Death by Deceit (Book #5 in the Caribbean Murder Series) (21 page)

Cindy waded through the mess
to the back door, which was unhinged and cracked. It took nothing to push it
with her shoulder and get it to open.

Delighted, Cindy went in. There
were boxes piled up near the back entrance and piles of unfolded laundry in
baskets. She walked up a few steps, deciding to see what she could find. A closed
sliding door lead to a room off the living room. Cindy slid it open and went
into a small, dark, cloistered room with the blinds pulled down.

Two old, wooden cabinets with
very narrow drawers, were standing next to each other along the far wall, and a
tattered rug was tossed in the center. Cindy went over to the cabinets, and opened
one drawer after another, not knowing what she was looking for. The first two
drawers were filled with loose change, rocks, scraps of paper, nothing of interest.
The third draw had an antique, carved, box in it. It caught Cindy’s attention.

She opened the box carefully
and inside was a, beautiful, unusual handmade shell necklace. The necklace was
compelling. Cindy took it out of the box and stared at it.  It looked oddly familiar,
too, though she couldn’t place it. As Cindy turned it over in her hands, the
sliding door to the room suddenly yanked open.

“What the hell are you doing
here?” Katrina jammed her way in.

Shocked, Cindy gasped. “I
thought you were gone for the week-end.”

“Who cares what you thought?
What in the hell are you doing here?”

“I needed to see you,” Cindy
spoke vehemently.

“So you break into my house?”
Katrina’s eyes were cloudy and unfocused, as if she were on some kind of drug.
“What the hell are you looking for?”

Cindy took a deep breath and
planted herself squarely opposite this oncoming whirlwind.

“I thought I’d find evidence
for the case,” Cindy managed.

 Katrina became more unhinged.
 “The case is over. They got the man.”

“Your husband?”

“Go drop dead. You’ve done
enough harm already haven’t you?”

“Harm? We’ve gotten Flan
locked up. We’re protecting you.”

Katrina’s eyes glared like a
wildcat caught in the dark.

 “Who needs you to protect me
from him? I told you I love him! You didn’t believe me.”

“You told me lots of things,”
Cindy countered.

Katrina began thumping her
fists against one another.  “You’ve a hell of a nerve breaking in here! I’ll
call the police on you for breaking and entering.”

“Katrina, I’m here to help
you.” Cindy took a step closer.

“Screw you,” Katrina shouted
like a banshee. “Don’t think I don’t know you went down to the boat to get a
whiff of him, too. Wanted to steal him away, too, didn’t you?”

“That’s completely crazy,” said
Cindy.

Katrina threw her head back
and howled. “Me? Completely crazy? You think I don’t know when a woman is after
the man I love? I’ve seen it over and over. And what the hell are you doing
with my favorite necklace?”

Cindy looked down at the
shells that seemed to be looking back up at her.

“I just found it,” said Cindy.

“Give it to me,” Katrina
demanded.

But Cindy could not. She
closed her hands around it more tightly. That the necklace didn’t belong to
Katrina. Cindy felt it.  

“I can’t give it to you,” said
Cindy.

Katrina stomped closer. “Give
it to me.”

Cindy held it tighter. “Why do
you want it so much?” she demanded.

“It belongs to Flan,” Katrina
mumbled then. “He loves it.”

“What else does he love?”
Cindy crouched and lowered her voice, threatening. She wanted to crack her,
bring the full story to light. She needed hard evidence and was getting close
it now. Outside it grew darker and the wind started to blow up.

“Storm’s coming, Katrina,”
Cindy taunted.

“So?”

“So, who else did your dear,
precious husband love?”

Katrina took the bait and came
closer.

“Plenty of them, one after
another. You think you and Shelly were the only ones? No. You think he cared a
second how much it hurt me? I told him over and over I loved him, too. He
always said they loved him better.”

Cindy flashed to the odd
conversation she’d heard between them in the Police Station.

“Maybe he was right?” said
Cindy.

“No.”

Cindy heard the horror in her
voice. She could only imagine how awful it felt. “Did they love him better?” Cindy
asked anyway. She was on a murder investigation and needed the whole truth.
“Were you able to give him the love he needed? I doubt it, Katrina.”

That did it. Katrina lunged at
Cindy, grabbed her throat and scratched her until her neck was bleeding. Then
she started choking her.

“It’s your turn now!” shouted
Katrina, rage in her eyes.

Cindy gasped for air. As the
thunder struck and the lights in the house started flickering, Cindy tried to
push Katrina off. Losing air, finally, she mustered her last ounce of strength
and managed to shove her off. Katrina stumbled backwards, tripping.

Cindy didn’t wait. Bleeding,
still clutching the necklace, she flew down the steps to the cracked door and
then out of the house, into the dark, raging storm.

Hot winds whipped across
Cindy’s face as she ran through sheets of pouring rain along dark, back streets
away from Katrina’s home. Blood from the deep scratches poured down her neck
onto her dress. Trembling, Cindy reached for her cell phone and called Mattheus.
He picked up instantly, almost as if he were expecting the call.

“I’m hurt, Mattheus,” Cindy
gasped, as she hunkered down under a huge tree.  

“Where are you?” Mattheus
asked horrified.

Cindy’s head started whirling.
“A few blocks from Katrina’s, on the back streets, under a tree.”

Her throat hurt and it was
hard to breathe.  Katrina had done more damage than Cindy’s realized. It was
hard to keep talking. Cindy felt a huge desire to sleep, closed her eyes for a
second and suddenly felt as if time were floating and she was floating with it.

When she opened her eyes
again, Mattheus was standing over her, drenched.

“Wake up, wake up,” he was
rocking her gently.

Cindy opened her eyes as he
lifted her slowly into his arms.

“My God,” Mattheus murmured,
pulling her close to him.

Cindy put her head on his
shoulder, exhausted.

“Katrina did this to you?”
Mattheus asked, putting his hand over the wound that was still bleeding.

“Same place Shelly was grabbed
and scratched,” Cindy said in a small voice.

“Cindy,” Mattheus pulled her
close, “nothing matters to me if I you’re not okay.”

Despite her pain, Cindy
smiled. It felt wonderful being wrapped in his arms, with the warm rain around
them.

“How did this happen? How?”
Mattheus asked when Cindy became more alert.

 Cindy remembered the struggle
over the necklace then. She’d slipped it in her pocket and had a strong desire
to show it to Mattheus now. She reached for it, brought it out for him to see.

“What’s this?” Mattheus
flinched as he looked at it.

“Katrina demanded I give it to
her. I didn’t want to. We struggled for it,” said Cindy.

Mattheus was stone silent for
a second. “It’s Shelly’s necklace!” he breathed, thunderstruck. “The one I gave
her!”

Cindy suddenly remembered. The
necklace had been on the photograph she’d seen of Shelly in Grenada. It had
struck her then, too.

Mattheus couldn’t take his
eyes off it. “How did you get it?”

“I found it in Katrina’s
drawer,” Cindy said.

Mattheus voice started
cracking.  “I made it for Shelly, She never took it off.”

“She didn’t take it off all
the time she was here, either,” Cindy said softly.

Mattheus started to cry as he cradled
the necklace in his hands.

“It was taken from Shelly’s
neck after she was killed,” Cindy said. “I don’t believe Flan would done that and
given it to Katrina.”

Mattheus’s voice grew darker. “So,
how did Katrina get it?”

 “She had to have known how
much it meant to Shelly,” Cindy said. “Katrina took if off her after she was
killed. Katrina did it. She was out for revenge.”

Mattheus and Cindy stared at
each other.

“We’ve got to go back to
Katrina’s house immediately,” said Cindy.

“The police are on their way
there,” Mattheus broke in. “I called them the second after you called.”

Then he took out a
handkerchief and wrapped it gently around the wound on Cindy’s neck that was
still bleeding. “Are you able to go with me to Katrina? Should you go to the
hospital first and get the wound dressed?”

“I can go to Katrina,” said
Cindy. “I need to be there with you when the police arrive.”

“Okay,” said Mattheus. “Let’s
go right away.”

*

Cindy and Mattheus walked into
Katrina’s house just as the police were circling her and she was thrashing
around, yelling for her lawyer.

The minute Cindy walked in, Katrina
stopped and stared.

The police turned and stared
at Cindy as well.

“She lunged at me, scratched
and choked me, right at the spot where Shelly was killed,” Cindy said plainly,
pointing to her neck.

Rodney and Alex looked daunted.

Katrina started frothing at
the mouth as her words boiled over, one after the other.

“Go to hell you bitch,” she
shot at Cindy.  “I’m only sorry I didn’t finish you off the way I finished
Shelly.  She was easier than you, though, she was stupid. She got what she
deserved, and you’re gonna get it, too.”

“Hold on, hold on,” Rodney was
trying to hold her back from lunging at Cindy again.

“And if I don’t get you,”
Katrina pressed forward, “once Flan gets out, he will.”

Rodney grabbed Katrina harder
and pulled her arms back. 

“Did you hear what you said?” he
growled.

“What?” Katrina practically
spit at him.

“You killed Shelly?”

“I did,” said Katrina, “why
shouldn’t I? Did she deserve to live?”

Mattheus, tight as a drum,
moved towards her. “Do you?”

Cindy held him back.

“Any idiot could see who killed
your precious wife and why!” Katrina jeered at Mattheus. “And I’m gonna kill your
other doll, too. And the police down here couldn’t care less. They see things
like this all the time.”

“She’s high on crack,” Rodney
said to Alex.

Alex turned to Mattheus, the
blood drained from his face.  “She’s out of her mind,” he apologized. “Of
course we care.”

“I know you do,” Mattheus was
trembling.

“The case is over,” Alex said
quietly then. “Take Cindy to the hospital to have her wound treated. Take good
care of her.”

“You better believe I’ll take
good care,” said Mattheus, “she’s all I’ve got left in the world.”  

*

Cindy was taken immediately at
the hospital to a treatment room, where her wound was treated and bandaged.
Only a couple of fly stitches were put in.

“There won’t be any scar,” the
doctor assured her.

There’s all kinds of scars,
thought Cindy, as Mattheus came to the edge of the door and peeked in. They
hadn’t let him in before and it was wonderful to see him now.

“Sorry you had to go through
this,” said the doctor, finishing up.

“I’ve been through worse
things,” said Cindy.

Mattheus walked in then,
holding a large bouquet of roses.

 “If it weren’t for you this
case wouldn’t have been solved,” Mattheus said, looking at Cindy adoringly. “No
one can believe it. You did it again.”

“We did it together,” said Cindy
slowly. She was tired and happy, but most of all relieved. She’d had an odd
feeling about Katrina from the moment she met her, and wondered how the women
at the Shelter were now taking the news that one of them was the killer. What
would Barbara do?

Mattheus handed Cindy the
flowers. “The story’s all over the news,” he said.

The doctor smiled and moved
back a little, giving the two of them room to be together.

“I don’t know what I would
have done without you?” Mattheus said as he came closer to Cindy.

She smiled. “I’m glad I could
help.”

“Help? That’s not the word for
it.”

The two of them looked at each
other for a moment that seemed to stretch through lifetimes.

At that very moment, Alex walked
into the room.

“Congratulations,” he said
walking over to the bed. “You’re a star. Reporters are waiting outside to
interview you—and we’ve received an urgent call for you both.”

“What about?” asked Mattheus.

“There’s another job for you
guys. A murder. Might be a serial killer.”

Cindy and Mattheus stared at
each other.

“How about it?” Alex pressed.
“Can I give them your number?”

Cindy looked up, caught
Mattheus’s eyes, and the two of them smiled. She could feel their destiny
swirling around them, and had a feeling that, no matter what they wanted, fate
had other plans for them both.