Secret Sisters (26 page)

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

Madeline stood at the rail and watched Cooper Island slide out of sight. The hood of her jacket was pulled up around her face. Jack stood beside her, his big frame blocking some of the chilled wind coming off the dark water.

“You went too far,” she said quietly. “You made yourself a human target when you threatened Webster personally.”

“Had to be done,” Jack said.

That was all he said.

She looked at him through the lenses of her sunglasses. She couldn't see his eyes because he, too, was wearing dark glasses. But she had learned a lot about Jack in recent days. He had retreated into his own personal no-go zone. She wanted to force her way past the invisible barrier, but she had no clue how to go about it. No clue if it was even possible. And no clue about how Jack would react if she was successful.

In the past she had always stopped at the invisible barricade because she knew she had no right to intrude.

But this time was different. He was her lover now.

“Why did you do it?” she asked. “Why not just let the authorities handle Webster? I never asked you to put yourself in his sights.”

“You hired me to deal with the problem. I told you at the start of this thing that I would use my best judgment. Until now you've been reasonable about most of my tactics. But today you insisted on going with me to see Webster. You changed the dynamic.”

Understanding slammed through her, leaving her momentarily stunned.

“You made that last threat because of me, didn't you?” she said. “Because I'm the one who lost control and accused him of murdering Grandma and Tom.”

“It didn't make any difference in the end.”

“If I had kept my mouth shut, you could have stopped the brinksmanship game with the evidence and the news that the authorities were in possession of those photos. Webster would have focused on the problem of dealing with the FBI. Instead, he's going to target you now.”

“Maybe not.”

“What do you mean, maybe not? You saw him. He'll do whatever he can to get at you.”

“He's going to have his hands full for a while,” Jack said. “I'm sure his first thought will be to get out of the country. He's a survivor. He won't hang around to take his chances with the authorities. He may hate my guts, but he won't risk arrest just to get revenge against me. He'll tell himself he should go to ground now.”

“I see what you mean.” She took a deep breath, aware of a tiny frisson of relief. “His first consideration will be his own survival.”

“Right now he's probably giving orders to get the yacht fueled and readied for an ocean voyage. If Webster makes it on board he'll be in international waters within hours. He'll be untouchable as long as he stays out of the country. He knows that. I'm sure he made contingency plans long ago.”

“Offshore accounts?”

“He would have been a fool not to make arrangements for a quick retreat.”

“Good point.” She thought about that. “I don't know whether to hope he gets arrested or that he escapes to some country or island that doesn't have an extradition treaty. If he gets picked up by the authorities, he'll probably make bail within hours.”

“In which case he might still be able to get to the yacht.”

“So, either way, the odds are he won't go to prison.”

“I doubt it.”

“Then what?”

“One thing I've learned in my business, Madeline. Sometimes it's a mistake to look too far down the road. There are times in life when you can't be sure of the pattern. You have to meet circumstances as they are.”

She used one hand to hold her wind-tangled hair away from her face.

“That sounds like the same approach you take to your personal relationships,” she said.

He smiled. “Saves me having to pay a private investigator to do a background check on all of my dates.”

“That,” she said, “was a low blow.”

“Yes, it was. I apologize.”

She turned toward him. “Jack, sometimes you scare me.”

“I apologize for that, too.”

“Not because I'm afraid you'll hurt me.”

“Never.”

She finished the sentence in her head.
You scare me because I'm afraid I'm falling in love with you.

This wasn't the time or the place for words. Jack wasn't ready for words. She reached out and took his hand, instead. For an instant she thought she had pushed too far.

But his powerful fingers closed very carefully, very firmly around hers.

She did not feel trapped or crushed or pinned like a butterfly. Instead she experienced an exhilarating rush of
rightness
.
We are stronger together,
she thought.
When will you realize that, Jack?

Together they watched Cooper Island slide into the mist.

After a while a stray thought jolted through her.

“What did you mean when you said
if
Webster makes it on board the yacht?” she asked.

“I'm not sure yet. What I know is that we're witnessing the implosion of an entire family. It's like watching a volcano that is starting to erupt. You want to be sure you're not standing too close to the scene. That's why we're going home to Arizona.”

“Home sounds good.”

“Yes, it does.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

Egan carried a pile of shirts across the bedroom and dumped them into the suitcase. He shot Louisa a savage look and went back to the closet for more clothes. He realized that he hated her now as much as he hated Jack Rayner. They would both pay, he thought.

“This is all your doing, you stupid, crazy bitch,” he said. “Everything, including the death of your precious Xavier. You had me followed that night in San Diego, didn't you?
Didn't you?
The PI who took the photos had your initials and your old phone number in his damn notebook.”

Louisa stood near the door, clutching her purse.

“What photos?” she said, her voice very tight.

“Pictures of me in the house with Seavers and that little slut he was sleeping with. Pictures of pages from a notebook. Pictures that could send me to prison for the rest of my life.”

She took a breath. “So you did murder them for the stock-picking program, didn't you? I always wondered, but I told myself you wouldn't have gone that far. I told myself that not even you would have crossed that line. But I knew. Deep down inside, I knew.”

Egan looked at her with disgust. “We were partners every step of the way, Louisa. Remember?”

“In those days I was still hoping that you loved me, at least a little.” Louisa's voice steadied. “Yes, I hired a private investigator to follow you around on your visits to your whores. I never got his final report. Norman Purvis billed me on a weekly basis for nearly two months and then he just disappeared. I assumed I had been scammed.”

“That bastard you hired was the one who started blackmailing me twenty years ago.”

“You told me that someone was trying to blackmail you, but you implied that it had to do with some insider trading issue.”

“Bullshit. You knew it was Purvis, didn't you? The PI you hired goes missing and the next thing you know I'm being blackmailed. You must have guessed that Purvis had found something and was using it against me. But you never said a word.”

She ignored that. “What happened to Purvis?”

“How the hell should I know? For the first two years it was just a slow bleed. I kept telling myself that one day I would find him and get rid of him. Then my fund took off and Purvis got greedy. He demanded a couple of million to be transferred into an offshore account. I agreed to pay it but only if I got the photos. I had it all arranged. I got him to agree to make the transfer here on the island. Figured once I knew he was here I would be able to control the situation.
But he never showed.
”

“And you never heard from him again.”

“At first I told myself that he'd lost his nerve. After time went by with no word from him I decided that maybe one of his other blackmail victims had taken him out. That's probably what did happen.”

“But why would the pictures and his notebook turn up now?”

“I don't have all the answers, damn it.”

Louisa had a death grip on her handbag. “Where are you going, Egan?”

“Isn't it obvious?” He zipped the suitcase shut. “I'm getting as far away as possible.”

“You're going to abandon this family?”

He wanted to scream at her, but at the last second he remembered that he had other, more effective weapons at his command. He had always been able to charm his targets.

“It's best if I leave, Louisa,” he said, gentling his voice. “Don't you see? It's the only way to deflect the attention of the authorities and the media. This way it will be all about me—the evil financier who murdered a colleague for a stock-picking program nearly two decades ago, deceived his family, friends, and business associates for years, made a fortune, and vanished when the truth came to light.”

“That's an interesting narrative. But what about Travis and the campaign? You can't just leave him here to pick up the pieces.”

“It won't do him any good if I stay. He'll be in a much better position to manage the fallout if I disappear. Don't worry about Travis. He'll land on his feet. Took me long enough to realize that he's the one who got my talent for surviving.”

“What do you mean?”

“Get real, Louisa. Hasn't it dawned on you that Travis will be the last one standing when this is all over? Don't you see? He was the one who got rid of Xavier last night. It must have been him.”

“No. Xavier was his brother.”

“Ever heard the story of Cain and Abel? Think about it. Xavier was always a problem for Travis. It was only a matter of time before Xavier did something that would have ruined the campaign. Travis must have realized that he had no choice but to get rid of his brother. The only surprising thing is that he had the guts to do it. Should have given him more credit.”

“You don't know that he murdered Xavier. You can't possibly know that.”

“It's the only logical explanation for what happened to Xavier last night.” Egan hoisted the suitcase off the bed. “I don't care what the campaign people are saying, we both know he wasn't a suicide. And I sure as hell didn't rig that boat to blow sky-high. It must have been Travis. Now get out of my way.”

“No,” Louisa said. “I won't let you abandon this family. Not after everything you've done. I've worked too hard. Put up with too much for too long. It almost drove me crazy, you know—your affairs, the realization that you were incapable of loving anyone, not even your own sons. Knowing that you routinely cheated and lied.”

“And made a hell of a lot of money. Don't forget that part. You liked the money, didn't you? You liked the things it bought you, right up to and including Travis's campaign.”

“Which you have now destroyed.”

“You're the one who had me followed that night, remember? If it hadn't been for you, the past would have stayed buried. You brought this disaster down on all of us.”

From out of nowhere a disturbing calm settled on Louisa. Egan's intuition suddenly kicked in. He needed to get out of the house. Now.

“You're right,” Louisa said. “What is happening to this family is my fault. I'm the one who must do what I can to repair the damage.”

She reached into the handbag and took out a gun.
His
gun. He stared at her, incredulous.

“You think killing yourself will solve all of Travis's problems?” he asked. “Fine. Go for it.”

“You don't understand,” Louisa said. Her voice was very calm and steady now. “I'm not going to kill myself.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

Breaking . . . Egan Webster, founder of a hedge fund empire and father of a potential congressional candidate, was found dead in the family compound on Cooper Island, Washington, earlier today. According to the police, cause of death was multiple gunshot wounds. The victim's wife, Louisa Webster, has been taken into custody. Sources report that she has confessed to the killing.

In the wake of Webster's death, rumors of past improprieties related to the operations of his hedge fund and questions concerning its current financial status have begun to surface. The FBI has opened an investigation.

There is also speculation that a murder investigation into the unsolved deaths of two of Webster's former colleagues will be reopened . . .

Madeline looked up from the computer screen. “I can't believe it. Louisa shot Egan right after we left on the ferry.”

Daphne and Abe had been waiting for them at Sea-Tac Airport. The four of them were gathered around a small table in the first-class
lounge, waiting for the flight to Phoenix. Abe had collected a small mountain of free snacks on a plate that he had placed in the center of the table—little plastic-wrapped packets of white and yellow cheese and crackers, small packages of carrots, some hummus dip, and cookies. They were all drinking coffee.

“Are you really shocked?” Jack asked. “She probably found him packing to take off in the yacht. It was the last straw.”

“He was going to leave her and Travis and Travis's wife to deal with the wreckage,” Madeline said.

“Webster pushed Louisa one step too far,” Daphne said. “So she shot him.”

“When you look at it from that angle, I suppose it isn't surprising,” Madeline said. She sat back in her chair. “Maybe the real question is, why did it take her so long to do it?”

“She had probably made her peace with her marriage,” Daphne said. “After all their years together they had formed an alliance. Webster provided a financial empire and, in turn, she gave him a son who was on the road to a seat in Congress and, eventually, maybe even the White House.”

“But it was all built on lies and murder,” Abe said. “Someone discovered the truth about the past and set out to clean it up and, as a side benefit, get rid of the rather nasty problem of Xavier at the same time.”

“My money's on Travis,” Jack said.

Madeline looked at him. “You think he's the one who set events in motion?”

“I think,” Jack said, “that Travis Webster is a chip off the old block—Egan Webster's true son and heir. When he decided to go into politics he did some serious opposition research on his own family and came up with the same troublesome anomaly that we did when we went looking—his father's sudden, meteoric rise in the investment world.”

“He must have stumbled across the mystery of Carl Seavers's murder
and started looking under rocks,” Madeline said. “I wonder how he got as far as Porter, or, rather, Norman Purvis.”

Jack helped himself to a packet of cheese. “Remember, Travis had an inside source of information—his mother.”

“If Travis confronted Louisa with questions about the past, she might have confided that once upon a time she hired a private investigator to follow Egan. And maybe she happened to mention that she never got the results of that investigation because Purvis disappeared.”

“With that much background information, Travis would have been on his way to piecing together the whole story,” Jack said. “He must have figured out that Purvis headed for Cooper Island and vanished shortly after arriving there. I'll bet his initial conclusion was that his father had killed Purvis and dumped the body.”

“It would have been a logical assumption,” Abe said.

“How did he figure out that wasn't what happened?” Daphne asked. “Assuming we're right, what led Travis to conclude that Purvis made it as far as the hotel before he disappeared?”

“It's not like there would have been a lot of options when it came to places to stay on Cooper Island,” Madeline pointed out. “Eighteen years ago, the Aurora Point Hotel was the only large inn on the island. The rest of the places were small B-and-Bs. It's impossible to remain anonymous at a B-and-B.”

“So Travis concluded that Porter-Purvis had checked into the Aurora Point eighteen years ago but never checked out?” Jack shook his head. “Maybe. But it seems like a stretch. I'll bet he turned up something much more conclusive.”

“The dead sister.” Abe straightened abruptly in his chair, put aside a cracker, wiped his fingers, and started tapping very fast on his computer. “The one who died from an overdose a few months ago. Remember her? It was her car that Porter-Purvis was driving the night he checked in at the Aurora Point. Here we go. Sandra Purvis.”

“That's it,” Jack said. He looked satisfied. “Travis Webster tracked down the sister and got enough information to convince him that Purvis had made it to the Aurora Point before he disappeared. He then realized that the only person around who might know what happened eighteen years earlier was the eccentric caretaker.”

“Travis used Ramona to cozy up to Tom Lomax and pump him for information about Porter-Purvis,” Madeline said. “She hit the mother lode when Tom told her about the briefcase in the wall, the one that contained an insurance policy.”

“But why would he do that?” Daphne asked.

“I'm just winging it here,” Jack said. “But I can envision a scenario in which Tom thought he could use the contents of the briefcase to blackmail Egan Webster.”

Abe paused in midbite. “Why would Lomax suddenly decide to blackmail Webster?”

“Because he thought he could get money out of Webster,” Jack said patiently. “A lot of money.”

“Again, why?” Abe said. “By all accounts Lomax didn't give a damn about money.”

Madeline picked up her coffee cup. “Tom had discovered a long-lost granddaughter. Maybe he wanted to do what a lot of grandparents try to do for their offspring—provide an inheritance.”

They sat quietly for a time, absorbing the story.

“Can't prove some of it, not yet,” Jack said. “But most of the pieces fit.”

“It's so sad,” Daphne whispered. “Poor Tom. He must have been so thrilled to discover a granddaughter.”

“A secret isn't a secret if more than one person knows it,” Jack said.

“Yeah, yeah, we know,” Abe said. “You need a new slogan, boss. That one is getting old.”

“It's not a slogan, just a fact,” Jack said. “I think we've got a pretty good handle on the case, but there are a few loose ends to tidy up.”

“Such as?” Daphne asked.

Madeline tapped the side of her coffee cup a couple of times. “The mysterious Ramona Owens.”

“Right.” Jack drank some of his coffee. “I'd sure like to know where she came from and how she hooked up with Travis Webster.”

“Well, I'm not an ace detective like some people at this table,” Madeline said. “But maybe—just maybe—Travis inherited other aspects of his father's less-than-sterling character.”

Daphne leaned back in her chair and shoved her fingers into the front pockets of her jeans. “You mean, maybe Travis is a womanizer, too?”

“Just like dear old Dad,” Madeline said. She shuddered. “If we're right, he seduced her into playing the role of accomplice and then murdered her when she was no longer of any use to him.”

“The Websters are one vicious clan,” Abe observed. He unwrapped a packet of cookies and put them on Daphne's plate. “Marrying into it must be a lot like marrying into a mob family.”

“It's starting to look like Travis is the meanest one of the bunch,” Jack said.

“If we're right about any of this, there's a very good reason to believe he's a murderer several times over,” Madeline said. “Think the FBI will figure it out?”

“My buddy Joe has enough to run with now,” Jack said. “It may take him a while to sort it all out, but I know him. He won't stop until he gets to the end.”

“If Travis is not just the meanest but also the smartest member of the Webster family, he's probably already on board the family yacht, headed for some convenient island,” Madeline said.

Jack unwrapped another packet of cheese. “Maybe.”

Madeline decided that was all they were going to get out of him for now. She smiled at Daphne.

“It will be good to go home. You can stay with me until all the loose ends are snipped off. We've got a lot of catching up to do.”

Daphne smiled. “That sounds like a most excellent plan.”

“You two can spend all the time you want catching up,” Jack said around a mouthful of cheese. “But you're not going home, Madeline. At least not to spend the night. You and Daphne will stay at my folks' house until I get the all-clear from Joe.”

Madeline looked at him. “Why can't we stay at my place?”

“Better security at my parents' house,” Jack said.

Daphne frowned. “You're really concerned about the loose ends?”

“It's always the loose ends that cause the most trouble,” Jack said.