Grave Danger (45 page)

“I heard everything. Sound travels well through the vent.” He pointed to a grill in the wall above her head. “I know you were talking to a Ms. Simms. I remember the name Simms. A union leader. She must be his wife. So my mother gave the will to the union leader.”

Libby didn’t respond. Her feet were hidden from his view behind the coffee table and a large vase of flowers. With her foot, she slowly inched her purse closer.

“Now all I have to do is find Simms to find the will.” He picked up her cell phone. “Caller ID is so useful.”

Libby leaned toward her purse.

“Stay exactly where you are.”

“You won’t get away with killing me.” Libby could feel adrenaline pulsing through her. Every sound, every sensation, every moment was magnified. “Ms. Simms is calling Mark right now.”

“Ms. Simms is a crazy old woman who’s gonna break her hip and die very soon. She called the chief at your request. Everyone knows you’re crazy. You’re going to fake another attempt on your life, but something’s going to go tragically wrong. This time, you’ll die.”

“Mark knows everything—about the will, about the stalking. He’s on to you.”

“Oh, sure. Even if you were stupid enough to go running to the chief when you learned about the will, he would never believe you. No one in this town would believe you if you said the sky was blue.”

“He believes me,” she said, fear, anger, and adrenaline mixing together.

“I’m sure you were a nice piece of ass. But he’s not going to risk his career over you. Soon you’ll be indicted for the Banks murder.”

She couldn’t get to her gun. She had to stall for time to give Enid a chance to relay her message to Mark or for Alex to arrive. And maybe, just maybe, James was innocent. Maybe he’d come to her rescue. “Exactly how did you set me up for that?” she said.

“You haven’t noticed? We took your hairbrush and your knife the night you were attacked.”

“We?” she asked, losing hope.

“James and I.”

Disappointment hit her with a sharp jab.
Stay focused
. Her purse was open and she could see the handle of the gun.
Keep him talking.
“Who killed your mother? Was it Lyle?”

“Of course,” he answered, as if it were of no consequence. “Who cares? The bitch deserved to die. She was giving
my
mill away.”

“But the mill was never yours. You only rubber-stamped your daddy’s decisions.”

Her cell phone rang. He ignored it. She had to get a reaction out of him, to distract him. “When did you first realize your father killed your mother?”

“The day she died,” he said. “He came home smelling like gasoline. He’d run her off the road, then doused her car with fuel and lit a match. He delighted in telling me that. I washed his clothes for him.”

She felt sickened a twelve-year-old could so blithely cover up his mother’s murder. “Why did you kill Eli?”

“He couldn’t keep his story straight and he wanted more money.”

Libby glanced down to the tape recorder. The wheels were turning. Mark would come. He’d be too late to save her, but he’d have his evidence against Earl.

“You’ve been very clever. Your plan to frame me was flawless. How did you know about Aaron Brady?”

“James offered to check your references for Jack. We’d hoped to find an incompetent archaeologist for the dig, but you were even better. You had past financial troubles and a cop who supposedly stalked you. That was when James got the idea to stalk you and make you look crazy.”

“Did you and James plan to attack and frame me from the beginning?”

“No. With your credibility problems the first few ‘stalking’ incidents should have been enough to discredit you. Who’d have guessed Mark Colby would fall for you?”

“So you escalated the stalking. You know, Aaron called me. He also called Mark. How did you get him involved?”

Earl laughed. “You got Colby to investigate him again. I bet that pissed him off. Guess he came gunning for you. Couldn’t have planned that better myself.”

“How did you manage to start the rumor I was in financial trouble?”

“James did that. Based on your past trouble with Brady, he knew you’d be vulnerable. We floated the idea that you wanted to get out of the project. The reporter ran with it.”

“Was Laura involved? Is that why she said I stole the artifact?”

“Laura knew about the will and about Angela. She had to help me get rid of Angela’s car. But we didn’t think we could trust her to keep her story straight with you. She said you stole the artifact only because you pissed her off.”

“What about Jason? Was he part of this?”

“Jason doesn’t know shit. He’d probably try to give the mill away, just like his bitch of a mother.”

“Then how did his arms get scratched?”

“James took Laura’s precious dog and trapped him in the blackberries behind the house. Laura cried and cried and hero Jason dug the damn dog out.”

Before she could ask another question, her cell phone rang again.

“
A
N OFFICER FROM THE
R
ICHLAND
PD will come by your house this afternoon to collect the papers you and Angela went through,” Mark said to Enid Simms.

“Oh, I almost forgot. Miss Maitland wanted me to tell you something. Although I didn’t really understand...she said she’s ten-something. Ten-thirty? Does that sound right?”

Mark’s heart stopped. “Ten-thirty-four?”

“That’s it!”

“Did she tell you where she was when you spoke?”

“No, she didn’t.”

“How long ago did you talk?”

“Just before I called you.”

They’d been on the phone a few minutes. “Thank you. I have to find Libby now.” He hung up and then dialed Libby’s cell phone. No answer. He glanced at his watch. Four twenty.
Shit. She was scheduled to interview Earl Montgomery at four.

The beat of his pounding heart could be felt all the way to the fingers that gripped the phone. He dialed the site. A crew member answered. Without preamble, he demanded to know whether Libby had gone to see Earl alone.

“Alex was supposed to go with her, but he’s still here, we had a problem—”

“She’s alone? At the Montgomery mansion?”

“Is something wrong?” the young woman asked.

“Yes.” He hung up and tried her cell again as he ran down the corridor. He called for backup to the officers in the squad room. Outside, in his police car, he hit the sirens and tore out of the station.

W
ITH
E
ARL DISTRACTED
by her ringing cell phone, Libby seized her chance. She braced her back against the couch and then kicked the wooden coffee table into Earl’s knees. He let out a yell as he dropped to the floor.

She grabbed her gun.

He scrambled to his back and pointed the barrel of his weapon at her. She kicked it away and stepped on his hand. His scream was loud and full of pain.

She pulled back the hammer on her gun and aimed at his face as she placed all the weight of her body on his hand. “Move and you’re dead. I’d love an excuse to shoot you.”

Hard angry eyes stared up at her, but he said nothing.

“You fucked up again, didn’t you, Earl?” James asked in a cold voice. He stood in the doorway, the gun in his hand aimed at Libby’s chest. “I’m not as stupid as my brother, Libby. So now you have to decide which one of us you want to shoot. Your gun is aimed at him. And I’ll shoot you in the time it takes for you to shift your aim to me.”

“You were the brains, weren’t you, James? Earl was just your tool. Were you the one who Tasered me?”

“Yes.”

“Were you going to kill me?”

“The plan was to frame you, not kill you. That dumb fuck on the ground there wanted to just kill you. But then there would have been another homicide investigation. With you alive and framed, the investigation would have ended with you. Colby messed with my plans when he showed up that night. But I’d planned carefully, so it still worked. He believed you set it up.”

“You started this the day we found the burial. How did you know we’d found Angela?”

“Jack kept me informed on all developments for the Cultural Center because I was the biggest investor.”

“Our find could have been a real burial.”

“Earl is the moron who buried her; he knew where she was. If you’d handed her over to the tribe like you were supposed to, I would’ve left you alone after that.”

“How did you steal my truck?”

“Easy. I took your spare key from the Shelby house.”

“You have keys to every TL&L house, don’t you?”

“Of course.”

“How did you cool the engine?”

“I drove your truck a block away and hid it in one of our garages. The engine hadn’t heated much but to speed things along I set a fan on it. Then I waited for you to notice the truck was missing.”

“And you returned it after I entered the police station.”

“You are stalling, Ms. Maitland.”

“If I shoot your brother, even if you shoot me, you’ll have a hell of a time explaining the mess.”

“I don’t particularly care. Earl’s the fuckup who got us in this situation. He killed Angela without finding out where the damn will was. Then I gave him a simple job—move Angela’s body before the land she was buried on was sold. So he moved her to Jack’s property. Do me a favor. Kill him. The papers were signed an hour ago. I’ll get his share, you’ll both be dead, and I’ll be a hero for shooting the psycho woman who killed my brother.”

Earl’s eyes hardened. He was now angrier with James than at her. In a swift motion, she switched her aim to James.

James pulled the trigger. His gun clicked, but there was no bang.

Libby fired.

James collapsed.

In that split second, Earl hit her across the back of her legs with the vase, knocking her to her knees.

She pushed his gun out of reach. Earl swung at her. The vase hit her in the back. She fell forward, trapping her own gun between her body and the floor.

Before she could move, the vase hit her head. Nausea rose. She heard sirens. Enid Simms must have talked to Mark.

Libby rolled to her side and rammed her elbow into Earl’s face. He shoved her forward. With his weight on her back, he buried her face in the rug, keeping her arm and gun trapped. Hands wrapped around her throat. Earl squeezed.

She struggled for breath and bucked beneath him. His hold didn’t loosen. She needed air.

A crashing sound came from the front hall.

His grip tightened.

She released the gun and clawed at the fingers on her neck. She screamed without sound as pain burned her throat. Her lungs ached and her head throbbed with the need to breathe.

Earl’s weight lifted from her back. The fingers that gripped her neck released. She took a shuddering breath and twisted to see Mark with Earl in a chokehold.

Libby coughed. Pain shot down her windpipe.

The room filled with officers. Luke Roth handcuffed Earl.

She needed to speak. Mark pulled her to her feet and whispered her name. She took a slow breath and found her voice. She looked at Mark and rasped, “I told Earl you believed me.”

C
HAPTER
T
HIRTY-
S
EVEN