Amanda Stevens Bestseller Collection: Stranger In Paradise/A Baby's Cry

by Amanda Stevens

  Then Emily knew. She was in Matthew’s room. Jenny Wilcox’s room. The murder room.

  And as her eyes became even more accustomed to the dim candle glow, she saw something else. The figure was standing in a corner, watching her through the eerie slits in the ski mask.

  Seeing that Emily was awake, the figure glided across the floor toward her. Something flashed in one of the gloved hands. Something bright and metal and…sharp. Deadly-looking. A knife. A long-bladed butcher knife.

  Slowly, ever so carefully, the other gloved hand came up and tugged off the ski mask. The woolen fabric slipped over the head and a tumble of blond hair spilled out.

  “Nella!” Emily gasped.

  “I found the Bible,” she said. “And the clipping. You had it all along, didn’t you? You knew about me.”

  Emily shook her head in desperation. “No! I received the Bible in the mail today. The clipping fell out, but I didn’t know what it meant. I didn’t know it was you….” She trailed off, remembering suddenly what she had been trying to recall earlier. Miss Rosabel’s words came rushing back to her.

  She’d had…infatuations before, you see, one rather serious. That’s why her father had sent her to me that year. She’d fallen madly in love with one of her teachers, and there was some trouble, because the man was married. There was a lot of talk, and, well, we decided—my brother and I—that it would be best for everyone if Nella came to stay with me until all the fuss blew over.

  “He didn’t love me, so I killed him,” Nella said, so calmly her words were even more chilling. “I had to, don’t you see? It was all meant to be. I had to get rid of him so I’d be sent here and meet Wade. He was the one. The real one. The others…” She shook her head. “I knew it the moment I first laid eyes on Wade, but she tried to come between us. She tried to take him away from me.”

  “Who?” Emily’s mind was working frantically. She had to get out of here, but her head was still pounding, and every time she moved a wave of dizziness swept over her.

  And Nella had a knife. In her weakened state, Emily would never be able to overpower her. The best she could do was to keep Nella talking until…until…Oh, God. Until what?

  Matthew, Emily silently cried. Where are you? I need you!

  Nella was staring down at her strangely. “Who?” she repeated incredulously. “Why, Jenny, of course. She pretended to be my friend, but she wasn’t. She just wanted to get me out of the way so she could have Wade all to herself.”

  “So you killed her,” Emily whispered in horror.

  “I had to.”

  “And Tony Vincent? How did you manage to convince him he’d killed Jenny?” Think! Emily commanded herself desperately. How was she going to get herself out of this mess?

  Nella smiled a little half smile that made Emily’s blood run cold. “I don’t mind telling you. That’s why I waited for you to wake up. So I could explain it all to you, and then you’d understand why you have to die. I owe you that much, since we’re friends.” Nella’s eyes glowed with madness in the candlelight, and Emily gasped. Any hope of talking rationally to the woman evaporated, and fear exploded inside Emily again.

  “Tony was in a drunken stupor that night,” Nella went on conversationally, staring down at Emily. “It was easy to plant Jenny’s blood all over him, put the knife in his hand and, when he awakened, tell him that I’d seen him leaving Jenny’s room. He couldn’t remember anything, and his temper had gotten the better of him before. He believed everything I told him.”

  “You had it all planned out, didn’t you? Every last detail.” Emily forced a note of admiration into her tone. “And Wade? What happened to him?”

  Nella’s blue eyes grew dreamy in the candlelight. “We were free to be together. I’d removed every last obstacle. Everyone thought he’d killed Jenny, but I told him I’d help clear his name. That could have brought us even closer, if he had just told me he loved me. But he wouldn’t. Even after everything I’d done for him, for us, he wouldn’t say it.” There was a note of wonder in her voice, as if, after all these years, she still couldn’t quite believe it.

  Emily took a deep breath, mustering her courage. She eased herself up against the pillows. “So you lured him to the river that night and waited for him. You were the one who stabbed him in the back.”

  Nella shrugged. “He wasn’t expecting anything like that from me. I took him by surprise. That’s always the key, you know. Surprise. I surprised you tonight, didn’t I?” She seemed like a child eager for approval. Her vivid blue eyes gleamed in the candlelight.

  Emily nodded, swallowing past the knot in her throat. Slowly, inch by inch, she drew up her knees. “Yes,” she murmured. “You really surprised me. So you just left Wade’s body there for the Avengers to find. You were the one who called Trey about Wade, weren’t you?”

  “Everyone suspected Trey Huntington was behind the Avengers, but no one would ever come right out and say so. I decided to find out for sure. I called him, then waited for him to find Wade’s body. Trey and the sheriff…and your brother.” Again her eyes shimmered with satisfaction as she waited for Emily’s reaction. When the desired result wasn’t forthcoming, Nella frowned in displeasure. “You knew!”

  “I’m still surprised,” Emily said quickly, tensing her muscles. “Especially at how you managed to pull everything off. You killed Wade and Jenny, and no one ever suspected. You killed Mike Durbin, too, didn’t you?”

  “He’d dug up all that stuff about my past, before I came here. He even found out my father had committed me to a mental hospital for a while. My own father! Can you imagine that, Emily? Can you imagine what that betrayal did to me?”

  Emily was imagining it, all right, and the visions were anything but reassuring.

  “I knew Mike had gone to talk to Aunt Rosabel. She never trusted me, you know. Never really liked me. She was always watching me like a hawk. I knew she suspected something when I found that clipping in her Bible. But then she hid it, the old battle-ax, and I could never find it again.”

  Emily gazed at Nella in horror. “You didn’t…kill Miss Rosabel?”

  Nella smiled. “Didn’t I?”

  “But how?”

  “It was easy,” Nella said, with a complacent shrug that sent a cold chill along Emily’s spine. “She was old. She couldn’t fight me. A pillow to her face, and it was all over. You can see why I had to get rid of her, can’t you? She was talking to people, saying too much. I couldn’t have that, could I?”

  Fear rushed through Emily as she realized how truly demented Nella was. How cold-blooded. “You were the one who locked me in Cora Mae’s basement, weren’t you?”

  “I heard you talking after the funeral,” Nella admitted. “I knew you planned to go see Cora Mae, so I got her out of the house. Then all I had to do was wait for you. I knew the first time I saw the two of you together that I would have to get rid of you, so that he could see how much he loves me.”

  “Matthew?”

  “Not Matthew. Wade. Wade. He’s come back. He’s come back to me. And now,” she said, taking a menacing step toward the bed, “now you have to die.”

  As Nella lifted the knife, Emily grabbed the candle from the bedside table and threw it as hard as she could into Nella’s face. It caught her by surprise more than anything else, but that was what Emily had been counting on.

  Surprise was always the key.

  MATTHEW PULLED to a stop in front of the inn and climbed off the Harley. He stood gazing at the darkened house for a moment, sensing that something was terribly wrong. He looked up at his bedroom, and a shadow passed in front of the window. Emily?

  The shadow had been too tall for her. Someone was in the house with her. Someone who wanted her dead…

  In less than half a dozen strides, Matthew was up the walkway and on the front porch. He pushed on the door, but it was locked. Emily never locked her front door.

  Matthew didn’t take time to check the French doors or even for an open window. He picked up o
ne of the wicker rockers and hurled it toward the stained-glass door Emily had just had reinstalled. The glass shattered into a million pieces.

  Matthew reached inside, unlocked the door and pushed it open. He stepped inside the foyer, and drew his gun as he cautiously made his way through the darkened house.

  AT THE SOUND of shattering glass, Emily jumped. She put a hand to her mouth to hold back a scream as she huddled in the linen closet at the end of the hallway, watching the flicker of candlelight through the louvered door. The light alternately grew brighter and dimmer as Nella methodically searched the hallway and the other bedrooms, slowly making her way down the corridor to where Emily hid in the dark.

  The breaking glass meant that someone else was in the house now. Matthew? Did she dare call out to him? Did she dare not? Emily wondered frantically. She needed to warn him about Nella. Matthew had no idea who the real murderer was, or that somewhere in the darkened house she was stalking them both, with a knife she had used before.

  But if Emily called out to Matthew, her hiding place would be given away. Nella was only a few feet away, and Emily was still weak from the blow to her head. She might not be able to get away this time.

  Matthew, she silently screamed. Be careful….

  SLOWLY, his every muscle tense and ready, Matthew climbed the stairs. The house was silent and dark. And

  waiting, he thought. Waiting for him. He had the eerie sensation that with every step he took, he was walking toward his destiny.

  At the top of the stairs, he paused, getting his bearings, listening to the silence for a moment before making his way down the hallway. He wished he’d thought to bring along a flashlight, but it was too late to go back for one now. His every instinct was warning him that Emily was up here somewhere, and he had no intention of leaving without her.

  The door to his bedroom was open, and he walked inside. Like the rest of the house, the room lay in darkness, and the mist outside partially obscured the moon. He could make out nothing more than hazy shadows. The hair on the back of his neck prickled, and as Matthew started to walk back toward the door, a shadow moved in the hallway.

  “Matthew, watch out! She has a knife!”

  “Emily!”

  Something rushed out of the darkness toward him. Matthew barely had time to brace himself before that something crashed into him and knocked him to the floor. His gun went flying out of his hand, and he cursed.

  He tried to spring up, ready himself for another onslaught, but the assailant, fast as lightning, was on him. Matthew had just a glimpse of her face in the darkness, just a hint of blond hair and demented eyes that caught him off guard.

  “Nella?” he whispered, just before he felt the sharp sting of a blade as it ripped through his side.

  Dazed, Matthew fell to the floor, his hand automatically going to the deep wound. Blood gushed through his fingers as he tried to roll away from Nella and the bloodstained knife she held in her hand. A wave of darkness swept over him, but he tried to fight it. He couldn’t lose consciousness now. Emily still needed him. Emily…

  Nella was standing over him. A drop of blood fell from the point of the knife and landed on Matthew’s face. “Say it,” she whispered. “Say you love me, Wade. That’s all I want.”

  Matthew lunged upward and, with his last ounce of strength, grabbed Nella’s arm. The knife went flying. It crashed to the wooden floor and skidded through the open French door, onto the balcony. Nella gasped and tore herself away from Matthew. She scrambled across the room, toward the knife, and picked it up, standing silhouetted in the open doorway.

  The blackness was rushing up to meet him, but Matthew tried to fight it. He steadied himself as best he could for Nella’s attack, but it never came. Another shadow flew past him. It was Nella who was caught off guard this time, and the momentum of the impact as the two bodies collided sent her flying through the French doors. She crashed into the balcony railing, and for no more than a second or two, she hovered against the splintered wood, the knife still grasped in her hand.

  Then the wood gave way, and without a sound Nella fell backward into the darkness.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Emily knelt in the hospital chapel and closed her eyes. She wanted to pray, wanted to beg God to spare Matthew’s life, but all she could think was that she’d made a mess of everything again, and this time the results had been tragic. Nella was dead, Mike Durbin was dead, Matthew was in surgery, fighting for his life, and Stuart’s life was in ruins. If Emily had never come back to Paradise, none of these terrible things would have happened.

  “Emily?”

  At the sound of her brother’s voice, Emily raised her tearstained face.

  “I thought I might find you in here,” he said. He knelt beside her. “How’s Matthew?”

  “He’s still in surgery,” Emily said numbly. “The doctors won’t tell me anything.”

  Stuart patted her hand, as if at a loss to know what to do for her. “He’s strong, and I’ve never met a man so determined. I’m sure he’ll be all right.”

  “Well, I’m not,” Emily said bitterly. “You were right about me, Stuart. I’ve always been a failure. I always screw things up, and now Matthew might die because of me.”

  Stuart looked at her in genuine astonishment. “If anyone’s to blame, it’s me. I’m the one who screwed up, bigtime. But you—” He spread his hands. “You saved a man’s life, Emily. Nella killed Jenny and Wade all those years ago, and then she killed Mike Durbin when he dug up too much about her past in Louisiana. She even killed her own aunt. Do you think she would have hesitated to finish off Matthew? You’re anything but a failure, in my book.”

  “I…I can’t believe I’m actually hearing you say that,” Emily said, feeling a glimmer of hope ignite somewhere in the bottom of her heart.

  “I’m finding it hard to believe a lot of things these days,” Stuart said gravely. “Mostly things about myself. I’ve been such a pompous bastard, Emily. Holding myself up as a role model to you, when all along—” He broke off, glancing away. He shook his head. “You always stood up for what you believed in, while I…I took the easy way out.”

  “What’s going to happen to you?” Emily asked, feeling a genuine sorrow for her brother and for the fragile closeness between them that had come too late.

  “I’m sure I’ll face disbarment. Beyond that, I don’t know. I haven’t formally been charged with anything yet, but the investigation has just begun. Trey, of course, is denying everything, but I’m through lying for him.” A ghost of a smile touched his lips. “I think it’s about time I become my own man, don’t you?”

  Emily touched his cheek with her hand. “I think you already have,” she whispered.

  “MATTHEW?”

  The voice, as soft as a butterfly’s wing, fluttered through his mind, teasing him awake. Matthew struggled to rise from the darkness. Slowly, he opened his eyes.

  “Matthew, it’s me. Emily. Can you hear me?”

  Emily? He had to be dreaming. Emily wanted nothing to do with him. He’d lied to her. Deceived her. She was the last person who would be sitting by his bedside.

  But it was such a wonderful dream, having her so near, that he didn’t want to wake up. He closed his eyes and let the darkness take him. When he woke up again—several hours later, he was told—Emily was gazing down at him.

  “Are you real?” he whispered through dry lips.

  Tears filled her eyes. “I used to wonder that same thing about you,” she said. She wiped away a tear from her cheek with the back of her hand.

  Matthew couldn’t stop looking at her. Her warm brown eyes. Her sweet smile. Her funny little haircut. He adored everything about her.

  “I didn’t think you’d come,” he said at last. “I didn’t think you’d ever want to see me again.”

  She glanced away from his face, her gaze drifting downward, to where a thick white bandage wrapped around his middle. She bit her lip as her eyes met his again. “I made a deal with God,” she
said, her voice trembling.

  Matthew wished he could take her in his arms, kiss away her fears, but all he could do was ask hopefully, “What did you bargain for?”

  Emily stared at her hands. “That if he’d make you okay, if he’d let you live…I wouldn’t let my pride stand in the way of telling you how I felt.”

  Matthew didn’t think it would be possible for his heart to beat any harder. “How do you feel, Emily?”

  Her eyes grew soft, misty. She put her fingertips to her lips, trying to quell their trembling. “I love you,” she whispered. “I have from the first moment I met you. I came back to Paradise looking for something that was right here all along.” She touched her heart with her hand. “You helped me find what I was looking for, Matthew. Faith in myself.”

  Matthew closed his eyes as a wave of joy swept over him. He didn’t deserve this. He’d lied to her. Deceived her. Almost gotten her killed. He didn’t deserve her love, but, dear God, he wanted it. Wanted it more than anything.

  He took her hand and brought her fingers to his lips. “I love you, too, Emily. More than I ever thought possible. I came to Paradise looking for something, too. I was looking for a reason to go on, trying to justify why I’d been allowed to live and Christine hadn’t. And I found that reason. In you.”

  “Oh, Matthew!” Emily threw her arms around him and kissed him soundly on the lips. Ignoring the jagged edge of pain that shot through him as she pressed a little too hard against him, Matthew wrapped his arms around her and held her close, not wanting to let her go. Ever.

  When Emily pulled away, he said, “I had a dream earlier. I was dreaming about you and Rachel. We were all together, healthy and happy. It was so peaceful, I didn’t want to wake up.”

  Emily smiled down at him. “Perhaps the dream was prophetic,” she said. “Rachel’s doctor called earlier, to let you know how much better she is. Dr. Klein thought it might help your own recovery to know. He let me talk to Rachel. She’s a remarkable little girl.”

  “Yes, she is. She has a very special place in my life, Emily. I’d like for her to have a place in yours, as well.”