The Echo Killing: A gripping debut crime thriller you won’t be able to put down!. Christi Daugherty

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      Harper had stared at her in disbelief.

      ‘Why did you do that?’

      Scratching her shoulder, Bonnie considered this.

      ‘Because you look lonely,’ she pronounced after a second. ‘And because I thought it would be funny. Come to my party.’

      Harper, who had already clocked the balloons tied to the front fence and the BONNIE IS SIX sign on the door, and who had watched other children arrive for the event, played it cool.

      ‘I didn’t know it was your birthday,’ she lied.

      ‘It is,’ Bonnie assured her. ‘But I hate my cousins. And my brothers are assholes. I want you to be there instead.’

      Harper didn’t flinch at the obscenity.

      ‘Why? You don’t know me.’

      Bonnie gazed at her with a look of beatific confidence.

      ‘I like your hair. Go ask your mom if you can come over and I promise I won’t spray you anymore.’

      Inexplicably satisfied by this explanation, Harper had removed the Silly String from her clothes and gone into the kitchen to seek permission from her mother, who waved an approving paintbrush from behind her easel.

      ‘Have fun, honey,’ she’d said, eyes still on the canvas. She was painting a field of daisies in the sunshine – each petal so real you could almost touch the cool silk of it. ‘Be sure and say thank you to Mrs Larson.’

      From that day forward, for reasons Harper never fully understood, she and Bonnie were inseparable.

      Their friendship had endured the trials of primary school and the grim anarchy of middle school. It had survived first boyfriends, Bonnie’s parents’ divorce, the pain of the Larson family moving away from the house next door. And worse.

      Much worse.

      Bonnie was the one reminder of Harper’s childhood that she allowed in her life. The only one who’d known her before.

      The only one who understood.

      Harper waited patiently until the bar gradually emptied out. At around two o’clock, Bonnie handed her the third unfathomably pink cocktail of the night, topped with a tiny paper umbrella and four maraschino cherries impaled on a long toothpick.

      ‘Carlo’s taking over for a while,’ she said, waving a beer bottle at the muscular, dark-haired guy behind the bar. ‘Let’s go talk.’

      Feeling much better about everything by now, Harper held her drink up to the light to admire its atomic shades.

      ‘This is my very favorite drink.’

      ‘There’s so much fruit juice and rum in that baby, it’s diabetes in a glass.’ Bonnie stretched her arms above her head with a groan. ‘Man, this has been a long night. I’ve got to get a real job.’

      At this hour, only the most determined drinkers remained, wrestling their demons one glass at a time. The music had been turned down and the air felt cooler.

      They found one of the side rooms completely empty. It was largely dominated by a pool table.

      Motioning for Harper to join her, Bonnie lifted herself up onto the green felt top.

      ‘Get up here and tell me what’s going on.’

      Harper climbed up next to her, less gracefully. Bonnie had put a lot of rum in those drinks.

      ‘Nothing’s going on,’ she said, stretching out her legs until her toes brushed the far edge of the table. ‘It’s all good.’

      ‘Harper.’ Bonnie shot her a look. ‘You’ve been sitting in my bar drinking pink drinks for over an hour without saying a word to anyone. In tourist season. Something’s going on.’

      Harper smiled. Bonnie always could see right through her.

      ‘There was a shooting.’ Harper made a vague gesture with her drink. ‘I got a little too close.’

      Bonnie took a sip of beer, studying her narrowly.

      ‘How close is too close?’

      Thinking of the windows shattering above her head, Harper held up her hand, finger and thumb two inches apart.

      ‘That close, I think.’

      Bonnie’s eyebrows winged up. ‘What the hell, Harper? You’re supposed to write about crime. Not get yourself shot.’

      ‘It was fine,’ Harper insisted. ‘I wasn’t in danger.’

      ‘Bullshit,’ Bonnie said bluntly. ‘It scared you. I heard it in your voice on the phone. I saw it on your face when you walked in the bar. Don’t lie to me.’

      Pulling the tiny paper umbrella from her glass, Harper furled and unfurled it absently. While she’d been waiting for Bonnie, she’d had a lot of time to think about what had happened. And to question her own motives.

      Through the protective haze of alcohol, she found herself asking a question she would normally never have said aloud.

      ‘Tell me the truth. Do you think I’m self-destructive?’

      Bonnie hesitated too long.

      ‘Come on,’ she said, finally, her tone softening. ‘You know you have good reasons for what you do.’

      It was true. But it also wasn’t a no.

      Out of nowhere, Harper thought of Luke, standing on the street like the god of justice, looking at her in a way he never had before. Like he was worried about her.

      She’d had some time to think about him, tonight, too.

      ‘By the way,’ she said, ‘I think I might have a crush on a cop.’

      She could sense Bonnie relaxing as the serious moment passed.

      ‘Well, hell, honey.’ She nudged Harper’s shoulder. ‘Get yourself a piece of that law-and-order action.’

      Harper shook her head. ‘I can’t. I write about cops. I’m not allowed to have crushes on them. It’s a …’ she sought the words from the drunken recesses of her mind, ‘… conflict of interference. No.’ She blinked. ‘Interest.’

      ‘Really?’ Bonnie looked doubtful. ‘Come on. What can they do?’

      ‘He could get demoted for it,’ she assured her. ‘Cops take this stuff seriously.’

      Bonnie made a derisive sound.

      ‘Since when do you give a damn about rules, Harper? The police don’t have cameras in your bedroom. Actually, I’ve been thinking for a while now you needed to get laid. When was the last time you had any?’

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