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The screen cut to Marley standing on her front porch, speaking directly to the camera.
“After watching the news for the first time today since Dale and Diana Blake were arrested, I’m appalled by the citizens of Boulder and their actions. I grew up here and I love this city, and I never would’ve expected to see Justin and Jordan Blake treated the way I saw today. They’re being blamed for something their parents did, something they had no knowledge of. I only met them a few weeks ago, but in that time, I became friends with Justin Blake. He is a good, honorable man who did nothing wrong.”
Friends. Such an inadequate word for what she meant to him. She paused, and the camera zoomed in closer. He leaned forward, waiting for her next words with breathless anticipation.
“I know beyond a doubt that he and his brother are as much victims in this as my mother and the man that was killed. We all want justice, but the sins of their parents should not be laid on the shoulders of these men. It’s not right.”
Moisture seemed to brighten her eyes. Amazed she didn’t blame him, touched by her sincere defense, Justin felt tears prick his own eyelids. Self-consciously, he blinked them away.
“Marley, have you talked to Justin Blake since he was arrested?” a voice asked off camera.
Anger flashed in her eyes. “Why do you say it that way?” she demanded. “All charges against him were dropped. No, actually, none were even filed. Why is it you don’t say that over and over again in your news reports?”
“So you have spoken to him?”
Marley paused, then tilted her head slightly. A sad smile appeared briefly. “No, I haven’t spoken to him.” After a visible swallow, she softly said, “And that makes this even worse…because I miss my friend.”
Abruptly, she turned and went back into the house. The feed cut back to the reporter behind the news desk, who moved on to another story.
Stunned, Justin sank onto the nearest barstool. What he’d just witnessed was not the face of a woman who hated him for what his parents had done. Her expression today was the identical twin to what he’d seen that night at the job site. Before she went in. An emotion that he didn’t dare define but made his hope soar all the same.
He’d wanted to talk to her a million times this past week, had even driven past her house once or twice. Or five. But the news vans reminded him he had no right to disrupt her life just so he could feel better about what had happened, so he’d kept driving.
Nothing could stop him from seeing her now, and it had nothing to do with easing his guilt. He wanted a definition of the emotion in her eyes. He needed her definition.
Halfway to the door he remembered he had to get Jordan’s ass home. A feat, he soon discovered, more easily accomplished when Jordan was completely drunk instead of just past buzzed.
The hour hand had crept toward nine by the time he arrived at Marley’s house. Dusk settled in as the sun dipped behind the mountains to the west. Noting the news vans still parked in front of her place, he halted down the block. He didn’t relish the possibility of them plastering his visit all over the ten o’clock news.
It only took a moment for Justin to decide to sneak through a neighbor’s yard and go around to the back of the house instead of announcing his visit to all of Boulder. Then he felt like an idiot, sneaking through the trees in the lengthening shadows. He prayed no one saw him and called the cops.
Marley sat in a chair on the patio, mug in hand. The sliding doors appeared closed, drapes drawn. Seeing her made everything else in his life fade into the background. She was his sole focus.
A branch snapped loud under his foot. He jumped, swearing under his breath.
****
Marley heard the noise and couldn’t control a reflexive jerk of her hand. Hot tea sloshed over the rim of her mug to soak the front of her robe. After a muttered curse, she called out a warning to who she guessed was an overzealous reporter.
“You’re trespassing and I have a gun.”
A familiar chuckle reached her ears. “How could I have forgotten that?”
Marley froze. “Justin?”
“Hi.” He stepped through the bushes and hovered on the edge of the patio, as if hesitant about coming too close. Muted sound from Nate’s action movie filtered through the closed patio doors to her left.
“Did you put that thing away already?”
“I was bluffing. I thought you were a reporter.” She wiped at the tea spill, her pulse tripping so fast, she felt light-headed. “What are you doing here?”
“I saw you on TV.”
Her hand stilled. Their gazes locked and she lost the ability to breathe. He took a step closer.
“God, I’ve been dying to see you again, Marley.”
She frowned. “But, I thought…you said…”
