Though Kilmer is set in Georgia, it’s a fictional town, so obviously you won’t find it if you drive south. I hope it feels real to you; as always, I grounded my what-if fantasy in our world, using Darien and Savannah to flavor my creation. Thanks to everyone who answered my questions about living in the South. You made it possible to enrich this book beyond what I could have managed on my own.
Finally, I must thank my readers, who are the cleverest, warmest, wittiest, and best-looking people ever to buy books. Please keep those e-mails coming; they never fail to make me smile. You can get in touch with me at ann.aguirre@ gmail.com.
Home Again
I’m still a redhead.
Before we left Texas, I touched up the roots, and then I had some tawny apricot highlights put in. I guess that meant I intended to keep this color for a while. Symbolic—I’d made a commitment, at least to my hair.
Too bad I couldn’t do the same with Chance. I didn’t trust him entirely, and what was more, he didn’t trust me, either. He secretly thought I’d leave, which I had done; die, which I’d nearly done; or break his heart. I just hoped I wouldn’t combine the three.
Until we resolved the conflict between us—such as his luck, which might kill me, and the former lover he wouldn’t talk about—I couldn’t be more than a friend to him. He knew it too. I think he’d known as much even when he pressed the point back in Laredo.
The Mustang purred along, emphasizing Chance’s silence. He wasn’t happy about this trip to Kilmer, Georgia, but he’d promised, and I wanted answers. He owed me.
When he’d shown up at my pawnshop in Mexico City, asking for my help after our breakup eighteen months before, I agreed because he swore to turn his luck toward helping me find out what happened the night my mother died. This point was nonnegotiable. I needed to understand why it happened, and who was responsible. I wanted justice for her death. Now that I’d fulfilled my end of the bargain in Laredo, he was keeping his promise.