Distant Blood jp-4

by Jeff Abbott

  “You're barely kin. So what if you were my great-grandmother's brother? I never knew her. I'm supposed to care about you, your feelings, when you've never shown the slightest regard for another human being in your life? You sit there and tell me not to feel pain. After my dad vanished, and my mom died, and my brother died?” She wiped tears away with the back of her hand. “No one can suffer but you? Wrong, old man. You sour everything you come near.” She stood. “I think I'll go see how Candace is feeling.” She turned and we heard the patter of her feet on the stairs.

  Jake did not look at us. He rose, leaned on his cane, and slowly made his way to the dining-room door. He glanced back, showing only his craggy profile, his gaze firmly fixed on the polished hardwood floor. “I shouldn't have read that book on tough love. I've upset Deb. I'm sorry to have ruined everyone's lunch.”

  “Uncle Jake-” Aubrey began, but Jake shook his head.

  “Bitter old fool. That little girl has no idea how much I really love her.” He turned on his cane and went across toward the study, his movements brittle with age. He eased the door closed behind him.

  Aubrey and Wendy quietly began to clear the plates. Philip followed them into the kitchen and I could hear the soft murmurs of their voices.

  I am a well-meaning idiot sometimes. If I couldn't heal the rift that'd divided Sass and me, perhaps I could help Deborah and Jake. I crossed to the study door, raising my knuckles to knock.

  And held them still when I heard Jake's low, cadaverous laughter, as though he were giggling at some profoundly funny joke.

  14

  My head ached, and I felt slightly ill My -self. I didn't relish further talks with a nut like Uncle Jake, and I wasn't about to go chasing around the island to find out what Bob Don and Aunt Sass were doing. So I retreated to my room and lay on the coolness of the cotton quilt covering my bed. I wondered, idly, if Goertz hands from long ago had shaped the quilt. With the crisscrosses of intrigue, lies, and deception that seemed to stitch this house together, the idea that anything fashioned by Goertzes could provide a momentary refuge made me laugh. I stared at the ceiling until my eyes began to feel heavy with sleep. The only noise in the room was the soft rise of my breath, and the counterpoint of the waves of Matagorda Bay crashing into the sand.

  I was nearly asleep when my skin prickled and I felt- and I will swear to this until the day I die-a gentle stroke of a finger across my closed eyelids.

  I didn't move. I didn't open my eyes. My whole body felt as though it would sink through the quilt if I remained motionless. I waited for the telltale footstep, the hiss of human breath, the creak of a floorboard to reassure me that I'd simply dozed, and while unawares, Candace or Bob Don or someone else had ventured into my room to awaken me.

  Silence. I remembered to breathe.

  Slowly I opened my eyes. Light, filtering in from the old and faded curtains, held dust motes in its grasp and I watched them spin. My face felt warm and crinkly, sure signs of a summer nap. I'd probably just dozed off and dreamed. I fingered the corners of my eyelids, but there was no sleep grit in them to clean away.

  I sat up on the bed, my mind still fuzzy. I hadn't slept well since our arrival, and the unrelenting feeling in this house-of tensions smoldering, ready to burst into crisp flame-made me edgy. Occupied with my own fears about meeting my new family, I hadn't thought objectively about what might be transpiring within these walls. Forces I didn't yet understand warped this family tree.

  I scooted so I could lean back against the polished headboard and got comfortable for a long hard think.

  Uncle Mutt was dying. My throat tightened at the thought. I'd no doubt that there was much to disapprove of about Emmett Goertz-he was a womanizer, a bit of a dictator, a fellow who'd stake unholy odds in a poker game to win an island. I wondered if he would have obliterated the family fortune if he'd lost that particular hand of cards. But at the same time he had a warmth and a gentleness about him that drew folks to him. For all the acrid dislike that volleyed between the Goertzes, Uncle Mutt avoided the venom. I wasn't sure if it was because of his undeniable charisma or because he held the fat wallet.

  And with him dying, a vast fortune tottered above grasping hands. He had no children. He had never married. Assuming that he wasn't leaving his entire wealth to charities or pet causes, surely enough money was available for everyone-from Tom to Aunt Sass-to come into substantial funds.

  Assuming, of course, that Uncle Mutt equitably distributed his money. I knew nothing about his will, except that he had mentioned Lolly's death would force him to rethink his legacies. Perhaps he'd intended to leave most to his sister. If so, had the rest of the family known that Lolly stood between them and millions?

  Within thirty minutes of Uncle Mutt's announcement to the whole family that he was terminally ill, Aunt Lolly died. By a means that technically could have fallen under suicide. Or, of course, she simply had a heart attack.

  But now I didn't believe Lolly took her own life. Aubrey contended that she was either actually mentally ill or dominating her family through her ruse of eccentricity. If she was sick, she might be suicidal. But if she was unrelenting in her need for control, I didn't reckon an egoist like Aunt Lolly would ever kill herself. It would mean ringing down the curtain on her starring role. And leaving Sweetie. Her devotion to her little dog seemed comical when she was alive, but I didn't doubt for a second that it was genuine. Not to mention that her death came along with viciously threatening letters to me, a doping of Gretchen's drink to drive her back to the bottle, and Philip's scam to hustle money out of Mutt. Much seemed afoot.

  So, if Lolly hadn't taken her own life, she'd either been murdered or died of natural causes. If her heart couldn't bear the news that Mutt was dying, wouldn't her attack have been far more sudden? I knew nothing about heart seizures, but I supposed she would have keeled over at the news if prone to episodes. Only the autopsy could answer that question. If the verdict was natural causes, then we could continue our mourning-as it existed, and the grief in this house was frighteningly, eerily minimal-and the death-watch over Uncle Mutt could begin again. If murder-there was one less heir to contend with.

  A prickle of fear ran along my back. One less heir. And here I was, an unexpected addition to the rank of possible legatees, unwanted, unwelcome. And Aubrey, Wendy, and Philip had already commented on Uncle Mutt's warming reception toward me.

  I didn't want his fortune. I wouldn't have turned money away if it came into my hands, but I had come to this island looking for lost parts of myself, not cash. I thought of Uncle Mutt, unseen, unknown, watching me during that long-ago junior-high baseball game. I could picture him standing next to Bob Don in the weathered gray bleachers, shading his face with the flat of his hand while he watched a skinny blond boy pound a fist into his shortstop's glove and shout encouragement to the pitcher. I thought it likely he had silently sent his own cheers to me. And wasn't Bob Don cheering you, too?

  I forced my mind back to the issue at hand. With Uncle Mutt gone, I suspected the very heart and center of the Goertz family would be gone, too. I found it hard to envision Deborah dropping in on Philip for a long weekend visit or Uncle Jake calling up Aubrey just to see how his next book was coming. Would the members of this family wander away from each other once the common center of gravity vanished?

  Make the leap, I told myself. Assume Lolly was murdered. Who had motive and opportunity? I got up and walked to the window and opened it. The bracing sea breeze wafted over my face, heavy with the smell of salt, fish, and time. I ran down a mental list of motives.

  Uncle Mutt. I couldn't see any reason why he'd want his sister dead, and he seemed genuinely distressed and troubled over her death. Besides, he was dying. The concerns of the living were only his for a short while. I thought I could strike him from my list.

  Uncle Jake. He struck me as an ornery, demanding, even calculating man, and if Lolly had been poisoned, his Digoxin medication was the likely source of the fatal dose. He would have had pl
enty of opportunity to amass a deadly amount of digitalis. With Jake, the stickler was motive. He had no reason to wish Lolly dead.

  Aunt Sass. My initial dislike for Sass hadn't budged much. She outright hated me for how I'd treated Bob Don and she obviously resented anyone who encroached on what she considered rightfully hers and Aubrey's. My status as newest family member had earned me only loathing as far as she went. And Aubrey had mentioned that Aunt Sass was devoted to Lolly-but I couldn't help but remember the standoffish stance Sass assumed as Lolly lay croaking her last words. Aubrey's claim that Sass was inordinately fond of Lolly might be a diversion from a far more unpleasant truth.

  Aubrey. His uninspired platitudes covered a much more subtle mind than I'd initially suspected. And his row with Tom-and the venom that followed-suggested Aubrey had a mean streak that his glib self-help rigmarole belied. He'd survived as a runaway for two years and could no doubt take care of himself. He'd angered most of the clan with his plan to write a book on families, and he was already in violent conflict with one family member: Tom. And I wondered if his devotion to his mother might include doing her bidding, even if the cost was another human life.

  Tom. The quietest member of the family had also shown the most violent temperament. His pale eyes made me uneasy with their furtive glances. He would have, I was convinced, beaten Aubrey senseless if Deborah and I had not intervened. His own unwillingness to explain his actions doubled my apprehension. Tom was a tightly reined fury, biding time for release. Had Lolly gotten in his way? He'd brought down the empty bottle of heart medication after her death, placing his fingerprints on it. Were they already there before the tragic dinner? I could almost imagine those cold, pale eyes watching the pills spill into his open palm, measuring out a dollop of death.

  Philip. He was at cross-purposes with Uncle Mutt over some failed financial venture, I believed. I needed to know more. And his odd partnership with Wendy Tran to chisel money away from Uncle Mutt only heightened, in my mind, suspicion on him for Lolly's death. Wouldn't one crime naturally link to another within this closed group? Why did he need money nowl Why not simply wait until Uncle Mutt was dead and buried? Even if his alleged mismanagement of Uncle Mutt's money meant he didn't benefit under the will, Philip could hit up one of his more favored relatives for a needed loan. And I could hardly forget that true-crime story of digitalis poisoning, subtly slipped back on the shelf by Philip's own hand. He quickly vaulted to the top of my suspect list.

  Deborah. Her quick and easy friendship with Candace, her supportiveness of Gretchen's sobriety, and her openness toward me had won me over. But I'd still seen her sneak into Lolly's room with distinct slyness. Her unwillingness to talk much about her own branch of the family tree's tragic past, her complicated relationship with Lolly, and her row with Jake made me wonder if even darker secrets lurked there. And, my liking for her aside, she was a nurse.

  She'd know, better than anyone, the amount of Digoxin needed to silence Lolly forever.

  Rufus. I couldn't quite fathom how Rufus Beaulac could have possibly benefited from Lolly's death, but an unquiet thought about him disturbed me. First, he struck me as a man much like a lapdog; he'd do the bidding of whoever he considered, as medieval as it sounds, his master. I'd no doubt that Uncle Mutt's ego was fueled to a degree by Rufus's loyalty. I wondered if when Uncle Mutt found a task too distasteful, Rufus became his errand boy. With a shudder, I envisioned Rufus nodding slightly as Uncle Mutt told him to get rid of Lolly. I didn't believe Rufus would use poison; his methods would be far more direct. Unless, of course, his hands were directed by Uncle Mutt or some other intelligence.

  Wendy. I thought her beautiful and dangerous, like a blossoming rose with piercing thorns. One moment she was leaning against Uncle Mutt in the casual caress of a lover; the next she was conniving with Philip to bilk Mutt. I did not like her or trust her, and I could easily imagine her poisoning anyone who got in her way. Also-she had the greatest opportunity. She'd prepared the food we'd eaten. And even though we'd dined buffet style, had she managed to give Lolly a select deadly portion?

  Gretchen and Bob Don. Of course I didn't suspect them. While Gretchen had proved in the past she could scheme with the best of them, I did not believe her capable of murder. And Bob Don… the very idea was ridiculous. But they were as inexorably caught up in the wire-edged web of this family's pain as any of the others.

  Gretchen's past with Bob Don's brother Paul still seemed a sore wound, and Bob Don's own ignoring of Sass's numerous faults might blind them to further tragedies. I was convinced Gretchen's drunkeness wasn't due to her own failure, but rather to the cruelty of one of our own. I resolved to protect Bob Don and Gretchen from whoever might have targeted them for such vicious behavior. And was that person necessarily Lolly's killer?

  Lolly had sent me terrifying mail. Had she terrorized anyone else? If so, had that other victim struck back with annihilating force?

  I also weighed the possibility that Lolly wasn't the intended victim. Poison can be used with uncertain aim. What if someone else at the dinner table was the mark?

  And even if I dismissed that possibility and accepted Lolly as the target for the digitalis, I had hardly considered the puzzle of opportunity. The family had bustled in and out of the dining room before the meal. Candace claimed only Lolly had drunk red wine, and a fair amount of it. I remembered her arm lashing out in her initial convulsion, spilling her wine across the snowy tablecloth. If Jake's Digoxin pills were the source, the capsules could have been opened and emptied into Lolly's wine. But when? If Lolly's dinnertime cocktail was consistently a red wine that no one else touched… I needed to ask some hard, hard questions. Someone had the time to dope her wine, or her food.

  I rubbed my temples. My theories were all well and good, but they were more insubstantial than the ocean spray that scented the air. I didn't have proof and I didn't have a clear path to follow to a suspect. And no confirmation that Lolly had even been murdered. If it was foul play, no doubt the police here would catch the murderer. After all, it had to be one of us. And while they completed their investigation, we might all be stuck on this island a lot longer than anyone had planned-trapped with a murderer cold enough to kill within his or her own family.

  I decided to check on Gretchen and found her in her room, drinking a large glass of ice water.

  “Can I come in?” I asked. She didn't answer but closed her eyes and placed the cool glass against her forehead. I ventured inside her room, shutting the door behind me, and stood before her bed.

  “How do you feel?” I asked. She sat on the edge of her mattress and didn't look at me.

  “Gretchen?” I tried to keep the irritation out of my voice. Her earlier, pain-filled confession made me more patient than my hair-trigger temper generally allowed. I didn't want her to hurt any more.

  “Bob Don said you think someone spiked my soda with alcohol.” Her tone was colorless and flat.

  “Yes. Unless you've changed your story about what happened.”

  “No. Not at all.” She rubbed her cheek with her hand, as though stinging from an invisible slap. “I don't know why anyone would slip me a mickey, though.”

  I chose my words carefully. “Although no one here seems willing to admit the possibility quite yet, I think Lolly was poisoned.” Gretchen's head jerked up, shock lighting her eyes. I continued: “If someone here was cruel enough to kill her, spiking your drink for a laugh wouldn't be hard to imagine.”

  She stared at me. Darkness bagged the skin beneath her eyes. She absently rubbed the hollow of her throat. “But the family always wanted me to be sober. What's the point of derailing me?”

  “They can't derail you. Not if you don't let them.” I sounded like Aubrey, but I didn't know what else to say. Meaningless advice works-at least to assuage the giver's guilt.

  The ploy didn't play. Gretchen answered me with a hard smile. “You're being awfully nice. I guess it's easy for you to feel superior to me right now.” Her voice had taken
on an unpleasant edge I was all too familiar with.

  “What?”

  “I can see the goddamned pity in your face, Jordan. You're just looking at me like I'm a worthless drunk all over again.”

  “That is about as far from truth as you could wander, Gretchen. I've been worried about you.”

  She shook her head and stared again at the window and its bright canvas of sky. “How could you worry about me? After all the bad blood that's passed between us?”

  “I don't know. It's not like you and I have ever been close. And we may never be. But I know how hard you've worked for your sobriety and it pisses me off beyond belief that anyone would casually shove you toward the bottle.”

  “We never have been close,” she murmured, echoing my words. She tented her hands before her face, hiding her eyes from me, breathing in her own breath. “Do you know how much I loved Bob Don when I first met him? How painful it was not to be with him?”

  “Because you were married to his brother?” I asked.

  “No, Jordan, because he wore too much plaid,” she snapped. My heart lifted a little-she still had a sense of humor, albeit twisted. I didn't answer. I only laughed softly. She laughed, too, but an undercurrent of deep sadness cooled any frivolity in her voice.

  She continued: “Yes. And Paul wasn't a good man. He was… empty inside. I don't know how else to describe it. Deborah would never speak ill of him-she's kept only the kind memories of her daddy. But Bob Don was so different from Paul.” She lowered her hands and tears glimmered in her eyes. “I thought if I could be with Bob Don, I'd never do anything to ruin it. And when I'd divorced Paul and married Bob Don, I was the happiest woman alive. Until the booze stole my life.”

  I remembered once when Bob Don had told me that Gretchen drank because she suspected someone mattered more in his life than she did-that person being me, his secret son. Now I wondered if there wasn't another reason, locked in the meshwork of relationships between Gretchen and the Goertz brothers.