Page 6 of Lost Love Cove 2
His parents bore down on them.
Erika Marshall, Arno and Katy’s mother, reached them first, her wide eyes landing on the stretcher where officers were securing the body. The scream that tore out of her chest was sharp enough to make Luna bolt and Muttley whine.
“No!” Her legs gave out, and she pitched forward, clutching at the air.
“Erika!” Ian Marshall’s arms caught her, but she wrenched free, stumbling toward the stretcher until one of the deputies gently blocked her path. “That’s my daughter!” she cried, her hands shaking. “Let me see her! Katy!”
Arno darted forward, grabbing his mother, pulling her against him. “Mom?—”
“Erika, please…” Ian held her.
“This is your fault!” Erika’s grief twisted to fury in an instant. She whirled on her husband, fists pounding against his chest. “Because you couldn’t leave it alone!”
“Erika, please—” Ian’s voice cracked, his face gray with shock. “Sweetheart, don’t?—”
“Don’t you sweetheart me!” She struck him once across the face, a slap that echoed even over the surf. Then she collapsed again against her son, clutching at him as if he were the only solid thing in the world. “Come, Arno. We need to go with her. We need to go now.”
Ian reached for them, desperate. “I’ll come too.”
“NO!” Arno’s voice split the air. He shoved his father back with a strength Matt wouldn’t have thought him capable of. His arm curled protectively around his mother’s shoulders. “You stay away from us.”
Matt’s heart clenched; the scene before him was almost unbearable. He thought of Alisha, of Cody, of the nightmare of losing a child and being blamed for it in the same breath. The ache that tore through him was sharp and merciless.
He was still reeling when another voice cut through the chaos.
“Matt, what’s going on?”
He turned and found Paula Day standing a few feet away, her bicycle abandoned half in the sand. Her eyes were wide, her usually bright face pale under the sinking sun.
“I heard the boat sirens,” she said, breathless. “I followed them here.”
Matt’s throat worked. He forced words out low, steady. “It’s Katy Marshall.”
Paula blinked, then shook her head in disbelief. “No. No way.”
“I’m afraid so,” Matt explained quickly, voice flat. “Carrie found her on a jog.”
Paula’s gaze flicked toward the stretcher, then to the Marshalls huddled together. “Is that Ian and Erika? I thought they were away all summer.”
“So did I,” Matt said grimly. “It’s one heck of a day for them to come back.”
“Or a very convenient one.” Paula’s words were soft, almost to herself, but Matt caught them.
He turned sharply to her, studying the lines of her face. Her eyes, usually alight with gossip, were sharper now, calculating, as if she were fitting puzzle pieces no one else had seen. He had the sudden sense, not for the first time, that Paula Day was far more than the island chatterbox she pretended to be.
Before he could press her, Erika’s screams echoed again, ragged and devastating. Matt turned back in time to see her collapseagainst Katy’s body as the officers prepared to lift the stretcher onto the waiting boat.
“This is all your fault!” she sobbed at Ian, her voice cracking. “I told you to just give them what they wanted. But NO!” She shoved him.
Ian staggered back, his shoulders bowing. “Erika, I?—”
“Don’t you dare,” she hissed.
Arno once again jumped in front of his mother. “I thought I told you to go.”
“She’s my daughter too,” Ian persisted. “Please…” His voice broke. “Let me go with you.”
“No!” Arno and Erika shouted in unison.
