Dusk by Miller Maureen A

Author:Miller, Maureen A.
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: romantic suspense, london, diamonds, blue diamond
Publisher: Maureen A. Miller

Barren trees locked black limbs to form a sinister canopy. Granted, in daylight the cemetery grounds were most likely beautiful with vintage stonework and craggy knolls and vivid green patches of grass.

But not at night…

Ray walked alongside Amanda, fighting the urge to reach for the Glock he had returned to his jacket pocket. She warned of a patch of roots ahead and guided them around the obstacle. Her steps were calculated, the deep-seated muscle memory of a blind person traveling about their house.

Climbing a grassy embankment she came to a halt before a low rectangular stone. It was too dark to see its inscription, or any artistic carvings. She approached it and dusted her fingers across the top. She didn’t kneel. She didn’t whisper prayers. She just stood there, looking down at the ground.

“These are my parents,” she explained.

“I suspected that,” he answered quietly.

“It’s really just their ashes. The authorities finished up with their bodies very quickly I am told. They explained that there would be a lot less red tape transporting ashes from South Africa to London than bodies.”

Ray listened for sorrow in the recitation, but it wasn’t there. Her voice was clinical.

“When the ashes arrived my Aunt tried to explain in some flowery way that my parents had ascended to Heaven and left us a cloud of their essence in those two tiny jars. I was a little girl trying to assimilate what had happened to my parents, and all I got was two jars and a cloud story.”

When her voice faded, Ray was tempted to touch her again, but he stood still. Watching her. Watching what little the moonlight would reveal. Watching a stone that remembered two loving parents who were taken too soon.

“But Uncle George−” she surprised him when she resumed. “He took me aside and he sat me down. He explained to me that my parents were dead. Their death was unfair. He explained the process of what happened to them to make them fit in those two tiny jars. And he asked me what I wanted to do with the jars.”

“Woah.” Now he could see the similarities in character between George and Amanda.

“That’s what I needed, Ray. Even at seven years-old. I didn’t want clouds and flowers. I wanted to understand. I didn’t want to be coddled. From the moment I found my parents on the side of that road, I never wanted to be coddled again. I wanted to know. My whole life I have sought out answers to every question imaginable so that I could know. My thirst for knowledge was unquenchable. I ate up college courses, always going back for more. I researched for work. I researched tirelessly every day−because I wanted to know.” She drew in a ragged breath. “And so help me, God. I want to know who this man is that is threatening me.”

Now Ray did move in−closing the gap between them until his chest bumped her shoulder. He didn’t wrap his arms around her. He kept them straight at his sides.

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