Vows of Silence (5 page)

“We’re all in this together,” Cassidy said with uncharacteristic softness. “It doesn’t matter who killed him. He’s dead and that’s the only thing that matters. We all wanted him dead, and we all participated in covering up what happened. We are all equally guilty. No one is more or less to blame. And each of us will do whatever it takes to protect one another. Shall we reiterate our vow?”

“I swear.” Kira was the first to speak up, her eyes glittering with fear.

Melinda nodded solemnly. “I swear.”

Lacy wanted to believe they were doing the right thing. She wanted desperately to trust Cassidy’s judgment, just like they always had, but part of her couldn’t pretend away the truth any longer. One of them had killed a man. All of them had covered up the murder, making sure the evidence would never be found. What they’d done was wrong….

But it was too late to back out now.

It was done, end of story.

“I swear,” she said with a reluctance she could no more hide than she could stop breathing.

Kira offered up a big, however shaky, smile and a subject change. “Melinda, I’ll be keeping you company today. Anything special you’d like to do.”

She sounded upbeat and as calm as the proverbial cucumber, but Lacy didn’t miss the little quiver in her voice or the way she kept glancing over at Deputy Brad Brewer. Cassidy had to have noticed it, too—she never missed anything—but she didn’t say a word. Instead she picked at her doughnut.

Enough. Lacy had to stop looking for conspiracies among her friends. She had to pull it together.

“Lacy, you’ll relieve Kira at about seven?” Cassidy inquired.

“Sure.” Yes, she definitely intended to do her part. She’d caused enough trouble this morning. It was time to suck it up and do what had to be done.

Melinda shook her head, the move so weary no one would have noticed had she not groaned at the same time. “Really, I feel like such a burden to you guys. I’ll be okay by myself. You don’t have to stay with me night and day.”

Cassidy turned to Melinda, her expression unexpectedly gentle for a woman so stern in nature. “Melinda, you’re not a burden to any of us. We want to protect you. You’re vulnerable right now. Let’s not keep going over and over the issue. We have to be careful. We don’t want you alone if the chief shows up at your door like he did Lacy’s.”

Melinda nodded, surrendering. “You’re right. I know.” She tried to smile, but the effort failed miserably. “I just don’t want to put anyone out.”

“We love you, Mel.” Lacy felt a genuine smile spread across her lips. This was the one good thing in all the insanity, a friendship that had endured through the years. She had to stop selfishly obsessing about her own feelings. “You couldn’t possibly put us out.”

Just as some of the tension lifted, Cassidy had to toss out another directive. “You steer clear of Summers,” she ordered Lacy. “I don’t know why he’s singled you out, but he’ll have his reasons. I don’t want you inadvertently giving him any additional fuel to fire his suspicions. He can’t possibly have anything more than a hunch.”

“I believe he used to have a crush on Lace,” Mel put in thoughtfully. “He stared at her all through art class, as I recall. It’s a miracle he ever finished a project. I remember thinking how sweet the whole thing was.”

Lacy refused to entertain the memories the comment stirred. She couldn’t look back. Getting caught up in what she and Rick had felt all those years ago would be a mistake. She had to stay away from him just like Cassidy said. And no one could know what had happened between them…not right now anyway. She already felt as if she’d been singled out as the
one
in this nightmare by those she trusted the most.

“Whether he had a crush on Lacy or not,” Cassidy allowed, “we don’t need him trying to use that against us. No one knows our secret. We have to keep it that way.”

The voice of last night’s caller slammed into Lacy’s brain. She had to tell them about the call! How could she have forgotten? Maybe because it was easier to forget than to analyze what the caller’s words no doubt meant. God, she hated to stir up more conflicting emotions.

“There’s something else,” she said quietly, dread welling all over again. Would the fact that she hadn’t already mentioned the call look suspicious to Cassidy?
Stop it!
she ordered.

The collective attention of those seated around the table settled heavily on her and Lacy would have gladly cut off her right arm not to have to bring this up. She’d caused enough hard feelings this morning. But she couldn’t pretend it hadn’t happened. Not when it could be the real thing…a true threat.

“After Rick left last night I received a phone call.”

Lacy moistened her lips, wished her throat didn’t feel all tight and parched. “The caller asked if I was Lacy Jane Oliver.” Lacy cleared her throat, could hardly breathe. “I said yes, thinking it could be a call about my parents. I was…worried they might have been in some sort of accident.”

“But the call wasn’t about your parents?” Cassidy guessed, her guard going up once more to conceal whatever her true feelings might be. Even her tone gave away nothing. But Lacy could feel the doubt expanding between them like a bottomless void. She was suspect of Lacy’s story even before she heard it.

Refusing to be dragged back into that whole paranoid frame of mind again, she forged ahead. “No. He or she—” she shook her head “—it was hard to tell if it was a man or a woman. The voice was so low and distant, almost distorted, like a bad cell-phone connection. Anyway, whoever it was said I should be very, very afraid. For a split second I thought maybe it was a prank but then he said
I know your secret.
”

Another long beat of nerve-racking silence passed before any of them found their voices again.

“But that’s…” Kira looked at each of them in turn. “That’s impossible. No one knows.”

“Could someone have seen you guys…?” Melinda moistened her trembling lips. “You know…”

“No one saw us,” Cassidy said flatly. “If someone had seen or had known anything we’d all be behind bars serving out our sentences.” She leveled her most intimidating stare on Lacy. “This is a hoax. You say the call came in right after Summers left?”

Lacy nodded. “Almost immediately.”

“Damn him,” Cassidy swore. “He’s trying to scare you. He can’t get away with that.”

“What do I do?” Lacy argued. “Tell him that his creepy calls about my secret are not going to work?”

“You don’t tell him anything,” Cassidy cautioned. “That’s exactly what he wants you to do. Ignore it.”

“But what if it’s not him?” Melinda leaned in close. “From what I’ve seen so far, Rick is a good chief of police. I can’t imagine he would stoop to this kind of underhanded tactic. Someone had to have seen what you did.”

Cassidy glanced around the diner as if worried that they were being watched. Deputy Brewer seemed to be focused on his breakfast. “Melinda,” she said, turning her attention back to the woman at her side, “you’re overreacting. No one saw us. If they had, they would have talked years ago. Don’t forget that Senator Ashland offered a sizable reward for any information on his missing son.”

Lacy had forgotten about that. Rumor had it that Charles, Senior, had even hired a private investigator in hopes of locating his son, but the man had found nothing. She wasn’t sure whether the four of them had simply been smart or extremely lucky.

Either way, Cassidy was correct. If someone had seen anything, they would certainly have cashed in on the reward ten years ago. But would Rick really go to such extremes to scare her?

“Remember,” Cassidy reminded, “this is his first murder case. He’s going to be working twenty-four/seven to solve it. Aside from Melinda, we—” she motioned to Kira, Lacy and herself “—are the most logical suspects. We all hated Charles for what he did to Melinda.”

Some of them hated him for other reasons as well, but Lacy kept that comment to herself. Nothing good could come of bringing up that past. Hurting Melinda further was the last thing she wanted to do.

“More coffee, ladies?”

The waitress’s question jerked Lacy back to the here and now. Apparently the whole group had been lost in their own thoughts.

“None for me,” she said, placing her hand over her cup.

“Come on, girls,” Cassidy urged, “let’s eat and enjoy. How often do we get together anymore?” She smiled broadly for the waitress. “The doughnut was great, but I’ll have the Betty special.”

“Me, too,” Kira piped up.

The Betty special consisted of two eggs, ham, biscuits, pan-fried potatoes and gravy. Lacy was sure she couldn’t handle a bite, much less a meal like that, on top of the worry churning in her belly.

“Just toast and orange juice,” she said when the waitress looked her way.

“Pancakes and more coffee,” Melinda announced, joining in. She smiled at the waitress and then said to those seated around the table, “My husband left me practically the same day we married. Why should I be sad now? Nothing’s changed, not really.”

The startled waitress hustled off to place their order. Lacy worked up a smile for her friend, but she was as surprised by Melinda’s odd comment as the waitress had been. If Kira or Cassidy thought anything of it they didn’t say a word. Maybe they thought it was for the best.

And perhaps it was. Lacy felt confused and uneasy with the whole situation. She’d struggled with what they’d done for ten long years. Having to face it now only sharpened the intensity of her regret.

But there was nothing she could do. It was done. Charles was dead and they were responsible. Assuaging her conscience would ruin not only her life, but also her friends’ as well. She wasn’t prepared to do that. Melinda’s children needed her.

The bell over the door broke into its tinny clatter, drawing Lacy’s attention in that direction. She’d tuned out the sound during the tenser portions of their meeting, but now, as the four of them grew somewhat relaxed again, her surroundings came back into full focus.

Rick Summers entered the diner and walked over to where his deputy, Brad Brewer, sat. The two men spoke for a few seconds before Rick’s attention drifted across the room to settle onto Lacy.

Every instinct warned her that he wasn’t here for breakfast, not really.

He was watching them…waiting for one of them to take a misstep.

As his intent gaze bored more fully into Lacy’s, she knew without doubt that she was the one he expected to falter.

And he intended to be right there waiting for the fall.

Chapter 5

“Y
ou gonna order, Chief?”

Rick dragged his attention from the four women seated across the diner. “In a minute.”

Brewer looked from Rick to the objects of his distraction. “Even before you told me what you wanted me to do, I had a feeling you didn’t ask to meet me here for the sake of a decent breakfast.”

No point arguing that. Rick had seen Lacy come into the diner. Mama Betty’s sat on the east side of the town square, directly across from his office. Since his office came with only one window, that was generally where his focus rested whenever he had something on his mind.

He’d known that Lacy’s friends wouldn’t be far behind her. The foursome had always traveled in a pack. Some fifteen years out of high school hadn’t changed that fact. But it wasn’t their cliquish behavior that nudged his curiosity. Nope. It was the likely subject of this morning’s get-together—his visit to Lacy the night before.

“You notice anything unusual?”

“Yep.” Brad downed a gulp of coffee. “Been some damn tense moments during their discussion, but they kept it too quiet to overhear anything.”

Brewer had always been able to anticipate Rick’s needs in a given situation. Rick had never appreciated that fact more than now. Not that he’d actually expected his deputy to overhear anything this morning. Rick had gotten just what he wanted: the climate between the ladies.

Tense.

That meant trouble.

He’d watched these ladies from afar since junior high school, maybe even before. He’d been infatuated with Lacy for as long as he could remember, for all the good it had done him. Not once in that time had he ever seen these four suffer a falling-out. Always United appeared to be their motto. Through thick and thin, they backed one another up.

That was how he knew for certain they were hiding something.

There wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell that Charles Ashland, Junior, had gotten himself murdered without one, and that would ultimately mean all, of them knowing it. He wasn’t ready to label one of them as the killer, but they knew something they weren’t telling. No two ways about that.

Lacy’s gaze collided with his and heat immediately seared his blood. Rick didn’t look away. He let her stare. He needed her to know he wasn’t backing off. But the move cost him. Every single muscle in his body went on edge, tightened unreasonably. It irritated him to no end that she still held that kind of power over him after all these years.

“Coffee, Chief?”

Rick smiled for Katie Jo, the waitress who always made it a point to take his order no matter where he sat in the diner. “Sure thing, Katie Jo. I’ll take the usual to go along with that fine-smelling brew.”

She grinned and blushed to the roots of her bottled-blond hair. “Coming right up.”

Katie Jo Hawkins had gone to school with him, as well, but she’d been a couple years behind him. She’d already been married twice, but that didn’t stop her from looking for the next available prospect before the ink was even dry on the last divorce decree. Well, at least she’d had the good sense not to have any children. The kids were always the ones who paid the highest price when things went sour. Maybe that was why Rick had opted to remain single.

After a three-year stint in the army, he’d chosen to focus on his career in law enforcement. He should have made time for college, but it just never worked out. Still, he’d done all right for himself. Probably folks like Lacy Jane Oliver wouldn’t think so, but then he’d never run in her circles. That wasn’t likely to change in this lifetime.

The women in question stood and made their way to the exit. He watched just to see if Lacy would look back.

And she did. He’d known she would. She was nervous. In that split second, he saw the uncertainty, the stark fear shining there.

Whatever she had to hide, it scared her to death.

All he had to do was figure out what button to push to make her talk. She was his best bet. Or maybe he just wanted it to be her. He couldn’t deny the nagging desire for a little revenge. After all, she’d used him that one time, let him feel she was his for that one moment. Then she’d walked away as if nothing had happened.

Rick shifted his attention to the steaming mug of coffee waiting on the counter for him. Why the hell couldn’t he put the past behind him? By the time this investigation was over he had to make sure of one thing, besides solving the case. He had to be damned certain she was out of his system, whatever it took to make that happen.

He couldn’t live the next fifteen years the way he’d lived the last.

The morning was practically over before Rick had a chance to get back to the real work that needed to be done—solving a decade-old murder. The mayor had insisted on an impromptu press conference and then he’d had to sit through a post mortem on the damned press conference with the mayor and his pals.

The only good thing that had come of the morning was the preliminary forensics report he’d found waiting on his desk when he returned. According to the report, Ashland had likely been dead the entire ten years he’d been missing. Both bullets found in the trunk of the Mercedes had come from his body. One had chipped a rib and was likely the one that had killed him since the position of the damage would have been in the vicinity of his heart. The other had glanced off his clavicle near the coracoid process, a minor shoulder wound.

The strangest part of the whole situation was the ballistics report. The two slugs discovered with the body were from two different weapons, both .38s.

Why would a killer use two weapons?

Rick tossed the report aside and rubbed a hand over his jaw. That scenario just didn’t fit. The more likely case was that Ashland had gotten himself shot by two different people. One bullet he’d survived, the second one he hadn’t.

That left the questions of who and why. But it was also an opportunity to withhold something perhaps only the killer would know. He would have to make sure this information was kept quiet.

He surveyed the reports his predecessor had left, specifically the statements made by Lacy and her friends. All four had alibis. They’d been at the hospital waiting for Ashland to arrive and pick up his wife. All three had admitted to being furious with him and had even gone so far as to get out and look for him when he didn’t show on time. Melinda’s brother, Kyle Tidwell, had owned up to the same in his own statement.

The problem was, after ten years, it was impossible to tell the precise time of the victim’s death. Hell, it wasn’t even possible to nail down the day, only the probable year.

Every last one of the statements in the file was basically useless beyond a point. Witnesses could attest to the last time they’d seen Ashland alive and comparisons could be made. But after about two o’clock on the day Ashland supposedly disappeared, there was no way to know what had happened.

Unless someone who knew told him.

That was the only chance he had of solving this case.

Rick sifted through the papers on his desk until he found another folder containing far fewer documents. Pamela Carter. She had gone missing around the same time as Charles. There had been talk at the time that the two had been lovers and, considering the hefty cash withdrawal, that they’d run off together. No connection between the two disappearances had ever been made, by Rick’s predecessor or any of the private investigators Senator Ashland had hired. Pamela had had stars in her eyes, wanted to marry a rich man. Most folks figured she’d run off to find her future. But Rick had ideas of his own. He’d spoken with the family and drawn a few conclusions based on what he’d learned. But all of it was only their word, supposition.

And then there was Bent Thompson. He’d abruptly left town about that same time. A week or so after Charles had disappeared. A local thug, well, the closest thing to a thug a small town like Ashland had. Thompson had been arrested for assault and battery a couple of times, public drunkenness even more often and there was a time when he was thought to have done a little dirty work for a loan shark operating out of Memphis.

Bent Thompson was the poster child for reasons to stay in high school. He’d dropped out and turned to doing whatever paid the most to get by. His reputation as a hooligan, if not a total thug, was noteworthy to say the least. Anyone who cared to consider what became of him most likely concluding he’d gotten out of town to avoid someone he’d crossed.

As far as Rick knew, Thompson and Ashland had shared no dealings and had scarcely shared the same air space. Much like him and Lacy. Two people from very different backgrounds and sides of town.

Rick shook his head as he considered that the railroad track at Houston Street had always served as a kind of dividing line. Those who lived south of it were lower middle class and below. And those to the north, well, they had the lake and all the money.

You fell into one class or the other and that was where you stayed. Boys south of Houston Street didn’t get the girls from the north side. All they could do was look…except for Rick. He’d gotten to do more than look that one time.

After that he understood why it was better to stick with his side of the tracks—it cost a lot less on levels that had nothing at all to do with money.

Rick shook off the frustrating memories and focused on the files and reports in front of him. The only option he had, as far as he could see, was to retrace the events of ten years ago and see if he discovered anything new, which was doubtful. Every instinct told him that if he didn’t break Lacy Oliver, he would never know what happened.

A ruckus in his outer office caught Rick’s attention. Senator Ashland, with at least three reporters on his heels, was waving his arms at Rick’s secretary.

Rick pushed out of his chair and strode into the middle of the fray just in time to hear the senator say, “I demand to see the chief right now.”

Francine, Rick’s easygoing secretary, looked a little uncertain and a whole lot frustrated.

“How can I help you, Senator?” Rick nodded to two of his deputies, who immediately herded the reporters toward the exit.

“Chief Summers, do you really believe the wife did it?” shouted the only one of the three media interlopers Rick recognized. Considering the man knew Melinda Ashland every bit as well as Rick did, he had no intention of acknowledging the insensitive question with a response.

“What about a jealous husband?” another cried before he could be hoisted out the door. “How many wives do you think young Charles seduced, Senator?”

Rick ushered the senator into his office and away from the blunt questions. It wasn’t as if the senator hadn’t heard it all before, but Rick just couldn’t stand by and let him hear it here.

“I apologize, Senator,” he said when he’d closed the door of his office. “Some of those fellas just don’t know when to keep their mouths shut.”

Senator Charles Ashland tugged at the lapels of his fancy designer jacket as if he’d just endured a physical altercation rather than a mere verbal bashing. “It’s not your fault, Chief,” he offered with something less than sincerity. “There are those of us who thrive and those who strive. Unfortunately for the latter, they generally attempt to do so by clinging to the upwardly mobile coattails of the former.”

Rick was pretty sure he’d just been insulted, but considering what the man had been through the past couple of days he decided to overlook it. “Yes, sir. Is there something I can do for you?”

Senator Ashland lifted his chin in the arrogant manner for which Ashlands were known and settled his somber attention on Rick. “You may arrest that gold-digging whore who killed my son.”

Rick held his tongue for three beats as he moved around behind his desk. He understood that the senator was agitated and had every right to be upset, but Rick also knew Melinda and she was no gold digger and certainly no whore. A murderer, well, now on that score he couldn’t say for sure, but his gut wouldn’t let him pin that rap on her. If she had anything to do with Charles’s death it was accidental not intentional…or was he fooling himself? Did he want to believe that because Lacy was most likely involved?

“Senator Ashland.” He gestured to a chair. “Please have a seat, sir, and let’s talk about this rationally.”

The senator threw his hands up in an argumentative gesture. “I am perfectly rational, Chief Summers.” He might be rational, but his face was beet-red with irrational emotion. “My wife and I have waited for this day for ten years. We knew when Charles went missing that
she
had somehow harmed him. We want her put behind bars where she belongs!”

Rick considered the best way to approach the subject for a moment before responding. Senator Charles Ashland was a powerful man in these parts. Insulting his intelligence or his integrity could lead to complications Rick didn’t need in his life right now.

“It’s true, sir, that in cases like this the spouse is generally a suspect, but we both know that the chances of Melinda having harmed her husband are very slim. And she was in the hospital as you’ll recall.”

Ashland shook a finger at Rick. “That’s another thing. I spoke to a nurse there who said she couldn’t be sure where Melinda was the afternoon Charles disappeared. She was out of her room for some time. Why haven’t you been looking down that avenue?”

Rick rested the tips of his fingers on his desk to keep his hands from clenching. The last thing he needed was to make any gestures of aggression. “I can assure you that every avenue is being examined, Senator. If Melinda left the hospital the day of her husband’s disappearance, I will know how and why.” He’d read the nurse’s statement in the file. Taylor hadn’t put much stock into the idea, because the nurse couldn’t be sure if Melinda was out of her room for twenty minutes or two hours when he’d tried to pin her down to an exact time frame. The nurse had admitted that they’d been unusually busy that afternoon.

Ashland grabbed the back of the chair in front of him. Rick couldn’t tell if he needed the chair for support or if he was fighting the need to rip something apart.

“Chief Summers, you have to understand our situation here.” The man sagged as if the burden he carried had suddenly become too great to bear. “Those children are all we have left of our son. We’re terrified that she’ll take them and run if she feels the heat bearing down on her. Can you see our dilemma, Chief? We can’t risk losing those children. So far, we’ve kept them separated from her, but God only knows how long we’ll be successful. She is their mother after all.” His face darkened with fury once more. “And those other women have rallied around her. I don’t trust them. I don’t trust any of them. They could all be involved!”