by EC Sheedy
Stan nodded. "And maybe some blankets." He turned to Susan. "See what you can do for Cade, love, then take a look at that one." He gestured at Bliss.
"How long have you been out there?" Cade asked.
"Long enough to get the hang of things, and avoid the bullets."
"Smart."
"Didn't live this long being stupid." Stan raised a brow.
"I don't understand." Addy looked at the tall man and the woman she'd thought was his wife, who was now fussing around Cade, the woman whose perfect hair was sleep-ragged and who was now wearing sneakers with no socks and a raincoat over her nightgown.
"Explanations can wait," Susan said, relieving Cade of the bloody towel he held to his shoulder with his gun hand. "Go," she insisted. "Find your friend."
After one last twist of the fishing line, making the duct-taped Bliss jerk and wince, Gus stood. "You're the grandmother," he stated, studying the woman, his eyes level and assessing.
Susan's head came up, and when their gazes met and held, a wariness curled between them—or instant dislike? Addy couldn't make sense of any of it.
Her curiosity and confusion didn't matter. What mattered, now that Cade was okay, was finding Beauty. "Gus, let's go."
* * *
A half hour later, Addy, Gus, and Stan were at the viewpoint. The rain was a sheet of frigid water, nonstop and blinding, as the three of them ran to the guardrail.
"Spread out," Gus ordered and moved out of her sight to her left. Stan stepped briskly in the opposite direction.
Time was not on their side.
Addy took the center, peered into the black hole below them. Her skin prickled with panic. It was like looking down a coal shaft.
"Beauty," she screamed, "can you hear me?"
My, God, even if we find you, how will we get to you? So black...
Still calling out, she moved closer to the edge of the steep gorge, or what she thought was the edge, too damn dark to be sure. She took another step, focused her light as best she could, then tested the stability ahead by pushing the toe of her sneaker into the tangle of growth framing the rim.
It was mud, thistle, and wild grass. The grass stalks, once tall and broad, had flattened under the relentless rain, creating a slippery slope to the cliff—and over.
As close as she could go now, she arced her light into the murk of the chasm below, and yelled until her lungs threatened to burst.
Nothing came back, not even the echo of her own voice.
"Beauty..." She heard the name being called from both sides of her, saw the flashlights fanning into the darkness beneath them. Useless, their arc too wide.
Dear God, it was hopeless. They didn't have a chance of finding her in this rain and blackness from this angle. They needed to see farther down, get the light on the side of the cliff.
She went down on her hands and knees. Then, flat on her stomach, inched closer to the lip of the gorge.
"Beauty." she screamed, shining her light over the cliff and sweeping its brush and thistle-laden side. "Beauty, answer me."
Only the maddening rain and silence. Addy shifted farther along the rim. "Beaut—"
"Gus." she shrieked. "I've found her. Over here."
Both flashlights swung toward her, then moved fast in her direction, disembodied as if attached to invisible high-speed bikes.
Addy immediately swung her own light back into the abyss, trained it on her friend—her sister. Relief washed through her, and her heart, its ceaseless pound a constant since Bliss arrived, slowed a notch.
Beauty was maybe twenty, thirty feet down; she couldn't be sure. "We're here, Beauty," she yelled. "Hold on." She scanned the area around her with the light. It looked as though her fall had been stopped by a rock shelf and a coarse growth of salal. Her body lay precariously close to the edge, one hand hanging over, the other hidden in the bush, the position awkward... and as still as the rock she lay on.
Addy's heart started to pound again.
Gus slid along the mud and grass next to her, followed the beam of her light. "Jesus."
Stan took one look and said, "We can't risk moving her. If she is alive, God knows what's broken."
Gus's hesitation was less than a second. "You're right Call 911, and get me the rope. I'm going down there."
Addy didn't move, couldn't take her eyes off the deathly stillness that was her friend.
"Be alive, Beauty," she whispered. "Please, please be alive."
* * *
Grover slithered along the wall of the toolshed and tried the door.
Unlocked. Thank God.
He was cold and wet, his very bones frozen.
Inside, the shed smelled like wet grass and gasoline. It wasn't much warmer than outside, but it cut the wind, and he was out of the rain at last.
He shoved a lawn mower aside, found a toolbox to sit on, sighed and rested his head back on a shelf loaded with paint cans, brushes, and garden tools.
It had taken him close to an hour to trudge through the trees and underbrush to get to Star Lake. Other than sex with Linda, he hadn't had this much exercise in years. The thought of her, the life he planned for them, would have made him smile, if he weren't so cold and angry.
If his spirits weren't flagging.
Grover wanted to go home, to his own warm bed, but of course that was out of the question. Sandra would kill him for getting so dirty, being so late.
No. That was wrong. Sandra was dead. Sandra wasn't a threat. It was the others. The ones in that office/house on the hill. If only they'd all stayed there, in one place, this tiresome business would be over by now.
He'd heard the shot, saw the truck roar out of the driveway with Vanelleto at the wheel. And, from the instructions Vanelleto shouted to Addilene and Stan, he knew where they were going. To find Beauty.
Now they were all split apart, and that wasn't supposed to happen. He wasn't sure what to do, and on some level it troubled him that Susan was up there. The thought of her made his stomach drop, ache painfully. She was his friend.
He didn't want to kill a friend.
He had so few...
But obviously Bliss, the stupid bungler, had failed to kill Vanelleto or the Wart. Now it was up to him—and there was no room for error.
When he spotted the moving blanket folded over the handle of the lawn mower, he pulled it over his cold, quaking shoulders. It was damp and stunk of motor oil, but he huddled into it gratefully. He patted the gun in his pocket, settled back.
There was nothing to do but wait for the right moment. When it came, he'd know it.
Chapter 25
Glock in hand, Cade prowled Addy's living room, wishing to hell the phone would ring or the door would open. He moved his shoulder. As far as bullet wounds went, his was a skimmer. Other than the piece of flesh torn off the top of his shoulder—which hurt like hell—it was more like a superficial burn. He looked at his watch: after 3 a.m.
Bliss, now duct-taped to silence, sat upright on the sofa. Earlier, Susan had raided Addy's medicine cabinet, found what she needed to patch him up—even given him a couple of Tylenols, which was more than the bastard deserved. He looked too goddamned comfortable to Cade, but he was also valuable, because behind that duct tape over his mouth lay the truth about what happened that night. And that truth would, he was sure, clear Addy of all charges connected to Belle Bliss's murder.
Now if the search party would come back with—
As if in direct response to his frustrated thoughts, the door opened, and Gus and Addy came in, both looking as if they'd spent the last hour in a mud-wrestling pit.
Vanelleto's expression was fierce, crazed. Without a word he walked over to Bliss, pulled him to his feet, and hammered a blow at his face, pulled his fist back to deliver the second in what Cade knew he intended to be a series.
"Gus." Addy yelled, her face white. "Stop it."
Cade pulled his arm from the sling Susan had insisted he wear, leaped across the room, and with his good arm, grabbed Vanelle
to's shoulder and spun him around, which earned him the punch intended for Bliss. It landed hard on his jaw.
At that, Vanelleto pulled back, snarled, "Stay out of this, Harding."
"I'll stay out of it when you tell me what the hell is going on," he said, rubbing his jaw.
"That sick bastard deserves to die."
"Maybe so, but how about we leave that to the guys with badges."
"Yeah, right." Vanelleto sneered at him. "Like we did fifteen years ago." He looked at the now-moaning Bliss. "You're not getting away with this, Bliss. Count on it." He turned away suddenly. "I'm going to change. We need to get back to the hospital." With that, he walked out.
"You found her," Cade said to Addy, almost unrecognizable under the dirt and grime on her face, the puffiness and bruises below that. Bliss had done a hell of a job on her.
"We found her, but—" Addy started. "They took her to St. Joseph's in Bellingham." She fell into silence.
"Are you all right?" Cade said, putting a hand on her shoulder and pulling her closer.
"Yes, I'm fine, but Beauty..." In a painfully soft whisper, she added, "She's barely alive, Cade. It was an awful fall. She's unconscious and the doctors don't know if—"
"Don't." He put a hand on her mouth. "From what you tell me, your friend is a born survivor. She'll make it, and the trauma center at St. Joseph's is state-of-the-art. She's in excellent hands."
She nodded, but not with much conviction. Cade heard the hitch in her breathing, sensed the effort she made to stay calm. "We're going back to the hospital as soon as we clean up a bit."
"And Stan?" Susan asked.
Addy turned to her, her expression now more studious than curious. "He stayed at the hospital. Gus and I wanted to, but he told us we'd best leave the first 'little chat' with the police in his hands.
"You saw how Gus is. Kind of... crazy. I've never seen him so out of control." She looked at Susan again, then at Cade. "She hired you, didn't she?" she asked him suddenly. "To look for the boy? You knew who I was all along." Before he could answer, she held up a hand, looked away from him, and shook her head. "No. I don't want to talk about it right now. Don't want to think about it. What it means." She rubbed her mud-caked forehead as if she had a headache, then said, "I'm going to shower. Gus will be back any second."
She walked out of the room.
Susan glanced up at Cade. "Trouble?"
His gaze resting on the door Addy had closed behind her, Cade said, "Hard to tell."
But he didn't have time to dwell on it before the outside door opened and Gus strode in—as dirty and disheveled as when he left moments ago, his austere face drawn in deep lines, all of them filled with frustrated rage.
A gun was jammed deep into his kidneys.
"What the hell?" Cade said, when a familiar face became visible behind Gus's tall wiry body.
"Wayne?" Susan said, her eyes wide in astonishment. "What are you doing here?"
Before Grover could reply, Bliss thumped his foot on the floor, and muffled sounds of demand funneled through his taped mouth. His eyes were set on Grover, angry and impatient.
Grover cast him a glance of pure loathing. "I'll get to you, Frank, don't you worry," he said. "Now, over there, all of you. We need to wait for Addilene." He shoved the gun harder in Gus's back. "You, too, Vanelleto."
When Gus's eyes met Cade's, both men gave the barest of nods, both smart enough to respect the status quo that the shiny Smith & Wesson imposed. The nod also relayed their intention to alter that status at the first opportunity.
Cade noted the gun was equipped with a silencer. Whatever Grover had in mind, it was lethal, and he intended to do it quietly.
They did what they were told and lined up against the wall separating Addy's bedroom from the living room. Cade, nearest the door, heard the shower running.
His insides boiled when he thought of Addy coming through the door. Pulling Susan close to his side, he shielded her with his shoulder. On her other side, Gus did the same.
"Wayne, whatever are you doing?" Susan said, her tone crisp. "With that"—she pointed angrily at the gun—"that thing in your hand. What's this all about?"
For a moment, he looked chastened. "You're the only regret I have in all this, Susan. But when you told me you were coming here, who you'd found, you gave me no choice." He licked his lips. "I'm... sorry."
Cade had no fucking idea what he was talking about, but he got the message. This nut-job was apologizing in advance for murder.
Grover took a deep breath, appeared to straighten his shoulders, pull in his gut. He looked at Cade then. "Sorry about you, too, Harding, but you're a threat, you see. And I can't live with threat anymore. Can't allow anyone to hurt me anymore." He shook his head as if to clear it. "I'm in charge now. Only me. And I have plans. I killed my wife, you know. Tonight." A tiny smile curved his lips, slightly lush lips, moist from his licking of them, and his eyes were flat, too bright.
Bliss thumped his foot on the floor again, yelled through his sealed-off mouth. His face was red from the effort, and a vein bulged in his forehead.
Grover shifted the gun, and without bothering to aim, got off a shot in Bliss's direction. He immediately retrained the piece on Cade, Susan, and Gus. The shooting was so reflexive, so spontaneous, Grover himself looked surprised by it.
Susan screamed and covered her mouth.
Gus didn't blink.
Cade's eyes moved from Grover to Bliss.
Grover might not have aimed, but he hadn't missed; the bullet caught Bliss in the upper thigh. His tied-and-taped body jerked wildly. His muffled wail sounded like a horn coming through dense fog, before he fell back on the sofa, staring at Grover from a face now contorted by fear.
"Shut up, Frank, or I'll do it again," Grover threatened.
Gus gave Bliss and Grover a slow once-over, then said evenly, "I see you boys have kept in touch."
Grover, his pale eyes now black with rage, spit at Bliss. "If you call blackmail keeping in touch." He looked a little wild now, as if the shooting had juiced him up.
Cade knew his heart would be pounding, that his nervous system would be on overload—like his brain already was. And, damn it, there was virtually no chance Addy heard the muted burst of the shot over the shower that he heard still running on the other side of the wall. She'd walk into this mess any minute. Whatever the hell was going on in Grover's head, it was the worst kind of dangerous—volatile and unpredictable. Then there was Bliss. Cade tried to assess the damage from the gunshot. Blood oozed from the wound, but he looked okay—for now. But if he bled out, if the son-of-a-bitch died, any chance of clearing Addy went with him. He wasn't about to let that happen. He sidled cautiously toward the door.
"Blackmail, huh? Now that's damn funny," Gus said, casting a scant glance Bliss's way. "Although it's good to know you didn't get off too easy, Grover."
"Shut up." Grover eyes darted to Susan.
Gus caught the glance. "Ah, I see. The grandmother doesn't know about you and Belle."
"I said shut up." Grover looked nervously at the door beside Cade, as if to will Addy through it. Get the killing done. "And you," he said to Cade, "stay where you are."
"What's he talking about, Wayne?" Susan demanded from beside him.
"He's talking about a social worker who was getting a little something on the side, by placing kids with Belle Bliss," Cade said, the pieces of that night dropping into usable slots.
Gus nodded, didn't take his frigid gaze from Grover. "A woman whose idea of child care was a locked room and an iron poker. A woman who let her son rape and assault girls, because she knew you'd never do a damn thing about it."
"No." Grover shook his head, licked his lips again, looked like a rabbit on a string. "That's not true. Not one child ever got hurt. Belle was a good woman. I loved her. And I never left the kids long—"
"You left us long enough for that piece of shit over there to rape Beauty and nearly beat her to death. Long enough for that little boy to scre
am for hours in a house where no one cared whether he lived or died." Gus's jaw was rigid.
Grover looked confused, shook his head in a futile defense. "I only put kids with Belle temporarily until I could move them to... better homes," he said. "A few government checks, that was all. I would never hurt a child. Never put them in danger. Never. I've devoted my life to children—kids no one else cares about. It's all I ever wanted to do. If it weren't for me—"
Gus didn't move, but his voice seemed to, curling tight and hard around his next words. "If it weren't for you, Grover, three kids wouldn't have had to run for their goddamn lives. If it weren't for you, you yellow-bellied asshole, Belle Bliss would still be alive."
"I'm not listening to any more of your lies." He steadied the gun, the distress on his face morphing into determination.
"And if it weren't for you"—Gus gestured toward Susan who stood at his side—"this woman wouldn't have spent years looking for a boy—a goddamn baby, for Christ's sake—you put with a snake-mean women who didn't give a damn about him, a woman who ignored his screams for hours before you showed up and—"
Grover's eyes went wide. "No. No, that's not true, Susan. You mustn't believe him. I would never hurt Josh. Never. I love my kids. I take care of them." Now holding the gun in both hands, he aimed at Gus's chest. "Why are you telling all these lies?" His voice rose to shrill.
Cade maneuvered himself between the bedroom door and Grover, who, wild-eyed, toggled the gun uncertainly between him and Gus. "We can talk about this, Grover. Make things right." Cade saw the sheen of moisture on his lips, left by his perpetually licking tongue. He reached out a hand, palm up. "Give me the gun."
"Get back."
"Stop now, Grover, and no one gets hurt."
"No. You'll hurt me. I know you will. And there's Linda, you see." His eyes widened, seemed to whirl in his skull. Then it was as if some new idea had entered his brain and sucked up his fear and confusion—and any remorse. Cade could see him force himself to a calmer state.
"The gun, Grover. Give me the gun."
He raised the gun to Cade's face, and a slippery, amused smile filtered over his mouth. "I think I'll give you what's in the gun instead."