Ultimate Cedar Cove Collection. Debbie Macomber

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      Bob Beldon was puttering around in his wood shop in the garage, cleaning tools and putting them away, when he noticed the sheriff’s vehicle in the distance. The green car was making its way along Cranberry Point; Bob wondered if Sheriff Davis was headed in his direction and what it meant if he was.

      It’d been a year since the John Doe had checked into Thyme and Tide and promptly gone to meet his Maker. So much of that night remained a blur in Bob’s mind. Of one thing he was sure: the man, whoever he was, had evoked the recurring nightmare. As the years passed, the dream had come less and less frequently. But it had returned that night. When he woke, he’d had the same sensation he always felt following the nightmare. He’d been badly shaken; discovering their guest dead in the downstairs bedroom had heightened his anxiety beyond anything he’d experienced in years.

      Considering the number of times Sheriff Davis had stopped by since that fateful morning, Bob couldn’t help feeling he was somehow a suspect. It was Davis’s last visit that had led him to contact Roy McAfee. He’d half expected an arrest warrant. He needed to talk to someone he trusted, someone who could help him, so—at Pastor Flemming’s suggestion—he’d gone to Roy.

      Retelling the story of that day in a Vietnam jungle hadn’t been easy. Peggy was the only one he’d ever told. Bob didn’t know what would’ve happened to him if not for his wife, who’d held him and wept with him as he relived those terrible memories. Since then—until now—they’d never spoken of the incident again.

      He peered out at the road again. Sure enough, the sheriff’s car drove through the wrought-iron gate that marked the driveway to Thyme and Tide. He recognized Troy Davis at the wheel. Bob reached in his rear pocket for a clean rag and wiped his hands free of sawdust and grime.

      Davis parked in back and climbed out, nodding in Bob’s direction.

      “Sheriff,” Bob said, coming out to meet him. He extended his hand, which Troy Davis shook, all the while looking him full in the face. That was encouraging. If Davis planned to arrest him, he figured there’d be some sign. Thus far, he hadn’t seen any.

      “How’s it going, Bob?” Troy asked.

      “All right.”

      “Peggy around?”

      “She’s inside baking. She’s probably almost done. Cookies, I think. Do you want to come in the house?”

      Sheriff Davis nodded. “I’d like to talk to you both.”

      Bob led the way through the back door off the kitchen. As he’d predicted, Peggy’s cookies were cooling on wire racks and the lingering scent of oatmeal and raisins filled the room. She must’ve seen Troy pull into the driveway because she’d already placed three mugs on the table and had the coffee poured. She’d set aside a plate of cookies, too.

      Silently they each took a seat at the round oak table in the alcove next to the kitchen, then reached for a mug.

      “You have news?” Peggy asked.

      Bob admired the fact that she got straight to the point. He assumed the sheriff had learned something. The fact that he was here in uniform told Bob this wasn’t a social call.

      “We have the identity of our John Doe,” Sheriff Davis said. He paused as if he expected Bob to provide the name.

      Peggy gasped. “You know who it is?”

      “Maxwell Russell.” Once again, the sheriff looked at Bob.

      “Max?” Bob repeated slowly. Roy had wondered about that possibility. A chill raced down his spine, and he closed his eyes as the face of his old army buddy came to him. The room felt as if it were buckling beneath his chair. In the back of his mind, for whatever reason, he’d known that the man who’d died was somehow connected to his past.

      “You remember him?” Davis asked, but it was clear he already knew the answer.

      “We were in the army together—that was years ago.”

      Davis nodded as if waiting for more.

      “Why didn’t he identify himself?” Bob asked. They hadn’t seen each other in nearly forty years. Max hadn’t arrived on his doorstep that night by accident. He’d come for a reason—and died before he could tell Bob what it was.

      “I was hoping you could give me the answer to that,” the sheriff murmured.

      Bob couldn’t. He’d never been particularly good friends with Max. They were in Vietnam together, in the jungle…in the village. Afterward all four men had gone their separate ways, desperate to put the past behind them, to forget. No one wanted a reminder of what they’d done. Least of all Bob.

      After the war, Bob had stayed away from Cedar Cove simply because Dan had chosen to return to their hometown. Bob did eventually move back, but the two men rarely spoke. It was as if they were strangers now, although in their youth they’d been close friends.

      “He died before he could tell you anything?” The sheriff made it a question.

      Bob pushed away his chair and stood. With his back to the sheriff and Peggy, he stared out the window. “No matter how many times you ask the question, I can only answer it one way. Max came to the door without giving us so much as his name, paid for a room and said he’d fill out the paperwork in the morning.”

      “But by morning he was dead.”

      The sick feeling in Bob’s stomach intensified. He didn’t understand why Max had come to Cedar Cove in the first place. Even more of a mystery was the fact that he’d had extensive plastic surgery—and that he’d carried false identification.

      “How’d you find out who he was?” Bob had a few questions of his own.

      “His daughter filed a missing person’s report with the police in Redding, California. I spoke to Hannah Russell earlier in the week.”

      “California?” Bob repeated. The trail had first led to an investigation in Florida, but that had quickly gone cold.

      “What did she tell you?” Peggy asked before Bob could.

      “Unfortunately not as much as I’d like. The last time she spoke to her father, he told her he was leaving town. He didn’t give her any details. They were apparently quite close, but when she questioned him about where he was going and why, he was evasive.

      “He never returned. After two weeks, she reported him as a missing person.”

      “That’s all she knows?” Bob turned to face the sheriff. He gripped the back of his chair and slowly released his breath. Reclaiming his seat, he mulled over the information, feeling more confused than ever.

      “It seems so,” Davis told him, picking up his coffee.

      “Was it a business trip?” Bob asked next.

      Davis shook his head. “He hasn’t worked since the accident.”

      “Accident?” Peggy echoed.

      “He was in a car crash five years ago. It killed his wife and badly disfigured СКАЧАТЬ