Читать книгу Cut to the Chase - Joan Boswell - Страница 5

The old-fashioned word “besotted” exactly described Danson Lafleur’s feelings for Angie Napier, his fiancée. He’d fallen for her in high school and never lost his amazement and gratitude that she loved him. Now, university behind them, they planned to marry. They’d be together forever—the thought filled him with joy.

Rays of late afternoon sunshine filtered through the trees encircling the patio behind a popular Danforth watering hole and bathed Angie in light, setting her apart like a beautiful painting. Danson wanted to hold the moment forever. He wished they were sitting in their own garden instead of a crowded, noisy restaurant.

Angie, laugh lines crinkling, brown eyes flashing and shining brown hair swinging, pushed her hair behind a delicate ear as she leaned towards him. “It’s time for us to make a decision. Should we elope? Do you have a long ladder?” she asked and laughed.

Danson grinned and grasped her slender hands. “No, I expect you to let down your long brown hair and let me creep up into the tower.” Her engagement ring sparkled as her hands moved.

“Seriously, should we have a wedding wedding—brides-maids, ushers, fancy dinner, speeches or...” she lowered her voice and whispered, “should we recruit two witnesses, your sister and my brother maybe, and hurry off to City Hall?”

Danson would do anything that made her happy. He loved her with an intensity he’d never believed possible. “Whatever you want,” he said.

“We could have a party afterwards. That way we’d be relaxed, and we’d have fun. Maybe a strawberry social or a fancy dress ball or—” she stopped, as a loud bang startled the diners. Then she looked surprised, let go of Danson’s hand and clutched her chest.

Danson watched an obscene red stain flower and spread over her pale yellow dress before she pitched forward face down on the table. He was vaguely aware that others were screaming and fleeing from the restaurant.

He could only focus on Angie’s stillness as her head rested on the table. It had to be a bizarre joke. How could this be happening? He sat frozen for seconds while his mind processed what he was seeing.

Jumping to his feet, he leaped to Angie’s side. “Call 911. Help us,” he shouted.

Not that anyone could. She was dead.

Danson felt as if a huge earth-moving machine had torn out his heart.

* * *

Eventually, Danson learned that a gang member who’d briefly served time before being deported had returned to Canada and taken up his old life. Angie had died in the gun fight between rival gangs.

Anger at the system that had allowed this to happen consumed Danson, and he vowed he would track down returning criminals and have them deported. He owed it to Angie to see that no one else died as she had, and to himself that no one else should suffer grief as he had.

No longer interested in his promising career as a tech consultant, he took a job that would put him on the fringes of the crime world and give him access to the information he needed.