Lavender's Blue by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer PRE ORDER now live

Vince: One

Depending on who was telling the story, I had expected Liz Danger to be either Harley Quinn or Jane Austen. But this Liz Danger? The one in the beat-up Camry she told Will Porter she loved? She didn't fit either of those. She was a blonde, but it wasn't hot blonde and for all her rep as a troublemaker, she just seemed . . . tired. And tense but putting a good face on it.

The overall package, though, was intriguing. She had an aura about her that was different in a way I couldn't explain. And she didn't lie. At least that's what she said. Oddly, I believed her.

And then there was the fact that when I called her license in, Steve Crider said, "Lizzie Magnolia is home again?" So that 'M' on Liz Danger's license stood for 'Magnolia.' Like she was some ante-bellum heiress in a big gown sipping mint juleps on the porch. She appeared to be anything but that. Still, it was an interesting fantasy to contemplate for a moment.

Nope. Didn't work.

But I didn't hang around. After dropping Elizabeth Magnolia and her fuzzy friend off at Porter's, I drove toward the biggest of the hills that loomed over Burney. At the base of the hill was the burnt out remains of what had once been the fourth largest cardboard factory in the United States. The factory, which took up three blocks in the middle of town, had been the basis of the Blue family fortune. When twenty years ago it became cheaper to make the boxes in Mexico, Cleveland Blue stripped out the main machinery and shipped it to Mexico and left the people behind. Burney's fortunes had taken a plunge. The factory had stayed open for storage and deliveries until about six years ago when Cleve died and it shut down completely, and then two weeks ago, there'd been a fire that had taken out the center section, floors and roofs, before the Burney FD could put it out. It was a huge, forlorn looking place in a little forlorn town.

A double-lane road wound past the factory and up the hill's knees, twisting and turning next to a steep ravine. A place might only be two miles 'up the hill' as the locals put it, but that was a ten-minute drive if you were careful.

The hole in the guard rail on the hairpin turn bespoke someone who hadn't been careful. I went past the turn and pulled off onto the shoulder to get the cruiser off the road and parked. I got out and walked to the edge as a car passed me, going up the hill. A snazzy red Lexus, so the mayor, Patrick O'Toole, probably on his way to the Blue Country Club. Not one of my favorite people, and I definitely wasn't one of his since I'd arrested him for spousal abuse. George had voided the arrest because O'Toole's wife had refused to press charges even though everybody in JB's bar had seen him hit her. O'Toole was more the chief's headache than mine—O'Toole's wife was his ex-wife—so I tried to stay out of his way. George had enough problems.

I turned to look down into the ravine. A splintered tree fifty feet below was the only sign of where Navy Blue's car had ended up. The Porters had had to call in help from the guy who had the big 18-wheeler truck rig to pull the car out. That was after I'd rappelled down to recover the body. Theirs had been more technically difficult but mine had been harder in other ways.

The car had gone through so fast, the metal between two stanchions had parted like paper. A couple feet either way, a stanchion might have stopped the car, although it would have been gutted. Once through, there was nothing to stop him except the long fall, and that was it.

Now one side of the torn guardrail stuck out over the void, twisted so that the flat side faced up. I sat on it and scooted out a little over the void, feet dangling. I'd grown to like the spot in the past few weeks because it felt like taking my feet off the ground disconnected me from Burney.

It's not that there's anything bad about Burney. It's like any other small town: politics and power plays over stupid small things at the top and mostly genuinely nice people everywhere else. Just sometimes I need a break.