This is an excerpt from the first in Louise Gaylord's Allie Armington mystery series, Anacacho:

CHAPTER 1

“HEY, ALLIE, GUESS WHO?” Reena Carpenter’s husky twang slithers through my telephone to rip open old wounds.

Forget her? Never. Seven years before, Reena, supposedly my very best friend and loyal sorority sister, ripped the love of my life right out of my unsuspecting arms. Over time I managed to erase her from my mind and ease the ache of my double loss, but in my dreams those sad months following her betrayal still replay with haunting clarity.

Reena doesn’t wait for my reply. “I’ve snagged a ride to Houston on the jet tomorrow. Will you see me?”

I manage a constricted, “How did you know where to find me?”

She gives her famous rusty-nail laugh. “Oh, c’mon, now. I have my ways. How about meeting me at Rudi’s for lunch?”

A familiar cold nugget settles on the bottom of my stomach, one I hoped would never return. “Rudi’s is a little too stiff for my pocketbook,” I say, glancing at the suddenly welcome stack of case files on my desk. “Besides, I only have one week left with this grand jury panel and I’m backed up with presentments. I don’t see how I can possibly . . .”

“Please, Allie.” Reena’s voice pinches with pain. “It’s graveyard.”

Top secret. I haven’t heard that word since our days at Texas.

I picture Reena Harper, silky blonde locks tumbling over her shoulders, as she pulls Susie Baxter and me onto her bed.

I hear Susie chirp, “If it’s graveyard, I gotta shut the door. You never know who’s out in the hall. Right, Allie?”

Allie. That’s what my father conjured out of my rather plain but alliterative Alice Armington. I was the giant of the trio, pushing five foot ten, all angles and bones. Heir to my father’s aquiline nose, along with a healthy dose of his love for the Law.

My resolve never to see the woman who savaged my past wavers. After all, Reena Harper gave my first three years at Texas an aura of excitement I have never experienced before, nor since.

I check the court calendar and see my jury panel has Monday off for Martin Luther King Day—plenty of time to run through the cases. Curiosity wins. “All right . . . I guess. How about noon?”

“Thanks, Allie. This means a lot. See you tomorrow.”

A deep voice behind me says, “Did you say something about a stiff at Rudi’s?”

I cradle the receiver and swivel my chair to look into the steady stare of Duncan Bruce, a recent transfer from Chicago.

Duncan bears his ancestors’ tall, massive build. His hair and heavy eyebrows shimmer with the blue cast of Highland Clans.

“Not that kind of stiff. I was talking about Rudi’s killer charge for a simple tuna salad.”

Duncan smiles. “Come to think of it, I haven’t been back since I took my mother there the last time she camped out in my guest room.” He settles on one corner of my desk and pitches me a file. “Check this.”