All the Beautiful Brides (28 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

“There’s Josie,” Anna whispered.

“Shh. We don’t want him to know we’re here.”

Anna stooped behind him. “What are we going to do?”

“Save them. Stay behind me and don’t do anything rash,” Cal told Anna. “We don’t know if he’s armed.”

She gave a slight nod, and he removed his gun from his holster, motioned for her to wait, then glanced through the window again.

Billy pushed Mona in front of the fireplace, fixed the veil around her head, fluffed out the skirt of her wedding dress, then stepped back and snapped a picture.

Cal gritted his teeth. Had he taken photographs of all his victims dressed in their wedding dresses as part of his signature? He’d kept a piece of jewelry from each of them—just like the Thorn Ripper had.

If this man’s mother had killed the teenagers thirty years ago, would they find the girls’ missing jewelry inside?

Every muscle in Cal’s body quivered with anger as Billy lowered the camera and clasped Mona’s hand. She looked frightened, but unharmed at the moment.

But if she crossed Billy or didn’t please him, he might crack.

Cal squinted in search of a weapon, but didn’t see a gun. He slowly tried the door, trying to keep it from making a noise, but it was locked. He raised his fingers in a count of one, two, three to signal to Anna what he intended to do, then kicked the wood door open and burst in, his gun aimed.

Billy jerked around and dragged Mona in front of him, then wrapped his arm around her throat in a choke hold.

Mona gasped, her eyes widening as she spotted Cal and Anna, while Josie yanked at the chains holding her to the metal bed.

“Let her go, it’s over,” Cal said between clenched teeth.

“No, she’s going to be my wife!” Billy shouted.

He sounded almost childlike, and a deep psychosis glinted in his eyes.

“We know who you are now,” Cal said.

Cal grimaced at the sight of the jewelry on the woman’s sickly frame. He recognized the jewelry from the descriptions given by the victims’ families.

“Billy, listen to him,” Mona said softly. “I care about you. Now let me go, and we’ll get you the help you need.”

“You’re just saying that ’cause you’re scared,” Billy snarled. “You tell everyone how important marriage is and how we should love each other. That’s all I want. Someone to love me like that.”

Cal saw red. “It’s over, man. Let her go.”

Josie inched forward as far as she could with the chains, trying to get the sick man’s attention. “I told you you’re not alone. I’m your sister, Billy. We’re family now.”

Anna’s heart was racing. She had to save Josie.

And she had to tell her the truth.

She suddenly stepped inside behind the agent. “No, Josie, honey, you misunderstood.”

Billy jerked his head toward her. “Stay out of here! Just leave us alone!”

“I’m Josie’s mother, and I can’t do that,” Anna said. “Just like your mother always wanted to protect you, I want to protect my daughter.”

“But Mama . . .” Billy’s voice cracked. “Mama isn’t supposed to die . . .”

“No, and I’m sorry she’s sick,” Anna said. “But Mona is a kind person. She wants to help you. And my daughter Josie is just an innocent young woman.”

“I do want to help you,” Mona said. “Just release me, Billy, and it’ll be all right. I promise.”

“But what about Mama?” Billy said brokenly.

“Your mother killed three teenagers thirty years ago,” Cal said. “She’ll have to answer to that.”

“They deserved it,” Charlene screeched, suddenly stirring back to life. “Those girls acted like Goody Two-shoes, but they were nothing but liars and whores. They made a pact that all of them were going to sleep with Johnny before prom. And they all had dates with him, but he ignored me.”

Anna gasped. “That’s why you framed him.” She faced Billy. “Your mother killed those girls and then stole their jewelry. Is that why you took Gwyneth’s and Constance’s jewelry, too? So you could give it to your mother?”

“Mama likes pretty things,” Billy said in a childlike voice.

“Release Mona and you can meet your father,” Cal said, trying to distract Billy. “In fact, I just talked to him.”

“You did?” Billy’s voice held almost a hint of wonder.

Josie looked at her mother. “You talked to Johnny Pike?”

“Yes. I thought you might have gone to see him.” Anna gave Josie an imploring look. “I’m sorry, honey, that you read my diary. But Johnny is not your father.”

Cal crept forward. “Billy, listen to me. Your mother sent your father to jail when he was an innocent man. She kept him from you.”

“No!” Billy shouted. But he turned to his mother with an angry glint in his eyes. “That’s not true, is it, Mama?”

“He didn’t deserve to be with you!” Charlene cried. “Not the way he treated me.”

“See, your mother is the liar, Billy. She lied and murdered those girls, and now she’s turned you into a killer just like her.”

“Shut up!” Billy released Mona and lunged toward Cal.

Billy was a big guy and full of rage, but Cal fired and the bullet struck him in the stomach. He bellowed in pain and shock, then rocked back and collapsed.

Mona stumbled and fell to the floor, gasping for air. Anna ran toward Josie and dragged her into her arms, rocking her back and forth. “I’m so sorry, baby, I’m so sorry. This is all my fault.”

“No, Mama,” Josie whispered. “It’s all right.”

Anna looked into her daughter’s eyes and saw the man who’d fathered her. But it wasn’t Johnny. She hadn’t lied about that.

“It’s time I told you everything, Josie.”

Even though Billy was bleeding, Cal unchained Josie, then dragged Billy over to the bed and handcuffed him to the metal frame. Then he raced over to Mona while Charlene collapsed into hysterical tears in her wheelchair.

“Are you okay?” Cal searched Mona’s face and ran his hands over her arms and shoulders. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m all right,” Mona said. “Call an ambulance for Billy and his mother.”

Cal checked Billy’s pulse as he made the call. Cell phone service was spotty in the mountains, but he got a connection.

Anna lifted a chain from around her neck, indicating a charm of a baby bootie on the end. “Josie, honey, I did have a baby by Johnny,” Anna said. “Another little girl. Not you, Josie, but you do have a sister.”

“What happened to her?” Josie asked.

“I gave her up for adoption.”

Mona frowned, Anna’s words sinking in as her head began to clear.

“Daddy was sure Johnny was the Thorn Ripper, and he insisted I give the baby up for adoption. He made me leave town until the baby was born.”

“That’s the reason you and my granddaddy don’t get along,” Josie said.

Anna nodded. “I hated him for making me give her up.” She rubbed her fingers over the charm. “I was so distraught that a few weeks after that, I met this other man, your father. I got pregnant right away . . . I guess I felt so guilty I had to replace one child with another.”

“So my father really did die?” Josie said.

“Yes, honey, I’m afraid so.”

Mona made another sound in her throat. “Anna, you gave up a baby . . .” Her gaze latched onto the baby bootie charm.

“Yes, a few months after Johnny’s arrest,” she said. “Daddy said my baby would be better off with a stable married couple, that if I kept her everyone would know she was a serial killer’s child.”

Mona’s heart pounded. “What happened to that baby?”

Josie frowned. “Yes, Mom, where is she?”

“I don’t know,” Anna said. “My father arranged for her to be adopted. He used the lawyer in town.” Anna’s voice cracked, and she stroked the charm frantically. “I held her for a minute after she was born, and I gave her a charm just like this one, so she’d have something from me, something so she’d know I loved her.”

Mona’s chest ached with unshed tears as she lifted her own chain from beneath the wedding gown.

It was the same baby bootie charm Anna was wearing.

“My God,” Anna gasped.

“My parents died, but they left a letter for me with their lawyer explaining that I was adopted, and that I was from Graveyard Falls. I’ve been looking for you for months.”

Emotions wrenched Anna’s face as she reached out for Mona.

Mona embraced Anna, tears clogging her throat. She had been looking for her mother, and now she’d finally found her.

Deputy Kimball arrived with an ambulance a few minutes later. Cal made sure the medics examined Josie, then he ushered Mona, Anna, and Josie outside while the CSI team entered the cabin to process it for evidence.

He instructed the deputy to drive the women to the police station to give statements, and to phone Sheriff Buckley to meet them there. “After that, pick up Felicity Hacker. We still have some details to clear up.”

Deputy Kimball agreed, and Cal phoned Agent Hamrick, filled him in, and told him he could stop the surveillance on Yonkers.

The similarities between Yonkers and Billy were eerie, but Cal had learned a long time ago that sometimes the most obvious suspect wasn’t the killer. He knew one man who would agree wholeheartedly with that statement—Johnny Pike. Cal still wondered if Yonkers was dangerous, though.

Hamrick drove over to escort Billy and his mother via ambulance to the hospital, where they would be placed under strict guard and psychiatric care. Billy would also be treated for the gunshot wound, and his mother would receive medical care.

Before the deputy left, though, Cal stepped out to talk to Mona and Anna. “I don’t want to go back to my father’s,” Anna said. “Not now.”

“Come to my house,” Mona said. “You and Josie.”

Cal heard the emotion in Mona’s voice and knew she had a lot to deal with. She had been searching for her mother for a long time, and now she’d found her and a half sister. She even knew her birth father’s name and hopefully could meet him.

Anna folded her arms. “We have to talk to the judge and free Johnny, Agent Coulter.”

“We will. The jewelry was the missing link before, and now we have it,” Cal said. “And the crime team will search this place thoroughly. Charlene may have kept more evidence than we know. I’ll also have those notes Johnny supposedly wrote analyzed. The handwriting should prove that Charlene wrote them.”

“Billy took pictures of me,” Mona said. “He probably took them of the other victims.”

“Okay. We’ll look for them.” His eyes searched Mona’s. “Are you okay?”

She nodded, although she averted her gaze. More than anything he wanted to hold her in his arms and console her.

But this wasn’t the time or place to confess his feelings.

Anna wrapped her arm around Josie and then Mona. “Come on, girls. Let’s ride with the deputy and give our statements, then we can go home together.”

Deputy Kimball escorted the three of them to his squad car. As they left, Cal went to confer with the investigators.

One of the techs stepped from the mother’s bedroom carrying a wooden box. “There are dozens of letters in here,” he said. “Love letters written from Charlene to Johnny that she never sent.” With a gloved hand, he dangled one of the letters in the air. “In this one, she writes about how she enticed the girls one by one to go to the falls with a rose and a fake love note from Johnny. The note claimed that he had chosen her over the others for his prom date. The girls went expecting a romantic rendezvous but fell to their death instead.” He removed another letter and showed it to Cal. “This one has a list of the victims—she titled it ‘All the Little Liars.’”