Cranberry Point (Cedar Cove #4)(68)

"I'm sure he did. Did she explain why she lied?"

"Peggy asked her the same thing. Hannah claimed she was afraid that if anyone found out, there'd be trouble and she couldn't deal with it. From what she said—and didn't say—trouble seemed to follow Max wherever he went."

Frowning, Roy sipped his coffee. "Did she happen to mention any of the names he used? Or where he got the various pieces of ID?"

"No, but if Peggy asks, Hannah will probably tell her." Bob didn't think Hannah trusted him enough to confide that information, but she had a close relationship with his wife.

"Have Peggy ask her and I'll find out what I can. It might give us a lead."

Bob nodded. He'd hoped Roy would volunteer to do exactly that.

"Did Hannah know anything about the fake ID her father carried when he died?"

"She says she didn't."

Roy studied him. "Do you believe her?"

Bob had considered that question carefully and the fact was, he couldn't be sure. He wasn't especially fond of the girl and couldn't account for it, even though he had no real reason to dislike her. Peggy had taken to her fast enough, and heaven knew the young woman needed his wife's affection. Hannah's nervousness and her jittery manner made him uncomfortable. If Bob raised his voice even slightly, she cowered as if she expected him to pounce. Of course, what she'd told Peggy explained a great deal.

"Anyone following you these days?" Roy asked just as the waitress delivered their breakfasts.

"Not that I can tell. Nothing since that night, anyway. I'm beginning to wonder if I imagined it. But I know I didn't. Maybe it's not even connected to Max. Maybe it was some random wacko."

Roy poured hot maple syrup over his pancakes. "You sound disappointed."

"I am. It's ridiculous to live the way Peggy and I are living. I want this resolved, one way or another. I'm also thinking it's time we started taking guests again. This whole mess has cost us thousands of dollars." He took a gulp of coffee. "If someone was really after me, wouldn't he have done something by now?"

Roy nodded. "I tend to agree with you. If someone was going to make a move, it probably would've happened already."

Bob grunted agreement through a mouthful of toast and jam.

"On second thought—"

"Come on, Roy," Bob protested, not giving the other man a chance to finish.

"You want my advice? Then I'll give it to you, and seeing that it's free, you should appreciate my generosity."

"All right, all right." He broke the egg yolk with a corner of his toast. "Share your wisdom."

Roy grinned. "Only accept reservations from people who've stayed at the B and B before. People you know."

"In other words, turn down strangers who arrive in the middle of a dark and stormy night."

His friend chuckled. "You got that figured out."

Bob finished his breakfast and reached for his recently refilled mug. "I have a theory I want to bounce off you."

Roy relaxed, leaning against the back of the booth. "Shoot."

"You know everything—what happened in Nam, right?"

Roy nodded, his expression serious.

"You remember that I didn't have an easy time after the war. I did everything I could to bury the memories. I sought oblivion. It was bad for everyone, especially Peggy and the kids." He paused. "Outwardly Dan Sherman seemed to adjust to civilian life. That's what I assumed, anyway. I didn't see him for decades. And even when I moved back to Cedar Cove, we tended to avoid each other. So I didn't know he struggled with demons, too."

Roy waited while Bob sorted through his thoughts. "From what Hannah told Peggy, Max didn't cope with life after the war any better than I did."

"He drank?"

"Some, I gather, but I don't think that was his only problem. He pretty much became an obsessive-compulsive, although that wasn't the term Hannah used."

"Remember how neatly everything was packed inside his suitcase?"

Bob nodded. They'd all been struck by it.

"What are you thinking?" Roy pressed.

"When I came back from Nam, I realized that someday, some way, I'd have to pay for what happened in that village. If I've learned anything about life these fifty-odd years, it's that there's a symmetry to things." He lowered his voice. "I...took lives, and now it seems someone wants to take mine."

With the words out in the open, Bob felt better. He'd been thinking about this ever since Max's death, but hadn't found the courage to verbalize it.

"Go on," Roy urged.

"I think Dan realized this, too. He preferred to take his own life, choose his own time."

"I __"

"Hear me out," Bob insisted. "I wonder if it's possible that a family member of one of our... victims has hunted the four of us down. He might have confronted Dan, forced him to take matters into his own hands. For that matter, what else would send Max rushing to Cedar Cove? I think whoever's responsible is looking for revenge."

Roy considered his theory. "I don't know. It could be, but I doubt it."

"Why? Plenty of Vietnamese have immigrated to the United States since the war."