by B. J Daniels
Stepping under the tiny porch roof, he knocked on the door and waited. He could hear faint music inside the cabin. Probably the television. Herb had installed satellite TV after years of fighting it.
“People say they come up here to get away and then they want to know why they don’t have HBO and Cinemax,” Herb would say and shake his head. “Next thing they’re going to be demanding is a swimming pool and one of them hot tubs.” Everyone in town knew how Herb felt about hot tubs.
Walker knocked a little harder. He could smell the lake through the rain. It drew him as it always had. He was a man who was destined to always live close to water.
Collins might be in the shower. Or asleep.
He knocked again, louder this time, a niggling feeling worming its way through him.
All his instincts on alert, Walker tried the door. The knob turned easily in his hand, the door swinging open with a groan. He already had his weapon in his hands by the time the door stopped groaning.
Blood. It was everywhere. And Marc Collins was right in the middle of it, a gun and a bottle of pills spilled on the floor next to his body.
Sprawled on the bed, half-naked, one arm flung over the side was a redheaded woman.
It wasn’t until Walker checked for a pulse that he recognized her. Pet Fairbanks.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
ANNA HADN’T GONE TO DOC’S house. She’d walked through the rain unaware of the cold or her wet clothing. She’d known about Marc’s failings. Not at first, but a woman couldn’t be married to a man for very long without knowing what kind of man she’d married.
It was hard to think of her marriage to Marc as a mistake though. She would never have had Tyler. Even for four short years.
She didn’t hear the car pull up next to her. Didn’t notice it at all until she heard the whir of the passenger-side window come down and Officer D.C. Walker’s voice calling her name.
She stopped walking as the patrol car came to a stop next to the curb. She knew even before she bent down to look inside that he’d been looking for her.
“Would you mind getting in?” Walker asked. “We need to talk.”
She hesitated, not out of fear that he planned to arrest her, but because of his demeanor. There was a gentleness in his voice, in his brown eyes, that she’d never seen before and it frightened her. “It’s about Tyler, isn’t it?”
He nodded, reached across the seat to open the passenger-side door, and she did the only thing she could. She slid in.
WALKER HAD PLANNED TO TAKE her to the station, but when he’d seen her wandering down the street, drenched to the skin, looking lost and scared and freezing, he’d driven straight to his place.
She didn’t say a word as he ushered her inside, led her to the bathroom and turned on the hot shower. He stripped off her jacket and boots and then put her in the shower clothes and all. Through the glass door, he watched see her slowly come back to life. It was a terrible thing to see, the way she hugged herself, curling around her soft middle, sobbing as the hot water beat down on her. He watched until he couldn’t stand it anymore and shut off the water and dragged her into his arms.
He pulled her down to the tile floor of the bathroom, both of them now soaked to the skin and held her until the sobs subsided and she lifted her head and asked him to leave her for a moment.
Reluctantly, he rose and left the bathroom. He heard the shower come on, the glass open and close. He stood outside, his back to the door, wondering how much more the woman could take.
As the shower shut off, he knew he was about to find out.
ANNA SAT BEFORE THE FIRE wearing one of Walker’s T-shirts and a pair of his sweatpants. Both were way too large. He’d given her a blanket from his bed to wrap up in until the chills went away and built a fire in the rock fireplace before going into the kitchen to make them both coffee.
Now she cupped the warm mug not for the heat but to keep her hands from shaking.
Walker told her simply. Marc was dead. An apparent suicide after the companion he was with overdosed on drugs. There was a note at the scene. Marc confessed to killing Gillian to keep her from telling Anna about his real affair—which was with drugs, according to his suicide note. The companion found dead in the cabin with Marc had been Patricia “Pet” Fairbanks.
Anna nodded, staring into the flames, and waited to feel something at this news. Anything. But she’d been unable to dispel the numbness she’d felt earlier when she’d learned that Marc had been out to the Fairbankses.
“You don’t really believe any of this, do you?” she asked finally. “Marc and Pet Fairbanks? Pet was having an affair with Jonathan. She wouldn’t risk losing all that money and power for a man like Marc.”
Walker’s brown eyes soften with sympathy, the last thing she needed. “I suspect Jonathan sent her there to pay off your husband. Everyone knew she was on drugs. For all we know Jonathan got her hooked. I think both of their deaths are part of a cover-up. If I’m right, it started with a hit-and-run accident on a narrow two-lane road south of Seattle.”
She listened as he told her about the eyewitness seeing a bumper sticker and a glow-in-the-dark fish.
“Billy Blake gave Jack that fish. I was there the day Jack stuck it over his father’s political bumper sticker. Billy and I laughed about it at the time.”
She heard the pain in his voice, pain not unlike her own. “What are you trying to tell me? That the man who saved my life took my son’s?”
“Yes. I suspect Jack Fairbanks was driving the car that killed your son and put you in a coma. Pet may have been with him. That was about the time she disappeared, California, I think, and came back after having plastic surgery. The rumor was it was a facelift but it was a hell of lot more than that.”
Anna realized Ruth had mentioned Pet’s facelift. Now it made sense.
He went on to tell her about Jack’s stolen SUV report, then about finding Gillian’s car near the rest stop, the bullet hole in the trunk, the lack of blood and the conclusion that Gillian had died of blunt force trauma from a blow to the head. That she was already dead when someone put her in Anna’s car trunk and fired a shot into her temple.
“Somehow your friend Gillian stumbled onto some information that led her to Fairbanks,” Walker said. “She might have found out that Marc was blackmailing Jonathan.”
Anna felt sick. “That would explain why I was so angry with Marc the night I headed toward Shadow Lake.”
“It appears she was meeting Jonathan Fairbanks at the rest stop,” Walker continued.
“But Jonathan wasn’t the one who saved my life,” she reminded him.
Walker shook his head. “It is as hard for me to accept that Jack is alive as it is for me to imagine Jack having any part in Gillian’s murder. You didn’t know Jack. I did. He couldn’t hurt anyone. If he was driving the SUV the night your son died…he would have wanted to turn himself in.”
“But he didn’t.”
“No. Jonathan got to him. Believe me, if Jack faked his death, then Jonathan forced him into it.”
Anna had already pieced a lot of it together for herself. Gillian’s call. She’d found out something about Tyler’s death but what she wanted to tell Anna was about Marc.
That was the shock that had stolen her memory. She hadn’t wanted to face what Gillian had told her.
As Walker told Anna about what he believed was a blackmail scheme by Marc, Anna felt the pieces fall into place. Gillian had found proof that Marc had not only known who the hit-and-run driver was but she’d suspected the bastard had been blackmailing the Fairbanks. That was what Marc had feared Gillian would tell her. That’s why he hadn’t gone through with the divorce, that’s why he’d pretended he and Gillian had had an affair. He’d wanted to discredit Gillian.
The night Anna went into the lake, she must have known that Gillian was heading for Shadow Lake to confront the man who killed Tyler. Anna would have wanted to go along, but she knew that her friend would have said she would handle i
t. Gillian had been in a hurry because she was meeting the man.
That’s why Anna hadn’t taken the time to change her clothing or kill Marc, although she was sure she would have wanted to do both.
Gillian would have been gone by the time Anna reached her house. She must have found the scrap of envelope that Gillian had written on and remembered her friend mentioning Shadow Lake.
“The gun was in your car,” Walker was saying. “When you reached the rest stop you would have seen where Gillian had driven around the barrier. You drove in, saw her car, got out to look for her. You would have been afraid when you couldn’t find her. You would have searched, then gone to get help.”
Anna could see herself driving fast out of the rest stop headed for Shadow Lake—and the police department.
“You’d requested directions to the police department earlier, at the same time you’d asked your in-car system for directions to Shadow Lake.”
“The deer,” Anna said.
He nodded. “You lost control of your car, ended up in the lake.”
“And Jack?” she asked.
“Jack,” he said on a sigh. “I know someone came to the rest stop by boat. There is a cove just below the rest stop where a boat had been pulled up onto the shore.”
“Jonathan.”
“Jack had to be with him or at least close by,” she said, seeing how hard this was for Walker to accept.
He nodded.
“I’m trying to make sense of all this. Jack had to be going through hell over what he’d done. He would have wanted to go to the authorities. Jonathan had to be desperate to shut him up. I still don’t know how Jonathan talked him into faking his death, if that’s what he did…. You know Jonathan lost his leg because of Jack—and he never let him forget it.”
“Why would Jack save my life and expose himself?”
“Guilt. He would have known who you were since your husband was blackmailing Jonathan. Or maybe Jack didn’t think. He just did what would have come naturally to him before Jonathan got his claws into him.” Walker swore under his breath. “The Jack Fairbanks I knew couldn’t live with what he’d done. I guess that’s why when a rumor surfaced after Jack’s drowning that he’d taken his own life, I believed it. I knew something was bothering him.”
“It sounds like you believe Jack’s alive.”
Walker raked a hand through his hair and looked toward the fire for a moment before he answered. “How can I not, given everything I’ve learned? At least I believe he was that night. I’m not sure he is now. Jonathan has to get rid of Jack for good. He can’t take the chance he’ll surface again. If I’m right and Jack can’t live with what he’s done, then he will surface—and he’ll take Jonathan down with him. But I fear it’s too late and Jack is already dead, and gone for good this time. Jonathan would see to that.”
She shivered as she heard him voice her own fear. “But Ruth is having Jack’s body exhumed.”
“Not anymore. She’s canceled it. Apparently she has realized that opening that casket will jeopardize both of her sons’ lives.”
“Can’t you get a court order—”
“Anna, even if I tried to get an exhumation now, the Fairbankses would fight it for years. As far as anyone is concerned, the case is closed. Marc Collins killed Gillian Sanders. Open and shut. Chief Nash has already made a statement to the press and has stepped back in to see that nothing new surfaces.”
“You think that is Jonathan Fairbanks’s doing?”
“Yeah. Chief Nash has retired.”
She could tell he hated to admit that Nash might have helped Jonathan get away with murder. Clearly, Walker had liked and respected the police chief.
“Even if Ruth would agree to the exhumation, it wouldn’t prove that Jack faked his death or that he was driving the car that killed your son,” Walker said. “Everyone involved who knew something is dead.”
“Except Jack and Jonathan.”
He nodded solemnly. “Jack’s got to know that he’s next. Jonathan will never be able to trust Jack to stay dead.” Walker looked out the window toward the lake, his expression forlorn.
“If Jack’s the man we think he is, then he can’t take the chance that Jonathan will ever rise so far in politics as to be president,” she said.
Walker turned back to her, surprise in his expression. “You think he’ll get Jonathan before Jonathan gets him? Still it has to end badly. Jack knows that.”
She saw how hard this was on him. Jack had been his best friend. “What does D.C. stand for?” she asked.
Walker smiled almost sheepishly. “Dennis Charles. See why I go by Walker?”
She smiled back at him. Dennis Charles Walker was handsome when he smiled like that.
“Some year this one has been,” he said. “I would imagine you’re anxious to leave Shadow Lake, get back to Seattle, put all this behind you. If you can.”
She could only nod. Seattle was the last place she wanted to go. There was nothing there for her anymore. Gillian was gone. Mary Ellen…well, she no longer thought of her as a friend. “What will you do?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Shadow Lake is my home. You should see it in the summer. It’s beautiful here and the fishing—” He laughed. “I would imagine you don’t fish, huh.”
“I grew up on the Sound. Of course I fish.”
A silence fell between them. Walker had taken Jack’s alleged death hard. He’d taken his betrayal even harder. Jack must have thought that faking his death would make this all go away. Maybe, she realized, the same way that Marc had thought that blackmailing the Fairbankses would be justice for Tyler’s death.
“I’m sorry about your friend,” she said.
Walker stared into the fire for a long moment, then turned to look at her. “I would think you would hate Jack for what he did.”
She smiled ruefully. “From the time I awoke from the coma, all I’ve thought about is my son’s killer. I was obsessed with finding him.” She shook her head, thinking of all the loss. Tyler. Gillian. Marc. “And now…Jack saved my life, and by doing so sacrificed his own. I don’t know what I feel.”
Walker nodded. “You do realize that we can’t prove any of this. Jonathan took care of both Marc—and Pet. He had to know that Marc would continue blackmailing him. Pet? I’m betting she found out that Jack had faked his death or was even in on it from the beginning.”
Anna listened to the crackle of the fire and the rain falling on the deck outside the window feeling small and insignificant. Tyler was gone. So was Gillian. And now Marc. For months she’d thought she wanted justice for Tyler. She hadn’t wanted Gillian to give up looking for the hit-and-run driver.
But she knew that what she really wanted was to know that she hadn’t been responsible for Tyler’s death. “When you talked to the eyewitness about the accident…”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Walker said. “The SUV swerved into you. There was nothing you could have done.”
She nodded. Marc had led her to believe it had been her fault. Now she knew, thanks to Walker, that he’d been drinking that night. That was why she’d taken Tyler and left. But still, if she hadn’t been on that road…
She pushed the thought away, knowing that it would always haunt her. Nothing would change that. Not the arrest of Jack or Jonathan Fairbanks.
“I’m sorry,” Walker said. “Sorry I was so suspicious of you in the beginning. I was wrong about you.”
“I know how hard that must be for you to admit.”
He gave a little quirk of his mouth. “You have no idea.”
His cell phone rang, jarring them both. “Walker,” he said into it and looked up at Anna. “She’s right here. Yes. No. I’ll tell her.”
She looked up at him and saw the concern in his face. No more, she thought. She wasn’t capable of hearing any more bad news. But then who was left in her life? “Tell me it’s not Doc.”
Walker shook his head. “It’s Ruth Fairbanks. She’s asking to see you.”
WALKER GOT HER CLOTHES FROM the dryer. They were still a little damp. Anna couldn’t help feeling anxious. Ruth would have heard about Marc and Pet. She would be relieved Gillian’s killer was caught and Anna was free and clear. She would also know it was all a lie.
Walker drove her to the hospital, promising to wait for her even though she told him it wasn’t necessary. She was free to leave Shadow Lake. There was nothing keeping her here now and they both knew it.
“Are you sure you’re up to this?” he asked her just before she got out of the patrol car. “You don’t have to do this.”
She nodded. “I’ll be fine.” Although she wasn’t sure of that at all.
Inside the hospital, Anna walked down the empty corridor to Ruth’s room. The guard outside gave her a nod and reached to open the door.
Ruth lay in the bed, her face turned toward the window and the lake.
Anna stepped in, afraid she already knew why Ruth wanted to see her.
Ruth turned then and held out her hand. Anna moved to take it. The hand was cool, the skin thin and dotted with age spots. Anna’s own hand was cold and trembling. Ruth didn’t seem to notice.
“I’m glad you came,” she said and motioned for Anna to pull up the chair next to her bed. “I wasn’t sure you would.”
“How are you feeling?” Anna asked.
“I’ll live.” Ruth squeezed her hand, those gray eyes of hers suddenly brimming with tears. “I like you. I wish Jack had met someone like you. How different things might have been if…” She let her voice trail off as she shook her head and let go of Anna’s hand to brush at the tears as if angry with herself.
“No changing the past,” the older woman said. “You and I have learned that, if nothing else.” Her eyes brimmed again with tears. “Your son.”
“Tyler,” Anna said around the lump in her throat.
Ruth opened her mouth, lips moving, but no words came out.
“I know,” Anna said.