Page 19 of The Woman By the Lake

Riggs sucked back some of his Aromacobana coffee in order to get rid of the sudden shitty taste in his mouth, but also to give her time to leave the table, and when she was gone, he noted, “This isn’t a fun story, Harry.”

“It doesn’t get better,” Harry warned.

Riggs sighed, set his coffee aside and picked up his fork, trying not to think about how huge of a dick he was to Nadia that morning.

Granted, the woman bore down on his place raring for a confrontation, and the way she did put him in the mood to give it to her.

He’d still been a huge dick.

“Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” Harry went on, picking up his spoon and mixing his healthy breakfast. “Not sure how Rogers didn’t figure that out, but even with Fyodor gone, Alyona was no pushover. She wanted to be a lawyer. She became a prosecutor. Fyodor had sold the family business because she had no interest in it, but this meant she was loaded. Rogers showed, probably demanded money, murder scene says she was not about to give it to him or take his shit. He was in a bind, desperate, the cops on his ass. It was messy, Riggs. Brutal and messy. He took some licks, but in the end, he beat her to death.”

“Fucking hell,” Riggs muttered, setting his fork aside.

He was no longer hungry, and he no longer wanted to hear this story.

He looked out the window.

Brutal and messy.

And he’d called the woman’s daughter a bitch at least once that morning.

Fuck.

“I don’t know what they told Nadia about her dad,” Harry kept at him. “But police reports note that she had no idea who her father was. No idea, until he came back and killed her mother.”

At that, Riggs looked direct at Harry and demanded, “So you want me to look after her?”

And to that, Harry asked the obvious question.

“Who better?”

“Brother—” Riggs began.

“Nadia was married,” Harry stated.

“She’s not wearing a ring,” Riggs forced out.

“Yeah, because she met and fell in love with a firefighter. They got engaged, and a couple months into the engagement, he finds out he’s got terminal cancer.”

Goddammit.

Riggs tipped his head back and hissed, “Jesus Christ,” to the ceiling, wondering why he followed Harry to the Double D.

And no, that weight in his chest hadn’t lessened.

It just kept getting heavier.

“Word is, he tried to break it off,” Harry told him. “Nadia refused. Fast-tracked everything. Married him. Big, lavish wedding. Fyodor sent them on a two-month-long honeymoon where they did everything on his bucket list. They got home, five months later, he’s dead.”

“When did this happen?” Riggs asked, all four of the words tight.

Harry lifted one shoulder and said, “Think around seven years ago.”

“So, dead granddad. Dead mom. Dead husband. Incarcerated, murdering, conman, asshole, piece of shit dad.”

Harry swallowed the bite he took, and how he could eat and tell this story was one of the reasons he was sheriff.

Then he shook his head. “The dad got pinned in at a motel and committed suicide by cop. Came out gun blazing, took six bullets, died at the scene.”

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