Deadly Deceptions (30 page)

I want my dad.

It was all I could do to remain upright. I wanted to drop to my knees on the muddy ground, double over and beat at the earth with my fists, but that wasn't an option.

“He's on his way home, Danny,” I said.

It was raining again.

Danny wavered, like a reflection, and I realized I could see
through
him, as though he'd been projected onto the night itself. I hadn't met that many ghosts, up close and personal, but the ones I
had
encountered were all as solid as anybody else.

Did that mean—please, God—that Danny wasn't dead?

I took a step toward him.

Don't touch me,
he said in his silent voice.

My face was wet with tears. “Okay,” I answered softly. “You're dreaming, Danny. You're only dreaming. Go back to—” I paused. “Go back to your body.”

Hope filled his small, freckled face.
I'm dreaming?

I nodded.

He smiled, and then he was gone.

I fell back against the side of my car, one hand pressed to my heart.

Rain pelted me, drenching my clothes and hair, sogging up my shoes, washing away my tears. I'm not sure how long I stood there, unable to move.

A sound from inside the house jolted me out of my shock.

A shout?

A gunshot?

I couldn't be sure.

I opened the car door again, grabbed the Glock case from under the seat and tried to remember how Max had loaded a similar weapon at the shooting range.

Joe Fletcher had been inside the Severn house for too long, since I'd given him a half hour head start and then made the trip myself, using up another thirty minutes at least, because of the muddy roads and the wrong turns. Yet his squad car was still sitting there, with the lights whirling on top.

I opened the glove compartment, brought out the box of hollow-point bullets Bubba had sold me along with the Glock. Every few seconds I looked out the car window for Danny, but he was nowhere in sight.

I began to sweat, even though I was wet to the skin.

But I extracted the magazine from the Glock, loaded it with bullets and drew a deep breath. Holding the gun in my right hand, with the flashlight I'd purchased earlier pinned to my side with my elbow, I got out of the car and headed around the side of the farmhouse, toward the back.

A dim light glowed from the cellar window.

My heartbeat picked up speed.

I crept to the door, praying it wouldn't creak on its hinges.

It did.

I flipped on the flashlight, hoping to avoid the soft places in the kitchen floor. Below me, I heard voices—a woman's, a man's—but I couldn't identify them, or make out the words.

The entrance to the cellar stood open.

I tightened my grasp on the Glock, my finger already hooked in the trigger, and tried to see below.

You don't need a gun. This is Greer. Your sister.

That's what my brain said. My body kept the Glock in a death grip.

I moved onto the top step, bent to peer into the cellar.

Joe Fletcher was lying on the floor, groaning, his head bloody. I didn't know if he'd been shot or bludgeoned with something, but he was conscious. His gaze connected with mine, and he seemed to be willing me backward, out of the kitchen, out of the house, away.

Greer couldn't have done this violence—could she?

But she'd shot Jack Pennington. If Joe had scared her badly enough, she might have reacted instinctively.

Joe closed his eyes, shook his head slightly.

I tightened my hold on the Glock and stepped full into the cellar.

Beverly Pennington was sitting cross-legged on the sleeping bag Tucker and I had seen on our visit, idly thumbing through the copy of
Town & Country.

Seeing me, she smiled.

“Here at last,” she said.

I kept the Glock trained on her. Sidestepped toward Joe, crouched beside him.

“Where's Greer?” I asked.

“Probably dead by now,” Beverly said. “I knew she'd come here. Back to the scene of the crime. And I was right. Imagine my surprise when
you
showed up, too.”

Joe rolled slowly onto his back, blinking blood out of his eyes. I saw that he'd been relieved of his service revolver—and when I glanced up, Beverly had it trained on me.

“Where,”
I repeated,
“is my sister?”

“I don't suppose it will do any harm to tell you,” Beverly answered pleasantly, setting aside the magazine. “Since you'll be joining her soon. She's back there—in the little room behind the furnace.”

I wasn't fool enough to look over my shoulder.

“Why?” I said. “Why are you doing this?”

Beverly sighed prettily. “Everything got out of hand,” she said, sounding regretful. “I didn't recognize her for a long time—Greer, I mean. But she looked like someone—and then it came to me.
Little Molly Stillwell.
The girl who'd poisoned her own stepfather, turned him into a vegetable. For a while it seemed like too much of a coincidence, both of us coming from Shiloh, and I was still drinking then. Still torn up over losing my husband to another woman. So I turned to Jack—my dear son—and told him what I suspected. He took it from there, and pretty soon we were funneling money into various offshore bank accounts.” She paused, smiled fondly. “Alex was frantic, of course. It was delightful to see him falling apart that way.”

Joe's hand found my right wrist, tightened around it. I knew he wanted the Glock, but I couldn't unlock my fingers. They seemed paralyzed.

“And then Alex got too close, didn't he?” I asked quietly. “So you and Jack decided to kill him, and frame Greer for the murder.”

“Jack handled that,” Beverly said. Her face, so placid before, suddenly hardened. “He must have gotten greedy, though. I know he had some idea that Greer had been siphoning off far more of Alex's money than she'd given us. He probably meant to kill her and eliminate the problem, but he wouldn't have expected her to fight back. Fool. I knew she would.”

Joe squeezed my wrist again. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him looking at me, felt him silently pleading.

Beverly trained the service revolver on him, swung it to me and then blew out the cellar window. In that instant I managed to let go of the Glock. Joe grabbed it, sighted in on Beverly.

“Drop the gun,” he said.

She laughed. Swung the revolver toward us again.

And Joe fired.

Beverly looked stunned. Her hands flew out from her sides, and the revolver went off again, taking out a chunk of the cellar wall. A crimson flower bloomed at the center of her chest.

And then she pitched over onto the floor, face-first.

Joe got to his feet, breathing hard.

I made a dash for the room behind the furnace.

It was padlocked shut.

“Greer!” I yelled, looking around for something to use to pry the lock loose. “Greer! Can you hear me?”

Joe appeared, his head still bleeding, and thrust one shoulder hard against the ancient door.

It gave immediately.

The room was dark.

I remembered my flashlight, realized I must have dropped it.

Joe had one in his service belt, and he sent a cone of light spilling into the gloom.

Greer was lying in a corner, trussed in duct tape like a mummy, from her shoulders to her ankles. But her eyes were open, gleaming in the darkness, huge with fear.

“Greer,” I said, landing on my knees beside her. “It's Mojo. Everything is okay.”

She blinked. She was probably dehydrated, and her left arm was broken. The pain of being bound like that must have been excruciating.

I began to pick and pry at the tape.

Joe was on his radio. “I'm at the Severn place,” he said. “I need an ambulance….”

I stroked Greer's matted hair.

“Mojo,” she whispered, her voice a raw rasp.

“Take it easy,” I murmured.

“Beverly…”

“Shhh,” I said. “She's dead. She can't hurt you anymore.”

Joe produced a jackknife and began cutting away Greer's bonds.

“Be careful,” I told him. “She's got a broken arm.”

He nodded.

A prickle danced up my spine, and I turned around. Beverly Pennington was standing in the doorway. I gasped, and Joe pulled the Glock out of his holster, where he must have automatically shoved it after shooting Beverly, and whirled.

I knew what he was seeing. Nothing.

I watched, appalled, as Beverly began to melt, like some gruesome statue in a burning wax museum. If there was a hell, she was in it.

She gave a terrible, piercing shriek, and then she was gone.

I looked at Joe and Greer, certain they must have heard the cry, but Joe was busy with Greer's bonds again, and she was staring up at me.

“Mojo,” she explained, “sees dead people.”

“She needs water,” Joe said to me, probably thinking Greer was delirious. “I've got a bottle out in the squad car, along with a blanket. I'll go and get it.” He swayed a little as he stood. He was covered in blood, and possibly seriously injured himself.

“You stay with Greer,” I said. Frankly, I wasn't eager to go out into the rainy night alone, after all that had happened, but I wanted to check on Dave anyway, and I wasn't sure Joe wouldn't be leaving the scene in an ambulance himself, right alongside Greer.

But Joe refused.

“My dog…”

“I'll bring him in,” Joe said.

Greer was free of the worst of the duct tape, but she lay still, cradling her left arm in its filthy cast.

“What happened here, Greer?” I asked after giving her a few moments.

She tried several times to speak, before she got a word out. “I was hiding—and she found me—”

“I don't mean that. I mean before. When you were Molly Stillwell.”

“I didn't poison my stepfather,” Greer said.

After all the secrets, all the lies, implied and stated, I believed her. “Who did? Rick?”

Greer shook her head. “Mom,” she whispered.

“Why?”

“He was—he was molesting Tessa.”

I gave Greer my hand, and she clung to me.

“And you?”

She looked away for a moment. “When I said I did something terrible…I meant I—I let him touch me. I was hoping he wouldn't bother Tessa.”

My stomach roiled. “Did you tell your mother what was going on?”

“She—she didn't want to believe it.” Greer ground out the words. “Not at first.”

“It's okay,” I said, blinking back tears of rage and pity. “We can talk about it later.”

Greer nodded in relief and closed her eyes.

Joe came back with a blanket, a bottle of water and Dave at his heels.

I was so glad to see my dog that I started to cry again.

Joe spread the blanket over Greer, squatted to give her water from the bottle. “Careful, now,” he said gently. “Little sips.”

Dave scrambled into my arms, squirming, laving my face with his tongue.

“This was beeping when I opened your car door,” he said, pulling my cell phone from the pocket of his bloody jacket. “I thought it might be important.”

Tucker couldn't have gotten to Phoenix already, even if he'd caught the first plane out, but I wanted to hear his voice, even the recorded version.

I pressed the messages button.

“Moje?” Tucker said, his voice ragged. “I'm at the airport in Missoula. My plane's leaving in a couple of minutes, so I'll have to shut this thing off pretty soon. I just wanted to tell you—I understand. Why you couldn't come with me, I mean. Stay safe, okay? Look—I've gotta go. Here's hoping there'll be a message waiting when I land. Bye.”

He was gone.

I felt as though everything vital had been jerked out of me.

Crying again, I keyed in his number. “Hey, Tuck,” I said, my voice breaking. “We found Greer—Joe and I did. Call me as soon—as soon as you know anything about Danny's condition. I don't care what time it is. Just call.”

I'd barely broken the connection when the phone rang in my hand.

I knew it couldn't be Tucker—he was in flight—but I said his name anyway.

It was Jolie. “Sorry I didn't get back to you,” she said. “Sweetie chewed up my phone, and I had to get a new one.”