Copper Lake Secrets

by Marilyn Pappano

  “Haven’t you heard the old saying ‘Let sleeping dogs lie’?” he asked, as polite as any well-bred Southern gentleman could be.

  “That’s not a dog,” Jones replied.

  “No, it is not. How about this one: ‘Curiosity killed the cat’?” He smiled at Reece and added, “Meow.”

  Cat, meet Curiosity.

  Looking very unkittenish, still holding tightly to the bone, Reece moved to stand beside Jones. “You knew about this body?”

  “Of course. I knew about that one.” He pointed where they’d found the grave. “I knew about that one.” This time his finger shifted three feet away. “And that one. And that one and that one. I know about all of them.”

  Jones’s stomach heaved. “How many are there?”

  “I never bothered to count them. Besides, the number changes. After today, there will be two more.”

  “Grandmother will be back any moment,” Reece bluffed.

  “No, she won’t. She had lunch with Macy and me at the country club after her meeting with Robbie Calloway. Macy convinced her to attend the historical-society meeting with her. They won’t be done for several more hours. Do you know why she went to see Robbie?”

  “To cut me out of her will?”

  “You were already out of it. Grandfather took care of that when you refused to attend her birthday party.” He grimaced with fake sympathy, then scowled. “She put you back in. Can you believe it? She said it was only fair, you being Elliott’s daughter, even if you were a ridiculous little drama queen.”

  “And what? If I die before she does, the money goes back to you?”

  “Me and my children.”

  Reece scoffed. “You can have it. I don’t want anything from the Howard family. I don’t even want their name anymore.”

  Though he rested the pipe on the ground, Mark’s aim with the pistol remained steady. “I’m supposed to believe that? That you’d turn your back on a fortune because you don’t like the people who had it first? I’m not stupid, Clarice. Besides, that’s not the only reason you have to die. You’re nosy. You always have been. You never learned to respect other people’s boundaries. Snooping in the yard, in the garage, spying on Grandfather and me. You want to call the police about that bone, don’t you? Let them come out here and dig up the entire property and tarnish Grandfather’s name and traumatize poor Grandmother. I can’t let that happen.”

  He moved a few steps closer, and all trace of pleasantness disappeared beneath a cold, angry, insane smile. “I won’t let that happen.”

  Reece’s knees were unsteady, her lungs tight. She’d accepted that her grandfather was a murderer, but her cousin, too? What the hell was the Howard motto? The family that kills together…?

  Oh, God, this couldn’t be real. None of it. She wasn’t standing here in the rain holding all that was left of some poor stranger’s arm while her childhood tormentor pointed a gun at her and Jones. Mark had outgrown that behavior; he was an adult, a husband, a father, a likable, respectable man. He couldn’t really intend to kill them, could he?

  The gun drew her gaze like a magnet. Yes, apparently he could.

  “Then your objection to the garden restoration was never about the money,” Jones said quietly.

  “It was always about the money. But it was also about protecting my family.”

  “She’s your family.”

  “No, she’s not,” Mark said.

  “I’m not,” she insisted. She’d always known the family was a bunch of snobbish, entitled elitists, but now she knew they were also all crazy. She had some personal issues, but insanity wasn’t one of them.

  She looked at Jones, utterly motionless in the light rain, and thought she’d be damned if she’d let a crazy man kill her when she’d just found the man who could help her deal with those issues.

  “So…what?” she asked. “You plan to shoot us and add us to your boneyard? You think no one will notice? No one will wonder?”

  Mark shrugged. “Grandmother told you to leave. You left. And when he—” he jerked his head toward Jones “—realized he wasn’t getting the contract for the garden project, he left, too. What happened to you after you drove out that gate is anyone’s guess.”

  “That’s pretty lame.”

  “We’re Howards. No one would ever suspect us of wrongdoing.” He gestured with the pistol. “Let’s take a walk.”

  Reece’s feet actually started moving, but Jones didn’t budge. “Let’s not.”

  Mark’s expression was comical for a moment, then he waggled the pistol. “Man with a gun here. The way this works is I tell you what to do, and you do it.”

  “That only works if you’re undecided about killing us. But you’ve already made the decision, and you expect us to cooperate? To make it easier for you?” Jones shrugged, looking far less scared than Reece felt. “Dead is dead, whether it’s here or in the woods. I vote for here.”

  What was he thinking? That maybe the housekeeper would come out and Mark would have qualms about killing her? That Grandmother would return home early? Or maybe that Detective Maricci would come back with information or new questions? Any of those seemed about as likely as another bolt of lightning coming out of the dreary gray sky and striking Mark dead where he stood.

  Furtively Reece glanced around. The nearest cover was the corner of the house, too far to reach before Mark shot them, and the only possible weapons were the shovel a few yards away and the bone in her hands. She couldn’t imagine Mark coming close enough for the shovel to be of any use or that the bone would do much, if any, harm before it broke.

  If Jones was looking for a way out, too, it didn’t show. He looked as calm as Mark, as if this was just any old discussion on a fall afternoon. “You’re wrong that no one would suspect you. You know Tommy Maricci?”

  “The cop? Of course.”

  “You remember that tarp out in the shed with the old man’s pickup? The one with the big, dark stain?”

  Mark’s brow wrinkled. “I didn’t realize Grandfather kept that truck. He hadn’t driven it for years. We had some good times in that truck.”

  “Yeah, well, Detective Maricci has that tarp. They’ve already identified the blood as human.”

  Mark started shaking his head halfway through Jones’s statement. “Grandmother would never let a police officer take anything from this property.”

  “You’re right, she wouldn’t. So Reece and I gave it to him. It may not be admissible in court, but all these remains will be.”

  Two details struck Reece at the same time: Mark’s confidence was shaken by that news, and Jones was edging away from her, moving so slowly that she hadn’t even noticed. Her first impulse was to follow him, to stay right at his side because she always felt safer there, but she forced herself to not only stay, but to shift just the tiniest bit away.

  “You had no right.” That cold, imperious Howard tone came through in Mark’s voice, making him sound eerily like Grandfather.

  Another shrug. “One of these bodies is my brother’s. That gives me every right.”

  Sorrow washed over Reece. She’d forgotten about Glen for a moment. She wished she remembered his face, his friendship, his saving her life, but there was just that big blank. But Jones remembered. He would never forget.

  “Where is Glen?” she asked softly.

  “Somewhere out there.” Mark indicated the expanse of lawn. “We only kept track of graves to know where to dig the next one. But you’ll be seeing him soon.”

  We only kept track of graves to know where to dig the next one. God, he sounded so normal, so sane, as if murder was simply a hobby he’d shared with Grandfather, the way other boys fished with their grandfathers, keeping track of which lures brought better catches.

  Reece edged another half inch to the right. “Why did Grandfather kill him?”

  “He didn’t. I did. He didn’t respect boundaries, either. He interfered with my plans—snooping around, trespassing, probably stealing anything that wasn’t nailed dow
n. That’s what gypsies do, you know.”

  Her stomach tightened and heaved. Mark had been fourteen years old when Glen died, barely into his mid-teens, and he’d murdered a boy. How could she not have known he was so cold, so damaged?

  Because she’d been thirteen. The idea of one kid killing another had been totally foreign to her. Though now she knew rationally it happened, it still felt foreign.

  She pushed the ugly thought from her mind, focusing instead on his last comment, stealing a glance at Jones. Gypsies? That was the family tradition he’d run away from? He’d wanted to live a life without the scams and cons and prejudices that were his heritage?

  “‘Gypsies’ is a word the uninformed use,” Jones said blankly. “We were Irish Travelers.”

  Mark shrugged impatiently. “You say Irish Travelers. Everyone else says lying, thieving bastards.”

  The shovel was within Jones’s reach. One quick lunge…and then what? Charge Mark and hope the element of surprise kept her cousin from shooting him? Reece had no idea. All she did know was that she needed to keep Mark’s attention on her. Outwardly bold, inwardly quivering, she began walking toward him. The pistol in his hand swung around, aimed straight at her.

  “You killed Glen because he stopped you from killing me.”

  “Yeah. And because I could. He was so arrogant. He stayed to look out for you. He thought he could protect you from me.” Mark snorted. “He never even knew what hit him. One instant he was there, hiding behind that tree—” he jerked his head toward the oak that had suffered the lightning strike “—and the next…lights out.”

  After a thoughtful moment, Mark gestured. “I don’t have all afternoon to chat. I’m going to count to three—” he thumbed back the hammer on the weapon “—and if you aren’t headed toward the woods, I’ll kill you here. One.”

  Reece swallowed hard. Her feet wanted to obey, but Jones was right. If he was determined to kill them, the last thing they should do was cooperate. Damned if she’d die easily for him.

  “Two.”

  Her mouth was dry, her palms damp. The arm bone she held visibly shook.

  Mark’s index finger began to tighten on the trigger. “Thr—”

  In an instant, an icy wind swirled around them, giving voice to an inhuman roar as dark and menacing as the vortex surrounding them. Reece staggered from the force of the gale, stumbling, and would have fallen to the ground if Jones hadn’t grabbed her, supported her. Their wet clothes whipped around them, her hair standing practically on end. Dust swirled in the air, stinging her skin, making it difficult to see, to breathe.

  Jones tried to move; she felt his muscles straining, and she tried to herself, but the wind held them in place, rushing with fury, pelting them with rage. With one hand cupped around her eyes, Reece saw the terror on Mark’s face as the pipe was snatched from his hand and sent soaring across the yard. He spun in a circle, cursing, searching, then stiffened, his eyes widened, his nose wrinkling. She did the same, smelling dirt, damp and cigar smoke.

  “Holy God,” Jones whispered.

  A figure was taking form at the core of the fierce wind that shook her to her very core: large, threatening, the center of her nightmares for fifteen years. It hovered, shaking so violently that its outlines blurred, and a long, drawn-out rumble vibrated the air. Nooo mooore!

  Helpless against the spirit’s force, Mark managed to squeak out one pleading word. “Gr-grandfather?”

  I told you no more!

  “But—but, Grandfather—” Mark’s protest broke off with a shriek as his gaze shifted to his hand. Slowly, moved by an invisible force, his hand twisted, the barrel of the gun pivoting toward him. His elbow jerked out, as a wooden doll’s might under the control of an angry puppeteer, and the gun pulled upward.

  His expression turned panicked. “Grandfather, no! I was just doing what you taught me! I was just protecting you! No, you can’t—”

  The gunshot echoed as Jones pushed Reece’s face against his chest.

  As quickly as it had come, the storm dissipated and the air cleared. Unnatural quiet settled around them, heavy enough to make Reece’s ears ring, then slowly she became aware of the rapid tenor of her breathing, the thud of her heart, the slow control of Jones’s breaths.

  She didn’t want to look. Didn’t want to see Mark lying lifeless on the ground. She wasn’t sure she could look. It took all her strength to stay on her feet, clinging to Jones as if she would never let go.

  His body was solid, his arms strong around her. “It’s okay,” he whispered. “It’s okay, sweetheart.”

  Gradually her trembling eased, and she lifted her head just enough to meet his gaze. “Grandfather…”

  He nodded.

  “He saved our lives.” The man who’d terrorized her in life had protected her in death, and he’d done it by… “Mark was his favorite. They were so much alike. And he killed him.”

  Jones glanced past her, his expression grim, then nodded again. “He wanted the killing to stop.”

  I told you no more. And when Mark had ignored him, Grandfather had taken matters into his own hands. Oh, God, what would this do to Grandmother and the rest of Mark’s family? He had a mother, a wife, a daughter, another one on the way. They would be devastated. Grandmother, at least, would blame her, and probably the others would, too.

  Not that it mattered. The important people—she and Jones—knew she wasn’t guilty.

  With a deep breath, she turned in Jones’s arms to face her cousin for the last time. He lay on his back, his head turned to the side, his eyes closed. The entry wound was small, the exit, if there was one, not visible from her vantage point. Nothing about him screamed He’s dead! He didn’t appear particularly peaceful, or as if he’d just lived through the last moments of his own terrifying murder. He just looked like Mark.

  Mark the pest, the bully, the tormentor. The murderer.

  And this yard was his and Grandfather’s burying ground.

  Her fingers tightened on Jones’s arm. “I’m so sorry about Glen.”

  Emotion shuddered through him. “I knew when I came here he was dead. I felt it. At least now we know.”

  She understood the difference between knowing and knowing. She’d known something bad had happened that summer. Now she knew exactly what.

  Would it make a difference to him—that his brother had died because of her? Would it change the way he felt about her? She was trying to find the courage to ask when he sighed heavily, his arms tightening.

  “Fate,” he murmured. “Everything happens for a reason.”

  Her father’s death, Jones’s and Glen’s desire for new lives, that horrible summer, her return at the same time as Jones’s, Mark’s secrets, Grandfather finally, for the first time, doing something to protect his granddaughter.

  Fate.

  She breathed deeply of rain-washed air, the damp of the river, the scents of sweat and soap and Jones and herself, then gently pulled from his embrace. “We’d better call Detective Maricci.”

  Hand in hand, they skirted Mark’s body, circled around the house and headed to the cottage. As soon as the authorities arrived, she figured, the entire property would be declared a crime scene and she and Jones would have to leave. He might return here someday to work, but she never would. The past was over, and Fair Winds had no place in her future.

  Even if it had brought her Jones.

  She loved fate.

  And she was pretty sure she loved him.

  It had been a week since their discovery of the first body. The excavation had been slow going, but so far, more than forty bodies had been found buried in the front lawn. The authorities assumed the victims were mostly hitchhikers, runaways and homeless people—the kind of people who could go missing without anyone noticing. They estimated the older graves at forty to fifty years old. Arthur Howard had started his hobby young, about the time he destroyed the gardens.

  The thought repulsed Jones: What kind of man preferred moldering bodies in his yard ove
r color, fragrance and well-maintained flower beds?

  Glen’s body hadn’t been identified yet. DNA and dental matches could take a while with so many victims.

  So many victims. Thank God he and Reece hadn’t become two more in the Howards’ lifelong killing spree.

  Mark’s funeral had been private, and Miss Willa had sent a message that Reece wasn’t welcome. After the service, she and Mark’s family had left Copper Lake for Raleigh, where his mother lived. No one knew whether she would return to the home that had meant so much to her or if the revelations would keep her away. Jones was betting she would be back.

  But he wouldn’t. There were too many other things he wanted to do. Get on with his work. Live his life. Spend every moment possible with Reece.

  They were standing in the nearly deserted parking lot of the motel where he and Mick had first stayed in town. She lifted her suitcase into the SUV, then turned to catch him watching her. The smile that spread across her entire face warmed him from the inside out. She was beautiful. She was everything he could ever want in a woman. She was his fate.

  “Are you ready?” she asked, reaching through the open pickup window to scratch between Mick’s ears.

  “I am.” In less than forty-eight hours, they would be in New Orleans, where he would meet her friends, whose approval he wanted, and her dogs, whose approval he needed. He trusted his obvious love for her would be all Evie and Martine would have to know, and dogs always liked him. If Bubba, Louie and Eddie were a little hesitant, he could count on Mick—and plenty of treats—to smooth the way.

  He kissed her, and the hunger that was always right there simmering beneath the surface flared. Reluctantly he stepped away, opened the door for her and waited until she was buckled in before he closed it again. After climbing into the truck, he leaned forward to see past Mick’s wagging tail. “Hey, you said last week that you didn’t want the Howard name anymore. You want to consider mine?”