by BETH KERY
Brooke’s expression broke. Several more tears fell down her cheek. “That’s not true,” she exclaimed shakily. “Do you really think that? I care about my team. A lot.”
Alice stared, seeing the other woman’s genuine dismay at the idea that someone thought she was selfish when it came to her team. She exhaled sharply, resisting a strong urge to roll her eyes. Suddenly feeling awkward, she turned back to pour her coffee. Jeez, she hadn’t even had a single sip of coffee yet, and she had to deal with not just a regular Brooke, but an anguished Brooke. God help her.
“I don’t really think it,” Alice mumbled grudgingly, ripping the paper on a sugar packet and pouring it into her steaming coffee. “I’ve watched you. You’re really good with them. They like you. My student team leader, Judith—you know, the one in the Bang pictures—thinks you’re brilliant, the perfect example of feminine leadership. Compassionate. Strong. Put together. Always unruffled,” Alice said, scowling. It was a truth she’d sworn she’d never confess to anyone, let alone to Brooke, of all people. But it was a fact. During the first week of camp, when Judith and Alice had been grinding against each other at every turn, Judith had made a few pointed remarks within Alice’s hearing about Brooke’s superior pedigree and education in comparison to Alice’s. Now that she knew Judith better, she didn’t think the girl had been doing it solely to annoy her because she knew Brooke was Alice’s nemesis, either. Judith really did respect Brooke.
When Brooke didn’t speak after Alice had ripped open her fourth sugar packet—she didn’t even take sugar in her coffee—she glanced sideways warily. Her eyes sprang wide in alarm.
Brooke was totally unmasked. She stood there, all traces of smugness and superiority vanished, her expression open, unguarded, and undone. Her tears had smeared mascara onto her cheeks. Alice hastened to pull some napkins from the dispenser. She handed them to Brooke.
“Here,” Alice said uncomfortably. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“You didn’t have to say that about Judith,” Brooke sniffed, wiping her cheeks. “Everyone at camp knows how much Judith defied you at first. It was sort of . . . well, entertaining to watch, to be honest,” she added a little regretfully. “I thought she was going to kick your ass a few times.”
“Me, too,” Alice admitted.
Brooke swallowed thickly. “And you brought her around completely. She adores you now.”
“Oh God, no,” Alice insisted emphatically. “Judith worships no man or woman. She prefers to be on the adored end of things.” Brooke smiled shakily. Another tear fell down her cheek and she wiped it away quickly. “There’s nothing wrong with a woman knowing what she wants.”
“No. I guess there’s not.”
An awkward silence fell.
“Well . . .” Brooke inhaled and wiped her cheeks one final time. Alice could almost see her willfully knitting together her fraying ends. Not for the first time, she admired Brooke. Maybe they’d never be the best of friends, but Thad had been right about one thing: Brooke had her moments.
“I’m sorry for jumping all over you like that,” Brooke said briskly, tossing the napkins. She met Alice’s stare levelly. “I panicked for a few minutes when I saw the photos and heard the rumor about how much the managers admired the Red Team’s stunt.”
“I don’t think you have any reason to panic.”
“I still think there’s a good chance we’ll beat you tonight,” Brooke said, her chin tilting up.
“Maybe. I’ll be fine with that, as long as my kids feel okay about themselves. It might be time for them to deal with some disappointment, anyway. They’re getting a little cocky with all their wins,” Alice said, suppressing a smile and not succeeding.
“Imagine that,” Brooke said, her arch look reminding Alice of the Brooke of old. But then she gave Alice a small, genuine-seeming smile before she turned away.
Brooke was gone before Alice realized that neither of them had mentioned Thad. Alice was glad he hadn’t come up. Maybe both of them had realized intuitively that Thad was too weighty of a topic to withstand their unexpected, delicate truce.
THAT night at the bonfire, her kids were flying high. The entire camp was buzzing with the word of Judith, Jill, and Noble D’s exploit at Camp Wildwood. Terrance was telling anyone who would listen that Judith, Jill, and D were the chosen emissaries from the Red Team because they were three of the more upstanding, rule-abiding kids, and therefore under the night supervisor’s radar. He assured people that the entire team was involved in the venture, though, and had agreed on the three campers to represent them.
“We all chipped in for the pizza, and it was my idea to tie the Red Team’s flag around the goat’s neck,” Alice overheard Terrance bragging to the Gold Team’s student leader as darkness fell and a couple managers started to shout for them to take their seats.
Alice started to sit down on the beach between Judith and Matt Dinorio when someone spoke from behind her.
“Alice? A word please before things officially get started.” Alice noticed Judith’s concerned expression when they both turned to see Sebastian Kehoe standing behind her.
“Sure,” Alice said.
Kehoe nodded in the direction of the woods. The sun had just slipped beneath the horizon, leaving the western sky a brilliant blend of magenta, orange, red, and gold, but the woods were dark. Kehoe paused just inside the shadow the tall trees cast onto the beach and faced her.
“I suppose you know what this is about?” Kehoe asked.
“Um . . .” Alice blinked. The light from the western sky gleamed red in his glasses, although his face was cast in shadow. “Bang?” she asked hesitantly.
He looked grim. “I’m not happy about your little spectacle. I’ve made it clear around camp that while Camp Wildwood forays have been condoned if not encouraged in the past, we were putting a damper on the idea this year. Now your kids have gone and made it seem even more glamorous and desirable to break the rules in subsequent years.”
Alice swallowed thickly. “I didn’t think there was any real danger in it, sir. My kids knew they’d have to be respectful. I wasn’t encouraging theft. I made sure they understood that.”
Kehoe’s mouth clamped together in a tight, straight line. “I suppose you had some advice from a certain former Red Team member? Some instructions from another Durand maverick?”
A chill passed over the surface of her arms. He was referring to Dylan, of course. He really did suspect their involvement. Or possibly, he more than suspected.
But he was wrong to think Dylan had given her the idea. She raised her chin.
“No. Any ideas I did plant with the kids were mine alone, and they came up with the rest. The whole photo as a symbol of the claiming of the goat versus actually stealing it was their idea. So was the pizza party, which personally, I think was brilliant. It was a gesture of friendship, and it went a long way to mend any bad feelings that happened between Camp Durand and Wildwood last year.”
Kehoe looked like he’d just eaten something bitter. “Apparently, most of the Durand managers agree with you.” He hesitated. “So did the Camp Wildwood staff. Their staff supervisor contacted me this afternoon and asked all of the Durand campers and staff to come to a cookout next year at Camp Wildwood.”
“That’s great!”
“I didn’t ask you over here to praise you,” he snapped. Alice’s grin vanished in a split second. He was coiled as tight as a spring. She resisted an urge to step away from him. Surely it was a trick of the fading light and shadows, but Kehoe looked a little crazed at that moment.
“You’re as full of yourself as she was. As he is. What do you actually think is going to come of this? That you’re going to ride off into the sunset with your prince?” he snarled. “It didn’t happen before. It’s not going to happen now.”
She stood there, her mouth hanging open in shock, watching as Kehoe walked stiffly away from her toward the blazing bonfire.
AS she returned to the circle of the kids, she not
iced Sal Rigo standing at the back of the crowd. His face looked rigid as he watched her approach. She had the distinct impression he was poised to spring into action. Alice nodded once in reassurance. For the first time, the sight of him nearby reassured instead of annoyed her. Kehoe had been beyond rude. He’d bordered on vicious. Rigo warily turned and sat with the others on the sand, keeping Alice within his sight.
The encounter had rattled her. She had no doubt the “he” that Kehoe had referred to as he dressed her down was Dylan. Had he garbled his words, by initially saying she? And what had he meant about before? Was he trying to make her believe Dylan had become involved with a new recruit before, and that Kehoe had stopped it? Because Alice had worried about that in the beginning, but in the end, she just didn’t believe Dylan made a habit of this. It showed how angry Kehoe was . . . how desperate, that he’d stoop to innuendo and slander. She’d never seen Kehoe come undone. He was usually so meticulously in control.
Maybe too in control. Tonight, all the pressure he must exert to be so together all the time had seemed to be steaming out of the cracks in his armor.
The only thing she knew for certain was that Kehoe’s feelings toward her were not the dislike and disapproval she’d suspected.
Sebastian Kehoe clearly hated her.
SIXTEEN
At nine thirty that night, Dylan sat in his den talking to Jim Sheridan. Since tonight was the bonfire, Alice would work late. They’d planned to meet an hour later than their usually designated time. He’d originally been glad to have a little extra time to deal with Jim’s visit.
Now he was just annoyed and frustrated.
“Why did you have to push it?” he barked at Jim, his anger undisguised.
He sat at his desk, his elbow on the blotter. He pressed his fingertips against his shut eyelids. His flash of fury drained out of him almost instantly, leaving him weary in its wake. Jim had just informed him that he’d done a background check on Alice Reed. In doing so, he’d come across Sissy Reed’s name, and done a subsequent check on her. Being the bullheaded, diligent cop he was, he’d eventually gone deep enough into both Sissy’s and Avery Cunningham’s separate criminal histories to notice that Sissy and Cunningham had both served time at Cook County Juvenile Detention at the same time.
“I’m sorry. I’m a curious son of a bitch, you know that. Always have been,” Jim said apologetically. Dylan slowly opened his eyes and met the sheriff’s stare. “Your reaction on the night the alarm went off set me down the path. Clearly, this wasn’t some run-of-the-mill bedmate, as wound up as you were. But the more I looked at Alice . . .” He shrugged helplessly. “I’m sure you notice the resemblance between her and Lynn, too. It wasn’t obvious at first, but there was something familiar that was tickling at my memory. Then it was prodding at it so bad I couldn’t sleep. You’re right. I couldn’t let it go.”
“She’s not ready to face the FBI’s interrogations. The press. The Durand board. The challengers to a claim that she’s the long-lost Durand heiress. The result of the Reeds being implicated in the kidnapping. I was just trying to buy some time for her.”
“Would anyone ever be ready for that?” Jim asked, compassion in his tone.
“Can you at least wait to tell the FBI until after the genetic testing is in? You could say we wanted to be sure before we contacted them.”
“That would require that I lie in regard to everything you just told me about Avery Cunningham’s deathbed confession, Dylan. That’s a hell of a lot of withholding, for a hell of a long time, whether the genetic testing is conclusive or not. Besides, both of us know what those results are going to be.”
“Just give me until the end of the week, then,” he bargained without pause. “For whatever reason, the completion of Camp Durand means the world to Alice. She wants to prove that she’s capable of being a Durand leader.”
“If that testing proves it, she owns the company, doesn’t she?” Jim asked, bewildered.
“Of course, but you don’t know Alice,” Dylan frowned. “She’s very . . . stubborn at times.”
“Hasn’t changed that much from when she was little, then,” Jim said with a small, sad smile.
“Just give me until Friday. Give Alice until then. That’s the last official day of camp. There’s a dinner and the individual awards and the Team Championship trophy are given here at the castle. You have no idea what it’d mean to Alice, to finish this before the swarm descends.”
“I can’t keep something this big a secret, Dylan. Not without sacrificing some pretty damn important professional ethics.”
“I know you have to inform the authorities. I understand. Just give it a few days? The counselors don’t know it, but the managers and Kehoe start to tabulate all their evaluations to decide which of the nine counselors are going to become Durand employees tonight, after the points are rewarded for team competition. The votes are tallied and the results are final by Wednesday. On Thursday, they start to inform each counselor who was chosen and who wasn’t in private meetings. At least give me enough time so that if push comes to shove, she could see the results and know she’d been selected as a Durand manager, fair and square.”
He sensed Jim’s continued hesitation. Frustration rose in him.
“Sometimes, I don’t think I’ll ever get her to accept her legacy if she can’t make the first step of successfully completing this damn camp,” Dylan said, slapping his hand on the desk. Jim started at his intensity. “She’s fixated on the idea. I can’t sway her. But then—” He exhaled and sagged heavily back in his chair. “Sometimes, I see her point, even if I’d rather not. She’s had a shitload of confusion and shock and disbelief dumped onto her. Completing the camp successfully feels like . . . some kind of tangible stepping stone for her, I guess.”
“Between Addie’s world and her own,” Jim said.
He met Jim’s stare and nodded once.
“I’ll give you until Thursday evening. That’s the best I can do, Dylan. I’ll let on like we just had this conversation before I contact them. And I’ll tell them that you were holding off in telling the truth because you wanted to see the results of the blood test first. The chances are that agents won’t arrive here until the following day, if I contact them after hours. Hell, I don’t even know who’s going to answer the phone for the number I have,” Jim said, shrugging dubiously. “For all I know, the agents who worked on the case are retired or moved on to other jobs.”
“Do you think I’ll be in trouble with the FBI?” Dylan asked quietly. “For withholding the truth until now?”
“I doubt it. All you did was succeed in a mission they failed at for twenty years. But there’s always the chance they won’t take to your keeping secrets kindly. I suggest we don’t let on so blatantly that we’re as convinced as we are that Addie Durand and Alice Reed are the same person. Who knows?” Jim said, shrugging. “It may turn out we’re wrong.”
“Not a chance,” Dylan said grimly. “You won’t think so, either, when I tell you about some of Alice’s returning memories.”
“I don’t need much convincing as it is.” Jim pointed toward the door. “I’m going to use the facilities first. Tell me about her memories when I come back?”
Dylan nodded. Jim didn’t shut the den door when he left. As Dylan waited, he heard a distant knocking. Hammering, actually. Someone was at the front door. He quickly checked his watch. It was going on ten o’clock. Who the hell was visiting at this hour?
As he neared the foyer, he realized the knocking was persistent and loud. He swung open the heavy front door and saw Sebastian Kehoe standing on the stoop, his face fixed and pale.
“Sebastian. Is something wrong?” Dylan asked, alarmed at his unexpected appearance and tense presentation.
“She won again tonight. The team competition,” Sebastian grated out without answering Dylan’s question. “She tied with Thad Schaefer, but it doesn’t matter. She won the team competition last week, as well. She’s managed to win the favor of every manag
er. They’ll all cast votes in favor of her.”
“What’s your point?” Dylan asked slowly.
“You don’t even ask whom I’m talking about,” Kehoe said bitterly. “You know I’m referring to her. Alice.”
“I figured,” Dylan said with false calmness. “Alice Reed. I’m aware that she won the team competition last week.”
“You’re aware of a hell of a lot more than that about her.”
“Careful, Sebastian,” Dylan said softly. Kehoe’s mouth snapped shut. Suddenly he shook his head.
“No. No, I’m not going to let it happen. I’m not going to let that know-it-all, trailer-trash upstart claim the position of Durand executive. She’s completely unsuitable,” Kehoe shouted.
“I suggest you calm down. As for Alice, the twelve Durand managers seem to disagree with you. And it’s what the majority vote says that counts.”
“It’s because of your constant intrusion that we’re in this situation. You brought her here. I would never have hired her as a counselor to begin with. You contrived to get that interview with her while we were in Chicago, didn’t you? You’ve been manipulating me! I will not let this happen.”
“Then you’ll be out of a job, won’t you?”
“I was working and excelling at this job before you knew how to drive. How dare you threaten me,” Kehoe bellowed.
Dylan stepped forward, anger pouring like ice through his veins. “You really think that was a threat? That was reality, plain and simple. Am I making myself clear?”
Kehoe looked apoplectic. Dylan had been in more than his fair share of fistfights as a kid and young man. He had the familiar feeling of being face-to-face with a person who had reached his limit, with whom logic’s hold was weakening. The word rabid came to mind. He tensed, fully prepared for Kehoe to physically attack him.
“What’s this all about?” a mild voice asked from behind them.
Eyeing Kehoe carefully and remaining on high alert, Dylan took a step back.
“It’s Sebastian Kehoe. He’s expressing some concerns about some goings-on at the camp tonight.”