by Jaye Maiman
I slowed the car as I approached Douglas Marks’ empty driveway. His house was dark. I found myself braking. Where had he disappeared to for the day? Could he have tracked me to Wilkes Barre? I mentally retraced my route. Had any cars followed me too closely? I remembered the sound of a car revving up just as I pulled away from the Central Presbyterian Church. If he had tailed me —
I cupped a palm over my mouth as anxiety bit down on my intestines. Without hesitating I cut my headlights and eased the car forward till it slumped to the shoulder of the road, next to a stand of broad pines. Wherever Douglas was now, there was one thing I knew for sure — he wasn’t home.
I retrieved my pick case from the knapsack in the back seat and slipped outside. My eyelashes flicked against the snow. If it kept up at this strange, halting pace, by morning we’d have less than an inch. I thought of K.T. back at the cabin, recalled how her skin flushed after a long bath. I envisioned the way shadows danced along the pine beams lining the ceiling of the living room, the logs hissing and cracking in the stone fireplace. Tonight was perfect for snuggling up on the couch, our bare legs entwined, her soft burnt sienna hair turning coppery in the fire’s glow. I wanted to taste her again, make love to her as slowly as the drift of a snowflake in a night without wind.
But she was at the cabin with Dean and I was standing here, a slender pick in my hand, breaking into my neighbor’s home. The lock gave easily — three quick flicks of the wrist and I was in. My eyes had already adjusted to the dark. Still, remembering the array of antiques cluttering this room, I searched my pocket for a penlight. The beam cut across the floor, leading me toward the rear hall. I stumbled only once, just as I entered Douglas’ office. My right foot caught on the edge of the spinning wheel I had admired less than a week ago. So much had changed since then.
The office was located at the rear of the house. There was only one window in this room and memory told me that it overlooked a thick grove of oak and ash trees. I risked flipping on the overhead light, confident that my presence would be detected only by nosy raccoons and other nocturnal carnivores, then proceeded to search the desk.
The first thing that struck me were the research books lining the shelf above his desk. The assorted tomes on botany and ballistics no longer appeared innocuous to me. I pored through the contents of each desk drawer. Other than a pedantic paper on heart disease, I found nothing of even the faintest interest. Obviously, I was looking in the wrong place.
I retraced my steps, found the central hall, then climbed the stairs to the second floor. I cracked open a door and jerked backward as a light shot into my eyes. I flattened myself against the wall, heart pounding. It took a few seconds for my mind to register the after-image. I lowered the penlight and reentered the room. A large oval mirror hung on the opposite wall. I located the night table, then flicked on a lamp, grimacing as a reddish glow filled the room. The mirror was gilded, antique in design. The bed itself was king-sized, with red velvet and gold-tasseled ropes draped over the walnut canopy. The only furniture in the room besides the bed and night tables was a similarly ornate fainting couch angled so that it faced an incongruously modern armoire.
Instinct made me cross the room. I was just out to open the armoire’s doors when I heard a creak behind me. I held my breath and listened with every cell in my body. Only after a full minute had passed did I continue with my search.
I slid the door open and felt my jaw drop. The armoire was actually an entertainment center — that is, if you deemed porn entertainment. The central compartment held a television and VCR combination unit. But what made my blood pump was the contents of the top shelves. I fingered the first book. Spread Eagles. The title was disturbingly accurate. I rotated the book, trying to discern just what part of a woman’s anatomy the center spread depicted. When I figured it out, I snapped the book tight and glanced over to the titles printed on the spines of Douglas’ impressive videotape collection. Ride Her High! I slipped the case out. The plastic jacket was yellowed and cracking from age. I started to return it to its place on the shelf, then stopped abruptly, my eye drawn to the front cover.
The photograph had to be at least a decade old, but the face on the bare-chested male was unmistakable. Douglas Marks was one of the film’s stars. At last, the reticence about his acting career made sense.
So Douglas Marks used to be Doug Adonis, porn star. What did that prove? Nothing, I tried to convince myself as I finished rummaging through the bedroom.
Down the hall were two other bedrooms. Both were country-inn perfect. I wasn’t surprised. In the past few years, I’ve come to learn that most of us move in more than one world. So often, the public persona reflects little of the passions, fears, and impulses that seethe under the skin.
What attracted me and repulsed me about my work was that it plunged right into the churning bloodstream of the shadow world.
As I opened drawers and closet doors, searched under beds and directed the penlight toward bookshelves, sounds of movement just outside the house rattled my nerves. I knew Doug could come home any minute. And a glance at my watch told me that I was almost late for Maggie’s call. But I was intent on finishing my search. I had one last room to inspect. The knob resisted me. I smiled as I whipped out another pick.
Once inside I changed my assessment. The interior was more a walk-in closet than a full-sized room. A yellow light bathed the contents. On the right-hand wall was a gun cabinet. I moved aside an air matress and jerked open the bottom drawer. I heard the bullets rattle before I saw them.
My fingertips and scalp were tingling, and the gurgle in my stomach echoed in my ears. I forced myself to stop and take ten slow breaths. I had to keep myself sharp and steady now. With measured calm I scrutinized the rest of the closet. On a shelf, on the rear wall, next to a twelve-pack of paper towels, I discovered a collection of antique binoculars. I held one in my hands and closed my eyes. Could he be Daniel Finnegan? If so, Doug possessed not only motive and the medical knowledge necessary to take Noreen down, but also the ideal position for covering up his involvement in the death.
An alarm sounded downstairs and I jumped backward. Shit. Reflexively, I reached for the revolver resting in the bottom drawer of the gun cabinet. As soon as it was in my hand, my body broke out in a cold sweat. I hadn’t held a gun since my sister Carol’s death. My partner Tony had repeatedly admonished me that firearms provided a critical line of defense in our profession. I had taken tae kwon do instead.
Now I checked the gun to confirm that it was loaded. The bullet blurred as a drop of sweat rolled into my right eye. I wiped my forehead with the back of one hand, abruptly noticing that the buzzing had stopped and a voice was booming up the stairs.
Carol’s face swam before me, her open mouth brimming with bright red blood. I can’t handle this, I thought, prepared to drop the gun back in the drawer. Then I recognized the voice. Dean. All at once the only image before me was K.T.’s face, the way she looked in the morning as the sunlight gently swept her face.
I rushed out of the closet and clambered downstairs, shouting Dean’s name. He just kept speaking, rushing over my words. I ran toward the sound, realization dawning on me as I neared the source.
Dammit. I screeched to a halt near Douglas’s desk, the gun pointing at a son-of-a-bitching answering machine. Dean had already hung up. I put the gun down, flicked on the desk lamp, then searched for the “play” button. My finger hesitated for a nanosecond. Dean’s call might be urgent. I pressed the button, wondering if he had seen his car in the driveway and was trying to warn me that Douglas was nearing home.
Glancing over my shoulder nervously, I listened to the tape whir into place. That’s when I noticed the medical bag discreetly tucked behind an overstuffed armchair. I scurried over, snapped the flap, and began rummaging through the contents. My blood ran cold as I scanned the notes Douglas had hastily scribbled onto a legal pad.
Dean was Noreen’s brother. And he was the one who had ordered her cremation.
/> There was a long buzz, then Dean’s voice banged into the room. “Hey, Mr. Adonis, it’s Dean. When you get home tomorrow morning, call me right away. I’m going to need your help to solve a little problem I’ve run up against. I’ll explain later. Call me at the seven-eight-nine-one number. If I don’t answer the first time, keep trying until you reach me. The calls will be forwarded to wherever I am, so don’t give up. You’ll understand the urgency when you call. ’Bye.”
There was a mechanical clack and then silence.
From the number he left, I gathered he had left K.T, alone. I breathed half a sigh of relief.
I was shaking as I dialed the number. It rang eight times before I heard a click. I waited for the bastard to pick up, but the ringing resumed. As I was setting the phone down, I heard a faint ringing in the distance. I cocked my head and listened. The ringing ceased as soon as I hung up. I dialed the number again and the ringing resumed. I ran a hand through my hair and stared at the doorway, fear finally riding a tidal wave through my limbs. Dean’s car was out there. It was his cellular phone that was ringing.
Atlanta. Dean hadn’t answered until the ninth ring. He could have had his damn calls forwarded to a phone booth at the airport. Or a cellular phone in a rented car. Or any goddamn place he chose.
The truth finally cracked through my defenses.
Chapter Sixteen
I crashed Dean’s car into the mail box post outside the cabin. I punched the gears into reverse, then punched them again into drive. I almost drove through the screened-in porch. The driveway was empty, I noted dully as I leaped out of the car.
My consciousness kept trying to warn me. The driveway is empty. Blindly, numbly, I raced up the steps. Only after I kicked in the front door and heard my cry shriek through the vacant rooms did I realize that I had Douglas’s gun cemented to my right hand. I couldn’t remember taking it. And I couldn’t put the damn thing down. I screamed K.T.’s name once, like a woman gone irretrievably and gratefully insane, then I searched through the house. There was no trace of them. No clue telling me where he might have taken her.
I will not lose you, a voice shrieked inside my head.
I ran into the den and rifled through my files, the gun still plastered to my hand. I found what I was looking for and grabbed the phone. As I listened to the line ring, I closed my eyes. Another refrain was swelling inside me. The Yiddish words my father had flung at me in disgust. You are the Angel of death.
“Carol!” I sobbed into the phone.
“Uh, no. This is Lisa.” The voice was so unnaturally calm it tugged me back to the moment. I told her what I had discovered about Dean.
Lisa gasped.
“I was so afraid of this.”
I screamed into the phone. “You were afraid of this. This? Don’t tell me you suspected Dean.”
Lisa didn’t hear the threat in my words. Or she chose to ignore it. “I knew he had beaten Maggie in the past,” she said quietly. “Enough so that she lost one baby. Believe me, I know what that’s like. We talked a lot about what it was like to be battered, but she couldn’t leave him. That’s why I was so proud of her when she decided to go through with the abortion without Dean’s permission. When he found out, he hurt her real bad. But he didn’t kill her. So when you came to me—it just doesn’t make sense that he’d murder Noreen.”
I tried to interrupt, but she was hell-bent on purging herself. “I figured Maggie had finally wised up and left him. I guess I was wrong. I told your friend that when I called a little while ago.”
“You spoke to K.T.?” I was sputtering with rage.
“Well, yes. I told her Maggie wanted me to meet her at the abandoned Regal Park Inn. Your friend said that she’d go there in my place. What a relief that was—”
I never heard the rest of her sentence. I was already halfway to the front door.
Twenty minutes, I kept repeating to myself. Under normal conditions, the drive would take twenty minutes. But not tonight. I’d fly if I could. The engine roared, then shrieked as I hit the gas before I’d even shifted into drive.
I shuddered as I recalled Douglas’s notes. I slammed the gas pedal to the floor so hard, the car skidded onto the shoulder with a jolt.
Calm down. Those two words became my new mantra. Then another one joined in: Think.
Calm down. Think.
Dean would want K.T.’s murder to look like an accident. That was his modus operandi. He wouldn’t use a gun. Or a knife. His weapons were subtler, cagier. A syringe! That’s what he’d use. But what about Maggie—and Lisa? I cracked a window, desperate for air. And then it dawned on me exactly what he planned to do.
The road disappeared as the tears broke through. I cursed myself over and over until my vision cleared. Not now, you moron. Calm down. Think.
He wants to trap Maggie. Setting a trap takes time. And time is just what I need.
I was on his cocky, sly heels. I slapped the wheel with both hands, veering sharply across the road, then angling back, the smell of burnt rubber seeping into the car, smothering the scent of pine trees, of wet, delicious country air. He had already ordered that calls be forwarded to his car phone. What did that mean? He planned to come back for me. For his car. But he didn’t intend to run, the phone call to Douglas told me that much. Instead, he was hoping—no—concocting another coverup, one that would include at least two more murders. K.T. and me.
I was whipping around curves with a fierceness as if some dark, defeated part of me wanted to lose control, to wrap Dean’s car and my own body around the trunk of an unyielding, snow-kissed tree. Anything was better than losing again, than waking up tomorrow morning knowing that it had happened once more.
Why had I let that woman in? I felt as if razor blades were cutting through my throat. But I couldn’t cry. Not yet. My teeth clamped down on my lip and a spurt of blood oozed over my tongue, burning into my taste buds. My stomach heaved, past horrors rising on the tide of bile.
Calm down. Think.
Dean must have broken into Noreen’s garage right after I phoned him about my plans to fly to Atlanta. I shivered, remembering the way the Bronco ran me off the road. He had wanted me to link the vehicle with Manny, find the airline tickets. Accuse the mourning lover. He practically pleaded me to do just that when I’d cut him off earlier today. Fred must have been his second choice. And Douglas too close for comfort. The man had spun me around his finger and manipulated my every move.
Damn! He must have followed me to Atlanta, hoping I’d lead him straight to Maggie. How terrified he must have been to realize that I had discovered another one of his siblings. Suddenly desperate to find out just how involved Ellen was in the investigation, he must have resorted to searching her house.
Then I remembered Caroline, how I pleaded with her to let Dean and Maggie adopt her as-yet-unborn child.
“What an asshole!” I exclaimed out loud.
With me out of the picture, Dean might still get his way. I steadied my hands and took the last turn with nerves of tightly coiled steel. This time, you bastard, you’ll lose.
I cut my lights and shifted into neutral. I knew this park as well as Dean did. Maybe better. Carly, Amy, and I had spent many summer days exploring the rickety ruins of the former Regal Park Inn. Once an exclusive refuge for the oh-so-rich, the place had gone bankrupt in the eighties. Since then, its occupants had been small, furry mammals, none of which would ever make it to the shoulders of some Upper East Side matron.
By shifting into neutral, I could glide down the snow-covered road with hardly a sound. Dean wasn’t expecting me and I had no intention of announcing my arrival. As the car skidded downhill, I scanned the grounds. A full moon, slipping in and out of night clouds, illuminated the snow. The wind had ceased entirely by now, and the landscape around me glowed with an eerie, deceptively peaceful smoke-blue light. For a split second, I felt as if I were embalmed in one of those plastic-domed doodads that tourists bring home for their kids. Except that the snowflakes were real and
a killer was about to strike.
I turned the car off and waited a moment, my hot breath fogging the windows. I removed my jacket and used its sleeve to clear the window. It was no use. I unlocked the door, opened it a crack, then paused. The gun was on the seat next to me. There was no way I could use it, yet I found my fingers around it, a new kind of horror driving me. I stepped outside. By now, my pulse rate was off the charts. I wanted to dart into the center of the road and scream Dean’s name at the top of my lungs. Instead I searched for my rented car. Finally I found it parked off the road, tucked between two massive rhododendrons. The windshield was already dusted with snow. I continued to scan the terrain methodically, but Maggie’s car was nowhere to be seen.
Panic gripped me. What if she hadn’t arrived yet and Dean was hiding out in the inn, waiting for her car to edge through the old stone gate at the top of the hill? Right now, he could be watching me, waiting for my next move. The other alternative was worse. K.T. was already dead and Dean had escaped in Maggie’s vehicle.
I started marching in the direction of the park’s entrance, then stopped abruptly. Over the stone wall that circled the grounds I caught a glint of moonlight reflecting off a maroon car roof. It was completely clear of snow. Maggie must have arrived minutes before me. Now I barreled toward the inn, my palm sweating against the gun metal. Somewhere deep inside me, a voice was screaming for me to drop the gun. I couldn’t listen. K.T. was inside that inn and she was waiting for me.
The back door was warped and hung limply from rusted hinges. I sidled in and held my breath. Voices trailed toward me from the west wing. The former ballroom. I closed my eyes and pictured the way it had looked last summer. A cavernous, octagonal room with a gaping hole in the ceiling that a stained glass skylight once spanned. Only fragments of glass remained. Verdigris onion-shaped sconces were fastened to a copper railing that ran along each wall. Off to one side, sinking like the Titanic, was an abandoned piano, one thin leg cracked, the others ready to give in. Plaster columns circled the room. There were two exits—one of them blocked by a wooden plank nailed over the outside.