Veil of Fear

by Judi Lind

“Harley’s going to call the local police and get their fax number. Where’s the main station?”

  “Downtown. But that’s over ten miles away and it’s starting to snow.”

  He crossed the room and looked out the window. “Son-of-a-gun! It’s really coming down, too.” He straightened up and let the cotton curtain drop into place. “Think your dad would mind if I borrowed his car?”

  She thought about offering to drive him, but realized Trace might be glad of the opportunity to get away by himself for a short time. Besides, three mugs of her mother’s malted hot chocolate had the same effect on Mary as an equal number of tranquilizers. She was almost asleep on her feet. “Of course you can use one of the cars. But take Dad’s Suburban, it has four-wheel drive. Come on, I’ll find you some warm clothes.”

  Keeping their voices low so as not to disturb her parents, Mary and Trace tiptoed downstairs. She found the spare keys to the Suburban on a holder by the back door. Next, she led the way to the mudroom, so she could find Trace warm clothing to wear out into the ever-building snowstorm.

  Although Trace was a much larger man than John Wilder, Mary eventually found an insulated jacket, lumberjack cap and mittens that he could squeeze into. His feet, however, wouldn’t fit into any of her father’s snow boots so Trace had to wear his sneakers.

  “Stay out of snowdrifts,” Mary warned, “or you’ll get frostbite. Those tennis shoes will be soaking wet in just a couple of minutes if you walk through heavy snow.”

  For the first time since she’d awakened him that morning, Trace gave her that familiar, crooked grin, causing her heart to lurch. “Yes, Mother Mary. And I won’t slam on the brakes if I start to slide and I’ll keep the flaps down over my ears and I won’t play in the snow. Anything else?”

  “No, smart aleck. I...I just worry about you.”

  Trace cupped her worried face between his mittened hands. “Don’t worry, Mary-Mary. Everything is going to be just fine. Trust me.”

  Giving her a light kiss on the tip of her nose, he stepped out the kitchen door into the swirling snow. A moment later, she heard the garage door open, and she watched out the window until the Suburban backed into the street. A few seconds later, its taillights disappeared from her sight.

  Mary turned away from the window, feeling suddenly alone and abandoned again. She’d thought she’d find sanctuary here in her parents’ home, but her heart told her that Trace had been her refuge all along. Why hadn’t she realized the truth before? Why hadn’t she told Trace how she felt, deep inside where it counted?

  Suddenly, she couldn’t wait for his return. Filled with a strange surety that she and Trace could work out their problems, she was eager to talk to him. To tell him that she loved him.

  But for now, as unaccustomed as he was to driving in heavy snow, she could do nothing more than pray he returned safely.

  Too late, Mary realized she’d forgotten to give him a door key, so she left the back door unlocked and walked softly upstairs to the familiar warmth of her former bedroom.

  * * *

  MARY DIDN’T KNOW how long she’d been asleep when she awoke abruptly. For a moment, she felt disoriented until she realized she was back in her childhood bed. Safe in her parents’ home.

  She was wondering what had awakened her, when she realized she hadn’t heard the Suburban pull back in. Hadn’t heard the garage door close. Had something happened to Trace?

  A vague creak in the hallway brought her to a sitting position. She recognized that creak; it always caught her when she was sneaking home late from a date. It was right past the landing by the stairs, almost impossible to avoid.

  Her senses thoroughly aroused, she listened intently until she heard the soft thud of a footstep outside her bedroom door. “Trace? Is that you?” she called.

  Only an echoing stillness responded.

  The sense of foreboding that had been trailing her all day returned with a vengeance. Something was wrong; terribly wrong. She sat up and switched on the bedside light.

  “Trace?” she called again.

  Once more, only the eerie silence returned her call.

  Suddenly, Mary detected a peculiar odor emanating from the hallway. A stinging, acrid odor, one she’d smelled before but was surely out of place now. She sniffed the air and got another, stronger whiff. So familiar, yet so elusive.

  It reminded her of evenings at her parents’ camp. Of cool evenings when they’d light the kerosene heater and—

  Kerosene!

  At that moment, the smoke alarm at the top of the steps blared out a warning. Immediately, the strong odor of kerosene was dissipated by another, even more frightening smell. The hot choking scent of fire!

  As the piercing shriek of the fire alarm continued to scream in her ear, Mary sprang out of bed and ran to the door. Barely recalling her training, she placed her palm on the wooden door panel and was relieved to find it only warm. She pushed out into the hall into black suffocating smoke.

  Holding her hand in front of her mouth, she started for her folks’ bedroom and was relieved to see Trace, still fully dressed, shepherding her bewildered parents into the relative safety of the hallway.

  Huddling together, the foursome started for the staircase, when Mary stopped, pointing in horror. Dancing, sizzling flames were already leapfrogging up the steps. Their primary escape route was cut off.

  “Come on,” Trace shouted, grabbing her arm. “We’ll have to go out a window!”

  Herding them into Mary’s room, he took a precious moment to pick up the telephone by her bed. A shake of his head told her the phone line was dead. They wouldn’t be able to count on any outside help. They were on their own.

  “How steep is the roofline?” he asked her father.

  The older man shook his head in confusion. “Not too bad. At least I don’t think so.”

  Deciding to see for himself, Trace dashed toward the bedroom window. A popping sound struck their ears a split second after Mary’s window shattered. Reacting purely by instinct, Trace dropped to the floor and shouted, “Turn out that lamp! Everybody stay down.”

  Mary blindly obeyed his command, but her attention was focused on the broken window. What had caused it to shatter like that? Heat from the fire?

  Crawling on his stomach like a giant, slinky lizard, Trace moved away from the window and rose to his feet at Mary’s side. “He’s out in the yard. That was a rifle shot. He has every avenue cut off.”

  “He? Who? What do you mean a rifle?” Mary had been through so much trauma these past weeks that she couldn’t absorb any more. She was dazed, punchy.

  Grabbing her by the shoulders, Trace buried his face in her hair and whispered so her parents wouldn’t hear, “The man who’s been trying to kill you. We have to get your folks out of here.”

  Mary raised her gaze to meet his. “But the stalker’s dead. Isn’t...isn’t he?”

  The pained look on Trace’s face was answer enough. He pulled her close to his chest and cupped her face between his hands. “I love you, Mary Wilder, and we’re going to get through this. Do you understand?”

  Trace loved her. Everything else faded into insignificance.

  Suddenly feeling alive again, Mary snapped back, fully alert now. Giving her dazed parents a single glance, she knew her first responsibility was to get them safely out of the fire. “If he’s watching the windows on this side of the house, we can go out the other,” she said to Trace.

  But when they led her parents out of her bedroom, Mary saw that the flames had already encompassed the rooms across the hall and were rapidly spreading. “Never mind!” she shouted above the crackling roar. “We can go up through the attic and still come out on the other side.”

  “Good,” Trace yelled. “Get going. I’ll be right there.”

  Leaving her to tend to John and Elizabeth, Trace darted back into Mary’s room and yanked the covers loose. He carried the sheet and blankets to the adjoining bathroom where he threw them into the tub and doused them with cold water
.

  Carrying the dripping bedding in his arms, he followed Mary. She’d pulled down the retractable attic stairs and was trying to coax her parents up the narrow staircase.

  “Here.” Trace draped soaking-wet blankets around John’s and Elizabeth’s shoulders. “Keep these over your heads so a stray spark doesn’t ignite your hair or burn your eyes.” He pulled Mary beside him and covered them with the sopping wet sheet. Together, they eased her mother up the narrow stairs and turned to help her father.

  Even in the dim red glow cast by the now-raging fire, Mary could see her father’s face was ashen. Oh, dear heavens, please don’t let him have another heart attack, she prayed. All thoughts of the peril they were facing, of the madman waiting on the lawn below disappeared beneath this more immediate and more frightening danger. She couldn’t stand to lose her father. She just couldn’t.

  Feeling Trace’s strong arm around her waist supporting her both physically and emotionally, Mary leaned forward and kissed her father’s weathered cheek. “Come on, Dad! Just a little farther and we’ll be safe.”

  John turned a dazed face to his daughter and nodded. Slowly, the trio climbed the steps and joined Elizabeth in the dark attic.

  Taking a moment to get her bearings, Mary pointed to the brick chimney jutting up through the middle of the attic floor. “Over there! There’s a gabled window on that side.”

  Wrapping an arm around each of her parents, she headed for their last avenue of escape.

  Trace hung back, making sure the Wilders were safe. Holding the soggy blankets, he batted at the tiny spurts of flame that shot up on the plywood floor. The window Mary had led them to was painted shut. He was just about to rush to her aid, when she picked up a dusty brass andiron and wrapped it in the sheet.

  Motioning to her parents to stand back, Mary swung the andiron in its percale sling and shattered the window. Grabbing a piece of wood, she cleared the fragments of glass from the window frame.

  Trace couldn’t help the thrill of pride. That was some resourceful woman he’d fallen in love with. Still keeping ahead in his battle with the encroaching flames, Trace watched out of the corner of his eye while Mary urged both her parents out onto the rooftop. Just as she lifted a pajamaed leg to follow, a section of the attic wall caved in, almost catching him beneath the debris.

  As he raced to follow Mary out the window, Trace felt a sharp pain in his right hand and glanced down. A falling timber must have struck him. A gaping slash along the outside of his palm was oozing blood.

  Ripping loose a piece of his shirt, Trace tied a makeshift bandage around the wound and scrambled through the window onto the roof.

  As John had promised, this section of the roofline was gently sloped. Thankfully, it had stopped snowing some time ago, but the asphalt shingles were still slick and treacherous. Moving with great caution, Trace crawled to the opposite corner of the house from the gunman. A huge oak tree was nestled against the vinyl siding. If he could somehow get them into that tree...surely they could make their way to the ground.

  One by one, while the others huddled together in the darkness as their home crumbled beneath them, Trace helped first the parents, then the daughter to the ground.

  Trace held his fingertip across his lips in a signal for quiet as they raced across the snow-crusted ground to the relative safety of the garage. Although both the Suburban and the sedan were parked inside, they quickly discovered all sets of keys were inside the blazing inferno.

  They were temporarily safe from the fire, but they were several miles away from town and outside help. Would anyone even see the flames in the night sky before it was too late?

  And they couldn’t forget a killer was still somewhere in the inky darkness, stalking them.

  Trace had never felt more frustrated in his life. They were completely at that madman’s mercy. His gun, the keys, everything that might be used as a weapon was burning up inside what was left of the house.

  Keeping his fingertip over the light switch on the sedan door, Trace pushed Mary’s parents into the back seat. “Get down on the floor and stay there,” he hissed. “Don’t move until Mary or I come to get you.”

  He knew better than to hope he could convince Mary to wait with her family. And, for once, he was grateful for her obstinance. He needed her help if they were to stand a chance of outwitting the gunman.

  He looked over to where Mary stood just inside the garage. Trace knew she hadn’t yet made the connection; she still didn’t know the identity of the man who was outside waiting to kill her. Why the hell did Trace have to be the one to break the awful news?

  Pulling her farther into the shadows of the garage, he kissed the top of her smoky hair. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart. Truly sorry.”

  Mary lifted her head and stared deeply into the golden eyes she so dearly loved. “What did you find out?”

  Wordlessly, Trace reached into his jeans pocket for the fax he’d received from Harley. He handed it to her.

  Moving slightly, to gain light from the blazing abyss that had been her family home, Mary held up the blurred photo.

  Wife of Local Merchant Perishes in Blaze! the caption beneath the photo proclaimed. Slowly, her eyes drifted upward until they locked with the blank stare of the man looking back at her from the newspaper clipping.

  Martin King’s thick dark hair was cut in a full, collarlength style reminiscent of the seventies. His face was youthful and bland, the character in its features not yet formed. Nonetheless, Mary instantly recognized the blank stare of Martin King. The man she’d come to know as Jonathan Regent.

  For a long time, Mary stared at the photograph. She wondered why she felt no surprise, no shock. Could it be that in the deepest recesses of her heart she’d suspected all along?

  Martin King-Jonathan Regent. She almost laughed aloud. Regent was a none-too-subtle synonym for king. Martin/Jonathan must have thought he was so clever. Had he killed his first wife for the insurance money, as the newspaper hinted? Had he intended all along to kill her, as well?

  Why, Jonathan, her heart cried, why did you want to hurt me so badly?

  Trace’s gentle finger wiped at her cheek and Mary realized she must have been crying. Taking his hand in hers, she lifted his fingertips to her lips. It was then that she saw the blood-soaked rag around his sooty hand.

  Using her teeth, she ripped a piece of wet sheeting and rebandaged Trace’s injured hand. The wound looked nasty. He definitely needed medical attention. But first they had to get away from Jonathan so she could lead them to a neighbor’s camp, and hopefully find a telephone.

  “We have to get him,” she whispered fiercely.

  “I know.” Trace rummaged through a pile of garden implements until he found a sturdy shovel. “I’m going to circle around behind him.” He pointed to a stand of trees about twenty yards away. “After I’m in place, see if you can call him, maybe lure him into that clearing.”

  Mary nodded. While Trace slunk close to the ground behind the garage, she looked at the family car with her parents huddled on the cold floorboards. Shifting her attention outside, she watched with a cold angry heart as the blackened timbers that had once been her folks’ dream house collapsed in on itself. She thought about a dead man who’d only been trying to warn her. And she thought about the attempt on her own life.

  Those hands at her back pushing her into the path of that bus were the hands of the man she’d meant to marry.

  Jonathan Regent was responsible for all those horrible deeds.

  There was no worse betrayal.

  Stepping out of the sanctuary of the garage, she moved into the open as silently as a wraith. Sensing his nearness, Mary called out, “Jonathan? It was me you wanted all along. I’m here now. Come get me.”

  Crackling embers were the only response.

  Deciding to try a different tact, she shouted, “Jonathan? It’s me, Mary. I’m sorry. I never meant to...” To what? What had she ever done to him? Desperately trying to release her mind, to find s
omething that might lure him into conversation, Mary gasped aloud when a shadow moved and Jonathan stood before her.

  Holding the rifle centered on her heart, he stepped forward. “So, Jezebel, you’ve decided to own up to the truth.” His voice was as cold and malevolent as death. “I should have known you’d betray me. You’re a tramp. All women are tramps.”

  “Jonathan, I’m sorry.”

  “Sorry? I didn’t want you to be sorry, I wanted you to be pure. Different from the others. For a while, you had me fooled. But then, of course, you proved my trust wasn’t warranted. Damn you, Mary! Why couldn’t you be pure?”

  Mary stood quietly while his curses rained down on her. Martin/Jonathan was insane; why hadn’t she seen it before? All the little clues came rushing into her consciousness. The way he’d always referred to her purity, to the virginal look of her fair hair and skin. Even her name, Mary, had delighted him. Now she realized it was because of the subliminal connection to that most pure, most innocent of women: the Virgin Mary.

  “Are you listening to me, Jezebel? You must atone for your sins. Like my mother, who left my father for another man. But I found her and made her pay.”

  “Like you made your first wife pay?”

  “Ah! So you know about her, do you? You and that bodyguard have truly been busy. Oh, yes, I know all about the two of you and your disgusting little affair.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, Mary saw Trace slip out of his hiding place. Shovel held high above his head, he stole quietly over the melting snow toward Jonathan. It was a horrible, eerie sight, one Mary knew she’d never forget. The sky had taken on a Halloween-orange glow from the ruins of her home. Charred timbers and the occasional hiss of a flame touching the melting snow made a stark contrast to the peaceful serenity of the snow-blanketed woods surrounding them.

  Jonathan had paused and was watching her curiously. Terrified that he’d hear or sense Trace sneaking up behind him, Mary desperately tried to pick up the threads of the diatribe Jonathan would call conversation.

  “I never meant to betray you, Jonathan. You have to believe that.”