by Carly Bishop
THEY TOOK OFF THROUGH the backwoods of the Bancroft estate for three or four miles. Beyond the junction of 202 and 20 in Westfield, holding hands, ducking through back alleys, they walked another couple of miles to the place of an old colleague of Chris’s.
J. J. Gelham was a former legal counsel in the Boston district US. marshal’s office whose chief delight in life had been finding a way to let the marshals do what they had to do without running afoul of the letter of the law.
A small man, blond, with a wide brow and balding head, Gelham lived alone in an isolated spot on the outskirts of town. He wrote opinion pieces for periodicals now, and repaired and renovated vintage Karmann Ghias as a hobby.
The former attorney was wheelchairbound. Chris had told her that Gelham had lost the use of his legs in a car bombing. He despised most lawyers. He knew more ghastly lawyer jokes than any stand-up comedian. According to Chris, after the bombing, Gelham had decided that life was too short to spend the rest of his life facilitating criminal arrests. He’d quit, and mostly he wasn’t much for company, even old friends.
Or maybe, especially old friends. But he was more than happy to sell Chris a little hunter green Karmann Ghia that Eden liked for a couple thousand bucks, which was about all he had left of Catherine’s life-insurance payout.
Eden offered to show Gelham how to make some repair stitches on an original piece of upholstery he’d been working on when she and Chris had arrived. Chris went inside to call Margo and make sure things had gone okay between her and Ed after their encounter.
When Chris didn’t return for a while and the repair was done, Gelham rolled to the miniature refrigerator in his impeccable garage and pulled out a couple cans of root beer and gave one to Eden.
She cracked hers open gratefully and sat on a tool chest. In peaceful moments like this, it seemed almost impossible to believe that somewhere out there, Broussard was just waiting for one more chance. And remember that he would never stop coming after her.
Gelham looked at her. “It appears the two of you are in some serious doodoo. I don’t imagine you would deny that.”
Eden swallowed. “No. We’re in a lot of trouble on my account.”
“Winston Broussard... unless I miss my guess?”
She shivered, then met Gelham’s flinty gaze. “You know who I am?”
“I do.”
“How long have you been gone from the Marshal Service?”
“Six years. However, I keep abreast of things. Tierney got drunk here with me one night not long after he put Catherine in the ground. Told me about her. I doubt he even remembers the occasion. He never spilled his guts about her before that night. Not once.” He took a slug of his soda. “Tell you what,” he went on. “I’ve got a fairly good idea of what Chris intends to do. I’d kill the S.O.B. myself were I in Chris’s shoes. Although I believe there are better ways of handling such things.”
Eden looked down at her hands. Gelham seemed to be expecting her to say something, maybe confirm for him what Chris was planning, both to kill Broussard and get out of the “serious doodoo.” She wouldn’t betray Chris’s trust, and so she said nothing.
Gelham swallowed the rest of his root beer in a single long pull and crushed the can in one hand. He nodded slowly at her, as if approving her allegiance as much as her silence. “Personally, I’d rather see Broussard do hard time in a maximum security pen where he can get a substantial grip on what it is to be preyed upon.”
Eden cleared her throat. “Did he have anything to do with the car bombing?”
“No.” Gelham wheeled around and lofted the remains of his can into a recycling bin, then angled back. He blinked. His brown eyes gleamed. “At least, nothing that I know of, though he may very well have supplied the terrorists with their nasty little hardware.” He reflected silently a moment, then smiled faintly and went on. “It does not require a personal vendetta, Ms. Kelley, for me to wish quite fervently that Winston Broussard experience that particular brand of powerlessness every day for the rest of his miserable, offensive life. And I think it can be done.”
Eden crossed her arms over her chest. “How?”
“The best defense is always a good offense, Ms. Kelley,” the former legal counsel answered. He let her ponder his reply before continuing. “As we speak, Broussard is doubtlessly smiling himself sick he’s so enamored with the chase. The more you run, the harder you run, the better he likes it.”
Eden said nothing, but her expression must have conveyed her certainty that what Gelham imagined of Broussard was more than likely.
Gelham leaned forward, his voice harshly urgent. “Don’t wait for Broussard to come after you. Go after him. Enlist David Tafoya to your cause. Go in wired and get him to admit he paid good money to incompetent fools to kill you once and for all.”
Eden shook her head. “Broussard is too smart to make such a foolish mistake, Mr. Gelham. Much too smart.”
“I’m certain he believes he is.”
“But?” she prompted.
“He is not a fool, but you have an edge. An...advantage he cannot overcome.”
“What’s that?”
“Winston Broussard is a moral cretin.” Gelham threw an arm over the back of his wheelchair. “He believes in voodoo. And he’s obsessed with you, Ms. Kelley. Surely you can find opportunity in such twisted passion.”
Eden shuddered. The thought of going anywhere near Winston Broussard again made her stomach clench painfully. But perhaps that was exactly Gelham’s point. So long as she ran from him, Broussard was in power anyway. “If you believe this will work, Mr. Gelham, why aren’t you trying to convince Chris?”
“Because, Ms. Kelley,” Gelham responded, “Christian Tierney is not in love with me.”
AFTER CHRIS’S conversation with Margo, he came to get Eden to place her call to Britta Nielsen in New York.
She went with Chris to J. J. Gelham’s study. Done in native rock and stained hardwood, the interior of the house was darkly handsome. The mahogany desk gleamed. A thin manuscript was placed precisely on one corner, a telephone and fax on the other.
Eden sat in the specially made executive chair that facilitated Gelham’s access from his wheelchair, then dialed the Manhattan area code and telephone number from memory. She identified herself as Lisa Hollister. Britta’s secretary put her on hold, warning the wait could be several minutes.
Keeping the receiver to her ear, Eden turned to Chris. “How did it go with Margo and her husband? Will she be all right?”
“Ed had a 9:00 a.m. surgery scheduled. He apparently left as soon as they got back to the house.” Chris scrubbed his eyes with his fists. “I can’t blame him for believing I put his family at risk.”
Eden couldn’t, either. Her cheek cramped. “But does he understand that they’re at an even greater risk if he calls the authorities? He doesn’t know Broussard. Most ordinary people would have a very hard time believing men like Broussard exist outside of the movies.”
Chris agreed. “He knows, though, Eden. Anyway, he knew after Catherine was blown away.” He stared out the window a moment, then took a deep breath. “He would still get off on seeing me toasted, but he’s smart. He realizes the stakes are too high. I don’t know.” He shrugged. “Maybe he thinks when all this is over, I’ll get what’s coming to me anyway.”
“What about the Mustang?”
“Margo is taking care of it. She promised to call the doctor and tell her where the car is. Margo thought she could convince the doctor just to leave the car for a while, knowing it’s being looked after—and not in some potentially disastrous high-speed chase with a madman at the wheel.”
Eden gave a smile and started to make some smart remark when Judith’s literary agent came on the line. “Lisa, my dear. How are you? How is Judith? Nothing is wrong, I hope?”
“Hello, Britta,” Eden responded. “I just wanted to check with you. I had to leave Jackson Hole unexpectedly. Judith promised to fax you a letter—to let you know how she is. I was h
oping you could tell me.”
“Eden, I’m sorry, but I haven’t received anything from Judith. Does she even know how to fax? How extraordinary!”
Eden’s heart sank. Fear for the dear old woman flooded her. She held the receiver with both hands, as if she could hear better, hear something else. “Britta, are you sure? Could you just check with your secretary?”
“There’s no need of that as I’m quite certain. Lisa, dear, you’re giving me a bit of a fright. I thought you were living permanently with Judith. What’s going on?”
Eden began to shake. “Britta, it’s very complicated. Let me call you back.”
“Please do. I’m very concerned—”
“So am I—but I will find out and call you back. Goodbye.” Eden shakily replaced the receiver. “Chris, I have a very bad feeling about this.”
He gritted his teeth, then snatched up the receiver and dialed an operator. “This is a police emergency, Operator. Please connect me to the Park County Sheriff’s Department in Wyoming.” He punched the speakerphone button and waited, saying nothing, knowing Eden wouldn’t tolerate empty reassurances, wanting badly to find some way to assuage the guilt out of her glittering gray eyes. “What’s the sheriff’s name, Eden?”
“Ross something.” She combed anxiously through her hair. “No. Donald Ross.”
Chris ID’d himself as a United States deputy marshal and his call as an emergency, then asked for Ross. He repeated his introduction without naming himself. The sheriff acknowledged that much, but Eden could hear antagonism ringing in Ross’s voice.
Chris cut straight to the point. “Sir, we’re in custody of the relocated witness who was living with Judith Cornwallis. Have you seen or spoken to her in the past few days?”
“No, sonny, I haven’t, and let me tell you why. You federal yo-yos left an unholy mess. One of my men is dead, and Miz Cornwallis’s cabin went up like a tinderbox. You fellas come back here anytime soon and I’ll personally kick your butts to hell and back. Am I making myself crystal clear to you, sir?”
Chris made some conciliatory noises Eden couldn’t even understand as words. Shock-ridden, she stared at the speakerphone, listening to the sarcastic and angry disembodied voice of the Park County sheriff, a man who’d been a friend to Judith for many years. She felt as if some internal flame, some essential light she depended upon to carry her through, had guttered out. But the sheriff wasn’t quite done even when she thought she’d heard the worst of it.
“I’ve just had word your own damn pilot got himself whacked.”
“Dan Haggerty?” Chris choked out, the color draining from his face.
“That’s the one. So you save your sorries, sonny. Sorry don’t get it. Don’t come close. You tell your witness I said she’d be better off waving a red flag at a goddamned bull moose than hanging with you boys.”
Chapter Fourteen
Eden rose and turned and fled. The guilt inside her turned to a solid, freezing chunk of ice in her chest. Her blood ran as cold as a winter slurry. She ran, gasping for air, and ran still farther, out the door, behind J. J. Gelham’s house as far as her legs would carry her. She came to a pond surrounded by oak trees, dotted with lily pads. She dashed headlong into the pond, crying, splashing the still, stagnant water, hoping wildly that the pond would swallow her alive.
But the water rose no higher than her hips, and by the time she knew it would take sinking to the bottom to drown her pain, Chris had grabbed hold of her.
Standing thigh-deep in the lily pond, she clung to him, choking on her sobs, on the guilt, on Chris’s own angry words in the Jackson airport. Listen to me. Listen well. Get this, Eden Kelley. Try to remember. Innocent people die when you’re around. “It’s true,” she cried. “It’s true.”
Chris didn’t know exactly what her cries meant, but he could guess. The rage inside him matched her pain. He knew it like an old enemy, like the familiar throb inside his head. He held her and stroked her hair and let her rage burn itself out. His own legs and feet grew numb with water that wasn’t so cold but cold enough to sap whatever resilience was left in her. He lifted her from the pond and carried her to the house. Grim-faced, J. J. Gelham led the way to a hot shower, then laid out clothes of his own and discreetly wheeled himself elsewhere.
Crying softly and as lifeless as a rag doll, Eden let him strip off her sodden clothes, and then he shed his own and helped her into the shower. She felt so small and delicate, her flesh like a newborn’s. He soaped himself, soaped her, praying with all his withered faith that the shower would wash away the horror and somehow restore Eden’s spirit.
Torn up inside by her bottomless sorrow, he framed her face in his hands and kissed her and they clung to each other for a long time. After a while, he got out and left her standing alone beneath the needle spray of hot water.
At some point, Eden didn’t know when, perhaps when her fingers brushed the stitches beneath her collarbone, a cold fury began to displace the guilt and sorrow, and she knew she could never run and hide again, no matter what. For Broussard to attempt to pick her off every time she surfaced for air was one thing, even if, in the end, he succeeded in riddling her body with bullets. But for him to cold-bloodedly murder all the innocent bystanders in her life was quite another.
Gelham had suggested Broussard was still vulnerable because of his obsession with her. She knew in her heart that must be true. There could be no other explanation. Broussard dealt internationally in illicit arms. He could have found complete safety and supported his insatiable appetite for fine living in high style in any number of exotic foreign locales. If he’d left the country, he need never have worried about her or prosecution for trafficking in illegal arms ever again.
If it was arrogance on his part to stay, it must be his overweening obsession with her that made him send his assassins to punish the people who’d kept her alive.
For murdering Judith and Dan Haggerty, she would make him pay or die trying.
She shampooed and rinsed out her hair, then stepped out of the steam-filled shower and toweled herself dry.
Gelham had left on his bed a pair of his own designer jeans and a beautiful navy-and-gray mohair sweater. The jeans, somehow, fit her perfectly. When she emerged from the master bedroom, Chris and Gelham were putting together ham sandwiches.
Standing at a cutting board on the kitchen counter, Chris stopped slicing the meat. In his wheelchair, spreading mayonnaise and mustard on slices of bread, Gelham gave a low, appreciative whistle. “I had no idea my jeans could look so good.”
A tear spilled over her lashes. Anything either one of them said might have earned what must be her last possible tear, but a compliment raised fresh guilt. She wiped away the tear and nodded.
Chris cleared his throat. “Are you okay?”
She lifted her chin. “Of course.”
“Eden...” Gelham began. “May I call you that? Eden?” When she nodded, he went on. “Eden, you’re going to have to lighten up. None of this is your fault.”
“I may not have pulled the trigger or set the fire, Mr. Gelham, but the people who tried to help me are dead. And if it’s the last thing I do, I will see Broussard in that little piece of hell you described.”
THEY SAT DOWN to the sandwiches and glasses of a merlot wine and waited until dark to drive away from Gelham’s place in the tiny hunter green Karmann Ghia.
Chris took the secondary highway running parallel to I-90 headed toward Boston. Though Eden knew he was uneasy, she put off telling him what Gelham had suggested until they were well under way.
Not surprisingly, he disagreed. Violently disagreed. He whipped the steering wheel around, spinning the little Ghia off the highway onto a damned convenient side road, jammed the pedal to the metal and tore through a couple miles of dense, black-as-coal forest.
He spilled out of the Ghia and came around to her door, hauled her by the wrist out of the low-slung car until she stood toe-to-toe with him. Even then he didn’t let go. “What the hell are you
thinking?” he demanded. “What makes you so damned stubborn?”
Her chin shot up defiantly. “Self-preservation,” she snapped. “And don’t waste your time thinking you can intimidate me out of what I’m choosing of my own free will to do.”
“Broussard will make hash of your free will, Eden,” he barked. Anger roiled inside him, clawing at him. The last thing he wanted to do was cram down Eden Kelley’s throat the fact that there was nothing she could do to save herself. “He will chew you up and spit you out in little pieces and you’ll be lucky if you even know what hit you.”
“That’s ridiculous,” she uttered fiercely. “He’s a coward who has never once come after me himself.” She jerked her wrist, trying to free herself but she could never overcome his strength, and he didn’t release her. “Let me go, Chris.”
He released her and swung away, jabbing his hands into his pockets, yelling at her now. “Do you think Broussard survives dealing illegal weapons to terrorists because he’s a coward?”
“Of course not,” she shouted back, catching his arm, trying in vain to make him face her. “That’s not the point and you know it! When it comes to me, to dealing with me, he’s vulnerable.”
“Oh, yeah,” he sneered, pacing in the tangled grass beneath a thick canopy of trees. “Winston Broussard is a regular soft touch when it comes to you. How naive do you want to be about this, Eden? Tell me that,” he demanded, wagging a finger under her nose. “You want to get in and have me drive you right up to his front door tonight? Really take him by surprise?”
“What I want is to use whatever slim advantage I have!” Her hands balled into fists. She wanted to lash out at him, to haul off and hit him. Hot tears pricked at her lids because he stubbornly refused to understand. “Get this through your thick, macho, lawman skull, Chris Tierney. There’s a reason why he never touched me—”