by Nancy Bush
Hayley shook her head quickly. “We had Dinah. Dinah took care of things.”
Candy hesitated. “You tell Denise that none of it matters anymore. There’s no evidence, so she should just keep quiet.”
Connor rubbed his face. Candy was still stuck on her theory that Denise was the culprit. A cowardly, selfish part of himself wished it were true.
Hayley’s smile was sick. Candy looked around some more for a chair, then decided it was time to go. “Stop by,” she told Hayley on the way out. “He can show you the place.” She jerked her head to indicate Connor, then she sidestepped through the door and into the house.
Silence, except for the rustle of wind through the trees, icy cold, cutting into her despite the weight of her jacket.
He sat down beside her and picked up one limp hand. “The sassy hooker I met on Hollywood Boulevard wouldn’t react like this.”
“She never existed.”
“She kept you going for nearly ten years. She’s there. Bring her back. You need her.”
“I just want off the planet.”
“You’re afraid I’ll find out something about Denise.”
The words cut to the bone, too true to argue with.
“Come on, Hayley,” he said in a softer voice, one full of concern and, dare she believe it, affection? “Fight back.”
Of their own volition, her fingers reached for him, tentatively touching his chin, questioning and unsure. He dragged her closer, comfortingly. Their heartbeats melded.
She whispered, “I used to be able to focus on a vision of a field with dry grass and huckleberry bushes, somewhere in the mountains. It kept me sane. But now I think that field is where . . . he was killed. It came over me out there like a wave, drowning me.”
His chin rested on her crown. She closed her eyes and gave herself up to his protection. She’d never wanted to be close to a man, and she found this inordinately scary.
“Y’know, I always said I was a virgin,” she went on through dry lips. “But it was a lie. I didn’t know it, but it was a lie.”
“You’re you.” His voice was a growl in his chest. “That’s all that matters.”
She drew a shaking breath. “No, it’s not.”
His lips were against her hair. Now her whole body was trembling. “Tell me,” he whispered.
There was a disturbance inside the house. Exclamations. Connor turned his head to listen, then watched in amazement as Mary ran out breathlessly, hands clutching at her throat again.
A long-legged woman strode outside behind her. In the dim light it took Connor a moment to recognize the newcomer.
“Dinah?” he said in surprise.
“Dinah!” Hayley came alive.
“Well, hello,” she greeted them. “Is this a private party or can anyone join the powwow?”
Hayley rushed into her arms as John Callahan appeared beside her and Connor drawled, “Why do I get the feeling Dinah’s here to fix things . . . again?”
Chapter Nineteen
It was late, especially for a school night, but Matt Logan had no intention of going to sleep until he’d gotten all the facts written down. Juggling a flashlight and a pen and notebook, he huddled beneath the blankets of his bed, fully clothed. He had to take good notes for Uncle Jack. He didn’t care what Mom said. He was important. He’d found the skull, hadn’t he? It bugged him that everybody seemed to forget that!
Chewing on his lower lip, he wrote six big question marks in a row. He could tell Uncle Jack was worried about his actress friend. He must think she knocked off old man Daniels. Matt didn’t believe it, though. She was too pretty and nice.
Matt had listened hard at the back door to their conversation until Mom shooed him away. Heather had snitched again. She’d smirked at him and he’d wanted to smack her, but if he did, he’d be the one who got sent to his room, not her. Besides, she could scratch with those icky, long fingernails and it really hurt!
Scribbling down names, he made a face as he wrote Candy. Yuck. She was fat and weird. He’d bet five dollars that she did it.
And now this other sister had arrived and Matt itched to know what they were all talking about down there.
Maybe it was time to find out.
Carefully, he cracked open his window, which screeched as if it had lungs. He clamped his hands over his ears, scared, but nobody came to nail him. When he peered outside he realized why. They were gone. The back porch was quiet and empty.
Knowing he was begging to be caught, he sneaked out of the room and crept down the stairs. They were all in the family room off the kitchen now, talking by the fireplace in low, serious voices. But it was that other one—that new sister—who was doing most of the talking.
Pencil at the ready, Matt settled on the second to last step and craned an ear to listen.
It wasn’t easy to confess. She’d never planned to do it. For over eight years she’d kept the secret close to her breast until it had become a fable, a fantasy, something less than real.
Funny, she’d always believed it would remain that way. Or if by some bizarre twist of fate, the truth were revealed, then it would be Denise who cracked. Not Hayley.
But one look at Hayley’s dull eyes and wan cheeks and Dinah had realized her sister was breaking apart. That brilliant, diamond-hard facade Hayley had adopted soon after the accident, the one Dinah had begun to believe was the true Hayley, had completely collapsed.
So it was time to face the music. They were waiting. Faces turned to her. Expectant. Worried. Dreading the truth, just as she dreaded telling it.
“I came home early from school,” Dinah began. Hayley sat in silent horror; Jackley frowned in concentration; John stood with a cool, watchful aura of distrust and disappointment. Her throat closed in on itself, but she tore on, knowing if she stopped she’d never be able to finish. “I was playing music, Rihanna, mostly, blasting it through the windows and outside. Hayley knocked on the door and yelled at me to turn it down but I paid no attention.
“Mama was dead, and I didn’t care where Tom was. We had a cat . . . a cat named . . . Bobo,” she admitted, her voice faltering a bit as she’d left the current Bobo in the care of her neighbor. “Tom had been home and he’d kicked Bobo so hard, the cat had run away, limping. I hated him for that.”
She paused for a moment, her jaw locked, but then she continued. “Denise was with Jimmy Fargo. At least I thought she was. They were as thick as thieves then, and he was bragging about sleeping with her. He disgusted me. So did dear old Stepdaddy, but I could handle him, although it did cross my mind that I might have to kill him someday.
“It got later and later. Hayley went out, I guess. She was gone for a long time. When she came back, she called for help, and I went to see what was wrong.”
Hayley murmured, “I tripped when I was running back to the house.”
Dinah nodded. “That’s right. You’d fallen down hard and apparently passed out. And you were screaming about something out in the woods. Somebody beating someone again and again. I made you lie down. You were confused—concussed, actually, though I didn’t know that at the time. I grabbed the ax by the back door and went outside.”
John stirred uncomfortably. Dinah’s pulse beat hard, her feelings threatening to overwhelm her.
Connor said, “You took the ax with you to the clearing.”
Dinah nodded again. “But I didn’t use it, if that’s what you’re thinking. I walked out there and Denise was rocking herself and crying. Thomas’s body was there.” Dinah swallowed, her mouth dry as sand. “He’d been beaten so badly, you could hardly tell who he was.
“Denise was covered with blood,” Dinah finished, forcing the words out. “I took her home. Hayley was on the couch, dazed. And Denise started babbling about all these things he’d done to her.” She inhaled and exhaled quickly, several times. “I put her in the shower, but she just went on and on. Hysterical. Crying and crying. And then she started bleeding. She miscarried later that week.”
Dina
h stopped abruptly. The pop and crackle of the fire punctuated the silence. Gazing at John, she longed to be taken in his arms again and soothed and comforted.
“Did she admit to the killing?” Connor asked.
Dinah slowly shook her head. “She wasn’t coherent. But if you believe half the things she said he did to her, then she killed him to stop him. I have no doubt that it’s his fault she miscarried.”
Connor slid a look Hayley’s way, checking for corroboration.
She smiled wryly, a faint reminder of her former, more selfish self. “I just remember an arm smashing downward and her screaming.” She swallowed. “But . . . but I think it was my arm . . .”
“Don’t accuse yourself of something to protect someone else,” Connor warned.
“I’m not,” Hayley said wearily.
He turned back to Dinah. “How did his body get in the storm drain?”
“I put it there. I dragged him across the field and shoved him inside.”
“What did you do with his clothes?” he asked.
Dinah regarded him blankly. “He was naked when I found him.”
“Do you think Denise removed them?”
“I never saw them anywhere.”
He frowned, the loose end clearly bothering him. “I’d like you both to talk to Gus Dempsey tomorrow, and Denise needs to be a part of this, too.”
“No!” Dinah and Hayley declared in unison.
Dinah went on quickly. “She’s finally on track. This whole thing nearly killed her, and she’s been killing herself ever since. Please don’t mess this up.”
Connor considered. “How about if I talk to Dr. Stone?”
“Fine,” Dinah agreed, shooting John a glance. What was he thinking? What did he think about Denise now? About her?
He stood near the fire, his expression grim and reflective. She dared not move closer to him; his vibes clearly said her approach wouldn’t be welcome.
“I’ll call Hayden Stone tonight,” Connor said grimly, heading out of the room, cell phone in hand.
“Denise is a royal pain in the rear end,” Dinah couldn’t help from saying, “but she’s a victim. I don’t want her hurt any more than she already has been.”
Connor glanced over his shoulder, reading the faces of his three guests and came to the not-so-hard-to-reach conclusion that they all believed Denise had murdered her stepfather. Not Hayley. Not Dinah.
Denise.
He swallowed, hoping it was true.
The Wheel Treat You Right Motel’s sign sputtered and hummed in green neon. John Callahan walked beneath it, so conscious of the woman beside him, he felt tied to her presence by an invisible rope.
“Dinah,” he muttered, as her foot reached the first step of the outdoor stairs that led to their connecting rooms.
She turned back, her face serious and pale in the uncertain light. They stared at each other. So much to say and no way to say it.
His lips twisted into a bitter smile. “I don’t care about any of it except that you couldn’t tell me the truth.”
“I’m the protector,” she said.
He wanted to tell her he loved her, but didn’t.
Dinah closed her eyes, took a deep breath. Unconsciously, she leaned toward him and he gathered her in his arms and kissed her face and neck and hairline. She sank against him and he half led, half carried her up to his room.
“I don’t want to care about you,” she murmured. “You’re arrogant, and exacting, and difficult.”
“You could be describing yourself.” A thread of amusement filtered into his voice.
“And you were once married to my sister.”
Gently balancing her against his shoulder, John twisted the key in the lock and pushed open the door to his room—an unattractive hovel currently blasting heat from its baseboard units. As the scene for a romantic reunion, it couldn’t have been worse.
“You’re everything she just couldn’t be. It’s not her fault.”
Her breath was warm on his neck. She hesitated, finally pulling away to arm’s length so she could read his expression. “What is this?”
“A fresh start together?”
She looked around, swallowing. “I’d like that,” she admitted, “but everything’s so unsettled. I can’t . . .” She glanced toward the bed. “Do you understand?” she asked bleakly.
“You’re turning me down.”
“But when this is over . . . when we’re back in L.A. . . . ?”
He paused so long, she feared she’d made a mistake. But then he said solemnly, “We’ll pick things up again,” and with a lighter heart, Dinah slipped through the connecting door to her own room.
Matt skittered upstairs, heart thumping, poised at the upper landing, ready to flee from sneak attacks. A frigid blast of air swept through his open bedroom window and surrounded him in the hallway.
What would a real policeman do? What would Uncle Jack do, if he was on the force again?
He’d go to the scene of the crime. They always did that. Searched for clues and stuff.
Looking over his shoulder to the source of the icy air, he thought about how dark and cold it was in the clearing tonight. His blood nearly froze in his veins.
What’sa matter? You scared, shit-for-brains?
With new fortitude, he set his jaw and tiptoed back to his bedroom in search of his darkest, warmest coat.
Connor clicked off his cell, his thoughts moving rapidly. Dr. Hayden Stone was nowhere to be found, though Connor had left messages both on the doctor’s cell and with his emergency number.
It was late; John and Dinah had left several hours earlier. Hayley had fallen asleep in the guest room and he was considering dropping onto the couch for the night.
A crunch of gravel.
Connor looked out to the drive and saw a dark figure hurrying away. Someone from the house?
Lightly, he moved upstairs, hesitating outside Hayley’s room. Part of him wanted to step inside and climb into the warmth of her bed. They were heading in that direction. Rapidly. Too rapidly, maybe. Or from his point of view, not rapidly enough.
Cracking open the door, he peeked inside.
The room was empty.
“Shit!” Denise muttered through her teeth. The word, though spoken softly, seemed to echo through the trees and meld with the wind. As if in answer, a lash of icy rain peppered the side of her face.
She stopped short, momentarily lost. It had been eight years since she’d followed the path from her house to the wildflower-strewn ledge where she’d met Jimmy Fargo for those moments of unrelenting lust. She wasn’t exactly a nature hiker anyway, and in the darkness she couldn’t see her torn nail—compliments of a wild moment with a spider web and a pine tree—but she could feel its rough surface.
Swallowing, she counted her heartbeats, aware this little midnight foray was right up there with totally crazy. But she’d met Jimmy many a night, late, after she’d escaped from him.
Thomas Daniels. She shook her head. Why had it taken so long to remember? She must possess amazing powers of repression for she hadn’t recalled anything but her sick feelings whenever she thought of Wagon Wheel. She’d pushed the memories way back in her brain.
And it was dissociation, too. I hurt, but I won’t feel, because if I feel, I die. Better to pretend it had never happened. Even with other celebrities confessing to abuse, she still couldn’t touch her own memories.
Stone had pushed her. Stone had made her recall everything awful that had happened to her at the hands of that sicko Lambert Wallace, and made her realize she was perpetuating the cycle of victim.
She was a victim; she knew that. Her stepfather had sexually abused her innumerable times and she’d lied and told Jimmy he was the first and that they were having a baby together. Desperate, desperate measures. The hope that he would take her away from all this. The realization that Jimmy—hunk that he was—would never be man enough to help her.
And then that final evening . . .
Deni
se kept walking, fighting her way through damp bushes and sticking pine branches, which threatened to poke out an eye. Breathing hard, she finally reached the upper ledge, then promptly sat down on the moist, pine needle-littered ground.
“I’m pregnant,” she’d told Jimmy, tears welling unexpectedly.
He’d been talking about his pickup: black satiny finish, oversized wheels, roll bar, and gun rack. The words rolled off his tongue like compliments to an adored lover. Her announcement stopped him cold, mouth open, eyes blinking comically.
“Pregnant?” he repeated dumbly. “Jesus fucking Christ!”
“I wanted to know what—you thought we should do,” she stumbled on. “Make some decisions.”
“Hell, we’ve only done it twice!”
“What do you think?” she asked desperately.
“Get rid of it. I don’t care. Jesus! You think you could use some protection! I don’t want a baby.”
A bad, bad moment. The realization that she was going to have to tell Thomas the truth.
She’d sleepwalked through the whole next day at school. Jimmy wouldn’t talk to her. Whispers. Pointing fingers. She and Dinah and Hayley weren’t considered cool. They were pretty and poor and had only been around a couple of years. No one knew them; no one wanted to know them. But everybody knew Thomas Daniels.
And then . . . the rest was still a blur, pictures in fast-forward. She must have told him. She could remember serious yelling, and she had a mental picture of him in the fading sunlight, standing in the driveway waiting for her, his face livid with rage.
He’d yelled and hit her. Nothing new. She’d tried to scream for Dinah but there was music everywhere. A cacophony of sound. Beautiful and oddly terrifying because she couldn’t hear the smack of his fist against her face—nor could she feel it.
Time passing. The clearing. And then, very clearly, she remembered the stink of his breath and the taste of his slobber and the hunh-hunh-hunh of air leaving his chest as he jumped atop her. His idea of how a man should have sex with a woman. His stepdaughter. Her.