by B. J Daniels
“Did you see Stephanie?”
“No. I saw her earlier arguing with Ariel. And later I saw Ariel arguing with Jennifer. Ariel was fighting with everyone that night.”
“What were they arguing about?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I only heard bits and pieces. They were trying to keep their voices down.”
“Who did you see after Ariel left?”
“I went home. I thought I heard thunder. My mom has always hated to be alone in a bad storm.”
Lizzy considered what Kayla had told her. Ariel and Stephanie had been arguing at the party, but also Ariel and Jennifer. Stephanie was getting arrested for a DUI that night so she couldn’t have climbed into the back of Ariel’s car. Had anyone seen Jennifer after Ariel left? That’s what she needed to know. Jennifer could have climbed into the back of Ariel’s car to hide while everyone else was distracted by the argument with Brad.
“Did you notice anyone in the kitchen before that?” Lizzy asked, remembering what Brad had said about his mother’s missing knife.
Kayla shrugged. “They were all in and out because there’s no bathroom in the garage. I saw Ariel mostly going into the kitchen to argue with people so I couldn’t hear from where I was sitting on the couch. But like I said, all of them were in the kitchen at one point or another.”
“I’m curious,” Lizzy said. “How did you end up at Progressive?”
The woman looked away for a moment, her normally pale face suddenly flushed red. “I had problems in public school. I didn’t fit in.” She smiled. “My mother thought I’d be happier at Progressive because it was smaller.”
When Kayla finally looked up and their gazes met, Lizzy could see that Kayla found humor in that because she hadn’t been happier there.
* * *
SHADE FROZE AS their former classmate Tyler Brent walked into the room wearing nothing but a white bath towel wrapped around his waist. His dark hair was wet and even from a distance, Shade could smell a cedar blend of bath gel.
Tyler stopped at the sight of Shade standing just inside the door and laughed. “Honey, I think we have a visitor!” his former classmate called back down the hall.
“What are you talking about?” Ashley sounded irritated. She came out wrapping a bright floral print robe around her. Like Tyler, her hair was wet from the shower. She stopped the moment she saw Shade.
“The screen for the slideshow,” he said by way of explanation. “You also said something about awards?”
Heat rushed to her face. “I forgot. I—” She glanced at Tyler and her mouth opened. Shade half expected her to say, “This isn’t what you think it is.” But what would be the point?
“The screen is still in my SUV parked out front,” she said. “I’ll bring the awards when I come up to the reunion.”
He nodded, realizing that Tyler’s vehicle must be hidden in the garage. “Sorry to have...” He didn’t bother to finish as he turned and went out the door. He was loading the screen from Ashley’s car into the passenger side of his pickup when he heard her come out of the house.
Turning, he found Ashley standing barefoot behind him, nervously tying and retying her robe sash. He closed the truck door. “You really don’t have to say anything,” he told her.
“I feel like I do.”
“I’m not going to tell anyone,” Shade said. “It’s your personal business.”
She let out a bitter laugh. “As if anyone can keep a secret in a town this size. I lied. Lance isn’t here because of his flight schedule. He fell for one of his flight attendants. He left me but no one knows yet.” Her face twisted into a grimace. “Clichéd, huh? Except the flight attendant is older and nowhere near as pretty as me.” She threw out the last words on a sob. “Why does that hurt even worse?”
“I’m sorry,” he said, wishing he’d thought to call before coming over. He didn’t want to know any of this.
“Tyler is...” She laughed. “I have no idea what he is. Temporary, that much I know.” Her gaze met his. “I’m sorry I forgot you were coming over.”
“Me, too.” He’d had enough sexual intrigue for one day. Tipping his Stetson, he went around to the driver’s side, slid behind the wheel and started his pickup’s engine. Ashley was still standing in the driveway, looking lost, as he drove away.
* * *
WHEN SHE RETURNED to her office, Lizzy found the report from DCI in her email inbox. She quickly opened it and printed it off, anxious to have a hard copy to take with her to study. She saw that she had a message from Shade. She promised herself that she’d call him once she looked at the report.
She didn’t expect that there would be much in Ariel’s car that would help her find the killer. As it came out of the printer, she scanned the report, hoping for at least a thread that she could follow.
Ariel had been tied to the steering wheel with yellow ski rope made of polypropylene, half inch in diameter, which she’d seen for herself at the crime scene.
She dropped down the page. Probable cause of death. Drowning.
Farther down the page, she read on. Decomposition of body. Due to the tepid temperature of the water in a pond fed by a natural warm spring, the body could have decomposed within days. After ten years, the body had been almost completely skeletonized.
Feeling sick to her stomach, Lizzy let her gaze go to the other information the lab had sent. Little had been found in the car. Most of the clothing had decomposed except for some of the denim and buttons on her jeans and jacket. Her purse and its contents were still intact.
She scanned down the list.
Wallet with eighty-two dollars and forty-seven cents.
Nail clipper.
Small mirror.
She stopped on the line for a small bottle of Juicy perfume.
Instantly, she could smell the scent as if Ariel had walked into the room. It was the woman’s signature perfume. None of her friends were allowed to wear it. The scent made Lizzy’s already weak stomach roil.
She continued down the list, stopping at the word lighter followed by packet of cigarettes. Ariel smoked? Lizzy couldn’t have been more shocked, until she checked the brand. She remembered who smoked those. With a start, she realized that the cigarettes weren’t for Ariel. She’d had Christopher’s.
Lizzy already knew that they had been together that night at the party. But why did Ariel have the cigarettes and lighter? Had she planned to meet up with him later? If so, Christopher must not have known or had failed to mention it.
Down the list, Lizzy found something else that stopped her.
Bottle of prescription medicine.
Ariel was taking antianxiety drugs? But then Lizzy saw that the prescription was in Ariel’s mother’s name.
Then something else caught her eye.
USB flash drive, inoperable.
There probably wasn’t anything of interest on the drive anyway. Ariel had often put her homework on a flash drive that she brought to school.
Lizzy reached the bottom of the list and realized something was missing. Ariel’s cell phone. She pushed the report aside. Was it possible it had been lost before she’d drowned in the vehicle?
Another thought struck her. What if the killer had taken it to monitor Ariel’s calls? Or to send a text to her friends? The text that got them all to the cemetery that night.
* * *
SHADE COULDN’T BELIEVE he was about to get a paternity test as he walked into the lab just before three in the afternoon. He found Hannah sitting in a chair reading a magazine. Maisie was playing in an area filled with toys.
When Hannah saw him, she put down the magazine and said, “We’ve already had ours done.”
The receptionist told him to come right in. As he stepped through the door, he glanced back at Maisie before the door closed. Her blond head was bent over a doll as she attempted to take off the
baby’s clothing.
It all took only a few minutes including the buccal swab of his mouth. He was told it usually took from two to three days before the results came back, but because of the circumstances, they would put a rush on them.
“We should have results within the next twenty-four hours,” he was told. “Do you want to come back in for them or—?”
“The circumstances?” he asked, but the technician was busy writing something down.
When she looked up, she smiled and said, “Or shall we call you with the results?”
“Call.” He gave her his cell number, feeling as if caught in a whirlwind.
“Is there anything else we can do for you?” the technician asked, making it clear she was busy.
He shook his head. Feeling as if he was sleepwalking, he returned to the waiting room. He saw that Maisie had climbed up on her mother’s lap. Those big blue eyes couldn’t seem to stay open. Hannah had her arms around her. With surprise, he saw that Hannah was crying softly.
When she saw him, she hurriedly wiped her eyes and tried to rise. But Maisie’s weight seemed too much for her.
He rushed to help, taking the little girl in his arms. He thought she’d put up a fuss, but instead, she cuddled against him and closed her eyes. She felt warm and soft and smelled sweet in his arms. Past Maisie, he saw the expression on Hannah’s face.
“What’s really going on here?” he asked quietly.
She motioned to the door and he followed her outside where she stopped at the curb and turned back to him. “I’m so sorry to hit you with all of this. First Maisie got hurt and then I found out she was yours and...” Her voice broke. “I never wanted you to know.”
“You were never going to tell me that I had a daughter?”
She swallowed. “Thomas had raised her for two years. I thought...” Her voice broke again. “Please, this is hard enough for me. There’s more. I wasn’t going to tell you this until we got the results, but I already know what they will be—and I think you do, too. Maisie is yours and she needs her father now more than ever—”
“Excuse me, but where does your husband fit into all of this?” he interrupted.
“Thomas doesn’t. He wants nothing to do with me or Maisie since learning the truth about her paternity.”
Shade blinked. “But he raised her for two years, surely—”
“He and Maisie were never close. I think he suspected she wasn’t his since she looked nothing like him, nor does she have his temperament. He was also very disappointed she wasn’t a boy. He had his heart set on a son.”
Bastard, he thought as he held the sleeping child closer. How could any man have this child for two years and not be the father she needed even if they weren’t blood related? “I’m trying to get my head around all of this, but what I can’t understand is why you’re here now, especially if you planned to keep all of this from me. You do realize how wrong that would have been, don’t you?”
She looked away as if trying to get her emotions under control.
“I can see that finding out the truth has been like dropping a bomb into your life. I’m sorry,” he continued. “But if Maisie really is mine, what is it you want from me, Hannah?”
Tears filled her eyes again. “I realized that you had the right to know.”
He nodded, remembering what the lab tech had said. “You asked for a rush on the DNA tests and they agreed because of the special circumstances?”
Hannah looked away for a moment and then wet her lips before she turned back to him. “I’m dying, Shade.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
SHADE HAD THOUGHT his head was already spinning. Then Hannah had dropped even more shocking news on him. She’s dying? He was having trouble taking it all in as he left Hannah and Maisie at their motel. Struggling with his own emotions over everything he’d learned, he’d actually forgotten all about the video until he got the call from Lizzy saying she’d gotten his message. He’d been too upset to think about anything but what Hannah had told him and what it meant. Before long, Maisie would be without a mother.
“You said Ariel left you something?” Lizzy asked over the phone. “Shade?”
He’d been in a shocked haze since leaving Hannah and Maisie. He’d carried Maisie to their motel room and put her on the bed, shaken by the news. If Maisie hadn’t fallen and punctured a hole in her thigh, they might never had found out that she wasn’t Hannah’s husband’s child. Shade would never have known Maisie was his. That was if the DNA test came back positive, of course.
He cleared his throat, thinking how much his life had changed in a matter of hours and how much more it could change depending on that DNA test. “It’s good to hear your voice,” he said, realizing how true it was.
“Shade.” She thought he was flirting with her.
“I’m serious. I needed to hear your voice.” He could tell that she was busy and didn’t want to keep her. But he worried that the video might be important to the case, although he couldn’t see how.
“So what did she leave you?”
“A disk. What’s on it is...disturbing. I think you might want to take a look at it.”
“I’m on my way.”
He’d been shaken by the video at first. Now, he was merely angry. When he’d seen the fabric of the dress on the edge of the bed, he’d had one heart-stopping moment where he’d thought it was Lizzy because of her dress. But then he remembered seeing Ariel in that dress and even Jennifer. The girls had all shared their clothes. In that split second, he’d known that the woman in the video wasn’t Lizzy.
By the time he’d seen the tattoo on the man, he’d known better. So if Ariel had wanted to put doubt into his mind for longer than a second, she hadn’t succeeded.
If Ariel had given the video to him and not died, would he have called Lizzy and insisted she watch the video and assure him it wasn’t her? She would have been insulted and probably never spoken to him again—once she got over her initial shock about who was on the video and what it meant.
What disturbed him even more was that Ariel had recorded this scene. Were there other videos around? Had she used them to blackmail the participants? Or had they known they were being recorded?
If Ariel had been the woman in the bed, had the video been a cry for help? Was it possible that Coach was the father of her baby?
Even if Ariel had lived and given Shade the package, he wouldn’t have believed that the girl was Lizzy. But he would have shown it to Lizzy and the truth would have come out. Or had Ariel been so sure that he would believe it and wouldn’t show the video to Lizzy that she’d gambled on it?
He realized he was driving himself crazy with these thoughts. He’d never been able to understand Ariel when she was alive. Now that she was dead and gone and had left a twisted mess for them to unravel, it was worse.
However, thinking about Ariel and the video kept him from stressing about the DNA test and Hannah and Maisie. He tried hard not to let himself worry about anything past the paternity test. Once he knew if Maisie was his...he’d deal with it.
He paced the front porch until he saw Lizzy’s replacement patrol SUV coming up the road to the ranch house. He’d found the video more than unsettling—just as he knew Ariel had meant it to be.
Lizzy pulled in and got out. He saw her expression change when she saw how upset he was. “Is the video that bad?”
“It is, but there’s a lot more going on right now,” he said, knowing this wasn’t the time to get into it with her. What would she think if it was true and Maisie was his daughter? More important, what would she think if suddenly he was a single father raising his daughter alone?
“I thought you’d want to see it.” He opened the door and led the way down the hall to his living quarters. Living on the ranch with his brothers had worked out all these years because they had added living areas of their own. The ranch house
had taken on separate wings so he and his brothers and Dorothea all had plenty of space to themselves.
With the guest ranch and the house his brother Will and his wife, Poppy, shared up on the mountain during the warmer months, there was no reason for them to build another house in the valley. His brother Garrett and his wife, Joslyn, were planning to build their own home next spring near the main valley ranch house. Now with Dorothea getting married soon and moving out, Shade realized it wouldn’t be that long before he, too, would be ready to move on. Maybe much sooner than he’d thought. With Lizzy? Now things seemed so up in the air, he didn’t know what he could hope for.
He pushed open the door to his living area and handed her the remote. “I’ll leave you to it.” He thought about telling her to watch out for the part where the woman’s dress hem was in view—as well as the man’s tattoo—but he knew she’d catch it, just as he had.
Restless, he wandered back outside to sprawl into one of the chairs on the front porch. Looking out across the land, he tried to concentrate on anything but the woman watching the video inside the house and Maisie’s sweet sleeping face as he’d set her on the motel bed earlier.
At the sound of the front door opening sometime later, he sat up and turned to look at her.
“The woman in that video isn’t me,” she said.
“I recognized the dress, just as Ariel hoped I would.”
“It was mine. But I wasn’t wearing it the day that video was made because I wasn’t the woman on the bed. Ariel borrowed the dress and never returned it, no doubt because she knew it was my favorite. But she wasn’t the only one who ended up wearing it. Ashley, Stephanie, Jennifer...” She shrugged. “So the woman in the video could be any one of them.”
He’d had time to think about it. “It’s Ariel’s bedroom and her video so she knew who it was.”
Lizzy nodded. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it was her in the video. I’m sure she was hoping you’d recognize the dress and think it was me.” She made a sound under her breath. “So Ariel left this for you?”