to escape Sandra than any curiosity about Allison. As he approached her, she caught sight of his name tag, her eyes widening in surprise.
“Gilbert Holloway?” she said, looking him up and down.
“That’s right,” he replied. “How are you, Allison?”
“You know how I am.” She moved closer to him and whispered, “The question is, what are you doing here?”
“Catching up with old friends,” he replied, caught off guard by her reaction.
“Are you nuts?” she hissed. “This isn’t the time to be playing games. There’s too much at stake.”
His instincts as a cop kicked into high gear at her words. It looked like there was more to the mystery of Allison than anyone here had imagined. There was something going on between her and Gilbert. Not a physical relationship, obviously, since she didn’t realize he was an imposter—which left another incriminating possibility.
“I guess I like to live dangerously.”
“I know why you’re here,” she accused, her gaze narrowing on him. “You want to see goody-two-shoes Gracie.”
The jealousy in her tone was unmistakable. But he still couldn’t be sure about her connection to Gilbert. He needed to draw her out and make her reveal something that would lead him in the right direction. “What makes you say that?”
“Maybe the fact that you’re compromising the entire plan by showing up here tonight. Why did you insist that I make contact with Walker Mullen if you were planning to be here?”
Walker Mullen? The name didn’t sound familiar. Just how many alumni from the class of ’95 were involved in this case?
“In case you’re interested, he bought my story about the stalker and is making the plans for us to travel incognito. I’m supposed to pick up the airline tickets at his agency on Monday.”
So Walker Mullen was a local travel agent—and a dupe. That answered one question but still didn’t get him any closer to finding Gilbert.
“Now you’re taking a chance of blowing everything. And for what?” She rolled her eyes. “A chance to moon over Gracie Dawson?”
Zach wished he knew what she was talking about. He was floundering here and had no idea how to dig for more information without revealing himself.
“Let me buy you a drink,” he offered, noting the empty glass in her hand. He could smell the alcohol on her breath and hoped a little more would help her loosen her tongue.
She shook her head. “I’m leaving now. Besides, I prefer to keep a clear head. It’s safer that way. And I suggest you do the same—especially around Gracie. If she gets in the way…”
“What?” he prodded, his skin prickling at her tone.
“Just follow the plan and Gracie won’t get hurt,” Allison replied. “I know where she lives, so if anything goes wrong—and I mean, anything, then she’ll be the one who pays. Got it?”
Before he could reply to her not-so-veiled threat, Allison turned on her heel and walked away. Zach started to follow her when another woman came into his view. The woman he’d flown over a thousand miles to meet. The woman he’d only seen before this moment in a yearbook and in his dreams.
Gracie.
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