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Authors: Carolyn McSparren

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She nodded. “I know,” she said quietly. “Go home. Try not to worry. Everything’s going to be all right.”

She watched him drive off and turn toward Long Pond.

Then she began to shake.

Had David lied to her again? Had he done the same thing he’d done in the past—simply not told her the entire truth? Old habits died hard.

In actuality, he was free; Waneath was free. The disparity in their ages was not much greater than the difference between hers and Alec Mullholland’s. If she ignored the fact that Waneath was ostensibly his son’s girlfriend, then David was well within his rights, if not his right mind, to get involved with the little gold digger.

David had a history of getting women pregnant. Maybe he’d expected Waneath to be on the Pill. His and Kate’s generation didn’t talk quite so openly about birth control as Jason’s did.

But irrational though it was, she felt betrayed all over again, not only as a woman but as a lawyer. She always said she expected clients to lie, but this seemed gratuitous. Unless, God help them all, he actually was responsible for Waneath’s death. How could she handle that knowledge? She couldn’t cover up a killing, even for David.

She called Arnold’s room, and when he answered, she said, “Sony, I won’t be able to have breakfast with you. I’ve got someplace to go.”

He said muzzily, “Wha...?”

“Don’t worry about it. Have coffee, eat. Get yourself into your right mind. I’ll either see you at the café, or I’ll catch you here later.”

“Where?”

“I promise to leave my cell phone plugged into the car. Bye.” She hung up on Arnold’s second “wha?”

She showered and dressed hurriedly, all the while trying to keep her mind from racing ahead. It wasn’t easy. David made a kind of grim sense as the father of Waneath’s baby. He taught at the college she’d attended. Had he really gone down that list of professors so casually, knowing all the time that he was the man she sought?

He’s an actor,
she kept repeating under her breath.

DAVID HEARD tires crunch on the gravel in front of his house and walked to the front door with his first cup of coffee in his hand. He looked out the window, recognized his car and felt his heart lift.

He opened his front door before she reached it, picked up the
Athena Weekly Sun
from his front steps and held it folded in his hand while he waited for her to come to him. He knew he was smiling like a lunatic, but he couldn’t help his feelings. He hoped she’d spent as lousy a night as he had, and was here because she couldn’t wait a moment longer to throw herself into his arms, ready for a long leisurely morning of making love as they used to do on weekends in New York.

He held out his arms to her, but she sidestepped him and stalked past him into the house. Not the actions of a woman come to make love. “Kate?” he asked.

She dropped her handbag beside the fireplace and turned to face him. Even in the dim light from his reading lamp he could see the set of her jaw. She was breathing hard.

“What is it?” he asked, and went to her.

She put her hands up in front of her like a shield. “Stay on your side of the room, okay?”

“What’s the matter?” His blood chilled. “Jason. Is anything the matter with Jason?”

“You could say that,” she said. “You could say tha there’s twenty years of secrets and lies and mistrust the matter with him.” She raised her hands to her temples a though fending off a headache. “I was crazy to think you’o changed.”

His frustration began to make him angry. “What are you talking about?”

“How come you neglected to tell me that Waneath wa carrying your baby?”

He gaped at her. Whatever he’d expected, it wasn’t this He shook his head. “She wasn’t.”

“Are you denying that you had an affair with her afte Jason left for Pepperdine in September?”

“Hell, yes, I’m denying it! Are you nuts? Why would do that?”

“She was a beautiful woman. Lonely. You saw eacl other at college. Nothing odd about Jason’s daddy com forting his girlfriend.”

“Kate, I saw her in the cafeteria three or four times Joined her for dinner once or twice. We talked about Jason and how much we missed him.”

“Oh, really. You didn’t mention those little dinner par ties before.”

“I didn’t think they were important. I felt sorry for her.’

“Sorry enough to take her to bed?”

“No!”

“Well, David, that’s what she told Jason right after he refused to marry her. Right before she walked off to find you to tell you that you were about to become a father fo the second time.”

“Say what?” He felt his heart pounding in his chest. Hi skin felt hot, as though he were suddenly sick with a fevei He had to sit down. He felt behind him for the wing chai and sank into it. His mouth turned dry in an instant. He swallowed, trying to get enough moisture to speak.

She stalked back and forth in front of the windows with her arms crossed on her chest. He saw suddenly what a formidable litigator she must be.

“Waneath had no reason to lie,” Kate continued. “She didn’t expect to die that night. She was annoyed at Jason all right, but what she told him could easily be proved or disproved. She was telling the truth.”

He shook his head. “I don’t pretend to know why she lied, but she did. I promise you, Kate, I never slept with the girl.”

“And is there any reason why I should accept your version? Do you have an unblemished reputation for honesty in these matters?”

He surged to his feet. “Yes, I do, dammit!”

“Then why, when your son drove over here that night to talk to you about Waneath’s allegations, were you not here? Where exactly did you spend the remainder of that night? Do you have an alibi? Or did you just happen to pick up Waneath on the side of the road where Jason dumped her?”

“Lord God in heaven,” David whispered. “He thinks I killed her.”

“Damn straight. Killed her, dumped her and brought me in to get him off so you don’t have to confess to save him. He asked me to explore a plea bargain for him. He’s willing to go to jail to save you.”

He shook his head. “That’s crazy.”

“Oh, you haven’t heard the best part.” She walked over and took the newspaper from his limp hand, unfolded it and held it in front of him.

He looked at the headline and the accompanying picture. “Holy hell!”

“Wedding announcements and recipes?” she said sweetly.

“How did they find out?”

“Some housewife-turned-reporter ran across my full name somewhere, no doubt. Who cares? Jason knows I’m your ex-wife, and by now so does Dub and the entire state of Mississippi.”

“Kate, I’m sorry.”

“Oh, there’s more.” She wadded up the paper in her hand and paced. “After your giant-size son tried to run me down in the motel parking lot this morning, he explained to me in great detail how I’m planning to get him sent away to Parchman for life to revenge myself on Melba for stealing you away from me.”

She threw the newspaper at the couch. It slid onto the floor. Kate ignored it and stormed over to stare out the window.

David stared at her. “That’s...that’s...” The idea that Kate would do something that Machiavellian was beyond ludicrous. When the laughter began to bubble up inside him, he wondered for a moment whether men got hysterics.

Kate whirled, her face set, her shoulders heaving with fury.

He was instantly sober.

“It’s not funny.”

“I know,” he said. And promptly burst out laughing.

“Oh, Kate, the idea that you’d get Jason sent off to prison. I’m sorry. I know this is serious. Maybe it’s so damn serious that if I don’t laugh I’m going to howl. Surely to God you don’t believe him?”

“About getting him sent to prison, of course not. As for the rest of it...”

He surged up out of his chair and went to her. He took her by the shoulders and spun her to face him. “If I had done it, do you think I’d have let Jason be arrested?”

“Where were you that night?”

He let her go and went to the refrigerator. “I need a drink.”

“It’s eight-thirty in the morning.”

“Milk, orange juice, more coffee—something. My mouth feels too dry to speak.”

“You need to stall long enough to think of a good alibi is what you need.”

He shook his head, reached into the refrigerator, pulled out a carton of milk and took a long swig straight from the container. He continued to drink for a moment, then flipped the plastic top and set the carton back into the refrigerator, shut the door carefully, turned to the counter and leaned on it with both hands. “This has knocked me for a loop.”

“Obviously. Where were you?”

“If you’re asking whether I have an alibi, the answer is no. Never occurred to me I’d need one. I definitely was not with another woman.”

“You weren’t home. Car was gone, house was dark.”

“I was restless. I knew Jason was out partying, and I was worried about him. I drove down to the joint to see if I could spot his car, but he wasn’t there.”

“Did you speak to any of his friends? Hear about the fight?”

“No, I kept a very low profile. I knew he’d be mad as hell if he caught me bulldogging him. I didn’t get out of the car, I just cruised by. His car wasn’t there.”

“You didn’t pass him on the road?”

He shook his head. “No. It was a beautiful night. Full moon. I just drove for a couple of hours.”

“Oh, come on!” Kate said. “You drove around aimlessly in the middle of the night? You can do better than that.”

“The truth? Celibacy sucks. I’m sick to death of cold showers. The nights can get very long, and frankly, the only woman who haunts my dreams was at that moment handling a lawsuit in California.”

“I’m supposed to believe that?”

“Since the crops are in, I don’t go to bed bone tired. I couldn’t sleep.”

“Did you stop anywhere? For coffee, maybe? A soft drink? Gasoline?”

“I had a full tank of gasoline. I drove all the way to the outskirts of Jackson and back. Didn’t get home until one, two o’clock in the morning.”

“Did you drive by the levee where they found Waneath’s body?”

He shook his head. “I took the back roads.”

“Anyone see you?”

“No one I knew or could recognize. No one who recognized me. Do you believe me?”

“I have no idea.” She turned away.

He felt a terrible surge of loss, as though after all these years the final thread binding them together had snapped. “You’ll never be able to trust me completely, will you?”

She glared back silently.

“But so far as Waneath’s baby goes, you’ll have proof of that when the DNA test comes in. That’ll prove I wasn’t the father.”

“Perhaps it will, perhaps it won’t.”

“What?”

“You and Jason share a good deal of DNA. Your patterns could be markedly similar.”

“So I could always be under suspicion?”

“Yes.”

“Then all I can tell you is that it’s not true. I don’t know why she told Jason that, except maybe she was so damn mad at him that she hit out with the most hurtful words she could. Maybe she planned to force his hand that way. I did not sleep with her. I give you my word.”

“And we all know what that’s worth.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way. Sorrier than you’ll ever know,” David said. He grabbed his jacket off a hook beside the back door. “But now I have to find my son.”

“Can you make him believe you?” Kate asked.

He stopped with one sleeve on and one off. “When I haven’t convinced you, you mean?”

She shrugged.

He pulled the jacket on the rest of the way. “Either twenty years ago you married a man capable of killing a woman and leaving her by the side of the road, or I’ve changed so much in those twenty years that I have become that man. Or a third possibility—I’m innocent. You work it out. And when you come up with an answer, let me know. In the meantime, I’m going to my son.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

K
ATE STOOD rooted to the floor of David’s living room and watched him slam the front door behind him. A moment later she heard his truck start and the whine of gravel.

She’d gotten what she wanted all right. No chance of getting back together with David now even for an evening’s sexual dalliance. By telling him she didn’t believe him, she’d as good as called him a killer.

Lovely.

The problem was that she
did
believe him. All that anger that she hadn’t realized still existed had come from someplace deep within her. She’d wanted to hurt him. After twenty years his betrayal still rankled. She wanted to see him bleed, and she’d gone about it with the same singleminded determination she used against hostile witnesses.

She sank onto the sofa and automatically began reassembling the Athena newspaper. She glanced at the story again, then tossed the paper aside. Time enough to read it later, when she could think straight.

Assuming that time ever came.

She closed her eyes and dug the heels of her hands into them as though to keep them from falling out of her skull.

She and Waneath weren’t that different. Kate had looked on marriage to David as a career in and of itself. Marriage wasn’t a career. It was a relationship between two fallible people who brought emotional baggage with them.

The trick was to fit all the disparate bits and pieces into the relationship. Tough to manage, especially since neither partner had a clue how much stuff was being dragged along. Hang-ups simply leaped out of closets and crawled from under beds at inopportune moments.

Kate had wanted to hurt David in the worst possible way. Waneath had wanted to hurt Jason. Telling him that David was the father of her unborn child was the nastiest thing Waneath could have said. She probably didn’t think any further than the moment. She was furious and scared.

David was right. He was fundamentally decent, whatever mistakes he’d made. He wouldn’t have killed Waneath. He’d have been more likely to offer her marriage if he really were the father of her child. That’s what he’d done the last time.

But wouldn’t it be jim-dandy to have legal confirmation to back up Kate’s instincts?

She pulled herself to her feet. With luck Arnold would still be at the motel and ready for breakfast. Suddenly she was hungry and as tired as if she hadn’t slept a wink.

Halfway to the front door, she jumped when the telephone rang. She stared at it, wondering whether it was David trying to get in touch with her. She hesitated to pick up his telephone. Let the answering machine pick up, then if it were David, she could interrupt.

After five rings, the machine clicked on. David’s voice did the standard machine number. The machine beeped.

As the voice began to speak, Kate gaped.

“David, dear, this is Mrs. H. How is Kate?”

Kate dived at the telephone, picked it up and held it to her ear. “Mother?”

She heard the sharp intake of breath at the other end. “Uh. Good morning, dear.”

“What are you doing calling David at eight-thirty in the morning? Or any time, for that matter.”

“Um.” Silence.

“Well?”

“I wanted to tell him how sorry I am about his trouble.”

“Mother,” Kate growled. “You’re lying through your teeth.”

“I beg your pardon.”

Kate felt her blood pressure top two hundred. “How often do you two have these little chats?”

“My friends are my own business, young lady. He didn’t divorce
me
! I managed to forgive him. Took some time, but he was persistent. He never meant to hurt you. He’s very different from your father, even if you refuse to believe it.”

Kate sank into the wing chair beside the telephone and dropped her head into the hand not holding the receiver. “How nice. I can’t believe this. You never considered telling me you knew where David was and what he was doing?”

Now her mother sounded huffy. “You made it quite clear you wanted nothing to do with him. But the way he suffered without you—well, I started feeling sorry for him. I always liked him. You know I wanted you to talk to him—try to work things out between you.”

“So you went behind my back and formed this little ‘fool Kate club.’”

“We knew what your reaction would be.”

“No wonder he knew Alec was dead and where to find me. Is there anything about my life he
doesn’t
know?”

“There’s plenty
I
don’t know.”

Kate groaned. “But what you know he knows. Oh, Mother, how could you?”

“Kate, David was very helpful to me after your father died. In fact, he’s the one who encouraged me to sell the house and move down here.” She waited a moment, then rushed on. “You were so busy.”

Kate felt a wave of guilt. “You told me you didn’t need any help from me. But now answer me this. Are you the reason I’m here?”

This time her mother sounded guilty. “I did suggest it might be a good idea. But I’m sure he would have come to the same conclusion eventually. He’s very proud of what you’ve done, Kate.”

“And what the hell right has he to be proud of me?”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake. He’s still crazy about you. Stop acting like such a...”

Kate heard her mother searching for a word.

“Such a...such a...
lox!
”

That did it. Kate burst out laughing. In a moment her mother joined her.

Kate sputtered to silence. Her mother waited. “All right, Mother,” she said. “What’s done cannot be undone. But will you please, please, please keep your mouth shut about my business from here on? That is, if you expect me to confide anything at all to you.”

“Very well, Katherine.”

“Mother?” Kate asked. “What are you doing for Christmas?”

Instantly her mother sounded happy and girlish. “I’m going on a cruise! I’ve never been on a cruise before. We’re going to Puerto Rico and the Bahamas. It’s going to be glorious.” She paused, then asked, “Why? Where are you going this year?”

Kate hoped she sounded as happy as her mother did. “Haven’t decided. Maybe Saint Moritz.”

“Oh, dear, it’s your first year without Alec. What was I thinking? It’s not too late to cancel the cruise. You and I will go somewhere. Or you could join me.”

Kate shook her head as though her mother could see her.

“No, darling. Go, have a blast. And think of me sliding down the side of a mountain on two very thin pieces of Fiberglas.”

“Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. I love you.”

“And I love you.”

As Kate lowered the telephone, she heard her mother’s voice.

“So does he.”

DAVID SAW that Jason had driven his car home and parked haphazardly with one wheel buried deep in the azalea beds. Neva would have a fit. He climbed out of his truck as the front door opened, and Dub strode out to meet him. He brandished the rolled-up Athena newspaper in front of him like a club.

“Is this true?” Dub snapped.

David brushed by him. “Talk to me later. At the moment I need to find Jason. He in his room?”

“Dammit, you’ll talk to me now!” Dub reached for David’s shoulder, but missed.

David raced up the staircase two steps at a time, knocked on Jason’s door and opened it without waiting for an acknowledgment.

Jason was working at his computer, and when he saw his father, he stood up so quickly the desk chair fell over backward.

“David! Come back here!” Dub’s shout came up the stairs. David ignored it, reached behind him and flipped the latch on the door.

“I didn’t kill her,” he said without preamble.

“Oh, God, I told her not to talk to you.” Jason backed up against the wall.

David went to him, but Jason kept the desk between them. David leaned on it so that his face was less than a foot away from his son’s. “I didn’t sleep with her. She was not pregnant with my child. None of it is true.”

Jason caught his breath. “Why should I believe you? Why would she lie?”

“To hurt you. I can’t think of any other reason. Good Lord, son, do you actually think I’d seduce a girl I’ve known since she was three years old?”

Jason’s face turned sulky. “Somebody sure as hell did.” “Well, it wasn’t me.”

“Then where were you?” Jason wailed. “It was way after midnight when I came looking for you.”

David turned away and shoved his hands through his hair. “Driving all over Athena County. I went looking for you at that party, and when I didn’t find you, I just took off.”

“Alone?”

David walked across and sat on the bed with his forearms on his knees. “I’ve done the same thing for years, Jason. You never knew because you were asleep, or sleeping over at some friend’s house.” He pointed at the door. “Ask Dub. He knows.”

“He thinks you go to other women.”

“What other women? In Athena? I don’t know a lot of unmarried women over the age of twenty-five who live here.”

“After Momma died, every woman this side of Jackson started going after you,” Jason said. “That’s why you built that house, wasn’t it?”

“No. I built the house for us—you and me.” He sighed.

“Maybe I should have forced you to move in with me, but you were so adamant about not leaving Long Pond. Adults make mistakes, son, and I’ve made more than my share, but seducing Waneath Talley was not one of them.”

“How about getting your ex-wife to defend me?” The sneer was obvious, both on Jason’s face and in his voice.

“Now, that was not a mistake—it’s the best thing I could have done for you.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Jason, she’s one of the best lawyers in this part of the country, and she has a national reputation for defending clients she believes in. If you were a jury, what would you think? That even the woman who has the
least
reason in the world to want to help my son has come all the way from Atlanta to Athena, Mississippi, to put her career on the line for him.”

Jason’s eyes widened. “I hadn’t thought of it that way.” David realized he’d hit the right note. That Kate had not come to Athena for that reason was something he didn’t need to tell Jason right now.

“She does say she believes me.”

“She
does
. She told me so in no uncertain terms. And believe me, son, that woman fights like a tiger for the things she believes in.” He grinned ruefully. “I’ve got the scars to prove it.”

Jason picked up his chair and sank into it. For a moment he stared at his father without speaking, then he said, “Was she the great passion of your life?”

David caught his breath. After only a moment’s hesitation, he said, “Yes.”

“You still feel the same way about her?”

“Yes.” He shrugged. “I have no idea how she feels about me. She’s spent twenty years hating me.”

Jason grinned. “Heck, she sure jumped in to defend you quick. Told me you didn’t kill Waneath, and even if you did, you wouldn’t let me take the blame for it for a minute. Man, she was tough.”

David felt his heart lift. “How do you feel about that, son?”

Jason shook his head. “I don’t know. Momma’s been dead three years, and I guess you’ve got a right to go on with your life, but...”

“But you still feel disloyal.”

“Yeah, I guess that’s it. I just wish it was somebody else.”

“You’d feel the same way no matter who it was.”

“Maybe,” Jason said. “You think she’ll get me off?” David hesitated. Again, this was not the time for complete honesty. “Yes,” he said simply.

Jason sighed deeply. “Okay.”

“You believe me about Waneath?”

“I guess.” He frowned. “But if it wasn’t you, then who was it?”

“Probably somebody she met at college. We’re trying to find out.” He stood, walked over to his son and laid a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t freak out yet.”

Jason grinned up at him. “You’ll tell me when to freak, right?”

“I promise. Now, how about you shave off that stubble, take a shower, open the window to clear the fug out of this room and straighten up.”

“Oh, Dad.”

“And then come on downstairs, have something to eat with your grandfather.”

“I’ve got an editing project I’m working on,” Jason said.

“Designing credits for a TV movie.”

“Fine. But do it after you’re clean, fed, and this room is straight. Smells like you’ve been keeping goats in here.”