In the Waning Light Read Online Free Page A

an impeccable sartorial sense, a faint British accent, and the financial resources with which to indulge his love of all things fine.
    Meg was seized by an urge to just lean into him, let herself go, let their relationship swallow her wholly and properly. Be the woman he wanted her to be. Yet always, there was this tug of restraint she could never quite rid herself of. A tension. Like a wire stretched too taut, humming just under audible range, ready to snap at any moment.
    “He’s an asshole,” she quipped, as they started up a gangway strung with white fairy lights. Wind gusted and hair blew across her face. “I told him backstage—Sherry’s murder was off-limits.”
    He opened the restaurant door for her.
    “Why?”
    She stalled. “Why what?”
    “I mean, why is it off-limits? Maybe it would be good to just put it out there, talk about it. He did have a point, you know, with his question about your memories in relation to Lulofs’s.”
    “Oh . . . no. No. Don’t you go pulling out the old victimology tricks and profiling me , Doctor Lawson. Sometimes people just do things, okay? Doesn’t all have to be traced back to childhood trauma.”
    But by the time they were seated at a table in front of tall glass windows, cocooned with candlelight and looking out over the bay, snow starting to fall in fat gauzy flakes under the halos of lamps, Meg’s mood had soured further. She picked at her napkin while Jonah perused the wine list and ordered a Burgundy from the slopes of the Saône River.
    Once the waiter had poured the wine and left, he said, “Maybe you should write it, Meg. Go back and put the past finally, properly, to bed. Get closure.”
    She stared at him. “I have closure. Tyson Mack is dead. Why are you even pushing this?” She reached for her glass and took a fierce slug of wine.
    He crooked a brow, watching her intently. “Stathakis was right about the commercial potential.” He raised his glass, gently swirled the liquid. “The ending is poignant, too. Your father going to prison. Your mother—”
    “Stop,” she said, her voice low, quiet. “Stop right there.” Something in her tone must have brooked no argument, because he went very still, his dark blue eyes holding hers. Her cheeks burned and she took another heavy pull of the damn fine Burgundy she knew he’d ordered because they’d visited the vineyard. It was where he’d proposed. Over two years ago. And by the price it was a wine to be savored.
    “You of all people should get why I don’t want to tackle it, Jonah. It’s personal. It’s mine —not for public consumption, not for money. And it’s over. Christ, it’s almost a quarter of a century ago. I don’t want to talk about it anymore. I have put it to bed. And there are more cases. Tons. Sick killers—monsters out there who’d make excellent antiheroes, more subject material than I’ll ever be able to tackle, so why in the hell worry about Sherry’s story? I moved on years ago.” She reached again for her glass.
    “Except, you haven’t.”
    She stilled, glass midair. She held his eyes. “Shall we just eat? Order? Call the waiter—” She raised her arm to summon somebody. “Anybody! Some service here, please?”
    He reached for her raised hand, lowered it slowly back to the table.
    “Prove it,” he said quietly.
    A whispering chill of foreboding sunk into her chest.
    “What do you mean? Prove what?”
    He removed the wineglass from her grip, set it down gently, and took both her hands in his across the white linen tablecloth. Candlelight sparkled in his eyes, but they were cool and sharp with an intensity that scared her. He swiveled the diamond cluster around her finger as he held her gaze. The ring they’d bought together in Paris.
    “Marry me, Meg. Let’s set a date. Tonight.”
    Her mouth opened. On some level she’d known this was coming tonight, that it was the root of her tension. The whispering, rising panic. The tightening claustrophobia.
    “I