“I wish I could say something to make this better for you,” she said. “I wish I could tell you we’ll find her somewhere else and stop her before she invades your life any further, but I can’t. If we leave here now, she’ll go into hiding. She’ll wait. Months maybe, or years. Then one day, she’ll show up on your doorstep and finish her plans.”
“You mean kill me.” He braced his knotted hands against the porch railing. “Can you answer one question for me?”
“If I can.”
“Why? Why is she doing this? I remember Tom White. He seemed like a good enough guy. A little too focused on getting into a girl’s pants, but basically okay.” Brushing one hand through his hair, he shook his head. “I remember hearing about the whole statutory rape case against him, but as much as he talked about sex in the locker room, he never would’ve forced anyone. Emma dropping the charges seemed like the right thing to do at the time, so why did she kill him after all these years? And why is she after me?”
“What kind of relationship did you have?”
“We were in one class together. I never even paid any attention to her until she started throwing herself at me.” Jace tried to imagine the scene. A handsome young man wouldn’t notice one plain girl, but that same girl might do whatever it took to attract him. “One day I was sitting behind her, and she started telling her best friend how she wanted me inside her. She went into details I’d only read about in dirty magazines. Looking back, I know it probably wasn’t the most chivalrous thing to do, but at seventeen, I jumped at the chance.”
His head dropped into his hands. “From the way she talked, I thought she was experienced. She acted like she’d already had every other boy in the school, and several of the teachers…”
“You had sex with her?”
“In the back of my father’s Cadillac. Afterwards, I knew the truth, but I swear to God, I didn’t know. Hell, it was my first time, too.”
“Then you had no way of knowing she was a virgin.”
“It didn’t matter. My father raised me better than that, and I knew it. I’d never felt so ashamed. All the things I thought I knew about her, only to find out she was playing a trick on me. I couldn’t even look at her after that.” Raising his head, he stared at Jace. “Shortly after, I graduated and came out here. I haven’t thought about her since. Now, she’s coming to kill me? What kind of person would kill a man for taking her virginity when she offered it?”
“A very sick person, Mr. Mitchell, and I promise we’ll catch her before she hurts anyone else.”
#
From her perch in the low hanging branches of a stunted oak, Emma could see Peter on his porch, talking to Douglas like they were the oldest of friends. The binoculars pressed so tight against her face the bridge of her nose ached. She welcomed the pain; it kept her focused.
“You traitorous cow!” One hand reached out to rip away the tiny twigs from the surrounding branches. “You knew where he was all along. That’s how you got up here so fast. And you fooled me into thinking you were in love with that stupid cop. Now he’s dead, you think you can move on to the next guy, but you can’t have Peter! He’s mine, and he always will be.”
Taking out her gun, she sighted along its barrel like she saw people do in the movies. Following the line of cold metal, she could put a neat hole between the agent’s eyes if she was close enough. “How far away does one of these things shoot?” she asked, as if she expected an answer from the trees. “I’ll just have to ask the nice man at the bar. With all the dead things he has on his walls, he ought to know.”
One more night to perfect her plan. One more night spent sitting at the corner of that ghastly bar, chatting with the locals and trying not to lose focus on her mission. Peter needed to die next, no matter how many local yokels decided a woman who came into a bar alone begged for their company. The one last night had practically been begging to burn alive. His hand on her thigh brought the flames into her head, and she could see him squirming against the glue, trying to get away—and screaming as the fire licked along his skin.
She could’ve killed him and dumped him—reserved the fire for Peter—but if they found the numbskull’s body first, her plan would be ruined. Of course, last night, she believed Douglas would never find her here.
As she looked once more at her prey and her nemesis, she wished she could go back in time and kill that asshole in the bar. She already lost the element of surprise, so one more body wouldn’t make any difference. Maybe she’d find the guy and make him burn tonight, and then come for Peter in the morning.
In the morning—when his guardians were asleep or too tired to react—she would end Peter Mitchell, and if she was particularly lucky, she could take out Douglas at the same time.
#
Peter’s lasagna should’ve been excellent, but Jace spent more time pushing it around her plate than into her mouth. One call the morning of her arrival telling her Ben made it through surgery, and not a damn thing since. The old adage ‘no news is good news’ wasn’t doing her any good.
“I’m sure your partner will be fine,” Peter said into the stony silence. “But I’m beginning to think he’s more than your partner. Am I right?”
“Am I that obvious?”
He smiled. A few months ago, she would’ve fallen into the man’s deep blue eyes, but now she could only focus on the eyes she’d last seen etched with pain.
“If the right woman showed that much concern about me, I’d marry her on the spot. So, yes, you are that obvious.” He reached out and touched her hand. “I’m sorry this happened to him and to you.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for. I’m the one who should be apologizing. If we could’ve caught her earlier, you wouldn’t even know any of this happened.”
“He was shot pretending to be me, and you say I have nothing to apologize for? I’m the one that hurt her. For all you know, that one action all those years ago started this. If anyone had to take the brunt of her anger, I think the person responsible should’ve, and that means me.”
Jace stood and walked toward the fireplace. Since she lost her family, she never enjoyed the warmth of a fire. The two hearths in her own home had never been lit. Tonight, though, something drove her toward the flames—partly a need to whip her psyche mixed with a need to understand the anger inside her. Part of her agreed with Pete. If he had been kinder to Emma she might’ve turned out differently; the same part of her wanted to be angry with Peter because Ben went to a hospital in his place.
But a bigger part knew the truth.
“No one is to blame for Emma’s actions but Emma,” she heard herself say as she watched the swirling dance of fire over wood. “So ‘teenage you’ did something stupid to ‘teenage her’. We all have stupid things in our pasts we wish we’d never done, but we can’t keep whipping ourselves—or others—for them. At some point, the past has to be the past.” Even as she spoke the words to comfort Peter, she knew they weren’t just directed at him. The stupidest thing she ever did still hung over her head like a guillotine, and every day, she waited for the blade to fall. “It’s not the past that shapes who we are, it’s how we react to what we experience. Think of all the things you see in the news about murderers who claim they’re not guilty because of some horror they survived. Thousands of people have similar things happen and go on to lead normal—sometimes even happy—lives. Emma doesn’t get a pass because she endured heartache, or abuse, or a crappy childhood. She does what she does because it’s the path she’s chosen. She didn’t have to go there.”
“But if I handled it better…”
“Someone else would’ve hurt her, and instead of you being on her list, it would be another man.” She turned to look at him, and his eyes showed how much he let this thing torture him. “Listen, Pete. These killings are her choices, and not all of them have one damn thing to do with the pains of the past. Besides the men she knew, she killed several other people—men she never met before. One after he helped her. She chose t
o kill him, and whatever reasons lay behind it, it still boils down to her choice. Some people choose to rise above the pain and move on. Emma chose to embrace all the little hurts and let them fester until one day she decided to take matters into her own hands. She’s taken the phrase ‘Paybacks are Hell’ to use as her own system of justice.”
She stared into the crackling fire, and a door opened inside her. “We all have to pay for our mistakes in our own way,” she said almost to herself, “but no one deserves to die because of a mistake.” And no one deserves to live devoid of love either, she added silently.
“Even if this is Emma’s choice…” His words trailed off, but Jace knew where his thoughts were headed. Even though Emma was intent on killing Peter Mitchell, he still held some measure of sympathy for her—sympathy or guilt. “Maybe she doesn’t understand that what she’s doing is wrong. This could all be a mistake.”
“When she killed her husband, that may have been a mistake, but every death after that went beyond anything anyone could think of as a mistake.” She’d heard it all before in so many variations—a misunderstanding, a mistake, a quirk of the brain—and even though she knew she should keep her mouth shut, the words came tumbling out. “Ask Devin Thatcher’s wife if she thinks her husband is lying comatose because of a misunderstanding. Ask Hugh Bower’s boyfriend if he’s living his life alone because of a mistake. Ask the family of that poor kid she killed in Utah. I’m sorry, Mr. Mitchell, but they won’t agree with that sentiment and neither do I.”
“But what about—?”
Jace cut him off. “Regardless of what happened to her in the past, this is the present. Because she thinks she’s earned the right to kill, do her victims deserve to die? Don’t pity Emma Sweet. Trust me when I tell you this—she wouldn’t afford you the same courtesy. She knows what she’s doing, and the more she does it, the more she likes it.”
#
“The time to hesitate is through. No time to wallow in the mire. Try now we can only lose, and our love become a funeral pyre. Come on, baby, light my fire…” The jukebox blared the song, just the way Emma liked it. When it finished, it would come on again like it had twice already. Already the other patrons were beginning to shoot dirty looks in her direction. She didn’t care. It was her goddamn quarter.
She took another swig of her beer and set it down with a giggle. “More like it’s my fifteen quarters.”
“What’s your problem, lady?” a walking beer-gut said as he leaned his considerable bulk against the stool next to her.
“You’re breathing on me,” she said. After the evening she had, she just wanted to sit and listen to her song. Maybe get a little drunk. Maybe find just the right baby and light his fire. The thought made her giggle, and the sound made the mountain of fat next to her growl.
“You put a goddamn roll in that thing, and it’s all the same song. What the fuck?”
“If you don’t like the song, find another bar,” she said. “Otherwise, wait until my money is gone and play something else. Either way, leave me alone.”
“Listen, lady.” He stood and flexed his fists menacingly.
Turning her head toward him ever so slightly, she clicked her tongue. “Big man. Are you going to hit me next? Please do. I would enjoy making you pay for it.” Her hand slipped into her purse, caressing the revolver she loved so well.
“Whatever lady. I’m outta here. You’re nuts.”
Shrugging, she took another pull of her beer. Her mother always said drinking beer wasn’t ladylike. Will had always ordered her a white wine or some fruity drink. After all those years of drinking what other people wanted her to drink, she found a cold beer refreshing in ways they don’t bother to tell you about in the commercials.
“Ma’am?” the bartender said. “Sorry to have to do this, but I’m pulling the plug on the jukebox. Tell me how much money you put in, and I’ll pay you back, but you’re killing business.”
She shrugged once more. “Whatever. And keep your money. Just bring me another beer and don’t bother me again. I need to think.”
Silence permeated the room, replaced by the buzz of voices. Seconds later a different song came onto the reset jukebox. The other patrons were happy, but Emma just seethed.
In reality, she couldn’t be bothered with the sounds around her. When she said she needed to think, she meant it. It just happened that music helped her think, and she had become particularly fond of the song. The lyrics fit her mood—especially tonight and especially considering what she had to think about.
Grabbing the bottle in front of her, she made her way to the back of the bar, settling on the only darkened booth not occupied with couples trying to inhale each others’ tonsils. To Emma’s surprise, the sounds of people groping each other served the same purpose as the song. It got her in the mood—not for love, but for revenge.
With one finger, she traced lazy circles in the condensation her beer left on the table. “So, you think you can have Peter, do you? And I thought you had the hots for that cop. Silly me. What woman could think of any other man once she looks into those eyes?” Just the thought of drowning in those deep blue pools brought a wistful sigh to her lips. “I never had you pegged for being so fickle. Not that I blame you, but you picked the wrong man. Any of the others, I might have given them to you for all your hard work, but this one… He was mine then, and he’ll always be mine.”
From her perch in the tree, she had seen the way Douglas had thrown herself at Peter. The binoculars showed everything in clear detail—the way the agent batted her eyes at him, the gentle touch as he responded to her advances. As the sun went down, Emma watched as they went inside.
Peter made a fire, and then as the agent stood watching, he cooked her a meal. Although their words didn’t reach to her perch, Emma knew they were courting. Peter had that look in his eyes, and Douglas was doing her best to make him fall in love with her. She sat on a high stool, and Emma just knew the woman was flaunting her shapely legs. When he bent to check on dinner, he would have the perfect view under the skirt Emma imagined the agent wearing.
Every second of their meal played through her head as she sat drinking her beer. By the time she raised her hand to summon another, her fingernails had dug long grooves into the wood.
She hadn’t planned on killing the agent. Through the whole mission, she’d looked on Douglas as an equal, even though they were at cross-purposes. Emma admired the business-like way the agent handled herself, and she’d been impressed by the police work it took to track down every bit of her life. The day they figured out her name, she congratulated Douglas on her fine police work, even as she cursed her.
The thought of ending the other woman’s life clutched at her heart. She’d only made one mistake, and that mistake would cost her life. She was after Peter, and that was one thing Emma wouldn’t allow.
Peter was hers, until the day he died.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Sunrise in the mountain wilderness crept in through the branches, dappling the forest floor with shades of pink and orange. Jace didn’t spare more than a moment to wonder at the magic of it; her thoughts were on the man she left in San Francisco. She and Peter had talked long into the night. He talked because, for the first time, the solitude of his cabin had become more like a prison than a refuge. She talked because she needed an objective ear while she tried to figure out her past, and Peter was an exceedingly good listener.
At first, they talked about nothing, which suited both of them just fine. The light conversation gave her time to reflect, and the more she knew of the man, the more comfortable she felt. When his old mantel clock chimed twelve, and the coffee had grown cold, she began to open up.
For the first time in her life, she admitted her fears to a stranger. She told him of the fire, and how her lack of focus brought about the horror of losing her family. Then she sat back and waited for the storm she knew would come.
Instead, he looked at her with gentle eyes. “You should be telling Ben th
is, not me,” he said. “But I understand. Sometimes the most important things are the hardest ones to talk about, especially with a new love.”
“You sound like you’re talking from experience.”
He shook his head. “I had someone once, and I let her go. Maybe because I never could talk to her about those important things. Don’t make the same mistake.”
By the time the fire crackled down to embers, they sat in companionable silence. She thought about Ben. Even given their short acquaintance, he tried so many times to get her to open up. Despite the kinship she’d felt for him, she just couldn’t. Too many past events attached themselves to too much pain. If she opened herself to him, he might not look at her the same way. Telling him the truth could make him turn away from her, and she couldn’t bear that look again.
Her father wore a look behind his eyes for all his remaining years, but the fullness of it had been reserved for his only surviving child. It held disappointment, and shame, and always behind it all, disgust. They never spoke of the fire, but she knew in her heart, he never doubted its cause.
She didn’t blame him. Her childish mistake cost him the love of his life and his youngest child. If the situation were reversed, she wouldn’t have been able to look at him without letting her feelings show through.
If Ben looked at her that way, though, she couldn’t bear it.
“You’ll never know if you don’t try, and if you don’t try, you’ll always have this hanging between you.”
Later as the sun rose on a little-used trail behind the house, Peter’s words rang over and over through her head. She could never have a relationship with any man while the past stood in the way. Telling Ben could change his potential feelings for her, but they could also pave the way toward a stronger bond.
In the end, she had to make a choice between letting the past stay hidden and perhaps tearing them apart, or shining a light on the past and maybe bringing them closer together. Certain failure or possible success.
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