by S. R. Grey
The heavy, metal door clanged shut behind me with finality, my fate sealed. And just then a person stepped out from behind the staircase, looking not the least bit surprised to see me. I couldn’t say the same. Here was the missing person everyone was looking for. And it wasn’t Chelsea. No, it was Ami Hensley.
What is she doing here? I thought. Then I feared this was where she was being held captive. But as I glanced around furtively, I realized we were the only two.
“Expecting Adam?” Ami drawled, tossing her long, blonde hair back with a flick of her wrist. She then dipped a hand into the front pocket of her raincoat. The same powder-blue coat she’d worn the day we’d first taken the ferry from Cove Beach to Fade Island. But unlike that time, Ami’s stomach was now perfectly flat. No fake-pregnancy bump today.
My mind raced to assess the scene before me. Well, well, well. Ami was not only the mystery blonde in the Polaroid photo with Chelsea, but she was obviously not missing after all. Had we all been duped by a crazy person?
“Ami, I, uh,” I stammered, at a loss for verbal coherency, at first. But then I pulled it together. “What are you doing here? Everyone thinks you’re—”
“Missing? Dead?” she finished for me, sounding bored. “Nope, as you can see, I’m alive and well.”
Had she faked her own disappearance? To what end?
“I don’t understand,” I said, truly confused.
Ami sighed and took another step closer. Now both of her hands were stuffed into the front pockets of her raincoat. Odd. But what really gave me pause was how fake her plastered-on smile appeared to be. Instinctively I took a step back as she came closer still. There was something very wrong with her expression.
“What don’t you understand, Maddy?” Ami cooed. I didn’t answer, and she continued, “In light of recent, shall we say, events, I needed to lay low. See how things played out. Know what I mean?”
I had no idea what she was babbling about. Why would Ami need to “lay low”? And see how what played out? One thing I knew for sure was that I didn’t care to stick around any longer. I didn’t know why Ami—and not Adam—was here at the lighthouse. I had no idea why Ami would fake her own disappearance. But it seemed the longer I stuck around, the more likely this bizarre situation could become volatile. And I didn’t want that.
“Look, Ami, I’m leaving. I don’t know what you’re up to, and to tell you the truth, I don’t care. I came down here to meet Adam, but obviously he and I got our signals crossed—”
“You’re such a stupid bitch!” Ami shrieked, cutting me off. “Adam didn’t leave you the fucking note. I did!”
“That can’t be right.” Dread crept over me. “It was his handwriting.”
“Listen up, Maddy, and listen good,” Ami said. “You don’t work for a man for five years, signing document after document, and not learn his handwriting. I’ve signed Adam Ward’s signature probably more times than he has.” At this she laughed maniacally.
Oh God. I’d fallen into Ami’s trap. And nobody even knew where I was. Adam certainly wasn’t going to come to my rescue. I mentally kicked myself for being so foolish. Why had I not called him to verify he’d written that note? Sure I didn’t want to ruin his surprise, but really, was it worth my well-being? And yes, the café had been dark. But nothing had precluded me from dropping by Helena and Nate’s bungalow to tell them I was heading down to the lighthouse. Nothing but my own foolhardiness. Not even Max knew I was here because I hadn’t searched him out either. I’d been reckless, and now I was going to pay for it.
Panicked, I turned and lunged for the door, my hand grasping for the metal handle. But then I froze when I heard the distinct sound of a gun being cocked echoing in the confines of the lighthouse.
“Turn around,” Ami said, her voice icy.
Out of options for now, I obeyed. As I turned to face my captor, I found myself staring down the barrel of a firearm—a .38—aimed directly at me. Behind the gun Ami smiled triumphantly. I thought about making a run for it, but there was no way I was taking that chance. The likelihood of getting shot in such close quarters was high. It didn’t matter if Ami could shoot or not. But by the confident way she was holding the .38 with both hands, I was betting she could handle the gun just fine.
“Ami,” I whispered. “Just let me go. Please.” I wasn’t above begging, not at this point.
Her eyes narrowed. “No,” she stated, sighing. “You started this with your snooping around. Always asking questions, always wanting answers.”
“Please, Ami. I won’t ask any more questions, I promise.”
She ignored my plea. “You wanted answers. Well, you’re finally going to get them.”
Sure I’d wanted answers. But at what cost, I thought. The temperature in the lighthouse felt like it had dropped several degrees. But maybe it was just the effects of the chill coursing through my body. For the first time since I’d been on the island, I really didn’t want any answers. At this point I just wanted one thing—to get out of the lighthouse, alive.
Ami began speaking again, “Like aren’t you wondering how I even got in here, Maddy?”
With the gun she motioned for me to step further away from the door. I moved a few feet to the right, still keeping close to the perimeter and far from the lit candles. God, if a fire started—which could easily happen if even just one of the many candles got knocked over—would Ami let me out? As I watched her eyes flit around the lighthouse, I noted she appeared to be as absolutely crazy as everyone said she was. So no, I feared if there were a fire, she’d leave me here to burn.
“Stop right there,” she said, smiling. “Now let’s talk. Just like old times.”
Ami was enjoying this, I could tell from her expression. I was her captive audience, in every sense of the word. She evidently wanted to talk. So I reassessed the situation. Maybe I could get her to share her story. Why had she pretended to be missing? How did she get in here? What had been going on with her and Chelsea? I had a million questions after all, and if I could keep this crazy girl talking, my penchant for inquisitiveness just might be my way out of this mess.
So I asked, “Fine, tell me. How did you get in here?”
“I bet Adam never mentioned there were once two keys to the lighthouse,” she said, her voice low and conspiratorial, like she was about to share with me the biggest secret in town.
Good God, maybe she was. Only I feared it was not about a key.
Swallowing hard, I shook my head. “No,” I answered. “He didn’t.”
“Adam had one, of course. But Chelsea had a spare made, so she had one as well.”
Yeah, yeah, so her secret lover had given her a key. I’d seen the picture, so I knew Ami and Chelsea had had something going on. My enthusiasm to play along was waning, particularly since the .38 had not wavered. And maybe I shouldn’t have uttered the next words, but I did. “Ami, I know all about you and Chelsea. So she gave you a key. Big deal.”
The gun shook in Ami’s hand, and her cheeks reddened. “That little fuck!” she screamed.
Before I could figure out who the little fuck was, cold, hard steel impacted across my cheek. For a fleeting moment, I thought for sure she’d shot me, but then I realized Ami had hit me with the gun. And, fuck, it hurt like hell.
Wiping away at the trickle of blood running down my face, I struggled to stay upright. She’d hit me so hard that the metal had cut into my left cheek, leaving a gash. And though my cheek throbbed, it was my whole head that was ringing.
Ami was pacing, the gun at her side. I shot a glance to the door, but my feet wouldn’t move. Terror coursed through my veins, holding me frozen in its grip. When the ringing in my head finally subsided, I realized Ami was not only pacing, she was talking. And what she was saying only served to ratchet my terror level up a notch.
“That little fuck,” she repeated. And then she went off. “I should have known he’d have more than one. There were more. I always knew there were more. But I thought they’d been destroy
ed. I paid that old, perverted bartender for all of the pictures years ago. How do you think he got the money to move to California? And the other morning, I got the final one; the one he must have given to that fucking pervert kid. But there was only one in that envelope. I’m sure of it.”
Ami continued pacing, and I wiped away blood as it trickled down my cheek. She stopped and aimed the gun at me once again. “He made a copy, didn’t he?” she asked, her voice flat.
I nodded weakly, and she mumbled something indistinct about “a plan” and “so that’s why,” but I couldn’t make anything else out. Even so I’d heard enough that my blood ran cold. Ami had stolen the picture out of the envelope at Billy’s. Had she also been the person who’d shot Jimmy? I felt a lump forming on my cheek from where she’d hit me with the .38. It wasn’t lost on me that it was the same type of firearm used to murder Jimmy.
And suddenly I knew. I was sure she’d done it. “You killed Jimmy,” I whispered.
Ami’s head shot up. The way she looked at me, I thought for a moment she would hit me again. But then her eyes glazed over, all dreamy, like she was reminiscing. And I guessed she was, as disturbing as it was.
“I didn’t really want to shoot him,” she said quietly. “I went to Billy’s that morning to talk to him. See if any other pictures really were floating around. I had my doubts, but there was just no other explanation for you to keep going back there. I knew he had to have had something to keep you interested.”
“Ami, please—”
She ignored me and rattled on, “And then I saw the look on that kid’s face when I walked through the door. I knew then he recognized me from those pictures. But when I saw the envelope on the bar, with an ‘M’ on the front, I knew what it held.”
“So you killed him?” I said, shaking my head with disbelief that an act like murder could be so easy for her.
Ami shot me a look of pure hatred. “Don’t say it that way,” she spat. “It’s not like I wanted to kill him. I asked him what was in the envelope, just to be sure. And he immediately lunged for it. There’d be only one reason he’d want to grab that envelope before I did…and…well, somebody had to stop him.”
“With a bullet to the head?” I asked, appalled.
Ami didn’t hear me because she began to laugh. Or maybe she had heard. In any case it sounded so wrong in light of what she’d just confessed to doing.
Her steely gaze returned to me. “I must say, you showed up that morning at the perfect time.” She suppressed a giggle. “Sometimes dumb luck is better than all the planning in the world. I couldn’t believe my good fortune. Not only had I gotten to the picture minutes before it would have been in your hands, but then the police suspected you of killing the stupid kid.” She sighed, a picture of contentment. “It was beyond perfect.”
Ami may have been crazy, but she was evil and clever as well. Her tone was cold and calculating, never betraying an ounce of remorse. Not for killing Jimmy. Not for allowing me to take the fall. Not for faking her own disappearance. Nothing.
“Even though the police were focused on you, I had already planned to lay low for a couple of days. Just to be safe. But then I had an idea,”—another icy smile of wickedness flashed my way— “why not make it so the police suspected you of two crimes? So I called you before I took off. I knew you’d take the bait, seeing as you were just soooo curious as to why I’d gone to California.”
“Why did you go to LA?” I asked listlessly, since it didn’t really matter. Not anymore.
“Contrary to whatever you’re thinking, Maddy,” she began scornfully, “I’m not all bad. I didn’t want things to come to this” —she waved the gun around the lighthouse interior— “I really hoped you’d get discouraged. Quit digging around. Go home to a guy who obviously still cared for you.” She sighed. “But it didn’t work, did it? You just had to fall for Adam. Just like back in high school.”
“Shut up,” I said, not wanting to hear Adam’s name even cross her evil lips.
“Thought you weren’t interested anymore, Maddy?” Ami mocked.
“I guess I lied.”
“You don’t even know him,” she scoffed.
“Better than you,” I shot back defiantly, but my courage wavered when the gun began to shake in her hand.
“So you think,” Ami ground out.
Arguing was probably not a smart move, so I changed the subject. “Let me go, Ami,” I pleaded. “It doesn’t have to end this way.”
“I wish I could.” She smiled a sad smile. “But you know too much.”
I didn’t know why she suddenly looked sad, but I wanted to strike while the iron was hot. Play on her emotions, if that were possible. “Let me go. If not for me, Ami, do it for Sean’s sake, he—”
Suddenly she lunged at me. This time I raised my arm to protect my face from the assault. “Shut up!” she screeched as she swung the firearm at me. I ducked, and the gun whooshed through the air. “Don’t even say his name, you bitch.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I cried, terrified the gun would discharge with her wild flailing.
Finally Ami backed off, her chest heaving. Her hands shook, but she managed to keep the gun leveled at my chest. “I’m sorry,” I whispered once more for good measure.
“I love my husband,” she choked. “But she was going to ruin it all.” Amy took one hand off the gun and wiped at her face, pushed back a swath of hair that had fallen into her face.
“Who?” I asked.
“Chelsea,” she replied, her breathing ragged and raw with emotion. “She didn’t want me anymore. She was going to tell Sean all about us.”
I swallowed hard. Ami was offering up a pretty strong motive. One lover scorned, the other threatening to expose the affair to an unsuspecting spouse. Yeah, my gut was telling me that Ami had played a role in Chelsea’s disappearance. The only way to find out was to keep her talking. And her talking bought me more much-needed time. Maybe somebody—Max, Nate, Helena—would see the parked Lexus and come down to investigate. Maybe even Adam would return, wonder where I was, and come save the day. Anything was possible; I had to hold on to that hope.
To keep Ami talking, I asked as gently as I could, “Ami, what happened?”
The Ami I once knew, the girl I’d shared secrets with, that girl met my eyes. If I could reach her, maybe, just maybe, I’d get out of this unscathed. It took everything I had to muster an encouraging smile, but it worked.
Ami began to tell me everything.
She told me how she and Chelsea became friends, even before Adam purchased Fade Island and hired Ami to run Harbour Falls Realtors. She was thrilled that the beautiful Chelsea Hannigan had chosen her as a friend. But Chelsea had other plans. She became intent on seducing Ami. She complained to Ami that Adam had quit sleeping with her years earlier. Ami asked her why she stayed with him, but Chelsea said she’d never let him go. Never. And even though Chelsea claimed to hate Fade Island, many of her trysts with Ami occurred at the lighthouse. When Ami realized Chelsea was using her, she felt shameful that she’d cheated on her husband. And Ami had done so with someone who seemed to just want to get back at Adam for not wanting her anymore.
Shortly before the wedding, Chelsea sought to sever all ties with Ami. She confirmed that their fling had meant nothing to her. It had all been playful experimentation, she’d said. And now that she was getting married, it was time for it to stop. Ami felt slighted; for it seemed Chelsea’s words suggested that Ami having been married the whole time meant nothing.
“Chelsea didn’t care about things like marriage and fidelity,” Ami snorted, echoing Jimmy’s words—her victim—without even knowing it. “She just didn’t want me. She thought she could discard me; move on to the next one.”
I wondered if Ami knew Chelsea had been carrying on a fling with J.T. O’Brien as well. Maybe she’d known, and it hadn’t mattered to her. Unfortunately I didn’t have the luxury of figuring it all out, not with the gun still pointed at me. No, I knew time was w
asting. So I stood perfectly still, glancing at the gun. Had she lowered it slightly?
“Ami,” I soothed, “I’m sure Chelsea cared about you in her own way.”
Ami’s pale eyes hardened to an icy blue. “No, she didn’t,” she countered. “I called her the day of the wedding rehearsal. She had a disposable cell phone she used for our…meetings” —that explained why Ami’s number never showed up in Chelsea’s phone records— “or sometimes we’d use pay phones. Anyway I asked her not to end it. I asked her to keep seeing me. She laughed at me. She told me she was destroying the cell phone and not to contact her once she was married. Maddy, I begged, but she just laughed.”
The emotion in Ami’s face was an odd mix of heartbreak and fury. “Ami,” I said softly.
But she laughed, the heartbroken moment quickly fading. “Don’t pity me, Maddy,” she hissed. “After she was done laughing, she threatened to tell Sean everything if I didn’t back off. I couldn’t take that chance, the chance of ending up with nothing. I asked her to meet me one last time that night. I told her to come down to the lighthouse. I knew she’d show up. And I knew what I had to do when she did.”
A sick feeling washed over me anew. “Oh God, Ami, what did you do?” I whispered.
“She came to the lighthouse. It was late, really late. She said she had stopped in Harbour Falls to tell Sean about us but chickened out at the last minute.”
That was why Chelsea had been at the bank; Sean and Ami’s house was in that neighborhood. It was all falling into place.
Ami continued, “She told me she almost went back to the hotel. She called Adam, but I guess he didn’t say what she wanted to hear.” Ami swiped at her face, wiping a tear that had fallen. “So she came here to the lighthouse and sealed her fate that night.”