The first book in this series, More Than Memories, released in the spring quite a while ago… years ago actually! It was a standalone romantic suspense novel, and it wasn’t until about two years ago that I realized there was much more to tell here.
The first book revolved around Molly’s return after a four year absence due to memory loss. That loss comes back in this book; as you’ll see, it opens during the summer after all of them graduated.
Some truths should stay buried. Others refuse to die.
When a convicted killer is released on new DNA evidence, Trent Williams expects controversy. Instead he gets a new case and a possible killer in town. They were all at the lake party that summer long ago, the night Wendy Harper vanished. The real killer could be any one of them: one of their friends, a local cop, or town resident.
The original evidence was ignored, which pointed to several suspects. The wrongly imprisoned man now wants to find the truth. Then a copycat murder rocks Ridge City—and Trent’s family becomes the target of a chilling message: You ruined my life.
It all happened the summer Molly Williams disappeared. Her memory of that time is scattered at best… and yet certain images keep coming back to haunt her, like a cabin in the mist.
The past is haunting them all. But is the killer hunting them right now?
Prologue
The July Fourth After Graduation
A shooting star streaked across the black sky high above their campfire and circle of chairs. Eighteen-year-old Alicia tracked it until it disappeared behind the old growth forest crowding around the lake. Was it a sign? It had to be good luck for the rest of their lives, starting this summer.
A few of them were singing or humming along with the song playing in the pickup a ways off. A fitting song about living in a small town.
She shivered as the night air settled around them, even though her face and arms were hot from the fire. They’d all swam in the lake as the sun set, and her damp hair felt cold on her neck.
Once it was dark, some of the guys lit fireworks over the lake and on the sandy beach where it was big enough to be safe. She liked watching them… But this was better. The quiet noises of nature, the crackling fire, and laughter.
Suddenly another huge star blazed across the sky, this one so bright it had a long tail.
“Did you see that?!” Alicia squealed and pointed up, sitting across the bonfire from her older brother Trent. Slightly older brother Trent. “That’s the biggest shooting star I’ve ever seen!”
She looked back down at their circle of friends: Trent and Molly, Wendy and Colby, Mark, and his cousin Jaycen with his girlfriend Lauren. They were a couple years older, so that automatically made them seem more sophisticated. Plus, they’d driven up from California two weeks ago, both with golden tans and honey blond hair like a Hollywood couple. So far everyone liked them.
“It’s technically an asteroid,” Colby said under his breath to his girlfriend Wendy. Alicia rolled her eyes but didn’t comment.
“Let’s make a wish!” she said.
“I wish…” Wendy closed her eyes while her mouth moved silently. Her dark hair looked extra shiny in the campfire light.
“I want another six pack!” CJ yelled from out in the darkness, and a couple football players with him whooped. They were hanging out about thirty feet away by the tree line, at the back end of the pickup truck with the tailgate down to hold the beer coolers.
Groans followed from around the campfire where her group sat.
In between songs, an owl screeched off in the distance, probably across the lake from them, reminding them of all the nature out there in the dark. Sometimes they even heard coyotes out here but no one really worried about them.
“Seriously!” Alicia added loudly. In a normal voice, she added to her friends, “What should we wish for? For all of us?”
“More nights like this,” her brother Trent said, soft orange light dancing on his face. He turned his head to gaze at his girlfriend Molly. They sat snuggled up, their heads resting against each other, her dark curls falling on his shoulder.
Molly was Alicia’s best friend… and it was a little weird that she was dating Trent. Or, it was at first. Now it seemed like it was always meant to be.
“Yes!” Mark raised his beer. “More campfires! Fishing trips. And smooth sailing when we apply to the Police Academy.”
Alicia raised her Pepsi with only a little hesitation. She wanted her brother to be happy. Both Trent and Mark wanted to be officers on the Ridge City police force. Mark was focused on his goal, ignoring everything else. Trent, on the other hand, spent a ton of time with Molly. Was that good for someone who wanted to be a cop?
Mark and Alicia were the only two single people sitting around the fire, but they’d always been just friends. He was good-looking. Tall, lean, an easy smile. Curly blond hair that made all the girls want to touch it. Maybe the two of them never entertained the idea because he was her brother’s best friend. But he had been there for her too.
Everyone here was woven into the memories of her growing up years. Almost everyone out here at the lake too. Ridge City was a small town and everyone knew everyone. The jocks, skaters, and smart kids had their own groups but it all overlapped.
“Mol, what about you, babe?” Trent asked, pulling their blanket over her shoulder where it was slipping. Molly leaned her head back to give him a sly smile.
“A nice house, babies… and some kind of cool business.”
Everyone snickered. Molly had a different business idea for every day of the week. Alicia almost cracked a joke but the love was sizzling between her brother and best friend.
“Maybe some wedding bells in there?” Trent said, his low voice making Molly giggle. Those two.
“Yes, some wedding bells too,” Molly whispered.
“Get a room!” Colby said even though he was tucked in with his girlfriend too. Or, actually, Wendy was in her own chair.
Alicia wanted romance like that. Sometime later, maybe. She had plans and didn’t want to get sidetracked.
“I wish we could stay longer,” Lauren said wistfully. She was an outsider, but she came here with Mark’s cousin, Jaycen.
Alicia looked her way and tried to read her expression in the flickering orange light. She was kinda fancy for their group, not that they were snobs or anything. Just… Lauren really dressed to impress even though it sounded like she came from a small town too. Alicia’s mom had commented it seemed like Lauren was “putting on airs” to make up for something.
Anyway, her wish surprised Alicia.
Lauren’s light blond hair gleamed as the fire crackled and popped. They were a fun couple. Well, Jaycen was super fun. Always singing and joking. Maybe it’d be cool if they got to stay longer, but he’d come for a seasonal summer job.
“You never know, honeycakes,” Jaycen said jokingly, but in that honeyed voice of his, while his arms wrapped around her so one draped between her knees. “You never know what the future holds.”
Lauren didn’t smile. Alicia tried to read her expression better but couldn’t. It was Jaycen’s face catching the light, his wide smile and thick blond hair. It was straight and shiny, a little long like he wanted to look dangerous. Or sexy. Dangerous was a funny word to use.
“Alicia, what about you?” Molly asked her, breaking into her thoughts. “College and taking on the world?”
“Yeah, what about you?” Wendy asked from right next to her. Everyone was under a blanket with their boyfriend, Wendy included. She was sitting with Colby.
Alicia turned their way. “You first.”
“I want…” Wendy paused, thinking, but Alicia knew her friend had plans. Maybe she was nervous to share them. “I want to go to U of O, for Ocean Studies.”
“For what?” Colby asked in a condescending way.
“Ocean Studies,” Wendy said with a scoff. “As if you care. Or know what that is.”
“That’s super cool,” Alicia told her, cutting off the argument before it started. Wendy was one of her close friends. Not quite as close as Molly, her best friend. Still, she hoped all of them would stay close after this summer. Everything was changing…
An awkward silence was building so Alicia shared.
“I wish… that I get all A’s in college.”
“Seriously?” Colby asked while also covering a burp with his elbow.
“Gross!”
“Seriously,” Alicia said, raising her soda can in a toast to herself. “College and taking on the world.”
She wasn’t ready to tell anyone she wanted to write novels.
Campfire smoke caught her in the face then and she tilted her head back to breathe.
She saw another shooting star. This time, she made a silent wish. Two wishes.
I wish to be a writer someday.
And… I wish we’re always friends.
Chapter One
Molly Williams – Present Day
Molly Williams stepped outside her front door to retrieve the morning paper. She paused to appreciate the soft mist clinging to the tall evergreens on the other side of the private road leading deeper into the property. The morning sun was burning through the mist to create a halo bursting through the old growth trunks.
Robins hopped through the Rhodies growing close to the house, chirping good morning to everyone. She loved their yard, and this entire property where they would ride horses and take the kids on picnics.
She sipped her steaming black coffee and grabbed the paper, then stilled as she caught sight of a few words.
…Killer Colby Whitbourn…
She knew that name.
She shook it out to read the full title before stepping inside and hurrying back toward the kitchen and her husband, Trent. Her two children stopped their play to look up as she sped by, trying not to slosh coffee.
“It’s okay, kids!” she called. Shyann had poked her head into the hallway. Molly glanced back to make sure her daughter had rejoined Lucus. They were already giggling.
Trent startled, setting his own mug down without taking the planned drink.
“Have you seen this?” Molly slapped the morning edition of the Ridge City Review down on the table in front of his coffee, anger and fear burning in her chest. “Candice didn’t think to call us?”
Candice, a tall reporter with pretty brown eyes, ran the local paper on her own, and was somewhat of a friend. At least, they helped each other. Before retiring from the police force, Trent shared some information with her and she did the same. Candice had been working with Trent’s sister Alicia on a book, too, about a true crime here in Ridge City.
They kept a subscription to the paper over their friendship.
Trent lifted the paper to read the headline out loud, “DNA Evidence Exonerates Convicted Killer Colby Whitbourn. What…? How is this possible?”
Two photos sat side by side on the front page. On the left, a mug shot showed a young and despondent Colby Whitbourn, his head tilted forward as he glared at the camera. His dark blond hair looked greasy, slicked in different directions. Molly could remember his light green eyes that made up for his plain face. The photo didn’t capture his eye color well.
On the right, a young woman with light blue eyes and dark hair smiled for her senior photo. How sad that her life and name would always be shadowed by her murder.
“What happened that summer?” Molly asked, sitting down and springing up again to pace. “All these memories are swamping my brain…” She bracketed her head with her hands, flustered. “I didn’t forget this too, did I?”
Trent held out a calming hand, waiting until she looked him in the eye.
“It’ll come back, and if it doesn’t, I’ll talk you through it, okay?” He waited for her nod and refocused on the paper.
She’d lost her memory a long time ago, and although she regained it, once in a great while something popped up that made her question things from the past. This was one of them.
“What evidence? Is it new?” he mumbled to himself, beginning to read.
Colby Whitbourn spent over a decade in prison–for a crime he didn’t commit. Whitbourn was convicted for the murder of Wendy Harper, a recent high school graduate at the time. All the clues pointed to him, and he was convicted on circumstantial evidence.
Whitbourn maintained his innocence and this past year the Innocence Project worked with state authorities and new technologies to clear his name.
While police did discover DNA evidence during the investigation, it was inconclusive at the time and not usable in court. However, new techniques have developed ways to test the old samples, and this revealed that Colby Whitbourn is innocent. This story is unfolding and more information will be forthcoming.
Trent leaned back, his gaze focused on the slider. It offered a view of their expansive backyard that backed into forest, but Molly doubted he was actually looking at the view.
“This says Colby wasn’t a match to the DNA sample, but that doesn’t mean…” He glanced over and let the rest of his words fade away.
Molly folded her arms and chewed on a fingernail while pacing. It sounded like Trent was already working a case while she was trying to process this.
“I’m not sure why it’s upsetting me so much,” she said quietly. “It’s like I’m remembering it for the first time since… since that summer and what happened. I feel horrible, like I simply pushed it out of mind all this time.”
“Mol, hey,” he said, reaching out to her. She didn’t go to him. “That was the summer before you lost your memory, when you hurt your head and your parents took you and fled town. That year before has always been fuzzy for you. Don’t blame yourself.”
He had a point. She’d spent four years in California after that, no memory of who she was or what had happened here in Ridge City. That could be why this got all but erased. Now, however, it was burning up through her memories and wrecking havoc on her stomach.
Almost like there was more to it.
Trent rose and pulled her into a tight hug, rubbing a hand up and down her back. They stood together, body to body, sharing heat and strength. Molly laid her head on his chest and listened to his heartbeat, going back in time.
Did she remember that year correctly, or was it tinted through the trauma of the next few years?
“That was a great summer until things went south,” he murmured, and she knew he planned to talk her through things and calm her nerves. “We were so young. Fresh out of high school. We were secretly talking about marriage anyway. Maybe not so secretly. Alicia was all fired up about going to college. Mark knew he wanted to go into law enforcement.”
“So did you.” She remembered all of that, and how they were trying to fit in as much life and memory making as possible, because some of them were moving on. Life was a big open road ahead of them, full of possibilities, and change. “Do you remember her?”
“Wendy Harper… Yeah, of course I do. I knew we weren’t super close, but she went through all twelve years of school with us. She hung out with us a lot our senior year and that summer.”
“I remember going to the lake with everyone… more than once.”
“More than once,” he echoed with a small laugh. “More like once a week. Our smaller group, anyway. You and me,” he started listing, “Mark, Alicia, Colby, Wendy, and Jaycen. That was Mark’s cousin, and Jaycen’s girlfriend, Lauren too. They stayed for two months.”
“I don’t remember him…”
“They were just visiting anyway.”
As she remembered, she smelled the lake, the campfire smoke, and Trent’s cologne that he wore back then. She could see the stars in the black sky, the tree line across the lake, as she sat by the campfire with everyone.
She remembered swimming in the lake in the evenings, jumping off the dock, and then how cold the air grew late at night.
She remembered that summer… but not the exact night Wendy vanished.
“Hmm.” Trent made a noise that meant he wasn’t happy about something. “The thing that’s always stuck out to me… It wasn’t what I saw, but what I missed. I don’t know if I talked to Wendy that night, and I just barely remember seeing her once or twice. I didn’t have any useful information.”
“That’s not your fault.” She tried to look up at his face but couldn’t see his expression.
“Still.”
“Wendy went to the bathroom,” she said almost like a confession. “And didn’t come back. Once we realized, everyone started looking and yelling for her.”
Molly leaned back. Trent loosened his embrace so they could see each other before he said, “It came out that Wendy was starting to see another guy and Colby found out. I’m not sure if you were here to hear that, or the end of the investigation.”
“End of the investigation?” She didn’t follow.
He sighed. “A month later, a hiker found a gravesite out past the reservoir. It turned out to be Wendy.”
She stepped back and wrapped her arms around herself. Did she remember that? Her memory grew foggy sometime during that summer.
Little Lucas ran into the room, giggling, with Shyann right behind him. She wiggled her fingers in front of her like monster claws. They ran around the table, and back out again, with Shyann’s curls making a long cape behind her.
Trent watched them with a soft smile on his face. Molly waited for him to call out for them to slow down but he was too distracted. He refreshed his coffee mug and handed it to her. With a wave toward the paper, he said, “Candice probably thought we knew. I mean, I’m not on the force but Mark’s my best friend.”
“Surely he knew? He’s the chief now. How come he didn’t know?”
“Or didn’t tell us,” Trent said softly, implying that Mark Stone, the Ridge City Chief of Police, might have chosen not to tell them. “I’ll find out more when I head in. I’m sure Mark will want my help digging into the old files.”
Again? She didn’t like how often he was pulled back to the station, to his old life as a detective. They ran a retreat on their property now, which had been Trent’s idea.
But, the old life still pulled at him. The past always wanted them back.
