Sunset Point: A Shelter Bay Novel by Joann Ross Page B

delicious.” And an admitted treat given that, like everyone else in the office, she usually ate her lunch at her desk. No one ever became a government prosecutor for the salary or lifestyle.
    “Lombardi,” he murmured thoughtfully as he cut into his pulled pork sandwich. “I put a great deal of my royalties into the coffers of Lombardi Wineries. I don’t suppose you happen to be—”
    “Luca Lombardi was my four-times-great-grandfather,” Tess cut in. “He started the winery with vines he brought over from his family’s vineyard in Tuscany.”
    The name instantly rang a bell. Damn . No wonder she’d stiffened when he’d brought the subject up. Nate had just graduated middle school when eight-year-old Tess Lombardi had disappeared while walking back to the Lombardis’ vast estate, where she’d been visiting her maternal grandmother. Twenty-four hours later, her mother, Claudia Lombardi, had received a ransom note demanding a million dollars in uncut diamonds for her child’s safe return.
    The family had paid the ransom, Nate recalled. Although the news hadn’t been 24/7 back in those days, it was impossible to miss talk of the frightening case of the kidnapped young heiress. Even as far away as Orchid Island, where he’d grown up. Although he’d never admit it to her, the event had inspired a short story for a writing competition. But in his version, her character had been beamed up into a spaceship by aliens.
    As updates of the case turned up on the nightly news every night, his mother and father, and those of every other kid he knew, had suddenly turned hypervigilant, making today’s helicopter parents seem downright laid-back by comparison.
    It was two more desperate weeks before the sheriff and her dad had found her in what was essentially a hidey-hole at a remote cabin in the coastal mountains. Although a medical examination had declared her physically unharmed, the press had openly speculated about the child’s emotional health for weeks.
    Six months later her father Mike Brown, a Portland police detective, had tracked the Lombardi housekeeper—who’d disappeared the day of the kidnapping—to Idaho. In a stroke of unfortunate timing, he’d arrived hours after the woman’s death, which a coroner had ruled to be a suicide. Although never proven, there were those, including Brown, who believed that the woman had been murdered by someone wanting to ensure she’d never talk about the crime.
    “I’m sorry. Now I understand why you reacted so harshly when I grabbed you. Which I apologize for. Even without your history, that was out of bounds. And, honestly, way out of character for me.” His deep voice softened with sympathy. “It must have brought back a lot of memories.”
    “That’s where you’re wrong.” There’d been times when Tess couldn’t decide whether her lack of memory of the experience was a good or bad outcome.
    “Yet I frightened you.”
    “Of course you did. It was getting dark, I was alone, and you were a much-larger strange man who came out of the shadows and grabbed me. Any woman in her right mind would have been scared.”
    “I can’t argue with that,” he said. “But I still believe we’re talking more than expected nerves.”
    Those clear, intelligent eyes saw too much. In that respect, he reminded her of Donovan. “All right. I’ll admit it. I was scared.” The control she’d demonstrated in the courtroom slipped a bit as her fingers tightened on her fork. “I’ve been receiving some calls that have made me uncharacteristically jumpy. My first thought was that you might be him.”
    “Damn. Now I’m really sorry. What kind of calls?”
    “Merely the anonymous kind that come with the job. And I have absolutely no idea why I’m telling you this.”
    The only other people who knew about the calls were Donovan Quinn, Multnomah County District Attorney Thomas Barnes, Jake, and Alexis. Tess hadn’t even told her father.
    Despite having retired from the force