With a touch of hesitation, I crept from my room. I had to admit that my entire body was tight with nerves as I realized what I was about to do. So many things could go wrong.
But so many things could go right as well. If my theory was correct, the killer was waiting for an opportunity to strike again. If this person was paying attention, he or she would know I was leaving right now and would follow.
I was 99 percent certain I knew who would be confronting me tonight. I thought I knew who the killer was and the nefarious reason behind the act.
A slight tremble raked through my body as I stepped outside. Goosebumps joined the party as I hurried across the grass. By the time I reached the stairs leading to the beach, nausea joined the crowd and I felt like a mess inside.
I glanced around the dark beach but saw no one. Hesitantly, I sat on the shore. The sand was slightly damp from high tide, and the smell of the sea was even stronger than usual. Or maybe it was the fact that adrenaline heightened my senses. If I’d timed all of this correctly, the marine police should be showing up in twenty minutes because of suspected oyster poaching.
There was so much that could go wrong. But I couldn’t think like that. I had to stay positive.
If everything worked out, the killer should show up any time now. Riley hid in the shadows, as well. It felt good to know I had someone covering my back.
The minutes ticked by. What if I’d been wrong? And if this didn’t work, how would I find evidence to nail the perpetrator of these crimes? I couldn’t let someone get away with this.
Just then I heard a footstep behind me.
CHAPTER 46
I looked up. Just as I suspected, Dr. Turner stood there. He wore a parka instead of his usual cardigan. He had a heavy flashlight in his hands and a different aura about him. Gone was the meek next-door neighbor, and in its place was someone malicious and conniving.
“Gabby, I thought I heard someone leave.” He took a step closer. “With all the accidents happening around here lately, I wanted to make sure you were okay. It’s dangerous out here, you know.”
I nodded. “I realize that. Especially with all the tragedies here on this island.”
He sat beside me. Mr. Rogers Goes to the Beach.
It didn’t seem nearly as entertaining now as it had earlier.
A moment of silence fell as we both stared out at the water lapping the shoreline. I waited for him to make his next move. I had to remember to keep a cool head. It could mean the difference between life and death.
“Gabby, I realize you’re going through a hard time,” Dr. Turner finally said, his voice compassionate and concerned. “But it’s no reason to want to end your life.”
I swallowed hard, his words causing an eerie chill to wash over me. “I wasn’t thinking of ending my life.” My voice sounded gravely solemn. I didn’t take things like ending my life lightly.
“Anyone in your state would consider it. Your marriage is falling apart. You’ve made mistakes that your husband will never forgive you for.”
My muscles tightened even more as his words taunted me. Then I remembered I was playing a role here. I couldn’t lash out and say the things I wanted. Not yet.
“I don’t know that.” My voice sounded melancholy. “I’m still hopeful that things will work out between Riley and me. Don’t you think they will?”
“You don’t deserve to be with Riley, Gabby. I’m sorry to tell you that, but I’d be doing an injustice if I didn’t speak the truth.”
My stomach lurched. Probably because what he said had echoed my own sentiments so many times in the past. But not anymore.
“What do you mean?” I stole a glance at Dr. Turner. His eyes looked intense and almost eager, which only made my instincts even more alert.
“Men want respect,” Dr. Turner continued. “When a wife betrays her marriage vows, the husband will never again feel respected. God’s design for marriage is that the two become one . . . but cheating puts a crack in the unity. A crack that can’t be repaired.”
I pulled my knees closer to my chest, wiping some stray sand granules from my hands. This whole conversation was disturbing on so many levels. “But I thought marriage was a matter of changing and forgiving and growing. Isn’t that what you said?”
“It’s different in this case. There’s no undoing what you’ve done.” A new gleam glistened in his eyes. “It was with Garrett, wasn’t it? He’s the man you cheated on Riley with.”
“What?” His words truly shocked me. How had he remembered Garrett? How had he known exactly where to throw his sucker punch?
“Riley mentioned him once. Was he the man you cheated with?”
I wanted to say no, but then I remembered my ruse. My heart panged as I responded with, “Yes. He was.”
“You know what the Bible says about adultery, right?” Dr. Turner said.
“That it’s wrong.” I swallowed hard again and continued to stare at the mesmerizing water. At the moment, I halfway wished it would swallow me up just so I could avoid this conversation.
And was Riley close enough to hear? If so, what was he thinking? Was Dr. Turner putting thoughts in his head and making him regret the rekindling of our relationship?
“The Bible says that adultery is punishable by death.” His words were hard and unyielding. Dr. Turner believed what he was saying. He was convinced that his judgment was correct. “Hebrews 13:4 says God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous. John 8:5 reminds us Moses commanded the stoning of such women. Proverbs 5:3 and 5, “For the lips of the adulterous woman drip honey . . . Her feet go down to death; her steps lead straight to the grave.”
A chill rushed through me. “There are a lot of verses you left out. Jesus forgave. He commanded adulterers to leave their lives of sin. He commands that of all of us. Besides, there’s always hope for redemption. That’s the entire gospel message.” I believed that. I had to believe that. Without that truth, then there’d be no hope for my life. Or anyone else’s, for that matter. That was the reason that Christ had died for my sins.
Dr. Turner squeezed the flashlight in his hands, his jaw clenched. “There are some sins that are abominations in the Lord’s eyes. There are some things you can never undo. Gabby, no one would fault you for wanting to end your life because of this. They’d understand what drove you to do it.”
I sucked in a deep breath. He really was implying what I’d thought: He wanted me to end my own life. The outrage in my voice was real. I couldn’t hold it back any more. “To do what? I’m just sitting on the seashore reflecting on life. I’m not going to kill myself over some guy.”
He turned toward me, his nostrils flaring. I stared at the flashlight in his hands, wondering what it would feel like if he banged it over my head. How could I protect myself? I had to be on guard here.
“He’s not just some guy.” Dr. Turner stared at me, bitterness in his eyes. The man was losing it, and I was going to be here to experience it. “He’s your husband.”
“No one’s worth ending my life over.” My words left no room for doubt.
“The guilt you’re going to carry for the rest of your life is going to be overwhelming, too heavy of a burden.”
“I can overcome anything through Christ. Right? That’s what I read in the Bible.” He was starting to mess with my head. I wasn’t expecting this. I was expecting a direct assault.
“You don’t want to live in disfavor with God. It’s no way to live. No way to live at all, Gabby.”
“You must know God differently than I do because I believe that God loves me despite my sin. That he loved me enough to die for me and take away the punishment I deserve.”
“Don’t fool yourself, Gabby. No one will be surprised if you sleepwalk right into these waters. There will be no shame in that. It will look like an accident.” He pointed toward the dark water before making his fingers imitate me walking toward my death.
I’d had enough of this.
“Is this what you did to Anna? You convi
nced her to swallow those pills?” I hadn’t planned on saying that, but I was starting to feel cross-eyed with his double-talk and innuendo.
Dr. Turner knew how to mess with people’s heads, and that was a dangerous skill to possess. In fact, that must have been how he’d killed the other women. He’d been able to read their weaknesses and use those traits against them. That’s why I knew I would survive tonight—as long as I could remain in control of my thoughts.
Something changed in his gaze. There was a spark of realization there. Either that, or the man was coming undone. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Or how about Ginger? Did you try to convince her to end her life, but when it didn’t work you pushed her off that bluff?”
“That would be crazy. No sane person would do that.” His voice practically sounded like a growl now. “Besides, I wasn’t here that night.”
“But you were. You came back early. In fact, I’d bet there was no meeting. You just needed an alibi.”
He smiled, but his eyes looked empty. “Nice theory. You can’t prove it.”
Mr. Rogers Stars in a Horror Movie.
“Then how about Khloe Wescott? I know she had a heart attack, but I’d even venture to say you gave her some pills. Maybe to relax her? You have our medical history so you must have known she’d have a reaction to whatever was in those pills. You probably encouraged her to take them, and now you think your hands are clean. You prey on women using the power of suggestion. It’s a deadly trait to have, and you’ve mastered it.”
“You’ve done some homework, haven’t you?” He sneered. “But I would never purposefully hurt someone.”
As his hands tightened on the flashlight again, I stood. “But you would. You’re bitter about your wife’s death. You’re even more bitter about the fact that she had an affair. So now you’re trying to punish any woman who’s cheated on her husband?”
Something changed in his eyes at that moment. I’d struck a nerve. I knew I was getting closer and closer to the truth. With any luck, I was turning the tables on him.
“I loved her. I dedicated my life to her, and what did I get in return? Her unfaithfulness. She said I worked too much. That I cared more about other people’s marriages than I cared about my own.” He shook his head, his emotions bubbling to the surface. “She didn’t understand me. If the news of what she’d done had gotten out, I would be ruined. Ruined.”
“What she did was wrong. But you don’t have to punish everyone else because of what your wife did.”
“But I do! Women have to be punished for their indiscretions.” His nostrils flared, and I knew I was getting to him.
“But not men?”
He slowly rose to his feet. Wearing that dark parka, he’d be hard to spot out here. Had he planned it that way? “The Bible speaks of a woman’s unfaithfulness. It’s punishable by death.”
“Don’t you remember what Jesus said to the adulterous woman?” I countered.
“Adultery is punishable by stoning,” Dr. Turner continued.
“I’m not justifying unfaithfulness, but in the words of Jesus, ‘Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone.’”
“You’re going to walk into the water, Gabby.” He pulled a gun from his jacket pocket. “I was hoping to do this the easy way, but I can see that won’t be happening.”
CHAPTER 47
I shook my head and took a step back. “I’m not walking into the water. You can shoot me. Then everyone will know what kind of person you really are. You won’t be able to deny your involvement when they find out I’ve been shot.”
“People will realize that you were the one who provoked this. This is your gun, Gabby.”
I sucked in a deep breath, my eyes skittering down to the weapon in his hands. Sure enough, that was mine, a 9 mm Smith and Wesson I’d purchased after my ordeal with Scum. In all of my planning and calculating, I hadn’t anticipated this. It was a game changer.
“How did you get my gun?”
He smirked, no longer seeming like the meek therapist I’d once thought he was. “I’m not as naïve as you might think. I know you came here to snoop around. I figured that out after your first weekend here.”
He’d figured that out? I’d thought I was a better actor than that. But Dr. Turner was programmed to read people. That made him even more dangerous than your common criminal.
“But that doesn’t explain how you got my gun.”
“Blaine found it. She has a little problem with kleptomania, among other things. I’ve been working with her.”
She must have been the one who took my necklace. And Steve’s knives. And Anna’s letter. “I thought she was obsessive . . .”
“That too. She’s also very resourceful. There were multiple reasons I hired her. Besides, she owes me. Emotional leverage is always a powerful asset.”
I had a feeling she was the one who’d been following me. Probably the one who’d stolen the list from my van. Obsessive, with sticky fingers, and unusually dedicated to Dr. Turner. It all made sense.
“Now let’s get this over with,” Dr. Turner said.
“Dr. Turner, put the gun down.” Riley stepped from the shadows. “This is over. The police are on their way.”
The doctor sighed. “I really didn’t want to have to hurt two people. But murder-suicide it will be. The two of you set this all up for me this evening so very well with that argument in the hallway.”
His words were true, weren’t they? We had given him the perfect excuse if he went through with this. The man was smarter than I’d given him credit for.
“You’ll never get away with it,” I told him, casting a fleeting glance at Riley. He stood on the other side of Dr. Turner. We were too far away to truly protect each other. I prayed this whole situation turned out okay. I had a deep-seated fear that one day life wouldn’t. That my carefully—or not so carefully—planned move would backfire. “You should just give up now.”
Dr. Turner chuckled.
He was losing it, I realized. Maybe his head had never quite been screwed on straight. Just like mechanics had broken-down cars, landscapers had terrible lawns, and crime-scene cleaners had messy houses, maybe therapists also had messed-up mental states.
“But I have a plan. Don’t you see?” Dr. Turner asked.
I looked at Riley again, desperately wishing we were closer. “Apparently, we don’t.”
“Well, you will soon enough.”
What did that mean? I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out. Where were the police? They were an extremely important part of this equation, especially now that Dr. Turner had a gun.
“So you were the one who went through my suitcase, who put a hole in that kayak—even though that was meant for Ginger. You probably even tampered with the throttle on Blaine’s boat.”
“She wasn’t supposed to be aboard. That was intended for Leroy. I couldn’t have him running illegal operations from the island.”
“Why did Anna have two suicide notes?”
He let out a cackle. “One was part of a lesson we did here at the retreat. She was taking it with her, and she was going to leave the island. But I caught her before she could. I didn’t know she’d stashed that letter in a kayak. I would have removed it, of course. Before that, I’d convinced her to write another letter.”
“Convinced her?”
He nodded. “That’s right. We talked through all her problems, and she finally saw things my way. She even put the pills in her mouth and swallowed. So you see, I’m not really guilty of anything.”
“Except knowing how to manipulate people. It’s almost like mind control. I may have even fallen for the power of suggestion a few times since I’ve come here. Nevermore, though.” Yes, I’d found inspiration through Edgar Allan Poe.
“As people think, they do. Thoughts can be very powerful.”
“Did you convince Ginger to jump off the cliff?”
“She was convinced I was going to push her. So she did
it herself. Again, it wasn’t my fault. It was all in her mind. But she needed to pay for what she’d done to Jim and Jill Wagnor.”
“What about what Jim Wagnor did?”
“Ginger committed the ultimate disrespect to marriage.” Dr. Turner shook his head. “You’re clever, Gabby. I always knew you were. I could see it in your gaze that you were different than most people I’ve encountered. Too smart for your own good.”
Just then I saw movement behind Riley. My eyes widened. It was Blaine!
And she was carrying a baseball bat.
“Riley, watch out!” As I started to lunge toward him, the gun fired. Fire ripped through my arm. But I kept moving.
I didn’t need to, apparently,
Riley whirled around and grabbed the bat before Blaine could clobber him. He twisted it in her hands until she yelped and released it. Then he shoved Blaine to the ground and rushed toward Dr. Turner.
We reached him at the same time.
Riley grabbed his hands and pointed his gun upward just as it discharged again.
My heart lurched with fear.
Please say Riley wasn’t shot. My heart can’t handle that trauma again.
CHAPTER 48
I held my breath, waiting to understand and comprehend what had just happened. The next instant, Riley had Dr. Turner’s hands pinched behind his back. Riley’s other arm was tightly slung across the doctor’s chest, holding him in place.
Where had Riley learned those moves?
It didn’t matter. What mattered was that he was okay! He was okay!
“You’re bleeding, Gabby.” Riley nodded toward my arm.
I glanced down. Sure enough, that bullet had skimmed my arm. The wound stung, but I’d been through worse. A few inches difference would have brought me to my knees.
“It’s just a flesh wound.” I tried to keep my British Monty Python accent at bay.
“Gabby, behind you!” Riley yelled.
I turned in time to see Blaine charging toward me, a crazy look in her eyes. I grabbed the bat at my feet and swung it. The wood connected with her knees, and she yelped with pain before falling to the ground.
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