Christmas Delivery

by Patricia Rosemoor

  Katie and Carole entered arm in arm. Rather Carole had her arm linked with Katie’s as if she were pulling her niece inside against her wishes. Apparently still miffed at being dragged from her party the night before, Katie was wearing a green dress that matched her eyes—Simon’s eyes—as well as her best mulish expression.

  Noticing that Katie had also worn the pendant that Lexie had given to Katie for her birthday—a gold abstract representing a mother and daughter with a square-cut emerald the color of her eyes in the middle—Lexie decided to act like nothing was wrong. She moved to the other side of her daughter, where she linked arms.

  “I picked out a table for us.” She indicated a large round one not far from the door. She needed to be easily found, just in case.

  “It’s so nice to have the whole family together outside of home or the store,” her mother said.

  But the whole family wasn’t together. Lexie thought as they took their seats. Simon wasn’t here with them and probably never would be. Their argument had crystallized things she hadn’t wanted to face.

  As the tables filled up with guests, Lexie looked around the room, transformed with plants and decorations and lighting special effects. The ballroom looked like a setting in a fairy tale. Kind of like the story she’d been trying to tell herself about her and Simon.

  Not wanting to spoil the evening for her family, Lexie temporarily set aside her heartbreak and concentrated on them. She checked out the buffet with her mother, who put her seal of approval on the menu. She examined the silent auction contributions with her sister, who made bids on several items. She danced with her father, who tried out new steps he’d learned in the weekly class he took with her mother. She tried to get Katie interested in anything about the ball, but her daughter was stubbornly silent, refusing to interact with anyone any more than she absolutely had to.

  “You know, there are other young people here,” Lexie said. “A couple of cute boys your age. They came with their parents, too. I bet you know some of them.”

  Katie simply sighed and did her best to look bored. Carole rolled her eyes at Lexie, who bit the inside of her lip so she wouldn’t laugh. She was trying to figure out how to handle her stubborn daughter when Katie suddenly reminded her of Simon.

  Feeling a little too vulnerable, Lexie excused herself and wandered over to the windows that overlooked the terrace and gardens and faced a small cove on the bay. The wind had picked up and the snow whirled and swirled in delicate patterns. On the other side of the inlet on another promontory, soft light made every window at the Manor at Drake Acres glow. Lexie felt as if she were looking out at a Christmas card.

  That Simon had probably already broken in to the Christmas card seemed ludicrous to her. And frightening. How long would it take him to learn that he was wrong? she wondered.

  Or that she was?

  Just then, the band at the far end of the room stopped playing and Brandon and Marie stepped up onto the stage. Lexie hurried back to her seat at the family table.

  Her daughter wasn’t there.

  Her pulse picking up, Lexie asked, “Where’s Katie?”

  “Said she had to go to the powder room,” Carole whispered.

  Lexie relaxed as Brandon and Marie stepped up to the microphone on a stand.

  “Welcome to Drake House,” Brandon said, leaning more lightly on his cane than usual. “Marie and I want to thank you all for giving your support to the Drake Foundation.”

  “Remember that we have some exciting items contributed to the silent auction,” Marie said, “so don’t forget to put in your bid. The winners will be announced at midnight.”

  “Ah, winners…” Brandon said. “My Uncle Cliff has an announcement to make.” He indicated that Cliff should come up to the microphone, then, with his arm around Marie’s waist, left the stage.

  As usual, Cliff was one of the handsomest men in the room. Certainly, he was the best dressed in a designer black tux and black silk shirt, Lexie thought, trying to push out of mind the idea that he could be a mastermind of evil. She looked around for Doug Heller, but couldn’t find the operations manager among so many people.

  Holding a large envelope in one hand, Cliff stepped in front of the mike. “As you know, every year the Merchants’ Association sponsors a contest for the best and most tasteful holiday display. They asked me to announce this year’s winner.” He went on to read the list of nominations before opening the envelope. “And the winner is…Sophie Caldwell, owner of House of the Seven Gables Bed-and-Breakfast! Sophie, come on up here and say a few words.”

  Lexie heard the announcement as if through a filter. She couldn’t help it. She barely saw Sophie’s beaming face as she left the table with her niece, Chelsea, and Chelsea’s fiancé, Michael, and stepped up to the mike. Though she wanted to put everything but the here and now out of mind, Lexie simply couldn’t. She scanned the crowd for Doug Heller before looking back to the stage where Cliff was handing Sophie the envelope.

  Staring at Cliff, she tried to see through the outer facade, tried to discern the face of evil.

  If it was there, she simply didn’t recognize it.

  Would Simon find something to prove otherwise?

  IN POSITION FOR SEVERAL HOURS, using night-vision binoculars, Simon had watched the occupants of the Manor at Drake Acres abandon it. The cars had left one at a time until none but a few high-priced toys in the main garage were left. The snow was coming down more heavily now, and it was getting more difficult to discern details. Certain that the grounds were truly empty, though, he made his run from the tree line to the redbrick buildings that comprised Cliff Drake’s home.

  In addition to the main house, with its three-story white pillars and the nearly-as-tall white-cased windows and balconies on each floor that overlooked the water, there were two garages—one for Cliff, the other for the servants—a guest house, a cabana and outdoor pool, and farther back from the water, the stables. At the water’s edge, there was also a large boathouse and a pier jutting from it, a high-performance boat docked there despite the weather.Did Drake Enterprises really make Cliff enough money to support such ostentatiousness? Or did a secret source of income provide him with a lifestyle most people only dreamed of? Simon guessed that the latter was more probable.

  Rather than trying to breach the main house directly, he decided to approach from the rear. Overriding the security system, he didn’t even need a key to open the door. He slipped inside the largest kitchen that he’d ever seen in a private home. Several doors lined the opposite wall. The first one he checked was a pantry. The second a half bath. He went straight out the third and down a hallway that led to a two-story atrium at the front of the house.

  Lights were on all over the house, as if leaving him a trail of breadcrumbs to the first-floor office located off the atrium.

  Once inside, he spotted the file cabinets immediately.

  They were the wrong ones.

  Not only were they modern, rather than antique, but the key wouldn’t go into the locks.

  “What the hell?”

  He’d been so sure he would find the fit to the key here, but it looked as if Lexie had been correct. Then where would the damn cabinets be? What if there weren’t any others?

  Or…

  What if he hadn’t been wrong and had simply looked in the wrong room?

  The manor was certainly big enough to house more than a single office. This one was situated in a high-traffic area, accessible to anyone coming in the front door. Not a good place to store valuable documents, especially not ones that could mean a prison sentence.

  There had to be another office, so Simon vowed not to leave the building until he’d checked every room.

  He started on the first floor and found another office, smaller than the first, but this one didn’t even have file cabinets.

  The second floor held a third office, but no luck there, either.

  As he went through the house, Simon realized that unlike what Lexie had said about Drake H
ouse, all the furniture here was ultramodern, the artwork abstract, as if Cliff had purposely made the Manor at Drake Acres as different from Drake House as he could. Those old file cabinets simply wouldn’t fit in here.

  Admitting he’d run into another dead end, Simon stood in the atrium for a few moments, looking out into the snowy night. A night transformed by wind and fog like the one when he’d been taken from Jenkins Cove and thrust into a world he hadn’t imagined.

  An unexpected chill shot through the atrium, pebbling Simon’s flesh. For a moment, he could hardly breathe.

  He felt the weight of the dead on his shoulders.

  Of the injustice.

  Felt as if myriad ghosts were pleading with him not to give up.

  Looking deep into the fog curling up to the house, he could almost see them—men, women, the kid he’d seen killed. Did he really see them or was it an illusion? He blinked and when he looked again, they were gone. But the weight of their deaths wasn’t. He felt it like a tangible thing, knew their souls wouldn’t rest—that he couldn’t rest—until he avenged them all.

  But at what cost?

  Had he already lost Lexie? She didn’t trust him, but could he blame her?

  He’d known from the beginning that what he’d been through had turned him into a man she wouldn’t want to know. He’d lived on the edge his entire adult life, long enough that he didn’t have any idea of how else to be.

  His father had changed, he reminded himself. No matter that he’d learned another painful truth that afternoon, Rufus Shea would always be his old man. And if his father could choose to straighten up his life and be a man a kid could be proud of…

  Shaking his head, Simon left the house the way he’d come. Only when he was about to make his way back to the road did he stop and consider the other buildings on the property. Primarily the guesthouse.

  Was it really?

  Suddenly an arctic cold whipped through him and he felt invisible hands pushing him, urging him toward the guesthouse. Simon acquiesced.

  As he crossed the back of the property, the cold followed. His inner ghosts filled him with tension. He gazed around, on the lookout for trouble. The small hairs at the back of his neck stood up, but he saw no reason for it. He checked the ground. For as far as he could see through the snow, the fresh white cover remained undisturbed by recent footprints except for the ones he was leaving.

  Only him and the ghosts, he thought, his mood darkening.

  Upon reaching the guesthouse, he was surprised to find the security system unarmed. Edgy now, he tried the door handle. It turned and the door swung open. Too easy, he thought, unless there was nothing here to protect. Stepping inside, he turned on the light.

  The place looked occupied, as though someone was living there. Furnished in a combination of comfortable couches and chairs and some antique wooden pieces, it had a totally different feel from the main house. The artwork was different, too—all related to the Chesapeake Bay and the Eastern Shore, from the framed watercolors on the walls to the metal sculptures of bay creatures decorating the various old end tables and a hand-carved buffet in the dining area.

  Assuming that Cliff had guests for the holiday, Simon was about to leave when a cold breeze shot down his spine. He stopped and examined the room again. A briefcase lay on the coffee table. He drew closer, and saw the initials DH engraved on the metal clasp.

  DH for Doug Heller?

  The briefcase was filled with Drake Enterprises work. Why else would Heller have left it in the guesthouse if he hadn’t made himself at home here?

  Simon gazed around the room. Instincts buzzing, he headed for a closed door and opened it to a bedroom. A familiar canvas jacket—one he’d seen on Doug Heller—was thrown on the chair across from the bed, making Simon think the operations manager did live, or at least work, in the guesthouse.

  So where were the damn file cabinets? Simon wondered as he left the bedroom.

  Another door on the other side of the living area called to him. A rush of sound like wails of pain and grief unnerved him, but Simon knew it was all in his own head. He crossed to the door. His hand actually tingled as he gripped the knob. Swinging the door open, he turned on the room light to face another office.

  Against the opposite wall was a file cabinet with leaf marquetry. Simon crossed the room, pulled out the key and tried the lock.

  A match.

  He could hardly breathe as he opened the drawer. Inside were file folders with names written across the top. Inside his head, the victims chanted their names…Anna Bencek…Franz Dobra…Tomas Elizi…Lala Falat…

  Exactly as Bray had seen when he’d touched the key.

  Simon pulled Anna Bencek’s folder, which held proof of a medical check and blood workup and Anna’s signed statement that she was voluntarily donating a kidney for transplant. It also held her current information—address, phone number, name and address of her shop.

  The other folders gave up similar information, a folder for each transplant donor.

  So Heller knew where to get to these people…

  The middle drawer produced more folders with similar information. But these held information on the recipients, including who each person’s donor had been and how much the recipient had paid to skip to the head of the line for a new shot at life.

  Doug Heller had used his position with Drake Enterprises to run his own illegal business, and right under the nose of his employer. How had he gotten away with it all these years? Simon wondered.

  Well, Heller wouldn’t get away with it anymore, Simon thought as the cold seeped through him once more, straight into his bones, into his soul.

  Time to mete out some justice.

  Simon was so engrossed in his dark thoughts that he didn’t hear the whisper of footsteps until they were practically upon him. Even as he whipped around, he heard a pop followed by an incapacitating pain.

  He barely caught a glimpse of the two wires connecting to him…and then he saw nothing at all…

  Chapter Seventeen

  When nearly a half hour had passed and her daughter hadn’t come back to the table, nor had Lexie so much as caught sight of her, she started to worry.

  “I’m going to go look for Katie,” she told her sister.“She’s probably with some other kids her age,” Carole said. “She won’t appreciate your interrupting.”

  An uneasy sensation in the pit of her stomach wouldn’t let Lexie back down. “If she is, I’ll keep walking without bothering her. I just want to make sure she’s all right.”

  Making her way through the crowd was a feat in itself. People were shoulder to shoulder and more were arriving all the time. Lexie looked everywhere—the ballroom, the buffet, the dining room, even the upstairs parlors—but couldn’t find her daughter. That uneasy sensation blossomed into something akin to panic. She began to ask people if they’d seen Katie in the last half hour, but no one had.

  On her way back to alert Carole and her parents, Lexie heard her name. Pulse fluttering, she stopped and turned to see who was calling her.

  “Cliff.”

  His usual jovial expression was missing. “I need to talk to you.”

  Cliff gestured that she should follow and, not knowing what else to do, Lexie did. He crossed the foyer and passed the racks of coats into the front room of the personal wing.

  Facing her, he said, “First, let me say Katie is all right.”

  “Katie?” Lexie’s heart began to pound. “What happened to my daughter?”

  “Apparently, she took herself for a walk out of here and slipped and fell on the road.” Cliff patted her shoulder. “She only sprained her ankle a little, that’s all. She’ll be fine.”

  “Where is she? Upstairs?”

  “No, not here. Tommy Benson found her near his place so he took her home to ice the ankle. Then he called me. He didn’t have your cell number, but he knew you’d be here. I’ll take you to her. Let me get our coats.”

  The pressure in her chest easing a bit, Lexie n
odded. “Thanks, Cliff.”

  Tommy Benson was a Jenkins Cove police officer. Good thing he’d found Katie or she might have been out in the snow for who knew how long. What was she doing out on the road? Rebelling against being here and going home in protest? After what Katie had pulled the night before, Lexie wouldn’t doubt it. She figured she was in for a lot more worry over her daughter’s escapades during the next few years.

  Thinking she should let her family know what was going on, she pulled her cell phone from her purse just as Cliff came back with the coats.

  “Here you are.” He held out Lexie’s coat for her.

  She slipped her arms into it. “Thanks. I should call Carole, so she doesn’t send a search party after me.”

  “Maybe you should wait until after you see Katie for yourself. That way they won’t worry like you’re doing right now.”

  “Maybe you’re right.”

  She put her cell back in her purse. Even with Cliff’s reassurance that Katie was fine, Lexie couldn’t help but feel off-kilter. Knowing she wouldn’t feel better until she saw Katie herself, she quickly followed him out of the house to the BMW one of the valets had already pulled up front. Cliff tipped the man who ran around to the passenger side and opened the door for Lexie.

  “Try to relax,” Cliff said as they fastened their seat belts. “We’ll be there in a few minutes.”

  Lexie nodded and took a deep breath. As they set off for the Benson place, she couldn’t help wishing Simon were here with her. Sometimes it was so hard being a single parent, especially where her child’s welfare was concerned.

  Suddenly it hit her…Simon…at Cliff’s place…In her worry for Katie, she’d forgotten about what he was doing. Surely he was done searching the Manor.

  So why hadn’t he called? No matter what he’d found or hadn’t found, he would call to tell her about it, even if he was still angry.

  Great. Now she had two people she loved to worry about.

  Suddenly she realized they were slowing and she looked for Benson’s house, but only saw twin redbrick pillars with wrought-iron gates decorated with a fancy C and D.