“Alec stays with me at night, Evan. I already have someone to watch over me and help listen for problems.”
The boy set his hands on his hips. “Is that so? A fine lot of good he’s been to you, from what I can tell.”
Alec winced a little at the words, but they had no power to dent the exultation rising inside him. “You’re right, Evan,” he said in quiet assurance, “or you were. Now I have a better idea what to expect.”
Laurel stared at him, her gaze bleak. He met it without evasion. She had admitted their affair. She had made him an official part of her life in front of her son, one of the few people who meant anything to her. Regardless, she wouldn’t smile, didn’t look happy about it. Tight anguish entered his chest along with the kind of hovering stillness that told him he had gone from minor to major danger.
“Get rid of him,” Evan said to his mother. “You don’t need him, and he’s an embarrassment to you.”
“Evan! You have no right to say such a thing. And you know better than to do it in front of someone.”
“The truth is the truth,” her son retorted, his face turning so red it was almost purple. “I can do a better job of looking out for you. Anyway, when he’s gone there might not be anything to guard against.”
The wariness inside Alec tightened a notch. “If I thought that was true for a minute,” he said, “I wouldn’t be here.”
“You can bet on it, then,” Evan shot at him.
“No!” Laurel cried in sharp intervention. “There’s no need for anything more to be said about this, no reason for any changes. Besides, the fire may be the end of it.”
She was afraid he and Evan would get into a fight, Alec saw, and she might well be right. He was keeping a rein on his temper out of regard for the fact that Evan had some right to be concerned, but his patience was not too reliable.
“You don’t really think that,” Evan replied in barely concealed anger.
The oval of Laurel’s face was tight. “It’s better than watching for a bogeyman in every shadow.”
“Right,” her son said hotly. “And makes about as much sense as having one in bed with you!”
Alec moved forward, but Laurel put a restraining hand on his arm. She lifted her chin, her face like marble and her eyes the fathomless blue of glacier ice. “Let me make this perfectly plain, Evan, then I don’t want to hear any more about it. Your place is at school where you can concentrate on your studies and make the best possible grades for the summer quarter. I don’t want you here where I would have to worry every minute that you might be attacked next. I have Alec. He’s all I need.”
She was using him as a shield, Alec saw with sudden insight. That was all her public recognition meant. To admit their intimacy was better in her mind than the possibility of having to worry about, or even lose, someone she loved. But did that mean she thought he was more capable of taking care of himself than Evan, so ran no risk? Or was it proof that he was expendable?
He’s all I need.
A few minutes ago, those words would have been a wonder. Now his only thought was, yes, but how? And why?
Evan tried every argument he could lay tongue to, proving in the process that he had his mother’s intelligence and a fair degree of her notions of sacrifice. At the end of it, he and Alec had a better understanding, if no better rapport. However, Laurel did not budge an inch.
When Evan drove away, finally, Laurel stood watching until his car was out of sight. Her eyes were shadowed, her expression heavy with acceptance. At the same time, there was also a touching air of peace about her.
She turned to Alec as he stood by her side. “It’s getting late,” she said quietly. “I don’t see much point in trying to get anything more done today. You might as well go and check on Gregory, if that’s what you need to do.”
He gave a stiff nod. “I’ve been leaving him to Gran a little too much lately.”
“You don’t have to come back,” she added, her gaze resting on his face. “Not unless it’s what you want.”
“It’s what I want.” He watched her, watched the way the afternoon shadows slid across her features and made shifting patterns of light and dark on her skirt and blouse. The way her eyes did not quite meet his. Inside him, there hovered a puerile need to hear her say she did not want him to return. He required that evidence of her caring and concern, even as he knew he would instantly reject any attempt to protect him.
She didn’t extend it. Instead, she gave him a slow smile. Her gaze, dark with secrets, came to rest on his. Her voice as clear as a chiming bell, she said, “Hurry back, then.”
Laurel stood and watched Alec zoom away on his bike. It occurred to her that she was always watching him go. One day, she knew, he would leave and not come back. She would be left alone in the big empty barn of a house. But not yet. Not yet.
Behind her, Maisie emerged from the house with her big purse hanging from the crook of her arm and her folded apron in her hand. It was time for her to go home, too. She clumped down the steps and stopped beside Laurel.
“You going to be all right here by yourself?” she asked abruptly.
Laurel nodded with a reassuring smile. Knowing Maisie was well aware that Alec had spent the last few nights with her, she added, “It won’t be for long.”
“I could stay awhile. My old man’s working late this week and I won’t have to get his supper for a while yet.”
“I guess if anybody came around who was up to no good you’d hit him over the head with your purse,” Laurel said with an affectionate smile.
“That would sure fix him, considering all the stuff that’s in it.” Maisie sobered almost at once. “I worry about you, honey. This business started out spiteful and mean, the kind of thing that happens when people get to feuding and fussing, but it’s fast getting out of hand.”
“Yes, I know,” Laurel said, running her fingers through the hair at her temple. “It’s so insane, since I don’t know what the feud is all about.”
“You’re sure? You still can’t think of anything that was said or done that might have set somebody off?”
Laurel gave a slow shake of her head. “Unless it has something to do with Alec, I have no idea.”
Maisie was quiet for a moment. “If he’s really the root of it, might not be such a good idea, him being here day and night.”
“Tell him that,” Laurel returned dryly.
“I see what you mean.” Maisie pursed her lips. “I could maybe have a talk with Callie. Alec listens to her when he don’t pay any mind to anybody else.”
Maisie could be right, Laurel thought. “I’m not sure it would make any difference at this point. Besides…”
“Besides which, you like having him around?”
Laurel’s smile was wry. “Am I that transparent?”
“You’re different, I’ll put it that way.” There was caring and sympathy in the older woman’s gaze. “Well, all right, I’ll go. But you be careful, you hear? Both of you. Be sure and lock the door when you go back inside.”
“I’ll do that.”
Maisie nodded, then swung around and started toward her car. “See you in the morning.”
Laurel did not turn immediately toward the house. A few deadheads on the new roses caught her attention, and she walked down the path to reach for them and snap them off. She was aware of Maisie getting into her car, which was parked on the grass off the edge of the drive, then grinding the starter. It was only after the third try with no results that Laurel looked up.
Maisie got out of the ancient, boatlike Cadillac and set a fist on her padded hip. Laurel moved in her direction. As she passed through the side gate, she called, “Problems?”
“Dang thing’s gone and died on me. Guess I’ll have to call the old man, though he won’t be home till all hours.”
“I could drive you,” Laurel said, “but then you wouldn’t have a way to come to work in the morning. I doubt the repair shop will send anybody out this evening.”
“
Oh, that old man of mine can fix the piece of junk a lot faster and cheaper, anyway.”
“Tell you what, take my car, then,” Laurel suggested. “It needs driving, and you can bring it back in the morning.”
“You sure? You might need it.”
Laurel laughed, a dry sound. “Oh, I’m not going anywhere.”
There were more protests to overcome but, in the end, Maisie agreed. Laurel fetched the keys from inside, and the older woman drove off in the Buick. Laurel was left alone.
Alone.
The insect songs from the encroaching woods seemed loud in the stillness. The slanting rays of the sun no longer felt as warm. The warbling of the garden fountain had a melancholy note like the dreariness of rain on a winter afternoon.
Moving with quickening steps, Laurel went back along the path and into the house. She closed the big front door and locked it carefully behind her.
It was perhaps an hour later when the phone rang. She was chopping tomatoes on the cutting board for a light dinner of broiled chicken and salad. She didn’t want to answer since nothing in the past few days gave her any reason to expect pleasant news. Still, it might be Alec or Evan, or even Marcia, checking on her. They would be concerned if she didn’t pick up.
“Laurel? Dan Tanning, here.”
“Dan, how are you?” she asked politely as she cradled the phone between her ear and shoulder and went back to her chore.
“Fine, though this isn’t a social call. I don’t want to upset you, but there’s been an accident.”
Laurel put down her knife, took a firmer grip on the phone. “It isn’t Evan or…”
“No, no. It’s Maisie. She ran off the road a few miles from town. She’s hurt pretty bad—broken leg, internal injuries. Her doctor’s called the medevac helicopter to take her to Shreveport.”
“Oh, Dan, is she going to be all right?”
“Can’t say, but she’s having a fit. Swears she won’t go until she talks to you.”
“I’d be halfway to the hospital already, but I don’t have my car.”
“I know. God, Laurel, I nearly lost it when I saw that old Buick of yours wrapped around a tree. But not to worry. One of my deputies is on his way to pick you up. He’ll be there in five minutes.”
18
“You can’t go in right now,” Dan said as he met Laurel outside the emergency room of the hospital. “The doctor is with Maisie, trying to explain things to her and her husband. Step in here and let me get you a cup of coffee.”
“How bad is she?” Laurel kept her voice low as she allowed herself to be led into a waiting room.
Dan’s eyes were shadowed, as if he had seen too many tragedies. “They’ve got her stabilized, she’s conscious, and that’s about the best you can say. She’s not a young woman, you know.”
“She was going to retire next year, with her husband.” Laurel pressed her lips together, breathing deep, swallowing against the tight ache of tears. “I keep thinking it’s my fault, that I should have driven her home.”
“Then there’d maybe be two of you here.”
He swung abruptly toward the coffee machine in one corner, returning a few minutes later with two foam cups. The brew was bitter, but the heat helped take away some of the shivery chill inside her.
“What happened?” she asked. “Your deputy said something about a steering problem?”
“Hose for the power-steering fluid came loose, squirted the sticky stuff all over the windshield. Maisie couldn’t see, and of course the steering went from easy to hard, just like that. Might have been all right if she’d had quicker reflexes or been on a straight stretch, but there’s nothing but curves between here and where you live. She panicked, lost control, wrapped the Buick around a tree.”
Laurel gave the sheriff a taut look. “The car hasn’t been driven much in some time.”
“Maisie said Alec Stanton checked it out last week.”
“I suppose he could have missed something,” Laurel answered in quick response to the insinuating tone of Dan’s voice.
He stared into his own cup of coffee. It bent under the pressure of his fingers before he spoke. “I heard from California.”
“And?” The beat of her heart took on a sickening throb as she waited for his answer.
“He killed her, all right.”
There was no need to ask who he meant. It felt like disloyalty to Alec, but still she had to ask. “How? What happened?”
“Painkillers. A massive overdose showed up on the autopsy. She was dying, but not fast enough, so he helped her along. They had been married seven months.”
Laurel’s lips were cold, her brain colder. “Why isn’t he in prison, then?”
“Not enough evidence to convict. The medicine had been prescribed for her. Apparently he hoarded the pills over several weeks or even months.” Dan shrugged a uniformed shoulder. “Stanton’s lawyer claimed she tucked them back herself, that she committed suicide.”
Ignoring the shading of sarcasm in his comment, she asked, “There was a trial?”
“Not for murder, but there was a big circus of a civil trial. The wife’s heirs weren’t too happy at being done out of the estate, as you can imagine—especially by the gardener, a kid their mama had taken in out of the goodness of her heart. They charged him with wrongful death and asked for an outlandish sum in damages. Didn’t manage to make that charge stick, either, but by the time the thing was over, nobody won. Lawyers wound up with most of the money.”
“But that doesn’t prove Alec was guilty!”
“Lord, Laurel!” Dan replied in exasperation. “Just think about it. A man marries a wealthy widow twenty-odd years older than he is, then she dies under suspicious circumstances. What do you think happened?”
“If she was so sick, why wouldn’t he have just waited?”
“Too impatient, I guess. How the hell do I know? But, if I were you, I sure wouldn’t accept any marriage proposals from him.”
Marriage proposals. She stiffened her spine as a shiver ran down it. “I’m not wealthy—far from it.”
“Compared to what? Or rather, who? Ivywild is worth a bundle, and if you’ve spent even a fraction of what Howard had in the bank or what you got from the whopping-big insurance policy he was carrying, I’ll be amazed.”
“I didn’t realize my finances were common knowledge.” Her voice was brittle with distaste.
“Everybody’s finances are common knowledge in Hillsboro,” he said wearily. “I bet you can guess within a couple of hundred what I make a year.”
She could. She looked away from him.
“Right. For a con man with next to nothing, you make a nice target. Think about it—that’s all I ask. Just think about it.” He drained his cup and tossed it into a wastepaper basket, then strode toward the door. “I’ll go check, see if Maisie is ready for you.”
Oh, Alec. Laurel’s chest hurt when she thought of what he must have gone through in California. At the same time, she couldn’t be easy in her mind. The things Dan had said were so damning. So logical. At least she didn’t have to think about it just now. A low, thumping rumble in the distance signaled the approach of the medical-evacuation helicopter. If she was going to talk to Maisie, it had better be soon.
Abandoning her cold coffee on a table, Laurel stepped into the hall. Dan was coming to meet her. He waved her on. “This way, on the double.”
The stretcher where Maisie lay was stationed near the hospital’s back door, which opened onto the helicopter pad. Tubes and monitor cords draped the gurney like Christmas tinsel, and a team consisting of her doctor, two nurses and two aides stood by. Maisie’s husband, a big, gangling man with a black rim of grease under his fingernails, was leaning against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest and his head down.
The doctor stepped forward to intercept Laurel. “Keep it short, Mrs. Bancroft, and make it as easy for her as possible. Try to stay calm. The last thing she needs is any more excitement.”
Laurel nodded h
er understanding, but she was distracted. Maisie had opened her eyes and was reaching out to her, muttering her name. The doctor moved aside. Laurel’s knees wobbled as she walked to the edge of the stretcher and took Maisie’s cold fingers in a careful grasp. Dread loomed suddenly in her mind, clouding her ability to think. She was afraid of what Maisie might say.
“Oh, Laurel, honey, I’m so glad you got here,” Maisie said, her eyes huge, the pupils expanded with the drugs already circulating in her bloodstream. “I was afraid you wouldn’t. Not before—”
“Never mind,” Laurel broke in, keeping her voice soft and steady with an effort. “I’m here now. Was there something you needed to tell me? Is that why you asked for me?”
The white head dipped in a slight nod. “It was you, not me. It was you supposed to be in the car. I’ve been thinking, studying about Sticks and Alec and the letters, about everything. You got to be careful.”
“I know, and I will be.” The words were automatic, meaning next to nothing. Outside, the sound of the helicopter was rising to a roar. Its triangulated shadow hovered on the concrete landing pad, while the tall pines nearby whipped in the mechanical wind.
Maisie pulled Laurel closer, though she was trembling so hard the stretcher shimmied on its wheels. In a rapid undertone, she said, “It’s on account of that other killing. I heard a few whispers, but paid no mind. I should have listened.”
The doctor squeaked forward on his rubber-soled shoes. “That’s enough, Mrs. Bancroft. It’s time to go.”
Laurel glanced at him and began to ease aside. The team of nurses moved forward, releasing the stretcher’s brakes, gathering IV lines and monitoring equipment. Maisie’s husband stepped to the glass doors to shove them open.
Still, Maisie would not release Laurel’s hand. She held on with desperate strength even as the stretcher began to roll. “You talk to Callie,” she said, her eyes pleading. “She used to be a nurse, knows more about what went on than she’s ever told. But she’ll talk to you if you tell her I said ask. You do it now. You hear?”
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