In the Shadows (The Outsiders Book 1)

by Susan Finlay

  “I’m so glad you’re home, dear boy” she said. “I’ve missed you.”

  Home, he thought. That didn’t sound bad.

  She looked up into his eyes. “Have you heard from Maurelle?” she asked. “We’ve been worried sick about both of you.”

  “How long has she been gone?”

  “We went to the festival yesterday and it was a lovely day. But when we woke up this morning, she was gone. She left a note.”

  “Greg told me.”

  “Do you know what it means?”

  “I have a hunch. Is there a Gendarmerie around here?”

  Fabienne nodded.

  “You have a visitor. Come with me.” Maurelle was lying on a cot and looked up at the guard, but didn’t move since she assumed he was speaking to the woman on the other cot. “Are you coming?”

  She raised up on an elbow and glanced at the woman on the other side of the small room. The woman was sleeping. “Do you mean me?”

  “Yes. Come on.”

  She jumped up and watched as he unlocked the cell door. She followed him out, walking past three other empty cells. He opened another door and led her into a long gray corridor without windows or decoration. He stopped three-quarters of the way down and opened another door. Standing behind his broad body, she couldn’t see anything and didn’t know what was happening. He finally moved aside and motioned for her to enter. She hesitated, took a deep breath and walked in. There, sitting at a table, was Dave.

  She stood frozen, unsure how to behave, her mouth gaping open. Dave got up and approached her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know you didn’t want me to turn myself in until you’d had a chance to investigate, but I had to do it. It was a mistake to run. I think they’re making arrangements to send me back to England.”

  Leading her on in a mixture of amusement and irritation Dave replied, “Why now? Why turn yourself in while I was trying to solve the case? Didn’t you trust me to know what I was doing?”

  “Of course I did. I don’t know that you trusted me though. Anyway, an investigation can go on for months, years even. It was wrong of me to let you go there and put yourself at risk. I was wrong to put your grandmother and Jeannette at risk. I can’t undo any of that, I know. All I can do is—”

  Smiling, he said, “Maurelle, it’s over.”

  Her heart lurched, and all she managed to stammer was, “What?”

  “The police made an arrest yesterday afternoon. It’s a solid case now with concrete evidence and a confession.”

  Her eyes widened and her heart pounded. “It’s solved. Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure. The suspect is behind bars.”

  “Who killed Jared?”

  “Ian Waitley.”

  “What!” Her mouth gaped open for a second. “Are you serious? He seemed so harmless.” Dave nodded. “Why on earth would he do something that awful? He was kind to me and to almost everyone.”

  “Apparently, he was a Peeping Tom, and Jared found out. Jared threatened him, saying that if he didn’t stay away, Ian would regret it. When Jared caught him in the Raybourne house, spying on Elizabeth, Jared killed Ian’s cats. I guess killing Jared was Ian’s revenge.”

  Shaking her head and moving to sit in one of the chairs, she replied, “I guess he was pushed over the edge. I guess you never know about people. He seemed so nice and funny, just a bit eccentric.”

  “Yeah, I feel a little sorry for the guy because, from what I can tell, Jared really did push him to it. But what I can’t forgive him for is getting you to run. At the end, he was even prepared to claim he’d seen you go into the house that night. ”

  She got up and hugged him, squeezing him tightly, then faced him. “Thank you for everything you’ve done. What will you do now? Are you going back to Chicago straight away?”

  He stared into her eyes. “I’m not entirely sure. What about you? Will you go back to England, to teaching?”

  She shook her head. “Will they release me from here?”

  “Yes. It might take a few hours. They’re working on it.”

  “I can’t go back to teaching. The murder case may be closed, but once there’s the accusation of an affair . . . .”

  “I spoke to Headmaster Fowler and the inspectors,” Dave said. “They’re willing to let that go. It’s over.”

  The way Dave was looking at her, she could tell he thought she was guilty of an affair with Jared. “I still won’t return to teaching. If a teacher is accused of that, her or his career is basically over, whether or not it’s proven. And even disregarding that, the stigma of being a murder suspect will stick. I don’t know if I’ll ever redeem myself. As for England . . . .” She shrugged, not knowing where she would go now. He didn’t say anything, and she felt suddenly sad and looked away so he wouldn’t see.

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” he said finally. “I thought the same thing, until recently.”

  She didn’t know how to respond.

  “Have you considered staying in Reynier or here in St. Julien?” he said.

  “Well, I do like France.”

  “I did some checking on the internet while I was in London. There is this lovely troglodyte house for sale in Reynier. I saw photos of it on the web and I called up the estate agent. Believe it or not, I’m thinking of buying it and relocating to France.” Maurelle smiled. “That is, unless you’ve had your fill of cave-dwelling.”

  She cocked her head. What was he saying?

  “If you’re done with caves, I could buy a normal house, instead. And if you’d prefer Saint-Julien, I could talk to Grand-mère about buying her house. I’m not promising anything, but we could try living together and see what develops.”

  She reached up and kissed him.