All She Ever Wanted - Barbara Freethy [118]
"What?" he asked when she didn't continue. "What's wrong?"
"You'll never guess who just pulled up outside. It's Drew."
Drew was in Santa Cruz? His stomach flipped over. "Natalie, you need to know something about Drew—"
"You can tell me when you get here. I want to go out on the roof before everyone comes upstairs. I think it will help me remember what happened that night."
Natalie hung up before he could tell her to stay away from Drew and, most important, to stay off the damn roof. He tried calling her back, but she didn't answer. "We've got to get to the sorority house," he told Dylan.
"What's going on?"
"Natalie is about to step onto the roof. And Drew just pulled up outside." Cole strode toward his car, wanting to get to the sorority house as quickly as possible.
"Whoa, slow down. He's not going to hurt Natalie."
"Are you sure about that? McKinney has a lot to protect: a wife, a family, a business, a reputation."
"If Natalie knew McKinney gave Emily the drugs, she could have revealed that years ago. Drew wouldn't be afraid of her," Dylan argued.
"Or he might think that piece of information is locked up in Natalie's head along with what happened that night. If she remembers one thing, she could remember something else. Or maybe it's not that at all." Cole shook his head as they got into his car, a sudden thought occurring to him. "Damn. Maybe Malone got it wrong. Natalie didn't kill Emily. Drew did."
Chapter 19
Natalie drew in a deep breath as she looked out the window that would take her onto the roof. She could see that at one time the window had been nailed shut, but at some point in the last ten years, the window had been opened, and it opened easily now. Could she do it? Could she climb out onto that roof where Emily had taken her last breath? Not yet.
Her stomach churning, Natalie looked away from the window, focusing instead on the room in which she was standing. Two sorority girls shared this room now. There were colorful bedspreads on the twin beds, stuffed animals and fluffy pillows, posters on the walls, and laptop computers on the desks. She wondered if these girls had any idea that one night a young woman, just like themselves, had gone out on the roof to gaze at the stars and had ended up dead.
Closing her eyes, she told herself to forget about the present and go back in time. She needed to see the room as it had once been, not as it was now. She needed to force herself to remember everything about that night.
There had been a quilt on Emily's bed, made by her great-grandmother. Her stuffed animals had included tigers in various shapes and sizes. Emily had placed a poster of the magician David Copperfield on the wall over her bed. She'd also had a picture of Cole and her parents on the desk and another one on her dresser. Natalie could see the photographs in her mind, the happy Parish family, not a care in the world.
How she'd loved them, not just Cole but all of them. They'd filled a need in her heart for family— for people to care about her. And Cole ... he had completely swept her off her feet. He'd made her dream again. He'd made her want more from life than just basic survival. He'd shown her how to let loose, how to have fun, how to be herself. She'd loved him—passionately, with every fiber of her being. It was the first and only time she'd given her heart completely. And all she'd known how to do was hang on ... That's why she'd begged Emily to get Cole to come to the party. But what had happened next?
She tried desperately to remember. The sights and sounds of that night trickled back into her mind. She could hear the laughter, the music, the sounds of people talking. The downstairs was packed with kids. She could barely make it through