Worth Dying For (17 page)

“To the girl’s body?”

“Yes,” Tessa replied.

“Well, strange thing was, the very next day you was found and brought to the hospital in the same shape that other poor gal had been in, except you was alive. Just barely. And the sheriff got hold of your daddy before he left town and he rushed right over to the hospital and saw that you was his little girl. Flossie said she saw him that day and he was a crying something awful. Right after that, Mr. Maitland sent the other girl’s body off to be cremated.”

Dante tensed. “Who ordered her cremation?”

“I ain’t got no idea. But afterward was when Mr. Maitland told me and the others who knew about the girl to never tell a soul, that there was some sort of criminal investigation going on that would trap the man who’d killed her and nearly killed the Westbrook girl.”

“What sort of criminal investigation?” Tessa asked.

“Don’t know. That’s all we was ever told.”

Dante jerked his hand out of Tessa’s grasp as he faced Deanetta. “What happened to the other girl’s ashes?”

“That was something plum peculiar, you know. Don’t reckon she had no kin folks. Nobody ever claimed her
ashes, but somebody paid for a plot over in the cemetery and I went with Mr. Maitland the day they buried the urn with that poor little gal’s ashes in it. Weren’t nobody there except Mr. Maitland, me and Reverend Allsboro. And the grave digger, of course.”

“Where’s the cemetery?” Tessa asked.

“You want to go by and pay your respects?” Deanetta asked. “I guess it’s only fitting, ’cause except by the grace of God, it could have been you who died and not her.”

D
ANTE HADN’T
said a word. Except for the fact she could see his chest rising and falling, Tessa wouldn’t have been sure he was even breathing. Once Deanetta gave them directions to the cemetery, they’d left her house hurriedly. After he’d thanked the old woman for the information, Dante had all but run outside and straight to the car. Tessa had lingered only long enough to hug Deanetta.

“The other girl, the one who died…” Tessa had said. “We—we think she might have been Dante’s fiancée. They were engaged when they were teenagers.”

“Mercy to goodness!” Deanetta had held Tessa’s hands tightly and looked deeply into her eyes. “You go help him say goodbye to her. And then you show him he’s still alive.”

The old woman’s words repeated themselves over and over in Tessa’s mind. She might be able to help Dante say goodbye to Amy Smith, if that was his intention. But she suspected it might be impossible to convince him to let Amy go.

Dante parked the rental car alongside the road, then got out and headed toward the cemetery. Tessa opened the door and stood by the car for several minutes, watching Dante as he walked among the headstones. He was so obsessed with finding Amy’s grave that he’d all but forgotten Tessa.

“Look for the pink marble monument,” Deanetta had said. “Only one like it in the whole cemetery.”

She shouldn’t let him do this alone. But did she have the courage to stand at his side and give him whatever support and comfort she could while he mourned for another woman? How could she be so jealous of Amy Smith when the poor girl wasn’t even alive? Because Dante had loved Amy. Because he still loved her.

As her gaze kept pace with Dante’s every move, she cried out quietly when he stopped and stared down at a small, pink marble monument. The afternoon sun hung midhorizon, its light hitting the row of pine trees lining the far side of the graveyard. Shadows cast by the tall, skinny pines flickered about on the ground, across the pink marble and over Dante’s stoic face.

All thought for herself evaporated as loving concern for Dante filled her heart, and Tessa rushed across the cemetery. He needed her. Even if he didn’t know he did. He was all alone, facing his worst fears, forced to accept the bitter truth. Although they had no proof that the other young, blond woman who’d been dumped out on the highway a week before Tessa was found had actually been Amy Smith, the odds were that she had been Dante’s missing fiancée. Tessa only suspected that the date the girl had been found was close to the same time Amy had disappeared. If her suspicions were right, then Dante would have no choice but to accept the facts. Undoubtedly Nealy had dumped Amy’s body, then kidnapped Tessa almost immediately afterward.

When Tessa came up behind Dante, he didn’t even hear her. And when she placed her hand on his shoulder, he didn’t flinch, although she felt his muscles tense.

“There’s no name on the monument and the only date is the year,” Dante said, his voice amazingly calm. Too calm.

Tessa took a good look at the monument. Pink marble, exquisitely carved, with the verse of a poem about the deceased living on in the gentle breeze, the morning sun, the soft rain, spanned the distance between two marble roses that graced either side of the headstone. No name. The only date, the year. Seventeen years ago.

There was no doubt in Tessa’s mind who had paid for this young woman’s cremation and her expensive monument. But why? Had her father been overcome with pity for the girl who had no family to claim her body and gratitude that it had been she and not his own daughter who had died? What other explanation could there be?

“It might not be Amy,” Dante said.

Tessa squeezed his shoulder. “It might not be.”

“You think it is, don’t you?”

“I think it’s highly probable. And so do you.”

Tessa felt a slight tremor rippling through Dante.
Oh, God, help him. And help me to say and do all the right things, to give him whatever he needs to get through this ordeal
.

“It’s my fault she’s dead,” Dante said.

Moving closer to his side, Tessa slipped her arm around his waist. “You’re talking nonsense. It’s not your fault. Eddie Jay Nealy preyed on young women. He’s the one responsible for Amy’s death, not you.”

Dante trembled again. “She was waiting for me and I was late that night. I always picked her up after work so we could have a little time together. But I had a flat tire that night and when I got to the Dairy Dip, she wasn’t there. I—I found the engagement ring I’d given her on the sidewalk, along with the chain she kept it on around her neck.”

Tessa hugged up closer and closer to Dante, wishing she had the ability to absorb some of his pain. He was reliving the night he’d lost Amy, the night his world had come crashing down around him. In his own way, Dante had suffered unbearably, just as she had. Dante and she and Amy were all Eddie Jay Nealy’s victims.

I refuse to allow that evil man to win. I rebuilt my life from the ashes of a broken body, a mind void of memories and a crushed spirit. If I did that, why can’t Dante find the strength to accept what he cannot change, then move on and find love again?

Selfishly, Tessa wished that Dante could love her. Not as he’d loved Amy. Young love, first love could never be equaled, never be repeated. But if he could open his heart to the possibility of loving someone else, maybe she could be that someone.

But what about Leslie Anne?

Dante accepting Amy’s death was only one of many hurdles they would have to overcome if there was any hope of them having a future together. Would Dante ever be able to forget that Tessa’s daughter had been fathered by the monster who had killed Amy?

Tessa sighed softly as her dream of loving and being loved by Dante vanished like the phantom wish it had been. She and Dante had no future together, nothing beyond a fleeting moment in time. But surely fate had brought them together for a purpose.

Yes, of course,
Tessa thought.
Dante and I are destined to help each other. He has come to me not only for Leslie Anne’s sake, but to show me that I can feel passion. And I’m with him, here and now, because he needs me.

“Have you blamed yourself all these years?” Tessa asked, knowing full well that he had.

“Oh, yeah,” Dante said. “I know it’s not logical. Fate conspired against Amy and me from the very beginning. I was a real bad boy and she was such a good girl. People warned her to steer clear of me and they were right to warn her. I went after her because I wanted to prove I could have her, but boy did I get the shock of my life. I fell for her like a ton of bricks. I was so crazy in love with her I couldn’t see straight. And the funny thing is, she felt the same way about me.”

Dante stared directly at Tessa, but she realized he was looking straight through and seeing a ghost from his past. How would it feel, she wondered, to love and be loved that way?

“Any other night, I’d have gotten to the Dairy Dip on time,” Dante said, “and Eddie Jay Nealy would never have gotten his hands on her.”

Dante clenched his teeth, balled his hands into fists and groaned. Tessa held on to him as he quivered from head to toe, shaking with the force of his barely suppressed emotions.

“Oh, God, Dante, don’t,” she pleaded. “Stop thinking about what he did to her. It all happened so long ago. Please, darling, please, don’t think about it. I can’t bear to see you in so much pain.”

Jerking with emotion, agony ripping through him so fiercely that Tessa could practically see the slash marks on his body, Dante dropped to his knees before the pink marble headstone. He dragged Tessa down with him because she refused to release her tenacious hold on him. Together, both on their knees, they faced Amy Smith’s monument.

“Deep down I’ve known for years what happened to her, but I held on to the hope that I was wrong, that somehow,
someway—” He leaned over and beat the ground, his fists pounding repeatedly. “God damn son of a bitch!” He kept repeating those words over and over again as he continued clubbing his fists against the hard ground. Finally he crumpled over, holding his bloody hands between his knees.

Tessa wrapped her arms around him and held him. For what seemed like an eternity, she didn’t say anything, didn’t move, barely breathed. Dante’s body shook uncontrollably. But he didn’t cry.

“Don’t hold it in any longer,” Tessa said. “Let it go. Release it.”

“I can’t,” he told her, his words spoken through tightly clenched teeth. “I don’t dare.”

“Yes, you can. I’m right here with you. I’m your lifeline. I won’t let you drown.”

G.W.’
S AFTERNOON ROUTINE
had been interrupted by three consecutive phone calls, giving him little time to regroup and think between the conversations. First, he had reluctantly accepted a phone call from Olivia, wondering at the time what was so urgent. After all, it had been only a little over two hours since he’d had lunch with her.

“I received the most dreadful phone call,” Olivia had said and quickly went into this lengthy tirade about a mysterious voice telling her an ugly, vicious lie about dear little Leslie Anne.

G.W.’s blood had run cold when Olivia mentioned the name Eddie Jay Nealy.

While he was still on the phone with Olivia, G.W.’s personal assistant, Fay Harris, had interrupted, telling him that his sister-in-law needed to speak to him immediately, that she claimed it was a family emergency. He assured Olivia that what she’d been told was a pack of lies, then got off the phone with her as quickly as possible. He’d gone through a similar scenario with Myrle, who had been practically hysterical. By the time he’d persuaded her that someone was spreading vicious lies and he would deal with them harshly, G.W. realized that whoever had sent Leslie Anne those newspaper clippings was damned and
determined for the whole world to learn the truth about his granddaughter’s paternity.

As he’d prepared to leave the office and go home, Sharon had called. Before she’d said a word, he knew why she’d called him.

“I’m heading out the door,” G.W. had told his sister. “Whatever you do, don’t let Leslie Anne speak to anyone. And tell that Dundee agent, Lucie what’s-her-name, about what’s happened. I don’t want Leslie Anne to hear about this before I get a chance to tell her myself.”

When he pulled his Mercedes to a stop in front of the house, not bothering to park in the garage, G.W. had already planned and discarded several different solutions to the problem at hand. More than anything, he wanted to protect Tessa and Leslie Anne. But it would take a miracle to prevent the looming disaster. Out there somewhere was a person armed with the truth about Tessa’s rape and Leslie Anne’s conception. And apparently he or she was on a mission to see that the whole world knew the Westbrook family had been living a lie for the past seventeen years.

Before he even got out of the car, Sharon opened the front door and came rushing off the veranda, a look of panic on her face. His sister was rather dramatic and often overreacted to things, but in this case, he shared her sense of doom.

“God, G.W., what are we going to do?”

Leaving his briefcase lying on the front seat, he emerged from the Mercedes and faced his sister. “Did you recognize the voice of the person who called you? Was it a man or a woman?”

“Didn’t I tell you that the voice was disguised?” Sharon reached out and put her arm through G.W.’s as they rounded the car’s hood and headed toward the front
veranda. “I probably didn’t. I’ve been so upset that I’m not thinking straight.”

He felt the slight tremor in her body and wondered if the shakiness inside him was apparent to her.

“Where’s Leslie Anne?” he asked. “Does she know—”

“No, she has no idea that someone’s calling everyone we know to tell them about Eddie Jay Nealy being her biological father. I explained what’s been happening to Ms. Evans and she got Leslie Anne out of the house by suggesting they go horseback riding.”

“Is that where they are now?”

“Yes, yes.” Sharon paused, threw her arms around G.W. and hugged him. “I’ve been worried sick about you. This stress can’t be good for your heart. Maybe we should call Dr. Lester.”

“I don’t need a damn doctor. What I need is the Dundee Agency to find out who’s trying to destroy my family. What did Ms. Evans have to say about all this? Has she heard anything from Dante and Tessa?” He’d been damn upset to learn that Tessa had run off with Moran, that they were in Rayville, searching for ghosts. But what could they find out? Hadn’t he spent a fortune to keep all their secrets buried? Nobody would dare admit to anything, not when anyone who knew anything had been involved in the cover-up themselves or were bound by ethics not to reveal confidential matters.

“Ms. Evans put in a call to the other two agents to alert them and they’ll contact Mr. Moran,” Sharon said, easing her tenacious hold on G.W. “I tried to call Tessa, but I got her voice mail. She’s either out of range or she’s turned off her cell phone.”

“Damn time for her to be away.” G.W. put his arm
around Sharon and led her up the steps and onto the veranda. “She had no business going off with Moran. I don’t understand her reasoning.”

“Her whole life is falling apart, G.W. Don’t you think she has a right to—”

“I gave her this life, and by God I won’t let it fall apart. She should know that.” G.W. opened the front door and held it for Sharon to enter. “I’ll protect Tessa and Leslie Anne, no matter what the cost.”

Sharon walked into the foyer, G.W. directly behind her. “I don’t think all the money in the world can keep the truth from coming out and spreading like wildfire. Whoever this person is who made the phone calls, he—or she—isn’t going to stop. This has become a damn avalanche that keeps growing bigger and bigger and picking up speed. This family is in the line of fire and we’re not going to come out of it without taking a direct hit. We’re going to be buried alive by seventeen years of lies.”

G.W. slammed the door. “We have to come up with some type of damage control. You get on the phone and find out what you can from Olivia and Myrle and tell them to keep their damn mouths shut. I’m contacting Sawyer McNamara at Dundee headquarters and explaining the situation. I’ll hire however many agents we need to get to the bottom of this mystery. I want to know who’s doing this to us and why!”

“Myrle and Celia are already on their way over here,” Sharon said. “I told them not to come, but you know Myrle.”

“Then you’ll have to handle them because I cannot deal with Anne’s sister. Not until I decide the best way to handle this mess.”

“What about Charlie?”

“What about him?”

“He’s already here.”

“What?”

“Myrle called him and told him about the phone call she received and he came right on over. He’s worried about Leslie Anne and Tessa. And about you, G.W. You know how Charlie worships you.”

G.W. glanced across the foyer at the parlor. “Where is he?”

Charlie had been like a son to G.W., and despite his deficiencies as a businessman, he was a charming, likable young man who reminded G.W. of Charlie’s dad, who’d been G.W.’s best friend and his fraternity brother. Lieutenant James Sentell had died a hero’s death in the last days of the Vietnam War, when Charlie had been little more than a baby. It was at that time G.W. had stepped in to help James’s widow, Brenda, who was G.W.’s first cousin, once removed. And even after Brenda remarried, G.W. had remained a father figure to Charlie.

“I left him in the library,” Sharon said. “The poor boy is terribly upset, just as we all are.”

“What did you tell him?”

“Nothing, but…I put him off, then finally I lied to him and said I couldn’t image how such a vile rumor got started. But, G.W., I know he didn’t believe me.”

G.W. patted her on the shoulder. “It’s all right. I suppose I should have told Charlie the truth years ago, but I kept hoping he and Tessa would get married and he’d adopt Leslie Anne. I wasn’t sure how he’d feel about Leslie Anne, if he knew Eddie Jay Nealy had fathered her. Brenda raised him to look down on anyone he perceives as beneath him. It’s her fault he’s such a damn snob.”

“Go talk to him before you call Sawyer McNamara,”
Sharon said. “I’ll phone Olivia to try to put her off and then I’ll deal with Myrle and Celia when they arrive.”

“Lock the damn door and refuse to let them in.”

“I can’t do that and you know it. It’s no use trying to postpone the inevitable.”

“When I find out who’s responsible for this disaster, I’m going to make him wish he’d never been born.”

G.W. stomped off toward the library, leaving his sister to handle things the best way she could. He’d spent a fortune, even broken the law, to keep his family’s ugly secret. And he had no regrets about what he’d done. He’d do the same things all over again. Everything he’d done—every lie he’d told—he’d done for only one reason. To protect the people he loved. And he
had
protected the person he’d loved most in this world. Anne. Even now, after so many years, he missed her unbearably. But he was thankful she had not lived to see this day. The truth would have broken her heart.

The library doors stood partially open, allowing G.W. to see inside before entering. The room was empty. Where the hell was Charlie?

“Charlie?” G.W. called.

No answer.

He couldn’t worry himself with his godson’s whereabouts. Charlie had always had the run of the house. He’d probably gone to find Hal and ask for a drink. It was getting close to that time of day.

G.W. sat down behind the massive mahogany desk, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. Was there any possible way to stem the tide before the dam broke? Or had the dam already broken? Were Olivia and Myrle the only people who’d received a call from the mysterious voice? Or had this person telephoned half the citizens of Fairport?

Trying to think rationally about a subject that was entirely emotional and extremely personal, G.W. reminded himself that even if the entire world learned the truth, he and his family would find a way to deal with it. So what if the worst happened and everyone knew that Tessa had been one of Nealy’s victims and Leslie Anne was a result of Tessa having been raped? Most people would be understanding and sympathetic and to hell with those who weren’t. Leslie Anne would have to undergo therapy whether the secret stayed within the family or spread through the whole county. And Tessa had already proved she was made of tough stuff. She had survived Eddie Jay Nealy; she could survive this, too.

So what do I do now? Should I admit to Olivia and Myrle that I covered up the truth about what happened to Tessa all those years ago? Do I confess to having committed a crime in order to save Anne a heartache I felt she couldn’t endure?

He might not have any other choice. It seemed someone was intent on revealing the truth about the past. But who? And why? And just how much did this person really know?

T
ESSA HELD
Dante as he knelt at Amy Smith’s grave, time standing still for both of them. The crisp October wind picked up, whirling around them. Dead autumn leaves danced haphazardly over the graves and came to rest against the headstones. Tessa shivered. Dante glanced at her, his features tight, his eyes glazed by grief.

“You’re cold,” he said, his voice lifeless. “We should go.”

She hugged him, his back to her chest, then laid her chin on his shoulder as she pressed her cheek against his and whispered, “We’ll stay here as long as you need to.”

“I don’t want…to leave…her.” His voice cracked with emotion.

“Oh, Dante.”

He reached out and caressed the cold pink marble, his fingertips tracing the words of the heartbreakingly sweet poem etched into the stone. A low, guttural wail emerged from deep within him as he clutched the top of the monument and doubled over in pain, his forehead grazing the edge of the sculpted rose on the left. Tessa released him and came to her feet, then stood over him, allowing him this moment alone with Amy.

She longed to hold him. Comfort him. Ease his suffering.

When her father had stood by and watched her endure sheer hell as she’d slowly recovered from Eddie Jay Nealy’s handiwork, had he felt as helpless as she felt now? Had his heart broken in two seeing her suffer and knowing he could do so very little to help her?

Oh, Dante
. She didn’t understand why she cared so deeply, why he’d touched her heart in a way no other man ever had. He was little more than a stranger to her and yet she felt as if she’d always known him, as if they were soul mates. If she believed in reincarnation, she’d swear they’d been lovers in another life.

Was this connection she felt to him nothing more than a strong sexual attraction? Or was it because she shared a tragic history with Amy Smith? Dante’s teenage sweetheart and Tessa hadn’t known each other and yet fate had forever linked them by the vicious acts of a madman.

Tessa wasn’t sure how long they stayed at the cemetery, how long Dante was trapped in the throes of inconsolable grief, but when he rose to his feet, the sun lay low in the western sky. Approaching twilight painted the horizon with glorious color.

After Dante turned around, he didn’t look at Tessa; he
simply walked away. She caught up with him and fell into step at his side. When they reached the rental car, he yanked the keys from his pants pocket and tossed them to her.

“Can you drive?” he asked.

“All right.”

As soon as they were buckled into their safety belts, Tessa started the car, then glanced at Dante. “Is there anywhere you want to go before—”

“Let’s just go back to the motel for now.”

“Sure.”

They rode in silence for quite a while, although Tessa kept thinking of ways to approach Dante without mentioning what had happened at the cemetery. He’d fallen to pieces and yet hadn’t shed one tear. Tessa knew from personal experience that he couldn’t hold back the tears much longer without exploding. That’s when he would need her. And she intended to be there for him when it happened.

L
ESLIE
A
NNE
found herself laughing when she and Lucie returned to the stables and worked together to rub down the horses. They’d talked girl-talk for the past couple of hours, nothing serious, nothing to remind Leslie Anne of recent events. She’d given Lucie a tour of the Leslie Plantation and had been surprised that the Dundee agent rode like a pro.

“I grew up on a farm,” Lucie had told her. “I was riding not long after I learned how to walk.”

They’d stopped twice during the afternoon, once down by the river to let the horses drink and then again underneath the tree house her granddaddy had had constructed as a sixth birthday present for her.