If You Ever Tell (26 page)

“That’s what made you so appealing—you trying to act like you flirted outrageously with men every day when I knew from my mother and my friends that you were really shy around guys.” She blushed more, remembering how she’d deepened her voice to what she’d considered irresistible sexiness, batted her eyelashes, and flipped her long black hair over bare shoulders. “I think if I’d started to climb up that trellis leading to your room, you would have fainted, Miss Teri.”

Teresa laughed. “Oh, I absolutely would have! I’d been practicing my seduction of you for about fifteen minutes before I got the nerve to call out to you. And even though you acted just the way I wanted you to—interested, faintly attracted—my heart was still pounding and my stomach was in a knot from nerves. For once I was relieved when I heard my father stomping down the hall and I had an excuse to flee from that window. What a femme fatale!”

“You were, even if you didn’t realize it.”

They smiled at each other. Teresa absently dropped another jerky strip to Sierra, who would no doubt suffer some stomach discomfort tomorrow for overindulging. Then Teri got up, filled her and Mac’s cups with all the coffee left in the pot, and sat down again, suddenly feeling as tired as she could ever remember.

“Why don’t you go on up to bed, Teri?” Mac said. “You look like you’ve just about had it. I’ll linger awhile in case the sheriff gets really ambitious and comes up here. You need rest.”

“I know I need rest, but I also need to answer the question you asked earlier. Why did I come back here?” Teresa took a breath and spoke slowly. “I came back because my brother and my nephew live here—they are my only living relatives, Mac, and I didn’t want to keep them at a distance just because I was afraid of public opinion. I also wanted to show the people in this town I had nothing to hide, no reason to run from Point Pleasant.” She hesitated, then decided to tell Mac the complete truth. “And I thought if my mother was still alive, she might come back here and…”

“And she couldn’t turn to Kent?”

“Kent loved her, but I loved her more. And he’s married and has a family, whereas I’m alone and I could concentrate just on her. I wanted her to come to
me…
at least, I thought I wanted her to come to me. But now…”

Mac frowned and leaned closer to her. “But now
what
?”

Teresa stiffened. Because of her shock over Gus’s murder and because Mac was being so kind to her, she’d let her guard down; she’d talked too much. But she was going to stop talking. She wasn’t going to tell Mac that earlier in the evening she’d seen a frantic-eyed woman she thought was her mother running across the road, perhaps running from the barn where she’d turned loose the horse that looked just like the horse Cassandra she’d had so long ago. Maybe Gus had walked in and caught Marielle turning Eclipse loose. Maybe he’d recognized her, wanted to help her, tried to keep her, to “capture” her—the last thing an unbalanced Marielle would have wanted. So rather than be trapped, to perhaps be held accountable for the murders eight years ago, Marielle had…

Teresa closed her eyes. Marielle had stabbed Gus to death.

A
BELL.
I
N THE
distance a bell. Her mother was ringing a bell, beckoning her—but beckoning her to where? To whom? A sad, lonely mother who loved her child dearly and desperately needed her, or a mother who had turned into a killer and wanted to use her daughter as a shield or even worse—

Teresa jerked awake, drenched with sweat. The bell rang again and she realized it hadn’t been part of her dream. It was her doorbell. She glanced at the bedside clock. Seven thirty. She hadn’t gone to bed until three.

Sierra had already sprinted down the stairs barking furiously at the closed front door as Teri clambered out of bed and slipped on a robe. She went to the front door hesitantly, expecting to see the sheriff. Instead, Josh Gibbs stood red-eyed and haggard on her porch.

“Oh, Josh, come in,” Teresa said with a rush of emotion, opening the door, reaching out to take his arm and draw him inside. “I didn’t get a chance to talk to you last night. I’m
so
sorry about your father. I can’t begin to tell you how awful I feel. I can’t believe anyone would hurt Gus—”

Teresa broke off immediately, realizing she was babbling while Josh’s face remained like stone. Her hand dropped from his arm. “Would you like a cup of coffee?” she asked.

“I want to talk to you,” he said without emotion.

“Yes, of course.” Teresa suddenly felt absurdly guilty, as if she’d killed Gus. “I’m sorry we couldn’t talk last night, but everything was such a mess and we were all so shocked.…”

Josh nodded as if he was supposed to respond, not as if the movement came naturally. “Shocked, yes.” He swallowed. “I guess I could drink a cup of coffee.”

“It’ll just take ten minutes for me to put on a pot. Do you want to come in the kitchen?”

“I’ll stay out here, ma’am, in the living room with the dog.”

“Ma’am.” “The dog.” Not “Miss Farr” or “Sierra.” Teresa realized Josh’s world had been rocked last night. Still, the stiffness of his manner unnerved her. She fumbled with the coffeemaker and spilled grounds on the counter. She knew she should go back and talk to Josh while the coffee dripped, but instead she paced around the kitchen until the last drop of coffee hissed into the pot. Three minutes later, she carried a tray with full cups of coffee, sugar, and cream into the living room and made a great fuss of preparing each cup. Afterward, though, she was forced to sit down and face Josh.

“You said you wanted to talk to me,” she dived in. “I suppose you want to know how I found your father—the circumstances, I mean.” Josh nodded and Teresa started with Mac banging on her door to tell her about the panicked Eclipse, their capture of the horse, then the discovery of Gus’s body in the stall. “I have no idea who let out Eclipse or who could have… hurt your father,” Teresa ended weakly, thinking she sounded as if she were more coldly self-concerned with conveying her innocence than with trying to comfort Josh.

He stared into his coffee cup as if he could see an answer in its depths. Finally, he began to talk, almost more to himself than to her. “One of my friends got a new stereo system and I went to his house to see it. He picked me up because Dad said he might need the car later.”

“For what?” Teri asked sharply.

“He didn’t say. In fact, I didn’t even notice that he said he might
need
the car. It was the sheriff last night who jumped on the word. I don’t think it’s important. Dad probably just said that because he didn’t like for me to argue with him, and he wanted me to realize that if I moved out like I planned, I wouldn’t have it as easy as I did living with him.” Josh half-smiled. “He didn’t want to live alone after being with me and my mother for so long, although he and Ma didn’t really get along. I guess you know all about them, though.”

“No, Josh, I don’t know anything about your parents’ relationship,” Teresa said carefully, remembering how Josh had looked when Gus had been talking to her about his feelings for young Marielle.

“Well, he wasn’t happy with her and he tried to hide it, but he couldn’t. Ma was real resentful. Bitter. Hurt.” Josh looked directly into Teresa’s eyes. “I don’t blame her.”

Teresa felt acutely embarrassed, as if she were overhearing an argument between Gus and his wife, Sarah. She didn’t understand why Josh was telling her this. Maybe there was no purpose, she thought. Maybe Josh, still shocked, was simply rambling.

Then Josh suddenly leaned forward. “Do you think the person who was on your porch night before last and left the night-light murdered my father?”

Teri had the impression Josh was trying to startle an admission from her—if not a verbal response, then a physical one that would betray her knowledge about what had happened to Gus. But she had no actual knowledge—only doubt and fear.

At that moment, while Josh still leaned toward her intently, Sierra leaped up and started barking, making both Josh and Teri jump. A few moments later, the doorbell rang again. Teresa tossed Josh a nervous smile. “Sierra is my early alarm system.” She stood up and headed toward the door, thinking distractedly, Dear God, I hope this isn’t the sheriff. I can’t face him.

But Kent stood on her porch, his face tense and strained. He plunged into the house, pushing Teresa aside as he demanded, “What the hell is going on around here? Why didn’t you call me? Gus Gibbs has been
murdered
? Here? In your
barn
?”

Teresa felt her face blanch. She motioned at Josh sitting rigidly on the couch. “Kent, Gus’s son is here. Please calm down—you’re upsetting both of us.”

“I’m upsetting
you
?” Kent blasted. “What about
me
?”

“What about you?” Teresa shot back. “This didn’t happen to you. You’re just throwing a fit because I didn’t call you last night, and now is not the time to be worrying about yourself! Didn’t you just hear me say this is Gus’s son, for God’s sake?”

Kent immediately seemed to shrink within his own skin. His face turned from white to red; he lowered his eyes, obviously trying to compose himself; then he moved toward Josh, hand extended. “Josh, I’m so very sorry about your father. I didn’t mean to come in here like… like I don’t know what. I was just stunned about your dad and worried about Teri. And about you, of course.”

Kent could have left that last part off, Teresa cringed mentally, because he obviously hadn’t given Josh a thought. Nevertheless, he thanked Kent for his false concern with the aplomb Teresa was certain she couldn’t have managed in the same situation.

“I suppose you’re busy making funeral arrangements,” Kent said.

“The medical examiner probably won’t release my father’s body for at least a couple of days,” Josh returned coolly.

“Oh, God. Of course.” Kent’s face turned redder. “I just thought maybe you were making arrangements for your father with Teri.”

“I can make arrangements for my father by myself,” Josh went on in the cool, composed tone. “I’m here because I wanted to ask Miss Farr about the person who was on her porch the other night.” He stared at Kent, who looked blank. “The person who left that horse-shaped night-light.”

Oh no, Teresa thought as Kent’s gaze flashed to her. She purposely hadn’t told him about her night visitor or the return of Snowflake. He was volatile enough after Roscoe Byrnes’s announcement that he hadn’t killed Hugh and Wendy. “What is he talking about?” Kent demanded of Teri.

“I had a prowler.” Teresa tried to make her voice as nonchalant as possible. “Josh scared him away.”

“A
prowler
?” Kent repeated as if she’d just said “a rapist.”

“Yes. Well, probably just a Peeping Tom.”

“Who was dressed in a black hooded coat and left a night-light at her door,” Josh added.

Kent gaped at Teresa. “Just like the person you thought you saw last night? The one you thought was
Mom
?”

Josh stared at her accusingly. “Did you see someone hanging around here last night? The same person who was on your porch, who left that light?”

“What the hell light are you talking about?” Kent nearly yelled. “Teri, what is going on?”

Sierra began barking at the uproar and Teresa held up her hands, desperate to quiet the three of them. “Stop it! All of you!” Sierra abruptly shut up, but Kent opened his mouth, ready to fire more questions at her. “Kent, I mean you, too!” Teri took a deep breath. “I saw someone on the porch night before last. He left something. Some kind of toy,” she said vaguely. “And Josh, I did see someone last night as I was driving home. They ran across the road and into the woods. Maybe it was the same person; maybe it wasn’t. I couldn’t really see—”

“You saw someone with a pale face and big eyes and long black hair,” Kent intervened. “You told me. You said it was
Mom
!”

“Okay, for a minute I thought it was Mom,” Teresa admitted. “But as you pointed out, Kent, I was upset, I was thinking about Mom, I only caught a glimpse—”

“But you
saw
someone.” Josh was on his feet now, his body trembling. “You didn’t say anything about that to the sheriff last night! What are you hiding?”

“I’m not hiding anything, Josh. Last night I was just so exhausted and upset, I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

Josh’s fists clenched in rage. “You weren’t too exhausted and upset to spend half the night with that guy you were with in the barn!”

Kent whirled on her. “What guy?”

“M-Mac.”

“Mac MacKenzie?” Kent shouted. “You spent the night with Mac MacKenzie?”

For a moment, Teresa almost cowered from the two furious men standing in her living room glaring at her. Then, slowly, she felt the heat of ire build within her. How dare these two males come into
her
home and start firing questions at her, putting her on the defensive,
yelling
at her, for heaven’s sake? She had done nothing wrong. In fact, she’d had a much bigger shock than Kent, and one almost as bad as Josh’s, yet they both seemed determined to make her feel guilty and embarrassed. It was outrageous and she wouldn’t stand for it another minute.

Teresa drew a deep breath and looked squarely first at Josh, then at Kent. “I really resent the way both of you are acting,” she said in a firm voice. “Josh, I am devastated about your father, and I did see someone running from this property last night, which I didn’t mention in the barn, but I have every intention of telling the sheriff today.

“And, Kent, as for Mac, he came by here because we’d had an argument at his club. I left in a hurry and he decided to follow me to settle things. On his way to the house, he saw Eclipse running loose. He was banging on the door while I was on the phone to you. We caught Eclipse and then we found Gus. I was shattered. He stayed with me until I thought I could sleep, which wasn’t for some time. I don’t owe you an explanation for Mac being here, but I gave you one anyway and I will thank you to back off and stop acting like Dad!”

Teresa’s last verbal jab at Kent hit home. He looked startled, then slightly ashamed as he silently acknowledged the truth of her comparison. He said nothing, however. He just stared at her.