The Southern Comfort Prequel Trilogy Box Set

by Lisa Clark O'Neill

  “What? Oh, yeah. Of course.” She came in and closed the door. And though her tone was breezy enough, Caitlin couldn’t help but notice that her voice shook a little. “Bummer that my first time at your place is under such awful circumstances.”

  “That’s right,” Caitlin said. “I’d forgotten that you were out of town when Lance helped me move in.”

  “Damned convention,” Connie muttered. As manager of the company’s sales team, she was required to attend several different medical conferences each year to keep up with the technology.

  “Could you hit that light switch?” Caitlin said. “Right there by the door. The flashlight is helpful, but this darkness is freaking me out a little. Although I’m not sure this will be any easier in the light.”

  “At least you’ll be able to see what you’re doing. You’re blind as six bats at night. I remember you bumping into the wall every time you got up to go to the bathroom when we had sleepovers.”

  “Because I didn’t have my glasses on. Not all of us have vision like a cat.” And speaking of her glasses, Caitlin needed to remember to bring them. Her vision wasn’t terrible, but the continual strain of trying to see without them was giving her a headache.

  “Look, I’d like to give you the tour,” she told Connie “but the fact is that I’m barely holding it together. Everything I need is upstairs.”

  “So let me go get it,” Connie insisted, and when Caitlin shook her head, she sighed. “Stubborn as a goddamn quarry of rock. You want me to go first, at least?”

  “I want you to follow behind me so that I don’t bolt.”

  Connie looked like she wanted to lodge another protest, but Caitlin turned away. Further conversation right now would make it that much more difficult to face what she had to do. And she had to do it. While a large part of her wanted to run the other way, to hop that plane to Thailand and pretend this hadn’t happened, the fact was it had. And the small spark of defiance that she’d felt earlier that day rekindled, flaming a bit brighter. This was her home. The first one she’d ever had that was fully and completely hers. She’d worked really hard to buy it. And someone had invaded it. Violated her space. Violated her. Even if she hadn’t been raped, she’d certainly been drugged against her will. Made to do things she wouldn’t have agreed to consensually. So she would be damned if she would let him have any more power over her than he’d already stolen.

  Caitlin flipped on the overhead light in the hall, wincing when she and Connie encountered the tape marking off the spots where she’d bled on the wood. But she marshalled her determination, blocking out the image of herself fleeing down the stairs, terrified beyond reason, and simply avoided those spots as she climbed to the second floor. The smell hit her halfway up, and she froze, trying to convince her stomach that one bout of nausea was more than enough for one day.

  She then switched to shallow breaths, drawn through her mouth. Hopefully that would be sufficient.

  “I’m going to my office first,” she told Connie, her voice sounding oddly hollow as it echoed in the quiet stairwell. She rounded the bannister, avoiding looking at her bedroom door as she took the short hall to the other room. Everything here looked much as it had when she’d left… was that only two nights ago? Given how much her life had changed during that time, it seemed like it should be much longer.

  She spotted the Post-It Detective Clark referred to, and the knowledge that they’d been in here, rifling through her notes swarmed over her skin like fire ants. This, perhaps even more than her bedroom, was where she lived. So much of her personal beliefs and values and dreams and fears went into her writing, and it angered her to think of anything here being used against her.

  Caitlin unplugged her laptop, wrapping the cord around it before sliding the whole thing into its travel bag. A couple of notebooks followed.

  “It’s weird,” Connie said from her position in the doorway. “This is like being in one of your books.”

  “Hopefully my books don’t have so many plot holes,” she said, thinking of her earlier conversation with Jack.

  “Plot holes?”

  “There are several things that don’t make sense.” She started to grab the glasses lying on the desk, but her hand froze mid-reach.

  “What?” Connie said.

  “These glasses shouldn’t be here.”

  “What do you mean? You always have a pair of glasses next to your computer.”

  “Yeah, but I bought a special pair last month. Made just for working at the computer. They cut the glare, and help protect against CVS.”

  Connie’s brows drew together. “The pharmacy?”

  “What? No.” She shook her head. “Computer vision syndrome. My eyes had been watering and blurring more than usual, and my optometrist explained that computer screens are usually set at an intermediate vision zone – not as close as if you’re reading, but also not distance. So my usual prescription wasn’t quite cutting it.” She glanced at her desk again. “These are my regular glasses.”

  “How can you tell the difference?”

  “The other ones have a very faint tint on the lenses. And they’re tortoiseshell, although they appear black if you aren’t looking closely.”

  Connie stared at them for a moment. “Maybe you just got them mixed up.”

  “No. Sometimes I forget I have them on and wear them into another room, but I always bring them back here. I was rushed the other night. When I was getting ready to go meet Leslie. I might have worn them out of the office and sat them down somewhere, I guess. Or maybe shoved them in my purse if I was out the door before I realized I had them on. I’ve done that before. Anyway, the point is, I wouldn’t have brought these glasses in here.” She swallowed hard. “These were the ones I was wearing at the bar.”

  Connie was silent for several seconds. “Caitlin. I hate to bring this up. But you can’t remember what happened that night. You weren’t in your right mind. So you don’t know what you might have done.”

  She was right, of course, but everything inside Caitlin wanted to reject it. But then if she’d stabbed a man and didn’t recall doing so, she didn’t know why putting the wrong glasses on her computer desk seemed like an issue.

  Caitlin sighed and grabbed the glasses. “I want to finish up.”

  But as she swung the computer bag onto her shoulder, she heard something crash behind her. Turning around, Caitlin saw that she’d knocked her Scrabble letters off the window sill.

  “Crap.”

  “You still have that Scrabble set?” Connie asked, peeking over her shoulder.

  “Are you kidding? That was the greatest triumph of my youth. Me, you, Lance and Peyton trapped inside that beach house during a tropical depression, and I finally had a chance to beat you all at something that didn’t require athletic prowess or coordination.”

  “You’re not uncoordinated.”

  “I grant you exhibit A,” Caitlin countered, and then bent down to pick up the spilled tiles.

  “Let me help you.” Connie placed the letters she’d grabbed on the sill. “What is this supposed to say?”

  “Duplicity. It’s the name of the book I’m working on right now.”

  “Ah, I didn’t realize you’d decided on the title.”

  “Well, I haven’t exactly been chatty as of late.” Caitlin took a deep breath and then signed. “I’m sorry about that. I’m sorry for… everything. I’ve got to get out of here, Connie.”

  “Let’s go, then.”

  Caitlin sat the computer bag down at the top of the stairs, wanting both hands free to simply grab what she needed. The door to her bedroom was cracked, the light from the hallway spilling into it in a wedge. Spots seemed to dance at the edge of her field of vision, and she realized she wasn’t breathing. Caitlin closed her eyes, drawing a deep breath that she immediately regretted. The metallic, decaying meat smell of blood filled her nostrils, and she shivered in horrified disgust.

  You can do this.

  Caitlin reached into the room, fl
ipping on the light switch. Pushing open the door, she steeled herself against the remembered horror.

  The bed was stripped. Sheets, comforter, decorative pillows… even the top part of the mattress had been cut away. The ubiquitous black dust covered the nightstands and dresser, along with the slats on her louvered headboard. Caitlin’s gaze ran over all of that before landing on the bloodstained floor.

  As awful as seeing the body there had been, it was somehow worse to see the empty spot coupled with the aftermath of the investigation. Maybe because she’d only glanced at the body before running away, but she thought it had something to do with the clinical aspect of what came afterward. She’d looked at dozens of crime scene photos when she was researching her books. The photographing, the measuring, the diagramming and documenting of every part of what happened in those moments seemed to be the final blow to the victim’s dignity. It marked their transition from a living, breathing human being to a case number, a thing.

  Caitlin felt a mild sense of shock that she seemed to be feeling pangs of sympathy for the man who’d violated her. Her inability to remember must have created some sort of mental gap, or emotional distance. Whatever reason, she found herself horrified all over again.

  “Bastard,” Connie said from behind her, and Caitlin turned around to see her friend’s hands clenched into fists as she studied the room. “I hope he hurt bad. I’m sorry,” she said when she saw Caitlin’s face. “I don’t mean to make this more difficult. But the idea of him doing… whatever it was that he did to you. It’s infuriating. He deserved to die.”

  Caitlin closed her eyes. “He didn’t rape me.”

  “What? How do you know?”

  “I called the hospital when you were in the shower. There was no semen. No pubic hairs other than my own. No sign of vaginal trauma. None of the usual signs of sexual activity.”

  “Well,” Connie said after a moment. “Good. He was stopped before he could get that far, then.”

  Because something inside Caitlin felt precariously close to breaking, she rushed toward the bathroom.

  “Caitlin!” Connie called after her. “I’m sorry, honey.”

  “No, it’s okay.” She started opening drawers, tossing toiletries into the travel bag she kept under the sink. Her things had obviously been rifled through here also – the towel she’d used to wipe the blood from her face was gone – but she put that out of her mind. She couldn’t deal with it at the moment. “Could you grab a few things from my closet?”

  “Sure. What do you want?”

  “I don’t care. There’s a black duffel on the top shelf. Just shove some things in there.”

  Caitlin zipped up the travel bag, and realized that her underwear were in the bureau on the opposite side of the room. Past the bloodstain.

  “Nope,” she muttered to herself. She would pick up some at a department store. She still didn’t have her purse, but there was some cash tucked into the inside pocket of her computer bag.

  She slung the bag over her shoulder. By habit, she started to turn out the light as she exited the bathroom, but suddenly couldn’t stand the idea of leaving it dark. She wanted every light blazing, energy conservation be damned.

  Connie was just emerging from the closet, and Caitlin had to pull up short to keep from bumping into her. “I need to get out of here.”

  She grabbed her laptop and then practically flew down the stairs, not bothering to wait for Connie. She strode down the hall, through the kitchen, out the back door. She didn’t stop until she all but ran into the side of the Land Rover.

  Her heart reverberated like a bass drum, and she forced herself to breathe. In. Out. In.

  “I left the light on in the kitchen and locked the back door,” Connie said. “And put the key back up the gnome’s butt. I felt bad about not using lube, but figured if he’s still smiling after almost twenty years, he probably likes it.”

  Caitlin snorted, as welcome as it was unexpected. “You’re the only person I know who could make me laugh in this situation.”

  “I’m a national treasure. I should probably have my profile on a coin. Here, let me put your bags in the back. You get in and sit.”

  Caitlin did. She wasn’t normally one to allow herself to be coddled, but figured it couldn’t hurt right now. In fact, it would probably make both her and Connie feel better.

  She leaned against the headrest, closing her eyes while Connie stowed the bags and came around to the driver’s side. When she climbed in and started the engine, Caitlin glanced over. “Thank you.”

  Connie adjusted the air. “Stop thanking me. We’re family, and we do what we have to. Speaking of which, I have to get up at the ass crack of dawn to go the airport. Lance’s plane arrives a little after eight. You want to come with, or stay at the hotel and get some sleep?”

  “I’ll stay.” As much as she desperately wanted to see her brother, she also thought he and Connie needed an opportunity to reconnect after being apart for more than two weeks. Plus, she really wanted to get her purse back and take care of a few other errands before she saw him. She needed to feel together, so that she didn’t fall apart. Lance had always been strong for her, so it was time to return the favor.

  “You sure?”

  “Yes. I… wait, Connie stop. Stop the car.”

  Caitlin lurched forward against the seatbelt as Connie hit the brakes. “What?”

  “I think there’s something on my windshield.”

  Caitlin was out the door before Connie could shift into park. She approached her car, the headlights from the Rover illuminating things sufficiently that she could identify the object as a sheet of paper. When she got closer, she realized it was a page from a book. She leaned in.

  One of her books.

  Her nerves fluttered, like something with feathers was caught in her chest.

  “What is it?” Connie said.

  “It’s a page from one of my books. Do you have the flashlight?”

  “Let me grab it.” She was back momentarily, shining the light directly on the page. “Is something highlighted?”

  “Yes,” Caitlin said, studying the words that were highlighted in pink. “Several things.”

  “Oh my God.” Connie sucked in a breath beside her. Apparently she’d read the same message.

  The words highlighted weren’t consecutive, but rather were taken from various sentences. But when you put them together…

  “Hand me your phone,” Connie said. “We’re calling the police.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  JACK watched Detective Donaldson straighten after closely examining the paper on Caitlin’s windshield. The older man continued to look at it for several moments before switching off his flashlight, and turning his head toward Jack.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay?” Jack returned his stare. “That’s an interesting choice of words, Detective. In fact, I think it’s a very revealing linguistic decision. Because nothing about that,” he pointed to the page from Caitlin’s book “is okay.”

  Donaldson waved a hand. “Don’t get your silk boxers all in a bunch. I meant okay, it bears checking out.”

  “It’s a threat, Detective. And I expect you to treat it as such.”

  The older man’s words dropped like chunks of ice from a particularly slow machine. “I know how to do my job.”

  “Good. That will save me from pointing out that this should additionally factor in to your current investigation. Using Ms. Cavanaugh’s own words to suggest something like too bad you didn’t die instead indicates malice, and opens up the possibility that the incident involving Ms. Cavanaugh’s defense of her life may not be as straightforward as it initially appeared.”

  Donaldson took a toothpick from his pocket and stuck it in his mouth. “Is that right.”

  Jack knew, of course, that Donaldson had never thought the incident straightforward, and on that point Jack was inclined to agree. But at least he’d made his point. This development, while understandably upsetting to Caitlin, cou
ld work in their favor. There was no way of knowing yet whether the two things were connected, but for Jack it represented an opportunity to create reasonable doubt. And he and the detective both knew it.

  “I wouldn’t have bothered to call you specifically if I didn’t think so. The patrol officer would have been sufficient. And the fact that you willingly came out despite being off duty suggests that while you and I don’t necessarily like each other very much, we both have a degree of respect for the professionalism of the other.”

  Donaldson stared at him, and then acknowledged Jack’s assessment with a dip of his chin.

  “I’ll expect to be kept apprised of any developments,” Jack said “considering my client’s safety is at stake. She’s already,” he added “survived one attack in her home this week. I trust that you and your department will do everything within your power to see that she comes to no further harm.”

  Because there was no need to belabor the point – aside from the little bit of pleasure he derived from pissing off Donaldson – Jack merely nodded at the detective before turning around and strolling toward his client, who was sitting on the steps to her back porch. The red and blue strobe lights from the patrol car that had arrived prior to Donaldson lent her face an eerie glow, and Jack’s brief feeling of triumph faded. This might be a potential positive as far as Caitlin’s defense was concerned, but it certainly wasn’t something to cheer about. And while his speech to Donaldson might have been designed to promote the image of Caitlin as a victim at potential further risk, Jack found that he didn’t care for the thought himself.

  When his shadow blocked the flashing lights, Caitlin looked up.

  “You made the right decision,” he told her. “Calling me before you called the cops.”

  “You told me not to talk to them without you being present.”

  “So I did.” He gestured to the step beside her. “May I sit?”

  She scooted over, even though there’d already been plenty of room. Jack wondered if she found the entire male species worthy of her contempt at the moment. He couldn’t really blame her if she did.