Page 7 of The Secrets She Keeps

Gunnar tookone look at the people starting to crowd into the FCGH waiting areas and bit back a curse. Of course. When an officer-down call went out, people came from everywhere.

Both from solidarity—and damned curiosity.

Fear for Haldyn was sharp. And Jarrod. Jarrod would be freaking right now. Jarrod Foster was in love with Haldyn—Gunnar had seen that for himself within weeks of transferring to Finley Creek years ago. The other man just hadn’t been aware of that fact until recently. But Gunnar wasn’t a fool.

Haldyn. She hadn’t deservedthisat all.

Tall, slim, strawberry blond hair, big soft blue eyes, little wireframe glasses—Gunnar had taken one look at Haldyn years ago and felt his heart lurch. At the similarities. She had looked so much like Jamie, the wife Gunnar had lost years before he came to Finley Creek.

Jamie had been five months pregnant at the time. The grief for his wife and unborn baby had nearly destroyed him.

For the first two years he had been in Finley Creek, Gunnar would admit it—he’d been attracted to Haldyn. But after a while, he’d realized it wasbecauseof how much she’d reminded himof Jamie. A relationship built on that wouldn’t have been fair to Haldyn. Gradually, the physical attraction had waned, and Haldyn had become more of a friend than anything.

One of their ladies-of-the-lab. The counterparts to him and his buddies in Major Crimes. It was a natural progression. Madison, Charlotte, Haldyn, A.J., Daryn, and now even the newest recruit to the lab—Hope.

Hope. Who had taken a bullet to the chest.

Hope Coleson was all of twenty-three or -four years old, maybe five foot six, and one hundred ten pounds on areallyheavyday. With rocks in her pockets to weigh her down. She never stopped moving for a moment.

She’d usually been grinning and happy whenever their paths had crossed before. Almost bouncing.

She was beautiful.

They called her their little gremlin of the lab now.

They met Powell’s parents and two of her brothers coming in the lobby doors. Powell clung to her mother for a moment. “Mom, Hallie’s in surgery now. We just arrived.”

“Let’s get you upstairs, baby girl,” her mother said. Her cheeks were just as wet as Powell’s. Powell had called her parents from the car. “We’ll be waiting when our Hallie wakes.”

One of Gunnar’s teammates came up the hallway. Detective Murdoch Lake had a crowd of women with him.

Gunnar knew who they were with one look.

TheColesons. Hope’s family. There were a lot of them. This wasn’t evenallof them either.

Hope was part of a family of a dozen women and nearly as many children. They lived together in the richest neighborhood in Finley Creek, sharing the bills on the mansion they’d inherited from a relative there. It was incredibly tight financially for them—that fact had been blasted all over the local tabloid after whathell Dr. Gregory Eastman had put some of them through back in October—but they pulled together.

Like the family they were.

In front of that Coleson crowd, right next to Murdoch, was the head of theHomicidedivision of the TSP Major Crimes Unit.

Miguel Rodriguez made Gunnar—at six five and a cool two ninety—feelpetite.The man had a fierce look in his eyes Gunnar had never seen there before. Miguel was out on medical leave after taking a bullet in the TSP parking lot. The same lot Haldyn had been taken from.

That parking lot should have been guarded better.

Miguel had his arm around a woman more than a foot shorter than he was. Dainty and delicate andfragile.Gunnar recognized her immediately—the woman who had raised Hope and Heather Coleson.

“Erickson? What happened?” Miguel asked. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t have a clue. Powell and I were at the Barratt. The Realtors Association banquet. We’ve just arrived. All I know is that Haldyn and Hope are both in surgery now.”

Elliot Marshall was there. Elliot—chief of the Finley Creek post and Gunnar’s closest friend. He approached them. Held out his hand to the woman next to Miguel. “Bonnie…”

“Murdoch told us what happened. Where is my baby girl?” Bonnie stood ramrod straight. Her cheeks were dry. Her voice didn’t waver. But there was so muchpainon her face. “I need to know where Hope is.”

“Where is Heather?” a blonde asked. There was blood all over her. “We were separated downstairs. Where is she?”

“Heather is in the surgical waiting room,” Elliot said. “We’re still putting things together now. I need to speak with Heather myself first.”

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