Never Con a Corgi (30 page)

Yet nothing hurt. Her arms and legs kept moving. Her body seemed functional.

The shot had missed.

She stopped her zigzagging motion and raced for the house as the crow flies. She was out of range now. She had to be. Anna hadn't chased her, had she?

Leigh was sure she could hear the shouts of grown men somewhere behind her in the distance. But she kept running. When at last she neared the house, she could see someone coming toward her on the trail.

She no longer heard the children's voices. Where were they? Only one figure approached.

It was Aunt Bess.

Leigh closed the distance between them in a trice, tried to stop, and stumbled at the other woman's feet.

"Aunt Bess," she breathed. "The Pack! We've got to get them inside!"

"They're inside already; they're safe," Bess said quickly, her face as pale and anguished as Leigh had ever seen it. "Are
you
all right?"

"I—" Leigh considered. She had heard of people not realizing they'd been shot, but she didn't think she was one of them. She took another look down to make sure, and alarm spiked as she saw blood smeared everywhere—both on her arms and legs. But a quick swipe of her hands soon confirmed it—there were no bullet holes. Only a heck of a lot of scratches.

"We have to get inside," Leigh panted, trying to rise. "She shot at me... she may be following..."

"No, kiddo," Bess said soberly, her hands on her niece's shoulders. "Anna won't be coming here. I saw it on the monitor. She wasn't even aiming at you."

Leigh looked up.

Bess's eyes teared. "Anna shot herself."

Chapter 28

Leigh took another long, savoring drag of decaf. It was late. Very late. Ethan and Allison were tucked upstairs in Frances' sewing room, theoretically asleep, with Chewie snoring on the floor between them. Mathias and Lenna were with Lydie in her house next door. Everyone else in the family, plus Maura, was gathered in the Koslow's living room decompressing over hot drinks and warm apple pie. Everyone except Gil, Leigh noted. He had been present a moment ago, but must have slipped away.

"Are you sure Allison is asleep?" Leigh asked her husband, who had just returned from his third child reconnaissance trip up the stairs.

"As sure as I can be without poking her and waking her up," Warren answered. He returned to Leigh's side, where she sat on the couch with her swollen, smarting legs propped up on her father's favorite ottoman. Warren had been hovering at her side, quite uncharacteristically, all evening.

She was rather enjoying it.

"I can't believe Allison is upset that she didn't guess about Anna," Leigh commented with a sigh. "How on earth could she? None of us did."

"I'm the one who should feel responsible," Bess said ruefully. "I knew the woman was a strange bird, but I never would have thought—"

"Don't you dare blame yourself, Bess," Maura said firmly. "She fooled everybody. Peterson and I both interviewed her, and we missed the signs. Maybe if you'd known her back then, when she was still married, you'd have had a clearer picture. But Anna was right about one thing. People do tend to underestimate the elderly. Especially women."

"I still don't see," Randall said calmly from his leather armchair in the corner, "why Allison was asking about female serial killers, if she didn't suspect Anna."

Over in the loveseat, Cara let out a sigh. "Leigh and I figured that out," she offered. "Allison overheard us talking one morning in the kitchen, when I was worrying about Diana doing something to frame Gil. I'm not sure exactly what we said, but what Allison
heard
was that some woman was out to get Gil, and she assumed it was the same person who had killed Brandon."

"She was surprised we weren't doing more to protect her uncle," Leigh said.

"Ah," Randall noted. "The bulletproof vest."

"Exactly," Leigh confirmed. "I do believe she would have ordered one herself, if she had a credit card."

"I just wish she would have told us what she was thinking," Warren said.

Leigh sighed. "Well, I suppose we were asking for that, the way we tiptoed around the whole subject of murder. She could see how uptight I was, and the way I flipped out over those pictures on the internet..."

Warren smiled sadly. "So she was protecting our delicate sensibilities."

Leigh nodded. "Speaking of which," she turned to Bess, "thank you again for keeping the Pack out of the fray tonight. I'm sorry you had to see what you did."

Bess shuddered. "So am I, believe me. And when I recover, I plan to be plenty miffed at you for thinking I would let those children go anywhere near that pond."

"I know," Leigh apologized, "I'm sorry. But once I saw the monitor, I could barely think straight."

Bess had, as it turned out, left a note for Leigh and Cara in the kitchen, telling them that she and the Pack were headed over the hill—the opposite direction from the pond—to nose around some of the abandoned houses Lyle had left in his wake. When they returned to the house, Bess had let the kids play in the yard while she presumably went inside to see Leigh, but instead got an eyeful on the monitor, tuning in just as Anna stepped back into the frame with the gun pointed off camera. But rather than turn to jelly when her neighbor turned the gun on herself and pulled the trigger, Bess had unplugged the monitor, locked the kids up inside, grabbed her phone to call the police, and then run out after Leigh herself.

"You were amazing, Aunt Bess," Cara agreed. "We all owe you so much." She shuddered herself. "I hate to think of what might have happened if the Pack had seen what you saw."

Bess took another swig of her herbal tea, which Leigh was pretty sure Randall had supplemented with his secret stash from the basement. Her father didn't drink a drop himself, but living with Frances required certain talents in the pharmaceutical department. "Don't worry about me, kiddos," Bess responded. "I'll be jus-sst fine."

Leigh and Cara exchanged a glance. It was a good thing Bess would be staying at Lydie's tonight.

"Maura?" Gil's voice came from the dining room doorway, where he stood holding his phone. "That call I just took was from Courtney."

The detective straightened in her chair. "Where is she?"

"Back in Chicago," he answered, coming and joining his wife on the loveseat. "She wanted me to find out if she's in any trouble here. For leaving the county, that is."

Maura let out a snort. "That woman has far worse to worry about than Peterson—but I'd advise her to call him, pronto. Has she been in contact with the boyfriend?"

Gil nodded. "She was hanging out in an airport bar, waiting for a flight to Nevada, when the evening news reports broke. She turned her phone back on, and he texted her. Long story short, they agreed to meet in the airport parking lot. After they talked, she switched her ticket for a flight to Chicago, and he drove back in his car."

"So they're back together?" Cara asked incredulously.

Gil released a tired breath. "I wouldn't say that, no. She confessed what she'd suspected him of, apologized for running, claimed she still wanted to be with him. But she doesn't have any intention of continuing to see him. This business with Brandon really did terrify her. And although he obviously didn't murder her husband, she's not at all sure he's never murdered anybody else."

"He might not
let
her go," Maura said soberly.

Surprisingly, Gil smiled. "Funny thing about that. Apparently the only reason this guy came to Pittsburgh was because he looked up Lyle online and found out he'd just been murdered. He thought Courtney did it."

Leigh's jaw dropped. "So she could be with
him?"

"What an ego!" Cara exclaimed.

"Indeed," Gil agreed. "He thought that's why she was running scared. He figured she was only being coy and evasive in her texts with him because she was afraid of the police getting her phone records. What he wanted to do was catch up with her in person."

"To tell her how proud he was?" Cara asked.

"Evidently," Gil continued. "But apparently he wasn't too impressed once he learned the truth. Courtney thinks
that
disappointment has already accomplished her next goal—to disenchant him of her charms."

Maura stood with a groan. "So many crimes. So few charges to be filed."

"What?" Leigh asked, surprised. "What about the boyfriend?"

The detective exhaled. "I wouldn't hold my breath, Koslow. Gil's office is in a public building. The guy didn't force his way in, and a good lawyer could argue that the security guards had no right to forcibly detain him. He might get charged with simple assault for the guard he plowed over, but the DA's office isn't likely to knock themselves out pursuing that, considering the effort it would take to extradite the man, whoever he is. We still don't have a name on him."

"The important thing is," Frances proclaimed, "whatever his name or occupation, he poses no threat to this family."

"No," Gil agreed. "No worries, there." He squirmed awkwardly a moment, then faced his wife. "Diana Saxton did tell him that Courtney and I were... having an affair. Just to make trouble for me."

Cara jerked upright, but Gil hastened to soothe her. "It's all right. Courtney denied it, and he believed her. In fact, she said he seemed rather... amused by Diana's ploy."

Cara's eyes narrowed. She turned to Maura. "And Diana? Please do
not
tell me there are no charges that can be slapped on her!"

Maura's lips twisted. "Peterson will talk to the DA. But don't get your hopes up. The ballistics report on the gun came back negative, of course. It wasn't the murder weapon. So even if we could prove that she took the gun from Brandon's apartment and Gil's gym bag from his car, and left them both in the health club—which so far we can't—none of it was actual crime scene evidence. Peterson's tried to nail her for the bomb threat, but it looks like she used a disposable phone; he's got nothing to go on. There might be something related to interfering with an official investigation, but even that's iffy. Fact is, she had nothing whatsoever to do with Brandon's murder. She's just been screwing with all of us for the fun of it."

Cara's face turned dangerously red.

The room turned so quiet Leigh could hear Chewie's snores through the ceiling. Bess let out a hiccup. The mantle clock ticked.

Finally, Cara's unpleasant color diffused. She took a long, deep breath. "Well, I'm done thinking about her," she proclaimed, slapping her thighs. "No more negative energy—that's done. The wench will trip herself up eventually. Somehow, someway, she'll get what's coming to her."

Leigh watched as a tiny spark of determination lit up both of Maura's baby blue eyes.

"Yes," the detective said evenly. "I do believe she will."

Epilogue

Two weeks later

Diana Saxton sat back in her zebra-striped desk chair and sighed.

The job that wifey-poo had paid her so generously to accomplish was done at last—no thanks to the snippy business guru and his sniveling accountant friend. Two worse whiners, the world had never seen. She could have done the work in five days if it weren't for their anal-retentive badgering. As it was, she'd had to work every hour of the two weeks Courtney had already paid her for.

And she still hadn't found a new target.

With all the fuss over Brandon's murder, she wasn't at all sure how she was going to. The once promising Lyle Development, Inc. was no more—or at least it would be no more, once the bankruptcy lawyers got through with it. The undeveloped properties Brandon had bought would be auctioned off to the highest bidder, with the proceeds going straight to his creditors. She had thought the Nicholson project might be revived, since the primary holdout, a.k.a., Brandon's murderer, had conveniently bought herself a one-way ticket to hell. But
no
, wouldn't you know it! The old bat had left all her property to another old bat—that relative of Gil's, no less—and old bat #2 wouldn't grant access if hell did freeze over. All those now-worthless plots of Brandon's would be divided back up and sold to more insignificant little people to put more insignificant little houses on.

"Insignificant" didn't interest her.

Neither did "little."

She pulled a file from her drawer and addressed a ragged nail. She couldn't stand this town much longer. She had been quite good, lately, and the strain was getting to her. She had cooperated with the police—been ever so helpful, ever so innocently unsuspecting of their motives. They couldn't make a single charge on her stick, and they knew it. She was free to leave town, now. The dance had reached its end.

She sighed once more.

It was funny how things worked out. She'd never had a clue who'd killed Brandon. She had thought—when she bothered to think about it—that it was probably some nefarious business contact from the past. Someone he'd tried to steal from, someone he'd tried to blackmail. Regrettably, Brandon had not been in the habit of telling her his secrets.

But she did know one thing for certain. Brandon Lyle would not have been pleased at the nature of his demise. Being shot by a disgruntled business associate was one thing. A vicious attack by a jealous lover—all the better. But being shot in the back by a crazy little old lady with a vintage 1950s Smith & Wesson thirty-eight?

OMG! The man would
die
.

Diana chuckled at her own joke. It was quite comical, really. And to think that the murderer got caught red-handed, out digging up
another
grave, by the same woman who had found Brandon's body! What was it with Gil's in-laws, anyway? Diana had never actually met Cara's cousin Leigh, but she had to admit she was curious. That chick had some seriously weird karma going on.

Diana tossed her nail file back in the drawer, and her eyes caught sight of something interesting. A white business card lay in the tray, just under her purple highlighter. She reached in and pulled it out.

Bruce Anjelo.

She smiled as the image replayed in her mind of his stunning body blow to the security guard. He had a stunning body, period. She had thought of it often.